Motley Moose – Archive

All photos in this post are by Prince Balume and Achilles Balume, and are posted here with permission.

In 2006, DR Congo passed a new constitution, which is similar to our (US) constitution in many ways. The right to vote, to assemble, and to free speech are guaranteed. Beyond our constitution, it guarantees strong parity between men and women. The issue today, though, is that it imposes tenure limits on the President.  

By law, President Joseph Kabila must step down and allow an open election in 2016. He began as a military dictator who led the country through a transitional government, and was then democratically elected President. His re-election met with some criticism, and he’s since been maneuvering to extend his tenure — recently by trying to amend the tenure law outright, and then by introducing requirements that would delay the election.

People in DR Congo are still learning about the law and starting to believe in their rights. If Kabila stays in power, it will set back the progress the people have made toward a Democratic DR Congo. John Kerry and the US State Department have been trying to get him to step down at the end of his term.

Last month, Kabila’s supporters in Parliament passed a census requirement for the next election. That law would delay the 2016 election indefinitely. The people of DR Congo organized a coordinated demonstration to protest the census requirement. The government cracked down on the protesters. Some were killed and others are not yet accounted for.

The great success was that Parliament eventually relented and removed the census requirement. It was a real step toward implementing democracy. It dearly cost people who demonstrated, though — some who paid with their lives.  

Found on the Internets …

Well, of course there are probably some Republicans who are glad that the economy is doing well (perhaps as a sign that the trickling down that started in 1981 is finally reaching ordinary Americans????) … but in general terms Eric Boehlert is right: this is NOT good news for those who are willing to destroy the economy to bring down President Obama.

Here are the cold hard facts.

The White House: Third Estimate of GDP for the Third Quarter of 2014

Real gross domestic product (GDP) grew 5.0 percent at an annual rate in the third quarter of 2014-the strongest single quarter since 2003-according to the third estimate from the Bureau of Economic Analysis. While quarterly growth reports are volatile, and some of the growth in Q3 reflected transitory factors, the recent robust growth data indicate a solid underlying trend of recovery. Indeed, the strong growth recorded in each of the last two quarters suggests that the economy has bounced back strongly from the first-quarter decline in GDP, which largely reflected transitory factors like unusually severe winter weather and a sharp slowdown in inventory investment. Consumer spending, business investment, and net exports all remained positive contributors this quarter. Real gross domestic income (GDI), an alternative measure of the overall size of the economy, was up 4.7 percent in Q3.

CNN/ORC Poll:

More Americans still disapprove of the job Obama is doing as President. But at 48%, Obama’s approval rating is at its highest point in CNN polling since May 2013.

The gains were driven by newfound backing among women, independents and millennials – groups where Obama’s approval numbers jumped 10 percentage points from a month ago. […]

Tuesday’s CNN/ORC poll showed for the first time in seven years, a majority of Americans – 51% – have a positive view of the economy, a sharp increase from the 38% who felt that way in October.

1.9 Million Americans Sign Up For Obamacare, 4.5 Million Renew Coverage

Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia M. Burwell says health care sign-ups are off to an encouraging start, but a lot of work is still needed to make the second open enrollment season for the federal insurance market a success.

Burwell says 1.9 million new customers have picked a plan through the federal market as of Dec. 19. It serves 37 states.

Another 4.5 million have renewed existing coverage, with most automatically re-enrolled.

More …

The President’s Weekly Address post is also an Open News Thread. Feel free to share other news stories in the comments.

From the White House – Weekly Address

In this week’s address, the President highlighted the good news in Friday’s jobs report – that American businesses added 314,000 new jobs this past month, making November the tenth month in a row that the private sector has added at least 200,000 new jobs. Even with a full month to go, 2014 has already been the best year of job creation since the 1990s. This number brings total private-sector job creation to 10.9 million over 57 consecutive months – the longest streak on record.

But even with this real, tangible evidence of our progress, there is always more that can be done. Congress needs to pass a budget and keep the government from a Christmas shutdown. We have an opportunity to work together to support the continued growth of higher-paying jobs by investing in infrastructure, reforming the business tax code, expanding markets for America’s goods and services, making common-sense reforms to the immigration system, and increasing the minimum wage.

The President’s Weekly Address post is also the Weekend Open News Thread. Feel free to share other news stories in the comments.

From the White House – Weekly Address

In this week’s address, the President discussed his recent trip to Minneapolis where he met a working mother named Rebekah, who wrote the President to share the challenges her family and many middle-class Americans are facing where they work hard and sacrifice yet still can’t seem to get ahead. But instead of focusing on growing the middle class and expanding opportunity for all, Republicans in Congress continue to block commonsense economic proposals such as raising the minimum wage, extending unemployment insurance and making college more affordable.

The President will keep fighting his economic priorities in the weeks and months ahead, because he knows the best way to expand opportunity for all hardworking Americans and continue to strengthen the economy is to grow it from the middle out.

From the White House – Weekly Address

In this week’s address, President Obama calls 2014 a year of action, which should start with Congress quickly passing emergency unemployment insurance for the 1.3 million Americans who lost this vital lifeline as they fight to find jobs and make ends meet.

Republicans are congratulating themselves over extracting concessions in the recent 2-year budget deal that left the extension of unemployment benefits to 1.3 million Americans on the cutting room floor.

Those benefits are from the Emergency Unemployment Compensation (EUC) Act passed in 2008 and extended 11 times, usually as a hostage held by the Republican Party to force President Obama and the Democrats to give in to their demands. At the end of 2010, Republicans in Congress used the threat of real harm to millions of Americans, from the expiration of EUC benefits, to extend the Bush tax cuts (a compromise for which the president took a lot of heat from his “base”).

What is EUC?

Extended Benefits are available to workers who have exhausted regular unemployment insurance benefits during periods of high unemployment. The basic Extended Benefits program provides up to 13 additional weeks of benefits when a State is experiencing high unemployment. Some States have also enacted a voluntary program to pay up to 7 additional weeks (20 weeks maximum) of Extended Benefits during periods of extremely high unemployment.

Before the expiration:

After the expiration:

From the White House – Weekly Address

In his weekly address, President Obama says our economy is moving in the right direction. We have cut our deficits by more than half, businesses have created millions of new jobs, and we have taken significant steps to reverse our addiction to foreign oil and fix our broken health care system.

The previous post looked at the economic history of the United States over the past two centuries. In that post, what stood out most was the fact that the economy of the United States has always been one of the strongest in the world.

There are three defining moments of American history after 1800, and this post will examine them. They are the Civil War, the Great Depression, and the Second World War. How did these events affect the economy?

More below.

The United States economy is a subject that is very much on the mind of Americans today. It’s also a very obviously influential part of the world; the American consumer market, for instance, often sets trends around the world.

Let’s take a look at the history of the United States economy. How did the American economy become as big and influential as it is today? We begin two hundred years ago, in 1800. Note that the next post will look at three specific moments during the American economy.

1800

More below.

Back on October 4, Vincent Reinhart wrote in The New York Times’ Deal Book that despite all the political maneuvering currently going in Washington the contingencies to prepare for a default are “a waste because the United States government is not going to default, ever.”

Reinhart argues that government officials will be forced to violate one of three laws or constitutional mandates:

1. The Second Liberty Bond Act of 1917 that establishes the debt ceiling;
2. The Federal Reserve Act that prohibits the Fed from lending directly to the Treasury; or,
3. The 14th Amendment of the Constitution, which holds that the debt of the United States government, lawfully issued, will not be questioned.

Finally, of the consequences, Reinhart writes:

An official anticipating stretching the law ranks alternatives by precedent, punishment as specified in the law and standing as to who can claim a violation of the law. Either a secretary of the Treasury who holds No. 3 as the overriding instruction or a chairman of the Federal Reserve who waives No. 2 saves the global financial system and, at most, risks being impeached or fired. That seems to be a reasonable risk and reward trade-off.

That, however, ignores the real nightmare that would happen immediately after any of those actions were taken to avoid default by the United States Government.