The Last Two Years

++Enjoy the last two years of the Obama Presidency. They may be the last of a democratically elected President.

++Princeton University published a study this year that already proclaimed the United States was no longer a democracy. 

++The 2016 elections are already upon us. Conservative websites just released an analysis of the 16 leading GOP hopefuls. Organizing for America is conducting their fund-raising drive. The Democratic congressional committee are already tut-tutting about Boehner's miscues. The caravan moves on.

++Grover Norquist is urging the GOP to claim they are responsible for the economic recovery. That's the spirit. They still send e-mails around blaming Barney Frank for causing the meltdown on Wall Street. So why not claim credit for the recovery?

++In case you haven't got the message the Republican Congress' message this year is "Jobs, jobs, jobs", which can only be created by giving corporations more tax breaks to ease their burden.

++When discretionary spending in the US budget is at the lowest level in decades and the military,intelligence terrorist complex eats 2/3rds of the budget, your political system has severe problems. Expect these problems to be solved by the new super duper "dynamic scoring" system the GOP wants to install in the Congressional Budget Office, instantly ruining one of the outstanding bipartisan arbiters of the budget in history.

++Your Supreme Court will continue its games. The case against the ACA runs into their corporate supremacy doctrine. Can SCOTUS really destroy an industry? They don't case about anyone getting healthcare. It's all the survival of the insurance industry. 

++Your know your system has problems when corporations are considered living, breathing beings with first amendment rights and the right to have religious beliefs. The Roberts Court's view that corporations are superior to individuals may help save same sex marriage--because its denial would mean material harm to businesses as the various amicus curiae briefs from business groups attest.

++Running up to 2016,expect the majority of GOP run state legislatures to gerrymander even more congressional districts and pass even more laws restricting voter access. The Supreme Court's gutting of the Voter Rights Act affected the results in 24 states this year. Expect this to have an extremely negative result in 2016.

++Then we have the issue of dark money in politics. It's not for nothing that the John Doe case in Wisconsin has references by campaign workers to the Scott Walker's "dark side". The FEC is so eviscerated that you should expect billions from overseas donors. Sheldon Adelson's Macau Casinos could be a case in point.

++Then we have permanent war. Left-wing bloggers used the anniversary of the invasion of Panama to mark when this period began in earnest. Unfortunately they are right. James Fallows in the most recent Atlantic has a seminal article on what's wrong with our war-making machine. Please read it.

++The next two years, expect the Republican Congress to try and destroy anything President Obama has done positively. Our economy should remain strong through 2015 but Congress has to artificially create a recession for 2016. So that you forget President Obama and Hillary will be forced to distance herself from him.

++On the positive side,we should expect some sort of climate change agreement in December of next year. We may--but I am beginning to doubt it--see an agreement with Iran over their nuclear program. If there is, our Congress and their military will try to sabotage it.Don't expect any declaration of war against ISIS in any meaningful way.Congress doesn't want any responsibility for this action, just the right to criticize President Obama.

++Since I have no opinion on the matter--yet--expect Congress to give the President "fast track authority" to approve two free trade pacts--one with the Pacific nations, the other with the European Union.