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Chamber of Commerce Makes Bipartisanship Part of Its Scorecard

A small push on Thursday to narrow the Capitol's partisan breech could have some lasting significance given its unlikely source: the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, traditionally the most influential lobbying force for the Republican establishment.

The chamber said it will start considering bipartisanship and collaborative legislating, not just a pro-business voting record, when deciding its endorsements for Congress. The group will make each of those characteristics count for 10 percent on its annual scorecards, which have had enormous influence in steering campaign contributions toward incumbents with the top numbers.


"This new approach reflects our belief that many of Washington's troubles — including dysfunction, division, and incivility — could be helped by rebuilding the political center and restoring responsible governing," the chamber's president, Thomas Donahue, said in announcing the first change to the scorecard system in four decades. "Lawmakers should be rewarded for reaching across the aisle, not punished."

To this point, the chamber has spent overwhelmingly on Republican candidates and endorsed them almost exclusively. It has only endorsed two Democrats this decade, and both lost: Sen. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas in 2010, when she was defeated for a third term, and veteran Connecticut politician Mary Glassman in 2018, when she lost an open-seat primary to Jahana Hayes, now a freshman House member.

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The Evolving Social Contract: From Common Good to Contemporary Practice

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The Evolving Social Contract: From Common Good to Contemporary Practice

The concept of the common good in American society has undergone a remarkable transformation since the nation's founding. What began as a clear, if contested, vision of collective welfare has splintered into something far more complex and individualistic. This shift reflects changing times and a fundamental reimagining of what we owe each other as citizens and human beings.

The nation’s progenitors wrestled with this very question. They drew heavily from Enlightenment thinkers like John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, who saw the social contract as a sacred covenant between citizens and their government. But they also pulled from deeper wells—the Puritan concept of the covenant community, the classical Republican tradition of civic virtue, and the Christian ideal of serving one's neighbor. These threads wove into something uniquely American: a vision of the common good that balances individual liberty with collective responsibility.

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We’ve Collectively Created the Federal Education Collapse

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We’ve Collectively Created the Federal Education Collapse

“If we make money the object of man-training, we shall develop money-makers but not necessarily men.” - W.E.B. Du Bois

The current state of public education has many confused, anxious, and even fearful. Depending on the day, I feel any combination of the above, among other less-than-ideal adjectives. Simply, the future is uncertain. Schools are simultaneously cutting budgets and trying to remain relevant, all during an increasingly tense political climate.

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Recent Republican policies and proposals limiting legal immigration and legal immigrants' benefits and rights

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Recent Republican policies and proposals limiting legal immigration and legal immigrants' benefits and rights

In a recent post we quoted a journalist describing the Republican Party as anti-immigration. Many of our readers wrote back angrily to say that the Republican party is only opposed to immigrants who are present illegally.

But that's not true. And we're not shy of telling it like it is.

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The Importance of Respecting Court Orders
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The Importance of Respecting Court Orders

The most important question in American politics today is whether Donald Trump will respect court orders. Judges have repeatedly ruled against his administration.

But will he listen?

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