The 10 States With the Best Economies in America

Not all states have experienced the same kind of economic pain since the Great Recession began.
August 26, 2011

The best local economy in the United States, by far, is the DC metropolitan area. Average incomes in the region top $150,000, more than triple the national average. The reason for Washington's affluence (or parts of Washington's affluence – the Capitol also has abundant poverty) is clear: while the rest of the economy is facing a crisis in demand as a result of high unemployment and stagnant wages in the private sector, the Capitol, in classic Keynesian style, is making up for it with plenty of public spending, which has skyrocketed since 9/11 – defense and homeland security contractors, and other firms providing goods and services to the government are flush.

It's the same model that got us out of the Great Depression, but in this age of austerity, Washington isn't spreading enough public dollars around to help those of us living in the 50 states. Even so, not all states have seen the same kind of economic pain since the Great Recession began. Here are 10 that are doing pretty well, with relatively low unemployment, fewer homes in foreclosure, decent wages and a large share of their populations enjoying health insurance. It's not a comprehensive analysis of the thousands of economic metrics one might examine, but it does provide a handy snapshot of some of the states that are weathering the storm fairly well.
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"Age of Greed" Author: The GOP's War on the Poor Could Very Well Backfire

On last night's Countdown, Keith Olbermann had on Roosevelt Institute Senior Fellow and Age of Greed author Jeff Madrick to talk about the GOP's ongoing war on poor Americans. As Madrick notes, Republicans are pushing to raise taxes on low- and middle- income citizens who can't afford even their current taxes; although 46% of Americans are too poor to pay income taxes, they are still paying regressive Social Security taxes. As we know, Republicans have misrepresented that figure, telling voters that close to half of Americans don't pay taxes -- something Madrick calls "deliberate" and "an outright lie." Read more

Maddow on How Americans Dislike the Tea Party More Than Gay People, Muslims, Atheists, and Liberals

Last night, Rachel Maddow took a look at data from a recent poll, which found that the Tea Party is the single most unpopular group in America -- more unpopular than Muslims, atheists, gay people, liberals, and conservatives. This is something you'd think the Republican Party would take to heart. As Maddow noted, "If you were the Republican Party, and you were going to give one of these groups of Americans veto power over who was going to be your presidential nominee...which of these groups would you [choose]? I mean, really? You'd give that power to the one at the very, very bottom, underneath the atheists? Really?" Read more

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Coulter Goes All Science-y in Bid to Disprove Evolution

In her latest syndicated column, Ann Coulter launched an attack on Darwin's theory of evolution. She argues that "[m]odern science has disproved Darwinian evolution" because biologists now know that many features of organic life, such as complex cell structures, DNA, blood clotting, molecules, and "the cell's tiny flagellum and cilium" are extraordinarily complicated. From this, Coulter makes the leap that such things couldn't possibly have evolved through natural selection and random mutation, claiming this shows that evolution is "mathematically impossible."

Not only is that false, it's yet another example of Coulter's longtime war on science.

The concept Coulter is describing -- originated by intelligent design proponent Michael Behe -- is called "irreducible complexity." The basic idea
is that "that there are in organisms 'irreducibly complex' systems that cannot be explained by random mutation and natural selection. These 'irreducibly complex' systems would cease to function if any one part fails -- which Behe claims rules out evolution and leaves only design."

Coulter devoted a significant portion of her 2006 book Godless: The Church of Liberalism to an attempt to disprove evolution. She similarly touted Behe and his "irreducible complexity" theory, claiming it "disproved evolution." Media Matters thoroughly addressed the issue at that time,noting several deep flaws in her reasoning:
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Nice! Perry Sought to Make Money from Insurance Scheme Speculating on Retiree Death

Now this is what I call constituent service --- if your constituents are wealthy Wall Street donors:

Two weeks before Thanksgiving in 2003, top officials from Texas Governor Rick Perry's office pitched an unusual offer to the state's retired teachers: Let's get into the death business.

Perry's budget director, Mike Morrissey, laid out a pitch that was both ambitious and risky, according to notes summarizing the meeting provided to The Huffington Post.

According to the notes, which were authenticated by a meeting participant, the Perry administration wanted to help Wall Street investors gamble on how long retired Texas teachers would live. Perry was promising the state big money in exchange for helping Swiss banking giant UBS set up a business of teacher death speculation.

By Digby | Hullabaloo
Posted on Thursday, August 25, 2011 @ 07:45 PM

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Why Rick Perry Would Put the World on a Fast Track to Total Meltdown

From calling the BP disaster an "act of god" to responding to his state's drought with prayer, Perry's anti-environmental resume is extensive.

August 25, 2011

Burned trees, charred wildlife, destroyed homes — Texas has endured more than 16,000 wildfires since January, which have consumed over 3 million acres of land. With little rain, the state has become a tinderbox. Bloomberg reports that drought in Texas has resulted in $5.2 billion of agricultural losses ... and still counting. The state climatologist pegged the drought as the “worst single-year dry spell in 116 years,” according to the San Antonio Express-News. The town of Robert Lee in West Texas has seen its water supply dwindle to 1 percent and West Kemp is out of water.

Texas Governor Rick Perry, the new darling of the GOP presidential field, leapt to action. His response to catastrophe?

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Polar Bear in strange new surroundings where there used to be snow and ice.

Some Of Your Taxpayer Assets Will Be Sold Off To 'Vulture Funds,' In Case You Were Interested

Jason Linkins
Jason Linkins jason@huffingtonpost.com Become a fan of this reporter

Hey, everybody! Time now to check what's going on with that giant portfolio of foreclosed-upon homes that we, as taxpayers, own. Did you forget that we owned a giant portfolio of foreclosed-upon homes? Because we do. Anyway, the good news is that we may not have this portfolio for much longer. The bad news is that we'll be relieved of it in one of the worst deals possible.

At any rate, Ken Layne points us to some recent news on that front:

The largest transfer of wealth from the public to private sector is about to begin. The federal government will be bulk-selling the massive portfolio of foreclosed homes now owned by HUD, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to private investors -- vulture funds.

These homes, which are now the property of the U.S. government, the U.S. taxpayer, U.S. citizens collectively, are going to be sold to private investor conglomerates at extraordinarily large discounts to real value.

You and I will not be allowed to participate. These investors will come from the private-equity and hedge-fund community, Goldman Sachs and its derivatives, as well as foreign sovereign wealth funds that can bring a billion dollars or more to each transaction.

In the process, these investors will instantaneously become the largest improved real estate owners and landlords in the world. The U.S. taxpayer will get pennies on the dollar for these homes and then be allowed to rent them back at market rates.

See, what's happening is that the Treasury Department, acting in concert with some other federal agencies, has submitted a "Request For Information" about this big pile of sad homes we "won" in the financial inferno of 2008. As the article notes, the point of an RFI is to stage a private sector consultation about the best way forward. However, the private sector interests here have already come up with the plan -- the federal government just has to go through these motions to make whatever comes next technically legal, while hoping that taxpayers don't loudly object. If there's no massive protest, the federal government will proceed to make a bargain-basement offer for this housing portfolio.

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