MORNING MESSAGE
Millions
of Americans ... are living on the edge. Yet the country has not confronted the
question of how we will continue to prosper without a workforce that can pay for
its goods and services. You didn’t have to read Das Kapital to see this coming
... You could instead have read The Economist ... I keep in my files a warning
published in that magazine a dozen years ago, on the eve of George W. Bush’s
second term. The editors concluded back then that, with income inequality in the
U.S. reaching levels not seen since the first Gilded Age and social mobility
diminishing, “the United States risks calcifying into a European-style
class-based society.” And mind you, that was before the financial meltdown of
2007-2008 ... The United States now has a level of income inequality
unprecedented in our history and so dramatic it’s almost impossible to wrap
one’s mind around.
SAnderS, WARREN JOIN BATTLE FOR CONGRESS
Sanders
and Warren hit the trail for Senate candidates. The Hill: “Sanders and
Warren are launching their efforts by stumping for Democrat Katie McGinty in
Pennsylvania … Warren and Sanders are also notably speaking at universities,
making a pitch to the millennial voters who have flocked to their message [but]
skeptics say a few visits to battleground states won’t be enough to sway
outcomes.”
Democrats
see House pickup opportunities. Politico: “Democrats — who would need a
whopping 30 seats to win the House — are already targeting at least 18 of the 60
GOP districts with the highest share of college-educated white voters, many of
which also have large numbers of nonwhite voters … The average district in the
emerging House battlefield — which so far includes 45 GOP-held districts … is 10
percentage points less white than in 2006, and the white population in those
seats is about 5 percentage points more college-educated than a decade ago.”
DEMS PUSH SOCIAL SECURITY EXPANSION
Democrats
increasingly united around Social Security expansion. Roll Call: “On Friday,
Democratic Reps. Linda T. Sánchez, Mark Pocan, and Michael M. Honda announced
legislation to expand Social Security … the Progressive Change Campaign
Committee released statements from incumbent Democratic senators and Senate
candidates saying they supported Social Security and Medicare expansion. One of
the co-signers was Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet, who said in a 2010 interview,
‘We can’t solve our budget crisis without dealing with our entitlements.'”
Clinton
should go big on climate, says American Prospect’s David Atkins: “Clinton
will not have the luxury of spending four or eight years taking baby steps
toward carbon reduction … Clinton’s only option, as Obama’s has been, may be to
use her executive powers … R.L. Miller [of] Climate Hawks Vote, a
climate-focused PAC[, says,] ‘That means considering the climate test in
approving all new fossil-fuel infrastructure, choosing an attorney general who
will investigate Exxon and other fossil fuel companies for failing to disclose
their global warming research in the 1970s, prioritizing renewable energy over
natural gas, and pricing carbon.’ Miller also recommends a moratorium on any new
fossil fuel projects.”
BREAKFAST SIDES
Trial
of AIG’s Maurice Greenberg begins this week. NYT: “The charges date to an
era when Eliot Spitzer, then the New York State attorney general, brought a
barrage of cases accusing Wall Street research analysts of biased research … and
insurance brokers of bid-rigging and kickbacks. Mr. Greenberg and A.I.G.’s
former chief financial officer, Howard I. Smith, are accused in part of
engineering bogus reinsurance transactions in 2000 and 2001 to bolster reserves
to make the company’s numbers look better to Wall Street.”
Court
ruling forces CT to confront school funding gap. NYT: “…Judge [Thomas]
Moukawsher seemed offended by the irrationality of the state’s education system:
He said its funding of new school buildings was driven not by need, but rather
by how much clout individual legislators might have; he criticized the teacher
evaluation system and said the high school graduation standards were all but
meaningless. He told the General Assembly it first had to determine how much
money schools actually need to educate children and then must allocate the funds
in a way that met that goal.”
Senate
to move first on measure to keep government open. The Hill: “Senate
leadership is hoping to take up a short-term spending bill this week that would
fund the government through Dec. 9 … House Republicans have not yet finalized a
plan … GOP lawmakers, with the exception of the most hard-line conservatives,
emerged from a closed-door meeting on Friday in favor of a plan to pass a CR
into December and pass smaller packages of appropriations bills in the lame-duck
session to avoid an all-encompassing omnibus bill.”
Progressive
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