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: Take Back The Capitol and Occupy Our Homes
OurFuture.org's Richard Eskow: "... there are two exciting 'Occupy' developments this week that could change the equation - 'Take Back the Capitol' in the District of Columbia, and Tuesday's 'Occupy Our Homes' events around the country. Think of them as complementary actions: One is taking place at the site of our greatest government power. The other is bringing the action to homes where people have been victimized by bankers ... what's most important is that we understand that consumers have far more power than we usually realize - provided we act together."
Protests Set To Shake Up Washington, Mortgage Industry
Washington braces for "Take Back the Capitol." Politico: "Beginning at the Lower Senate Park located next to the Capitol, groups of protesters will fan out to congressional offices to 'remind members of Congress that the Capitol is the people’s house, and demand that they represent the 99 percent,' according to SEIU. Some plan to set up tents around the Capitol overnight, and according to Progressive Maryland, the marchers will urge lawmakers to support the extension of unemployment insurance benefits."
Occupy Our Homes launches today. Mother Jones: "...a new 200-member squatting organization known as Organizing for Occupation (O4O) ... teams up with Occupy Wall Street and others to launch a campaign called Occupy Our Homes, a public showdown against the big banks and housing authorities. They intend to disrupt foreclosure auctions, unveil secret squats, and announce further plans to defend foreclosed-upon homeowners from eviction in some 20 American cities..."
Wealth gap widens globally. Politico: "The average income of the richest 10 percent across developed countries is about nine times more than that of the poorest 10 percent of the population in those countries ..."
Experienced public sector workers retiring early to avoid more painful cuts. NYT: "... increasingly workers fear a permanent shift away from the traditional security of government jobs, and they are making plans to get out now, before salaries and retirement benefits retreat further ... some experts and workers question the ultimate result of so much leaving, saying it is already leaving some governments short-staffed (and, in some cases, obliged to pay overtime) and at risk of losing institutional knowledge and technical expertise as older workers vanish."
Dem Sen. Bill Nelson looks to strengthen Wall St. reform law. WSJ: "A Democratic member of the Senate Finance Committee is raising questions about a provision in the Dodd-Frank financial regulation law that handed a tax benefit to many derivatives investors. The issue appears likely to come up in a Tuesday hearing before the Senate Finance and House Ways and Means committees on use of sophisticated financial instruments to duck taxes. Some Democrats hope the hearing will bolster their argument that top earners are using such techniques to avoid paying their fair share."
Dems Revise Payroll Tax Cut Plan
Dems scale back tax cut proposal, but keep millionaire's surtax. Politico: "...the latest Democratic proposal would drop the idea of extending the tax break to employers, instead lowering to 3.1 percent the workers’ tax rate that is set to increase by 2 percentage points at year’s end unless Congress takes action. Differing from their last plan, Democrats would pay for the costs by proposing cuts to non-health mandatory programs that were under consideration for reductions by the congressional supercommittee. But Reid isn’t dropping his effort to make the rich pay: He is pushing for a millionaire surcharge of 1.9 percent over 10 years to offset a chunk of the payroll tax cut’s costs. Democrats will also call for means testing for certain government benefits — such as unemployment insurance and food stamps — to ensure affluent individuals no longer receive compensation from the government."
Bipartisan duo tries forging compromise. NYT: "The proposal, devised by Senators Susan Collins, Republican of Maine, and Claire McCaskill, Democrat of Missouri, would extend the current payroll tax cut for employees and reduce the employer’s share of the payroll tax as well. It would also provide additional money for highways, bridges and other job-creating transportation projects. It would offset the cost with a 2 percent surtax on income in excess of $1 million a year, but would carve out protection for many small-business owners who report business income on their personal tax returns.
Other GOPers insist any surtax on millionaires must be dropped. The Hill: "Aides say that given the common ground on the issue, if and when Democrats drop their insistence on a tax hike for millionaires, serious negotiations could begin and a deal could get done quickly."
"Republican Proposal To Pay For Payroll Tax Extension Would Increase Already-Severe Cuts In Discretionary Programs" concludes CBPP.
Robert Reich tries to make sense of the GOP position on the payroll tax cut: "For years, Republicans have been telling us tax cuts pay for themselves by promoting growth. That was their argument in favor of the Bush tax cuts, remember? So if they believe what they say, why should they worry about paying for a one-year extension of the payroll tax holiday? Surely it will pay for itself."
W. Post Walter Pincus touts Dem Sen. Al Franken bill raising taxes to pay for future wars: "His 'Pay for War Resolution' called for budget cuts or added revenue if the costs could not be covered by the core defense budget. If it were an emergency situation, the fund requirement could be overridden by a vote of 60 senators ... how about linking funds gained from letting the Bush upper-income tax cuts expire to paying for overseas war expenditures? That would gain $40.9 billion in fiscal 2012 according to a 2010 Treasury estimate; another $49.7 billion in fiscal 2013. It would also put us on the way to covering all the extra war expenditures by fiscal 2014."
President seeks to channel Teddy Roosevelt in speech today. McClatchy: "Looking to inject his economic agenda with the grand sweep of history, he'll travel Tuesday to the small town of Osawatomie, Kan., the same place where Theodore Roosevelt a century ago summoned the nation to a new progressive era under what he called a 'New Nationalism.' ... Obama will say the times of sweeping change that animated Roosevelt at the start of the 20th century — including a growing gap between the rich and poor, with a middle class squeezed and falling behind — are much the same at the start of the 21st. And while he'll echo his push for short-term answers, such as extending middle-class tax cuts and raising taxes on the wealthy, both now stalled in Congress, he'll strive to frame the entire debate heading into the 2012 elections and the decade to come."
GOP Flip-Floppers Are Presidential Toppers
TNR's Mark Schmitt tries to understand why Republicans accept Gingrich's flip-flops: "Gingrich did more than just move the Republican party to the right ... he brought to the party a 'say anything' style of politics that lives on long after his heyday, and that makes it a tactically formidable opposition force ... He was able to create a broad appeal by combining his optimistic, techno-visionary liberalism with angry shrink-government conservatism. His secret: He didn’t really mean any of it ... The daring, improvisational style of the modern Republican Party is in many ways Newt Gingrich’s creation. And his flip-flops, unlike Romney’s nuanced legalisms, are perfectly suited to it."
"Romney Flip-Flops in Favor of Payroll Tax Cut Extension" reports NY Mag: "Previously, Romney dismissed the cut as a 'temporary little Band-Aid,' saying he desired a fundamental economic restructuring. But that was October. In November he was noncommittal and it's currently December, when Mitt Romney supports a one-year extension of the payroll tax cut that President Obama is furiously pushing in an effort to boost consumer spending. 'I would like to see the payroll tax cut extended just because I know that working families are really feeling the pinch right now — middle-class Americans are having a hard time,' Romney said Monday ..."
NYT edit board unimpressed with Mitt Romney's budget plan: "The biggest whopper in Mitt Romney’s fiscal plan comes right at the beginning of the description on his Web site: 'We will level with the American people about what it will take to truly cut spending and balance our budget.' Actually, Mr. Romney never tells voters the full cost of his plan to balance the budget while cutting taxes: popular programs would be slashed or eliminated, vital state and local services would disappear, misery would be inflicted on the poor and the working class."
Breakfast Sides
President meets with college presidents to discuss affordability. NYT: "'It was an unusually interesting meeting, and not your usual list of college presidents,' said Jane Wellman, founder and director of the nonprofit Delta Project, which studies college costs. 'These were all people who had led institutions that had done something about reducing spending or improving student learning ...' ... there seemed to be some consensus at the White House meeting that the federal government should develop policies on financial aid, its biggest tool, to spur a higher graduation rates, whether by limiting the number of semesters for which students could receive aid, requiring them to attend full-time, or doling out aid bit by bit to discourage students from dropping out mid-semester ... Several of the participants said they discussed the importance of linking colleges with K-12 education, and a recognition that attempts to control costs would require a fundamental rethinking of the traditional model of higher education, making greater, and different, use of technology."
NYT's Joe Nocera laments the GOP obstruction of Donald Berwick to continue as Medicare chief: "Dr. Berwick, I’m here to tell you, was the most qualified person in the country to run Medicare at this critical juncture, and the fact that he is no longer in the job is the country’s loss ... Obama named Berwick to the post in a recess appointment that did not require Senate confirmation. But, like all recess appointments, it was temporary ... What did Berwick accomplish in those 17 months? A lot — though not nearly as much as he would have liked to ... Health insurers and hospitals, who had generally thought of Medicare as little more than a stodgy, bureaucratic insurer, began to see it in a different light as well, as Medicare staffers, trained as 'improvement coaches,' began to share ideas and push for simple, sensible steps that would, for instance, keep people with chronic medical problems from having to be constantly readmitted to the hospital."
Most Americans want to keep or expand "ObamaCare." CAP's Ruy Teixeira: "... by majorities ranging from 57 percent to 84 percent, they are approve of almost all provisions included in the law. The sole exception is the individual mandate to purchase insurance, where just 35 percent are in favor ... These views explain why 50 percent of respondents in the same poll say they would like Congress to either expand the Affordable Care Act or keep it as-is rather than repeal or replace it with a Republican-sponsored alternative (39 percent)."
"Inspector General Probes NLRB Republican" reports WSJ: "The National Labor Relations Board’s inspector general is investigating whether Republican board member Brian Hayes was improperly influenced to threaten to resign in order to hobble the agency ... Mr. Hayes didn’t follow through on his threat to resign or to skip the meeting of the board last week, where the two Democrats outvoted him to approve the [union election reform] proposal."
