March 9, 2018

After a Mother Jones Investigation, a Right-Wing Albanian Party Attacks

And the Russian embassy there calls the magazine part of a “dirty news campaign”

Hannah Levintova Mar. 8, 2018

On Tuesday, Mother Jones published a lengthy investigation about a mysterious Russian-linked firm that hired a former Trump campaign aide named Nick Muzin to work in the United States to help the right-wing Democratic Party of Albania during the country’s 2017 parliamentary elections. The story zeroed in on Biniatta Trade, a Scotland-based shell company that paid Muzin $150,000, and perhaps more, to help the DPA and its chairman, Lulzim Basha. According to corporate filings in the United Kingdom, the two Belize-based shell companies that created Biniatta Trade were linked to other firms controlled by Russian nationals. It was a complicated trail, and here’s a chart to help explain what Mother Jones uncovered:



The bottom-line question was this: Did Russians use the political system in the US to meddle in Albanian politics?

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https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2018/03/after-a-mother-jones-investigation-a-right-wing-albanian-party-attacks/

March 9, 2018

Trump official under fire after granting broad access to mining and oil firms

Source: The Guardian

A key Trump administration official scheduled roughly twice as many meetings with mining and fossil-fuel representatives as with environmental groups, public records requests have revealed.

Further investigation shows that some of the firms she met with later benefited directly from administration decisions that weakened wilderness and wildlife protections.

As is the case with other prominent interior department officials appointed by the department secretary, Ryan Zinke, the official work calendar of his senior adviser Kathleen Benedetto indicates the remarkable access that the extractive industries have to the Trump administration.

“It makes it look like [Benedetto] is the fixer for mining companies,” said Aaron Weiss, a staffer at Center for Western Priorities, an environmental group. The interior department did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/mar/09/environment-trump-oil-gas-kathleen-benedetto

March 9, 2018

The NRA Says It Has 5 Million Members. Its Magazines Tell Another Story.

Its magazines lost more than 10 percent of their readers last year.

Dave GilsonMar. 7, 2018

The National Rifle Association likes to boast that it represents 5 million gun owners. Or maybe it’s “nearly” 5 million—or perhaps “more than” 5 million. The NRA has never provided solid numbers on how many members it has, yet a look at what data is out there suggests that its claims may be wide of the mark—and the real figure could have dropped by more than 10 percent in the year after Donald Trump was elected president.

The NRA’s membership figures have always been a moving target. In 2013, Mother Jones reported that its public membership claims had fluctuated wildly over the past two decades, suggesting both volatility and and plenty of soundbite-friendly vagueness.

But the overall trend has been upward: The NRA’s self-reported membership has nearly doubled since it hit a low of 2.6 million in 1998—after it was widely criticized for its inflammatory rhetoric (e.g., “jack-booted government thugs”) following the 1993 Waco siege and 1995 Oklahoma City bombing. Its 5-million figure has stayed more or less constant for the past four years.

As my colleague Josh Harkinson reported a few years ago, the NRA is thought to use a few tricks to pad its numbers, such as keeping dead lifetime members on its rolls. It also gives away free memberships to buyers of select gun brands. (Taurus, a major NRA backer, offers one-year memberships to its customers.) As a result, the organization’s core of committed members is likely much smaller than the overall number claimed.

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https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2018/03/nra-membership-magazine-numbers-1/

March 8, 2018

A Connecticut proposal could charge up to $10,000 for not carrying health insurance

The plan would raise the previous fine for not carrying coverage to as high as 9.6 percent for the highest earners.

By Sarah Kliff Mar 7, 2018

Connecticut is considering a proposal to create a super-charged individual mandate — one that could charge state residents a big chunk of their income for not carrying coverage.

The plan would raise the fine for not carrying coverage from 2.5 percent of income (the fine under Obamacare) to as high as 9.6 percent for the highest earners.

A Yale economist first proposed the idea in February. Now, some of these fees have worked their way into a bill pending with the Connecticut legislature. It comes at a moment when states that support Obamacare are grappling with how to deal with the fallout of Republicans repealing the federal requirement to carry health coverage.

Maryland was first out of the gate with its own unique twist on the individual mandate. Now, Connecticut is exploring much steeper fines — meant to encourage those without insurance to enroll in a plan instead.

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https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/3/7/17093644/obamacare-health-insurance-mandate-connecticut-states-voxcare

March 8, 2018

The Health-Care Gap Between Red and Blue America

States have a surprising degree of autonomy to block President Trump’s changes to Obamacare—and liberal-leaning states are already making their move.

Ronald Brownstein

The battle over health care is moving to the states.

The most immediate effect of the recent steps taken by President Trump and congressional Republicans to unravel the Affordable Care Act will be to create an even deeper gulf between red and blue states in the availability and quality of health insurance. An array of blue states is exploring ways not only to blunt Trump’s moves, but also to reach beyond the ACA with new mechanisms to expand coverage. Simultaneously, many red states are leaning into the rollback—both by seeking to limit access to Medicaid, and by embracing Trump’s efforts to deregulate insurance markets in ways that will restore the pre-ACA separation between the healthy and sick.

“In the states that don’t act to strengthen their regulation, you are going to see these non-group-insurance markets weaken,” by eroding the risk-sharing between the healthy and sick that the ACA required, said Linda Blumberg, a fellow at the Urban Institute who closely studies the law. “It really takes us major steps back to where we were prior to [the law].”

Two big moves from Trump and congressional Republicans are expanding this wedge between the states. The first was the tax bill’s provision repealing the ACA’s individual mandate, which required all Americans to buy insurance. The second was the administration’s recent proposal to significantly expand the availability of “short-term” health plans that don’t guarantee minimum benefits or prohibit discrimination against consumers with preexisting health problems.

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https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/03/obamacare-trump/555131/

March 8, 2018

Leading feminists on why Times Up and #MeToo mean there's no going back

Rebecca Solnit, Nadifa Mohamed and others on a transformative moment for women and gender equality

Alexandra Topping
Thu 8 Mar 2018

Demands for an end to violence against women, equality in the workplace and more diverse representation in positions of power are nothing new on International Women’s Day – the cry for change is as regular as the day itself. But this year, feminists argue, could be different: people may just be listening.

Since sexual harassment scandals tore through Hollywood last October, the repercussions keep on coming. In multiple workplaces, across unrelated fields, we are starting to see what change might look like.

At the start of the year 300 Hollywood employees, including many high-profile stars, launched the Time’s Up legal fund to support women fighting sexual misconduct; in less than a month, all UK companies with more than 250 employees will have to report their gender pay gaps; across the globe women are confronting repressive laws and speaking up at home and at work.

We asked leading feminist thinkers if they were hopeful this International Women’s Day – and what change they wanted to see.

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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/mar/08/sexist-agendas-finally-exposed-international-womens-day

March 8, 2018

Hundreds of Canadian doctors demand lower salaries

By Amy B Wang March 7

In a move that can only be described as utterly Canadian, hundreds of doctors in Quebec are protesting their pay raises, saying they already make too much money.

As of Wednesday afternoon, more than 700 physicians, residents and medical students from the Canadian province had signed an online petition asking for their pay raises to be canceled. A group named Médecins Québécois Pour le Régime (MQRP), which represents Quebec doctors and advocates for public health, started the petition Feb. 25.

“We, Quebec doctors who believe in a strong public system, oppose the recent salary increases negotiated by our medical federations,” the petition reads in French.

The physicians group said it could not in good conscience accept pay raises when working conditions remained difficult for others in their profession — including nurses and clerks — and while patients “live with the lack of access to required services because of drastic cuts in recent years.”

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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2018/03/07/hundreds-of-canadian-doctors-demand-lower-salaries/?utm_term=.3ecf971e3318

March 8, 2018

Rep. Keith Ellison is taking up the Medicare-for-all mantle in the House

Ellison is now the lead sponsor of the House’s single-payer bill.
By Ella Nilsen

Progressive Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN) has taken on the mantle of Medicare-for-all in the House of Representatives.

On Wednesday, Ellison received unanimous consent from his House colleagues to become the lead sponsor of the Expanded and Improved Medicare for All Act — originally introduced by former Rep. John Conyers (D-MI). (Conyers resigned in December in the wake of multiple sexual misconduct and harassment claims from former female staffers.)

The bill, more commonly known as the House version of the Medicare-for-all bill, would guarantee universal health care in the United States (Sen. Bernie Sanders is the lead sponsor of the Senate version). It enjoys support from 121 House Democrats — more than 60 percent of the caucus.

To be clear, it has no chance of going anywhere in the current Republican-controlled Congress. But it’s a signal of the policies Democrats could pursue if they’re able to take back the House in 2018 and, furthermore, a signal that more congressional Democrats are getting behind progressive health care policies.

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https://www.vox.com/2018/3/7/17092850/ellison-conyers-medicare-for-all-house-congress-single-payer

March 7, 2018

Exodus from Puerto Rico grows as island struggles to rebound from Hurricane Maria

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/exodus-from-puerto-rico-grows-as-island-struggles-to-rebound-from-hurricane-maria/2018/03/06/b2fcb996-16c3-11e8-92c9-376b4fe57ff7_story.html?utm_term=.f0ee7d426f17

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — There have been three muses in Ramoncito “El Andino” Rodríguez’s life: love, lament and la isla, Puerto Rico.

The founder of one of the oldest musical acts here, Rodríguez croons boleros and lyrical anthems that at times quicken the heart and at others create a daydreamy lull. Many of them are homages to his motherland, love songs to this Caribbean island. It was a place he never wanted to leave.

But leave, he did.

Rodríguez reluctantly abandoned Puerto Rico after several feet of floodwater spilled into his home during Hurricane Maria in September, destroying his instruments, albums and handwritten compositions. The 78-year-old joined hundreds of thousands of other islanders who boarded flights in the past five months, creating a growing diaspora that, as time passes, is increasingly unlikely to return. Rodríguez and his wife, like so many others, picked Florida, and their stateside sojourn was supposed to be temporary.

They didn’t expect stability back home to be so elusive for so long.

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March 7, 2018

How a Russian-Linked Shell Company Hired An Ex-Trump Aide to Boost Albania's Right-Wing Party in DC

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2018/03/how-a-russian-linked-shell-company-hired-an-ex-trump-aide-to-boost-albanias-right-wing-party-in-dc/

Did Russians use the US political system to fuel political discord in the Balkans?

David Corn, Hannah Levintova and Dan Friedman

A former Trump campaign aide working as a lobbyist, a half-million-dollar payment, a conservative Albanian political party, four Republican congressmen, Breitbart News, a kosher restaurateur in New York City, an online dating service that promotes “beautiful” Ukrainian women, and Russian-linked shell companies—these are some of the elements in a bizarre tale of influence-peddling that spurs the suspicion that Russians covertly used Republicans in Washington in an effort to foment political conflict in the Balkans.

It’s a complicated story of international political skullduggery with a dizzying plot: A year ago, a sketchy Scottish firm called Biniatta Trade, which was formed by two Belize-based shell companies, paid a Republican lobbyist and former Trump campaign aide named Nick Muzin for work in the United States to help the Democratic Party of Albania. At the time, a parliamentary election was underway, and the right-wing DPA was challenging a government run by the Socialist Party. That government was led by Prime Minister Edi Rama, who was steering Albania into the European Union and warning of the rise of Russian influence in the Balkans. Coincidentally—or not—the two Belizean shell companies behind Biniatta Trade were both connected to firms controlled by Russians.

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