Required reading from around the web of the best, most interesting, or most though provoking things we’ve read:
Greenfield: The New Crooked Congressional Black Caucus
“In the last decade, every single House Democrat sent to prison for financial crimes was a Congressional Black Caucus member. In the last twenty years, it’s been over 80%. After the midterms, the CBC has grown past a record 50 members. But that doesn’t mean it’s getting better. Power makes it worse. […]The Congressional Black Caucus has only one foe it hates more than Republicans, the Office of Congressional Ethics. Rep. Marcia Fudge, who had recently essayed a failed bid against Rep. Pelosi for the Speakership, tried to gut the independent organization in 2010. Joining her were 19 CBC members. The resolution would have sealed complaints against House members away from public view.”
Leonard: US abortions hit record post-Roe v. Wade low
“The number of abortions in most of the U.S. fell to 638,169 in 2015, according to data released Wednesday from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, a new post- Roe v. Wade low. The latest number represents a 2 percent drop from 2014 and a 24 percent drop from 2006. The number of abortions reached a peak in the 1980s, following the 1973 Roe Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion in every state, and mostly fell after that. The data are incomplete, and are reported voluntarily, but shed light on patterns in demographics and public health practices. The latest information represents 49 areas, excluding California, Maryland, and New Hampshire. Teens saw a significant drop in abortions, by 41 percent since 2006. The data mirrors the results in other studies that have found that teens are using more effective birth control, that they are less likely to get pregnant, and that they are more likely to delay sex. Women in their 20s accounted for nearly 60 percent of abortions. The CDC’s latest data, from 2014, indicated . . .”
Read more at the Washington Examiner.
BLAS: Texas Is About to Create OPEC’s Worst Nightmare
“OPEC’s bad dream only deepens next year, when Permian producers expect to iron out distribution snags that will add three pipelines and as much as 2 million barrels of oil a day.”