All Life Is Problem Solving

In my last post I discussed the Washington Post’s Hooverite anti-deficit campaign and Fred Hiatt’s recent piece in the deficit hysteria genre. Now, let’s look at the latest effort of Robert Samuelson, a well-known WaPo columnist to frighten us some more.

Like Fred Hiatt, Samuelson wants President Obama to pivot from health care reform and do something serious about “deficit control,” regardless of whether this will hurt economic recovery and leave us with high unemployment rates for a long time. He says:

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Last weekend that so-called epitome of liberal media bias called The Washington Post continued its on-going war on economic recovery and the American people with two salvos on the “crisis” in Government finances created by our “unsustainable” deficits, written by Fred Hiatt and Robert Samuelson. Hiatt and Samuelson are not the only deficit warriors in the WP army. Others of note include David Broder, Dana Milbank, Steven Pearlstein, and Lori Montgomery. Together, and along with the absence of any writers who write about deficits from a positive point of view, the WaPo reflects a determined Hooverite position on deficits, advocating that the Administration now “pivot” toward deficit reduction, even though their writing recognizes that such a pivot can only come at the cost of a delayed or a denied economic recovery, and even at the cost of a renewed plunge into deeper recession or even depression.

This position is not liberal or “progressive.” Some may call it neo-liberal. I’d prefer to call it Hooverite, because it is a renewed application of the economic philosophy of Herbert Hoover to the 21st century American economy. But, in any case, whatever the label used to characterize it, any Newspaper or other publication taking such a position cannot be characterized as liberal, or progressive, or “left.” But in our modern context must, be seen as “right,” corporatist, “neo-liberal” and globalist, because it demonstrates that it cares nothing for working people and their well-being, but only cares about defending the interests of the already well-off, the financial institutions, and the predatory economic globalists. Let’s take a look at the latest efforts of Hiatt and Samuelson to frighten us over the deficit, beginning with Hiatt’s in this blog post, and then following with Samuelson in my next one.

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The Press continues to be full of opinions reflecting deficit: “mongering,” “hawkism,” “terrorism,” and “errorism,” all based on erroneous neo-liberal ideas about economics. There are a number of sites however that provide very good analysis and refuting of these very dangerously silly ideas, which our President, who claimed he understood economics during his campaign, both espouses and seems ready to implement at both his political and our material peril. So, I thought it would be useful to identify some of those here, especially for those progressives who still think it’s a good idea to balance budgets at all costs. [Read more →]

It looks like we’re approaching an inflection point of great danger in working through problems in creating Economic Recovery. The inflection point is coming because there has been little economic recovery both internationally and domestically, with some nations continuing to run large deficits, and a growing chorus from many, calling for austerity and Governmental budget balancing even though it’s well known that the consequences of these policies will be economic contraction and further hardship for all of us but the rich. The big question is: which way will nations that have debts held in their own sovereign currency like the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, and Australia go? Will they listen to the domestic and international deficit hawks (e.g. the ratings agencies, the IMF, the European Commission (EC), and various currency traders and hedge fund managers) and cause further contraction and hardship for their citizens, or will they tell the deficit hawks to “take a hike,” create demand from the public sector, where private sector demand is falling short, full employment, and healthy economies?

I can’t answer this question, but what they ought to do is stated quite clearly in a recent blog post by L. Randall Wray and Yeva Nersisyan. Here’s an extensive sampling of their views along with some comments. [Read more →]

It looks like the Democratic Leadership will get its wish, a sprawling “health care reform” bill, mostly focused on changes to the health insurance system that deliver many millions of new customers to the health insurance industry. The Democrats are making many upbeat claims about this bill, calling it historic and claiming that it will produce affordable “universal” health care coverage for Americans, and for 32 million more than are covered by insurance today, while blithely ignoring the contradiction between these two statements. There have been many recent analyses of these claims, and I won’t add another one here. The analysis of the FDL team authored by Jane Hamsher, contrasting mythical claims about the pending bill with “the truth,” is the best of the analyses of the bill I’ve seen in the past few days.

So, assuming that the Leadership’s HCR legislation passes the Senate and moves to the President’s desk for final approval, I’d now like to look forward and ask where the Democrats stand politically in the wake of their nearly one year investment in painstakingly crafting their “health care reform” bill. To put it crassly, what will they have to run on that means something to most, or, at least, a large number of voters? [Read more →]

Recently, Paul Rosenberg published a piece called: ““Stimulus for Dummies” — A Public Service Instruction Guide.” at Open Left. It had previously appeared in Random Lengths News, where he is Senior Editor, I appreciate Paul’s attempt to try to explain the stimulus to some imaginary skeptic, though I’m not altogether taken with calling the skeptic “Dummy.” Nevertheless, on reading his piece, I thought it was a little bit off the mark and failed to clearly explain some very fundamental ideas related to Government spending and the stimulus that I think “Dummy,” as well as well as most progressives who may have found themselves agreeing with Paul’s piece, really need to know. So here goes my attempt to explain these fundamentals cast in terms of comments by a fictional “Stimulus for Smarties,” replying to Paul’s imaginary dialog between “Dummy” and ‘Stimulus for Dummies.” To cut down on the length of this I’ll quote Paul in part, and also summarize some of what “Stimulus for Dummies” has to say. [Read more →]

Lambert, DC Blogger and various commenters at Correntewire report an observed problem at The Wonk Room. Experience, tests, and screen shots indicate that the Wonk Room site is rejecting links to the PNHP and Health Care-Now web sites. Both sites advocate for enhanced Medicare for All, while the WonkRoom and its parent organization the Center for American Progress are advocates for the public option. [Read more →]

In spite of the fact that there is much evidence to suggest that it is favored by a majority of Americans, enhanced Medicare for All, Single Payer has been shut out of the mainstream legislative process by Barack Obama, Rahm Emanuel, Max Baucus, Congressional Leaders and a coalition of “Liberal”/”Progressive” organizations and media who either joined in, or acceded to the view of the politicians, that passing single-payer was not politically feasible, and that it was much preferable to advocate for a health care reform that would focus on health insurance and feature a nebulous and ever-changing concept called the Public Option. These leaders and organizations proceeded to take single-payer “off the table,” and to exclude its advocates from Congressional hearings, from substantial media coverage, from many blogopsphere discussions, and, in general from serious consideration as a reform alternative. [Read more →]

For some time now discussions have been going on in the blogosphere about the filibuster and whether or not to get rid of it. Nowhere have these discussions been more frequent or intense than at Firedog Lake, where you’ll find them here, here, here, here, and here. Over time, two positions on what to do about the filibuster have developed. One held by many at FDL, including myself, is that the practice of the filibuster in any form should ended. The second is that the present filibuster procedures should be ended, but that the classical filibuster should be restored because it really would not introduce intolerable delays into the legislative process, and it also would provide a needed focus for open debate in a Congress currently dominated by “ruthless” “top-down” party perspectives. [Read more →]

The corporatist-centrist politicians, such as Judd Gregg, Kent Conrad, Evan Bayh, no longer afraid of a total collapse of the world economy, are using deadly innocent frauds, scare, myths, and lies about the deficit and the national debt to undermine the possibilities of progressive change in the United States. It seems, also, that they’re now being led by President Obama, who has emerged as a full-throated champion of deficit hawkism, while pretending to be concerned about the well-being of the Middle Class, during his first State of the Union speech, where the President treated us to the following statements, about the debt, and the deficit, among others. [Read more →]