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Lyft and Uber said they will cease operations in Minneapolis after the city’s council voted Thursday to override a mayoral veto and require that ride-hailing services increase driver wages to the equivalent of the local minimum wage of $15.57 an hour. Lyft called the ordinance “deeply flawed,” saying in a statement that it supports a minimum earning standard for drivers but not the one passed by the council. “It should be done in an honest way that keeps the service affordable for riders,” Lyft said. “This ordinance makes our operations unsustainable, and as a result, we are shutting down operations...

DC_Draino @DC_Draino Democrat donates to organization that attacks politicians who support President Trump after J6 Democrat gets appointed Federal judge in CO by Biden Leftists file to remove Trump from CO ballot for J6 Judge *refuses* to recuse herself

The issue of food scarcity and food deserts have led to protests and shined a spotlight on deep-rooted inequities in Chicago. "It is an abomination to think that 10 miles from Englewood people are living twenty years longer because they have access to things they need," said Ameya Pawar, Economic Security Project. The non-profit Economic Security Project and the city are partnering to explore the creation of a municipally owned grocery store. "Really it's filling the gaps for the market and making sure that people have access to all the goods and resources that they need to survive and thrive,"...

California residents working for companies like Lyft and Uber would get the rights of employees entitled to a minimum wage and workers compensation under a law the state Assembly passed on Wednesday. The sweeping bill, which now goes to the Senate, carries new standards defining whether workers are employees or independent contractors, upending how workers are treated in industries from trucking to the burgeoning gig economy. Under those standards, for example, workers could only be classified as independent contractors if they are free from the control or direction of an employer and they do work outside a company’s usual course...

California Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters celebrated Martin Luther King Jr Day by claiming the civil rights leader would have encouraged people to march for the impeachment of President Trump. “If MLK was alive today, he’d be marching not only for civil rights & protecting voting rights, but to urge Members of Congress to accept their responsibility to save the U.S. from a dangerous man who has no respect for our Constitution & no concern for strengthening our democracy,” Waters wrote on Twitter on Monday.

California’s governor and legislative leaders on Wednesday proposed raising $52 billion to fix the state’s roads through a big gasoline tax increase, higher car registration fees and a charge on emission-free vehicles. The 10-year plan would boost gasoline excise taxes for the first time in more than two decades, raising them 12 cents per gallon — a 43 percent increase. The tax would rise automatically with inflation. For the first time, owners of zero emission vehicles would pay a $100 annual fee because they use public roads but don’t pay gasoline taxes that fund highway maintenance. The plan also includes...

Under a President Donald Trump, the Republican Party would become a different one, a broad, populist coalition focused on workers who have gone too long without a raise and on social programs the party establishment has long seen as anathema to its long-term success. “Love the question,” Trump said in response to a question from Bloomberg Businessweek's Joshua Green in a profile of Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus published Thursday. The article bears the headline, "How to Get Trump Elected When He’s Wrecking Everything You Built." “Five, 10 years from now — different party. You’re going to have a...

Residents of Maryland may or may not know that over 100 new laws will be effective July 1. The laws include myriad new or adjusted rules on licenses to serve alcohol, requiring union representation fees for those in public education institutions, and fifteen million dollars in potential bond debt.Garrett County Memorial Hospital is a 55 bed hospital. Senator Edwards (Republican, D-1) sponsored the successful bid to authorize the County Commissioners to borrow up to $15,000,000 in order to assist in financing the cost of hospital improvements. The votes for this legislation were 135-0 in the House and 46-0 in the...

North Korean Diplomats 'Sell Millions of Dollars Worth of Drugs' North Korea sent a large amount of illegal drugs to its embassy in an East European country last December and ordered diplomats there to sell it for cash by early April, a diplomatic source here claims. "South Korean intelligence obtained the information from a North Korean agent who defected recently," the source said. "Similar orders were delivered to other North Korean embassies." North Korea has ordered each diplomat to raise US $300,000 to prove their loyalty and mark the birthday of nation founder Kim Il-sung on April 15. Each North...

HERE IS AN EYE-OPENING CHANGE --- Interesting website change we see at the NEW U.S. JUSTICE DEPT. http://www.justice.gov/ Little by little, the subtle changes come until one day we will wake up and be in the United Socialist States of America. The election is just around the corner, BECOME engaged as if our nation depended on it... because it does!!!!! Department of Justice ditches red, white, and blue stars and stripes. It seems the U.S. Department of Justice has changed its web site. Gone are the colorful red, white, and blue U.S. Flag decorations on the page! Replaced by...

SAN DIEGO -- Assembly Speaker John A. Pérez may be nowhere more popular than at a labor caucus meeting at a Democratic convention, and so it was that he received a standing ovation here this afternoon and tried out a one-liner on the crowd. "This year you've seen Mitt Romney and others talk about the fact that corporations are people," the former labor organizer said. "I won't believe corporations are people until Texas executes one of them."

Berkeley's Telegraph Avenue responded Monday to U.S. killing of Bin Laden with a big ho-hum and grave respect for the dishonored dead. Mon. evening, Chris Hedges, a leading critic of U.S. government policies covered much of the street's ground. Many street people surveyed were less than ten years old when the World Trade Center crashed in 2001. Also interviewed were shop clerks, businessmen, and passers-by. They were all asked to comment on the death of Bin Laden Monday evening Chris Hedges, Pulitzer Prize winning former journalist turned best-selling author and minister to progressives, sermonized at Berkeley's First Congregational Church on...

California is being looked at as the rare alternative to Tea-Party rule these days. Jerry Brown’s direct style and transparent budget strategy as governor have led to a waning in people’s longtime pessimism about state government. Yet, with the extreme policies of other new governors dominating the news -- and with Meg Whitman remaining in the public eye-- one must wonder how it would have been if California had voted the other way in 2010. It was certainly significant that voters went to the polls and beat back Whitman's $178 million candidacy. This is further relevant because in California elections...

Do you love love love Cheese Board pizza? Is your idea of heaven standing in line for a slice and then eating it picnic-style with friends on the grassy strip down the middle of North Shattuck in what’s called “The Gourmet Ghetto” in the New York Times Style Section? Well, think again, because the clueless merchants of North Shattuck are scheming to make it illegal. Or maybe it’s not actually you and your lunch buds that they’re out to get, but if equal protection is still the law of the land you’ll have to be on the radar too if...

Days after jumping into California's U.S. Senate race, moderate Republican Tom Campbell has catapulted into the lead as the top GOP candidate and the strongest potential foe of incumbent Democrat Barbara Boxer, a development that may herald a more competitive race in the Democratic-leaning state, a new Field Poll shows. The poll results suggest that shock waves from Republican Scott Brown's Senate upset this week in the Massachusetts special election could extend to California in the fall. Campbell, a former South Bay congressman and dean of UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business - and not a favorite of the state's...

Berkeley would become the first city in the United States to independently try to comply with U.N. treaties on torture, civil rights and racial discrimination, if the City Council passes a measure on the issue tonight. The measure would require the city to file biennial reports to the United Nations on how - or whether - the city meets international human rights standards. In Berkeley, that could include its record on homelessness, the achievement gap among different racial groups at Berkeley High and the presence of John Yoo, a UC Berkeley School of Law professor and Berkeley resident who authored...

The Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority Board is said to be considering removing former president Ronald Reagan’s name from the City’s airport. “National monuments should reflect an accurate picture of a society’s character and core values,” said Board Chairman H.R. Crawford. “Reagan symbolized a kind of ‘cowboy individualism’ that ran counter to the mainstream of American history. His political ascendancy was an aberration, a detour, so to speak, on the nation’s road to greater social consciousness. We shouldn’t be exaggerating that detour by having the City’s airport named after him.” Crawford suggested that “if we have to personalize it, LBJ or...

Supervisor Chris Daly, the sworn enemy of gentrification in the city, announced Wednesday that he has bought a house in the suburb of Fairfield and has moved his wife and two children there. The revelation brought out his critics, who highlighted the extreme irony of him falling victim to his own legislative efforts to encourage the building of low-income housing at the expense of middle-class housing. Daly, who was 28 when he was elected to the board in 2000, has been in the vanguard of far-left politics since he arrived from Maryland in 1993. He has opposed legislation that would...

Even though city officials would prefer to avoid a public conversation, behind closed doors the Oakland City Council has discussed filing for bankruptcy protection in the midst of a $100 million budget deficit. "We have asked the (bankruptcy) question because we wanted to know the impact," said District 5 council member Ignacio De La Fuente. "In closed session, the question has been asked, and an answer was given." He would not elaborate. "It's a possibility," he acknowledged. "Things are that bad." Council President Jane Brunner was equally aloof. She ably acknowledged the city's dire financial problem while managing to avoid...

Berkeley property owners may soon be asked to approve a 20 percent increase in city refuse fees in a somewhat controversial “majority protest” mail-in voting procedure. The unusual ballot process automatically counts votes not received as “yes” votes. The Berkeley City Council is scheduled to consider sending the rate increase proposal to property owners at the council’s next regular meeting, Tuesday, April 21, following a March 23 Zero Waste Commission decision recommending the increase. If approved by property owners, residential refuse collection rates for the average 32-gallon can would rise $4.52 per month, from $22.58 to $27.10. Commer-cial rates would...