MORNING MESSAGE: A Long Cold Summer For Young People Looking For Work

OurFuture.org’s Isaiah J. Poole: “Just in the past decade Congress has cut $1 billion from youth jobs programs, according to a report by the Center for American Progress. And that is at a time when even before the Great Recession youth unemployment was at chronic high levels … There is currently a youth jobs deficit of 4.1 million; that is the number of jobs that the economy would have to produce to restore the job market to what it was in 2007 … It may be too late to do much for the teenagers who are now beginning to end their school years and will face a summer without serious job prospects. But Congress has still before it a fiscal 2014 budget. If House Republicans would end their stonewalling on negotiating with the Senate on the budget details, Democrats can insist that a robust youth jobs program be a priority for 2014.”

Senate Dems Seek To Break CFPB Filibuster

Possible Thursday Senate vote on confirming Richard Cordray at CFPB. The Hill: “Senate Republicans, however, say they will filibuster Cordray unless changes are made to the bureau … Democrats argue that blocking a nominee to extract changes to the law is an abuse of the Senate’s filibuster rule, and say the so-called nuclear option — a controversial maneuver to change the Senate’s rules with a simple majority vote — is back on the table if Republicans do not end their obstruction of nominees. ”

Republicans wasting their time with Cordray filibuster. Politico: “… there has been little evidence that the standoff has prevented the agency … from doing its job. Since Cordray was installed through a controversial recess appointment in January 2012, the agency has marched through its day-to-day work, including writing highly anticipated, and lobbied, mortgage rules while putting in place programs to supervise banks and other lenders … privately [financial] industry officials appear to be tiring of the debate, noting that Cordray has proven to be a more open and reasonable regulator than they anticipated.”

Former 14-year NLRB member Wilma Liebman urges approval of labor board nominees: “…, the five nominees are highly experienced labor lawyers and qualified to serve as members of the NLRB … At any other time, their confirmation would be a virtual certainty … the unions, employers and individual employees who rely on the NLRB to resolve disputes over unfair labor practices and union representation deserve better than this crisis of governance.”

Immigration Vote Nears

Senate Judiciary Cmte may vote on immigration reform bill this week. AP: “…the committee must resolve a few remaining disputes … One involves amendments over high-skilled immigrant visas sought by the high-tech industry but opposed by labor unions … There’s also a disagreement over whether gay Americans should be given the right to sponsor their foreign-born spouses for green cards like straight Americans can …”

Business-labor compromise may unravel. Bloomberg: “… a series of amendments backed by technology and construction companies and opposed by the AFL-CIO labor federation risk upsetting a delicate balance … the reopening of fissures between business and labor serves as a reminder of how tough the challenge is. That divide is the one that scuttled the last attempt in 2007.”

Battle For Affordable Student Loan Heats Up

Sen. Gillibrand proposes student loan reform. HuffPost: “Debtors with high interest rates on their federal student loans would refinance into cheaper loans under proposed legislation to be unveiled this week, in a move that would lower borrowers’ burdens and potentially hurt private lenders and investors. The plan sponsored by Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) would force the U.S. Secretary of Education to automatically refinance most government loans carrying interest rates above 4 percent into fixed, 4-percent loans. Roughly nine of 10 federally-backed loans would be affected…”

Warren student loan bill “the germ of a counter-revolution against austerity politics,” argues Robert Kuttner: “Corporations are able to declare bankruptcy under Chapter 11 and write off old loan — but college debt follows former students literally to the grave even if they go bankrupt. Big banks have gotten trillions of dollars of debt relief from the TARP program and the Federal Reserve’s program of buying toxic assets from banks. But there is no debt relief for students and former students. Can’t we build a movement around that?”

Breakfast Sides

Good Jobs Nation rallies for living wages in DC tomorrow at noon.

NYT edit board slams CFTC derivatives deal: “…the commission’s initial proposal called for hedge funds, asset managers and corporations to contact at least five banks when seeking prices for a derivatives contract. In a major concession to the banks, that number was lowered to two in the final rule. Sometime in 2014, it is supposed to rise to three, but that would still be inadequate. Worse, there’s always the risk that delayed rules will never go into effect. The initial proposal also called for derivatives trading to take place on open electronic platforms. The final rules will allow much of the negotiation over derivative prices to take place over the phone, a practice that is difficult to monitor and prone to abuse.”

MORNING MESSAGE: Five Real Scandals Republicans Might Want To Address

OurFuture.org’s Bill Scher: “Republican might want to ask themselves: do we really believe there’s any there there? … Meanwhile, there are real scandals out there: festering crises that demand policy solutions and government action. For example: 1. Carbon dioxide atmospheric levels hovering around 400 parts per million … 2. Our crumbling infrastructure needs $3.6 trillion just to reach a “state of good repair” … 3. The top 1 percent in America holds 35 percent of the nation’s wealth … 4. More than 4 million Americans have been jobless for more than half a year … 5. Forty percent of America’s children between 3 and 5 are not enrolled any sort of preschool…”

Bipartisan House Group Reaches Immigration Agreement

Bipartisan House group reaches tentative agreement. Politico: “House immigration negotiators emerged from a meeting Thursday with an agreement ‘in principle,’ and plan to turn their attention to drafting a comprehensive reform bill. Rep. John Carter (R-Texas) made the announcement after the two-hour meeting. He declined to elaborate on the details of the deal.”

Senate negotiators trying to woo Sen. Orrin Hatch. W. Post: “The bid to bring Hatch into the fold highlights the strategy of Senate immigration proponents who believe that building as much bipartisan support for the bill is crucial to improving its chances in the Republican-led House … Hatch has filed several amendments to relax visa limits and rules for high-tech companies seeking to hire foreign engineers and programmers … Sen. Richard J. Durbin (D-Ill.), backed by labor unions that fear that Americans could lose out on jobs, fiercely opposes the further relaxation of restrictions on H-1B visas for high-tech companies.”

Filibusters Loom, Dems Near Breaking Point

EPA, Labor nominees clear committee on party-line votes, likely face filibuster, renewing rules reform push. NYT: “…many Democrats have become increasingly exasperated by routine efforts to stall and block presidential nominees. And they are now more supportive than ever of exploiting a technicality of Senate rules that would allow them to make changes with a simple majority of 51 votes.”

Republicans signal opposition to package of NLRB nominees. WSJ: “While ‘It is important to have a fully confirmed National Labor Relations Board … I can’t support the nomination of these two’ recess appointees, said Sen. [Lamar] Alexander, who called them both ‘qualified’ and armed with ‘distinguished backgrounds.’ ‘My problem is that they have continued to issue decisions’ after the D.C. Court ruled against their [prior recess] appointments, said Mr. Alexander … He suggested that Mr. Obama should nominate two equally qualified candidates to replace them, though some Democrats question whether Republicans would confirm any Democrat to the board…”

400 professors and 125 community leaders sign letter urging approval of NLRB nominees, announces American Rights at Work: “In order for our labor laws to work effectively, it is essential that the agency responsible for enforcing these laws be operational. Current and future vacancies on the NLRB, together with the uncertainty created by the D.C. Circuit’s recent Noel Canning decision, make it imperative that the Senate move quickly to consider the package of nominees.”

Breakfast Sides

Republican debt limit hostage plan taking shape. Politico: “In addition to hiking the debt limit, the legislation is likely to have three categories: spending cuts, a framework for tax reform and what will be called a ‘jobs’ element, which will include energy legislation, which would likely be a provision related to the Keystone XL pipeline.”

Bank of England official praises Brown-Vitter “too big to fail” reform bill reports HuffPost.

MORNING MESSAGE: Simpson-Bowles Austerity Gang, Go Home

OurFuture.org’s Richard Eskow: “A lot of liberals, like Josh Marshall, are celebrating the fact that the deficit is plummeting so rapidly. But it’s actually going down too quickly, in a way that undercuts long-term stability and growth … ‘Go big or go home,’ bellow Bowles and Simpson, and for once they’re right. Go home, all of you, and take the sequester with you. Then the grown-ups can start working on realways to fix the economy, with jobs and growth and other things that really work.”

Rifts Form In Immigration Reform

Tension between Dems and Rubio. The Hill: “Rubio caught fellow members of the Senate’s gang off guard Tuesday when he voiced support for an amendment sponsored by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), the bill’s most outspoken opponent, to dramatically strengthen the system for tracking entry and exit visas. The Sessions measure was defeated … ‘He needs this bill to succeed as much as Democrats do. If this bill goes down, he goes down with it,’ warned a senior Democratic aide. ‘Rubio is overplaying his hand if he thinks we’ll go along with anything.’”

Sen. Orrin Hatch making demands to win his vote for immigration reform. Roll Call: “Hatch has offered a package of 24 amendments to the bill, and he wants to see some of them adopted before he will lend his support to the measure. But a few of Hatch’s proposals are within the jurisdiction of the Finance Committee, and that may make it difficult for Democrats to compromise with him.”

House GOPers may dissolve bipartisan working group. Politico: “Republicans in the House bipartisan immigration group are threatening to leave negotiations if they don’t come to an agreement Thursday … If the House does not come out with its own plan, it will make immigration reform a lot more difficult. The theory from Republican leadership was that the bipartisan group’s product would give the House GOP buy-in … The group has been hung up over how the legislation deals with the health care of newly documented workers and worker visas.”

Medicare Chief Confirmed

Senate actually confirms a nominee. NYT: “The Senate on Wednesday approved President Obama’s nominee to run Medicare and Medicaid, Marilyn B. Tavenner, providing the agency with its first confirmed chief in six and a half years … [She] will have a huge role in carrying out major provisions of the new health care law, including the expansion of Medicaid and the creation of marketplaces to sell subsidized private insurance.”

Another vote scheduled on CFPB nominee for next week. Reid warns of filibuster reform if blocked. TPM: “‘We’re going to fill that job. Cordray is there now. He’s going to get a vote.’ Reid wasn’t able to explain why he believes (or claims to believe) Cordray will ultimately be confirmed. But he alluded to the possibility that he may pursue a rules change mid-session. ‘Whether it’s Jeb Bush or Hillary Clinton that’s the next president, I don’t think they should have to go through what we’ve gone through here,’ Reid said. ‘People better watch.’”

Senate cmte moves on labor nominees. WSJ: “First up will be a 9:15 a.m. Senate Health, Education, Labor & Pensions Committee vote on [Labor Sec nominee Tom] Perez … He is expected to clear the committee, where Democrats outnumber Republicans by two, but his fate before the full Senate remains cloudy … Afterwards, the committee plans a hearing on the pending nominations to the National Labor Relations Board … The five-slot board currently has just three members, the minimum needed to issue rulings and conduct most business. NLRB Chairman Mark Pearce’s term will expire in August, leaving the board without a quorum …”

New Clothing Maker Accepts Safety Agreement

Abercrombie & Fitch agrees to safety plan. NYT: “Under the legally enforceable plan, retailers and apparel companies have committed to having rigorous, independent factory inspections, and to helping underwrite any fire safety and building repairs needed to correct violations.”

Other garment companies considering running from factory problems instead of solving them. NYT: “Western executives are checking on potential new suppliers in southern Vietnam, central Cambodia and the hinterlands of Java in Indonesia. Yet safety problems could exist anywhere. The ceiling of a small factory that makes shoes in central Cambodia collapsed on Thursday morning, killing at least two people … Many multinationals are exploring their options in case street clashes and politically motivated national strikes worsen in Bangladesh … Garment manufacturing makes up a fifth of the economy in Bangladesh and four-fifths of its exports … desperately dependent on continued export orders to stave off soaring unemployment and possibly further political unrest.”

Breakfast Sides

Republicans can’t agree on a debt limit hostage plan. Roll Call: “They talked about balancing the budget in 10 years, repealing Obamacare, slashing spending and overhauling the tax code. In other words, the House Republican meeting Wednesday afternoon to brainstorm a path forward for dealing with the debt limit basically consisted of ‘a laundry list of everything imaginable,’ in the words of Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah.”

Apple will testify to Congress about offshore tax shelters. Politico: “The company recently avoided paying as much as $9.2 billion in taxes by buying back stock with debt instead of offshore cash, Bloomberg reported. Apple has a reported $100 billion in offshore funds.”

“Big Banks Get Break in Rules to Limit Risks” reports NYT: “…regulators initially planned to force asset managers like Vanguard and Pimco to contact at least five banks when seeking a price for a derivatives contract … [But] the Commodity Futures Trading Commission has agreed to lower the standard to two banks … [Chair Gary] Gensler, eager to rein in derivatives trading but lacking an elusive third vote, accepted the deal … Mr. Gensler said that, even with the compromise, the rule will still push private derivatives trading onto regulated trading platforms, much like stock trading. He also argued that the agency plans to adopt two other rules on Thursday that will subject large swaths of trades to regulatory scrutiny.”

The social safety net is still helping. ThinkProgress: “Nearly a third of the country’s population would be living on less than half of the median income without the social safety net, but taking it into account drops that number to 17.4 percent.”

Simpson and Bowles, those two hired pitchmen for budget-cutting hysteria, are still hawking an economy-killing product called “austerity economics,” a product that’s designed to benefit their wealthy patrons at everybody else’s expense.  This philosophy provides some (very thin) intellectual cover for the Republicans’ lunatic bloodbath of spending cuts.

Of course, Simpson and Bowles and austerity’s other sales people aren’t really economic thinkers. They’re paid to pitch a product. They didn’t invent austerity any more than Alex Rodriguez invented Pepsi.

But what they’re peddling isn’t a soft drink. It’s a lot worse for you than that.

Snake Oil

You don’t believe that Simpson and Bowles are frauds, snake-oil salesmen trying to lure us into a bait-and-switch for the rich and powerful?  See for yourselves:

The wealthiest among us captured almost all of the after-tax income gains from the late 1970s up to the financial crisis (which accounts for the sharp drop at the right – a drop that still left them well ahead of everyone else.

And, as Emanuel Saez has shown, the wealthy captured 121 percent of the “recovery” gains since the 2008 crisis. In other words, they were able capture even more of our national income after the crisis, while everybody else fell behind.

Free Riders

With the rich earning so much more of our national income, you’d expect Federal tax revenues to go up. After all, they’re supposed to pay a higher percentage of their income than everyone else. That might be scant comfort for the pillaging of the middle class, but it’s something, right?

Wrong.

Corporations have had it even easier. Take a look:

Total tax revenues have plunged, and corporations are paying far less of the tab than they used to. Does that mean that the wealthy are picking up the slack for corporate tax dodgers?

No. As an analysis originally conducted by the Tax Foundation shows, the effective tax rate for millionaires – the amount they actually pay – fell from 66.4 percent in 1945 and 55.3 percent 1965 to 32.2 percent after the Bush tax cuts. While the recent compromise has shifted those figures slightly, billionaires and other very high earners are still paying roughly half of what they paid during the period of our greatest economic growth. They’re even paying less than they paid under Reagan.

Who does that leave to pick up the tab? Presumably you and me.

Tax Magic

And yet, when Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson make their spiel, they actually combine their “deficit reduction” pitch with an appeal to lower tax rates for the highest earners and corporations.

They call it “Tax simplification that eliminates loopholes, lowers rates and raises revenue.” We call it by a more accurate name: Voodoo.

They claim they’ll make up the difference by closing loopholes, but a) making up the difference doesn’t nearly make things right, and b) who believes that’ll ever happen in a town filled with lobbyists?

I’m willing to bet they don’t believe it. We’re pretty sure their corporate sponsors don’t.

Republicans4Anarchy

And yet, Simpson and Bowles prattle on … and on … and on. They’ve increasingly revealed their far-right colors – by embracing right-wing extremist Paul Ryan, by endorsing a far-right Tea Party Congressional candidate named Charlie Bass, and by moving their own pro-corporate “bipartisan” plan increasingly to the right.

The Republicans claim they don’t like the sequester. They were particularly upset when it inconvenienced business travelers. (I was one of them.) But, as Howard Fineman notes, that’s how it’s designed. The sequester doesn’t just cut the national budget by 8.4 percent: it cuts hundreds of individual line items, include the FAA’s, by 8.4 percent.

That’s why Simpson and Bowles really do hate the sequester. Their sister organization, “Fix the Debt,” is stuffed with defense contractors who are losing a bundle under the sequester. The austerians who fund them both would rather see steeper cuts to programs that preserve the social contract, and less in defense. That would preserve and expand their tax breaks without cutting into corporate profits.

Runaway Republicans in the House apparently aren’t as disturbed by the sequester – or else they’re just upping the ante for future negotiations.  Their only proposals for ending sequestration have consisted of bills that double down on the anti-government jihads of earlier proposals. They included like H.R. 5652, Sequester Replacement Reconciliation Act, and H.R. 6684, the Spending Reduction Act of 2012, both sponsored by Ayn Rand fanatic (and Simpson Bowles darling) Rep. Paul Ryan.

Budget Butchers

Those proposed budgets were recipes for anarchy. Republicans don’t want to trim the fat from government. They want to slash the muscle and eviscerate its innards.  At least it’s an ethos, as John Goodman’s character in The Big Lebowski might say – an ethos of virulent government hatred. That’s exactly what voters rejected decisively last November. The Republicans even lost the House – in the popular vote – by one million votes. Only gerrymandering has left them in a negotiating position today.

But their proposed budgets aren’t negotiations. They’re ransom notes made from cut up pieces of newsprint.  As we’ve seen in the sequester, their hatred of government is so severe that they would even cut the military and police functions that seem to arouse such … enthusiasm in their ranks.

And, despite their professed outrage over the Benghazi deaths, the GOP budget actually cuts funding that provides protection for our diplomats overseas. And, as Markos “Kos” Moulitsas points out, they want to cut those funds even more in future budgets.

Why have we had this big stand-off, anyway? Why have we been saddled with the sequester at all? Because the Republicans don’t want to accept any tax increases for the wealthy and corporations.

Mind the Gap

A lot of liberals, like Josh Marshall, are celebrating the fact that the deficit is plummeting so rapidly. But it’s actually going down too quickly, in a way that undercuts long-term stability and growth. It even undercuts long-term deficit reduction.

Let’s go back to the slide that shows receipts vs. outlays:

The gap between the red line and the blue line represents the deficit. You can close the two by lowering the red “spending” line, by raising the blue “revenue” line, or by combining the two. But Republicans don’t want their wealthy and corporate patrons to pay a nickel more in taxes.

A Tax Hike … For You

When you hear them talk about changing “tax expenditures” as if it were some sort of compromise, that means that – like Simpson and Bowles – they’re willing to have the middle class pay more by eliminating some of its much-needed deductions, like those for mortgage interest and employer health insurance.

But we could – and should – emphasize raising revenue through millionaire taxes and corporate tax hikes instead. That money could be used to create jobs and grow the economy – moves which would lead to more tax revenue from re-employed Americans (which raises the blue line) and less demand for government assistance (which lowers the red line).

The American people understand that, which is why they support job creation and proposals such as the millionaire’s tax. Apparently they’re too smart to buy the snake oil.

The Incredible Shrinking Austerians

Simpson and Bowles raises the volume on their demands with every new piece of evidence of their foolishness.  Europe’s austerity mess, our GDP shrinkage after past budgets, the discrediting of economic theorists Ken Rogoff and Carmen Reinhart … with each setback they seem to get a little smaller and their vocal pitch seems a little higher, something like Rod Steiger’s General in Mars Attacks!

Case in point: The Washington Post’s Lori Montgomery reports  that Bowles and Simpson have a new plan that “seeks far less in new taxes than the original, and it seeks far more in savings from federal health programs for the elderly.”

That’s exactly what voters rejected, and it’s an approach which polls show voters widely despise across party lines. And yet, somewhat strangely, Montgomery describes this rightward tilt as “a concession to political reality.”

Go Big or …

The other austerians are starting to shrink, too. The “Center for a Responsible Federal Budget,” another Pete Peterson front operation which usually has more sophisticated patter, keeps moving the goalposts in defense of their pro-wealthy, pro-corporate position.  

And Bill Clinton, who struggles mightily to retain liberal support while serving as a dyed-in-the-wool Peterson pitchman, is now skirting the borderline of gibberish by saying things like “I think Paul Krugman’s right in the short run, and Pete Peterson and Simpson-Bowles and all those guys, everybody’s right in the long run. And the question is timing.”

That makes no sense, because Krugman and the other common-sense Keynesians have said all along that it’s a matter of timing. Their position is diametrically opposed to the self-serving cynicism of Peterson and Simpson-Bowles (which is a redundancy in any case, since Simpson and Bowles serve Peterson), so Clinton’s making no sense. He’s just trying to have it both ways – but what else is new?

“Go big or go home,” bellow Bowles and Simpson, and for once they’re right. Go home, all of you, and take the sequester with you. Then the grown-ups can start working on real ways to fix the economy, with jobs and growth and other things that really address our grave economic problems.

MORNING MESSAGE: America’s Education Spring: A Growing Revolt Against ‘Reform’ Mandates

OurFuture.org’s Jeff Bryant: “… the resistance to top-down education mandates is building. The movement is propelled by forces far greater than what education journalists and policy leaders understand – widespread grievances about inequity, unfairness, and public disempowerment. The revolt is happening. The revolt is now.”

Deficit Shrinking, Health Care Costs Slowing

New CBO projection shows plummeting deficit. NYT: “Since the recession ended four years ago, thefederal budget deficit has topped $1 trillion every year. But now the government’s annual deficit is shrinking far faster than anyone in Washington expected, and perhaps even faster than many economists think is advisable for the health of the economy … the deficit for this fiscal year, which ends on Sept. 30, will fall to about $642 billion, or 4 percent of the nation’s annual economic output, about $200 billion lower than the agency estimated just three months ago.”

CBO even projects slowdown in health care costs. WSJ: ” In 2012, federal spending for Medicare for the elderly and Medicaid for the poor was about 5% below what CBO had projected in March 2010. CBO has been more reluctant than some other analysts to conclude that this is a lasting downshift in health care spending growth, but gradually it has concluded that some of the slowdown will persist.”

“If this holds … the deficit will have been cut by more than half over Obama’s first five years” notes US News’ Pat Garofalo.

W. Monthly’s Ed Kilgore: “I must have missed the blaring MSM news coverage, and also the ticker-tape parade. But then I guess deficits are news only when they are going up.”

…Yet Nothing Changes

Conservatives push deep cuts in exchange for debt limit increase. Roll Call: “Looking to up the ante on debt limit negotiations, House conservatives will push to enact spending changes included in the House-passed budget in exchange for an increase in the nation’s debt ceiling … Rep. John Fleming, R-La., said that, for him and many members of the conservative Republican Study Committee, any deal to raise the debt ceiling would have to be tied to a budget that would balance in 10 years ‘at a minimum.’”

Republicans may still want a grand bargain. NYT: “…if Republicans take control of Congress and the White House in the next two elections … they would then shoulder the political responsibility for the inevitable pain that comes from curbing those huge and popular programs. Much as Republicans may dislike Mr. Obama and his policies, a Democratic president can provide them a measure of political cover … Without cuts in entitlement programs, which can only come through a deal with Mr. Obama, Republican leaders will have trouble making Congress do something they acknowledge it must do — raise the debt limit.”

Pentagon announces sequester furloughs. Politico: “Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel told 680,000 civilian workers they’d have to stay home 11 days without pay. About 140,000 workers from other government agencies have already been given furlough notices. The number is expected to grow as more department heads make their own tough decisions…”

Immigration Reform Faces High-Tech Visas

High-tech visas delicate issue for immigration reform. Politico: “The Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday largely kept intact an agreement on high-tech visas in the Gang of Eight immigration bill, making modest changes while defeating measures that would dramatically alter the compromise. But one major flash point remains … Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), a major advocate for the tech industry, is viewed as a potential swing vote … But Hatch’s plans run right up against Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), a top critic of H-1B visas and a Gang of Eight negotiator …”

“House bipartisan group at “impasse” reports Politico: “…top aides and lawmakers are unsure if they’ll ever come to the agreement they’ve sought for four years … Some Democrats and immigration reform advocates don’t want the House to move quickly. They are pressuring the group to slow down and wait until the Senate passes a bill before announcing a compromise, fearful that a conservative House bill would pull the reform effort to the right too soon.”

GOP Rep. Steve King deems immigration reform a plot to legalize new Democratic voters. CNN quotes: “[Democrats] are in the process of seeking to establish another monolithic voting bloc”

Breakfast Sides

Wal-Mart tied to Bangladesh factory disaster, pledges new safety measures. NYT: “Wal-Mart promised to stop production immediately at factories if urgent safety problems were uncovered and to notify factory owners and government authorities of improvements. But the company, the world’s largest retailer, stopped short of committing to help underwrite the improvements — one of the crucial aspects of the Bangladesh safety agreement adopted by European companies.”

Obama, GOP not far apart on student loan reform. McClatchy: “Congress now sets the rate, but a plan from House Republicans would base it on market rates instead. If it becomes law, subsidized loans – those that don’t accumulate interest while a student is in school – would have a higher interest rate next year. Unsubsidized loan rates would be lower. In the next five years, if interest rates rise as expected, student loans would cost more. The White House plan is similar, but would use a different formula than that set forth by House Republicans … Some House Democrats and student advocates say Congress should continue to set a low rate, at least for now.”

House GOP to hold 37th vote to gut ObamaCare. NYT: “…since 2011, Republicans have spent no less than 15 percent of their time on the House floor on repeal in some way.”

“It’s always hard to tell for sure exactly when a revolution starts,” wrote John Tierny in The Atlantic recently. “I’m not an expert on revolutions,” he continued, “but even I can see that a new one is taking shape in American K-12 public education.”

Tierney pointed to a number of signs of the coming “revolution:”

• Teachers refusing to give standardized tests, parents opting their kids out of tests, and students boycotting tests.
• Legislators reconsidering testing and expressing concerns about corruption in the testing industry.
• Voucher and other “choice” proposals being strongly contested and voted down in states that had been friendly to them.

Tierney linked to a blog post by yours truly, “The Inconvenient Truth of Education Reform,” explaining how the movement known as “education reform” has committed severe harm to the populations it professes to serve while spreading corruption and enriching businesses and political figures.

Echoing Tierney, on the pages of Slate, The Nation, and elsewhere, David Kirp, education professor and author of a popular new book casting doubt on competitive driven, market-based school reform, declared that cheating scandals and parent rebellions over high stakes standardized testing were proof that much ballyhooed reform policies championed by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Education Secretary Arne Duncan are not “a proven – or even a promising – way to make schools better.”

Kirp declared that mounting evidence from school reform efforts in major U.S. metropolitan areas reveals “it’s a terrible time for advocates of market-driven reform in public education. For more than a decade, their strategy – which makes teachers’ careers turn on student gains in reading and math tests, and promotes competition through charter schools and vouchers – has been the dominant policy mantra. But now the cracks are showing.”

In a legislative view, the Progressive State Network, which supports left-leaning state legislators and monitors legislative policy in state houses, noticed “a backlash is brewing in many states as more and more parents and legislators alike start asking questions about corporate education reform.” The post on PSN’s website referenced Tierney’s article and highlighted a Minnesota bill that eliminates testing requirements for graduation and several states that are embroiled in battles to defeat measures known as the “parent trigger,” which enables private takeovers of public schools.

These observations are not alarmist chatter but well-reasoned, valid conclusions that anti-government collectivist actions related to public school policy are scaling up from isolated protests to a nationwide movement of unified resistance.

The movement is widespread among teachers, students, and parents. It is grassroots driven and way out in front of most journalists and political leaders. And it’s scaling up in intensity.

A Teacher-Student-Parent Movement

For quite some time now, education historian and reform opponent Diane Ravitch has written about the ever expanding discontent among teachers over the emphasis on standardized testing and test-based teacher evaluation and school rating systems.

As proof of this discontent, Ravitch has closely followed and commented on a boycott against standardized testing among teachers in Seattle, an ongoing protest among principals in New York state against new teacher evaluations, and objections to the “testing beast” among educators and parents in Texas.

In ever-greater numbers, however, students are also leading the resistance. A recent article in The Nation reported on the growing student resistance movement driven by grievances over austerity budgets and systemic racism.

From all corners of the country – North Carolina to Philadelphia to Louisiana to Chicago – students as young as eight years old are organizing and taking part in a variety of actions including zombie protests, school walkouts and sit-ins, and acts of defiance like the recent rant by a high school student in Texas that went viral over the Internet when he castigated a seemingly indifferent teacher for dispensing education in “packets” rather than engaging the class in meaningful, relevant learning.

In Chicago, youth voice is forming in grassroots groups like CSOSOS (Chicago Students Organizing To Save Our Schools) and VOYCE (Voices of Youth in Chicago Education) that have led prominent, headline-earning protests to school closures, teacher firings, and over emphasis on high-stakes testing.

In Philadelphia, a handful of students used their social media and organizing skills to whip up student resentment and send hundreds of students into the streets to protest budget cuts to their favorite education programs.

In Denver, high schoolers have formed Students4OurSchools and staged walkouts protesting the over-emphasis on standardized testing.

Students in Philadelphia, Providence, Rhode Island, Portland, Oregon, and elsewhere have formed student unions that have developed attention-getting tactics, which have spread to a national scale. These student organizations’ Facebook pages speak in unison against school closures and cutbacks, widespread teacher firings, and top-down implementations of mandated standards and high-stakes testing.

In many places, teachers and parents are supporting rebellious students and even joining in the protests. Grassroots parent groups, in fact, have been the driving force behind efforts to beat back school voucher proposals in Tennessee and parent trigger legislation in Florida.

Resistance is particularly vehement in low-income communities of color in large urban school districts where reform measures have lead to widespread teacher firings and school closings. In Chicago, Philadelphia, New York City, Cleveland, and Detroit, vocal protestors have been organizing in their own communities but also uniting in national campaigns, such as this year’s Journey for Justice effort that brought hundreds of activists in allied grassroots organizations to the White House to protest school closings.

Unlike school reform proponents who benefit from massive donations from rich foundations and politically connected funders, grassroots groups leading the resistance – like the Alliance for Educational Justice and Alliance for Quality Education – have far humbler means and few connections to the political class and deep pocketed philanthropists like Bill Gates.

Nevertheless, these groups have generated strong outpourings of popular dissent and produced important analyses of the duplicity of the reform agenda.

A Movement Getting More Recognition

Mostly, grassroots-led protests against education mandates have gotten little attention from even the few media outlets and reporters focused on education.

That changed, however, when the head of the American Federation of Teachers, Randi Weingarten, called for a moratorium on the consequences of high-stakes testing related to the Common Core.

All of a sudden, when there was a crack in the conventional wisdom that education policy was a centrist agreement between teachers’ unions and conservative belief tanks, many education bloggers and journalists decided the school accountability movement had reached a surprising new level of intensity.

Long-time education journalist Dana Goldstein speculated on her blog that Weingarten’s moratorium call is proof that education matters that were once considered products of a “coalition” of centrist-minded – although mostly conservative – wonks and Beltway operatives are now points of strong contention.

Her conclusion was that these differences represent a “deep divide” among the political class about whether it’s a good idea to “scare us into meaningful school reform.”

Another experienced education journalist, Sam Chaltain also reflected on his blog on calls for a testing moratorium. He recalled that after Barak Obama was elected, Obama proceeded with “a series of education policies that further entrenched America’s reliance on reading and math scores as a proxy for whole-school evaluation.”

Critics of those policies “vented,” Chaltain explained, but “policymakers nodded. And absent any real noise, the tests continued.” But with this more recent backlash to education mandates, Chaltain observed, “policymakers have been unable to ignore a groundswell of noise and resistance.”

Chaltain concluded that conflicts over school policy had “reached a tipping point.”

Similarly, veteran education reporter at Education Week Michelle McNeil observed, “Not since the battles over school desegregation has the debate about public education been so intense and polarized.”

McNeil sourced the polarity to the conventional wisdom that public education is “an institution that historically is slow to change,” and now it’s being “forced to deal with so much change at once.” And she asserts that the controversy over change is mostly “about centralization or decentralization” of specific “reform” efforts.

But what Goldstein, McNeil, and others on the sidelines fail to grasp is that the pushback against the nation’s education policy is not new. The “polarization” is not “obscuring” the issues – as McNeil contends – it’s clarifying them. And the “debate” over education has broken free from being an issue confined to “fringes” and “policy elites” to take its rightful place at the center of “a growing, broader backlash.”

Indeed, just like the fight to integrate public schools was connected to the larger struggle for civil rights, fights to preserve and strengthen public schools – whether they take the form of students walking out of class to protest education cuts, parents fighting against deceptively named “empowerment” policies, or teachers boycotting standardized tests – are connected to much larger struggles over what kind of nation America is becoming.

A Leadership Out Of Touch

The growing rebellion to education mandates has been driven mostly by grassroots groups formed first among low-income communities of color, but now the movement is extending to people of greater means and social-political capacity like parent groups that worked an inside game with state legislators to thwart implementation of the Common Core standards in Indiana, block parent trigger bills in Florida, and curb the emphasis on high stakes testing in Texas.

This unification of the grassroots with the “grass tops” in education is not well understood in the media or among policy elites.

In fact, people in charge of education governance appear to be more clueless than ever about what they are intent on accomplishing and legislating.

Witness the recent confession from one of the movement’s most influential leaders, Bridgeport, Conn., school chief Paul Vallas. As Valerie Struass reported at her blog on The Washington Post, Vallas has led reform efforts in Chicago, Philadelphia, and New Orleans that have become blueprints for education policy ideas across the country. Yet he admitted that the policies he has championed are resulting in a “nightmare” of complexity.

Reportedly, he characterized his efforts to enact test-based teacher evaluations as a feature of a “testing industrial complex” and “a system where you literally have binders on individual teachers with rubrics that are so complicated … that they’ll just make you suicidal.”

Vallas’ newfound doubts over what he has created reflected other confusing comments from education policy leaders. Most notable was the commentary by Bill Gates, widely acknowledged as a leader in the movement to base teacher evaluations and school ratings on student test scores, warning against the “rush to implement new teacher development and evaluation systems” based on test scores.

Even more perplexing was Secretary Duncan’s recent inability to deliver a straight answer about parent trigger bills. As Beltway gadfly Alexander Russo recently reported, “Duncan described the trigger as ‘an important tool’ for parent involvement -– but not the only or even the most important one” – whatever that means.

Compared to authentic grassroots outpourings for resources, equity, and real democracy, these equivocations from education policy leaders are puny and venal to say the least.

Intensity Is Building

“Scared” or not, recalling Goldstein’s comment, activists driving protests against the nation’s prevailing education policies are ratcheting the fight to unprecedented intensity that will likely become even more forceful in future efforts.

Later this month, for instance, teachers in Chicago are planning a citywide three-day march to protest impending school closures. Education related bills in state legislatures in California, Texas, New York, North Carolina, and elsewhere will be highly visible points of contention. And actions to protest the imminent doubling of college loan debt interest rates – certainly an issue related to public education – are generating a unified response from hundreds of thousands of Americans.

Clearly, the resistance to top-down education mandates is building. The movement is propelled by forces far greater than what education journalists and policy leaders understand – widespread grievances about inequity, unfairness, and public disempowerment.

The revolt is happening. The revolt is now.

MORNING MESSAGE: Lift The Millstone of Student Debt That’s Slowing The Economy

OurFuture.org’s Isaiah J. Poole: “… if you or someone you know has had a hard time finding a job or selling a home, part of what you are experiencing is the effect that escalating college costs, combined with the weak employment and income prospects of college graduates, is having on the economy. This is a key reason why it is important to support Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s legislation to lower student interest rates to 0.75 percent, the same rate that the nation’s largest banks and private lenders pay to borrow money from the government.”

Jobs Scandal Continues

The Atlantic’s Derek Thompson explores why Washington is ignoring long-term unemployment: “‘m paid to spend my day reading economic papers and asking people to explain their conclusions. Spending my time this way has persuaded me that long-term unemployment is a national emergency … Politicians have a slightly different information diet. They spend more time gleaning information from lobbyists and rich donors … The centrality of big money in politics makes it nearly impossible for an issue like long-term unemployment to buy a sliver of mindshare.”

“This is no time to cut food stamps” argues NYT edit board: “…a proposed $4.1 billion cut in food stamps in an omnibus farm bill [is] heading toward Senate agriculture committee vote … Yet food stamps are already scheduled to take a hit when increases approved in the 2009 economic recovery act expire in November. The $4.1 billion reduction would result in an average cut of $90 per month for nearly 500,000 households nationwide … Allowing cuts in food stamps is the wrong position fiscally and morally, and a terrible strategy for beginning negotiations with the House.”

“Sequestration Batters Schools On Military Bases And Native American Reservations” reports ThinkProgress: “As sequestration went into effect in March, some lawmakers argued that the impact of the cuts would not be as immediate as had been claimed, as they would take place over a matter of years. But there are some areas that felt the impact immediately. One of those is schools on military bases or Native American reservations.”

Immigration Reform Faces Next Challenge

“Gang of 8 looks to defend guest worker plan” reports Politico: “This week, the gang will have to fend off amendments from both the right and left to fiddle with the program, either to appease businesses or insert stronger protections for labor. Much as they did with border security measures last week, the four members of the gang on the Judiciary Committee, who brokered the immigration deal will aim to band together and defeat changes that could prove fatal to the overall bill.”

Farmers want immigration reform to increase crop production, reports Bloomberg: “Farmers now have reasons to plant new crops … Produce buyers are seeking multiple sources to shield against regional crop failures, and the popularity of locally grown food has fueled a 150 percent surge in the number of farmers markets … A lack of workers can impede taking advantage of those opportunities, farmers say. Declining rural populations leave fewer kids at home to help in the harvest …”

Breakfast Sides

Amtrak earns record ticket revenue, invests in new locomotives. AP: “More than 31 million passengers rode Amtrak in the 2012 fiscal year, generating a record $2.02 billion in ticket revenue. Amtrak said it will be able to pay back a $466 million federal loan for the locomotives over 25 years using net profits from the Northeast Corridor line, where ridership hit a record high last year for the ninth time in 10 years.”

Democrats reconsider filibuster reform via simply majority vote. The Hill: “The option … was raised during a private meeting Wednesday involving about 25 Democratic senators and a group of labor leaders … Reid told a group of Democratic donors at an event hosted by venture capitalist John Doerr in San Francisco in late April that he is seriously mulling another attempt at filibuster reform, according to a person briefed on the meeting.”

Looking for a quick fix to the deep inequality that so afflicts us? Stop your searching. We need to strategize instead for the long-term. A riveting new work from a leading historian helps us see how.

The 79-year-old corporate gadfly Robert Monks, the former top federal regulator over America’s pension system, earlier this year opined that Corporate America operates “for the personal enrichment and glorification of its manager-kings.”

Too harsh a judgment? Hardly. Current standard corporate operating procedures only make sense if we acknowledge that America’s biggest private enterprises have essentially become the private preserve of an elite executive class.

How else to explain today’s most routine corporate behaviors? The endless rush to mergers that create little more than chaos in newly consolidated workplaces. The ongoing corporate refusal to invest significantly in research and development and employee training. The billions of dollars corporations spend to “buy back” company shares of stock on the open market.

All these moves leave corporations less equipped to succeed in the long term. But all these moves generate multiple millions, sometimes even billions, in the here and now for the corporate executives who make them.

Corporations, of course, have always done well by the executives who run them. But a half-century ago the United States had institutions that kept this enrichment within somewhat reasonable bounds. Trade unions acted as a brake on executive greed grabs. A progressive tax system — with rates as high as 91 percent on income over $400,000 — discouraged the greed grabbing in the first place.

But both these institutions — trade unions and progressive taxes — have atrophied over recent decades. Income and wealth, without these institutional checks in place, have concentrated at America’s economic summit. Below that summit, daily life for average Americans has become ever more insecure.

The United States, in effect, has slid into what University of Maryland historian and political economist Gar Alperowitz calls a “systemic crisis.” For the nation’s vast majority, America has simply stopped working. Daily life has turned into an ever-faster treadmill. And no real relief looms anywhere on the near horizon.

In this dreary environment, an understandable disillusionment — with our political leaders — runs deep. So does a decapacitating cynicism. Why bother struggling against an unjust status quo when nothing ever changes?

Historian Alperovitz has a new book out that aims to rouse us from this suffocating political stupor. In his new What Then Must We Do? Straight Talk about the Next American Revolution, he endeavors to show that societies in “systemic crisis” can change. Revolutions do happen. Indeed, he suggests, “we may now be well into the prehistory of the next American revolution.”

Just what does Alperovitz mean by that? In any social order, he explains, political power reflects the ongoing distribution of wealth. Meaningful change only begins when that existing distribution starts coming under challenge.

Alperovitz sees the challenge needed today as much more than any single campaign for a candidate or cause. He has something deeper in mind: an “evolutionary reconstruction” of our society, a decades-long shift that aims to democratize wealth, to build “a community-sustaining economy from the ground up.”

Pie-in-the-sky fantasy? We already, Alperovitz stresses, have the seeds of an alternate, wealth-democratizing economy in place. Well over 100 million Americans belong to credit unions and co-ops. Ten million Americans labor in worker-owned enterprises. Millions more Americans live in municipalities where public institutions generate electric power — or even provide Internet service.

Alperovitz envisions a steady expansion of wealth-democratizing institutions like these. Over time, over decades, the people these institutions touch begin to see from their daily experiences that alternatives to our dominant corporate status quo do exist. They begin to hold “clear ideas” about what can be done.

In times of acute crisis — say another banking failure — people with clear ideas about democratizing wealth won’t let their tax dollars bail out billionaires. They’ll demand public banks. They’ll carve away at private corporate power, bit by bit.

What Then Must We Do? mixes these intoxicating visions of a future yet to be with concrete descriptions of wealth-democratizing efforts already underway all across the nation, from Cleveland and Chattanooga to Portland and Sacramento.

These descriptions can surprise. One example: In Texas, the heart of red-state America, Dallas has opted to build a city-owned convention center hotel. Quips Alperovitz: “Everyday socialism, all the time, American-style.”

The pages Alperovitz has penned here hold a promise that goes beyond the compelling clarity of his prose. National networks are already working to advance his strategic vision, efforts like the community wealth-building initiative of the Maryland-based Democracy Collaborative and the New Economy Working Group, a center for both local and global thought and action.

America, Alperovitz reminds us, has become the wealthiest nation in the history of the world. The nation’s annual income, if divided equally, would be enough to bring each family of four $200,000. We can, in other words, do far better for average Americans than we do today. Why not try?

Labor journalist Sam Pizzigati, an Institute for Policy Studies associate fellow, writes widely about inequality. His latest book, The Rich Don’t Always Win: The Forgotten Triumph over Plutocracy that Created the American Middle Class, 1900-1970, has just been published.

MORNING MESSAGE: Help Elizabeth Warren Get Students the Same Rates as the Big Banks

OurFuture.org’s Robert Borosage: “On July 1, interest rates on student loans will double, jumping to 6.8%, according to current law. While the Big Banks are now enjoying interest rates of almost zero. Enter Elizabeth Warren with her first bill as a Senator: It solves the problem by giving students the same rock-bottom interest rates as the big banks. That’s why the Campaign for America’s Future is joining with Daily Kos to help get it passed. Click here to tell your Senators: Co-sponsor Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s Bank of Student Loan Fairness Act.”

Grand Bargained Out

“A rosier economic outlook” reduces pressure on Congress for grand bargain, reports The Hill: “With increased federal revenues reducing the deficit, pushing a debt-ceiling showdown beyond the summer and into the autumn, lawmakers have been debating gun control and immigration … [However,] economic improvement may mask any damage done by the sequester and make it harder for appropriators to undo those much-maligned indiscriminate cuts.”

“It is time for President Obama to abandon his hopes of reaching a grand budget bargain with Republicans” says NYT edit board: “For years, the party has demanded entitlement cuts, but the moment the president actually offered one, he was attacked … Instead of negotiation, Republicans cling to their strategy of extorting budget demands by threatening not to raise the debt ceiling … Only when the Republican Party feels public pressure to become a serious partner can the real work of governing begin.”

“Renewed drive to ease sequester” reports Politico: “The shortlist for the next round of possible sequester saves includes cancer patients, medical researchers, hungry seniors, poor people and pre-schoolers … Whether any one proposal has a shot at becoming law requires a confluence of events. It needs bipartisan support and at least some semblance of a spending offset to cover the costs.”

Austerity Kills

Austerity is increasing the suicide rate and worsening health, argues David Stuckler and Sanjay Basu in NYT oped: “Countries that slashed health and social protection budgets, like Greece, Italy and Spain, have seen starkly worse health outcomes than nations like Germany, Iceland and Sweden, which maintained their social safety nets and opted for stimulus over austerity.”

“Europe Tries to Boost Economy After Pressure From U.S.” reports Bloomberg: “The bloc’s finance ministers and central bankers left weekend talks of the Group of Seven signaling that they’re poised to scale back austerity, are open to increased monetary aid and looking to unfreeze bank lending … Still in doubt for economists is what kind of stimulus will actually be delivered …”

Prof. Robert Pollin tells Real News Network it’s time to stop talking about the discredited Reinhart-Rogoff paper: “Maybe it’s time we just stop talking about their paper altogether … Let’s get back to talking about austerity … We’ve been in a recovery for four years, and there’s 21 and a half million people who are unemployed or underemployed … this, quote, economic recovery has been so skewed to benefit the rich that the gains in income over this four years since we’ve had a, quote, recovery have been going entirely to the top 1 percent…”

Breakfast Sides

Bangladesh pledges to increase garment worker pay. WSJ: “Workers’ groups say the current $38-per-month minimum wage, half of Cambodia’s, is barely enough to scrape by on … Bangladesh’s textile minister, Abdul Latif Siddiqui, said the government will soon start talks with labor groups and factory owners to agree on a new minimum wage … Wages are unlikely to go much higher. Factory owners, who oppose the hike, say they can’t afford to pay significantly more to workers because Western consumers have become accustomed to cheap clothing.”

Maligned firm handling foreclosure settlement payouts to face Congress. WSJ: “Lawmakers and federal bank regulators are stepping up scrutiny of a consulting firm that twice bungled payments to consumers in a foreclosure-abuse settlement … To critics, the problems with incorrect checks are the latest evidence that regulators haven’t done enough to oversee consulting firms hired to examine banks’ mistakes and compensate consumers.”

My mother has never liked Mother’s Day. She says it’s a phony holiday designed to boost profits for Hallmark Cards. I say, Who cares as long as everybody’s happy? After all, I tell her, Hallmark isn’t Blackwater or Halliburton. And besides, not all profits are evil.

That doesn’t mollify her. In fact, I think she’s beginning to suspect I’m a capitalist roader at heart. In any case, she continues to issue ominous threats toward anyone who might ever send her another Mother’s Day card.

But that’s my Mom.  She’s not feeling so well right now, but she was still able to reiterate those combative sentiments to me today. (I believe the phrase “drawn and quartered” was employed.) She’s an extremely kind person in most respects, but this holiday brings out the aggressive side of her nature.

Granted, most mothers aren’t as adamantly opposed to this day as mine. But if you’re not the card-giving type – or if you are, but are also looking for more socially conscious commemorations of motherhood – here are seven fine activist ways to honor the mothers of America.

 1. Tell our leaders to stop talking about budget cuts.

I don’t know about you, but my mother and father always told me: If you do something stupid and bad things happen, don’t do it again. It aggravates many of America’s mothers when this advice isn’t followed.

And yet, astonishingly, our leaders in Washington are still arguing over who can cut the deficit more efficiently, even as we’ve watched this kind of austerity economics devastate the economies of Europe. And they keep doing it even as deficits are falling.

Mother wouldn’t like that. So write them and tell them you want them to stop.

2. Demand that Congress repeal the sequester.

The sequester is a remarkably stupid policy, even by today’s degraded standards. It has already cost the country a lot of lost jobs, and has shrunk the economy at a time when government should be investing in its growth. As Dave Johnson notes, sometimes it’s even costing the government money to enact these “cuts.”

Overall the sequester will almost certainly increase deficits, rather than decrease them, a phenomenon we’ve already seen in Europe.

Congress needs to repeal this numbskull grab-bag of destructive cuts and invest in growth instead. The President needs to stop using “I’ve got a smarter austerity plan” argument and start arguing forcefully for jobs and growth. If he refuses, other Democrats need to step up to the plate as the Congressional Progressive Caucus and a handful of others have done.

Mothers are working Americans, and the sequester is costing them jobs. Mothers and fathers need Head Start and other vital programs which are being cut by the sequester.

You can go here to drop a Mom-centric message to Congress: Repeal the nitwit sequester once and for all.

3. Demand more education funding, rather than less.

Mothers and fathers also care about their children’s education, and funds for education are being slashed. We need to hire more teachers, stop trying to siphon education money off to private corporations, provide our schools with adequate supplies, and rebuild the ones that are in bad shape.

At the higher-education level, it’s time to start making education affordable again. It’s the ticket to economic advancement, and the way to regain some of our lost social mobility. Cheaper student loans – really cheaper loans, like those Elizabeth Warren are proposing – are an urgently-needed first step.

Then we need to make sure that doesn’t fund a sudden inflation in college tuitions, which are already sky-high, and set about making education affordable. That includes revitalizing our public colleges and universities, while slashing their tuitions. (Yes, the rich will have to chip in. Mother knows best.)

4. Insist that Congress create jobs – for the young, for our crumbling infrastructure, for the future.

Those crumbling schools need workers to rebuild them. So do our crumbling roads, bridges, and other infrastructure.

The men and women hired for those jobs will spend money on things they need, and that will create more jobs in the future. Mothers, like fathers, are sending their children as emissaries into an unknown future. This will make that future a better one.

It will also help alleviate the devastating youth unemployment rate in this country.

5. Tell Congress not to pass the President’s destructive Social Security cut. (It’s also a tax hike.)

The most cynical con in this country is the idea that cutting Social Security cost-of-living adjustments – through the President’s proposed “chained CPI” – is being done to protect “the younger generations” from “greedy geezers.”

This cynical provision hurts younger people more than it will hurt the already-retired. Besides, older people aren’t “greedy” just because they expect to the benefits they’ve paid for throughout their working lives.

And that’s no way to talk to your mother.

6. Support the fast food and retail workers’ strike.

Low-wage workers went on strike last week in New York, and the walkout is spreading like wildfire: first to New York, then Chicago, then to St. Louis, and now to Detroit. Terrance Heath has a good write-up on working conditions in Detroit.

The D15 campaign of Detroit fast food and retail workers lists some of the corporations being struck, including McDonald’s, Burger King, KFC, Dollar Tree, Little Caesar’s, Domino’s, and Long John Silver’s.

Most low-wage workers are employing by larger corporations, including some of the largest in the country. Those corporations have been enjoying record profits and have paid their executives record bonuses, while at the same time underpaying their workers and resisting any attempt to raise the minimum wage.

The working mothers of America are too often the victims of these predatory practices. Some of them are on those picket lines. They could use your support.

7. Contact Congress and demand they raise the minimum wage.

The minimum wage has failed to keep pace with inflation, depriving generations of Americans of a decent life. If it had kept pace with inflation, it would be more than $16 per hour by now.

More than seven million children have parents who work minimum wages. As we explained in “Real Faces of the Minimum Wage,” most minimum wage workers – nearly four out of five – are adults. And, much as it bedevils the conservatives who race-bait the issue while professing concern for minorities, most of them are white. (We’re looking at you, Wall Street Journal.)

You can go here to sign a petition demanding an up-or-down vote on the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2013.

Postscript: Mother’s Work Day

Julia Ward Howe, who wrote The Battle Hymn of the Republic, was the one who first popularized the idea of Mother’s Day. She got the idea from Anna Jarvis, an Appalachian housewife who organized “Mother’s Work Days” to provide sanitary conditions for troops on both sides of the Civil War. Jarvis went on to promote worker health and safety issues, as well as reconciliation between Northern and Southern soldiers.

There’s a different kind of Civil War being waged today. It’s a Class War, and the wealthy are waging it on the rest of us. As we’ve said before, the Class War is a War On Women. It’s time to take action against this economic assault on all women, including the Mothers of America. What better day to rededicate ourselves to that struggle than Mother’s Day?

When it comes time to ask your friends and neighbors to join in the struggle, or to let your elected officials know how you feel, you know what to say: Tell ‘em Mother sent you.