by Terrance Heath | Oct 3, 2008 | Blog
I have a confession to make. I've been trying to grasp the national global economic situation. I even constructed a (popular and recently updated) timeline. But I didn't feel I could make any sense of it, Because, no matter how many times I've had it explained to me,...
by Terrance Heath | Oct 3, 2008 | Blog
Yikes! I realized that the Meltdown 2008 timeline needed updating, with all that's gone on this week. And when I logged in to add new events I discovered my timeline was featured on the front page, among the "Trending Topics - Making a Splash"! (The screenshot below...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Oct 2, 2008 | Blog
In the unsanitary sausage kitchen that is Congress, the bailout bill that the Senate approved Wednesday night is particularly ugly and smelly. Must vote-buying be so shameless in the midst of a serious financial crisis? We've focused a lot on what this bailout bill...
by Robert Borosage | Oct 2, 2008 | Blog
The Senate voted overwhelmingly to pass a bad bailout bill last night. Nothing to kick-start the real economy, except tax breaks for business. No help for homeowners.. No mandate for taxpayers to get shares in the banks that are bailed out. Virtual unchecked...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Oct 1, 2008 | Blog, Minimum Wage
A new report released this week adds some statistical weight to what dismayed us about the media's performance during the 2008 primary debates: The media failed to engage the candidates in a meaningful discussion of the issues, but instead largely focused the...
by Bill Scher | Oct 1, 2008 | Blog
Today, the ban on most coastal drilling has officially expired. Conservatives planned to claim this day as "Energy Freedom Day." But the celebration seems awfully quiet. Conservative politicians, who went into a "Drill, Baby, Drill" frenzy all summer, got exactly what...
by Sara Robinson | Sep 30, 2008 | Blog
Conservative pundits and politicians have piled onto the excuse like shipwreck victims clinging to a passing log: The real blame for the current economic crisis lies not with anything they did, but rather with the 1977 Community Reinvestment Act—a successful...
by Roger Hickey | Sep 30, 2008 | Blog
Long before anyone had been nominated or elected, the voters of 2008 had gotten one message across loud and clear: Fix our dysfunctional health care system! For obvious reasons (and big reasons that aren't so obvious), the leaders of 2009 must heed that call....
by Bill Scher | Sep 30, 2008 | Blog
The one-sided idea war continues. Last week, it was evident that while progressives were bursting with fresh ideas to get our deregulated derailed economy back on track, conservatives were running on fumes -- reflexively offering 80s right-wing favorites like more...
by Robert Borosage | Sep 30, 2008 | Blog
On September 29, Congress revolted against the $700 billion price tag of the proposed bailout of Wall Street. The day before, that same Congress passed without murmur—unanimously in the Senate—a $700 billion budget for the Pentagon in 2009. The worst financial crisis...
by Eric Lotke | Sep 30, 2008 | Blog
The bailout package failed. Republicans didn’t line up behind their leadership, unconvinced about the size, the urgency or even the rightness of rescuing tycoons from their own mistakes. Congress may soon try again, especially because the market showed its contempt...
by Robert Borosage | Sep 29, 2008 | Blog
The fix was in. The leadership of both parties in Congress, both major presidential candidates, media poobahs, financial statesmen from Warren Buffett to Bob Rubin, all weighing in to support giving Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson a $700 billion revolving fund to...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Sep 29, 2008 | Blog
The House has just voted down the $700 billion bailout bill. We have not yet seen the roll call, but the numbers suggest that a significant bloc within the Progressive Caucus on the left and the Republican Study Committee on the right held firm against the...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Sep 29, 2008 | Blog
Whatever you think of the Wall Street bailout bill that was voted on in the House of Representatives today, there is one thing we all should agree on: Congress must take steps this week to help the working families who are being hurt by this economic downturn. Here's...
by Bill Scher | Sep 29, 2008 | Blog
While the Sunday shows were, true to form, heavier on the politics of the bailout than substance, it was actually one of the better days for the Watchdog. On ABC's This Week, Sen. John McCain was asked about the need for additional economic stimulus -- albeit not as...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Sep 28, 2008 | Blog
The pernicious lie that a law designed to increase lending to people of color and in lower-income neighborhoods played a key role in the financial meltdown in Wall Street won't go away, even though there's no evidence to support it. And now House conservatives are...
by Bill Scher | Sep 26, 2008 | Blog
Every Friday in our Weekend Watchdog feature, we post suggested questions for scheduled Sunday guests. You can add your own questions in the comment thread. We'll also include contact information for the shows, so we can let them know what their viewers want asked....
by Bill Scher | Sep 26, 2008 | Blog
Apparently, everyone in Washington is falling over themselves to pacify House conservatives, who instead of taking responsibility for the deregulation that led to this financial crisis, are throwing another one of their predictable temper tantrums. No one in Congress...
by Tula Connell | Sep 26, 2008 | Blog
Before she became the first female Labor secretary in 1933, Frances Perkins had seen firsthand the tragedy of Manhattan’s 1911 Triangle Shirtwaist fire. Locked in by their employer, 146 mostly young girls died when they couldn’t escape the burning building...
by Robert Borosage | Sep 26, 2008 | Blog
The following is the text of the "agreement on principles" that blew up yesterday at the White House, as House Republican leader John Boehner blindsided negotiators by saying Republicans wouldn't support the deal. Sen. John McCain who had arranged the photo op refused...
by Terrance Heath | Sep 26, 2008 | Blog
My previous post had me asking "How did we get here?" (Actually, I cleaned up my language for this post.) How did we end up on what could be an economic "road to perdition." per·di·tion – noun 1. a state of final spiritual ruin; loss of the soul;...
by Sara Robinson | Sep 25, 2008 | Blog
Those who don't remember the past are condemned to repeat it. Santayana's warning is now such a persistent cliche only because it's so painfully true. Where have we seen this kind of meltdown before? Oh, yeah, right—we've got those family snapshots of our grandparents...
by Bill Scher | Sep 25, 2008 | Blog
Rick flagged one of the conservative attempts to shift blame for the financial crisis away from their market deregulation and pin it on "government," namely the Community Reinvestment Act. Last night, President Bush played the blame-shift game again, trying to claim...
by Robert Borosage | Sep 25, 2008 | Blog
Get ready for the steamroller on the $700 billion bailout of Wall Street. Tuesday was the time for throat clearing. It started to get out of hand. Opposition to the plan grew through Wednesday morning. Then... 1. Warren Buffett, the Oracle of Omaha and the biggest...
by Terrance Heath | Sep 24, 2008 | Blog
I admit it, the past week has left me speechless. As I sat and read the news about how the last of the investment banks shuffled off into extinction (kinda; they're just becoming regular old banks now), it did feel like I was sitting in front of my television again...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Sep 24, 2008 | Blog
In a memo posted at the Poynter Institute journalism website, David Cay Johnston, a former economics reporter at The New York Times, warned journalists about accepting at face value Bush administration claims that a crisis on Wall Street demands the rapid, drastic...
by Bill Scher | Sep 24, 2008 | Blog
Congressional leaders have backed down to conservatives and will let the current federal ban on most coastal drilling to completely expire. What does this mean for our energy policy? What does this say about the congressional leadership and the progressive movement?...
by Robert Borosage | Sep 24, 2008 | Blog
It's gut check time. The attempt by Treasury Secretary Paulson to put a gun to the head of Congress and terrify them into forking over a $700 billion blank check to the Bush administration in 48 hours has failed. Now what? Most Americans would just as soon the Masters...
by Bill Scher | Sep 23, 2008 | Blog
As I write this, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is testifying before the Senate Banking Committee. In his opening statement, he appeared to depart from prepared remarks to respond to statements from Senators calling for independent monitoring of Paulson's actions in...
by Eric Lotke | Sep 22, 2008 | Blog
The economy is sinking. Wages are flat, costs are rising and bridges are collapsing. Wall Street doesn’t know which way is up. The bail out is coming now and the stimulus checks came in the spring. But three quarters of Americans (still) think the country is on the...
by Robert Borosage | Sep 22, 2008 | Blog
How did it come to this? The banksters issue a threat: Hand over $700 billion in taxpayers’ money–on top of the $600 billion already forked over–or we’ll take down the global economy. There will be a lot of obfuscation—fingers pointing every which way—but the story is...
by Terrance Heath | Sep 22, 2008 | Blog
What a weekend it was for the watchdog, and the rest of the country, as we literally watched history unfold from our respective perches. So much history, that it made it kind of hard to keep score, but we're going to call it 2-for-3 for the watchdog this weekend. On...
by Bill Scher | Sep 22, 2008 | Blog
Last week, the House passed a compromise bill with more coastal drilling and more clean energy without the support of conservatives. The Senate had been expected to follow suit -- since it was the "Gang of 10" group of Senators who had the original idea of such a...
by Robert Borosage | Sep 21, 2008 | Blog
Call it extortion. Every American is told to ante up $2,000—an estimated $700 billion in all—to bail out the banks from their bad bets, or they’ll bring down the entire economy. In a speculative frenzy that allowed the Masters of the Universe to pocket millions...
by Terrance Heath | Sep 19, 2008 | Blog
After an exhausting week of gasps and gaffes, mostly related to the economy, it's time for another weekend watchdog. All week long, the headlines have been blaring news of bankruptcy, bailouts, and buyouts up and down Wall Street. Most of us probably have more...
by Alan Jenkins | Sep 19, 2008 | Blog, Economy
The challenges facing Americans today tend to be framed in the media and on the campaign trail as a daunting and often depressing laundry list of economic and social woes: home foreclosures and bank failures, rising health care costs and falling wages, underfunded...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Sep 19, 2008 | Blog
Almost overlooked in this morning's extraordinary headlines about government intervention to protect the nation's financial system from collapse was the failure of the House of Representatives on Thursday to act on a $50 billion stimulus package for the rest of us....
by Isaiah J. Poole | Sep 17, 2008 | Blog
If Sen. John McCain isn't going to be honest about the impact of his health care plan, we're just going to have to get louder and more blunt about it. We've said it before, but it bears repeating: When McCain says he won't raise taxes, he's wrong. His health care plan...
by Bill Scher | Sep 17, 2008 | Blog
As predicted here last week, House leaders put an "All of the Above" energy bill on the floor. And conservatives in Congress -- who pretended to support an "All of the Above" energy policy all summer -- rejected it, staying under the covers in bed with Big Oil. The...
by Bill Scher | Sep 17, 2008 | Blog
Not only did Institute for America's Future launch our Op-Ad series this week, putting the focus on progressive principles that can solve the big crises facing America, but the Progressive Ideas Network -- a coalition that includes Campaign for America's Future --...
