Dave's Politics

Ignorance Ain't Cheap

2011-07-03T06:50:00.000-07:00

Politicians are campaigning to slash education budgets, and even refusing to spend federal money allocated for education.

NEA researcher Michael Petko says the reason lies in “faulty economics.”

“Many people don’t realize that, dollar per dollar, education funds are going to increase state income and produce more jobs than money spent in any other sector in the economy.”

In 2004, NEA conducted two studies on the economic impact of education spending, “K-12 Education in the U.S. Economy” and “The Effects of State Public K-12 Education Expenditures on Income Distribution.”

These studies revealed a statistically significant correlation between education spending and economic development. Study authors argued that increasing education spending would decrease poverty and promote economic growth, and that decreasing education spending would do the opposite.

For each dollar a state saved per student, 0.4% fewer small businesses would come to the state and bring jobs, the researchers found.

Economic stagnation is just one of the many negative consequences of cutting education budgets. Reducing classroom spending will also make it harder for Americans to compete in the international job market against the Chinese and others who are increasing how much they invest in their children’s education.

The United States now spends less than many peer nations on primary and secondary education. In 2009, the United States only spent 25% of its per capita GDP on secondary education, while Austria spent 30% and Italy spent 29%, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

Teachers aren’t causing our economic problems. Why are they the scapegoat? We have to stop cutting their salaries!

History

2011-06-12T07:30:00.000-07:00

If you’ve been following my blog, you know nothing bugs me more than the ease with which politicians (mostly Republicans) rewrite history.

When Palin answered that “gotcha” question about Paul Revere’s ride, she said he rode to warn the British that we were armed and ready for them. When questioned about it later, she said she knew her history. She had stumbled across the fact that after his capture, Revere told the British we had 500 armed men there to meet them.

Poor Sarah says, "In a shout-out, gotcha type of question that was asked of me, I answered candidly. And I know my American history."

The ambush question was, “What have you seen so far today, and what are you going to take away from your visit?”

Her explanation doesn’t work because he had no intention of riding out into the night to warn the British in the first place. His mission was a secret. He was to riding to Lexington to warn John Hancock and Samuel Adams.

He was a courier. Coincidentally, that’s how I make my living.

Revere was captured almost immediately.

I guess we need fact checking with every statement made publicly (obviously an impossible job). I’ve heard historical revisionists have changed the Paul Revere Wikipedia pages.

Wikipedia is great for science and technology, but we have to make sure everyone knows the information there can be modified by anyone. Unfortunately a lot of people believe history is opinion. I will concede, in a lot of cases, there is more than one point of view but I’m really worried about agenda driven history.

How can anyone think opinions manipulated by lies can be positive?

Beck on Obama

2011-06-05T07:05:00.000-07:00

Glenn Beck’s star has faded, finally. He’s just about gone. For years his dis-information campaign has gone unchallenged. His claim that NAZIs and fascists were lefties is taken for granted by people I’ve personally spoken to. Beck likes to pull facts out of his butt.

Last February he claimed Michelle Obama had 43 staffers working for her.
"I think Nancy Reagan may have been the one who had the most people on the staff. She had three. Three!"

"The first lady's office needs 43 people? For what? These people are out of control. It is really Marie Antoinette."
In 2009, FactCheck.org and Snopes.com debunked the claim circulated in a chain e-mail that Michelle Obama had an "unprecedented" number of staffers, with 22.

"First lady Michelle Obama’s staff is no different in size than that of her predecessor, Laura Bush -- around 25 people -- and is based on a similar staffing model," according to
Catherine McCormick-Lelyveld, a spokeswoman for Michelle Obama.

While every first lady approaches the job differently, the responsibilities of the office of the first lady have grown over the years to include planning and hosting hundreds of events at the White House and across the city of D.C., planning and supporting domestic and foreign travel with and without President Obama, receiving, cataloging and responding to thousands of pieces of mail, and supporting the first lady’s active schedule in support of the President -- hence the staff size for both Mrs. Bush and Mrs. Obama."

The size of a first lady's staff fluctuates year to year. First ladies typically have several staff members each handling correspondence, press, social engagements and projects. At 25, Michelle Obama's staff is similar in size to her immediate predecessors.

According to the Clinton Presidential Library, the size of Hillary Rodham Clinton's staff fluctuated from 13 in October 1993 to 19 by March 2000.

Beck singled out Nancy Reagan, and claimed she had just three employees on her staff. Sheila Tate, vice chair of the Washington, D.C., communications firm Powell Tate, who was Nancy's Reagan's press secretary, said there were 15 people on First Lady Nancy Reagan's staff. That includes four on the press team (including Tate); two in the projects office; two in the advance office; three in the social office; a personal secretary and her assistant; and the chief of staff and his assistant.

Stacy A. Cordery, a history professor at Monmouth College who serves as bibliographer for the National First Ladies' Library in Ohio, said the role of first ladies has expanded over the decades, and so has the size of the staffs.

Unbelievable

2011-05-29T06:24:00.000-07:00

What is it about the Constitution? People carry their copies around like it’s the Bible and chastise the rest of us for not reading it. I’ve ranted before about its interpretation but has anyone actually read it? I admit it’s a bit dry, not to mention, deliberately vague.

Herman Cain announced his presidential bid last Saturday. There’s always been something odd about black republicans to me, especially when they wear cowboy hats. I know there were actually a lot of real black cowboys, but you sure don’t see them in the John Wayne movies these yahoos are referencing.

"We don’t need to rewrite the Constitution of the United States," Cain said. "We need to reread the Constitution and enforce the Constitution."
"And I know that there’s some people that are not going to do that. So, for the benefit for those that are not going to read it because they don’t want us to go by the Constitution, there’s a little section in there that talks about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
"You know, those ideals that we live by, we believe in, your parents believe in, they instilled in you. When you get to the part about life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, don’t stop right there, keep reading.
"’Cause that’s when it says that when any form of government becomes destructive of those ideals, it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it. We’ve got some altering and some abolishing to do."

Those words were in the preamble of the Declaration of Independence.

Unbelievable!

Disappointment

2011-05-15T08:33:00.000-07:00

It’s really hard for me to read the comments section of political blogs. There are a lot of people who are incredibly ignorant about history. I can’t believe how many people equate Fascism with Socialism. Fascism was a response to the left in spite of the word Socialist in NAZI. It really seems pointless to believe social justice is possible given our lowest common denominator awareness of the world around us.

The biggest fallacy perpetuated by the right is that Obama is a lefty.

Before the gulf oil spill, President Obama pushed to expand offshore drilling. His Interior Department gave British Petroleum's rig a "categorical exclusion" from environmental scrutiny and, according to the New York Times, "gave permission to BP and dozens of other oil companies to drill in the Gulf without first getting required permits. After the spill, the same Interior Department kept issuing "categorical exclusions" for new Gulf oil operations, and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar still refuses "to rule out continued use of categorical exclusions," the Denver Post reported.

Salazar, who oversaw this disaster and who, before that, took $323,000 in campaign contributions from energy interests and backed more offshore drilling as a U.S. senator.

Obama’s corporate support has always been right out of the Republican playbook.

Obama has continued George W. Bush’s detention and domestic wiretap policies. He won’t end the federal ban on gay marriage. Immigrant activists are frustrated by the administration’s failure to push for immigration reform.

He has taken some good ideas from the right.

The first Cap and Trade plan was from George H. W. Bush It was about acid rain. Newt Gingrich voted for that plan. He actually said Cap and Trade for carbon would be a great idea.

An individual mandate health care bill was a republican idea. It was the republican alternative to Clinton’s single payer plan. Mitt Romney was doing an individual mandate plan as late as 2009. Chuck Grassley even said individual mandates had bipartisan support.

A budget deal to cut the deficit with both spending cuts and tax hikes was a George H. W. Bush plan. He said it was necessary. He did it, and it worked.

Now these are considered crazy Liberal ideas.

Republicans have abandoned ideas that actually worked. Cap and Trade improved the acid rain problem. An individual mandate worked in Massachusetts and George H. W. Bush did set the stage for balance budget in the ‘90s.

Why have Republicans given up on their successful policies? I guess polarizing American voters and winning elections is more important. Does Obama believe this as well?

The Economic Effects of Taxes

2011-05-08T07:07:00.000-07:00

Republicans are trying to convince us that getting rid of taxes will make our economy grow. Many things affect the economy more than the federal tax code.

Changes to revenue generally aren't caused by the tax rates at all, but by other changes in the broader economy. Bill Clinton raised taxes in 1993, and the economy expanded for much of the 1990s and tax revenue went up.

"There's no clear relationship between taxes and economic growth," said Bob Williams of the nonpartisan Tax Policy Center. "Too many factors complicate the picture to draw clear conclusions about the taxes-growth relationship."

A 2006 report from the U.S. Treasury Department concluded the effect of most tax laws on the wider economy were "uncertain, but probably generally small."

The Treasury report sought to document the revenue effects of every major tax law passed since 1940. To compare the different laws, it examined tax revenues as a percentage of the Gross Domestic Product, a measurement that accounts for economic growth and inflation.

The report found that laws that lowered taxes produced declines in revenues, and that laws that increased taxes produced increases in tax revenues. Tax cuts don’t increase government revenues more than they would have increased otherwise.

Tea Partier Rep. Joe Walsh said on This Week with Christiane Amanpour, "Every time we've cut taxes, revenues have gone up, the economy has grown."

That’s not true. Revenues did not go up in 2001, 2002 or 2003, after tax rates were lowered.

The Bush tax cuts had a time limit because they were unsustainable. We were at historic lows for taxes already. All the cuts have to end, not just for the wealthy! We would have achieved a surplus in 2007 without them.

Trump

2011-04-30T05:50:00.000-07:00

I heard someone on a call-in radio show say, “Donald Trump’s business experience makes him far more qualified to get our country out of our financial difficulties than Obama.”

Really?

Trump financed the construction of his third casino, the $1 billion Taj Mahal, primarily with high-interest junk bonds.

In the August 21, 1990 edition of the Jersey Record, columnist Mike Kelly wrote “If we still had debtors’ prisons, Trump would be in the dungeon.”
Although he shored up his businesses with additional loans and postponed interest payments, by 1991 increasing debt brought Trump to business bankruptcy and the brink of personal bankruptcy.

Banks and bond holders had lost hundreds of millions of dollars, but opted to restructure his debt to avoid the risk of losing more money in court.

The Taj Mahal re-emerged from bankruptcy on Oct 5, 1991, with Trump ceding 50% ownership in the casino to the original bondholders in exchange for
lowered interest rates on the debt and more time to pay it off.

By 1994, Trump had eliminated a large portion of his $900 million personal debt and reduced significantly his nearly $3.5 billion in business debt.

He was forced to relinquish the Trump Shuttle (which he had bought in 1989), but he managed to retain Trump Tower in New York City and control of his three casinos in Atlantic City.

Chase Manhattan Bank, which lent Trump the money to buy the West Side yards, his biggest Manhattan parcel, forced the sale of a parcel to Asian developers.

In 1995, he combined his casino holdings into the publicly held Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts. Wall Street drove its stock above $35 in 1996, but by 1998 it had fallen into single digits as the company remained profitless and struggled to pay just the interest on its nearly $2 billion in debt.

In a May 28, 2004, Wall Street Journal article, Trump said the specter of bankruptcy bothered him “from a psychological standpoint,” but added, “it really wouldn’t matter that much.”

A number of his bondholders disagreed. In the same article, Meyer Marvald, a Florida retiree who said he owned about $44,000 of the bonds, claimed “Trump has the Sword of Damocles hanging over our heads.” On October 21, 2004, Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts announced a restructuring of its debt. The plan called for Trump’s individual ownership to be reduced from 56 percent to 27 percent, with bondholders receiving stock in exchange for surrendering part of the debt. Since then,
Trump Hotels has been forced to seek voluntary bankruptcy protection. After the company applied for Chapter 11 Protection in November, 2004, Trump relinquished his CEO position but retained a role as Chairman of the Board. In May, 2005 the company re-emerged from bankruptcy as Trump Entertainment.

Trump’s ruthless dealings have ruined many lives. Anyone who thinks his business experience qualifies him to run our country would probably consider Sarah Palin an intellectual.

Fun With Photoshop

2011-04-24T06:30:00.000-07:00

Hoping to illustrate its diverse enrollment, the University of Wisconsin at Madison doctored a photograph on a brochure cover by digitally inserting a black student in a crowd of white football fans.

The original image, below, shows US President Barak Obama ahead of the group with Mubarak trailing at the very back, while the doctored Al-Ahram image shows the Egyptian leader in the front.

Left: Conservative candidate Ed Matts with Ann Widdecombe protesting in support of the Kacheps family, who were facing deportation.
Right: The same picture, doctored to support the party line, on Mr Matts' election leaflet.

More Fun from the Electorate

2011-04-17T08:36:00.000-07:00

Is This a Game?

2011-04-10T07:50:00.000-07:00

It seems our politicians will never get past whether their side will be perceived as winners or losers. The final negotiating points of this latest fight were over less than one-fifth of one percent of the federal budget.

Of course it was really over the symbolism of not funding Planned Parenthood. Less than 1 percent of the American public views abortion as their top priority issue.

Our leaders in Congress nearly brought government services to a halt. If one side wins a little ground, it’s seen as a victory and a mandate.

We need a functioning government not held hostage by extremists. At least avoiding a shutdown was a loss for the tea party, who seemed eager for a shutdown. I hope they’re at odds with public opinion.

We have bigger issues coming up with the debt ceiling and next year's budget. If it was this hard to settle the minor question of the remainder of the year's budget, the prospects of another shutdown or economic upheaval are much greater when actually important issues are on the way.

No one gets off without blame. Democrats should have passed a budget when they had majorities in both chambers and the White House. It was stupid to go into the fall 2010 elections without passing a single budget bill, when they knew they were going to lose their majority.

Republicans are incapable of bargaining coherently or effectively. Unfortunately, they fear the tea party in the primaries more than they fear the general electorate. There can’t be compromise in the House GOP.

More Bad Spin on Healthcare

2011-04-03T06:28:00.000-07:00

In the official response to Obama’s January 25th State of the Union address Rep. Paul Ryan said, “What we already know about the president’s health care law is this: Costs are going up, premiums are rising, and millions of people will lose the coverage they currently have. Job creation is being stifled by all of its taxes, penalties, mandates and fees.”

According to insurance companies and state insurance commissions, rising medical costs are the primary driver of increasing premiums. The Congressional Budget Office has said the law won’t have much of an impact on premium costs for most Americans, compared with what premiums would have been without the law. Premiums had been rising well before the law, and were expected to rise without it. People who buy their own insurance will see an increase of 10 percent to 13 percent and more than half of those individuals will get subsidies that reduce their costs substantially. The increase in premiums will be due to an increase in benefits in those plans.

Health care spending is expected to rise by less than 1 percent over a decade because about 34 million more Americans will gain coverage, according to the chief actuary of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services.

The CBO estimates that 8 million to 9 million people who would normally have employer-sponsored coverage won’t get such an offer from their employers. The reason is that these are mostly low-income workers who will get subsidies to go buy their own insurance in state-based exchanges. Whether the law had been enacted or not, employers would be free to drop coverage.

The CBO says the law would have a small impact on the labor supply, and that would be mostly due to workers retiring early or working less because they would have more secure health care options. It’s also expected to reduce the deficit over the next two decades and beyond.

The law does not create a government-run system. Studies on the quality of care worldwide have not put the U.S. at the top. A 2010 Commonwealth Fund study ranked the U.S. last among seven countries in health system performance. The U.S. ranks 49th in life expectancy, according to the CIA World Factbook, and many countries have lower rates of infant mortality.

The problem, of course, is the philosophical difference between the right and the left. The phrase Social Darwinism has been thrown around. These people believe in the survival of the fittest. Fee Market Capitalism will kill the weak and balance everything out. These folks have never read Darwin.

According to Darwin,“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable to change.”

Humans are a weak species, we need to work together to survive. We are SOCIAL animals, like it or not. Civilized people require social programs like health care and public education. Personally, I embrace our social nature.

A Republican friend of mine gave me a copy of On the Origin of Species. It’s a good read, I recommend it.

Teachers

2011-03-05T07:47:00.000-08:00

I haven’t been motivated to post lately. It’s not because there’s nothing to write about. Unfortunately there’s too much to write about and it’s all heartbreaking.

Tea Party politicians say we have to act like grown-ups when it comes to balancing our budget. They tend to focus on fringe expenses.

Slashing and burning funding for education is only going to lead to an ignorant, third world America.

If we’re going to act like grown-ups we have to raise taxes.

We should always go after waste, fraud and abuse but that’s not what got us here and vilifying teachers is pathetic!

Governor Scott Walker is being disingenuous when he says teachers make more than private sector employees. In their education demographic, they make less.

Teachers have taken pay cuts and doubled what they pay for benefits. Walker says public sector bargaining rights for teachers will be too expensive for Wisconsin. He doesn’t make the same claim for police or fire fighters. They, coincidentally, voted for him.

When people get outraged by teachers’ generous benefits they miss the fact that these benefits are supposed to make up for their lousy pay.

Walker is obviously trying to bust unions.

Union abuses should be exposed but unions are the only lobby workers have to fight the lobbyists of big money.

Big money has America convinced that Big Government is Big Brother. Government is inefficient but it’s hard to avoid when there are over three hundred million of us. We have to keep working at it.

Big money is only concerned with maximum production at minimum cost. They are in no way concerned for our quality of life and we should keep that in mind.

Eminent Domain

2011-02-19T09:51:00.000-08:00

Some of the first apartments I lived in when I moved away from home were in the Central West End in St. Louis. This was in the 70s and Barnes Hospital/Washington University began what seems a never ending process of expansion.

I would end up losing three apartments to them before I gave up and moved back to the Soulard neighborhood.

The last one they forced us out of was owned by an old woman named Effie. She told us Effie meant grandma in Polish. She and her late husband had moved from Poland during WWII.

Effie owned two 4 family flats. She loved visiting everyone. She putzed around like she was working on the place, but it was really only an excuse to see what everyone was up to.

Effie came to us in tears with news that Barnes was taking her buildings. There was nothing she could do about it. They found her a little bungalow on the south side, but she still didn’t want to sell.

Effie’s son fought it out in court for her, but Barnes had too much money and power. Effie died in that little bungalow a year later.

There is a legal battle in St. Louis over a sign painted on the side of a building near my house. The brick house is owned by a non-profit ministry called Sanctuary in the Ordinary and managed by Neighborhood Enterprises, Inc., which is headed by Jim Roos. They used to manage a 2-family building of mine.

The city's Board of Adjustment voted 4-1 in July to uphold the city's denial of a permit allowing a 369-square-foot painted sign on the south side of the building. The sign is visible from Interstates 44 and 55 and Gravois Avenue coming into downtown.

Roos and the Missouri Eminent Domain Abuse Coalition decided to appeal. The issue is now in federal court.

Roos says the mural is on the building to protest the potential that it and other property between 13th Street and Tucker Boulevard south of Lafayette Avenue could be taken by eminent domain for a shopping center to the west.

While the city sent out letters in May saying it is no longer interested in the property, it didn't remove the blighting designation that allows the city to take it if it wanted.

Apparently the sign could stay if it depicted an American flag, said something about Jesus, or could be considered art.

This is turning into a big problem for the city because if they deny Roos’ right to display the sign based on content, it’s a violation of the First Amendment to the Constitution.

Personally, I think the city just can’t stand anyone getting such a great advertising space for free.

Thanks Ronnie!

2011-02-06T09:11:00.000-08:00

What a man!

Ronald Reagan cut social spending, creating the homeless problem by turning hundreds of thousands of mentally ill people out on the streets.

He appointed Antonin Scalia to the Supreme Court.

He cut school funding, trying to classify ketchup as a vegetable.

He traded arms, money, drugs, and hostages between Iran and the Nicaraguan rebels.

He claimed that trees cause most pollution.

He lowered taxes in 1981, creating debt so bad he raised taxes each of the next six years and still didn't make up for it. And while he streamlined the complex and exemption-riddled income tax, his changes created the largest-ever shift of tax burden from the wealthy to the middle-class and working poor.

Reagan ignored the health crisis caused by AIDS.

Reagan spent billions on SDI, an "anti-missile shield". Which, incidentally, violated
the ABM treaty.

Reagan more than tripled the national debt.

Surgeon General C. Everett Koop discovered that a woman
did not suffer long-term physical or emotional trauma as a result
of having an abortion. Reagan suppressed the report.

Reagan provided Saddam Hussein with chemical weapons.

When a Marine barracks was blown up by terrorists in Lebanon, Reagan
responded by pulling American forces out of Lebanon and invading the
small Caribbean island of Grenada.

Reagan's attorney general, Ed Meese, was investigated
by three different special prosecutors for involvement in three
different scandals.

Over 100 Reagan appointees were convicted
of crimes committed while in office.

Reagan convinced millions of Americans that the threats they faced were: African-American welfare queens, Central American leftists, a rapidly expanding Evil Empire based in Moscow, and the do-good federal government.

He almost totally sabotaged the behind the scenes work of Gorbachev. They already had signed agreements when Reagan made his grandstanding speech, “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”

In his First Inaugural Address in 1981, Reagan declared that "government is not the solution to our problem; government is the problem."----and here we are.

Rational Health Care

2011-01-26T10:55:00.000-08:00

Republicans are still using tort reform as their answer to health care reform. As if, frivolous law suits are why health care is so expensive. We’ve had caps in Missouri and Texas for years and it’s only made matters worse.

By setting arbitrary time limits to file personal injury or medical malpractice claims, putting caps on non-economic and punitive damages, and limiting liability for manufacturers of defective products, tort reform is making it extremely difficult for people to seek compensation when they have truly suffered serious losses at the hands of another. In addition, tort reform weakens the deterrent effect that civil suits have on wrongdoers.

An 85-year-old Alzheimer’s patient living in a Texas nursing home facility was raped by a nurse assistant who had a history of sexual assault at previous nursing home jobs. The patient’s daughter wanted to file a negligence lawsuit against the nursing home facility for hiring the man despite his past.

However, tort reform in Texas made the lawsuit almost impossible. Attorneys advised against filing a suit, which alone could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars, because it wouldn’t be worth it due to the caps on non-economic and punitive damages, the higher standard of burden of proof that falls on the plaintiff, and other tort reform strategies implemented by the state.

The nursing home who hired a sexual predator would continue to run as if nothing had happened. This woman and other victims that were once helped by the civil justice system are now regularly barred from court.

A man who was undergoing open-heart surgery woke up during the middle of his procedure because of being under-anesthetized due to medical error. For three hours, this man drifted in and out of consciousness and suffered severe pain during the surgery, but was helpless to call out in anguish. The breathing tube down his throat prevented him from making a sound and paralytic drugs left him motionless during the procedure.

Approximately 20,000 to 40,000 of the 21 million patients who receive general anesthesia before surgery wake up during their procedure from being under-anesthetized by mistake. These patients undergo extreme physical pain and suffering and often develop post-traumatic stress disorder and other serious psychological problems as a result.

Patients who have tried to speak out about anesthesia awareness have been silenced by doctors and other medical professionals They were told their experiences were “all in their head.” When this open heart patient told the nurse he had been awake during surgery, she did not believe him. When he was able to recount the doctor and nurses'' conversations and where they were standing during surgery, the nurse got the doctor. He said, “Don’t worry the patient won’t remember any of this tomorrow.”

Due to tort reform’s caps on non-economic damages such as pain and suffering and mental anguish, this man and thousands of other medical malpractice victims would not be able to receive compensation for their enormous losses. Many would not even get a chance to bring their claim to court. Negligent medical professionals responsible for this nightmare would continue to threaten the well-being of patients unabated.

The really sad thing about all of this is, it doesn’t bring down the cost of healthcare! I have pointed out before that it would be cheaper for us to have single payer universal healthcare. Please refer to my Associated Content article from 2008, it still applies.

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/860847/our_health_care_system_is_a_national.html?cat=9

Who's Writing History?

2011-01-16T08:02:00.001-08:00

I didn’t want to post about the shootings that took place in Tucson last week. The right and the left wasted no time blaming each other. It doesn’t matter what motivated the shooter, he was a self absorbed pathetic little man and neither side has to take credit for his actions.

What does bother me though, were the few on the right who pointed out he had a copy of the Communist Manifesto. There was no mention that he also had a copy of Mein Kampf. As if these two books went hand in hand.

I think it was Glenn Beck who first started calling the Nazis leftists because the word socialist in their title.

The National Socialist German Worker’s Party was simply called The German Worker’s Party until 1920. Adding the word socialist was purely a populist move.

Nazi ideology stressed the failures of laissez-faire capitalism, communism, economic liberalism, and democracy; supported the "racial purity of the German people" and that of other Northwestern Europeans; and claimed itself as the protector of Germany from Jewish influence and corruption. They began as a reaction to leftist unions.

They were allies of the Italian Fascists who were as extreme right wing as you can get; a system of government run by corporations and the military.

I can’t understand why talking heads try to influence people by rewriting history. The press has to start calling them out on it!

One Chance To Make A First Impression

2011-01-08T05:26:00.000-08:00

"Repealing the Job-Killing Health Care Law Act." That’s actually the name of HR2, House Republicans attempt to kill Obama’s health care package. It’s hard to tell whether this title reveals the childishness of Republicans who are pushing for it or the voters it’s aimed at.

The Congressional Budget Office has issued a statement that repeal of the health care law will add $230 billion to the deficits through the next ten years.

Republicans can’t seem to discuss any issue without adding misleading talking points; “Job Killing” Health Care Act, “Government Run” Health Care, etc.

They’ve convinced their constituents that:

Guns make you safe
The earth is 6000 years old
Gays are evil and dangerous
Iraq had something to do with 9/11
Obama is a Muslim
Obama is a communist
Obama is the Antichrist
Lowering taxes for the super rich would help the economy
Deregulating banks leads to prosperity
Jesus is coming back soon
Every word of the Bible is true – literally
We don't need trains that work, infrastructure that functions and new energy, just Jesus...

When they said they were going to read the entire constitution at the opening of the 112^th Congress I wondered how they would include blacks equaling 3/5 a person and not being free in free states. It was easy, they omitted those parts entirely. So much for the intentions of the original framers.

Two Republican House members, including a leader on the Rules Committee, cast 6 votes on the US House floor despite missing Wednesday's swearing-in---- A violation of the Constitution they now have to struggling with correcting.

It’s impossible to overstate the incompetence of the Democrats, but Republicans should note that you only get one chance to make a first impression.

Saying it makes it so!

2010-12-24T05:41:00.000-08:00

Obama has been a great disappointment to a lot of us on the left. People who support him point out his willingness to compromise. Capitulation is not compromise. I’ll never understand how folks on the right have been able to stick him with the Socialist label. In my view he’s very right of center.

He’s definitely no negotiator. He has a habit of giving in to all demands from the right and negotiating down from there.

Look at healthcare. I knew we were in trouble when he said, “Single payer is off the table.” If he’d have left that in as a bargaining chip we probably could have had the public option.

So now we have universal healthcare and I still can’t afford it. I haven’t had insurance in over ten years.

The most maddening thing is the right has made the phrase “government run healthcare” stick.
The government will not take over hospitals or other privately-run health care businesses. Doctors will not become government employees, like in Britain. And the U.S. government intends to help people buy insurance from private insurance companies, not pay all the bills like the single-payer system in Canada.
The legislation is designed to set up new systems to encourage private health insurance companies to provide more coverage and better services.
That coverage would be paid for the same way it is now -- by private employers and individual premiums. That's not a government takeover.

The right has known something the left just can’t seem to grasp; saying it makes it so!

Bleeding Brain?

2010-12-19T06:30:00.000-08:00

I was listening to Frank O. Pinion, a local radio show, the other day. They got on the subject of drugs. They started talking about the different effects different drugs produced. Everything they’d read about psychedelics described faces melting.

Peon asked, “Why would anyone want to experience that?”

Frank said if he even tried it, he’d love it and wouldn’t be able to control himself. It struck me as an unusually honest remark.

Someone called in to tell Frank all hallucinogens work by making your brain bleed. The cast of the show all took this for granted as fact.

I was amazed by the statement and decided to research the subject. There is no evidence that drugs cause the brain to bleed, let alone bleeding is the reason drugs work.

-------Hallucinations and other effects of hallucinogens are however very complicated experiences. They are not simply a part of a cause and effect system in the brain, where hallucinogenic drugs act on serotonin and cause hallucinations. Instead, hallucinogenic drugs act initially on the serotonin system, which sends into motion a pattern of complex action potentials and activity. Other neurotransmitters may be involved in these activities as well. The effects that inputs and outputs have on each other in this system as well as the pattern of action potentials mediated by hallucinogenic drugs help to cause many of the complex changes that allow hallucinations to happen. (B.L. Jacobs, "How Hallucinogenic Drugs Work")

Why would someone bother to call in to a radio show with misinformation? Why would the cast of the show take it for granted the caller was telling the truth? Did the caller hear this information somewhere or was he deliberately supporting an agenda with lies?

It strikes me that we’ve all become pretty gullible and shouldn’t take anything we hear for granted. Just because we’re surrounded with information we shouldn’t accept anything as fact without research.

I would love it if FactCheck and PolitiFact followed every statement our politicians make through the corporate media. Unfortunately, I’ve seen FactCheck called liberal for calling a conservative to task for spreading misinformation.

Wikileaks

2010-12-12T07:02:00.001-08:00

The U.S. Justice Department opened a criminal probe of Wikileaks and founder Julian Assange after the leak of diplomatic cables. Attorney General Eric Holder affirmed the probe was “not saber-rattling” but "an active, ongoing criminal investigation. The Washington Post reported that the department was considering charges under the Espionage Act. Prosecutors have a hard time with this because of First Amendment protections for the press.

I have mixed feeling about this whole case.

I believe there is information that should be classified. Lives and policy are at stake. I also believe way too much government information is classified to hide improprieties.

We’re told the leaks have made it impossible for people with influence to confide in our ambassadors. I believe their self-interests will trump that idea.

You can’t call Assange’s actions treasonous; the worst he can be accused of is bad citizenship – except he’s not a citizen. I don’t blame Assange, I blame the State Department for the leaks.

There have actually been calls for Hillary’s resignation. Let’s get real--- the government has its own private internet to contain information but this information is spread out over the world. Any one of thousands of government employees with a flash drive can take anything they want.

If Bush’s yellow cake uranium lie had been leaked in time, maybe we wouldn’t have invaded Iraq. When the information was exposed, not only was it too late but they outed Valerie Plame in retribution. (This was a controlled leak I still think Karl Rove should be prosecuted for.)

Probably the most important information we’re getting from the leaks is the fact of Arab nations wanting us to go to war with Iran.

Americans should be in the loop when it comes to war! Aren’t our representatives representing us?

Why a Progressive Tax is fair

2010-12-05T05:21:00.000-08:00

A flat tax could work if it was high enough, didn't allow for any deductions, taxed all income such as capital gains the same as earned income.

That won’t happen, so the progressive tax system is all that's left. Besides raising revenues, progressive taxation is designed to prevent one group of people from eventually attaining all the wealth.

Over the past 30 years, according to IRS data, the richest 1 percent has tripled their share of America's total income, after taxes, while the bottom 90 percent has seen their share drop over 20 percent.

The tripling of income by the wealthy is the result of money-transferring financial strategies, government deregulation, and tax cuts -- not because they worked three times harder than everyone else.

With our current federal tax system, the wealth generated by the 95% who work for wages goes to the investing class. As they become richer most of the political power of the country goes to them as well.

Teddy Roosevelt warned us about it, “To maintain a functioning democracy within a republic you can't allow one small group of people to attain all the wealth and power. There would be no difference between that and a monarchy or aristocracy!”

Being 'fair' isn't the end game. The end game is maintaining a democratic republic with a thriving middle class of productive and engaged citizens.

In other words, money isn’t everything. An equitable distribution of our nation’s wealth would not mean the end of our Republic or make us Commies or Socialists.

Let Them Expire

2010-12-04T06:43:00.000-08:00

It’s obvious to me all the Bush tax cuts need to expire if we’re going to get a handle on our deficit. When they were put in place, the country was operating with a tax surplus. There was a sunset on the cuts for a reason; they were unsustainable!

It won’t be a tax increase; it will be an end to a temporary policy. How the Democrats let the Republicans get control of this message, I’ll never understand. I’m really disappointed in them.

There seems to be some misunderstanding of how much letting the cuts expire will affect the middle class.

Here’s the break down based on 2011 income. This is according to the Joint Committee on Taxation. (As you can see, if you were to pay an extra $100.00 a week, your income would be between $200,000 and $500,000--- I think you could afford it.)

Income: Less than $10,000
Number of filers: 28,681,000
Average increase: $70
-
Income: $10,000 to $20,000
Number of filers: 24,383,000
Average increase: $410
-
Income: $20,000 to $30,000
Number of filers: 18,523,000
Average increase: $756
-
Income: $30,000 to $40,000
Number of filers: 15,679,000
Average increase: $893
-
Income: $40,000 to $50,000
Number of filers: 13,001,000
Average increase: $923
-
Income: $50,000 to $75,000
Number of filers: 23,972,000
Average increase: $1,126
-
Income: $75,000 to $100,000
Number of filers: 15,245,000
Average increase: $1,837
-
Income: $100,000 to $200,000
Number of filers: 16,885,000
Average increase: $3,672
-
Income: $200,000 to $500,000
Number of filers: 3,757,000
Average increase: $7,187
-
Income: $500,000 to $1 million
Number of filers: 608,000
Average increase: $18,092
-
Income: $1 million and over
Number of filers: 315,000
Average increase: $101,587
-

Bush’s cuts were responsible for 25% of our deficit. If we let them expire for only the rich, we’ll only generate 700 billion dollars, if they all expire, it would mean 3.7 trillion dollars.

This is all a distraction, of course. The deficit isn’t why our economy is in shambles. It’s high unemployment. No one will pay taxes if they don’t generate an income.

Banks have to lend to small businesses!!! They’re making plenty of money trading in foreign currency, so they don’t have to. (I can’t wait to find out what WikiLeaks dug up on the banks). I have mixed feelings about WikiLeaks that I’ll post about next week. --- I digress---

For now, short term deficit spending is a necessity.

It’s been proven that Bush’s tax cuts and the tax cuts that made up a third of the stimulus (Obama’s compromise with the Republicans that only diluted the effect of the stimulus), do not stimulate our economy.

Right now extending unemployment would be much more bang for the buck.

Republicans are convinced that extended benefits will only motivate the unemployed to stay that way. It doesn’t matter that there are 5 people for every job posted.

All Americans Have to Participate

2010-11-28T04:41:00.000-08:00

The Economic Growth and Tax Reconciliation Act of 2001 and the Jobs and Growth Tax Reconciliation Act of 2003 are the Bush tax cuts we hear about everywhere.

The tax reductions in EGTRRA were designed to be phased in over a period of up to 9 years. Many of these slow phase-ins were accelerated by the JGTRRA, which removed the waiting periods for many of EGTRRA's changes.

EGTRRA was designed to sunset, or revert to the provisions that were in effect before it was passed. EGTRRA will sunset on January 1, 2011 unless further legislation is enacted to make its changes permanent.

According to Roberton Williams, a senior fellow at the Tax Policy Center, "The biggest argument for extending the tax cuts right now is our economy is very weak, and raising taxes during a recession, or the recent weak recovery from the recession, could reverse our economic growth,"

If the tax cuts are extended, however, taxpayers won't really notice any change in their bottom line. So it's unlikely to create any new stimulus for the economy.

Treasury estimates the costs of making the tax cuts permanent for everyone is $3.7 trillion over 10 years.

Republicans’ refusal to participate in any real way with any legislation that would benefit Americans is explained with “Obama refuses to work with us.”

This has been extremely frustrating for us on the left who feel he’s given away the store. His compromises have weakened every policy from health care to corporate regulation and credit card usury rules to the point of uselessness. They’ve done nothing but allow the right to say, “See, it doesn’t work!”

A third of Obama’s stimulus has been tax cut Republicans have asked for. This is one of the reasons the stimulus was so weak.

Recovery will never happen until banks decide to lend to small businesses again.

Most Americans don’t even notice the small tax reduction on their paychecks but it’s definitely adding to the deficit.

8 years of Bush’s tax cuts not only didn’t make our economy grow but it helped create this deficit. None of the tax cuts worked! Why is there even an argument?

We were already at a historical low for taxes before the cuts. Let these stupid cuts expire for everyone. All Americans are going to have to take part in our recovery.

What Country Does John Boehner Live In?

2010-11-20T09:26:00.000-08:00

Last week I didn’t post because sometimes I just hate politics. The childish posturing, bickering and lies leave me totally disheartened.

A few days ago John Boehner said, "I believe that the healthcare bill that was enacted by the current Congress will kill jobs in America, ruin the best healthcare system in the world, and bankrupt our country,"

What country is he living in?

Among the richest nations, the U.S. is 19th of 19. America is awful at treating asthma, diabetes and kidney disease. The U.S. does do well with breast and prostate cancer, but these are represented by strong lobbies.
It has improved. I wrote an article for Associated Content on July 15, 2008 called Our Health Care is a National Disgrace. At that time we were 37^th! Nothing really has changed since then. Check it out.......

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/860847/our_health_care_system_is_a_national.html?cat=9

The Republicans have been in bed with big money in health care from the beginning. It will be interesting to see how things turn out now that the health interests have tooled up for the new health care bill. They do not want it repealed. Can the Republicans stand up to one of their biggest sources of income?

Where's The Press?

2010-11-07T06:58:00.000-08:00

Why are all the stands taken by politicians based on lies and why doesn’t the press hold their feet to the fire?

Republicans claim the Health Care bill contains a $500 billion Medicare cut. The law calls for reducing future growth of Medicare spending over the next ten years by seven percent. The law guarantees benefits won’t be reduced and even improves coverage for pharmaceuticals.

The conservative 60 Plus Association spent more than $5 million on ads against 16 Democrats in House races saying they “betrayed their constituents by voting for the health care overhaul. Thanks to the recent Supreme Court decision their identities don’t have to be disclosed.

The ads say the law threatens seniors’ ability to keep their own doctor. The new law has nothing to do with it. Some doctors have said they may stop accepting Medicare patients because of scheduled payment cuts set in motion by the 1997 Balanced Budget Act.

In fact if you look at what lawmakers have done to scheduled cuts to doctors’ pay that were mandated by the 1997 law: "Congress has overridden all of the scheduled reductions for physicians from 2003 to November 2010. And for the hospitals and other providers covered by the new law: "Congress would presumably act to adjust Medicare payment rates as necessary" before the providers withdrew from the program.

The ads feature seniors saying the law will "hurt the quality of our care." But the law specifically forbids cuts in the basic package of Medicare benefits, and even adds some new features, such as wellness checkups. It also closes the "doughnut hole" gap in the prescription drug benefit.

Nevada Republican Senate candidate Sharron Angle said that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, "voted to use taxpayer dollars to pay for Viagra for convicted child molesters and sex offenders. Reid voted to table an amendment that would have barred convicted sex offenders from getting coverage for drugs like Viagra from health plans sold through state-based exchanges. That measure was one of a series of amendments that Republicans proposed in an effort to delay passage of the health care legislation.

There’s nothing in the legislation that even mentions such prescriptions. The Congressional Research Service said that nothing in the health care law would mandate that health plans "limit the type of benefits that can be offered based on the plan beneficiary’s prior criminal convictions." The new law will be just like the old one, convicts who are not in prison, including those convicted of sex offenses, will be able to buy any health plan they choose, some of which may cover drugs that treat erectile dysfunction.

Republicans continue to insist the economic stimulus has failed to create jobs. House Minority Leader John Boehner even said in an address that the stimulus had harmed the job situation, since "America’s employers are afraid to invest in an economy stalled by stimulus spending and hamstrung by uncertainty."

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.

Spineless Democrats, who should be united against an onslaught of disinformation are bowing to public fears. Democratic House incumbents in nine states claimed that they voted against the Troubled Asset Relief Program when in fact they weren’t yet in office when it was enacted. They voted against a later bill to allow release of the second half of TARP funds, a purely symbolic and futile vote. The Senate had already approved release and only disapproval by both houses could freeze the funds under terms set by the original bailout legislation.

You could fill a large book with the lies the American voting public take for granted. Where’s the outrage? Where’s the press?