February

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The Education Scam

The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) is a reauthorization of the federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act. It is the Bush administration’s education reform plan. Why is NCLB being criticized and labeled a set-up for vouchers and privatization?

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The Great Medicare Robbery

Private insurance and pharmaceutical companies 1, seniors 0. Yes, the medical/health monopolistic private sector has prevailed once again. The major focus of the Medicare prescription drug bill has been on the prescription drugs-for-seniors component. An evaluation of this legislation triumphantly signed by Bush last December, shows that its major beneficiaries will be the medical/health monopolies. It does little or nothing for seniors.

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Your Health at a Cost: The Medical Supply Industry

The world was glued to the TV screen last February as a teenager was victimized by a tragic error at a major medical institution and given a mismatched heart-lung transplant. The frenzy that followed to find yet another organ donor captured our imaginations and hopes until it came to its tragic end. It was barely mentioned, as to who was going to pay for her procedures and the use of the array of medical equipment.

Healthcare not Warfare

As much as anything else, we need to turn the 2004 elections into a referendum on whether all Americans should finally be able to get affordable, high quality health care with their right to choose their own doctor. -- AFL-CIO Executive Council, February 2003.

America Behind Bars

There has been an alarming trend developing over the past 20 years in regards to the skyrocketing prison populations. Prisons have been transformed from tools of the criminal justice system to segregate the most dangerous and offensive criminals from society at large, to large-scale detention centers aimed at controlling massive numbers of working class youth. We are called by some “the home of the free,” but a more accurate description is “the home of the incarcerated.”

On Rights and Privileges

Opponents of affirmative action advance the myth that it is a new concept invented by the left during the civil rights movement as a means of creating “reverse discrimination” or “quotas.” Affirmative action is criticized as an unfair punishment for people in the present for crimes of the past. These fabrications are part of the campaign to discredit affirmative action policies.

For Corporate Control

The 3-2 ruling by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to further deregulate media ownership has been met with overwhelming grassroots opposition. From trade unions to internet activist groups like MoveOn.org the anger towards and engaged interest in the FCC ruling is unprecedented.