22 Matching Annotations
  1. Feb 2024
    1. Historically, the princeps senatus of the Roman Senate was such a figure and initially bore only the distinction that he was allowed to speak first during debate
    1. Novus homo or homo novus (lit. 'new man'; pl.: novi homines or homines novi) was the term in ancient Rome for a man who was the first in his family to serve in the Roman Senate or, more specifically, to be elected as consul.
  2. Feb 2023
  3. Dec 2022
  4. Jun 2021
    1. Anne: So I don't know if you follow what's going on in the US. There's a law, that probably won’t get passed in the Senate but just got passed in the house, that basically says that if someone like you, graduates from high school, or is on the way to graduating from high school and hasn't gotten in trouble, you can get a conditional residence—Mike: Right.Anne: And get a social security card for ten years. Ten years conditional residence. And then if you get employed in three years during that time you can get permanent legal access.Mike: Oh, okay. So that was the Trump administration when they came to an agreement, right?Anne: No, they haven't reached an agreement, but it's this new dream. If you had known that all you had to do was keep going to school and you could get a social security card and you could have a path to citizenship, would that have made a difference, do you think?Mike: Yes. I feel like yes, if I would have known earlier. But at the same time, once you start living in Arizona, or anywhere in the US, you kind of start thinking like you're from there. I was telling the nice lady from earlier, Anita, that once you get used to it, once you think that you're from there—that was my mistake, because I started not caring—you just start doing stuff that if you don't have papers you should know you're not supposed to do. I got kind of carried away and was trying to get the whole world. Because I didn't have my papers, I was trying to go after everybody. I'm like, "Okay. So if I can't work, cool, I'll just do my own thing, or I'll just do this, do that."Mike: I feel like if I was a little more informed, it would have gone a different way, or a little more help, programs or anything. I feel like I could have still had a fighting chance.Anne: Yeah. I mean the hope is that there will be policy that will give hope to people like you that as soon as you finish going to school, you can then get a social security card, you can get a job, you can make a life for yourself, but currently—

      Reflections, The United States, Policy to help migrants

  5. Apr 2021
    1. West Virginia’s non-Hispanic white population is 92 percent, much higher than the nation overall (60 percent). I’m not suggesting that Manchin doesn’t care about Black voting rights, but he doesn’t have a huge Black constituency pressing him on this issue, as only 4 percent of West Virginians are Black (compared with 13 percent in the nation overall). 

      This seems to be the biggest linchpin in the system propping Sen. Manchin up.

      It at least provides him cover for not helping to tip the scales toward equality for all Americans.

  6. Mar 2021
    1. In Georgia, which went for a Democrat for the first time since Bill Clinton in 1992 and just elected two Democratic senators — one Black and one Jewish — there have been a raft of proposed voter restrictions.

      This may of stuck out to me purely because I live in Georgia, but Blow's decision to include this in his article is interesting. The democratic victory was determined to be the direct result of increased voter turnout, particularly in communities of color. It is interesting that the legislation he mentions here manages turn this victory into a loss of some sort.

  7. Feb 2021
    1. For example, the United Nations Gender Inequality Index combines several measures related to women’s progress toward equality. One of the measures used in the GII is “representation of women in parliament”. Two countries in the world have laws mandating gender representation in their parliaments: China and Pakistan. As a result these two countries perform far better in the index than countries that are similar in all other ways. Is this fair? It doesn’t really matter, because it is confusing to anyone who doesn’t know about this factor. The GII and similar indices should always be used with careful analysis to ensure their underlying variables don’t swing the index in unexpected ways.

      Given how the US Senate is composed and elected, why don't we mandate one male and one female from each state to better balance our representation.

      How might we fairly do this to ensure better ethnic and socio-economic representation as well?

    1. On the Motion to Proceed (Motion to Proceed to S. Con. Res. 5 )

      Note that not a single Republican voted to advance the COVID-19 relief bill in the Senate.

      They failed us miserably on Epiphany and now they've failed us again on Caldlemas. Miserable that they consider themselves Christians.

    1. The 2001 example is the most recent time that the Senate has had this type of split: It’s only happened two other times in history, in 1881 and 1954.

      Senate 50-50 split

    1. A good overview of what the elimination of the filibuster might mean to the Biden administration and the Democrat party.

    2. In 2013, a Democratic Senate majority effectively ended the filibuster for district and circuit court nominations as well as executive branch nominations, and then in 2017, a GOP-controlled Senate ended the filibuster for Supreme Court nominations.
    3. With a Senate majority, Biden can basically choose whomever he wants for both Cabinet and sub-Cabinet roles in federal agencies, as those choices are not subject to the filibuster.
  8. Oct 2019
    1. If voters turn against Trump, especially Republicans, GOP senators will have less reason to stick with him.

      it would require TWENTY republican senators to vote for impeachment ASSUMING all democrats vote to impeach. most analysts view this as nigh impossible.

  9. Sep 2019
    1. He's got ministers questioning the fundamental connection between humanity and climate change. These are questions that could be answered by any sixth-grader in any classroom around the country.

      Clearly the Senator has no idea of the complexity involved in understanding natural climate variability.

  10. Mar 2018
  11. Oct 2013
    1. larger fight over limiting the filibuster and restricting how far the minority party can go to thwart a president’s agenda.

      yep, the fight is what it's all about, eh?