President Donald Trump recently snipped $810 million in federal spending. The late September cuts would come to spending authorized mostly for federal aid to undocumented immigrants…. (Read more)
Blog
In Our Current System, Congress’s Crazy
There’s no shortage of vital issues facing our country at the moment: rising gas prices, the ongoing war in Iran, concerns on the unfettered expansion of artificial intelligence. This is to say nothing of longer-term issues like immigration, healthcare and housing affordability, that continue to go untouched. Meanwhile, Congress, the institution constitutionally assigned to tackle […]
Propaganda: Paid for by You
Democratic government’s greatest strength is its greatest vulnerability. We are referring to the government’s extraordinary power to communicate. And this weekend we had a vivid lesson in what can go wrong. We citizens don’t think about it much, but the government supplies citizens with an untold array of information. Federal government agencies tell us what […]
Congress Is Struggling to Govern. Are El...
Congress performs poorly by most measures, and a mere 15 percent of the public approves of our national legislature’s performance. The public’s discontent is understandable. Legislators have failed to debate and craft policies to address important issues such as immigration, healthcare, and housing affordability. This report examines whether electoral incentives are to blame for Congress’s […]
Congress Is Vulnerable to a Paralyzing T...
On a sunny Tuesday morning 25 years ago, Congress reconvened. Speaker Dennis Hastert called the House of Representatives to order, and the Illinois Republican recognized Rep. Earl Blumenauer. The bowtie-wearing Democrat from Oregon began delivering a speech criticizing the marketing of tobacco. He was the first of three members queued to give speeches…. (Read more)
Upgrading Congress to Meet the Demands o...
Americans’ dissatisfaction with Congress is long-standing; its public approval rating has hovered between 10 and 30 percent for the last two decades. This discontent threatens national unity and democratic confidence, especially amid polarization and partisan political conflict…. (Read more)