Thank you for this opportunity to submit testimony regarding the damage that Citizens United and the rise of Super PACs has done to our system of democratic government. In the text below I will discuss why rules that govern the role of money in politics are important to our democracy; the impact of Citizens United and related decisions on our electoral system; and what Congress can and must do to promote the core American value of political equality.
What does the acronym, “LIBOR,” stand for?
The “London Inter-bank Offered Rate.”
What does LIBOR represent?
LIBOR is promoted as representing the average interest rate that large banks can borrow from one another. LIBOR is not the interest rate on any single loan. Rather it is an index intended to reflect average interbank interest rates as determined by a defined procedure.
LIBOR is not a single interest rate, but is approximately 150 interest rates.
Recommendations for the Special Joint Committee on Redistricting as it seeks to assess lessons learned after the 2010 Census and to set goals for the next Census redistricting process.
According to all available data, the voter participation rate of the first Americans, American Indians and Alaska Natives, is among the lowest of any ethnic group in the country. There are complex historical and cultural reasons that make the issue of voting among American Indians and Alaska Natives unique.
One of the most often-cited reasons for the STEM achievement gap is a lack of skilled and trained STEM teachers. The greatest percentage of under-qualified teachers at the K-12 level is found in STEM disciplines – 40 percent of high school math teachers and 20 percent of science teachers in high needs areas lack a higher education degree in the subject they instruct.
The report is timed to the two-day federal trial that starts tomorrow morning that will redraw Kansas’ legislative districts. If the Court were to adopt the House’s proposed map, Kansas would end up with a dubious distinction: having the nation’s most extreme instance of prison-based gerrymandering in a state legislative district.
In February and March 2012, Demos surveyed a nationally representative sample of 997 low- and middle-income American households who carried credit card debt for three months or more.
Demos commends Connecticut for passing one of the strongest campaign-finance disclosure bills in the United States and recommends that the Governor promptly sign the bill into law. This is an important bill that will bring much-needed transparency to financing for political campaigns.
After seven years as a lawyer specializing in public and private securities offerings, I was an investment banker at Goldman Sachs for more than a twelve years and then managed a small advisory firm. I also served as CEO of a firm providing counterparty credit management services in the derivatives markets. For the last two years, I have focused my efforts on financial system reforms, participating in dozens of formal comments and various roundtable discussions at the request of regulatory agencies.
Authored by Robert Repetto PhD, a Senior Fellow in the United Nations Foundation's climate and energy program, these four policy briefs examine the health, economic and environmental challenges posed by the effects of climate change in four particularly susceptible states.
The details of the report lay out the near and likely long-term consequences should these states fail to make a serious committment to combatting climate change.
Click on the titles below or select a state in the righthand column to view the individual reports.
Climate change poses a tremendous threat to Florida. Sea level rise, more intense precipitation, and stronger hurricanes increase the risk of natural disaster and imperil the state’s economy and its citizens’ safety.