Is there anyone out there who really believes that the reason Republicans oppose the minimum wage hike is because of lost jobs? Of course not. If the Congressional Budget Office had said there would be no lost jobs — instead of as many as 500,000, although very likely fewer — Republicans would still oppose the raise, as they have for many years. Eugene Robinson offers a test: If the problem is jobs, there are many ways to ensure that there are more of them. Like extending long-term unemployment benefits. According to the CBO, that would add 200,000. Or another stimulus — which according to the suddenly not-to-be-questioned CBO — added 1.6 million jobs every year between 2009 and 2012. On the other hand, if job loss is not the real issue …
The GOP tears over the CBO’s job-loss projections are, Robinson writes, just so many crocodile tears. Via the Washington Post.
As the workers have disappeared from sight, so has the concept behind work. Where are the Amazon workers that make your life (if not, necessarily theirs) so easy? Via the New Yorker.
Andrew Cohen writes that Colorado prison director Rick Raemisch’s 20 hours in solitary confinement were well intentioned, but not nearly enough. Via the Atlantic.
America has been at the edge of marijuana legalization several times during the past half-century, but never as close to mass acceptance of the drug as the nation is today. The rise and fall and rise of legal pot. Via the Washington Post.
Michele Bachmann says Obama was elected because of white guilt. You should never pay attention to Bachmann, but maybe this time she’s so wrong that you should. Via Salon.
It wasn’t over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor, but it’s over now. Comic genius Harold Ramis – of Animal House, Stripes, Ghostbusters, Caddyshack, Groundhog Day – is dead at age 69. Obit via New York Times.
[ Image via Denis Bocquet. ]
