March, 04 2010, 09:00am EDT
For Immediate Release
Contact:
Larry McNeely, U.S. PIRG Health Care Advocate
Office: (202) 546-9707 x303
lmcneely@pirg.org
Time to Move Forward With Health Reform
Statement by Larry McNeely, Health Care Advocate, on President Obama’s decision to move forward with health care reform
WASHINGTON
"With
tens of millions of Americans facing double-digit hikes in their health care
premiums, the U.S. Public Interest
Research Group applauds President Obama's decision to move forward
with a health care package that
embraces new cost containment ideas from Republicans
and Democrats.
"This
sensible compromise takes the steps American families and small businesses
desperately need: it ends the worst abuses by insurance companies, lets
ordinary Americans choose to purchase the kind of coverage now enjoyed by
members of Congress, and reins in skyrocketing costs.
"After
a year of constant partisan debate, it's high time each and every member
of Congress stop just talking about rising health costs and actually do
something to address it."
U.S. PIRG, the federation of state Public Interest Research Groups (PIRGs), stands up to powerful special interests on behalf of the American public, working to win concrete results for our health and our well-being. With a strong network of researchers, advocates, organizers and students in state capitols across the country, we take on the special interests on issues, such as product safety,political corruption, prescription drugs and voting rights,where these interests stand in the way of reform and progress.
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Bitcoin Hits New High as Crypto-Friendly Atkins Tapped to Lead SEC
"If Atkins is confirmed by the Senate, crypto grifters will surely rejoice at their newfound freedom to swindle, but most investors in the U.S. will be much less safe," wrote one researcher.
Dec 05, 2024
The price of a single Bitcoin topped $100,000 Wednesday—a major milestone for the cryptocurrency—mere hours after President-elect Donald Trump selected crypto advocate Paul Atkins to lead the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Atkins previously served as the SEC commissioner from 2002 to 2008 and then went on to found a financial consulting company, Patomak Global Partners, which included failed cryptocurrency exchange FTX among its clients, according to The Wall Street Journal. Atkins is expected to adopt a warmer approach to crypto.
On a podcast last year, Atkins noted that "if the SEC were more accommodating and would deal straightforwardly with these various [crypto] firms, I think it would be a lot better to have things happen here in the United States rather than outside," according to The Washington Post.
"[Atkins] believes in the promise of robust, innovative capital markets that are responsive to the needs of Investors, and that provide capital to make our Economy the best in the world. He also recognizes that digital assets and other innovations are crucial to Making America Greater than Ever Before," wrote Trump on Truth Social when announcing the pick.
Trump on Thursday claimed credit for Bitcoin reaching new heights: "CONGRATULATIONS BITCOINERS!!! $100,000!!! YOU'RE WELCOME!!! Together, we will Make America Great Again!"
Crypto leaders cheered the Atkins news.
"Paul Akins is an excellent choice for the new SEC chair!" wrote Brian Armstrong, the co-founder and CEO of the cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase. Brad Garlinghouse, CEO of the cryptocurrency firm Ripple, called Atkins an "outstanding choice."
Current SEC Chair Gary Gensler has pursued legal action against a number of crypto companies, including FTX, and drawn the ire of the crypto world for maintaining that by and large the crypto industry should be governed by the same SEC rules that oversee stock and bond trading.
Meanwhile, critics of the Atkins pick warned that investors could be less safe if he is confirmed to helm of the SEC.
"Donald Trump's nomination of Paul Atkins to chair the Securities and Exchange Commission is a huge gift to the crypto industry, as evidenced by the immediate jump in Bitcoin's stock price... If Atkins is confirmed by the Senate, crypto grifters will surely rejoice at their newfound freedom to swindle, but most investors in the U.S. will be much less safe," wrote Kenny Stancil, senior researcher at Revolving Door Project, a watchdog group.
Bartlett Naylor, financial policy advocate for Public Citizen, added that "any sentient being—let alone a securities markets expert—should understand that bitcoin is 'thin air,' as Trump himself once put it. That Paul Atkins has made a living promoting such a scam doesn't bode well for his reflexes as a shepherd for investor protection."
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The Biden administration faced backlash from scientists, advocacy groups, and vulnerable Pacific islands on Wednesday for arguing before the United Nations' highest court that the Paris agreement is sufficient and countries should not face additional legal obligations to fight the climate emergency.
The U.S. position, outlined at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) by State Department legal adviser Margaret Taylor, was deemed "morally bankrupt" by Oxfam America, which
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Taylor argued during her presentation in The Hague on Wednesday that "the U.N. climate change regime, with the Paris agreement at its core, is the only international legal regime specifically designed by states to address climate change" and that "cooperative efforts through that regime provide the best hope for protecting the climate system for the benefit of present and future generations."
While technically a legally binding international treaty, the Paris accord has failed to arrest the rise of planet-warming carbon emissions, which have surged to an all-time high this year. The agreement—from which the U.S. is expected to withdraw for a second time under Trump—has no enforcement mechanism, and its language leaves ample room for countries to continue burning fossil fuels at levels that scientists say are incompatible with a livable future.
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Delta Merner, lead scientist for the Science Hub for Climate Litigation at the Union of Concerned Scientists, criticized the U.S.—the largest historical polluter—for resisting "calls for climate accountability" at Wednesday's ICJ hearing.
"Instead of taking responsibility for its contributions to the climate crisis, the United States used its 30-minute slot to downplay the role of the courts for global climate action, emphasize nonbinding national commitments under the Paris agreement, and reject the notion of historical responsibility," said Merner. "By framing climate change as a collective action challenge without clear legal obligations for individual states, the United States dismissed the potential for redress or binding accountability measures that advance justice for climate-vulnerable nations."
"In the face of stonewalling from major polluters, we applaud the leadership of Vanuatu and others for advancing this process," Merner added. "These proceedings must continue to center the voices of frontline communities."
The Pacific island of Vanuatu first launched the push for an ICJ advisory opinion on climate in 2021. Less than two years later, the U.N. General Assembly approved a resolution calling on the ICJ to issue an opinion on countries' legal obligations regarding the global fight against climate change.
Ralph Regenvanu, Vanuatu's special envoy for climate change and environment,
criticized the U.S. presentation at Wednesday's landmark hearing and said treaties such as the Paris agreement can't be "a veil for inaction or a substitute for legal accountability."
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Dec 05, 2024
The leading human rights group Amnesty International said late Wednesday what United Nations experts, national leaders, and historians have been arguing for months: that Israel's massive assault on Gaza amounts to the crime of genocide against the Palestinian population.
Amnesty, which had sharply criticized Israel's U.S.-backed war but until Thursday stopped short of labeling it genocide, details its findings and conclusion in a sprawling new report titled "You Feel Like You Are Subhuman": Israel's Genocide Against Palestinians in Gaza.
The 296-page document features interviews with survivors and witnesses of Israel's large-scale campaign of bombing, displacement, arbitrary detention, and destruction of Gaza's agricultural land and civilian infrastructure, interviews supplemented by an analysis of satellite imagery, video footage, and other visual evidence.
Israeli authorities, the group said, did not respond substantively with any of its inquiries between October 2023—when the assault on Gaza began in the wake of the deadly Hamas-led attack on Israel—and October 2024. The report does, however, include quotes from Israeli officials and soldiers, including one who declared that "there is no innocence in Gaza."
"Through its research findings and legal analysis," the report states, "Amnesty International has found sufficient basis to conclude that Israel committed, during the nine-month period under review, prohibited acts under Articles II (a), (b), and (c) of the Genocide Convention, namely killing, causing serious bodily or mental harm and deliberately inflicting on Palestinians in Gaza conditions of life calculated to bring about their physical destruction in whole or in part."
Amnesty said it also "found sufficient basis to conclude that these acts were committed with the specific intent to destroy Palestinians in Gaza, as such, who form a substantial part of the Palestinian population."
Agnès Callamard, Amnesty's secretary-general, said in a statement that her organization's report "demonstrates that Israel has carried out acts prohibited under the Genocide Convention, with the specific intent to destroy Palestinians in Gaza."
"Month after month, Israel has treated Palestinians in Gaza as a subhuman group unworthy of human rights and dignity, demonstrating its intent to physically destroy them," said Callamard. "Our damning findings must serve as a wake-up call to the international community: this is genocide. It must stop now."
Amnesty published its findings more than a year into an Israeli assault that has killed more than 44,500 people in Gaza, displaced almost all of the enclave's population, and left many at dire risk of starvation and disease. Nearly 70% of the deaths verified by the U.N. have been women and children.
"Governments must stop pretending they are powerless to end this genocide, which was enabled by decades of impunity for Israel's violations of international law."
The human rights group's report comes less than a month after a special U.N. committee said that the Israeli military's actions in the Gaza Strip—including the obstruction of humanitarian aid and targeted attacks on civilians—bear "the characteristics of genocide."
Amnesty echoes that assessment, pointing to Israel's mass destruction of cultural and religious sites in Gaza, detention and torture, use of dehumanizing language against Palestinians, and—in the case of many soldiers—the open celebration of Palestinian suffering.
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Callamard called on nations continuing to provide military support for Israel's assault, including the United States, to cease arms transfers immediately, as they are "violating their obligation to prevent genocide and are at risk of becoming complicit in genocide."
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