debt ceiling crisis

Bob Woodward's releasing a new book, so we are now seeing articles based on it. more »

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At times of national fiscal crisis, President Franklin Roosevelt ever so firmly believed, you don't give the awesomely affluent a free pass. You pound them — and then you pound them some more.

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Want to be a cynic? You've got plenty of material to work with, that's for sure. But if you want to be an idealist, a practical idealist who can get things done, cynicism would be a tragic mistake. Lately all I've been hearing — and, frankly, most of what I've been saying — has shed too much heat and not enough light.

Here's the cynical view of what's going on in Washington right now: This whole "debt ceiling crisis" isn't real. Choose your metaphor: It's a Wild West show for gullible rubes, a Kabuki dance, an Indonesian puppet play that's nothing more than shadows on a dirty screen ...

That last image is ideal for the cynically minded. Matchstick puppets dance before a candle or a naked lightbulb, casting images on a bedsheet to enact an ancient epic of good over evil. But they're really only pieces of wood in the hands of puppeteers, masters of illusion who use light and shadow to bring life to dead dolls and make them seem larger than they are. more »

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