Rethinking the Economy

On March 20, House freshman and Tea Party backer Rep. Stephen Fincher (R-Tenn.)
voted for the a Republican House budget that cut billions of dollars, including from many other transportation priorities. His office put out a press release scolding “out of control” and “reckless” federal spending.
But two days before, he was fighting furiously to save [...]

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Discussing the round of pro-stimulus remarks from economics advisers who recently left the Obama administration, the Economist’s R.A. writes:
There was a strong case for policymakers to say, look, we’ll continue to act until we’ve solved the problem or markets demand that we stop. Would there be the potential for waste and inefficiency in this approach? [...]

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There was a lot of great material in Van Jones’ speech at the Rebuilding the Dream kickoff — so much so that I decided I want to write up some of it to experiment with later. Here are some of my favorites:
On the myth that we are broke:
We’re not broke, we were robbed.
Saying “we [...]

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Does pushing for cleaner energy kill jobs & growth? No, says Google (via Grist’s Stephen Lacey). In fact, waiting will cost us dearly:
Google, a leader of innovation in the digital economy, says that without a private and public focus on innovation in renewables, storage, and electric vehicles, the cost of delaying the clean energy [...]

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Exhibit 4792 of how little politicians who say “get the government out of the market” really believe it: in Wisconsin, the Republican-controlled leg is trying to ram through legislation that would make Coors/Miller Beer and big distributors happy but burn microbreweries:
The Legislature’s Republican-controlled Joint Finance Committee recently approved an amendment to the state budget [...]

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You’ve probably already seen this one, but just in case: from the LA Times via Krugman:
Ask a Briton to describe “American-style” healthcare, and you’ll hear a catalog of horrors that include grossly expensive and unnecessary medical procedures and a privatized system that favors the rich. For a people accustomed to free healthcare [...]

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Via Felix Salmon:
The Pentagon is very encouraged by Wall Street’s response to aerospace companies and arms makers, even as U.S. defense spending flattens, the top U.S. weapons buyer said on Tuesday. [...]The median stock price for the industry’s to 20 aerospace and defense contractors is about 92.5 percent of their 52-week trading highs, he said. [...]

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On the Series-O-Tubes-o-Spheres and in conversations with some friends, I’ve been hearing the same theme – the Right has overplayed their hand. From Scott Walker’s Wisconsin crusade to wipe out public unions to the House Republicans jumping off the cliff by signing up to privitalize/gut Medicare ala Ryan, conservatives are pushing policies that go [...]

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Yesterday’s loss in Wisconsin was a real blow, although the folks in Wisconsin and their supporters around the country did a damn good job of fighting back. Now they’re gearing up for the next battle. Their immediate target: recall the jackasses who voted for it.
I’m glad they’re aggressively going for recalling these [...]

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Matt Yglesias writes:
Suppose I had a business where what I do is find people who live in flood prone areas and threaten to wreck their houses unless they pay me money. That would be called an extortion racket, not capitalism. I don’t own those people’s houses. Real capitalism requires the government to restrain [...]

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