In the Public Interest

I’ve always been intrigued by the major questions not asked by reporters at press conferences, not asked by legislators at public hearings or even the questions citizens at town meetings don’t ask public officials. It’s not that they do not know about or could not easily become informed enough about a given issue and ask…

You can thank House Speaker Ryan and President Trump for pushing their cruel health insurance boondoggle. This debacle has created a  big opening to put Single Payer or full Medicare for all prominently front and center. Single Payer means everybody in, nobody out, with free choice of physician and hospital. The Single Payer system that…

March 22, 2017 By Ralph Nader It is not just Donald Trump whose rhetoric is chronically bereft of reality. Politicians, reporters, commentators and academics are often similarly untethered to hard facts, albeit not for narcissistic enjoyment. There are many patterns of fact, relevant to a subject being discussed, that are off the table—either consciously or…

Donald J. Trump was a builder of casinos and high-priced hotels and golf courses. Now he is a builder of a tower of contradictions for the American people that is making “America Great” at  their expense. He  made many conflicting promises throughout his presidential campaign. He was going to be the “voice of the people.”…

  Why does House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte (Rep. VA) want to fast-track legislation  overhauling civil litigation that protects all Americans—including those in his Congressional District, who simply wish to have their day in court when wrongfully injured or cheated by the very corporations to whom Chairman Goodlatte is beholden? Does he distrust judges…

By Ralph Nader March 1, 2017 Back in Congress following February recess’s raucous town meetings, Republicans are shuddering. Instead of nearly empty auditoriums, where legislators’ staff often outnumber voters in attendance, meetings were packed with citizens determined to block the “take away” agenda of the Trump Republicans. It takes provocation for people to show up…

In not so merry old medieval England, wrongful injuries between people either were suffered in silence or provoked revenge. Cooler heads began to prevail and courts of law were opened so such disputes over compensation and other remedies could be adjudicated under trial by jury. Taken across the Atlantic to the colonies, this system –…

The current troubling news reports from China are describing a major Avian Flu epidemic among huge flocks of chickens. Such epidemics have been worrisome to public health specialists because they could be the precursor of transmission to humans and a possible global pandemic. Since President Trump is developing his policy against “terrorism”, I’m reproducing below…

Far from the corrosive political circus unfolding in Washington, DC, local citizen groups are improving  conditions for the people in their own backyards. Although they receive almost no national media attention, these stalwart citizens work tirelessly to make their country a safer, cleaner and more just place to live.  One shining example of such a…

The Trump Gang, hardly two weeks in the White House, is giving strong, petulant signals that it is hijacking the checks and balances of our democratic institutions. Coupling the Boss’s easily brusiable ego, marinated in infinite megalomania, with ideologues harboring objectives that would have frightened Nixonites and Reaganites alike, a runaway train is leaving the…