NRA's Suspected Ties to Gun-Loving Russian Billionaire Expose Risks of Dark Money

[t]   Thursday, March 29, 2018 [t r u t h o u t] [View Recent Newsletters]( [Tell a friend about Truthout!]( [Donate Today!](   Truthout is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization; donations are tax deductible.   BuzzFlash Senate Fails to Strengthen Sexual Harassment Protocols in #MeToo Era Mark Karlin, BuzzFlash at Truthout: Taxpayers should not be paying sexual harassment claims for senators. [Read the BuzzFlash Commentary](   Kim Jong Un Agrees to Meet South Korean President at Summit on April 27 [Read the Article at the Guardian](   No Arms, No Armies: Addressing the Roots of Militarism and Gun Violence in the US [Read the Article at BuzzFlash](   Fired Veterans Affairs Secretary Says White House Muzzled Him [Read the Article at NPR](   Leaked Memo: EPA Shows Workers How to Downplay Climate Change [Read the Article at HuffPost](   How Teachers in the Isolated Gaza Strip Are Providing Arabic Lessons to Students Beyond the Blockade [Read the Article at BuzzFlash](   Kentucky Republicans Ignore Court Decisions, Ban Common Abortion Procedure [Read the Article at Rewire.News](   Onion Inc. Has Unionized [Read the Article at The A.V. Club](     Our fundraising campaign is at an end and we have great news to share: 1,400 readers raised $50,000 for Truthout, ensuring that our honest, independent journalism can continue. From the whole Truthout team, thank you for your support! [Single-Payer Health Care Takes Center Stage in Gubernatorial Races]( Michael Corcoran, Truthout: In the coming gubernatorial races, many single-payer candidates are challenging incumbent or establishment Democrats. While it's hard to predict how some of these candidates will fare, advocates hope the 2018 election will put single-payer allies in governors' mansions across the US, thus increasing prospects for the policy at the state and federal levels. [Read the Article]( [What the NRA's Suspected Ties to a Gun-Loving Russian Billionaire Tell Us About Money in Politics]( Mike Ludwig, Truthout: Sen. Ron Wyden deepened his probe into the NRA's ties to a Russian oligarch this week. Unfortunately for Wyden and the rest of us, current campaign finance rules allow the NRA to raise and spend huge amounts of money to influence elections without revealing its donors. Is it time to reignite the fight for campaign finance reform? [Read the Article]( [Bernie Sanders Warns Against VA Privatization After Trump Tweets Shulkin's Ouster]( Jon Queally, Common Dreams: Amid concerns that his administration wants to move more aggressively to privatize the health care system that provides for the nation's active and retired military personnel, President Trump took to Twitter late Wednesday afternoon and announced the ouster of Secretary of Veterans Affairs David Shulkin. Does this latest firing signal a turn toward large-scale privatization? [Read the Article]( [Big Week for the Russia Probe: Promises of Pardons and a Suspected Russian Spy]( Heather Digby Parton, Salon: Until Wednesday it was a weirdly slow news week in this high-energy Trump era. However, that all changed with reports yesterday that Trump's former attorney had been discussing the possibility of presidential pardons with the lawyers for Paul Manafort and Michael Flynn, when they were being pressed to cooperate with Mueller. Now, Trump appears to be increasingly wondering whether he can pardon himself. [Read the Article]( [Hollywood and the Case of the Missing Arab Woman]( Jamil Khader, Truthout: The film Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri, has been praised for its portrayal of the systemic misogyny in the US's cultural, legal and political institutions. But the film fails to go beyond a passing reference to those same values when they are exported in the form of sexual violence against women by US soldiers fighting in the Middle East and elsewhere. [Read the Article]( [As North Korea Talks With China, South Korea and Japan, Could Bolton Derail Denuclearization Progress?]( Amy Goodman, Democracy Now!: The leaders of North and South Korea announced that they will hold a historic meeting on April 27, coming together for talks for the first time in more than a decade. The news comes after Kim Jong Un's surprise trip to China this week to meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping, where he reportedly said he was willing to give up North Korea’s nuclear weapons. [Watch the Video and Read the Transcript]( [Tear Gas Is a Weapon of War]( Anna Feigenbaum, Verso Books: In Tear Gas: From the Battlefields of World War I to the Streets of Today, Anna Feigenbaum traces the toxic history of how tear gas became a police weapon. "Tear gas is a weapon that polices the atmosphere and pollutes the very air we breathe," writes Feigenbaum. Not only is it a weapon against democracy that is used in an attempt to break the spirit of protesters, but it also comes with harmful health effects. [Read the Book Excerpt]( [Tennessee Wants to Use Funding Meant for Poor Families to Kick People Off Medicaid]( Rebecca Vallas, TalkPoverty.org: The Tennessee legislature is finalizing legislation to add work requirements to the state's Medicaid program, kicking at least 3,700 Tennessee workers off their health care. Unwilling to foot the bill for their new policy out of the state's general budget, Republican lawmakers have decided to pay for it with funds from the state's Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. [Read the Article]( [Trump Is Running a War Crime Recycling Program]( Rebecca Gordon, TomDispatch: Why resurrect the ancient history of George W. Bush in the brave new age of Donald Trump? Because the Trump administration is already happily recycling some of those Bush-era war crimes, along with some of the officials who committed them. What's more, this administration's top appointees are threatening to generate new war crimes of their own. [Read the Article]( [Alton Sterling's Death Proves Once Again That Body Cameras Won't Stop Police Brutality]( Mehreen Kasana, AlterNet: On Tuesday morning, Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry declared that no state charges would be filed against the two Baton Rouge police officers who killed Alton Sterling in July 2016. Once again, it's become distressingly clear that body cameras won't fix police brutality. The US needs an honest reckoning with its institutions of law enforcement and their racist origins. [Read the Article]( [Want to strengthen Truthout and help us plan for the future? Click here to become a monthly sustainer.]( [The Newspaper Guild] Please add messenger@truthout.org to ensure you receive our messages Truthout is a proud member of the Newspaper Guild/CWA, Local 36047 [Subscribe]( | [Unsubscribe]( [Privacy Policy](