We’re On Crack

Bob Herbert of the New York Times has a most excellent column on US political denial this morning, but there’s one element missing to a stream of facts that bears close scrutiny.

State and local governments, faced with fiscal nightmares, are reducing services, cutting their work forces, hacking away at health and pension benefits, and raising taxes and fees.

Open Thread

Joe Romm of Climate Progress asked an interesting question:

What should I say to a group of people who don’t follow the climate issue closely but are interested in the issue and what they might do?

I really liked this suggestion:

Whatever you do stress that it is possible for a single person to make a difference now. Not only possible, necessary.

This was another good one.

Despite the massive propaganda being driven from those who make profit off the status quo, it is definitely worth our while to make a difference however we can.

Do the Democrats remember why they are Democrats?

The Republican Bush administration inherited a budget surplus from the Democratic Clinton administration. The Bush administration destroyed the surplus and created the largest deficit in human history by cutting taxes, increasing corporate welfare, and launching a trillion dollars worth of wars. President Obama inherited one of the worst disasters inherited by any president. But he knew, going in, what he was getting. Or he should have.

The obvious answer should have included repealing and revoking as much of the Bush agenda as was possible. Let the tax cuts on the wealthiest expire. Cut corporate welfare. Draw down the two lost wars. Instead, one war was expanded and we now hear that the other may be allowed to continue. Corporate welfare to Wall Street increased. The tax cuts may be allowed to remain in place. And instead of helping the vast majority of the American people by upending the Bush agenda, we may actually see the burden fall even harder on the most vulnerable. Even Social Security is on the table.

Not even Bush tried to cut Social Security. Not when he had a Republican Congress and was soaring in the polls, and not in his second term, when he faced a Democratic Congress that wouldn't have given such an idea a serious hearing. If President Obama follows the recommendations of the Catfood Commission, he will be going where not even Bush dared go. We will have a Democratic administration taking on the Third Rail of which Democrats, in particular, are supposed to be unwaveringly protective. We are told that the Catfood Commission is just advisory, and we shouldn't fear the worst. We must hope that turns out to be true.

The truth is that we got a health insurance plan that was so whittled down that part of the rationale for passing it was that it was only step one, and could be fixed and improved. Later. We got an escalation of the lost war in Afghanistan that was rationalized with the explanation that we'd begin to draw down the troops in 2011, although the amount and pace of the drawdown was left completely opaque. And now even that no longer seems to be the intention. If you believe McClatchy, who only happened to be right, despite much doubt and criticism, when they broke the story that the war would be escalated. And when the administration appealed the ruling that Don't Ask Don't Tell is unconstitutional, the rationalization was that they wanted it repealed through Congress, not the courts. Which doesn't seem to be a particular priority of the administration, as the clock runs down on the Democratic House. And of course the rationale for extending the Bush tax cuts is that they, too, will be fixed later. Allowed to expire. Later. In two years. When things will be so different. The buck stops there. Then. Anywhere other than here, now.

The Democrats got drubbed in the election because too many base voters didn't vote. But the White House seems to be taking the exact wrong message. Although it's not really clear that the election was the key factor. The economy is still staggering. The wars continue. The income gap continues to expand. And if the Democrats can't pursue policies that solve these problems, and instead continue to buy into Republican framings, they will be in even more trouble in 2012 than they were this year. If the Democrats can't defend Social Security-- the very backbone of our social safety net-- from they that would destroy it, the Democratic Party as we know it may not survive.

How Was the Harvest?

If modern American life often seems a grind or a bore (or a trip to the gulag taking a flight) at least the above question, such an urgent and all-consuming worrying one for all the epochs of our existence, has been lifted from our burdened American shoulders. Many of us have a lot of trouble buying food in our busted model, but at least we never have to worry about it never being there.

The California 2010 harvest was lousy but sustaining, for strangely enough global warming has brought us many more rain cycles than was normal late 20th century. Heavy spring rains battered cherries and strawberries badly and seriously dented the nut crop, while a cool summer with a burst of heat and rain crushed the wine grapes. We still have stunning pasture acreage, we grew a lot of rice, corn and wheat, along with massive dairy, meat and egg processing, no basic food worries for 2011.

Open Thread

Barry Ritholtz takes the Washington Post to task for their mealy-mouth depiction of the foreclosure crisis. The WaPo seems to think the crisis is due to some "questionable practices" by the banks. But Barry flatly says the problem isn't some innocent misunderstanding due to "questionable practices", but that those practices were rather outright fraud and that's a Felony.

And Barry expresses my feelings exactly on the right response to the thought there could be a "MERS pardon." I'll help pay for that team of Ninja lobbyists of the night.

Open Thread

A baby blackhole. That's just awesome.

Sliding to 2014

So in the midst of ongoing reports of corruption within the Karzai regime, and mismanagement of rebuilding projects by the Pentagon and its disaster capitalism cronies, three more years have been suddenly added to our Afghanistan combat commitment. This was done at a time when Hamid Karzai, the corrupt one himself, has been demanding that General David Petraeus tone down his counterinsurgency strategy and go easier on the Taliban, while telling us all is good. It also happens in the same week the Catfood Commission wants significant cuts in domestic spending, while staying silent about our overseas wars.

Where exactly is the money going to come from to pay for another three years of combat operations in Afghanistan and a still-to-be-extended presence in Iraq? If you think that question will give Obama pause for even a minute as he asks Americans next year to accept cuts in Social Security and Medicare, you haven't been paying attention. The man wants to make sure that no one gets to his right on national security heading into 2012, so inconvenient thngs like moral priorities will not trouble him.

We're about to see the new GOP leadership fight tooth and nail against unemployment insurance and any additional spending for jobs here at home. Will they be just as opposed to bankrolling 100,000 troops in Hamid's Playhouse for another three years? Just keep this new 2014 date in mind next year when Obama and the GOP give us the lecture on fiscal discipline.

The progressive left will have a huge opening on this issue, despite what the White House wants, and there are Tea Partiers out there who are no fans of unrestrained defense spending. Perhaps progressive Democrats in the House should begin mapping out their own triangulation strategy against the White House, now that Nancy Pelosi has adroitly solved her leadership challenge.

The NY Times Challenges You to Fix the Budget

Give it a try. I didn't have much trouble fixing the budget, but military spending definitely took a hit with my planning.

I think it is clear that their are important options that are not included in the NYT list. For example: on fixing Social Security, why is there only a limited option to remove the cap on earnings subject to the social security tax? The most aggressive option there subjects 90% of income to the tax over time. Take off the cap entirely and watch what happens to the budget accounting makes the top 1% pay the same kind of taxes that most of us pay. Give me that option please. That is actually my first choice to "fix" social security.

Happy Monday. Weather has gotten cold in the northwest, I am out shopping for new battery for the daughter's car this morning.

clipped from www.nytimes.com: Budget Puzzle: You Fix the Budget

Today, you’re in charge of the nation’s finances. Some of your options have more short-term savings and some have more long-term savings. When you have closed the budget gaps for both 2015 and 2030, you are done. Make your own plan, then share it online.
Related Article | Behind The Times’s Deficit Project | Printable PDF Version | Room for Debate: 16 Ways to Cut the Deficit