As the latest reports indicate that the U.S. economy is slowing down and the intellectual foundation for austerity economics has been discredited, Congressional Democrats are pushing back against President Obama’s austerity budget. Democrats in the Senate and even more in the House no longer see the logic in austerity cuts to social programs such as Social Security and Medicare given that the evidence contradicts the intellectual rationale for them.

Join us for a Community Forum on Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid with Tim Kaine and George Allen live from Fairfax, Virginia.

On election night the state I’m going to be watch is Virginia, which fortunately will be one of the first states to report. How Virginia goes will probably tell us who has won the evening.

A flood of new Senate polling holds mixed news for Democrats as they try to retain control despite a very unfriendly map.

Feeling poleaxed by the audacious hopes it raised during the ‘08 campaign, Team Obama will attempt to lower expectations going into 2012–and nothing lowers expectations like proving yourself irrelevant.

Tim Kaine announced he would run for the Virginia Senate seat vacated by Jim Webb, leaving an opening at the Democratic National Committee. President Obama moved swiftly to fill that today by choosing Debbie Wasserman Schultz.

Jim Webb, who squeaked out a victory for Senate in Virginia in 2006, will leave the Senate after one term, adding another to the many opportunities for Republicans in the Senate in 2012.

At this point of the evening, let me remind you that Tim Kaine, former Governor of Virginia, is the DNC Chair presiding over this debacle tonight. I mean this guy has presided over the loss of his entire state– much less significant swaths of our country–to the Republicans.

If there are any progressives left, it’s time for them to acknowledge that the Obama Administration is systematically destroying their brand.

Two-thirds of Democrats in polls are ready to end the Afghan war, most of them strongly. Is the institutional Democratic Party trying to score political points on an issue that a solid majority of their party opposes?