by Terrance Heath | Dec 16, 2011 | Blog
The sausage is nearly made. The deal is almost done. Shutdown has been averted. Again. For now. The process wasn't pretty, and progressives are justifiably disappointed that Democrats gave up on the millionaire's surtax — which had overwhelming public support, even...
by Dave Johnson | Dec 16, 2011 | Blog
Companies are always looking for ways to reduce the number of people they employ, and for ways to reduce the pay and benefits for the ones they keep. One way they have been doing this is to send jobs out of the country to places where the people don't have the...
by | Dec 16, 2011 | Blog
In case you were wondering whether the Village would be dizzy with excitement over the Ryan-Wyden plan, here's NBC's First Read: *** Wyden gives Romney cover: When he was asked about the new Paul Ryan (R)/Ron Wyden (D) Medicare proposal at last night’s debate, Romney...
by Dave Johnson | Dec 16, 2011 | Blog
What did people expect would happen when they voted for Reagan, Bush and other conservatives, or supported their policies? In the Holland (Michigan) Sentinel community columnist Ray Buursma writes, American workers got what they deserved. Some of the things he says...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Dec 16, 2011 | Blog
Keith Chatterton, a 61-year-old former salesman for a building components company, recently told the Syracuse Post-Standard that he hasn't had a steady job since 2008, even with "days scouring the Internet for openings, attending job fairs and support groups, trying...
by Bill Scher | Dec 16, 2011 | 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: Privatizing...
by Bill Scher | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog, Economy, Financial Reform
Today, presidential candidate Mitt Romney outlines his "jobs" plan in USA Today, by asserting that: "All too often ... government gets in the way. The past three years of unparalleled government expansion have retaught that lesson all too well." Funny that Romney's...
by Scott Hochberg | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
No matter how fatigued the rest of the country is with the endless Republican debate schedule, Mitt Romney must be looking forward to tonight’s face-off in New Hampshire. Despite reports that he is losing ground in some states to Herman Cain and others, Romney knows...
by Bill Scher | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
Last Thursday, presidential candidate Mitt Romney said, "the people who need the help most are not the poor, who have a safety net." Two days later, his economic adviser Gregory Mankiw wrote in the New York Times, "To maintain current levels of taxation, we will need...
by Bill Scher | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
If you were waiting for an economic plan from presidential candidate Mitt Romney that helps the poor, you might be waiting for a while. Stumping in Iowa last Thursday, Romney explicitly stated that helping the poor need not be a top priority -- "In our country, the...
by Dave Johnson | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog, Economy
Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney has unveiled a "Jobs Plan." CAF's Bill Scher celebrates with his post, Romney "Jobs" Plan Latest Attempt To Copy Bush, The Worst Jobs President Since Hoover, Funny that Romney's lesson-learning stops at 2009, and skips...
by Richard Eskow | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
Mitt Romney has very serious ideas for fixing the economy. How do we know? By the typeface. Romney's released a 59-page plan in one of those very, very serious typefaces - Garamond, or Cambria, or Times New Roman - Well, to be honest, I'm not sure which. But trust me....
by Bill Scher | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
It has come to this. The Republican primary race has become so sad that even Newt Gingrich gets a turn at playing frontrunner. He has long conned much of conservative movement and the Washington media into treating him as some sort of intellectual giant, when his...
by | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
Listening to Newtie blather on about foreign policy last night reminded me of his gooey, wannabe relationship with the military over the years. I wrote about it back in March of 2003: Last week I wrote a post about the likelihood that Newt Gingrich is heavily involved...
by | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
Originally posted at Capital Gains and Games. Former Speaker and current GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich might well have said that he wants to kill his personal physician because he didn’t like being told his blood pressure was too high. But that’s the...
by Jeff Bryant | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog, Education, Minimum Wage
When you call yourself a "historian," you create the implication that you can speak authoritatively about, well, history. But last Friday, Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich defied that common sense. Speaking at one of America's top institutions of...
by Bill Scher | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich received $600,000 from Freddie Mac in two years preceding the 2008 financial crisis. Former Freddie Mac officials say, according to Bloomberg, he was paid "to build bridges to Capitol Hill Republicans" who were "seeking to...
by | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
I'm so looking forward to this GOP primary with Newt Gingrich as the front runner. He's been around for so long, has said so many incredibly idiotic things and continues to do so, that for a political blogger it's the mother lode for material. Here's one of my...
by | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
To those wondering why Newt is doing so well, read this piece by Ben Adler at The Nation. There is one thing he does better than any other politician in America: articulating conservative contempt for liberals. And I do mean liberals, not liberalism. This is about bad...
by Richard Eskow | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog, Minimum Wage
Fire all the janitors and make poor kids clean their schools? Zap Korea with an airborne superlaser that's never worked during testing? Ignore global warming and plan to re-engineer the entire planet with untested technology instead? People like Maureen Dowd have been...
by Bill Scher | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog, Financial Reform
With one month to go before the Iowa caucuses, the debate among Republican primary voters for the moment is between Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich. It would be premature to conclude that it stays that way all month -- the top two candidates in the Dec. 2003 Iowa polls...
by Robert Borosage | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog, Economy
Democrats are salivating -- or as Rachel Maddow put it -- cheering, screaming, crying -- at the prospect of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich becoming the Republican presidential nominee. And why not? Gingrich, conservative George Will writes, "embodies the vanity...
by Dave Johnson | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
Once again, Republicans are holding government hostage, trying to force through unpopular cuts to the things We, the People -- "the 99%" -- do for each other and our economy, while giving handouts to the 1% who pay for their campaign ads and smears. Once again they...
by Dave Johnson | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
The public overwhelmingly wants taxes on the 1% increased to help pay for things that help the 99% and our economy. But the Senate was prevented from even voting on this. This was a filibuster. A minority that represents the 1% was able to block something demanded by...
by | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
Many of the big supporters of the Health Care reform have said that the idea was to eventually apply apply its logic to Medicare. That is, that Medicare would eventually be a subsidy system with "choice" among private insurers and perhaps a public option (as long as...
by Terrance Heath | Dec 15, 2011 | Blog
James Thwinda has a great post up at In These Times about "Why Conservatives Can't Fix Poverty." He zeroes in on Newt Gingrich as the prime example of the contemporary conservative approach to poverty, debunks the right's "distorted characterization of poor people,"...
by Bill Scher | Dec 15, 2011 | 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 Edu-Bubble...
by Jeff Bryant | Dec 14, 2011 | Blog, Education
Heard the term "edu-bubble" yet? Chances are you will soon. No doubt you've heard of the "dot-com bubble." And if you're like millions of Americans, you may be currently experiencing the ravages of the "housing bubble." But the edu-bubble? During the dot-com bubble,...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Dec 14, 2011 | Blog
While the rest of Congress is arguing over how to continue a payroll tax cut that will not dramatically improve the economy over the next year, members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus planned to introduce legislation today that its leaders assert would create...
by Terrance Heath | Dec 14, 2011 | Blog
Today, the Congressional Progressive Caucus showed their colleagues on the right in what a real jobs bill looks like. And if Republicans still don't get it, the folks over at Change Nation took the extra step of literally drawing a picture for them. Visit the link to...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Dec 14, 2011 | Blog, Economy
Congress could this week enact legislation, if it chose to, that would create more than 5 million jobs in the economy over the next two years. That works out to more than 208,000 jobs a month, well above the average of 132,000 jobs a month that have been created over...
by Josh Rosenblum | Dec 14, 2011 | Blog
This morning at the Newseum House Speaker John Boehner was asked by Politico's Mike Allen if he could produce any small business owner whose lives would face an impact if a millionaire surtax became law. Allen cited NPR’s Tamara Keith who couldn't find anyone in...
by Terrance Heath | Dec 14, 2011 | Blog
No doubt Republicans know the fight over extending the payroll tax is one they could lose. Thus, they've pivoted away from opposing the extension, and have presented a plan of their own — one that Timothy Noah says the Democrats should be willing to work with because...
by Richard Eskow | Dec 14, 2011 | Blog
This morning I appeared on KPFK's Uprising program with Sonali Kolhatkar to discuss the "payroll tax holiday" debate now going in the Senate. There's a lot of confusion around this issue. For one thing, the general public always struggles to understand numbers,...
by Richard Eskow | Dec 14, 2011 | Blog
Yesterday Thom Hartmann and I discussed the proposal to extend and expand what Democrats have called the 'payroll tax holiday.' (Video is below.) There are no heroes in this debate, but there are certainly villains. There are several different ways this could end -...
by | Dec 14, 2011 | Blog
Lest we forget, there is an alternative. If it weren't for Rand worshipping lunatics and corporate lackeys, this is what would be done: Restore the American Dream for the 99% Act Background After repeated efforts by conservative Washington politicians to reenact the...
by Bill Scher | Dec 14, 2011 | 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 Forgotten...
by Bill Scher | Dec 13, 2011 | Blog
Congressional Republicans have been in disarray since the President cranked up the pressure to extend the payroll tax cut before it expires this month, with some leaders swearing that Republicans really really would like to extend it but not if it means...
by Robert Borosage | Dec 13, 2011 | Blog, Economy, Minimum Wage
When Newt Gingrich maligned our "truly stupid" child labor laws and suggested that children 14 and under be put to work cleaning their schools, he sparked the outrage the former House speaker relishes. Less attention was paid to the other casualty of his proposition:...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Dec 13, 2011 | Blog
Congressional Republicans know what must be done. If they do not act in good faith, millions of workers will face a significant hit in their paychecks once a temporary payroll tax reduction expires, and several million long-term unemployment people will lose their...
