So let me get this straight – after his brilliant float-above-the-fray strategy resulted in a hideously compromised Senate healthcare reform bill which Americans hate so much that it cost the Democrats a Senate seat in Massachusetts, Obama’s Cunning Plan to fix the healthcare reform mess is… to float above the fray some more?

The White House released a statement today (a rare Saturday news dump) expressing the President’s support for the Conrad-Gregg commission. This commission would create a bipartisan panel of equal numbers of Republicans and Democrats to make recommendations for reducing the deficit. Many fear that it would open a gateway to cutting entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare. The rules governing the Conrad-Gregg commission are more problematic for their recommendations than even normal legislation.

Stiglitz documents America (and much of the world’s) descent into crony capitalism (pp. 41-42, 122). He explains that while other bankrupt firms settle claims on credit default swaps (CDS) at 13 cents on the dollar, Paulson and the Fed pressured AIG to pay favored systemically dangerous institutions (SDIs) such as Goldman Sachs 100 cents on the dollar – with the public bearing the cost of this secret subsidy (p. 49). His broader point is that the neoclassical triumph in the battle of ideas (and its triumphalism about winning the battle) led not to the promised utopia of efficient, stable markets and growth, but rather to economic stagnation for the middle class, a catastrophic fall for the working class, and recurrent crises.

Clarke is one of 60 Democrats who signed a letter saying she wouldn’t vote for a bill without a public option, and she has said that her constituents very much want one.

Someone hand me the large polo mallet.

The Fed is statutorily obligated to manage monetary policy for maximum employment consistent with stable prices. Bernanke has done nothing to meet the employment part of the Fed’s obligations. There are people who will.

History might be written by the winners, but our most profound, long-lived legends and stories are created by the folk. That’s why the stories, songs and poems are not called Elite Lore. Many of them are cautionary tales about the blindness, cruelty, hubris and dehumanizing excesses of authority. The Framers, aware of this creative power, [...]

One of the things that happened in one of Ari Fleischer’s last briefings (trying to look for it now) is that he was informed by reporters that Tony Blair would be coming for a visit–Fleischer, apparently, had not been told about what was apparently a last minute trip. Which had the effect of–just days after Plame’s identity was leaked and on the day Kelly was suicided–having Blair and Bush having a last minute visit together.

Scene: the Hart Senate Office Building. A congressional hearing in early 2010. An OBAMA ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL prepares to testify before a panel of SENATORS.

The latest whip count from The Hill shows 25 Senators supporting Bernanke, with 13 opposed, thus far. That count does not include Durbin, so it’s 26-13. The count makes the assumption that those who voted for Bernanke in the Banking Committee will also do so on the floor of the Senate, although at least one Democrat, Sherrod Brown, expressed hesitancy at doing so.