National News Round-Up

by Leigh Graham · 2009-04-18 11:14:00 UTC
Topics:

A survey of what's been happening this week nationally while I've been working on borrowed PCs here in SF:

States Slashing Social Programs for Vulnerable; I wrote about this concerning AZ's plans to eliminate public assistance.

Foreclosures are up 46% from a year ago.

Obama promises no program protected in federal budget cuts to reduce waste.

Police make wish lists for stimulus money.  More cops on the street - a good thing or a bad thing?

Undocumented immigrants moving to new states across the country.  More interesting facts: this group comprises only about 4% of the US population, and growth has stabilized.

Public and national parks nationwide are facing major budget cuts.  I'm plagued by pretty severe allergies myself, but even I find this a bummer.

The number of African-Americans imprisoned for drug offenses declined for the 1st time in 25 years, though more whites are now being incarcerated for drug charges.  Police speculate it follows a decline in crack cocaine use and a rise in meth use, respectively.  Regardless, blacks are still way overrepresented in our prison populations.

And finally, some plain speaking on our financial mess: Elizabeth Warren breaks it down for Jon Stewart.  Good stuff.

Leigh Graham
PREVIOUS STORY:
Which State Will Be First to Pass Homeless Hate Crime Protection?
NEXT STORY:
Sallie Mae Blinks!

COMMENTS (0)

    Comment Policy

    · All fields are required to comment.

    [X]

    Comments on Change.org are meant for further exploration and evaluation of the campaign on Change.org. To that end, we welcome constructive comments. However, we reserve the right to delete comments which, as determined solely in our discretion: (1) are offensive, abusive, or off-topic; (2) include content solely intended to personally attack the campaign creator, (3) are designed to subvert or hijack comment threads rather than contribute to them; and/or (4) violate our terms of service and/or privacy policy. Repeat offenders may be permanently removed from the site at our discretion. Please also be advised that: (A) we do not actively curate and/or monitor in any manner whatsoever the comments made on the Change.org platform, and (B) the creator of each campaign on Change.org may remove any comment at her/his/its discretion.