Karl Reiner: Ordinary People Buffeted by Extraordinary Events

June 1, 2012

By Karl Reiner The Great Recession was caused by covetous bankers, slapdash regulation, a glut of cheap money and too much enthrallment with home ownership.  Since peaking at 10% in 2009, the unemployment rate has been on a slow decline, unfortunately ticking back up to 8.2% in May.  Chronic underemployment has been the only alternative … Read more

President Bain

June 1, 2012

By Dr. Jim Saunders Inasmuch as I have of late publicly derided Mr. Romney’s campaign, premised as it has been on his superior knowledge of business and economic matters, I am writing here to make equally public my withdrawal of my erroneous jeers.  I have previously stated that in my view Mr. Romney’s experience was … Read more

Fact Checking the mendacity of ‘Mittens’

June 1, 2012

Posted by AzBlueMeanie: Time once again for Steve Benen's weekly fact checking of the pathologival liar, Willard "Mittens" Romney. Chronicling Mitt's Mendacity, Vol. XX: On last night's show, Rachel Maddow talked at some length about a subject I follow with great interest: Mitt Romney's habit of saying things that aren't true. Summarizing some of yesterday's … Read more

Wisconsin Update: The ‘Big Dog’ rallies the troops for Tom Barrett

June 1, 2012

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

The "Big Dog," former president Bill Clinton, was in Milwaukee today to tell hundreds of cheering supporters of Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett that Wisconsin needs "a government with shared responsibilities and shared sacrifice, not 'winner take all.'" WisPolitics Election Blog: Clinton advocates 'shared responsibilities and shared sacrifice':

Clinton said, "People look at Wisconsin and see America's battleground." He said Gov. Scott Walker has created "constant conflict."

Noting that the Pledge of Allegiance mentions the idea of a nation "undivided under God," Clinton declared, "Every day when a child in Wisconsin says the Pledge of Allegiance, it's a rebuke to the far right's winner-take-all, take-no-prisoners, divide-and-conquer, constant-conflict philosophy of government."

"Ordinarily, I'm against recall elections," Clinton said. "But sometimes it's the only way to change a disastrous course."

Barrett, wearing a Milwaukee Brewers jacket, told the crowd gathered at Pere Marquette Park that Clinton "is a fella who knows a lot about the middle class, a fella who knows a lot about balanced budgets, a fella who knows a lot about running a surplus, a fella who knows a lot about leading this nation to the largest economic expansion in our nation's history."

Why do saguaros’ arms reach for the sky? Fitz has the answer.

June 1, 2012

by David Safier Fitz has decided Arizona has its own action star, Rich Carmona. And like Chuck Norris, Carmona deserves his own list of "facts." You may not know about the Chuck Norris Facts website filled with pages of facts, like: When Chuck Norris does push-ups, he isn't lifting himself up. He's pushing the earth … Read more

The coming global recession reflected in May jobs report

June 1, 2012

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

We live in a global economy. And the global economy is biting us in the butt.

As Matthew Yglesias reported this week, Global economic crisis: China, India, Brazil are slowing down, plunging world into possible recession:

America is still recovering from the Great Recession and Europe is melting down, yet from a global perspective, the economy has never been as healthy or prosperous. The world economy enjoyed amazing growth from 2002-08, took a small dip in 2009, and then went back to growing. Sadly the good news seems to be coming to an end in Brazil, China, and India, and that’s horrible news for us.

* * *

China and India are so large that their catch-up growth was able to raise the entire worldwide rate of economic growth. That’s why the world economy kept growing through the 2008-09 financial calamity.

* * *

The slowdown in India, which remains a much poorer country than China, is very alarming.

* * *

The Chinese growth dynamo that rescued the world economy after the financial crisis isn’t going to reappear this time around. That means the stakes as Europe confronts the ongoing meltdown of its banks and America faces the prospect of a new debt ceiling standoff are higher than ever. The bad economic news of 2008-09 came with the major silver lining that growth continued in the places that needed it most. This time around, if the rich countries can’t get our act together, the whole world will spiral into recession.

They are sounding the alarm bells in Europe this week as well. Eurozone is unsustainable, European bank president says:

U.S. and European officials, who just weeks ago seemed to be getting a handle on the eurozone's financial crisis, are now scrambling to prevent a new round of problems from pulling down some of Europe's largest economies.

European Central Bank President Mario Draghi warned in Brussels, Belgium, on Thursday that he considers the eurozone's current structure "unsustainable" and that the region's governments must surrender far more budget and regulatory power to a central authority if the currency union is to be saved.

His comments and an intense week of high-level lobbying by U.S. officials come amid a worldwide swoon on stock markets, a flight by investors to the haven of U.S. and German bonds, and a growing concern that problems in Spain's banking sector may force the eurozone's fourth-largest economy to seek a costly bailout.

Major U.S. stock-market indexes were down 6 percent in May, and the euro is trading near a two-year low against the dollar.

This is the context one needs to understand today's jobs report. But this is an election year, and politicians do not do "context." They do the blame game. They blame their opponent, rather than the flawed economic policies at the heart of the matter because voters just don't get economics, and don't care.