MORNING MESSAGE: The Rising American Electorate Sinking Together
OurFuture.org's Robert Borosage: "The 'rising American electorate' is the name given to the core of the Obama electoral majority of the young, single women, and minorities. Democratic pundits suggest that this coalition essentially dooms Republican presidential prospects for the foreseeable future ... This ignores one depressing reality: The rising American electorate is sinking together in this economy. The faltering jobless recovery isn’t working for most working families. Over 20 million are still in need of full-time work. Wages and family income are falling ... And in this bleak scene, the Obama coalition is faring the worst."
House Conservatives Accept Path to Citizenship
House immigration bill would create multiple paths to citizenship. NYT: "Young immigrants in the country without legal papers, who often call themselves 'Dreamers,' and low-skilled agricultural workers would qualify for an expedited road to legal status ... The second group to receive a path to legal permanent residence would be immigrants who have either a family or an employment relationship that would allow them to apply for legal status, except that they have already entered the country illegally ... [They would] have to return to their home country to apply for legal status, aides said, but could do so only after completing a series of hurdles including paying fines and back taxes and learning English ... The remaining illegal immigrants could apply for 'provisional legal status' if they came forward and admitted breaking the law, paid fines and back taxes, and learned English ..."
The potential deal is a win for labor, argues Robert Reich: "...why would the AFL-CIO agree to any new visas at all? Presumably because some 11 million undocumented workers are already here, doing much of this work. The only way these undocumented workers can ever become organized – and not undercut attempts to unionize legal workers — is if the undocumented workers also become legal."
Corporations Against Corporate Tax Reform
Corporations may sink tax reform on their own. Politico: "...with Congress starting to dig into the details, many captains of industry are backpedaling ... The corporations aren’t keen on giving up the special tax breaks that have let many of them pay Uncle Sam less than advertised for years. And they’ve gone on the offense to protect their favorite loopholes ... For corporate tax reform to have any chance at succeeding, it will need the strong support of the business community, and the more companies rebel, the more its prospects dim."
"Chamber Of Commerce Calls For Corporate Tax Reform That Would Make It Easier To Offshore Profits" reports ThinkProgress: "...chief among its wishes is a so-called 'territorial' tax system that would exempt most foreign profits earned by American multinational corporations from taxation in the U.S. ... studies show that a territorial system would simply make it easier to store profits in offshore tax havens and avoid American taxation..."
Rift between Senate Finance Chair and Senate Dem leadership. The Hill: "[Sen. Max] Baucus views tax reform differently from Senate Democratic leaders. While the Montana Democrat has told Republicans he wants to move a bipartisan reform package, his leadership views it primarily as a vehicle to raise more revenues to help shield safety-net programs from cuts ... Leaders such as Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), the Senate Democrats’ chief political strategist, see tax reform as the key to a balanced deal to reduce the deficit, closing tax loopholes for the wealthy and cutting mandatory spending programs."
"Chained CPI a gimmick we'll all pay for" argues USA Today's Duncan Black: "Advocates of using chained CPI who claim that their support for it is due to its increased accuracy should also support the construction of a well-researched index specific to the population of retirees. Unsurprisingly, they generally do not, as their interest is in finding a way to cut benefits without anybody noticing. Supposed accuracy is just an excuse, not the real reason."
Sequester Nation Update
"Sequestration Could Deny Rental Assistance to 140,000 Low-Income Families" reports CBPP.
"Federal sequestration hits local nonprofits" reports Santa Maria Times.
Vanderbilt University Medical Center "freezes pay raises, vacations amid sequestration" reports The Tennessean.
"Unemployment in Euro Zone Reaches a Record 12%" reports NYT: "Spending cuts and tax increases aimed at trimming debt and addressing the financial crises in bailed-out euro zone countries, and the rising rate of joblessness in much of the currency bloc, 'are feeding off of each other,' said Mark Cliffe, chief economist at ING Group. 'It’s a bit of a vicious circle,' he said. 'Europe is pursuing a policy that is self-evidently failing.'"
WH Pushes Help For Prospective Homeowners
"Obama administration pushes banks to make home loans to people with weaker credit" reports W. Post: "...administration officials say they are working to get banks to lend to a wider range of borrowers by taking advantage of taxpayer-backed programs — including those offered by the Federal Housing Administration — that insure home loans against default ... The administration’s efforts come in the midst of a housing market that has been surging for the past year but that has been delivering most of the benefits to established homeowners with high credit scores or to investors who have been behind a significant number of new purchases."
"Democrats Are Undermining Wall Street Reform, Too" reports Mother Jones: "A group of 21 House lawmakers—including eight Democrats—is pushing seven separate billsthat would dramatically scale back financial reform ... although all of the proposed bills have beenpresented as technical fixes to Dodd-Frank, financial-reform advocates say that's not true."
