Any lingering doubt Republicans have a big time image problem was removed by a poll conducted for The Hill newspaper this week. By nearly a 2-1 margin (55 percent to 28 percent), respondents preferred the budget proposed by House Republicans over that proposed by Senate Democrats.  Even 40 percent of the Democrats among the 1,000 likely voters surveyed think deficits should be trimmed mostly by cutting spending rather than by raising taxes. But support for the Republican budget collapsed when respondents were told it was Republicans who proposed it.  A plurality (35 percent) said they trusted Democrats more on budget issues.  Only 30 percent said they trusted Republicans more. 

The farthest known galaxy is about 13.3 billion light years from here.  But MACS0647-JD may be closer to earth than Democrats and Republicans are to each other on taxes, spending and debt -- and either is to reality. Last week, House Republicans presented their proposed budget for the 2014 fiscal year, which begins Oct. 1.  Senate Democrats (for the first time in four years) offered a budget, too. The Congressional Budget Act requires the Congressional Budget Office to project federal spending and tax revenues ten years into the future.  This lets lawmakers and staff try their hand at writing fiction.  So who's writing more fiction here, the Pubs or the Dems?

Perhaps the most troublesome question that investors and business decision makers confront today is, "When will significant inflation and interest rate increases show up?" The next quarter, the next year, the next decade? Everyone fears these, but no one can predict exactly when they will appear. Investment is severely hampered by this uncertainty. The potential inflationary/interest rate pressures exist largely as a result of Fed's massive purchase of government bonds and mortgage-backed securities. But much of this increase in money is locked up in the banks because the Fed now pays interest on the bank reserves held at the Fed (and therefore it is not lent or spent), because of increased regulatory restrictions that discourage banks from making loans to small businesses and consumers, and because of the lack of demand for new loans. In addition, many individuals and businesses are holding unusually high sums to weather regulatory and economic uncertainties. Yet, there are many factors that could trigger inflationary/interest rate increases that are largely out of the Fed's ability to forecast and control.

There is a new pope.  To the surprise and dismay of most in the MSM, he's Catholic. * * * * Anti-American statements by Afghan President Hamid Karzai have put our troops at greater risk, said our commander there. * * * * Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis) has released his budget plan for FY 2014, which begins Oct. 1.  It would lead to a balanced budget in 10 years without raising taxes, because it would reduce currently projected spending over the decade by $5.7 trillion. The national debt as a proportion of GDP would decline to 62.3 percent. But if would actually reduce federal spending. Senate Democrats will offer a budget for the first time in four years.  Under it, federal spending would rise 62 percent over the decade. Deficits would be more than $400 billion every year.  Ryan assumes the economy will grow at a rate of a little more than 3 percent a year, which has been described as "rosy," since growth was much lower than that in Zero's first term. The GDP growth assumptions in the Democrat budget (an average of 4.9 percent a year) are positively surreal. * * * *  Cancelling White House tours has backfired big time.  A judge tossed out Nanny Bloomberg's "arbitrary and capricious" ban on large sodas.  The Inspector General for the Justice Department slapped around the Civil Rights division.

For the first time in more than half a century, "the average American is both earning less and worth less than four years earlier," the New York Times reported last June. Total household net worth is nearly 7 percent below what it had been in 2007, the Federal Reserve estimated then. Per capita income in the U.S. in 2008 was $40,947.  It rose to $41,560 in 2011, an increase of just 1.5 percent.  But because inflation rose more than that, purchasing power declined. What have been hard times for most Americans have been boom times for the federal government and for federal employees.  They, including the president, work for us.  Why do we stand for them, including the president, to live large at our expense, when tens of millions of us have no jobs?

One of my favorite researchers is Barbara Fredrickson, of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Her new book is Love 2.0, in which she looks at "love from the body's perspective" -- meaning that she has been studying how the experience of the emotion of love affects your physiology, including your physical health. Now, when we hear the word "love," we think of romantic love, or how we love our kids, other family members, and friends. We even feel it in what Fredrickson calls "micro-moments of connection." The nice conversation you have with the checkout person at the grocery store; the warm greeting of welcome by a new acquaintance at a meeting; even the moment of eye contact with a stranger who holds open a door. It turns out that these micro-moments of connection are actually filled with stuff that is good for you, like a good meal is filled with nutrients; emotionally, psychologically, and in terms of your overall health.

"The foundation of every state is the education of its youth," said Diogenes Laertius, a third century biographer of the ancient Greek philosophers.  The foundation of our nation is in alarming disrepair. Ours is now the only major economy in the world where today's students will not be better educated than their parents were, said Andreas Schleicher, special adviser on education at the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). What's important isn't the money wasted.  It's the lives being crippled.  Only one in five young adults in the U.S. reaches a higher level of education than their parents, OECD statistics indicate.  The ignorance of young people today is so prevalent and so pronounced that mocking it has become a staple of late night comedians.  But there is nothing funny about ignorance so massive it threatens the health of our economy and the viability of our democratic institutions.