Progressive Breakfast: White House (Finally) Considering Another Stimulus?, Campaign for America’s Future, September 3, 2010, by Terrance Heath, used with permission, quoted verbatim:

White House (Finally) Considering Emergency Stimulus

Politico Reports that the White House is considering an emergency economic stimulus: “The Obama administration is mulling a raft of emergency fixes to stimulate the economy before the midterms, including an extension of the research and development tax credit and new infrastructure spending, according to several people familiar with the situation. Administration officials have been huddling almost continuously during the past week, brainstorming for ideas that would boost employment without hiking the massive federal deficit – with Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner rushing to the West Wing for further consultations late Thursday. The White House press office on Thursday refused to say how much a financial package might be, other than to say it won’t be a “second stimulus.” But the administration will have a tough time selling nearly any package to terrified, Obama-phobic Hill Democrats who increasingly blame the president – and his ambitious, expensive legislative agenda – for their dismal prospects this November.”

It’s (Still) The Economy, Stupid

Bernanke tells the Financial Crisis Commission that he had no options to stop Lehman’s collapse: “Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told a panel examining the U.S. financial crisis that he had no options to prevent Lehman Brothers’ failure in September 2008 even though he knew its downfall would be “catastrophic” to the financial system and economy. The Lehman failure set off severe market turmoil, spurring debate about whether the government should have done more at the time to halt the investment bank’s collapse. Speaking to the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission on Thursday, Mr. Bernanke said legal and practical considerations prevented taking action, even though ‘I never at any time wavered in my view that we should do absolutely everything possible to prevent the  failure of Lehman.’ The Democratic chairman of the 10-member panel, Phil Angelides, pressed Mr. Bernanke on the move, again calling it a ‘conscious policy decision,’ as he did during the commission’s hearing on Wednesday, citing comments from other government officials.”

Dean Baker considers the latest advice from the IMF, and wonders why these people still have jobs: “If the boys and girls at the IMF can learn a little economics, they would discover that we can run a deficit that is pretty much as large as we want in a period of high unemployment like the present. This does not have to create a debt burden because the Fed can just buy and hold the debt. This way the interest on the debt is paid to the Fed, which is then refunded to the Treasury. If we are lucky this process will generate a little inflation which will lower the real interest rate and reduce the debt burden on households and the government. If they have trouble with the theory, they can see how this works in practice. There is a small island nation where the central bank has bought an amount of debt that is almost equal to its GDP. It’s called “Japan.” Its interest burden is less than 2 percent of GDP and the interest rate on long-term debt is well under 2.0 percent in spite of having a debt to GDP ratio of 220 percent. It is incredible that IMF economists still have jobs. It is even more incredible that anyone in a policy position would waste their time listening to them.”

Ruth Marcus wants us to get shed of the word “shed”: “How did shedding migrate from shaggy dogs to job loss? The Oxford English Dictionary cites The Economist of March 1975, “the industry shed about 100,000 of its workforce.” In the last three months alone, a computer search of news reports shows 2,116 uses of the term in connection with jobs, from Ireland to Fiji. You can imagine how the term took hold. Financial writers became bored with saying the economy lost jobs. Shed is evocative. Shed worked for copy editors trying to cram the news into a headline only a few columns wide. But what might have been compactly colorful is now unnecessarily insensitive—not to mention trite. Lost is a better four-letter word. Even the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the official tallier of the nation’s joblessness, stoops to shed.”

As the summer comes to an end, Liz Schuler explains what a jobless summer means for young people: “So, what does this mean beyond a bunch of teenagers without gas money, a few new video games or an outfit their parents won’t finance? Plenty. A May report in the National Journal described the job plight of today’s young workers as a broken escalator. Instead of young people getting on at the bottom and smoothly traveling to the top throughout their careers, workers already near the top are losing jobs and going backwards, nudging out young people trying to climb on. Older workers who can’t afford to retire aren’t stepping off the escalator to make room for a new generation. And with jobs still disappearing, the escalator has all but stalled. That’s what we see in the teen jobless rate. Teenagers are competing with jobless adults for low-end, entry-level positions. This is especially true where state and local budget crises have destroyed summer jobs programs for teens.”

Peter Boone and Simon Johnson diagnose the problems of the Irish economy and the implications for the global economy: “Ireland, simply put, appears insolvent under plausible scenarios with current policies. The idea that Ireland, Greece or Portugal can cut spending and grow out of overvalued exchange rates with still large budget deficits, while servicing all their debts and building more debt, is proving — not surprisingly — wrong. Such policies leave nations burdened with large debt overhangs that effectively tax businesses and borrowers — because interest rates must stay high to reflect risk. Investors must wonder whether businesses and homeowners can afford these higher interest rates, so banks and investors cut credit lines and reduce lending. This strangles economies, even when the fiscal authorities take tough steps needed to cut deficits.”

Slate’s Daniel Gross writes that the U.S. auto industry is smaller now, but healthier: “With Ford’s restructuring, and the bankruptcies of General Motors and Chrysler, the U.S. auto industry has shrunk and cut costs to the point at which it can make money on a smaller, more realistic number of sales. So far this year, auto sales have risen in spite of tighter credit, an absence of artificial government support and slack overall demand. They’re being spurred by the demand that arises naturally from people who need and want to replace cars—not by the demand that arises artificially when lenders, dealers, manufacturers, and the government offer bribes. In large measure, the activity in the car market is mimicking that of the overall economy, one in which retail sales are rising even as credit card use declines and savings increase. Of course, it’s possible that vehicle sales will fall off a cliff and help lead the U.S. economy back into recession. But the data suggest that the industry is in a pretty decent place, especially considering where it has been. It may be years before the electric car becomes popular, but in the meantime, gasoline-powered cars may have entered an era of sustainable consumption.”

Reconsidering Iraq

WaPo’s Matt Miller admits to his Iraq mistake: “My fellow Americans: I’m a pundit, not a president, but since it’s a moment for taking stock of America’s role in Iraq, I want to remind you that I blew it. …I supported the war in 2003 because I thought Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. …Still, I’m torn. I can’t help thinking that, 100 years from now, America’s readiness to send its brave youth half a world away to topple a heinous dictator and then flush him out of a hole will be seen as noble. And not just about oil. For better or worse, I lack the moral clarity and strategic certainty of the war’s ardent supporters or foes. Instead, in retrospect, invading Iraq strikes me as a bad decision that the United States has had no choice but to make the best of. Our troops have performed remarkably. Whether they’ve been well served by their political leaders — or their political pundits — is another matter.”

Oil & Water in the Gulf

BP reports that the cost of the spill as hit $8 billion, WSJ: “Oil major BP PLC said Friday it has spent around $8 billion to date in response to the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and expects to resume its relief-well drilling shortly. The sum includes the cost of the spill response; containment; relief-well drilling; the “static kill” operation of providing mud and cementing; grants to the Gulf states; compensation claims paid; and federal costs. No new oil has flowed into the Gulf of Mexico from the Macondo well since July 15, the company said in a statement. BP said individuals and businesses had submitted more than 42,000 claims since the claims processing was transferred to the Gulf Coast Claims Facility on Aug. 23. They relate to compensation sought for damages resulting from an explosion in April on the Deepwater Horizon rig, which caused the U.S.’s largest offshore oil spill. BP has made 127,000 claims payments, totaling about $399 million so far.”

BP also says that limits on drilling are hampering oil spill payouts: “BP is warning Congress that if lawmakers pass legislation that bars the company from getting new offshore drilling permits, it may not have the money to pay for all the damages caused by its oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The company says a ban would also imperil the ambitious Gulf Coast restoration efforts that officials want the company to voluntarily support. BP executives insist that they have not backed away from their commitment to the White House to set aside $20 billion in an escrow fund over the next four years to pay damage claims and government penalties stemming from the April 20 explosion of the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig. The explosion killed 11 workers and spewed millions of barrels of oil into the gulf.”

BP has removed the the cap on the leaky remains of the Deepwater rig: “The Obama administration’s pointman on the Deepwater Horizon oil catastrophe Thursday evening announced that BP successfully removed a containment cap that had stopped crude oil from spewing into the Gulf of Mexico nearly two months ago and is expected to remove the well’s dysfuntional blowout preventer later Thursday. ‘Under the direction of the federal science team and U.S. government engineers, BP has completed the capping stack removal procedure _ an important step in the process to remove and preserve the damaged BOP,’ Retired Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen said in statement, using the common abbreviation for the blowout preventer. ‘This procedure was undertaken in accordance with specific conditions I set forth in a directive authorizing the capping stack removal and BOP replacement last week. BP will continue to follow these required conditions for the BOP removal procedure, which is expected to commence this evening. I will continue to provide updates as necessary.’”

Another fire on an offshore oil rig in the Gulf may delay lifting the ban on drilling: “The fire on a Mariner Energy oil and gas platform in shallow waters of the U.S. Gulf on Thursday was a major setback for companies hoping for an early end to the government’s drilling moratorium and raised more questions about the safety of offshore drilling. ‘This explosion will make it less likely that the moratorium on offshore drilling will be lifted,’ said Rick Muller, senior analyst for Energy Security Analysis Inc in Boston. The United States is still reeling from the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Interior Department officials declined to comment on whether the Mariner accident would prompt Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to consider expanding the current deepwater drilling moratorium to shallow waters. Such a action would be a blow to the oil industry, which has complained that the department has been too slow to approve permits for shallow water drilling since the Gulf oil spill. The Interior Department imposed a six-month halt on exploratory deepwater drilling in late May after an explosion on April 20 left a well spewing crude into the Gulf.”

Hazing Arizona

Newsweeks Eve Conant reports that the past 24 hours have been rough on Arizona politicians: “It started with Brewer, whose opening statement in last night’s debate with gubernatorial contenders, including Attorney General Terry Goddard, was painful to watch. Whether it was stage fright or just the result of a really bad day is hard to know, but Brewer, known for her brash statements, found herself struggling for words and appeared ill prepared. …Arizona’s other leading tough talker, Sheriff Joe Arpaio, is also out of his comfort zone, and this case—his ongoing dispute with the federal government—could be a lot more serious. He told reporters today that he just needed more time to comply with the feds, who are investigating allegations that his department discriminates against Hispanics. The Justice Department today said it was suing the sheriff for failing—for more than a year—to turn over records as part of that investigation.”

AZ Gov. Jan Brewer stumbled through her first debate: “Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer stumbled out of the gate during her opening statement in the first and potentially only debate in the state’s race for governor Wednesday night. Brewer, who has gained national notoriety for signing into law the country’s toughest provisions for illegal immigrants, awkwardly paused twice during the opening statement of the Clean Elections Debate broadcast on the state’s PBS affiliate. ‘I have … done so much and I just cannot believe that we have changed everything since I’ve become your governor in the last 600 days. Arizona has been brought back from its abyss,’ Brewer said, after appearing to lose her train of thought. Then, after saying, ‘We have cut the budget, we have balanced the budget and we are moving forward. We have done everything that we could possibly do,’ the governor paused for 10 seconds — an eternity in a live televised debate — before looking down at her notes. ‘We have … did what was right for Arizona. I will tell you that we have really did the best that anyone could do,’ she said, visibly flustered.

After her debate debacle, AZ Gov. Jan Brewer ran away from reporters questions about her bogus claims of beheaded bodies in the AZ desert: “Later, in an exchange about the economy, her opponent, Attorney General Terry Goddard, pointed out that Brewer’s fearmongering about violence in Arizona did not do great things for the state’s financial prospects. He then called on Brewer to recant her totally made-up claim that illegal immigrants were running around beheading people in the Arizona desert. Naturally, Brewer evaded the question. Afterwards some reporters had the gall to continue the line of questioning, asking Brewer if she still stood by her completely made up story. She was clearly too flustered to dissemble or lie, so she just ran away.”

More bad news for Brewer. News reports from Arizona say that her campaign has ties to private prisons housing illegal immigrants: “Gov. Jan Brewer’s campaign chairman and policy adviser is also a lobbyist for the largest private prison company in the country.

Chuck Coughlin is one of two people in the Brewer administration with ties to Corrections Corporation of America. The other administration member is communications director Paul Senseman, a former CCA lobbyist. His wife still lobbies for the company.

According to campaign finance records, CCA executives and employees contributed more than $1,000 to the governor’s re-election campaign. The company’s political action committee and its lobbyists contributed another $60,000 to Brewer’s top legislative priority, Proposition 100, a sales tax to help avoid budget cuts to education. Caroline Isaacs from the American Friends Service Committee, which advocates for social justice issues, said the money is evidence of influence the company has on the governor. …Corrections Corporation of America holds the contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement to lock up illegal immigrants picked up in Arizona. Tough immigration laws such as Arizona’s SB 1070 could send thousands of new bodies its way, and millions of dollars.”

The Justice Department is suing Maricopa County Sherrif Joe Arpia over a bias investigation: “The Justice Department filed a lawsuit on Thursday against Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County for not cooperating with an investigation into whether his department was systematically violating the rights of Hispanics. Obama administration officials called the suit the first time in 30 years that the federal government had to sue to compel a law enforcement agency to cooperate with an investigation concerning Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. …The Justice Department issued 51 requests for documents, most of which Sheriff Arpaio’s department ignored, as well as asking for tours of department facilities and interviews with commanders, staff members and inmates. Sheriff Arpaio, who has denied that he engages in racial profiling, has remained defiant of the government’s investigation. His lawyers have repeatedly refused to provide the documents sought by the Justice Department or provide unfettered access to its facilities.”

Politico’s Ben Smith says Arizona Governor’s debate performance is a poor reflection: “Arizona Governor Jan Brewer’s opening statement in last night’s debate reflects either an amazing lack of preparation, or sheer panic.”

Breakfast Sides

A new survey says employers are passing health care costs on to employees: “Score one for the nation’s employers. On average, the total cost of a family health insurance policy rose just 3 percent last year, to $13,770 in annual premiums, according to a survey of employer health benefits released on Thursday by the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonprofit research group. (See updated article.) But the news was much better for employers than their workers, according to the survey, which is conducted yearly by Kaiser with the Health Research and Educational Trust, an organization affiliated with the American Hospital Association. Instead of sharing the pain, as they have generally done in the past, employers chose to keep their costs steady by passing the higher costs onto workers. As a result, the employee contribution toward family coverage rose an average of 14 percent, or almost $500, from what employees paid last year. Workers are now paying nearly $4,000 a year for a family policy, a jump of 47 percent since 2005. Wages have increased by just 18 percent during that time, according to Kaiser. It included a chart detailing the changes over the last five years.”

Michael Scott Moore ponders what it means to be liberal: “Social liberals in America have been tarred by economic liberals (“conservatives”) for being so illiberal about free markets, while true social conservatives resent them for being morally liberal on the one hand, or over-liberal with a tax dollar on the other. Economic liberals in Europe, meanwhile, rarely charge ahead on social justice, because by calling themselves “liberal” they don’t necessarily mean minorities should have equal rights. It’s the economic wing of liberalism that the last few years of financial trouble have bruised so badly. Free markets have gone out of style. (Never mind whether an opaque gambling market for complex derivatives with no real use to the public should be called “free,” if most participants can hardly grasp what they’re doing.) Europeans relate market liberalism to the “Anglo-Saxon” economic model. But that’s another term that slithers around what it means.”

John Dickerson wonders what the president will say to excite Democrats about this campaign season: “President Obama has been slowly turning up his political rhetoric for months. He’s made broad attacks on Republicans and taken specific shots at people like Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. He hasn’t turned the dial up to 11 though—yet. Before his vacation, he warned Republicans he’s going to start. ‘They’ve forgotten I know how to politick pretty good,’ he said before leaving for vacation. He’s likely to start Monday in Milwaukee, Wisc., at a Labor Day rally. What will the new pitch sound like? Will Obama and his aides fully let go of worries about damaging his post-partisan brand? More important, will the president be effective at rallying Democrats to the polls with more partisan rhetoric? Obama clearly enjoys giving a political speech, but his circumstances have changed since he last gave so many good ones. During the 2008 campaign, he was derided as all pretty words and no substance. Now he faces the opposite problem: He’s pushed and passed a heap of big, fibrous legislation but gets criticism (sometimes from himself) for not being very good at communicating.”

The EPA will issue more rules on greenhouse gas emissions: “The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will roll out more regulations on greenhouse gases and other pollution to help fight climate change, but they will not be as strong as action by Congress, a senior administration official said. The agency ‘has a huge role to play in continuing the work to move from where we are now to lower carbon emissions’, said the official, who did not want to be identified as the EPA policies are still being formed. President Barack Obama, looking to take the lead in global talks on greenhouse gas emissions, has long warned that the EPA would take steps to regulate emissions if Congress failed to pass a climate bill. The Senate has all but ruled out moving on greenhouse gases this year, even though the House of Representatives passed a bill last year. In late July, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid stripped climate provisions out of an energy bill, saying he could not get one Republican vote for them.”

Terrance Heath is the Online Producer at Campaign for America’s Future. Prior to his current position he worked as a Blogging and Social Media Consultant for a number of organizations and agencies, as an outgrowth of his work as Blogmaster for EchoDitto, Inc. He stumbled into blogging and social media after starting his own blog, The Republic of T., but cut his teeth as an activist working on LGBT equality and HIV/AIDS issues. In that capacity he worked for the Human Rights Campaign and the National Minority AIDS Council. Terrance has kindly allowed Evans Liberal Politics to publish his works on an ongoing basis. He sums himself up: Black. Gay. Father. Vegetarian. Buddhist. Liberal.

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