Paul Krugman: 'Fiscal Poison Pill'

Column here.

Exhibit A of the poison pill in action is the sad case of John McCain, part of whose lingering image as a maverick rests on his early opposition to the Bush tax cuts, which he declared excessive and too tilted toward the rich.

Since then the budget surpluses of the Clinton years have given way to persistent deficits, and income inequality has risen to new heights, vindicating his opposition.

But instead of pointing this out, Mr. McCain now promises to make those tax cuts permanent — and proposes further cuts that are, if anything, tilted even more toward the wealthy. And how is the loss of revenue to be made up? Mr. McCain hasn’t offered a realistic answer.

You can explain though not excuse Mr. McCain’s behavior by his need to shore up relations with the Republican base, which suspects him of being a closet moderate. But he’s not the only one seemingly trapped by the Bush fiscal legacy.

Barack Obama’s tax plan is more responsible than Mr. McCain’s: relative to current policy, the Tax Policy Center estimates, the Obama plan would raise revenue by $700 billion over the next decade, compared with a $600 billion loss for Mr. McCain.

The Obama plan is also far more progressive, sharply reducing after-tax incomes for the richest 1 percent of Americans while raising incomes for the bottom 80 percent.

But while $700 billion may sound like a lot of money, it’s probably not enough to pay for universal health care, which was supposed to be the overriding progressive priority in this election.

Why doesn’t Mr. Obama propose raising more money? Blame the Bush poison pill.

First of all, Mr. Obama — like, to be fair, his main rivals for the Democratic nomination — isn’t willing to challenge the Bush tax cuts as a whole. He only proposes rolling back tax cuts for those making more than $250,000 a year.

Second, Mr. Obama proposes giving back a substantial part of the revenue raised by this partial tax-cut rollback in the form of new tax cuts.

These tax cuts would mainly benefit lower- and-middle-income families, although this can’t be said of Mr. Obama’s plan to eliminate income taxes on seniors with incomes under $50,000: since most seniors already pay no income taxes, this would do nothing for those most in need. And one wonders why we should create the precedent of exempting particular demographic groups from taxes.

But the big question is, are these tax cuts, however appealing, a top priority? The most expensive proposal, under the title Making Work Pay, would give most workers $500 in tax credits, at a 10-year cost of more than $700 billion. Isn’t it more important that workers be assured of health care?

The problem, I believe, is that even Democrats have bought into the underlying premise of the Bush years — that the best thing you can do for American families, or at least the only thing that can win their votes, is to give them a tax break. . . .

[L]ooking at the tax proposals of the two presidential candidates, it’s remarkable and disheartening to see how effective President Bush’s fiscal poison pill has been in restricting the terms of debate.

Progressives, in particular, have to hope that Mr. Obama will be more willing to challenge the Bush legacy in office than he has been in the campaign.

Paul Krugman: 'Driller Instinct'

Column here. (Emphasis added.)

Blaming environmentalists for high energy prices, never mind the evidence, has been a hallmark of the Bush administration. . . .

[T]he administration has spent the last eight years trying to convince Congress that the key to America’s energy security is opening up the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling — even though estimates from the Energy Information Administration suggest that drilling in the refuge would make very little difference to the energy outlook, and the oil companies themselves aren’t especially interested in punching holes in the tundra.

But it still comes as a surprise and a disappointment to see John McCain joining that unfortunate tradition.

I’ve never taken Mr. McCain’s media reputation as a maverick seriously, because on most issues, he’s a thoroughly conventional conservative. On energy policy, however, he has in the past seemed to show some independence. Most notably, he voted against the really terrible, special-interest-driven 2005 energy bill, which was backed by the Bush administration — and by Barack Obama.

But that was then.

In his Monday speech on energy, Mr. McCain tried to touch all the bases. . . .

The item that made news, however, was Mr. McCain’s call for more offshore drilling. On Tuesday, he made this more explicit, calling for exploration and development of the currently protected outer continental shelf. This was a reversal of his previous position, and it went a long way toward aligning his energy policy with that of the Bush administration. . . .

As many reports have noted, the McCain/Bush policy on offshore drilling doesn’t make sense as a response to $4-a-gallon gas: the White House’s own Energy Information Administration says that exploiting the outer shelf wouldn’t yield noticeable amounts of oil until the 2020s, and even at peak production its impact on oil prices would be “insignificant.”

But what I haven’t seen emphasized is the broader picture: Mr. McCain has now aligned himself with an administration that, even aside from its blame-the-environmental-movement tendencies, has established an extensive track record as the gang that couldn’t think straight about energy policy.

Remember, they didn’t just insist that the Iraqis would welcome us as liberators; on the eve of the Iraq war, administration officials were also adamant that regime change in Iraq would add millions of barrels a day to the world oil supply, driving oil prices way down. (In fact, Iraq’s oil output took five years just to recover to preinvasion levels.)

So why would Mr. McCain associate himself with these characters? The answer, presumably, is that it’s a cynical political calculation.

I’m reasonably sure that Mr. McCain’s advisers realize that offshore drilling would do nothing for current gas prices. But they may believe that the public can be conned. A Rasmussen poll taken before Mr. McCain’s announcement suggests that the public favors expanded offshore drilling, and believes (wrongly) that this would lower gasoline prices.

And Mr. McCain may also hope to shore up his still fragile relations with the Republican base. As anyone who has read what’s in his inbox after publishing an article on oil prices can testify, there are many people on the right who believe that all our energy problems have been caused by sanctimonious tree-huggers. Mr. McCain has just thrown that constituency some red meat.

But I very much doubt that Mr. McCain’s gambit will work. In fact, it’s almost certainly self-destructive.

To have a chance in November, Mr. McCain has to convince voters that he isn’t just Bush, continued. Energy policy is one of the areas where he could best have made that case.

Instead, he has ceded the high ground on energy to Mr. Obama, and linked himself firmly to the most unpopular president on record.

Lucy report

I'm glad it's the weekend and I can devote lots of time to the cats. I know that Lucy especially misses the attention she used to get while B. was here and I was at work. She's hanging in there, however.

Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution (one of the Bills of Rights)

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers [including now e-mails], and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

This is the law of the land. And our president swears to abide by the law when taking office. (IT people don't have to swear this.)

Left blogosphere's reaction to FISA legislation

My take on it is: abuses happened but they should be prevented in the future. I've read nothing showing that the telecoms' breaking the law for President Bush made us safer. There are legal (and expeditious) means of gathering intelligence that do not in any way compromise its effectiveness. We don't need a police state. Frankly I don't care whether the telecoms get retroactive immunity or not--they were being coerced by the lying Bush Administration at the time. Now all the lies have been exposed. (More on Sista Soljah here.)

Digby writes:

Sistah Soljah'd ?

There's lots of blogospheric angst today, and for good reason, around this FISA legislation. Senator Obama's commitment to support the "compromise,"(while promising to "work" to remove the offensive telcom immunity) is a big disappointment to many.

I am tempted to say this is a Sistah Soljah moment, wherein Barack makes it clear to the Villagers that he is not one of the DFH's [dirty fucking hippies], despite all their ardent support. Nothing is more associated with us than this issue. It may even make sense on some sort of abstract level. He's obviously decided that he has to run to the right pretty hard to counteract that "most liberal Senator" label.

But, I actually have no idea what his motivation is any more than the rest of the Democrats, who seem stuck in some 2004 time warp, fighting the battle of Fallujah with Don Rumsfeld. He may genuinely think the legislation is good or just be afraid that the Republicans will use it against him. (I don't think that's going to help frankly --- he voted against it last time and that's all they need for the scare ads.) He does say that if he wins, he promises not to abuse the power it gives him, so I guess we should feel good about that.

I do know this: they would not have made this "compromise" and then brought this to the floor without his ok, and probably without his direction. He is the leader of the Democratic Party now, in the middle of a hotly contested presidential campaign. If he didn't come to them and say to get this thing done before the fall, then they came to him and asked his permission. That's just a fact. They aren't going to do anything he doesn't want them to do.

So, it's not really a capitulation. It's a strategy.

Update: Jack Balkin says Obama just wants the power as president. He may be right. That would also be a good reason to keep him from having it.

'Be A Patriot, Take Bush's Secrets to the Grave!'

From TPM.

'One in three IT staff snoops on co-workers: survey'

A co-worker sent me this. (I don't know where he found it.) These people have nothing better to do? They should be fired.

Thu Jun 19, 2008 11:57am EDT

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - One in three information technology professionals abuses administrative passwords to access confidential data such as colleagues' salary details, personal emails or board-meeting minutes, according to a survey.

U.S. information security company Cyber-Ark surveyed 300 senior IT professionals, and found that one-third admitted to secretly snooping, while 47 percent said they had accessed information that was not relevant to their role.

"All you need is access to the right passwords or privileged accounts and you're privy to everything that's going on within your company," Mark Fullbrook, Cyber-Ark's UK director, said in a statement released along with the survey results on Thursday.

"For most people, administrative passwords are a seemingly innocuous tool used by the IT department to update or amend systems. To those 'in the know' they are the keys to the kingdom," he added.

Cyber-Ark said privileged passwords get changed far less frequently than user passwords, with 30 percent being changed every quarter and 9 percent never changed at all, meaning that IT staff who have left an organization could still gain access.

It added that seven out of 10 companies rely on outdated and insecure methods to exchange sensitive data, with 35 percent choosing email and 35 percent using couriers, while 4 percent still relied on the postal system.

Kitchen update

I was back at Home Depot tonight for quite a while, going over details and ultimately paying for the Silestone countertops (under $4,000 with discount). I may have mentioned that I didn't get my HELOC because my condo wasn't on the bank's approved list of condos (condos are shaky right now, but mine is actually doing OK). (I immediately went and took out an unsecured loan from my bank and paid for the cabinets.)

Last night I went on the Home Depot website and saw they had a much better deal on unsecured loans for home improvements. To make a long story short, today I got a loan from Home Depot at a much better interest rate and on more favorable terms and used that to pay for the Silestone today. Also, they're going to get the cabinets paid from the Home Depot loan. So I'll be able to pay off the bank loan immediately and may just incur some processing charges. I also have quite a bit of time to accumulate funds to retire the Home Depot loan as soon as possible.

Cat update

All is well. I had administered her ear medicine shortly before I took this.

Obama's first general election ad

From MyDD.

The campaign also announced the states where the ad will run: Alaska, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, Indiana, Michigan, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Virginia.

Complete MyDD post here.

She dances, too, at 82

Queen likes to dance to Abba, DJ Chris Evans claims

THE Queen stunned guests at a Windsor Castle bash by strutting her stuff to an Abba disco classic, it was claimed yesterday.

The 82-year-old monarch showed her moves when the Swedish group's Dancing Queen came on at the end of a dinner dance.

Radio 2 presenter Chris Evans told listeners: "A friend of mine went to a dinner at Windsor Castle hosted by the Queen.

"The meal was had, the speeches were made and then the disco commenced.

"Apparently, she loves to get down on the dancefloor.

"And what was the song being played? It was Dancing Queen by Abba. She was on the floor and everybody said, 'My goodness me, there is the Dancing Queen.'"

Evans added: "That is a true story and she said audibly to the guests around her, 'I always try to dance when this song comes on because I am the Queen and I like to dance.'"

Story here.

All about hats at Royal Ascot

Royal hats here. Story here.

'Voting Reform in FL Still Moving Too Slowly'

Talk Left post here.

Americans who are convicted of crimes do not lose their citizenship, are not relieved of their obligation to pay taxes, and should be just as entitled to participate in the democratic process as everyone else. In Florida, however, even after felons are released from prison and from supervision, even after they've paid their fines and made restitution, there are still barriers to voting. Those barriers stem from an ugly history of disenfranchising black voters. . . .

The issue of voting rights here has long been intertwined with race. The ban on voting by felons became part of the state Constitution in 1868, when many Southern states found ways to suppress black votes in the wake of the Civil War.

Florida's Gov. Charlie Crist has advocated a measure of reform that, since April, has reinstated voting rights for 115,232 ex-offenders. But 80 percent of them remain disenfranchised. . . .

Gov. Crist bases his call for reform upon his belief in the value of redemption. . . .

It is the voting system in Florida that needs redemption, in the form of additional change. Civil rights are restored automatically in most states after completion of a sentence. Florida needs to follow that example if it wants to move past the vestige of post-Civil War vote suppression.

Lucy report

She's acting almost normal again. Her ears still bother her (that was normal) but the new ointment (EnteDerm) is working miracles. The mildew has almost disappeared! Plus she didn't complain as much tonight when I gave her a dose.

I'd bought all kinds of stuff at pet stores and over the Internet to treat her ears, but apparently she needed serious drugs. The vet even told me don't bother to clean them anymore (as I'd been doing when I felt it was necessary). I was glad to hear that. It was always a big ordeal for Lucy and me both.

This morning she was up and at 'em and out of the bedroom. She didn't want to be shut up in there again.

When I got home from work, she ate canned food in the kitchen with Bootsy (on her own paper plate). She even walked up to me after I'd opened the can, eager to be fed.

Both Lucy and Bootsy have lost interest in the dry food (and I'd even tried a different brand which at first they seemed to like). I'll just feed them more canned food (and still keep the dry food out for them in case their interest picks up again).

I still have a cat box and food and water supply back in my bedroom (where Lucy's basket is) to make things a little easier on her, if necessary.

Both cats were traumatized emotionally by B's departure (not my doing!) but they seem to be pulling through. I give them all the support I can.

'German court rules fear or letters is no excuse' (?)

I couldn't figure that one out! See story here. (It's fear of letters.)

A German court has ruled against a woman who claimed a phobia of official letters in her appeal of authorities' decision to cut off child support benefits. . . .

There was a time in my life when I dreaded going to the mailbox myself.

'Bush Backs McCain’s Highly Innovative, Out-Of-The-Box “More Drilling” Plan'

Post at Firedoglake here.

President Arbusto loves McSame's "give the oil companies exactly what they want" proposal so much, he's giving it the kiss of death his stamp of approval:

President Bush asked Congress Wednesday to permit drilling for oil in deep water off America's coasts to combat rising oil and gas prices.

"There is no excuse for delay," the president said in a Rose Garden statement.

Tough talk for a man who's pissed away 7 years. And wasn't the invasion of Iraq supposed to lower gas prices? I thought we were going to kick their ass and take their gas.

Anyway, Big Oil is absolutely thrilled with the Bush/McSame proposal. When you see headlines like "oil execs respond favorably," that sort of tells you everything you need to know. But here's where I'm confused.

* Bush has a 24% approval rating.
* Cheney has an 18% approval rating.
* And 90% (90%!) of Americans think Big Oil is culpable for high gas prices.

So people hate Bush, hate Cheney and really, really hate Big Oil -- yet McSame is lining up with them. Again.

I'm starting to think an Obama mole is running the McSame campaign.

Lucy's still hanging in there

She didn't like being shut up in the bedroom today, so I won't do that again. Appetite is pretty good. As I wrote in an email to a friend.

I don't know about the "thing" in her abdomen (and neither does the vet), but her ears have bothered her for a long time (it's like they're mildewed from the Florida humidity). That was the stated reason why I took her to the vet (but the real reason was the weight loss and not eating right). The vet gave me an ointment for her ears. But I can't administer it the way the vet did. She goes nuts. I did my best. I wish they had ear drops or a spray for this condition. (I think I'll ask the vet about that.) I'm supposed to insert the elongated tip of a tube of ointment into her ear canal, every day. I can barely make out where the ear canal is. Please.

'Scans see "gay brain differences"'

BBC story here.

The brains of gay men and women look like those found in heterosexual people of the opposite sex, research suggests.

The Swedish study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal, compared the size of the brain's halves in 90 adults.

Gay men and heterosexual women had halves of a similar size, while the right side was bigger in lesbian women and heterosexual men.

A UK scientist said this was evidence sexual orientation was set in the womb. . . .

Dr Qazi Rahman, a lecturer in cognitive biology at Queen Mary, University of London, said that he believed that these brain differences were laid down early in foetal development.

"As far as I'm concerned there is no argument any more - if you are gay, you are born gay," he said. . . .

Gore endorses Obama (?!)

Wow. Did anyone think Gore was going to endorse John McCain? Maybe I'm missing something here, but Alex Koppelman at Salon's War Room makes this into a big deal.

Koppelman always slanted toward Obama during the Democratic primaries. Now that the dust has settled and Hillary is out of the race, he writes as though Gore is endorsing Obama over Hillary. (Gore was smarter than to do that.) (Emphasis added.)

Monday night, Al Gore took to the stage at Joe Louis Arena in Detroit, Michigan, to finally deliver the endorsement many political observers had been waiting for all year. By now, though, there was no suspense as to what candidate Gore would endorse; instead, with Barack Obama beaming next to him, Gore added his voice to the growing chorus of Democrats coming out to support their party's presumptive presidential nominee. . . .

I've never been impressed by what Alex Koppelman has to say. He comes across as a political neophyte. I miss the other guy at War Room. I trust he has a better job now.

Lucy OK

Talked to the vet today. Kidney function is normal, despite the "thing" (as she called it today) the vet had felt during the examination on Saturday. Lucy does have some infection, however, and is anemic. Tomorrow morning I'll pick up some antibiotics from the vet's and give Lucy a dose before going to work. I'm also shutting her up in the bedroom by herself, so she won't have to deal with Bootsy while she's recuperating. (I'll be sure to open the hurricane shutters, however, so she'll have some light and can look out the window.) (I normally like to keep the bedroom as dark as I possibly can.)