Our hearts go out to all those affected by Sandy, especially to those who lost family.
One of the bits of good news I read today:
AFL-CIO Now
30 Oct 2012
Columbus, Ohio, Has Busiest Day of Early Voting as Storm Hits East Coast
Despite bad weather brought on by Hurricane Sandy, voters in Franklin County, Ohio—home to Columbus—showed up more than any other day of early voting up to this point.Read more »
GOTV! Hope all are voting early that can!
Rebuilding after Sandy
Rebuilding after Sandy might offer hope to millions of jobless, a perfect segue to offering a new New Deal of infrastructure direct hire jobs program in the US.
Just last week, however, the President was back talking tax cuts for his next term :
Robert Kuttner:
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So what is our president doing to shore up his support by reassuring voters that things will pick up in the next four years? More public investment, more jobs, more overhaul of the financial system, more relief for the mortgage mess, right?
Well, not exactly. While he gives lip service to these goals, Obama is preparing to do a major deal for deficit reduction, which will only add to the drag on the recovery. His administration has bought into the argument that the business elite and the money markets expect deficit reduction, and that it will also play well with the voters.
In his recent off-the-record conversation with the editors and publisher of Iowa's largest paper, the Des Moines Register, which was made public under pressure from that newspaper, Obama had this to say about deficit reduction:
I am absolutely confident that we can get what is the equivalent of the grand bargain that essentially I've been offering to the Republicans for a very long time, which is $2.50 worth of cuts for every dollar in spending, and work to reduce the costs of our health care programs.
And we can easily meet -- "easily" is the wrong word -- we can credibly meet the target that the Bowles-Simpson Commission established of $4 trillion in deficit reduction, and even more in the out-years, and we can stabilize our deficit-to-GDP ratio in a way that is really going to be a good foundation for long-term growth. Now, once we get that done, that takes a huge piece of business off the table.
Say what? Four trillion dollars of deficit-reduction, otherwise known as economic contraction. Really? If Obama strikes such a deal, it guarantees that a sluggish economy will continue.
Oh, and I almost forgot. The Register was so appreciative of Obama for releasing the transcript and so persuaded by his economic logic that they endorsed Mitt Romney.
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Sandy and the President
Sandy's aftermath offers the President a chance for transformational change.
Rather than use Sandy to offer a call for more austerity, he can offer hope for so many who are suffering right now, including those outside the path of Sandy.
Right after the election, or even in his next State of the Union, he can offer a bold vision for America, one that will offer hope to the millions and millions of unemployed and their families.
Atrios
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To suggest that the response to the storm impact might improve the economy is not to suggest that the storm is somehow a good thing, but a quick mobilization of resources to complete necessary repairs could temporarily boost employment and improve business for companies producing and selling construction materials. There would also be additional multiplier effects of this spending on the economy, as workers and business owners spend their increased wages and profits.
But this could be true even absent widespread storm damage. Speeding up other infrastructure repair projects would also put people back to work. For example, many cities have aging water systems that experience regular costly water main breaks. These projects don't need costly studies or lengthy environmental impact reports and could be implemented almost immediately. Buy materials, dig up the streets, replace the pipes, repair the streets and pay your workers. They are truly shovel ready projects in need of funding.
Sadly, fiscal austerity is all the rage in Washington, and state and local governments are limited in their ability to raise additional revenues and enact additional spending in a depressed economy. There are 575,000 fewer public sector jobs than there were when President Barack Obama was inaugurated. These job losses have been a drag on the economy, hindering the recovery.
But it doesn't have to be this way. The federal government could provide additional money to state and local governments to fund improvements in public infrastructure, putting people back to work doing useful and necessary things and boosting the overall economy in the process.
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We need to rebuild what Sandy destroyed.
We need to repair our infrastructure.
We need jobs.
We need to continue what the President began in his first term: sustainable green energy industries and transportation.
We cannot let the plutocrats control the debate, control the recovery.