Washington, DC–(ENEWSPF)–June 7, 2011.  A failure to raise the federal debt limit could be a disaster for the fragile economic recovery—and conservative threats to block action could already be causing harm. There’s been great concern about how financial markets might react to not raising the debt ceiling, but there’s a[Read More…]

Washington, D.C.–(ENEWSPF)–June 2, 2011.  Today the Department of Education released the final version of its gainful employment rule, a measure many hoped would require career-education programs—particularly at for-profit colleges—to make sure their students get a high-value education. The rule is a step in the right direction but it leaves much[Read More…]

Washington, D.C.–(ENEWSPF)–May 26, 2011.  Families across the country are now planning their summer vacations, eager for this weekend’s Memorial Day kickoff of the spring and summer driving season, but on this coming three-day weekend, rising prices at the pump will be hard to miss. Today, the Center for American Progress[Read More…]

Washington, D.C.–(ENEWSPF)–May 23, 2011.  The Center for American Progress released “What Now, Mr. President?: Obama’s Middle East Speech Now Requires Follow Through,” by Brian Katulis, on President Barack Obama’s Middle East speech on May 19, aimed at laying clear the bottom line positions of leaders and people in the region[Read More…]

WASHINGTON–(ENEWSPF)–May 17 – Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) today introduced important legislation that would update the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA). ECPA was passed in 1986, before the advent of much of our communications technology, and has not been substantially updated since. The ECPA Amendments Act will give Americans[Read More…]

Washington, D.C.–(ENEWSPF)–May 16, 2011.  Billions of taxpayer dollars per year can be saved by reforming the way Medicare and Medicaid investigate improper payments, says Marsha Simon in a new report from the Center for American Progress entitled, “Payment Police 2.0: How to Stop Paying Bad Medicare and Medicaid Claims.” Despite[Read More…]

Washington, D.C.–(ENEWSPF)–May 12, 2011.  Yesterday the Center for American Progress released the column “Exxon Mobil Dodges the Tax Man: Exxon Pays a Lower Effective Tax Rate than the Average American,” with an accompanying spreadsheet that includes the data on Exxon’s effective tax rate from 2008 to 2010 as the Fortune[Read More…]

Washington, D.C.–(ENEWSPF)–May 6, 2011. All kinds of families have faced the prospect of job losses, downsizing, involuntary part-time work, and often less-generous benefits as a result of the Great Recession. Dual-earner, married couples may seem like the luckiest kind of families when it comes to unemployment since they have a[Read More…]

Washington, D.C.–(ENEWSPF)–May 4, 2011. Billions of dollars in agricultural subsidies would be better spent on deficit reduction while also investing in a clean energy future in our rural communities, argues a new paper out today from the Center for American Progress’s Jake Caldwell. The report, “Bad Seeds: A Plan to[Read More…]

Washington, D.C.–(ENEWSPF)–April 27, 2011. The Center for American Progress has previously pointed out that the House Republican budget for fiscal year 2012 forces future beneficiaries out of Medicare into more expensive private plans. One of the ways Republicans are trying to sell their Medicare proposal is by claiming that beneficiaries[Read More…]