Rose Madeline Mula writes: These days I hear those three little words often. No, not “I love you,” but “for your age” — as in “You look wonderful for your age” and “You’re so sharp for your age.” Unfortunately, I can’t say that about my memory which is becoming unreliable. But that, too has a benefit — I can reread a favorite book and it will be brand new to me and just as enjoyable the second time. Ditto favorite movies. There’s really not much need to kick bad habits any more. At a certain point, none of us is going to live long enough for excess smoking, drinking, eating, or inactivity to catch up with us.

A bill to direct the Federal Trade Commission to prescribe rules prohibiting deceptive advertising of abortion services; “Racial Disparities and Social Determinants in the Maternal Mortality Crisis;” reporting of incidents of child abuse or neglect; Improve Data on Sexual Violence Act; A bill to improve the care provided by the secretary of Veterans Affairs to newborn children; A resolution recognizing the fifth anniversary of the Chibok girls kidnapping by the Boko Haram Terrorist Organization; improving the capacity of military criminal investigative organizations to prevent child sexual exploitation; A bill to improve Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program for low-income mothers.  

In terms of what sort of policies are needed for inclusive prosperity, Rivlin was optimistic that the US economy remains strong and that enacting or strengthening a few “sensible centric economic policies” would help the country see continued growth while expanding the pool of those benefiting from the growth. The issue, said Rivlin, who was the founding director of the Congressional Budget Office, was whether these policies could ever be translated into law and action.

Jo Freeman writes: Reparations for slavery has been in the air this year. It comes with lots of questions. In this book, Woodley answers them for one group who suffered directly from white supremacy. In 1959 the Prince Edward County school board closed its public schools rather than integrate them. Most white students were able to attend private academies for whites only. Black students had to leave the county or go without an education. Not until 1964 did the Supreme Court rule that the county had violated the students constitutional rights and ordered the public schools to reopen. Forty years later a Virginia professor calculated that these five years without public schools resulted in 2,202 black and 258 white youths receiving no formal education in their lifetimes.

We subscribe to a newsletter called Science Smooze. Here is part of their current message as well as the video: Watch any show about science now and you will see many women in key positions. Imagine how many more are in the trenches doing the work of scientists. "When I see weird behavior [from male colleagues], my first inclination is not to think, 'What's wrong with me. It's, 'What the heck is wrong with these guys?'" - Lene Vestergaard Hau (physicist, known for her work with cold atoms and light)  

“We’re facing a perfect storm of a highly contagious infection introduced into pockets of unvaccinated children,” says Melissa Stockwell, an associate professor of population and family health at Columbia Mailman and of pediatrics at Columbia University Irving Medical Center. While most cases of the measles are mild, one in twenty infected children in the US is hospitalized with pneumonia, and some infections can cause deafness. In 2017, the illness killed 110,000 people worldwide, nearly all young children in low-income countries.

Since 2000, the number of people age 25 and over whose highest degree was a master’s has doubled to 21 million. The number of doctoral degree holders has more than doubled to 4.5 million. Now, about 13.1 percent of US adults have an advanced degree, up from 8.6 percent in 2000The tables show, among other things, that women make up a smaller share of high school dropouts than men, the share of Asians with advanced degrees is growing and that recent immigrants are more likely to go to college than earlier immigrants or native-born.

"Today's community listening session is part of a series called 'Fed Listens.' The Federal Reserve is undertaking a review to make sure we are carrying out the monetary policy goals assigned to us by the Congress in the most effective way we can... we are reaching out to communities around the country in sessions like this to understand how you are experiencing the economy day to day ... our goal is to keep inflation around 2 percent over time ... Congress has directed us to achieve the highest level of employment — and thus the lowest level of unemployment—that is consistent with price stability."

As I search for clues to my nomadic lifestyle, I often return to that childhood in Chicago's Humboldt Park neighborhood. Was there something way back when family lived down the block, when we romped with our buddies on the concrete streets, when parents sat on folding chairs watching over us — that stuck? Is it familial closeness, comfortable camaraderie, a sense of security that has spurred my frequent quests? Or is the answer much simpler: I like moving, and I have no regrets about any of the 17. So, I hereby announce I will no longer be cowed by my compulsion.

On Thursday, the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee will hold a hearing, “Achieving the Promise of a Diverse STEM Workforce;” Bills introduced: A bill to ensure that certain incidents involving a covered employee that are reported to the Title IX coordinator at an eligible institution of higher education have been reviewed by the president of the institution and not less than one additional member of the institution's board of trustees, and for other purposes; A bill to prohibit group health plans and health insurance issuers offering group or individual health insurance coverage from imposing cost-sharing requirements or treatment limitations with respect to diagnostic examinations for breast cancer that are less favorable than such requirements with respect to screening examinations for breast cancer.

"As we stated in our meeting of March 5 and reiterated to the Department early in the afternoon of March 24, the introductions and executive summaries of our two-volume report accurately summarize this Office's work and conclusions. The summary letter the Department sent to Congress and released to the public late in the afternoon of March 24 did not fully capture the context, nature, and substance of this Office's work and conclusions. We communicated that concern to the Department on the morning of March 25. There is new public confusion about critical aspects of the results of our investigation. This threatens to undermine a central purpose for which the Department appointed the Special Counsel: to assure full public confidence in the outcome of the investigations." ... Robert S. Mueller III,

Established in 1816 as one of the original standing committees in the United States Senate, the Senate Committee on the Judiciary is one of the most influential committees in Congress. Its broad legislative jurisdiction has assured its primary role as a forum for the public discussion of social and constitutional issues. The Committee is also responsible for oversight of key activities of the executive branch, and is responsible for the initial stages of the confirmation process of all judicial nominations for the federal judiciary.

So-called “fake news” has renewed concerns about the prevalence and effects of misinformation in political campaigns. Given the potential for widespread dissemination of this material, we examine the individual-level characteristics associated with sharing false articles during the 2016 US presidential campaign. To do so, we uniquely link an original survey with respondents’ sharing activity as recorded in Facebook profile data. First and foremost, we find that sharing this content was a relatively rare activity. Conservatives were more likely to share articles from fake news domains, which in 2016 were largely pro-Trump in orientation, than liberals or moderates. We also find a strong age effect, which persists after controlling for partisanship and ideology: On average, users over 65 shared nearly seven times as many articles from fake news domains as the youngest age group.

"Washington’s recent fixation with lowering drug costs has introduced Americans to once-insider terms like 'pharmacy benefit managers' and 'list prices.' During an April 22 CNN town hall event for Democratic candidates, Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) described a drugmaker practice that sounds a lot like bribery — drawing attention to yet another secretive process that lawmakers and experts say prevents patients from obtaining affordable prescription drugs.