I have noticed that Democrats, especially the leadership and its apologists, are stuck in the 1990s. Paraphrasing what one commentator said of White House Chief of Staff Rahm, he's "an old general fighting old battles." I think that will be the party's epitaph if it does not heed the wake up call. We are no longer fighting the rise of Reaganism. We are at Reaganism's, or neoliberalism's, end.

I should point out that in writing this I am not claiming that the GOP has better ideas or will easily capitalize on progressive ideas coming into popularity. What I can say is that Democrats will remain static if they do not heed the call. Now, this outcome, a party that is perpetually not quite strong enough to pass progressive policies, may be a feature rather than a bug, but let's pretend for this diary that they really do want to pass progressive policy. Let's also assume that the real issue is that they are living in 1994 rather than 2009.

Previously, I voiced  my concern about Timonthy Geithner's role as one of the chief stewards of our economy.

Certainly, his neoliberal bent, solutions to the banking crisis and his push for "too big to fail"  into policy were disturbing, but some part of me believed he was simply an ideologue. A misguided, incompetent one, but just an ideologue.

Now, comes news that he was one of the principles "responsible for overpayments that put billions of extra tax dollars in the coffers of major Wall Street firms, most notably Goldman Sachs."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/16 /aig-bailout-government-ov_n_359919.html

There is this perception amongst those who wish to act favor the Democratic Party leader that the gay rights debate is solely about wealthy white gay men who are impatient or want to assimilate. This stereotypes ignores the reality.

First, let me start by pointing out what this is really about. This is about a checklist of things that the Democrats said they were going to do once in office, and many of which, have not been done. Many of them are fairly easy to do, but are, nevertheless, not being done.

This issue is not simply, therefore, about marriage equality or Don't Ask, Don't Tell. Although, to me, all is the same on the front of these issues because they are all at base about animus toward gay people.

Take this with a grain of salt, but Politico is reporting that Reid may include the Stupak anti-abortion provision in the Senate version of the bill:

"Senator Reid opposes abortion except in the cases of rape, incest or when the life of the mother is at risk. Passing comprehensive health reform and improving access to health care will likely go a long way towards reducing the rate of unintended pregnancies and the resulting abortions.

I expect that any bill that Senator Reid brings to the floor will ensure that no federal funds are used for abortion and that the conscience rights of providers and health care facilities like Catholic Hospitals are protected."

http://www.politico.com/livepulse/1109/R eid_will_likely_include_antiabortion_pro vision.html

It is from Politico. Therefore, I am not sure how much this should be considered true.

Polling data indicates that Americans are more positive than Europeans about economic outcomes. The question is whether this positive attitude represents economic realism, or, to put it another way, the ability to accurately assess risk? Does the American attitude reflect a gap between reality and belief that harms our ability to assess what policies politicians should be enacting? On the flip side, are politicians enacting policies that properly assess economic risks to the American middle class?  I argue here that our attitude does not reflect a proper assessment of risk, and that this harms our ability to properly set for the right policies.

Economic indicators are funny things. If you measure the right thing, they can tell you that even in bad times for most Americans that things are going well. In my previous diary, I discussed the great risk shift from multinational corporations to the average American citizen. Now, I would like to take the discussion in a different direction by looking at why we do not notice this great risk shift. One of the reasons we do notice the shift is the use of GDP as the primary indicator for the state of our economy. Indeed, right now, the GDP has begun to grow for the first time in a year. It stands up 3.5 percent.

The problem, however, in the number is several folds. One it does not address job creation, kind of jobs created or wage stagnation/deflation. Two, it does not address what is being left out of the equation, which is the subject matter of this diary. Thus, the GDP is as interesting for what it leaves out as what it  puts into the equation. However, we rarely have that discussion in America. For these reasons, I advocate that we look at the Quality of Life Index to see where our country really is for the bulk of Americans in our economy.

The bailout of the banking industry was the result of decades of Reagan policy making carried out by both Democratic and Republican neoliberals that shifted risk from corporations to the American public.  It is only the tip of iceberg. This shifting of risk is the flip side of the coin to wage stagnation and deflation that acts to increase the debt and loses of the American people.

To understand, why this is the case requires an understanding of what risk is.  This is not an easy task.  However, to have a working definition, let's just say that risk is the chance in any given transaction for one to be a winner or a loser. It is the concept of working the odds. What are the  odds that you will obtain a job that will cover your debt from college?  What are the odds that you will have enough money to pay for health care premiums and save money? What are odds of bank failure if they are too big to fail?

I am one of the biggest critics of President Obama and Democrats here, but I want to point out some economic policy news that together are signs that may be the administration and Democrats are going to move in the right economic direction. Much of this you probably already know, but I want to focus on the news in one place as well as point out some additional things that I would love to see happen toward restoring America to a country focused on "Main Street" or "middle-class" capitalism rather than neoliberal economic thought. Main street capitalism focuses on increasing wealth for the greatest number of people rather than merely increasing wealth

First the news that I think is very positive:

- Ending the antitrust exemption for health insurance moves forward

• Limiting executive pay in a way that creates incentives for long term investment
  
• Shifting bailout money to stimulate small businesses
  
• House's action regarding public option at Medicare plus 5