While You Were Out . . .

While the mainstream media have been paying a great deal of attention to the sexual harassment charges against Roy Moore and against him - Al Franken - here are some news stories you might have missed:

The House voted 227-205 to pass a huge tax reform bill.  It gives most of its tax breaks to the wealthy, with permanent corporate tax decreases and temporary tax cuts for individuals.  The Senate has a tax reform bill that pretty much does all of that plus gets rid of the Affordable Care act's health-insurance mandate, undermining the health-care law.  The final bill could eliminate deductions for state and local taxes and throw budget plans in high-tax (and mostly Democratic) states in disarray. 

The Trump Administration decided to cancel an Obama rule that barred elephant heads and tusks acquired by hunters from being imported into the United States.  Trump himself doesn't like hunting, doesn't see the sense in it, and doesn't understand the appeal of it - but his grown sons love it!  (Trump has since put the regulation repeal on hold as a result of public outcry.)

The Federal Communications Commission just repealed a regulation limiting the number of television stations a broadcaster can own in any given market, and it's also cleared a path for a potential buyout of Tribune Media by the right-wing Sinclair Broadcast Group, which means that Big Media will able to promote arch-conservative politics in every local broadcast market with few - if any - competing broadcast outlets to provide a counterpoint.

And the Koch brothers want to by Time magazine and Time Warner's other print-media outlets.  You think Sports Illustrated's annual swimsuit issue is vulgar now?  Just you wait!

An alliance of fifteen countries led by the United Kingdom and Canada - other countries in this alliance include Denmark, Finland, Italy, France, the Netherlands, Portugal, Belgium, Switzerland, New Zealand, Ethiopia, and Mexico - has formed to oppose the proliferation of coal-based energy at the 23rd Conference of the Parties climate-change summit in Germany, which the American government and the American media have largely ignored.  I learned this news from the Web site of a British newspaper.

And, more than two hundred thousand gallons of oil from the Keystone Pipeline leaked in South Dakota. 

So the news is basically American greed, American stupidity, American arrogance, American suppression, and American ignorance.  Good night, and have a pleasant  tomorrow. >:-(