Obama Talks With Joe the Plumber

Hey, Joe the Plumber. Sounds like your business is doing great. Don’t you think it  would be awesome for business if more people could afford your service. 

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All About The Benjamins

 

National Debt Clock

We keep hearing about consumers who were drunk with easy credit drove our economy to the brink by getting themselves into bad loans. While some of that may be true, it can’t be as bad as the crack addict deficit spending of the federal government. In fact it is now so bad that they ran out of digits on the National Debt Clock. You’d think they could do a little better than just jamming it in like they did.

George Packer goes to Ohio

The New Yorker’s George Packer has a fantastic article in the current Politics issue about working class voters in Ohio. He discusses whether or not the Democrats can ever get these voters back. They, along with so many other Americans, have grown so skeptical of government that even now when the Republican platform of “less government” (which has really meant more government during the Bush era = torture, Guantanamo, Iraq, gay marriage) has failed, they are too disenchanted to give Obama a chance. Packer goes to find out why.

Mining electoral data from the General Social Survey, they found that the decline in white working-class support for Democrats occurred in one period—from the mid-seventies until the early nineties, with a brief lull in the early eighties—and has remained well below fifty per cent ever since. But they concluded that social issues like abortion, guns, religion, and even (outside the South) race had little to do with the shift. Instead, according to their data, it was based on a judgment that—during years in which industrial jobs went overseas, unions practically vanished, and working-class incomes stagnated—the Democratic Party was no longer much help to them. “Beginning in the mid-to-late 1970s, there was increasing reason for working-class whites to question whether the Democrats were still better than the Republicans at promoting their material well-being,” the study’s authors write. Working-class whites, their fortunes falling, began to embrace the anti-government, low-tax rhetoric of the conservative movement. During Clinton’s Presidency, the downward economic spiral of these Americans was arrested, but by then their identification with the Democrats had eroded. . Having earlier moved to the right for economic reasons, the Arizona study concluded, the working class stayed there because of the rising prominence of social issues—Thomas Frank’s argument. But the Democrats fundamentally lost the white working class because these voters no longer believed the Party’s central tenet—that government could restore a sense of economic security.

“I think the party-line Democrats are having a hard time with Obama,” Bobbie Dunham, a retired fourth-grade teacher, told me. When I asked if Obama’s health-care plan wouldn’t be a good thing for people in Glouster, she said, “I’ll believe it when I see it. If it’s actually happening, I’d say that’s good.” But she and the others had far more complaints about locals freeloading off public assistance than about the health-insurance industry and corporations. Dunham declared her intention to write in a vote for either Snoopy or T. Boone Pickens. “I’m not going to vote for a Republican—they’ve had their chance for the last eight years and they’ve screwed it up,” she said. “But I really just don’t trust Obama. He only says half-truths. He calls himself a Christian, but he only became one to run for office. He calls himself a black, but he’s two-thirds Arab.”

I asked where she had learned that.

“On the Internet.”

The Obama Doctrine of Preemption

The campaign goes on the offensive against McCain and the Keating Five. McCain’s ads this week will focus on Ayers.

Financial Crisis, What to Do? Blame the Poor of Course.

There is a new series of misleading attack viral emails and videos that try to pin the current financial crisis on the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977. While it is quite amazing that a law passed in 1977 is suddenly now responsible for the massive failure of the credit markets, I find it even more disturbing that they are trying to pin this current crisis on the low income families.

To refresh everyone’s memory, the Community Reinvestment Act was instituted to prevent the act of redlining, where banks used to draw a red line around minority neighborhoods to indicate where they wouldn’t lend money. The Community Reinvestment Act sought to mandate that banks provide loans to qualified individuals regardless of their race or neighborhood.

Michael Moore Has It All Figured Out

Michael Moore has it all figured out. He sent this out to people on his mailing list. Click the link below to see the full plan.

Friends,

The richest 400 Americans — that’s right, just four hundred people — own MORE than the bottom 150 million Americans combined. 400 rich Americans have got more stashed away than half the entire country! Their combined net worth is $1.6 trillion. During the eight years of the Bush Administration, their wealth has increased by nearly $700 billion — the same amount that they are now demanding we give to them for the “bailout.” Why don’t they just spend the money they made under Bush to bail themselves out? They’d still have nearly a trillion dollars left over to spread amongst themselves!

Of course, they are not going to do that — at least not voluntarily. George W. Bush was handed a $127 billion surplus when Bill Clinton left office. Because that money was OUR money and not his, he did what the rich prefer to do — spend it and never look back. Now we have a $9.5 trillion debt. Why on earth would we even think of giving these robber barons any more of our money?

You’ve Got Some Splainin’ To Do

Douglas Rushkoff has an interesting write-up trying to outline some of the issues with the bailout.

The mortgage and credit crisis wasn’t merely predictable; it was predicted. And not by a market bear or conspiracy theorist, but by the people and institutions responsible. The record number of foreclosures, credit defaults, and, now, institutional collapses is not the result of the churn of random market forces, but rather a series of highly lobbied changes to law, highly promoted ideologies of wealth and home ownership, and monetary policies highly biased toward corporate greed.

He has some other interesting pieces on his site that attempt to explain the current crisis, here.

Banks didn’t really care (because they weren’t holding the bad paper) but the people investing in those “mortgage-backed securities” were slowly getting wise to the fact that many of the borrowers were in over their heads. What to do? The credit industry went ahead and lobbied Washington to change the bankruptcy laws. While corporations could claim bankruptcy and stop paying for their retirees’ health coverage, individuals would no longer be able to claim bankruptcy, and even if they did, they would still owe their creditors the money they borrowed, forever. The credit industry spent over $100 million lobbying lawmakers for the new provisions.

 

More Good News For Obama

ABC/The Washington Post poll:

Who is mainly responsible for the defeat of the financial rescue? Republicans 44, Democrats 21

Do you oppose or favor the bill? Oppose 47, Favor 45

More from the poll here.

Why are we in this handbasket and where are we going?!

BAILOUT REJECTED

 

House Votes ‘No,’ 228-205; Stocks Plunge

House Rejects Bailout Package, 228-205; Stocks Plunge

Leaders Fail to Convert Opponents

In a moment of historic drama in the Capitol and on Wall Street, the House of Representatives voted on Monday to reject a $700 billion rescue of the financial industry.

 

The Paradox of Deleveraging

While the current financial crisis has many complicated details, the basics of it aren’t. Paul Krugman over at the International Herald Tribune has a quick and concise explanation of the current situation and details why it is so important to properly negotiate this bill.

Some are saying that we Americans should simply trust Paulson, because he’s a smart guy who knows what he’s doing. But that’s only half true: He is a smart guy, but what, exactly, in the experience of the past year and a half – a period during which Paulson repeatedly declared the financial crisis “contained,” and then offered a series of unsuccessful fixes – justifies the belief that he knows what he’s doing? He’s making it up as he goes along, just like the rest of us.

Stop the Tax Lie

I keep hearing the Republican talking point, “Obama will raise your taxes.” Whenever John McCain says Obama will raise your taxes, what he means is, “Obama will raise my taxes,” because unless you are making more than $603,000 a year, your taxes aren’t going up!

Unfortunately, I don’t fall into that bracket, but if I did, I would be embarrassed to complain about paying more. Has anyone noticed the massive debt incurred under this administration.

If you dig deeper, you will also find that John McCain wants to tax employer-provided health insurance. Which is a back door way to raise the taxes of the average American family by more than $1,323.

The truth of the matter is that none of this will matter to the next President, as they will be hamstrung by the collapsing economy and the legacy of one of the most massive buildups of government and government spending in the history of the country over the last 8 years.

If you need a cheat sheet, here is a good one.

 

Tax Cheat Sheet

The Debate About The Debate

John McCain has pulled out of the Presidential debate. I think this is a very deliberate political move to once again divert America’s attention. By doing this I think he believes:

• He will get to say that he is bringing Washington together by working across the aisle.
• If Obama doesn’t agree he can be made to look like he is not on top of the issue (it is still an issue he needs to deal with as a senator).
• He will look presidential by bringing himself, Obama and Bush together to work out a solution.
• It will help erase some of the memory of the neglect of Katrina by dropping everything to deal with important issues (common theme for the Republicans).
• It will get him out of talking about Iraq.
• McCain knows he will be stronger in a debate on Iraq when the financial crisis is not at the top of people’s minds. 

Most likely in a debate, he will parrot the line of the current generals on the ground (ie General Patraeus) that the force is necessary to maintain security for the citizenry so that Iraq can build government and services. This will be presented in contrast to Obama who is more in line with the General Casey strategy (and the Joint Chiefs) who were promoting the “stand down so the Iraqis stand up” strategy. The surge strategy has, to this point, improved the security situation and the Iraqi government has made limited progress in the wake of that.

There are 3 points that Obama needs to focus on in this debate:

1. We are over committed. We have no strategic reserves left for trouble in other regions of the world. The surge represented an all-in strategy by deploying all remaining divisions. This leaves no reserves for addressing Afghanistan or any other hotspot in the world. While temporary stability has been achieved, the strategy is one of multiple surges. In order to maintain the level of presence McCain advocates he will have to reinstate the draft.
2. The country is on the verge of economic collapse. The war has driven the country to the edge, and we need to focus on our country and building its economy before it is too late. The war is a tremendous financial burden that the country can no longer continue to bear.
3. The current strategy has no end and no vision. Bush’s strategy has been to simply kill all of the enemy combatants until there are none left. He has a body count mentality of the war. When you look at the idea of an extended presence this is what you are going to get. The problem is slowly the entire population becomes hostile and the fighting continues until there is no one left. That is the myopic military view. Obama has to present a vision of political resolution, a “hearts and minds” strategy (although not calling it that and dragging us back to Vietnam failure) where bettering the lives of people rescues them from warfare.

Bush always speaks in terms of idealistic concepts, “People love freedom, we want to promote democracy.” Unfortunately, he has little understanding of what that is. Iraq is not a democracy, it is a military dictatorship, with the President of the United States in the role of dictator. At the end of the day, there will most likely be a bloodbath in Iraq when the US pulls out, no matter when that is. The question is when is that going to happen and how bad is it going to be. 

General Casey’s plan was to pull out troops, let the Iraqis battle it out and only step in when violence reaches the level of a Srebrenica. The hope is that this would force the Iraqis to take responsibility of the war and their country. I hope we can do better. No matter how you look at it the administration should have all listened to Colin Powell when he explained the Pottery Barn rule of war, “If you break it, you own it.”

His Economic Plan

I think he should do more and more of these ads. By looking straight into the camera, and outlining proposals, he comes across as truthful and serious. And it’s a different kind of ad – a conversation versus a smear.

(See McCain’s ad released the same day – 30 seconds vs. Obama’s 2 minutes. And he claims that Obama is “all talk.” Don’t even get me started.)

If 50% of Americans do not think he is the right choice, then they do not deserve him. However, that means the rest of us are screwed.

Visit BarackObama.com/plan to read Obama’s plan.

Go Joe

Biden Says Election Is About Values. Damn Straight It Is.

Yes, this campaign is about change, but it’s about even more than that.  It’s about what we value as a people.  It’s not just about a job, it’s about dignity. It’s not just about a paycheck.  It’s about pride.  It’s not just about opportunity. It’s about respect. That’s why Barack and I are in this race.

And here’s out of touch John: