The New Ledger » Podcasts

Obamacare’s End

Ben Domenech — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 20:58:52 +0000

Coffee & Markets will wait til Sunday (we want to see how things turn out), so here’s a brief podcast with a few thoughts from me on the eve of health care reform’s final vote: “Obama’s dedication to passing this spectacularly flawed and unpopular health care bill appears to be based on the assumption that the American people like a winner even if the victory comes at their expense.”

You can read the whole thing at CBS News.

Coffee and Markets: Financial Regulation and Obamacare

Francis Cianfrocca — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 13:19:27 +0000

It’s time for your weekly dose of Coffee and Markets, featuring The New Ledger’s Francis Cianfrocca, a podcast brought to you by the fine folks at Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com and LibertyPundits.com, your home for conservative podcasts. In this week’s edition, we’ll talk about the fallout from a failed attempt by Senators Dodd and Corker to make new financial regulations bipartisan, the latest activity on the bond markets, and what’s next for Obamacare.

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You can subscribe to the podcast by following the links above, and if you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

The Unemployment Numbers and America’s Jobs Problem

Ben Domenech — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 14:26:56 +0000

It’s time for your weekly dose of Coffee and Markets, featuring The New Ledger’s Francis Cianfrocca, a podcast brought to you by the fine folks at Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com and LibertyPundits.com, your home for conservative podcasts. In this week’s edition, we’ll talk about the unemployment numbers released this morning and the debate about America’s jobs problem in the context of declines in education.

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You can subscribe to the podcast by following the links above, and if you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

Tom Friedman on Intel and Jobs
Abe Greenwald on LAX
TNL: The End of Easy Fixes

Live From Blair House

Ben Domenech — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 16:19:02 +0000

It’s time for your weekly dose of markets and politics with Coffee and Markets, featuring The New Ledger’s Francis Cianfrocca, a podcast brought to you by the fine folks at Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com and LibertyPundits.com, your new home for conservative podcasts. In this week’s edition, we’re recording on-site from the president’s Blair House summit by the White House, and we’re talking about the bond market, the targeting of Toyota, and the future of health care reform (note: the quality on this one is a bit below our normal episodes, since we had to record remotely).

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You can subscribe to the podcast by following the links above, and if you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

The Stimulus is Totally Awesome

Francis Cianfrocca — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 05:43:10 +0000

It’s time for your weekly dose of markets and politics with Coffee and Markets, featuring The New Ledger’s Francis Cianfrocca, a podcast brought to you by the fine folks at Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com and LibertyPundits.com, your new home for Conservative podcasts. In this week’s edition, we celebrate the anniversary of the stimulus (celebrate probably isn’t the right word), unpack the ramifications of the financial meltdown in Europe, and hash out the realities of America’s jobless future.

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You can subscribe to the podcast by following the links above, and if you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

Coffee and Markets: Debt and the Inevitability of Higher Taxes

Francis Cianfrocca — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 20:09:25 +0000

It’s time for your weekly dose of markets and politics with Coffee and Markets, featuring The New Ledger’s Francis Cianfrocca, a podcast brought to you by the fine folks at Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com and LibertyPundits.com, your new home for Conservative podcasts. In this week’s edition, we hash out what’s happening in Greece and the global markets, President Obama’s broken promises on taxes, and what lies ahead for the big entitlement bomb.

Download Podcast | iTunes | Podcast Feed

You can subscribe to the podcast by following the links above, and if you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

Politico: Obama’s Bipartisan Health Summit

Daily Beast: An Interview With Paul Ryan

Paul Ryan’s Roadmap

It’s Not About Him: America’s Decline is About a Lot More Than Obama

Francis Cianfrocca — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 21:26:23 +0000

“We have never had, in the history of the world, periods of sustained economic prosperity and growth accompanied by a sustained decline in population. Today, every developed nation in the world is witnessing this decline.”

It’s time for your weekly dose of markets and politics with Coffee and Markets, our podcast from The New Ledger with Francis Cianfrocca, brought to you by BigGovernment.com.

Download Podcast | iTunes | Podcast Feed

You can subscribe to the podcast by following the links above, and if you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

Yeah, Bernanke’s Back

Francis Cianfrocca — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 15:28:49 +0000

Bernanke’s back, the State of the Union is one long chiding of the country, and the markets continue their turmoil. It’s time for your weekly dose of markets and politics with Coffee and Markets, our podcast from The New Ledger with Francis Cianfrocca, brought to you by BigGovernment.com.

Download Podcast | iTunes | Podcast Feed

You can subscribe to the podcast by following the links above, and if you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

Domenech: The Speech Obama Didn’t Give

Morrissey: Ryan Reintroducing Health Care Reform

Samuelson: Bernanke Must Rebuild Confidence

Paul Krugman and the Future of the Marketplace

Francis Cianfrocca — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 05:54:43 +0000

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In the wake of a stunning political result in Massachusetts, it’s time to assess the future Scott Brown dictates for the market, for the Democrats, and for the country. It’s the third week of January 2010, and here’s the latest edition of Coffee and Markets, a weekly podcast from The New Ledger on politics, policy and the marketplace with Francis Cianfrocca, brought to you by BigGovernment.com.

You can subscribe to the podcast by following the links above, and if you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

WSJ: Obama Scales Back Health Care Plans

Paul Krugman: Obama Wasn’t The One We’ve Been Waiting For

Coffee and Markets: What Obama’s Big New Bank Fee Means for You

Francis Cianfrocca — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 09:52:36 +0000

For the past year, Francis Cianfrocca and I sat down every weekday morning to chat about politics, economics and the shifting global marketplace. It’s been loads of fun and we’ve gained a few thousand listeners — all of whom we love in an intimate and personal way. But Francis is a busy fellow with a thriving business, and I have my own responsibilities with the New Ledger and the Heartland Institute — and rather than worry about losing any quality in these podcasts, we’ve decided that for 2010, we’ll shift to recording once a week. I hope you don’t mind, and we’ll still jump in with an emergency episode or two if breaking news demands it. As always, just email us at coffee at newledger.com if you have any questions. Thanks for listening, and welcome to today’s edition of Coffee and Markets, a weekly podcast from The New Ledger, brought to you by BigGovernment.com.

Download Podcast | iTunes | Podcast Feed

You can subscribe to the podcast by following the links above, and if you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

Bloomberg: Obama to Announce Fee on Large Banks

Tapper: Question for Gibbs

TAPPER: On the fee for banks, without asking for any details,* how can you guarantee that this, that this fee, tax, levy, whatever it ends up being, is not passed on to consumers and they take another hit when it comes to Wall Street?

GIBBS: Yeah, well, look, obviously, Jake we’ll have a chance to go through the structure of this. The economic team has worked for quite some time on a structure that will ensure that what taxpayers gave to banks to ensure their safety and security, in a time of crisis, is paid back in full. And I can assure you that is one of the things the economic team has taken into account in the structure.

Books You Should Read: The End of Secularism

Ben Domenech — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 13:04:08 +0000

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With Christmas coming up, we wanted to spend some time on books we think are worthy of giving to your friends and even, perhaps, your enemies. My choice for that would be The End of Secularism, written by Hunter Baker, JD, PhD, longtime contributor to the American Spectator, The City and what feels like dozens of blogs. Published by Crossway Books, The End of Secularism is an important book, one that I highly recommend — and it’s been the subject of some fascinating podcasts on faith, politics and the public square.

So in today’s special edition of The New Ledger podcast, I ask Dr. Baker questions like: “During a passage on Marxism and science, you give a nod to Whittaker Chambers’ acknowledgment that by shifting from the side of communism to the side of its opponents, he was joining the losing side. This year marked the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, and it seems clear history proved Chambers wrong, at least in the form of communism he opposed. Do you think that communism’s force lives on in the less violent but still all-encompassing secularism of today — on issues like climate change and economic socialism? And second, do you think that those who strive against secularism today are on the losing side of history?”

The End of Secularism comes highly recommended by bestselling author Andrew Klavan, who says: “This is a very well written, concise and learned primer on the secularization of the public square. It gives a fair recital of the arguments in favor of it, and a strong but sensible and moderate outline of the arguments against. It has a firm grasp of history and neither falls for the usual ‘This is a Christian country!’ rhetoric that makes its way onto television nor accepts the ’separation of church and state,’ pieties that were rendered obsolete by the state’s aggressive intrustion into what Dr. Baker calls ‘the life-world,’ i.e. our values and private lives. It’s a book you’ll be glad you read the next time you get in an argument about religion’s role in politics.” I hope you’ll consider it as a gift this Christmas.

As always, you can subscribe to the podcast by following the links above, and if you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

Too Big To Fail Reconsidered

Francis Cianfrocca — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 14:26:23 +0000

Muscling through a rough cold, Francis shares his thoughts on an interesting piece on the Too Big to Fail concept in the latest issue of National Affairs on today’s edition of Coffee and Markets, a daily podcast from The New Ledger on politics, policy and the marketplace with Francis Cianfrocca, brought to you by BigGovernment.com.

Download Podcast | iTunes | Podcast Feed

You can subscribe to the podcast by following the links above, and if you’d like to email us, you can do so at coffee[at]newledger.com. We hope you enjoy the show.

Related Links:

National Affairs: Too Big Not To Fail

The catastrophe that struck America’s financial system in 2008 was not inevitable. Rather than a failure of markets, it was a failure by government to understand its proper role in markets — and the product of an unwise (and unnecessary) abandonment of a sensible system of rules and boundaries that had served American finance well for six decades.

Beginning in the 1980s, and continuing over the quarter-century that followed, Washington afforded the world of big finance a terrible luxury: freedom from the fear of failure. Managers and lenders at financial companies came to understand that the larger and more complex their firms got, the more immunity from market discipline they would enjoy — since they could depend on government guarantees when necessary to protect the broader economy from their mistakes. The government thus countenanced and subsidized an untenable financial system. And it inevitably got more of what it paid for: reckless risk building up to disaster.

The errors laid bare by the financial crisis clearly call for regulatory reform. But in designing that reform, we should avoid the temptation to seek heavy-handed new approaches — and should instead look to the long-term success of the system of rules whose decay brought about the crisis.