Each morning, Bill Scher and Terrance Heath serve up what progressives need to affect change on the kitchen-table issues families face: jobs, health care, green energy, financial reform, affordable education and retirement sec
Major Social Security Poll To Be Released Today
Pollster Stan Greenberg, Campaign For America's Future and MoveOn.org to release new poll data at 10 AM ET showing danger for politicians that back Social Security cuts. Check out OurFuture.org later today for poll details.
Separate AARP poll shows vast majority opposes cutting Social Security: "85% oppose cutting Social Security to reduce the deficit as program celebrates 75th anniversary ... 50% of non-retired adults are willing to pay more now in payroll taxes to ensure Social Security will be there for them when they retire."
FDR's grandson James Roosevelt pronounces the Social Security "crisis" more myth than fact: "The truth is that Social Security is completely solvent today, and will be into the future because it has a dedicated income stream that covers its costs and consistently generates a surplus, which today is $2.5 trillion ... those 'baby boomers' who are going to bust Social Security when the retire? They have been paying into the system for more than 40 years, generating the large surplus the program has accumulated. Much of the money that baby boomers are and will be drawing on from Social Security, is, and will be, their own. That fact is conveniently forgotten by the critics."
Conservatives Resist Doing Anything For Economy
WH econ aide Jared Bernstein criticizes Rep. John Boehner's call to suspend the stimulus: "John Boehner wants a lot of people to lose their jobs. ...That would be the direct consequence of his suggestion that we shut down the Recovery Act: 'There's still about $400 billion or $500 billion of the stimulus plan that has not been spent. Why don't we stop it?' Now if you have been following this blog, you know that the notion there is '$400 billion or $500 billion' in Recovery Act funding unspent couldn't be further from the truth. In fact, we're right on track to hit the goal set when the Recovery Act passed: that 70% of the $787 billion in funds would be 'outlaid' or provided in tax benefits by September 30, 2010. But you don't have to take our word for it -- independent fact-checker Politifact.com recently rated Rep. Boehner's claim flat-out false."
Anti-stimulus Rep. Mike Pence hosts job fair with stimulus recipients. CBS: "...Democrats say Pence's job fair is yet another example of Republicans taking credit for jobs created by the stimulus while at the same time criticizing the program."
GOP Gov. Rick Perry wants federal government handout, not federal government standards. Wonk Room's Pat Garofalo: "...the state aid bill that passed yesterday includes $10 billion in money to prevent teacher layoffs — including $800 million for Texas — but comes with the stipulation that Texas must commit to maintaining its current level of education funding ... [Previously,] Texas pocketed the education money that it received from the Recovery Act ... then cut its education budget ... Perry, however, is not taking the conditions imposed very well..."
Ezra Klein worries that even more state aid is needed: "If states have to cut $120 billion from their budgets, that money -- and the things it does -- will just leave the economy. There will be fewer jobs, higher taxes, less financial aid. None of that is speculative. There's no theory in which it doesn't happen. This is a large economic contraction that we've decided to allow, because we would prefer to allow it than to put down the money -- much less money, incidentally, than it will cost to extend the Bush tax cuts for the rich -- necessary to prevent it."
There are 5 unemployed workers for every job opening. This is actually an improvement. NYT's Catherine Rampell: "That is a less discouraging ratio than earlier this year, but the improvement may mainly be a result of workers who have given up looking for a job."
TNR's Richard Florida touts high-speed rail as key to accelerating economic recovery: "If the government is truly looking for a shovel-ready infrastructure project to invest in that will create short-term jobs across the country while laying a foundation for lasting prosperity, high-speed rail works perfectly ... By connecting declining places to thriving ones—Milwaukee and Detroit to Chicago, Buffalo to Toronto—it will greatly expand the economic options and opportunities available to their residents. And by providing the connective fibers within and between America’s emerging mega-regions, it will allow them to function as truly integrated economic units."
Tough choices face Fed, with critics from all sides. NYT: "...where some observers fear excessive boldness in Mr. Bernanke, others see an unacceptable timidity."
$3B more slated to help jobless keep their homes. NYT: "...the Treasury Department said it was adding $2 billion to its Hardest Hit Fund [which] goes to housing finance agencies in various states to create local aid programs ... the Department of Housing and Urban Development, will draw on $1 billion authorized by the new financial overhaul law [to] would work with local aid groups to offer bridge loans of up to $50,000 to eligible borrowers to help them pay their mortgage principal, interest, insurance and taxes for up to 24 months ..."
GOP plan to keep Bush tax cuts for wealthy increases the deficit. W. Post: "[The proposal] would add more than $36 billion to the federal deficit next year -- and transfer the bulk of that cash into the pockets of the nation's millionaires, according to a congressional analysis..."
Will Crackdown Will Lead To Comprehensive Immigration Reform?
Dems portray border security bill as strengthening argument for broader reform. CQ: "'Democrats are setting the stage for comprehensive reform,' said Darrell M. West, vice president of governance studies at the Brookings Institution. 'Republicans have been saying Congress needs to address border security, and now it’s doing so.' ... But the Obama administration and congressional Democrats are in for disappointment if they think any amount of resources sent to the Southern border will yield Republican cooperation on immigration, said Marshall Fitz, director of immigration policy at the liberal Center for American Progress."
New Pew study shows most undocumented immigrants who have children did not come just to "drop a child." NYT: "More than 80 percent of mothers in the country illegally had been here for more than a year, the figures show, and more than half had been in the country for five years or more..."
Immigrant advocates say internal govt docs show majority of deported not serious criminals. Miami Herald: "[An ICE spokesman said the "Secure Communities"] program has identified more than 262,900 foreign nationals in jails and prisons who have been charged with or convicted of criminal offenses, including more than 39,000 charged with or convicted of major violent or drug offenses ... The analysis of the documents by the activists, however, says that the majority or 79 percent of people deported in connection to Secure Communities were non-criminals or had been picked up by local police for relatively minor offenses including traffic violations or petty juvenile mischief."
David Love, at The Progressive, writes that "Repeal of the 14th Amendment is un-American: "Citizenship should remain a birthright in this nation of immigrants. But that right was a secured only by fighting a bloody Civil War and overcoming a brutal legacy of slavery. Sadly, some people want us to turn the clock back to the antebellum days."
Swing State Senators To Face Heat On Climate
Climate activists plan to hound swing state Senators during recess. Grist's Jonathan Hiskes: "The 'Shadow a Senator' organizers suggest a polite-but-firm style rather than the screaming summer '09 [Tea Party] approach. In fact, 350.org has a fun video on how not to shadow a senator, featuring some of the gun-toters and xenophobic-sign wavers from last summer."
Greenland breaking up, literally. AP: "An island of ice more than four times the size of Manhattan is drifting across the Arctic Ocean after breaking off from a glacier in Greenland, potentially threatening shipping lanes and oil platforms."
140 solar cell manufacturing jobs leaving Michigan to Mexico. WSJ: "ECD’s decision to shift what it described as low-skill assembly jobs to Mexico is part of a broader effort to cut costs and compete with solar cell makers which have manufacturing operations in China, Malaysia and other lower-wage nations ... ECD says it’s pushing ahead with plans to use the $13 million stimulus tax credit it received to upgrade other parts of its Auburn Hills [Michigan] operations ... When ECD announced the Department of Energy award, it said the $42 million project would create about 600 additional jobs in Michigan ... the company still expects to create those 600 jobs. But that could take longer than originally planned."
Coal carbon capture project hits snag. The Hill: "The town of Mattoon, Illinois wants no part of the Energy Department’s revised 'FutureGen' project after seeing its role in the program change and shrink ... [Sen. Dick] Durbin, in a statement Wednesday, said he was 'disappointed' in the decision by leaders in Mattoon and Coles County, but vowed to work with DOE to continue the project elsewhere."
"The power sector's pollution problem is largely the problem of old coal plants" notes Grist's David Roberts, but EPA is on it: "Congress designed the Clean Air Act to be a living document. EPA is instructed to periodically review the best science ... that is what Lisa Jackson's EPA is doing as we speak: updating a whole panoply of Clean Air Act and other pollution standards. That's what has coal utilities terrified."
BP keeps gushing with new outrages. Truthout's Jim Hightower: "In the early days of the cleanup, crews suddenly appeared wearing scarlet pants and white t-shirts with bold red letters spelling out, "Inmate Labor." Investigative reporter Abe Louise Young writes that the sight of prison laborers outraged the local community, so they were removed. Not the inmates, the uniforms. ... a local sheriff's official told Young, 'They're not getting paid -- it's part of their sentence.' But guess who is getting paid for this convict labor? BP ... corporations can get a 'work opportunity tax credit' of $2,400 for every work release inmate they hire."
Bank Bailout Help Foreign Banks
Elizabeth Warren's TARP watchdog panel finds bailout benefited other nations. W. Post: "The federal government's effort to stabilize the financial system in 2008 by flooding money into as many banks as possible resulted in a boon to many foreign firms and left the United States shouldering far more risk than governments that took a narrower approach..."
Wells Fargo may pay back unfair overdraft fees. AP: "A federal judge in California ordered Wells Fargo & Co. to change what he called 'unfair and deceptive business practices' that led customers into paying multiple overdraft fees, and to pay $203 million back to customers ... The decision noted that the Federal Reserve has outlawed some of the practices detailed in the case, most notably debit card overdrafts permitted without customers agreeing to accept overdraft protection."
Tea Party Over?
Voters hate everybody, but Obama the least. New NBC/WSJ poll: "While Obama’s overall approval rating remains lukewarm at 47 percent, it’s still enviable to those on Capitol Hill ... Just 33 percent have a positive view of the Democratic Party ... As for the Republican Party, only 24 percent see it positively — the GOP’s lowest-ever rating in the poll ... for the first time in the survey, the Tea Party movement has a net-negative rating, with 30 percent viewing it positively..."
Tea Party pulling GOP to the right in primaries. NYT: "The slate of general election prospects includes fewer moderate Republicans than party leaders had imagined when they began recruiting candidates a year ago, and more backed by the Tea Party movement. The results leave Republicans facing a critical question heading into the general election: Can the added enthusiasm of their conservative base for the insurgent candidates offset a potential loss of appeal to independent and centrist voters?"
