| |
 |
Friday, August 2, 2002 |
Coincidences and Corruption You probably snicker cynically when you see the latest example of corruption -- such as a member of Congress fronting for some interest group that pours big money into his campaign fund -- and everyone involved says, "There's no connection between the money and the bill sponsorship." [Dan Gillmor's eJournal]
10:04:07 PM 
|
|
|
Corporate getaways!. President Bush says he's getting tough on crime in the suites -- but his old friends at Enron might never see the inside of a jail. [Salon.com]
Of course his friends at Enron will get away. They gave him too much money to do any jail time. It'll be "just not enough evidence" to convict, or something like that...
9:34:13 PM
|
|
|
Joe Conason's Journal. How can Democrats beat Bush in 2004? The way Clinton did it in 1992 -- by uniting the party. [Salon.com]
Can they do that, or are they just like crabs in a barrel?
8:47:23 PM
|
|
Bush's Double Dip? A few months ago the vast majority of business economists mocked concerns about a "double dip," a second leg to the downturn. But there were a few dogged iconoclasts out there, most notably Stephen Roach at Morgan Stanley. As I've repeatedly said in this column, the arguments of the double-dippers made a lot of sense. And their story now looks more plausible than ever. ... On the surface, the sharp drop in the economy's growth, from 5 percent in the first quarter to 1 percent in the second, is disheartening. Under the surface, it's quite a lot worse. ... Bear in mind that government officials have a stake in accentuating the positive. The administration needs a recovery because, with deficits exploding, the only way it can justify that tax cut is by pretending that it was just what the economy needed. [Daypop Top 40]
8:38:12 PM
|
|
|
Party of the pocketbook As the latest Bush recession heads into its second dip, it's washing away one of the oldest truisms in American politics.
When I was growing up in the '60s and '70s, conventional wisdom about our political parties was clear: Democrats stuck up for working people and minorities, but you couldn't trust them with your money. For that, you wanted a Republican. This reached a head in the late '70s, as Jimmy Carter faced runaway inflation, oil shocks and unemployment, and couldn't seem to make headway against them. Reagan's election brought a recession, a tax cut and a deepening federal deficit -- but one way or another he got credit in the national mythology for dispelling the Carter malaise and putting the economy right.
Since Reagan, though, a new pattern has emerged, not just in the reality of the economy's numbers but in the shorthand of the popular mind. Bush I: Recession. Clinton: Economic growth. Bush II: Recession.
Circumstance and luck play a huge part in all this, to be sure. But patterns like these are what build popular myths. If Bush doesn't begin improving the fumbling performance of his economic team, or break free of his "tax cut or die" ideology, he could inherit a cruel variation on James Carville's mantra from the 1992 election -- as "It's the economy, stupid" gets transformed in the popular mind to "It's stupid's economy." [Scott Rosenberg's Links & Comment]
8:30:09 PM
|
|
Homeland Insecurity. The September issue of the Atlantic Monthly has a remarkable special report called Homeland Insecurity (not yet excerpted online). It features none other than Bruce Schneier. I am delighted to see Schneier's philosophical transformation -- from crypto-infatuated fortress builder to pragmatic watchguard -- detailed in a mainstream magazine. People who would never have read Secrets and Lies will read this excellent article, and I hope will ponder Schneier's message: ... [Jon's Radio]
8:28:30 PM
|
|
© Copyright 2003 Michael Alderete.
|
|
|
|
|
