Entries for March 2009

By Mary Kate Cary, Thomas Jefferson Street blog

A new Gallup poll is out that finds almost no difference between mainstream American Catholics and non-Catholics when it comes to deciding the moral acceptability of abortion (a majority of both say no) and embryonic stem cell research (a majority of both say yes).

By Mary Kate Cary, Thomas Jefferson Street blog

It's French Revolution time. The White House put General Motors CEO Richard Wagoner's head on the guillotine this morning, when it required his resignation as a condition for further bailout money. Buried in the coverage was the fact that technically Wagoner will have to stay on board at his $1-a-year salary, because if he really resigned he'd be paid millions in severance under the terms of his contract, which the White House doesn't want either. Even the Washington Post called the move "an extraordinary intervention of the federal government into the management of a private company." The stock market dropped about 300 points as a result, ending its rally.

By Mary Kate Cary, Thomas Jefferson Street blog

This very insightful commentary is from a man--a former colleague of mine from the Bush #41 speechwriting shop, Mark Lange of the Christian Science Monitor. The headline reads: “What if women ran the world? Male hubris has made a mess.”

By Mary Kate Cary, Thomas Jefferson Street blog

This morning's Wall Street Journal includes a good op-ed pointing out the discrepancy between the president's statement on Tuesday that his budget moves us from an era of "borrow and spend" to an era of "save and invest." Take a look at this and then I'll tell you who wrote it:

By Mary Kate Cary, Thomas Jefferson Street blog

The president did a great job last night at his second prime-time press conference. He has a very reassuring way of speaking, one that is instructive and (at least so far) not lecturing. His closing remarks on the value of patience and persistence were right on the mark.

President Obama held the press conference because he knows there is a lot of anxiety among voters right now. I think he might be misunderstanding the source of that anxiety. Let me explain:

By Mary Kate Cary, Thomas Jefferson Street blog

The bubble has finally burst. I'm not talking about the credit bubble. Or the housing bubble. I'm talking about the bonus bubble—that ugly, reckless behavior by Congress last week that threatened targeted taxes on AIG executives who failed to return their bonuses. The bonus bubble grew last week as the president promised to get the AIG bonuses back by "every legal avenue"...as Senator Grassley called for AIG executives to commit suicide...and busloads of angry citizens reportedly roved the Connecticut suburbs looking for bonus-takers. The worst of it was when Congressman Barney Frank threatened to subpoena those who accepted bonuses to appear before Congress and CEO Ed Liddy voiced his concerns about their safety, citing E-mails he'd received warning employees of being strangled with piano wire.

Last Thursday night, a question that Jay Leno asked President Obama caught my attention. The substance of that same question made the weekend talk shows and now the Monday papers: What's preventing Congress from passing more legislation that imposes sky-high taxes on specific segments of our population, as it did when the House voted to impose a 90 percent tax on AIG executives who kept their bonuses? "It seems a little scary to me as a taxpayer that they can just decide that," said Leno.

Jay Leno was on to something. Singling out groups of taxpayers is scary. When Leno asked Obama about it, the president didn't have much of an answer. But since Thursday night, the president's team has apparently thought about it: Anger from members of Congress directed at banking leaders could derail the administration's toxic assets plan being unveiled today. And so over the weekend, the White House tried to put the kibosh on the targeted tax that passed the House. The administration hasn't said yet that it'll veto the measure if it passes the Senate, but I bet that's under consideration.