Stop Whining For Jobs - Move Back With Your Parents

by Jonathan Tasini

All that clamoring for jobs. Feh. Complain, complain. The Republican family values crowd will soon be promoting this: Why don't you just move in with your parents, like a lot of other stressed-out Americans, and then we can give out even more tax cuts for the wealthy:

Of the myriad ways the Great Recession has altered the country’s social fabric, the surge in households like the Maggis’, where relatives and friends have moved in together as a last resort, is one of the most concrete, yet underexplored, demographic shifts.

Census Bureau data released in September showed that the number of multifamily households jumped 11.7 percent from 2008 to 2010, reaching 15.5 million, or 13.2 percent of all households. It is the highest proportion since at least 1968, accounting for 54 million people.

Even that figure, however, is undoubtedly an undercount of the phenomenon social service providers call “doubling up,” which has ballooned in the recession and anemic recovery. The census’ multifamily household figures, for example, do not include such situations as when a single brother and a single sister move in together, or when a childless adult goes to live with his or her parents.

For many, the arrangements represent their last best option, the only way to stave off entering a homeless shelter or sleeping in their cars. In fact, nearly half of the people in shelters in 2009 who had not previously been homeless had been staying with family members or friends, according to a recent report, making clear that the arrangements are frequently a final way station on the way to homelessness.

A New York Times analysis of census “microdata,” prepared by the University of Minnesota's state population center, found that the average income of multifamily households in the records fell by more than 5 percent from 2009 to 2010, twice as much as households over all, suggesting that many who are living in such arrangements are under financial siege.

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My Solution To Americas Woes

Once upon a time in America

We used to build things. Not just consumer goods but infrastructure.

In the 1950s we created the world’s greatest interstate highway system and electrified virtually all of rural America. A decade later we sent a man to the moon and brought him safely back while developing a new technology that would drive our economy well into the 80s. We had the money to eradicate Small Pox from the face of the Earth, remove the scourge of polio and tuberculosis from our soil, give every veteran a college degree and build things, really big things. Now the Interstate is in falling apart, half of the bridges are in need of repair, sewer and water systems are broken, unemployment is at 10%, there is no money to maintain anything and everything we buy or use is made in China. How the hell did this happen?

The making of a perfect financial storm

In 1960 John Kennedy cut the top tax rate from 70% to 50% starting a trend that it seems never ended.In the mid 70s banks invented credit cards making it possible to go into debt without collateral or a loan application. Then the Supreme Court nationalized bank’s interest rates neutralizing state usury laws. Over the next 35 years consumer spending went from less than 1 trillion to over 10 trillion dollars a year while outstanding consumer debt climbed from $200 billion to more than $2.4 trillion.

The 1980s gave us the Reagan revolution and fast-track free trade agreements that made it easy for corporations to outsource manufacturing so jobs began to flow across our borders into low paying countries without worker protections or environmental concerns. At the same time massive tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, increased pentagon spending and military adventurism throughout Central America and the Middle East necessitated borrowing from foreign countries to meet day to day expenditures. The deficit and debt exploded.



George H. Bush and Bill Clinton gave the economy a brief respite by raising taxes and spurring consumer spending, the only way to replace the GDP loss from outsourcing manufacturing. For a few brief years we actually enjoyed a budget surplus and a shrinking debt. However, Clinton continued to globalize our manufacturing with more free trade agreements and he signed the Graham, Leach, Bleighly act into law effectively erasing the financial restraints put in place after the Great Depression of 1929.

Enter George W. Bush.

In less than three months we lost the surplus to even more tax cuts for the top 2% of incomes and corporations. Then, after ignoring terror threats in the face of blatant warnings from within and without our intelligence agencies, he used the 911 attack to start two wars which for the first time in the history of the United States were financed with foreign money. What few environmental and business regulations remained suffered from neglect and lack of funding. Jobs continued to flow overseas, income disparity increased and the deficit continued to grow and the debt to explode. In late 2000 Senator Phil Graham wrote, and Bush signed, the Commodities Modernization Act simultaneously creating and deregulating derivatives trading. Eight years later the entire U.S. banking industry imploded. The housing industry, the bedrock of our economy, died from bad loans hidden in convoluted mortgage backed commodities rated A+ by unregulated rating agencies. Almost every other industry followed suit.

This is what Obama and the Democrats inherited and all they have been able to do is nibble around the edges and it’s unlikely that any meaningful changes will come anytime soon from this weak administration. The promised hope and change has delivered just more of the same. A bitter disappointment.

NOW I hear from people:  "All I hear from you is Bitching Fed Up - whats your solution?"

Well fuckers here ya go!!!

What I would if I were King

Tax Reform: Leave income tax as-is up to $350k. Add two new brackets; $350-1,000,000 @ 40% and $1,000,000 up @ 50%. Tax capitol gains at the same rate as earned income (it’s called un-earned income for a reason). Raise or eliminate the cap on Social Security and Medicare. Implement a .01% tax on all stock, bond and commodity trades (Lincoln funded the Civil War with such a tax). Tax inheritance over $1 million/heir @ 50% (they did nothing to earn it so anything they get is a freebie). Change the Alternative Minimum Tax to $500k and adjust it to inflation. Close corporate loopholes that allow corporate headquarters in a P.O. Box in the Caribbean to avoid taxes. Close loopholes that allow corporations to hide profits in foreign branches (corporate tax revenues fell from 5% of GDP in 1980 to 1.4% in 2009). Penalize moving jobs offshore and reward new job creation inside our borders (U.S. corporations created 1.4 million jobs in 2009-all overseas).

Financial reform: Repeal Graham, Leach, Bleighly thus reinstating Glass Stiegel. Outlaw derivative trading and short selling, if it doesn’t exist or you don’t own it you can’t sell it. Regulate commodities trading to reflect real future value changes. Pass a national usury law with the maximum interest rate pinned to individual’s credit history and the Fed interest rate. Much of my other ideas have been implemented or will be by the new Consumer Protection Bureau.

Budget: Reduce Defense spending by 40% (about $225 billion) by closing foreign bases, cutting extravagant weapons systems purchases, phasing out civilian contractors and re-evaluating real world threats and tactics. Internalize all social spending and eliminate any private sector middle men. Enforce Pay-Go with an emphasis on user fees and taxes on those who would benefit where possible.
Domestic policy: Increase Federal R&D spending to 1950s levels. Revamp the GI bill to make it comparable to the one for WWII vets. Restructure the safety net to provide help early before a person loses everything. Find ways to reduce the cost of higher education and increase wages for teachers, paying them commensurate with their value to society (at $70k/year we can pick the very best school teachers). Move to Medicare for All financed by the lifting of payroll tax caps.

Foreign policy: Don’t even get me started . . .

Very little of this can happen short term because of sheer momentum, special interests, and simple Republican recalcitrance but some move toward any of these policies, in my opinion, is a move toward fiscal and social responsibility.

Edited by Dave Capra 12/30/2101
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x87026
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A Year of Fall and Decline

Posted by davidswanson in General Discussion

The fall and decline of an empire can take many years, but certain "benchmarks" (as imperial courts have been known to call them) can measure the progress in one year alone. Take, for example, the year 2010.

This year opened with the United States Supreme Court claiming further power to rewrite the U.S. Constitution, specifically by further opening up elections to the highest bidder. The year closed with congressional elections that cost more than before and in which money spent by third parties to influence the elections was more decisive than before. Election advertisements, in the view of myself and many others, also became uglier, baser, and more hateful than before, while the positions advertised moved a big step rightward. These were all trends that could be measured in previous years as well, and which we will probably see advance further in years to come, barring a change of course.

The year 2010 opened with the closing of Air America Radio, a semi-leftist radio network that was badly managed. The year also saw right-wing radio networks cancel top programs in various cities because those programs leaned left. Meanwhile, rightwing media took further steps into astroturfed activism, promoting and then reporting on rallies. And the year ended with the corporate media selling the public on the need to criminalize actual journalism that exposed what the U.S. government was doing. These were all trends that could be measured in each previous year, and as likely as not in the years to come.

As in past years, 2010 saw the largest U.S. military budget yet recorded, whether one counts only the Pentagon or the Pentagon and the off-the-books wars or the Pentagon, the wars, and all the military spending through other departments. As in past years, in 2010, military spending became a larger percentage of government spending, more of the military was privatized, more U.S. military bases were opened in more nations, more missile offense equipment was positioned, more wars were fought in secret, more drone strikes killed more people, more wars were underway -- including an unacknowledged (much less congressionally declared) ground war in Pakistan; and by all measures of violence, death, expense, and public opinion the wars in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iraq were headed in a bloodier and more counterproductive direction. As in each year of the global war on terrorism, terrorism increased globally.

In 2010, as in each previous year, presidential power expanded, while the power of the legislature and the power of the people contracted. The president claimed greater powers of secrecy, immunity, and legislative and judicial ability. Lawless imprisonment is being "legalized" and habeas corpus lost to time. The president has claimed the power to assassinate Americans as well as to imprison them for life without charge. Crimes of aggressive war, torture, and warrantless spying, among others, have been granted immunity, and known criminals rewarded with huge sales for published remorseless confessions. Congress continued its collapse, its addiction to filibuster fever, its domination by partisanship, and the degradation of the powers of impeachment, subpoena, and oversight.

In 2010, our nation owed more money to others than it did before, more Americans had no jobs than before, more Americans had been foreclosed on, more poverty shortened more lives, more people lived without homes, and Wall Street saw more profits with more of its money than before coming from the public treasury. Inequality continued to rise, and the very richest Americans got richer. The United States fell in international rankings in areas including inequality, education, life expectancy, and the rule of law.

In 2010, the idea of addressing global warming before it destroys the planet -- which had actually been a topic of conversation in 2009 -- pretty much disappeared. Our government resigned itself to facilitating the death and suffering of billions of people not yet born, and most of us flipped the channel to something sexier.

And then there was light, or at least wikileaks, which in 2010 exposed U.S. efforts in 2009 to sabotage international negotiations on global warming, not to mention exposing US embassies as servants of its military and CIA full of contempt for the world and serving primarily as salesrooms for U.S. weapons against which the United States might be able to arrange to fight some future wars. Wikileaks has just begun, and has exposed wars, war crimes, torture, support for military coups, diplomacy as muscle for corporations, Saudi terrorism funding, Saudi pressure for an illegal attack on Iran, lies about Iranian missiles, and U.S. pressure to block investigations or prosecutions of its crimes in Spain, Italy, Germany, and England. The rest of the world is coming to terms with the cynical militarization of U.S. diplomacy, and so might Americans themselves if they find out about it.

And they might. Good media outlets are growing and being born as well as dying. No new war on Iran or Korea has been launched yet, and I think we could stop it if it were publicly debated. Cutting the military budget, including foreign bases and NATO, is very much on the table. The START treaty is a start in a better direction. The filibuster rule's future is not certain, and a vote may be taken in the Senate to end or modify it in the next week. (Our demand must be to end it!) The veal pen has some broken fences, as groups loyal to both justice and the Democratic Party are having to choose one or the other. And sometimes it has been known to be true that what does not kill us makes us stronger.

David Swanson is the author of "War Is A Lie" http://warisalie.org

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What Team Does Obama Play For?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x69610

Obama’s supporters note that many of us don’t even get excited about such victories as the repeal of DADT, and they ask “what has happened to my loyalty to Obama?” What has happened is that we have a Democratic president whom many or most of us have come to believe is very bad for our country. More specifically, we believe that his actions have repeatedly supported the wrong side in the ongoing class war. We cannot get excited about small victories because they don’t seem to us to matter that much in the context of today’s overall picture.

What do I mean by small victories, and why would I describe the repeal of DADT as a small victory? Well, to be blunt about it, many of us believe that the class war is the defining issue of our time because so much else depends on it. The result of this class war will determine how the necessities of life are distributed in our society. It will determine the status or even the existence of long-standing social safety net programs such as Medicare and Social Security. It will determine whether the corporatocracy is allowed to maintain and extend their control over systems of communication in our country. It will determine how many people are able to find jobs and obtain adequate health care, shelter, and food for themselves and their families. And it will determine whether or not any restraints will be put on the ability of the corporatocracy to destroy our planet.

With all that at stake, we can’t get too excited about victories not related to the class war. DADT was repealed because the corporatocracy didn’t care to fight against repeal. That did not threaten their profits in the least. They were probably happy to let it be repealed because it gives the appearance to some degree that we are a progressive nation. If DADT repeal threatened their profits or their power they would have fought tooth and nail against it, and it would not have been repealed.\

The wealthy/corporate class is winning the class war big time, and President Obama gives little evidence of being part of the solution. For all the reasons I’ve described, we see him more as part of the problem. Progressive victories that do not affect the class war in our favor do little to change our minds about this. Unless and until the President shows himself willing and capable of challenging powerful interests on our behalf we will probably continue to see him as part of the problem.

Of course most of us recognize that the obstacles to challenging powerful corporate interests in today’s world are considerable. We do not know for sure that another president could do better. But we want to see our president at the very least make a visible effort to challenge them and to adhere to his campaign promises on our behalf.

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Looking Forward To 2011

2011: Year of Resistance

Posted by davidswanson in General Discussion

You say protests are outmoded because the corporate media ignores them (unless they're corporate sponsored). I say the corporate media is outmoded because it ignores protests.

The coming year is going to see intense resistance to the plutopentagonocracy from volunteer representatives of that majority of Americans that opposes its agenda. We are not going to ask for the media cartel's approval or permission. We are going to continue developing our own communications systems, which are already working well.

If we abandon the work of protest and resistance, those acts will soon be criminalized. If we abandon the work of self-communication we will each come to believe that the rest of us support that criminalization. There is another way.

William T. Hathaway's new book "Radical Peace: People Refusing War," tells true stories of people helping U.S. soldiers to desert and hide, chasing military recruiters out of schools, educating young people as counter-recruitment, caring for veterans, vandalizing recruiting stations, and burning unguarded tanks and airplanes. Many people will like some of these stories and not others. Personally I thought the Afterword was dumb enough to almost ruin an otherwise remarkable and wonderful book. The point is that these are stories that it is up to us to tell each other.

As I travel the country on a book tour I hear in about equal parts from people doing extraordinary things that nobody knows about and from people complaining that nobody is doing anything. We do not have an activism shortage so much as a communications shortage. People are engaged in civil resistance to the government, the banks, and the war machine in great numbers and with stunning creativity.

Since top aggressive war and torture lawyer Jay Bybee became a judge on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which meets up and down the West Coast, he has sat in court few if any times without my friend Susan Harman in the room to protest him. She has become friends with the other judges who are increasingly aware that something must be done.

Were you aware of this? Did you know that students were being arrested for demanding living wages for university employees? Did you know veterans were being arrested at the White House for asking for peace? Did you know that foreclosure victims and journalists alike, when testifying in congressional hearings, were beginning to reprimand Congress? Did you know neighborhoods were preventing evictions? Did you know school districts were preventing the military testing of students? Did you know that most Americans in the corporate media's own polls favor policies depicted by that media as crazy and unpopular, things like peace, taxation of billionaires, green energy, public education and healthcare, and cuts to the military budget?

By understanding how many of us there are and how many are actively engaged, it can become easier to get involved or to remain involved, and to discover approaches that work for you -- and work for the rest of us. Here's a hint: taking a gun to a school board meeting doesn't fix anything. Shutting Congress down by blocking off its buildings with a human wall could. Our enemies are violence and silence. In 2006, according to then president George W. Bush's new book, the Republican minority leader of the Senate Mitch McConnell asked him to pull troops out of Iraq. We were that close, and nobody told us. They never tell us. They have yet to announce our ongoing success in preventing larger wars and in preventing the bombing of Iran. They never will. We have to make our own announcements.

But 2006 was the last moment in which Democratic-Party loyalists fully supported peace. Our task, therefore, is to develop activism and communication independent of political parties -- just as the other side does with its corporate front groups, tea parties, and Fox News; they support Republicans only when Republicans support fascism. One effort to build a counter-force to the Tea Party is called the Job Party: http://jobparty.org

But we need an alternative not only to Fox News but also to the rest of the corporate media. This is the easiest and most important project anyone can work on. The dream of persuading the labor movement (which can't even strongly oppose corporate trade aggreements when the president is a Democrat) to invest in a new television network should be abandoned. If the George Soros's of the world haven't figured out that there's a communications problem, they never will. But we already have what we need; we just need to make it bigger, and we can do so. We should invest in TheRealNews.com, Thom Hartmann, Free Speech TV, Link TV, GRIT TV, Democracy Now, Pacifica Radio, community radio stations, blogs and websites. We should make use of foreign outlets that, for their own reasons, are willing to provide decent coverage of US politics: Al Jazeera, ATN, RT-America, etc. Unsubscribe from the New York Times, stop contributing to any purchasing of ads in it, stop reading it, and read the Guardian online instead. Get connected online, and people will send you the occasional good article or video that all lousy outlets produce. Share that one further, but promote a good website that's hosting it, not the corporate source.

Above all, we must become the media we wish to see in the world. If you take action for peace or justice and do not make that news available online, you have largely failed. If you cannot make it available online, you can Email it to me at david at davidswanson dot org and I will post it at http://warisacrime.org

It's all well and good to stand up in book events and ask everyone to stop paying their taxes, as happens at nearly every event I speak at. But unless you communicate that people are doing that and why, the impact will not be felt. You can withhold the 50% of your taxes that goes to war, but the government will simply defund schools and housing. We have to set aside fears of egotism, fears of spelling things wrong (that never stops the tea party), or whatever other factors cause people to do the work we all need done and then hide it away.

Are you angry enough to put something hard and metal in your hand and go after your congress member? Make it a video camera. Stalk them with it. Sit in their office and refuse to leave until they stop funding Wall Street and wars. Make a movie of what happens and POST IT ONLINE. There is probably enough video footage currently aging in people cameras to save our republic, giving new meaning to the term camera obscura.

On January 11, Witness Against Torture will begin its protests of the policies symbolized by Guantanamo, which turns 10 that day. Come to Washington, D.C., or join in wherever you are.
http://www.witnesstorture.org

On January 15, Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday, the peace movement will mark 20 years of U.S. war on Iraq. Come to Washington, D.C., or join in wherever you are.
http://warisacrime.org/20years

January 17 is both the official Martin Luther King Day and the 50th anniversary of President Eisenhower's speech warning of the military industrial complex. Events are being planned.

January 21 marks one year since the Supreme Court's "Citizens United" ruling handing corporations the power to spend unlimited funds on elections. Events are being planned.

To make this a year of growing resistance, we'll need to start it right. Every advance, from the ending of slavery to the establishment of women's rights, has looked absolutely hopeless until shortly before it was achieved. In fact, it has looked to most people INCOMPREHENSIBLE until shortly before it was achieved. While we no longer talk of good or bad slavery and good or bad rape, we still talk about good or bad wars. That will continue until we resist it sufficiently. There's no telling whether the amount of resistance still needed is large or small, but that it is both our moral responsibility and much more enjoyable than sitting home and grumbling is beyond dispute.

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David Swanson is the author of "War Is A Lie," http://warisalie.org
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Obama Fucks Us AGAIN

BREAKING: Minutes ago, the FCC -- led by Obama appointee Julius Genachowski -- sold out Net Neutrality and the future of free speech online. The rules -- written by Comcast and AT&T, the companies the FCC is supposed to regulate -- broke Obama's campaign promise¹ and allow corporate censorship. 
Read the 3 reasons why -- then share with friends by filling out the form on the right.

1: Corporate censorship is allowed on your phone

The rules passed today by Obama FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski absurdly create different corporate censorship rules for wired and wireless Internet, allowing big corporations like Comcast to block websites they don't like on your phone -- a clear failure to fulfill Net Neutrality and put you, the consumer, in control of what you can and can't do online.²

2: Online tollbooths are allowed, destroying innovation

The rules passed today would allow big Internet Service Providers like Verizon and Comcast to charge for access to the "fast lane." Big companies that could afford to pay these fees like Google or Amazon would get their websites delivered to consumers quickly, while independent newspapers, bloggers, innovators, and small businesses would see their sites languish in the slow lane, destroying a level playing field for competition online and clearly violating Net Neutrality.³

3: The rules allow corporations to create "public" and "private" Internets, destroying the one Internet as we know it

For the first time, these rules would embrace a "public Internet" for regular people vs. a "private Internet" with all the new innovations for corporations who pay more -- ending the Internet as we know it and creating tiers of free speech and innovation, accessible only if you have pockets deep enough to pay off the corporations.⁴

The FCC could have reclassified and regulated these greedy corporations in an enforceable way, but instead, they sold out. This isn't Net Neutrality, this is a historic mistake.


Sign HERE to hold President Obama accountable to his promise -- and then share with your friends!
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^{Sources:
1:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/13/net-neutrality-obama-see_n_681695.html
2, 3, 4: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/craig-aaron/the-fccs-guide-to-losing_b_795061.html}

Obama Sells Out - Put In Perspective

I’ve seen an abundance of comments recently praising President Obama’s “compromise” with the Republican Party on their recently passed tax cut deal. The people who make these comments note that everybody or almost everybody “gained” something through this deal, so we all ought to be appreciative. They note that none of us wanted to see the rich get massive tax breaks, but if that what was required in order to ensure that those in most need of additional money at this time get what they need, then it’s worth it, and liberals should not “whine” about the rich getting something too.

First of all, let me say that it is not mathematically possible that everyone – or even nearly everyone – “gained” from this deal. These tax cuts are a zero sum game at best – unless you hold to the repeatedly discredited Reagan philosophy of trickle down economics that says that giving money to the rich will benefit everyone because it will “trickle down” to everyone. The money for these tax cuts did not materialize out of thin air. One way or the other, they will have to be paid for, and they come at an enormous price. But before talking more about that, let’s consider some of the breakdown of benefits of this $858 billion deal.


Some facts about the distribution of benefits

The most complete accounting I can find on the breakdown of benefits comes from a recent AP article. Even so, it is far from complete, and it tends to hide how much this deal favors the rich. The largest single bulk of the $858 billion deal would come from a reduction in income tax. The AP article notes that the bill reduces the highest marginal tax rates, on individual incomes above $379,150, from 39.6% to 35%, while reductions on those with individual incomes below $8,500 are reduced from 15% to 10%. Let’s calculate what this comes out to regarding average benefit for those in the top bracket vs. those in the lowest bracket, given that the average income in the top bracket is about $1.6 million, and assuming (a generous assumption) that the average income in the lowest bracket is $8,500:

Average income tax reduction in top bracket: $73,600
Average income tax reduction in bottom bracket: $425
Ratio of average savings in top bracket to average savings in bottom bracket: 173:1

In addition, we have a bunch of other cuts that primarily go to the richest households. Let’s tally them up:

Income tax reductions (discussed above): $186.8 billion
Itemized deductions: $20.7
Capital gains: $25.9 billion
Dividends: $27.3 billion
Taxes on estates over $5 million: $68.1 billion
Total tax reductions going primarily to the wealthy: $328.8 billion

That comes to more than 38% of the total package, and the good majority of these benefits go primarily to the wealthy. The rest of the tax reductions are more evenly distributed than the above noted 38%.


How will this $858 tax giveaway be paid for?

There are a few possibilities for how this tax giveaway will be paid for. But first it should be noted that $120 billion of it, 14% of the total, will come out of the Social Security Trust Fund. So how will the remaining $738 billion be paid for?

One possible way would be for the government to just print the money. But that would be highly inflationary, reducing the value of the money that we all hold, and I haven’t heard anyone talking about that as a solution.

Another possibility would be for the government to reduce its expenditures over the next couple of years. With a Republican House you can bet that there is going to be great clamor over the next couple of years to reduce money spent on much needed social programs – of the type that provide a safety net for the most vulnerable Americans.

And then, the rest of it will simply be added to the national debt. So our children and grandchildren will be encumbered by this problem so that multi-millionaires and billionaires can have their tax breaks.

Again, let me stress my main point of this discussion. Everyone will NOT benefit from this. One way or another, this deal causes some Americans to pay for the tax breaks of other Americans. With this particular bill, the money will be paid to the upper 1% of earners from the rest of us – as well as from our children and grandchildren.


On the “temporary” nature of the tax cuts

The above noted figures assume that these tax cuts will be “temporary” – the term used by our president to sell this deal to the American people. But what if it’s not temporary? Or what if it’s “temporary” for only the next 20 years? Obviously if it’s not temporary, or if it extends beyond two years, it will be more expensive than $858 billion.

So are these tax cuts “temporary”? Well, if a Congress with large Democratic margins in both houses and a Democratic President couldn’t come up with a better deal than this, then what is the likelihood that a Congress with a large Republican majority in the House will let this deal expire? It should be clear that the chances of that are close to zero – unless the American people finally wake up, understand what’s going on, and demand something better.


Additional downside to this giveaway to the wealthy

Since Ronald Reagan began his presidency in 1981 the income and wealth gap between rich and poor has been continually widening, so that now it is at record levels, even greater than the gap that existed in 1929 and ushered in the Great Depression. Furthermore, the United States has the greatest disparity between rich and poor of any of the industrialized nations.

Our best economists believe that this wealth gap was a major cause of the Great Depression. This was recognized by FDR’s Chairman of the Federal Reserve (1934-48), Marriner Eccles, who wrote in 1951 an explanation of the role that the extreme wealth gap of 1929 had in causing the Great Depression:

As mass production has to be accompanied by mass consumption, mass consumption, in turn, implies a distribution of wealth to provide men with buying power equal to the amount of goods and services offered by the nation's economic machinery. Instead of achieving that kind of distribution, a giant suction pump had by 1929-30 drawn into a few hands an increasing portion of currently produced wealth…. By taking purchasing power out of the hands of mass consumers, the savers denied to themselves the kind of effective demand for their products that would justify a reinvestment of their capital accumulations in new plants. In consequence, as in a poker game where the chips were concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, the other fellows could stay in the game only by borrowing. When their credit ran out the game was stopped.

It should be obvious that the extension of the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy will further increase our already record level wealth gap. Besides the harmful economic consequences of these cuts, there are the political consequences that must be considered. We are dealing with a vicious cycle here, in which vast sums of wealth concentration among the wealthiest American individuals and corporations are used to bribe our elected representatives through an army of lobbyists, for the main purpose of enacting legislation designed primarily to concentrate ever more vast sums of wealth in their hands.


On Presidential leadership

Many of President Obama’s supporters have expressed the view that he didn’t have any choice in this matter. They argue that the Republicans tied the tax giveaway to the rich to benefits desperately needed by the unemployed and the middle class. But why did Obama stand by and allow them to do that by making a deal with them, rather than putting up a fight? Thom Hartmann discusses this point:

President Obama should have been publicly DEMANDING an “up or down vote” in the same way that the Republicans were screaming and shouting for such a vote on Bush’s Supreme Court nominees. President Obama’s office should have been coordinating talking points for Democrats in the House and Senate for every radio and television appearance they made. After all, it’s an easy sell. The middle class tax cuts are already what most Americans want.

Instead of a coordinated effort including regular public statements and press conferences on being entitled to an “up or down vote” on tax cuts for the middle class, the President capitulated. The deal that he made with the Republicans provides only very short-term relief and at a HUGE cost.

The grifter class

The most recent tax giveaway is just one more incident in a long line of events that have resulted in a massive transfer of wealth to the rich from the rest of us. In recent weeks I’ve discussed that issue at length here, here, and here, so I won’t repeat those discussions here. Matt Taibbi has many insightful things to say about this in his new book, “Griftopia – Bubble Machines, Vampire Squids, and the Long Con that Is Breaking America”. In the first chapter of his book he talks about the roots of our current financial crisis:

The root cause of all these disasters was the unraveling of a massive Ponzi scheme centered around the American real estate market, a huge bubble of investment fraud that floated the American economy for the better part of a decade…

Later in the chapter he gets into some of the dynamics behind this massive fraud:

Even after the rich almost destroyed the entire global economy through their sheer unrestrained greed and stupidity, we can’t shake the peasant mentality that says we should go easy on them, because the best hope for our collective prosperity is in them creating wealth for us all. That’s the idea at the core of trickle-down economics and the basis for American economic policy for a generation…

What’s accelerated over the last few decades is just how thoroughly the members of the grifter class have mastered their art… What has taken place over the last generation is a highly complicated merger of crime and policy, of stealing… The financial leaders of America and their political servants have seemingly reached the cynical conclusion that our society is not worth saving and have taken on a new mission that involves not creating wealth for all, but simply absconding with whatever wealth remains in our hollowed-out economy. They don’t feed us, we feed them.

The giant military-industrial complex… has now been expertly and painstakingly refitted for a monstrous new mission: sucking up whatever savings remains in the pockets of ordinary people… the little hidden nest eggs of the men and women who built the country and fought its wars, plus whatever pennies and nickels their offspring might have managed to accumulate in preparation for the gleaming future implicitly promised them, but already abandoned and rejected as unfeasible in reality by the people who run this country.

In summary – The power of money converted to propaganda

I sometimes wonder why I should be so upset about all this. After all, we presumably live in a democracy, in which we all have input into our collective futures. If the representatives whom we elected to serve our interests work out a compromise that presumably provides a little bit for all of us, why shouldn’t I accept that?

The problem is that our elected representatives for the most part have chosen to serve the interests of the grifter class rather than the majority of their constituents because the grifter class has amassed the money – and consequent political power – to make a mockery of the principle of one-person-one vote and maintain their minions in office. Taibbi sums up our current situation at the end of his first chapter in similar words:

The new America is fast becoming a vast ghetto in which all of us, conservatives and progressives, are being bled dry by a relatively tiny oligarchy of extremely clever financial criminals and their henchmen in government, whose main job is to be good actors on TV and put on a good show. This invisible hive of high-class thieves stays in business because… we prefer not to ponder the dilemma of… why our pension funds just lost 20 percent of their value, or why… banks that have been the opposite of prudent get rewarded with free billions. In reality political power is simply taken from most of us by a grubby kind of fiat… through a thousand separate transactions… that most of us are simply not conscious of.

Derrick Jensen, in Volume II of his book “Endgame”, puts the issue in even starker terms. Referring to perhaps the most valuable human resource of all, he says:

We hear all the time, for example, that “we” are running out of water. And it’s true that rivers are dying. Lakes are dying. Seas are dying… And we are told that within a few years two-thirds of all humans will be without adequate access to water… We know as well that governments are busy “privatizing” water, which means they are declaring that regular humans do not have access to water while corporations do. We know also the truth of what one water company, Global Water Corporation, puts on its website: “Water has moved from being an endless commodity that may be taken for granted to a necessity that may be taken by force.” And we know who will use that force. But through all of this talk, we are not so often told that more than 90 percent of all water used by humans is… in fact used by agriculture and industry… The Colorado River has been murdered for golf courses in Palm Springs and fountains in Las Vegas…

Thus it is that we live in a country and an era in which vast sums of money are used for the purpose of convincing us to accept that the wealthy deserve so much more than the rest of us, and that they are hard at work creating a world that will benefit all of us – the philosophy behind trickle down economics. Their vast wealth allows them to do this, through control of our national communications media and the politicians whom we elect to serve our interests. Otherwise they could not possibly hold our needs hostage to our transferring of vast sums of money from us to them.

They require our passive acceptance of all this in order to maintain their myths and their scams. The Internet provides a means for us to see through these myths and scams. But not enough Americans thus far have availed themselves of this opportunity. Until they do, our situation will continue to worsen and our democracy will continue to slip away.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x41629
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For Those That STILL Believe In Obama - A MUST READ!

I am not a cheerleader for a commander in chief, I am his employer - and I damn well will call out the person I am paying if they are not doing the job I am paying them to do. Just like I did for bush.

Don't bury your head in the sand, I am a Democrat for progress as well - and when I don't see progress by those I elected I think it is my duty to call them out. Maybe you think it is your duty to stand by them and make excuses.

Give them the benefit of the doubt, vote for them even when they let me down, campaign for them even when they don't agree with me 100%? Sure thing - but I sure as hell will NEVER sit on my ass and give them a pass if they fail and do not do what it was I hired them to do.

I am against the same things I was before Obama got into office. Maybe you have changed in what you believe in, but I will hold our elected officials now to the same standards I did before.

Obama has kicked ass on some things, and I am DAMNED glad he is the President right now instead of McLame and quitter queen palin. I would take a bad dem over a repug any day of the week - but I won't thrust out my pom-poms in support when the things I support are being thrown under the bus.

We are better off today than we would have been with the opposing party in the WH, but we are not better off than we could have been because some people in the party are not working as hard as we had hoped they would.

I owe it to my principles and to my party to hold the feet of those in power who claim to be progressives to the fire. If you cannot handle criticizing your team when they are not performing well then I don't know what to tell you.

either you are for an ideal, or you are for a person who claims to be a part of your family/party.

I am for the ideal.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x41435
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Will The REAL Obama PLEASE Stand Up

Though Barack Obama was far from my favorite Democratic Presidential candidate in 2008, and I did criticize him frequently during the primaries, after he locked up the Democratic nomination I found plenty of substantial differences between him and John McCain, in Obama’s favor. So large did I perceive those differences to be that I frequently wrote about them and the reasons why I felt it was crucially important that Obama be elected president.

Sadly, those differences turned out to be far less than I had hoped or anticipated, while the differences between Obama’s campaign promises and his actions as President turned out to be much greater than I had anticipated. I think those differences are worth recounting, as I think it is time that progressives/liberals (or anyone who believes that government should not be controlled primarily by the rich and powerful) start giving considerable thought to whether a second Obama administration is something they should work for, or whether their time, effort, and money would be better spent elsewhere.

To recount those differences I go back to a 2008 post of mine that more than any other of my writings systemically pointed out the differences between candidate Obama and John McCain. These were the issues that I considered to be of great national importance – on which I argued the need to elect Barack Obama president. If I had it to do over again I would remain silent on the subject because, given Obama’s actions as president I no longer consider the good majority of what I wrote on May 10, 2008 about candidate Obama’s plans to be valid. So let’s consider the status of candidate Obama’s plans then (as I documented them at the time), compared to what he has actually done as president.


Torture and human rights

Obama then
Obama had been universally and strongly against torture. This is what Obama had to say about George Bush’s Military Commissions Act (which McCain voted for) and his torture programs:

The five years that the President's system of military tribunals has existed, not one terrorist has been tried. Not one has been convicted. And in the end, the Supreme Court of the United found the whole thing unconstitutional, which is why we're here today. We could have fixed all of this in a way that allows us to detain and interrogate and try suspected terrorists while still protecting the accidentally accused from spending their lives locked away in Guantanamo Bay…

Instead of allowing this President – or any President – to decide what does and does not constitute torture, we could have left the definition up to our own laws and to the Geneva Conventions…

But politics won today. Politics won. The Administration got its vote, and now it will have its victory lap, and now they will be able to go out on the campaign trail and tell the American people that they were the ones who were tough on terrorism.

Obama as president
President Obama does deserve credit for banning torture on the second day of his presidency. However, as Alain Nairn explains in “The Torture Ban that Doesn’t Ban Torture”:

What the Obama dictum ostensibly knocks off is that small percentage of torture now done by Americans while retaining the overwhelming bulk of the system’s torture, which is done by foreigners under US patronage. Obama could stop backing foreign forces that torture, but he has chosen not to do so. His Executive Order instead merely pertains to treatment of “an individual in the custody or under the effective control of an officer, employee, or other agent of the United States Government…”, which means that it doesn’t even prohibit direct torture by Americans outside environments of “armed conflict,” which is where much torture happens anyway since many repressive regimes aren’t in armed conflict.

The Military Commissions Act of 2006 that Obama spoke so eloquently against as a U.S. Senator enabled our military to kidnap people around the world, accuse them of being terrorists, and ship them off to Guantanamo Bay to waste away, without any due process to establish their guilt. But a U.S. Supreme Court decision in June 2008, Boumediene v. Bush, ruled that this process was unconstitutional. Glen Greenwald describes the close similarity of the Obama and Bush administrations on this issue, as they both thumbed their nose at the Supreme Court ruling:

In the wake of the Boumediene ruling, the U.S. Government wanted to preserve the power to abduct people from around the world and bring them to American prisons without having to provide them any due process. So, instead of bringing them to our Guantanamo prison camp, the Bush administration would instead simply send them to our prison camp in Bagram, Afghanistan, and then argue that because they were flown to Bagram rather than Guantanamo, they had no rights of any kind and Boudemiene didn't apply to them. The Bush DOJ treated the Boumediene ruling, grounded in our most basic constitutional guarantees, as though it was some sort of a silly game…

Back in February, the Obama administration shocked many civil libertarians by filing a brief in federal court that declared that it embraced the most extremist Bush theory on this issue – the Obama DOJ argued…as Charlie Savage put it, "that military detainees in Afghanistan have no legal right to challenge their imprisonment there, embracing a key argument of former President Bush’s legal team." … and they argued that those individuals can be imprisoned indefinitely with no rights of any kind – as long as they are kept in Bagram rather than Guantanamo.

Last month, a federal judge emphatically rejected the Bush/Obama position and held that the rationale of Boudemiene applies every bit as much to Bagram as it does to Guantanamo. Notably, the district judge who so ruled – John Bates – is an appointee of George W. Bush…

Climate change

Obama then
During the 2008 campaign, candidate Obama emphasized the need to combat global warming, saying “I don't believe that climate change is just an issue that's convenient to bring up during a campaign. I believe it's one of the greatest moral challenges of our generation.”

Obama as president
It was widely recognized by climate scientists prior to the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference of December 7-18 in Copenhagen, commonly known as the Copenhagen Summit, that failure would likely portend world-wide disaster. An article in Scientific American by Douglass Fischer, titled “What Would Failure at Copenhagen Mean for Climate Change”, written a month prior to the Summit, summed up the stakes:

Climate experts, scientists and negotiators say that, absent international agreement, the children and grandchildren of those living today will negotiate a world where planetary geo-engineering is a part of daily life, sea-walls defend coastal cities, the world's poor are hammered by drought, floods and famine and our planet is heading toward conditions unseen for the last 100 million years…

The accord that the 30 leading countries agreed upon dropped the goal of 80% greenhouse gas reduction by 2050, despite the fact that our best climate scientists say greenhouse gas emissions must be cut 80% from 1990 levels by 2050 to avoid catastrophe. It retained a (non-binding) commitment to reducing global temperatures by 2050, but contained no concrete plans for achieving that goal. Consequently:

Many countries almost immediately tore to shreds the compromise plan that the group of 30 countries presented in the main hall. Those countries that could face destruction as a result of climate change, in particular, could not see any solutions in it. Now we are faced with the threat of an impasse in global climate politics. And the consequences of this holdup will primarily be felt by the poorest of the poor. Experts anticipate that they will be subjected to storms and flooding stronger than ever before. Their crops will wither. Melting glaciers might deprive several million people of their water supplies and deprive them of their livelihoods.

Later, the United States committed to a 4% reduction in greenhouse gas emission from 1990 levels by 2020 – a puny and laughable gesture compared to 80% reduction by 2050 that climate scientists say is necessary in order to avoid catastrophe.

An article in the Guardian by Suzanne Goldenberg, titled “Barack Obama’s Speech Disappoints and Fuels Frustration at Copenhagen”, summarizes the disappointment over the lack of U.S. leadership felt by much of the world:

Barack Obama stepped into the chaotic final hours of the Copenhagen summit today saying he was convinced the world could act "boldly and decisively" on climate change. But his speech offered no indication America was ready to embrace bold measures, after world leaders had been working desperately against the clock to try to paper over an agreement to prevent two years of wasted effort from ending in total collapse.

Obama, who had been skittish about coming to Copenhagen at all unless it could be cast as a foreign policy success, looked visibly frustrated as he appeared before world leaders. He offered no further commitments on reducing emissions or on finance to poor countries beyond Hillary Clinton's announcement yesterday… He did not even press the Senate to move ahead on climate change legislation, which environmental organizations have been urging for months.

Economic issues

Obama then
Obama’s tax plan was in many ways the opposite of McCain’s. It would have reversed the Bush tax cuts for the rich, while reducing taxes and simplifying filing for working and middle class Americans. Specifically, he said:

The Bush tax cuts – people didn't need them, and they weren't even asking for them, and they ought to be relaxed so we can pay for universal health care and other initiatives.… We have to stop pretending that all cuts are equivalent or that all tax increases are the same…. At a time when ordinary families are feeling hit from all sides, the impulse to keep their taxes as low as possible is honorable. What is less honorable is the willingness of the rich to ride this anti-tax sentiment for their own purposes.

In addition to his tax proposals, Obama had an extensive economic plan, which included: fighting for “fair trade” instead of “free trade”, as manifested by NAFTA; job creation; restoring workers’ rights to unionize; the creation of a universal 10% mortgage credit to give relief to homeowners; a crackdown on mortgage company abuses; and a crackdown on predatory lending policies.

Obama as president
Far from reversing the Bush tax cuts, Obama waited until they were about to expire, and then he castigated progressive Democrats for not submitting to Republican blackmail to hold extension of unemployment benefits to the unemployed hostage to tax cuts for the rich. The first major clue to his plans to give in to Republican blackmail on this issue was when he clarified at the G20 Conference in Seoul his plans for dealing with it. At this conference Obama said, “I continue to believe that extending permanently the upper-income tax cuts would be a mistake and that we can't afford it". What exactly does “temporary” mean in this context? These tax cuts have already been operating for close to close to 10 years, contributing to an ever-expanding income gap between the wealthy and ordinary Americans, which is tearing our country apart. What meaning did his pledge to reverse them have if he allows them to be continued to the end of his first term? When exactly does he intend to reverse them?

So far job creation has been negative during the Obama administration – representing the worst job creation record since Herbert Hoover. One thing that could be said in Obama’s defense is that he has been president for only two years, and that he inherited a nation in economic crisis. That is true, but so did FDR. Yet the philosophy and actions of the two administrations have been very different. In fact, Obama’s philosophy leans towards the Republican side of the spectrum, as he made clear in a statement:

See, I’ve never believed that government has all the answers to our problems. I’ve never believed that government’s role is to create jobs or prosperity. I believe it’s the drive and the ingenuity of our entrepreneurs, our small businesses; the skill and dedication of our workers… that’s made us the wealthiest nation on Earth. I believe it’s the private sector that must be the main engine for our recovery. I believe government should be lean; government should be efficient.

He’s bragging about us being “the wealthiest nation on Earth” during the midst of an economic crisis that is driving millions of Americans into poverty? Worse than that, his actions have not been commensurate with the magnitude of the crisis: Though our best economists recommended a much stronger stimulus package, he decided instead to go with the advice of his much more conservative economic advisors; his solution to the home foreclosure crisis was “Making Home Affordable”, a program that William Kuttner explains in his book, “A Presidency in Peril”, was orders of magnitude more favorable to banks than to homeowners; his continuation of the Bush bailout of Wall Street without demanding much fiscal reform from Wall Street failed to improve our financial situation; and in his 2010 State of the Union message he indicated that deficit reduction would be a priority over stimulation of a stagnant economy. Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman’s response was scathing in his criticism of that:

A spending freeze? That’s the brilliant response of the Obama team… It’s appalling on every level. It’s bad economics, depressing demand when the economy is still suffering from mass unemployment… And it’s a betrayal of everything Obama’s supporters thought they were working for. Just like that, Obama has embraced and validated the Republican world-view.

And what happened to the Employee Free Choice Act he claimed to support?


Civil Rights

Obama then
During the 2008 presidential campaign, Obama described a plan to strengthen civil rights on his website. That included: overturning of the USSC decisions that weakened laws against employment discrimination based on race or sex – including passage of the Fair Pay Act to ensure that women receive equal pay for equal work; ending deceptive voting practices that prevent citizens from voting; a plan to end racial profiling; elimination of racial sentencing disparities for drug offenses; and the use of rehabilitation, where appropriate, to replace prison for first time non-violent drug offenders.

Obama as president
Obama did in fact sign equal pay legislation to ensure that women receive equal pay for equal work, early in his presidency. And he also signed the Fair Sentencing Act to reduce extreme racial disparity in sentencing involving crack cocaine (more commonly used by blacks) vs. powder cocaine (more commonly used by whites). His administration also signaled a minor thaw in the “War Against Drugs” by announcing that it “will not seek to arrest medical marijuana users and suppliers as long as they conform to state laws”. And he did authorize a review of mandatory minimum sentencing.

President Obama deserves credit for all of these things.


Health Care

Obama then
Obama offered a national health care plan to all Americans to buy affordable (through government subsidies) health care coverage that is “similar to the plan available to members of Congress.” Unlike the McCain plan, this plan would have made healthcare coverage affordable for everyone, prohibited discrimination based on preexisting illness or health status, and substantially changed our current private for-profit insurance company domination of the market by making available to everyone a Medicare-like, government sponsored program as an alternative.

I noted at the time that some criticized Obama’s plan because it left the private for-profit insurance system intact. While it is true that private insurance companies would not have been prohibited under his plan, they would have been seriously wounded by the competition provided by the far superior government programs. That competition would have forced insurance companies to either provide a product comparable to the government insurance programs or else get out of the market. It would have been a vast improvement over our current situation, and there is every reason to believe it would eventually have morphed into a single payer system as private insurance companies decided that there isn’t enough profit left in the business to encourage them to stay in it (See Paul Krugman’s discussion of this issue).

Obama as president
The plan that Obama eventually offered the American people as president was nothing like the one he promised as a presidential candidate. Instead of a plan “similar to the plan available to members of Congress”, he offered us the option – or, rather, mandate – of purchasing a plan from the same health insurance industry that has consistently abused its near monopoly of its product for the past several years or decades – albeit restrained by some government regulation. Instead of a system that provides competition to that insurance industry he offered us a system that mandates most Americans to purchase health insurance from that same industry – thus solidifying their monopoly.

Worse yet, Obama didn’t even appear to fight for the plan that he promised the American people. It simply slipped off the table. Worse still, he didn’t even acknowledge his about-face. He unveiled his shocking surprise in a speech of September 2009, in which he said:

An additional step we can take to keep insurance companies honest is by making a not-for-profit public option available in the insurance exchange. (Applause.) Now, let me be clear. Let me be clear. It would only be an option for those who don't have insurance. No one would be forced to choose it, and it would not impact those of you who already have insurance. In fact, based on Congressional Budget Office estimates, we believe that less than 5 percent of Americans would sign up.

In other words, the plan that as a candidate he offered to “all Americans” – the not-for-profit public option – was now being offered to “less than 5 percent of Americans”, as Obama struggled to make clear to the insurance industry that threatened to fight him tooth and nail at the slightest indication of competition to their racket.

But even that proved to be too much for the health insurance industry to accept. Obama was forced to take even his measly offering of 5% off the table – without a semblance of a fight.


Children

Obama then
As a presidential candidate in 2008, Obama produced an extensive plan to combat poverty if elected President. A plan to fight poverty, which disproportionately affects women and children in our country, is perhaps the one most important thing that a President could do for American children. In 2008, 14 million American children lived in poverty.

Obama as president
The poverty rate for 2009 was 14.3%, representing almost 44 million Americans in poverty – the highest U.S. poverty rate since 1994. More than 20% of those Americans are children, most who are considered to be living in food insecure households.

In short, our rising poverty rate is largely a function of the Obama administration’s too conservative approach to the economy in general. I discussed that above, so I won’t repeat it here.


Iraq

Obama then
During his presidential campaign, Obama promised to withdraw from Iraq, while committed to meeting our humanitarian responsibilities there. He stated on his website:

Obama will immediately begin to remove our troops from Iraq. He will remove one to two combat brigades each month, and have all of our combat brigades out of Iraq within 16 months. Obama will make it clear that we will not build any permanent bases in Iraq. He will keep some troops in Iraq to protect our embassy and diplomats; if al Qaeda attempts to build a base within Iraq, he will keep troops in Iraq or elsewhere in the region to carry out targeted strikes on al Qaeda…

Obama believes that America has a moral and security responsibility to confront Iraq’s humanitarian crisis – two million Iraqis are refugees; two million more are displaced inside their own country. Obama will form an international working group to address this crisis. He will provide at least $2 billion to expand services to Iraqi refugees in neighboring countries, and ensure that Iraqis inside their own country can find a safe-haven.

Obama as president
In September, 2010, Obama announced an end to U.S. combat operations in Iraq, thus apparently fulfilling a major campaign promise. Some have reported additional evidence that the U.S. military is planning to exit Iraq, as in an article from August, 2010, titled “Obama is Also Pulling Equipment and Bases from Iraq”. And indeed U.S. military casualties in Iraq during the Obama administration have been only a small fraction of what they were during the Bush administration – only 60 U.S. dead in 2010 as of October of that year. But the extent to which Obama actually intends to end U.S. military involvement in Iraq is open to question. From “Business as Usual in Iraq” by Marjorie Cohn, one week after Obama’s announcement:

Last week, President Obama ceremoniously announced that U.S. combat operations had ended in Iraq… Obama felt he had to make good on his campaign promise to move the fighting from Iraq to Afghanistan. But while he has escalated the killing in Afghanistan, it’s business as usual in Iraq. The United States, with its huge embassy in Baghdad and five large bases throughout Iraq, will continue to pull the strings there…

Obama’s speech about withdrawing combat troops from Iraq is an effort to demonstrate compliance with the SOFA… But events on the ground reveal that he is playing a political version of the old shell game. As Obama proclaimed the redeployment of a Stryker battalion out of Iraq, 3,000 combat troops from the 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment redeployed back into Iraq from Fort Hood, Texas. And that cavalry regiment will have plenty of company. The State Department is more than doubling its “security contractors” to 7,000 to make sure U.S. interests are protected. And with them will come 24 Blackhawk helicopters, 50 Mine Resistant Ambush-Protected vehicles and other military equipment.

Fifty thousand U.S. military troops remain in Iraq. Forty-five hundred U.S. special forces troops continue to fight and kill with Iraqi special forces. American troops are still authorized to take preemptive action against any threat they perceive. The policy regarding air strikes and bombings will remain unchanged. And untold numbers of “civilian contractors” – more accurately called mercenaries – will stay in Iraq, unaccountable for their war crimes.

What about Obama’s promises regarding Iraqi refugees? The international Integrated Refugee & Immigrant Services (IRIS) reported on this in June 2009:

So has Obama lived up to his promises ? Is his policy concerning Iraqi refugees considerably different from that of George W. Bush ? … Obama’s promise of change has not yet been realized. Granted, Obama has not yet held office for even half a year… However, the tens of thousands still awaiting resettlement in addition to the continued abysmal conditions of both Iraqis that have been resettled to the United States and also those living in countries neighboring Iraq serves as a stark reminder that significant progress is still much needed.

A report by Human Rights First in August 2010 documented little or no improvement, recommending that the Obama administration “should implement immediate changes that would prevent the unnecessary and prolonged detention of asylum seekers…”


Conclusion

Obama’s adherence to some of his civil rights related promises shows at least that his campaign promises means something to him. Why then has he broken so many of his most important promises?

The crucial factor appears to be the amount of pressure applied to him by powerful and wealthy individuals and corporations. Most of them are not much threatened by such things as equal pay for women or minor reforms of our “War on Drugs”. President Obama is often willing to enact progressive legislation if it’s not opposed by powerful interests.

But taking on the financiers of Wall Street, the Military Industrial Complex, the health insurance or pharmaceutical industries, or seriously challenging the paradigm that excuses our shameful “War on Drugs” are entirely different matters. These people don’t tolerate changes to the status quo that threaten their wealth or power status. They aggressively use their money and control of national communications media, as well as (to an unknown extent) their control of the machines that register voters and count our votes, to influence elections and through that our elected representatives. It requires substantial moral courage to stand up to them.

But when it comes down to a choice of challenging these behemoths or giving in to them, Obama chooses the latter every time. Consequently, the wealth gap explodes, the American empire expands, planetary destruction portends widespread catastrophe, the economic and political power of the wealthy climbs to obscene levels, and the rest of us remain mired in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

I for one no longer believe that Barack Obama has the ability or inclination to reverse these dangerous processes.
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An Obituary - R.I.P.

Posted by CanonRay in Editorials & Other Articles
Fri Dec 17th 2010, 09:29 AM

Democratic Party 1933-2010 RIP

The Obama Administration today announced the death of the Democratic Party, the AP is reporting. The Party was 77 years old.

Although many believed the party to be much older, it was born March 4, 1933 at the inauguration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The Party led a vigorous youth, passing in its early days a number of socially conscious programs, including Social Security, banking reform legislation, and many jobs programs. The Party was able to lead the nation through World War II, and remained strong and confident it its beliefs.

Most Party watchers believe the first signs of illness began shortly following the end of the Truman administration. Although outwardly the Party seemed healthy, the early sixties showed the beginnings of a slow atrophy in its otherwise strong union arms.

The Party rallied briefly in the mid 1960’s, passing the Civil Rights Act and Medicare, as well as environmental legislation, and to most it appeared to regain its youthful vigor. However, most experts believed that exposure in the jungles of Viet Nam caused the final illness leading to death. Following the Party’s return home from that conflict, a long decline ensued, and the Party was by the turn of the century a mere shell of itself.

Although on life support, the Party rallied again briefly in 2008 with the election of the first black President, but the appearance of health was an illusion.

With the apparent willingness to dismantle the most basic Democratic programs, including Social Security, Medicare, and Unemployment, and its inability to maintain any semblance of fight against the Republicans, the Party was today pronounced dead.
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To ALL Current Obama Supporters

In 2006, John Dean published his seventh book, “Conservatives Without Conscience.” This book relied heavily on the work of Dr. Robert Altemeyer, a professor of social psychology at the University of Manitoba. Dean's contribution to the understanding of what makes conservative republicans so repulsive to human beings is valuable, indeed. But as I noted when the book was first out, it is important for people to do further research on this topic, especially the works of Erich Fromm, who wrote extensively on this very topic.

In recent months, I've read an unsurprising, yet disturbing, number of threads on the Democratic Underground, which in effect state that support for all democratic candidates is not only essential, but that even questioning this can cause President Barack Obama to lose to Sarah Palin in 2012. Clearly, the concrete thinking known as “authoritarianism” is not monopolized by rigid republicans. Like rabies, it is a disease than can infect the public at large.

In the field of psychiatry, what is known as an “authoritarian personality” has been identified. In American political history, some toxic examples include J. Edgar Hoover and George W. Bush. It is not hard to recognize them and others as having posed grave threats to democracy. But in sociology, “authoritarianism” can blur any clear lines of distinction. Let's take a minute to look at “authority” in sociological terms, and then examine its potential for abuse.

There are three types of “authority.” They are traditional, charismatic, and bureaucratic. The first type is what was found among all people in early societies, including hunter-and-gatherers, and agrarian cultures. People do as they do, because it is “the way it has always been done.” Charismatic authority comes by way of a person who is respected by others for his or her individual leadership characteristics. And bureaucratic authority comes as a result of a large collection of people requiring a system to meet the needs of the majority of individuals in a systematic way. Both industrial and high-tech societies tend to have bureaucratic leadership.

Because the United States is run, by definition, by way of bureaucratic authority, we should now focus our attention on most common styles of authority within such social systems. The first has to do with the overlap with another type – charismatic authority. And even within this type, there are at least two sub-sets. There are charismatic leaders who are attractive as individuals, but who maintain the status quo of the system. They often challenge parts of that system which they are part of, but they maintain an allegiance to its foundations.

The next sub-set of charismatic leaders are those who opt not to participate in the comforts of the system as it is, but rather, choose to challenge its very foundations. In India, Mahatma Gandhi was such a charismatic force. In the USA, examples would include Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr., and even Senator Robert F. Kennedy, in his last two years of life. Charismatic leaders tend to initiate change, before being expelled, in one way or another, by the system they are attempting to alter.

Perhaps more important, in the context of this discussion, are the two other types of authority: “overt” and “anonymous.” Overt authority, in a democratic society, can be best illustrated by the example of the police forces. Obey the law, and you are generally okay. Break the law, and you will be punished in any of a variety of ways. However, as we see in the instance of J. Edgar Hoover, when a person with an authoritarian personality is in charge of a policing agency, they tend to advocate illegal procedures to find ways to punish those who obey the law, but challenge the system. And, worse, when a George W. Bush goes far beyond Hoover's wettest dreams, there is the risk of an authoritarian system “changing” the laws, or absolutely failing to punish the criminals – Bush, Cheney, Rove, et al – who openly violated the law of the land.

While overt authority says “do this or be punished!,” Erich Fromm pointed out that anonymous authority takes a different approach. It “suggests” that you do something, because “everyone else is doing it.” And, truth be known, a majority of Americans, hypnotized by electronic gadgets, with their senses dulled by the novocaine administered by the media, “freely” choose to be of the herd.

It is very sad to see parts of these forms of authority infecting the thought processes of good democrats. The idea that people should – indeed, must! – always vote for every single democrat in every single election, advocates a form of generic thinking that defines herds. I do not deny that the democratic product is better than the republican product. In national elections, I vote for the democratic candidate every time. But all elections are not national. Even this year, there were local elections with no democratic candidates in the mix. Should I have been confused? Wrote in the name of a democrat who was not running? No, of course not. While I would never advocate a third party candidate on this forum, I'll still vote for one if they are the best choice.

Likewise, I fully understand and appreciate that a person can be a very good democrat, and not invest time, money, or perhaps even a vote for specific democratic candidates. I'm saddened to see the repeated attempts of overt authority: “then it's your fault if Palin is elected!” Or even the attempts at anonymous authority: “you can be a good democrat, so long as you always and only vote for democratic candidates.”

By their nature, members of the democratic left recognize these crude attempts to bully people into accepting the unacceptable. For if democratic politicians can take for granted that the herd will support them, no matter how many times they betray our best interests, then brothers and sisters, we have tied our own hands, and do not deserve democratic representation. We have then betrayed our own interests, and that of our families and friends. We have chosen to submit to an authority that will capitalize on our ignorance.

In every situation, as adults, we should be thinking for ourselves. You and I should have enough trust in ourselves to trust our own insights and judgment. And anyone who tells you not to think for yourself sure as heck is not your friend. No, do not allow yourselves to be reduced to cattle or sheep, like the republicans that you know, or see on television. Also, have a conscience: help our confused and frightened democratic friends and associates to find the strength to think for their selves That is the best hope for the real Democratic Party today. Nothing less will do.

Thank you,
H2O Man

http://journals.democraticunderground.com/H2O%20Man/838
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Yet ANOTHER Obama Fuck Up

A "Public Option" Would Not Be Overthrown in the Courts Like Obama's Mandated Healthcare Has Been.

Public services provided to the People are paid for through the tax system.

A Public Option or Single Payer Health-care would have fit into the long established and legal precedent of government provision through taxation just like public schools, Social Security, Medicare, police and fire and more.

Either a public option or single payer healthcare would have not have been and could not have been thrown out in the courts.

Mandating Americans to purchase a service or a commodity, especially health-care, will never stand up and will lose at the Supreme Court of the United States, especially this Supreme Court.

Today's predicted defeat for President Obama's ill-conceived "deal" with insurance companies is the first nail in the coffin of the stupid concept. It's finished.

President Obama pissed away a moment in history that will not come again for our generation to provide health care, Medicare for all, or even an incremental expansion of Medicare to children and those 55 and older (which would have passed the Senate and the House, along with provisions for pre-existing conditions).

To Speaker Pelosi's credit, the House of Representative passed the Public Option only to have the White House negotiate it out.

President Obama wasted his first entire year of his Presidency on this doomed "mandated purchase" concept. And it cost us the House of Representatives and nearly the Senate.

Instead of focusing on job creation and the housing disaster, the White House fiddled to this idiotic song that will now be thrown out by the Supreme Court.

One year wasted for nothing.

What an idiotic approach to solving the health-care crisis in this country. And, predictably, it failed.

We are back to square one on health-care and there will still be over 30 million Americans without health-care.

It's simply appalling.
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NO WONDER Boehner Is Crying All The Time

In this 1996 documentary by PBS called "The People and the Power Game," John Boehner is caught red-handed in an amazing act of corruption, and his biggest critics are fellow Republicans.

Boehner: Mine asked me to give out a half dozen checks quickly before we got to the end of the month and I complied. I did it on the House floor which I regret and I should not have done, it's not a violation of the House rules, but it's a practice that's gone on here for a long time.
Were the checks from tobacco companies?
Boehner: Ahh, I think if my memory serves me correctly, I think it was a tobacco company, yes.
Q)....but in this case tobacco's well timed contributions helped save its subsidy. The people that were passing out the checks won.

He did say that he's never been to a tanning salon before so I guess it's all that golf he plays in the bright sunlight that gives him that orange hue. Lesley also got hung up on the fact that President Obama repeatedly said that the Republicans were holding America hostage.

Stahl: He basically called you a hostage-taker.
Boehner: Excuse me, Mr. President. I thought the election was over. You know, you get a lot of that heated rhetoric during an election. But now it's time to govern.
{}
Stahl: There have been moments of disrespect shown to President Obama.
Boehner: Well, there was some disrespect, I would suggest, that was shown to me yesterday by the president.

Boehner repeatedly attacked the Democratic Party and the President too many times for me to recount but here's a few:

Hmmm. So let's see now. This would be the same John Boehner who threw an hour-long hissy fit on the House floor, called President Obama a "leftist" (when you stop laughing so hard, remember that David Gregory didn't bother to challenge him on that either), promised to do everything within his power to make it difficult to pass health care reform, advocated layoffs of police and firefighters rather than compromise on the stimulus bill, and called President Obama a socialist before lying about calling him a socialist.

He's so sensitive, or is he? One of the most alarming things in this interview was the fact that he starts crying like a baby at the drop of a hat. There's "sensitive" and then there's pathological. It was truly bizarre. People think that's it's hard for an actor to cry during a scene, but watching Boehner weep more often than Glenn Beck illustrates that it's not very hard at all.

And on election night, in his victory speech, the public saw something they probably never expected from Boehner: it was called "the sob heard round the world."

Can you imagine if Democratic politicians acted this way? FOX News would be running stories 24/7 about how al-Qaeda and all the lone wolf cells would be emboldened to terrorism because of their weakness. It would be non-stop.

How serious is a man like John Boehner after all?

http://crooksandliars.com/john-amato/does-john-boehners-60-minutes-interview
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