Same old, same old
by digby
Vanity Fair’s “New Establishment” Top 50 looks a lot like the old Establishment, only younger. A bunch of white guys with a couple of African Americans and six women thrown in for variety, the highest listed being Lady Gaga. But hey, women only make up slightly more than half the population so what would anyone expect?
The good news is that there’s no need for feminism anymore so we’ll all STFU now.
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BFF seating
by digby
I’m not going to waste a bunch of time on this stupid speech scheduling business because, well, it’s depressing. From what I’ve gathered it really was a White House error (for which someone should probably be fired, except that it was also probably signed off on by VIPs.)Whatever. I don’t even want to think about it. Just watching Hannity and co. crow about making Obama cry Uncle etc is enough.
However, I do hope they at least don’t do one of those “Democrats and Republicans sit together and hold hands” business again, as is rumored. I know that the White House thinks it’s really great to not show partisanship by having the two parties stand up and cheer together (or sit on their hands) but they couldn’t be more wrong, especially in this case. If he’s going to come out with some job creating policies he needs to show that the Democratic party is backing them — and the Republicans aren’t. (It’s possible they’ll stand up and cheer too, but doubtful.)
This battle has to be waged and if he won’t call out the Republicans rhetorically, he needs to at least show in some way that they are obstructing his program. If everybody’s sitting together giggling and texting with their bffs (bipartisan friends forever) I have my doubts that this speech is going to serve the purpose they want it to serve.
So please, let the two parties show that they take different sides on these issues. It’s not a bad thing. It’s how we do it in America.
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Falling back to earth
by digby
This piece by Martin Wolf is a must read. I’m sure that nobody will pay any attention to it because it charges policy makers and Very Serious People with a massive error. And as we all know, that means it can’t possibly be right.
The depth of the contraction and the weakness of the recovery are both result and cause of the ongoing economic fragility. They are a result, because excessive private sector debt interacts with weak asset prices, particularly of housing, to depress demand. They are a cause, because the weaker is the expected growth in demand, the smaller is the desire of companies to invest and the more subdued is the impulse to lend. This, then, is an economy that fails to achieve “escape velocity” and so is in danger of falling back to earth.
Now consider, against this background of continuing fragility, how people view the political scene. In neither the US nor the eurozone, does the politician supposedly in charge – Barack Obama, the US president, and Angela Merkel, Germany’s chancellor – appear to be much more than a bystander of unfolding events, as my colleague, Philip Stephens, recently noted. Both are – and, to a degree, operate as – outsiders. Mr Obama wishes to be president of a country that does not exist. In his fantasy US, politicians bury differences in bipartisan harmony. In fact, he faces an opposition that would prefer their country to fail than their president to succeed. Ms Merkel, similarly, seeks a non-existent middle way between the German desire for its partners to abide by its disciplines and their inability to do any such thing. The realisation that neither the US nor the eurozone can create conditions for a speedy restoration of growth – indeed the paralysing disagreements over what those conditions might be – is scary.
This leads us to the third big point: the dire consequences of soaring risk aversion, against the background of such economic fragility. In the long journey to becoming ever more like Japan, the yields on 10-year US and German government bonds are now down to where Japan’s had fallen in October 1997, at close to 2 per cent (see chart). Does deflation lie ahead in these countries, too? One big recession could surely bring about just that. That seems to me to be a more plausible danger than the hyperinflation that those fixated on fiscal deficits and central bank balance sheet find so terrifying.
A shock caused by a huge fight over fiscal policy – the debate over the terms on which to raise the debt ceiling – has caused a run into, not out of, US government bonds. This is not surprising for two reasons: first, these are always the first port in a storm; second, the result will be a sharp tightening of fiscal policy. Investors guess that the outcome will be a still weaker economy, given the enfeebled state of the private sector. Again, in a still weaker eurozone, investors have run into the safe haven of German government bonds…. The risks of a vicious spiral from bad fundamentals to policy mistakes, a panic and back to bad fundamentals are large, with further economic contraction ahead.
Yet all is not lost. In particular, the US and German governments retain substantial fiscal room for manoeuvre – and should use it. But, alas, governments that can spend more will not and those who want to spend more now cannot. Again, the central banks have not used up their ammunition. They too should dare to use it. Much more could also be done to hasten deleveraging of the private sector and strengthen the financial system. Another downturn now would surely be a disaster. The key, surely, is not to approach a situation as dangerous as this one within the boundaries of conventional thinking.
Uhm no. We’re like a family, you see and when the going gets tough we tighten our belts. But we’d like to buy a road too. Or something.
Update; I see Krugman hit this yesterday.
Changing our politics
by David Atkins (“thereisnospoon”)
Any hopes that a kinder, gentler bipartisan Washington would surface once Congress returns after Labor Day were summarily dashed on Wednesday when President Obama and Speaker John A. Boehner clashed over, of all things, the date and time of the president’s much-awaited speech to the nation about his proposal to increase jobs and fix the economy. In a surreal volley of letters, each released to the news media as soon as it was sent, Mr. Boehner rejected a request from the president to address a joint session of Congress next Wednesday at 8 p.m. — the same night that a Republican presidential debate is scheduled.
In an extraordinary turn, the House speaker fired back his own letter to the president saying, in a word, no. Might the president be able to reschedule for the following night, Sept. 8?
For several hours, the day turned into a very public game of chicken.
By late Wednesday night, though, the White House issued a statement saying that because Mr. Obama “is focused on the urgent need to create jobs and grow our economy,” he “welcomes the opportunity to address a joint session of Congress on Thursday, Sept. 8…”
Not that the selection of Sept. 8 is free of complications. It is the first night of the N.F.L. season.
So Obama and Boehner were, like, posting stuff on each others’ facebook. And Obama was all, I wanna talk with a bunch of you guys about jobs and stuff because we need to get off our duffs and do something or we’re gonna lose the apartment. Can you guys come listen and act like you care? And then Boehner was like, no way man, we’ve got a little party thing we’re doing, gonna have some beers with our buddies and make fun of you. Plus we’re not gonna be home, dude, we told you that, like, weeks ago. And then Obama was all, oh wait, really? I’m sorry guys. My bad. How’s about, like, the next night? And then Boehner and his friends were all, like, sure man, but that’s like, the first night of football, so we’ll totally be paying attention to whatever it is you wanna jabber about. Seriously dude. ROFL. And then they just started fighting with each other like on Jersey Shore or something.
And it was sooooo awkward. ‘Cuz like, everybody could see it, ‘cuz it was all public on facebook and stuff, and Obama’s been trying so hard to be friends with these guys. They should just totally get together in a room and make it all work out or something. That’d be sure to work, and then we could all just party again like we did in the 90s when everything was cool with everybody. Well, besides that thing where those same guys had girl trouble with that one guy Bill something or other and tried to kick him out. But still, those were some gooood times. ‘Cuz this totally sucks.
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The long march to dismantle democracy
by digby
I’ve been writing about the conservative movement’s long term project to disenfranchise Democratic voters since I started this blog. I had hoped that after the debacle of the 2000 election, the Democrats would take this issue seriously and put some weight behind substantial election reform. This was not to be. As usual, nobody wanted to look in the rearview mirror or play the blame game and now the results are possibly catastrophic.
This piece by Ari Berman in Rolling Stone tells the tale of that project finally coming to fruition. And it’s chilling;
As the nation gears up for the 2012 presidential election, Republican officials have launched an unprecedented, centrally coordinated campaign to suppress the elements of the Democratic vote that elected Barack Obama in 2008. Just as Dixiecrats once used poll taxes and literacy tests to bar black Southerners from voting, a new crop of GOP governors and state legislators has passed a series of seemingly disconnected measures that could prevent millions of students, minorities, immigrants, ex-convicts and the elderly from casting ballots. “What has happened this year is the most significant setback to voting rights in this country in a century,” says Judith Browne-Dianis, who monitors barriers to voting as co-director of the Advancement Project, a civil rights organization based in Washington, D.C.
There are a lot of scary things going on in our political and economic culture right now. The growing police state, the dysfunctional governing structures, the economic failure and corruption. But this one goes right to the heart of our democracy and attacks it head on.
The movement has been leading up to it for decades, but it’s picked up speed in the last 12 years. They impeached a Democratic president and stole an election in a two year time span. They fired US Attorneys for failing to rig elections and dismantled the voting rights section of the DOJ. They’ve packed the courts with anti-democratic judges and filed cases before them to create a sense of systematic voter fraud that doesn’t actually exist. And last November they made their move into state houses all over the country and wasted no time in creating laws to disenfranchise as many liberal voters as possible.
Democrats had better hope that the coming elections aren’t close. If they are, there’s just no way they can win with these laws that are coming on line. And that’s the plan.
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