Abbreviated Pundit Round-up: Yes, Virginia, Conservatives are ruining the country

^{Visual source: Newseum}

Joseph Stiglitz:

The United States is in the midst of a vicious cycle of inequality and recession: Inequality prolongs the downturn, and the downturn exacerbates inequality. Unfortunately, the austerity agenda advocated by conservatives will make matters worse on both counts.

Jonathan Chait:

The Supreme Court is likely to announce soon if it has decided to declare the individual mandate unconstitutional. (Which is to say, it's announcing whether Anthony Kennedy hates health care reform a lot or only a little, because everybody assumes the other four Republican justices hate it so much they'll declare it unconstitutional.)

As you can tell, I'm already bitter about this, as the constitutionality of the individual mandate is so obvious that the mere fact that the controversy exists suggests a frightening will to power by the legal arm of the conservative movement. But, as we consider the possible outcomes, it's worth keeping in mind something that is not likely to come through in the news coverage: The vast majority of the bill is likely to stay in place.

James Ceaser:

Whenever there is a controversy at the University of Virginia ' such as the current one over the abrupt removal of president Teresa Sullivan ' the natural reflex is to ask: What would the school's founder, Thomas Jefferson, think?

The Washington Post takes lots of deserved crap for their Republican-slanted political coverage, but their reporting on U Va has been outstanding.

Ben Adler:

The only example in American history of business executives playing the role in national government that Romney promises to fill'disinterested bearer of managerial acumen'was the class of patrician 'Wise Men' who served in post-war cabinets. Many of them were recruited to government from Wall Street or corporate law firms. Although these were not ideologues like Mellon or crony capitalists like Stanford, they were quite capable of making of devastating mistakes. 'The 'Whiz Kids' come out of Ford, where Robert McNamara trained, presumably applying to foreign policy and war-making the lessons learned at Ford and other corporations,' says Steven Fraser, a professor of American studies at Columbia who has written several books about Wall Street. And you know how well that turned out in Vietnam.

But no sooner did McNamara's Vietnam quagmire end than the Reagan Revolution created a new paradigm that is favorable to Romney: the assumption among Republicans that the private sector is always superior to the public sector.

Charles Blow:

'Making the Bus Monitor Cry.'

That's the name of the video. It's more than 10 minutes long, but if you make it through more than three of them with your eyes not getting misty and your blood not boiling then you are a rock, or at least your heart is.

The video shows Karen Klein, a 68-year-old grandmother and bus monitor in upstate New York, being relentlessly tormented by a group of young boys.

Gail Collins:

As you know, American Hispanics are an important and fast-growing voting bloc. Romney has long had a strategy for winning them over. The key, he explained last year, is to tell them 'what they know in their heart, which is they or their ancestors did not come here for a handout.'

Hard to get more appealing than that...

As for the mere college graduates, whom Obama has now announced he will protect from deportation under an executive order, Romney was, um, vague. But whatever he does will be 'long-term.'

Also, he seems to have banished 'self-deportation' and 'amnesty' from his vocabulary. Unless it looks as if they'll come in handy somewhere down the line.

Romney's a flat-out liar. It's become so obvious even the WH press corps will have to take notice sooner or later.

Added:Guardian/Michael Cohen:

Mendacious Mitt: Romney's bid to become liar-in-chief

Spin is normal in politics, but Romney is pioneering a cynical strategy of reducing fact and truth to pure partisanship

Someone noticed.