Punting the Pundits: Sunday Preview Edition

Punting the Punditsis an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

The Sunday Talking Heads:

This Week with Christiane Amanpour: ABC News Senior White House Correspondent Jake Tapper is still hosting. He will have separate interviews with former Utah governor and U.S. Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman and top Obama campaign adviser David Axelrod.

The roundtable with George Will, political strategist Donna Brazile, Jeff Zeleny of the New York Times, Republican pollster Frank Luntz, and Liz Claman of FOX Business Network size up the economic outlook and the 2012 field.

Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer: Chief White House Correspondent Norah O’Donnell sits in for Bob Schieffer; she’ll talk to Sen. John McCain (R-AZ), economist Mark Zandi, plus a key voice from each party: former RNC Chair Ed Gillespie, & former DNC Chair Terry McAuliffe.

The Chris Matthews Show: This week’s guests, Katty Kay, BBC Washington Correspondent, John Heilemann, New York Magazine National Political Correspondent, Rick Stengel, TIME Managing Editor and Helene Cooper, The New York Times White House Correspondent, will discuss:

Is Perry like Reagan, the Westerner who can defeat the establishment Romney and in bad economic times, would Perry’s far right rhetoric get overlooked?

Meet the Press with David Gregory: Obama for America Campaign adviser, Robert Gibbs and former President Bush budget director, Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels (R) are guests in separate interviews.

The roundtable with former Tennessee congressman, Harold Ford, Jr. (D); columnist for the Wall Street Journal Peggy Noonan; columnist for the Washington Post, E.J. Dionne; and host of CNBC’s Closing Bell, Maria Bartiromo, will discuss developments and analysis of the Republican field and the political landscape.

State of the Union with Candy Crowley: Obama campaign adviser David Axelrod sits down for another interview. Governors Bob McDonnell (R) of Virginia and Martin O’Malley (D) of Maryland, chairs of their party’s governors associations will discuss how they are handling the economic downturn in their states. Congressional Black Caucus member Rep. Elijah Cummings of Maryland discusses job in black communities. U.S. economic editor of The Economist Greg Ip and Editor of Thomson Reuters Digital Chrystia Freeland discuss the stock marker.

Eugene Robinson: Where’s the Syria Plan?

Washington – It’s hard to argue with President Obama’s call for Bashar al-Assad, the bloodthirsty Syrian dictator, to step down. But it’s also hard to discern any logic or consistency in the administration’s handling of the ongoing tumult in the Arab world.

It is obvious that Assad, like Libyan strongman Moammar Gaddafi, has no intention of surrendering power voluntarily. It is also clear that Assad’s savagery is a match for Gaddafi’s. Both used armored columns to put down peaceful protests. Both ordered assassinations and arrests. Both used naval vessels to shell cities that had become hotbeds of unrest.

So do we give Assad the Gaddafi treatment? Does Obama follow up his statement with a barrage of cruise missiles? Do we involve ourselves in yet another Middle Eastern war?

William Rivers Pitt: The Unacceptables

All you need is ignorance and confidence and the success is sure. ~ Mark Twain

And so begins again the Herculean task of wrapping my poor, abused mind around yet another crop of Faustian caricatures lined up to scrap and scrape for the Republican presidential nomination. They seem to get worse every year, but this time around, there are definitely a lot more bananas in the bunch.

Let’s see. We have Newt Gingrich, who pointedly continues to declare that he remains a viable candidate, despite having blown four tires and an engine immediately after leaving the starting line. We have Rick Santorum, whose name, when Googled, is given a whole new definition that appears at the top of the search engine list (presumably despite the best efforts of Mr. Santorum’s campaign and supporters). There is Ron Paul, whose much-ballyhooed libertarianism fails to encompass his desire to give the Federal government whole and complete control of a woman’s reproductive process.  There is Jon Huntsman, who seems like a fairly balanced guy (he has openly declared his belief in evolution and global warming), which means he is utterly doomed in the GOP primary chase. There’s Herman Cain, Gary Johnson, Thaddeus McCotter, and Buddy Roemer, too…and if you said “Who?” to any or all of those names, you’re far from alone.

Edward B. Barbier: Economics is Always the First Casualty of Politics

Both the past wild week of debt negotiations in Congress as well as the debt downgrade of the US by Standard & Poor represents once again the Barbier dictum: Economics is always the first casualty of politics.

In my opinion, the Obama Administration made a fundamental mistake earlier this year in not endorsing the Bowles-Simpson plan on deficit reduction that called for a combination of revenue increases, spending cuts and entitlement and tax reforms as the basis of a plan for deficit reduction over the medium term, while at the same time arguing that there is the need for continued government spending on selected infrastructure and investment opportunities in the short term while continuing to be in recession.  From the beginning of the 2008-9 recession, such short-term government spending needed to be supported by a number of economic incentives and policies to stimulate private sector investment, too.  However, as long as the US economy remains in a recession with lack of consumer or private investment spending, public sector spending in the short term is necessary.  But by adopting the Bowles-Simpson plan immediately, the Obama Administration would have signaled to the markets and the rating agencies that tackling US deficits and debt in the medium and long term, once economic recovery had started in earnest, would be the main priority.