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Unemployment insurance is widely popular, and economists say it’s an effective stimulus. But there’s one obstacle it can’t overcome: the U.S. Senate.

Just how fast are those prospective Karzai-Taliban peace talks advancing? According to this Voice of America report, a mini-jirga meeting of Afghan and

Over a complete Republican boycott, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee passed its climate bill last week by a vote of 11-1. The lone dissenter

Over at Human Events, Rowan Scarborough attempts to advance the story, first floated by House Republicans, of David Axelrod’s long-disclosed financial gains

Photo: John Steven Fernandez, Flickr Some teachers at Anoka-Hennepin School District have failed a teachers test because they refused to affirm that the district’s policy limiting discussions of LGBT issues in the district’s schools is intended to make “students feel safe.” The district’s policy is at the heart of a culture war in the district and is the subject of a lawsuit by six students and their parents who say the district has not taken appropriate steps to prevent bullying against students who are, or are perceived to be, LGBT.

I’m set to write a piece on Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton’s just-wrapped speech in, oh, an hour, but a few policy highlights: The biggest U.S.

On ABC’s This Week on Sunday, both Paul Krugman and Robert Reich offered far more pessimistic views of the economy than the rosier outlook put forth by

Twenty-seven days, four votes and a long lesson in tedium later, the upper chamber has passed legislation extending unemployment benefits by at least 14 weeks

A great piece in The Washington Times today reveals a remarkable degree of hypocrisy from some GOP critics of last year’s $787 billion economic stimulus

Forget auditing the Fed or breaking up the banks. Before senators address those proposed amendments to Sen. Chris Dodd’s (D-Conn.) financial regulatory reform

We weren’t the only folks curious about the morning’s claim from Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) that the GOP’s health reform bill covers more uninsured Americans

The University of Phoenix logo (Pic via 2.bp.blogspot.com) Harper’s Magazine has unveiled a lengthy piece on the University of Phoenix, one of a host of for-profit colleges that is currently being investigated in the state of Florida and across the country. The piece, which is worth reading in full, explores the falsities in the schools’ recruitment practices, along with their embarrassingly low graduation rates and the high debt taken on by their students.

Seeking to stop the Pentagon from using taxpayer funds to sponsor NASCAR — and earning a death threat along the way — Rep. Betty McCollum sponsored an amendment to ban such funding.

Foreclosures jumped again in April, setting another record and providing more evidence that the housing crisis shows little sign of slowing down. RealtyTrac,

Mine Safety and Health Administration head Joseph Main countered, “MSHA did not run the Upper Big Branch Mine -- Massey Energy did.”

If this came in any other context except the aftermath of a dispiriting, fraud-filled election, this statement from Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton

It turns out just under 400 people have applied for relief under a $100 million fund BP set up to compensate rig workers who lost their jobs because of the

Hundreds of people gathered in Benton Harbor yesterday to protest the Emergency Manager law that has stripped power from the local government. “Benton Harbor is the new Selma of the 21st century, a battle ground for human rights and civil liberties,“ Mayor Wilce Cooke told a crowd that gathered in the town library before the march. “The whole world is watching us to see what is going to happen here in Benton Harbor

This is starting to make the veins in my forehead throb. Sarah Posner finds Vision America’s Rick Scarborough untethering himself completely from reality to

Good news first: The oil spewing from the busted well on the Gulf of Mexico’s seafloor is likely of a light grade that will be easier to clean up than some

I almost missed this John Boehner (R-Ohio) comment: “Scrapping the U.S. missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic does little more then empower

INA, the French national television archive, has released a 42-minute documentary depicting life in Hanoi during the Vietnam War that contains four and a half

At Salon, Sara Hepola performs a true public service by personally testing the value menus of several fast-food restaurants, in an attempt to present the