Source: JimBovard.com
by James Bovard

“One hundred years ago, Senator James Couzens, a Michigan Republican, took to the Senate floor to denounce the Bureau of Internal Revenue for abusing its power and trampling innocent taxpayers. Couzens launched a sweeping Senate investigation of federal tax collectors. One year later, Internal Revenue Commissioner David Blair personally delivered a demand for $10 million in back taxes as Couzens stepped out of the Senate chamber. Couzens fought the case, and eventually proved that he had actually overpaid his taxes by roughly one million dollars, as David Burnham noted in his 1989 classic, A Law Unto Itself: The IRS and the Abuse of Power. But the precedent of the IRS exploiting its power to attack its critics was firmly established.” (04/15/24)

https://jimbovard.com/blog/2024/04/15/one-hundred-years-of-irs-political-targeting/

Source: The Daily Beast
by Matt Lewis

“Donald Trump’s New York hush-money-to-a-porn-star trial has barely begun and, already, his MAGA backers are trying to rig the outcome. On Monday, conservative media personality Clay Travis sent the following tweet to his one million-plus Twitter (X) followers: ‘If you’re a Trump supporter in New York City who is a part of the jury pool, do everything you can to get seated on the jury and then refuse to convict as a matter of principle, dooming the case via hung jury. It’s the most patriotic thing you could possibly do.’ Make no mistake, this is a very dangerous and irresponsible message to send. It seeks to pervert the American legal system, a system where no man is above the law and the goal is to deliver blind justice.” (04/15/24)

https://www.thedailybeast.com/its-day-1-of-the-trump-trial-and-maga-is-already-losing-its-mind

Source: The Atlantic
by John Hendrickson

“What if everyone’s wrong? What if Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s presidential campaign is savvier, more organized, and more cunning than it’s been given credit for? This past weekend, Kennedy’s ‘We the People’ party gamed an Iowa loophole to secure his spot on the state’s 2024 election ballot. Instead of spending months gathering thousands of signatures, Kennedy’s allies persuaded hundreds of voters to show up in the same place on the same day and partake in something akin to a potemkin political convention. The summit barely lasted two hours. It was a bold gambit, and it worked.” (04/15/24)

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2024/04/rfk-jr-2024-ballot-access/678075/?utm_source=feed

Source: In These Times
by Jazmin Orozco Rodriguez

“In a little more than two years as CEO of a small hospital in Wyoming, Dave Ryerse has witnessed firsthand the worsening financial problems eroding rural hospitals nationwide. In 2022, Ryerse’s South Lincoln Medical Center was forced to shutter its operating room because it didn’t have the staff to run it 24 hours a day. Soon after, the obstetrics unit closed. Ryerse said the publicly owned facility’s revenue from providing care has fallen short of operating expenses for at least the past eight years, driving tough decisions to cut services in hopes of keeping the facility open in Kemmerer, a town of about 2,400 in southwestern Wyoming. South Lincoln’s financial woes aren’t unique, and the risk of hospital closures is an immediate threat to many small communities.” (04/15/24)

https://inthesetimes.com/article/rural-hospitals-losing-money-closures-medicaid-expansion-health

Source: Independent Institute
by Raymond J March

“Spending more doesn’t always get you more and that includes money going towards combatting America’s ongoing opioid crisis. But don’t tell that to the Biden Administration. A recent budget proposal by the Republican Study Committee aims to cut federal non-defense spending by 30 percent. This includes funds sent to states to address opioid overdoses and misuse. The proposal specifically targets State Opioid Response grants, which have supplied state governments with the means to purchase about 10 million overdose reversal medication kits since 2018 for reduced funding.” (04/15/24)

https://blog.independent.org/2024/04/15/opioid-crisis/