When Low Is Mistaken For High (Tea and Taxes)

"Still, at the very moment anti-tax protesters were emerging as the most powerful force in American politics, handing Republicans landslide control of the U.S. House, the data show that people were sending the smallest portion of their income to the federal government since 1979."

- Lori Montgomery in "In 2009, Americans paid lowest federal tax rates in 30 years"

Private sector recovery relatively good; would have been better if it weren't for govt layoffs

"The economy created more private sector jobs after the recession than we did in 1991 or 2011. Yes, this is like bragging about the heat coming off a warm ice cube. Yes, we fell further and had more room to catch up. But Obama's recovery doesn't look like either of the Bush recoveries because Obama oversaw total decline in government employment and Bush I and II oversaw a growing public sector."

- Derek Thompson in "Was Obama's Recovery the Worst in Modern Times, or the Best in 20 Years?"

Horsey on Socialists Everywhere

from David Horsey's "Ultraconservatives see socialists everywhere"

Why polarization? Sharp rightward move of the GOP

"political scientists Keith Poole and Howard Rosenthal, who have long tracked historical trends in political polarization, said their studies of congressional votes found that Republicans are now more conservative than they have been in more than a century. Their data show a dramatic uptick in polarization, mostly caused by the sharp rightward move of the GOP."

-- Thomas E. Mann and Norman J. Ornstein in "Let’s just say it: The Republicans are the problem."

From Kenneth Thomas's "Social Security Hurt by Republican Jobs Obstructionism",

"What we see from the Trustees Report is that as jobs and income decline, Social Security is directly harmed. And I'm starting to have the feeling that for the Republicans, this is a feature, not a bug."

Now is the Key Time to Invest in Infrastructure

From Now is the Key Time to Invest in Infrastructure,

"The report he referenced, published on Friday by the Treasury Department with the Council of Economic Advisers, found that right now is the key time to invest in infrastructure to create middle-class jobs, increase our long-term competiveness, and support a more secure energy future. Unemployment among construction workers stands at over 17 percent right now and has averaged 15.6 percent for the past twelve months. Overall, the unemployment rate among those expected to gain jobs from investment in infrastructure has averaged approximately 13 percent over the past twelve months.  These investments create middle-class jobs – 80 percent of the jobs created are in the construction sector, the manufacturing sector, and the retail and wholesale trade sectors – where nearly 90 percent of the jobs have middle-class wages."

How Many Must Lack An Employer-Sponsored Insurance Option Before We Can Get A Public Option?

According to the report "Great Recession Accelerated Long-Term Decline of Employer Health Coverage",

"Between 2007 and 2010, the share of children and working-age adults in the United States with employer-sponsored health insurance dropped 10 percentage points from 63.6 percent to 53.5 percent, according to a new national study by the Center for Studying Health System Change (HSC)."

This isn't a new trend ... just a spike in the trend.

And yet, while the employer-sponsored system declines, conservatives continue to stand against a public option. How much further will the employer-based system have to fall apart before we can have at least a public option if not a full single-payer system?