Day: November 29, 2008

The Mitt Is Back

I think Mitt is stepping in a pile of dog pooh…..

Back in the Republican primaries, when Mitt Romney staked his campaign’s prospects on victory in his native Michigan, he was a loud voice calling for Washington to save Detroit.

“The question is, ‘Where is Washington?’ ” Romney said outside a General Motors plant in January. “Where does it stop? Is there a point at which someone says ‘enough’? Or are we going to allow the entire domestic automotive manufacturing industry to disappear?”

But now, with the Big Three automakers lobbying Congress for a bailout that executives say is needed to keep the industry alive, the former Massachusetts governor is prescribing a tough love approach to the industry he grew up in.

Romney is strongly opposed to the auto industry’s request for $25 billion in low-interest loans. He is calling for management shakeups inside the companies as they engage in extensive economic restructuring, and is recommending bankruptcy or similar legal arrangements for America’s auto giants.

Romney entered the national debate this week with an op-ed in The New York Times that carried an eyebrow-raising headline: “Let Detroit Go Bankrupt.”

His stark statements caught many political observers — including some of his most influential backers in Michigan — by surprise.

The Mitt is back and sounding the waters for 2012.

National Economic Recovery Act

The US needs a NERA to get the economy and the country moving again.
Make no mistake about it, this election was won on bread and butter economic issues. While John McCain and Sarah Palin focused on the rhetoric of patriotism, “trickle-down” economics, “staying the course” on Bush’s tax cuts and family values; they also embraced the very economic policies that both undermine the middle class and subvert the security of American family life.
What the election results told us is we need a President who understands and believes in coherent, comprehensive and equitable policies that promote sustainable and healthy economic growth. What we need is a leader who in his First Hundred Days in office will deal effectively with the housing crisis and demand legislative oversight and accountability of those financial, insurance and other corporations that have, or will be, bailed out.

The first thing that President-elect Obama should do is to begin to restore the confidence of the American people by demonstrating that he is willing to provide leadership; that he is willing to take immediate and bold policy initiatives to put the economy back on the right track. Toward this end he should call a meeting as soon as possible with Senator Harry Reid, the majority leader, and Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House. At this meeting he should propose that they call Congress back into a special session to consider emergency legislation: The National Economic Recovery Act of 2008.

The legislation would include:

* Investment in alternative energy development and new green collar jobs;

* An extension of unemployment benefits;

* Expansion of the Food Stamp program;

* Re-negotiation of mortgage terms for those about to lose their homes;
* An increase in the Community Economic Development discretionary budget to $250 million a year so that community economic development corporations (CDCs) can create more business and employment opportunities in economically distressed neighborhoods and communities that have been hit hardest by the sub-prime loan crisis; and most important

* A major economic stimulus package that would provide $250 billion in direct assistance to states and local governments for infrastructure development. This kind of direct federal spending for community and economic development would be far more productive than rebate checks. It will create jobs and crucial investments where it counts and is needed.
It is the smartest investment we can make as a nation. Just think about some recent events: a bridge in Minneapolis collapsing; the electric grids failing last summer; Hurricane Katrina hitting New Orleans; commuter traffic logjams; and a sewage system breaking down in Honolulu are but a few examples of our outdated and crumbling infrastructure. In communities across our nation, our schools, mass transit systems, water and sewer plants, hospitals, bridges, levees, railway beds, ports and subways are in disrepair. If we are to participate in an increasingly competitive international economy we must rehabilitate our infrastructure

Ideas are those of Arthur Blaustein and deserve a good hard look….we need new ideas not the same sort of crappy thinking that put us in this spot in history.

Why Do They Keep Injecting Race?

The media that is.

As the Obama team rolls out their picks for the various position the media reports on it by stated that “She will be the first African-American to hold the position”  Or that he will be the first African-American in the AG’s office.  Or…well you get the idea……

This past election has proven that most Americans have moved past the race thing, but somehow the media has to keep injecting it into the conversation.  Why?

I realize that the media thinks at most of us mortals are ignorant dolts,  but I do not think that most of us need their unsolicited help.  We are a visually aided society and I think that most Americans can determine what a persons ethnic origins are.  Well, I guess there are some that will need assistence in this area, but most of us can do it all by ourselves.

May I suggest that it is time to let that crap go.  Time to move on and report the news and stop the commentaries.

Obama And Jobs

The economic plan announced Saturday by President-Elect Barack Obama, with the goal of “saving or creating” 2.5 million jobs in 2009 and 2010, is a measure that has already been outstripped by events. The deepening crisis of American and world capitalism could destroy that many US jobs in the next six to nine months alone.

The collapse of the auto industry itself would wipe out 2.5 million to 3 million jobs according to most estimates, canceling out the entirety of Obama’s plan, even if it were to be enacted quickly and in full by the incoming Democratic-controlled Congress. The broader recession, well under way, is expected to increase the ranks of the unemployed by a million or more by next spring.

Obama announced his jobs plan in a brief radio speech on Saturday morning, excerpts of which were also posted on YouTube. He noted the most recent, extremely ominous, economic figures: “New home purchases in October were the lowest in half a century. 540,000 more jobless claims were filed last week, the highest in eighteen years. And we now risk falling into a deflationary spiral…”

The gauzy, patriotic rhetoric conceals a lie. The economic and class divisions in the United States are not small; they are the largest and widest in American history. Never has such a tiny minority of the population monopolized such a huge proportion of overall wealth, to the detriment of the vast majority. As for the demand that action be taken “above all, together,” it means that the financial aristocracy, which is responsible for the crisis, should not be compelled to pay for it. Instead, the burden will be placed on the backs of “all,” i.e., on working people.

Obama aides signaled the next day that he was retreating from his campaign promise to roll back the Bush administration’s tax cuts for the wealthy. Top adviser David Axelrod, appearing on two Sunday television interview programs, did not contradict reports that Obama would instead allow the Bush tax cuts to continue for another two years, when they are scheduled to expire. Another Obama adviser, William Daley, former Clinton commerce secretary, told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that a continuation of the tax cut for those making over $250,000 a year until its scheduled expiration at the end of 2010 now “looks more likely than not.”

In other words, these selections demonstrate that Obama will pursue economic policies determined by the same class interests upheld by his Republican predecessor. The primary concern will be the defense of the financial system—i.e., the accumulated wealth of the financial aristocracy, embodied in the giant banks, hedge funds and other huge financial institutions, whose parasitic and speculative operations precipitated the current crisis.

But To Die In A Stampede?

You here about this sort of thing in India at a religious site or in Latin America at a Football game, but in the US?

A Wal-Mart worker was killed yesterday after an “out of control” throng of shoppers eager for post-Thanksgiving bargains broke down the doors at a suburban store and knocked him to the ground, police said.

Other workers were trampled as they tried to rescue the man, and customers stepped over him and became irate when officials said the store was closing because of the death, police and witnesses said.

At least four other people, including a woman who was eight months pregnant, were taken to hospitals for observation or minor injuries, and the store in Valley Stream on Long Island closed for several hours. It reopened shortly after 1 p.m.

eanwhile, in Palm Dessert, Calif., two people were shot to death in a crowded toy store yesterday in a confrontation apparently involving rival groups, city officials said. Palm Desert Councilman Jim Ferguson said police told him two men with handguns shot and killed each other.

Oh BTW–Merry Christmas