Portside

This isn’t simply about a short-term budget fight. This is about whether we have a president and an electorate united in moving forward a sane economic platform that will strengthen the American economy in the uncertain years ahead, or if we will allow the ideologues and big-money interests to succeed in taking the wheels of the American economy and driving us all off a cliff.

Science doesn't need another moonshot, and it really doesn't need another vaguely thought-out initiative dropped on it during a State of the Union address. What it needs is much more important—and probably much more difficult politically, because those needs are much less flashy. What science needs is stable, sustainable budget growth. Take the NIH budget and promise to grow it at a percent or two above inflation for a number of years. The number 10 would be good.

The right-wing Illinois governor is slashing programs for the state and threatening bankruptcy for Chicago Public Schools instead of offering any revenue raising solutions.

What good is it to protect ourselves with nuclear weapons if we poison our people in the process? Unfortunately, this sentiment seems to be missing from the Obama administration and Congress, and one of professor Parkinson’s most important lessons—that “delay is the deadliest form of denial”—remains lost on US decision makers.

Given the acute need for jobs and rising incomes, what passes for “bolstering job creation” in a summary of the budget bill released by the House Appropriations Committee is scandalous. Incredibly, a provision that allows banks to engage in high-risk derivatives trading under the shield of federal insurance is listed as a measure to “bolster job creation.”

What you won't hear about this new deal: Public workers will get eviscerated, to achieve "deficit reduction"