Sequester Nation For All (Except Air Travelers)
Sequester slashes CA jobless aid. KGO-TV: "Federal unemployment benefits will be cut by 18 percent due to the federal sequester spending cuts that Congress allowed to automatically kick in to reduce the deficit ... The average unemployed worker will lose $52 per week in benefits."
60 air shows have been cancelled. Christian Science Monitor: "...there’s another group of frequent flyers who’ve been grounded by across-the-board budget cuts ... Navy and Air Force flight demonstration teams ... John Cudahy. president of the International Council of Air Shows tells the Associated Press that about 200 of the nation's 300 air shows have been affected by the federal budget cuts and 60 have already been cancelled ... 'The worst case is that they either cancel and go out of business, or they don't cancel and they have such poor attendance and they go out of business,' he said. Economic impact studies indicate the shows are worth $1 billion to $2 billion nationwide, Cudahy estimates."
Cancer clinics wonder why Congress won't save them before dealing with airport delays. ThinkProgress: "After automatic budget cuts slashed their funding, cancer clinics have been forced to delay chemotherapy treatment for their patients. Some clinics may actually have to close their doors ..."
Fewer Coast Guard patrols in CA, reports KGO-TV: "... San Francisco Port Director Monique Moyer says other agencies have to step up. 'What they're not going to be able to do is some of the preventative searches and that's a little disturbing,' Moyer said."
W. Post's E. J. Dionne slams Congress for selective sequester fix: "It’s outrageous that Congress and the administration are moving quickly to reduce the inconvenience to travelers — people fortunate enough to be able to buy plane tickets — by easing cuts in air traffic control while leaving the rest of the sequester in place. What about the harm being done to the economy as a whole? What about the sequester’s injuries to those who face lower unemployment benefits, who need Meals on Wheels or who attend Head Start programs?"
Dems Losing Austerity Fever
Dems moving away from austerity, reports Politico: "...aided by a pile of recent data suggesting the deficit is already shrinking significantly and current spending cuts are slowing the economy, more Democrats such as Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine and Maryland Rep. Chris Van Hollen are coming around to the point of view that fiscal austerity, in all its forms, is more the problem than the solution."
NYT's Paul Krugman recaps the austerity debate: "...the drive for austerity has lost its intellectual fig leaf, and stands exposed as the expression of prejudice, opportunism and class interest it always was."
Recovery Act saved the cities, but what happens now, asks Prof. Patrick Sharkey in NYT oped: "Compare the current conditions in urban America with those in the early 1980s, when the nation saw a less severe recession, yet neighborhoods were deteriorating and violent crime was much higher ... There are many factors that help explain the difference between now and then, but I believe the primary one is the unpopular, $840 billion fiscal stimulus program in 2009 ... A historical perspective on urban policy reveals a cycle in which periods of major investment are followed by periods of neglect, disinvestment and decline. This pattern is in the process of repeating."
Breakfast Sides
Online sales tax bill divides GOP. NYT: "For years, conservative Republican lawmakers have been influenced heavily by the antitax activists in Washington, who have dictated outcomes and become the arbiters of what is and is not a tax increase. But on the question of Internet taxation, their voices have begun to be drowned out by the pleas of struggling retailers back home who complain that their online competitors enjoy an unfair price advantage."
House immigration bill may require guilty pleas before citizenship. Roll Call: "The House immigration working group has tentatively settled on a plan that would require illegal immigrants to appear in federal court and plead guilty to breaking U.S. immigration law. Illegal immigrants would be required to complete this step before embarking on a conditional pathway to citizenship that would take at least a decade. In fact, illegal immigrants would essentially be granted legal status when a federal judge sentences them to 'probation' for illegally crossing the border."
