Progressive Opinion

huffingtonpost.com — The debate we have just witnessed has shown Washington, D.C. not just to be broken, but corrupt. The American people are disgusted watching politicians play political chicken with the nation's economy and future. In such a bitter and unprincipled atmosphere, whoever has the political clout to enforce their self-interest and retain their privileges wins the battles. But there are two casualties in such political warfare: the common good and the most vulnerable. So how will vulnerable people fair under this deal?

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feeds.guardian.co.uk — You'd think Congress would be too busy wrecking the economy to attack the environment. Yet, in the midst of a packed schedule snapping at President Obama's heels and lunging for each other's throats, Republicans have found time to try and rip the heart out of the Environmental Protection Agency, killing 40 years of protections for water, air, endangered species, wildlife habitat and national parks. Instead of taking direct shots at the environment – not even Tea Tendency zealots come out and say they're pro-pollution -- Republicans are going after the EPA.

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thenation.com — Most of the endless rehashing of the debt deal has correctly focused on the fact that corporate interests and Tea Party politics have prevailed again, at the expense of the middle class, children in poverty, students and the elderly. But in understanding the long-term impact of this drawn-out debate, too little attention has been paid to the blow it has dealt to the foundational principles of our democracy. When all is said and done, the process that created the deal may end up being as destructive as the deal’s effects. While the country watched helplessly, each new turn and every talking head in the seemingly endless saga demonstrated that ordinary people had no real part to play. Unless we employ an army of lobbyists or have a key to the Congressional washroom, it seemed there was no reconciling the debate on the Hill with the needs and desires of those most affected by the final deal.

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motherjones.com — When the voting began on the controversial—and ugly—debt ceiling bill in the House of Representatives on Monday, Rep. Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader, did not know how many votes House Speaker John Boehner had for the measure that had been crafted by President Barack Obama and the Republicans. Boehner had not reached out to her to make certain that the crucial legislation designed to prevent a potentially disastrous U.S default would be approved. When Boehner "went to the table"—brought the bill to a vote—he "had no idea" how many votes he had, Pelosi says. The speaker, as it turned out, did not have enough Republican votes to pass the bill—only 174—and he had made no arrangement to guarantee its success. When there were minutes left for the vote, and it became apparent that Boehner would fall far short of the 216 votes necessary for passage, Pelosi's Democrats began voting in favor of the measure.

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washingtonmonthly.com — Way back in late May, House Republicans unveiled a plan to create jobs. Of course, "plan" was a strong word. It could charitably be described as a bad joke, and not even the most public-relations-savvy GOP leaders made an effort to talk about the agenda. It was unveiled, ignored, and forgotten, pretty much within the span of an afternoon. The most glaring problem with the GOP jobs agenda is that it won't work, but nearly as painful is the realization that it's already been tried, over and over again, to no avail. They either don't care or can't understand the famous axiom: "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

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washingtonmonthly.com — Way back in late May, House Republicans unveiled a plan to create jobs. Of course, "plan" was a strong word. It could charitably be described as a bad joke, and not even the most public-relations-savvy GOP leaders made an effort to talk about the agenda. It was unveiled, ignored, and forgotten, pretty much within the span of an afternoon. The most glaring problem with the GOP jobs agenda is that it won't work, but nearly as painful is the realization that it's already been tried, over and over again, to no avail. They either don't care or can't understand the famous axiom: "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."

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huffingtonpost.com — This year is, as every American must know by now, the 150th anniversary of the outbreak of the Civil War; after a century and a half, the conflict still seems far from over. In fact, there is a striking similarity between the events that led up to the attack on Fort Sumter and the current war of the Right on the Federal Government. Now as then, an intransigent block of political and social reactionaries has committed itself to ending governance at the national level unless it is allowed to dictate policy in every particular. The response of President Obama to this challenge has been utterly different from that of President Lincoln. Obama let the reactionaries dictate the agenda for negotiations and this week he surrendered -- unconditionally, if the truth be told. He, understandably, was unwilling to confront the kind of crisis that a stronger response would have precipitated. Abraham Lincoln was not, and what ensued is instructive.

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truth-out.org — Thirty years ago today, President Ronald Reagan threatened to fire almost 13,000 air traffic controllers unless they called off their strike and returned to work. He then followed through on his threat, firing most of the workers — represented by the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Organization (Patco) — and banning them from the federal workforce for life. Today’s GOP is celebrating by holding another group of airline industry workers hostage over the party’s radical anti-union stance. Republican demands that a measure making it harder for workers to unionize be attached to the re-authorization of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has led to the agency’s shutdown, costing the government more than $200 million a week, leaving 4,000 FAA employees and 70,000 construction workers out of work, and forcing airline inspectors to work without pay. And because Congress is now in recess until September, the shutdown is almost assured to last at least another month.

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washingtonmonthly.com — We knew that the Great Recession was bad. We didn't appreciate just how bad. When Obama administration's economists put together its Recovery Act, it was working with a certain set of data and expectations, and envisioned what a worst-case scenario might look like. They were right about the need for action, but wrong about the scope of the disaster they'd inherited -- the worst-case scenario was far too rosy and the stimulus response was overwhelmed by conditions that were more severe than officials even imagined. Part of this was the result of faulty expectations. The notion of the U.S. unemployment rate going from under 5% to over 10% in just two years was so absurd, many just didn't consider it possible. But it was -- the mess the Bush administration left for Democrats to clean up really was that mind-boggling bad. But part of this was also the result of faulty statistics.

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washingtonpost.com — The White House is promising a pivot to jobs. But pivoting doesn’t create jobs. Demand creates jobs. And two of the three ideas Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner laid out in his op-ed this morning — the Social Security payroll tax cut and extended unemployment benefits — are already in effect. Letting them expire would hurt the economy, but simply extending them isn’t the same as adding support for a weak labor market. But there are other ideas out there. A canvass of economists and policy analysts returned five suggestions that have, at times, enjoyed bipartisan support, and that could potentially make a real difference.

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