by Bill Scher | May 4, 2009 | Uncategorized
Specter Opposes Public Health Plan Option New Democrat Sen. Arlen Specter opposes public health plan option, on NBC's Meet The Press: DAVID GREGORY: You would not support a public plan? SEN. SPECTER: That's what I said, and that's what I meant. MR. GREGORY: Do you...
by Sam Pizzigati | May 3, 2009 | Blog
Who takes more of a risk when they wake up in the morning and go in to work? Laborers at construction sites? Or CEOs? Statistically, the answer could hardly be any plainer. Just over 1,200 Americans, notes a new report that surfaced last week, died on the job in...
by Terrance Heath | May 1, 2009 | Blog
National Urban League head Mark Morial recently described the state of black America today as "the best of times and the worst of times." He's right. The inauguration of the first African-American president was a moment worth celebrating as an undeniable example of...
by Leo Gerard | May 1, 2009 | Blog
“He’s a real nowhere Man, Sitting in his Nowhere Land, Making all his nowhere plans For nobody.” These lyrics to “Nowhere Man,” written and recorded in 1965 by John Lennon and Paul McCartney, describe the Republican Party of 2009. Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter...
by Bill Scher | May 1, 2009 | Uncategorized
Banks Grade Grubbing Stress Tests Bloomberg reports: "The Federal Reserve is postponing the release of stress tests on the biggest U.S. banks while executives debate preliminary findings with examiners, according to government and industry officials. The results,...
by Terrance Heath | Apr 30, 2009 | Blog
Many people — including the president himself — have mentioned the absurdity of judging Obama's success at cleaning up messes that were decades in the making, based on his first 100 days in office. It's equally absurd to expect the first 100 days in the administration...
by Bill Scher | Apr 30, 2009 | Blog
Congress passed the budget resolution for 2010 yesterday. The biggest progressive policy victory has already been well reported: the ability for Congress to use budget rules to pass health care reform and direct student lending with a simple majority vote in the...
by Bill Scher | Apr 30, 2009 | Uncategorized
Budget Passes With PAYGO Compromise W. Post on final passage of the federal budget: "...Democrats overwhelmingly endorsed the president's request for hundreds of billions of dollars in new spending over the next decade for college loans, early childhood education...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Apr 29, 2009 | Blog
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by Sara Robinson | Apr 29, 2009 | Blog
Somewhere back in February, about three weeks into the Obama Administration, everybody on the left suddenly noticed that there was something different going on with the conservatives. The outrageous screeds and paranoid delusions sounded pretty much as they always had...
by Robert Borosage | Apr 29, 2009 | Blog
Grading a president after 100 days always strikes me as presumptuous. The only real grade is an incomplete. And as good teachers will tell you, letter grades—as opposed to written evaluations—are inherently arbitrary and misleading. One thing is clear. If we're...
by Bill Scher | Apr 29, 2009 | Uncategorized
Sharp Recession Continues GDP shrunk at annual rate of 6.1% in first quarter of 2009. Will Specter Switch Affect Health Care? Wonk Room's Igor Volsky: When it comes to health care reform, Sen. Arlen Specter may be one of the few (former) Republicans open to...
by Bill Scher | Apr 28, 2009 | Blog
At the 100 Day mark of the Obama Era, climate protection is behind health care for all. This shouldn't be and isn't a contest. Solving both domestic crises is critical to sustain our economy and our planet. And the fact that health care is farther along the political...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Apr 28, 2009 | Blog
The warning, in retrospect, could not have been any clearer. It led to this unambiguous headline on CNN.com on September 17, 2004: "FBI warns of mortgage fraud 'epidemic'." Assistant FBI Director Chris Swecker said the booming mortgage market, fueled by low interest...
by Bill Scher | Apr 28, 2009 | Uncategorized
Budget Deal Fast-Tracks Health Care, May Put PAYGO On Path Politico: "The more immediate fight will be health care, where the budget gives Obama an invaluable backstop if Republicans attempt to stall this initiative past Oct. 15. Conrad said Democrats are still...
by Bill Scher | Apr 27, 2009 | Uncategorized
Chrysler-UAW Deal NYT: "Union leaders said Sunday that they had reached an agreement with Chrysler that meets federal requirements for the automaker to receive more financing. The deal includes Fiat ... Neither the United Automobile Workers union nor the company...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Apr 24, 2009 | Blog
Economist Simon Johnson, in an interview Friday on "Bill Moyers' Journal," makes the case for why the nation needs a tough, independent inquiry into the financial crisis similar to the Pecora Commission of the 1930s. "Everyone is worried about the disproportionate...
by Tula Connell | Apr 24, 2009 | Blog, Economy
We're giving up Styrofoam cups here at our building in Washington, D.C. Also doing an energy audit and taking a few other steps as a start toward making our building a green one--just some of the actions the AFL-CIO announced this week, in time for Earth Day. Back in...
by Bill Scher | Apr 24, 2009 | Uncategorized
Possible Budget Deal With Wide-Ranging Implications CQ reports on deal to allow simple majority vote on health care and student loan reform, possibly in exchange for bipartisan commission that could fast-track Social Security and Medicare cuts: House and Senate...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Apr 23, 2009 | Blog
Momentum toward a Pecora Commission-style inquest into the roots of the financial crisis got a boost from the Senate on Wednesday when it approved an amendment to a financial fraud bill that would authorize a select investigative committee. If the bill passes with the...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Apr 23, 2009 | Blog
The Obama administration this week got a warning shot across its bow against structuring a bank resuce plan that would amount to yet another taxpayer subsidy of the wealthy. It's a shot that progressives who have the administration's ear on economic policy need to...
by Bill Scher | Apr 23, 2009 | Blog
The first congressional hearings regarding comprehensive clean energy and climate protection legislation were held yesterday, and the most important fact mentioned did not get much traditional media attention. When Energy Secretary Steven Chu was asked by a...
by Bill Scher | Apr 23, 2009 | Uncategorized
Restoring Rules on Credit Cards Credit card crackdown bill moves. CNN/Money.com: " A key House panel on Wednesday advanced a bill to crack down on credit card interest rates and fees amid signs the Obama administration will try to toughen the bill further before it...
by Bill Scher | Apr 22, 2009 | Uncategorized
Simple Majority Vote For Health Care? The Hill reports likely Senate support for simple majority vote on health care reform, including possibly Bayh: "Democrats appear to have the votes for a budget measure that would allow reform of the nation’s healthcare system...
by Robert Borosage | Apr 21, 2009 | Blog
"The decisions that are made in the next six months or so are likely to set the economic course of this country for the next 50 years," says Elizabeth Warren, who chairs the COP, the Congressional Oversight Panel charged with reviewing the banking bailout. "That's...
by Sara Robinson | Apr 21, 2009 | Blog
Whew. Run your bank into the ground? Hey, it was our fault for not keeping a better eye on you. Here's some cash. Since you're rich guys, we trust you to do the right thing going forward, so we're not going to bother you with a bunch of rules and oversight—but you...
by Bill Scher | Apr 21, 2009 | Blog
Senate leaders are negotiating health care reform with a wide range of "lobbyists representing doctors, hospitals, insurers, drugmakers, the American Cancer Society, the seniors lobby AARP and others," the Washington post reminds us today. Fair enough. Everyone...
by Alan Jenkins | Apr 21, 2009 | Blog
Article 1 of the International Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment provides, in simple terms, that “torture means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on...
by Bill Scher | Apr 21, 2009 | Uncategorized
Senate Sets June Benchmark for Health Care Sens. Baucus and Kennedy tell President Obama they plan a June mark-up of health care legislation. Time's Jay Newton-Small: "The letter [to the President] is significant as it sets a time table that will now have political...
by Bill Scher | Apr 20, 2009 | Blog
In an oped published Sunday by the Omaha World-Herald (and reprinted today by Grist), I argued for a climate compromise with the coal- and oil-state Senators needed for a 60-vote supermajority: a strong carbon cap that makes pollu
by Bill Scher | Apr 20, 2009 | Uncategorized
Congress Back To Work CQ on congressional schedule for clean energy and health care: "House Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry A. Waxman, D-Calif., has said he expects to complete work on a climate-change bill, which will probably include a controversial cap-and-trade...
by Sam Pizzigati | Apr 19, 2009 | Blog
The United States has been regularly counting people, via the Census, since 1790. But the federal government didn’t start counting the dollars in people’s pockets, with any regularity, until 1983 when the Federal Reserve began conducting a “Survey of...
by Bill Scher | Apr 17, 2009 | Blog
After Congress in 1990 gave the EPA the authority to regulate air pollution, after the Supreme Court in 2007 told Bush's EPA they couldn't ignore greenhouse gas pollution that causes global warming, and after a full review of the scientific evidence, the EPA announced...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Apr 17, 2009 | Blog
Journalist and author William Greider is urging the labor movement and other progressives to get tough with the Democratic Party, even if that means putting the party's majority control in the House and Senate at risk. Greider, who was at the AFL-CIO headquarters in...
by Bill Scher | Apr 17, 2009 | Uncategorized
Stress Surrounds Stress Tests "The Federal Reserve and other regulators aim to release the results of stress tests on 19 of the biggest U.S. banks on May 4," reports Bloomberg. "The tests are designed to mesh with the administration’s effort to remove distressed...
by Bill Scher | Apr 16, 2009 | Uncategorized
Compromise on Public Health Plan Option Within Reach? AP reports on optimistic comments from WH: President Barack Obama's top health care adviser said Wednesday a compromise is within reach on a government health plan for the middle class that wouldn't drive private...
by Terrance Heath | Apr 15, 2009 | Blog
Hillary Clinton surprised me when she said, on a recent trip to Mexico, "Our insatiable demand for illegal drugs fuels the drug trade." Strong words, and far more sagacious than George W. Bush's declaration, during a trip to Mexico in 2001, that, "One...
by Robert Borosage | Apr 15, 2009 | Blog
Tax Day. Fox News is flogging Astroturf "tea parties" underwritten by corporate lobbyists, while its pundits warn that raising the top income tax rate to the level it was under Bill Clinton constitutes "socialism." The Wall Street Journal editorializes about the evils...
by Bill Scher | Apr 15, 2009 | Uncategorized
Stress Test Results To Go (Sorta, Maybe) Public NYT reports some stress test results will be made public: The administration has decided to reveal some sensitive details of the stress tests now being completed after concluding that keeping many of the findings secret...
by Leo Gerard | Apr 14, 2009 | Blog
Americans are paying big time now for decades of buying into a hoax. And it wasn't sub-prime mortgages. It was the conservative contention that government is evil and inept. Swallowing that absurd assertion resulted in relaxation and elimination of supposedly onerous...
