Archive
What Real Tax Reform Could Look Like
No matter our politics, most Americans have a beef with taxes. And it's no wonder. Working class Americans pay a much greater share of their income than the wealthiest Americans, who get away with exploiting tax loopholes and paying less than their fair share to...
Tax Cuts for the Rich Are Threatening America’s Sacred Places
Right now in Washington, D.C., Congress is making decisions that will affect my future and that of my people — the Gwich’in Nation of Alaska and Canada. A critical part of our ancestral homelands, the coastal plain of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge — one of the...
Mass Incarceration is a Women’s Issue, Too
Over the last few years, our broken criminal justice system has become a national issue as horrific stories of victims of mass incarceration have made their way into the mainstream media. The dominant narrative around this issue is usually that it disproportionately...
The Pain Behind Opioid Abuse
Donald Trump recently declared the opioid epidemic a national public health emergency. At first I thought, is this the first time I approve of something Trump has done? Alas, no. And here's why: Nine years ago, I lost my brother to a heroin overdose. My brother and I...
Who’s Really in Charge of the Afghanistan War?
In June, our Tweety Bird president tweeted this message to members of the U.S. Army: “Proud to be your commander-in-chief.” Actually, Trump is only the delegator-in-chief — he's passed to subordinates a president's most solemn duty of guiding our nation's war...
One Way to Weather Extreme Climate
In OtherWords: October 25, 2017
This week yielded ever more about our president's ongoing spat with the widow a U.S. soldier who was killed recently in Niger. It's not a good look for Trump, but I've got something else on my mind: What on earth are U.S. soldiers doing in Niger? On Capitol Hill,...
A U.S. Soldier Died in Niger. What on Earth Are We Doing There?
In our military-revering culture, it’s a strange thing for a president to start a war of words with the grieving families of slain soldiers. Strange, yes. But from Donald Trump’s campaign season feud with the parents of Humayun Khan, who died protecting fellow...
If You Want to Collect Social Security, Trump’s Tax Plan Is an Outrage
How much did your paychecks total last year? You know the answer, of course. So does the Social Security Administration. The totals for every American’s paycheck income are sitting in Social Security’s computers. Once every year, Social Security does a serious data...
If There’s a War on Coal, Coal Already Lost
"The war on coal is over," according to Scott Pruitt, head of the Environmental Protection Agency. Pruitt spoke these words in a speech to coal miners in Hazard, Kentucky, where he announced the formal repeal of Obama’s Clean Power Plan. What he failed to mention is...
