Mark Kleiman

1. A phased-in, but ever-rising, greenhouse gas tax or carbon tax. (Raises revenue, protects the planet.) 2. Tripling the federal alcohol tax. (Raises about $15B/yr. in revenue, prevents violent crime – including about 600 homicides per year – and auto accidents, protects health, prevents birth defects.) 3. Tripling the federal cigarette tax, with half the […]

According to Wikipedia’s latest tabulation, Mitt Romney has received 60,227,548 of the 126,832,750 votes tallied so far. That’s 47.485%, which rounds off to … 47%. Mission accomplished. [Cross-posted at The Reality-based Community]

Republicans are floating three ideas to make cuts to the Affordable Care Act as part of a fiscal deal. Since they’re Republicans, all of the ideas they’re floating are horrible: less money for community health and prevention (because sicker is better), cutting the subsidies (because the middle class needs another financial hit right now) and […]

Most everyone in Red Blogistan and on the Red-team varsity of punditry (Pete Wehner at Commentary is an honorable exception) seems to agree that GQ was mean to po’ widdle Marco Rubio in asking him about the age of the Earth. “Gotcha” seems to be the agreed-upon keyword; the Reds back Rubio in his assertion […]

Marco Rubio decides that running for President as a Republican means pretending to believe that the Earth is flat, or that it might be flat, or that the question of its shape is in dispute among scientists and theologians and therefore above his pay-grade, but in any case kids shouldn’t be taught the scientific answer […]

1. The Federal government needs some revenue in medium and long term but we still need fiscal stimulus in the short term. 2. The planet needs a decrease in greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions. 3. The right way to control GHG emissions is to tax them. 4. The ideal GHG tax would phase in slowly to allow […]

It appears that even some media outlets are getting tired of John McCain’s shtick. His decision to skip a classified Senate Intelligence Committee briefing about what happened in Benghazi in order to hold a press conference demanding a Watergate-style special committee to investigate what happened in Benghazi was a bridge too far. Most of McCain’s […]

Public opinion about marijuana has moved sharply over the past few years; about half now support legalization. Last Tuesday voters in Washington State and Colorado took the leap of approving commercial production and sale for non-medical use, under more or less the same rules that apply to alcohol. Ideologues on both sides are claim to […]

Studying drug policy is no fun if you like things to make sense. But it’s a good way to cultivate an appreciation of the absurd. The United States consumes large amounts of cocaine, cannabis, heroin, and methamphetamine, most of which enters the country from the south. Mexican drug trafficking organizations are able to make money […]

All that stuff I’ve been saying about deficient reality-checking by the Red team? Rachel Maddow says it about 100 times as well: [Cross-posted at The Reality-based Community]