Day: December 4, 2015

Climate Change Doesn’t Worry Most Americans

Buck Banks

1 in 4

Americans are extremely or very worried about climate change, according a new poll by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. About one out of three Americans are moderately worried and the highest percentage of those polled — 38 percent — were not too worried or not at all worried. Despite high-profile preaching by Pope Francis, only 36 percent of Americans see global warming as a moral issue and only a quarter of those asked see it as a fairness issue. “As top-level international negotiations to try to limit greenhouse gas emissions start later this month in Paris, the AP-NORC poll taken in mid-October shows about two out of three Americans accept global warming and the vast majority of those say human activities are at least part of the cause.”

Painkiller Addiction Touches Many Americans

Buck Banks

40%

Of Americans know someone who has been addicted to prescription painkillers, including 25% who say it was a close friend or family member and 2% who acknowledge their own addiction, the Washington Post reports from a Kaiser Family Foundation survey. More from the survey: 16% say they know someone who has died from an overdose of prescription painkillers, including 9% who say that person was a family member or close friend; 56% of the public say they have some personal connection to the issue; prescription painkiller abuse is most common among whites (63%) and the affluent (63% among people with incomes of $90,000 or more).

November Another Robust Jobs Month

Buck Banks

211,000

Number of jobs the American economy created in November, the government reported Friday, “a robust showing that all but guarantees policy makers at the Federal Reserve will raise interest rates for the first time in nearly a decade when they meet this month,” the New York Times reports. “The unemployment rate held steady at 5 percent, unchanged from October.”

Mo. Lawmaker Proposes Gun Laws Similar to Abortion Laws

Buck Banks

Since Missouri holds the rank as one of the strictest abortion regulation states in the country, it is logical we borrow similar restrictions to lower our horrific gun violence rates.

— Missouri state Rep. Stacey Newman (D), introducing a bill to apply “the restrictions placed on women seeking abortion services to all prospective firearm purchasers, such as a requirement that anyone buying a gun first watch a 30-minute video on fatal firearm injuries,” St. Louis Magazine reports.

Trump Continues to Widen Lead, Bush Recedes

Buck Banks

36%

A new CNN/ORC poll finds Donald Trump alone at the top of the Republican field with 36%, followed by Ted Cruz at 16%, Ben Carson at 14% and Marco Rubio at 12%. All other candidates have the support of less than 5% of GOP voters in the race for the Republican Party’s nomination for president. Jeb Bush is at just 3%. Key finding: “Trump is supported by 46% of Republicans without a college degree, compared to 12% for Cruz, 11% for Carson and 8% for Rubio.”

Democratic Insiders: Trump Would Be Easiest GOP Candidate to Beat

Buck Banks

60%

Of Democratic insiders in the first four nominating states say Donald Trump — who has mostly avoided tapping his vast personal fortune to fund his campaign — would be the easiest of the leading GOP candidates to defeat in the general election, Politico reports. “Roughly two out of three picked Rubio from a list of five leading GOP contenders — including Trump, Ben Carson, Ted Cruz and Jeb Bush — as the most formidable GOP hopeful due to his biography and political skill.”

If Rubio is the Establishment Candidate, the Establishment has Turned Right

Buck Banks

If Marco Rubio is the establishment candidate, look at how far we’ve come. This is someone who ran as an outsider, who ran as a conservative, someone who was a Jim DeMint–endorsed, Club for Growth–endorsed candidate who forced a sitting governor to switch parties.

— Wesley Goodman, former head of the Conservative Action Project, quoted by National Review.