A Progressive Economic Vision For America Is Coming

The "Team of Rivals" idea has had a few progressives worried that Obama would not appoint anyone from the left. The fear was that by picking certain people, the conservatives would get their center-right Administration after all. Well, those fears are largely unfounded, especially since it is about the policies of the President that truly matter. Though if you are interested in names, you should check out Melody Barnes, who will be the Domestic Policy Council head in the new Administration.

From The Field:

Melody Barnes, Domestic Policy Council served as chief counsel to Senator Ted Kennedy on the Judiciary Committee from 1985 to 1993. Want to get an idea of how progressive she is? Read this: In January of 2007, prior to President Bush's state of the union address, Barnes wrote this essay for the Washington Post, What a Progressive President Might Say:

Here at home there is urgent work to do to fight the historically high -- and growing -- gap between our richest and poorest citizens. While the mean income of households on the low end of the income spectrum -- the bottom 20 percent -- is just $10,655 a year, the income of the top twenty percent of households averages almost $160,000. That's 15 times as much. At the same time, according to the latest census figures, the middle class, beset with stagnant wages and mountainous debts, is shrinking. The sad fact is that one of our most cherished values as a society, namely equality of opportunity, is fading as a reality for far too many people...

No news agency predicted it or broke the story until two hours ago this morning when the Think Progress blog became the first - beating all commercial media at their own game - to do so.

Likewise, the nomination to head the Council of Economic Advisors, Christina Romer, went un-predicted and without leaks until just three hours before today's press conference when Politico broke the story.

It's funny hearing morons like Mark Halperin talk about how the media fawns over Obama, yet they can't even get a handle on the news that the President-Elect breaks nearly every single day. The truth is, no one can really predict what Obama is going to do yet, he won't be President for almost two more months. What we can go on is what he has been saying to us for 21 months on the campaign trail and three weeks after, that we are going to get change and a total departure from George Bush, something that for one, Melody Barnes among others represents.