Each morning, Bill Scher and Terrance Heath serve up what progressives need to effect change on the kitchen-table issues families face: jobs, health care, green energy, financial reform, affordable education and retirement security.
MORNING MESSAGE: The Next Voting Rights Movement Must Start Now
OurFuture.org's Isaiah Poole: "In state after state, new hurdles, such as voter ID laws, are being constructed to the right to vote that will especially trip up low-income people, students, rural residents and seniors. They disproportionately affect many of the groups who helped put Barack Obama in the White House in 2008 and who are in the vanguard of opposition to right-wing economic policies today ... It is time for us to demand that Attorney General Eric Holder stand up to these governors and state legislatures that are acting to suppress access to the voting booth, with lawsuits if necessary."
Senate To Vote on House GOP Budget
Senate to vote on House GOP budget next week. USA Today: "The proposal stands little chance of passing the Democratic-controlled Senate, but Reid's move is part of an effort by his party to tie GOP lawmakers to the plan in advance of next year's elections."
Senate GOP leaders not pressing their members to vote for it. The Hill: "The decision to let GOP senators vote their conscience means there might be more 'no' votes on the budget plan from Republicans in the Senate ... One GOP senator who spoke on the condition of anonymity expressed his belief that Ryan made a serious tactical mistake by spelling out Medicare reforms in his budget plan."
Gang Of Six-Minus-One still meeting. W. Post: "'We had a very constructive meeting today; we intend to meet again tomorrow, and we’re going to keep working,' Senate Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad [said.] ... there were signs Wednesday that [GOP Sen. Tom] Coburn might return to the group if it could make substantial progress ... the Oklahoma Republican also plans to 'put out his own marker' that would cut $9 trillion over the next decade by trimming entitlement, defense and discretionary spending as well as increasing revenue..."'
Coburn left after Sen. Dick Durbin confronted him over Medicare cuts. Politico: "In Durbin’s view, Coburn’s calls for cuts affecting current Medicare beneficiaries went beyond Ryan’s plan, something his party would never accept. In Coburn’s view, Durbin was not putting 'everything on the table,'..."
Attention shifts to Biden-led group. The Hill: "Senators and budget experts said the Biden talks on raising the debt ceiling are not capable of producing the kind of grand bargain the Gang was discussing: tax and entitlement reform paired with discretionary and mandatory spending cuts and caps.
Biden himself has said he is only looking for a 'down payment' on deficit reduction in order to get all sides to raise the nation’s debt ceiling by Aug. 2."
E.J. Dionne fears Medicaid will be sacrificed for debt limit deal: "Having lost on Medicare, Republicans are likely to drop back and seek huge Medicaid cuts ... The Obama administration has been strangely reserved about Medicaid, which plays a key role in the new health-care law’s effort to expand coverage. You have to pray that this will not be the issue on which President Obama revs up his Preemptive Concession Machine."
Dem Rep. Gerry E. Connolly leads fight to protect federal worker pensions from budget ax. W. Post: "...Connolly (D) joined federal employee unions on Wednesday to denounce a plan to target federal pensions to balance the budget, calling it an assault on civil servants and a tax on 2.2 million 'middle-class' Americans. 'They are deliberately making the federal employee a scapegoat for the federal debt and deficit spending,' said Connolly ... The White House and congressional leaders are considering asking civil servants to contribute more to their retirement plans, to about 6 percent from the current 0.8 percent ... It would amount to a 5 percent pay cut."
The Danger Of The Default Deniers
"No alternative" to raising debt limit, says WH. HuffPost: "If Congress does not raise the debt ceiling by then, there is no plan in place for dealing with the resulting defaults, a senior administration official said in a briefing with reporters ... The White House is pushing back against a few Republicans -- including Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Penn.) and Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.) -- who hinted this week the government could default on its debts for a short time in pursuit of a broader deal to cut the deficit."
Leading "default denier" Sen. Pat Toomey skewered by W. Post's Dana Milbank: "Obama administration officials don’t regard this as a matter of choice ... Bush’s first treasury secretary, Paul O’Neill, likened those who opposed raising the debt limit to 'terrorists.' But Toomey ... says it is 'absolutely false' to claim that failing to raise the debt limit by the deadline would 'equate to a default on our debt at all.' He argued that ... the government can easily stay current on its debt payments using the $2.2 trillion it expects in tax revenues. There’s only one problem: Without borrowing, we’d have to cut Obama’s budget for 2012 by $1.5 trillion. That means even if we shut down the military and stopped writing Social Security checks, the government would still come up about $200 billion short."
Privatization Fail
States aren't saving money by privatizing prisons. NYT: "Despite a state law stipulating that private prisons must create 'cost savings,' the state’s own data indicate that inmates in private prisons can cost as much as $1,600 more per year, while many cost about the same as they do in state-run prisons. The research, by the Arizona Department of Corrections, also reveals a murky aspect of private prisons that helps them appear less expensive: They often house only relatively healthy inmates."
New GOP congresspeople find new love for federal government after spate of natural disasters. Politico: "...these freshmen — especially those from Louisiana, Alabama and the Midwest — realize more than ever their constituents need the federal government’s help. And money. Many have blunted their anti-government tough talk — choosing instead to focus on how local, state and federal agencies can best help their constituents rebuild."
Some states are responding to unexpected tax revenue by proposing to ged rid of it. Tapped's Sarah Babbage: "In Michigan, which was facing a $1.4 billion deficit prior to receiving an unexpected $429 million this week, Republicans are already calling for additional tax cuts to business, which they say will strengthen the state’s nascent economic recovery ... There are two dangers in these proposals. The first is that they assume tax cuts for business will generate more economic growth than would restoring spending on the social programs cut to deal with the deficit ... The other danger is that by lowering tax rates so much, Michigan will set itself up for indefinite deficits in the future. The reason the state received this windfall is that it had a reasonable tax rate."
Public programs are preventing more poverty. CBPP's Arloc Sherman: "...a major new study from the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) finds that public programs keep one in six Americans out of poverty — primarily the elderly, disabled, and working poor — and that the poverty rate would double without these programs."
Cry Wolf Project's Donald Cohen humiliates California Chamber of Commerce for being perpetually wrong about regulations: "The chamber's argument is always the same: If 'job-killer proposal X' passes, companies will go bankrupt, shrink or move out of California ... business lobbies have made these claims every time California has increased the minimum wage; every time businesses have had to disclose or limit toxic material in workplaces, consumer products and communities; every time California's wealthiest or most profitable corporations have been asked to pay their fair share of taxes; and every time legislators and voters have taken action to limit greenhouse gas emissions ... But if we look backward, we find that the job-killer predictions are often wrong."
College Grads Suffer Horrid Job Market
"Bleak" job prospects for new college grads. NYT: "... of the class of 2010, just 56 percent had held at least one job by this spring, when the survey was conducted. That compares with 90 percent of graduates from the classes of 2006 and 2007 ... about only half of recent college graduates said that their first job required a college degree ... This may be a waste of a college degree, but it also displaces the less-educated workers who would normally take these jobs."
Jared Bernstein notes that real wages are taking a hit: "You thought they’ve been falling for a while? Not so ... even though your paycheck probably wasn’t growing much, inflation was low enough that real earnings kept rising through last year. But lately, with gas and other commodity prices rising ... there’s been a collision between slower nominal wage growth and faster price growth. As of last month, real weekly earnings were about $13 off their peak last October. That’s over $600 a year for a full-year worker."
The new manufacturing isn't like the old manufacturing, notes TNR's Jonathan Cohn: "The old manufacturing jobs provided good pay and benefits even to workers without college degrees. The new manufacturing jobs don’t."
TNR's Ruy Teixeira tries to explain why so many Democrats are prioritizing deficit reduction over jobs, despite public opinion: "There is a very significant section of the Democratic Party, including many moderates but also some liberals, that is not convinced by the standard Keynesian argument that deficits, even at their current levels or higher, are not a problem in the short run ... It is likely that, lacking any clear economic philosophy of their own, many Democrats are easily swayed by elite media pressure and bogus economic arguments ..."
Senate Kills "Drill Baby Drill"
GOP drill bill falls far short of majority support in Senate vote. AP: "Five Republicans joined 52 Democrats or independents in rejecting a bill written by Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell to speed up decision-making on drilling permits and force previously scheduled lease sales in the Gulf of Mexico and off the Alaska and Virginia coasts ... White House spokesman Clark Stevens said the Senate bill was unnecessary, noting that the Obama administration has already taken many of the steps advocated in the bill, including a one-year extension of leases ... What remained in the GOP bill 'would have undercut the important safety standards put in place following the largest oil spill in U.S. history,' Stevens said."
Dem Sen. Clare McCaskill lashes out at League Of Women Voters for criticizing her anti-EPA vote. Wonk Room's Brad Johnson: "...McCaskill is [now] on the attack, accusing the league of being 'bad guys,' a 'tacky' front group 'hiding donors behind the cloak of their good name'..."
Breakfast Sides
GOP senators stand up for wealthy donors under IRS scrutiny. NYT: "The Republicans, all members of the Senate Finance Committee, which has oversight of the I.R.S., said they were concerned that political considerations might have played a role in the agency’s decision to scrutinize [campaign] donations more closely. The senators are seeking the names of any agency staff members involved in that decision, along with internal documents and any correspondence with White House officials."
GOPers resisting compromise on immigration reform. AP: "...many lawmakers agree the most likely first step toward immigration legislation is a requirement that all businesses use E-Verify [which] lets businesses know whether employees have the necessary papers ... The president’s recent push ... prompted Senate Democrats this month to reintroduce the DREAM Act [which would] give a path to legal status for law-abiding young people who were brought into the United States without documents as children ... Some Democrats have suggested a compromise bill incorporating elements of both DREAM and E-Verify, even as they acknowledge the prospects for such a deal are dim."
CFPB proposes simpler mortgage forms to reduce fraud. LAT: "The prototypes have simpler language and use highlighted terms, arrows and 'yes or no' graphics to provide key details about a loan. Those include whether the mortgage terms can change, projected monthly payments for different years and a new piece of information — how much of the loan would be paid off in five years. Seven banking executives saw the prototypes Tuesday and liked them, said Bob Davis, executive vice president of mortgage finance for the American Bankers Assn."
