Democrats haven’t had a week this bad since 2010 and its only Wednesday. While the headlines are focused on Democrats losing the special election in Florida’s 13th Congressional district, even worse news came in the form of an NBC News/Wall Street Journal national poll released last night, along with four statewide surveys conducted by a highly-regarded Democratic pollster in key Senate race states.
and ends it:
The bottom line here is that at least for today, this election is not about the myriad of problems facing the Republican Party (with minority, young, female and moderate voters) but instead is about President Obama and the Affordable Care Act, both deeply unpopular. The fight for the Senate is being fought in terrain far more challenging for Democrats (read more Romney than Obama states) and with a midterm electorate that is older, whiter, and much tougher for Dems than the one that re-elected Obama in 2012. Environmentally, this election reflects a mood not dissimilar to 2010; the big difference being in the House, where Democrats have relatively few vulnerable seats to protect, so the possibility of a party shift at a magnitude similar their 63-seat loss four years ago is extremely unlikely.
I think he goes a bit too far. Candidates that look good from party headquarters aren’t necessarily that appealing to the voters who actually show up to vote. The party label isn’t enough and, indeed, can work against you.
I do think that Democrats face headwinds that will only be made worse if they adopt a strategy of bitter negative advertising. Democrats may still hold on to the Senate. President Obama’s prospects for working with a Democratic Congress for the remainder of his term are vanishingly slim and IMO his tone for the last month or so suggests that his pollsters are telling him the same thing.
The Federal Reserve started tapering its bond purchases at the beginning of the year and is on track to end them by October. That’s good news for small businesses, jobs and living standards.
Rather than creating or printing money, as is often assumed, the Fed borrows heavily from banks to buy bonds, setting arbitrarily low interest rates and diverting credit away from job creators. It’s been sucking oxygen out of the economy, explaining the very weak growth and jobs performance from 2009-13.
As the Fed winds down its bond buying, it will also stop its new bank borrowing, allowing a better allocation of credit in the economy. In 2013 alone, the central bank borrowed nearly $1 trillion from the banking system. It wasn’t created out of thin air. It is recorded as a liability of the Fed and an asset for banks.
It would be even more interesting if we were at a different point in the business cycle or if the Obama Administration’s policy preferences didn’t foster slower growth than might otherwise be the case. In anticipation of the howls of protest I suspect I’ll receive at that statement I’ll give three examples of many:
failing to approve the Keystone XL pipeline gives environmental policy precedence over economic growth
the PPACA spends more money on healthcare insurance and, presumably, healthcare than would otherwise be the case and which produces reduced economic growth
reinstating the payroll tax prioritized putting money into the Social Security Trust Fund over present economic growth
I’m not claiming the administration is anti-growth. I just think they value other things more.
He goes on to explain the results of the Fed’s policy:
The data are clear that credit has been channeled away from growth, in effect rationed to the safest and best-connected creditors (government and big business) at the expense of those more likely to create jobs. In the five years through 2013, credit to the government grew $6.1 trillion in nominal terms, but private credit grew only $1.2 trillion. Credit to corporations (e.g., corporate bonds) increased by $1.9 trillion, forcing an outright shrinkage in credit to noncorporate businesses and households. Loans outstanding to these smaller borrowers fell by $660 billion during the five-year period, a devastating blow to small business investment, while loans surged to the government and corporations, the chosen beneficiaries of Fed policy.
To maintain the long maturity of its assets, the private sector has been replacing the long-term government bonds the Fed buys with similar assets—relatively safe long-term loans such as corporate bonds or real-estate loans. This type of lending generally goes to well-established companies offering good collateral, but it creates fewer jobs than loans to other businesses might create. The Fed’s bond-buying was almost tailor-made to help the haves—those with size, collateral and a long track record. Tapering will allow banks to make different, more job-intensive loans.
In order to put people back to work we’ve got to create more jobs while refraining from importing a workforce to fill the new jobs that have been created. To create more jobs we’ve got to give priority to private sector growth, particularly small businesses. Big Business has been shedding jobs for decades; most government subsidies go to Big Business, a perverse result from the standpoint of job creation.
To will the end you must will the means and fostering small business creation and health needs to be made a higher priority. Credit is one part of that. Lack of business ceased being the greatest concern of small businesses a long time ago. Now their main concerns are healthcare costs, uncertainty about the economy, uncertainty about economic policy, and energy costs.
The Christian Science Monitor, Fareed Zakaria, and Charles Krauthammer all pull in different directions over the crisis in Ukraine.
My own view is that we need to examine our own interests in the matter with flinty-eyed scrutiny. We need to reassure the Europeans without confusing our own interests with theirs. In particular we should not let Germany dictate U. S. policy.
I think that Glenn Reynolds has a point here. Does the NSA installing malware on Americans’ computers constitute a taking? I think it almost certainly violates the Third Amendment.
I’ll bet you thought those expensive and wildly inappropriate outfits for dogs were distinctively, characteristically, and embarrassingly American. I certainly did. Well, as it turns out, like so much else the Chinese made them first:
While President Barack Obama has Bo and Sunny, and President George W. Bush had Barney and Miss Beazley, a newly published tale of a dog that lived in China’s Forbidden City more than a century ago reveals this pup’s lifestyle easily outdid that of any presidential pooch.
The royal dog named Big Luck (in translation) had a silk outfit, specially tailored, that covered the dog from snout to tail, the researchers revealed for the first time in a book. Although the dog’s breed is unknown, and the sex is uncertain, it appears to have been about 3 feet (1 meter) long and the outfit was decorated with images of peonies. It even has the dog’s name inscribed on the lining. It was created during the reign of the Guangxu emperor (A.D. 1875-1908).
The silk robe is pictured above. Stylish but not practical.
You know, if the coverage of the Senate debate on the aid package for Ukraine is at all representative, there was far too much discussion of ways and means and not nearly enough identifying the U. S. interest. I asked the question when the hazunga first hit the fan in Ukraine but I think I need to ask it again: what’s the U. S. interest in Ukraine?
A U.S. judge on Wednesday ordered former Goldman Sachs Group trader Fabrice Tourre to pay more than $825,000 after a jury found him liable for defrauding investors in a subprime mortgage product that failed during the financial crisis.
The decision by U.S. District Judge Katherine Forrest in Manhattan came in one of the prominent Wall Street cases linked to the crisis,and one of the few in which an individual was held personally responsible for wrongdoing.
my immediate reaction was that it was far too small. That’s just about half of the compensation he received in 2007, the year of the fraud.
It’s been widely reported that Tourre is unrepentant and unremorseful. Of course he is. When fines are so non-punishing they’re an acceptable risk. For somebody in his position the fines should have been in the multi-million dollar range. What he got was just a slap on the wrist.
Microsoft seems to have got a little inspiration from Google in terms of licensing the Operating System. The company reportedly said to have waived off licensing fee for Windows Phone OS for its hardware partners in India. The company announced back at MWC that it will be partnering with Indian manufacturers like Karbonn, Xolo and Lava to make windows phones. This step from Microsoft indicates that it wants the Windows Phone OS to run on multiple devices just like Android.
With this the company will be able to offer affordable Windows Phones in India, currently Indian Windows Phone market is heavily dominated with Lumia phones from Nokia. Some of Nokia Lumia phones come in the affordable range while other are expensive and fall in the high end category. It was necessary for Microsoft to waive off the licensing fee to attract these Indian manufacturers who are currently bagging success on Android OS. Android OS is also free for license and all that a company has to pay is for the Google Services. Services like Gmail, Google Playstore, Google Talk are charged by Google, the OS is free and is open source.
First, my CIA colleagues and I believe strongly in the necessity of effective, strong and bipartisan congressional oversight.
Why does that strike me as funny? To the best of my knowledge that CIA withheld documents, withdrew documents, and has repeatedly lied to the committee is not under dispute. How in the heck does he think that the Senate can perform its oversight duties under those circumstances?
The only real dispute in this whole sorry affair is why hasn’t the Senate reined in the CIA long since? I think it’s fear. Fear of the CIA. Fear of the unknown. Fear of their constituents.
WASHINGTON — The White House has been withholding for five years more than 9,000 top-secret documents sought by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence for its investigation into the now-defunct CIA detention and interrogation program, even though President Barack Obama hasn’t exercised a claim of executive privilege.
In contrast to public assertions that it supports the committee’s work, the White House has ignored or rejected offers in multiple meetings and in letters to find ways for the committee to review the records, a McClatchy investigation has found.
The significance of the materials couldn’t be learned. But the administration’s refusal to turn them over or to agree to any compromise raises questions about what they would reveal about the CIA’s use of waterboarding and other harsh interrogation techniques on suspected terrorists in secret overseas prisons.
The dispute indicates that the White House is more involved than it has acknowledged in the unprecedented power struggle between the committee and the CIA, which has triggered charges that the agency searched the panel’s computers without authorization and has led to requests to the Justice Department for criminal investigations of CIA personnel and Senate aides.
Mr. Brennan might reasonably have said “We can’t show you the documents you’ve requested because the president won’t let us” but I don’t see how he says what he has with a straight face.
There are conflicting stories this morning in the continuing saga of Malaysian Airlines Flight 370. Last night the Wall Street Journal reported that the area within which the craft might be found had actually expanded:
U.S. investigators suspect that Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 stayed in the air for about four hours past the time it reached its last confirmed location, according to two people familiar with the details, raising the possibility that the plane could have flown on for hundreds of additional miles under conditions that remain murky.
Aviation investigators and national security officials believe the plane flew for a total of five hours, based on data automatically downloaded and sent to the ground from the Boeing Co. 777’s engines as part of a routine maintenance and monitoring program.
A flying time of an additional four hours would place the plane anywhere in South Asia, South-East Asia, and a good chunk of the Pacific, as illustrated by the map above.
(CNN) — Yet another conflicting storyline emerged overnight in the perplexing disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 nearly six days ago.
After search crews failed to find any trace of debris suggested by Chinese satellite photographs, Malaysian officials on Thursday denied a newspaper report that suggested the plane may have kept flying for four hours after its last reported contact.
The officials acknowledged the search for the jetliner, which disappeared early Saturday, is becoming harder and harder.
The report from The Wall Street Journal said U.S. aviation investigators and national security officials were basing their belief that the missing plane kept flying on data automatically transmitted to the ground from the passenger jet’s engines.
But Malaysia’s acting Transportation Minister Hishammuddin Hussein said at a news conference that the report, citing unidentified people familiar with the matter, was “inaccurate.”
The precise wording could be significant. There’s quite a bit of distance between “inaccurate” and “flat-out wrong”. Inaccurate covers everything from flat-out wrong to wrong by twenty minutes, AKA substantively correct.
BEIJING, March 13 (Xinhua) — As myriad information fuels surging anxiety among the family members of passengers on board the missing Malaysian flight, experts have become concerned about their mental well-being.
Despite the airline advising passengers’ families to “prepare for the worst result,” it will surely be hard for many of them, awash with helplessness and despair, to let go of hopes for the survival of their loved ones.
Flight MH370, an Malaysia Airlines plane, has been missing for more than five days since contact with it was lost early on Saturday.
It was flying over the Ho Chi Minh air traffic control area in Vietnam and carrying 227 passengers, including 154 Chinese.
Experts worry that the spreading negative emotions will take a heavy toll on the emotional well-being of the family members, who have been provided with no professional counseling thus far.
Fang Xin, director of the psychological counseling center with Peking University, said that the daily drip-drip of information, be it true or false, will inevitably cause mood swings among the family members and increase their levels of discomfort.
“The unknown fate of the passengers will have generated severe insecurities and anxiety in them,” Fang said.
Xin Hua has dozens of stories connected with the fate of the flight. I just selected one human interest story to give you some idea of the coverage.
If the WSJ story is true, it seems to me that increases the likelihood of hijacking as the cause of the disappearance.
I’ve got to admit I’m surprised that in this day and age commercial aircraft wander around with nobody really sure whether they’re in the air or not or where they’re going.
