As a pediatric subspecialist in practice for twenty years (pediatric pulmonology), I have been a long time member of the American Academy of Pediatrics. I have been proud of their advocacy for children, including their being a reputable source of information and a strong voice for pandemic preparedness from a pediatric perspective (special thanks to the Committee on Infectious Diseases for that work), as well as keeping an eye on teen smoking risks, well before it was fashionable to do so.

Professional organizations like the AAP are very important to practicing docs, and there are as many professional organizations as there are specialties. Many practicing docs belong to one or more professional organizations; some are more politically active than others. Recently, I wrote about why I have not been a member of the American Medical Association. Few, if any, of the professional societies are more patient-focused than the AAP, which helps to establish practice standards for pediatricians all over the country, and advocates for issues as diverse as lead screening, autism recognition, health reform and nutrition in schools.

I had the opportunity to discuss some of these issues with the President Elect of the AAP, Dr. Judith Palfrey, FAAP (Fellow, American Academy of Pediatrics.) Dr. Palfrey has a distinguished record from Radcliffe, Columbia and Children's Hospital, Boston, where she is based, and is all too familiar with the issues and barriers that pediatricians, specialists and primary care docs face in practicing modern medicine today, issues that are at the heart of health reform.

Daily Kos: Thanks for making yourself available. Let’s talk some about health reform, and how it relates to children.

Does the AAP have specific concerns about how the health reform debate is playing out in regard to the needs of children and adolescents? What are we not talking enough about?

The AAP supports the current effort to reform our health care system, particularly as it relates to improved access, benefits, quality, efficiency and appropriate payment for services. We do have concerns that policy-makers and the general public think that the reauthorization of the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) earlier this year accomplished all the goals of health reform for children. It was an important step forward, but CHIP was not health reform for children. There are still millions of uninsured children. With the recession and its effects on states, even with Medicaid and CHIP, there are woefully inadequate funds to provide high quality health services to children. Also, privately insured children are not assured the age-appropriate pediatric benefits. Our state immunization programs are not well funded and we lack registry functions to track and monitor vaccines.

We are also very concerned that policymakers and the general public do not understand that pediatric services are undervalued. In many states, children cannot get access to health care because Medicaid rates are at 60-70 percent of Medicare (which, by the way, is often considerably lower than private insurance).

Finally, we do have effective, proven methods of prevention and care delivery that are not fully deployed because of mal-alignment of incentives in our current system. We are eager to see explicit recognition of the importance of maternity benefits, the Medical Home, Bright Futures and support for pediatric subspecialists and pediatric emergency and hospital services.

Daily Kos: The AMA recently made news with opposition to a public option. Other specialty groups like the American Academy of Family Physicians appear more open to a public plan (  http://www.aafp.org/...  ) Does the AAP have a position?

Our position is that we want to remove all barriers to full access to age-appropriate benefits with appropriate payment. We will accept any program that delivers on those goals.

Daily Kos: There appears to be a shortage of primary care doctors looming. Are there enough pediatricians and pediatric specialists to meet future needs, including after universal care is achieved? Is it the right mix? If not, what do we need to do to fix the problem?

You are right. Because of all the hassles and difficulties in our current system, many young people have opted not to go into primary care. They see a life that is filled with administrative forms, telephone trees to authorize medications, inadequate payment for services provided and too little time to practice the kind of high quality medicine they have been taught. Reforming the system will do a great deal to bring people back into primary care.

We also have a real problem with the mal-distribution of pediatric subspecialists. Rural areas and some poor urban areas find it hard to attract and retain pediatric subspecialists. In some ways, this is a much harder nut to crack because it has to do with the low volume of cases in the lower population areas as well as the desire of subspecialists to be affiliated with research universities where they can be involved in working on the latest science. The advent of electronic medical records and telemedicine should provide some relief for this problem, but we will probably not solve it entirely without serious attention to regionalization of services and more attention to epidemiology, demographics and placing doctors where they can reach out most effectively to the greatest number of patients through techniques such as circuit riding and co-management.

Finally, young people who are interested in medicine in general are being turned off and are turning away from potential careers in pediatrics (both primary care and subspecialty) because of the enormous debt burden they face...now in the many hundreds of thousands of dollars. The Obama administration’s recognition of this problem and attention to it is most welcome and should help the situation if there is adequate funding for loan repayment.

Daily Kos: We have a new head of the FDA (Margaret Hamburg). What message would you give her regarding the availability and approval of medications for children, particularly new medications that come on board that may or may not have been tested in children, or come in child-friendly forms?

The FDA serves the very important function of assuring the safety and efficacy of drugs and medical devices. Children's bodies are different from those of adults and they handle medications differently. If children are not involved in drug trials, many life saving and health promoting medicines and medical devices remain unavailable to children. For more than a decade AAP has been on the forefront of legislative initiatives to improve children's access to medicines and devices that are labeled for their use. We have made progress legislatively in getting more access to needed testing and FDA has been a good partner in implementing appropriate policies regarding children.  We welcome Dr. Hamburg and encourage FDA to continue to involve children and adolescents in the FDA's priorities.

Daily Kos: Does the AAP have a position on the new law regarding tobacco products being regulated by the FDA? How about funding SCHIP through tobacco taxes?

Yes. The AAP has been a strong advocate for regarding tobacco as a product needing regulation. Tobacco manufacturers market tobacco aggressively to teen-agers by adding flavors and using teen-attracting slogans and other techniques. We know that people who start smoking in their adolescent years have a high likelihood of becoming addicted to cigarettes. Having the FDA regulate tobacco will have the benefit of governmental oversight on how the products are promoted.

Tobacco taxes have provided a double benefit. The tax has been a good source of revenue. And raising taxes deters smoking. We are actually supportive of this pro-health approach related to products such as sugar-sweetened beverages, which are associated with the obesity epidemic.  

Daily Kos: In a pandemic or other natural disaster, special needs children are among the most vulnerable populations. Are we doing enough to prepare for the needs of this population and their parents?

The American Academy of Pediatrics is very concerned that children are often not considered when disaster plans are being made. Disasters may happen during the day when children are in school and daycare and can become separated from their families. Systems for reunification are critically important. Stockpiles of medications in pediatric formulations should be a routine part of the disaster plan as well as high priority responses to address the needs of children who have special health care needs and may depend on technologies that require generator or other back-ups.

Thank you, Dr. Palfrey.

The American Academy of Pediatrics health reform links and web site can be found at www.aap.org

^{Previous Daily Kos interviews with health care and policy experts, including Erika Seward (American Lung Association), Jeff Levi (Trust For America's Health), Georges Benjamin (American Public Health Association) and Scott Layne (UCLA School of Public Health) can be found by clicking the links.}

Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future
By Chris Mooney and Sheril Kirshenbaum
Basic Books, New York, July 2009
Hardcover, 209 Pages, $ 24.00 New
Extended Author Q & A Here

Forty years after Apollo 11 half of all Americans believe that humans were created in their present form less than ten thousand years ago. Senators, Representatives, and influential pundits proudly deride global warming and ridicule the overwhelming scientific evidence for anthropogenic climate change. Science sections in traditional media outlets are reduced or eliminated completely, while virtually every newspaper runs a daily astrology column. How did the most advanced scientific nation on earth end up like this, what are the consequences, and what can or should be done about it?

Unscientific America by Chris Mooney and Sheril Kirshenbaum is a must read for anyone who cares about understanding or reversing the long national slide into pseudoscience and willful ignorance that has periodically gripped America. The book neatly follows up Mooney's best seller, The Republican War on Science, into a broader, nonpartisan narrative of an entire nation enamored by the nifty gizmos and life saving applications of science, yet saddled with a long history of anti-intellectualism that periodically spills over into open contempt. It's a dose of stiff but sorely needed medicine for baby boomers and genx'ers who grew up during a short thaw in that icy antiscience trend by way of a cold war, a hot space race, and one great communicator named Carl Sagan.

The book is full of delightfully written examples of assaults on science, each ripe with opportunity for anyone wise enough to seize it. The demotion of Pluto produced sacks of angry mail, and ignited a wave of interest in planetary astronomy from kindergartens to grad schools. Hollywood needlessly butchers science and scientists on the alter of cinematic appeal, but special effects wizardry in movies like Jurassic Park by-passed the usual media filters and stereotypes to kick-start a whole new generation of paleontologists and geneticists. The Bush administration's authoritarian disregard for science was legendary, but it galvanized the scientific community into action like no other Presidency.

Enter the era of cable television and the Internet: alas, as the book honestly explains, in today's fractured information landscape, science friendly mags, TV programs, and blogs are preaching to the choir. It's just as easy, if not more so, for a creationist or moon landing hoaxer to find websites that cater to their predispositions as it is to find Science Blogs or Discover Online.

As to who is too blame, the short answer, presented with convincing research and rationale, is everyone. Politicians poorly trained in science have little to gain and much to lose by taking firm positions, a point well illustrated by the brick wall Mooney and others ran into when they tried to arrange a science debate during the 2008 Presidential campaign. Mainstream media is consumed by presenting both sides of an issue -- even when one of them is ridiculous -- while less objective media venues suffer no corresponding ethical dilemma and blasts out misinformation like a howitzer. Science writers get wrapped up in the culture war over science and atheism. Scientists and academia share responsibility for not engaging the public and the media more forcefully, or blazing a viable career path for charismatic scientists with a flair for public speaking.

Scattered throughout the book and summarized in the last chapter are ideas on how science might raise, or re-raise, its profile and once again become a vibrant, central component in American culture. My one constructive suggestion would be that those ideas were more fleshed out, but that can hardly be the authors' fault. They dwell in the reality based community where,  as the book spells out, there is no unified, coordinated effort to cool off our latest national affair with know nothingism and pseudoscience.

Mooney and Kirshenbaum complement one another seamlessly in Unscientific America to deliver a hard hitting message informed by their years of experience in the public eye and behind a lab bench. The writing is superb, the narratives concise and easy to follow, and at 132 pages plus footnotes it is easily digested by readers of all ages and backgrounds. Order it, read it, and hope this book serves as a wake up call to Americans, and a catalyst to politicians, before it's too late.

Sheril Kirshenbaum is a marine biologist and Associate at Duke University whose next book is 'The Science of Kissing'! Chris Mooney is a frequent public speaker on science and science policy and best selling author of The Republican War on Science. Chris and Sheril can be found at Discover Magazine's popular blog The Intersection. More info on the book and tour dates here, additional Q & A here, and both authors are available to respond to a few of your questions or comments below.

Sunday, with a cloudy aspect and a bit of rain on the horizon. Better get the punditry in before we get wet.

Barack Obama: Rebuilding something better. And excerpts from the Ghana speech, w/live blog.

Andrew Alexander (WaPo Ombudsman):

The Washington Post's ill-fated plan to sell sponsorships of off-the-record "salons" was an ethical lapse of monumental proportions.

Frank Rich:

In the aftermath of her decision to drop out and cash in, Palin’s standing in the G.O.P. actually rose in the USA Today/Gallup poll. No less than 71 percent of Republicans said they would vote for her for president. That overwhelming majority isn’t just the "base" of the Republican Party that liberals and conservatives alike tend to ghettoize as a rump backwater minority. It is the party, or pretty much what remains of it in the Barack Obama era.

Indeed. But it's small. And it can't win elections. And it should not be pandered to by the press any more, as if it's still in power.

Maureen Dowd:

PALIN: @SenJohnMcCain — How the heck are ya, ya big hero?? Long time no hear, pardner. Y did u defriend me on Facebook?

MCCAIN: @AKGovSarahPalin — I needed room for Kissinger

Andrew Sullivan:

Writing about Sarah Palin always presents a quandary. Does one operate under the usual assumption that this is a rational figure, a serious politician, a rising Republican star . . . or do you acknowledge the copious evidence that she cannot tell the truth, has delusions of grandeur, has no policy record to speak of and quit her job as Alaska governor halfway through her first term because she is, in her own explanation, "not a quitter"? I think that you have to proceed under the assumption that this is a joke of a candidate and a symptom of a political party in the middle of a mental breakdown...

But trying to makes sense of Sarah Palin is a fool’s errand. I spent a lot of time last year trying to figure out how her bizarre pregnancy story could make any sense at all — it doesn’t — and came up with nothing but a suspicion that large parts of it were made up. If you present the facts to Palin spokespeople, they seem offended and regard you as some liberal hater. But the facts reveal she lies all the time about almost everything and so is probably improvising about her reasons for resigning.

Peggy Noonan: You go, Andrew!

"The elites hate her." The elites made her. It was the elites of the party, the McCain campaign and the conservative media that picked her and pushed her. The base barely knew who she was. It was the elites, from party operatives to public intellectuals, who advanced her and attacked those who said she lacked heft. She is a complete elite confection. She might as well have been a bonbon.

"She makes the Republican Party look inclusive." She makes the party look stupid, a party of the easily manipulated.

David Broder: Achieving health reform will be difficult and it will cost money, so Congress is nervous. Breaking.

George Will:

Before he became an economic adviser in the Obama White House, where wit can be dangerous, Larry Summers said: Liberals oppose a VAT because it is regressive and conservatives oppose it because it is a money machine, but a VAT might come when liberals realize it is a money machine and conservatives realize it is regressive.

Greg Dworkin:

Teens and young adults are disproportionately affected by this H1N1 flu, and adults much less so. That means that the recommendations for flu vaccine will change this fall for pandemic vaccine, separate from the usual drive to vaccinate the over 65’s (if you were born before 1957, you likely have some cross-protection from a previous version of this virus.) $350 million in extra funds for this shovel-ready project have just been made available to cash-starved states ($30 million to California alone.) Expect to hear more, but the possibility of a worsening picture in early fall, with more school closures and, alas, more deaths and illness in a younger cohort, is very real. Interestingly, the on line reaction was: how can we help get the message out?

Severance package for your mistress: $25,000

Hush money for her family (paid by your parents): $96,000

FedEx shipping charges + gas money for your religious buddies: Unknown

...

Your recent trip to Iowa: Priceless

This evening's Rescue Rangers are YatPundit, vcmvo2, dadanation, mem from somerville, sunspark says, and srkp23, with watercarrier4diogenes at the wheel of the Editmobile, frantically chasing a vintage Perley A. Thomas streetcar on a hot New Orleans night, hoping to get its operator, YatPundit, back aboard before any of the passengers get wise.

Tonight's diaries take us on a roller-coaster ride from prehistoric man to that legal neanderthal, John Yoo, from burquas to baseball. We hope you'll enjoy this bounty of excellent reading.

• Avenging Angel addresses the topic of further revelations about the legal mind behind the Bush administration's many civil rights abuses in John Yoo, the Right Man for the Job. (vcmvo2)
• Lib Dem FoP reminds us of an important story in Africa's recent history, and asks us not to gloss over that, with Remember the San, Mr Obama. (mem from somerville)
• In an interesting diary about French President Nicholas Sarkosy's controversial move, mosaicnews discusses the possible outcome of Sarkosy Hiding Behind the Burqua? (vcmvo2)
• In case you missed last night's no-hitter at the San Francisco Giants' baseball game, Alfonso Nevarez's diary Jonathan Sanchez: Nearly Perfect! is the next best thing to being there. (dadanation)
• ramara writes about a recent school dress code issue involving Native Americans in Support for a Child's Religious Freedom from Many Communities. (vcmvo2)
• In Savage Beasts, zwerlst muses on the development of teeth and ancient music. (watercarrier4diogenes)
• cosmic debris brings our attention to the hidden problems of economic hardship and homelessness in Home is a hotel without a lawyer: Slipping into America's Crack. (vcmvo2)
• joetex scrutinizes an expensive technology, and examines how it fits into the health care crisis today, with Healthcare Cost: A Scanner Costly. (mem from somerville)
• beglin tackles the topic of student loan reform in The Educated Poor: Reforming Financial Aid. (vcmvo2)
• Lib Dem FoP discusses the equipment shortcomings of the British Army while reminding us that there are More British Dead in Afghanistan than Iraq. (YatPundit)
• In a beautifully written diary Marina Asbury tells us about losing her beloved cat in Saying goodbye to Malijah. (vcmvo2)

jotter delivers High Impact Diaries: July 10, 2009, while carolita has Top Comments 7-11-09 -- Healthcare Edition.

Enjoy and please promote your own favorite diaries in this open thread (even if you're the author! Here's where that's actually appreciated). And, of course, since it's an open thread, PLAY NICE, OK? 8^)

If you enjoy Diary Rescue, please consider joining the Rescue Rangers. It's a great way to become more involved with the Daily Kos community. Did we mention it's rewarding and fun? To volunteer or learn more, please contact us (don't forget to tell us your screen name) at: dkos.rescuerangers@gmail.com

Jeff Sessions (R-AL), on the upcoming Sotomayor hearings:

"I don’t think the outcome of this hearing is a foregone conclusion," Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), the ranking Republican on the committee, told reporters Friday. "Judge Sotomayor has made some troubling statements. ... She has ruled in some cases that are troubling and need to be examined."

Sessions then gives the standard GOP laundry list:

• She's a racist (a.k.a. "wise Latina woman" remark"),
• she'll take away our guns (a.k.a a ruling that top conservative judges agreed with),
• she hates white people (a.k.a. following precedent in the Ricci case), and,
• she's associated with a terrorist organization (a.k.a. the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund).

In other words, same crap, different day. Now, I can appreciate that Sessions has a job to do and wants to do it right. And if Sotomayor had said things like, oh, I don't know, maybe calling the National Association for the Advancement of Colored people and the American Civil Liberties Union "un-American" and "Communist-inspired," or, during a murder investigation of the Ku Klux Klan, said that she "used to think they [the Klan] were OK’ until (s)he found out some of them were ‘pot smokers," or if she made a habit of calling African American men "boys," and cautioned them about how they talked to "white folks," she would be unfit to hold any position of power and respect. Right, Mr. Sessions?

Dahlia Lithwick looks into the rather litigious background of Frank Ricci, the firefighter at the heart of the case the GOP is hoping will sink Sonia Sotomayor's nomination for the U.S. Supreme Court. Ricci is scheduled to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee next week, and Lithwick is licking her chops at the prospect:

Ultimately, there are two ways to frame Frank Ricci's penchant for filing employment discrimination complaints: Perhaps he was repeatedly victimized by a cruel cadre of employers, first for his dyslexia, then again for his role as a whistle-blower, and then a third time for just being white. If that is so, we should all be deeply grateful for the robust civil rights laws that protect Americans from unfair discrimination in the workplace. I look forward to hearing Republican Sen. John Cornyn's version of that speech next week.

The other way to look at Frank Ricci is as a serial plaintiff—one who reacts to professional slights and setbacks by filing suit, threatening to file suit, and more or less complaining his way up the chain of command. That's not the typical GOP heartthrob, but I look forward to hearing Sen. Cornyn's version of that speech next week as well.

Funny, isn't it, how easily Republican Senators can become fan boys of serial litigants (and, we must assume, their grievance-filled trial lawyers) if they are members of that famous oppressed minority, the American white male.

Behold, yet another thing Mark Sanford's "Hike in the Appalachian" should (but probably won't) cost him: his top secret-clearance. U.S. News:

As a chief of state and head of the South Carolina National Guard, Sanford has a top-secret security status that lets him in on classified information such as possible terrorist threats and emergency tips. But with that need to know come intelligence community rules of conduct, a key one being that relationships with foreigners must be revealed. The reason: Those in the know can leave themselves open to blackmail from rival intelligence services about a compromising dalliance.

And it's happened before (to a Democrat):

Homeland Security canceled former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich's after he was arrested on corruption charges.

Sanford's security status, however, remains unclear. A spokesman didn't return calls, and Homeland Security, while confirming that it issues the clearances, would not comment on Sanford, also a captain in the Air Force Reserves.

Who knows. Maybe Sanford can get his friends at C Street to pull some strings on his behalf. Somehow, it's hard to imagine he won't figure out a way to pull off the old IOKIYAR trick.

Coming up on Sunday Kos ....

• Devilstower will look at the cost of not having a public option on health care.
• Laura Clawson thinks Sarah Palin is unqualified, unethical, and at the very least intellectually incurious -- and it's not anti-feminist to say so.
• DarkSyde will have two essays, one of which will explore how investment in new technology is nothing new to American history in East meets West. He also will review Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens our Future.
• SusanG will review Jon Jeter's Flat Broke in the Free Market: How Globalization Fleeced Working People.
• Do the flagging poll numbers for a number of Democratic governors have you worried? Steve Singiser thinks you should be concerned, but will caution that the abysmal stats are reversible, and they are not solely limited to Democrats.
• DemFromCT will interview Dr. Judith Palfrey, FAAP, President-Elect, American Academy of Pediatrics, on health reform, tobacco, and pandemic preparation, and the special needs of children in all regards.

(From the diaries. Susan)

Breaking news from the New York Times:

The Central Intelligence Agency withheld information about a secret counterterrorism program from Congress for eight years on direct orders from former Vice President Dick Cheney, the agency’s director, Leon E. Panetta, has told the Senate and House intelligence committees, two people with direct knowledge of the matter said Saturday.

The report that Mr. Cheney was behind the decision to conceal the still-unidentified program from Congress deepened the mystery surrounding it, suggesting that the Bush administration had put a high priority on the program and its secrecy.

This is incredibly damning news about the power that Bush/Cheney and the executive branch usurped from the supposed "separation of powers" enshrined in our Constitution.

CIA Director Leon Panetta is now saying that the CIA did not even, as required to by law, report to the so-called Gang of Eight (leaders in Congress and from the intelligence committees) about this covert anti-terrorism unit:

If the President determines that it is essential to limit access to the finding to meet extraordinary circumstances affecting vital interests of the United States, the finding may be reported to the chairmen and ranking minority members of the congressional intelligence committees, the Speaker and minority leader of the House of Representatives, the majority and minority leaders of the Senate, and such other member or members of the congressional leadership as may be included by the President.

Sources told the New York Times that this specific intelligence program was not interrogation-oriented, nor was it a domestic surveillance program, so this is not directly related to the Bush administration's role in torturing suspected terrorists, but it is quite possible and somewhat likely, in my opinion, that the sheer amount of evidence of illegal actions piling up is what's prompting AG Eric Holder's newfound willingness to look into torture prosecutions of ex-Bush administration officials:

Holder, 58, may be on the verge of asserting his independence in a profound way. Four knowledgeable sources tell NEWSWEEK that he is now leaning toward appointing a prosecutor to investigate the Bush administration's brutal interrogation practices, something the president has been reluctant to do. While no final decision has been made, an announcement could come in a matter of weeks, say these sources, who decline to be identified discussing a sensitive law-enforcement matter.

We shall see as more is revealed.

Ever since the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act passed less than a month after President Obama took the oath of office, some critics have said the stimulus it provides isn’t big enough. Actually, many progressive critics said it wasn’t big enough well before it passed the Senate by the skin of the teeth of three moderate Republicans, one of whom has since become a Democrat.

Those critics were lined up against other critics – Republicans, ConservaDems, Blue Dogs – who said the stimulus was too big or that there should be none at all. Just let the economy come back on its own, devil take the hindmost.

We’ve seen quite a lot of the travails of the hindmost lately, with rising consumer loan delinquencies, horrific numbers in shipping activity, more bad news from the unraveled safety net, more foreclosures, fall-out from foreclosures and fallout from Michael Jackson’s funeral, as well as bad news in just about every other story from California.

Most of the Leading Economic Indicators indicate the economic bottom may have been reached. But as the pain and anxiety of tens of millions of unemployed and underemployed and underwater Americans worsens, talk of another round of stimulus has been growing.

Hurrah for the sentiment, but does anybody really, seriously, truly believe that another round of stimulus stands a chance of passing even with a gargantuan flow of political capital from the White House?

Republicans, true to form, are saying, in effect, See, we told you the stimulus was a bad idea, and we were right, it’s not working. Paul Krugman, about whom progressives are sharply divided, has all along argued for a larger stimulus package, but he put the screws to those GOP talking points this week. The problem, he wrote:

...is not that the stimulus is working more slowly than expected; it was never expected to do very much this soon. The problem, instead, is that the hole the stimulus needs to fill is much bigger than predicted. That — coupled with the fact that yes, stimulus takes time to work — is the reason for a second round, ASAP.

Krugman also pointed out that those who argued last January and February for a larger stimulus were frozen out in the megamedia, just as bigger-stimulus advocates here at Daily Kos were repeatedly told five months ago to shut up because the administration had everything all figured out. Wrote Krugman Wednesday:

And the voices calling for stronger stimulus are, may I say, sorta kinda respectable — several Nobelists in the bunch, plus a large fraction of the prominent economists who predicted the housing crash before it happened.

But somehow, the pro-stimulus people are unpersons. Who makes these decisions?

Vice President Biden recently gave the stock market some downward pressure when he admitted that the administration "misread how bad the economy was." He has been urging audiences all week, while the President is in Europe, to have patience. Both Biden and Obama adviser Austin Goolsbe have said it is too soon to be talking about another stimulus when the first has yet to get up to full steam. However, Laura Tyson, one of Obama’s outside economic advisers, seems to have joined the second stimulus crowd:

The U.S. should consider drafting a second stimulus package focusing on infrastructure projects because the $787 billion approved in February was "a bit too small," said Laura Tyson ...

The current plan "will have a positive effect, but the real economy is a sicker patient," Tyson said in a speech in Singapore [Tuesday]. The package will have a more pronounced impact in the third and fourth quarters, she added, stressing that she was speaking for herself and not the administration. ...

"The economy is worse than we forecast on which the stimulus program was based," Tyson, who is a member of Obama’s Economic Recovery Advisory board, told the Nomura Equity Forum. "We probably have already 2.5 million more job losses than anticipated." ...

Tyson said the U.S. should shift away from its dependence on consumption to grow, and promote expansion through investment and exports. The dollar will need to weaken in the longer term to promote export-led growth, she said.

As Biden told David Gregory on Meet the Press in mid-June, the reason for the misreading was "We took the mainstream model."

Exactly the problem, responded economist Stephanie Kelton:

For as near as I can tell, the mainstream models have been successful at just one thing: failure. They predicted that: subprime loans would not default at substantially different rates than prime loans; the riskiness of credit default swaps and other mortgage backed securities could be efficiently judged; deregulated financial markets were capable of self-policing; and so on. And they were wrong. ...

The prediction that comes out of any macroeconomic model is, to a very large extent, driven by the assumptions that underlie it. The mainstream models tend to assume things like: efficient markets, rational expectations, infinite planning horizons, and so on. The rosier the assumptions, the rosier the predictions. ...

It's time to abandon the mainstream model and the rose-colored glasses that go with it.

What would a second round of stimulus look like? Assuming, that is, that the administration is willing to try to pass another in the face of potential bond trader freak-out over inflation fears, and in face of political challenges. Not the least of the latter would be a lot of whining about "why didn’t Obama get it right the first time" rather than "he’s doing what FDR did effectively, experimenting until it clicks."

Differences over whether to do another stimulus pale beside differences over what to do. If the key is to get money into people’s hands quickly, which is what most of the complaints are about, then just adding to the $787 billion pot won’t do the trick. L. Randall Wray, a professor of economics and director with the Center for Full Employment and Price Stability has a set of ideas worth discussing:

Payroll tax holiday: About $2500 of tax relief annually per worker, with the same going to the employer. Stimulus: $650 billion per year. Easy to implement and to phase out. Effect: immediate.

Additional state and local government assistance:: Too little money from the Recovery Act made its way to the states and local governments where the suffering is immense. Yes, some of it they brought on themselves; but Wray recommends $400 billion "allocated by population (a bit over $1200 per capita)." This would halt further layoffs and furloughs which have just begun to devastate various state and local governments. Easy to implement. Effect: more or less immediate.

Jobs to reduce poverty:  6.5 million jobs are already down the tubes (nine years’ worth of job creation wiped out), and if the actual numbers of discouraged and underemployed workers are added, we really need 15-20 million more jobs. "A substantial amount of America's poverty problem is really a jobless problem ... direct job creation [can not only] reverse the trend toward ever-higher unemployment rates, but it will also go a long way toward filling the growing holes in the social safety net." At least part of this goal could be achieved in the short run by adopting a 21st Century WPA, as proposed by bonddad and NewDealDemocrat in May. More complex to implement. Effect: Not for at least six months.

Homeowner relief:  "When banks begin to foreclose, the government would step in to purchase the property at the lower of market price or outstanding mortgage balance." These homes would then be rented to the foreclosed owners. "Reducing evictions by offering a rental alternative will help reduce the pain of foreclosure. It might also allow the process to speed up (with smaller losses for banks) since many families would choose to stay-on as renters, with the possibility that they could later buy their homes at more reasonable prices." Complex to implement (how do you determine a fair market price in this environment?). Effect: As soon as a mechanism can be established, which could take a while, but just knowing the mechanism is coming would slow down foreclosures..

How much all this might cost is unknown. A trillion dollars already with just those first two items. But as economists James Galbraith and Dean Baker, among others, have been arguing for some time, it’s better to spend a bit too much and deal with the problems that may cause when people are working again than to spend too little and not put enough of them back to work.

Even without another stimulus, the Great Recession will no doubt end anyway, someday. If the technical recession - as decided by the National Bureau of Economic Research - ends this month and the trend of the past four downturns holds true, we’ll return to the number of jobs we had in December 2007 by around mid-2013. That time frame could be greatly shortened by bolstering the Recovery Act with a second stimulus targeted at both instant and longer-term economic relief.

It’s easy, however, to see why the administration is not eager to take action. A second stimulus could well be almost as tough a sales job in Congress as getting those legislators to do something about the upward transfer of wealth, stagnant wages, unfettered off-shoring and oligarchical manipulations that plague our economy. But the difficulty doesn’t make it any less necessary.

Even as the right prepares to oppose Sonia Sotomayor's nomination, they're finding it increasingly difficult to work up a proper fury. Partly that's because there's nearly universal agreement from people who have worked with Sotomayor.

The American Bar Association gave Sotomayor its highest rating on Tuesday. The vote was unanimous, based on hundreds of confidential interviews with Sotomoayor's colleagues on and off the bench, and a review of her opinions by scholars and practitioners.

Partly it's the support she has from national organizations.

Then the Democrats rolled out endorsements by leading law enforcement organizations, including the National District Attorneys Association, the National Sheriffs Association and the Federal Law Enforcement Officers Association.

Partly it's her support from members of Republican administrations.

Later this week former FBI Director Louis Freeh is expected to formally endorse her nomination in a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee. Freeh got to know Sotomoayor when the two served as federal trial judges in Manhattan.

You even have Lindsey Graham, who was on the "let's delay Sotomayor just to screw with Obama" train a few days ago saying that he might vote for her.

It's not that she won't catch flack over her positions. Of course she will. It's not that the Republicans won't distort those positions to try and make points. Of course they will. And it's not as if they won't curry favor with their Glennbeckistan base by pulling such stunts as dragging a firefighter into a Supreme Court hearing to dazzle us with his legal acumen.  That's a given.

But two months from now, the castings generated by worms like Jeff Sessions will be forgotten. Instead, the narrative from the right will be all about how reasonable Republicans were toward Sotomayor. They'll be going on about the horrors faced by Clarence Thomas. They'll Whine Along With Sarah about the unfairness of how the press maligns their most accomplished quitter.

And you know what? To some extent, they'll be right. Sonia Sotomayor won't take the pounding in the press that Palin has. She won't be the subject of all those late night jokes. She won't get an entry in the urban dictionary. Which will generate another round of limbaugh-boo-hoos about the unfairness of it all.

What the right will completely ignore is that Sotomayor is deserving of a Supreme Court nomination. She earned it. The reason she'll take a smoother path through D.C., despite the best efforts of the GOP to generate roadbumps, has absolutely nothing to do with any sort of rediscovered comity on the part of Republicans. It has to do with President Obama putting forth a nominee who is highly-respected and capable. It has to do with her not being an automaton capable of nothing more than repeating rote talking points and hewing to unwavering ideology. No one who has paid the slightest attention (and who at least occasionally steps outside the Bill O'sphere) would pretend that Sotomayor isn't smart or experienced enough for the appointed task.

The problem the Republicans are having is caused by their own set of extremely lax requirements: can you repeat the talking points? Rigid ideology + half-decent camera presence = Republican star. That's a hurdle snails can cross. And they do.  The Republican base doesn't see knowledge as a part of leadership. They don't value innovation. They place a negative value on competence.

Stupid still has it's appeal, otherwise Glenn Beck wouldn't have a show, but it's a vanishing appeal in a world that's less and less manageable through sloganeering. Maybe, sometime in the near future, some Republican leader will be able to steer the party out of its self-destructive teabaggery. Maybe not. With every day that passes, the rigidity of the party hardens like concrete.

Two months from now, Republicans will be whining again about the unfairness of the media. In the meantime, Sonia Sotomayor will be on the Supreme Court.

The Blue Dog caucus, and their not so Republican-lite colleagues in the New Dems, seem to be splintering again over healthcare reform. You'll remember last month when they created their manifesto for a trigger on the public option, only to have a some prominent members in the group dissent, killing (for the time being, anyway, the trigger in the House).

It's happened again, in reaction to the New Dem leadership telling Pelosi last month that "many of our members remain concerned about any public option."

A band of 22 New Democrat and Blue Dog lawmakers say they support a "robust" government-run health plan, boosting chances of moving healthcare reform with a public insurance plan through the House.

Democratic centrists remain the biggest obstacle to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) ability to pass a healthcare bill with a public plan, and many conservative Democrats oppose a public option as unfair to private insurers.

But the letter from the 22 New Dems and Blue Dogs indicates opposition from this group is far from universal.

"We have a broader coalition to pass this than what was assumed before," said Rep. Lois Capps (Calif.), a New Democrat who circulated the letter supporting a public option with Rep. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.). "While we may belong to a more moderate branch, we want it known that we support the public option."

Now will these 22 stand with the 120 some member progressive coalition who've drawn a line in the sand against any proposal that does not include a public option? That's the key question. Right now, it's enough to have their support for a public option to counter the kneejerk opposition to anything remotely progressive from their leadership. It bolsters the chances for a public option significantly.

• With the House proposing taxing the wealthy to pay for health care, Atrios warns we should brace ourselves for the following waves of crappy press coverage:

  Confusion between total and marginal tax rates.

  Confusion between small business revenue and small business profits.

  Stories about how in some places $350,000 isn't all that wealth.

• Via Balloon Juice, a couple of interesting posts. First, John Cole notes that while President Obama was pure enough to bask in the Pope's presence yesterday, he wasn't good enough for Notre Dame; and Cole finds a great piece on how dog therapy is being used for PTSD patients.
• President Obama has appointed Brendan Johnson, the 34-year-old son of Senator Tim Johnson (D-SD) as U.S. attorney for South Dakota.
• More British troops have now been killed in Afghanistan than in Iraq.
• General Motors is going to take to eBay to try to sell new cars.
• President Obama visits Ghana, only the third sitting president to do so.
• Karl Rove gets in a Twitter of a discussion about executive overreach when someone asks him about Obama and his appointments of "czars":

  
  Too bad Think Progress can name all the czars Rove's boss appointed while in office.

• A five-year prison term has been handed down in the case of a man convicted in September of having a gun outside the Obamas' home in Chicago.
• Secretary of State Hillary Clinton asks North Korea to grant amnesty to the two American journalists being held there.
• A new report takes a look at neo-Nazis in the U.S. military and it's not pretty. But don't worry, by Monday someone will be apologizing for stating the truth, a la the DHS report walkback.
• Rep. George Miller is going to introduce legislation next week that will reflect President Obama's plan to restructure the student loan industry--a plan that's being fought tooth and nail by private banks, which will be cut out of a lot of interest-bearing action if it passes.

Time to take stock of the best hate mail gems from the last 13 weeks (has it been that long already?).

Well, 12 of those 13 weeks. The "Dear Socialist Fuckstick" email is the undisputed champ and was an instant classic. But putting that one aside, what's your next favorite hate mail?

To the extent that Sarah Palin has offered a rationale for her retirement, it is that her remaining in office would be a waste of Alaska tax dollars because she had been targeted by a series of frivolous ethics complaints since being tapped as John McCain's running mate.

As Alaska blogger Mel Green and The Plum Line's Greg Sargent took the lead in arguing, Palin's story doesn't hold up.

For starters, as Green notes, under Alaska law truly frivolous complaints can be dismissed, but thus far, only one complaint has been found to be frivolous.

Moreover, as Greg Sargent discovered, all of the money Palin claims was spent defending her from ethics investigations would have been spent anyway. The government lawyers who defended her weren't doing anything that hadn't already been budgeted. Put another way, they were just doing their job, and their job would have existed with or without the ethics complaints.

The icing on the cake comes from work conducted out by Green and the Anchorage Daily News showing that the figures provided by Palin to defend her claim don't add up.

In a nutshell, Sarah Palin claims that through June 23, 2009, the state had spent $1,963,840 defending her from ethics complaints. However, as Green and the ADN showed, there are several problems with that claim:

• The document is remarkably devoid of details. For example, three line items total just over $1 million without offering any explanation. One of those line items is for the "Personnel Reivew (sic) Board" at a comfortably round $560,800.
• In cases where it does offer detail, as Palin's own office admits, some of the numbers on the 2-page document are internally inconsistent.
• According to the document, less than 20 minutes of work was billed at an hourly rate of $30,000. In addition, one line item shows 119 hours of work costing $14,564, while a set of lines elsewhere total 13 hours of work at nearly identical cost of $14,565.

Perhaps the nail in the coffin of these numbers is that before Palin invented her retirement explanation, the state was reporting the cost of her ethics inquiries was $296.042. Green broke down those costs in this handy pie chart:

In addition to Greg Sargent's reporting that none of these costs were incremental (they would have been incurred with or without Palin's ethics inquiries), it's clear from this chart that Palin's claim that her ethics complaint problems stem from her spot on the GOP's national ticket -- almost all of the costs were allocated to investigations launched in 2008, before she became a national figure.

This is worth repeating: in all, 94% of these funds were allocated to investigations from 2008. Two-thirds of that was from troopergate, in which the state found she had abused her power as governor.

Meanwhile, just 6% were from 2009 investigations. Sarah Palin claimed her retirement was due to a flood of new ethics complaints that were costing the state hundreds of thousands.

According to the state's own numbers, however, Palin's claim was false. Only a nominal sum was spent defending her from new ethics complaints.

Still, Palin was undaunted by the truth, offering up her own fictional narrative, repeated ad nauseum by a credulous press corps when the story was "hot."

Now that the dust has settled and her lies have been revealed, the few media outlets that have documented them are finding themselves in lonely company.