I thought reportage of the recession could no longer surprise me. I was wrong. The cover story in Newsweek, declaring that the recession has ended, THAT surprised me. By now I’m used to Wall Streeters, government types, economists and financial journalists exclaiming that economic reports that show things are getting worse more slowly really show they are getting better; that awful profit reports that...

Let me share my random thoughts…When lust takes center stage, the thinking and rational behaviour flies out of the window. We live in a promiscuous age/world where America provides, apart from huge arms and war material, 80 per cent of pornography world-wide. Now a question: Why is the USA pumping so much money in Afghanistan? It looks more like a case where a love-lorn or lust-stricken person puts at...

Barack Obama’s poll numbers on health care and his approval ratings are moving south just as assuredly as elderly New Yorkers go south to Florida for the winter, NBC News reports: Despite his public-relations blitz over the past two weeks to promote his plans to reform the nation’s health-care system — including holding two town halls on Wednesday — President Barack Obama has lost ground...

We may as well copy this headline and this first short paragraph (and we will) since we will likely have to use it again and again — as the political bar with what constitutes debate in our country goes lower and lower: It DOES. Details here.

Is the public plan option DOA in the ongoing Congressional discussions on President Barack Obama’s stalled healthcare reform plan? Several reports suggest it could well be. The best summary comes from Bill Press, writing on The Hill’s Pundit Blog: Don’t look now, but Democrats are about to abandon their commitment to a public plan option, if they haven’t already done so. In every public appearance,...

We may have recently elected a President who is a young, mixed-race natural-born U.S. citizen, but the political and economic power of this country still rests with a few thousand rich old white guys (ROWGs) born well before 1960. If one looks at the U.S. Senate, less than a dozen of these guys are making most of the decisions on how to run the U.S. – all the while principally representing the wealthiest...

Yesterday, I wrote on Texas Governor Rick Perry’s follies, including his secession nonsense, his refusal to accept federal funds to help the Texas unemployed, his phony anti-Washington rhetoric, and his sheer hypocrisy when it comes to rejecting and then accepting—begging for—federal stimulus funds and federal loans. I also quoted an Austin American-Statesman editorial blasting Perry for similar...

I will come right out and say it. No federal funding for abortion procedures should be stipulated in the healthcare legislation now being deliberated in Congress. It pains me to say that because on principle I am pro-choice. The decision should rest with the doctor and the woman, the father, perhaps the pastor and definitely not the government. I realize this position is contradictory because it penalizes women...

The Austin American-Statesman reports today that U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, who is planning to run against Texas governor Rick Perry next year, is making inroads with previous Perry “loyalists” and “chipping” into Perry’s “rich donor base, taking 21 percent of $6.7 million she raised from December through June from 35 percent of Perry’s historically staunchest...

Proving Daniel Gross’s Newsweek Cover Story true, there’s good news and bad out today… WSJ: New-home sales soared in June from the previous month, the third increase in a row and supplying fresh evidence the housing market is beginning to recover from its long crisis. Sales of single-family homes increased by 11.0% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 384,000 compared to the prior month,...

Vice President Biden takes to the pages of today’s NYT, defending the administration’s stimulus spending. In doing so, he writes: … the [Recovery Act] was intended to provide steady support for our economy over an extended period — not a jolt that would last only a few months. Ed Morrissey, with a little help from others, jumps on this dismissal of “jolt” as a descriptor of the...

The Obama administration recently unveiled a proposal which would make changes to international tax law in the United States tax code. The general thrust of this effort would be to reduce tax avoidance by American companies for overseas investments and resources and reduce the incentive for expatriating profits and jobs. An excellent nine point summary of the plan can be found in this International Business...

Mr President Keep the Change by Michael Reagan In late April of this year, at the three-month mark of his administration, President Obama challenged his cabinet to save $100 million over the following 90 days. Well, not surprisingly those 90 days have come and gone without the spend-happy administration saying anything about meeting the goals of this self-imposed publicity stunt. Now don’t get me wrong, any...

Fred Barnes is on his high horse again, accusing Barack Obama of being the “know-nothing-in-chief” because, in Barnes’s view, Obama knows nothing about “free market” economics.

It’s no secret I am not a fan of conservative radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh. That does not mean I don’t respect the guy for the millions he has earned milking the political juices from his loyal following. Hell, I don’t even own a radio so I obviously don’t listen much. The “listening” comes from snippets of video clips mostly his enemies play on MSNBC-TV. Usually they...

Obama’s Health Care Struggle – Waterloo or Water Down? by Bill Moyers and Michael Winship Push finally came to shove in Washington this week as the battle for health care escalated from scattered sniper fire into all-out combat. If it all seems to be getting more and more confusing, join the club. It’s hard to see what’s happening through all the gun smoke. The Republicans have more...

America has attracted adventurers in droves in the past two centuries. It’s a country that has challenged human limitations of thoughts and actions. At a time when the mainstream media (MSM), by and large, prostrated itself in front of the altar of profit and greed, several alternatives to provide “real” news to the public appeared on the scene. One fascinating example is The Huffington Post...

It pays not to always believe health care providers when they say “no” to paying for services. On Tuesday I lamented my case in which California’s MediCal system because of budget cutbacks no longer paid for my test strips used to monitor my blood glucose which for a diabetic is essential as breathing. Today I struck gold. After 45 minutes plowing through the automated phone tree of Health...

I do not eat kosher but I learned to cook kosher for friends and family when I was younger. I personally enjoy cooking and eating roast pork, barbequed baby-back ribs, pork sausages, pork chops and even bacon or prosciutto. (I’m not going to prepare a luncheon anytime soon for Temple Beth Israel.) About once a week I’ll eat some form of pig meat. I also eat a variety of other meats during the week but...

Single Payer Healthcare Would Be Better by Jim Bell Thinking that we can solve our health care problems with one bill is wishful thinking at best, and is no where near realistic. Initially, the bills in the House and Senate are taking the approach that the Government should enter the health insurance business and offer health coverage that would ultimately make it all but impossible for the health insurance...

John Cole, The Scranton Times-Tribune This cartoon is copyrighted and licensed to run on TMV. All Rights Reserved. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited.

This just in. Wall Street banks which have paid back federal bailout funds are stockpiling billions of dollars to pay employee bonuses that at the present rate would exceed compensation levels before risky trading plunged the industry into a meltdown last year. It’s business as usual, President Barack Obama said mockingly at his Wednesday night press conference. “With respect to compensation, I’d...

Sorry, Rush. Very sorry that your market investments (I am sure you have one or two) have risen in value by about 10 percent if tracked by the DJIA, and by about 30 percent according to the NASDAQ composite, since the day president Obama took the economic disaster over from Mr. Bush Actually, since the market lows in early March 2009, those two indices have risen a whopping 34 percent and 55 percent,...

This week’s solar eclipse grabbed major headlines in Asia and the world (pics here). “Solar eclipses are indeed a marvel of Nature, and the media’s excitement was justified,” says Sri Lankan journalist Nalaka Gunawardene, our Guest Columnist. “For once, it was good to see them devoting a great deal of airtime and print/web space for something that was not violent, depressing or life-threatening. “How...

The Politics of Tenacity by E.J. Dionne, Jr. Washington Post Columnist WASHINGTON — Wow, what big and unexpected news! Reforming the health care system is really hard, and Republicans want President Obama to fail. Imagine that. Oh, yes, and when the public gets a close look at the sausage-making process in Washington, it doesn’t like what it sees. And one more revelation: In a bad economy,...