articles+ search results

VETO, WEAPONS exports & imports, STOCK prices, and DIPLOMATIC & consular service

On October 2nd, 2018, Jamal Khashoggi, a journalist and critic of the Saudi Arabian regime, disappeared after a visit to the Saudi Arabian consulate in Turkey nd was most likely murdered shortly afterwards. After this incident, a period of uncertainty started about whether or not a major arms deal that was signed between the United States and Saudi Arabia would still going to be approved by Congress or in turn will be rejected. The main findings presented in this study clearly demonstrate that the uncertainty surrounding the deal caused a significant drop in the daily return on the equity prices of US defense firms. This result suggests that investors believe that it is very likely that the major arms deal will be blocked by Congress in the short-run thereby reducing the business perspectives of the US defense-related industry. Besides these findings also imply that investors expect that the US president will not use its veto power or make permanently use of the exemption clause provided in the US arms trade legislation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

SMOKING prevention, ELECTRONIC cigarettes, SERIAL publications, TOBACCO products, COVID-19 pandemic, and ADOLESCENCE

The article discusses the efforts of the U.S. Federal Drug Administration (FDA) to curb youth smoking after passage of the Protecting American Lungs and Reversing the Youth Tobacco Epidemic Act. Topics include the purpose of the Act, estimated number of middle and high school students that use tobacco products according to the 2021 National Youth Tobacco Survey, and things that can be done to prevent and reduce the use of tobacco products.

RUNOFF elections, ELECTIONS, PARTISANSHIP, DEMOCRATS (United States), VOTING, PRESIDENTIAL elections, and FEDERAL government

Recent work on American presidential elections suggests that voters engage in anticipatory balancing, which occurs when voters split their ticket in order to moderate collective policy outcomes by forcing agreement among institutions controlled by opposing parties. We use the 2021 Georgia U.S. Senate runoffs, which determined whether Democrats would have unified control of the federal government given preceding November victories by President-elect Biden and House Democrats, to evaluate support for anticipatory balancing. Leveraging an original survey of Georgia voters, we find no evidence of balancing within the general electorate and among partisans across differing model specifications. We use qualitative content analysis of voter electoral runoff intentions to support our findings and contextualize the lack of evidence for balancing withan original analysis showing the unprecedented partisan nature of contemporary Senate elections since direct-election began in 1914. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

YOUNG women, CRITICAL theory, BABY boom generation, and ELECTIONS

Critical mass theories predict that women in government will sponsor and vote for more women and feminist bills as their numbers increase. Using Voteview.com data of roll-call votes measuring left–right ideology from 1977 to 2019 this paper shows that ideological divides among women in the U.S. House of Representatives have deepened rather than veered in a liberal direction. Republican women have moved rightward over time and more conservative ones are winning elections. Belonging to a politicized generation, older Silent Generation and Boomer women are more ideologically extreme than younger women. Parties are also elevating their more ideological female members. As their numbers increase, female House members are expected to remain ideologically diverse in a polarized legislative environment. Critical mass theories are deficient in failing to place female political actors in a dynamic workplace. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LEGISLATIVE voting, VOTING, DEMOGRAPHIC characteristics, ELECTIONS, DEMOCRATS (United States), and REPUBLICANS

Why do some members of Congress vote more on the extremes of their party than others? I argue that lawmakers representing more homogeneously white districts have greater electoral incentive to moderate their voting records, since the two parties compete more for support of white voters than for the support of minority voters. I provide evidence using roll-call votes from the U.S. House and Senate. I find members representing more homogeneously white districts have more moderate voting records, a finding that holds for Democrats and Republicans. I explore two potential mechanisms: legislator responsiveness and electoral punishment. While legislators do not seem to adjust their voting behavior in response to short-term changes in district racial composition, more homogeneously white districts are found to assess larger vote share penalties on more extreme candidates in general elections. The findings have implications for our understanding of race, representation, and electoral accountability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

MILITARY life, LIFE partners, MILITARY dependents, DEPLOYMENT (Military strategy), and MILITARY research

The emotional cycle of deployment theorized by Logan and adapted by Pincus, House, Christenson, and Alder is often applied by academics and military support agencies to define, explain, and provide advice on the experiences and possible emotional reactions of military families during phases of deployment. Interviews with army partners showed that spatiotemporal experiences and perspectives are more complex than those afforded by the emotional cycle of deployment. This article argues that applying the concept of liminality uncovers some of this complexity, illuminating the in-between times experienced during deployments that are otherwise hidden. Army partners move through and between deployments and deployment phases haunted by specters of past and future deployments. By disrupting seemingly chronological and discrete spatiotemporal narratives, which often frame research on military families and deployment, this article demonstrates how army partners move through and between deployments and deployment stages negotiating past and future deployments. It shows how they continuously adapt and evolve practices while negotiating interpreted pasts and imagined futures in pursuit of becoming "ideal." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prescription drug prices in the United States continue to rise with no end in sight. Individuals are foregoing other needs to pay for their medicines while healthcare companies continue to rake in enormous profits. In this Essay, I discuss how Americans can reverse this oppressive drug pricing trend. As both a pharmacist and a member of Congress, I explain why drug prices are so high from a unique perspective, and illuminate what patients and Congress can do to bring prices down and advocate for a better system. After discussing various actors involved with prescription drug pricing, this Essay then focuses on Pharmacy Benefit Managers ("PBMs") as the clandestine menace of the healthcare industry. This Essay utilizes first-hand stories from patients, pharmacists, and doctors to illustrate why PBMs need to be exposed and held accountable. Most importantly, this Essay will provide a legislative framework for making lower drug prices a reality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

QUANTITATIVE research, CHINA-United States relations, LEGISLATION, ACTIVISM, and GOVERNMENTALITY

Through a quantitative analysis of Taiwan–related legislation between 1979 and 2020, the article finds that the degree of Taiwan–related legislation is significantly correlated with the degree of tension in U.S.—China relations. While a deteriorating cross–Taiwan Strait relationship is clearly associated with the increasing legislative activities for the sake of Taiwan, an improving relationship from the state of fair to good cannot guarantee a decrease of such activities. A unified government and the extent of the Taiwan lobby are both helpful in passing pro–Taiwan acts but statistically insignificant. A content analysis of pro–Taiwan bills approved by the Trump administration suggests a creeping movement to "normalize" U.S–Taiwan relations with congressional activism and the less-restrained White House as a co–engine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

WOMEN legislators, BLACK women, EDUCATIONAL attainment, and LEARNING

Black women have been historically excluded from Congress and the policymaking power available in the institution. This essay shares details about the 52 Black women who have navigated this raced and gendered institution (Hawkesworth 2003) since 1969. We discuss data on these Black congresswomen, including, but not limited to, their educational attainment, occupations prior to serving in Congress, and ties to Black Greek Letter organizations. We argue that this descriptive data will prompt new questions for legislative scholars and open conversations about disciplinary norms and assumptions which may need revision in light of Congress' increasing diversification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

POLARIZATION (Social sciences), LOBBYING, PRESSURE groups, and VOTING laws

Abstact: The lobbying activity of interest groups has been overlooked as a contributing factor to legislative party polarization in the United States. Using bill-level data from Congress and three state legislatures, I show floor votes on bills lobbied by more non-profit interest groups are more polarized by party. The state legislative data demonstrate the robustness of the relationship between lobbying and polarization, showing it is not an artifact of party agenda control, salience, or bill content. Increased lobbying from these groups in recent years helps explain high levels of partisan polarization in Congress and an uneven pattern across the state legislatures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LEGISLATIVE bills, VOTING, FIXED incomes, and FIXED annuities

State senators will vote on the bill on the Senate floor tomorrow. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

UNITED States. Congress

US Congress looks increasingly unlikely to approve the global minimum corporate rate, but the rest of the world may go ahead regardless. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

STUDENT loan debt, CORPORA, STUDENT loans, PERSONAL bankruptcy, and LEGAL language

An American college degree is both elite and very expensive. Thus, with the average annual tuition list price hovering in the tens of thousands of dollars, large swaths of students are forced to take out student loans to fund their educations. Unfortunately, unpredictable job opportunities resulting from the COVID-19 pandemic require each student loan debtor to ask: How do I pay my loans back? The bankruptcy code, found under 11 U.S.C. § 523(a)(8), offers student loan debtors an opportunity to discharge their loans--provided they can show that repayment will inflict "undue hardship." There is currently a shallow circuit split over undue hardship's meaning. The majority view found in the Second Circuit's Brunner decision rarely permits discharge under section 523(a)(8), essentially requiring debtors to prove complete destitution.1 Conversely, the minority view under the Eighth Circuit's Long decision is more lenient, merely requiring the court to balance various factors on a case-by-case basis.2 Neither scholars nor members of the judiciary agree over how strict or lax Congress intended undue hardship to be. This Article proposes a new method of statutory interpretation to demystify undue hardship: legal corpus linguistics (LCL), or the use of large, naturally-occurring bodies of text to understand how different language communities understand legal language. In conducting an LCL analysis, this Article addresses four matters. First, it explores the history of consumer bankruptcy and student loan debt under section 523(a)(8). Second, it tackles America's student loan debt problems and discusses how they pair with Brunner and Long. Third, it discusses LCL in-depth as a method of legal interpretation. And finally, it conducts an LCL analysis on undue hardship--demonstrating that the ordinary legal and lay meaning of undue hardship is a hybrid of both Brunner and Long. Ultimately, this Article aims to demonstrate LCL's feasibility, and show that student loan debtors are entitled to an easier way out from under the load. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

REGULATORY reform, ROBUST control, and REPUBLICANS

This study examines the impact of political connectedness (PC) on enforcement actions by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Our analysis confirms that SEC is not captured and shows that firms or executives with stronger PC are more likely to be criminally charged or face bar or suspension than firms or executives with weaker PC. In addition, we document that imposed fines are relatively higher for prosecuted firms and executives with stronger PC. These findings are robust to inclusions of controls for Republican Congress, Republican President, and recent regulatory reforms and are not driven by endogeneity concerns and sample selection bias. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

COALITION governments, PRESSURE groups, OLIGARCHY, GOVERNMENT policy, and POWER (Social sciences)

The weak implementation of the House of Representatives', or Dewan Perwakilan Rakyat's (DPR), function indicates stagnation in Indonesia's democracy. This fact is due to the party oligarchy's stronghold in the Jokowi government, which ignores the nature of public representation that should be carried out. The oligarchy controls the government and DPR's performance in establishing political compromises for every legislative policy with the government to facilitate the affairs of party oligarchs, who are also the members of the Jokowi government coalition. In addition, they engage in cartel politics to secure their respective power and material interests. This article examines the roles of party oligarchs in influencing the implementation of political functions in the DPR. Ironically, the coalition formed by the party oligarchy has helped the Jokowi government and the DPR to secure government policies and the economic and political interests of the oligarchic group. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

MILITARY spending, ITEM response theory, LEGISLATORS, LEGISLATIVE voting, PUBLIC opinion, CAMPAIGN funds, and UNEMPLOYMENT statistics

While a great deal of research has examined determinants of military spending, few studies have systematically investigated how legislators vote on defense expenditures. This study fills this important gap. Based on a sample of roll-call data on defense spending from the 112th U.S. House, we estimate legislators' ideal points through an item response model. Several interesting findings emerge. First, Republicans are more likely to favor military spending, a finding that is both statistically and substantively significant throughout our analysis. In addition, interest group campaign contributions play an important role by increasing the probability a legislator supports defense spending. Third, when a congressional district has a larger number of veterans or a lower rate of unemployment, its elected legislator is likely to favor military spending. Finally, the effect of public opinion disappears after the district demographics are controlled for. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

WAR on Terrorism, 2001-2009, CIVILIANS in war, CENTRALITY, WORLD War I, BROTHERLINESS, FILIPINO Americans, TERRORISM, and MILITARY bases

I Bound by War i surveys the Philippine-U.S. relationship from U.S. acquisition in 1899 to the return of the Balangiga Bells (war booty from the Philippine-American War that followed annexation) in December 2018. Capozzola argues that the military connections were the relationship's most important aspect: "War shaped every aspect of the Pacific Century, from how Americans and Filipinos thought about each other to how they lived together" (7). These matters were most evident with Philippine Scouts and with those Filipinos who were allowed the join the U.S. Navy, most to serve as messmen and stewards (reflecting racial stereotypes). [Extracted from the article]

PEDIATRIC neurology, EPILEPSY surgery, and ANNOUNCEMENTS

Bridging Basic with Clinical Epileptology - 7: Accelerating Translation in Epilepsy Research b San Servolo (Venice), Italy https://www.ilae.org/congresses/2022-advanced-san-servolo-epilepsy-course B 16 September 2022 b B Irish Epilepsy League Annual Meeting b Dublin, Ireland https://www.ilae.org/congresses/irish-epilepsy-league-annual-meeting1 B 21 - 29 September b B 15th Baltic Sea Summer School on Epilepsy b Virtual school https://www.ilae.org/congresses/15th-baltic-sea-summer-school-on-epilepsy B 23 - 25 September 2022 b B Canadian League Against Epilepsy 2022 Scientific Meeting b Kelowna, BC, Canada https://www.ilae.org/congresses/canadian-league-against-epilepsy-2022-scientific-meeting B 28 - 30 September 2022 b B 5th Swiss Federation of Clinical Neuro-Societies Congress b Basel, Switzerland https://sfcns2022.congress-imk.ch/frontend/index.php B 28 - 30 September 2022 b B Cleveland Clinic Epilepsy Update and Review Course b Ohio, USA & Virtual course https://www.clevelandclinicmeded.com/live/courses/EpilepsyUpdate22/ B 9 - 13 October 2022 b B 4th Bologna EPIPED-EEG Course: EEG interpretation in pediatric epilepsies b Bologna, Italy http://www.epiped-eeg-course.com/ B 12 - 14 October 2022 b B 2022 ILAE British Branch Annual Scientific Meeting b Cardiff, UK https://www.ilaebritishconference.org.uk/ B 26 - 28 October 2022 b B Epilepsy Society of Australia 36th Annual Scientific Meeting b Adelaide, Australia https://www.ivvy.com.au/event/ESA2022/ B 14 - 17 December 2022 b B 12th World Congress for Neurorehabilitation b Vienna, Austria & Virtual congress https://www.wfnr-congress.org/ 2023 B 23 - 26 January 2023 b B 12th EPODES - BASIC b Brno, Czech Republic https://www.ilae.org/congresses/12th-epodes-basic B 20 - 24 June 2023 b B 15th European Paediatric Neurology Society Congress (EPNS): From genome and connectome to cure b Prague, Czech Republic https://www.epns.info/epns-congress-2023/. [Extracted from the article]

Movies beyond the scope of Hollywood and entertainment have shaped notions of race in American culture since the early decades of cinema. A range of nontheatrical sponsors and creators in the US made films to serve practical functions in society—to inform, to organize, to persuade, to promote, etc. The US federal government was a major sponsor of many of these films, which provided American and foreign audiences depictions of race that differed considerably from popular commercial images. For example, Men of the Forest, a film made in 1952 by the United States Information Service focuses on the Hunters, a Black family who owns land and a forestry business in rural Georgia. A documentary of sorts, the film highlights Black life, work, and land ownership in the South in ways not seen in popular feature films of the day. Yet, in the film and others like it, histories of institutional racism are woven into cinematic form and content in ways that are distinct from the entertainment industry. The creators of Men of the Forest omit details of segregation in the South to emphasize the Hunter family as examples of American democracy, a choice suited to the film's Cold War purpose: to counter the anti-American message of Soviet propaganda for foreign audiences. On one hand, by producing and distributing the film, the federal government acknowledged Black farmers and landowners in the Jim Crow South. On the other hand, it avoided the structural inequality surrounding the Hunters to frame their reality as an example of American democratic progress for international circulation. Today, government films like Men of the Forest prompt contemporary reflection on the institutional histories they represent and their evolution into the present. The film and many others are available online due to the digitization of collections from the National Archives, Library of Congress, and elsewhere. With this increase in access, contemporary scholars have the ability to investigate how the federal government and its various internal entities mediated racial ideologies with moving image technologies. As an example of such research, this essay examines Men of the Forest by focusing on the past and present contradictions that arise from its depiction of a Black family with land and an agricultural business in rural Georgia. Two recent events shed light on the histories reflected in the film and their contemporary significance. In 2018, Descendants of Men of the Forest, The Legacy Continues—a documentary created by family members of the film's original participants—contextualized the original production as evidence of the Hunter family's legacy in the community of Guyton, Georgia. Underlying this local effort, Men of the Forest serves as an important historical event and record of the family and the community. On a broader scale, in March 2021, Congress passed a large relief package for disadvantaged minority farmers, intended to help alleviate decades of systemic racism in government agricultural programs. Lawsuits from white farmers and conservative organizations followed quickly, challenging the provision of government aid based on race. In this federal context, Men of the Forest exposes an institutional image of individual success that downplays the structural racism facing people of color, especially those with agricultural livelihoods. Even as politics and legislation evolve, this vision of democracy once exported by the federal government has widespread currency and accumulating effects. The connections between Men of the Forest and these recent events reveal the racial politics at play in government films and the ways in which they take shape in the real world beyond the screen. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Veterans Health Administration (VHA), responsible for providing 9 million veterans with quality healthcare, is not insulated from concerns about efficiency. In the aftermath of the Veterans Affairs (VA) hospital scandal in 2014, Congress passed the Veterans Choice Act of 2014, which allows eligible veterans to use non-VA hospitals instead of VA hospitals. After analyzing 118 or 119 VA hospitals each year from 2012 through 2017 in the U.S, this paper evaluates the efficiency scores of VA hospitals and examines how the 2014 Act has influenced their technical efficiency over time. Slack analysis shows that inefficient VA hospitals can improve efficiency by reallocating input resources, and regression analysis demonstrates that the overall technical efficiency of VA hospitals decreased by 0.164 after the implementation of the Act. This means that as more veterans used non-VA hospitals under the 2014 Act, the technical efficiency of VA hospitals decreased considerably. Given that a substantial portion of veterans' demands for healthcare transferred out to non-VA hospitals, the VHA should evaluate whether the current capacity of VA hospitals is appropriate and try to reduce wasted input resources to improve efficiency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

POLYLACTIC acid, ENVIRONMENTAL impact analysis, PRODUCT life cycle assessment, SUGARCANE, BIOPOLYMERS, POLYETHYLENE glycol, and FILMMAKING

Purpose: Plastics generate more than 500 tons of waste in Ecuador each year, according to statistics from 2016. Therefore, the Ecuadorian Congress has approved a law to ban single-use plastics to deal with their high volumes contaminating the environment. Furthermore, researchers and policymakers have been concerned about finding possible solutions to replace single-use plastics. Hence, the production of polylactic acid (PLA) in Ecuador and its environmental impact analysis and potential use as the replacement material for petroleum-based polymers is the aim of this study. Methods: An environmental performance analysis is carried out for the potential production of polylactic acid (PLA) in Guayaquil, Ecuador. For this purpose, the life cycle assessment (LCA) methodology has been used. Therefore, the LCA was considered in three steps: production of PLA, transformation to film product, and end-of-life scenario. The LCA was performed to analyze the potential environmental impact of 1 m2 PLA film production. The International Life Cycle Data System (ILCD) 2011 Midpoint + method, which exists in SimaPro software, was used for the impact analysis. Results and discussion: The production of biodegradable PLA film causes a climate change impact of 0.85 kg CO2 eq for the established functional unit and several positive environmental impacts. Due to the natural raw material used for its production, the PLA production process significantly contributes to the impacts. The process contribution order was calculated starting with PLA production (74.32%), then electricity (20.41%), polyethylene glycol (PEG) (5.05%), and finally transport (0.21%). An increase in PLA production requires more land, machinery, fuel, and fertilizers. These increases mean higher environmental impacts. PLA production in Ecuador showed a 14% higher climate change indicator than its production in the USA. Optimization of the process could lower the indicator. The landfill scenario was the most pollutant, but recycling shows great promise as the option for end-of-life. Conclusion: Despite being a bio-solution, all the parameters must be considered when analyzing a shift from plastics to PLA biopolymer. According to the sensitivity analysis, the production of PLA and its film product system had a good consistency when parameters like the amount of sugar needed is varied. According to the environmental score obtained, PLA production from sugar cane is the best option in its production in Ecuador. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

DEMOCRATS (United States), REPUBLICANS, and ELECTIONS

In this paper, we test the optimal position taking strategy for senators running for reelection vis-à-vis their party's president. Using data from a survey experiment conducted using a national sample, we examine the responses towards three hypothetical Democrats: (i) 'embracing' or supportive of Barack Obama (ii.) ambiguous about their attitude towards Obama (iii.) 'eschewing' or opposed to Obama. Comparing participants exposed to the ambiguous and the embracing Democrat, we find some evidence of a difference in candidate preference, but little evidence to suggest that the strategy gains votes. Comparing participants exposed to the eschewing Democrat to the embracing Democrat, we find that the strategy does yield some gains but these are offset by losses amongst the base. Overall, these findings suggest that the optimal reelection strategy for Democratic candidates is to remain supportive, unless they are running in areas with a high concentration of Republicans—then the eschew strategy can yield some gains. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LEGISLATIVE voting, VOTING, and PRIMARIES

Theoretical and empirical models of congressional voting assume that legislators vote with the sole purpose to move policy closer to their ideologically ideal point. While NOMINATE correctly classifies most votes cast by members of Congress, a significant number of votes are misclassified and coded as spatial error. The literature on congressional voting assumes this error to be random and idiosyncratic across members. We argue that spatial errors are systematic across members, with spatial error being more likely on roll-call votes tackling salient policy issues and among members representing constituencies with greater ideological divergence between the median voter and the member's primary election constituency. Using Aldrich-McKelvey scaling to place legislators and constituencies in the same ideological space, we find support for our theory. We attribute this finding to the electoral uncertainty faced by members of both the House and Senate representing constituencies with greater ideological divergence between these key electoral principals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LEGISLATIVE bodies, GOVERNMENT agencies, and POLICY sciences

When does legislation trigger regulation? The US Congress regularly passes laws that authorise government agencies to write legally binding regulations. Yet, when this occurs, agencies may take years to act – or, at times – may never act at all. We theorise that the breadth of the congressional statutory delegation drives the timing of agency policy production. In particular, when Congress expressly tells an agency to promulgate a rule, we expect agencies to do so quickly. Yet, when Congress provides greater policymaking discretion to agencies, we expect other factors – and especially, internal agency considerations – to drive regulatory timing. We use data from almost 350 statutes spanning four decades, which are then matched up with thousands of regulations, to assess the argument. Using innovative methods, we find support for our hypotheses. Overall, we produce a deeper understanding of the link between delegation and discretion: suggesting when it occurs, as well as, importantly, why. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

FLOOD damage, AMERICAN Civil War, 1861-1865, DYNAMIC loads, and NAVAL architecture

The submarine H. L. Hunley conducted the first successful submarine attack on an enemy vessel, USS Housatonic, during the American Civil War but was lost with all hands because of unknown circumstances. The submarine has been recovered, and recent archeological findings have uncovered that a spar torpedo was used as opposed to a standoff torpedo that was commonly assumed to have been used. As a result, the submarine would have been in close proximity to the weapon when it exploded than previously thought. A multipart investigation has been conducted with the goal of determining if this reduced standoff distance could explain the mysterious loss of the vessel in the minutes or hours after the attack. Here, the results of a bottom-up naval architectural and weapons-effects analysis are reported. Together, the experimental, computational, and analytical results provide new insight to the vessel's stability characteristics, propulsion, and dynamic loading environment during the attack. In addition, a discussion of possible loss scenarios, informed by both calculation results and inspections of vessel's hull, is presented. Although the story of what happened to H. L. Hunley that night remains shrouded in mystery after this work, several important new research questions emerge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

EXPERTISE, HIGH speed trains, ENERGY shortages, INFRASTRUCTURE funds, and REINVESTMENT

The Northeast Corridor Improvement Project aimed to upgrade the most important passenger route in the country so that it could support high-speed trains. By the early 1970s, North America's rail network had been in decline for decades. However, the energy crisis and strong congressional support prompted a policy of reinvestment. Execution of the Northeast Corridor Improvement Project was plagued with problems owing to both lack of experience delivering major rail projects and a counter-productive, complex administrative structure resulting from conflicts between Congress and the White House. The project's original scope, which was necessary to achieve high-speed operations, was reduced over time as budgetary limits were exceeded. Compared to the coeval Paris–Lyon high-speed rail project, Northeast Corridor Improvement Project history demonstrates the importance of continuous infrastructure investment to maintain the expertise necessary to effectively deliver major capital projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

LABOR unions, MINERS, LABOR union personnel, POWER (Social sciences), and INCOME distribution

This essay historicizes some of Stephen Ashby's findings, and elaborates on a thesis that union democracy is weak in the United States because capitalist opposition was so strong in a formative stage of union development. It introduces a brief survey of the first major U.S. industrial union, the United Mine Workers of America, to show that leadership cordoned off more radical alternatives in service to capital and to middle class and political operatives influence. It introduces a brief survey of the first major industrial union, the United Mine Workers to show that leadership cordoned off more radical alternatives in service to capital and to middle class and political operatives influence. Union leadership responded to that challenge with highly centralized control that blocked more democratic and struggle-based unionism. This had long term consequences through the next insurgency the Congress of Industrial Organizations. These historic influences are operative in the present, when workers seek power to build a counter to the growing inequality of wealth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

HEDGING (Finance), PARTISANSHIP, CLEAN energy, POLITICAL participation, DEMOCRATS (United States), INVESTMENT risk, and TAX rates

We examine whether firms' political hedging activities are effective at mitigating political risk. Focusing on the risk induced by partisan politics, we measure political hedging as the degree to which firms' political connections are balanced across Republican and Democratic candidates. We find that greater political hedging is associated with reduced stock return volatility, particularly during periods of higher policy uncertainty. Similarly, greater political hedging is associated with reduced crash risk, investment volatility, and earnings volatility. Moreover, the reduction in earnings volatility appears to relate to both a firm's taxes and its operating activities, as we find that greater political hedging is associated with reduced cash effective tax rate volatility and pretax income volatility. We further find investors are better able to anticipate future earnings for firms that engage in political hedging, suggesting that political hedging helps improve firms' information environments. Lastly, we perform an event study using President Obama's Clean Power Plan. We find that on the days this policy proposal was debated in Congress, energy and utility firms experienced heightened intraday return volatility (relative to other firms and nonevent days). However, this heightened volatility is mitigated for energy and utility firms that are more politically hedged. Overall, we conclude that political hedging is an effective risk management tool that helps mitigate firm risk. This paper was accepted by Suraj Srinivasan, accounting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

HOSPITAL charges -- Law & legislation, MEDICAL policy, HEALTH care industry, STATE governments, CONTRACTS, COMPARATIVE studies, CONCEPTUAL structures, and METROPOLITAN areas

Policy PointsLooking for a way to curtail market power abuses in health care and rein in prices, 20 states have restricted most‐favored‐nation (MFN) clauses in some health care contracts.Little is known as to whether restrictions on MFN clauses slow health care price growth.Banning MFN clauses between insurers and hospitals in highly concentrated insurer markets seems to improve competition and lead to lower hospital prices. Context: Most‐favored‐nation (MFN) contract clauses have recently garnered attention from both Congress and state legislatures looking for ways to curtail market power abuses in health care and rein in prices. In health care, a typical MFN contract clause is stipulated by the insurer and requires a health care provider to grant the insurer the lowest (i.e., the most‐favored) price among the insurers it contracts with. As of August 2020, 20 states restrict the use of MFN clauses in health care contracts (19 states ban their use in at least some health care contracts), with 8 states prohibiting their use between 2010 and 2016. Methods: Using event study and difference‐in‐differences research designs, we compared prices for a standardized hospital admission in states that banned MFN clauses between 2010 and 2016 with standardized hospital admission prices in states without MFN bans. Findings: Our results show that bans on MFN clauses reduced hospital price growth in metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) with highly concentrated insurer markets. Specifically, we found that mean hospital prices in MSAs with highly concentrated insurer markets would have been $472 (2.8%) lower in 2016 had the MSAs been in states that banned MFN clauses in 2010. In 2016, the population in our sample that resided in MSAs with highly concentrated insurer markets was just under 75 million (23% of the US population). Hence, banning MFN clauses in all MSAs in our sample with highly concentrated insurer markets in 2010 would have generated savings on hospital expenditures in the range of $2.4 billion per year. Conclusions: Our empirical findings suggest banning MFN clauses between insurers and providers in highly concentrated insurer markets would improve competition and lead to lower prices and expenditures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

COINS, ROMAN Empire, 30 B.C.-A.D. 476, ROMAN coins, and EMPERORS

Emperor Hadrian is known for his passion for travels. However, his action was driven by specific political goals. These goals were related to the need to unify the Roman empire. The emperor was aware that relations between the ancient cities and the colonies founded by his predecessors had to be rebalanced. Between 134 and 138, the emperor Hadrian and the Senate minted an enormous variety of coins that featured some of the provinces, and occasionally the cities, of the Roman empire. There are essentially three types of monetary issuances representing the provinces during the reign of Hadrian: the Natio (or Provincia) type; the Adventus type; the Restitutor type. Among them, the coins depicting the personification of Judaea constitute a special issuance that needs a more detailed analysis. In particular, the unusual presence of various numbers of children has already attracted several scholars, but the meaning of their presence is still unknown. This paper aims to study these coins in order to highlight the relationship between Hadrian and Judaea. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

POWER (Social sciences)

It is no secret that political power in the United States and elsewhere has, overall, shifted to "the executive" and away from legislatures. There may be debate about whether this is a product of willful "overreaching" by executives or whether, within the United States, Congress has instead willingly ceded power by engaging in what Justice Cardozo in 1935 called "delegation run riot." The concern about executive power has perhaps become heightened in the aftermath of the Trump presidency—just as Boris Johnson, with his own defiance of some of the "conventions" that are essential to the British constitutional order, is provoking debate in Great Britain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PARTISANSHIP, SEXUAL harassment, CITIZEN attitudes, LEGISLATIVE voting, PRACTICAL politics, PUBLIC officers, SEXUAL assault, and LEGISLATIVE hearings

Two current members of the U.S. Supreme Court took their seats despite allegations of sexual harassment (Clarence Thomas) and sexual assault (Brett Kavanaugh) leveled against them during their confirmation hearings. In each instance, the Senate vote was close and split mainly along party lines: Republicans for and Democrats against. Polls showed that a similar division existed among party supporters in the electorate. There are, however, differences among rank-and-file partisans that help shape their views on the issues raised by these two controversial appointments to the nation's highest court. Using data from a national survey of registered voters, we examine the factors associated with citizens' attitudes about the role of women in politics, the extent to which sexism is a problem in society, the recent avalanche of sexual harassment charges made against elected officials and other political (as well as entertainment, business, and academic) figures, and the #MeToo movement. We are particularly interested in whether a strong sense of partisan identity adds significantly to our understanding of people's attitudes on these matters. In addition, our experimental evidence allows us to determine whether shared partisanship overrides other factors when an elected official from one's own party is accused of sexual misbehavior. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ISLAMOPHOBIA, PARTISANSHIP, ATTITUDES toward Islam, UNITED States Congressional elections, DEMOCRATS (United States), VOTERS, and REPUBLICANS

This article argues that the unusually large and persistent association between Islamophobia and opposition to President Obama helped make attitudes about Muslims a significant, independent predictor of Americans' broader partisan preferences. After detailing the theoretical basis for this argument, the article marshals repeated cross-sectional data, two panel surveys, and a nationally representative survey experiment, to test its hypotheses. The results from those analyses show the following: (1) attitudes about Muslims were a significantly stronger independent predictor of voter preferences for congress in 2010–2014 elections than they were in 2004–2008; (2) attitudes about Muslims were a significantly stronger independent predictor of mass partisanship during Obama's presidency than they were beforehand; and (3) experimentally connecting Obama to Democratic congressional candidates significantly increased the relationship between anti-Muslim sentiments and Americans' preferences for Republican congressional candidates. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of these results for American politics in the Trump era. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

VOTING, PARTISANSHIP, GENDER differences (Sociology), GENDER, PUBLIC opinion, and ABORTION

Analyzing votes on abortion-related legislation from the 103rd (1993–94) to the 115th (2017–18) Congresses, we find that both gender and party influence members' voting behavior. Among Republicans, women are more likely than men to oppose pro-life initiatives, although the impact of gender attenuates over time. Among Democrats, apparent gender differences in voting behavior are explained by the nature of the districts they represent. We also find that the type of abortion issue impacts the influence of gender. Republican women are more likely than Republican men to defect on policies that highlight women's autonomy, such as on bills related to contraception, while Democratic men are more likely than Democratic women to support legislation related to abortion bans. These gender differences reflect a complex dynamic of members' responsiveness to public opinion on specific issues and party efforts to influence that opinion in ways that favor perceptions of party issue expertise. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

PUBLIC officers and TOMBS

The present paper publishes a new, nearly complete bulla excavated in 2013 beneath Robinson's Arch in Jerusalem. It was first identified in 2019 during sifting of soil excavated from a Roman-era drainage channel. The bulla belonged to a Judahite government official, 'the One Who Is Over the House'. The excavation of this bulla validates the authenticity of several other bulla bearing the same legend and clarifies both epigraphic and biblical attestations of the title 'the One Who Is Over the House'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

GOVERNMENT regulation, GOVERNMENT agencies, MEDICAL research, and FEDERAL government

The article announces the creation of the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H), which will be part of the National Institutes of Health, to aid biomedical and health research following approval by the U.S. Congress.

TARIFF, CARBON, and ATHLETIC fields

The US Senate is working on a proposal for a carbon border adjustment that would raise tariffs on carbon-intensive imports, while allowing US companies to maintain a level tax playing field domestically produced goods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

CANCER invasiveness, OLDER patients, BLADDER cancer, BACILLUS (Bacteria), PROGRESSION-free survival, META-analysis, and IMMUNE system

Introduction: There is a challenge on the medical efficacy of intravesical Bacillus Calmette-Guérin (BCG) therapy and the power of the immune system boosting, which can be influenced by the age of the non-muscle-invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC) patients. This meta-analysis evaluates the efficacy of BCG therapy among aged (>70) and younger patients with non-muscle-invasive bladder cancer (NMIBC). Methods: The central database of PubMed, Scopus, and Web of Science were queried until August 4, 2021, by using "BCG," "Bladder Cancer," "AGE," and "efficacy" keywords. After excluding duplicated results, titles and abstracts were evaluated by two independent reviewers. The exclusion criteria included non-English studies, conference abstracts, reviews, editorials, letters, and comments. Three main outcomes, disease-free survival (DFS), progression-free survival (PFS), and cancer-specific survival (CSS), were considered. The statistical analysis was performed using STATA (version 14; Stata Corp, College Station, Texas, USA). Results: From 1115 found documents, the 24 research articles were recruited in the systematic review, and 10 were the candidate for meta-analysis. The overall estimate of H.R. revealed that BCG therapy in those over age 70 is significantly associated with an improved risk of progression and cancer-specific death in studied patients. However, this association was not statistically significant for DFS (1.04 (95% CI: 0.85,1.26)). Conclusion: The BCG maintenance therapy improved CSS and PFS oncological outcomes in elderly patients with NMIBC. BCG therapy did not significantly change the DSF. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

GENDER, WOMEN legislators, WOMEN'S rights, VIOLENCE against women, and ABORTION laws

As critical mass theorists have argued, the number of female legislators is important in the enactment of gender-status laws. Female legislators share strong beliefs on women's rights and have easily coordinated their legislative activities on gender issues. In addition, their strong coordination and consequent political influence have often allowed them to form a legislative majority by influencing male legislators. Gender policies, however, are frequently associated with non-gender policy dimensions on which female legislators tend to have different ideas. Thus, when a gender issue is interpreted in terms of a conspicuous non-gender policy dimension, critical mass theory may not work properly; the heterogeneity of female legislators regarding non-gender policy dimensions can weaken their legislative coordination, thereby hampering gender-status lawmaking. This article examines these propositions by reviewing the legislative histories of violence against women and the legality of abortion in the United States. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]