by Robert Borosage | Jun 18, 2012 | Blog
As progressives gather at the annual Take Back the American Dream Conference today in Washington, they are gearing up for what is a fundamental struggle about America’s future. Clearly, America’s modern-day economy no longer works for working people. The financial...
by Bill Scher | Jun 18, 2012 | Uncategorized
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...
by Sam Pizzigati | Jun 17, 2012 | Blog
The Federal Reserve has once again counted up America's personal wealth — and omitted the nation's 400 richest from the final tally. But the new figures, even with that omission, show a divide still deepening. In the middle of middle America — in a suburb just outside...
by Jeff Bryant | Jun 16, 2012 | Blog, Education
A funny thing happened on the way to the news cycle the past two weeks when the issue of education -- specifically, public schoolteachers and student loan relief -- maintained a presence on the political stage. Because the conclusion among the Very Serious People is...
by Terrance Heath | Jun 15, 2012 | Blog
Collection agencies do not make condolence calls. I understand this, believe me. But there are certain events in life during which people deserve to be treated with more than standard human decency. (Yes, I realize I'm pretending that treating people with human...
by Dave Johnson | Jun 15, 2012 | Blog
Yesterday in Ohio candidate Mitt Romney said he would clamp down on China's currency manipulation. Today he is still not asking the House Republicans to bring the China currency bill up for a vote. Mr. Romney has the opportunity to demonstrate leadership and put his...
by Bill Scher | Jun 15, 2012 | Blog
President Obama's bold stroke to prevent deporting nearly 800,000 undocumented people who came to America before they turned 16 will be analyzed by most through a crude political lens: will this pump up Latino turnout or not? I'm not naive enough to believe that...
by Richard Eskow | Jun 15, 2012 | Blog
It had to happen sooner or later: Jamie Dimon, the bank CEO who's become the public face for our greedy and corrupt banking system, is openly backing the austerity plan pushed by former Senator Alan Simpson, the arrogant and abusive voice of our country's...
by Dave Johnson | Jun 15, 2012 | Blog
Some news you may have missed: Last week thousands of AT&T workers walked out in protest of AT&T's lack of progress in contract negotiations, aggravated by a mocking memo from an AT&T executive. We Party Patriots: Thousands of AT&T Technicians Stage One Day Walk Out...
by Bill Scher | Jun 15, 2012 | Uncategorized
MORNING MESSAGE: Back Bernie's Budget OurFuture.org's Isaiah Poole: "As progressive leaders from around the country prepare for next week's Take Back the American Dream conference, we're not waiting to start hitting Congress with our key demand: Bury austerity, put...
by | Jun 14, 2012 | Blog, The Sequester
And they call the unions thuggish. Get a load of this: Facing economic uncertainty, defense contractors are plotting to spur Congress to nix the automatic budget cuts set to begin next year. The plan? Threaten to send out layoff notices — hundreds of thousands of...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Jun 14, 2012 | Blog, Economy
As progressive leaders from around the country prepare for next week's Take Back the American Dream conference, we're not waiting to start hitting Congress with our key demand: Bury austerity, put jobs first and resurrect the middle class. We're asking you to sign the...
by Terrance Heath | Jun 14, 2012 | Blog
Yesterday was the last day of school for public school students in Montgomery County, Maryland, where we live — including our nine-year-old son, who just completed the third grade. I began the morning by sending a one last email to his teacher. I asked her about the...
by Dave Johnson | Jun 14, 2012 | Blog
Why is the health care law so messed up, and why didn't it include at least a public option? Because big money in politics corrupted the process and nullified the wishes and interests of the public. Once again we learn that the public good is thwarted for the benefit...
by Bill Scher | Jun 14, 2012 | Uncategorized
MORNING MESSAGE: Get Money Out Of Politics Take Back the American Dream speaker Rep. Keith Ellison: "The Wisconsin election shows that we will not have a government of, by and for the people as long as we have politicians who are bought and paid for by special...
by Dave Johnson | Jun 13, 2012 | Blog
Starbucks has launched an initiative to restore American jobs, and as part of that effort is ordering mugs from an American company and helping revive an Ohio Rover town! The company is earning some great publicity for itself. Like this: Starbucks(R) Indivisible...
by Dave Johnson | Jun 13, 2012 | Blog, Making it in America
Last week at Netroots Nation we talked about the problem of Apple (and all the others) manufacturing in China, costing our country jobs and dollars. Next week at the Take Back the American Dream Conference we will talk about what can be done to fix things. Last week I...
by Bill Scher | Jun 13, 2012 | Uncategorized
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: Resolve to...
by | Jun 13, 2012 | Blog
Originally published at Capital Gains and Games. Remember the “fiscal cliff” that everyone from Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke to analysts of every political stripe to media pundits have been talking about so incessantly in recent weeks as something that...
by Richard Eskow | Jun 13, 2012 | Blog
Wednesday is the day that JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon testifies before the Senate Banking Committee. He was called before the Committee (I believe the term is "invited") after it was disclosed that his bank lost billions of dollars in reckless and unregulated...
by Dave Johnson | Jun 12, 2012 | Blog
Following are my prepared notes for my talk on the Netroots Nation panel, Why Can't Apple Make Your iPhone in America? except cleaned up to make me look better: We used to make things here, and then came free trade and then China opened up, and we moved a lot of...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Jun 12, 2012 | Blog
We give a hat tip to Paul Krugman for recalling the infamous 2008 statement by Phil Gramm, then-presidential candidate John McCain's top economic advisor, that what Krugman is now calling the "lesser Depression" was really nothing more than a figment of our...
by Dave Johnson | Jun 12, 2012 | Blog
As much as conservatives want to pretend otherwise, you can't have strong, healthy, prospering businesses without a big, strong government. The kinds of businesses that don't want a big, strong government are exactly the kinds of businesses that We, the People don't...
by Dave Johnson | Jun 12, 2012 | Blog, Reagan Revolution
(This post was originally dated August 9, 2010) Conservatives like to say that taxes are theft. In fact it is tax cuts that are theft because they break a long-standing contract. The American Social Contract: We, the People built our democracy and the empowerment and...
by Richard Eskow | Jun 12, 2012 | Blog
Suddenly the headlines are filled with talk of an impending "fiscal cliff," a series of tax and budget changes which the news pages say is an impending catastrophe and which the editorial pages are urging Washington lawmakers to prevent. How would they do that? Why,...
by | Jun 12, 2012 | Blog
I've always loathed this jerk, but he is always one of those guys who is wiling to come right out and defend the indefensible, so you have to give him a sort of credit: Transcript via Think Progress: SUNUNU: Let me respond as a taxpayer, not as a representative of the...
by Bill Scher | Jun 12, 2012 | Uncategorized
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 Fiscal Cliff...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Jun 12, 2012 | Blog
When Van Jones took to the stage as the closing keynote speaker for the Netroots Nations conference Saturday afternoon, he began with the obvious. Yes, progressive activists are disheartened by losing the recall election of Gov. Scott Walker in Wisconsin. They are...
by Steven Capozzola | Jun 11, 2012 | Blog, Making it in America
The New York Times' Keith Bradsher reports that China's domestic economy has been stumbling of late due to a slowdown in construction and a sluggish retail market. But that's not a major problem because China has an ace-in-the-hole. Whenever the economy of the...
by | Jun 11, 2012 | Blog
Last Tuesday, Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker kept his job, but with a high price tag. In a state of only six million people, $60 million was poured into the race, $50 million of which went to Governor Walker. And almost half of that was spent by outside groups -- most of...
by Sam Pizzigati | Jun 11, 2012 | Blog
All those millions that America's billionaires are pouring into super PACs, where do they come from? We can trace a huge chunk of that political cash to the truly massive tax cuts our richest now enjoy. How massive? Over $25 billion a year -- for our most affluent 400...
by Bill Scher | Jun 11, 2012 | Uncategorized
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: Building a...
by Dave Johnson | Jun 11, 2012 | Blog
The elites who make policy, write about it, have dinner parties where they cluck their tongues about it, mostly have good-paying jobs, health care and secure retirements. They are not affected by it. The elite commissions don’t include unemployed people. The...
by Dave Johnson | Jun 11, 2012 | Blog
As I mentioned Friday in "Real Jobs At Stake" I attended a blogger meeting with Rhode Island's Senator Sheldon Whitehouse. The meeting was put together by Americans for Tax Fairness, a new coalition formed to help win the coming fight over the expiring Bush tax cuts....
by Terrance Heath | Jun 8, 2012 | Blog
George W. Bush returned to the White House last week, for the unveiling of his official presidential portrait. Fox Nation used the occasion to ressurrect the billboard that loomed over a Wyoming, MN, which featured a head shot of W. next to a caption that asked, "Miss...
by Radhika Raman | Jun 8, 2012 | Blog, Financial Reform
Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., former CFTC chair Brooksley Born and others are none too happy about the 2013 financial services appropriations bill. President Obama had requested $308 million for the Commodities and Futures Trade Commission, an amount that House...
by Dave Johnson | Jun 8, 2012 | Blog, Economy
I attended a blogger meeting with Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) to talk about Americans for Tax Fairness, a coalition that has formed to help win the coming fight over the expiring Bush tax cuts. As you remember, two years ago the Republicans held unemployment...
by Terrance Heath | Jun 8, 2012 | Blog
Plenty of things have been bothering me in the wake of the Wisconsin recall election. But one that particularly "sticks in my craw" is what appears to be the developing conventional wisdom that recall elections should hardly ever happen, and are appropriate only in...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Jun 8, 2012 | Blog
Perhaps the best strategy for avoiding having to settle for a bad "grand bargain" on the federal deficit that would shortchange the pillars of economic security for struggling households is to jump off the feared "fiscal cliff" at the end of the year and push Congress...
by Steven Capozzola | Jun 8, 2012 | Blog
We've reported frequently on the abusive labor practices and suicides at Apple's Foxconn factory in China. Essentially, Apple outsources the production of its iPad and iPhone to a massive labor facility in Chengdu, China. On the plus side for Apple, labor...
