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The Obama Opportunity
Mon, 02/23/2009 - 9:06pm | mal contends
President Barack Obama will speak to the American public tonight via an address to a joint session of Congress.
This critical address comes as financial markets are tumbling while the American public continues to express high levels of confidence about Obama as president and his agenda addressing the economic crises.
Obama needs to call forth a collective effort from the American people. Politically, he is at the apex of his administration’s ability to summon the excitement of community and sacrifice that Americans have always given at moments of peril.
It's an enduring dynamic of human beings living in a community at crisis that is too rarely called on but is most needed at the worst of times.
This critical address comes as financial markets are tumbling while the American public continues to express high levels of confidence about Obama as president and his agenda addressing the economic crises.
Obama needs to call forth a collective effort from the American people. Politically, he is at the apex of his administration’s ability to summon the excitement of community and sacrifice that Americans have always given at moments of peril.
It's an enduring dynamic of human beings living in a community at crisis that is too rarely called on but is most needed at the worst of times.
Tags: License granted for a total war on recession
Tue, 12/16/2008 - 2:58pm | mal contends
Update: Wall Street Journal: "We are running out of the traditional ammunition that's used in a recession, which is to lower interest rates. They're getting to be about as low as they can go. And although the Fed is still going to have more tools available to it, it is critical that the other branches of government step up."
- Barack Obama in a news conference in which he called for a government spending stimulus program.
The incoming Obama administration has just been granted a political license to pursue virtually anything it wants in fiscal policy in light of the seriousness with which the Fed is addressing the economic situation facing the world.
Reducing its key rate to a historic low, near zero, the Fed said it would use “all available tools” to fight the recession; in other words War against the recession by any means necessary.
----
Reads the Fed's statement:
For immediate release
The Federal Open Market Committee decided today to establish a target range for the federal funds rate of 0 to 1/4 percent.
- Barack Obama in a news conference in which he called for a government spending stimulus program.
The incoming Obama administration has just been granted a political license to pursue virtually anything it wants in fiscal policy in light of the seriousness with which the Fed is addressing the economic situation facing the world.
Reducing its key rate to a historic low, near zero, the Fed said it would use “all available tools” to fight the recession; in other words War against the recession by any means necessary.
----
Reads the Fed's statement:
For immediate release
The Federal Open Market Committee decided today to establish a target range for the federal funds rate of 0 to 1/4 percent.
Krugman: Large fiscal expansion needed
Mon, 12/01/2008 - 9:46am | mal contends
Update: National Bureau of Economic Research says the U.S. economy fell into a recession last year.
Among the pathological programs pursued by the Bush administration is its enterprise to turn the national debt from prospects made in 2001 of the debt being completely paid off in 10 years to upping the debt to $10 trillion.
'Deficits don't matter,' infamously mumbled Dick Cheney at a high-level meeting that was recalled by former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neil.
Worse is the wish list that the rightwingers wanted from the future administrations dealing with the massive debt: Eliminating those awful programs like Social Security and Medicaid and Medicare which would become unsustainable because of the debt purposefully piled up by Bush and Cheney.
Nobel Prize-winning Paul Krugman warns today that president-elect Obama should not clean up the fiscal mess immediately in the face of a dangerous recession, and views government spending as a economic imperative to ending the recession:
Among the pathological programs pursued by the Bush administration is its enterprise to turn the national debt from prospects made in 2001 of the debt being completely paid off in 10 years to upping the debt to $10 trillion.
'Deficits don't matter,' infamously mumbled Dick Cheney at a high-level meeting that was recalled by former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neil.
Worse is the wish list that the rightwingers wanted from the future administrations dealing with the massive debt: Eliminating those awful programs like Social Security and Medicaid and Medicare which would become unsustainable because of the debt purposefully piled up by Bush and Cheney.
Nobel Prize-winning Paul Krugman warns today that president-elect Obama should not clean up the fiscal mess immediately in the face of a dangerous recession, and views government spending as a economic imperative to ending the recession:
(C)ircumstances right now are anything but normal. ...
Go for the Juggler, Obama
Fri, 11/07/2008 - 11:14am | mal contends
Paul Krugman has a piece in the Times this morning advocating that President-elect Obama pursue a full-blooded “progressive agenda.”
In opposition to the warnings of the center-right pundits who recommend that Obama go slow and not attempt too much change, Krugman echoes most citizens in our democracy who advise or more accurately demand: Change.
That rabble! And it’s all going so well.
Seriously, in light of the gargantuan problems facing our country and the irrefutable electoral mandate, in which direction do you think Obama will direct his legislative and administrative agendas?
Putting aside the ludicrous notion that we are a center-right country that discredited-by-facts pundits are spewing (and didn’t we just have an election or two these last two years repudiating the thesis?), Obama can be counted on to go for the juggler.
That sage advice decided upon by the American people in the 2008 election is called an “electoral mandate.”
In opposition to the warnings of the center-right pundits who recommend that Obama go slow and not attempt too much change, Krugman echoes most citizens in our democracy who advise or more accurately demand: Change.
That rabble! And it’s all going so well.
Seriously, in light of the gargantuan problems facing our country and the irrefutable electoral mandate, in which direction do you think Obama will direct his legislative and administrative agendas?
Putting aside the ludicrous notion that we are a center-right country that discredited-by-facts pundits are spewing (and didn’t we just have an election or two these last two years repudiating the thesis?), Obama can be counted on to go for the juggler.
That sage advice decided upon by the American people in the 2008 election is called an “electoral mandate.”
Warren Buffett Says Confidence is Oxygen
Thu, 10/02/2008 - 10:26am | mal contends
"You want to be greedy when others are fearful. You want to be fearful when others are greedy. It's that simple. ... They're pretty fearful. In fact, in my adult lifetime, I don’t think I’ve ever seen people as fearful economically as they are right now."
- Warren Buffett, October 1, 2008 on the Charlie Rose Show
Why the Charlie Rose show featuring an exclusive conversation with Warren Edward Buffett, regarded as the world's greatest investor and chair of Berkshire Hathaway, is not endlessly broadcast this week is a mystery of the American political culture.
Even as House Republicans scream (at the apparent urging of Newt Gingrich) that the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act 2008 is a slippery slope to socialism, Buffett's reasoned defense of the Bush-Paulson-US Senate-Everyone-except-the-GOP-House Members Act assures that not only may the bailout bill produce a net profit (if conceived of in those terms) for American taxpayers, but the fear and loathing epitomized by the House Republicans (though not singled out by Buffett in the interview) is ludicrously removed from reality.
- Warren Buffett, October 1, 2008 on the Charlie Rose Show
Why the Charlie Rose show featuring an exclusive conversation with Warren Edward Buffett, regarded as the world's greatest investor and chair of Berkshire Hathaway, is not endlessly broadcast this week is a mystery of the American political culture.
Even as House Republicans scream (at the apparent urging of Newt Gingrich) that the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act 2008 is a slippery slope to socialism, Buffett's reasoned defense of the Bush-Paulson-US Senate-Everyone-except-the-GOP-House Members Act assures that not only may the bailout bill produce a net profit (if conceived of in those terms) for American taxpayers, but the fear and loathing epitomized by the House Republicans (though not singled out by Buffett in the interview) is ludicrously removed from reality.
Hey Chairman Obey, The Recession's Over Here
Tue, 06/24/2008 - 10:38am | Nate W
As the economy worsens, more and more key players are getting on board with the idea of a second economic recovery package. But not everyone's where we need them to be to get something done in time to matter. For example Rep. David Obey (D-WI), powerful chairman of the Appropriations Committee free associated to Congress Daily (subscription only) and revealed that he doesn't quite get how urgent doing something to stave off this recession is:
"People use a kinds of terminology; I don't care if you call it a second supplemental or a second economic [stimulus] package -- to me there are all kinds of things that we need domestically -- but we need finish this job [war supplemental] before we can start thinking about the next one"
This pains me. Not only are House Democrats punting on telecom immunity, they're putting war spending ahead of domestic spending.