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A Tale of Two Lootings by Richard Wolff, truth-out.org | August 4, 2011
The political posturing around the debt ceiling "crisis" was mostly a distraction from the hard issues. The hardest of those - underlying US economic decline - keeps resurfacing to display costs, pains and injustices that threaten to dissolve society. Its causes - two long-term trends over the last 30 years - help also to explain the political failures that now compound the social costs of economic decline. The first trend is the attack on jobs, wages and benefits, and the second is the attack on the federal government's budget. The first trend enables the second. A capitalist economy suffering high unemployment with all its costly consequences shapes a bizarre, disconnected politics. The two major parties ignore unemployment and the system that keeps reproducing it. They argue instead over how much to cut social programs for the people while they agree that such cutting is the major way to fix the government's broken budget. read more »What Everyone Should Know About the “Debt Crisis” in the U.S. by Mark Weisbrot, cepr.net | August 4, 2011
Since the U.S. “Debt Crisis” has been a big international story for the last few weeks, it is worth clarifying what is real and what is not. First, the U.S. government does not have a “debt crisis.” The U.S. government is paying net interest of just 1.4 percent of GDP on its public debt – this is not much by any historical or international comparison. There was never any chance that the U.S. would actually default on its debt. The whole “crisis” was manufactured from the beginning, with Republicans in the House of Representatives using a technicality to win unpopular spending cuts that they could not win at the ballot box. It worked. The right won because President Obama chose to collaborate with them, also seeking to take advantage of the manufactured “crisis” to implement cuts that offended and hurt the people who voted for him. Of course he also wanted to increase taxes on the rich, but because he had accepted the legitimacy of the Republicans’ extortion, he lost that too. read more »First They Came for the Light Bulbs... by Tim Murphy , Mother Jones | August 4, 2011
Few issues get Rep. Michele Bachmann going quite like light bulbs. At campaign stops across the country, she has repeatedly denounced a 2007 law that required manufacturers to develop energy-efficient light bulb varieties. Bachmann sees the law as an affront to American values. "I think Thomas Edison did a pretty patriotic thing for this country by inventing the light bulb," she told a New Hampshire audience in March. "And I think darn well, you New Hampshirites, if you want to buy Thomas Edison's wonderful invention, you should be able to!" In reality, no one's stopping anybody from buying any kind of light bulb they please. But Bachmann's crusade is about much more than energy-conserving bulbs: the Minnesota congresswoman is part of a movement that considers "sustainability" an existential threat to the United States, one with far-reaching consequences for education, transportation, and family values. If Bachmann is right, light bulbs will soon be the least of our worries. read more »Forgetting Lessons of Keynes and FDR Brings On the ‘Obama Recession’ by David Woolner, newdeal20.org | August 4, 2011
Just under three quarters of a century ago,in 1937, a group of conservative economic advisers close to Franklin Roosevelt informed the President that they were worried about the rapid rate of growth in the U.S. economy. Since 1933, when FDR took over at the height of the Great Depression, the economy had been expanding steadily, at an average rate of 14 percent per year. The President was advised to cut the budget, reduce deficit spending and tighten the money supply as a means to stave off inflation. Heeding their word, FDR did just that. The results were an unmitigated disaster. FDR launched one of the sharpest economic downturns in American history -- the “Roosevelt Recession”. It is sad to think that history may be repeating itself. But the apparent decision of this administration to embrace cuts over spending may soon lead the President down the same path that FDR took in 1937. Only this time the “Obama recession” of 2011-2012 will most likely cost the current president his job. read more »The F.A.A., After the Republicans by The New York Times, The New York Times | August 4, 2011
Here is what has happened since the Federal Aviation Administration lost its authorization on July 23, courtesy of House Republicans. The agency has not collected more than $300 million in taxes (money the airlines have mostly pocketed). It has had to furlough some 4,000 workers and halt construction projects worth $11 billion in 241 airports, putting 70,000 more people out of work. Salaries for airplane inspectors and air traffic controllers come from other funds. But the F.A.A. had to stop paying 40 airport inspectors, who continue — incredibly and thankfully — to do their jobs. And why is this happening? Republicans, who are experts at such maneuvers, have been holding the reauthorization of the F.A.A. hostage for months, trying to get Democrats in the Senate to agree to weaken transportation workers’ rights. read more »The American People Lost the Debt Ceiling Debate by Bob Cesca, Huffington Post | August 4, 2011
The debt ceiling fracas was an insanity-inducing syllabus of everything that's wrong with the American political system. Everything. Simply put: deficit reduction during a slow-growth recovery from an historically deep recession, with continued high unemployment and a housing market still in crisis, is just phenomenally stupid. When has deficit reduction ever stimulated economic growth during a difficult recovery, and especially considering the disturbing economic indicators we're experiencing today? Never. So regardless of the deal's content, this shouldn't have been an issue in the first place and we're all going to pay the price irrespective of political party or ideological affiliation. Here's how. read more »Jobs, Jobs, Jotbs by Revered Al Sharpton, Huffington Post | August 4, 2011
Like much of the nation, I spent the last few days and weeks fixated on the debt negotiations in Washington. Intently watching as extreme factions on the right were willing to lead us into default in order to advance their agenda, I'm certain we are all breathing a sigh of relief now that the major crisis is seemingly over. But before everyone begins celebrating, it's absolutely vital that we turn our focus to the one challenge that has remained constant before, during and now following the debt crisis: a lack of jobs. For those who have been struggling to gain employment, feed their families, salvage their homes and survive on a daily basis, this isn't breaking news. But it is time the rest of us pay attention -- we need jobs, jobs and more jobs. read more »Please Congress, Can I Have Some More? by Jamie Bouie , prospect.org | August 4, 2011
To liberals, conservatives walked away from the debt-limit crisis on Tuesday with a killer deal. In exchange for lifting the debt ceiling by $2.5 trillion, they received $1 trillion in immediate spending guts, with the promise of at least $1.2 trillion more come December. In Congress, House Progressive Caucus co-chair Raul Grijalva typified the left’s reaction to the agreement: “This deal trades people’s livelihoods for the votes of a few unappeasable right-wing radicals.” Conservatives, however, aren’t so sure it was a touchdown. read more »Oh, What a Tea Party! by Richard Reeves, truthdig.com | August 4, 2011
The big winners in the budget "deal" were the people who understood the least: the tea party folk, a minority, generally ignorant, who had a simple plan, easy to execute. They just did nothing but wave the pledges they had signed never to raise taxes, particularly on rich people. Their nominal party, the Republicans, could not bring them into the party -- or the government, for that matter. The 2012 elections are going to be critical in terms of which way the Republicans choose to go—compromise or go over the cliff. The ironic thing is that Obama, who screwed up on this -- not a single new dime of revenue is in the bill he signed -- will probably be re-elected. But the real question is whether the tea party know-nothings can convince the country it doesn’t need a government and can control the internal decision-making of the Congress -- which they do now. read more »A Fix for the Debt Ceiling That No One Is Talking About by Dean Baker, tnr.com | August 3, 2011
Economists believe that people respond to incentives. The fact that economists never suffer career consequences for failing to consider new ideas explains why they so rarely consider any policy that has not long been in the standard bag of tricks. I mention this background since it is relevant to the reaction given a proposal on the debt ceiling that Ron Paul originally put forward and that I subsequently endorsed. Paul suggested that the Fed could destroy the $1.6 trillion in government bonds that it now holds as a way of getting room under the debt ceiling. Debt to the Fed counts as part of the government debt subject to the limit. If the Fed destroyed $1.6 trillion in debt, then it would create a space of $1.6 trillion under the ceiling. This is an interesting way of getting around the ceiling, although it would almost certainly require an act of Congress to do it. As it turns out, the other side of this story is even more interesting. read more »
The Latest
TARP expected to cost U.S. only $25 billion, CBO says, The Washington Post | November 30, 2010
The Troubled Assets Relief Program, which was widely reviled as a $700 billion bailout for Wall Street titans, is now expected to cost the federal government a mere $25 billion - the equivalent of less than six months of emergency jobless benefits. read more »
If GOP wins, Expect More Obstruction, The Washington Post | October 19, 2010
I'm cautious about the conventional wisdom that the Democratic Party is about to get flattened by a Republican steamroller. Pollsters are less certain than they'd like you to believe about who's a "likely voter" and who isn't. read more »
Bank of America to restart foreclosures in 23 states, The Washington Post | October 19, 2010
Just 10 days after announcing a nationwide halt to foreclosure sales, Bank of America, the nation's largest bank, said Monday that it would begin resubmitting paperwork on Oct. 25 to restart foreclosures on borrowers who missed their payments in 23 states. read more »
Banks Restart Foreclosures, The Wall Street Journal | October 19, 2010
Bank of America Corp. reopened more than 100,000 foreclosure actions, declaring that it had found no significant problems in its procedures for seizing homes. GMAC Mortgage, a lender and loan servicer, said that it also is pushing ahead with an unspecified number of foreclosures that came under intense pressure.
