Economists are now reporting what we all know already - America's economic growth has ground to a halt. Wednesday's report from the Commerce Department was bleak. The expected growth in GDP was 1.1%, but the Commerce Department is now reporting a rate of growth of only 0.1%. This has been felt for a long time by average Americans. According to a Gallup poll, economic problems dominate in the question of the most important problem facing the nation today. This makes the priorities championed by Democrats all the more puzzling. As we struggle to sustain an economic recovery that has been charitably described as "choppy", Democrats continue to push an agenda that is out of touch and fails to solve the underlying problems.

As the blogosphere expands, diversifies and matures, many folks in the conservative blogging world are tempted to say that the mainstream, legacy, alphabet network media has become obsolete. Bloggers seemingly break more news, do more investigative journalism, produce high quality audio and video, and fill a void that newspapers are no longer able to fill. As ad revenue has shrunk, reporting staffs at newspapers across the nation have been slashed, and circulation is shrinking. All while consumers have an ever growing appetite for news, amplified by the instant access of social media. It is tempting to view this landscape and smugly conclude that we bloggers are the wave of the future, and it's only a matter of time until the MSM is little more than a memory.

In an intersection of well intended laws and unintended consequences, Oregon's Government Ethics Commission has created a debate about what constitutes a real journalist. Once again, we're debating who is a real journalist, and who is not. The result of this determination could have much greater impact than anyone realizes. According to a report in The Oregonian (allegedly a real newspaper),

In 2011, with bipartisan support from both Democrats and Republicans, Cover Oregon was ushered in as the vanguard of the state based healthcare exchanges encouraged by the Affordable Care Act. Instead of resisting the Obamacare mandate, the Oregon legislature doubled down on Obamacare, with the encouragement of our Democrat Governor, former ER doctor John Kitzhaber. Despite innumerable warnings from grassroots activists that the project was doomed to failure, most Republicans in the legislature were persuaded to go along. Now, Oregon is saying goodbye to the terminally ill Cover Oregon, after millions in wasted taxpayer money, FBI investigations, lawsuits and political fallout that will be felt for years to come.

This month, pundits from across the political spectrum are noting the 50th year of Lyndon Johnson's declaration of war on poverty. Liberals cite the good intentions of the programs, while Conservatives rue the trillions wasted on this failure and the massive growth of the federal bureaucracy it spawned (as I wrote about last year), but rarely do we do any self-examination. What do we do about it? We can't just be about pointing out that the war on poverty has failed. We have to offer solutions. I participated in an intriguing discussion group this morning that posed this very challenge.

The Hills Are Alive ...The Twitterverse was alive on Sunday night with the reverberations from the news that the loathsome Piers Morgan will be taking his anti-freedom talents back to England. Morgan was famous for two things: railing against the American concept of constitutional liberty, and tanking ratings. The wonder is not that his show is being canceled, nor that his ratings cratered. The only wonder is that it took so long for this decision to be made.

On November 26, Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) released his plan to generate tax revenue from Oregon and California lands currently under control of the federal Bureau of Land Management. The plan has met with mixed reviews. Counties in Oregon that are desperate to replace lost tax revenue from timber jobs are crossing their fingers, hoping this is their long sought solution. Environmentalists are predictably frothing at the mouth. But the solution proffered only serves to expose the problem in more stark relief: the fact that any of these lands are under federal control is the real problem.

Every year since college, my best friend Dan and I have submitted our best observations on a wide range of topics that reflect on the year that has just expired. We follow the well established template of The McLaughlin Group program.Here are my reflections on 2013:BIGGEST WINNER OF THE YEAR: I can't even think of one, as 2013 has seen so many failures that have hurt so many Americans. The only one I can think of is David Ortiz of the Red Sox, who emphatically reclaimed the City of Boston for Bostonians.

Recently, I attended a speech that attempted to lay out a case that Ronald Reagan would not have been a Tea Party President. The speaker, a conservative not terribly familiar with the Tea Party movement, made an interesting case.

It's been a rough couple of months for Congressional members from Oregon who rammed the massive health care bill down our throats. You see, the Democrats who are up for reelection in 2014 have this signature legislation that is colloquially referred to as Obamacare.