Too Big a Piece of the Pie

An article at the New Rules Project by Stacy Mitchell talks about about credit card fees. We're not talking about the myriad nuisance fees like late fees and overdraft fees that you can avoid with diligence but the transaction fees that are skimmed by the credit card companies on every single credit card purchase:

Although the exact rate charged on any given transaction varies widely depending on many factors, including the size of the business and the type of card, the average interchange fee in the U.S. is now about 2% of the value of the sale — two to six times the regulated rates imposed on Visa and MasterCard in Australia and much of Europe.

....Interchange fees now comprise a substantial share of the income these companies make on credit cards. In 2004, card issuers took in $28 billion in interchange. By 2008, that figure had shot up to $48 billion. That's more than one-quarter of all credit card revenue and more than the total collected by banks in credit card late fees, over-the-limit fees, and ATM fees combined.

Business owners are helpless since they can hardly stop taking credit cards and they aren't allowed to directly pass along transaction fees to consumers. You can rest assured though that these fees wind up coming out of our pockets eventually. Merchants have absolutely no bargaining power at all as to turn away credit card and debit card users would be a disaster in today's world. To understand how bad we are getting screwed you should understand that in Europe, transaction fees have been cut to 0.3% by the EU government.

We can chip away at the credit card companies with various limits and caps on interest rates and all sorts of nickle and dime rules but until we force them to restrict their take of American business to a reasonable percentage then we are just pissing into the wind. If I am not mistaken adding a percent or so to the profits of American business might be a pretty stimulus in itself.

Credit and debit cards are supposed to facilitate business by providing a symbiotic way for consumers to interact with merchants. Somehow, in the U.S. at least, this has turned into a parasitic relationship with the credit card companies slowly bleeding the American economy by taking an unwarranted share of each transaction. I am not against Visa, MasterCard, Discover or American Express and I expect them to make a fair profit. Fair being the operative word. This is just another example where, on many fronts, the EU is ahead of the U.S. in making sure the playing field is somewhat level with respect to the relationships between business and consumers.

H/T Kevin at Mother Jones

Done Deal

Well, the stimulus package made it through both houses of Congress. Nada Rethug votes in the House and the 3 amigos in the Senate. According to Specter, a lot of the GOP in the Senate think it is the right thing but were too chicken to vote for it.

I hope President Obama and his team have learned their lesson on how successful bipartisan outreach can be with the current Republican party. I think they have. I expect the president to continue his outreach and consultations with the opposition but now will realize that they only have his and the Democratic party's failure in focus and not the well being of the nation or its people. There is still a lot to do and I think the president will forge ahead and try to get it done, with or without the Republicans. He will give them a chance to participate in the rebuilding of America but only as far as they are willing to make a genuine and meaningful contribution.

President Obama will sign the stimulus bill on Monday and we can all start the hard road back. There is still a lot of pain for millions of us ahead but I do believe we are finally headed in the right direction. I wish the bill would have been bigger but considering the political realities we are probably lucky we got what we did.

Now we need to turn our sights on a bunch of bankers.

The Stimulus Plan

I previoulsy posted highlights but this is the actual plan as it currently stands. The previous post indicated that there would be money to help with COBRA...apparently that is not in the plan.

This is the final package reached by negotiators from the House and the Senate. Now both bodies have to vote one more time on the final combined package. Summary from the House and Senate majority Appropriations staff:

United States Congress

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009
Creating Jobs, Supporting the States and Investing in Our Country’s Future

The United States is facing its deepest economic crisis since the Great Depression, one that calls for swift, bold action. The goals of this legislation are the same as they have been from day one: to strengthen the economy now and invest in our country’s future.

This legislation will create and save jobs; help state and local governments with their budget shortfalls to prevent deep cuts in basic services such as health, education, and law enforcement; cut taxes for working families and invest in the long-term health of our economy. We do all of this with unprecedented accountability, oversight and transparency so the American people know their money is being invested responsibly.

To accomplish these goals, The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act provides $311 billion in appropriations, including the following critical investments:

Investments in Infrastructure and Science - $120 billion
Investments in Health - $14.2 billion
Investments in Education and Training - $105.9 billion
Investments in Energy, including over $30 billion in infrastructure - $37.5 billion
Helping Americans Hit Hardest by the Economic Crisis - $24.3 billion
Law Enforcement, Oversight, Other Programs - $7.8 billion

Investments in Infrastructure and Science include:

Infrastructure Improvements
- $7.2 billion for Broadband to increase broadband access and usage in unserved and underserved areas of the Nation, which will better position the U.S. for economic growth, innovation, and job creation.
- $2.75 billion for the Department of Homeland Security to secure the homeland and promote economic activity, including $1 billion for airport baggage and checkpoint security, $430 million for construction of border points of entry, $210 million for construction of fire stations, $300 million for port, transit, and rail security, $280 million for border security technology and communication, and $240 million for the Coast Guard.
- $4.6 billion in funding for the Corps of Engineers.
- $1.2 billion for VA hospital and medical facility construction and improvements, long-term care facilities for veterans, and improvements at VA national cemeteries.
- $3.1 billion for repair, restoration and improvement of public facilities at on public and tribal lands.
- $4.2 billion for Facilities Sustainment, Restoration and Modernization to be used to invest in energy efficiency projects and to improve the repair and modernization of Department of Defense facilities to include Defense Health facilities.
- $2.33 billion for Department of Defense Facilities including quality of life and family-friendly military improvement projects such as family housing, hospitals, and child care centers.
- $2.25 billion through HOME and the Low Income Housing Tax Credit program to fill financing gaps caused by the credit freeze and get stalled housing development projects moving.
- $1 billion for the Community Development Block Grant program for community and economic development projects including housing and services for those hit hard by tough economic times.
- $1 billion for the Bureau of Reclamation to provide clean, reliable drinking water to rural areas and to ensure adequate water supply to western localities impacted by drought.

Transportation
- $27.5 billion is included for highway investments
- $8.4 billion for investments in public transportation.
- $1.5 billion for competitive grants to state and local governments for transportation investments.
- $1.3 billion for investments in our air transportation system.
- $9.3 billion for investments in rail transportation, including Amtrak, High Speed and Intercity Rail.

Public Housing
- $4 billion to the public housing capital fund to enable local public housing agencies to address a $32 billion backlog in capital needs -- especially those improving energy efficiency in aging buildings.
- $2 billion for full-year payments to owners receiving Section 8 project-based rental assistance.
- $2 billion for the redevelopment of abandoned and foreclosed homes.
- $1.5 billion for homeless prevention activities, which will be sent out to states, cities and local governments through the emergency shelter grant formula.
- $250 million is included for energy retrofitting and green investments in HUD-assisted housing projects.

Environmental Clean-Up/Clean Water
- $6 billion is directed towards environmental cleanup of former weapon production and energy research sites.
- $6 billion for local clean and drinking water infrastructure improvements.
- $1.2 billion for EPA’s nationwide environmental cleanup programs, including Superfund.
- $1.38 billion to support $3.8 billion in loans and grants for needed water and waste disposal facilities in rural areas.

Science
- $1 billion total for NASA.
- $3 billion total for National Science Foundation (NSF).
- $2 billion total for Science at the Department of Energy including $400 million for the Advanced Research Projects Agency—Energy (ARPA-E).
- $830 million total for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA).

Investments in Health include:

- $19 billion, including $2 billion in discretionary funds and $17 billion for investments and incentives through Medicare and Medicaid to ensure widespread adoption and use of interoperable health information technology (IT). This provision will grow jobs in the information technology sector, and will jumpstart efforts to increase the use of health IT in doctors’ offices, hospitals and other medical facilities. This will reduce health care costs and improve the quality of health care for all Americans.
- $1 billion for prevention and wellness programs to fight preventable diseases and conditions with evidence-based strategies.
- $10 billion to conduct biomedical research in areas such as cancer, Alzheimer’s, heart disease and stem cells, and to improve NIH facilities.
- $1.1 billion to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, NIH and the HHS Office of the Secretary to evaluate the relative effectiveness of different health care services and treatment options.

Investments in Education and Training include:
- $53.6 billion for the State Fiscal Stabilization Fund, including $39.5 billion to local school districts using existing funding formulas, which can be used for preventing cutbacks, preventing layoffs, school modernization, or other purposes; $5 billion to states as bonus grants for meeting key performance measures in education; and $8.8 billion to states for high priority needs such as public safety and other critical services, which may include education and for modernization, renovation and repairs of public school facilities and institutions of higher education facilities.
- $13 billion for Title 1 to help close the achievement gap and enable disadvantaged students to reach their potential.
- $12.2 billion for Special Education/IDEA to improve educational outcomes for disabled children. This level of funding will increase the Federal share of special education services to its highest level ever.
- $15.6 billion to increase the maximum Pell Grant by $500. This aid will help 7 million students pursue postsecondary education.
- $3.95 billion for job training including State formula grants for adult, dislocated worker, and youth programs (including $1.2 billion to create up to one million summer jobs for youth).

Investments in Energy include:

- $4.5 billion for repair of federal buildings to increase energy efficiency using green technology.
- $3.4 billion for Fossil Energy research and development.
- $11 billion for smart-grid related activities, including work to modernize the electric grid.
- $6.3 billion for Energy Efficiency and Conservation Grants.
- $5 billion for the Weatherization Assistance Program.
- $2.5 billion for energy efficiency and renewable energy research.
- $2 billion in grant funding for the manufacturing of advanced batteries systems and components and vehicle batteries that are produced in the United States.
- $6 billion for new loan guarantees aimed at standard renewable projects such as wind or solar projects and for electricity transmission projects.
- $1 billion for other energy efficiency programs including alternative fuel trucks and buses, transportation charging infrastructure, and smart and energy efficient appliances.

Help for Workers and Families Hardest Hit by the Economic Crisis includes:

- $19.9 billion for additional Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly Food Stamps, to increase the benefit by 13.6 percent.
- Child Care Development Block Grant: $2 billion to provide quality child care services for an additional 300,000 children in low-income families who increasingly are unable to afford the high cost of day care.
- Head Start & Early Head Start: $2.1 billion to allow an additional 124,000 children to participate in this program, which provides development, educational, health, nutritional, social and other activities that prepare children to succeed in school.
- State and Local Law Enforcement: $4 billion total to support law enforcement efforts.
- $555 million to expand the Department of Defense Homeowners Assistance Program (HAP) during the national mortgage crisis.

Unprecedented Oversight, Accountability and Transparency

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan provides unprecedented oversight, accountability, and transparency to ensure that taxpayer dollars are invested effectively, efficiently, and as quickly as possible.

- Funds are distributed whenever possible through existing formulas and programs that have proven track records and accountability measures already in place.
- Numerous provisions in the bill provide for expedited but effective obligation of funds so that dollars are invested in the economy as quickly as possible.
- The Government Accountability Office and the Inspectors General are provided additional funding for auditing and investigating recovery spending.
- A new Recovery Act Accountability and Transparency Board will coordinate and conduct oversight of recovery spending and provide early warning of problems.
- A special website will provide transparency by posting information about recovery spending, including grants, contracts, and all oversight activities.
- State and local whistleblowers who report fraud and abuse are protected.
- There are no earmarks in this bill.

Predators

Very interesting excerpt from James Galbraith’s new book, “The Predator State”, over at Corrente. Does it ring any bells?

In the corporate Republic that presides over the Predator State, nothing is done for the common good. Indeed, the men in charge do not recognize that public purposes exist. For this reason, the concept of competence has no relevance: to be incompetent, you must at least be trying. But the men in charge are not trying; they have friends, and enemies, and as for the rest — we are the prey. Hurricane Katrina illustrated this perfectly….

Predation is the enemy of honest and independent and especially of sustainable business, of businesses that simply want to sell to the public and make a decent living over the long run. In a world where the winners are all connected, it is not only the prey (who by and large carry little political weight) who lose out. It is everyone who has not licked the appropriate boots. Predatory regimes are, more or less exactly, like protection rackets: powerful and feared but neither loved nor respected. They cannot reward everyone, and therefore they do not enjoy a broad political base.*

[T]o tolerate the Predator State is a formula for eventual national economic failure … [Where] the worst polluters, the flagrant monopolists, the technological footdraggers are given control over the system and capital markets reward them, their more progressive counterparts will eventually give up, disappear, or move away. Bad business practices will drive out good. …

And equally, the predators suck the capacity from government and deplete it of the ability to govern. In the short run, again, this looks like incompetence, but this is an illusion. Predators do not mind being thought incompetent; it obscures their actual agenda. Failure [on the scale of Katrina] is not due to incompetence. Rather, it is intended. There is a willful indifference to problems of competence. Inside the government, no one cares. The attention of the people in charge is focused on other goals.

Lies and Damn Lies

Devilstower has a necessary read over at the Great Satan but here are the guts. There is more there. In a nutshell, it is a damn lie that the New Deal didn't work and that it, in fact, made the depression worse. You have read it and heard it everywhere including in the comments on this very blog. Read the whole thing.

Where was the stimulus? Just take a look. From the moment FDR began to enact the programs of the New Deal, the economy began its recovery. After four years of steady declines, Roosevelt's programs brought on an immediate improvement in the national fortune. Within three years, the national GDP exceeded the level in 1929. By the time the bombs fell at Pearl Harbor, the GDP had been up every year but one since 1933, and that one downward tick in 1937 marks the exact point at which budget hawks forced cuts in the New Deal programs.

That's the story the numbers tell. The New Deal worked, worked well, and worked quickly. These days, we define recessions as two consecutive quarters of declining gross domestic product. By that measure, when did the Great Depression end? One quarter after Roosevelt took office, that's when. Yes, it took years to repair the damage of the anything goes marketeers, but the recovery started the moment the New Deal started.

But even clamping their hands over their eyes and refusing to look at the numbers isn't the strangest part of the Republican Myth of FDR Failure. The oddest idea is that "putting the nation on a war footing" was the cure that finally ended the depression when the New Deal couldn't get the job done. It's something that gets repeated every time this tall tale is told, because even Republicans realize that the Great Depression did end. They just have to think of some way to give credit to something other than Democrats.

edited to fix the link

Being Wrong Should Have Consequences

Something seems to be missing from all the debate going on around the stimulus package. That somethings is...If you are a failure at economic policy and the results of your failed policy are evident why should you have a place at the table? Why this simple fact is missing from the debate and the media reporting is a mystery. Is it that they are afraid to say it too loud? Do they not think that is clear that GOP economic policy is inherently suspect?

It's true, and it's a point that bears repeating over and over. When it comes to economic policy, now is the time when the Republican Party needs to be hiding in the john. This is a party that insisted that Bill Clinton's economic policies would be a disaster(whoops!), and then rallied enthusiastically behind George W. Bush's economic agenda with the results we are now having to face. To make matters worse, in recent weeks they have the audacity to question FDR's policies which proved correct and have embraced Hoover's which, again, were a spectacular failure.

Given all of this, why does the Republican Party believe it has any credibility on economic policy? It is a mystery and why aren't more people, especially Democrats shouting it from the rooftops? President Obama has hinted it at but, he too, should be on national TV and radio everyday driving the point home. Repeat and rinse. How can a group of supposedly intelligent people who have gotten everything spectacularly wrong for years still insist that their opinion carry any weight?

Everyone should be repeating the following phrase every hour on the hour.

Those who fail don't get to give lectures about how to succeed.

Update: Go read Steven Pearlstein

What the Chickens have Laid

Krugman is not pleased with the “compromise” wrought by the wimps in the Senate:

I’m still working on the numbers, but I’ve gotten a fair number of requests for comment on the Senate version of the stimulus.

The short answer: to appease the centrists, a plan that was already too small and too focused on ineffective tax cuts has been made significantly smaller, and even more focused on tax cuts.

According to the CBO’s estimates, we’re facing an output shortfall of almost 14% of GDP over the next two years, or around $2 trillion. Others, such as Goldman Sachs, are even more pessimistic. So the original $800 billion plan was too small, especially because a substantial share consisted of tax cuts that probably would have added little to demand. The plan should have been at least 50% larger.

Now the centrists have shaved off $86 billion in spending — much of it among the most effective and most needed parts of the plan. In particular, aid to state governments, which are in desperate straits, is both fast — because it prevents spending cuts rather than having to start up new projects — and effective, because it would in fact be spent; plus state and local governments are cutting back on essentials, so the social value of this spending would be high. But in the name of mighty centrism, $40 billion of that aid has been cut out.

My first cut says that the changes to the Senate bill will ensure that we have at least 600,000 fewer Americans employed over the next two years.

The real question now is whether Obama will be able to come back for more once it’s clear that the plan is way inadequate. My guess is no. This is really, really bad.

Not Looking Out for You

Greg Sargent has the latest on the "so-called" fine tuning Senators Collins(R) and Nelson(D) are doing. These are the folks that are supposed to be figuring out how to optimize the stimulus but it sure seems to me that they are just plain insane. It has been shown over and over again that items such as food stamps return a lot more stimulus for every dollar spent than tax cuts or military spending. Yet what are the cutting out? Idiots! Seems there is always a need to stimulate their buddies in the military industrial business though.

Total Reductions: $80 billion

Eliminations:

Head Start, Education for the Disadvantaged, School improvement, Child Nutrition, Firefighters, Transportation Security Administration, Coast Guard, Prisons, COPS Hiring, Violence Against Women, NASA, NSF, Western Area Power Administration, CDC, Food Stamps

*****************************

Reductions:

Public Transit $3.4 billion, School Construction $60 billion

*****************************

Increases:

Defense operations and procurement, STAG Grants, Brownfields, Additional transportation funding

*****************************

Over the Edge

Paul Krugman has another brilliant article in the NY Times today. Everyone should read it and that goes double for politicians and quadruple for Republican politicians. Every word is the painful truth.

Paul Krugman also gets credit for the quote of the month...

The American economy is on the edge of catastrophe, and much of the Republican Party is trying to push it over that edge.

GOP--No Price is Too High to Prevent a Win By Obama

Krugman in the NYT is a must read:

As the debate over President Obama’s economic stimulus plan gets under way, one thing is certain: many of the plan’s opponents aren’t arguing in good faith. Conservatives really, really don’t want to see a second New Deal, and they certainly don’t want to see government activism vindicated. So they are reaching for any stick they can find with which to beat proposals for increased government spending.

Some of these arguments are obvious cheap shots. John Boehner, the House minority leader, has already made headlines with one such shot: looking at an $825 billion plan to rebuild infrastructure, sustain essential services and more, he derided a minor provision that would expand Medicaid family-planning services — and called it a plan to “spend hundreds of millions of dollars on contraceptives.”

But the obvious cheap shots don’t pose as much danger to the Obama administration’s efforts to get a plan through as arguments and assertions that are equally fraudulent but can seem superficially plausible to those who don’t know their way around economic concepts and numbers. So as a public service, let me try to debunk some of the major antistimulus arguments that have already surfaced.

Krugman does a good job of debunking the arguments. Everybody who is interested in the passage of Obama's stimulus package needs to read this column. Once again the Republicans are demonstrating why they lost the White House and both houses of Congress. They are lying, which appears to be the only pony in their show. They don't care that Obama's efforts to stimulate the economy are based on sound economic principles and are desperately needed if we are to avoid a depression. What they are afraid of is success by Obama and by extension the Democrats. Success in reviving the economy by the Democrats now in power will destin the GOP to the political wilderness for a generation or more. They know it, and preventing an Obama success is more important to them than the survival of the American economy. They don't care if you and I starve, lose our cars, houses and or life savings.

The complete destruction of the American economy is a small price for them to pay in order to stop Obama from winning the battle over the economy.

Surprise! Surprise!

Surprise! Surprise! As Gomer would say. Guess what? Obama's idea of getting any Republican Senators to support his stimulus plan is a pipe dream. The idea that the GOP really cares about what happens to the nation is once again proven to be a joke. Seriously, the GOP only has one goal and that is to see the Obama presidency fail. They do not care that in order to have it fail the nation will have to fail as well. This should be a learning experience for Obama. Never, ever trust the GOP to do the right thing when it comes to the American people:

Obama's stimulus package is on track to pass before the Presidents Day recess in mid-February. But it is increasingly doubtful that he will pick up the 80 Senate votes he had hoped to win in the first major legislative test of his presidency. Instead, the bill is likely to pass on the strength of the Democrats' majority.

Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) said Wednesday that prospects for bipartisanship in the stimulus debate rapidly were eroding.

"The air is coming out of that balloon," Thune said. "To attract Republicans, they lose Democrats. It is a very difficult needle to thread. They are discovering that the goal [of an 80-vote majority] is unrealistic. He got so much push-back from his own people."

House Republican leaders have set up a working group to draft their own stimulus proposal focusing on permanent, across-the-board tax relief. And the Republican Study Committee, a group of about 100 conservative House Republicans, unveiled a bill Wednesday that contains a series of tax cuts, including reducing all personal income tax rates by 5% and cutting the corporate tax rate from 35% to 25%.

Now is the time to tell the GOP to go to hell and take his Congressional majorities and run with them. A huge number of people have worked to get the adults in charge once again and now is the time to make all that hard work pay off. All the experts say that tax cuts won't do the job and the evidence is already there to prove it. The GOP tried it and it has now put us where we are today. Massive government spending on the order of a trillion dollars is what is needed if we are not to slide into a major depression.

Making the Economy Fair

David Cay Johnston has an excellent article over at Mother Jones on getting the economy back on its feet. This is not a pleasant piece to read and if you are like me it might possibly make you mad. Read it anyway. I know some of this stuff but have never really stewed on it that much. I was doing OK, paying my taxes and mortgage and generally living the good life. Things have changed a bit and now this just really sucks. There is a huge opportunity to fix the way things work in this country but we really need to focus if we are to survive. The status quo is way out of whack as this article shows. Let's do something about it.

PEBO Asked and Received

Obama challenged Paul Krugman the other day for some specifics and today Paul gives him some answers. Here are some ideas for beefing up the stimulus discussions that are worth a read. He concludes:

...my advice to the Obama team is to scrap the business tax cuts, and, more important, to deal with the threat of doing too little by doing more. And the way to do more is to stop talking about jump-starts and look more broadly at the possibilities for government investment.

I really want to see something positive come out of all this discussion and it sure looks like there is going to be some positive dialogue. As Krugman says the middle class tax cuts were a campaign promise but they won't do a thing for folks like me and the other 11 million of us that are income challenged at the moment. Not saying I am keen about grabbing a shovel and building roads but I think I could bring value to such things as health care automation and some other technology related infrastructure things. The numbers out there that says we will have 7-8% unemployment going on for three or four more years with the existing plans are not too encouraging to say the least.

Krugman Chips In

Paul Krugman is the second Nobel economist in two days (Stiglitz weighed in yesterday) to say that Obama's stimulus plan isn't big enough to help, by a long shot.

I don't how much more Obama needs in order to rethink the tax cut part of his plan. These kinds of comments have to carry some weight.

What No Rubber Stamp?

This is encouraging. We might actually see some real honest to goodness dialogue on how best get the necessary stimulus going in the economy. This is a really big piece of legislation and if it is done right is going to make the difference in all our futures. If it is done wrong we are all screwed. Passing major legislation should be a negotiation and discussion of competing ideas and not just a rubber stamp as it has been the last 8 years.

President-elect Barack Obama's economic recovery plan ran into crossfire from his own party in Congress on Thursday, suggesting that quick passage of spending programs and tax cuts could require more time and negotiation than Democrats once hoped.

Senate Democrats complained that major components of his plan were not bold enough and urged more focus on creating jobs and rebuilding the nation's energy infrastructure rather than cutting taxes.

[T]he broad support [Obama] has enjoyed so far for the basic concept is now being tested as the specifics become clearer. While conservatives criticize the high spending, and moderate Democrats express concern about the swelling deficit, liberals are pushing for even more money devoted to social programs, alternative-energy development and road, bridge and school construction.

Harkin and Conrad want to see more infrastructure investments. Kerry wants to alter the employment tax credits. Other Democratic senators expressed other competing concerns to transition team officials. This is all constructive and needed discussion. We already know experts like Krugman and Stiglitz are concerned that it is focused too heavily on tax cuts and not nearly big enough. Let's talk it out.

No one is arguing the importance of acting quickly but it's very important for Congress to engage and follow a collaborative process in which an administration and leading lawmakers engage in some back-and-forth. There is some talk on the right and in the media that this is the beginning of the typical Democratic circular firing squad but as far as I can tell this is legitimate discussion and policy debate. It's called "governing." Granted, we have not seen much, if any, of this stange process in the last 8 years but it really is how it is supposed to work.

John Cole at Balloon Juice had some good input on this: "Maybe the Republicans will pull their heads out of their collective asses and decide that in the wake of the DOW dropping 80,000 points and massive unemployment and five quarters of negative growth there is something more important than capital gains tax cuts, Elian Gonzalez, Terri Schiavo, and the fairness doctrine, and join in the debate and act for once in good faith and with the best interests of the country in mind."

Pretty radical idea but one can dream.