President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans are promising one of the biggest tax cuts since the days of Ronald Reagan, similar to what North Carolinians have already experienced through state legislation. The poor would be especially hard hit, critics contend. For example, a border adjustment tax “would be passed through to people based on what they consume,” says tax law professor Lawrence Zelenak.
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Political Opposites Try Listening To Each Other
Under the auspices of Duke University, 30 leaders met five times for all-day sessions featuring civil conversations about how to help more North Carolinians earn enough to support their families. Fritz Mayer, who headed the Duke project, called it a “fascinating exercise” and said Duke had funding to bring in another group of North Carolina leaders in the fall.
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Activists Try to Turn Anti-Trump Protests Toward Nine Companies
Liberal activists groups are hoping to turn the wave of anti-Trump outrage against nine corporations they say are enabling Trump’s agenda. “Whether we like it or not, everything is political now, including business,” says Aaron Chatterji, associate professor at The Fuqua School of Business. “We can leverage the way people interact with campaigns to the way they interact with companies.”
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NC Republicans’ Latest Power Grab: State Judicial Appointments
The Republicans who control North Carolina’s legislature are attempting to strip the state’s Democratic governor of more powers, this time over who has the power to make appointments to the state’s courts. “This is a pretty significant push I think to undercut the independence of the judiciary,” says law professor Marin Levy.
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Risky Brinkmanship With an Unstable North Korean Regime
“We should hope that the United States is not resolved to risk major catastrophe in an exchange in which a victory only produces marginal gains. In this case, an adage from another early 1980s movie, ‘WarGames,’ applies: ‘The only winning move is not to play,’ ” writes political scientist Kyle Beardsley.
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French Voters Have Rejected The Establishment
Political scientist Herbert Kitschelt says the terms of political competition in France are shifting: Voters are increasingly gravitating toward either liberal positions on both economics and societal issues (immigration, LGBTQ rights, the place of Islam, etc.) or authoritarian positions on both sets of issues.
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U.S. Cyber Defense ‘Terrible,’ Former NSA Director Says
“Over the last decade cyber has become an element of national power used by us and by our adversaries. We need the defensive architecture that allows industry to defend itself long enough for government to (then) come in and help,” Gen. Keith Alexander, former commander of U.S. Cyber Command and former director of the National Security Agency said in a speech at Duke.
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How Will Trump Draw Immigrant Scientists to The US?
This question comes from Duke’s “Glad You Asked” podcast. Molecular biologist Raphael Valdivia wonders if the country’s legacy of welcoming scientists and experts from all over the world is at risk because of the new administration’s crackdown on immigration and rejection of certain scientifically accepted concepts, like man-made climate change.
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GOP Keeps Obamacare ‘Fragile’ as Trump Nears 100 Days
It’s unlikely any repeal or replacement of the Affordable Care Act can be achieved anytime soon, leaving markets where Americans buy individual Obamacare policies in a “fragile” state, perhaps for another year or longer. “The fragility (of the market) will continue for some time,” says Dr. Mark McClellan, director of Duke’s Margolis Center for Health Policy and a former top health official in the George W. Bush administration.
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Will The March For Science Backfire By Politicizing Science?
“The science community’s effort to more actively engage in the public sphere could backfire. If science begins to be seen as a “liberal” pursuit, it risks losing public favor and the ability to attract the best talent,” writes Megan Mullin, associate professor of environmental politics. “If, however, science advocates keep the focus on supporting scientific research in all its forms, scientists may be able to protect their work from cuts in funding and support — even if the broader goals of evidence-based policy-making must take a back seat.”
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Khizr Khan: ‘The Country Remains Divided’
Khzir Khan is a lawyer whose son was killed while serving in the Iraq war. He and his wife, Ghazala, entered the national spotlight when he addressed the Democratic National Convention in July and offered to lend Donald Trump his personal pocket Constitution. Since then, he has continued to speak out on behalf of Muslim-Americans and veteran families. “Now, as we continue to speak, the country remains divided,” Khan told Zach Fuchs, managing editor of Duke Political Review.
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Trump Reverses Course on Iran Deal; Free Speech on Campuses
Sanford School professor David Schanzer and Scott Briggaman of WPTF/NCN News in Raleigh discuss the deepening political crisis in Venezuela and President Trump’s admission that the Iran deal is working. In light of another student protests of a right-wing speaker, Schanzer offers his insight on the state of the First Amendment on college campuses across America.
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