Democratic Party

Yesterday Thom Hartmann and I discussed the proposal to extend and expand what Democrats have called the 'payroll tax holiday.' (Video is below.) There are no heroes in this debate, but there are certainly villains. There are several different ways this could end - and most of them aren't good.

By proposing to expand and extend this 'holiday,' Democrats have bypassed more efficient ways to help the economy, and have once again endangered Social Security. And by demanding tax breaks for millionaires while blocking them for the middle class, Republicans have once again demonstrated their willingness to blow up the economy for self-serving purposes.

The choice is either to back the highly flawed Democratic proposal or let the Republicans block it, which would plunge the economy into an even deeper hole than it's in right now. Imperfect as the proposal is, the alternative is unacceptable. If it failed the already-wounded economy would suffer even more, and millions of jobless Americans would be left without the unemployment insurance they need. more »

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Some Democrats have come under a lot of criticism lately, much of it deserved, for abandoning popular and important programs that were historically associated with their party. But some of the other Democrats -- the ones who are trying to act in the country's best interests -- are genuinely concerned about what will happen to the economy if the Super Committee fails to come up with a plan.

This message is for them -- and anyone else who has the same concern. You need to know that the evidence is clear: A Super Committee failure won't hurt the economy at all.

But its "success" almost certainly would.

Economic Y2K

Every month it seems as if there's another "bipartisan" process designed to impose austerity on the American people. And every month we're told there will be terrible consequences in the world's markets if it doesn't succeed. These predictions are the economic equivalent of "Y2K" -- always apocalyptic, never true, and all too frequently believed.

Democratic officials and staffers are being bombarded by these predictions, delivered by think-tank operatives from their own party who have been steeped in the cult of austerity. It doesn't matter how many times they're refuted by impeccably constructed papers, or by the observations of Nobel Prize winners. And it doesn't matter how many times these predictions are proven wrong.

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If you've ever questioned whether the so-called "Super Committee" represents a breakdown in the democratic process, yesterday's proposal from the group's Democratic members should put your doubts to rest. The system's seriously broken when unelected super-legislators from both parties keep trying to top each other in proposing inhumane and unpopular programs. more »

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Thanks to a hit piece by one of those Beltway pseudo-"bipartisans" we can now state conclusively what many of us have long suspected: Occupy Wall Street speaks for the American majority. We've got the polling numbers to prove it. We now know where the real center lies.

It's easy to understand why people like Douglas Schoen are lining up to attack OWS. It shines a spotlight on their cardboard centrism - that think-tank designed, artificially-inseminated, vat-grown corporate ideology so widely rejected by the public at large. OWS represents the real American consensus, and that has them running scared.

But Schoen's Wall Street Journal editorial falls so far short of the mark that it elicits only a soft sense of pity. It illustrates nothing except the intellectual and moral bankruptcy of those out-of-step Democrats who sell themselves to conservatism under the 'centrist' or 'Third Way' banner.

Oh, wait. It also provides enough data to undermine his entire argument - and possibly his entire ideology. more »

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Here's an interview we did with Sam Seder today (Monday) on his Majority Report show. It's about raising the Medicare eligibility age. Great discussion (it's always a great show):

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On most issues Lawrence O'Donnell is on the side of the angels. But O'Donnell, who held senior staff positions on Capitol Hill during the 1990's, is one of many Democrats and liberals who think the way to fix today's problems is by recycling yesterday's solutions - even when those solutions didn't even fix yesterday's problems. Nostalgia for the great compromises of the 90's is going to sink the Democratic Party, not help it. More importantly, it will lead to the wrong policy decisions.

Nowhere is this more evident than in the current deficit debate. When O'Donnell accepted Esquire's challenge to create his own "deficit commission," he was already reinforcing the mistaken idea that deficits are the nation's number one concern. I hosted The Young Turks broadcast (America's #1 online news show, I'm told!) for three days this week. The clip below shows O'Donnell's last comments on the deficit debate, along with our comments.

The short version of our reaction? Lawrence, we love ya, but you're completely wrong on this one. And this is exactly the kind of thinking that will drive us over a cliff if we stick with it:

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Do you hear a noise like power saws cutting away at your Social Security benefits? That's the sound of the politicians working on the "Chain Gang."

They're promoting the "chained CPI," Washington's latest gimmick for tricking voters and cutting their hard-earned benefits to protect the wealthy. That may sound like inflammatory rhetoric, but the numbers don't allow for any other conclusion. People retiring today could lose more than $18,000 in benefits over their lifetimes - and people who are already retired will feel the pain too.

What's wrong with this idea?

1) It's an underhanded way to cut Social Security benefits (its true intent).
2) It's unnecessary.
3) It's unfair to women, the poor, minorities, and the very elderly.
4) It reflects a un-American political culture of pessimism and lost faith in the future.

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How broken is today's political debate? The only politician standing up for most Republican voters on today’s most burning political issue is. … a Socialist.

The question is whether we reduce the deficit only through spending cuts, or also by raising taxes on the rich. This should be an easy issue for Democrats to stand on ... and run on. A recent New York Times/CBS News poll showed that 72% of of those surveyed agreed that federal taxes should be raised for households making more than $250,000 - including 55% of Republicans. Yet even with the GOP leadership far to the right of the country on this issue, Democrats haven’t taken an unequivocal position.

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Only two budget proposals are being 'taken seriously' in Washington right now. One adopts the rhetoric of "austerity economics," that grab-bag of right-wing misconceptions that's weakened the British economy and wounded its ruling coalition.

The other comes from the Republicans.

There's a third budget plan, too. It reflects the views most Americans hold - including, in some cases, most Republicans . But it's either being ignored or contemptuously dismissed by the People That Matter, apparently for that most traditionally British of reasons: it doesn't come from "the right sort of people."

What this country really needs right now is an opposition party, one that refuses to accept stale and discredited conservative ideas. The President and other Democrats have been governing as if they were in a coalition government with Republicans - and sometimes like the junior partner in that coalition. There are better ways to serve themselves, their party, and their country. more »

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Congratulations! The "grand compromise" will cut nearly thirty nine billion dollars in needed government spending, which proves how "serious" everyone is about reducing the deficit. The grand compromisers could have cancelled the next ten years of tax subsidies for oil companies and cut the deficit by forty billion, but apparently that's not how serious people do things.

If the Republican Party were singing to its base today, the song would be the theme from Friends, "I'll Be There For You." And the Democrats would be singing "You Always Hurt the One You Love." We're being told we should celebrate a "compromise" in which Democrats gave up $38.5 billion in spending cuts, when the original Republican demand was for $32 billion. That means the Democrats only gave the Republicans 20% more (20.2135%, to be precise) than they originally demanded.

Okay, guys. You get an extra 20% -- and not a penny more!

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