The Senate Wednesday confirmed a former coal executive with a dismal safety record to lead the government’s top agency regulating mine safety. President Trump’s nomination of David Zatezalo, former CEO of Kentucky-based Rhino Resources, was approved by a party-line vote of 52-48. Zatezalo will bring an unconventional perspective to the Mine Health and Safety Administration (MSHA) after

In the United States, many municipalities rely on fines from traffic violations and other misdemeanors to fund basic government services. The upside of this means of revenue generation, from a political perspective, is that it’s invisible to most voters, and painless for rich people (who are often campaign donors). But the policy’s downsides are considerable. For

By: Paris Martineau, Source: NYmag.com, Originally Published: 10.17.17 It’s a pretty self-evident fact that cell-phone use makes you a crappy driver. But the consequences of that crappy driving are still murky: According to a recent report by Bloomberg, what we think we know about our cell-phone usage behind the wheel is wildly inaccurate, and that’s a

By: Timothy Williams, Source: NY Times, Originally Published: October 12, 2017  SUMTER, S.C. — Larry Marsh has a history of mental illness and drug addiction. Homeless, he has no place to go. The police in this city have arrested or cited him more than 270 times for trespassing. In December, they got him four times

Fifty years after actress Jayne Mansfield died in a Buick that slammed underneath a tractor-trailer, auto safety advocates say regulations inspired by that gruesome crash need updating to prevent hundreds of similar deaths annually. “We’re asking Congress to pass a bill that would mandate comprehensive underride protection, not only on tractor-trailers but on single-unit trucks,”