Bob Herbert implores "the movers and shakers to lift the shroud of oblivion and reach out to those many millions of Americans trapped in a world of hurt." Herbert cites a boatload of statistics on what we already know -- there is no economic recovery for average American workers.

The Constant Weader comments:

Although some of the statistics you cite are news, the general deteriorating conditions for American workers has been known for a long time. It has been reported for at least two decades that the rich are getting richer & the poor getting poorer. Every year brings new statistics that show the situation is getting worse for "real Americans."

That is why it is mind-boggling to hear Mitch McConnell defend tax cuts for the rich with this out-and-out lie: "

We can't let the people who've been hit the hardest by this recession, and who need to create the jobs that will get us out of it, foot the bill for the Democrats' two-year adventure in expanded government.

Later, McConnell's spokesman tried to walk back the remark. A little. Allow me to rephrase the spokesman's "clarification": "I'm sorry, my boss is a craven pawn of the rich and said what he meant. Let me tell you what sounds better."

The major Republican "justification" for tax cuts for the rich, as McConnell so inartfully put it, is that if they are allowed to lapse, small businesses will be pinched & will not be able to hire any of those out-of-work Americans. As the Times reported Friday evening, that is malarkey. IRS stats show only 3 percent of small businesses would be hit. Many of those approximately 750,000 so-called businesses that would be subject to the old tax rate "are sole proprietors — a classification so amorphous it can include everyone from corporate executives who earn income on rental property to entertainers, hedge fund managers and investment bankers." Ninety percent of these "small businesses" have no employees at all.

Anyone who thinks Republicans are even vaguely interested in improving the economic lives of ordinary Americans is a fool. Republicans have been as upfront as possible in their shilling for the rich, at the expense of the rest of us. Their defense of their policies is a joke, & their offense is offensive -- calling the President names, insinuating he is a foreigner -- an exotic import one might come across while on an African safari -- blaming him for the decade of decreasing economic power for American workers, & complaining that the government the Republicans themselves have hobbled isn't doing enough for American workers.

The President is finally fighting back:

Some of the Republican candidates for office are noticeably worse than the obstructionists who are already there. There is some hope. If Democrats will fight not just for their own survival, but also for the survival of Democratic values, the results of the November elections won't be as bad as today's polls indicate. But the prospects are dicey. As the AP reported, & as we all know, “...a majority of Americans today are very confident in — nobody.” All of us must do all we can to avert a Republican landslide. Nothing could be worse for the American worker.

Update: Extra-Credit Reading. Timothy Noah has a ten-part series in Slate on growing income inequality.

The Commentariat -- September 18

Just when you think Newt Gingrich can't get any crazier.... Kasie Hunt of Politico reports, "Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich on Saturday said Republicans should try to oust Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius because she was acting 'in the spirit of the Soviet tyranny' and represents 'left-wing thought police.'” ...

... The Second Coming, Values Voters, Style. Ashley Parker of the New York Times: "... At the Values Voters Summit, Indiana Congressman Mike Pence..., whose forceful, hard-line speech at the conference Friday drew calls of 'Pence for President,' came in first in the summit’s annual straw poll on Saturday with 24 percent of the vote. He also took first in the poll for vice president:

I guess that would be good — if he died he could replace himself. -- Tony Perkins, President of the Family Research Council, which sponsors the event

       ... Following Mr. Pence was Mike Huckabee (22 percent), Mitt Romney (13 percent), Newt Gingrich (10 percent) and Sarah Palin (7 percent).

They tell us that they they represent America the way it used to be, self-reliant, virtuous individuals and small businesses. And the truth is, what they want to do is dismantle government so corporations, big corporations will control our destiny. -- Bill Clinton, on the extreme right that is taking over the Republican party

Who Do that Voodoo like You Do? Christine O'Donnell cancels her Sunday talkshow appearances -- even the one on Fox! -- after Bill Maher airs her witchcraft video, which is embedded on my post above titled "Woman of the Middle Atlantic."

Glenn Greenwald: at a $30,000-per-plate DNC fundraiser in Greenwich, Connecticut, President Obama mocks the "petulant" left. CW: does he really think this is a good way to energize his base? Here's the money quote:

Democrats, just congenitally, tend to get -- to see the glass as half empty. (Laughter.) If we get an historic health care bill passed -- oh, well, the public option wasn't there. If you get the financial reform bill passed -- then, well, I don't know about this particularly derivatives rule, I'm not sure that I'm satisfied with that. And gosh, we haven't yet brought about world peace and -- (laughter.) I thought that was going to happen quicker. (Laughter.)

     ... Here's Jane Hamsher on the same subject.

Margaret Wheeler Johnson, in Slate, on the history & art of gay-baiting in American politics.

Gail Collins on the Alaskan Senatorial campaign. Collins highlights a candidates' forum: "On Thursday, in the beautiful fishing town of Petersburg, [Joe] Miller and [Scott] McAdams mixed it up in a candidate forum. The organizers seemed unsure about whether Miller would show up, but he walked in halfway through the proceedings to murmurs of excitement in the school gym where people had been listening to a rather unthrilling discussion on a transportation reauthorization act." You can watch the debate here.

On the presidency, Sarah Palin would "give it a shot" if she's "The One":

Surprise! The Republicans Have Been Lying to You. David Kocieniewski of the New York Times: IRS "statistics indicate that only 3 percent of small businesses would be subject to the higher tax, and many studies of previous tax increases suggest that it would have minimal impact on hiring.... Even among the 750,000 businesses that would be subjected to the higher rates in 2011, many are sole proprietors — a classification so amorphous it can include everyone from corporate executives who earn income on rental property to entertainers, hedge fund managers and investment bankers." Ninety percent of these "small businesses" have no employees.

Keith Hagey of Politico wonders if the Jon Stewart-Stephen Colbert Washington rally on October 30 is the Democrats' "October surprise." CW: he has a point. The rally is three days before the election. I'd love to go.

Stupid Secrecy. Scott Shane of the New York Times: the publisher distributed about 100 advance copies of the uncensored version of Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer's Operation Dark Heart before the Defense Department bought & destroyed the entire first printing. Now the second, redacted printing is out, replete with blacked-out text, giving a window into the Pentagon's ideas of what should be "secret." Shane says a lot of the so-called secrets are common knowledge or are available from multiple sources:

There’s smart secrecy and stupid secrecy, and this whole episode sounds like stupid secrecy. -- conservative scholar Gabriel Schoenfeld, whose book Necessary Secrets defends protecting classified information

Nancy Youssef of McClatchy News: "With the U.S. drawdown in Iraq, the Army is finally confronting an epidemic of drug abuse and criminal behavior that many commanders acknowledge has been made worse because they'd largely ignored it during nearly a decade of wars on two fronts.... A 350-page report issued in July after a 15-month investigation into the Army's rising suicide rate found that levels of illegal drug use and criminal activity have reached record highs, while the number of disciplinary actions and forced discharges were at record lows."

Ah, Looking ahead to 2012. Jim Rutenberg & Jeff Zeleny of the New York Times: "The Republican presidential field for 2012 is beginning to take shape in a period of intensive upheaval set off by the rise of the Tea Party movement, expanding the roster of potential candidates but presenting a more complicated road to the nomination.

The Commentariat -- September 17

Delusions of Grover. Clyde Haberman of the New York Times on New York's Republican gubernatorial nominee Carl Paladino: "On [Paladino']s campaign Web site, prominently displayed near the top of the home page, is a notice that says in large white-on-black type, 'The last NY governor from Buffalo became president of the United States.' ...  The two men have things in common, including fiscal conservatism and a distaste for political patronage and bossism. Oh, there’s one other matter: Both acknowledged having fathered children who in a quainter time were described as — pass the smelling salts — illegitimate."

** The Unwashed Candidates. Glenn Greenwald makes a cogent argument as to why the GOP is all aflutter over the ascendency of tea party candidates -- it isn't that the tea partiers' political ideas are any different from what Republicans have been pushing for decades; rather, it's their unsophisticated way of expressing themselves. "And it's especially uncouth when the person [is] some poor, unprivileged, very ordinary Walmart shopper like Christine O'Donnell." ...

... Andrew Sullivan argues that "it isn't class snobbery. It's the difference between those who use far right convictions and those who actually hold them."

Jeffrey Smith of the Washington Post: "From the moment Boston-based OneUnited Bank began seeking a federal bailout in the summer of 2008, it received special treatment that went beyond what the Treasury Department or the bank and its political supporters have previously disclosed.... A close look at how OneUnited - which is now at the center of an ethics investigation involving Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) - won bailout money shows how the Treasury Department, federal regulators and another influential lawmaker helped it despite its record of bad investments and extravagant spending."

Roger Cohen of the New York Times on Pope Benedict XVI's visit to the British Isles: "Britain would have done well to heed tradition and deny the honor of a state visit to this pope, a blunder-prone spiritual leader of rigid intellect and uncommunicative soul, too remote to heal a church in crisis."

Howard Kurtz in the Washington Post: Robert Gibbs calls a Forbes cover story by Dinesh D'Souza, which "accuses President Obama of adopting 'the cause of anti-colonialism from his Kenyan father,'" "a new low." Forbes stands by its story.

Steven Pearlstein of the Washington Post laments the collapse of the political center. "This is the way wealthy nations become poor. There are no vibrant economies without effective political systems, and there are no effective political systems without a vibrant center.... In the end, there are no winners - except, perhaps, for the Chinese."

Conor Dougherty & Sara Murray of the Wall Street Journal: "The downturn that some have dubbed the 'Great Recession' has trimmed the typical household's income significantly, new Census data show, following years of stagnant wage growth that made the past decade the worst for American families in at least half a century." ...

... BUT. Tiny Violins, Please. Mark Whitehouse of the Wall Street Journal: "It's not as easy to be rich as it used to be."

Peter Wallsten & Danny Yadron of the Wall Street Journal report on the Tea Party Express, which "played a central role upending Republican primaries in Nevada, Alaska and, this week, Delaware, raising millions of dollars to help topple candidates favored by GOP bosses.... The Tea Party Express ... is driven by ... Sal Russo..., a longtime California GOP operative and former aide to Ronald Reagan, [who] runs Tea Party Express out of his Sacramento, Calif., consulting firm."

New York Times: "Jon Stewart ... plans to stage a rally in Washington to counter what he identified as extremists on either side of the political spectrum. Mr. Stewart told his audience the show had secured the National Mall in Washington on Oct. 30 for what he called 'The Rally to Restore Sanity.'”

Jon Stewart announces his Rally to Restore Sanity October 30:

Contra Stewart, Stephen Colbert announces his March to Keep Fear Alive:

Also, see Stewart's extended interview of President Clinton here. It's a four-parter, so I'm not posting it, but it's worth clicking thru.

     ... New York Times Update: "A day after the 'Daily Show' star Jon Stewart announced plans to stage an ambitious public rally to counter what he identified as extremists on either side of the political spectrum, specifics were in short supply on Friday, with most of the details still to be worked out." The Website established by the rally is www.rallytorestoresanity.com.