WH Looks Arrogant, Clueless on Gitmo
Michael Goodwin, New York Post
Eric Holder is too good for America. He knows best — he said so himself! — yet this nation of fools and bigots, aided and abetted by a cowardly Congress, won't heed his word.Such, in essence, is the graceless view of the attorney general of the United States. Because the public overwhelmingly opposed his harebrained idea of giving a civilian trial to the 9/11 plotters, and because even a Democratic-led Congress responded by blocking any money for a trial, Holder is forced to hold his nose and assign the case to a military tribunal.
Dems Playing Into Tea Partiers’ Agenda?
Michael Tomasky, The Guardian
Back during the Vietnam war an antiwar senator is reputed to have said that the United States should just declare victory and go home. I've been reminded of this story watching the Tea Party element in Congress these last few days, because on the cusp of a more than respectable first-round victory, they're trying to declare defeat.To get you quickly up to speed, the deadline for a budget agreement looms on Friday. Congress has already passed two stopgap spending bills to keep the government functioning – for three weeks, then two. Republicans say there'll be no…
A U.S. Fiscal Crisis Is in Spitting Distance
Laurence Kotlikoff, Bloomberg
The two parties are having a heated debate over the Republican plan to slice $61 billion off Uncle Sam’s projected $3.6 trillion budget. If the Republicans get their way, the deficit will fall from 9.5 percent of gross domestic product to 9.1 percent. If they don’t, they’ll probably shut the government for a couple of days. Then they’ll compromise on, say, a $40 billion budget cut, having proved they gave it their best shot.
