Some Short Subjects to Mostly Burden One's Mind

I. Environmental Protection
*A 2016  poll by Colorado's College's State of the Rockies Project found that 76 percent of Republicans in Western states -- and nearly 80 percent of all registered voters in Western states --support common-sense rules that cut natural-gas waste on public lands.

*A federal appeals court in Washington D.C.  blocked EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, allowing EPA methane standards to go forward. The court ruled that the agency illegally implemented a 90-day stay of the rule, while opening a two-year study, intending to essentially remove the rule.

*On June 27, Pruitt started the process to repeal the Clean Water Act, putting the sources of drinking water for more than 117 million Americans at risk and increasing threats to streams and wetlands that filter pollution and provide habitat for wildlife. (Source: Rachel Corn, "EPA move endangers drinking water," Rio Grande Sierran, July/August/September 2017).

*The EPA dismissed at least half of its Board of Scientific Counselors with the intent of replacing the scientist members with industry representatives. (Source: Phil Carter, "States will suffer from EPA cuts," Rio Grande Sierran, July/August/September 2017).

*Over 1,800 tons of highly-radioactive waste is being stored at San Onofre, a shuttered nuclear power plant on the Pacific coast between Los Angeles and San Diego.

II. The Business of Business
*Nearly half the country has $0 invested in the stock market. Most families with incomes over $100,000 have at least some money in the stock market.

*"And corporate profits are at record levels as a percentage of GDP, but revenues from corporate taxes are lower than the industrial-world average as a percentage of federal income." (Source: Robert Borosage).

*A June survey by Hart Research for Americans for Tax Fairness found that only 16 percent of respondents supported lower corporate tax rates.

*By 1920, there were 925,000 black-owned  farms, representing about 14 percent of all farms in the United States. By 1975, just 45,000 black-owned farms remained." "Today, African Americans comprise less than two percent of the nation's farmers and one percent of its rural landowners." (Source: Leah Douglas, "Stolen Birthright," The Nation, July 17/24, 2017).

*A 2001 report from the U.S. Agricultural Census estimated that about 80 percent of black-owned farmland had disappeared in the South since 1969. Approximately half of that land was lost through partition sales.

III. Miscellaneous
*When Trump said that prosecutors should be looking at Hillary Clinton's 33,000 missing emails, the West Virginia crowd shouted "Lock her up!"

*In a tweet, Trump claimed that Hillary sold uranium to angry Russians.

*According to Prison Policy Initiatives, 74 percent of jails banned in-person visits when they implemented video visitation.

*President Trump told Mexican President Nieto: "I won New Hampshire because New Hampshire is a drug-infested den." Hillary won New Hampshire.