Stephen Dubne proposes a novel theory:
Is it possible that the availability of good plumbing has contributed to our national weight gain? This may sound ludicrous, but think about it for just a moment. Very few people have to trek through the night to use an outhouse anymore; furthermore, restroom facilities are readily available just about everywhere — which means you don’t have to worry about getting rid of your waste, which frees you up to consume as much as you’d like.
Is he shitting us?
Megan explains what the economic meltdown means for the candidates’ economic proposals:
McCain will probably not be able to make the Bush tax cuts permanent. It’s possible that tax revenues will recover by 2010, though frankly I think the magnitude of the cuts on Wall Street will take years for the tax base to digest. But we won’t know that until early 2011, after the tax cuts have already expired. He’ll likely have to push this through with the grim memory of a plummeting 2009 revenue line fresh on everyone’s minds.
But Democrats shouldn’t smile too much, because this also means Barack Obama will not get his middle class tax cut.
Raising taxes on the rich will not raise all that much revenue in the next year or so. He’ll need the stable middle-class base just to sort of cover current expenses.
Plus, Barack Obama will probably have to radically trim back his spending plans. Unlike John McCain, he can’t just wait a year or so and see if Wall Street bonuses rebound. He needs the political momentum that he will presumably derive from election to get a big package like his health care plan through. Given the budget problems, unless he’s willing to spend money like a drunken sailor, those programs will come attached to a hefty tax increase that will need to fall, at least in part, on middle-class voters.
Otherwise, the Democrats will have to abandon Paygo. It’s not clear how much good this will do them, however. The price of money after the fallout settles may make this pretty unattractive–if not to Democrats, then to their constituents.
Marc explains why we can’t just borrow more.
The conservative paper that favored civil unions over marriage for Californian gay couples has now changed its mind. They are now opposing the anti-marriage Proposition 8:
Supporters of Proposition 8 make two arguments. The first is that, for thousands of years, marriage has been defined as between a man and a woman exclusively. Considering how Californians historically have been wide open to change, this appeal is not likely to carry much force.
The second argument made by supporters is that children should be raised solely by a father and a mother, not by two fathers or two mothers. Yet the debate over child-rearing is entirely beside the point, because Proposition 8 is about marriage only. It would do nothing to prevent gay couples from adopting children or from having children through artificial means.
Indeed, all Proposition 8 would do is ensure that the children of gay couples would be raised in households where the parents were unmarried. Would that be a healthier situation for children?
In the past, this page has advocated civil unions for gay couples rather than marriage. But our thinking has changed, along with that of many other Californians. Gay and lesbian couples deserve the same dignity and respect in marriage that heterosexual couples have long enjoyed. We urge a No vote on Proposition 8.
Noah Millman provides a summary of each candidates’ economic crisis messaging:
McCain: We’re in this mess because a bunch of Wall Street hot shots got us into it, but they won’t dare to pull that stuff when I’m in the White House, because I survived five years in a POW camp. Do I look like the kind of guy who hangs around with a bunch of Wall Street sissies who buy their shirts at Thomas Pink? Not on your tintype girlie-girl.
His Obama take-down is very shrewd too. Don’t you wish we had an actual conservative on either ticket?
In yet aother attempt to personalize and demonize the financial crisis (what else does he know how to do?) McCain attacks Obama over Franklin Raines. There’s a subtle racial undercurrent here as well:
Obama denies the connection.
My hero, Ron Paul, proven as prescient on the economy as he was on Iraq, explains why he can’t back McCain:
Russia arranges for permanent bases in S. Ossetia and Abkhazia.
Colin Kahl evaluates Odierno, Petraeus’s replacement:
Is he up to the task? I think he is. Even if he is not the completely "transformed" individual he is sometimes described to be, that is partly because the initial view of him was a bit of a caricature. Most importantly, what Odierno brings to the job is a "feel" for the current situation in Iraq and a relationship with key Iraqi players. Leveraging this tactile sense and working these relationships may hold the key to consolidating progress in Iraq. In my recent discussions with Odierno about the way forward in Iraq, it was clear that he has a multi-layered understanding of the core political challenges that confront him, and is ready to take them on.
Robert Reich doesn’t approve of the rumored bailout of all bailouts, while Felix Salmon reports that business journalists aren’t getting a lot of sleep this week.
Deborah Treisman remembers David Foster Wallace:
Great literature, Wallace once said, made him feel “unalone—intellectually, emotionally, spiritually.” He was one of the few satirists able to avoid meanness; he was moral without being judgmental. He took on the absurdities of modern life in an attempt to understand or to parse them, not to mock them.
The Dish 