Robert Reich gives Obama an A minus ...

[kentuck]

on his latest speech. That is high praise coming from someone who has been fairly critical of the President lately.

On the Lawrence O'Donnell show last night, he said he gave the high grade because it was the morally right and the politically right thing to do.

The President had to take a stand. If he can stick to his guns, he may win re-election yet? The people needed to hear those words from the President.

A good place for the President to start is with folks like Robert Reich...

[pipoman]

1. And I give Robert Reich a big fat fucking F

The free trade labor secretary should crawl under a very small rock..

[Owlet]

4. Aww..cut Bob Reich a little slack

He's for free trade, sure, but has the smarts to see that it hasn't worked out the way it could have. Call him naive if you want to, but I don't think he belongs under a rock.



"Traditional big-business Republicans support trade. But the tea partiers who are taking over the GOP don't. An astonishing 61 percent of people who describe themselves as "Tea Party sympathizers" say trade is bad for America. That's close to the 65 percent of union families who are against trade."

Think about it. The ground troops for both parties -- tea party Republicans and union Democrats -- believe free trade is bad.
<snip>

Neither trade nor immigration has been responsible for the huge job losses of the Great Recession. These losses have been due to the bursting housing bubble and collapse of domestic demand.

But dig deeper and you'll find a longer-term truth about trade. While all of us have benefited from access to lower-cost products made abroad, the burdens of free trade have fallen disproportionately on what we used to call the working class.

Globalization is part of reason the median wage of male workers hasn't risen in three decades, adjusted for inflation. Starting in the late 1970s, technologies like cargo ships, containers, and satellite communications, followed by computers and the Internet, enabled companies to efficiently parcel out work around the world wherever it could be done most cheaply. The result has been to undermine unions and destroy many good-paying routine jobs in America.

Meanwhile, the biggest benefits have gone to the top -- to executives of U.S. global corporations, Wall Street financiers, big-name entertainers, and the most successful digital entrepreneurs. All have been sufficiently educated and well-connected, or lucky enough, to find a huge and growing global market for what they sell.

The consequence has been a degree of inequality not seen in this country since the late 1920s.

The winners from globalization have gained so much that they could have fully compensated the losers and still come out ahead. They could have financed better schools and free higher education for most Americans, along with wage subsidies that brought almost everyone up to a higher standard of living.

But they didn't. Instead, they fought to keep their tax shelters, loopholes, and lower marginal rates, and they fought against more outlays for public investments and social safety nets. Wall Street got bailed out but Main Street got zilch."

huffingtonpost.com/robert-reich/the-emerging-antitrade

[FBaggins]

2. Which raises an obvious question...

... Was he able to do it with a straight face?

[digitaln3rd]

3. A speech means nothing.

He's done a thousand speeches.. let's see some action if he really wants to impress us.

[MatthewStLouis]

5. The President is on the right track...

Reich is right. It was heartening to hear the President express in clear terms that he isn't going to back down or compromise his way out of a victory on the Jobs bill fight. It's a win-win for democrats. Unfortunately, it's not that clear for our economy. When the republicans, in their campaign to destroy Obama, don't pass the Jobs bill; our economy will miss out on a much needed boost.

Let's hope democrats in congress and those running for congress, don't back down on the class warfare fight. Obama has given them something to run on. If democrats can't fight for the middle class, who the hell are they fighting for? (Don't answer that. I'm sure some can be paid for by soulless amoral corporations, just like republicans.)

[mmonk]

6. Speeches are nice when there is no risk.

Republicans hold the House now. If something bold had at least been proposed when we had majorities we likely won't see again for awhile, the possibility we wouldn't have gotten in this bad of a mess would have been higher.

[lonestarnot]

7. Give that man a job in the cabinet!