Jared Bernstein at Economix, a
New York Times blog, writes
Narrowing the Income Gap, Without Another Bust:
There are two opposing views out there right now regarding the economic prospects for 2014. There are those making the case that this will be the year the economy finally escapes the residual gravitation pull of the great recession and hits escape velocity, i.e., gross domestic product and job growth accelerate, households — with their balance sheets back in the black, and with home prices rising — pick up their consumption, and businesses respond to this newfound activity by bringing more of their investment capital off the sidelines and into the game.
The other view is embodied in a recent CNN/ORC poll result that finds that nearly 70 percent said the economy “is generally in poor shape,” while “just over half expected the economy to remain in poor shape a year from now.” […]
There is no single United States economy that’s either doing well or poorly. When someone asks “how’s the economy doing?” the correct response is (preferably with a Jersey accent), “Whose economy you talkin’ about?”
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Blast from the Past. At Daily Kos on this date in 2010— The progressive benefits of rules reform:
The campaign to reform Senate rules--most prominently those rules regarding the filibuster--has undeniably been fueled in large part by Democratic frustration at our inability to pass more and better legislation over the past two years.
However, it must be admitted that the current reforms being discussed, making the filibuster real and reducing opportunities for obstruction on nominations, would not have altered the outcome of any of the major legislative fights of 2009-2010. Even if both changes had been in place back in January 2009, the stimulus, housing, health care, energy, immigration, financial reform and tax cut fights would have all played out largely the same, at least in policy terms.
So why are we doing this at all? Because the proposed reforms would be big differences outside of the major legislative fights. Most notably, the legions of vacancies in our federal judicial, regulatory, law enforcement and diplomatic departments would be nowhere as severe.
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Tweet of the Day:
Darrell Issa isn't incompetent. I'm sure he could've gotten to the bottom of Benghazi story if he had the resources of the New York Times.
— @TeaPartyCat
On
today's Kagro in the Morning show, the morning wingnut outrage: Someone said "spooning" on CNN, and that's Teh Sex!
Greg Dworkin brings us a round of ACA stories. Charles Gaba (aka
Brainwrap) gets a front page
WaPo nod. Greg's next story becomes the 1st hour obsession, NBC's coverage of the ACA's impact on a Michigan car dealership. But not before distracting us with the very wonkish notion of carving time up into infinitely small slices, to see if we can defeat federal health care policy. The NSA is in the news again, and we read Cory Doctorow's treatment of the big Der Spiegel story. Also: Bloomberg reveals the new American Caymans, in South Dakota.
High Impact Posts. Top Comments.