http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2010_11/026717.php
THE WRONG QUESTION AT THE WRONG TIME.... CBS News sent around a press release yesterday afternoon about a special "In Focus: Debt and Deficit," hosted by Katie Couric.
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But while the mistakes were glaring and important, I was more troubled by the basis of the report itself. The deficit matters, but not nearly as much as the ongoing employment crisis. Where's our "In Focus: Jobs and Economic Growth"?
The media/political establishment keeps asking the wrong question. .
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The establishment tends to ignore liberal hippies on this, but maybe they'll listen to Time's Joe Klein, an establishment member in good standing, who asks this week, "Why are we spending so much time and effort bloviating about long-term deficits and so little trying to untangle the immediate economic mess that we're in?"
Poll after poll lately has shown the same, consistent result: the public wants policymakers to focus on jobs and the economy, not deficits and the debt.
The conversation seems to have gotten wildly off track in Washington, and it's not getting better. Republicans' first post-election priority yesterday was going after NPR and opposing unemployment aid that boosts the economy. Going forward, the emboldened GOP wants to gut health care, cut spending, and protect a failed tax policy -- but creating jobs isn't part of the gameplan.
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I WIll be up to President Obama and congressional Dems to try to get the political world focused again
All more reasons while these talks of compromising are crazy. The GOP does not care about creating jobs. They care about defeating Obama in 2012, and if it takes sabotaging the economy for this to happen, so be it.