U.S. News & World Report

... already had their demands for new cars? That's the argument made by Megan McArdle and others--that Cash for Clunkers just moved auto sales forward. ...

... of the population," says Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a nonpartisan group promoting fiscal education. ...

The purpose of the accounts, says Reid Cramer, director of the Asset Building Program at the New America Foundation, is to get people invested in their future.  ...

"We've already been hit with the sticker shock of just how much this is going to cost -- a trillion dollars plus in 10 years with higher costs beyond that, so there remain questions about whether this is the right time to be engaging in such an expensive agenda item," said Maya C. MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, in Washington, D.C. She said the House measure doesn't do enough to make "a real dent in… more

This week has brought retreat and retrenchment on healthcare. The headline in Politico was, "Health reform hits Senate speed bumps." As Politico explained, the bumps began on Monday, when "The Congressional Budget Office returned a $1.3 trillion price tag on Sen. Ted Kennedy's bill--a number that far exceeds what most lawmakers are willing to pay." And here's how the Associated Press summarized the Capitol proceedings:

... fastest-growing poverty group in the United States...so we're going to have to spend a lot of money on the elderly," says Phillip Longman, author of Born to Pay: The New Politics of Aging in America and a senior fellow at the New America Foundation.

Imagine for a moment that you are driving your child to the hospital. She has a high fever and is suffering from severe abdominal pain. It's unclear what's wrong but she is in definite need of medical attention.

Now imagine that the only doctor on call is a recently graduated medical student. It's her first day on the job and there is no experienced physician or surgeon available for consultation. Are you satisfied with this level of care for your child?… more

President Obama campaigned on the repudiation of Bush-era policies, most notably the neoconservative idea of military pre-emption. The Bush Doctrine--regime change, followed by democratization and reconciliation--is indeed in disarray, but Barack Obama has yet to offer a fully complete alternative.

President Obama might be modeling his presidency after Franklin D. Roosevelt's. In hard times, most Democrats think fondly of the New Deal--certainly Obama's media fans are making the connection--but thus far, he is shaping up less like the 32nd president and more like the 18th, Ulysses S. Grant.

He was speaking at a conference sponsored by the New America Foundation and the Committee for International Trade of the Saudi Chambers of Commerce. In contrast to his only slightly veiled criticism of Bush policy, Alireza said that President Obama's ...