BobJacobson's Comments (42)

“Permit me to baldly state, forgo the public option and you doom any motion toward a single-payer plan for the rest of our lifetimes. Given the the current proposed laws wouldn't cut in for four years in any case, long enough for them to be burnt to the ground by a hostile Administration, I'd rather put off a vote on Mr. Dorn's substandard insurance bills and try again next year or in the next Administration. The law he supports would do precious little for anyone save the insurance companies, believe me. The upside he offers is minimal and the downside immense.”

“The way not to lose the battle is to retreat from it and take it up again when the trends identified become evident to everyone -- and unfortunately, when more individuals, including many of the naysayers and scoffers, lose their coverage or discover how inadequate it is.

Such object lessons will pave the way for passage of a law that means something AND that doesn't preclude more complete reforms in the future.

It's not a fault to retreat from a battle lost because of insurmountable if irrational odds. It's the halfway assault that costs the most in terms of resources spent and wasted. President Obama, take it back and wait until the calls for reform become overwhelming as is inevitable.”

“Economists are essentially commentators who try to shade things to favor their clients and/or constituents. They are not scientists in the usual sense of the term -- that is, individuals who propose hypotheses that can be tested.

While some are very good at describing what is taking place (before everyone's eyes to see), none is particularly good at forecasting the future, the magic for which they are ritually prepared and for which they are paid high sums, essentially to validate the decisions by those who pay them.

Economics, ever since it was deliberately separated from politics, as in its precursor "political economics," thus giving economics the appearance that it is a science, is a fraud. There are those in the "profession" -- which it isn't either, since it has no canons or enforceable ethics -- who are more perceptive than others and who, confessing to sharing our common bewilderment, still manage to help us to see more clearly. Paul Krugman is one of these. George Stiglitz is another. There probably are equally conscientious women economists, though the field is probably more sexist than ... I can' think of another practice even close in its bias.

It's time to realize as Jane notes that these mini-Wizards of Oz are all smoke and mirrors. Help the economic recovery: put economists to work doing something useful (other than empowering through incantations the already powerful), like building roads.”

“These are not street fighters. Street fighters would have had THEIR crowds out on the streets at the get-go. The much vaunted Obama organization, the hundreds of thousand Obama for Americans -- where are they now? They were forgotten as soon as the elections ended.”

“"The winner" might clue the rest of us in on this fight plan. So far, it's only in your imagination.”

“Here's a hint, Robert: they're all game players addicted to the game. Fanatic opponents unable to see that their obsession with "winning" -- as defined in the Beltway -- has terrible real-world consequences for the rest of us.

It's not bipartisanship. It's unipartisanship, and one wing just trounced the other.”

“The Jesuits who organized the Inquisition were Good Men, too.

Intellectually problematic but morally, utterly self-confident, they saved Southern Europe for the period's imperial Catholicism.

It's always the brightest thinkers who preserve outdated orthodoxies.”

“Keep hope alive.”

“Each time Geithner speaks, my stocks -- in infrastructure and alternative-energy companies -- fall by 10%. They've now declined 30% based on the Recovery Act's omissions and Geithner's bizarre financial theories. It's been rumored that his appointment was some sort of deal with Goldman Sachs. I don't believe that for a moment, but I do wonder -- why with such an otherwise experienced, and often exciting Cabinet appointments, this uninspiring, uninspired moneyman was chosen to oversee our financial recovery plan. I frankly can't afford it, and neither can the nation.”

“AZ is going to face such extreme environmental challenges in the near future -- e.g., summer heat that is life-threatening, water rationing, dust storms, etc. -- that even a Republican will have to govern intelligently or have blood on his or her hands. It is really going to be that bad. Everyone here (Tucson) knows it and those in Phoenix, the big, even hotter city, are gradually getting the word. If there aren't big changes, this state literally dies of heat exhaustion.”

“Accurate observations, but the bottom line is, she didn't fail -- and that means, she won. What an easy target, forgone!”

“I'm so tired of Democratic "strategists" recommending going easy on Palin and hard on McCain. Palin leads the ticket, symbolically. Her escape tonight, unscathed, really, really hurts the Democrats more than would a McCain debate win.

How about some fire? Or do we win on the Technocratic Ticket? What kind of mandate does that award?”

“Talk about perpetuating falsehoods! If you're an economics teacher, I'm glad I'm out of school. On every objective indicator, Americans are NOT better off than they were 25 years ago or more. The media owned by GE, Viacom, Disney, and Home & Garden favors the left? Gimme a break. Most newspaper editors are Republicans. The religious right has been limiting our civil liberties since before there was a Constitution and ever since. Everything in this post is false. Hello, this is the "new" tactic: lie now, circulate it, and hide until the election is over. What cynical trash.”

“I beg to differ. The suppression of the left wing, the part of the Democratic Party with ideas and energy to work for them, is the story of the 2008 Democratic Presidential campaign -- and the congressional campaigns, too. No highly visible Democrat will identify with rock-rib Democratic ideals like those of JFK and RFK, let alone FDR and MLK. Forgo your base and forgo the election. Now we're fighting a defensive battle as a party and we haven't even accomplished a single controversial legislative or executive policy to merit a defense! It's horrible even to have to defend the left or Arianna. Without them, there would be only one party with two faces, unfortunately a potential outcome of 2008.”

“Today's Democratic politicians have no message. They are living to control state power just as are their Republican counterparts. What would they do with it? Partial health-care? Rebates to help people pay their mortgages? Redeploying the troops from Iraq to Pakistan? Alternative energy policies that don't upset the oil companies too much, that merely impose a tax on oil but reduce its use incrementally while the climate goes wild?

The professionals who run the Democratic Party are no greater lovers of the common man than the Republicans' idea-mongers, Their problem is that they largely agree with the Republicans on the big issue, which is that a privileged political elite should control the state to the advantage of rich people. The Republicans stop there, the Democrats add, "And by the way, something to soften the blow for the rest of America." That is not a message with much meat on its bones.

If the American people decide to go fascist because of a brighter future propagated by hegemonic culture and media, can the Democrats be counted on to promote a counter-vision given the low esteem in which the grassroots -- the common people-- are held, generally in our society's folklore and specifically in the Republicans' cant? Maybe the Democrats' perpetual failure is a feature of our political system, built in.”

“The Democrats should just treat Palin as a joke. I can't imagine her recovering from a public address by Hillary Clinton that begins with Hillary laughing out loud at the notion of Palin standing in for Clinton. Laughing and laughing. And that's the end of the speech. Palin's selection is a joke, after all, full of humor. Why not play it for all it's worth?”

“Palin for President.

That's the Republicans real intent. McCain is just a surrogate, a cranky and unreliable "maverick," the old guy who suffered through the primaries. His job is to hold open the door for Palin. Then he will move on, one way or another. And then we have our own Margaret Thatcher, without Thatcher's occasional wit and less frequent wisdom.

Palin may have been in the back pocket of the Republican playmakers even before the primaries were over. Whoever was nominated for the Presidency was guaranteed to have Sarah Palin for a running mate. Of course, this presumes the Republicans are smart. But they always do well in elections, although they can't run a village, let alone a nation, without controversy -- and as elected leaders, they always fail.”

“This is a fine chance for the left to show compassion for the unborn child, because this one will be born with children for parents -- which typically results in emotional tension and child abuse. But this opportunity will be foregone if the left only focuses on the young mother's (and father's) well being. Both parents and child may be bound for tragedy, complicated by the fact that Palin has now sacrificed them on the altar of realpolitick, entangling them in power politics in the worst possible position: unable to act in their own behalf, able only to support others' , their elders, ambitions.”

“Why assume that the right, should it come into power, will honor the positions being forced on it or which is promoting on an ad hoc basis only for strategic purposes? The right's demonstrated hypocrisy in the unbridled pursuit of power (well illustrated and critiqued in Kevin Phillips' Conservatives Without Conscience) negates every Republican expression of compassion for the put-upon. The Republicans' current spiel is complete break with reality.”

“Ironic that the left, which has traditionally has been the upholder of anti-sexism, is now being beaten about its head with the subject. Perhaps because the left's elected allies never really accomplished anything majorly anti-sexist, leaving the cards on the table for the right to play.”

“Championing a 17-year-old child giving birth to a child (was she 16 when it was conceived?) is never the right choice. Why the press isn't honing in on the age of Palin's child -- for whose behavior, she is indeed responsible, if family values is to mean anything at all! -- and focusing on the choice issue, where Palin is resolute (though wrong), is incomprehensible. Childhood maternity results in child abuse and deprivation; abortion doesn't. Let's focus on the inevitable outcome of Palin's inadequacy as a parent and someone who has placed an as-yet-to-be-born child at great, great risk despite it's oh-so-wonderful grandparents (at least on one side).”

“A brilliant analysis. The McCain campaign, whether as an intelligent choice or an inane one, has selected as its VP candidate someone totally in keeping with the NASCAR, "trailer-park" class -- except that she's a woman, which is a terrific twist. The contrast with the intellectualism and liberal positions of the Obama campaign, couldn't be stronger.

Palin is, after all, the only candidate among the four without ties to the national government. In addition to working-class values (as defined by the right), she also embodies hard-edge localism: in the case of Alaska, humankind vs. the environment, big-time. Radical individualism. People who (so the myth goes) shoot anything that moves.

Any counter to Palin's candidacy inevitably comes off, as defined by the Republicans and now the press, as "elitist." That is, if you don't recognize Palin's authenticity and her connection to the land and the American people, you are somehow either detached from reality, un-American, or both.”

“The Anti-Maverick Maverick and the Anti-Woman Woman. A perfect team.”

“This hurricane season may yet produce another catastrophe on a scale to match New Orleans' -- and with a fresh crew of incompetents in the White House and FEMA to botch the recovery. Then what will we say to ourselves as Americans? That we are experts in triage? Good at cutting away the damaged parts and hobbling away on what's left?

New Orleans' abandonment is a national disgrace ranking up there with the war on Iraq, only more Americans have suffered directly as a result of the Bush Administration's callousness and cruelty. It's not even a mere political disgrace anymore; this one has vaulted into the heavens of ethical and moral corruption.

The other thing to note is that what happened to New Orleans was possibly a direct result of global warming, which isn't something that's going to happen, but that's already been happening for a century. Not to lament it and pledge to fix it, as a sign that we get the connection, is an indictment of our whole society, not just Hillary Clinton or the next politician who focuses on drilling offshore rather than on the unhealed wounds on the Gulf Coast.”

“The developing nations are less socialistic than the US, the government of which is now into almost weekly multi-billion (and lately, multi-trillion) government subsidies for failing banks, highly profitable oil companies, and absentee corporate farmers. It's called corporate socialism or in the European tradition, fascism.”