I've been as upset as most of my other progressive friends about the changes that have been imposed on the health care reform bill in the senate, and over how the most important measures seem to keep getting stripped out in order to please "moderates", insurance & pharmaceutical industry shills, abortion opponents and, of course, Joe "Look-At-Me-I'm-A-Pompous-Little-Man-With-Shit-for-Brains" Lieberman. But, I have to say that once I took a few deep breaths and did some reading, this is actually exactly par for the course when major social legislation is enacted. I find that a historical view is essential to keep things in perspective:

1) The Civil Rights Act of 1957:

- When Lyndon Johnson (as senate majority leader) passed the Civil Rights Act of 1957, he faced all the same shamelessly hypocritical opposition that health care reform faces today, including hysterical claims that civil rights represented a takeover of states rights by the federal government, etc. This was the legislation that Strom "I Love Black Women" Thurmond filibustered for 24 hours straight, setting a record that sill stands. LBJ had to make so many compromises to win the support of southern dixiecrats, including stripping out anti-lynching provisions, that the final bill was almost completely ineffective. In fact, fewer african americans were registered to vote in 1960 than had been registered in 1956. But, the logjam had been broken, and "It did however open the door to later legislation that was effective in securing voting rights as well as ending legal segregation and providing housing rights. In particular, it established both the Commission on Civil Rights and the office of Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights. Subsequently, on December 9, 1957, the Civil Rights Division was established within the Justice Department by order of Attorney General William P. Rogers, giving the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights a distinct division to command." (wikipedia). By passing an imperfect bill, LBJ established the framework for later improvements and expansions that provided true civil rights.


2) Social Security:

- When Franklin Roosevelt passed Social Security, it had to be watered down so severely in order for him to get it passed that at first it didn't even cover african-americans. Republicans screamed that social security was socialism and that it would cause the loss of millions of jobs. In the version that was finally passed, women and minorities were excluded from unemployment insurance and old age pensions. Jobs that employed mostly women and minorities were also excluded, including workers in agricultural labor, domestic service, government employees, and many teachers, nurses, hospital employees, librarians, and social workers. "Nearly two-thirds of all African Americans in the labor force, 70 to 80% in some areas in the South, and just over half of all women employed were not [initially] covered by Social Security" (Wikipedia). But, as Paul Krugman wrote in yesterday's New York Times "Social Security originally had huge gaps in coverage — and a majority of African-Americans, in particular, fell through those gaps. But it was improved over time, and it’s now the bedrock of retirement stability for the vast majority of Americans."


3) The Emancipation Proclamation:

- Finally, when Abraham Lincoln enacted the Emancipation Proclamation, it was also a very circumscribed piece of legislation that disappointed many abolitionists of the day. Josh Marshall discussed this yesterday in Talking Points Memo (www.tpm.com) and is worth quoting at length:

"Like President Obama, President Lincoln was seen by many of his supporters as something of a disappointment once in office. This was largely due to the number and types of compromises he needed to make, most notably with the institution of slavery. In his first inaugural address, Lincoln came out and said that he was not bound and determined to end slavery, that the President does not in any case have the power to unilaterally change the law of the land, and that his first priority was the preservation of the Union, even if the price of that preservation was to accept the continuation of slavery. During the war, when pressed by a group of ministers about why he had not more forcefully worked to end slavery, he reiterated that his overriding priority was to preserve the Union, and added that there were four slave states which had stayed loyal and which were currently contributing 50,000 soldiers to the war effort; these, he pointed out, were states and soldiers which he could not afford to lose in a dispute over slavery.

"When Lincoln finally issed the Emancipation Proclamation, its scope was remarkably circumscribed: it did not call for the emancipation of slaves in loyal states (for this, Lincoln would need the participation of Congress, and in any event, as described above, he did not seek such an act for fear of worsening the Union's position in the war); it did not call for the emancipation of slaves in those areas under military control by the Union; it limited emancipation to those areas which would be brought under military control subsequent to January 1, 1863, which was about 3 months after the Proclamation itself was issued. As one historian noted, this meant the Proclamation carefully excused all of the slaves which the United States actually had any authority over at the time of issuance! As another historian noted, the Proclamation was in essence the offer of a bribe: any state then in rebellion which would lay down its arms and return to the Union would not be compelled to give up its slaves; any state conquered by force of arms after January 1, 1863 would be so compelled.

"Needless to say, the Proclamation was seen by anti-slavery partisans of the time as wholly unacceptable, a compromise too far, and yet more evidence of the unfitness of their elected standard-bearer in the White House. And yet, as Foote points out, Lincoln is today hailed as the preserver of the Union, which he was, but as The Great Emancipator, which he was not. This is because the Proclamation, while useless in a practical sense at the moment of issuance, was the crucial starting point for the abolition of slavery, a project which was completed just a few years later." (http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/2009/12/pt_appeals_to_history.php#more?ref=fpblg)


Final thoughts:

So - my view, and the view of many people who I respect, is that many, if not all, social insurance programs tend to start out highly compromised, imperfect and incomplete. But, one the precedent has been set, and a framework is in place, then the programs can get better and more comprehensive with subsequent revisions and expansions.
- Obama knows this, he takes a long-term view to these issues, which is why he can maintain such calm and equanimity throughout the process.
- The republicans know this, and they know that social programs tend to be quite popular once they are enacted (you don't see many of the older tea-baggers volunteering to give up medicare, do you?), so they are fighting tooth and nail to deny Obama and the democrats a victory.
- The insurance and pharmaceutical companies know this too - even if there is a short term benefit to them, the longer term trend will be to reduce costs and improve coverage, which will ultimately force change to their industries.

By passing the bill, universal coverage will be established as a goal and the process of cost containment will begin. The internet and 24 hour news coverage allow us unprecedented views of the nitty-gritty of the legislative sausage-making process, and it's ugly up close, but if health reform passes, and I pray with every cell in my resolutely atheist heart that it does, Obama will be on track to be the greatest president since FDR.

California's unemployment rate is averaging 12.3%, which some counties reporting 20% and some parts of Kings, Fresno and Imperial counties are experiencing unemployment rates that top 30% (another source quoted 16.5% for Fresno county, not sure if that's seasonally adjusted).

Some highlights:

Riverside and San Bernardino counties: 14.2%
Orange County: 9.4%
Ventura County: 11.2%
San Diego County: 10.3%
Los Angeles County: 12.4%


Statewide Average: 12.3% Google Publicdata from US Labor Statistics

Full story from the LA Times



Ho. Ho. Ho... I think I have a better chance of finding a Red Ryder BB gun under the tree than an economic recovery.

This is the sickest, most evil thing I've heard for quite a while

How Banks Fleece the Unemployed

To avoid penalties, the jobless must find out how much money is on their cards. But here’s another catch: In Nevada, they get one free ATM balance inquiry a month. After that, the price tag is 50 cents a throw. In Michigan, it’s $1 for every one after the first (per week). In Texas, inquiries are free at Chase ATMs, but 50 cents at all others.

So apparently in America you have to pay not only to withdraw your money but also to find out if you have any money in the first place! Next time someone tells you we Western Europeans are Commie Librul Socialists, remind them of little facts like this. Holy crapola! Why do you Yanks put up with this shit? Why aren't you out burning and killing the motherfuckers?

Huey P Newton, your country needs you!

History shows that technological revolutions are followed by not only a lowering unemployment rate, but also an increase in average and often equitable wealth. This is one of the reasons I am something of a Bull about our economy when I was something of a Bear in the past. There are lots of great leaps just around the corner, and here is a story about just one of them.

Matthew Herper On The New Genetic Revolution
12.17.09, 06:00 AM EST
The long-awaited $1,000 genome will finally arrive this year, ushering in a new era of genetic medicine.

Gene deciphering technology will start to move from the research lab to the doctor's office. Major cancer centers like Memorial Sloan Kettering and M.D. Anderson are setting up gene sequencing labs that will analyze DNA from patients' tumors to assess what kind of targeted drugs they need. This type of approach will gradually become common in various types of advanced tumors as studies prove it useful in guiding treatment. Meanwhile, researchers are beginning to use DNA sequencing to help diagnose rare genetic diseases.
http://www.forbes.com/2009/12/08/genomics-personalized-medicine-business-healthcare-sneak-peek-10-genomics.html

Martin Feldstein, former President of the official arbiters of recession start and end dates in the United States, today told Bloomberg that the US is still in recession.

If defining recessions more narrowly as two back-to-back quarterly declines of GDP, Feldstein doesn't have much data on his side. And even using the more encompassing method officially employed by the NBER itself, Dr. Feldstein doesn't have a whole lot to hang that hat on. But he has some. And, it is still possible that these early GDP estimates are revised in a few years to show that it was in fact still actually flatish to negative during the second half of 2009.

Only time will tell.

Bloomberg
Harvard’s Feldstein Says U.S. Economy Still Mired in Recession

Dec. 17 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. economy remains mired in a recession, prospects for next year are weak and home prices may resume declines, Harvard University economics professor Martin Feldstein said.

“The recession isn’t over,” Feldstein said today in an interview on Bloomberg Radio in New York. “It will be a while before we have enough information to know if the recession ended.”

Feldstein is a former president of the National Bureau of Economic Research and remains a member of the group’s Business Cycle Dating Committee, the panel charged with determining when recessions begin and end.

His comments are at odds with those of the panel’s chairman, Robert Hall, who said early this month that the recession may have ended.

Employers in the U.S. cut 11,000 jobs in November, the fewest in 23 months, and the unemployment rate unexpectedly fell to 10 percent from 10.2 percent, a government report showed on Dec. 4.

The report “makes it seem that the trough in employment will be around this month,” Hall said in an interview on the day the figures were released. “The trough in output was probably some time in the summer. The committee will need to balance the midyear date for output against the end-of-year date for employment.”

...Restrained consumer spending suggests “2010 is going to be a very weak year,” said Feldstein, 70, who was chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers during the Reagan administration.

“Thrift in the long run is a very good thing, but increasing thrift as you come out of a recession is going to be a drag,” he said.

Housing Market

Regarding the residential property market, where the recession initially emerged, Feldstein said the Obama administration’s effort to revive the housing market is a failure and home prices will continue to decline.

“It was just not well enough designed,” Feldstein said. “They ended up failing.” That suggests the housing slump will “continue to push down house prices,” he said.

“We saw a little pause in home-price declines in the summer but I think that was because of the first-time home buyers program,” Feldstein said. “We’re not going to get that boost...

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aj0La0i2g5_s&pos=3
Evidently the Fed says that the economy is continuing to grow.

But I noted this bit: “The nastiness of the storm has dissipated,” said Paul Ballew, a former Fed economist who’s now a senior vice president at Nationwide Mutual Insurance Co. in Columbus, Ohio. “Concern about the financial market has passed, but they’re looking at weak labor markets and sluggishness in the real economy.

And then I wondered "Growing for who?". If the labor market remains weak, then for the vast majority things remain shitty and we're still in double-digit unemployment and rewarding capitalists for their own incompetence. And in that case, it's arguably not a recovery unless for the average person there is improvement as much as for the coffers of the fat cats. And, too, another question that occurs to me is that since real wages have been stagnant for 30 years is it possible that we've had a bad economy for a lot longer than we accepted and it's just finally all ground to a screeching halt after being in trouble for a good long time?

Huffington Post
McCain, Cantwell Battle The Monolith To Reinstate Glass-Steagall

Yesterday, the decidedly odd couple of Senators John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.) teamed up to introduce legislation that would restore the Glass-Steagall Act (aka the Banking Act of 1933), which would force giant banking institutions to choose between operating as a commercial bank or an investment bank. For decades, Glass-Steagall imposed a firewall between the two, until it was repealed in 1999 by the Gramm-Leach-Bliley act.

Give McCain and Cantwell a big round of applause for their effort, because in Washington, this seemingly obvious response to the financial crisis is considered the domain of wild-eyed hippies (and Paul Volcker.) It is, after all, the sort of idea that would bring real pain to the banking industry, who'd much rather we quickly forget about the collapse of the economy last year and return to business as usual. The most cutting remark against McCain and Cantwell's efforts comes courtesy of Unnamed Treasury Official, who, as you might imagine, is some kind of awesome prick:

I think going back to Glass-Steagall would be like going back to the Walkman.

But hey, you'd go back to your Walkman too, if everytime you put your iPod on shuffle, it blew up the goddamned planet...

It is being widely reported today that Ireland pulled out of recession in the third quarter, with Irish GDP rising by a greater than expected 0.3% QoQ.

Since being the first more major EU country falling into recession, Ireland has fallen into what most economists could agree is a capital "D" Depression, along with other advanced nations like Spain and Iceland.

That Ireland's GDP was a bit stronger than anticipated in the third quarter may further raise some concerns about the EU's overall performance in the final three months of the year, as it is very possible that Ireland's third quarter "performance" helped overstate the "strength" of the EU "recovery," and extract some payback in Q4.

Related Article (Bolding added for emphasis of key points I made above)

The Irish Times
Ireland technically out of recession
CHARLIE TAYLOR Thursday, December 17, 2009, 13:45

GDP grew slightly during the third quarter but the Central Statistics Office (CSO) has urged caution on calling an end to recession.

The latest Quarterly National Accounts, which were published this morning, indicate that on a seasonally adjusted basis there was a 0.3 per cent increase in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) from July through to September.

On an annual basis, GDP fell by 7.4 per cent in the year to the end of October, compared to a 7.9 per cent decline in the preceding quarter.

Technically, given that the definition of recession is two quarters in a row of falling GDP, this means that Ireland has now exited recession.

However, at a press conference earlier today, assistant director general of the CSO Bill Keating refused to call an end to the recession, pointing out that much of the rise in GDP was attributed to profits from multinationals based in Ireland.

Whether Ireland was out of recession or not was " a matter of semantics", Mr Keating said.

"The general picture shows that on a seasonally adjusted basis there is a levelling off in GDP but GNP continues to decline, albeit at a slower pace than it has in previous quarters. Contributing to the GDP increase in a fairly major way was growth in the multinational sector," he added.

Analysts also warned against declaring the end of what has been one of the worse recessions ever experienced in Ireland.

GDP is the international method of calculating economic decline but in Ireland's case, the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) and other local bodies prefer to focus on GNP (Gross National Product) a measure which strips out multinational profits, much of which usually leave the country.

According to CSO, profits declared here by foreign-owned enterprises increased by €1,054 million during the year ending October 31st 2009.

During the third quarter Gross National Product (GNP) showed a decline of 1.4 per cent on a seasonally adjusted basis. In the year to the end of October 2009, GNP was 11.3 per cent lower.

Thomas Net News

Industrial Production Rose More than Expected in November

Industrial production rose 0.8 percent last month, the strongest gain since August, according to the Federal Reserve this week. Still, industrial output has fallen 5.1 percent over the past year.

Since a small percentage point drop in June, the nation's mines, factories and utilities have made small but steady gains, except for a flat October. In the third quarter of the year, United States industrial output posted the first quarterly gain since early 2008 and the largest single-quarter gain since Q1 2005, improving hopes that the current production upswing may be a permanent one.

Industrial output continues its positive trajectory, as growth in U.S. industrial production last month posted its strongest gain since August, according to the Federal Reserve on Tuesday.

Overall, industrial production rose a better-than-expected 0.8 percent in November, the fifth consecutive month without a negative change, according to the Fed's report on industrial production and capacity utilization yesterday.   

                             U.S. Industrial Production Index 1933-2009

While US Industrial Production only stalled in October and then rebounded, EU's October Industrial Production numbers may be reason for concern if no bounce came in November:

Wall Street Journal
Euro-Zone Industrial Output Declines

LONDON -- Euro-zone industrial production fell in October from September, the first such drop since March, highlighting the fragility of the economic recovery and suggesting a tough final quarter for the sector, data showed Monday.

According to Eurostat, the European Union's statistics agency, industrial production in the 16 countries that use the euro declined 0.6% in October from September and was down 11.1% from the year-earlier month. The annual fall was the 18th straight year-to-year decline.

The monthly fall may undermine expectations for the euro zone's gross domestic product to grow for a second consecutive quarter in the current quarter, particularly after a 2.1% decline in German manufacturing orders for October. Manufacturing orders are a good forward-looking indicator of output and suggest that the expected economic pickup in the fourth quarter could depend more heavily on increased consumer spending in the holiday period. Euro-zone GDP grew 0.4% in the third quarter from the second.

The report "is a reminder that the euro zone still faces a difficult economic environment and a tough job to develop a healthy, sustainable recovery," said Howard Archer, an economist at IHS Global Insight, a consulting firm...

~William Lind and Noam Chomsky are pretty much at the polar opposite of each other on the so called Left/Right political spectrum. But here are recent quotes from each of them.

This is Lind from his column ON WAR #326: Finis:

"..[T]he U.S. military is largely an intellectual void...“Not invented here” is part of the problem, but the larger part is that our major headquarters think little if at all about war. What they think about is money...most “big ticket” weapons programs are irrelevant to where war is going. That is not what the brass, or the defense companies they plan to work for after retirement, want to hear.

What might change that picture? Nothing will change in DOD until the money simply isn’t there anymore. The news, which is simultaneously good and bad, is that the money soon won’t be there. Like every previous imperial power, we are bankrupting ourselves. A trillion dollars here and a trillion dollars there, and soon it adds up to real money. The twin financing mechanisms of piling up debt and debasing the currency can only go on so long. We can already see the night at the end of the tunnel."

And here's Chomsky in an interview with Z Net:

"The U.S. is different from Europe and other industrial countries in this respect. The U.S. is, to a very unusual extent, a business-run society. There are all kinds of reasons for that—it has no feudal background, so institutions that remained in place in Europe did not remain in place here. There are a lot of reasons. But the fact of the matter is that the U.S. is run by an unusually class-conscious, dedicated business class that has a very violent labor history, much worse than in Europe. The attack on unions has been far more extreme here, and it has been much more successful. Also, the business propaganda has been far more successful. Anti-union propaganda has been considerably more successful here than in Europe, even among working people who would benefit [from] unions. In fact, a rather striking aspect of business propaganda in the United States is the demonization of government, starting after the Second World War.

The Second World War ended with a radicalization of the population in the United States and everywhere else, and called for all kinds of things like popular takeovers, government intervention, and worker takeovers of factories. Business propagated a tremendous propaganda offensive. The scale surprised me when I read the scholarship—it's enormous, and it's been very effective. There were two major targets: one is unions, the other is democracy. Well, [to them] democracy means getting people to regard government as an alien force that's robbing them and oppressing them, not as their government. In a democracy it would be your government. For example, in a democracy the day when you pay your taxes, April 15, would be a day of celebration, because you're getting together to provide resources for the programs you decided on. In the United States, it's a day of mourning because this alien force—the government—is coming to rob you of your hard-earned money. That's the general attitude, and it's a tremendous victory for the opponents of democracy, and, of course, any privileged sector is going to hate democracy. You can see it in the healthcare debate."

While the focus is different, and I suspect each man would hate the other [if they don't already], you can see there is in fact a unity of thought; Capitalism is destroying us.

In receiving the Nobel Prize in 1970, Mr. Samuelson was credited with transforming his discipline from one that ruminates about economic issues to one that solves problems, answering questions about cause and effect with mathematical rigor and clarity.

When economists “sit down with a piece of paper to calculate or analyze something, you would have to say that no one was more important in providing the tools they use and the ideas that they employ than Paul Samuelson,” said Robert M. Solow, a fellow Nobel laureate and colleague of Mr. Samuelson’s at M.I.T.

"What Mendel was the Darwin, Samuelson was the Keynesian revolution."



Full obituary here...
http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/obituaries/articles/2009/12/14/nobel_laureate_paul_samuelson_eminent_economist_dead_at_94/

From America Blog
Monday, December 14, 2009
by John Aravosis

Some views from Twitter on the historic cave tonight by Senator Reid and the White House to Joe Lieberman, gutting the health care bill by killing the Medicare buy-in (after they killed the public option, and replaced it with the Medicare buy in):

@markos Insurance companies win. Time to kill this monstrosity coming out of the Senate.

@HunterDK: Breaking: Senate agrees to drop healthcare reform from #HCR bill. Will be replaced with picture of Calvin peeing on you.

@johngcole: But hey- they got to posture for the Stupak amendment, so it isn't a total loss. Idiots.

@pourmecoffee Final health care reform now looking like mailer with healthy recipes from FLOTUS vegetable garden.

@stephanietaylor Sherrod Brown, asked what the bill DOES do: "30 million more people will be covered now." BECAUSE U R FORCING US TO BUY SHITTY INSURANCE.

@GregMitch In Japan, Harry Reid would have to, literally, fall on his sword.

@aravosis When it still feels like Bush is in the WH and Gingrich the Congress, I don't call that 'change'

@markos Bye bye, Reid. You weren't a bad MINORITY leader.

@HunterDK: Private mandate still in. Apparently Senate only feels they can regulate individual citizens already struggling to get by.

@Atrios: 2010 gonna be grim

@HunterDKT Well, I'm out. There's more to be gained from purging corporate whores in Dem party than having 60 votes... or even 55.

@SamSeder In the words of Mr. Rotten, "Ever get the feeling you've been cheated?" F U Joe Lieberman and the caucus you rode in on.

@markos They're still trying to stick us with the mandate, right? Another government bailout of a broken industry.

@HunterDK Somehow I don't see "Let Them Eat Cake" being a winning campaign slogan for senate Dems in 2010, but what do I know.

@pourmecoffee Children of Aetna management not allowed to go to sleep tonight before writing thank-you note to Lieberman.

~Our Rep is the GOP Deputy Whip, so I don't have to say a word to him...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8411898.stm
Just what in the name of all the Nine Circles of Hell did the rich countries expect? The poor countries are not going to stay poor and get poorer just to make things easier on the rich countries. This kind of detachment from basic understanding of human motivations, namely expecting poor non-whites to stay that way is why environmentalists as a whole fail. The Great Powers at Copenhagen have pretty much admitted that much of the effort to prevent Climate Change ties into the global status quo and maintaining the superiority of the rich white countries over the other countries. Frankly, I agree with the developing countries here. And I am also skeptical that many of the affluent white people pushing the new climate regulations understand how bloody expensive the whole reality will be.&

Just what in the name of all the Nine Circles of Hell did the rich countries expect? The poor countries are not going to stay poor and get poorer just to make things easier on the rich countries. This kind of detachment from basic understanding of human motivations, namely expecting poor non-whites to stay that way is why environmentalists as a whole fail. The Great Powers at Copenhagen have pretty much admitted that much of the effort to prevent Climate Change ties into the global status quo and maintaining the superiority of the rich white countries over the other countries.

Frankly, I agree with the developing countries here. And I am also skeptical that many of the affluent white people pushing the new climate regulations understand how bloody expensive the whole reality will be.

In case you haven’t noticed, the U.S. economy today is actually being hit by two tsunamis at once: The Great Recession and the Great Inflection.
The Great Inflection is the mass diffusion of low-cost, high-powered innovation technologies — from hand-held computers to Web sites that offer any imaginable service — plus cheap connectivity. They are transforming how business is done. The Great Recession you know.

The “good news” is that the Great Recession is forcing companies to take advantage of the Great Inflection faster than ever, making them more innovative. The bad news is that credit markets and bank lending are still constricted, so many companies can’t fully exploit their productivity gains and spin off the new jobs we desperately need.

More:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/13/opinion/13friedman.html

London to 'lose out' to Shanghai

London could be pushed into third place as a global financial centre by Shanghai in the next decade, according to a report.

The survey, carried out by law firm Eversheds, suggests business leaders think the West is facing accelerated competition from the East.

More than 90% of bosses in Shanghai and Mumbai are confident in their economic outlook for 2010.

This compares with 22% of business leaders in London and 35% in New York

Cleaners 'worth more to society' than bankers - study

Hospital cleaners are worth more to society than bankers, a study suggests.

The research, carried out by think tank the New Economics Foundation, says hospital cleaners create £10 of value for every £1 they are paid.

It claims bankers are a drain on the country because of the damage they caused to the global economy.

They reportedly destroy £7 of value for every £1 they earn. Meanwhile, senior advertising executives are said to "create stress".

The study says they are responsible for campaigns which create dissatisfaction and misery, and encourage over-consumption.

From Robert Reich's Blog
Thursday, December 10, 2009

( The public option is dead... )