Tom Foley
Health Reform Repeal As A "Plan"
If you want to know why Republicans aren't going to repeal the Affordable Care Act, consider this political ad in Connecticut by Dan Malloy: The heart of it is an attack on Republican Tom Foley, who favors repeal: Now, Foley has a health care plan for us: allow insurance companies to discriminate based on preexisting conditions, and deny coverage for breast and prostate cancer screening and autism treatment. The public has always favored health care reform.
The Wasteland
Where should all the waste from our nuclear power plants go? This isn’t a new question—quite the opposite, it can be shocking to realize how long the debate has dragged out. This past February, in San Diego, at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), some of the world’s top experts on nuclear-waste management held a panel discussion. Papers were read. Exciting ideas unveiled. Yet some of the attendees couldn’t shake the sense of déjà vu.
Muzzled
The Southern Coup
When the new Republican Congress was sworn in last January, the South finally conquered Washington. The defeated Democratic leadership had been almost exclusively from the Northeast, the Midwest and the Pacific Northwest, with Speaker Tom Foley of Washington, Majority Leader Dick Gephardt of Missouri and Majority Whip David Bonior of Michigan in the House, and, on the Senate side, Majority Leader George Mitchell from Maine. The only Southerner in the Democratic congressional leadership was Senate Majority Whip Wendell Ford of Kentucky.
The Elephant Man
It's a few minutes to six on a Thursday evening in October, and the corridor outside the House chamber, thick with bodies a week ago, is a lazy parlor for a team of guards kicking back on swivel chairs bolted to the marble floor. Afternoon light sifts through windows painted shut since Truman was president, smoothing a coat of gold over the sculpted walls and vaulted ceiling.
