Help The Middle ClassNews and Information For The Heart Of America
USA/Gallop Poll: More Now Blame Obama For Economic Woes (USA Today)
Seven months before the midterm elections, Americans seem disaffected about nearly everything political.
A majority disapprove of both political parties, their leaders and most members of Congress, a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds.
Attitudes are reminiscent of those in 1994 and 2006, when control of Congress switched from one party to the other.
The favorable rating for the Democratic [...]
CNN/OPINION: U.S.-Mexico ‘War On Drugs’ A Failure (CNN)
Editor’s note: Charles Bowden is the author of 11 books, including “Down by the River: Drugs, Money, Murder and Family”; “Juárez: The Laboratory of our Future”; “Some of the Dead Are Still Breathing” and his latest, “Murder City,” about Ciudad Juarez. He is a contributing editor of Esquire and writes for newspapers and magazines such [...]
Unemployment Holds Steady At 9.7%. Temp. Hirings Up March Job Figures (Politico)
President Barack Obama got the first unequivocally good news on the nation’s employment picture Friday, as new government figures showed the nation gained 162,000 jobs in the month of March.
The unemployment rate held steady at 9.7 percent. That’s the first time the nation has gained, rather than lost, in jobs since late 2007, with the [...]
New Poll Shows People Believe America Is Going In The ‘Wrong Direction’ (MSNBC)
The health-care debate has generated intense levels of frustration among the bill’s opponents, and those who say they are outright angry almost universally believe that the country is going in the wrong direction — some say toward an America they no longer recognize.
Of the 26 percent of people who described themselves as “angry” about the [...]
Transportation Department Sets New Fuel Efficiency Standards For Autos (The Washington Post)
Consumers will pay more for cars upfront but may save money in the long term under new rules finalized Thursday by the Obama administration that will increase fuel efficiency and for the first time set greenhouse gas emissions standards for cars and light trucks.
The new fuel efficiency standards, issued by the Transportation Department and the [...]
Fed’s Mortage Purchase Program Ends. What Now? (Los Angeles Times)
The government’s $1.25-trillion program to prop up the housing market by purchasing mortgages came to an end Wednesday — in a small, messy room at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York with four desks and a Nerf basketball hoop.
For the last year, a small team of traders has worked here to buy massive amounts [...]
Obama Now Says “Drill, Baby, Drill! Article And Video Looking At His Stunning Reversal (Huffington Post)
President Obama announced today a new energy policy that will open up waters along the southern Atlantic coastline, the eastern Gulf of Mexico, and part of Alaska to offshore oil and gas drilling.
The new policy represents a reversal not only of the current moratorium on any new oil drilling off most U.S. shores, but also [...]
Obama To O.K. Oil And Gas Drilling Off US Coast. The Dream Of George W. Bush Will Finally Come True (The Washington Post)
The Obama administration will approve significant oil and gas exploration off America’s coasts, including a possible sale two years from now of leases off the Virginia shore, administration officials said Wednesday.
The move, which President Obama will announce Wednesday morning with Interior Secretary Ken Salazar at Andrews Air Force Base, ends a long-standing moratorium on oil [...]
BIG QUESTION: Will The Middle Class Really Pay Less For Health Care? (USA Today)
President Obama’s restructuring of the nation’s health care system will make it easier for poor and sick Americans to get and keep insurance. What’s less clear is whether it will reduce health care costs for most Americans, as the White House says it will.
Medical costs are rising fast — up 5.7% last year, while the [...]
FDA Feeling The Heat To Fight Food Fraud (The Washington Post)
The expensive “sheep’s milk” cheese in a Manhattan market was really made from cow’s milk. And a jar of “Sturgeon caviar” was, in fact, Mississippi paddlefish.
Some honey makers dilute their honey with sugar beets or corn syrup, their competitors say, but still market it as 100 percent pure at a premium price.
And last year, a [...]
