#1 – Romney’s policies would “push us deeper into recession and make the recovery slower.” according to two economists - article HERE.
“Are all these things going to reduce the unemployment rate from eight to five in two years? No,” Joel Prakken, the chairman of Macroeconomic Advisers, tells me. He described Romney’s ideas as a “a bundle of reasonable policy proposals that could well stimulate the economy from the supply side over a number of years, but would do little to stimulate aggregate demand in the short run. The reason that unemployment is as high as it is is inadequate aggregrate demand, not inadequate supply.”
“On net, all of these policies would do more harm in the short term,” added Mark Hopkins, a senior adviser at Moody’s Analytics. “If we implemented all of his policies, it would push us deeper into recession and make the recovery slower.”
#2 – Union membership in the U.S. is at a modern low – article HERE.
#3 – George W. Bush has an approval rating of 43% with 54% rating him unfavorably. Remember – on his last day of office – he had a 75% approval rating among Republicans…which utterly blows my mind. Article HERE.
When asked in the survey whether they are better or worse off than they were four years ago, Americans are split, 44% to 43%. But when asked whether they are better or worse off than they were four years ago “when Bush was president,” a small gap opens – 47% say they are better off compared to 41% who say they are worse off.
#4 – Rand Paul put out a budget that is every Tea Party person’s dream … article HERE.
Dana Milbank has pointed out, Paul’s plan would:
cut the average Social Security recipient’s benefits by nearly 40 percent, reduce defense spending by nearly $100 billion below a level the Pentagon calls “devastating,” and end the current Medicare program in two years — even for current recipients, according to the Senate Budget Committee staff. It would eliminate the education, energy, housing and commerce departments, decimate homeland security, eviscerate programs for the poor, and give the wealthy a bonanza by reducing tax rates to 17 percent and eliminating taxes on capital gains and dividends.
#5 – Goldman Sachs is manipulating commodities prices for aluminum. They are warehousing 25% of the world’s inventory – article HERE.
A string of warehouses in Detroit, most of them operated by Goldman, has stockpiled more than a million tonnes of the industrial metal aluminum, about a quarter of global reported inventories.
Simply storing all that metal generates tens of millions of dollars in rental revenues for Goldman every year.
There’s just one problem: much less aluminum is leaving the depots than arriving, creating a supply pinch for manufacturers of everything from soft drink cans to aircraft.
#6 – (video) Top 5 Obama celebrity fundraisers – article HERE.
#7- Republicans vote to block transparency of political ads – article HERE.
Rep. Jo Ann Emerson, R-Mo., chair of the financial services and general government subcommittee of the House appropriations committee, added language to an appropriations bill ordering that no funds to be used to implement the disclosure rule. The bill, which passed the subcommittee Wednesday, funds the FCC and other agencies for fiscal year 2013.
The move by Emerson adds another question mark to the process of creating an FCC website with political ad data. At a subcommittee hearing Wednesday, a Democratic amendment to remove the Emerson language was defeated on a party line vote.
#8 – Russian mathemtician says global finance is a ponzi scheme – article HERE.
Now he’s back with an even more audacious endeavor: the honest scam. Last year, he announced the new project, MMM-2011, by stating boldly that it would be another Ponzi scheme. “Even if you strictly follow all instructions, you can still lose,” he wrote on a website describing the project. “Your ‘winnings’ may be withheld without any explanation or reason whatsoever.” Depositors would be paid solely from funds invested by other depositors. There would be no attempt to generate income in any other way. This, he said, was perfectly all right, and no different than the way some of the largest institutions in global finance operated, from the Russian pension fund to the U.S. Federal Reserve.
#9 - Ann Romney Says Husband Has Deeply Principled Side No One Ever Sees In Public – article HERE.
“Sure, on TV, Mitt might seem like a shameless opportunist who stands for absolutely nothing, but at home he’s actually just an ordinary guy with a decent sense of morality,” Romney said of her partner of 43 years. ”I’ve known this man almost my whole life, and I can tell you that, off camera, there are just so many things he cares about in a completely non-politically-motivated way.”
“I realize in debates and interviews he comes off as this completely amoral corporatist who couldn’t be more out of touch with average Americans—heck, sometimes even I roll my eyes,” Romney continued with a chuckle. ”But when he’s out of the spotlight and just hanging out with me or his grandkids, enjoying the weekend, you’d be amazed. To us, he’s just regular old person-with-genuine-moral-convictions Mitt.”
#10 - Clinton: Assad ‘must transfer power and depart Syria’ – article HERE.
