Author: Robert Borosage

The Obama administration has made its first serious misstep. No, it wasn’t the wooing of ingrate Republicans, or the dining with clueless reactionary pundits. It is much more significant. Faced with the failure of Paulson—Bernanke banking bailout, the Obama administration has decided to double down. The new plan, described in broad outline by Treasury Secretary […]

What will the Obama administration do with the banks that are now on life support? Pump in more taxpayers’ money to keep the zombies alive? Radical surgery? Pull the plug? The decision – with new announcements rumored for next week — is critical to any recovery plan. We’re not really invited to this discussion. This […]

We are headed into the most ambitious era of progressive economic reform since the New Deal. The crisis leaves little alternative, as job losses mount across the country and the world. The Obama administration has hit the ground running, pushing to pass an $800 billion plus recovery plan, scrambling to put together a new plan […]

“A man whose father less than 60 years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.” It was not the words, but this transcendent reality that evoked the tears at Barack Obama’s inauguration Tuesday. The somber eloquence of the new president, the […]

Longtime friend, Mark Steitz, an irrepressible Washington wit, described the potential threat posed by Osama bin Laden’s new arsenal: If bin Laden were smart, he’d disband his terrorist cells, and instead buy ad time on radio and TV stations. The ads could be simple: ‘Remember Americans, Your mortgage is a non recourse loan. You can […]

In their last obstruction, Mitch “Dr. No” McConnell’s Senate Republicans blocked a bridge loan for the auto companies, unwilling even to sustain them long enough for a new administration to sculpt a responsible response to their crisis. What was the sticking point? It wasn’t getting rid of the CEOs that drove the companies into the […]

Conservatives hail the incoming Obama administration appointments; progressives express misgivings. Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill celebrates Barack Obama as “pragmatic,” which she says may dismay some “on the left.” David Corn says this isn’t the change progressives voted for. The media wallows in the “disappointment of the left.” Welcome to the new “post-partisan” world, in the […]

Does President-elect Obama represent the change we need? His mainstream appointments — largely veterans of the Clinton administration — have sparked a clamor from worried supporters. But in one of the critical challenges facing the country — how to get the country out of what will be the worst downturn since the Great Depression — […]