Robert Reich: 'The Economic Challenge Ahead: More Jobs & Growth, Not Deficit Reduction'

Source:Robert Reich is a left-wing political activist & writer, with a law degree.

"Can we just keep things in perspective? On Tuesday, the President asked Republicans to join him in finding more spending cuts and revenues before the next fiscal cliff whacks the economy at the end of the month.

Yet that same day, the Congressional Budget Office projected that the federal budget deficit will drop to 5.3 percent of the nation’s total output by the end of this year. 

This is roughly half what the deficit was relative to the size of the economy in 2009. It’s about the same share of the economy as it was when Bill Clinton became president in 1992. The deficit wasn’t a problem then, and it’s not an immediate problem now. 

Yes, the deficit becomes larger later in the decade. But that’s mainly due to the last-ditch fiscal cliff deal in December. 

By extending the Bush tax cuts for all but the top 2 percent of Americans and repealing the alternative minimum tax, that deal increased budget deficits by about $3 trillion above what the budget office projected last August. 

The real deficit problem comes after that – when rising healthcare costs combined with 76 million decaying boomers will cost us all a fortune. 

"The answer is to move from fee-for-service health care to pay-for-healthy-outcomes, including lots of preventive care. This will almost certainly require a single payer instead of our balkanized healthcare system drowning in paperwork as each part of it bills and tries to collect from every other part. 

Right now the central challenge is to reignite the economy – getting jobs back, improving wages, and restoring growth. 

Deficit reduction moves us in the opposite direction. That’s because most consumers (whose spending is 70 percent of economic activity) are still losing ground, and businesses won’t expand and hire without more consumers. 

So government has to be the spender of last resort. 

Under these circumstances, increasing taxes on the middle class (as, for example, Republican legislators and governors are eagerly doing by raising sales taxes, and as the federal government did last month by raising Social Security taxes) makes it even harder for consumers to spend. Which means slower growth and fewer jobs. 

Likewise, cuts in government spending, such as occurred in the fourth quarter of 2012, cause the economy to contract – as it did in the fourth quarter. 

In other words, we’re still having the wrong discussion. It shouldn’t be how to cut the budget deficit. It should be how to bring back good jobs and economic growth. 

Deficit hawks and government-haters are still framing the debate. That bodes ill for all of us." 

From Robert Reich

Mike Gardner: Ronald W. Reagan vs Robert F. Kennedy- The Vietnam War (1967)

Source:Mike Gardner- U.S. Senator Robert F. Kennedy (Democrat, New York) in the United Kingdom in 1967.

Source:The Daily Journal

“The two debate against an angry English student in an early international town hall debate.”

From Mike Gardner 

Governor Ronald W. Reagan (Republican, California) and Senator Robert F. Kennedy (Democrat, New York) appearing on an international townhall between America and Britain, in 1967 over the Vietnam War. This photo is probably from BBC News, but the video from which the photo is from is not currently available online right now. 

Source:BBC News- Governor Ronald W. Reagan & Senator Robert F. Kennedy in 1967.

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Governor Reagan and Senator Kennedy were not just considered as potential presidential candidates against President Lyndon Johnson in 1968, but both were considered strong presidential candidates, that would both have their own political bases and the ability to raise a lot of money to run strong, national presidential campaigns in 1968. 

Salon Magazine: Natasha Lennard: 'Bureau of Prisons Agrees to Solitary Confinement Review'

Source:Salon Magazine with a look at solitary confinement in prison.

"Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., announced Monday that the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) has agreed to a full review of the use of solitary confinement in U.S. prisons. An independent auditor will carry out the review on the recommendations of a congressional hearing held last year by a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee chaired by Durbin.

“The United States holds more prisoners in solitary confinement than any other democratic nation in the world, and the dramatic expansion of solitary confinement is a human rights issue we can’t ignore,” noted Durbin. As Reuters noted, prisoners in isolation often are confined to small cells without windows for up to 23 hours a day. "[M]ore than half of all suicides committed in prisons occur in solitary confinement," noted Reuters, adding that in Durbin’s state of Illinois, 56 percent of inmates have spent some time in segregated housing.

Solitary Watch, an online project aiming to highlight the widespread use of solitary confinement in U.S. prisons, noted that in 2010, a spokesperson for the BOP said that federal prisons held approximately 11,150 prisoners in some form of segregated “special housing.” "This figure includes the 400 men held in ultra-isolation at the U.S. Penitentiary Administrative Maximum (ADX) in Florence, Colo., which is currently the target of federal lawsuits claiming conditions there lead to mental illness and suicide, and violate the Constitution," Solitary Watch noted Tuesday.

Civil liberties and human rights groups welcomed the news of the review, hoping that it would lead to a significant curtailing of the isolating of prisoners. "We hope and expect that the review announced today will lead the Bureau to significantly curtail its use of this draconian, inhumane and expensive practice,” David Fathi, director of the ACLU’s National Prison Project, said in a statement." 

From Salon Magazine

Austin Millbarge: ‘A Grace Kelly Tribute (2007)’

Source:Austin Milbarge- The Amazing Grace Kelly appearing in High Society, from 1956. High Society would've been an appropriate nickname for Grace as well.

Source:The Daily Journal

“No copyrights infringement intended.

My tribute to Grace Patricia Kelly, one of the most beautiful woman of all time, and great actress.

song: Yanni – Face in the photograph

enjoy:-)” 

From Austin Milbarge

Grace Kelly was one of those special women who had the best of all worlds at least physically. One of the most gorgeous, as well as adorable woman whose ever lived to go along with a nice body. And the only problem is that she died way too soon at fifty-three.

The American Princess I believe is the best and most accurate nickname that you can give Amazing Grace, because that is what she was, even if informally. Because that is how she presented herself and how she carried herself.

Amazing Grace was a gorgeous, baby-face woman, with an incredible voice and personality, as well as intelligence and humor to go with those other qualities. And feeling for other people, that she wasn’t the only important person on the planet. And that all people mattered and were important also.

CBS News: RFK Assassination (1968)

Source:CBS News anchor Walter Cronkite.

Source:The Daily Journal

“CBS News Live Coverage of the Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, as it happened.” 

From Joseph Hewes

“Raw footage shot at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles shortly after midnight (Pacific time) on June 5, 1968 – the night that Robert F. Kennedy was shot.

The shooting happens (off-camera) a few seconds after 19:40. At that moment, you can hear loud screams and see the ballroom erupt in chaos.” 

Source:CBS News- U.S. Senator Robert F. Kennedy (Democrat, New York) after just winning the 1968 California Democratic primary for President.

From CBS News

“Robert F. Kennedy, in full Robert Francis Kennedy, (born November 20, 1925, Brookline, Massachusetts, U.S.—died June 6, 1968, Los Angeles, California), U.S. attorney general and adviser during the administration of his brother Pres. John F. Kennedy (1961–63) and later a U.S. senator (1965–68). He was assassinated while campaigning for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination in 1968.”

Source:Britannica- I believe when he was still U.S. Attorney General in 1964.

From Britannica

I don’t want to sound like I’m making light of this tragic event here, because I’m not, but I believe the RFK Assassination represents what life is like when the climb the hill and then slip and fall all the way back down to the valley, immediately after reaching the mountaintop.

California alone wasn’t going to give Senator Kennedy the Democratic nomination. It really just kept his campaign going and kept him in the race as a strong contender for the nomination. But it also sent a signal to the media and to Democrats that RFK was a real force and could not only win the Democratic nomination, but perhaps give him the momentum that he needs to now win the nomination.

So Bobby Kennedy goes from the highest point of his own political career, to losing his life to at the time an unknown assassin in Sirhan Sirhan and for unknown reasons. We still don’t know 45 years later why Sirhan assassinated Kennedy. We just know that he did.

The Daily Beast: This Week In Punditry- February 3rd, 2013

Source:The Daily Beast- Hardball With Chris Matthews. According to Chris Matthews.

Source:The Daily Journal

"Rush Limbaugh was his typical incendiary self, Chris Matthews got heated about Hillary, and Bill O'Reilly pushed Colin Powell's buttons about race. See those clips and more in our roundup of the week's most controversial news talk show moments." 

From The Daily Beast

I’m not sure there are three better examples of what’s wrong with so-called cable news (which is really just partisan talk TV) then Sean Hannity, Chris Matthews, and Bill O’Reilly. You want to know why the mainstream media is about as unpopular as the U.S. Congress or your average trial lawyer or insurance salesman, or used car salesman, listen to any of these three guys.

Source:The Daily Beast- Sean Hannity, Chris Matthews, and Bill O'Reilly: The Three Stooges of American politics?

This week in punditry. Let's see, where should I start? Well, we just had a week with plenty of punditry in it, oh you want more than that, not sure why, but here it is if you want it, you’ve been warned. 

Well, we had a Secretary of State step down, because she has better things to do than manage our foreign policy. I know right, what’s more important than that. Well she has another book to write and needs to decide if she wants to be President of the United States, or not. Wait, that’s more important, but of course it's her decision. And I wish Secretary Hillary Clinton well with her new Gabby Giffords look in how she where’s her glasses. And I congratulate her with her service to the country the last four years by leaving Congress and not running for President and taking on President Obama. And the Democratic Party thanks her for that as well. 

Let's see what else happened, oh yeah we had a Secretary of Defense confirmation hearing, as if it’s not interesting enough that we would have a Progressive Democrat nominate a Conservative Republican for Secretary of Defense. But the fact that Chuck Hagel forgot to put caffeine in his morning coffee, or forgot to go to bed the night before and forgot to bring his memory, because not all of Chuck Hagel was at that hearing.

Did I also mention that Fox News claimed to be a serious news organization. No, seriously, I know when have they ever reported any news at all and that Fox News still remains the most trusted name in news. Well for the Republican Party anyway, but don’t take that very seriously. Because they also believe that it’s still 1955 and that President Ronald Reagan never raised any taxes. And that homosexuality was invented ten years ago and that Barack Obama is an African Muslim Socialist from Kenya. So take all of that for what it's worth, borrow a dollar if you have too. Or use that money to actually buy something of value. 

Fox News is as much of a news organization as Pat Robertson is a supporter of gay rights in America. And to be fair MSNBC is not much of a news organization either, but two cable networks that serve as mouthpieces for the two major political party’s in America.

What else happened this week? Oh yes, Rush Limbaugh who apparently still hasn’t died from a heart attack yet, declared that since the mainstream media won’t cover the real news in America, ( you know, anything negative towards Barack Obama and other Democrats) that if the mainstream media doesn’t do a job on Democrats, that Rush and his allies will. Perhaps force Democrats to listen to Rush's radio show 24 hours a day and smoke his cigars till they get heart attacks.

Rush Limbaugh is about as much of a reporter as Ron Paul is a Socialist, it’s simply not believable. But the good thing for Rush is that as much as he may hate it, as well as the rest of the country may hate having Rush living in America, he lives in a liberal democracy with freedom of speech and beliefs. 

That's the way it is as Walter Cronkite the famous CBS News anchor always said to close the Evening News. A big week for a lot of people and more evidence of why we need to fully fund mental health care in America. And have a better public education system with all of the nutty and ignorant people we have on both sides of the aisle. 

Caterina Balivo: In Skinny Denim Jeans in Boots

Source:Bruce FF- Caterina Balivo & guest.

Source:The Daily Journal

"From Festa Italiana 2009/11/25, The Delightful Caterina in leather over the knee boots."

From Bruce FF

Considering I have no idea who the hell Caterina Balivo is, other than she is a beautiful sexy Italian woman from Italy, ( not Italian-American at least born in America ) she is obviously a very attractive woman appearing here I guess on Italian TV. Not as curvy as say as the traditional Italian women American or otherwise.

Sophia Loren comes to mind, perhaps the goddess of goddess’ and perhaps the best looking woman of all-time at least in her prime. But Caterina is still a very attractive woman obviously and definitely worth checking out in her skinny denims in boots. Very popular in Europe and perhaps especially in Italy where the dress code for women is a bit more liberal than it is in America. And you even see newscasters sporting the jeans in boots look there. Claudia Kleinert in Germany is a perfect example of that.