Andrew Sullivan briefly lays out his ideal balance for deficit reduction: I think the ideal balance is roughly $2 of spending cuts for $1 of tax hikes. Most of the tax hike is going to come from people like me; and I don’t like it, and do think it adds a disincentive to work harder. […]
Jamelle Bouie
Jamelle Bouie is a staff writer at The American Prospect.
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Scenes From the Recovery.
Pontiac, Michigan is recovering: City officials signed a memorandum of understanding Tuesday to disband the Police Department and turn patrols in Pontiac over to the Oakland County Sheriff’s Office as soon as December. Faced with mounting red ink, the cash-strapped city of 66,000 residents has chipped away at its Police Department in recent years with […]
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Obama and Gun Control.
In the imaginations and fever dreams of right-wing Republicans, President Obama is a signature away from confiscating the nation’s guns, and delivering them to his personal Sharia-law task force. But as Ryan Reilly reports for Talking Points Memo, the truth is that Obama has done very little to advance anything approaching gun control, and in […]
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The National Disaster That Is Black Teenage Unemployment.
Mark this as the one time you’ll find me agreeing with Doug Schoen: There is a huge national crisis that America is currently facing that has gotten very little recognition or attention. That crisis is black teenage unemployment. Put simply, we are facing something approaching a national emergency that goes well beyond the current unemployment […]
Posted inEducation in America
When Affirmative Action Was White.
Over the weekend, Adam Serwer did a Bloggingheads with Amy Wax, author of Race, Wrongs, and Remedies and professor of law at the University of Pennsylvania. At the core of her book is a challenge to liberals who believe that government action is necessary to alleviate economic disparities between whites and African Americans. By her […]
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Mark Halperin Still Doesn’t Know What He’s Talking About.
For someone who only writes about politics, Mark Halperin knows stunningly little about the forces that drive any given election. For example, watch as he tries to explain President Obama‘s political woes without mentioning the economy, unemployment, or historical patterns: With the exception of core Obama Administration loyalists, most politically engaged elites have reached the […]
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Republicans Don’t Need Black Votes.
Eugene Robinson wishes there were more competition for African American votes: I’m firmly convinced that the progressive agenda championed by the Democrats is much better for African Americans, and for the nation as a whole, than the conservative agenda favored by Republicans. But I also believe that in politics, as in business, competition is good. […]
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The Myth of the Self-Funded Candidate
A willingness to spend money isn’t enough to seal the deal for would-be officeholders.
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Bloomberg Says “No” to Soda for Poor People.
Michael Bloomberg wants to keep poor New Yorkers from buying soda: Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg sought federal permission on Wednesday to bar New York City’s 1.7 million recipients of food stamps from using them to buy soda or other sugared drinks. […] The mayor requested a ban for two years to study whether it would […]
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The Same Base You’ve Always Known.
Ben Smith sees a Tea Party that isn’t too interested in fighting the culture war: The rise of a new conservative grass roots fueled by a secular revulsion at government spending is stirring fears among leaders of the old conservative grass roots, the evangelical Christian right. A reeling economy and the massive bank bailout and […]
