One day after the 150th anniversary of the Civil War, I’m not sure we need another hassle over Charleston Harbor. But now even the Tea Partiers are getting on Sen. Lindsey Graham’s case for threatening to shut down the senate over $50,000 for dredging Charleston Harbor that South Carolina lost in the shutdown averting budget deal.
I’m inclined to say nothing good ever comes out of fights over Charleston Harbor. But South Carolina TPM Reader DP gives us some background on what’s at stake for South Carolina in this fight …
When looking at it from a distance, Senator Graham looks like a moron for pledging to “tie the Senate in knots” over $50,000, but this is about much more than a study. In summary, the study and deepening project for the harbor are arguably the most important economic issue in the state. Graham’s quote of 260,000 jobs being impacted are real from everything I have read. It’s also involves about $2.1 billion dollar in wages if I recall correctly.
Speaker Boehner says his party’s plan to privatize Medicare doesn’t actually privatize Medicare.
Our reporter Benjy Sarlin caught up with Sen. Graham (R-SC) this morning to ask about the Charleston Harbor dredging money. And Graham offered a stirring defense of the role of government spending in creating jobs.
Speaker Boehner (R-OH) was just asked whether President Obama said he’d be willing to go along with more budget cuts as the price of getting House Republicans not to force the country to default on the national debt.
Boehner said: Yes, the president said he’s willing to go along with that.
President Obama’s core angle in this speech seems to be to focus on the fact that country got deficits under control in late 90s under Clinton and then went off the deep-end again with the Bush binge.
Hard to beat the truth.
(ed.note: Only bad part was repeating “win the future” line.)
This line from President Obama’s speech about the GOP budget plan caught our ear: “As Ronald Reagan’s own budget director said, there’s nothing ‘serious’ or ‘courageous’ about this plan.” That comes from this interview our Brian Beutler did with David Stockman last week.
Finding ways to commemorate the Civil War and describe the horrors of slavery to a class of fourth graders has to be a challenge. But having the white kids auction off the black kids just probably ain’t the way to do it.
Krugman’s verdict on Obama’s speech: “I could live with this as an end result. If this becomes the left pole, and the center is halfway between this and Ryan, then no — better to pursue the zero option of just doing nothing and letting the Bush tax cuts as a whole expire.”