Press release from U.S. Senate Assistant Majority Leader Dick Durbin
For Immediate Release
April 9, 2009
DURBIN AND ILLINOIS DELEGATION ASK DOT TO SUPPORT REVIVAL OF ILLINOIS TRAIN CAR INDUSTRY
[WASHINGTON, D.C.] – Assistant Majority Leader Dick Durbin (D-IL) today led the Illinois Congressional Delegation in asking [...]
Matt Yglesias has an interesting piece about educational levels around the Great Depression compared to today that reflects on Paul Krugman’s pessimism about the economy and Ryan Avent’s optimism. The question is where will our economic recovery come from (and how soon)?
I’m no economist, but my sense is we are not likely to recover [...]
Scary. I was listening to NPR this AM and thought of Dean Baker when this went on. It appears he was thinking the same thing.
Tonight Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal channeled the worst of Al Gore and Bert (of Bert and Ernie fame) in his GOP response to President Barack Obama’s economic address to congress. The contrast with Barack Obama’s speech made things even worse. Obama was gracious and addressed major issues with the maturity and importance that [...]
Senator Charles Schumer says we should stiff governors who want to take only selective stimulus money for political gain. I agree – this isn’t a game, it’s a world depression. Take the money and do some good – or don’t take it and face your voter’s wrath.
Some federal legislation is confusing and hard to evaluate. Sometimes it’s due to complexity – other times it’s because opponents create complexity to mislead the public. Congressman Peter Roskam recently decided to confuse what the recently passed stimulus package does – and then criticize it for what it doesn’t do.
The federal stimulus package [...]
This morning on WGN John Williams interviewed Congresswoman Judy Biggert of Hinsdale. John asked Congresswoman Biggert about Congressman Michael Capuano yelling at banker CEOs yesterday at a congressional hearing, quoting him saying, “So basically all or most of you engaged in all or at least some of the activities that actually created this crisis, [...]
We’d rather continue to substantially cut taxes, especially those at the upper end, while sacrificing our society’s future economic competitiveness and health through reduced infrastructure spending, reduced education spending, and reduced health care spending among others. On that latter topic, Ezra poses the challenge:
“A decent society doesn’t spen[d] $70 billion on an upper-class tax [...]
Michael Steele has recently admitted that he took part in a ghost payroll scheme, receiving money from the state of Maryland from 2003 to 2007, without working at a job there. Those years coincided with Steele’s term as Lt Governor of the state – some sort of volunteer position as he tells it. [...]
Washington, D.C. – Republican Senators accused of obstructing the national economic stimulus package pointed out that with 142,099,000 Americans employed in January, and job losses that month of almost 600,000 people, they could keep their own jobs for about 20 years with similar monthly job losses before no one was employed in the United States. [...]
