A CAUTIONARY WORD ON AUSTERITY

From the New York Times:

For a year now, Britain’s economy has been stuck in a vicious cycle of low growth, high unemployment and fiscal austerity. But unlike Greece, which has been forced into induced recession by misguided European Union creditors, Britain has inflicted this harmful quack cure on itself.

Austerity was a deliberate ideological choice by Prime Minister David Cameron’s ruling coalition of Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, elected 17 months ago. It has failed and can be expected to keep failing. But neither party is yet prepared to acknowledge that reality and change course.
....

Austerity is a political ideology masquerading as an economic policy. It rests on a myth, impervious to facts, that portrays all government spending as wasteful and harmful, and unnecessary to the recovery. The real world is a lot more complicated. America has no need to repeat Mr. Cameron’s failed experiment. (My emphasis)

But that's just where we're headed here in the US, with the obstructionist Republicans in the House and the Senate who will not cooperate with a jobs bill. Make no mistake: theirs is not an ideological or principled stand. The goal of the Republicans is to block all efforts to get the economy on the upswing but rather allow the situation go from bad to worse over the next year, in order that they may electioneer on the failure of President Obama. That's just how cynical the Republicans are. They will sacrifice the people and the country for the sake of politics.

TIME TO SEND YOU AWAY...

...to read two excellent blog posts. I've included quotes to entice you to read further.

First from Doug on the miserable State of the Union at his blog Counterlight's Peculiars:

These days, we find ourselves in a fun house world of morality where a large group of already very wealthy people committed what is probably the largest act of larceny in history, almost wrecking the global economy, and yet it is the rest of us suffering the consequences who are told to feel ashamed for our wanton ways. Our representatives go out of their way to coddle the very people who ruined us all, and meanwhile try to take away our last remaining protections against the predations of the market economy. They tell us solemnly to "take responsibility," while dodging their own responsibility for creating this whole crisis. People who keep overseas tax shelters, even in times of war and crisis, are congratulated on their patriotism.

Next on the daft Anglican Covenant from Lionel at Lionel Deimel's Weblog:

Alas, Rowan has increasingly become a threat to the Church of England and to the Anglican Communion. He is, in the end, a political appointee of the English government who has exploited the respect given his office to wield power he has not been granted, to interfere in the affairs of churches not his own—rumor has it that Rowan’s was the hand behind B033, for instance—and to press for a Covenant that will change the nature of the Anglican Communion and, some would say, of Anglicanism itself.

The rich want more money, and the powerful want more power, and to hell with the rest of us.

QUESTION OF THE DAY

Why is it that in discussions and negotiations within Congress and with the administration on balancing the budget and where cuts will be made so little attention is given to the cost in lives and treasure of the several wars in which the US is presently engaged?