President-elect Barack Obama is scheduled to deliver a major speech tomorrow at George Mason University in Virgina to sell his historic stimulus proposal.
I'm no economist, but thankfully NDN has Dr. Rob Shapiro on hand. NDN Green Project Director and Fellow Michael Moynihan is a serious economic commentator and NDN President Simon Roseneberg is as well.
What I do know is that this is no ordinary spending proposal. This is a stimulus of historic proprortions that reflects the national and global recession we have entered and the enormity of the challenge of recovering from the collapse of the U.S. housing market and crash of U.S. and global financial markets.
Michael has long argued (here and here) that such a massive recovery measure needs an oversight board to ensure that it is administered effectively, in a timely manner and without the waste that can erode public and investor confidence.
NDN issued a statement today from Michael and Simon:
NDN Lauds Obama's Move to Create Stimulus Oversight Board
NDN today applauded President-elect Barack Obama’s commitment to create an Economic Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board.
NDN Fellow and Green Project Director Michael Moynihan proposed the creation of such a board over a month ago, arguing that how the stimulus is administered is as critical to getting America’s economy moving again as its dollar amount.
"American taxpayers are collectively about to make the largest investment of their lifetimes," Moynihan said. "To ensure that the stimulus succeeds in creating jobs while also creating the basis for future growth, it is vital that they get value for their money."
Moynihan continued, "President-elect Obama’s decision to create an emergency recovery board, put details of the progress of infrastructure projects online and ban earmarks are the right actions at the right time to protect taxpayers' money. To administer a program of this magnitude, it is critically important to implement tough auditing and supervision."
Simon Rosenberg, President of NDN, said, "As excited as we are at NDN about the speed with which clean stimulus is now moving forward, moving money out quickly but also responsibly is vital to making this historic stimulus work. If the money is spent wastefully, or perceived as being spent wastefully according to political expediency, it will not only be a tragic missed opportunity but also reduce its impact and undermine market confidence."
-30-
Note: Moynihan previously served in the Clinton Administration under U.S. Treasury Secretaries Robert Rubin and Larry Summers.
- President-elect Barack Obama has forecasted years of $1 trillion deficits, as tax revenue falls and government spending rises with the economic bailout and impending stimulus package. Obama says we're going to have to get serious about budget reform.
- Katrina Vanden Huevel at the Nation calls for a solid $1 trillion to be spent over the next two years to revitalize the economy, top to bottom.
- The current stimulus package clocks in around $775 billion. Max Baucus will host a meeting of the Senate Finance Committee tomorrow to talk it over.
- The healthcare industry could reap $100 billion in the stimulus package, mostly via state medicaid programs.
Politics
- Dr. Sanjay Gupta (yes, that Dr. Sanjay Gupta) will be the next Surgeon General. Ezra Klein, for one, couldn't be happier with the selection.
- Poor Roland Burris was turned away from the Senate yesterday. He's going back today, hoping to get a seat this time.
- Dianne Feinstein has been raining the blows down on her fellow Democrats lately. First she blasted the choice of Leon Panetta to head the CIA (more specifically, she blasted the choice not to consult her), and now she's criticizing Dems for refusing to seat Roland Burris. Is she positioning herself to run for governor of California next year?
- In an act of great compassion and powerful mercy, Jeb Bush announced yesterday that he would not seek the Senate seat that Mel Martinez plans to vacate in two years. That pretty well blows up Republican plans, and opens the race up to damn near anybody.
- Could Caroline Kennedy's appointment to the Senate cost Democrats the seat?
International
- If you haven't checked it out, I strongly advise you go browse through Foreign Policy's new suite of blogs. For a primer, some of the best commentary on Israel's incursion into Gaza has come from their sites: Marc Lynch, here; Stephen Walt, here and here; David Rothkopf, here and here. And then you're just getting started.
- Joe Biden will be making a trip to "Southwest Asia" soon-- not as VP-elect, but in his capacity as a Senator. Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan will all be on the itinerary. The trip will show the governments and people of those states that the new administration is serious about their issues, while avoiding the rigmarole of organizing a vice presidential trip. Steve Clemons thinks it's a great idea, even if Politico doesn't.
One More Thing
- Do you need a Sarah Palin calendar? Do you ever!
- Can we please have a Barack-themed ice cream flavor? Yes, Pecan!
- Last, finally Anderson Cooper gets serious about Sasha and Malia's new puppy:
Getting Specific About Economic Recovery - President-elect Obama and congressional leaders met yesterday to discuss an economic recovery proposal, a package Obama discussed in last weekend's YouTube address.
In his remarks, Obama said:
To put people back to work today and reduce our dependence on foreign oil tomorrow, we will double renewable energy production and renovate public buildings to make them more energy efficient. To build a 21st century economy, we must engage contractors across the nation to create jobs rebuilding our crumbling roads, bridges, and schools. To save not only jobs, but money and lives, we will update and computerize our health care system to cut red tape, prevent medical mistakes, and help reduce health care costs by billions of dollars each year. To make America, and our children, a success in this new global economy, we will build 21st century classrooms, labs, and libraries. And to put more money into the pockets of hardworking families, we will provide direct tax relief to 95 percent of American workers.
NDN Globalization Initiative Chair Dr. Robert Shapiro and NDN President Simon Rosenberg have long advocated creating just such a Stimulus for the Long Run and also have proposed a number of the ideas that will feature prominently in such a package, including many of those proposed by NDN Green Project Director Michael Moynihan in Accelerating the Development of a 21st Century Economy: Investing in Clean Infrastructure. Michael also wrote an essay today, Getting the Stimulus Right, in which he makes a number of suggestions for ensuring that the upcoming, record-size stimulus package is a success, including a board to oversee the vast expenditures. For more on NDN’s efforts to accelerate the development of a 21st century economy for America click here, or visit NDN’s Globalization Initiative page.
As Morely and Mike wrote, "Almost before the echoes of Barack Obama's Grant Park victory speech had died, away pundits and the blogosphere began to keep score about the effectiveness of his transition. In a way, a presidential transition is like a political spring training that gives the incoming manager and his team a chance to prepare and set the tone for what amounts to a four-year long regular season. Every transition presents opportunities for an incoming Administration to put together a game plan to deliver hardball policy ideas to give the new team an early lead in the beginning of the regular season. One danger the new team faces during the transitional pre-season is being suckered by the other side into playing for keeps before opening day. With President-elect Obama’s Cabinet and White House policy team largely in place, and the maneuvering over various economic bailout options mostly behind us, it’s time for some preseason analysis of the management decisions the Obama team has made." To read the full essay, please click here.
In other "Millennial Makeover" news, the paperback edition will be released on March 15, with a new, post-election afterword by Morley and Mike. It will be a must read, so stay tuned for details. We are also very excited that "Millennial Makeover" was named one of the top 10 books of the year by Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times book critic Michiko Kakutani.
Big Challenges for the Democrats and the Republicans - In two recent essays, Simon writes about big challenges ahead for President-elect Barack Obama and the Democratic majority in Congress and also for the discredited Republicans. For the Democrats, it's a challenge of governing, of addressing incredible complex and difficult problems that will require Progress, Not Motion. For the Republicans, it's very much a political challenge. Drawing on an important essay -- On Obama, Race and the End of the Southern Strategy -- he wrote almost exactly one year ago, Simon revisits the massively discredited GOP approach to a 21st century America whose realities they have ignored or completely failed to understand. In The GOP and Magic Negros and A Long Road Back, Simon makes it clear that Democrats will be in the majority for a very long time unless Republicans get a new playbook.
Weekly Immigration Update - To find out what's new in the world of immigration reform, be sure to check out Zuraya Tapia-Alfaro's weekly immigration update. This week, she provides comments on U.S. Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid's statements on immigration reform on "Meet the Press" and analyzes the impact of Gov. Bill Richardson’s withdrawal of his nomination for U.S. Commerce Secretary on the prospects for immigration reform. She also takes a look at the prominence of immigration as an issue for Hispanics, provides examples of the need for comprehensive immigration reform, and discusses the long road back for the GOP and hate crimes.
New Tools Feature - In a quick New Tools update, "A Ball For All," I take a look at President-elect Obama's decision to host the first-ever Neighborhood Inaugural Ball.
With tickets available free or at an affordable price, it is the first official inaugural ball of its kind to be held during a presidential inauguration. A portion of tickets for this event will be set aside for District of Columbia residents. The ball will also feature a robust interactive component, including webcasting and text messaging, to link neighborhoods across the country with the new President and this premier event.
I explain why this is a smart move for Obama, both symbolically and strategically, and predicts that like the text-message VP announcement, this will help Obama down the road as he tries to build broad-based public support for his initiatives. For more new tools talk, check out the new tools section of our blog.
NDN Seeks New CFO - NDN is seeking a CFO with four years to five years of experience in financial management to direct and oversee all financial activities of the organization, including preparation of current financial reports and forecasts for economic trends and future growth. For more details, visit our jobs page or contact jobs@ndn.org for more information.
NDN Seeks Winter and Spring Interns - NDN is looking for interns to join our staff this winter and spring. If you or someone you know is interested in working at NDN during this exciting time, please refer to the internships page on our Web site or contact jobs@ndn.org for more information.
With President-elect Obama and congressional leaders meeting this week to discuss the economic recovery and reinvestment package, NDN is re-releasing a selection of its economic policy analysis and recommendations from the past few years. I hope you find these essays, memos, and papers helpful.
Background: Economic Recovery and Reinvestment
Getting the Stimulus Right by Michael Moynihan, 1/6/2009 - Moynihan makes a number of suggestions for ensuring that the upcoming, record-size stimulus package is a success, including a board to oversee the vast expenditures.
A Vision for a Modernized Electric Grid: Clean Infrastructure for a 21st Century Economy, 11/18/2008 - NDN's Green Project hosted this discussion with Congressmen Jay Inslee and Earl Blumenauer, FERC Comissioner Jon Wellinghoff, Kurt Yeager, and Reid Detchon on the benefits of modernizing the nation's electric grid as part of a clean infrastructure agenda.
A Stimulus for the Long Run by Simon Rosenberg and Dr. Robert Shapiro, 11/14/2008 – This important essay lays out the now widely agreed-upon argument that the upcoming economic stimulus package must include investments in the basic elements of growth for the next decade, including elements that create a low-carbon, energy-efficient economy.
Solar Energy: The Case for Action by Michael Moynihan, 8/1/2008 – This major paper on the dynamic solar industry argues that accelerating the deployment of solar energy must become a top economic policy priority of the United States.
The Green Economic Opportunity and Energy and the American Way of Life, 8/1/2008 - This two-part event featured an address from U.S. Senate Assistant Majority Leader Dick Durbin on the benefits of a low-carbon economy and Roger Efird, Greg Kats, Jack Hidary, and Shyam Kannan discussing green buildings and clean technology.
Investing in Our Common Future: U.S. Infrastructure by Michael Moynihan, 11/13/2007 - This
far-reaching paper proposes a set of measures rebuild and advance our aging infrastructure. These proposals include a GREEN Act to require that federal infrastructure and buildings meet a higher set of environmental standards that not only address issues such as global warming but also establish American leadership in green technologies.
A Laptop in Every Backpack by Simon Rosenberg and Alec Ross, 5/1/2007 – Rosenberg and the One Economy Corporation’s Ross offer a modest proposal for putting a laptop in the backpack of every American sixth grader, as connectivity to and facility with the global communications network are essential for success in the 21st century.
Background: Keeping People in Their Homes, The Bailout
If Detroit Goes Down, Will It Take the Economy -- and the GOP -- With It? by Dr. Robert Shapiro, 11/19/2008 - Shapiro argues that, since the Bush Administration is at least partially responsible for the economic situation facing the automakers, it should put its weight behind helping the industry and its workers.
Notes on the Financial Crisis by Michael Moynihan, 9/26/2008 - Moynihan examines the panic fueled by the Bush Administrations inadequate response to the financial meltdown.
Back to Basics: The Treasury Plan Won't Work by Dr. Robert Shapiro, 9/24/2008 - As the financial crisis unfolded and the Bush Administration offered its response, Shapiro argued that, while major action was needed, the Treasury's plan would be ineffective.
Keep People in Their Homes by Simon Rosenberg and Dr. Robert Shapiro, 9/23/2008 – At the beginning of the financial collapse, NDN offered this narrative-shaping essay and campaign on the economic need to stabilize the housing market.
NDN to Congress: "Keep People in Their Homes" by Simon Rosenberg and Dr. Robert Shapiro, 9/17/2008 - NDN made this leading statement on the need for the federal government to keep people in their homes.
Background: A New Economic Strategy for America
The Idea-Based Economy and Globalization: The Real Foundations of American Prosperity in the 21st Century by Dr. Robert Shapiro, 1/23/2008 – In this important paper, NDN Globalization Initiative Chair Dr. Robert Shapiro examines how and why U.S. companies and workers lead the world in developing and applying new intellectual property, and why this leadership in innovation constitutes a critical U.S. advantage in globalization.
Meeting the Challenges of the 21st Century: Crafting a Better CAFTA by Simon Rosenberg, Dr. Robert Shapiro, and Joe Garcia, 6/9/2005 - NDN calls on progressive policymakers to face squarely our own vision of how globalization can and should work, as well as how America can best promote economic and political progress by our Latin American neighbors.
Almost before the echoes of Barack Obama's Grant Park victory speech had died, away pundits and the blogosphere began to keep score about the effectiveness of his transition. In a way, a presidential transition is like a political spring training that gives the incoming manager and his team a chance to prepare and set the tone for what amounts to a four-year long regular season. Every transition presents opportunities for an incoming Administration to put together a game plan to deliver hardball policy ideas to give the new team an early lead in the beginning of the regular season. One danger the new team faces during the transitional pre-season is being suckered by the other side into playing for keeps before opening day. With President-elect Obama’s Cabinet and White House policy team largely in place, and the maneuvering over various economic bailout options mostly behind us, it’s time for some preseason analysis of the management decisions the Obama team has made.
This upcoming season is a particularly important one to get ready for because the new president is taking office during a political realignment. Realignments are rare events in U.S. politics, occurring only about once every four decades; the 2008 realignment is only the sixth in American electoral history. During and after a realignment, the old political truths–and the standards for judging presidential transitions–that appeared axiomatic during the preceding era no longer apply and the President-elect has to manage the process with an acute sensitivity to what the times demand.
As we indicated in our book, Millennial Makeover: MySpace, You Tube and the Future of American Politics, all political realignments are produced by the coming of age of a large, dynamic generation and the emergence of a new communication technology that effectively mobilizes the rising generation. All realignments give American politics an extreme makeover. However, because they are caused by different types of generations, either "idealist" or "civic," not all realignments are the same. Consequently, the standards for judging the success or failure of a presidential transition vary from one type of realignment to another.
Idealist generations, like the Baby Boomers (born 1946-1964), whose coming-of-age produced a realignment centered on Richard Nixon’s “law and order” campaign of 1968, try to impose their own personal morality on the country through the political process. Political debate in eras dominated by idealist generations often tends to focus on social or moral issues, not economic or foreign policy concerns. Because idealist generations are highly divided, ideological, and uncompromising, during these types of realignments, the most successful transitions are those that advance the ideological goals of the new president and his winning team.
The current realignment however, is a "civic" realignment, produced by the political emergence of America's newest civic generation, Millennials (born 1982-2003). Civic generations react against the efforts of divided idealist generations to advance their own moral causes. They expect their team to unify the country, focus on reenergizing political and governmental institutions and using those institutions to confront and solve pressing national issues left unattended and unresolved during the previous idealist era. The transition efforts of President-elect Obama should be measured against this set of expectations, not those of an idealist era like the one just ended.
Honest Abe's and FDR's Transition Lessons for Barack Obama
Previous civic realignments occurred in 1860 with the election of Abraham Lincoln and in 1932, when the Millennials' civic generation great grandparents, the GI Generation, put Franklin Roosevelt in the White House. It's no coincidence that these civic presidents, along with George Washington, top all lists of our greatest presidents. All three led the United States in resolving deep crises by inspiring and guiding new civic generations and creating, revitalizing, and expanding the country's civic institutions. It is this high historical standard that will set the bar for history’s evaluation of Obama’s presidency, making his preparation for the new season all the more challenging.
An incoming president during a civic realignment must avoid exacerbating the national crisis that he will soon inherit but also avoid being tied to the failed policies of the outgoing Administration. So far, President-elect Obama has been able to maneuver through this political thicket as deftly as Lincoln and FDR did after their own realigning elections.
Southern states began seceding from the Union within days of Lincoln's election. Lincoln attempted to reassure the South that he would do nothing to tamper with slavery in states where it already existed, but he could not keep secessionist states in the Union without acceding to their demands to permit slavery in new territories. That would have required him to reject his own principles and those of his Republican Party, something he was unable and unwilling to do.
The outgoing Democratic President, James Buchanan, argued that secession was unconstitutional, but also that he had no power to prevent it. Consequently, he did virtually nothing when the seceding states took control of federal institutions throughout the South and blockaded Fort Sumter in Charleston harbor. Lincoln waited until South Carolina actually fired on Fort Sumter before he announced his intention to use military force to relieve the federal garrison there. Not being precipitous or overly anxious made it easier for Lincoln to prepare for, rally, and lead the country in the war that followed.
The transition between the Administrations of Herbert Hoover and Franklin D. Roosevelt was far more strained. In contrast to Buchanan, Hoover made a number of post-election attempts to persuade or, in the view of pro-FDR historians, entrap Roosevelt into endorsing Hoover's monetary and fiscal policies. Hoover presented to FDR an offer to share power in the public interest, but what he really wanted Roosevelt to do was commit to killing the New Deal before it even started. In letters to conservative Republican senators, Hoover said that if the president-elect agreed to what Hoover wanted, "he will have ratified the whole major program of the Republican administration; that is it means the abandonment of 90 percent of the so-called new deal." More specifically, Hoover wanted his successor to renounce, among other things, aid to homeowners unable to pay their mortgages, public works projects, and plans for the Tennessee Valley Authority. FDR studiously avoided making any policy commitments or even responding to the outgoing president's efforts to contact him, going so far as to claim that a secretary had misplaced a letter to him from Hoover. FDR's ability to preserve his political independence and policy flexibility made the historically high-scoring first 100 days of his presidency possible.
Obama Is a Good Student of History
Both the Bush Administration and the Obama team seem to be well aware of the rocky Hoover-Roosevelt transition during which an already bad economy worsened. Both Obama and Bush wanted to avoid open conflict and strained to be, or at least appear, cooperative on issues such as the auto company bailout and the use of TARP funds to stabilize the nation’s financial system. This approach fits the promise of Barack Obama to avoid excessive partisan confrontation. It fits the desire of the Bush Administration to shape a historical record as positive as possible.
It is also clear, however, that Obama is attempting to follow in FDR’s footsteps by seeking to avoid collaborative policy making or commitments to continue any Bush Administration policies. For example, Obama’s economic team has resisted overtures from the Bush Administration to coordinate more fully on a financial sector rescue package or endorse the release of the second tranche of TARP funds. Instead, the Obama team has kept its focus on the next political season by pushing Congress to quickly pass an Obama-designed stimulus program even before January 20, 2009.
From the beginning of the transition, Obama and his team have repeated the mantra that the United States has "only one president at a time,” a nice way to say, “wait until spring training is over and the regular season starts before we start playing for real." Based upon the professionalism and historical sensitivity he has demonstrated during the transition, his team should be not only a pennant contender, but also one capable of winning the World Series of a civic realignment.
The stimulus package, no longer on track for an Inauguration Day signing but still the largest stimulus in modern history, is working its way rapidly through Congress. The timetable remains so short, and the stimulus so large, that the job before Congress and the skeleton Obama economic team remains huge. There is still time to get the stimulus right. But there is also a risk that things may go wrong. Here are a few thoughts on how to make the largest stimulus in history something we can all be proud of that will live up to its goal of aiding our economy in the short term and the long term.
First, we need to recognize that fiscal spending is messy, and accordingly, requires real effort and supervision. Not for nothing is it a fiscal tool that is rarely taken out of the shed.
Unlike monetary policy, which is highly virtual and information age -- you flip a switch, the target rate for federal funds, and the economy (ideally) responds -- or tax cuts, which at most involved mailing out a rebate, fiscal spending is very sticks and mortar. Clean infrastructure stimulus -- vital as it is to our future at this point in our history -- involves truck rolls, deliveries of heavy materials and actually putting shovel to earth. So far, the debate around fiscal stimulus has resembled the discussion prior to a monetary move -- what should the level of stimulus be, 600, 850 or perhaps a thousand billion. It must now take equal account of the process by which that number, whatever it is, gets translated into real economic activity.
Second, we need to face up to the fact that this level of stimulus is massive. For those not used to calculating in twelve digits, $850 billion is 6% of GDP (3% for each of the two years the stimulus will run), about one sixth of the annual budget per year and equal per year to almost all current discretionary spending. While yesterday, President Elect Obama signaled that a large chunk of the stimulus (about $300 billion) will take the form of a tax cut, reducing the size of the spending package, we are still talking about a massive amount of spending.
This is important because Congress must generally do two things to spend a dollar. It must first write law to authorize the spending and, second, appropriate money against the law. The first step, the "how," usually requires years of deliberation. The second step, the "how much," is easier once the spending authority exists. To meet the exceptional timeline, lawmakers are now combing previous authorization bills for authority to spend. However, even allowing that a substantial chunk of the stimulus will go to reimbursing state medicaid expenses -- in essence to state budget relief -- and another chunk to to a middle class tax cut, finding ways to spend this much money is no walk in the park.
For this reason, it is likely that substantial sums will have to go into holding pens of one type or another, where some official, a governor or perhaps a cabinet Secretary, will have the money available to spend once he or he has identified where to spend it.
So what potential holding pens exist?
State block grants are one potential holding pen for money. With a block grant, the money is sent to governors with light strings attached for them to spend. There is much to be said for pushing spending decisions as far down the line as possible.
However, the governors themelves have requested only $180 billion. Moreover, money dispatched to states risks being used to relieve pressing budget pressure, rather than on projects that create real jobs. As an example, in the 1990s Icetea legislation, billions that Congress wanted to go into new transportation projects were diverted by governors to covering ordinary transportation overhead when the economy weakened. If the Obama Administration is serious about rebuilding our infrastructure and creating new jobs, block grants are not a comprehensive answer.
Another potential form of holding pen is money allocated to a department, such as the Energy Department. However, again, money dispensed in this matter is likely to sit around until bureaucrats determine how to spend it. This, also, is inadequate to the crisis at hand.
Since this much spending is not easy and will require massive supervision to avoid waste and generate jobs quickly, the following two ingredients are critical to a successful plan.
Congress should empower a board to oversee the spending program. As I have written in a prior post, business as usual won't work when we're talking about almost doubling normal discretionay expenditures. A board would have the ability to act quickly to keep the money moving and oversee the entire process.
Second, Congress should establish a national state-by-state supervisory structure, staffed with auditors, engineers and managers, responsible to the board to oversee spending. During the New Deal, one state director of the youth activities of the WPA in Texas was Lyndon Johnson.
In short, it is important that we get this right. It is neither practical nor responsible to double discretionary spending without creating a supervisory mechanism to oversee and monitor it.
- Word leaked that President-elect Obama would choose former congressman and Clinton Chief of Staff Leon Panetta to serve as his director of the CIA. The choice was a surprise, to say the least, and reactions have been as impassioned as they have been varied. The primary bone of contention is that Panetta has no direct experience in intelligence, and will be heading an agency that prefers to be lead by its own. Spooks prefer spooks. Laura Rozen at the Cable has a good rundown of reactions from both sides.
- Some, such as Robert Baer at Time, have argued that Panetta's outsiderness will be an advantage. The CIA was a political tool under President Bush, he says, and having a chief who knows the ins and outs of Washington as well as anyone can only be a boon for the Agency.
- What's more, Panetta is an experienced and proven manager, and as Marc Ambinder points out, he'll have a massive human resources problem on his hands as soon as he arrives.
Politics
- As the Senate is sworn in today, the future of two prospective Senators is still cloudy. Roland Burris, "Crooked" Rod Blagojevich's choice to replace Obama, is wondering if he can get seated without the signature of the Illinois Secretary of State, the approval of the State Legislature, or the support of many Senate Democrats.
- Al Franken, likewise, who was finally declared victor in Minnesota yesterday, will face delays as Norm Coleman initiates a legal challenge to Franken's narrow victory.
- Eve Fairbanks has an interesting piece in TNR on the curious placidity of right-wing Republicans these days.
- Are you new to the House? A first-time Congressperson? Politico throws you a bone with "7 habits of highly effective Freshmen."
Economy
- PEBO worked the Hill yesterday, and did his best to convince
skeptical Republicans that they, too would have a voice in crafting the
stimulus plan. Obama is hoping to have a bill ready for his signature by late January or early February, and wants Congress to get cracking.
- Everyone's in a tizzy over Steve Jobs's choice to sit out this year's MacWorld Expo. Rumors that his health is in decline-- perhaps a recurrence of pancreatic cancer-- have driven Apple's stock price down, and worried investors and Mac fans alike. Jobs's explanation yesterday of his obvious weight loss were not particularly reassuring.
International
- Ten days in, the Israeli Defense Forces continue to push into Gaza, taking control of several high rise buildings in Gaza City. According the WaPo, more than 40 people were killed yesterday, nearly half of whom were children. Calls by European leaders to end the incursion have gone unheeded in Jerusalem.
- The Windy reports on Obama's push to shift US policy toward Cuba. NDN has long argued for a new, more enlightened approach to our island neighbor, including the easing of travel and remittance restrictions on Cuban families, and we're pleased to see Obama taking this stance.
One More Thing
- Just a month after the Clintons' cat Socks was reported to be terminally ill with cancer, the Bushes' cat India (AKA Willie; AKA Kitty) has bought the farm.
- In what some travelers might see as divine retribution, the new, blue uniforms worn by TSA employees are reportedly causing horrible skin rashes and otherwise making the officers ill.
- Did you hear about the man who accidentally bought Joe Biden's cufflinks at a thrift store?
- Last, TPM does a little video on the debate between the five men running for chairmanship of the RNC. For center-lefties, it's deeply reassuring:
Franken - The Minnesota State Canvassing Board confirmed today that Al Franken has won his Senate election, ending a weeks-long recount process that started with the Democratic challenger facing a roughly 215-vote deficit.
Black Swans - A great blog by David Rothkopfon Latin America and foreign policy. Here, the term "Black Swan" means a recurring theme throughout history in which key events or discoveries of real significance forced a rethinking of the rules and standard approaches that had previously guided society. And we definitely need to rethink our policies in Latin America. Excerpt of the piece:
The best place to begin looking at what might be unexpected is to identify
what most Washington types think is in store for us. As of right now, 2009 looks
like this: deeper, messier recession worldwide, the beginning of the U.S.
pullout from Iraq, worries about Pakistan and Iranian nukes, hopes that Obama
can restore U.S. standing. Oh, and recently a recognition that Israel-Palestine
will continue to be an open wound. But here's five black swans that could arrive and wreak unanticipated havoc:
1. The failed state next door
At a meeting of leading diplomats from around the Americas I attended not too long ago, the subject that caused the greatest concern was the situation in Mexico. Organized crime has taken a dominant position in a number of provinces and the federal government is struggling to contain the growing security threat. The country is losing oil revenue due to plummeting prices and mismanagement of PEMEX, the national oil company. The Merida Initiative, Plan Colombia-lite for Mexico, has not made the progress some had hoped for and the result is a fragile situation. Add the possible consequences of a very tough 2009 economically and a match is tossed on tinder. In a world in which there is no such thing as foreign policy any more -- every key event has U.S. domestic consequences -- there is no better example than our neighbor. The symptoms of crisis will come streaming over our borders and border-state politics will make it a problem Obama cannot ignore. (Especially with a Homeland Security secretary who is a former border-state governor.)
In a recent article by Sam Stein in the Huffington Post, Simon explains why the GOP's road back to power looks to be a long one:
"The core play in the GOP playbook for 44 years has been the magic negro playbook," said Simon Rosenberg, head of Democratic organization NDN and one of the most well-versed party figures on racial politics. "They don't have another play or another playbook. Whether it is Willie Horton, or welfare queens and tax and spend, or the way they have dealt with immigration... they don't have a play in their playbook that doesn't start with the exploitation of racial divisions... They are going to have to reject 44 years of GOP politics in order to have any chance in the 21st century America."
A somewhat distorted version of Simon's argument also received some critical attention from Donald Lambro in the Washington Times.
Simon's article on the difference between motion and progress was also featured in The Hill, and Rob was quoted in Grist on getting a carbon tax right.
Job Description:To direct and oversee all financial activities of the organization(s), including preparation of current financial reports and forecasts for economic trends and future growth
Essential Functions:
Oversee all accounting practices, budget preparation and audit functions
Meet regularly with president and department heads to keep informed and to offer direction
Prepare budgets and financial reports Direct financial strategy, planning and forecasts based on the financial reports and suggest methods for improvement
Supervise investment and/or raising of funds
Study, analyze and report on trends and opportunities for expansion and projection of future growth
Closely monitor cash flow with controller/bookkeeper
Qualifications:
Master’s Degree in business administration, accounting, or finance
CPA designation preferred
4 to 5 years of experience in financial management
Excellent verbal and written communication skills
Excellent analytical and organizational skills
Knowledge of MS Great Plains accounting software preferred
Leader: A Trillion
Leader: Outsider Insider
Sam here, writing with a reminder that you might be interested in working for NDN!
