Headlines

1. Medicare is under attack, but you can’t tell it by most press coverage.
2. Outsourcing of Federal Natural Resource Jobs Blocked.
3. A Safety-Net Hospital Falls Into Financial Crisis.
4. Dallas transit may try to engineer public-private rail solution.
5. Pensions, Profits & the “Mortgage Crisis”: Lessons against privatizing Social Security.

1. Medicare is under attack, but you can’t tell it by most press coverage. In the first of a series of articles aimed at sparking the interest of reporters The Nieman Watchdog reports that the current enthusiasm of key decision-makers for privatizing Medicare threatens to return us to a time when families had to make great sacrifices to pay for their parents’ and grandparents’ health care.

2. Outsourcing of Federal Natural Resource Jobs Blocked. According to documents posted by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), Congress effectively ended Bush administration efforts to outsource thousands of natural resource and environmental protection jobs.

3. A Safety-Net Hospital Falls Into Financial Crisis. The New York Times looks at the venerable Atlanta charity hospital whose financial woes mirror those of other public hospitals across the nation.

4. Dallas transit may try to engineer public-private rail solution. DART officials want the board to look at aggressively courting private companies to partner with the agency to build and operate some Dallas-area rail lines, according to the Dallas Morning News.

5. Pensions, Profits & the “Mortgage Crisis”: Lessons against privatizing Social Security. A piece in IndyMedia says that the Wall Street mortgage meltdown is teaching proponents of privatizing Social Security that there ain’t no such thing as a free lunch. Wall street investment of social security funds are no guarantee.

Reports

Federal Transit Administration Report to Congress on the Costs, Benefits & Efficiencies of Public Private Partnerships for Fixed Guideway Capital Projects