Light at the End of the Unemployment Line? (May 28th)

Light at the End of the Unemployment Line?
PoliticalAffairs.net

March 27th marked the 100th day since the passage of President Obama's economic recovery act. To observe the occasion, the administration released a report on the progress of the stimulus package and the economic recovery since.

The report provided anecdotal evidence of the impact the recovery act has had in different parts of the country. So far $112 billion from the recovery act have been obligated for various projects like infrastructure construction to job training, environmental clean-up, small business loans, expanded unemployment benefits, public education, science research grants, public safety, and green technology.

At the release of the report, Vice President Joe Biden said, "We’ve done a lot in 100 days. But we know there is still much to do... You know, as we do, that the road to full recovery will be long and not always smooth. But we also know that, working together, there is no doubt that we will reach the end of that road. When we do, America will be better and stronger than ever."

Rob Nabors, deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget, explained to reporters, "We have a long way to go, but today we have more hope for an economic turnaround than we did 101 days ago."

"We are starting to turn a corner," Nabors added.

Read the whole story here...

Notes on the stimulus bill

By Joel Wendland

The Republicans in Congress hated the economic recovery bill from the beginning. I think it reminded them too much of the past eight years and Bush's failure to handle economic matters in any intelligent way. It reminded them of how they toed Bush's economic line without deviation and voted for every single one of his budgets and his $3 trillion war in Iraq blindly. It reminded them of all the reasons they lost power.

This psychological turmoil combined with the humiliation of the loss in November prompted a bad decision-making process on how to handle the new political and economic reality in the country. When Obama and the Democrats introduced the stimulus package, top Republicans said to each other, let's fight the election battle all over again. Let's put our free-market fundamentalist, trickle-down ideology and policies that lost us the election out front – even with John McCain leading the way – and have it out all over again with Barack Obama.

So McCain led the way with an amendment to the stimulus bill that would have cut all the job-creating provisions in favor of hundreds of billions in new tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans. Needless to say, it flopped.

Other Republicans had other ideas. They have been a little trickier. They wanted to influence the outcome of the bill without having to actually vote for it.

Republican Sens. Tom Coburn, Chuck Grassley, Johnny Isakson, Mel Martinez, and David "DC madame client" Vitter added their own amendments or co-sponsored other amendments that were ultimately adopted to the bill and finally passed.

So much for the argument that the bill lacked bi-partisan input. Ironically, none of these Senators voted for final passage. Each one, instead, claimed the bill lacked bipartisan support and cost too much.

Funny claim, because two of those amendments offered by Republicans with bipartisan support added something like $100 plus billion to the final Senate version of the bill. One of those provisions actually would have provided $30 billion or so for a housing tax credit. They claimed it addressed the country's housing problems. In fact, the bill would have given a $15,000 tax credit to real estate speculators trying to take advantage of falling house prices by buying foreclosed homes on the cheap and flipping them for quick profits, and the government, under the Republican amendment would guarantee them a $15,000 profit for each house -- paid for by taxpayers.

That scheme wouldn't have fixed "the housing problem"; it would have exacerbated it. In fact it would have robbed taxpayers to pay off speculators.

But even with that Republican amendment, those Republicans who insisted it was meant to fix housing failed to vote for final passage of the bill.

(Note: the compromise package hammered out in conference Wednesday evening cut that $30 billion tax credit to $2 billion and reasonably limited it to first-time home buyers and imposed an income cap on who could claim the credit.)

Even more ironically, after the group of five Republicans named here (and probably more I have overlooked) added their amendments and raised the price tag of the total bill by more than 12 percent, most Republicans refused to vote for the bill.

Guess what their argument was. You got it. It cost too much and raised the deficit too much. This only shows a deficit in the Republican thought process. Their tax cut policy and war in Iraq added more than $5 trillion to the national debt after Bush inherited a surplus. Their tax policies delayed economic recovery after the 2001 recession for more than four years. Their economic policies and ideology of free-market fundamentalism handed the big banks the keys to the kingdom. They looked the other way as bankers robbed home buyers and made business decisions that caused the credit meltdown and the current economic collapse.

I don't envy Barack Obama the political and economic difficulties under which he leads this country. But the Republicans have proven, if nothing else, the bankruptcy of their ideas and the hypocrisy of their politics.

Needed: 17 million full-time jobs now!

Data released by the Economic Policy Institute last week reveal a worsening unemployment rate has combined with a 14 year high in the underemployment rate. The underemployment rate counts unemployed workers, "involuntary" part-time workers, and people who are "marginally attached" to the labor force by want and need steady full-time work.

According to EPI, "The underemployed currently includes about 9.5 million unemployed workers, 6.1 million involuntarily part-time workers, and 1.6 million workers only marginally attached to the workforce."

That is more than 17 million people who need steady, full-time work.

John McCain's "straight talk": I am going to kill more jobs than Bush

Tell Congress No Colombia Free Trade Agreement

Colombia's government has thwarted workers' right to organizeand bargain collectively-by weakening labor protections,refusing to register legitimate unions and failing to enforce the law against anti-union discrimination. The Colombia FTA extends NAFTA and CAFTA, so-called "free trade" agreements that have already undermined workers rights and environmental protections for U.S., Canadian, Mexican, and Central American workers.

U.S. and Colombian workers need agreements that guarantee the right to organize and improve living and working conditions for all workers. This agreement does none of that. Join Jobs with Justice in demanding fair trade and an end to the global race to the bottom.

You can take action on this alert either via email (please see directions below) or via the web at:
http://www.unionvoice.org/campaign/colombia_fta08/5n8ib297nxemb6?

Lowdown on Michigan Primary Results

By Joel Wendland

Of Michigan's more than 7,141,000 registered voters, only about 1,470,000 went to the polls, or about 20% voter turnout. TV people talked about it being snowy and cold, but it really wasn't so bad. It was worse in Iowa for the caucus, as I understand it.

Sen. Clinton won the most votes on the Democratic side, as only she and Kucinich were on the ballot. She did not campaign here; only Kucinich did. So for the most part this was an uncontested election.

Yet Clinton garnered nearly as many votes as the Republican front-runner.

Interestingly, "uncommitted" Democrats scored about 40% suggesting some dissatisfaction with Clinton's candidacy and somewhat embarrassing for her, but not a national news story to be sure. Washtenaw County (Ann Arbor) went "uncommitted," and three of the states other biggest counties – Wayne County (Detroit), Kent County (Grand Rapids), and Oakland County (Detroit suburbs) – edged for Clinton by slim majorities, suggesting that she has a lot of work to do to convince Michigan voters – both Black and white.

Exit polls indicated that African Americans would have voted for Obama by more than 7 to 3 if he had campaigned in the state.

Hold on, though, Michigan. Clinton did very well in the debate in Las Vegas. I especially enjoyed her line about Bush's "pathetic" attempts to beg lower oil prices out of OPEC. Her strongest qualities are her sharp anti-ultra right programs and her detailed plans for tackling the looming economic crisis. She has also come a long way on the war.

For the third straight primary/caucus, the big story, however, has to do with turnout. Even though the Republicans came here and pretended they cared about jobs (offering no solutions like fair trade, union rights, ending Bush tax breaks to companies who move out of town and country a la DeVos' Amway, etc.), they couldn't get Michigan voters excited about Republican ideas or four more years of a Republican presidency.

In states where Democrats contested the elections and debated the issues and talked about bringing the troops home from the war, about change, about universal health care and creating jobs, about ending our dependence on oil, about workers' rights, people came out in icy weather in Iowa and balmy weather in New Hampshire.