Free Republic

when it comes to public employee benefits and the damage they wreak on local governments, scoundrels have another refuge: blaming racism for concerns about lavish, unaffordable benefits and broken governments. ”Public-sector workers are disproportionately black. In 2011, about 19 percent of black workers were employed by the government, compared with 14 percent of whites and 10 percent of Hispanics. The upshot is pretty clear: Reducing the value of public pensions and other benefits wouldn’t just hurt blacks disproportionately; it would do so at a time when other economic trends have already hurt them more than most. So the question isn’t...

We’re living in two Americas. But unlike 50 years ago, when Michael Harrington’s “The Other America” shone a spotlight on poverty among certain groups within the U.S., today’s “other America” is one of profound differences in the most precious of all commodities – the length of our lives. We’ve known for some time now of the health and longevity disparities between blacks and whites. But, as new findings by the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on an Aging Society, recently published in Health Affairs, demonstrate, the story about these longevity gaps has gone through some rather startling changes.

VIDEO After the public shaming of NPR this week, Nina Totenberg was given the option of taking a day off from PBS's "Inside Washington" so that she wouldn't have to face the music concerning the so-called "news organization" she works for. Demonstrating admirable spunk, Totenberg showed up to "defend the product" her radio station produces only to have Charles Krauthammer say in the midst of a lengthy discussion about the issue, "If the product is so superior, why does it have to live on the tit of the state?" (video of entire segment follows with transcript and commentary): Transcript Excerpt:...

A prominent Pakistani politician has been receiving British state benefits to which he was not entitled while living in a palatial home in Karachi. As the governor of Sindh province in Pakistan, Dr Ishrat-ul-Ebad Khan lives in a mansion in the state capital while being waited on by servants and chauffeured in Mercedes limousines. Yet, while enjoying the perks of his position, he was for 10 months the recipient of money from the benefits system, including income support worth about £1,000 a month. Taxpayers also funded the £244-a-week rent on a house in north-west London, that Dr Khan keeps as...

Judge Orders N.Y. Couple Not to Conceive By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Published: May 8, 2004 Filed at 12:14 a.m. ET ROCHESTER, N.Y. (AP) -- A couple has been ordered not to conceive any more children until the ones they already have are no longer in foster care. A civil liberties advocate said the court ruling unsealed Friday was ``blatantly unconstitutional.'' Monroe County Family Court Judge Marilyn O'Connor ruled March 31 that both parents ``should not have yet another child which must be cared for at public expense.'' ``The facts of this case and the reality of parenthood cry out for...

Presidential Candidate Has Experienced Financial Scrapes, Transient Lifestyle WASHINGTON -- John Kerry is often attacked by political opponents for being a wealthy, out-of-touch elitist. But while he is quite wealthy, and has never been without at least a comfortable income and lifestyle, the presumptive Democratic nominee has experienced broader swings between the high life and pedestrian money concerns than the caricature suggests. Indeed, from about 1984 through 1995, in between his marriages to two wealthy women and during his first years in the Senate, the father of two stretched dollars from paycheck to paycheck and borrowed money to cover tuition...