Archive for September, 2010
When Polls Collide And Minds Explode
A CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll on Sunday: A new national poll released Sunday indicates that eight in 10 Americans say that the economy is in poor shape, and the number that says conditions are very poor is on the upswing after steady declines through the spring. And according to a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey, more [...]
Comings And Goings In the Liberal Blogosphere
Amanda Terkel used to be Deputy Research Director at the Center for American Progress and Managing Editor for ThinkProgress. Two weeks ago, she left them for The Hufffington Post. Today, someone at ThinkProgress finally decided that they should probably wish her a fond farewell (and that Friday afternoon on a holiday weekend was the perfect [...]
Adding Unemployment Insult To Unemployment Injury
Steve Benen writes today: Nevada’s Angle believes unemployment benefits doesn’t help anyone; Alaska’s Joe Miller believes unemployment benefits are unconstitutional; Kentucky’s Rand Paul thinks it’s time to cut the jobless off before we’re worse than Europe; and a wide variety of Republican lawmakers have said the aid to the unemployed is encouraging laziness. It’s ironic, [...]
CEO Compensation, Obscene Disparities And The Expropriation Of Stockholder Wealth
The title of the post is in the style of academic research studies. It’s not a generally accepted practice for such a long title to be followed by a subtitle. But if I were inclined to disregard such niceties, the subtitle would be “Robbing The Buggers Blind”. (1) Regular readers know what a numbers nerd [...]
On Deficit-Financed Wars
This part of President Obama‘s Oval Office address was clearly aimed at Bush: Unfortunately, over the last decade, we’ve not done what’s necessary to shore up the foundations of our own prosperity. We spent a trillion dollars at war, often financed by borrowing from overseas. This, in turn, has short-changed investments in our own people, [...]
“Trying To Split The Difference Between The Irreconcilable”
How’s this for most succinct summation of last night’s Oval Office address? President Obama‘s Oval Office address was impressive and perplexing. Politically, I liked the clever pivot to the domestic economy, but he left me utterly confused about the mission in Iraq and Afghanistan. Are we to continue to spend trillions supposedly building “democracy” in [...]