3 Things You Have to Know About the Bogus 'Fiscal Cliff'

By Larry Beinhart

November 23, 2012  |  Obama won. Romney lost. That is a crisis averted and a very good thing.

But the contest is hardly over. The election was essentially an intermission in a long drama over economics. What’s going to happen in the upcoming act? A sharp change? Muddled compromise? A new stalemate?

According to the coming attractions, the episode up next is a really big action scene: The Fiscal Cliff!

Wall Street manipulates deficit angst with fiscal cliff fear

Deficit hawks rely on media allies to report budget doom to advance their agenda of cutting Medicare and social security

Dean Baker
guardian.co.uk, Monday 3 December 2012 13.49 EST

Many of the nation's most important news outlets openly embrace the agenda of the rich and powerful that colors its coverage of major economic issues. This is perhaps nowhere better demonstrated than during the current budget standoff between President Obama and Congress, which the media routinely describes as the "fiscal cliff". This terminology seriously misrepresents the nature of the budget dispute, as everyone in the debate has acknowledged. There is no "cliff" currently facing the budget or the economy.

If no deal is reached this year, then on 1 January, daily tax withholdings will rise by an average of about $4 per person. Any money actually deducted from pay checks will be refunded if a deal is subsequently reached that returns tax rates to 2012 levels. Government spending probably won't change at the start of the new year, since President Obama has considerable discretion over the flow of spending. No one can think that this modest increase in tax withholdings would plunge the economy into a recession, but the Wall Street types seeking to dismantle social security and Medicare have used their enormous wealth and allies in the media to generate this kind of fear-mongering across the country.

Paul Krugman: Welcome Back to the Dark Ages

Quite a few bloggers are having fun with Senator Marco Rubio's bobbing and weaving in response to a question from GQ magazine during a recent interview:

GQ: How old do you think the Earth is?

Marco Rubio: I'm not a scientist, man. I can tell you what recorded history says, I can tell you what the Bible says, but I think that's a dispute amongst theologians and I think it has nothing to do with the gross domestic product or economic growth of the United States. I think the age of the universe has zero to do with how our economy is going to grow. ... I think parents should be able to teach their kids what their faith says, what science says. Whether the Earth was created in seven days, or seven actual eras, I'm not sure we'll ever be able to answer that. It's one of the great mysteries.

OPINION: the behind-the-scenes battle that could subvert Obamacare

Complex state level battle over stop-loss coverage could eliminate crucial consumer protections

By Wendell Potter | 6:00 am, December 3, 2012, Updated: 6:00 am, December 3, 2012

I’ve written before about the tight relationships between health insurance companies and organizations that claim to represent the interests of small employers, specifically the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the National Federation of Independent Business.

Those two groups have accepted hundreds of millions of dollars over the past two decades from the insurance industry in an effort to kill or weaken health reform initiatives designed to protect consumers, including those who work for small businesses.

The Chamber was the insurers’ organization of choice to derail Obamacare. During 2009 and 2010, America’s Health Insurance Plans —the major industry trade group— funneled more than $100 million of policyholders’ money to the Chamber’s anti-reform advertising campaign.

How Wall Street Hollowed Out Industrial America

Forget the fiscal cliff. America's real problem is a Wall Street that has eaten up industrial America and threatens to consume the rest of us.

—By Steve Fraser | Mon Dec. 3, 2012 11:03 AM PST

"Debtpocalypse" looms. Depending on who wins out in Washington, we're told, we will either free fall over the fiscal cliff or take a terrifying slide to the pit at the bottom. Grim as these scenarios might seem, there is something confected about the mise-en-scène, like an un-fun Playland. After all, there is no fiscal cliff, or at least there was none—until the two parties built it.

And yet the pit exists. It goes by the name of "austerity." However, it didn't just appear in time for the last election season or the lame-duck session of Congress to follow. It was dug more than a generation ago, and has been getting wider and deeper ever since. Millions of people have long made it their home. "Debtpocalypse" is merely the latest installment in a tragic, 40-year-old story of the dispossession of American working people.

For Pete's Sake, What's Happened to Our Democracy?

December 5, 2012 · By Sam Pizzigati
One billionaire has the wherewithal to totally redirect America's political discourse.

Down through the millennia, specific individuals have changed the course of history. Some made their indelible mark through their intellect, some through their courage, and still others through the depth and breadth of their vision.

But you don't need smarts, courage, or vision to change history. You just need a ton of money, the sort of fortune that 86-year-old Peter Peterson has amassed over his years wheeling and dealing on Wall Street.

GOP Offers to Throw Middle Class, Elderly Over the “Fiscal Cliff”

By Richard Eskow | December 4, 2012

The Republican Party has a message for the American people: Meet the new deal, same as the old deal. The GOP “counter-offer” to the President’s fiscal-cliff proposal isn’t really an offer at all: It’s a rehash of the tired and extremist right-wing economic warfare which the American people soundly rejected last month.

But a political tin ear is the least of the shortcomings Republicans bring to this debate. This rehash of their old, rejected budget ideas is a formula for reducing the United States of America to a crumbling and poverty-haunted land where the young have no opportunities, the middle class is struggling to survive, and the aged live in misery and fear.

Paul Krugman: The Big Budget Mumble

In the ongoing battle of the budget, President Obama has done something very cruel. Declaring that this time he won’t negotiate with himself, he has refused to lay out a proposal reflecting what he thinks Republicans want. Instead, he has demanded that Republicans themselves say, explicitly, what they want. And guess what: They can’t or won’t do it.

No, really. While there has been a lot of bluster from the G.O.P. about how we should reduce the deficit with spending cuts, not tax increases, no leading figures on the Republican side have been able or willing to specify what, exactly, they want to cut. 

And there’s a reason for this reticence. The fact is that Republican posturing on the deficit has always been a con game, a play on the innumeracy of voters and reporters. Now Mr. Obama has demanded that the G.O.P. put up or shut up — and the response is an aggrieved mumble.

Tax Incentives to Companies Bleeding Towns Dry, With Few Results

Sunday, 02 December 2012 09:51 
By Louise Story, The New York Times News Service | Report 

In the end, the money that towns across America gave General Motors did not matter.

When the automaker released a list of factories it was closing during bankruptcy three years ago, communities that had considered themselves G.M.’s business partners were among the targets.

For years, mayors and governors anxious about local jobs had agreed to G.M.’s demands for cash rewards, free buildings, worker training and lucrative tax breaks. As late as 2007, the company was telling local officials that these sorts of incentives would “further G.M.’s strong relationship” with them and be a “win/win situation,” according to town council notes from one Michigan community.