It has been an interesting week.  Unemployment has gone down in Canada and even though the overall percentage of unemployed has gone down in the States, it actually rose by 20,000 people in January due to a large number of unemployed no longer looking for work and the fact that companies have learned how to operate with fewer employees.  This is not good news for your average person.

On the political front, the President had an impressive week beginning with last Friday's embarrassment of the House Republican caucus when he refuted each of their talking points in an impressive display.  Go over to Fugumble's Youtube channel and check out the 'Obama dismantles Republican caucus' videos, to see for yourself.  I would argue that for someone to go in front of their greatest enemies and school them so handily on national television is beyond impressive, and perhaps a once in a lifetime event in American politics.

Following that success the President did a question and answer session with Senate Democrats, and while it was informative and enlightening, it just wasn't the same experience.  Especially because Harry Reid chose the most vulnerable Senators in the upcoming midterms to ask each question.  I think it would have been a better experience for the President to take questions from a group of Senators that didn't make it look staged, but then again, anyone taking questions from their own party looks like they are playing softball, no matter who is asking the questions.

Overall, the message form the Democrats this week was one of cooperation, transparency, and fight, instead of flight.

Perhaps most surprisingly this week was the Republican reaction to the President's offensive  and their continued high from the Scott Brown victory in Massachusetts.  Scott Brown was sworn in yesterday as the 41st Republican Senator a week early, angering labour groups because they are worried he will jeopardize the appointments of their preferred federal nominees coming next week.  It has become general knowledge over the past year that Republican Senators have put holds on Obama nominees for various positions in the Federal government for entirely unrelated reasons to the job or the nominee's credentials.  As an example of the ridiculous holds put on nominees for positions that are really important to be functioning, head on over to read this TPM article for your edification.

The other crazy reaction from Republicans is House Rep. Paul Ryan's (R-WI) 'shadow budget' proposal to compete with the budget just proposed by the President.  The reason I say it's crazy is because it's almost the same proposal by former President George W. Bush that was resoundingly defeated during his own Presidency.  It calls for the complete privatization of social security, which I'm sure will make voters ask something like 'WTF?', didn't we just have our 401K's completely obliterated by the private market because of their greed and selfishness?  Not only is the plan to privatize social security, but he also proposed to have social security cut to those 55 and under, letting the entitlement run to its end.

The second part of Mr. Ryan's proposal is to turn Medicare and Medicaid into a voucher system which would entitle a person to a certain dollar amount of medical care for their lifetime, and anything on top of that is up to the individual to handle themselves.  There is also, no provision for the value of the vouchers to increase with inflation which is sure to cause any number of problems for anyone who happens to get sick or get into an accident.  Anyway, you can see without thinking very hard the potential problems this plan entails.  It's essentially a survival of the fittest approach to healthcare, although it does indeed lower costs of healthcare in the United States by cutting off health support from the government.

I should point out that Paul Ryan's budget plan has not been officially accepted as the official Republican plan, but Ryan is the ranking Republican on the House budget committee, so if the House is taken back by the GOP in November, he'll be in charge of the Budget committee.  Take a look at this TPM article which does point out that the Republican budget will eliminate the deficit in 50 years, and take a look at Paul Ryan's Proposed Budget in all of its crazy glory.

Have a great weekend!