DelBene, Heck, Kilmer, and Larsen vote with Repugs to cut food stamps

Reps. Suzan DelBene, Denny Heck, Derek Kilmer, and Rick Larsen joined all four Washington Republicans in voting to cut an addition $9 billion from the food stamps program, SNAP. Kudos to Jim McDermott and Adam Smith for voting against the House farm bill that slashed food stamps while protecting most corporate pork. The Senate is…

Cost of food stamps versus corporate subsidies: fact checking

Source: (apparently) Being Liberal I’m trying to verify these numbers. When I go to the site http://www.whitehouse.gov/2012-taxreceipt referenced on the left of the figure, it prompts me to enter an income. No matter what income I enter, I don’t see $36 under the category Food and nutrition assistance (which, it says, includes food stamps). If…

Ask our congressional delegation to support the Voter Empowerment Act

Parallel bills are moving through the US Senate and House, S.123 – Voter Empowerment Act of 2013 and H.R. 12: Voter Empowerment Act of 2013. “To modernize voter registration, promote access to voting for individuals with disabilities, protect the ability of individuals to exercise the right to vote in elections for Federal office, and for…

Obama's defense of NSA makes the Dems look bad, makes Republicans look good

TruthOut is reporting on a bill introduced to the Washington State House: HB2272 was introduced by a bipartisan team of legislators, Rep. David Taylor, a Republican from Moxee, and Rep. Luis Moscoso, a former three-term secretary of the state Democratic Party from Mountlake Terrace. If passed, the bill would make it the policy of the…

On walkable cities

“Walkable City: how downtown can save America, one step at a time”, by Jeff Speck, was exciting to read. Speck presents all sorts of evidence and arguments that walkable downtowns — designed for people, not cars — increase real estate values, increase tax revenue, improve health, attract businesses, and make for fun places to live….

Answering doubts about MoveToAmend

Wednesday evening I went to a meeting of eastside MoveToAmend activists, in Bellevue.   Attendees discussed plans in place to collect signatures for I-1329, the initiative in support of an amendment to the US Constitution overturning the Citizens United Supreme Court decision that treats corporations as people and money as speech. Once the Secretary of State’s…

Not just Republicans are to blame for economic inequality

Oxfam released a report recently about economic inequality, World’s 85 richest people own nearly half of global wealth: Oxfam report. “In the US, the wealthiest 1 per cent of the population grabbed 95 per cent of post-financial crisis growth between 2009 and 2012, while the bottom 90 per cent became poorer.” “Wealthy elites have co-opted…