The new book "What The Great Ate: A Curious History Of Food & Fame" tells you that Madonna, when she was struggling to make ends meet, used to pick French fries out of the trash can. Also, that Elvis's last meal was six Chips Ahoy! cookies and four scoops of ice cream, two of which were peach flavored.

Matthew and Mark Jacob, the brother team that put together the collection of curious food stories, also has a blog.

Here are 12 people that you know and 12 things about what they ate that you didn't. Any of these treats on your list of favorites?

Dick Armey's father, the operator of a North Dakota grain elevator, liked to fish with his son in Canada.

As they drove, the boy noticed painted barns "straight from a Norman Rockwell canvas."

But at the border, as Armey writes in Give Us Liberty: A Tea Party Manifesto, the scenery changed:

The barns were unpainted. I wondered why Canadian farmers would allow their barns to degrade from exposure to the elements. The answer, I discovered, was government. At the time, Canada taxed painted buildings, so farmers left their structures exposed to avoid the penalty. These things make quite an impression on a child.

Yes, but what if it's the wrong impression?

My fact-checking suggests it is. Large unpainted barns were often erected in Southern Canada in the late 19th century -- and the custom seems to have continued. The Canadian government had nothing to do with the decor of those barns. The reasons the barns were unpainted were culture and esthetics.

A childhood misimpression casts a long shadow. At some point, Armey might have run across a different explanation. But this one neatly fits his politics. And now he passes that misinformation on.

Misperceptions can be useful. In the early '90s, the economics professor cast his lot with Conservative Republicans at exactly the right time, beating the drums in the House of Representatives against Bill Clinton's efforts to reduce the deficit the old-fashioned way -- by raising taxes. Later, when Armey's side was in charge, he was one of the Republican leaders who delighted in cutting taxes and growing the federal budget.

Consistency was never Armey's strongest suit. His view of the Clinton sex scandal: "If I were in the President's place, I would not have gotten a chance to resign. I would be lying in a pool of my own blood, hearing Mrs. Armey standing over me saying, 'How do I reload this damn thing?'" This quip backfired -- it inspired some of his former students to recall episodes of sexual harassment by Professor Armey. (There is now a second Mrs. Armey.)

In 2003, after eight years as Speaker of the House, Armey resigned and joined the Washington law firm now known as DLA Piper as a senior policy advisor, or, in plain English, as a lobbyist. The job paid well -- a reported $750,000 a year. But lobbyists are not in the public eye, so he also became co-chairman of Citizens for A Sound Economy, which, the following year, became FreedomWorks. The cause grew rapidly, and, by 2008, FreedomWorks was paying Armey a salary of $550,000.

Better believe he's visible now.

The philosophy of FreedomWorks is straightforward: "Lower Taxes. Less Government. More Freedom." It is, if you've tried to trace its ideas, a hopelessly self-contradictory program. The Tea Party folks want to cut the deficit, but insist on lower taxes. They hate national health care, but love Medicaid. [In his book, Armey and his collaborator, Matt Kibbe, write that "the government should be concerned with protecting my liberty, not my liver." ] They want freedom -- mostly from government -- but also want the Feds to do more to punish illegal immigrants. They are, in short, an ignorant army, pumped up by Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin and FreedomWorks to campaign for programs that would benefit them not at all. No matter. Their ideas are of less consequence than their numbers and the shrillness of their voices.

A funny thing happened to Dick Armey on the way to mega-prominence -- his employer and his cause turned out to be on opposite sides of several issues. DLA Piper represented drug companies that, at least initially, supported health care reform. And the firm represented General Motors, Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch. FreedomWorks opposed TARP.

Conservative bloggers noted these conflicts and attacked. Armey said he was the victim of a conspiracy -- 'I wouldn't be surprised if it stemmed from information put out by allies of the Obama administration" -- but in August of 2009, he resigned from DLA Piper.

"I hated to walk away from that kind of money," he said. "How many times in your life, or anybody's life, do they have an opportunity to earn that kind of money when they are 69 years old?"

These days money is not his problem. His movement is. In the courts, the Tea Party is losing (U.S. vs. Arizona), and Proposition 8 has been overturned. And another liberal woman is on the Supreme Court. With every decision that "they" lose, you can picture their rage spiking. Meanwhile, Armey and Fox and the right wing bloggers have been screaming "Take back America" for so long that they will almost surely incite some event that sets "real" America against illegals, deviants, liberals and, mostly and especially, the President.

And soon.

At a Tea Party event, someone will turn on an idiot protester. Or a Tea Party member will decide to right some wrong. A gun will go off. And there, along with blood and death, will be the media's useless and overdue finger-pointing.

On August 28 --- the anniversary of Martin Luther King's gathering --- Glenn Beck is leading his second March on Washington. This is worrisome. Since January 19th, 2009, Beck attacked the little-known Tides Foundation on his show 29 times; in July, one of his fans was arrested after a shootout with the California Highway Patrol. His plan: "to start a revolution" by attacking the American Civil Liberties Union and -- you guessed it -- the Tides Foundation. Beck, of course, saw no connection. But he has called for marchers at his rally to sign an oath of non-violence: Bring your gun if you must -- it's your constitutional right -- but don't pull the trigger.

Glenn Beck is not the only friend of the Tea Party set who's working hard to make sure he cannot be held responsible for any violence --- Armey uses the final 65 pages of his 245-page book to make it clear that FreedomWorks is not a leader of the Tea Party movement. Nobody is. It's local. Grassroots. FreedomWorks exists simply to support those groups and give them tips on organizing their events and meetings. Talking points, rallies, slogans -- all that comes, spontaneously, from patriots whose names we wouldn't recognize.

These pages, like the first 244 pages, are not terribly illuminating. They are very likely untrue. But to talk about them in journalistic or literary terms is to miss their purpose. "Give Us Liberty" may bear a publisher's imprint (surprise, it's Rupert Murdoch!) but it is not a book.

Dick Armey has, cleverly, published his legal defense.

[This post also appears on JUST BOOKS at the Brennan Center]

At events around the country, Democratic candidates are unveiling, buffing, and polishing the shiny new message that will drive this fall's campaigns. The message generally employs a car as its major metaphor, with direction as its logic, invoking remarks President Obama made several weeks back. Republicans, President Obama said, have driven the national car into the ditch, and "now they want the keys back." The president's message to Republicans? "You can't drive!"

If the meme rings familiar to political junkies, it should. Since the Clinton years, Democrats have frequently told voters, "D is for Drive, R is for Reverse." The message rolls both backward and forward, condemning conservative retrenchment and lauding progressive results. Recently on Meet the Press, Press Secretary Robert Gibbs put it this way: "Understand, the last six months of 2008, right, we saw an economy that shed three million jobs. The first six months of 2010, this economy has created 600,000 private sector jobs."

We should be concerned about the "D is for drive" message. Not because the facts aren't right -- they are. Democratic policies are doing more to turn the economy around than Republicans' policies -- if they have them -- ever would have done. While not perfect, the leadership of President Obama and Democrats in Congress helped save the auto industry and has generated hundreds of thousands of jobs.

But there are facts, and there's emotion. What's worrying is less the facts than the touch, feel, and underlying character of the new message. The message too easily risks the impression of complacency, an "insider" character, and even, perversely, cockiness -- at a time when Democrats need instead to identify with and channel the emotional frustrations of the electorate (and the majority of independents).

In other words, in their attempt to rebut the Republicans' specious attacks on policy, Democrats are overcompensating and becoming that which they should abhor: the establishment.

All the evidence shows that this November we're facing a change election, just as we did in 2008. A recent Washington Post poll found a stunning result: 26 percent of registered voters are inclined to support their current congressional representative, whereas 62 percent are inclined to "look for someone new." The large majority of the electorate will probably be uninterested in someone who is operating from a premise they don't buy -- in this case, touting a status quo economy because it "has started to create private sector jobs."

Across the nation, economic distress, coupled with a deep frustration with politics as usual, has generated a fascination with outsiders, reformers, and "courage politicians" in general. In the recent Washington Post poll, two figures jump out, respectively the highest and lowest figures in the over 20 years that the Post has been running this poll: The percentage of voters who trust neither party on the economy (17%) and the percentage of voters inclined to reelect their representative (25%).

This isn't only important for what it signals about the electoral abattoir that likely awaits Democrats this fall; it also signals a problem among leading progressive strategists. Time and again, you hear it from well-placed Democratic insiders: a faith that superior reason and facts will, on their own, win the argument. We have elected a supremely rational president who has surrounded himself with very bright people; excellent.

But there's precious little evidence so far that intelligence, reason, and facts are winning the day. Drew Westen's terrific book The Political Brain, proved that progressives too often rely on facts, while conservatives successfully go for the gut. But it was a bestseller years ago; you'd think Democrats would learn. But on the contrary, health care reform took twice as long as it should have and the public option was jettisoned, as the president was Swift-Boated with Sarah Palin's nihilistic, absurd, but emotionally resonant "Death to Granny" attacks -- and didn't fight back quickly or forcefully enough.

The lesson is that we need more passion, more heroes and villains, and a message that presents Democrats as impatient with (even angry about) the status quo, rather than satisfied protectors of the realm. Congressional candidates need to present a vision of the nation that impatiently challenges the establishment, on economic development, on national security, on consumer and small business issues.

Even a track record -- even facts -- won't necessarily win the day, if what the people want is someone who makes them feel like change is a'coming. As James Carville might say, "It's a change election, stupid." Even if you're driving in "D," you can still end up in the ditch.

With just one day until the Colorado primaries, Democrats in the state are receiving robocalls from former president Bill Clinton encouraging them to vote for challenger Andrew Romanoff.

In the recording, Clinton, who endorsed Romanoff in June, praised Romanoff's record as Speaker of the Colorado State House:

"Hi, this is Bill Clinton. I am supporting Andrew Romanoff for the U.S. Senate and I hope that you will vote for him in Tuesday's Democratic primary because he has really good ideas on the economy.

"He has proven himself to be one of the most effective legislative leaders in the entire country, and I think that he has the best chance of holding the seat in November ... And please mark the top line Andrew Romanoff for U.S. Senate. Thank you."

Last week President Barack Obama, who endorsed incumbent Michael Bennet nearly a year ago, held a conference call with voters to rally support.

On the Republican side, candidate Jane Norton had Senator and former presidential candidate John McCain stump for her over the weekend.

The latest polling shows close races in both Senate primaries.

Former Virginia Gov. L. Douglas Wilder, the nation's first elected black Governor and an Obama supporter, is out with an op-ed in Politico Monday that argues for a drastic shakeup of the current administration in order to prime the pump for a difficult 2012 presidential reelection campaign.

The first step, Wilder argues, is to replace gaffe-prone Joe Biden as Vice President with battle-tested Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

An idea that was heavily pushed in 2008, before then-candidate Obama selected Biden as his running mate, Wilder argues that the first 18 months of Biden's vice presidency have been unproductive and filled with "too many YouTube moments."

And, while "Biden has continued to undermine what little confidence the public may have had in him," Wilder contends that Secretary of State Clinton has only excelled.

"Clinton has been nothing but a team player who has earned good marks since being asked to serve as secretary of state. She has skillfully navigated the globe and been tough and commanding when the moment called for it (with Iran) and graceful and diplomatic when situations required (navigating complex relations with Russia, Pakistan and China)."

The restructuring of the 2012 ticket, Wilder writes, would revive Obama's prominent and popular campaign themes of "audacity" and "change," and could provide the President with serious reinforcement among working-class voters, a demographic that he has been losing ground with amid the financial crisis in the first year-and-a-half of his presidency.

Liz Peek over at Fox News proposed a similar scenario in June, writing that Hillary could provide some much needed "excitement among core Democrats" as Vice President. Furthermore, Peek says, if Obama were to get reelected with the help of Clinton, it would put her perfectly in line for a 2016 presidential run of her own.

Others have suggested that someone, and perhaps Clinton herself, might mount a primary challenge against Obama if his popularity continues to lag, though most have played this scenario off as incredibly remote, and ultimately unlikely to faze the President in his quest for reelection in 2012.

The 18th International AIDS Conference kicks off this week here in Vienna. Twenty-five thousand people are expected to attend sessions focused on the latest in HIV science, policy and programs, and the city is decked out, with a red ribbon adorning Parliament, a planned fashion show and Cotillion, and a concert by Annie Lenox. The theme? "Rights Here, Right Now."

Those who bemoan that the meeting is not more narrowly devoted to the latest from virology labs are missing the point: there are other more scientifically focused conferences on HIV/AIDS, and raising global attention to the on-going AIDS crisis requires some spectacle. Far too many people mistakenly think that this epidemic is over. The celebrities and politicians who gather biennially for this event are here to reaffirm that far too many have died of AIDS, far too many are continuing to die from AIDS, and we have the knowledge and resources to end this epidemic if we can muster the political will.

At the last conference, in Mexico City in 2008, Bill Clinton said that these conferences are important "because they enable us to measure our progress since the last meeting, to acknowledge continuing problems, to evaluate the positive and negative new developments." So, what progress has been made and what problems are continuing? What positive and negative developments can be noted?

Certainly, there is some positive news. UNAIDS recently announced that the prevalence of HIV has fallen among young people in 15 of the most heavily affected countries. The biggest drop was in Kenya, where HIV prevalence in 15 to 24 year-olds fell 60 percent between 2000 and 2005. Decreases were also seen in Ethiopia, Malawi, Cote d'Ivoire, Burundi, Haiti, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Rwanda and Lesotho.

But there are also many continuing problems.

In more than 160 countries the use of criminal law to target groups at high risk of HIV infection creates a barrier to effective HIV prevention and treatment. Criminal laws targeting sex workers, drug users, men who have sex with men, impede HIV outreach and treatment programs and drive people we most want to reach away from important, life-saving, services.

In Uganda, for example -- once a "success story" in the fight against AIDS, a law proposed in May criminalizes "attempted transmission" of HIV and requires mandatory testing and forced disclosure of HIV status. The result may be to discourage people from getting tested, getting treated, and preventing others from being infected. In Kenya, where homosexual conduct is punishable by up to 14 years in prison, violent attacks earlier this year against suspected homosexuals shut down HIV treatment programs.

In China, Cambodia and Vietnam, drug users are routinely swept up and detained -- for up to six years -- for "treatment" that consists of little more than arduous military-style exercises and forced labor. Understandably, in these countries, few drug users are keen on seeking out HIV services that might endanger their lives rather than protect them. In much of Eastern Europe and Central Asia, few drug users have access to needle exchange programs or opiate substitution therapy, such as methadone, which have been proven to cut HIV transmission effectively, and dramatically.

The conference in Mexico highlighted human rights as well, in particular discrimination against gay men and drug users, and barriers to accessing comprehensive HIV prevention information. President Felipe Calderon committed Mexico to eliminating restrictions on importing antiretroviral drugs, and pledged that his government would provide medicines to all people living with HIV.

In the two years since, though, attention to HIV in the local media has nearly disappeared. In the first six months of 2010, I could find only one article in a major Mexican newspaper, highlighting an increase in the number of people living with HIV and the number of people dying of AIDS. The article warned that the number of people unable to afford antiretroviral medicines was increasing.

The first conference on AIDS was held in 1985, and since 1989 the conferences have had slogans that reveal how we are addressing the epidemic. In 1989, the slogan was "The Scientific and Social Challenge of AIDS." Conferences in 1990 and 1991 also highlighted science and policy. Then came solidarity slogans: "A world United against AIDS" (1992); "The Global Challenge of AIDS: Together for the Future" (1994); "One World, One Hope" (1996); "Access for All" (2004). Recent themes have been more impatient ("Time to Deliver" (2006); "Universal Action Now" (2008); "Rights Here, Right Now" (2010).

Two years ago, Clinton talked about these meetings as a way of taking stock. Sadly, this is the one area where the global response to AIDS has failed the most. AIDS conferences are good opportunities to generate attention -- for a week. Holding governments to account for their promises is another thing altogether.

Success in the fight against AIDS requires protecting the human rights of those most vulnerable to HIV infection and making sure that those living with HIV are not discriminated against. It requires evidence-based and rights-based programs that reach those most in need. Governments everywhere are failing to meet their own commitments to spending on health or to providing aid for HIV programs in places that clearly don't have enough resources.

When we meet again in Washington DC for the 2012 conference we can have fashion shows and concerts, but let's make the theme "Accountability."

Perhaps the most important lesson I learned in my years in the Clinton White House was that when problems arise, it is up to the White House to solve them. When you are the top dog, you have more levers and tools of power than anyone else, and more glory and reward when things go well. But when there is a problem, no matter whose fault it is, no matter how bad luck it is, the White House either solves the problem or the failure to do so is theirs. The buck stops there, if you can't stand the heat, etc, etc.

It has always been this way, and always will be. James Buchanan didn't cause the problems that led the nation to disintegrate on his watch, but by not solving them he goes down as one of the nation's most failed Presidents. Herbert Hoover didn't cause the Great Depression, but failing to make progress on it similarly casts him as one of history's biggest failures. LBJ's failure to end the Vietnam War destroyed him, in spite of his own amazing record of legislative achievement earlier in his presidency. Conversely, the Presidents like Lincoln and FDR that dealt successfully with major crises are considered our greatest Presidents, even though they made their share of mistakes along the way.

The combination of problems inherited from George W Bush is the biggest protracted crisis this country has faced since those days of FDR. This economy is damaged beyond what many of the conventional economists or commentators are aware, with a sustained situation that looks bleak for at least several years in the future. The war that Bush started and then ignored in Afghanistan is a quagmire that shows no sign of getting better anytime soon. The other long term problems the Bush administration (and other politicians for decades before, for that matter) ignored - our rapidly deteriorating infrastructure, the health care system's dysfunction, college affordability, our long term trade and budget deficits - certainly don't help the country's sense of well being, or our ability to compete in the world economy of the 21st century.

Even problems less monumental are also tests of Presidential leadership. Jimmy Carter's inability to solve the hostage crisis contributed greatly to his failure as President, and Harry Truman's failure to win or end the Korean War made it impossible for him to run for re-election in spite of all his other accomplishments. LBJ, Ford, Carter, and George HW Bush all failed to get along with their party's respective base, and that alone would have doomed their Presidency. (No President with a strong primary challenge from their base has ever won re-election.)

Again, it doesn't matter whether these problems are some one else's fault, or just bad luck: it is up to the President to deal successfully with whatever they are faced with. Period, end of story.

That is why when I first heard the President, as well as Larry Summers and Tim Geithner, utter the words "jobs are a lagging indicator" early last year, I shuddered. That is trickle down, neo-classical economist speak for "sorry we won't be able to help you get a job anytime soon." That is why when I saw anonymous senior White House officials saying "the left of the left" is the problem in getting the health care bill passed, or when they complain about bloggers being too tough on them, I worry about the whiners' mentality that is setting in at the White House.

Even complaining about Republicans saying no to everything has major limits as a political strategy. When a party has the Presidency and big margins in both Houses of Congress, voters will have very little patience with talk about how things aren't working because of the Republicans. It's great to score political points against the Republicans when Obama and the Democrats are on the high political ground, as on the banking bill, but the bottom line is that you have to figure out a way to deliver on, and solve, the big problems of your Presidency.

The ironic thing in all this is that Obama has a track record of successfully passing legislation that actually is really impressive. The aforementioned Politico article, Peter Daou, Digby, many other good writers have referenced this point. Progressives have rightly complained that the jobs/stimulus bill last year was too small, that the health care bill had no public option and other flaws, and that the financial reform bill doesn't break up the big banks the way it should have. All true, but these are still huge pieces of legislation that accomplished many of the goals and investments progressives have been fighting on behalf of for generations.

The comparison that some people have used for Obama is Jimmy Carter: an inexperienced, intellectual President who didn't work very well with his Democratic base. I don't think that comparison is fair at all: I think a far more apt historical comparison is to LBJ. Carter did not get any major domestic pieces of legislation passed and signed while in office, whereas Obama's legislative track record - while not yet that of LBJ's - is remarkable. But in both cases, their wars in distant third world countries drag on with no end in sight. And in both cases, the relationship between the President and their base isn't working. Adding to Obama's problems is one huge negative factor that LBJ never had: the economy is damaged far beyond the usual business cycle recessionary bumps.

My recommendation to the President and his White House team is to draw two lessons from all this:

1. On the economy, they need to look to FDR's spirit of constant experimentation. FDR understood the deep, intractable damage to the economy done by the Great Depression, and he advocated continually trying to new things to see what worked and what didn't. The problem with "jobs are a lagging indicator" mentality is that while you are patting yourself on the back for stabilizing certain economic trend lines, you lose focus on the constant, urgent need to keep finding ways to produce more jobs. That doesn't necessarily mean more federal jobs and stimulus programs: it could be new ways to force banks to lend more money rather then giving it out in bonuses; it could mean new ideas about getting corporations to invest in jobs rather then hoard their cash as they are doing today; it could mean making it easier for state and local governments to issue infrastructure bonds; it could mean making sure more government contracts create American jobs with higher wages (because higher wages mean more spending and more jobs created); it could mean pushing harder on China to solve its trade imbalance. And, yes, it could mean government jobs, too. Because in the end, it is the President's job to produce more jobs - a lot more jobs, whether they are government or private sector jobs. And between creative policy making and creative politicking, the President has to deliver, not be satisfied that jobs will come eventually.

2. I know people who worked for Jimmy Carter that are still bitter about Ted Kennedy's primary challenge, and I know old LBJ hands who never forgave Gene McCarthy and Bobby Kennedy. But these challenges from the left were a symptom of the problems those Presidents had with their base, not the cause of it, and the fact that there was a rift that never healed helped cause their Presidencies to fail. By contrast, those of us in the Clinton White House left no stone unturned to reach out to progressives after the NAFTA fight, the health care disaster, and the 1994 election. Our ability to head off a primary challenge and enthusiastically unite our party going into the 1996 election allowed us to take control of the election narrative and soundly defeat Bob Dole.

If bloggers, labor, and other progressives are damaging your standing with the Democratic base and taking on the establishment candidates, the answer for the White House is not to bitch about it to reporters or gloat about whatever primary victories you manage to win. To have a successful presidency, the Obama team has to unite the Democratic Party and rekindle the enthusiasm of the door knockers and online contributors and base voters who brought him victory in 2008. It is up to the White House to reach out and fix this problem. They need a strategy to do it involving message, policy, and political outreach; and they need a strong team of people to execute the strategy. When the White House reaches out halfway, the thoughtful leaders of the progressive community will respond. But it is going to take effort, and it is going to take genuine gestures about things that really matter.

The Obama team has shown it has the ability to do some amazing things. In 2008, they elected a black man with an African Muslim name, an insurgent candidate with little experience. They turned out record numbers of voters, had more people knocking on doors, and had more contributors then any campaign in American history. In 2009, they passed the biggest jobs and investment bill in history. In 2010, they passed a bill to provide near-universal health care coverage, and a bill to improve regulation of the financial sector. Those were hellishly tough things to do. Now, they have to show they can produce jobs and repair the bridge to their base. If they can figure out how to do all they did so far in 2008, '09, and '10, they ought to be able to figure out how to get these other things accomplished as well. If they do, they will save the Obama Presidency.

The flight from reason that now marks American public discourse came home for me last Friday when I found myself on public radio debating whether Barack Obama is anti-business. The "news hook" for KCRW's "Left, Right & Center" show, which I have co-hosted for 15 years, was an absurd spate of charges from Obama's former big-business allies that he had become their enemy. If only it were so.

One of those who has been complaining is billionaire publisher Mort Zuckerman, who now finds in a White House he once supported "hostility" to the business culture he credits with the country's greatness. I assume he is not talking about the belated efforts to hold BP accountable for the cost of the oil spill that our pro-drilling president once thought not possible.

And then there was Jeffrey Immelt, CEO of General Electric and once friendly to Obama but now alarmed by new regulations. He was one of the many CEOs cited by Fareed Zakaria in The Washington Post as evidence of "Obama's CEO problem." General Electric is a company that got into deep trouble when it stopped worrying about making better light bulbs and came to devote much of its business through GE capital to fancy financial products. With GE having been saved by the taxpayers, one wonders what the conglomerate has to complain about. Or Wall Street donors now stiffing the Democrats and claiming Obama is hostile to them.

All this comes at the very time that Wall Street lobbyists stand poised to win a sweeping victory preventing a reversal of the radical deregulation that made the banking debacle possible. The "Volcker rule," restoration of the New Deal-era barrier between investment and consumer banking that Obama had pledged to support, is gutted. As a disappointed Paul Volcker told Louis Uchitelle in an interview for The New York Times, he would rate the reforms just a B and not even a B-plus. Leading Wall Street economist Henry Kaufman told the Times: "The legislation is a Rube Goldberg contraption, and there are long timelines before the Volcker rule is fully implemented."

Game over, Wall Street won big-time, and the Bush-Obama policy has made the financiers whole while largely ignoring the deep plight of the true victims of the economic collapse, the unemployed and the foreclosed. The argument that Obama is anti-business is nothing more than the old propaganda trick that the best defense is a good offense, so blame the victims for your crimes. The high-tone intellectual argument for that position was supplied by Harvard professor Niall Ferguson, a transplanted Thatcherite, at the same Aspen, Colo., gathering where Zuckerman spoke.

At a conference on ideas paid for and attended by the rich and well-positioned, Ferguson argued that the high rate of unemployment is not due to the Wall Street high rollers whose funny-money games wiped out 8 million jobs but rather the extension of the government's unemployment insurance program:

"The curse of long-term unemployment is that if you pay people to do nothing, they'll find themselves doing nothing for very long periods of time. Long-term unemployment is at an all-time high in the United States, and it is a direct consequence of a misconceived public policy."

Yes, except that the public policy that was so terribly misconceived was that of radical deregulation, launched by the Reagan Revolution and implemented by President Bill Clinton, not the pathetic palliative of unemployment checks.

Notice that the attacks on Obama are not about his having followed George W. Bush's example of throwing money at Wall Street, the cause of the meltdown and the run-up of the national debt, but rather the much smaller amount spent on ameliorating the pain that the titans of finance caused for ordinary citizens. And of course there is never a word of self-criticism on the part of folks like Ferguson, Immelt and Zuckerman for their own roles in having cheered on the radical deregulation that made this mess not only possible but inevitable.

Not so Volcker, once the darling of fiscal conservatives when he tamed inflation during the Carter and Reagan years, and when as Fed chair and later as an influential observer he failed to stand publicly against the move to radical deregulation. As was reported in the Times interview, "In retrospect, Mr. Volcker regrets not challenging the widely held assumptions that underpinned much of this. `You had an intellectual conviction that you did not need much regulation--that the market could take care of itself,' he says. `I'm happy that illusion has been shattered.'"

Unfortunately, that illusion has not been shattered for many of the elite in this country, as evidenced by their rage against Obama's too modest steps in the right direction.

The White House and Bill Clinton have begun the process of gradually charting out the role the former president will play in helping Democrats maintain control of Congress in 2010.

On Tuesday morning, longtime Clinton confidant Terry McAuliffe told MSNBC that Clinton had already been in talks with President Obama's political team in an effort to coordinate his fall schedule. A person familiar with those and other conversations, meanwhile, elaborated to the Huffington Post about the extent to which the former president will hit the trail.

Clinton, the source said, would be dispatched to places where he has a proven record of being a "validator" for endangered political candidates. On the Senate side, this means trips to Arkansas, New Hampshire, and potentially California. He'll be "helpful in a place like Kentucky," the source added. He has a special relationship with Florida Democrat Kendrick Meek as well.

On the House side, the process is likely to be more improvised. At the behest of the White House, Clinton traveled to upstate Pennsylvania several months ago to campaign on behalf of Mark Critz. He ended up propelling the Democratic candidate to a surprisingly large margin of victory in the special election to replace the late Rep. Jack Murtha (D-Penn). Whether he can duplicate that effort will be determined by polling numbers and Clinton's past performance in those districts.

Finally, the source added, expect to see Clinton's participation peak closer towards November than during the dog days of summer. This is, in part, because of the former president's already exhausting schedule. Mainly, however, it's because his effectiveness could be optimized during a campaign's late, frenetic stages.

"In the closing days of the campaign he has an ability to be a little more aggressive than a sitting president could be," the source said.

Clinton and the White House have not always had a coordinated 2010 philosophy. The president caused a stir when he publicly backed the election of Andrew Romanoff, the former speaker of the House in Colorado, over sitting Senator Michael Bennet, in that state's Democratic primary. The endorsement wasn't entirely unexpected. Clinton and Romanoff share ties dating back to his administration. But it caught the White House by surprise, with no heads up offered in advance.

The two parties have worked out the miscommunication in subsequent conversations. And while the former president isn't expected to simply do Obama's bidding, he is viewed, within the administration's political team, as a valuable weapon as Election Day approaches.

"They did not want Barack Obama in Pennsylvania-12," MSNBC's Joe Scarborough said during his interview with McAuliffe. "Bill Clinton goes up, wins. Arkansas? Holy cow. Other than what happened in Massachusetts, the biggest shock of the year -- Blanche Lincoln winning in Arkansas. Bill Clinton's got the Midas touch."

Watch McAuliffe on MSNBC's "Morning Joe":

Bill Clinton still carries a lot of clout in the Democratic Party and candidates from coast to coast are hoping to turn to the former president for some extra momentum in November.

"President Clinton will do anything he can to help Democrats win elections," former DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe said Tuesday on MSNBC's "Morning Joe."

According to McAuliffe, Bill Clinton has already been in talks with the White House political team in an effort to coordinate his fall schedule, and will do "a lot" of campaigning this election season.

Host Joe Scarborough pointed out an apparent shift in opinion toward Clinton, who in earlier elections had been kept "at arms length."

"They did not want Barack Obama in Pennsylvania-12," Scarborough said. "Bill Clinton goes up, wins. Arkansas? Holy cow. Other than what happened in Massachusetts, the biggest shock of the year -- Blanche Lincoln winning in Arkansas. Bill Clinton's got the Midas touch."

Watch McAuliffe on MSNBC's "Morning Joe":

TBILISI, Georgia — U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton rebuked Russia on Monday for failing to live up to the cease-fire agreement it signed nearly two years ago to end the fighting in this small former Soviet state.

She asserted that Russia is occupying parts of Georgia and building permanent military bases in contravention of the truce.

(No, I'm not an economist. But I figure I can't really do much worse than they've done)

So let me get this right. There used to be a savings crisis. Americans didn't save enough --unlike those industrious Chinese. In fact, the Chinese were so thrifty compared to us that we ended up in hock to them up to our keesters.

But wait a second, where did all the money the Chinese saved come from? It turns out, from us, from our inexhaustible purchases of their exports. Much of that was paid for with illusory housing bubble wealth -- but that didn't stop the Visa from going through at the Best Buy for that flat screen TV. Money that didn't just go to the Chinese. The TV had to be unloaded in port, and trucked to the store. Then there were the salaries of the store clerk, the manager, and the company execs, not to mention the fees of the advertising agencies who came up with the commercials to sell the TV on the TV, and so on.

Now, we're told, saving is part of the problem. When we save too much, we don't spend enough. And everybody knows, consumer spending is the engine to full employment. Not that this means we should incur more consumer debt. Debt bad. Spending good. No spending, no jobs. No jobs, no recovery.

That leaves the government to do the spending, and by extension, to incur the debt. But since debt is so "bad," Obama could barely get a wholly inadequate stimulus package through Congress. It was just enough to produce an anemic recovery, while plenty enough to add a lot to the deficit. The big evil deficit.

So we're spending a trillion plus more a year than we're collecting in taxes, borrowing prodigious amounts to do so. Where is all that borrowed money coming from? Banks. In other words, us. Our deposits. Our tax-funded bailouts. (It also comes from the Chinese, but that's money we give them too.)

So to whom, finally, do we really owe all that money?

Ourselves.

Banks, incidentally, love the national debt. They never want the principal repaid, because they can live on just the interest forever. And live very well, thank you very much.

So what would happen if all the interest that has been paid on the national debt was declared applied to the principal? (I can't find that calculation anywhere, but I'm pretty damn sure the national debt would no longer be the subject of giant digital clocks in the trillions.) It seems hard to believe I'm the first person to think of this, but I don't know why it can't get some serious discussion even if I am. As far as I can tell, the only people who'd lose out are the bankers.

Don't be intimidated by the economists and the deficits hawks. The problem is not debt -- not when you owe it to yourself, as depositor and taxpayer and employer of Chinese workers. The problem is distribution. Google "income inequality," and read for a while. Not one article -- even from the right -- claims that there hasn't been a huge increase in the wealth of the top quintile over the past decade, concentrated in the richest one percent. According to Professor Emanuel Saenz at Berkeley, (cited by Professor Richard Wolff in this graph) our income inequality is exactly where it was in 1932.

The problem is not that Grandma gets her medical care for free. The problem is not the lack of consumer spending, or even the deficit. The problem is that a few people have a lot more than they need, so a lot of people (including the government, i.e. all of us) have a lot less than they need. It's not rocket science, it's simple math.

At the very least, we should return to the level of taxation under Clinton--a level that produced surpluses. If Clinton is too liberal for the Republicans, we might propose going back to the way things were under Eisenhower. I was born in 1958, and my Dad not only supported 4 kids and a wife selling encyclopedias, but bought the house I was born in on that salary.

There were plenty of rich people in 1958 too -- they just had a proportionate sense of wealth. Three houses--not thirteen. First class travel -- not private jets. An understanding that a 91% maximum tax bracket was God's way of saying you had too much money, and that paying it was indeed, one of the most patriotic things an American could do.

As it has for many successive years now, Colombia continues to be the union murder capital of the world. The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), which keeps track of such statistics, issued its Annual Report yesterday, and reported that Colombia (with its small population of about 44 million people) accounted for 48 of the 100 union assassinations which took place in the world in 2009. That is, nearly one-half of all murders of unionists took place in Colombia.

As Guy Ryder, the ITUC General Secretary, opined: defending workers rights in Colombia is a "death sentence." The ITUC further reported that, of the 48 unionists killed in Colombia in 2009, "22 were senior union leaders, of whom five were women."

The country with the second worst record in terms of anti-union violence, Guatemala, fell far short of Colombia's record, with 16 union assassinations last year. Also, quite notably, as U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton argues for Honduras' readmission to the OAS, Honduras came in at number 3, with 12 union assassinations last year. Nearly all of these killings in Honduras took place after the militiary coup last summer which resulted in Honduras' expulsion from the OAS in the first place.

Notably, the nations usually vilified by the mainstream press in this country -- China, Cuba and Venezuela -- did not make the ITUC list at all, for they suffered no assassination of unionists last year.

What's more, the ITUC's report on Colombia's abysmal anti-union violence record comes just as Colombia was ranked the most violent country in Latin America, and the top 11th most violent country in the world in the 2010 Global Peace Index.

Meanwhile, at least 17 unionists have been murdered in Colombia so far this year.

All of this belies the claims of those in both the Colombian and U.S. governments, eager to pass a long-stalled Free Trade Agreement, who argue that Colombia is progressing in terms of providing peace and stability for its people.

Just as the reports of Colombia's record of violence came out, the United Workers Central of Colombia (CUT), the largest trade union confederation in Colombia, released a Statement about the corporate machinations at the ILO Standards Committee (a committee made up of business, government and union representatives) which led to Colombia's removal from the ILO's labor watch list.

The ILO watch list, which Colombia has been on for years given its horrendous labor record, subjects those 25 nations on the list to special monitoring by the ILO. As the CUT explains, the business sector on the ILO's Tripartite Standards Committee threatened to prevent any watch list at all from being approved if Colombia continued to be listed. In its Statement, the CUT characterized this action by the business sector as "blackmail."

Clearly, this maneuver was carried out by the business sector (led by The Coca Cola Company's Director of Global Relations Ed Potter) in order to give the business community ammunition in their constant quest to pass Free Trade Agreements with Colombia. These Free Trade Agreements are almost universally opposed by labor and human rights groups who fear that they will further erode the rights of workers, indigenous and Afro-Colombians, as well as the environment, as they open up Colombia for further multi-national penetration.

However, as the CUT noted, Colombia did not leave the ILO's Tripartite discussions unscathed. Rather, Colombia did in fact accept a sanction of receiving an ILO High Level Tripartite Mission. As the CUT explained, by doing so, Colombia itself was "admitting that the situation of freedom of association in Colombia has not improved."

Even as these revelations about Colombia's horrendous human and labor rights situation come to light, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is in Colombia today to meet with Colombian President Alvaro Uribe -- a long-time friend of the Clintons, and the U.S.'s closest friend in the Hemisphere. Curiously, the chief political strategist for Bill Clinton in his 1992 Presidential election campaign -- James Carville ("The Ragin' Cajun") -- is the senior political strategist for Uribe's former Defense Minister and heir apparent to Uribe, Juan Manuel Santos. Santos, who is the front-runner in the Presidential elections to be held on June 20, is running under a cloud of scandal for his overseeing the "false positive" program in which between 2,000 and 4,000 civilians were murdered by the Colombian military who falsely counted these victims as guerillas in order to justify continued U.S. military assistance to that country.

QUITO, Ecuador — U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Tuesday called the proposed new U.N. sanctions against Iran's suspect nuclear program the toughest ever, a day before the U.N. Security Council was expected to vote on the measure.

Clinton told reporters in Ecuador's capital that there is strong support for a fourth resolution penalizing Iran for its refusal to prove its nuclear program is peaceful and defying international demands to halt uranium enrichment.