NewsTrust - U.S. Budget - Most Recent Stories: Opinion

How Stimulating

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

Washington Monthly - By Steve Benen - Nov. 21 (Comment) - Republican critics of the economic recovery efforts, when they're not taking credit for the money that's benefiting their state/district, take it as a given that the stimulus "failed." For the right, it's a foregone conclusion, hardly worth discussing anymore. The New York Times reminds us today that "dispassionate analysts" agree that a fair look at the stimulus package shows that it may be "messy" but it's also "working."

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Deficit hawks attacking the wrong prey

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

Seattle Times - By David Sirota - Nov. 16 (Opinion) - When the House considered a health care expansion proposal that the CBO says will reduce the deficit by $11 billion a year, tea-party protesters and Congress' self-described "fiscal conservatives" opposed it on cost grounds. At the same time, almost none of them objected when Congress passed a White House-backed bill to spend $636 billion on defense in 2010. The hypocrisy is stunning

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Too Big to Fail - Too Big to Exist -

Fri, 06 Nov 2009 00:00:00 -0800

senate.gov - By Senator Bernie Sanders - Nov. 06 (Statement) - Senator Bernie Sanders introduced legislation that would break up financial institutions that are too big to fail. "If an institution is too big to fail, it is too big to exist," Sanders said. "We should break them up so they are no longer in a position to bring down the entire economy. We should end the concentration of ownership that has resulted in just four huge financial institutions holding half the mortgages in America, controlling two-thirds of the credit cards, and amassing 40 percent of all deposits."

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Ezra Klein on the House health care reform bill

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By Ezra Klein - Oct. 29 (Interview) - So what exactly did the House put out this morning? Is it the Robust opt-out Public Option that Sen. Reid talked about? Ezra Klein: No. So to do a bit on defining terms here: Robust refers to a public option that can use Medicare's payment rates. That would let the public option save 20-30 percent against private insurance. Neither the House nor the Senate includes such an option. The House bill has a national public option that will set rates in the same way private insurers do (negotiating with providers). The Senate bill has a national public option that works the same way as the House's, save that it has an opt-out feature starting in 2014.

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Health Care Budgeting 101: Congress’ Fiscal Scolds Earn an “F-”

Thu, 29 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Firedoglake - Oct. 29 (Opinion) - the market carve-out for Medicaid saves money, which means that if Blue Dogs really wanted to save money, they would enlarge the Medicaid carve out — say, up to 250 or 350 percent of FPL. In other words, if the fiscal-deficit scolds were genuinely serious about reducing the cost of the reform bill, they would expand eligibility to public health care to a lot more people and forget about shielding private insurers from competition.

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Tom Coburn picks on political science

Thu, 08 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Foreign Policy - By Daniel W. Drezner - Oct. 08 (Comment) - OK, dear readers, I want you to close your eyes and imagine a world in which your entire knowledge of political behavior emanated only from CNN, pollsters, pundits, historians, candidates, and political parties.

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Pox Americana

Sun, 04 Oct 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Tomdispatch.com - By Matt Bivens - Oct. 04 (Opinion) - There are many possible responses to the news that we have committed more than four trillion public dollars to Wall Street. Mine is a roar of admiration. Four trillion dollars! Holy hell! I didn't even know that was possible! U.S.A.! U.S.A.!

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Why the Dow is Hitting 10,000 While Everyone Else is Cutting Back

Tue, 22 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Huffington Post - By Robert Reich - Sep. 22 (Opinion) - So how can the Dow be flirting with 10,000 when consumers, who make up 70 percent of the economy, have had to cut way back on buying because they have no money? Jobs continue to disappear. One out of six Americans is either unemployed or underemployed.

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Healthcare vs. Warfare: The Future Costs of the Afghanistan War

Tue, 08 Sep 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Common Dreams - By Jeff Leys - Sep. 08 (Opinion) - On Wednesday, President Obama will address a joint session of Congress on health care. Later this year he will decide whether to deploy additional troops to the war in Afghanistan, in addition to the 69,000 troops already deployed. The struggle for health care and the struggle to end warfare are inextricably linked. The cost for substantive (though imperfect) health care reform as envisioned in the House of Representatives approach (with the public option) is projected to average $100 billion per year for the next 10 years. The cost to continue the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are projected to cost anywhere from $55 to $100 billion a year. Make a few modest reductions to the baseline military budget and the difference is paid.

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No Exit

Thu, 13 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Wall Street Journal - Aug. 13 (Opinion) - The Fed is keeping the money pumping even though it also conceded that "economic activity is leveling out," which is an acknowledgment that the recession is all but over.

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U.S. launches assault on Taliban stronghold in Afghanistan

Wed, 12 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Worldfocus - By Martin Savidge, Anthony Cordesman - Aug. 12 (Interview) - United States Marines went on the offensive on Wednesday, launching a major new attack on a Taliban stronghold in the south of Afghanistan. Hundreds of Marines, along with Afghan troops, went into battle under the cover of darkness to take back control of the town of Dahaneh in Helmand Province, a key base for Taliban fighters. Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, who worked on an advisory board to General Stanley McChrystal in Afghanistan, joins Martin Savidge to discuss the offensive and the next phase of the war in Afghanistan.

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Off Balance Sheet, Out of Mind

Tue, 04 Aug 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Gold Speculator - By Chris Wood - Aug. 04 (Opinion) - The U.S Treasury's Financial Management Service recently released its monthly Statement of Receipts and Outlays for the United States Government. For the first time ever, the Treasury reported a deficit above $1 trillion -- $1.086 trillion, and that’s with three big-spending months left to go in the current fiscal year. To put things in perspective, the reported federal deficit for all of 2008 was $455 billion. At the time, that was a record. But it is less than 42% of the borrow-and-spend total at this year's nine-month mark. As shocking as that seems, it’s not even the real deficit story. Most of the real deficit is hidden by the Treasury's accounting methods.

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Kucinich Calls for Debate on National Priorities, Speaks Against Military Funding Bill

Thu, 30 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Common Dreams - By Dennis Kucinich - Jul. 30 (Press Release) - "We need to have a serious debate about the wars in both Iraq and Afghanistan and the priorities of this nation. We need to discuss our options and we must immediately withdraw U.S. troops and contractors, not just combat troops, but all of our troops. It is time for this body to rethink the validity of funding military operations throughout the world when we have so many priorities that need to be addressed at home.

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Why NASA's Moon Landing is the Wrong Model for Science in America

Mon, 20 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

The Root - By Dayo Olopade - Jul. 20 (Opinion) - “We are attempting to develop major new systems with ten-year technology, eight-year programs, a five year plan, three-year people, and one-year dollars,” he wrote. What’s more, large, corporate contractors dominate the federal procurement process —hiking up the costs of aerospace technology for taxpayers. The consequences of this lax management can be both embarrassing and deeply wasteful: It took engineers six costly tries to get the shuttle Endeavor, carrying the last Japanese pieces of the International Space Station, into orbit last week.

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Rules For Commenting On The CBO's Judgments

Fri, 17 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By Ezra Klein - Jul. 17 (Opinion) - In the least surprising revelation of the day, the Congressional Budget Office doesn't see much in the way of savings coming from health-care reform in the next 10 or so years. This is because the bills under consideration do not save much money in the next 10 or so years.

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California v Texas: America's future

Thu, 09 Jul 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Economist - Jul. 09 (Opinion) - Plenty of American states have budget crises; but California’s illustrate two more structural worries about the state. Back in its golden age in the 1950s and 1960s, it offered middle-class people, not just techy high-fliers, a shot at the American dream—complete with superb schools and universities, and an enviable physical infrastructure. These days California’s unemployment rate is running at 11.5%, two points ahead of the national average. In such Californian cities as Fresno, Merced and El Centro, jobless rates are higher than in Detroit. Its roads and schools are crumbling. Every year, over 100,000 more Americans leave the state than enter it.

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A nation of Herbert Hoovers

Fri, 19 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Salon - By Andrew Leonard - Jun. 19 (Opinion) - One wonders what the poll numbers would be like if Obama had decided not to pass a stimulus bill or rescue the automakers. I'd bet his negatives would be much worse than they are now. But that's entirely speculative. His job right now is to make the case for why his strategy makes long-term sense.

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Now This CBO Projection Should Worry You

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

New Republic - By Jonathan Cohn - Jun. 17 (Opinion) - ... the Republican attacks clearly rattled centrist Democrats. And when the Finance projections came in, they began announcing that something drastic had to be done. "It’s clear there have got to be changes made to make the whole package affordable," Kent Conrad, a Finance member, told the New York Times.

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Wrong Way on Health ’Reform’

Mon, 15 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - By Robert J. Samuelson - Jun. 15 (Opinion) - ... uncontrolled health spending is almost single-handedly determining national priorities. It's reducing discretionary income, raising taxes, widening budget deficits and squeezing other government programs. Worse, much medical spending is wasted, the CEA report says. It doesn't improve Americans' health; some care is unneeded or ineffective.

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Will Obama's Financial Overhaul Bring Real Change?

Fri, 12 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

National Public Radio - By Liz Halloran - Jun. 12 (Interview) - President Obama expected to announce next week his plan to revamp regulation of the nation's dysfunctional financial system, speculation about what he'll recommend has been running rampant. But what already appears clear is that the president plans to pull back on some of the more ambitious proposals that his administration had floated on Capitol Hill, from consolidating four bank-and-savings regulatory agencies into one uber-overseer to merging two agencies that oversee financial markets.

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Obama's Pay-Go Flameout

Thu, 11 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Newsweek - By Robert J. Samuelson - Jun. 11 (Opinion) - If President Obama thought he'd score some easy political points by endorsing new PAYGO legislation to control deficit spending, he was sadly mistaken. Although PAYGO--budget-speak for "pay-as-you-go"--seems to limit Congress' ability to cut taxes or raise spending, the initial reviews were unkind and sometimes harsh.

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Obama's PAYGO Plan Won't Cut the Federal Budget Anytime Soon

Thu, 11 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - Jun. 11 (Editorial) - the president's self-congratulatory back-patting about fiscal rectitude is more than a bit hard to take in light of the huge exceptions he would grant. Yes, the president inherited a budget in arrears, an economy in tatters and a tax system that is unsustainable as written. It was necessary to add to the deficit in the short term to jolt the economy back to life. The House has these four exemptions in its pay-as-you-go rule; even without the Obama exceptions, there was no reasonable hope that these costs would be paid for.

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Obama sets the stage for health care reform battle

Thu, 11 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Newsday - Jun. 11 (Editorial) - Obama's PAYGO push met with some guffaws. A president who inherited a huge deficit, made it even bigger and then called for fiscal discipline, is an easy target. But as Washington moves beyond economic crisis management to structural reform, living within its means is key. It's no coincidence that PAYGO was in place in the 1990s when deficits became surpluses, or that deficits reappeared after it was abandoned. Health care for all is important. So is responsibly paying for it.

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No gain but we avoid a lot of pain

Tue, 02 Jun 2009 00:00:00 -0700

Los Angeles Times - By Michael Hiltzik - Jun. 02 (Opinion) - Whether the government's novel venture into industrial ownership will save the economy, or whether it's even a necessary component of an economic recovery, are questions certain to be widely debated in the coming months while GM hares its way through an expedited bankruptcy reorganization.

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Deficit Jam

Tue, 26 May 2009 00:00:00 -0700

New Republic - By Jonathan Chait - May. 26 (Opinion) - f there's one political blemish on Barack Obama's first four months in office, it's that he's losing the budget debate. Democrats are openly worrying about the red ink. Republicans have taunted Obama as less fiscally responsible than his predecessor. (House Republican John Campbell compared George W. Bush's deficits to a "couple of drinks," and Obama's to "falling down, throwing up and wasted.") The administration's hasty budget-cut announcements (first $100 million, then $17 billion) show signs of panic.

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