Media outlets are reporting that as rising unemployment continues to take a toll on the economy, some top aides to President Obama think a second economic stimulus package may become necessary. The Financial Times reports "senior administration officials think further stimulus might eventually be needed but they do not want to have this fight now. Both the economics and the politics call for postponing a decision to late this year or early in 2010." The New York Times reports, "For the moment, Mr. Obama and his top economic advisers are fending off calls for more action."
The CBS Evening News reported "since the President signed" the stimulus "into law in February, the nation has lost another two million jobs, pushing unemployment to its highest rate in 25 years." CNN's Situation Room reported, "If the question is, is the $787 billion recovery plan making a difference, Republicans in a House hearing today gave a resounding 'no.'" Fox News' Special Report noted that Administration aides said $57 billion of the stimulus funds have been committed, creating 150,000 jobs, or "$380,000 a job."
The Financial Times reports that "while arguments over the benefits of the stimulus continue to rage, Democrats have shown themselves to be divided." The Hill reports Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell (D) "urged House members to consider another stimulus package just for infrastructure projects in order to produce more jobs."
Rove Says Obama "Untrustworthy" On Fiscal Matters. Karl Rove writes in the Wall Street Journal, "In February...Obama signed a $787 billion stimulus bill while making lavish promises about the results. He pledged that 'a new wave of innovation, activity and construction will be unleashed all across America.' He also said the stimulus would 'save or create up to four million jobs.'" Rove adds, "We are at the cusp of a crucial political debate, and Mr. Obama's words on fiscal matters are untrustworthy."
Boehner Says Biden Remark On Economy Was "Fabrication" The Politico reports House Minority Leader John Boehner is "accusing the vice president of lying about the economy." Boehner said yesterday, "I found it...interesting over the last couple of days to hear Vice President Biden and the President mention the fact that they didn't realize how difficult an economic circumstance we were in. ... This is the greatest fabrication I have seen since I've been in Congress."
Stimulus "Overwhelmingly" Directed At Obama Counties USA Today reports, "Billions of dollars in federal aid delivered directly to the local level to help revive the economy have gone overwhelmingly to places that supported President Obama in last year's presidential election." Counties that "supported Obama last year have reaped twice as much money per person" from the stimulus package as those that voted for John McCain.
The New York Times reports the effort by Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus to "develop compromise health care legislation has come under sharp assault by fellow Democrats who have urged him to abandon a plan to help pay for the bill by taxing some employer-provided health benefits." Republicans, as well as "several centrist Democrats" favor the "tax on generous employer-provided health plans," but recent "opinion polls show the idea to be generally unpopular."
The Washington Times characterizes the disagreement as "cracks" forming "in President Obama's healthcare reform plan." In the House, "a plan to raise taxes on the wealthy is emerging as the leading option among House Democrats looking to finance health care legislation," the AP reports.
The Politico reports, "If Democrats thought taxing health benefits was unpopular, the second-least-popular idea might be a tough sell, too -- a straight-up income tax hike on people making more than $250,000 a year." The proposal "gained new currency in the Senate and the House Wednesday in part because it would not divide the Democratic base as much as taxing health benefits."
However, the AP reports, President Obama "promised to fix health care and trim the federal budget deficit, all without raising taxes on anyone but the wealthiest Americans. It's a promise he's already broken, and will likely have to break again." Tax experts say that the Administration will be forced to increase taxes to pay for healthcare reform because "it is simply implausible for the vast majority of Americans to get a free ride while the nation tackles such an incredibly difficult -- and expensive -- issue."
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Media reports tended to cast the global warming declaration by the Group of Eight as largely symbolic. While USA Today reports that President Obama and G8 leaders "joined with developing countries on a compromise global warming declaration," the AP says "the wealthy nations were unable to persuade leaders of developing countries to commit to reductions of their own." The Washington Post notes that "some environmental groups" saw the G8 agreement "as a weak nod at the obvious. ... For other groups, the best that could be said of Wednesday's declaration was that, although it did not commit countries to specific cuts in greenhouse gases, it appeared to create a moral imperative to do so eventually."
ABC World News similarly reported that "when it came to global warning, environmentalists had been hoping for bold action on climate change, but little consensus was achieved." The New York Times reports the lack of agreement "on specific cuts in heat-trapping gases by 2050, undercutting an effort to build a global consensus to fight climate change, according to people following the talks." McClatchy reports that Michael Froman, "the White House deputy national security adviser for international economic affairs," said the leaders "pledged to confront the challenges of climate change and committed to seek an ambitious global agreement" later this year.
Similarly, the Wall Street Journal reports, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown "called the G-8 decision a 'historic agreement' and German Chancellor Angela Merkel said it was 'a clear step forward.'" The Journal also says that "the G-8's failure to agree on shorter-term emissions-cutting targets and a firm amount of aid for developing countries led a larger group of nations to decide to drop numerical targets."
The AP reports CIA Director Leon Panetta "told Congress last month that senior CIA officials have concealed significant actions and misled lawmakers repeatedly since 2001, the chairman and other members of the House Intelligence Committee said in letters revealed Wednesday." While "exactly what actions Panetta disclosed to the House Intelligence Committee on June 24 is unclear," Chairman Silvestre Reyes "said that the CIA outright lied in one case."
In their letter to Panetta, the New York Times reports, Democrats said the agency had "misled members" of Congress "for eight years about the classified matters, which the letter did not disclose." Said the letter, which was made public late Wednesday by Rep. Rush Holt, "This is similar to other deceptions of which we are aware from other recent periods."
Reyes also "declined to expand upon the allegations" in an interview yesterday, the Washington Post reports, while the Wall Street Journal says the "murky circumstances surrounding the allegations make it hard to assess the claims and counterclaims of both sides." But the "public tussle nonetheless threatens to further undermine Congressional relations with the CIA."
The Politico, meanwhile, says that if the lawmakers' "claim is borne out, it would offer a measure of vindication to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who has been under constant fire since claiming in April that the agency misled Congress about waterboarding."
White House Threatens To Veto Intel Authorization Bill. The White House, meanwhile, issued a statement Tuesday, according to the AP, "threatening to veto a bill that would require the president to dramatically increase the number of lawmakers who must be notified about covert CIA activities." The veto threat, says the Washington Post reports, is "further increasing the tension on intelligence issues" coming amid the release of the lawmakers' letter. The White House said it "strongly objects" to the provision, "suggesting it would create an unconstitutional usurpation of executive power."
McClatchy reports the House "has written a $123.8 billion farm spending bill that's loaded with congressional earmarks." Brushing "off conservative criticism, lawmakers are steering funds toward California pest detection, wine grape research and 'asparagus production technologies,' among other targeted projects. More broadly, the funding bill largely retains the farm policy status quo some hoped to change." The AP adds that the bill "funds a 14 percent increase for food stamps as more people become eligible for the program because of rising unemployment."
The Financial Times reports "senior Democrat Senators said on Wednesday they would change a provision" in the climate change bill "that imposes carbon taxes on imports following warnings" that the House bill's "tough provisions to impose carbon tariffs, aimed at protecting American companies' competitiveness" could "spark a global trade war."
The Hill reports that House Energy and Commerce Chairman Henry Waxman, "the chief architect of the climate change bill," indicated Wednesday "that he's open to seeing the bill significantly altered by the Senate if that's what it takes to ensure its passage."
Bill Reinsch, president of the National Foreign Trade Council, has also claimed the import taxes "could violate world-trade rules," the Wall Street Journal reports, "by favoring US auto makers in the distribution of some $2 billion in government subsidies." Reinsch said that "the electric-vehicle program could amount to government subsidies for US auto makers, likely violating World Trade Organization rules that prohibit countries from favoring domestic companies," and "warned the program for electric vehicles would invite retaliation from other countries."
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The Chicago Tribune reports Illinois Atty. Gen. Lisa Madigan (D) "surprised the political world" and announced yesterday she would seek reelection to her current job rather than run for Senate or for governor, a decision the Chicago Sun-Times' Lynn Sweet says she made "despite wooing by President Obama" and other top national Democrats to run for Senate. Meanwhile, The Hill reports that Rep. Mark Kirk (R) began telling people that he would run for Senate, "just hours after it was reported" that Madigan "would not seek the office,' and he is "potentially the only Republican in Illinois who would start out the Senate race in a good position to win it." CQ Politics adds that Republicans "are high on Kirk as a Senate candidate because of his fundraising ability -- he generated $5.5 million to win re-election to the House in 2008 -- and centrist political stances that include support for abortion rights and embryonic stem cell research."
The AP reports, "The sex scandal engulfing" Nevada Sen. John Ensign (R) "deepened" yesterday "after his former mistress's husband revealed new details about the relationship, saying" Ensign paid Cynthia Hampton "more than $25,000 in severance when she stopped working for him." The Politico adds that the husband, Doug Hampton, told the Las Vegas Sun yesterday that Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn (R) urged Ensign to end the affair more than a year ago, which Coburn's office acknowledges. The Sun adds that Ensign "faces a possible felony violation of campaign finance law if he paid the severance but failed to report it as an in-kind contribution to the campaign committees where she worked, according to ethics complaints filed against him." Doug Hampton also provided a letter to the Las Vegas Sun that he claimed was a handwritten apology from Ensign to Cindy Hampton. ... 'I used you for my own pleasure,' the letter reads, later adding, 'Plain and simple it was wrong; it was sin.'"
The AP reports that New York Gov. David Paterson (D) yesterday "shocked Albany and risked a constitutional fight" by picking Richard Ravitch to fill the vacant lieutenant governor's post and break the deadlock in the evenly-split state Senate, a move the New York Times says "was intended to end the turmoil in the capital, but it seemed chiefly to intensify it, drawing threats of legal challenges even before the governor announced his decision." NY1.com says that both state GOP Senate Leader Dean Skelos and state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo (D) questioned the legality of the move and suggested it could lead to a court fight.
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Conan O'Brien: "In a recent study, the United States was ranked the 114th happiest country in the world. ... Then Sarah Palin stepped down. Now we're at 17."
David Letterman: New Minnesota Sen. Al Franken (D) "is an interesting guy: went from being a comedian to politician. George Bush, the other way around."
David Letterman: "A lot of entertainers are getting in to politics. For example, Tina Fey says she might run for governor from Alaska."
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