Stealing Worker Pensions

For all the Wingnuts who think that terrible union workers wear black hats and benign corporations wear white, here's an article from Bloomberg to consider.  I am waiting for Rick Santelli, Jack Welch, Joe Kernen, or any of other the corporate shills out there to express their outrage.  Just the other day I heard Santelli's typical rant about how awful it is to reward bad behavior.  Apparently it only applies to people whose mortgages are underwater thanks to the economic policies of the gang Santelli, Welch, Kernen, et al.  Hypocrites....

Other People's Children

I stole the title to this post from Paul Krugman's tweet....Matthew Yglesias has a pretty good take (here's the link) on Sen. Portman's welcome change of heart on gay marriage.

From Daily Kos

Here's the  link to a post on Daily Kos .  No further comment is necessary.

Drones

Most liberals oppose Obama's use of drones (cf. The Nation magazine over the last few years).  The only difference between us and the Republican Wingnuts is that we also opposed them when GW Bush was president.  Of course, when W was president, such opposition was un-American and traitorous.  Now it is the height of patriotism.

It's all pretty typical.  Bush did it and it was tough national defense.  Obama does it and it's a constitutional crisis.  Of course, there aren't many things Obama can do without the Wingnuts invoking a constitutional crisis--probably including eating his breakfast.

Market Update

Returning to a theme I have posted about several times before, here is a brief stock market update...

The Dow is up a little over 80% since Obama took office.  (And a reminder:  the Dow actually went down 22% during Bush II's eight years.)

Now, I will be the first to admit that a president can't take all the credit nor suffer all the blame for the performance of the Dow Jones Industrial Average;  but, still, this is not quite the disaster Jack Welch, Ken Langone, Joe Kernen, and all the other Obama haters predicted.

Just sayin'....

Obama's Spine

I guess it's about time that I took back my concern (expressed in my Dec. 19,2012 post) that President Obama was going to cave once more to the extremism and obstructionism of the Wingnut Party (aka GOP).  It surely seems that he has found his confidence and footing, and it's pretty gratifying.  I suppose there is still time for him to cave in the future but it seems pretty unlikely now.

So let this serve as my apology to the Prez.  Your spine seems to be plenty strong.  Hang in there...we are with you.

Santelli Silliness

I just caught the latest bit of high-decibel and high-pitched whinery from Rick Santelli on CNBC concerning the evils of Ben Bernanke and the Fed.  The problem for Rick is that he uses Phil Gramm to buttress his argument.  Earth to Rick:  there is no person in America whose economic views have been more discredited over the last ten years or so than Phil Gramm (except for maybe his wife).

You need a better argument, Rick.  Citing Phil Gramm only serves to disprove your idea.