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Southern Florida, rising ocean levels, limestone substrata, ocean acidification. See where this is going?
The Venus Project would work for all the people! Just saying.
Of course we have a lot of educating to get there.
I watched the first of two hour Frontline exposé recounting the largest war of choice since 55,000 men and women died in Vietnam. Many of the high level decision makers gave interviews to Frontline, some offering advice contrary to the decisions of president Chaney and the silent oil men warming the drilling rigs with an expectation of gushing oil. Only several days after Paul Bremmer took power, order number two was to disband the army, all 300,000 troops along stockpiles of weapons and instruments of war. Imagine, 300,000 heavily armed, suddenly jobless soldiers wondering the streets desperate to repulse the American invaders. Omg,
Alqueda arrived in the midst of the chaos and incited a brutal and bloody clash between the Shia and the Sunniand the Kurds. The American answer for peace is pay the factions $465,000 ,000 not to fight each other.
What happened to truth hearings? Congressional hearings.
What could have $465.000,000 brought in the USA?
Doesn't is seem that religion has closer ties with war and hate than with god and love?
Rich
The “war on terror” is nothing but a hoax. It serves three purposes that I can see: Under false pretense, justifies ongoing, endless war, great for weapons manufacturers and other war profiteers; under equally false pretense, justifies U.S. hegemonic abuses worldwide; also “justifies” the creation of a police state here, depriving U.S. citizens of their freedom and civil liberties, while at the same time, subjecting them to intrusive and unconstitutional surveillance practices. It’s hard to imagine any better “excuse” than 9-11 for creating a fascist police state at home, while trampling all over other countries in a perpetual, unholy quest for world domination. - AIW
el Presidente Transpencia is a total war hawk with complete dedication to the constant war economy. Obama's Orwellian targeted assassination drone program will be creating future enemies to justify war budget.
Suspending the right of habeus corpus, the right to anyone held by a government agency to have their day in court, Is one of the most wrong and stupid things G W Bush did besides getting us into two unnessessary wars. Arresting someone and saying they are not criminals but terrorist instead. so the law doesn't apply to them is insane. Terrorism is a crime so a terrorist suspect should be charged with the crime and brought into court for justice. If a person is a POW, that is different and may be held for prisoner swaps or until the war is over but must be treated properly according to Geneva covention rules. If the government finds a person innocent they should be let go. If you were arrested for suspected terrorism because someone said you were a terrorist, put in prison for an indefinate period of time, never charged with a crime, and never having your day in court, would it be ok? Is it ok if it happens to someone else? It happened to our Gwantanamo Bay prisoners and if it's wrong for you, it's wrong for them. You don't have to believe in God or government to know when some things are just wrong.
Today in Canada we deal with terrorists the best way you can. With enough bullets in him to kill him.
Very, very sadly "the land of the free and the home of the brave" has become a lost ethos
What I name facsim runs the land of america
Corporatins and business interests influence every aspecect of life
Wars have been fought against this when the monster was in your face
Now the monster has diguise
With knowing intention to fool the unaware
WAKE UP!
The American People have little to no understanding of the concept of the Commons. A book dealing with the Commons and its erosion of late is, in my opinion, desperately needed. The concept could be examined as:
a) current components of the U.S. Commons,
b) assault on the Commons,
c) desirable additions to the U.S. Commons,
-1) now extant in advanced countries,
-2) called for due to new technologies,
d) economics of the Commons,
e) ecology of the Commons,
f) areas which should be de-emphasized as a proportion of the Commons.
g) the Constitution and the Common Good
I would arrange the individual tax code to give deductions from taxable income for 1) food, 2) clothing, 3) shelter, 4) transportation, 5) education, and 6) medicine.
Once the family situation is taken into account, the first four deductions would be for average costs. This would encourage people to live less ostentatiously, and any extravagant expenditures in those categories by rich people would raise the average.
After the deductions have been included, I'd still have a graduated tax bracket system with a 0% bracket at the bottom for the first, say, $10,000.
The libertarians you had on apparently haven't read the Constitution
or the Declaration of Independence. All over both its We not
Me or I as in WE the people, not Me the people They are stuck in the Articles of confederation, not the constitution.
According to Thomas Piketty, the Top Marginal Rate in the USA only applies to a small fraction of the income of high income individuals who receive their incomes from Dividends and Capital Gains because they structure their investment portfolios to simply roll over any gains into the account. The only fraction taxed at the Top Marginal Rate is the fraction withdrawn from the account for living expenses.
The Dividend and Capital Gains rate is now at 20% (It was 15% during the Bush Tax Cut era), which is the relevent rate paid by high income individuals. This is why people like Warren Buffet and Mitt Romney only paid about a 16% (Buffet) or 14% (Romney) overall tax rate over the past several years.
The very best kind of economy is circular in structure and very simple--this can be the free market or capitalist system, but with proper rules and regulations that protect and respect each member of the circle--who work together for a common goal:
Workers are paid (living wages). Workers buy (reasonably priced, safe products). Business profits (long-term). Workers/consumers are 2/3 of ANY BUSINESS.
But the way our ecomony is structured now is a pyramid, where all money flows to the top and stays or is selfishly and priggishly doled out by the heavily rewarded few, who profit by punishing the slavish many. It is time we stopped them.
A circular economy allows opportunity, creativity, and new ideas to flow from ALL of its citizens, not just the ones with money and connections and the drive to defend the old ways under which they first prospered. We can solve the greatest problems our planet faces when we include everyone and honor ideas that solve these problems without the motive of profit. I think we are way past the "ME" on this planet and need to focus on the "WE," if we are to survive as a species. We are facing the Fall of the Roman Empire on a global scale--with selfish, greedy conservatives leading the way now as they did then in ancient Rome.
Doesn't it bother anyone that the GOP is backing ObamaCare? What does that say?
Reply to #10: Mr. Ford, the U.S. military reminds me of a blood-sucking tick. In exchange for our blood, the tick injects pathogens that live off us like parasites. Just like the military, sucking up our tax dollars in exchange for safety-net programs and infrastructure we could otherwise have had, which is the life's blood of any civilized society. Growing up in the fifties & sixties, I never would have predicted a freak show of this magnitude. We're reaching a point where the U.S. isn't Numero Uno in anything anymore, except the makings of war... nothing I would pledge MY allegiance to! - AIW
P.S. Democrazy, I love your moniker.
Some things we need to be doing to get the money out: WALK, SHOUT, TWEET, BLOG, AND ORGANIZE
WALK, WALK, WALK Lawrence Lessig: The unstoppable walk to political reform | Talk Video | TED.com
AND SHOUT, SHOUT, SHOUT: "Bernie for President"
and TWEET, TWEET, TWEET: Need Viral re-tweet. We must show we will support bravery Article: Bernie Sanders Versus Citizens United | OpEdNews http://bit.ly/1sSUeyt
BLOG, BLOG, BLOG:
OpEdNews A Revolution: Part III The Devil in Details. http://bit.ly/1g1nI3Q Support Art
V Convention. Join the conversation.........................pleeeeeeze!
The Plan - Wolf PACwolf-pac.com bit.ly/1otkeRq
this and other organizations
are involved in getting an amendment to the constitution that will help us
reduce the power of our corporate oppressors in selecting our candidates for public office.
and
Richard D Wolff
truth-out.org bit.ly/1cNMnrK
This economist shows how we can avoid the failures of all the isms over time, and evolve a new way of life.
and
Labor Unions Should Transform to Producers' Ownership
Unions | NationofChangenationofchange.org bit.ly/1n7QFUM
AND....
ORGANIZE, ORGANIZE, ORGANIZE:
truth-out.org/opinion/item/23026-why-no-sustained-protests-yet
Most people commenting on this blog are not experts on our corrupt political system, and the only information they have is what they hear from major media, which is controlled by the 1%. Few take the time to study the problems of our voting system, or economic system, or political science in general. Most voters are either too busy working for a living, or misbehaving, or competing for jobs, or competing for making the best appearances, or competing to have the prettiest and best house or car, etc., to actually learn something about our political and economic system. All of us are subject to being brainwashed by propaganda.
For these reasons I do not think many people should have a vote on anything of importance. We need honest experts to make our decisions based on what their expert opinions tell them is best for our country. They must be expected to be open and explain to us what they are doing and why, and how what they are doing is in our best interest. They need to talk to us on the level of education that most of us have so we understand. And we must be able to hold their feet to the fire if they betray us, (as they do now.)
We need a whole new system for placing power into the hands of our leaders. That is the real question. How do we do that?
As we have learned from their methodical destruction of the New Deal, it is suicidal to allow any vestige of capitalism -- or any capitalists -- to survive. This harsh truth will be increasingly obvious in the apocalyptic world of ever-worsening shortages that is now our unavoidable doom. Because of what capitalism is -- infinite greed elevated to maximum virtue (and thus the morally imbecilic rejection of every humanitarian precept our species ever set forth) -- it will always arise and in its quest for unlimited profits seek to destroy not just the common good but the environment itself. Capitalism -- especially in its logical extensions as fascism and Nazism -- is therefore the darkest most deadly evil ever spawned by our species.
The question, then, is what to replace it with. The purpose of government is to enable us to do collectively that which we cannot do individually. Anarchy, though emotionally attractive to the ignorant, is therefore doomed. It is destined, as in Somalia or Libya, to be self-destroyed by the same might-makes-right penchant for evil that produced capitalism, fascism and Nazism. Any form of socialism -- at least in the United States -- is likewise doomed. This is because the conditioning of the entire USian population in the selfish, indeed self-obsessed principles of Ayn Rand individualism has created a population utterly incapable of collective thinking. As a result, the politicians and bureaucrats universally operate from the everything-for-me-and-fuck-you values of the Ruling Class. USian officials -- men and women whom under socialism would presumably represent the people's interest -- are thus as viciously self-serving as any megacorporation's chief executive. We have literally been reduced to a nation of moral imbeciles -- which means, because relentless selfishness now invariably trumps all other considerations -- we have been rendered utterly incapable of any genuine sort of self-government.
No doubt a strict Marxian educational program could, at least in the younger generations, reverse the inculcated selfishness that fuels capitalism and capitalist governance. Of all the forms of socialism, only Marxism offers the requisite ideological and intellecftual discipline. But who would be the educators? Are there any USians who have not been irremediably tainted by capitalist greed? A very few, to be sure. But they are so few they will never be able to acquire the requisite power -- especially in a nation of people so morally depraved they willingly choose slavery rather than give up the modern "conveniences" that are destroying our planet and dooming our species to extinction.
I will of course continue working on behalf the cause of socialism because, even in old age, that is who and what I am. But I will never again inflict heartache on myself by allowing myself to be seduced by the self-indulgence of hope.
I am all for repealing Obamacare, we need UNIVERSAL health care !!!
Yes, socialized medicine !!!!
Get rid of all the middlemen health care insurance companies.
"It's time to fight for an economy that works for all the people of the world..."
useless unless we know what alternative economic system we're fighting for. the other side at least deludes itself that it has a system worth fighting for. what system do we propose as an alternative?
Not quite as filthy, as 10-K suggests.... or as piggish. But I doubt I'll live long enough to see this system transformed into something equitable and just. I only wish we could stop calling those of ordinary means "ordinary people", because I've known too many extraordinary people of ordinary means to buy into that! We really need to stop defining ourselves by what we have or don't have, in my opinion. What we have is not who we are. - AIW
Good point chuckle8...things were heading in the prosperity direction for the vast majority for decades before the biggest lie ever told got put in place by Reagan/Thatcher!
Time for a global economic Magna Carta. If we can't limit the insane amount of money the relative few bogart, then we need to limit their power with regulation . My suggestion, regulate out of control Capitalists by imposing a 99% tax rate after the first million. No one on Earth needs more than one million per year. Studies show over and over again that max happiness is reached at around $75,000 per year. In fact I'd be willing to bet percentage wise more billionaires die unhappy than working class citizens. Share the wealth with all who created it...what a happy and peaceful world we'd have. The rich would still be rich, just not quite as filthy!
RE #3 by Gary B -- Why would you want to try something that has never been used, when we have a proven economic system available that works. Just roll back Voodoo economics (AKA reaganomics).
I think to set in action either plan we need to enlist the labor unions. To enlist the labor unions we need to vote Democratic.
Thom Hartmann's opening statement holds the solution to economic inequality. What is the solution that should be obvious in his statement: "The top one percent own half of all the world's assets. In stark contrast, the bottom fifty percent of the world owns less than one percent."?
The obvious solution should be to empower the 99 percent, who are capital-less or under-capitalized in terms of wealth-creating, income-producing capital assets, to become capitalist owners. The rich are rich because they OWN. So why not the 99 percent?
But how when the 99 percent or dependent for their survival on a JOB, which for the vast majority translates to a condition of "Just Over Broke," as they barely are ever in a situation where they can actually save to invest.
The the question is how can we expect ordinary people, who are without pre-existing wealth and inheritance and are capital-less or under-capitalized to accumulate enough savings to significantly invest in full-earnings payout stock in corporate America and benefit from dividend earnings and compound interest?
Past savings, wether cash in a local bank or equities which can be pledge as security to secure loans to invest, is not a workable solution. This is especially true because tectonic shifts in the technologies of production will continue to destroy jobs and devalue the worth of labor––which is the ONLY means that ordinary Americans have to earn an income.
What is needed and necessary is a new policy direction specifically aimed at creating new capital owners simultaneously with the growth of the economy. The financial mechanisms used MUST NOT REQUIRE past savings and instead be available as a unique and exclusive opportunity for American citizens to access insured, interest-free capital loans for the specific purpose of acquiring newly issued full-dividend earnings payout stock in corporations growing our economy. In other words, we need to use a credit mechanism by which the loans are paid for with the future earnings generated by the creation of new capital assets, which result in products and services needed and wanted by Americans, which then further propels the economy's growth. Such a policy program is what the Capital Homestead Act would achieve.
The Capital Homestead Act (http://www.cesj.org/learn/capital-homesteading/capital-homestead-act-a-plan-for-getting-ownership-income-and-power-to-every-citizen/ and http://www.cesj.org/learn/capital-homesteading/capital-homestead-act-summary/) would grow the U.S. economy faster in a non-inflationary way, create new private sector jobs, finance new productive capital and provide capital incomes for all Americans from the bottom-up by enabling them to own trillions annually in new capital formation and transfers in current assets . . . without taking private property rights away from billionaires and multi-millionaires over their existing assets.