Lobenthal.com

In the Guardian, Marc Weisbrot comes out for Krugman, extolling his demonstrated ability to inject facts and sanity into the debt/deficit madness and deceipt.

Weisbrot writes: “The whole debate over economic policy in this country is taking place as though it exists in a fictional, upside-down world. With the federal government paying less than 1% of GDP in net interest on the debt, the lowest in more than 60 years, the loudest voices – backed by the biggest money – are daily trying to convince people and policy-makers that deficit reduction is our most important priority. This, despite the fact that most of them know that this will slow the economy and make it more difficult for the 22 million people who need work to find it.”

Hermione Hoby in London’s Observer writes about young people attempting to inject some badly needed oxygen into the New York publishing world.

I second Robert Naiman’s nomination at Commondreams.org.

So Chuck Schumer says the Dems won’t negotiate on the debt ceiling.  Sahil Kapur at Talkingpointsmemo.com has the details.  And I must say, Schumer does a good job of saying it.  But part of me is asking, “Exactly WHEN  next month does Obama start negotiating on the debt ceiling?”  But another part of me wants to believe.  And Schumer did say that the willingness of the Dems, read Pres. Obama, to negotiate on the debt ceiling in the summer of 2011 was a “mistake.” I’ll say.

In light of Obama’s disturbing and even a little wacko remarks after his latest revenue  fold, in which he manically assured us that he’s always willing to go even further down the compromise road, and that dancing to the bankers’ tune in a wounded economy—what have Geithner and his advisors been feeding him?—is his priority, reality has yet again reared its sobering head.  Vide the International Monetary Fund’s report: “Growth Forecast Errors and  Fiscal Multipliers.”  The Wall Street Journal links to it.

Once again, as with good old George W, we seem to have a president living, cogitating, and negotiating in a self-referential, part-fantasy realm.

The sale of Al Gore’s Current TV’s to Al-Jazeera.

Great statement, in any case, by Current CEO Joel Hyatt

“When considering the several suitors who were interested in acquiring Current, it became clear to us that Al Jazeera was founded with the same goals we had for Current: To give voice to those whose voices are not typically heard; to speak truth to power; to provide independent and diverse points of view; and to tell the important stories that no one else is telling. Al Jazeera, like Current, believes that facts and truth lead to a better understanding of the world around us.”

Norman Solomon at CommonDreams.org:

“President Obama is no longer the alternative to prevent a GOP takeover of the presidency. He goes into his last term as the leader exerting immense leverage that continues to move the Democratic Party—and the frame of political debate—in a rightward and corporate direction.”

Robert Borsage from the Campaign for America’s Future tells you why.

about how to use leverage in a negotiation,’ said Adam Green, a co-founder of the Progressive Change Campaign Committee, a liberal advocacy organization. ‘Republicans publicly admitted they lost the tax debate and would be forced to cave, yet the president just kept giving stuff away.’”

OK I finished the chapter.  Now re-reading the Times’s Peter Baker’s “View from the Left.”

That the next four years may be a question of progressives needing to mobilize to oppose Obama’s caving and collusion as much as it confronts the Republicans’ nihilist belief in demolishing what had made this country viable.