The New Republic

As I mentioned this morning and in my recent piece, not everyone in the administration was enthusiastic about the freeze idea from the get-go. Some were concerned about shifting to deficit-reduction mode too quickly, while job-growth was still a big problem. (The National Economic Council, for one, was initially pretty skeptical.) READ MORE >>

The big news today is that Obama plans to propose a freeze on domestic discretionary spending in Wednesday's State of the Union address. For what it's worth, I talked to some administration officials about the thinking behind this in December, not long after the idea was first floated. Here's the gist of what I found: READ MORE >>

The Wall Street Journal reports that a lot of the bank executives who shunned last year's World Economic Forum in Davos are quietly returning this year. Which could get a little awkward, since the execs will rubbing elbows with the global glitterati right around the time the average American is fulminating against their outrageously high bonuses. How's a banker to deal with the potential PR problem? According to the Journal, the answer is ... Haiti: READ MORE >>

The White House background briefing is that their proposals would freeze biggest bank size “as is”--this makes no sense at all. READ MORE >>

So Bernanke may be in even worse shape than I thought. The Times says Harry Reid isn't sure he has 60 votes for confirmation. In fact, he's not even sure he'll support Bernanke himself. The most telling detail in the piece: READ MORE >>

If I had to guess as I write this, I'd say no. But the trendlines for the Fed chairman aren't moving in the right direction. Today's Wall Street Journal had a piece noting that the Fed chairman was headed toward a closer than expected vote in the Senate next week, with Dems Byron Dorgan and Jeff Merkley joining Bernie Sanders, the Senate's chief Bernanke-hater on the left, as opponents of a second term. READ MORE >>

Update: the Senate needs to hold a new hearing for Ben Bernanke--here’s the full proposal. READ MORE >>

Paul Volcker, legendary central banker turned radical reformer of our financial system, has won an important round. The WSJ is now reporting: READ MORE >>

At this stage in the electoral cycle, Democrats should be running hard against big banks and their consequences. Some roots of our current economic difficulties lie in the Clinton 1990s, but the real origins can be traced to the financial deregulation at the heart of the Reagan Revolution--and all the underlying problems became much worse in eight years of George W. Bush’s unique brand of excess and neglect. READ MORE >>

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