Each morning, Bill Scher and Terrance Heath serve up what progressives need to affect change on the kitchen-table issues families face: jobs, health care, green energy, financial reform, affordable education and retirement security.
MORNING MESSAGE: Save Dems From Deficit Extremism
OurFuture.org's Richard Eskow: "..., the co-chairs of the Presidential Deficit Commission laid out a proposal that literally meets the dictionary definition of extremism ... The only four people who can prevent this disaster are the four Democratic members of the Deficit Commission who have yet to stake a clear position on this proposal: Sen. Kent Conrad, Sen. Max Baucus, Sen. Dick Durbin, and Rep. Xavier Becerra. They need to hear from intelligent, sober-minded people who will encourage them to take a brave stand against these destructive ideas ... 67% of the public opposes Social Security cuts. 69% are against raising the retirement age. 79% are against cutting Medicare. How many of these ideas are likely to be in the Simpson/Bowles proposal? All of them."
Deficit commission fails to meet deadline set by presidential order, delays vote until Friday. W. Post: "... they decided Tuesday to delay a final vote on the package, as they struggled to build a convincing bipartisan consensus ... Bowles and Simpson acknowledged that it will be difficult to assemble the 14 votes that would allow them to issue official recommendations ... Bowles and Simpson have strengthened protections for workers who might find it difficult to delay retirement, such as those in physically demanding careers such as nursing ... They have also made deeper cuts in discretionary spending to satisfy Republican demands. Otherwise, the new plan looks much like the old one..."
Commission meeting this morning. Watch on C-Span 3.
Dean Baker rips Simpson and Bowles for ignoring executive order: "...the commission will miss the December 1 deadline for a final report specified in both its by-laws and its charter ... they are violating the rules under which the commission was established."
"Plan to Trim U.S. Deficit Said to Retain Social Security Cuts" reports Bloomberg: "A new plan by the co-chairmen of President Barack Obama’s deficit-reduction commission will keep their recommendation to cut Social Security and is likely to include a payroll tax holiday ... The new plan will retain various options for eliminating tax breaks, such as the home-mortgage interest deduction, while lowering income-tax rates ... The co-chairmen still were working yesterday on how deeply to cut defense spending and Medicare..."
NYT's Matt Bai argues Obama will have to make a choice after commission's work is done: "He can side either with centrist reformers in both parties, who would overhaul both cherished entitlements and the tax system, or with traditional liberals, who prefer new levies on the wealthy and substantial cuts in military spending."
Citizens' Commission deficit plan shows path to fiscal stability while creating jobs. Daily Kos' Joan McCarter: "... in the short term, a focus on jobs, jobs, jobs. It recommends spending $500 billion in each of the next two years in job investment and growth, with a spending focus on vital services at the state and local levels and infrastructure. In the medium term, they recommend expanding investments in sustainable growth, in education and training, green energy technologies and a 21st century infrastructure in transit and energy, paid for with cuts where there really is bloat in the federal budget--military, farm subsidies. In the long term, target what really drives the deficit--healthcare costs. That means reining in prescription drug costs and expanding Medicare with a public option. What's not included, because it has nothing to do with the deficit and isn't a drain on America's finances: cuts to Social Security."
OpenLeft's Paul Rosenberg examines the Citizens' Commission tax provisions: "The Citizen's Commission is a broader array of organizations involved in activism, with a large membership and active involvement at the community level across the nation, especially through the union movement ... One distinctive feature of the report's proposals is the revenue sources it looks to, which include financial speculation taxes, a surcharge on top earners, taxing capital gains and dividends as normal income, cap and trade or a carbon tax, increasing the motor fuels tax, and others. The logic of these taxes is to tax those who most afford to pay, those who have benefitted disproporationately in the past and not paid their fair share, and to help move us in the direction of a sustainable green economy, which will also reduce costs due to global warming that are not yet even considered in other plans."
Senate Conservatives Block Jobless Aid Extension
Senate conservatives block attempt to prevent jobless aid cutoff. USAToday: "About 2 million Americans stand to lose their unemployment checks by the end of December after Congress failed to extend benefits Tuesday ... A motion by Sen. Jack Reed, D-R.I., to pass an extension on a voice vote fell short ... Economist Mark Zandi of Moody's Analytics says every dollar spent on jobless aid yields a $1.60 benefit to the economy. If benefits are not restored, he says, holiday sales growth will be shaved by nearly a percentage point and fourth-quarter economic growth will be cut by 0.3 percentage point. A million jobs could be lost in the next year as a result..."
GOP Rep. John Shadegg ignores economists. Wonk Room's Pat Garofalo quotes: "Unemployed people hire people? Really? I didn’t know that ... So your answer is it’s the spending of money that drives the economy and I don’t think that’s right ... the unemployed will spend as little of that money as they possibly can."
How's that playing in Kentucky? Lexington Herald-Leader: "With Christmas less than a month away, more than 21,000 Kentuckians are expected to lose their unemployment benefits this week ... Frustration and some despair Tuesday flooded the Jobs Center, where Lexington's unemployed go to register for benefits and look for work ... Latoya Collins, 27, said maybe Congress doesn't notice the working man. 'Look, they got jobs,' Collins said."
Senate GOP drafts plan to block nearly every piece of legislation this month. AP: " Senate Republicans intend to block action on virtually all Democratic-backed legislation unrelated to tax cuts and government spending in the current postelection session of Congress, officials said Tuesday, adding that the leadership has quietly collected signatures on a letter pledging to carry out the strategy. If carried out, it would doom Democratic-backed attempts to end the Pentagon's practice of discharging openly gay members of the military service and give legal status to young illegal immigrants who join the military or attend college."
Incoming Speaker looks to slow down appropriations process. Politico: "House Republicans are devising a plan to simplify spending decisions by considering government funding bills on a department-by-department basis in the new Congress ... it would also threaten to complicate an already tattered appropriations process on the House floor and in negotiations with the Senate, which is why the mechanics of the transition are still under discussion."
Tax Cut Talks Begin
Senate tax cut strategy unclear as White House sets up bipartisan negotiations. The Hill: "President Obama and congressional leaders ... agreed at a White House meeting to appoint a six-person team to negotiate a deal over how to extend the Bush tax cut ... Senate Democrats have shied away from a floor fight ... Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) had threatened after the election to pummel Senate Republicans by forcing them to vote repeatedly on Obama’s tax plan, which would set a $250,000 threshold for raising tax rates. Senate Democratic leaders appeared to choose a different tack after hours of caucus meetings failed to achieve a unified position ... A new proposal gaining attention would extend tax rates for middle-class families and set aside an estimated $700 billion in new revenue from tax increases on wealthy families to pay for deficit reduction."
NYT's David Leonhardt reviews the tax cut compromise options: "The first is a millionaire’s tax, in which the Bush tax cuts would be extended only on income below $1 million ... The second, more likely option is to extend all the tax cuts — and to package them with other tax cuts and spending likely to do more to help the economy than the Bush tax cuts ... a tax cut for businesses that added workers, an across-the-board payroll tax cut and an extension of unemployment benefits ... So which route should Democrats take? It depends on whether they think they have any chance of persuading a couple of Republicans to vote for a millionaire’s tax. If the Democrats fail ... they will be facing total capitulation — an extension of the high-end Bush tax cuts with nothing in return."
Dems link tax cut deal to unemployment benefits. Bloomberg: "Some Democrats, including Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, said an extension of unemployment aid should be included as part of any deal to extend tax cuts enacted during the administration of President George W. Bush."
Fed Worker Pay Freeze Plan Reverberates
Obama's federal pay freeze proposal likened to Reagan's attack on air traffic controllers. In These Time's Mike Elk: "... will scoring cheap political points by scapegoating workers lead to unintended consequences that could impede economic recovery? 'Is this Obama's PATCO?' says Campaign for America's Future Co-Director Robert Borosage, referring to President Ronald Reagan's mass-firing of Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization members in 1981. 'Will employers across the country use his language and his message to inflict another round of pay cuts?' A cut in wages by corporations across the board could decrease demand swinging us even further into a depression."
Simpson-Bowles plan on public employee pay may be worse. W. Post: "Obama would not halt their bonuses or the longevity-based 'step' increases. That apparently would not be the case under the original Simpson and Bowles plan. It would impose a three-year freeze on 'federal salaries, bonuses, and other compensation,'..."
AFSCME launches campaign to defend public employees from scapegoating reports Politico's Ben Smith.
Immigration Measure Headed To Senate Floor
Reid moves to bring DREAM immigration reform to the floor. Politico: "Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said he would file a motion Tuesday so the Senate could take up the DREAM Act, setting up a showdown over the immigration bill ... Democratic Sens. Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Mark Pryor of Arkansas said they will not vote for cloture on the bill. But Republican Sens. Dick Lugar of Indiana and Bob Bennett, who was defeated in his Utah primary race, have signaled they will vote for the DREAM Act. At this point, pro-immigration activists, Reid and other Democrats are courting a handful of other moderate Republicans, including Sens. George Lemieux (Fla.), Kay Bailey Hutchison (Texas) and Scott Brown (Mass.)."
Western Dem senators remind caucus that Latino voters are voters. HuffPost: "Multiple sources also confirmed to HuffPost that Sens. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) and Barbara Boxer (D-Cali.) also spoke up, saying they would not be in the room today if not for the support of Latino voters ... Cantwell, who is up for reelection in 2012, also predicted that Republicans could take a hit at the polls if they continue to oppose immigration reform."
Grassroots heats up to pass DREAM. NYT: "...groups held marches, hunger strikes, prayer vigils and protests at lawmakers’ offices on Monday and Tuesday in support of the bill ... Some of the protests in support of the bill took place at the Utah offices of Senator Orrin G. Hatch, a Republican who was one of the first sponsors of the bill, early in the decade. 'Knowing full well it won’t become law, Democrats are cynically using this legislation for political purposes to curry favor with a political constituency,' said Antonia Ferrier, his spokeswoman."
BofA Getting WikiLeaked?
Wikileaks feeds speculation it's about to release inside info on Bank of America. McClatchy: "...WikiLeaks' Julian Assange said his outfit plans a 'megaleak' regarding a major U.S. bank in early 2011. The release includes tens of thousands of documents and would reveal unspecified unethical behavior, he said. Assange didn't disclose the name of the bank to Forbes, but he told Computerworld in October 2009 that his organization was 'sitting on' five gigabytes of information from a Bank of America executive's hard drive."
Senate hearing today on foreclosure scandal. W. Post: "Mortgage industry executives have argued for weeks that they are foreclosing only on borrowers who deserve it for missing their monthly payments. But consumer groups and attorneys contend that many homeowners are being pushed into foreclosure because of errors or bad advice by the companies managing their loans ... Lawmakers plan to probe the cause of such 'servicer-driven foreclosures' - and question regulators over whether they are adequately watching the activities of mortgage servicers."
GOP Guns For EPA
GOP plots to overturn EPA rules. Politico: "GOP lawmakers say they want to upend a host of Environmental Protection Agency rules by whatever means possible, including the Congressional Review Act, a rarely used legislative tool that allows Congress to essentially veto recently completed agency regulations. The law lets sponsors skip Senate filibusters ... [But] direct attacks against the administration’s policies would certainly face White House opposition and difficulty getting the two-thirds vote needed in both chambers to overcome a veto. And it might look bad politically to be seen as simply undoing environmental regulations with no replacement or direction."
GOP candidates to head Appropriations Cmte pledge to defund EPA efforts to curtail greenhouse gases. The Hill: "Funding restrictions on EPA represent a potentially powerful tool for opponents of rules to limit heat-trapping emissions and other EPA policies that Republicans and conservative Democrats call overly burdensome."
Solar power job growth in Midwest thanks to the stimulus. NYT: "... DuPont is building a $175 million, 162,000-square-foot solar materials plant that will employ 70 people [in Circleville, OH] ... near Midland, Mich., Hemlock Semiconductor is completing a $1 billion polycrystalline silicon plant ... In between the two plants are six more new solar facilities in Michigan and three others in Ohio ... both states have an army of unemployed or underemployed skilled manufacturing workers ... DuPont received $50.1 million in federal manufacturing tax incentives from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 ... Michigan has leveraged the 2009 federal stimulus bill and an array of state manufacturing incentives, tax credits and other public aid to produce $4.1 billion in public and private investment in the state’s solar manufacturing industry in the last three years ... with 6,300 jobs, Michigan ranked fourth in solar sector jobs behind California, Pennsylvania and Texas. The Ohio Department of Development counts 1,500 jobs in its solar manufacturing sector."
GM hiring to build more green cars. AFP: "General Motors, which is rolling out its battery-powered Chevrolet Volt, on Tuesday launched a major hiring program to ramp up production of green vehicles. 'GM is going to lead the industry in the adoption of various vehicle electrification technologies, whether it's electric vehicles with extended-range capability, like the Chevrolet Volt, or the recently introduced eAssist technology that will debut on the 2012 Buick LaCrosse,' GM CEO Dan Akerson said ... Akerson also said GM is studying whether to expand production of the Volt beyond the 45,000 units the company plans to build in 2011."
Not a moment too soon. China displaces US for top spot in green energy market. Grist's Todd Woody: "Ernst & Young publishes a quarterly 'country attractiveness' index for investors that ranks nations' renewable energy policies, renewable energy markets, and other factors. China took first place -- again -- ousting the U.S. from the spot it had occupied between 2006 and 2010 ... South Korea, Romania, Egypt, and Mexico are rising fast as their governments devote more resources to renewable energy."
Nations have yet to follow through on pledges to end fossil fuel subsidies. Mother Jones' Kate Sheppard: "...countries have been reticent to list subsidies that could be eliminated, as leaders believe the subsidies support job creation or rural development, or don't artificially deflate the prices enough so as to matter."
Nations consider expanding ozone treaty to help deal with climate crisis. Greenwire: "... overcoming one of the most formidable hurdles to this approach may be on the menu at the global warming summit in Cancun ... a proposal to add industrial refrigerants with formidable global warming potential onto the list of chemicals that countries would be required to phase out under the treaty is garnering significant interest ... More than 90 countries ... signed onto a declaration earlier this month calling for adding hydrofluorocarbons, or HFCs, to the treaty. The United States also backs that move ... the Montreal Protocol has broad support from industry and congressional Republicans ... 'If we eliminated it, it would be a very small contribution, but a very important one because we don't want it to grow,' said Brenda Ekwurzel, a climate scientist with the Union of Concerned Scientists."
Bipartisan group of 15 senators calls for end to ethanol subsidies. NYT: "...the ethanol blending subsidy and the tariff on imported ethanol will expire at the end of the year without Congressional action. If they are allowed to lapse, re-enacting the policies may be difficult, given the more fiscally conservative nature of the incoming Congress."
Fracking disclosure policy considered by WH. WSJ: "The Obama administration is considering a policy that would force natural-gas drillers on federal lands to disclose the chemicals they use during a process known as hydraulic fracturing."
Food Safety Law Passes Senate
Major food safety law clears Senate. LAT: "The Senate's decisive approval of the first major overhaul of U.S. food safety laws in 70 years marked a major step forward in bipartisan efforts to give the government new tools for protecting consumers against tainted fruits, vegetables, eggs and other foods. The measure now must be reconciled with a House version that was approved more than a year ago but differs on details ... The FDA would gain expanded access to company records, step up inspections and, for the first time, have the power to order food recalls instead of relying on voluntary action by companies."
TNR's Jonathan Bernstein reminds sometimes Dems do pick up GOP votes: "...the bill wound up passing easily -- the final vote was 73-25. The NYT story emphasizes how rare bipartisanship was in this Congress, but I think I'd put it a little differently ... begin with the stimulus bill, which of course received three Republican votes ...There's also the Small Business bill, supported by LeMieux and Voinovich. There was a jobs bill which made it thanks to votes from Snowe and Collins. Snowe, Collins, and Brown were needed to reach 60 on Dodd-Frank."
Judge Upholds Health Reform
A second federal judge uphold constitutionality of health reform law. NYT: "Lawyers on both sides expect that the Supreme Court may eventually have to decide among conflicting lower-court opinions ... Judge Moon rejected the argument by plaintiffs around the country that the Commerce Clause of the Constitution does not empower Congress to require Americans to buy a commercial product like health insurance. To do so, they argue, would amount to the regulation of inactivity ... 'Far from "inactivity,"' he wrote, 'by choosing to forgo insurance, plaintiffs are making an economic decision to try to pay for health care services later, out of pocket, rather than now, through the purchase of insurance.'"
