Just as this election may not result in the worst possible outcome, there is really no best possible outcome, just bad to worst possible outcomes.
Good Outcome: Republicans LOSE seats.
Bad Outcome: Democrats keep the same disfunctional "majority".
Worse Outcome: Republicans gain seats.
Worst Possible Outcome: Republicans take both houses.
Under Obama and the Democratic majority we have suffered over the past two years; suffered the devastating effects of Republican "trickle up" economics, off-shoring jobs, endless wars, corporate entitlements to personhood and unlimited "free speech" through bribery, and obstruction of ALL efforts at reducing the suffering. Unfortunately suffering can breed insanity, and cruel exploitation by soulless amoral powers. The suffering will continue.
If you think the past two years were bad, you ain't seen nothin' yet. Since one of the two major political parties in the country is run by a "news" network, we'll be seeing FOX (R) set the agenda for our total collapse. President Palin, or one of their other employees, will surely finish the job. Soon these will be the missed and yearned-for “good old days”.
The propaganda is working. "Obamacare" is death panels. (To FOX (R) viewers.)The Stimulus failed. (Except when used as a GOP photo-op with a big check. And $288 billion out of the $800 billion cost of the recovery act was composed entirely of tax cuts. Yes, tax cuts! And according to factcheck.org. “In fact, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimates that the stimulus increased employment by between 1.4 million and 3.3 million people, compared with what employment would have been otherwise. Observers may differ on whether that’s a reasonable return on investment, but it’s not accurate to say that the stimulus harmed employment or that it didn’t help.”)
Obama is spending us towards doom. (Never mind President Obama and the congressional Democrats cut the deficit. Oh, yes, not that it matters. The first Obama budget was billions less than the final Bush budget.)
The truth does not matter. We can try to tell the truth but it will be rejected if it does not fit the belief system nurtured and fertilized by the Right. FOX (R) manufactures "fair and balanced" propaganda. Fair for the GOP, and balanced against Dems.
Americans have been indoctrinated into wanting to give more power to Republicans. Yes, with their record, we know for certain they'll fix everything...in favor of the economic elites, as usual.
Failure will once again be embraced. But that's OK. Liberals will still get the blame. FOX (R) will tell us so, and have they ever been wrong?
Now that they have bought the government, it is only a matter of time for all the wealth to “trickle up”. Neo-feudalism, here we come. It was the “divine right of kings” that assured the lock on power in medieval feudalism; it is the “divine right of wealth” that assures power now.
The "Fair and balanced" kool-ade cult has been pouring for a long time. Millions have been indoctrinated to believe Obama is a Marxist Muslim.
This cult is nothing short of a Fourth Reich, strangling our democracy by seizing near total control of highest bidder elections, and three corrupted branches of government. This will not be pretty. They will hurt people...again.
The American Fourth Reich is still destroying our freedom and democracy from within. We must fight them by calling them what they are, fascists. My American Heritage Dictionary says: Fascism n. A philosophy or system of government that advocates or exercises a dictatorship of the extreme right, typically through the merging of state and business leadership, together with an ideology of belligerent nationalism.
USA 2010: Democracy is dead. Reason is dead. Truth is dead. Fascism is winning. Insanity rules. We will expect different results from the same crew that always works against the interests of 98 percent of Americans. That is the definition of Insanity.
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
Tax The Rich. Rebuild America.
Why does nobody speak out for the most oppressed minority in America, especially you bleeding heart liberals? Where is your compassion?
Let us take pity on the poor rich, for mercy’s sake! Yes our persecuted minority of economic elites are unhappy with their “rich man's burden”. That would be taxes. Next to financial regulation and enduring a Democrat in the White House, taxes are the most terrible persecution for our pampered Plutocrats. Take the sad tale of Steve Schwarzman of the Blackstone Group. Perhaps persecution is too mild a term for this poor man’s plight. Americans put out of their jobs by his fellow economic royalists know little of the real pain Mr. Schwarzman suffers. When Obama suggested closing a tax loophole allowing him to pay only a 15 percent tax on his meager income, instead of the 35 percent the rest of us pay, he knew just what to compare his situation to. Schwarman declared it was like “when Hitler invaded Poland”. Ach, Gotterdammerung!
We hear the rage of the Tea Cult. We hear the rage of Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity and Savage. But their rage and suffering must pale in comparison to the injuries endured by exponentially wealthier hedge fund managers and major Wall Street swindlers. Thank Mammon at least our Right Wing propaganda machine feels their pain.
But wait. What’s this little peep I thought I heard about some wealthy person who thinks the super rich can afford to pay higher taxes? Can this be real? Surely not in the US of Republistan?
Hold on to your seat. There was an article in the LA Times last month called I’m Rich; Tax Me More. It was written by Garrett Gruener, the founder of Ask.com, chief executive of Nanomix, the co-founder and director of the venture capital firm Alta Partners and a member of the advisory board at NDN, a center-left think tank in Washington. Ah, I was right. He is, of course, no Republican.
He said, “Congress should let the Bush tax cuts expire for the wealthiest Americans and use the additional tax revenues that are generated to invest in infrastructure and research.”
How radical! He sounds like me. He also reveals the truth that no Republican wants you to know;
For nearly the last decade, I've paid income taxes at the lowest rates of my professional career. Before that, I paid at higher rates. And if you want the simple, honest truth, from my perspective as an entrepreneur, the fluctuation didn't affect what I did with my money. None of my investments has ever been motivated by the rate at which I would have to pay personal income tax.
And for some reason the corporate media never seem to tell us:
As history demonstrates, modest changes in the tax rate for wealthy taxpayers don't make much of a difference if the goal is to build new companies, drive technological development and stimulate new industries. Almost a decade ago, President George W. Bush and his Republican colleagues in Congress pushed through a massive reduction in marginal tax rates, a reduction that benefitted the wealthy far more than other taxpayers.
We were told the cuts would accelerate business growth and create jobs. Instead, we got nearly a decade of anemic job growth, stagnating wages, declining incomes and high inequality.
The supply-side, trickle-down economic policies of the last decade benefitted people like me, but the wealth didn't trickle down. So while we did quite well, people who live from paycheck to paycheck didn't.
What? Can it possibly be true that the sacred prophecy of Saint Reagan was wrong? And even more astonishing, can there be someone like FDR, a “traitor to his class”, who actually cares about the country that provided the environment that nurtured his prosperity? Amazingly, we hear from a rich man, through corporate media, telling us Republicans are wrong and shared prosperity is, in fact, desirable.
What American businesspeople know, and have known since Henry Ford insisted that his employees be able to afford to buy the cars they made, is that a thriving economy doesn't just need investors; it needs people who can buy the goods and services businesses create. For the overall economy to do well, everyday Americans have to do well.
Now that the Bush tax cuts are about to expire, Republicans are again arguing that taxes should remain low for the wealthy. The idea is that this will spur people like me to put more capital to work and start more ventures, which will create new jobs, power the economy and ultimately produce more tax revenues. It's a beguiling theory, but it's one that hasn't worked before and won't work now.
Thank you, Mr Gruener. You inspire more hope with your wisdom and honesty than we shall ever see from Washington DC.
Let us take pity on the poor rich, for mercy’s sake! Yes our persecuted minority of economic elites are unhappy with their “rich man's burden”. That would be taxes. Next to financial regulation and enduring a Democrat in the White House, taxes are the most terrible persecution for our pampered Plutocrats. Take the sad tale of Steve Schwarzman of the Blackstone Group. Perhaps persecution is too mild a term for this poor man’s plight. Americans put out of their jobs by his fellow economic royalists know little of the real pain Mr. Schwarzman suffers. When Obama suggested closing a tax loophole allowing him to pay only a 15 percent tax on his meager income, instead of the 35 percent the rest of us pay, he knew just what to compare his situation to. Schwarman declared it was like “when Hitler invaded Poland”. Ach, Gotterdammerung!
We hear the rage of the Tea Cult. We hear the rage of Limbaugh, Beck, Hannity and Savage. But their rage and suffering must pale in comparison to the injuries endured by exponentially wealthier hedge fund managers and major Wall Street swindlers. Thank Mammon at least our Right Wing propaganda machine feels their pain.
But wait. What’s this little peep I thought I heard about some wealthy person who thinks the super rich can afford to pay higher taxes? Can this be real? Surely not in the US of Republistan?
Hold on to your seat. There was an article in the LA Times last month called I’m Rich; Tax Me More. It was written by Garrett Gruener, the founder of Ask.com, chief executive of Nanomix, the co-founder and director of the venture capital firm Alta Partners and a member of the advisory board at NDN, a center-left think tank in Washington. Ah, I was right. He is, of course, no Republican.
He said, “Congress should let the Bush tax cuts expire for the wealthiest Americans and use the additional tax revenues that are generated to invest in infrastructure and research.”
How radical! He sounds like me. He also reveals the truth that no Republican wants you to know;
For nearly the last decade, I've paid income taxes at the lowest rates of my professional career. Before that, I paid at higher rates. And if you want the simple, honest truth, from my perspective as an entrepreneur, the fluctuation didn't affect what I did with my money. None of my investments has ever been motivated by the rate at which I would have to pay personal income tax.
And for some reason the corporate media never seem to tell us:
As history demonstrates, modest changes in the tax rate for wealthy taxpayers don't make much of a difference if the goal is to build new companies, drive technological development and stimulate new industries. Almost a decade ago, President George W. Bush and his Republican colleagues in Congress pushed through a massive reduction in marginal tax rates, a reduction that benefitted the wealthy far more than other taxpayers.
We were told the cuts would accelerate business growth and create jobs. Instead, we got nearly a decade of anemic job growth, stagnating wages, declining incomes and high inequality.
The supply-side, trickle-down economic policies of the last decade benefitted people like me, but the wealth didn't trickle down. So while we did quite well, people who live from paycheck to paycheck didn't.
What? Can it possibly be true that the sacred prophecy of Saint Reagan was wrong? And even more astonishing, can there be someone like FDR, a “traitor to his class”, who actually cares about the country that provided the environment that nurtured his prosperity? Amazingly, we hear from a rich man, through corporate media, telling us Republicans are wrong and shared prosperity is, in fact, desirable.
What American businesspeople know, and have known since Henry Ford insisted that his employees be able to afford to buy the cars they made, is that a thriving economy doesn't just need investors; it needs people who can buy the goods and services businesses create. For the overall economy to do well, everyday Americans have to do well.
Now that the Bush tax cuts are about to expire, Republicans are again arguing that taxes should remain low for the wealthy. The idea is that this will spur people like me to put more capital to work and start more ventures, which will create new jobs, power the economy and ultimately produce more tax revenues. It's a beguiling theory, but it's one that hasn't worked before and won't work now.
Thank you, Mr Gruener. You inspire more hope with your wisdom and honesty than we shall ever see from Washington DC.
Sunday, October 3, 2010
Angry Voters
The news is out. As the corporate media relentlessly inform us, this election the politicians are facing the wrath of the “angry voter”.
We’ve seen the angry town hall shouters screaming their rage against the machine; I mean “death panels”. We’ve seen the teabaggers howling about Obama’s non-existent tax hikes. The right wing pundits and propagandists are one-upping each other in spewing feverish foolishness about Obama the Socialist/Fascist/Communist/Muslim/foreigner who wants to destroy America. THEY certainly sound angry, don’t they? Of course they do, it’s their job. They are out to make their listeners angry, so they have to be extra furious.
The “not just no, but Hell no!” rhetoric of the radical right wing obstructionist Republicans rings across Foxland. Even Carl Paladino, the “family values” Republican father of an extra-marital child is airing ads telling us he’s “Mad as hell and not going to take it anymore”.
Wow. That’s a lot of anger out there. What ARE they so angry about, anyway? There are no death panels, no taxes raised, nobody started a new war to sent their kids off to kill and be killed. But, dammit! I think I might be getting angry too! I think it’s contagious.
So what am I getting angry about? I don’t want to waste all that emotion on Republicans. They’re just doing what they always do. They lie, cheat, steal and kill to get their way. They started wars that don’t end. They built an American police state. They are partners with big business in ripping off the citizens of not just the US, but practically the entire world.
But that doesn’t make me angry anymore. It’s just business as usual.
How about that teabagger cult? That circus of fools should be enough to piss me off. But that’s just what they are, fools. They are simply a bunch of misled dupes of Fox, big money and Republican organizers. I almost pity them. No they don’t make me angry, either.
Ah, that leaves the Democrats and Obama. Yes, they’re a marvelous lot, aren’t they? They talk about helping the regular guy yet give more money to Wall Street while pumping more of our cash into insurance companies. They talk about taking the country in a different direction while they renew the Patriot Act and embrace the Bush Administration’s “state secrets” to defend their crimes. They cower from Republican filibuster threats and accomplish next to nothing.
Well, that is starting to really annoy me.
I think if we couple the Democrats and Republicans, we have two self-reinforcing problems that should piss us all off to no end.
I am very angry that we have practically no choice in OUR elections than to vote for, or against, Democrats and Republicans. I’m sick of them all and I hate to always have to choose the lesser of evils.
I’m angry because we have no choice... but to suffer these stooges. Time to change the channel.
Say, who’s left on “Survivor”?
There, I feel better now.
We’ve seen the angry town hall shouters screaming their rage against the machine; I mean “death panels”. We’ve seen the teabaggers howling about Obama’s non-existent tax hikes. The right wing pundits and propagandists are one-upping each other in spewing feverish foolishness about Obama the Socialist/Fascist/Communist/Muslim/foreigner who wants to destroy America. THEY certainly sound angry, don’t they? Of course they do, it’s their job. They are out to make their listeners angry, so they have to be extra furious.
The “not just no, but Hell no!” rhetoric of the radical right wing obstructionist Republicans rings across Foxland. Even Carl Paladino, the “family values” Republican father of an extra-marital child is airing ads telling us he’s “Mad as hell and not going to take it anymore”.
Wow. That’s a lot of anger out there. What ARE they so angry about, anyway? There are no death panels, no taxes raised, nobody started a new war to sent their kids off to kill and be killed. But, dammit! I think I might be getting angry too! I think it’s contagious.
So what am I getting angry about? I don’t want to waste all that emotion on Republicans. They’re just doing what they always do. They lie, cheat, steal and kill to get their way. They started wars that don’t end. They built an American police state. They are partners with big business in ripping off the citizens of not just the US, but practically the entire world.
But that doesn’t make me angry anymore. It’s just business as usual.
How about that teabagger cult? That circus of fools should be enough to piss me off. But that’s just what they are, fools. They are simply a bunch of misled dupes of Fox, big money and Republican organizers. I almost pity them. No they don’t make me angry, either.
Ah, that leaves the Democrats and Obama. Yes, they’re a marvelous lot, aren’t they? They talk about helping the regular guy yet give more money to Wall Street while pumping more of our cash into insurance companies. They talk about taking the country in a different direction while they renew the Patriot Act and embrace the Bush Administration’s “state secrets” to defend their crimes. They cower from Republican filibuster threats and accomplish next to nothing.
Well, that is starting to really annoy me.
I think if we couple the Democrats and Republicans, we have two self-reinforcing problems that should piss us all off to no end.
I am very angry that we have practically no choice in OUR elections than to vote for, or against, Democrats and Republicans. I’m sick of them all and I hate to always have to choose the lesser of evils.
I’m angry because we have no choice... but to suffer these stooges. Time to change the channel.
Say, who’s left on “Survivor”?
There, I feel better now.
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