Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said Thursday that the Senate will not vote on its version of the legislation -- that is, once it has one -- until after it returns from recess. "It's better to have a product based on quality and thoughtfulness rather than try to jam something through,"

In other words, they still have a long line of lobbyists waiting to, umm, "express their concerns"* about the bill.

* = Make campaign donations

Obama's said it, Robert Reich has said it, and I'm saying it - job growth is ALWAYS the last thing to improve when a recession ends!

Yeah, and sometimes it lags so much that we're into another recession before it happens.

And in the real world we all have to compromise with each other all the time or we would have anarchy and worse.

My understanding of "compromise" is that nobody gets everything they want, but everybody gets something they want. What I've seen of Obama's "compromise" suggests that he is willing to give away the store for the sake of getting something, anything, passed that he can point to as a signature achievement. The problem is that the special interests have figured this out and are playing him for everything they can get.

Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Let's take what we can get now and hope for more later, rather than take all or nothing.

All I ask for is something that is actual progress. What I'm afraid of is that we'll get regression that is merely called progress.

Obama invited execs to the White House to woo them over to his side. Bush invited execs to the White House to WRITE the legislation.

If that is so, then why have so many lopsided "compromises" been made?

For example, a significant benefit of the "public" option was supposed to be that it would be big enough to bargain for better prices on services and medications. Now, that has been removed in the name of compromise, but what did we get in return? A vague and completely unenforceable "promise" from the pharmaceutical industry to "try" to contain costs.

The price keeps going up because lobbyists keep vetoing everything that might help to control costs. By the time congress gets done with this, it'll probably deserve the name "Medical Industry Profit Protection Act of 2009".

Those three countries seem to hold the key to whether the global economy will recover in a robust way or just sputter along for the next few years.

So much for "U.S. Leadership".

Include exemptions only for investments in productive enterprises - enterprises that create actual products that people buy.

The heck with that. How about exemptions only for activities that benefit the country as a whole?

For decades, we've been getting fed a line of B.S. about how investment creates jobs. It's pretty obvious that not all investment creates jobs, and plenty of investment activity actually produces the opposite result. People who make millions (or billions) of unearned income by gaming the system are not doing this country any good at all. It's time to stop giving them tax breaks for screwing us.

The French tried this

And it resulted in a net loss of national income as high wealth families fled to tax havens in Luxembourg, Liechtenstein and Switzerland.

So our wealthy freeloaders will depart and take their political campaign contributions with them. I'm having a hard time seeing how this would be a bad thing.

Cuz, ya know, if I'm ever threatened by a large black man in a bathroom, and I think he's going to beat me up, obviously the best thing to do is to offer him a blowjob! Surely that will avoid a beat down!

Yeah, that'll work real well if the guy just happens to hate gays.

... but let's put it in perspective: How does the price of reactors compare to the cost of speculators driving up the price of oil?

Nahhh. More like "When old white guys put on a silly show because they're on national TV".

What we have here is a bunch of useless old farts who spend their days taking money from lobbyists, and now they have a chance to pretend that they actually do something for their constituents.

... is that you stay at the top of the ladder by telling everyone else in the company that they have to sacrifice their families to get ahead.

A farer assessment..

would be that it was not specifically Clinton or necessarily Bush who ruined our economy but it was the pressures that were brought to bear on all political parties by banks and wall street...

Agreed, but each party blaming the other has been a very successful strategy for diverting attention from the real cause of the problem.

When families are given the responsibility for---and the resources for---taking care of their elderly members, you'll start to see the American economy and culture recover. Not before.

How many children do you think the typical family would need for that to be a viable "retirement plan"?

The future of the OS is you won't know it's there or care; something MS promised us 25 years ago and never delivered on.

Of course they never delivered. They can't. It's not a matter of technical difficulty, although that is a significant factor. The real problem is that they'd never get away with charging $400 a pop for something the customer can't obviously see.