Progressive Breakfast - 12/21/2011

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: GOP, Basta! Stop Sabotaging Our Economy.

OurFuture.org's Robert Borosage and Roger Hickey: "Look at what has happened since Tea Party-driven Republicans took the majority in 2010. They held government hostage twice to force Congress and the President to accept job-killing austerity. They have blocked every proposed bill that would actually create jobs. Now, they are actively throwing out their own stated belief that no taxes should ever be raised on anybody -- to make an exception for middle-class workers in the middle of a job crisis. Or at least to obstruct every effort to sustain the cuts, unless other programs are gutted. And they are doing so even after Democrats accepted a litany of demands from Senate Republicans, leading to a rare bipartisan vote. They are revolting – in both senses of that word. And we need to let them know: We are revolted." Sign the "Stop GOP Sabotage" petition.

House GOP Blows Up Payroll Tax Cut, Jobless Aid Compromise

House GOP rejects payroll tax compromise, calls for negotiations, then leaves town. W. Post: "As the last vote was called in the House on Wednesday — a resolution restating House support for its own payroll tax bill adopted last week — lawmakers left clearly believing their work was done through Christmas. 'All right! Woo-hoo!' said Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), her coat under her arm, heading for the Capitol doors."

President demands House GOP relent. Politico: "Congressional Democrats and President Barack Obama are betting Republicans concede out of fear they’ll get blamed for a middle-class tax increase. House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and his rowdy Republican Conference are pressuring Democrats to come back to the negotiating table — but right now, they’re negotiating alone ... Senate Democratic leaders have not appointed conferees and have not told any senators to return to Washington. Their thinking: Democrats would empower the GOP if they open the door to new talks when Republicans are on the defensive. They think Boehner will soon capitulate if they do nothing."

Senate GOP livid at House GOP. LAT: "...Republicans fell into an angry family feud over their strategy. Several GOP senators who face reelection next year accused their House colleagues of acting irresponsibly."

Sen. McCain tells CNN obstruction is "harming the Republican Party."

Senate GOP aide fumes to Politico: "'This is a colossal fumble by the House Republicans,' said a senior Senate GOP aide, requesting anonymity to speak candidly about his own party. 'Their inability to recognize a win is costing our party our long-held advantage on the key issue of tax relief. It’s time for Boehner and [House Majority Leader Eric] Cantor to look these rookies in the eye and explain how the game is won or lost.'"

Conservative WSJ edit board blasts House GOP: "Republicans have also achieved the small miracle of letting Mr. Obama position himself as an election-year tax cutter, although he's spent most of his Presidency promoting tax increases ... After a year of the tea party House, Mr. Obama and Senate Democrats have had to make no major policy concessions beyond extending the Bush tax rates for two years. Mr. Obama is in a stronger re-election position today than he was a year ago, and the chances of Mr. McConnell becoming Majority Leader in 2013 are declining."

Yet another poll shows strong support for raising taxes on wealthy. CBS: "Six in ten Americans believe Congress should raise taxes on Americans earning more than $1 million per year, according to a new CBS News poll, while only 35 percent oppose such an increase. A narrow majority of Republican primary voters say those making more than $1 million per year should not see an increase -- but they are nearly split on the question. Forty-three percent want to see taxes on millionaires increased, and 51 percent do not. Most GOP primary voters - 55 percent - don't think such a tax increase would have a negative impact on job creation."

Impasse puts jobless aid at risk for 3.6M. NYT: "Major provisions of the federal unemployment insurance program begin expiring in the first week of January, and people would begin to feel the effects over the next several months. By mid-February, the Labor Department estimates, 2.2 million workers would have lost jobless benefits, and by the end of March, 3.6 million will be affected."

Rep. Keith Ellison sums up the House GOP strategy, in The Nation, "If It Ain't Broke, Break It": "The Tea Partiers rejected the deal their leader blessed—knowing full well the Senate would not capitulate to their demand—and thereby risking the livelihood of 160 million Americans who depend on the extension of unemployment benefits and payroll tax cuts. These are the Grover Norquist disciples who want to 'drown government in the bathtub,' as Norquist, whose pledge they’ve all signed, famously said. Why? Because if they actually let government work, then people could have faith that government can work."

Presidential Challengers Praise Inequality, Irresponsible Corporations

Rick Santorum declares "I'm for income inequality" reports ThinkProgress.

Mitt Romney defends banks, insurers from criticisms by President. Think Progress quotes: "He creates these straw men and says that Republicans believe this terrible thing, and aren’t they awful. He went after insurance company executives, Wall Street, all these bad people he finds out there."

New Housing Plan Considered, Resisted

FHFA considers plan to reduce loan balances for underwater home owners, WH resists. FT: "The Federal Housing Finance Agency is 'actively considering' a plan that would call for Fannie and Freddie to allow homeowners in Chapter 13 bankruptcy proceedings who owe more on their housing debt than their homes are worth to pay zero per cent interest for five years, subject to approval by bankruptcy judges ... would in effect act as a backdoor means of cutting mortgage principal for 'underwater' borrowers, or those with negative equity ... the FHFA could implement the plan without the White House’s blessing ..."

CA AG sues Fannie and Freddie. LAT: "The suits ask a judge to order the two companies to answer a set of 51 questions served in November to each government-controlled company. The firms have refused to answer the questions, the suits allege, because the federal agency that oversees them says federal law preempts the state from issuing subpoenas to the two companies."

BofA may settle Countrywide probe. Bloomberg: "A deal may be announced as early as this week and will include money to compensate Countrywide customers ... Bank of America, the second-largest U.S. lender by deposits, would be the biggest financial firm to settle a case with the Justice Department’s new fair-lending unit."

EPA Readies Mercury Rule

EPA to announce final rule today cracking down on mercury pollution from coal plants, reports WSJ: "... it will stick to its original proposal calling on power plants generally to comply within three years ... The rule has been watched closely by power companies, some of which have said based on a draft released earlier this year that it would require expensive retrofits at coal-fired power plants in an unrealistically short time frame..."

Interior advances clean energy projects in Southwest. AP: "Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said his department has approved a 300-megawatt solar farm on public land in Arizona and a 200-megawatt wind farm in Southern California. The wind farm includes 186 megawatts that would be produced on federal lands. The projects, southwest of Phoenix and east of San Diego, respectively, are the 24th and 25th renewable energy projects approved on public lands in the past two years..."

Republicans ask GAO to audit CA high-speed rail program reports McClatchy.

Breakfast Sides

Auto industry, saved by government, "outperforms" economy, reports McClatchy: "...the industry's plodding recovery over the last two years has helped stabilize the greater U.S. economy and power a regional recovery in the Great Lakes and Rust Belt regions, where auto production is king. Both manufacturing-rich areas have seen some of the sharpest declines in unemployment in the country over the last two years as automakers regain their financial footing."

Bernanke's policies are working, suggests Bloomberg: "His easy-money policies are showing signs of speeding up the economic rebound three years after he cut interest rates to zero ... Since the recovery began in June 2009, households have focused on saving rather than spending, while banks have concentrated on rebuilding capital instead of lending. That may be changing, as both have made progress in rebuilding their balance sheets..."

Fed waits on setting capital requirements for banks. Bloomberg: "While companies must conduct stress tests and set internal liquidity limits under the Fed guidelines released yesterday, regulators didn’t specify how much cash lenders must hold. The central bank said it would wait for the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision to implement capital surcharges ..."