No surprise that a populist progressive Democrat like me would like President Obama's State of the Union address that talked so much about lifting up the middle class. But there's a background story on getting to the president's message last night.

While the middle class is losing faith, two Yale researchers say it doesn't have to be that way. In their plan, everyone benefits, but it's not a strategy likely to be adopted by Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan, who have never experienced the pain of economic insecurity.

"Clash warfare" may appeal to a minority, but it does nothing to respond to the economic and social concerns of the majority of Americans. For them, class warfare is not the issue -- fairness and opportunity are.

A president can't be a prophet, of course, but he can tell more of the truth than his advisers and apologists think he can about our entrapment in the slippery web of contracts and lies that is closing in on us.

Whether or not the the #Occupy Wall Street protesters explicitly adopt policy proposals or only generate political energy for the spirit of them, the Krugman/Stiglitz Army is at last on the march.