the Senate ~~ CONGRESS 1/8 ~~ the House


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The Senate stands adjourned until 10:00am on Wednesday, January 8, 2014. 

Following any Leader remarks, the Senate will resume consideration of the motion to proceed to S.1845, the Emergency Unemployment Compensation Extension Act, post-cloture.

 All time during adjournment will count post-cloture on the motion to proceed to S.1845.

 Today the Senate has continued to debate the motion to proceed to S.1845, Emergency Unemployment Compensation Extension Act, post-cloture. The Senate is now in a period of morning business until 6:30pm with senators permitted to speak therein for up to 10 minutes each. The time during morning business does not count against the post-cloture time. Another message will be sent if any votes are scheduled tonight.

WRAP UP

NO Roll Call Votes

 Legislative Business

Passed H.R.667, a bill to redesignate the Dryden Flight Research Center as the Neil A. Armstrong Flight Research Center and the Western Aeronautical Test Range as the Hugh L. Dryden Aeronautical Test Range.

Passed S.1171, a bill to amend the Controlled Substances Act to allow a veterinarian to transport and dispense controlled substances in the usual course of veterinary practice outside of the registered location.

 NO Executive Business

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Last Floor Action:
7:50:45 P.M. – The House adjourned.

The
next meeting is scheduled for 10:00 a.m. on January 9, 2014.

Last Floor Action:
4:17:08 P.M. – SPECIAL ORDER SPEECHES –
The House has concluded all anticipated legislative business and has proceeded
to Special Order speeches.

Last Floor Action:
10:00:50 A.M. – MORNING-HOUR DEBATE – The
House proceeded with Morning-Hour Debate. At the conclusion of Morning-Hour,

 
House will recess until 12:00 p.m. for the start of legislative business.

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2013


The White House Photography Office picked out some of the best photos from the past year to give you an inside look at the presidency — and some of the best moments from 2013.

Here’s what you can expect:

  • President Obama singing Happy Birthday to First Lady Michelle Obama
  • Lots of Sunny and Bo
  • Visiting South Africa to honor Nelson Mandela
  • Some very adorable kids with the President

You’re going to want to see this one.

Click here to check out our best photos from 2013.

Our best photos

Stay Connected

Do faith leaders need to be conservatives


Dear MoveOn member,

If you’re glad that Obamacare is finally here—that millions of Americans are, at last, covered by health insurance—then you’ll love this podcast.

It tells the inside story of the final battle to pass the bill, in the final week before the final vote. But it’s not a story about politicians. It’s a story about an unlikely group of heroes who saved the day: Catholic nuns. And it will bring a smile to your face.

Click here to listen to the podcast on iTunes—and if you like it, subscribe and post a review!

The Good Fight with Ben Wikler

Or you can listen on our website here, or on Stitcher, or subscribe via RSS.

You may have seen the headlines about the Catholic nuns suing over contraception coverage in Obamacare. The case just reached the Supreme Court. And it would be easy to look at that story and conclude that nuns in general are opposing the most significant piece of progressive legislation in decades.

But that would be exactly the wrong conclusion.

Sister Simone Campbell—one of the most charming, utterly down-to-earth, and profoundly committed people I’ve ever met—explains why. And in the process, she tells her own fascinating story, from an anti-segregation sit-in where, as a teenager, she decided to take her vows, all the way to the present and her delight in the joyous tone set by Pope Francis.

You’ve got to hear her voice. Listen in to “The Good Fight” on iTunes, and be sure to subscribe if you want to hear more!

(Or check out the episode on our website.)

Sister Simone’s story is a piece of recent history that we’d do well to remember. It punctures the myth, so often pushed by Republicans, that faith leaders are necessarily conservative. In fact, for Sister Simone and so many others, a commitment to social justice is linked inextricably with faith.

Whatever happens to this Supreme Court case, I’ll always be thankful to America’s nuns for what they did on health care. And once you hear this story, you will be too.

Thanks for all you do.

Warmly,

–Ben

More of the Same?


By 

Will 2014 Be a Turning Point for Women?

As we’ve documented, the last few years have been very difficult for advocates of women’s reproductive freedom. From 2011-2013, more restrictions on abortion rights — a record-breaking 205 — were enacted by state legislatures than during the entire previous decade.

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While we have kicked off 2014 with yet another conservative attack on the Affordable Care Act’s birth control benefit, advocates for women’s reproductive rights believe that this year will be a turning point:

“The momentum has shifted,” Ilyse Hogue, the president of NARAL Pro-Choice America, told ThinkProgress in an interview. “Americans as a whole have had enough. We’re not just going to sit idly by and fight defensive fights and take these attacks on reproductive freedom sitting down. We’re starting to define what a new agenda for reproductive freedom looks like in the 21st century.” […]

“Abortion access is ground zero of reproductive freedom; without it, we don’t have autonomy and self-determination over our lives. But it’s not as though our reproductive lives start and end there,” Hogue noted. “There’s a whole landscape out there of policies that have lagged far behind.”

What does this new agenda look like?

Those policies include other health-related initiatives, like ensuring that women have access to family planning services and maternity care. They involve tackling violence by cracking down on domestic abuse and rape. But they also include economic policies to help ensure that women have the resources to direct the courses of their lives and provide for their families — like equal pay legislation, affordable child care services, and efforts to prevent workplace discrimination. Rather than framing reproductive rights as a women’s issue, groups like NARAL are working on making the point that they’re also inextricable from the nation’s economic agenda.

For much, much more on this, check out the rest of ThinkProgress’ Tara Culp-Ressler’s deep dive HERE.

BOTTOM LINE: While conservatives are only interesting in dragging us back into the culture wars of the past, progressives are focused on a proactive agenda to make sure women and their families have a fair shot at getting ahead.