Let's face it. America is one giant fix-up project. Bridges are crumbling. Public transportation systems are rusting. Water mains are leaking. Getting everything repaired and modernized is perhaps the largest and most expensive "honey do" list imaginable.

As I discovered in researching my new book Audacity of Help: Obama's Economic...

Socialist. Communist. Hitler. Racist. The Joker. Has any president in recent memory been called so many names so quickly in his tenure?

It took a second term for George W. Bush, Bill Clinton and Richard Nixon to achieve pariah status among their detractors. President Obama is getting the primary-schoolyard...

When I was on Glenn Beck's Fox show a few months ago, I was apprehensive that he was going to malign me and the publisher of my columns. After a fairly mundane, fairly apolitical chat about the sorry state of the US home market, though, we both went our separate...

If a meaningful health reform plan doesn't pass, life in the U.S. will be inhumane and our country will begin to look like Great Britain after World War I -- hobbled and facing unrelenting poverty.
As I discovered in researching my new book Audacity of Help: Obama's Economic...

So, where are the jobs? Even as the fog seems to be lifting over housing, manufacturing and the financial sector, the unemployment rate continues to float ever higher.

Despite the largest economic bailout in America history, the jobless rate soared to 9.7 percent in August. All told, nearly 7...

Like FDR, Obama proposed a lofty agenda that will concentrate on creating employment and eventually economic security for working Americans. As a president who has a deep sense of history -- it's evident in his speeches, writing, and policy proposals -- Obama stated in his Audacity of Hope that "today,...

Foul. Turnover. Two strikes. No matter which overused sports metaphor you use to describe the Obama team's handling of their health care reform agenda, it's clear that the best one to date is "fumble!"

The most audacious health plan in two generations is sputtering thanks to really awful communication planning,...

You want to find a neighborhood that will hold its value and may even appreciate once the housing recession ends?

Take a walk.

Communities that have amenities and services within walking distance and don't require a car may win out over time and may even reward you with equity gains.

With every new story about the housing crisis, a piece of the American dream fades into dust.

Foreclosed properties sold on the courthouse steps in Atlanta don't attract enough buyers. California homeowners awaiting foreclosure neither pay their mortgage nor any rent; they are squatters in a property they hoped to...

Green is gold. Why didn't homebuilders get this idea? They could be building new homes again, employing millions, making inner cities and suburbs habitable and bring down the cost of housing for everyone.

Homebuilding needs to join the 21st century and apply the best, efficient technologies to lower costs...

If U.S. housing is going to rebound long-term, we need to vanquish the car and stop encouraging sprawl.

First, let's hasten the demise of the spurb, an ugly word I made up to describe sprawling, unwalkable urban-suburban areas that have no connection to public transportation and central cities.

Even before the home bubble burst, homes cost too much for more than four out of ten Americans. Only 56 percent of Americans could afford a modestly priced home in 2002, the first full year of the bubble. And as Americans went deeper into debt to finance their dream, they...

You would think with home prices still dropping like hailstones in most areas, that homes would be bargains.

The present buyer's market obscures a key fact about the housing crisis though: millions sought the refuge of cheap credit, subprime and adjustable loans during the boom because they were the easiest...