Op-Ed

US has an opportunity to lead on this serious but overlooked issue

President Obama has nominated Rep. Mel Watt (D-N.C.) to head the Federal Housing Finance Authority (FHFA). I applaud the president for his decision.
Watt will be an outstanding FHFA director, and I hope the Senate confirms him as soon as possible. Congressman Watt’s nomination also provides our country with an opportunity to debate one of the most important things we can do to improve our economy: housing finance reform. 

Roads and public transit are of primary concern as Charlotte, N.C., Mayor Anthony Foxx comes before the U.S. Senate to be considered as the  next Transportation secretary. We should not forget another important responsibility of the Transportation secretary: managing our nation’s extensive system of recreational trails.

Number of overstays has actually dropped since Sept. 11 attacks

Last year, in the middle of a hard-fought election, the Senate Agriculture Committee came together in a bipartisan way to craft a new kind of farm bill — one with major reforms and tens of billions of dollars in spending cuts, a bill that media outlets called a “landmark shift” and “one of the biggest policy changes in generations.” Even more important, our work reflected our commitment to the 16 million Americans whose livelihoods depend on agriculture.

“If you already have health insurance through your job — and because many of you are members of unions, you do — nothing in this plan will require you or your employer to change your coverage or your doctor. Let me repeat: Nothing in this plan will require you to change your coverage or your doctor.” Those were the words spoken by President Obama at the AFL-CIO Convention in Pittsburgh on Sept. 15, 2009. 

Just three years ago, Republican members of the Senate split with President Obama and his party over federal energy policy.

The biggest stumbling block to immigration reform is no longer politics. It is how to market the deal to conservatives.

Most people in America don’t know what the National Labor Relations Board is. Well, why should they? Here’s why.

The Internal Revenue Service dropped a bombshell last Friday, admitting that some of its employees had singled out Tea Party groups’ 501(c)(4) applications for extra scrutiny. In responding to the scandal, the first step, of course, will be to identify and discipline those who engaged in wrongdoing.