Public Health – Powers For the People

Podcast: National Infrastructure Bank Would Rebuild US, Create Jobs & Restore Global Competitiveness

Posted on August 6, 2022September 13, 2022 by Pamela Powers

In our history, beginning with President George Washington and Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, the US has created four National Infrastructure Banks (NIB). Under Presidents Washington, John Quincy Adams, Abraham Lincoln, Herbert Hoover, and Franklin Roosevelt, National Infrastructure Banks built and upgraded infrastructure across the country from roads, damns and bridges to health clinics, schools and the national parks; provided productive work and good pay for thousands if not millions of Americans; increased production and manufacturing capacity nationwide; and created economic vitality.

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Unintended Consequences Will Follow Loss of Abortion Care in Arizona (video)

Posted on July 25, 2022September 13, 2022 by Pamela Powers

“Parental choice!” is the rallying cry for Arizona Republicans who promote spending state tax dollars to pay for private and religious schools.

Republicans shout “My body! My choice!” on the Floor of the Arizona House when they rail against wearing facemasks to prevent the spread of COVID.

They cry for the freedom to be unvaccinated — against COVID, measles or anything else.

They exercise their power to protect their right to carry assault weapons to the grocery store and to keep guns cheap and plentiful in Arizona.

BUT when it comes to reproductive rights and body autonomy for women, Republicans insist on government control over family planning choices that are NONE of their business. This is the height of hypocrisy. Government has no right to insert itself into private medical decisions.

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Podcast: JUNE 24, 2022 … SCOTUS Ends Abortion Rights in Arizona

Posted on July 24, 2022September 13, 2022 by Pamela Powers

Season 2, Episode 11 of a View from the Left Side is a compilation of footage that I recorded on June 24, 2022, the day the Supreme Court of the United States struck down Roe v Wade, the landmark abortions rights decision from 1973. The Roe decision made abortion care up to the age of viability of the fetus legal in the US for nearly 50 years.

Now, SCOTUS has decided that access to legal and safe abortion care is a states rights issue. Why should a person’s rights change when they cross state lines in the US? Whether or not to become pregnant is a parental choice issue — NOT a government concern.

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Podcast: Leaked SCOTUS Opinion Sparks Pro-Choice Bans Off Our Bodies Protests

Posted on July 21, 2022July 21, 2022 by Pamela Powers

Season 2, Episode 10 of A View from the Left Side focuses on the fight to maintain abortion rights in the United States. [This podcast was recorded before the June 24, 2022 Supreme Court decision on abortion.]

Senator Nancy Barto brags that Arizona is the #1 “Pro-Life” state in the country. That’s because, for years, Arizona Republican politicians have followed the extreme anti-abortion agenda laid out by Cathi Herrod of the Center for Arizona Policy. Barto often sponsors these repressive reproductive rights bills, like the recent 15 week abortion ban.

If the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) strikes down the landmark abortion rights case, Roe v Wade, in the coming weeks, Arizona’s “Pro-Life” label will come back to haunt many residents as they find their right to body autonomy removed by state law.

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Podcast: As Gun Violence Rocks US, March for Our Lives Calls for Action

Posted on July 12, 2022July 21, 2022 by Pamela Powers

Season 2, Episode 9 of a View from the Left Side focuses on our country’s epidemic of gun violence.

My opening commentary, recorded on June 1, 2022, refers to the mass shootings at a Buffalo, New York grocery store and at the Uvalde, Texas elementary school. Unfortunately, there have been more since then, most notably the Highland Park, Illinois Fourth of July Parade mass shooting. There have been more than 300 mass shootings in the US in 2022, according to the Washington Post. (Mass shootings are defined as events in which four or more people — besides the shooter — are killed or injured.) Mass shootings are averaging one per day in 2022, and there have been no weeks in 2022 without a mass shooting, according to the Post. This is not a well-regulated militia. This is a country with more privately owned weapons than people.

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March for Our Lives Calls Out Lawmakers at Press Conference (video)

Posted on June 12, 2022 by Pamela Powers

On June 1, 2022, March for Our Lives Phoenix hosted a press conference calling for Governor Doug Ducey and the Arizona Legislature to take action on common sense gun violence prevention legislation.

Jacob Martinez, March for Our Lives Phoenix organizer, gave opening remarks and introduced Superintendent of Public Instruction Kathy Hoffman, Democratic House Minority Leader Reginald Bolding, and Senate Minority Leader Rebecca Rios.

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