Isaiah J. Poole

I suspected there was something being left unsaid when the headlines began streaming this morning that personal incomes in May surged 1.4 percent. And, indeed, there was.

President Obama will get an opportunity in the coming weeks to show American workers that he has the mettle to get tough with China when that country flouts the basic principles of fair trade, and it will be on an issue in which he does not have the luxury of ambiguity.

Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., has been doing his best to block the most critical element of health care reform—a public health insurance option that can keep private insurers honest. Behind the scenes, progressive groups are preparing to fight back with the proposals that will put to rest the excuse that taxpayers can't afford the substanrial changes we need.

There's a reason why lawbreakers don't get to negotiate the terms of their punishment or their parole. There is no bartering to be done between the protectors of law and order and the violators of law and order. There are only two basic questions for the person who dared to stand outside the law: What is required of you to atone and what must be done to prevent that lawbreaking from recurring.

Third Way, an organization of so-called centrist Democrats, is promoting what it calls a "hybrid" proposal for a health insurance public plan option that it says progressives should be able to support. No, we shouldn't. It's an unacceptable attempt by people too wedded to the status quo to protect the tail ends of the health insurance industry.

I suspected there was something being left unsaid when the headlines began streaming this morning that personal incomes in May surged 1.4 percent. And, indeed, there was.

President Obama will get an opportunity in the coming weeks to show American workers that he has the mettle to get tough with China when that country flouts the basic principles of fair trade, and it will be on an issue in which he does not have the luxury of ambiguity.

Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., has been doing his best to block the most critical element of health care reform—a public health insurance option that can keep private insurers honest. Behind the scenes, progressive groups are preparing to fight back with the proposals that will put to rest the excuse that taxpayers can't afford the substanrial changes we need.

There's a reason why lawbreakers don't get to negotiate the terms of their punishment or their parole. There is no bartering to be done between the protectors of law and order and the violators of law and order. There are only two basic questions for the person who dared to stand outside the law: What is required of you to atone and what must be done to prevent that lawbreaking from recurring.

Third Way, an organization of so-called centrist Democrats, is promoting what it calls a "hybrid" proposal for a health insurance public plan option that it says progressives should be able to support. No, we shouldn't. It's an unacceptable attempt by people too wedded to the status quo to protect the tail ends of the health insurance industry.