A shift in focus on the economy?

President Barack Obama may be taking his economic team in a different direction.

Alan Krueger, the Princeton University economist who is viewed as having a pro-labor focus, is expected to be named chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisors, replacing the more conservative, corporate-friendly Austan Goolsbee.

Such an appointment would be good news, but cannot undo the damage caused by the president's early ties to the Lawrence Summers crowd. Summers, Goolsbee, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and the rest of the crowd he assembled have been far too committed to the financial system and maintaining the status quo. Krueger alters that mix, but may not have enough juice to offset the Ben Bernanke/Geithner axis.

What we need is an economic team comprised of Krueger, Dean Baker, Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz -- which would move the president in a more progressive, pro-labor direction.

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Callous Cantor and the soul(lessness) of the GOP

Virginia gets hit with an earthquake and its most prominent national poltician -- House Majority Leader Eric Cantor -- questions the federal government's role in aiding the state in the aftermath.

While touring the damage in his district, Cantor surmised, “Obviously, the problem is that people in Virginia don’t have earthquake insurance.” As the Insurance Information Institute notes, “earthquakes are not covered under standard U.S. homeowners or business insurance policies, although supplemental coverage is usually available.” So, for Cantor, the problem here is that Virginians didn’t have the foresight to predict an exceedingly rare natural disaster and pay out of their own pocket in advance.

If absolutely nothing else, Cantor is at least consistent in his callous attitude. When Americans were struggling to recover from the deadly tornado that tore through south in May, Cantor also demanded that any disaster relief be offset with cuts. Apparently, to Cantor, the “appropriate role” for public servants is to completely fail the public they serve.

Cantor, of course, is not some outlier Republican. He's one of the voices of the party,part of its brain trust. What he says represents what the party believes.

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As dictators fall

George Bush was right to assume that the dictatorships ruling the Middle East were bound to fall. He was wrong, however, to assume that U.S. military force was necessary to make it happen.

Egypt, Tunisia and now Libya (and likely Syria) show that change comes from the grassroots, whether through nonviolent protest or through armed resurrection and cannot be imposed from above.

Admittedly, stability has not been achieved in either Tunisia or Egypt, but Afghanistan and Iraq remain violent, dangerous places despite the presence of American troops.

Change does not occur easily and there remains a danger that all of these countries could fall under the sway of new despots or religious fanatics. But what we need to learn is that we cannot manage these changes; the best we can do is react to them and profess our commitment to human rights -- economic and gender equality, minority representation and self-determination.

Times asks Paulsen the wrong questions

We must be in crisis. Otherwise, why would anyone want to know what Henry Paulson had to say?

As the story in today's Times points out, Paulson was at the helm in 2008 when the financial system entered meltdown and, if we wanted to be accurate about it, we would admit that he bore significant responsibility for the crash and the malaise that has followed.

But the Times left much of that out of its piece, preferring instead to focus on the prospects for the future. That might seem the best way to move forward to some, but the reality is that we cannot move forward without answering questions about cause and effect.

Rather than going to Paulsen for a diagnosis, we should be suing him for malpractice.

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• Suburban Pastoral, a chapbook by Hank Kalet, available here.

Sell outs and sell offs

The Dow Jones Industrial Index tumbled sharply today, a sign that even Wall Street has no stomach for the nation's economic malaise and the international debt crisis.

The sell-off should have been expected. Our political system has failed us at a time when we need it functioning at a high level to deal with issues of unemployment, housing and wage stagnation. Rather than working to create jobs and inject money into the economy, we have a political class that is in thrall to the debt-hawks and a Republican Party whose only goal is the destruction of a presidency.

I was talking at lunch today with some of my fellow writers, and it is clear that we all feel the same sense of hopelessness, as though the nation's well-being was being held hostage to political gamesmanship.

And the ugly undercurrent that has been bubbling up from the depths -- the racism and xenophobia that has used a black president as an excuse for extreme behavior -- is having real results in the halls of Congress and on the streets of America's cities.

The left has failed to provide an alternative narrative, one in which government aids Americans and acts as our defender against corporate greed. That is the story we should be telling -- while also reminding people that the Bush tax cuts, the recession and our two wars are responsible for most of the budget problems we are facing.

If we do not do that, we run the risk of allowing the right-wing populists to dominate debate and take the nation into the darkest of places.


The

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• Read poetry at The Subterranean.
• Certainties and Uncertainties a chapbook by Hank Kalet, will be published in November by Finishing Line Press. It can be ordered here.
• Suburban Pastoral, a chapbook by Hank Kalet, available here.

Progressive Democrats vote 'no' on debt bill

An interesting Facebook comment from Doug Henwood, the economist who runs Left Business Observer:

Another fun fact: two-thirds of the yes votes in the House for the budget bill came from Republicans; they were for it by 174-66. Dems were divided, with 95 for, 95 against. Has Obama become the de facto leader of the Republican party?

I think it is instructive to look at the Democratic "no" votes, to understand what this budget/debt bill means for the long haul. The most progressive members of the House cast votes against the bill, members who have committed themselves to defending programs that aid the middle class and poor, who view government as a necessary bulwark against the predations of capitalism.

Here is the statement from the cochairmen of the Progressive Caucus, Raul Grijalva (D-Airz.) and Keith Ellison (D-Minn.):

While voting to increase the debt ceiling is a necessary step, the deficit-reduction measures included in this deal will further harm our economy and hurt working Americans. With unemployment still above 9% and stagnating economic growth, taking money out of the economy will only place a heavier burden on working families.


This is the wrong approach for our economy at the wrong time, and it goes against our basic values. For that reason, we and many of our members will be voting no.

Progressives are committed to prosperity for the middle class, and we believe that reasonable deficit reduction can be achieved while advancing our values. But today’s deficit-reduction deal falls short. Republicans have sought to dismantle basic services for average Americans while spending more to support millionaires and corporations.

Tea Party Republicans have held our economy hostage to those demands, but deficit reduction should not be enacted in a hostage situation. We have long said default on the full faith and credit of the United States is unacceptable. If this bill is defeated, we urge the President to use his 14th amendment powers to raise the debt ceiling and avoid default.

We will continue to fight for programs that help working families. During recent weeks the Congressional Progressive Caucus stood with millions of people across the country to protect Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid from being cut in the deal being voted on today.

But preventing the worst from happening is not enough. Americans will not stand by while their livelihood comes under attack. We can structure our economy in a way that benefits everybody—not just special interests, and not just the extremely wealthy. We can articulate a vision for the country not based on what America can’t achieve—but what it can. That is the type of leadership Americans expect.

Obama is mentioned in the statement only tangentially, but the attack on false leadership must hit him along with the GOP leadership, which has used the Tea Party minority to stall the debt debate and push the compromiser-in-chief into a corner. A president more committed to progressive principles might have pushed back, but a Wall Street-friend Democrat just isn't going to do that.

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• Certainties and Uncertainties a chapbook by Hank Kalet, will be published in November by Finishing Line Press. It can be ordered here.
• Suburban Pastoral, a chapbook by Hank Kalet, available here.

Bad deal on debt

It appears that we've avoided default. So why don't I feel better about the economy or America's future?

The answer can best be summed up by U.S. Rep. Rush Holt, the Democrat who voted against the debt deal. In an e-mailed statement, Holt characterized the debate as a hostage-taking in which the "Tea Party and their enabler ... have insisted that, unless Congress enacted their radical, ideological agenda, they would force an unprecedented default on America’s obligations and thus trigger an economic collapse."

That approach, he said, led to an unbalanced deal that will do damage to the American economy and leave the most vulnerable Americans at the mercy of the market.

The House has voted for vast cuts in government services that ordinary Americans depend on:  student loans, unemployment insurance, food safety inspections, highway safety programs, and more.  These cuts will force layoffs among teachers, public safety officers, construction workers, and more.  These laid-off workers will, in turn, be forced to pare back their spending at their local grocery stores, drug stores, and small businesses, forcing still more layoffs – a vicious circle that threatens to destabilize our fragile economy.  We saw in last week’s economic reports that job growth has been choked back by cuts in state and local governments.  This deal does not help the situation.  It hurts the economy.

The deal lays the groundwork for another $1.5 trillion in cuts to come, to be negotiated behind closed doors by an unelected super-committee.  Given that the first round of cuts will have decimated discretionary programs, these later cuts will very likely focus on Social Security and Medicare.  The citizens who will be hurt most are those who have the least voice in our democracy.  After all, when a handful of politicians gather in the proverbial smoke-filled room, the interests of ordinary Americans are nearly always left out.

Yet although most Americans will sacrifice greatly, the most privileged among us will be immune.  Favored corporate interests, millionaires, and billionaires will continue to receive special tax breaks as far as the eye can see.  That is not the sort of fair, balanced deal that Americans asked for and expected.

As poor as this deal is on its merits, I am even more troubled by the precedent it sets.  The Tea Party and their enablers have, by taking the American economy hostage, transformed a routine budgetary authorization into the most dramatic reshaping of government in decades.  Today’s deal establishes that government-by-hostage-negotiation is a legitimate, effective way to achieve one’s political ends.  I am frightened by what this means for the future of our democracy.

• Send me an e-mail.
• Read poetry at The Subterranean.
• Certainties and Uncertainties a chapbook by Hank Kalet, will be published in November by Finishing Line Press. It can be ordered here.
• Suburban Pastoral, a chapbook by Hank Kalet, available here.

• Send me an e-mail.
• Read poetry at The Subterranean.
• Certainties and Uncertainties a chapbook by Hank Kalet, will be published in November by Finishing Line Press. It can be ordered here.
• Suburban Pastoral, a chapbook by Hank Kalet, available here.