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So why isn’t locking in funds for 30 years at a fixed rate of 3.3 percent a terrific investment for the U.S. government?
Leads | By Remapping Debate | Budget deficit
Might there be reasons independent of immediate job creation for the government to take advantage of historically low rates? More
“Safety myth” left U.S. ripe for nuclear crisis
Leads | By Remapping Debate | Energy
That wasn’t exactly the headline on Norimitsu Onishi’s excellent story published June 25 in The New York Times. Onishi’s reporting was presented under the headline, “‘Safety Myth’ Left Japan Ripe for Nuclear Crisis.” But the issues Onishi raised are begging to be probed in the U.S. context. More
Cuomo to gay couples: get married with my blessing, but don’t expect to find an affordable apartment
Leads | By Remapping Debate | Housing, NYC, Politics
Governor Andrew Cuomo — who just played a historic role in securing marriage rights for gay and lesbian New Yorkers — is already being referred to as a presidential candidate for 2016, and is being touted as an "aggressive pragmatist" or "dynamic centrist." Why won’t the press pin him down on what specific outcome he sought in the battle pitting the need of millions of New Yorkers for affordable and secure housing against the desire of landlords and free market ideologues to continue to dismantle the rent regulation system? More
Second 'kudos' for NYT's Kocieniewski
Kudos | By Remapping Debate | Budget deficit, Corporate influence, Taxes
A refreshing departure from the standard "he said, she said" model that assesses whether any evidence supports a new corporate tax holiday proposal. Reporter serves readers by standing outside the framework of corporate talking points, providing historical perspective. More
Questions for Gov. Cuomo even more important to New Yorkers than those for Rep. Weiner?
Leads | By Remapping Debate | Housing, NYC, Regulation
No, not about private indiscretions. Just about what sort of leadership the widely-hailed governor is or is not exerting when it comes to the fate of the homes of more than a million families. More
How many private health insurers are squeezing out-of-network care?
Leads | By Remapping Debate | Health care
Last week, Remapping Debate reported on the decision by Oxford Health Plans, a United HealthCare company, to change the reimbursement schedules on at least some of its "Freedom Plans" so that patients have to pay 50 percent more than previously for an out-of-network doctor visit or procedure. The idea is to discourage enrollees from using out-of-network services. Is Oxford an outlier, or are other private health insurance providers taking plans marketed as giving out-of-network choice and effectively limiting the ability of enrollees to use the out-of-network component? This is just one of a number of questions remaining to be answered. More
GOP's Tea Party faction and its relation to big business
Leads | By Remapping Debate | Politics
A front-page story in last Thursday’s New York Times purported to have uncovered an “odd alliance”: a non-profit group affiliated with the Tea Party running a PR campaign closely aligned with the interests of a gigantic Indonesian paper company. This confluence of “seemingly disparate interests,” the Times asserted, was surprising because “the Tea Party movement is as deeply skeptical of big business as it is of big government.” But while the story skillfully followed the money trail, it was an example of something all too common in American political journalism: an impressive display of fact-finding dropped into a confused conceptual frame. A more clear-eyed understanding of the relationship between the Tea Party and business interests points to a host of basic reporting tasks to which the Times and its peers could direct their impressive resources. More
How much lower can we go?
Kudos | By Remapping Debate | Corporate influence, Taxes
At a time when President Obama and others in Washington are calling for the top corporate tax rate to be reduced, David Kocieniewski's New York Times piece explains how "fierce lobbying for tax breaks" and "innovative accounting" have already helped companies bring the corporate share of tax receipts down to less than a quarter of what it was in the mid-1950s. More

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