Rick Perry, Mitt Romney, David Brooks and the descent into darkness of contemporary "conservatism"

Read THIS "shrill screed" if you read nothing else on politics and our dire straits today.
                                                   
                                                            Via Balloon Juice

"Put jobs at the top of the national agenda..."

President Obama has promised to deliver a jobs agenda in September.  Here's a good column by NYT's Nick Kristoff that helps put the jobs crisis in perspective:

When Americans are polled about the issue they care most about, the answer by a two-to-one margin is jobs. The Boston Globe found that during President Obama’s Twitter “town hall” last month, the issue that the public most wanted to ask about was, by far, jobs. Yet during the previous two weeks of White House news briefings, reporters were far more likely to ask about political warfare with Republicans...

2012: On political perspective and drawing lines where they matter the most

Winning Progressive lays out an excellent counter-critique to much of the over-heated criticism of President Obama coming from "the left" that dismisses his accomplishments and commitments: