Are Two Losers Better than One? Ok, Kerry and Gephardt aren’t really losers, they’re just losing the primary race. One has no chance and the other has a small chance. But they’re hoping not to go down alone: These two presidential contenders, who for months have been eclipsed by the surging campaign of Howard Dean, […]

What’s with Kinsley? I vaguely recall reading something in the last week or two about an op-ed by Michael Kinsley that many thought was excessively anti-Clark, or anti-Clark and unfair. Who knows? I like generally like Kinsley’s work, but I didn’t read that one. But in today’s Washington Post, Kinsley uses the following argument to […]

Low, Even for Astroturf The Iraqi soldier astroturf is old news, but now it’s mainstream news. Here’s an exchange that would be amusing if it were not so depressingly revealing of the length GOP supporters will go to–in this case, as soldier’s grenade wound is not bad news, but instead a great opportunity for some […]

Remember Back When a Democrat Was in The White House? Clinton, in his Jan. 19, 1999 State of the Union Speech: For the first time in three decades, the budget is balanced. From a deficit of $290 billion in 1992, we had a surplus of $70 billion last year. And now we are on course […]

Four More Days to Secure Iraq Today there was another major car bombing in Baghdad. That reminded me of the report issued this summer by a team of experts hand-picked by the Pentagon to assess the situation in Iraq. The group, led by former Assistant Defense Secretary John Hamre, concluded that the U.S. administration in […]

Economists For Dean I’m not one (yet), but if you like Howard Dean and you like numbers then you’ll love Economists for Dean: We are a growing network of economists who believe that Howard Dean is the man to beat George W. Bush in 2004 and end what George Akerlof, 2001 Nobel laureate in economics, […]

Joe Wilson Following in Josh Marshall’s footsteps, Salon now has an interview, by Dave Talbot, of Joe Wilson. Here’s something interesting that answers a question I’ve pondered a few times: TALBOT: Why did you contribute to both campaigns? WILSON: Well, I take great pride in being an American, and I don’t believe either party has […]

Economists Who Should Know Better Via the new Bush Blog, Max Sawicky caught a WSJ editorial (editorial here, subscription required) by three very sharp labor economists who should know better. Max gives their argument a quick drubbing and then issues a powerful warning to academic economists: The greatest threat to academic economists is the chance […]

The Arnold Effect in Germany From Reuters today: The straight-talking Hollywood action star’s election win in California has had an electrifying impact on Germany, leading to calls Friday for top politicians to voice clear ideas in simple language or be swept away at the polls. “The more confused we are by what they say, the […]

Producer Prices are Still Not Rising Unfortunately, the US still appears to be flirting with deflation. The BLS released new PPI numbers this morning, showing no increase in prices (excluding food and energy): The Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today that the seasonally adjusted Producer Price Index for Finished […]