George Zornick | The Nation
The Numbers Just Don’t Add Up on Immigration Reform
Demonstrators display placards during a rally in front of the Statehouse, in Providence, R.I., Wednesday, Oct. 5, 2011. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)
There Was No Reason to Surrender on Filibuster Reform
(AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari.)
There’s a lot of unconvincing spin coming from the Senate Democrats who brokered an awful “filibuster reform” deal with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell Thursday morning. Chief among them is the argument that this is any kind of actual reform—it isn’t.
New Congressional Task Force on Climate Change Aims to ‘Break Through Barricades of Denial’
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse and Representative Henry Waxman announce a new Congressional initiative on climate change in the US Capitol on January 24, 2013. Photo by George Zornick
President Obama’s new push on climate change will be an “aggressive campaign built around the use of his executive powers to sidestep congressional opposition,” which makes some sense: Republicans in the House of Representatives are so stridently against taking action on global warming they even killed an amendment in 2011 that simply stated humans are driving climate change.
The White House Sends Troubling Signals About Its First Climate Test: Keystone XL
Demonstrators rally against the Keystone XL pipeline in front of the White House on Nov. 6, 2011. (Reuters/Joshua Roberts.)
Addressing climate change was—quite remarkably—the most prominent policy vow President Obama made yesterday on the steps of the US Capitol Building. “We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that failure to do so would betray our children and future generations,” he proclaimed.
Congressional Progressives: Abolish the Debt Ceiling
Democratic Representative Keith Ellison and five others are sponsoring the Full Faith and Credit Act. (AP Photo/Haraz N. Ghanbari).
By Nation DC intern Anna Simonton
Obama Goes Big on Gun Control
President Obama speaks at the White House alongside Vice President Biden on January 16, 2012, about a new push to control gun violence. Credit: Reuters/Larry Downing.
One month and two days after the shootings in Newtown, the White House unveiled a broad strategic plan for reducing gun violence—and unlike too many other moments in his presidency, Obama went big. The policy proposals are ambitious, as was the presidential rhetoric used to ask for them.
Why Are Some Leading Dems Getting Soft on an Assault Weapons Ban?
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada speaks to reporters following the Democratic policy luncheon on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)
In the wake of the horrific mass shooting in Newtown, Connecticut, support for re-banning assault weapons grew exponentially inside and outside of the Beltway. It's only natural when an AR-15 is used to slaughter twenty schoolchildren and six educators, only months after another was used to shoot seventy-one people inside a movie theater.
Big Week for Gun Control, and the Debate Is Moving Left
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel (pictured when he was White House Chief of Staff) will order Chicago pension funds to divest from all gun manufacturing. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert.)
Search around the Center for American Progress website for position papers or blog posts on gun control pre-2012. You won’t find much. But Monday morning in downtown Washington—emblematic of the huge post-Newtown shift in the gun control debate—the influential center-left think tank* released a sweeping new set of gun control proposals that set a clear pro-reform benchmark for the debate over how to reduce gun violence.
The CAP plan calls for an expanded background check system in which every gun sold in America would subject the buyer to a background check; assault weapon and high-capacity magazine bans; and improved federal research into gun violence and better enforcement of gun laws. Vice President Joe Biden will announce his task force’s plan tomorrow, and it will be politically hard to propose significantly less than what’s in the CAP plan.
Beware Walmart’s Role in the Gun Control Debate
(AP Photo/Amy Sancetta)
As Vice President Joe Biden plotted his task force’s plan of action on gun control this week, he invited representatives Walmart to the White House to talk about it. That makes sense—as we detailed last month, the retail giant is the biggest seller of weapons and ammunition in the United States. Stakeholders as far-flung as the hunting groups Ducks Unlimited and Pheasants Forever were invited to meet with Biden’s task force, so Walmart surely has a place at the table.
Three Ways Sensible Gun Control Could Have Prevented Aurora Shootings
Colorado shooter James Holmes was able to acquire large amounts of ammunition and rapid-fire weaponry despite his erratic behavior. (AP Photo/Denver Post, RJ Sangosti, Pool.)
If the mass shooting this summer during a midnight screening of The Dark Knight Rises has receded in the public’s memory given the recent horror in Newtown, Connecticut, court proceedings in Centennial, Colorado, this week have thrust it back into view.
We’ve learned heretofore unknown and certainly unpleasant details from the day of the shooting. Prosecutors played a tape in which a panicked moviegoer calls 911, but the dispatcher can’t hear him over the sound of gunshots—30 of them in 27 seconds. An officer testified that, when there weren’t enough ambulances around, he crammed victims into the back of his patrol car. They were so badly injured that he testified he could hear blood “sloshing around” on the floor of his car when he made turns.
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