"I disagree with you, but I'm pretty sure you're not Hitler." – Jon Stewart
Posted in Blog Post on May 1st, 2011
NY Times StoryI’m not sure this makes much difference now. This is years too late, his ideas and methods have spread too far. Update:The President will make a statement soon. CNN is waxing eloquent about what important blow this is. I disagree. OBL was killed in a mansion near Islamabad. There are some spontaneous cheers [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Sep 20th, 2010
One way or the other the rich will get a tax cut, unless the GOP goes overboard with the obstructionism. All we’re really discussing is how big a tax cut they get. It’s not Obama’s fault the Bush administration resorted to some fiscal slight of hand to make it appear affordable by sun-setting the tax [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Aug 25th, 2010
Steve Benen points out the obvious: CONGRESSIONAL BUDGET OFFICE STEPS ALL OVER BOEHNER’S MESSAGE…. In his exceedingly silly speech on the economy today, House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) proudly proclaimed, “All this ‘stimulus’ spending has gotten us nowhere.” And almost immediately thereafter, the CBO made Boehner look pretty foolish. The oft-criticized stimulus plan boosted [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Mar 27th, 2010
All the bitching, groaning and outright threats from the right are all too familiar: What has been really striking has been the eliminationist rhetoric of the G.O.P., coming not from some radical fringe but from the party’s leaders. John Boehner, the House minority leader, declared that the passage of health reform was “Armageddon.” The Republican [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Mar 12th, 2010
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner : The New Yorker. Tim Geithner did manage to hold the financial system together for the most part through the worst financial crisis in modern times. Yet he seems reviled on both the left and the right. The media ignores the successes and plays up the failure, as the media so [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Mar 2nd, 2010
The New Yorker points out that despite bitching and moaning to the contrary the Senate Health Care bill is bipartisan: …the Democrats’ bill more closely resembles Richard Nixon’s health-care proposal—the one that Ted Kennedy went to his grave regretting he hadn’t embraced—than it does Bill Clinton’s, to say nothing of Harry Truman’s. Nor are all [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Feb 21st, 2010
As a long time supporter of systemic health reform I find this heartening: Democrats will finish their health reform efforts within the next two months by using a majority-vote maneuver in the Senate, Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said. Reid said that congressional Democrats would likely opt for a procedural tactic in the Senate allowing [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Feb 1st, 2010
My personal favorite Nobel Prize winning economist has a take on why Canada came out of the recent banking disaster relatively unscathed, while the US economy and financial institutions took a major beat down. It all comes back to the regulatory environment. The US decided, or rather the captains of industry in banking and a [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Jan 22nd, 2010
Republican Opposition to Obama Plan for Deficit Panel – NYTimes.com. Well of course they oppose a panel for deficit reduction, they created it. It came from unfunded tax cuts and benefit increases (think Medicare Part D), coupled with two unfunded foreign wars. They see Democrats retreating on HCR and are pressing their advantage. Democrats still [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Jan 21st, 2010
Kevin Drum takes on the notion that there are Republican votes to be had for a more conservative approach to HCR: This fantasy that there are Republican votes for a more moderate bill really needs to end. There are no Republican votes for healthcare reform, no matter how moderate or conservative it is. They’re opposed [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Aug 19th, 2009
Since the GOP as announced their opposition negotiation and any health reform at all, the Obama administration may abandon trying to get any GOP support. I was wondering how long it would take them to realize the GOP has zero interest in good policy. Their only concern is how best to hamstring the President’s policy [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Aug 7th, 2009
It appears to me like the President’s approach to building support is going to take the legs out from under one of the most important aspects of health reform cost control: via White House Affirms Deal on Drug Cost – NYTimes.com. Pressed by industry lobbyists, White House officials on Wednesday assured drug makers that the [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Jun 8th, 2009
ABC News’ interview with Lakhdar Boumediene and our current policies – Glenn Greenwald – Salon.com. First of all Glenn Greenwald deserves a lot of credit for championing basic human rights for US prisoners. In this piece he recounts the plight of Boumediene: …who, while living in Bosnia working for the International Red Crescent, was arrested by [...]
Posted in Blog Post on May 6th, 2009
The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan. The Dish rounds up what people are saying about the bank stress tests. From what I gather it appears the results are being carefully stage managed. It’s disturbing that regulators seem to be negotiating with the fianancial instiutions about the results, while releasing trial baloons in the form [...]
Posted in Blog Post on May 4th, 2009
So they want to prevent companies and wealthy individuals from sheltering assets offshore? Let the GOP wailing begin! We are sure to see, any moment now, complaints that this is a tax increase. No kidding, huh? They’re not paying taxes on income now so if they do in the future, of course it will increase [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Apr 21st, 2009
MSNBC is showing clips of Dick “The Penguin” Chenney asking for the de-classification of additional memos that he claims show that torture “enhanced interrogation” works. This is so we can have an “honest debate”. CHenney wants and honest debate? That’s just so loaded with irony it’s hard to know where to begin. Andrea Mitchell notes [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Apr 21st, 2009
Obama, Bush And The Rule Of Law | The Daily Dish | By Andrew Sullivan. Sully accurately makes the point that neither Bush nor Obama have the authority to torture, that Congress alone as the authority to make rules regarding captures. Laws and treaties have been passed that make torture clearly illegal in the US., [...]
Posted in Blog Post on Apr 10th, 2009
Wonkette : Heritage Foundation Releases Terrifying New Action Film. Like OMG, lily-livered, wine sipping, boy buggering liberals like Bush alumni Bill Gates, want to cut the very expensive and still unworkable missile defense system must want us all to die in an atomic mushroom cloud. The GOP and cconservative have nothing to use but fear [...]
Date: 09/11/2003