“Punting the Pundits” is 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.
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Paul Krugman: A War on the Poor
John Kasich, the Republican governor of Ohio, has done some surprising things lately. First, he did an end run around his state’s Legislature – controlled by his own party – to proceed with the federally funded expansion of Medicaid that is an important piece of Obamacare. Then, defending his action, he let loose on his political allies, declaring, “I’m concerned about the fact there seems to be a war on the poor. That, if you’re poor, somehow you’re shiftless and lazy.”
Obviously Mr. Kasich isn’t the first to make this observation. But the fact that it’s coming from a Republican in good standing (although maybe not anymore), indeed someone who used to be known as a conservative firebrand, is telling. Republican hostility toward the poor and unfortunate has now reached such a fever pitch that the party doesn’t really stand for anything else – and only willfully blind observers can fail to see that reality.
The big question is why. But, first, let’s talk a bit more about what’s eating the right.
Dean Baker: The Trans-Pacific Partnership: A Trade Agreement for Protectionists
The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) stands at the top of the Obama administration’s trade agenda. The argument from its supporters is that this agreement is part of the never ending quest for freer trade. The evidence from what we know of this still secret pact is that the TPP has little to do with free trade. It can more accurately be described as a pact designed to increase the wealth and power of crony capitalists.
At this point, with few exceptions formal trade barriers, such as tariffs and quotas, are not very large. If lowering or eliminating the formal barriers that remain were the main agenda of this pact, there would be relatively little interest. Rather, the purpose of the pact is to use an international trade agreement to create a regulatory structure that is much more favorable to corporate interests than they would be able to get through the domestic political process in the United States and in the other countries in the pact.
The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit was unwise to put a stay on the necessary remedies Judge Shira Scheindlin of Federal District Court in Manhattan ordered in August in response to the civil rights violations of New York City’s stop-and-frisk policy. And it overreached in taking the extraordinary step of removing Judge Scheindlin from the long-running litigation. [..]
Judge Scheindlin did not strike down the program, which, when properly used, is an important crime-fighting tool. But she sensibly ordered the city to use it in a manner that does not discriminate against minorities and that complied with constitutional protections against unreasonable search and seizure. Under the Fourth Amendment, police officers can legally detain people on the street when there is a reasonable suspicion that the person is committing, has committed or is about to commit a crime. In addition to violating people’s rights, the program, as practiced for years in New York, undermined trust in the Police Department in black and Hispanic communities throughout the city.
Given all the damage done by this program, the next mayor should end this saga by withdrawing the city’s appeal and instituting the cogent reforms laid out by Judge Scheindlin.
Richard (RJ) Eskow: Confirm Mel Watt Now
The Senate’s role in presidential nominations is usually described as “advise and consent,” not “obstruct and prevent.” And yet, continuing their extreme break with past Senatorial traditions and practice, Senate Republicans rejected another Presidential nomination on Thursday. Even so-called “moderate” Republicans like Susan Collins of Maine turned their back on civility and good government by refusing to break a filibuster against Rep. Mel Watt’s nomination to head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency.
The President has chosen Rep. Watt to replace Bush appointee Edward DeMarco at the FHFA, and Republicans are refusing to even allow a vote on his nomination. The FHFA is responsible for lending giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which the government was forced to bail out after the privatization of these enterprises turned out to be a disaster. As the Los Angeles Times reported, Republicans are afraid that Rep. Watt might “take more aggressive steps to help the housing market, such as reducing principal on mortgages.”
That would cut into Wall Street’s profits. As the old saying goes: Follow the money.
Nan Aron: Republicans’ D.C. Circuit Freak-out Endangers Justice
On Tuesday, I testified at a House Judiciary Committee hearing that posed the nonsensical question, “Are More Judges Always the Answer?”
This is a committee whose Republican members include Darrell Issa, Steve King, and Louie Gohmert, so it will come as no shock to anyone that a topic that sounds like a segment on a Fox News show was not designed to dispassionately explore the nuances of judicial nominations and the workloads of federal judges.
So what was this hearing really about?
It turns out it was actually about President Obama’s nomination of three highly qualified individuals to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, the court right below the Supreme Court in importance. You might ask why the House of Representatives is conducting a hearing on a subject that is the constitutional purview of the Senate, but the future of the D.C. Circuit is so important that it’s getting the full right-wing, high-volume Sturm und Drang treatment, even in places it doesn’t belong.
William Pfaff: Spying Scandal Makes Clear That Europe Must Declare Independence
The crisis caused in Europe by American intelligence interceptions of its allies’ electronic communications derives from a problem Europeans have known and put up with since the Second World War. The time has come to call a halt.
It can only be solved with drastic actions that assert European sovereignty and a salutary shock of defiance to longstanding American presumptions of international impunity and repeated acts in disregard of international law, as well as of commercial and diplomatic convention and tradition.
This problem is America’s asserted domination-active or implicit/potential-over West European affairs.
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