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Gutting GOP, Gutless Obama: Will America’s Economy Go the Way of Europe?

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The GOP is gutting food from the mouths of poor Americans, and Obama, moving ever right, doesn’t have the guts to stand up to them, all while the U.S. economy becomes more like Europe’s…

July has been a dreadful month for President Barack Obama and the American economy.

Just read last week’s columns and articles by Paul Krugman, Frank Rich and Joe Nocera and you could easily conclude that Obama and his economic advisers have failed the country and Obama’s chances for re-election are dwindling daily.

Meanwhile, Obama faces the unthinkable prospect that the Republican-led House of Representatives could actually fail to bring a bill that could pass in time to raise the federal deficit ceiling by a looming August 2 deadline.

Yes, our American government could actually default on our debts, not because we don’t have the money, but because we lack the requisite political will.

Factor in the White House’s ongoing, unconstructive negotiations with the House Republican caucus, driven by Tea Party animus to raising taxes and even raising the debt ceiling.  Arguably, the House majority is the most ideological Congress in modern history and Obama has a major political problem confronting him in the debt ceiling crisis that could even jeopardize his re-election.

Blogs have been buzzing this week with the idea of a primary challenge too. Democrats on Capitol Hill can not be feeling very secure in this moment.

Meanwhile, the Republican caucus, frustrated with Speaker John Boehner’s politicking with the President, switched negotiators to Eric Cantor, the Majority Leader, who arrived at the White House yesterday armed with color-coded spread sheets, omitting any tax revenues from the most wealthy of Americans.

The economic situation is pretty grim.

June  job numbers were published last Friday that indicate a downward spiral trend–only 18,000 newly created jobs last month, measly, weak numbers, following an equally bad month in May that produced only 25,000 new jobs. These latest numbers drove the unemployment rate up to 9.2 percent, sinking Americans’ confidence that indicate the hoped for  “summer for recovery” is out of reach.

Not the direction you want the economy to go, especially if you are President Barack Obama who is running for re-election and is currently engaged in the effort to raise $1 billion for his campaign during a dreadful, stagnating economy.

Republicans immediately blamed the president and Congressional Democrats for the sinking economy. Obama made a trip to the Rose Garden to prod Congress to extend the payroll tax past December and pass trade bills now pending with South Korea, Panama and Colombia.

The original stimulus money is finished, much of it being tax cuts and not cash that the economy desperately needed. Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz, both Nobel laureates, said from the beginning that $850 billion was not enough to put this economy back on track. And now the results are in: there are 500,000 fewer federal employees, state and local governments are laying off employees, including teachers and police too, as they tighten up their budgets. One municipal jurisdiction in Florida furloughed its police department for six months–they just did not have the necessary $165,000 on hand to keep the cops on duty.

With businesses sitting on mounds of cash, they are simply not hiring at a rate that would substantially improve the economy. During a weak economy, barely out of recession, the federal government becomes the banker and spender of last resort. But apparently the Republicans missed that chapter in macroeconomics 101.

Has America has gone the way of Europe? From the Feds to local  governments, everyone has embraced the austerity mode, so it is no surprise the economy is contracting and the metrics bear out the pain.

Similarly, the austerity approach is not working out so well for the weak sovereign funds and treasuries of Portugal, Ireland, Greece and Spain (known as the “PIGS”). Italy is also the latest in Europe, who apparently is joining the PIGS with teetering solvency problems too. The upshot could simply be said in three words: “likely to default.” And that is a problem for the European Central Bank, the Germans, the British and yes, the United States too.

Because our globalized financial and banking system is intricately connected, when an Italy or Spain potentially collapses, it will hit our markets who are likely to sustain steep drops in worth. Add in the unbelievable thought that the U.S. could default, you can bet the entire world will also feel America’s economic pain.

Back at home, as Obama and the majority of a Republican Congress prepares to put a political knife to bone, not meat, while long-term joblessness remains the achilles heel since the 2008 crash: 14.1 million unemployed, with 6.3 million of them having searched for work for six months or longer. Including those who are working part-time because they can’t find full-time work and those who have stopped looking, the broader unemployment rate is now 16.2 percent, its highest level since December 2010.

Americans have readjusted our expectations now as it is commonly understood that college graduates will return home to live after graduation.  They must delay venturing out into the world and yield to non-paid work as “interns” as long as their parents can support them.

During this recession, millions of Americans in their 50s and 60s have been chronically out of work, with many believing they will never return to the workforce.  With depleted 401K retirement accounts rocked by the 2008 economic crash, the prospect that Obama has put Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid on the negotiating table with the rabid Republicans, frightens people who are already fragile and hurting, believing from their kishkas (Yiddish for “guts”) that they will never recover.

As Krugman said last week, progressives and Democrats should be worried.  After Obama’s press conference yesterday, no progressive should have any doubt, he has moved to the middle politically and in the process reassured Republicans at least three times during the press conference yesterday that there were no new taxes in his proposed grand bargain until 2013.  He also said, what must have sent shudders through the Democratic caucus in both chambers:

We keep on talking about this stuff and we have these high-minded pronouncements about how we’ve got to get control of the deficit and how we owe it to our children and our grandchildren. Well, let’s step up.  Let’s do it.  I’m prepared to do it.  I’m prepared to take on significant heat from my party to get something done. And I expect the other side should be willing to do the same thing — if they mean what they say that this is important.

The face of this new economy got a little closer to me just last month in my middle-class neighborhood in Riverdale, New York, historically Jewish identified, although, increasingly diverse, located in the Bronx (many New Yorker’s like to say “Riverdale” is not the Bronx, at least not the Bronx that Hollywood portrays).

When returning from work on a late afternoon bus ride to Riverdale from Broadway Avenue, a nicely dressed and carefully coiffed woman, perhaps in her late 50s, early 60s, remarked about the Columbia University binder I was carrying. I told her I worked at the University. She told me she had attended the prestigious Bennington College and transferred to Harvard where she met her husband.

She said they went onto work in South Africa for 10 years. And then, without hesitation and in a non sequitur she said:  “My husband and I have only eaten one meal a day during the past year and today I finally got a job at a hair cutting salon. It isn’t what I wanted, but I need the job.” She added that they were behind in their rent, but was hoping to catch up soon. I responded by saying “I am so sorry to hear about your trouble. So many people are suffering right now.”  I wished her ‘good luck’ as she exited the bus.

By the time I arrived home, I was so rattled by this woman’s need to share her pain with me, a complete stranger, it was the only thing I could talk about for the next couple of weeks. During the same week, I walked to my favorite Italian restaurant in Riverdale to order a cappuccino and read the Sunday paper. While sitting outdoors with my golden retriever on lead, I overheard an older woman’s conversation with apparently, her husband, discussing their finances. She was clearly tracking the economy.  She mentioned Paul Krugman’s latest column and Obama’s efforts to revive the economy and said, “By the way, we have not received our food stamps for the month and I need to check to see if a mistake was made.”

These women were very much like myself (although clearly straight)– white, both in their late 50s or 60s, well-educated, albeit one had been out-of-work for more than six months and was now vastly underemployed and the other was retired, on a fixed  income needing food stamps to get by, both living in the” middle-class dream” in a Riverdale neighborhood, but barely hanging on.

Their lives and terrible circumstances is now what confronts Obama and Democrats alike, and puts his campaign for re-election in jeopardy, especially as he prepares to cut FDR’s safety nets with Democrats’ acquiescence.  Really?

I do not think moving to the “political center” is what gets Obama re-elected. These women’s plights represent what is most illustrative of America writ large today.

What he has forgotten are the people on Main Street and how to fight for them.

Can you only imagine what is happening to the poor? There are now 14 million children living under the legal definition of poverty in America. There are also 2.5 million more children living in poverty today than in 2000. Every night in America, children go to bed increasingly hungry. This reality has been reported by CBS’ “60 Minutes” twice in the past six months, with a recent update. It is heart-breaking.

In Congress, the Republican response is to gut–literally take food from people’s mouths during a time of general neediness all around. Congresswoman Marcy Kaptur (D-OH) told it like it should be told when she said the food stamp cuts and aid to women and children was a bridge too far, calling the Congress “the most gutless institution” during a recent floor speech.

She should include President Obama among the gutless in her next speech.

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NjS4Uo8F2R8&version=3&hl=en_US]

(Image, top: Gallup)

Tanya L. Domi is an Adjunct Assistant Professor of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University, who teaches about human rights in Eurasia and is a Harriman Institute affiliated faculty member. Prior to teaching at Columbia, Domi worked internationally for more than a decade on issues related to democratic transitional development, including political and media development, human rights, gender issues, sex trafficking, and media freedom.

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News

Lawmaker Slammed for Claiming College Basketball Players Were Actually ‘Illegal Invaders’

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Michigan MAGA Republican state Rep. Matt Maddock is under fire after claiming three buses were “loaded up with illegal invaders.” The buses, according to multiple reports, were actually loaded with the Gonzaga University basketball team arriving for March Madness.

“Happening right now. Three busses just loaded up with illegal invaders at Detroit Metro. Anyone have any idea where they’re headed with their police escort?” Rep. Maddock wrote on social media Wednesday evening, tagging far-right former U.S. Congressman Pete Hoekstra, who served as U.S. Ambassador to the Netherlands under Donald Trump and is now the state’s Republican Party chair.

Informed of his error on social media, Rep. Maddock doubled down, and attacked.

READ MORE: Ronna McDaniel Is Just a ‘Normal’ Person Who ‘Never Denied the Election’ Says Hugh Hewitt

“Probably teams for the NCAA Mens Sweet 16 playing at LCA on Friday and Sunday,” a user on X wrote.

“Sure kommie. Good talking point,” Maddock quickly shot back.

ABC affiliate WXYZ executive producer Maxwell White, responding to the Maddock’s original post wrote: “Just to be clear, this was the Gonzaga basketball team. Photos show Gonzaga getting on an Allegiant plane to Detroit for the Sweet 16, and Flight Radar shows a plane from GEG to DTW landed at 7:25 p.m., around the time this photo was posted.”

“This is a wild tweet,” White added, before adding more evidence.

Hoekstra, who was accused of using racism and xenophobia to win his campaign for a U.S. Senate seat (he lost), did not respond directly to Maddock but did repost the apparently false claim.

Michigan State Senate Democratic Majority Whip Mallory McMorrow denounced Maddock’s claim as “dangerous.”

Maddock’s remark also made the national stage when U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell responded.

READ MORE: Trump Campaign Says It Will Deploy ‘Soldiers’ to Polling Places

“Hey Einstein,” the California Democrat wrote, “your state is hosting the Sweet 16. Could it be a team bus? If it is, will you resign for your spectacular stupidity?”

In 2021 The Washington Post reported, “Michigan state Rep. Matt Maddock and his wife, Michigan Republican Party co-chair Meshawn Maddock, have repeatedly been called out by fact-checking journalists for promoting baseless claims of widespread voter fraud and falsely suggesting that covid-19 is comparable to the flu.”

See the social media posts above 0r at this link.

 

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OPINION

Ronna McDaniel Is Just a ‘Normal’ Person Who ‘Never Denied the Election’ Says Hugh Hewitt

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Right-wing talk radio show host Hugh Hewitt is facing backlash after declaring former RNC chair Ronna McDaniel, who was ousted after her hiring cost NBC News a tumultuous five days, a “normal” person who has “never denied the election.”

Last summer, The Washington Post‘s Philip Bump reported McDaniel “is still elevating 2020 election skepticism,” and “won’t say the election was fair.”

“I don’t think he won it fair. I don’t. I’m not going to say that,” McDaniel had said to CNN.

“CNN teased an upcoming interview between host Chris Wallace and Ronna McDaniel,” Bump wrote. “In the clip, Wallace asks McDaniel when she stopped being an ‘election denier’ — that is, someone who espouses skepticism about the validity of the election results. And, surprise! McDaniel never stopped.”

Bump also explained the danger in election denialism: “McDaniel won’t say Biden was legitimately elected because the base doesn’t want to hear it — but the base doesn’t want to hear it in part because leaders such as McDaniel won’t simply admit without qualifications that Biden won.”

READ MORE: Comer Refuses to Investigate Trump Family Member Over ‘Influence Peddling’ Allegation

“Establishing a system in which any loss can easily be framed as illegitimate means establishing a system in which no loss is accepted as valid,” Bump continued. “It means institutionalizing the idea that elections are inaccurate gauges of public opinion and, therefore, that the winners of those elections have no mandate to serve.”

On Wednesday Hewitt, a Washington Post columnist and former Reagan White House aide, said on Fox News that McDaniel “is a fine Republican. She is not an election denier. She has never denied the election.”

Former Republican Congressman Joe Walsh responded to that clip.

Bullshit Hugh. With Trump, she pressured MI canvassers to not certify the results; with Trump, she pressured other state attorney’s to sue & invalidate results in MI, PA, & WI; she worked with Trump on the fake electors scheme; she lied about charges of voter fraud well after those charges had been debunked. No major party chair in American history has done more to dispute a legit election. Shame on you,” Walsh wrote.

Media Matters’ Eric Kleefeld, also responding to that clip: “Somebody who helped coordinate fake electors and passed a resolution calling Jan. 6 ‘legitimate political discourse’ is not normal, and we must at all steps refuse to treat them as such.”

READ MORE: Greene Says She Won’t Take Responsibility if Johnson Loses Speaker’s Gavel Before Election

Hewitt had also told Fox News, “I don’t know who is going to keep MSNBC informed of what normal people think, because Ronna McDaniel is about as normal as they come. She’s a Michigan mom, she’s been in the job seven years. She represents the Republican Party.”

McDaniel, it could be said, does not represent the Republican Party, not the MAGA America First Republican Party of today, neither literally nor figuratively. Donald Trump engineered her ouster and installed his handpicked replacements, including his daughter-in-law and Michael Whatley, a right-wing attorney who was part of the Bush recount team during the contested 2000 presidential election.

The Atlantic’s Norman Ornstein, an emeritus scholar at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), blasted Hewitt, calling him “an utter disgrace,” while adding, “shame on those like the Washington Post who showcase him.”

Adam Cohen, vice chair of Lawyers for Good Government, pointedly responded to Hewitt: “Hate to tell you this, but normal people don’t try to foment a coup, or deny the truth about election results Like Ronna McDaniel did.”

Watch the videos above or at this link.

READ MORE: Trump Campaign Says It Will Deploy ‘Soldiers’ to Polling Places

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News

Comer Refuses to Investigate Trump Family Member Over ‘Influence Peddling’ Allegation

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Last year House Oversight Committee Chairman Jim Comer acknowledged former President Donald Trump’s son-in-law and senior White House advisor Jared Kushner had “crossed the line” when he accepted $2 billion in foreign investment funds from the government of Saudi Arabia as he started up a private investment firm just months after leaving the White House.

Now, Chairman Comer says he will not open an investigation into any possible wrongdoing, Huffpost reports, despite top Democrats alleging Kushner engaged in “apparent influence peddling and quid pro quo deals.”

On Tuesday, the top Democrat on Comer’s Oversight Committee, Ranking Member Jamie Raskin, and Democrat Robert Garcia, the Ranking Member on the Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs, formally requested Comer “convene a hearing regarding Jared Kushner’s apparent influence peddling and quid pro quo deals involving investments in exchange for official actions and to examine the resulting threats to our national security.”

“This Committee cannot claim to be ‘investigating foreign nationals’ attempts to target and coerce high-ranking U.S. officials’ family members by providing money or other benefits in exchange for certain actions while continuing to ignore these matters,” Raskin and Garcia wrote. “We therefore urge you to work with us to finally investigate Mr. Kushner’s receipt of billions of dollars from foreign governments in deals that appear to be quid pro quos for actions he undertook as senior White House adviser in Donald Trump’s Administration.”

READ MORE: Greene Says She Won’t Take Responsibility if Johnson Loses Speaker’s Gavel Before Election

The American people are deeply concerned about these business dealings and Mr. Kushner’s apparent influence peddling. We must address
those concerns with a fair, impartial, and public process to understand the truth and to institute meaningful reforms to safeguard public confidence in our executive branch.”

The two Democrats in their letter say their “request comes in light of allegations that Jared Kushner is pursuing new foreign business deals, just as Donald Trump becomes the presumptive Republican nominee for the presidency. Last year, well before these new allegations came to light, Chairman Comer had already conceded that Jared Kushner’s conduct ‘crossed the line of ethics’ and promised that the Oversight Committee would ‘have some questions for Trump and some of his family members, including Jared Kushner.'”

Raskin and Garcia paint a picture of “Kushner’s pattern of profiting off of his time in the White House.”

Citing The New York Times (apparently this article), they write, “Jared Kushner was closing in on investments in Albania and Serbia, leveraging relationships he built during his time as a senior adviser in his father-in-law’s White House. Reportedly, Mr. Kushner is considering an investment on the site of the former Yugoslav Ministry of Defense.”

“Mr. Kushner is reportedly being advised by Richard Grenell, another former senior Trump Administration official who served as U.S. Ambassador to Germany and, concomitantly, as ‘special envoy for peace negotiations between Serbia and Kosovo.’ Mr. Grenell reportedly ‘pushed a related plan’ for redevelopment of the same site during his time in the Trump Administration.”

READ MORE: Trump Says He Thinks He’s ‘Allowed’ to Accept Foreign Money to Pay Fines

“In pursuing investment opportunities in Albania, Mr. Grenell and Mr. Kushner have been openly leveraging their relationship with Edi Rama, the Prime Minister of Albania. While Commander-in-Chief, President Trump received unconstitutional payments from Prime Minister Rama and other senior Albanian government officials who spent thousands of dollars at theTrump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., over three separate stays,” Raskin and Garcia write.

They also allege, “Mr. Kushner successfully overruled State Department officials, including Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, to make President Trump’s first foreign trip as President to Saudi Arabia. Mr. Kushner personally intervened to inflate the value of a U.S.-Saudi arms deal and to finalize the deal President Trump signed, which was worth $110 billion. Mr. Kushner
also provided diplomatic cover and support to the Crown Prince after the brutal murder of Jamal Khashoggi, an American permanent resident and journalist. Mr. Khashoggi’s murder was assessed by American Intelligence to have been approved by the Crown Prince himself.”

Despite their extensive allegations, Chairman Comer is refusing to open an investigation.

“Unlike the Bidens, Jared Kushner has a legitimate business and has a career as a business executive that predates Donald Trump’s political career,” Comer said, as HuffPost reports. “Democrats’ latest letter is part of their playbook to shield President Biden from oversight.”

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