Food for Thought And lot’s of it, from Matt Stoller over at the ClarkSphere. It starts as a jeremiad, as Matt recounts his interactions with political consultants and the experiences that took him from Kerry to Dean and then to Clark, but he ends upbeat and very pro-Clark. Also noteworthy are the numerous positive things […]

Another Treasury Gaffe The record of ineptitude by Bush’s Treasury secretaries continues. Yesterday, Snow said that he’d be “frustrated and concerned” if interest rates didn’t rise next year. For a short list of reasons why it’s really, really bad for Treasury secretaries to make statements about future interest rates, visit Brad DeLong’s blog. So today […]

Gen. Boykin I came across this article, titled “FIRST-PERSON: Stabbed in the back.” It’s from something called BP News, which appears to be news for Baptists, and it’s a defense of Gen. “My God is bigger than yours, idolator” Boykin. Here’s the thrust: Gen. MacArthur and Gen. Patton and multiple others called on God, prayed […]

Addendum on the Deficit As AB mentions below, the final tally of 2003’s budget deficit was $374 billion. Yes, that’s a lot, and yes, it’s a record deficit by far. The next closest deficit in US history was $292 billion, under Bush 41. However, it is lower than the White House’s mid-year estimate of $455 […]

Biggest Deficit, Ever At least, until next year: WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. government posted its largest budget gap in history in the just-ended 2003 fiscal year, $374.22 billion in red ink, the Treasury Department said on Monday. That broke the previous record of more than $290 billion in the 1992 budget year. As a […]

Why Is Inflation Falling? In a pair of previous posts about the CPI and PPI, I pointed out that inflation is still falling in the US, with no sign yet of stabilization. I didn’t really address the reasons why inflation is falling so persistently, however. The most important reason, I think, was given in another […]

Keep Your Eyes Open… …for some upcoming developments in this story: The independent 9/11 investigative commission, headed by Republican Thomas Kean, is having serious difficulty in getting the documents that it has requested from the Bush administration. Things may be coming to a head this week. From Newsweek, a couple of weeks ago: Sept. 24 […]

Plame Still On While the NYT continues to studiously minimize coverage of the Plame outing and investigation, Time Magazine keeps pounding the administration: Security agencies all over the world are now quietly running Plame’s name through their data banks, immigration records and computer hard drives as the White House leak scandal continues to percolate. Officials […]

Whaaaa? When I first saw this at Blah3, I had to check and make sure it wasn’t a link to a story from the Onion. Then a quick Google search and I found this from the Washington Times (scroll down to “Unlikely recipient”): Sen. Edward M. Kennedy, Massachusetts Democrat, who recently accused President Bush of […]

State Department Predicted Post-War Trouble According to today’s NYT: “The period immediately after regime change might offer these criminals the opportunity to engage in acts of killing, plunder and looting,” the report warned, urging American officials to “organize military patrols by coalition forces in all major cities to prevent lawlessness, especially against vital utilities and […]