For some insight into the politics of the failure to renew unemployment compensation for 1.3 million jobless, check out Niraj Chokshi’s “Where the 1.3 million people losing unemployment aid this week live” at the Washington Post. States taking the biggest hits include: NJ; NY; PA; CT; NV; GA; CA; and OR.
The GOP’s failure to renew unemployment compensation or take action to reduce long-term unemployment may prove disastrous for their 2014 and 2016 hopes. To better understand why, read Brad Plumer’s Wonkblog post “Seven things you should know about the expiration of unemployment benefits.”
The “dems in disarray” meme is back in the MSM, but WaPo’s Eugene Robinson reports on “The GOP’s growing divide,” indicates that the Republicans may have bigger problems. While Dems have some reason to hope that swing voter opposition to the ACA will shrink as more are covered, the Republicans internal divisions remain deep, with no relief in sight.
For more on this topic, Hotline on Call’s Julie Sobel’s “Ranking the Top 5 Senators Vulnerable in 2014 Primaries” provides perspective on next year’s battle for Senate control.
At the L.A. Times Maeve Reston reports that “Louisiana’s Mary Landrieu adopts risky strategy in bid to keep Senate seat,” keeping her distance from Obamacare, while working to retain Black voters’ support.
Egberto Willies of Daily Kos discusses why “Opting out of ACA because it’s not single payer is dangerous” and why young people shouldn’t take the ‘young invulnerables’ Kool-Aid and refuse ACA coverage.
Speaking of avoiding the Kool-Aid, here’s a good cautionary tale for Libertarians about the downside of supporting Ron Paul and his schitzy philosophy.
Abby Livingston has an interesting Roll Call round-up of “The Best Congressional Campaign Ads of 2013.”
David Rosen’s “Why red state Democrats keep getting left behind” at Campaigns & Elections focuses on Arkansas Democrat Mark Pryor’s battle to hold his Senate seat.
Kind of a downer that “Inside Llewyn Davis” hardly touched on the social protest milieu that energized the NY folk music scene and nurtured Dylan, the Weavers, Seeger, Ochs, Van Ronk, Odetta and Baez, to name just a few of those who howled so eloquently against racism, social injustice and militarism.