September 2011
20 posts
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I was elected House Chair of the Legislative Task Force on Sustainable Building Design and Practices at the group’s first meeting of the new biennium yesterday. We elected Sen. David Johnson (D-Little Rock) to serve as Senate Chair. I was also recently named to serve the newly-created position of Communications Chair for the House Democratic Caucus.
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Autistic and Seeking a Place in an Adult World →
From the New York Times:
People with autism, whose unusual behaviors are believed to stem from variations in early brain development, typically disappear from public view after they leave school. As few as one in 10 hold even part-time jobs. Some live in state-supported group homes; even those who attend college often end up unemployed and isolated, living with parents.
But Justin is among the...
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Official: Ark. natural gas regulations sufficient →
A joint session of Agriculture, Forestry, and Economic Development spent nearly seven hours Tuesday discussing a package of Interim Study Proposals concerning natural gas production in Arkansas. The proposals, two of which I’m sponsoring, were first introduced during the 2011 legislation session. Since we met strong opposition, we sent the bills to study. Tuesday’s meeting marked the...
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Mississippi River Forum
I’m in New Orleans for the Mississippi River Forum hosted by the National Caucus of Environmental Legislators (NCEL). Follow @g on Twitter for live updates.
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Super PAC Plans Major Primary Campaign for Perry →
From The New York Times:
A new Super PAC with close ties to Gov. Rick Perry of Texas is laying plans to spend as much as $55 million to help him win the Republican presidential nomination, a sign that outside groups are likely to play a pivotal role in the party’s selection of its candidate.
The group, Make Us Great Again, was formed in late July by a group of Texas political operatives and...
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Smallest Electrical Motor Now Just a Nanometer... →
smarterplanet:
Way back in the early days of 2011, the world’s smallest electric motor was so…big. At 200 nanometers wide, it was a whopping 1/300th the size of a human hair.
Now, chemists at Tufts University’s School of Arts and Sciences have smashed that record, which was set in 2005, with this weekend’s unveiling of their single-molecule electric motor, which at 1 nanometer wide could be...
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Public disapproves of Obama on economy, but... →
From The Washington Post:
Here’s a striking disconnect that speaks volumes about Obama’s political problem right now: In the new NBC/WSJ poll, Americans express strong disapproval of Obama’s performance on the economy, and express low confidence that Obama has the right set of ideas to improve it.
And then, later in the very same poll, Americans are asked whether they support a range of...
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The Limping Middle Class →
From The New York Times:
THE 5 percent of Americans with the highest incomes now account for 37 percent of all consumer purchases, according to the latest research from Moody’s Analytics. That should come as no surprise. Our society has become more and more unequal.
When so much income goes to the top, the middle class doesn’t have enough purchasing power to keep the economy going without...
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Why the gender gap won’t go away. Ever: Women... →
From the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette:
It’s not at all clear how to solve this problem or even if there is a solution, but one thing is clear: the wage-gap debate ought to begin with the mommy track, not with proofy statistics.
There’s not much worth quoting from this piece, so I’ve left you with Ms. Hymowitz’s closing statement. If you’d care to submit a letter to the...
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Millions Are Starving in the Horn of Africa, but... →
From Mother Jones:
The United Nations has called the ongoing drought and famine in Somalia the “worst humanitarian disaster” in the world. It’s going to get worse in the coming months. Yet a new Pew Research Center study released on Thursday shows that news outlets have barely noticed: “In July and August the food crisis has accounted for just 0.7 percent of the newshole....
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“We’re the dark matter. We’re the force that orders the universe but can’t be...”
– a Navy SEAL describing his unit, in this latest update to The Washington Post’s investigation Top Secret America. (via washingtonpoststyle)