Democratic Challenger Kills Chances by Falling for Catfood Commission's Conjob

I was all excited about posting on the Democratic candidate for Kentucky's Fourth District Congressional seat, John Waltz, who outraised the repug incumbent in the second quarter and proved he has genuine grassroots fundraising skills.

But then I read his campaign website.

And for all his bragging about being a progressive and a Democracy for America nominee for "Grassroots All-Star," one of only three issues discussed on the site is "Debt Reduction."

I promise to support and push for enactment the recommendations made by the bi-partisan debt reduction task forces currently underway. I also promise not to distort, twist, or otherwise use any Republican or Democrat's vote for such measures against them.

Yes, boys and girls, that's your "progressive Democratic candidate" promising to - wait for it - eliminate Social Security.

Sure, one of his other issues is "Jobs," but his "solutions" focus almost exclusively on debt reduction and tax cuts.

Walz and his Blue Dog buddies might want to take a look at this chart from the Brookings Institute.


Click here to see a larger version.

Steve Benen explains:

... highlights how long it will take our economy to return to the unemployment levels that existed before the Great Recession began. If the economy added an average of 208,000 jobs per month -- a rate we're still not close to reaching -- it would take 136 months to get back to where we were. That translates to more than 11 years.

That's not a typo. Moderate monthly job growth would get us back to a pre-recession job market in 2021. That's how deep a hole we fell into. Obviously, more robust economic growth would get us back to pre-recession levels much faster, but by any scenario, we're still years away.

David Kurtz added, "Unless something changes -- and the deeply troubling current emphasis on deficit reduction suggests nothing will -- we're looking at a decade or more of chronically high unemployment. It's a situation that is not sustainable economically or politically."

It's that point about deficit reduction that stands out for me. As awful as the realization is about how long it will take to recover, the insult that gets added to the injury is the fact that the status quo isn't perceived as necessarily scandalous or devastating. The Washington establishment sees the numbers, but doesn't feel the need to leap into action.

On the contrary, we can't even extend unemployment benefits because Republicans won't let the Senate vote on them. When President Obama called on an emergency measure to prevent massive layoffs at the state level, Congress balked -- it was considered too tough a vote in advance of the elections. Additional stimulus and/or an ambitious jobs bill are effectively off the table entirely, in part because the GOP will refuse to allow a vote, and in part because Blue Dogs want to focus on deficit reduction and spending cuts.

It doesn't have to be this way, but the political will to act doesn't exist, and the only segments of the public screaming for political attention are deeply confused anti-government zealots who want the unemployment crisis to be slightly worse.

It sure as shit doesn't help when Democratic candidates like Walz run on anti-job, debt-cutting platforms that will destroy the economy.