by jpitney | Feb 26, 2021 | Civility, Congress, Deliberation, House of Representatives
Jonathan Bydlak at R Street: Dear Majority Leader Schumer, Minority Leader McConnell, Chairwoman Klobuchar, and Ranking Member Blunt: The COVID-19 pandemic, growing economic hardship for many American families, a national reckoning over racial injustice, and the...
by jpitney | Feb 21, 2021 | Congress, Constitution, Deliberation, House of Representatives, Senate
Yuval Levin at National Review: If the problem to be solved is that cross-partisan agreement is necessary for Congress to legislate but such agreement is very rare now, then there are broadly two sorts of possible paths toward reform: You could look for ways to make...
by jpitney | Feb 1, 2021 | Biden, Civic Education, civic virtue, Civility, Deliberation, Democracy, Polarization
A release from the University of Virginia Center for Politics Responding to President Joe Biden’s inaugural request to end the “uncivil war” in America, the University of Virginia Center for Politics is launching a yearlong national Civility Project in an effort to...
by jpitney | Dec 21, 2020 | Congress, Coronavirus, Deliberation, Economic Policy
First Branch Forecast: You gotta be kidding. We prep this newsletter during the week and finalize it over the weekend. Alas, there’s no way we could possibly evaluate what is in the appropriations + COVID bill(s) for you — and there’s no way most Members of Congress...
by jpitney | Nov 21, 2020 | Deliberation
Jonath Goldberg at The Dispatch: Here’s a small life hack: If you’re a right-winger, you should read more left-wing stuff, particularly if you currently don’t read any at all. And, if you’re a left-winger, vice versa. I used to read a lot of left-wing stuff. Indeed,...
by jpitney | Oct 24, 2020 | Civility, Deliberation
Geoff Edgers at The Washington Post: So you’re Tim Scott, the Republican senator from South Carolina who opposes Roe v. Wade and wants to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and you get a call from Chris Evans, a Hollywood star and lifelong Democrat who has...
