The Consequences of Tax Cuts Paul Krugman has a piece in this weekend’s New York Times Magazine about the long-term consequences of the Bush tax cuts. His argument is one that has been made elsewhere, but is nevertheless compelling: the Republican tax cuts have intentionally set the US on the path that will lead to […]

Bush’s Popularity Here’s a new bit of polling data from Gallup: GALLUP NEWS SERVICE PRINCETON, NJ — President George W. Bush’s job approval rating has dropped significantly over the last two weeks, and now, at 52%, is at its lowest point since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and within one point of the lowest […]

Aid to Cows I love this image from the BBC’s Cancun coverage: It’s a nice graphic depiction of the oft-cited comparison (slightly specious, but still good for making the point) that the annual dairy subsidy in the European Union in 2000 was $913 per cow, average income in sub-Saharan Africa was $490 per capita, and […]

Proposal for a 2004 Campaign Theme Picking up where AB left off with this post, here’s my proposal for the theme of the anti-Bush 2004 campaign: Time after time, George Bush’s policies fail to work. The Bush presidency has been a complete failure. You probably recognize this as an elaboration of Gephardt’s excellent “miserable failure” […]

Negotiating Tactics in Cancun Right now an important meeting of trade ministers is happening in Cancun, Mexico, where they are discussing possible changes to WTO rules. I’ve been worried that the US was going to get taken advantage of in the negotiations, though. So I was glad to read this story from the BBC reporting […]

, and DC, Northern Virginia, and Shanksville, PA Since then, we’ve failed to capture Osama bin Laden, and the president now no longer mentions his name, invaded a country with no documented ties to bin Laden or the attacks, allowed bin Laden’s family members to vacate the country (apparently without first questioning them), lied to […]

Mike Allen: Noted in The Building? Thursday’s Washington Post has an article, Bush Cites 9/11 On All Manner Of Questions, sure to upset Karl Rove. The punchline of the story is that, regardless of what the topic is, Bush will almost invariably make reference to 9/11: …President Bush paused in his Labor Day remarks about […]

Thou Shalt Not Make Taxes Less Regressive Actually, that’s not one of the Ten Commandments, but based on the results of yesterday’s vote on Republican Governor Bob Riley’s tax package (67-33 against!), most Alabamans think it is. Riley cast his plan, which proposed to deal with the state’s $675 deficit by increasing taxes on the […]

Debut Byline Blogging’s loss is The American Prospect’s gain. Matt Yglesias leapt from writing his blog to being an intrepid (and paid) writer. Via CalPundit, I see that Matt has his first byline today, House Broken: The gutting of federal housing vouchers and the declining fortunes of renters. Check it out. While Matt’s blog endures, […]

Crucial or Negligible? Writing in Salon about the Ashcroft road show promoting the virtues of the PATRIOT Act, Michelle Goldberg makes a good point: In the face of such opposition, Ashcroft has taken to the road to try to convince America of two somewhat contradictory propositions. On the one hand, he argues that without the […]