Topic “Thom's Blog”

For decades, unions have been fighting to preserve workers' rights, but that fight just got a lot more difficult.  Yesterday, two separate events illustrated just how extreme the war on labor has become.  First, Republican judges on Third Circuit Court of Appeals struck down President Obama's recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board.  

Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives have made their point – they hate Obamacare.  And, just in case anyone didn't get the message the first 36 times they made that point, they're about to waste even more taxpayer time and money on one more attempt to repeal the healthcare law.  

Yesterday, in response to recent IRS admissions, President Obama called the enhanced investigation of conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status “intolerable and inexcusable.”  And, Attorney General Eric Holder announced a criminal investigation into the allegations against the IRS.  But both of them are missing the point.  

The Associated Press has accused the Justice Department of “massive and unprecedented intrusion.”  That's according to one of the AP's top executives, after learning that the government secretly acquired two months of the news agency's telephone records.

According to the U.S. Supreme Court, Monsanto has the right to control our food supply.  In a unanimous ruling released this morning, the nine Justices sided with the agricultural giant, and held that an Indiana farmer violated Monsanto's patent by planting seeds produced from genetically modified soybeans.

Yesterday, the Senate Judiciary Committee held the first of many hearings on comprehensive immigration reform.  In the seven and a half hour hearing, senators debated 32 of the three hundred proposed amendments to the bill, and adopted 21 of the changes.  The proposals ranged from plans to correct technical immigration issues, to Sen. Ted Cruz's amendment to triple the number of border control agents, to Sen.

Yesterday, Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives postponed all floor votes so they could hold their ninth hearing about Benghazi.  Instead of working on any number of pressing issues effecting Americans, Republicans spent nine hours on a political witch hunt.  

Treasury Secretary Jack Lew appears to have the right ideas.  But, it doesn't seem like any of our elected leaders are listening.  On Monday, Secretary Lew sent letters to members of the House financial services committee, urging them to uphold provisions of the Dodd-Frank Act that regulate derivatives.

Last year, five major U.S. Banks and 49 state attorneys general agreed on a $25 billion settlement to compensate victims of abusive bank practices and foreclosure fraud.  But, according to New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, the banksters are violating the terms of that agreement.