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Atheists Start Their Own PAC To Elect Nonreligious Candidates

Posted on October 5, 2013 in Articles

Atheist PAC

The Article: Atheists Start PAC To Elect Nonreligious Candidates by Frank James in NPR.

The Text: Americans who count themselves among the “nones” — as in atheists, agnostics or those of no definite religious affiliation — have launched a new political action committee.

The goal? To support the election of like-minded lawmakers or, at a minimum, candidates committed to upholding the constitutional separation between church and state.

“The Freethought Equality Fund will work to elect the nones … in addition to those who will work for our rights so we can finally have the representation in Congress we deserve,” said Maggie Ardiente of the American Humanist Association, at a Washington news conference Wednesday where the new PAC was rolled out.

Afghanistan Veteran On Food Stamps Writes To “Caring” Conservatives

Posted on October 4, 2013 in Articles

Homeless Vet

The Article: Afghanistan Veteran on Food Stamps Writes Letter to ‘Caring’ Conservatives by Richard Roe in Americans Against The Tea Party.

The Text: Some people measure a society’s condition by the lifestyles of the rich and famous — and those people are usually the rich and famous. For the rest of humanity, a society’s success is measured by the living conditions of the poorest. And who exactly the “poorest” are.

This letter, posted on September 19th by a combat veteran named Jason, speaks volumes of what American poverty looks like on the side streets of our society, and of the people who sleep on them.

“My name is Jason. I turned 35 less than a week ago. My first job was maintenance work at a public pool when I was 17. I worked 40-hours a week while I was in college. I’ve never gone longer than six months without employment in my life and I just spent the last three years in the military, one of which consisted of a combat tour of Afghanistan.

Why Young Americans Should Emigrate

Posted on October 3, 2013 in Articles

Young Americans Emigrate

The Article: Get Out While You Can: Why Young Americans Should Emigrate by Thomas McGath in AlterNet.

The Text: The 20-somethings of my generation have been marginalized by the economic situation in America. We’ve had a tricky time finding a place in the economy and many of us have become burdens on our families, through student loans and living costs. Now, how do we fix that?

Emigrate, if you can afford it. Millennials have a ton of education and no use for it. There are many other countries that represent a great opportunity for millennials looking to enter into an increasingly globalized work market. I’m not saying we should try to be members of an elite in other countries — we should reject our shackles and become more worldly.

Part of that is learning a second or third language, something I thought I never would do. This changed after my time abroad in Ireland while studying at University College Dublin. I decided I was going to learn German, even though it was not the most useful of languages. Four years later, after teaching myself German from scratch, I have an operating fluency in German and now live in Berlin, where I will soon start my master’s degree. The tuition costs a fraction of what it would in America. Despite being an foreigner, I have access to public health insurance available for students at only 60 Euros a month.

GOP Haunted By Its Own Stupidity

Posted on October 2, 2013 in Articles

Cruz Rubio Paul

The Article: GOP’s anti-Obamacare stupidity is about to haunt them by Brian Beutler in Salon.

The Text: All year we’ve watched the running tally of House Republican votes to repeal, defund and dismantle Obamacare climb — 40, 41, 42 — to one and only one effect. Not to actually harm the Affordable Care Act but to exploit and intensify conservative outrage, by misleading GOP base voters about the likelihood and necessity of ending it.

It’s no surprise that those numbers have ticked up more rapidly in the past several weeks. Obamacare’s just days away from opening for business, and once that happens, repealing it or defunding it will entail taking health insurance benefits away from Americans. It becomes a much harder fight.

It’s also why I imagine that quite soon — certainly after the first of the year, when ACA-approved insurance actually kicks in — the GOP will lose its appetite for more and more and more doomed repeal votes.

RIP, Middle Class

Posted on October 1, 2013 in Articles

Middle Class

The Article: RIP, the middle class: 1946-2013 by Edward McClelland in Salon.

The Text: I know I’m dating myself by writing this, but I remember the middle class.

I grew up in an automaking town in the 1970s, when it was still possible for a high school graduate — or even a high school dropout — to get a job on an assembly line and earn more money than a high school teacher.

“I had this student,” my history teacher once told me, “a real chucklehead. Just refused to study. Dropped out of school, a year or so later, he came back to see me. He pointed out the window at a brand-new Camaro and said, ‘That’s my car.’ Meanwhile, I was driving a beat-up station wagon. I think he was an electrician’s assistant or something. He handed light bulbs to an electrician.”