Bill King: Party System Blocking Meaningful Change

ECONOMIC CRISIS

• King: Party system blocking meaningful change (By BILL KING, Houston Chronicle) To get any meaningful change in the current system, we are going to have to return to the Founders' view of political parties and start thinking differently about them. Instead of being proud to be associated with a political party, it should be an embarrassment. After this week's debacle with the so-called supercommittee, that sentiment should not be much of a stretch.
• Community Impact of Supercommittee Failure (by Yanick Rice Lamb, Special to the AFRO) Among independent voters surveyed, seven in 10 favor cuts in domestic spending and increases in taxes on corporations and wealthy people. About six in 10 of all respondents are against reductions in defense spending.

BLOOMBERG
Bloomberg pivots to slamming D.C. (By: Alexander Burns and Maggie Haberman, Politico) “My suspicion is he hasn’t quite figured out what his next act is, but the one thing he knows he wants is to stay relevant and continue cultivating his brand as the independent, sane, grown-up voice in American politics,” said Democratic strategist Dan Gerstein, a veteran of Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman’s independent 2006 campaign. “This plays into his sweet spot: It’s the intersection of independence, adult leadership, and finance and economics.”

2012
Is the Stage Set For a Third-Party Presidential Candidate? (By Amy Bingham, ABC News) “We are not a third party,” said Elliot Ackerman, the group’s chief operating officer. “The country has enough special interests and goofy ideologies out there. We are a second way to nominate our leaders.” By gathering enough petition signatures, the group has already secured a spot on the ballot in nine states. Ackerman said that number will jump to 28 by the end of the year and before November 2012, he said the group will have secured the remaining 22 states.