George Will, in his “for god’s sake, let’s just eliminate all taxes” sort of way, has made what passes for an argument against the newly passed health care reform bill. Here, we attempt to demolish his arguments as they occur in his Washington Post article of March 23, “A battle won, but a victory?” Basically, it’s the same old whine about taxes, with a lot of fluff and smoke screens thrown in.

“And everybody praised the Duke,

Who this great fight did win.”

“But what good came of it at last?”

Quoth little Peterkin.

“Why that I cannot tell,” said he,

“But ’twas a famous victory”

– Robert Southey,

“The Battle of Blenheim”

Oh, sure, start it out with a rather well known defeatist poem about a futile battle. If you buy into that intro, Will has half the battle won, right? Sorry, Will, no dice.

Barack Obama hopes his famous health-care victory will mark him as a transformative president. History, however, may judge it to have been his missed opportunity to be one.

A bald assertion, nothing more.

Health care will not be seriously revisited for at least a generation, so the system’s costliest defect — untaxed employer-provided insurance, which entangles a high-inflation commodity, health care, with the wage system — remains. Obama could not challenge this without adopting measures — e.g., tax credits for individuals, enabling them to shop for their own insurance — that empower individuals and therefore conflict with his party’s agenda of spreading dependency.

Now, here Will makes his major claim, but it’s almost as fatuous as is Will. In the first place, if politics had any justice, IF, if… if we got lucky, health care WOULD be revisited – with a public option or single payer, at some point before a generation from now. However, IF health care reform accomplished it’s purpose, then it would not NEED to be revisited. Moreover, the fact of health care being a high-inflation commodity with a wage system problem is true, regardless of how good the health care bill is, right? So the claim has nothing to do with the bill at all, it’s just an attempt to tie a structural health care problem into the new bill and then CLAIM (without any evidence to tie it in) that the new bill makes this worse. However, if COST is such a problem then Will would be touting the savings in Medicare, and the fact that the reform bill saves $130 billion the first decade and $1.2 trillion during its second decade. Fair is fair. Seems by that measure the bill goes a long way towards FIXING the structural problem of health care being a high-inflation commodity. And according to the Congressional Budget Office, the health care reform bill delays by over nine years the time when Medicare would become insolvent. That’s a bad thing, Will?

On Sunday, as will happen every day for two decades, another 10,000 baby boomers became eligible for Social Security and Medicare. And Congress moved closer to piling a huge new middle-class entitlement onto the rickety structure of America’s Ponzi welfare state. Congress has a one-word response to the demographic deluge and the scores of trillions of dollars of unfunded liabilities: “More.”

O.K., there are lots of us boomers, that’s neither here nor there in evaluating the bill, is it? Now, is the bill an “unfunded liability” or does it save some $1.32 trillion over the next twenty years over what health care would be saving the tax payers without reform. Jeez, Will, I’m real sorry to bring up the facts.

There will be subsidized health insurance for families of four earning up to $88,200 a year, a ceiling certain to be raised, repeatedly. The accounting legerdemain spun to make this seem affordable — e.g., cuts (to Medicare) and taxes (on high-value insurance plans) that will never happen — is Enronesque.

Now, maybe in WILL’S universe there will never be those taxes…. I’d sure as hell like to see them. Between World War II and about 1974, the eminently fair tax code in our fair land taxed the richest bracket at some 90 percent. What we saw during those years was an unshakeable GNP growth of about four percent annually, regular as clockwork. That was before Ronnie and W. had their way with the tax code and the obscenity that are derivatives had been created for the plunder of America. And arch-republican Will has some kind of nerve bring up Enron.

As America’s teetering tower of unkeepable promises grows, so does the weight of government, in taxes and mandates that limit investments and discourage job creation. America’s dynamism, and hence upward social mobility, will slow, as the economy becomes what the party of government wants it to be — increasingly dependent on government-created demand.

Same old tired hack about raising taxes and stunting growth. Same old Republican crap. Hey Will, did you hear anything in your extensive reading of the press about this health care bill being paid for in advance??? Anything at all??? By the way, do you have any kids, Will, any young twenty somethings you might like to keep on your rich man’s health insurance? As in up to age 26, according to the new law? And just how healthy are you Will??? Any pre-existing conditions? Like terminal wealthy snot-nose?

Promoting dependency is the Democratic Party’s vocation. The party knows that almost all entitlements are forever, and those that are not — e.g., the lifetime eligibility for welfare, repealed in 1996 — are not for the middle class. Democrats believe, plausibly, that middle-class entitlements are instantly addictive and, because there is no known detoxification, that class, when facing future choices between trimming entitlements or increasing taxes, will choose the latter. The taxes will disproportionately burden high earners, thereby tightening the noose of society’s dependency on government for investments and job creation.

Taxes, taxes taxes. Will seems to have a one track mind, really, when you strip the other arguments out of his argumentation. It’s always taxes with these guys. Well, a certain Galilean once said “feed my sheep”, Will. Did you ever hear the old saw about a Christian society being our brothers’ keeper? Guess not.

Politics in a democracy is transactional: Politicians seek votes by promising to do things for voters, who seek promises in exchange for their votes. Because logrolling is how legislative coalitions are cobbled together in a continental nation, the auction by which reluctant House Democrats were purchased has been disillusioning only to sentimentalists with illusions about society’s stock of disinterestedness.

Besides, some of the transactions were almost gorgeous: Government policy having helped make water scarce in California’s Central Valley, the party of expanding government secured two votes by increasing rations of the scarcity. Thus did one dependency lubricate legislation that establishes others.

This is the intellectual whore prig complaining about buying votes. So far as I can see, the entire Republican Party is a wholly owned subsidiary of the banks and multinational corporations, and here goes one of the chief apologists complaining about buying votes. It’s called horse trading, Will. L.B.J. was rather well known for it. Too bad.

The bill is a museum of hoary artifacts from liberalism’s attic. The identity politics of quasi-quotas? The secretary of health and human services “in awarding grants and contracts under this section . . . shall give preferences to entities that have a demonstrated record of . . . training individuals who are from underrepresented minority groups or disadvantaged backgrounds.” And the bill creates an Advisory Council on Green, High-Performing Public School Facilities and grants for “retrofitting necessary to increase the energy efficiency and water efficiency of public school facilities.”

The public will think the health-care system is what Democrats want it to be. Dissatisfaction with it will intensify because increasingly complex systems are increasingly annoying. And because Democrats promised the implausible — prompt and noticeable improvements in the system. Forbidding insurance companies to deny coverage to persons because of preexisting conditions, thereby making the risk pool more risky, will increase the cost of premiums. Public complaints will be smothered by more subsidies. So dependency will grow.

Seeking a silver lining? Now, perhaps, comes Thermidor.

Oh, crap, revolution again. Comes the bloody revolution. The only real revolution the G.O.P. really wants is to eliminate the entire Federal income tax. I’d bet they’d LOVE that revolution. Or maybe, not. The Republican Party is using coded and not so coded talk about “revolution” way too much for me to be comfortable about it. George Will? Revolution? No, Will, that’s not part of the political process in America.

That was the name of the month in the French Revolutionary calendar in which Robespierre fell. To historians, Thermidor denotes any era of waning political ardor. Congressional Democrats will not soon be herded into other self-wounding votes — e.g., for a cap-and-trade carbon-rationing scheme as baroque as the health legislation. During the Democrats’ health-care monomania, the nation benefited from the benign neglect of the rest of their agenda. Now the nation may benefit from the exhaustion of their appetite for more political risk.

Oh, yeah, Will, we LOVE the political kick in the ass we’re probably going to get for doing the right thing and passing health care reform. We Democrats love to be on the short side of opinion, don’t you know, that’s just what politicians love, doing unpopular legislation. You see, we LIKE to lose seats in Congress. No chance at all we’re doing it because it’s the right thing to do.

And all this fatuous argument coming from a man who doesn’t believe in global warming…. Why??? Certainly not because fixing global warming would cost the rich folks a little money, nah, couldn’t be you’re that predictable, Will.

See, Post Uses Xenophobia to Advance Its Budget Agenda, The American Prospect, March 29, 2010, by Dean Baker:

The Post once again used xenophobia to push its budget agenda as editorial page editor Fred Hiatt darkly warned readers that as a result of projected future budget deficits: “the United States would be increasingly at the mercy of China, Saudi Arabia and other lenders.”

Of course, as every econ 101 student knows, budget deficits do not determine the indebtedness of the U.S. to foreigners, the trade deficit does. The trade deficit in turn is the result of an over-valued dollar. The Post has actually been a supporter of the “strong dollar” policy that has given the U.S. high trade deficits. So, when it comes to the policy that actually puts us “at the mercy of China, Saudi Arabia and other lenders,” the Post has been on the wrong side.

It is also worth noting that the protectionist policies that the Post supports are a big factor in the deficit. If the U.S. allowed freer trade in health care services, especially the provision of Medicare, it could lead to enormous savings for the government and huge income gains to beneficiaries.

See, Why the President’s Next Big Thing Should Be Jobs, RobertReich.org, March 25, 2010, by Robert Reich.

See, Jeffrey Feldman’s comments on Twitter: “IF: Steele spends RNC $ at bondage club, Palin dons black leather at rally; THEN: dominatrix is the new family values??” — Not so lol.

If you appreciate our efforts to keep you informed,
why not share Evans Liberal Politics with friends?

Americans overwhelmingly see the new health-care law as a major shift in the direction of the country, but they remain as deeply divided today over the changes as they were throughout the long congressional debate, according to a Washington Post poll.

In the days since President Obama signed the farthest-reaching piece of social welfare legislation in four decades, overall public opinion has changed little, with continuing broad public skepticism about the effects of the new law and more than a quarter of Americans seeing neither side as making a good-faith effort to cooperate on the issue.

Overall, 46 percent of those polled said they support the changes in the new law; 50 percent oppose them. That is virtually identical to the pre-vote split on the proposals and similar to the divide that has existed since last summer, when the country became sharply polarized over the president’s most ambitious domestic initiative.

The health-care debate galvanized the country to a remarkable extent. About a quarter of all adults say they tried to contact their elected representatives in Congress about health care in recent months, including nearly half of those who say they are “angry” about the changes. In general, opponents of the measure were more than twice as likely as supporters to say they had made the effort.

But there are signs that Democrats have started to rally, with the party’s base firming up after intense internal battles over a public insurance option and provisions covering abortion funding. Fifty-six percent of Democrats now “strongly support” the recently enacted health-care changes; last month, 41 percent were solidly behind the proposals. Eight in 10 Democrats now approve of the way Obama is handling health care, the most since last summer.

Obama’s overall approval rating is at 53 percent in the poll, about the same as it has been in Post-ABC polls in the past several months; 43 percent disapprove.

Read the full article, here.

See, What are the Tea Baggers really angry about? Frank Rich nails it. It’s not health care., Daily Kos, March 28, 2010, by Goingallout.

See, Markos, owner of Daily Kos Twitter feed: @stevebenen: I get Hannity raising money for the RNC. But isn’t it odd for the RNC to raise money for Hannity?

If you appreciate our efforts to keep you informed,
why not share Evans Liberal Politics with friends?

50 Great Electronic Rock Tracks

#1 Rated by Google

In response to last week’s poll which revealed that a alarming large portion of Republicans hold extremist viewpoints, such as…

* 67 percent of Republicans (and 40 percent of Americans overall) believe that Obama is a socialist. * 57 percent of Republicans (32 percent overall) believe that Obama is a Muslim. * 45 percent of Republicans (25 percent overall) agree with the Birthers in their belief that Obama was “not born in the United States and so is not eligible to be president.” * 38 percent of Republicans (20 percent overall) say that Obama is “doing many of the things that Hitler did.” * Scariest of all, 24 percent of Republicans (14 percent overall) say that Obama “may be the Antichrist.”

…the Harris polling organization decided to take a similar look at the misguided views of Democrats and discovered equally disturbing results.

A phone survey, conducted over three days, that sampled 300 self-identified Democrats, proved that Democrats seem to hold EQUALLY drastic and out of the mainstream opinions.

For instance…

88% of Democrats believe John Boehner is an alien from a planet of soulless, self-tanning aliens that can secrete their own hair gel when sexually aroused.

72% of Democrats cannot tell the difference between John Shadegg, Peter King, John Cornyn, and James M. Inhofe, mistakenly believing them all to be the same old, white, fag-hating person.

63% of Democrats are under the impression that asking a paid prostitute to diaper you before having sex is NOT a virtue according to scripture in the bible. (It, of course, IS, cited as a divine practice (valued at 250 denari) in the Book of Trixie, chapter 4, verse 12)

53% of Democrats are unaware that the commandment “Thou Shalt Not Kill” does NOT cover “congressional representatives who voted FOR the ‘H.R. 3962, Affordable Health Care for America Act,’” which is, of course, actually covered under the little known 16th commandment “Thou Shalt Not Let The Uninsured Get A Pap Smear Before Terminal Cervical Cancer Is Discovered.”

48% of Democrats incorrectly identify Hawaii as an American state and not a county on the continent of Africa, close to Kenya.

38% of Democrats do not understand that the Roman empire was brought to its knees when 25 year-olds where allowed to stay on their parent’s heath insurance policies.

22% of Democrats are of the mistaken view that diseases like Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and Huntington’s are genetic and NOT God’s punishment for allowing people with darker skin to vote and be better dancers.

11% of Democrats are unaware that hanging a noose outside someone’s house is actually a sign of respect, signifying “I love you SO MUCH I want to hug your neck THIS TIGHT.” Additionally yelling “Nigger” is often, in the south, another way of saying “Black is beautiful!”

I hereby call on the media to CITE these disturbing results and give equal time to the anger and misinformation of the out of control, radical left!

Congress passed the final piece of President Obama’s landmark health-care package Thursday, the last legislative hurdle in a year-long debate over the issue.

On a 220 to 207 vote Thursday night, the House approved a reconciliation bill that amends the newly enacted health-care law and includes a major overhaul of the student loan program and expansion of Pell Grants. The bill now goes to Obama for his signature.

The House vote was actually its second on the reconciliation bill. It narrowly approved the bill late Sunday night, but it came back after Republicans identified two minor violations of reconciliation rules that forced changes to a provision on student loans.

The Senate passed the reconciliation bill — with the two small changes — by a vote of 56 to 43.

Democratic leaders said the provisions that were struck — from the part of the bill dealing with Pell Grants for college students — did not significantly affect the student loan program or the overall health-care bill.

“Of all the things they could have sent back, this is probably the most benign [and] easily fixed,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told reporters.

Senators stood and voted from their desks as the roll was called, a tradition reserved for high-profile bills. Before the vote, the Senate observed a moment of silence for the late senator Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), the Democratic champion of health-care reform, who died last year midway through the debatOn a 220 to 207 vote Thursday night, the House approved a reconciliation bill that amends the newly enacted health-care law and includes a major overhaul of the student loan program and expansion of Pell Grants. The bill now goes to Obama for his signature.

The House vote was actually its second on the reconciliation bill. It narrowly approved the bill late Sunday night, but it came back after Republicans identified two minor violations of reconciliation rules that forced changes to a provision on student loans.

The Senate passed the reconciliation bill — with the two small changes — by a vote of 56 to 43.

Democratic leaders said the provisions that were struck — from the part of the bill dealing with Pell Grants for college students — did not significantly affect the student loan program or the overall health-care bill.

“Of all the things they could have sent back, this is probably the most benign [and] easily fixed,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told reporters.

Senators stood and voted from their desks as the roll was called, a tradition reserved for high-profile bills. Before the vote, the Senate observed a moment of silence for the late senator Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.), the Democratic champion of health-care reform, who died last year midway through the debate. ….

Read the full article, here.

See, Final Votes in Congress Cap Battle on Health Bill, The New York Times, March 25, 2010, by David M. Herszenhorn and Robert Pear.

See, Going to Extreme, The New York Times, March 25, 2010, by Paul Krugman, excerpt quoted verbatim:

I admit it: I had fun watching right-wingers go wild as health reform finally became law. But a few days later, it doesn’t seem quite as entertaining — and not just because of the wave of vandalism and threats aimed at Democratic lawmakers. For if you care about America’s future, you can’t be happy as extremists take full control of one of our two great political parties.

Video: ‘A Big F—ing Deal’: Biden’s Health Care Reform F-Bomb On Live TV (VIDEO), The Huffington Post, March 25, 2010, by Huffington Post.

See, Biden On ‘Big F—ing Deal’: Obama Loved It, The Huffington Post, March 25, 2010, by Huffington Post.

And if THAT’S not enough on the “F” word, try Roy Sekoff Compares VP F-Bombs: Biden’s ‘A lot better’ than Cheney’s. I bet that burns up old Dickey….

See, Like hell I’m going to let some black president help me pay for Dialysis!, Daily Kos, March 25, 2010, by blackwaterdog.

See, Senate Plays Game of Chicken with Unemployment Benefits, The Huffington Post, March 25, 2010, by Arthur Delaney, excerpt quoted verbatim:

While Senate Democrats held a press conference celebrating their latest health care reform victory on Thursday afternoon, a Republican slipped into the chamber to move a bill that would extend soon-to-expire enhanced unemployment benefits — paid for with $10 billion in unused funds from the stimulus bill.

With Democrats caught off guard, the clock started ticking on the bill’s slog through the legislative process. Democratic leaders, who had planned to introduce the same bill without using funds committed to the stimulus, trudged into the chamber as Sen. Tom Coburn launched into an epic speech on the perils of deficit spending.

See, U.S. Plans Big Expansion in Effort to Aid Homeowners, The New York Times, March 25, 2010, by David Streitfeld, excerpt quoted verbatim:

The Obama administration on Friday will announce broad new initiatives to help troubled homeowners, potentially refinancing several million of them into fresh government-backed mortgages with lower payments.

Another element of the new program is meant to temporarily reduce the payments of borrowers who are unemployed and seeking a job. Additionally, the government will encourage lenders to write down the value of loans held by borrowers in modification programs.

The escalation in aid comes as the administration is under rising pressure from Congress to resolve the foreclosure crisis, which is straining the economy and putting millions of Americans at risk of losing their homes. But the new programs could well spur protests among those who have kept up their payments and are not in trouble.

The administration’s earlier efforts to stem foreclosures have largely been directed at borrowers who were experiencing financial hardship. But the biggest element of the new program will involve the government, through the Federal Housing Administration, refinancing loans for borrowers who simply owe more than their houses are worth.

About 11 million households, or a fifth of those with mortgages, are in this position, known as being underwater. Some of these borrowers refinanced their houses during the boom and took cash out, leaving them vulnerable when prices declined. Others simply had the misfortune to buy at the peak.

Many of these loans have been bundled together and sold to investors. Under the new program, the investors would have to swallow losses, but would probably be assured of getting more in the long run than if the borrowers went into foreclosure. The F.H.A. would insure the new loans against the risk of default. The borrower would once again have a reason to make payments instead of walking away from a property.

If you appreciate our efforts to keep you informed,
why not share Evans Liberal Politics with friends?

50 Great Electronic Rock Tracks

#1 Rated by Google

This makes 22 out of 23 reconciliation bills
which have been forced back into the House

WASHINGTON — With the Senate working through an all-night session on a package of changes to the Democrats’ sweeping health care legislation, Republicans early on Thursday morning identified parliamentary problems with at least two provisions that will require the measure to be sent back to the House for yet another vote, once the Senate adopts it.

Senate Democrats had been hoping to defeat all of the amendments proposed by Republicans and to prevail on parliamentary challenges so that they could approve the measure and send it to President Obama for his signature. But the bill must comply with complex budget reconciliation rules, and Republicans identified some flaws.

Under the reconciliation rules, provisions in the bill must directly affect government spending or revenues.

The successful parliamentary challenge did not appear to endanger the eventual adoption of the changes to the health care legislation. And Mr. Obama on Tuesday already signed the main health care bill into law.

A Senate Democratic aide said the one of the provisions in question involved changes to the Pell grant program, which is part of an education section in the reconciliation bill. The provision would prevent reductions in the amount of Pell grants for students from low-income families as a result of a decrease in money appropriated for the program by Congress.

Shortly after the discovery of the parliamentary issues, at about 2:45 a.m. Thursday, the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid of Nevada, indicated that he would bring the late-night session to a close, and that the Senate would resume work on the bill at 9:45 a.m. on Thursday.

Democrats had already succeeded in defeating more than two dozen Republican amendments or other proposals aimed at derailing the legislation or making changes that would delay it by forcing an additional vote by the House.

Read the full article, here.

See Senate sends reconciliation back to the House over Pell grants, Daily Kos, March 24, 2010, by Magnifico, citing AP:

Spokesman Jim Manley said Republicans consulting with the Senate parliamentarian had found “two minor provisions” that violate budget rules. The two provisions, dealing with Pell grants for low-income college students, will have to be removed from the bill.

Once those provisions are deleted and the Senate passes the measure, the House will have to approve the legislation before sending it to Obama for his signature. Manley said he was confident the House would do so with no problems.

See, Obama Signs Health Care Overhaul Bill, with a Flourish, The New York Times, March 24, 2010, by Sheryl Gay Stolberg and Robert Pear.

See, Obama’s Remarks at the Health Care Bill Signing, The New York Times from Federal News Service, March 24, 2010, transcript.

See, How the Health Care Bill will Affect You, The New York Times, March 24, 2010, by Tara Parker-Pope.

See, Health Care Reform and “American Values”, The New York Times, September 10, 2009, by Pauline W. Chen, M.D.

See, After Health Vote, Threats on Democrats, The New York Times, March 24, 2010, by Carl Hulse.

See, House of Anger, N.Y. Times Opinionator (Editorial), March 24, 2010, by Timothy Egan.

See, Slaughter On Violence And Threats: GOP ‘Fanning The Flames With Coded Rhetoric’, Talking Points Memo, March 24, 2010, by Ben Frumin.

Hoyer: ‘Yes,’ House Dems’ Security At Risk

It’s not nearly as momentous as the passage of Medicare in 1965 and won’t fundamentally alter how Americans think about social safety nets. But the likely passage of Obama’s health care reform bill is the biggest thing Congress has done in decades, and has enormous political significance for the future.

Medicare directly changed the life of every senior in America, giving them health security and dramatically reducing their rates of poverty. By contrast, most Americans won’t be affected by Obama’s health care legislation. Most of us will continue to receive health insurance through our employers. (Only a comparatively small minority will be required to buy insurance who don’t want it, or be subsidized in order to afford it. Only a relatively few companies will be required to provide it who don’t now.)

Medicare built on Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal notion of government as insurer, with citizens making payments to government, and government paying out benefits. That was the central idea of Social Security, and Medicare piggybacked on Social Security.

Obama’s legislation comes from an alternative idea, begun under the Eisenhower administration and developed under Nixon, of a market for health care based on private insurers and employers. Eisenhower locked in the tax break for employee health benefits; Nixon pushed prepaid, competing health plans, and urged a requirement that employers cover their employees. Obama applies Nixon’s idea and takes it a step further by requiring all Americans to carry health insurance, and giving subsidies to those who need it.

So don’t believe anyone who says Obama’s health care legislation marks a swing of the pendulum back toward the Great Society and the New Deal. Obama’s health bill is a very conservative piece of legislation, building on a Republican rather than a New Deal foundation. The New Deal foundation would have offered Medicare to all Americans or, at the very least, featured a public insurance option.

The significance of Obama’s health legislation is more political than substantive. For the first time since Ronald Reagan told America government is the problem, Obama’s health bill reasserts that government can provide a major solution. In political terms, that’s a very big deal.

Most Americans continue to be suspicious of government. That distrust is deeply etched in our culture and traditions. Our system of government was devised by people who distrusted government and intentionally created checks and balances, three separate branches, and almost insuperable odds against getting big things done. The period extending from 1933 to 1965 — the New Deal and the Great Society — was an historical aberration from that long tradition, animated by the unique crises of the Great Depression and World War II, and the social cohesion that flowed from them for another generation. Ronald Reagan merely picked up where Calvin Coolidge and Herbert Hoover left off.

But Reagan’s view of government as the problem is increasingly at odds with a nation whose system of health care relies on large for-profit entities designed to make money rather than improve health; whose economy is dependent on global capital and on global corporations and financial institutions with no particular loyalty to America; and much of whose fuel comes from unstable and dangerous areas of the world. Under these conditions, government is the only entity that can look out for our interests.

We will not return to the New Deal or the Great Society, but nor will we continue to wallow in the increasingly obsolete Reagan view that we don’t need a strong and competent government. Today’s vote confirms our hope that we can have both strength and competence in Washington. It is an audacious hope, but we have no choice.

*****

Robert Reich was the nation’s 22nd Secretary of Labor under Bill Clinton and is Professor of Public Policy at the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley. He has served in three national administrations. In 2008, Time Magazine named him one of the Ten Most Successful Cabinet Members of the century. He has written eleven books, including “The Work of Nations,” which has been translated into 22 languages. His latest book is “Supercapitalism.” For Professor Reich’s page on Amazon, go here. The above article is from Reich’s new blog, and can be viewed here.

Thanks to Professor Reich for permission to publish his articles on an ongoing basis. At Evans Liberal Politics, we give you the truth they don’t want you to see.