Every time I read a Paul Krugman column I stop and wonder: what would America look like if this man were in charge of the country?

We know from his most recent writings that Krugman would have nationalized the entire banking system, that he would have enacted a significantly larger stimulus package than the $787 billion that passed, that he would move America to a single payer health care system, and that he'd enact much tougher environmental policy to deal with global warming.

Today, Krugman spends the first half of his column lamenting the fact that without an additional stimulus package we may be headed for a "jobless recovery." He writes:

Now, it's bad enough to be jobless for a few weeks; it's much worse being unemployed for months or years. Yet that's exactly what will happen to millions of Americans if the average forecast is right — which means that many of the unemployed will lose their savings, their homes and more.

Krugman describes the prospect of lingering high unemployment as a "slow-motion human and social disaster." Fair enough.

But then Krugman spends the second half of his column arguing that the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill that just passed the House "fell well short of what the planet really needs."

Krugman doesn't elaborate on what type of additional environmental regulations are needed to avert the "utter catastrophe" heading our way, but he makes clear that we need much, much more than we have and that we need it fast.

How can we reconcile the two pieces of Krugman's argument? I'm not a Nobel Prize winning professor from Princeton, but it doesn't take more than a basic understanding of economics to know that the kind of stricter environmental policies Krugman is talking about (carbon taxes, capping emissions, additional regulations, etc) will come at a cost to the economy. The discussion is, and always has been, all about balance: how do we implement policies aimed at addressing the issue of climate change without putting additional undue burdens on the economy and stifling growth?

To achieve the kind of dramatic, fast-acting results Krugman envisions would obliterate such balance  (unless Krugman believes further massive government spending can somehow offset the havoc such legislation would wreak on the economy) and one byproduct of Krugman's prescription would almost certainly be higher unemployment.

It really doesn't make much sense. Krugman frames his argument with the colorful analogy of the slowly boiling frog. But, ironically, Krugman's solution for saving the frog is to pull him out of the boiling pot and strangle him to death.

From the NBC Today Show: Johnston: Palin's fame ‘got to her head'

It turns out the symbol is imperfect but the substance remains.

The liberal group People for the American Way, a strong defender of affirmative action, emailed reporters Friday about “Frank Ricci's troubled and litigious work history.” As a McClatchy story reported, the opposition research is reminiscent of the “sharp elbows” seen in the character assassination of Anita Hill, who testified against Clarence Thomas.

Sonia Sotomayor's confirmation hearings this week will not be as controversial as Thomas. And like Thomas, she will surely be confirmed. Conservatives are mounting a pro forma fight.

But Sotomayor will face some unflattering testimony, none more anticipated than Ricci's. Ricci was the white New Haven firefighter who served as the lead plaintiff in the recent reverse discrimination case.

In a tangential revelation Friday, it turns out that Ricci is not a reluctant litigant. The People for the American Way email charted past lawsuits filed by Ricci, including a 1995 case where he argued that the city violated the Americans with Disabilities Act for allegedly disqualifying him due to his dyslexia. Friday evening, Slate's Dahlia Lithwick wrote an article on Ricci's litigious background.

“Ultimately,” Lithwick wrote, “there are two ways to frame Frank Ricci's penchant for filing employment discrimination complaints: Perhaps he was repeatedly victimized by a cruel cadre of employers” or he is a plaintiff “who reacts to professional slights and setbacks by filing suit.”

Slate's Lithwick, one of the most influential legal writers in the country, infers that Ricci's litigious history undercuts the substance of his argument. She led her article by partly recounting a line of mine:

“Ricci has become a sort of folk hero for white men everywhere, having dared to stand up against the evils of affirmative action and race-based employment preferences. Next week, he will be called on to make the point, as David Paul Kuhn put it, that Sotomayor, for all her talk of empathy and the real-world impact of judicial decisions, "demonstrated no empathy for the 'real-world consequences' of affirmative action on Ricci."

Lithwick went on to write that “Ricci is invariably painted as a reluctant standard-bearer; a hardworking man driven to litigation only when his dreams of promotion were shattered by a system that persecutes white men.”

Criticism of the New Haven ruling did not center on whether Ricci was a reluctant warrior. His case earned attention because it personified how affirmative action's preferences for some inherently denies opportunities to others.

It's an old trick of debate to take your opponent's argument to an absurd extreme and therefore frame the entire argument as absurd. No reasonable critic of affirmative action, who understands the ocean of historic injustice it was attempting to alleviate, believes affirmative action is “evil” or “persecutes white men.”

But by design, affirmative action attempts to correct discrimination with discrimination. The policy offers opportunities to some Americans because of their race and/or gender, who otherwise do not qualify. That means someone who was qualified did not get the job or into the college. And yes, that person is usually a white male. Let's be honest about the debate.

Ricci's litigious background does not, after all, change the facts of the case. He still gave up a second job to study. He still paid an acquaintance more than $1,000 to read textbooks onto audiotapes in order to overcome his dyslexia. Ricci still studied 8 to 13 hours a day for the exam. That exam was still designed by an agency that specializes in preparing race-neutral promotional tests that are job relevant. Ricci still passed that exam, earned the promotion, only to be denied the opportunity as a consequence of his race.

The most sympathetic plaintiff is traditionally placed at the helm of significant cases.

I would agree with Lithwick that the Ricci case should force the political right to confront the upside of the doggedly litigious among us.

But Ricci's past does not change this case, nor the need for many liberals to confront the downside of affirmative action.

Twitter | RSS

Democrats continue to hold a substantial lead in party identification, though it slimmed some from the first to second quarters of the year, Gallup reports.

In the second quarter, 49% of respondents interviewed identified themselves as Democrats -- 9 points higher than Republicans. However, Democrats led Republicans by 13 points in the first quarter of the year, 52%-39%.

The second quarter numbers are based on more than 5,000 interviews.

If the 2012 election were today, President Obama would easily carry the state of Minnesota against either Gov. Tim Pawlenty or Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, a new poll finds (July 7-8, 1491 RV, +/- 2.5%).

Public Policy Polling reports that although his approval rating in the state dropped to 54% from 60% in April, Obama would take down two-term incumbent Pawlenty 51%-40%, and 2008 vice presidential nominee Palin 56%-35%. Obama defeated McCain last year 54%-44%, to take Minnesota's 10 electoral votes.

Much of Obama's approval rating drop results from a loss of Republican support. Just 12% now approve of the job he's doing, compared with 23% in April. Pawlenty, who's announced he won't run for a third term and is speculated to be considering a bid for president, has an approval rating of 44%, with 48% disapproving. Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) is at 56%/30%.

Massachusetts Republicans are excited about their latest prospect for the gubernatorial race. Charles D. Baker, a health care CEO, has declared for the race.

The Globe reports:

$96,000.  That's how much Senator Ensign has admitted his parents paid to his now former mistress. Ensign's lawyer proffered the following explanation:

"Each gift was limited to $12,000. The payments were made as gifts, accepted as gifts and complied with tax rules governing gifts.

"After the Senator told his parents about the affair, his parents decided to make the gifts out of concern for the well-being of long-time family friends during a difficult time. The gifts are consistent with a pattern of generosity by the Ensign family to the Hamptons and others.

None of the gifts came from campaign or official funds nor were they related to any campaign or official duties. Senator Ensign has complied with all applicable laws and Senate ethics rules."

Right. We are supposed to swallow the idea that eight payments distributed by the parents and crafted carefully as "gifts" to avoid scrutiny and comply with letter of the law and Senate ethics rules are in fact just part of a "pattern of generosity by the Ensign family to the Hamptons and others."

If it's a such a well documented pattern of generosity, let's see the proof of similar payments to other family friends.

We've noted polls in Ohio and Virginia this week where President Obama's approval rating has slipped. But a University of New Hampshire survey finds that he's maintained strong numbers in the Granite State, perhaps the only true battleground state left in the Northeast.

Obama Job Approval
(Overall / Dems / Rep / Ind )
Approve 61 / 93 / 26 / 63
Disapprove 33/ 6 / 67 / 25

His approval has dropped just two points overall since an April survey by UNH, but has actually increased by one point among independents. That contrasts significantly with this week's Quinnipiac poll in Ohio, which showed major slippage in both categories. UNH pollster Andy Smith told RCP that a major reason why could be that New Hampshire's economy comparatively strong. The state's unemployment rate in June was 6.5, compared to Ohio's 10.5.

A majority of New Hampshire voters approve of how he's handling the economy, though he does score higher on foreign affairs.

Obama Handling Of ...
Economy 57 / 39
Foreign Affairs 63 / 29
Iraq 65 / 24

The telephone survey of 558 New Hampshire adults was conducted June 24-July 1, and had a margin of error of +/- 4.1 percent.

A new University of Texas poll shows that Texans don't think much of what's going on in Washington, which may be weighing down Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R) as she prepares to challenge Gov. Rick Perry (R) in the March 2010 primary. She had led Perry in the last UT poll conducted in February.

Republican Primary Election Matchup (RVs)
Perry 38 (+9 from Feb)
Hutchison 27 (-10)
Berman 1
Undecided 26 (+2)

A Democratic primary matchup shows entertainer and 2006 independent candidate Kinky Friedman ahead among registered voters with just 13 percent, followed by state Sen. Leticia Van de Putte at 7, with 64 percent undecided. In a poll of the special election that would occur if Hutchison resigns her Senate seat, Republican Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and Democratic former state Comptroller John Sharp leading with 9 percent, with Houston Mayor Bill White (D) at 6 percent.

Perry is not overwhelmingly popular, and in fact won re-election in 2006 with less than 40 percent of the vote in a multi-candidate field. But President Obama has a net negative approval rating, while only 20 percent approve of Congress, which may explain Perry's vocal anti-Washington activities.

Job Approval
Perry 42 / 32
Obama 43 / 46
Congress 20 / 58

The poll also tests a potential 2012 White House matchup between Obama and Mitt Romney, with the incumbent slightly ahead.

2012 Presidential Matchup
Obama 36
Romney 34
Don't Know 30

The survey was conducted from June 11-22, surveying 924 adults with a margin of error of +/- 3.2 percent. The Republican primary subsample of 350 voters had a margin of error of +/- 5.2 percent.

This was the question dominating Washington punditry in Winter and Spring of 2009.  Political observers knew that Obama would not be able to sustain his approval ratings once the voters began to assign responsibility to Obama for the health of the economy.  They also knew that so long as people viewed the economic collapse as something that Obama had simply inherited from George W. Bush and was trying his level best to deal with, his high approval ratings would remain relatively intact.

The answer to the question now appears to be: four months.

On May 20, 2009, Rasmussen had Obama's overall approval rating at a healthy 58%-41%.  The Rasmussen Index -- which measures strong feelings on the President -- stood at 36% strongly approve to 29% strongly disapprove.

On that day, Gallup measured the President's approval rating at 64% approve, 29% disapprove.  The RCP Average of approval polls similarly had him at 61.2% approve, 32.3% disapprove.

In retrospect, May 20th seems to have roughly marked the end of what had been a pretty stable 3-month run for the President in polls (he quickly and perhaps unsurprisingly lost Republican support in his first month in office).  Since then, attention has focused less on "green shoots" in the economy, and more on the rise in the unemployment rate.  And since then, his approval ratings have steadily dropped.

Rasmussen now has him at a tepid 51%-48% approval, the lowest of his Presidency.  People with strong feelings about the President now lean against him:  30%-38%.  Gallup has his approval at 57%-36% -- up a point from the lowest point of his Presidency yesterday (56%-36%).  And the RCP Average has him at his lowest point ever as well: 56.5% approve to 38.5% disapprove.  This is also in line with polls from Ohio and Virginia showing the President's approval rating slipping below 50% in those states.

To be certain, these are not bad numbers.  They're good.  But they're not the strong numbers from March-May, and they aren't the stratospheric numbers from January-February.  And as more and more people begin to view this as Barack Obama's economy, we can expect more and more people to turn a critical eye toward the President, at least while the economy continues its downturn.

And when you consider that the President's job approval is one of the most important factors in determining how a President's party fares in midterm elections, you begin to understand why we are beginning to hear calls for a second stimulus.  Democrats need the economy to turn around, and they need it to do so fairly quickly if the electorate's perceptions of the economy are going to turn around in time for the 2010 midterm elections.