House Republican leaders used the new economic forecast from the Congressional Budget Office to criticize their Democratic counterparts for slowing the creation of jobs.And check out this hilarious bit of editorializing in what purports to be a “news” story from The Daily Tucker…
“The bottom line in this underwhelming report [is that] … President Obama’s policies are continuing to make it harder for the private sector to create jobs, and that’s continuing to make it harder to balance the federal budget,” Speaker of the House John Boehner wrote in a statement.
The Republicans’ focus on jobs, rather than deficits, reflects recent polling that shows swing-voters are more concerned about high unemployment than high deficits.Really? Anybody see a jobs bill from this bunch? Anybody?
And it sounds like Orange Man and his pals actually like the CBO now, doesn’t it?
Wonder why they didn’t here last January, when the CBO said that trying to repeal the health care law would add $230 billion to the deficit?
What a bunch of frauds (and here is an important reminder from Dem U.S. House Rep Joe Crowley).
Update 9/1/11: Oops, looks like the Repugs don't like the CBO again (here).
Well, seeing that gay marriage enjoys enough support to allow that state to become the sixth in the country to legalize gay marriage (here), I would be inclined to think that Gallagher and her pals will have to look somewhere else for a “wedge” issue (at the moment, Weprin appears to lead Turner by six points, as noted here).
As for the Repug candidate, Turner attacked Weprin for supporting the “ground zero mosque” here and also claimed that the Zadroga Bill shouldn’t cover volunteers who aided with 9/11 rescue and recovery here. So yeah, it looks like Turner is a good little Repug who would be a dutiful servant to the House Repug “leadership” (and more on Weprin is here).
Boeing’s aircraft assembly has long been done by its unionized labor force in Puget Sound, Wash. Most of the new (787) Dreamliners will be built in Puget Sound as well. But with the plane so far behind schedule, Boeing decided to spend $750 million to open the South Carolina facility. Between the two plants, the company hopes to build 10 Dreamliners a month.I don’t know of a “government agency” dictating where a company makes its products either. However, I would suggest that providing tax incentives to companies to offshore our jobs, to say nothing of signing crappy trade deals into law, helps to “dictate where a company makes its products” also, and I don’t hear anything near the squawking on that that we should be hearing as far as I’m concerned.
That’s the plan, at least. The Obama administration, however, has a different plan. In April, the National Labor Relations Board filed a complaint against Boeing, accusing it of opening the South Carolina plant to retaliate against the union, which has a history of striking at contract time. The N.L.R.B.’s proposed solution, believe it or not, is to move all the Dreamliner production back to Puget Sound, leaving those 5,000 workers in South Carolina twiddling their thumbs.
Seriously, when has a government agency ever tried to dictate where a company makes its products? I can’t ever remember it happening. Neither can Boeing, which is fighting the complaint. J. Michael Luttig, Boeing’s general counsel, has described the action as “unprecedented.” He has also said that it was a disservice to a country that is “in desperate need of economic growth and the concomitant job creation.” He’s right.
Also, it should be noted that, in the 2008 Boeing strike, workers ended up losing $7 grand in salary, which demonstrates yet again that labor strikes rarely have clear winners and losers (here). And in ’09, Boeing said here they had to open the S.C. plant because they couldn’t get a no-strike deal with the machinists, but now, they say they would have opened the S.C. plant “regardless of the labor issue,” which sounds like a flip-flop to me (and as noted here, Boeing originally committed to a second plant in Puget Sound in ‘07, but switched to South Carolina in ’09…so, as far as I’m concerned, they went back on their word concerning their original deal).
In addition (here)…
Boeing executives, including (Boeing Commercial Airplanes President and Chief Executive Jim Albaugh), have been saying good things about the importance of engineering in recent months and have shown “some signs” of following through on that talk, (Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace union spokesman Bill Dugovich) said.I’m willing to entertain a discussion on the merits of the Obama Administration’s efforts to tell Boeing to keep its aerospace jobs in Puget Sound. However, there are plenty of other examples of companies leaving their workforces high and dry for purposes of both on and offshoring, so when one comes along where unionized workers are being protected and they’re getting the work done…well, just don’t expect me to be terribly sympathetic to the company line, that’s all.
“We’re looking forward to seeing more of that,” he said. “It’s good to hear the president of BCA say they’ve outsourced too much and they won’t outsource key technologies in the future again. Certainly the wing technology is one technology we pointed out repeatedly that that’s just a critical skill and institutional knowledge that should stay within the Boeing Company.”
As for production certainty and cost control, Dugovich said: “We recognize that those are important concerns for Boeing, and they’re concerns for us, too.”
In a letter to union machinists, International Association of Machinists District 751 President Tom Wroblewski agreed with Albaugh’s statements about the Puget Sound aerospace workers, outsourcing, Washington’s business climate and the desirability of putting future commercial airplane programs in the area.
“As far as his comments about strikes and wages go, well, I found it interesting that he’d say something like that just days after he and CEO Jim McNerney both collected $3 million bonuses,” Wroblewski wrote.
(More from Media Matters – turns out that Nocera’s column is more appalling than I imagined…he pledged to write another column about Republicans and non-job creation later, so it sounds like we have more false equivalency on display here.)
The answer to what the proper role of government is really lies in what kind of country we want to have. And I think the vast majority of Americans share a common vision for what they want our nation to be. They want our nation to be two things at the same time.In response, I give you the following…
Number one: they want it to be free and prosperous, a place where your economic hopes and dreams can be accomplished and brought up to fruition. That through hard work and sacrifice you can be who God meant you to be. No matter who your parents were, no matter where you were born, no matter how much misfortune you may have met in your life, if you have a good idea, you can be anything if you work hard and play by the rules. Most, if not all, Americans share that vision of a free and prosperous America.
But they also want us to be a compassionate America, a place where people are not left behind. We are a nation that is not going to tolerate those who cannot take care of themselves being left to fend for themselves. We’re not going to tolerate our children being punished for the errors of their parents and society.
So, we are a nation that aspires to two things – prosperity and compassion. And Ronald Reagan understood that.
Rubio called for raising the age of eligibility to receive Social Security benefits here – so much for compassion. He opposed adding immigrants to the census here.
Of course, Rubio favors tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations (here).
And that including making the Dubya tax cuts permanent (here).
Also, did I mention Rubio’s education plan cuts tax credits for low-income families to help rich pay for private schools (here)?
And as long as I’m on the subjects of The Gipper and “compassion,” I’d also like to offer the following quote (from here)…
“Is it news that some fellow out in South Succotash somewhere has just been laid off?” (3/16/82)That Ronnie sure could turn a phrase, couldn’t he?
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