Yes, we do need to impose reasonable taxation on thre rich. If they don't like it, they have the means to leave. We've gone through a second Gilded Age of upward wealth redistribution, and once again, it has taken a very heavy toll on the country. We need to restore regulations, reversing the Reagan-era deregulation frenzy. We need to restore the safety net. Reality: Not everyone can work, due to health or circumstances, and there simply aren't jobs available to all who need one right now. No American should suffer (or die) because of the whims of the market. The US as we've known it cannot exist without a massive middle class. Americans shout that they want to "rebuild the middle class," and this can't be done without shoring up the poor, providing the means out of poverty.

I think it's a lost cause by now. We looked at the policies and programs that had been implemented from FDR to Reagan, which took the US to its height of wealth AND productivity, and chose to reverse course. The only plan we've seen for "rebuilding the country" involves increasing infrastructure jobs, the overwhelming majority of which are for men. Times have changed, and most women are co- or sole family providers. Many, many women are helping to provide for family members who have lost their jobs. Not everyone can work, due to health or circumstances, and there simply aren't jobs available for all who desperately need one. The US shipped out a massive chunk of our working class jobs since the 1980s. Millions of low-wage workers are a single job loss from losing everything, with no way back up. You can't get a job without a home address, phone, bus fare. We live in a culture that is comfortable with discarding our "surplus population."

Horsetrotter, if these people should not be driving commercial trucks, it should not be necessary to subject everyone indiscriminately to this harshly invasive practice in order to weed those people out. To suggest otherwise is horse crap. - AIW

Anyway Kend, one question a lot of us would like to know the answer to, but shouldn't really ask, how rich are you, anyway?

You shouldn't feel you have to answer, I wouldn't want to start a hierarchy on socioeconomic status here. The annonymity of the blog is like a Catholic school uniform in some ways athough you already alluded to and implied greater means than most of us.

BP has shown their true colors and should suffer the corporate death penalty in the US. They have proven they are not above lying to cover up their criminal mis-deeds, to put it politely. Oil corporations get away with way too much due to their world wide econoic controls and influence in our political system and this is not good for anyone, except them.

Mark I am 52, married 32 years, i have 2 sons and 3 grandchildren. You?

Oh, and I do like your laughable argument, "taxing the rich always ends up being the middle class that pays". You mean after you stick it to them and manage to shift your burden on to them? And that's the very standard, classic, strategic, dividing, PR technique of sowing what is called, "middle class resentment". It's the whole idea behind making universal basic entitlements into means tested welfare programs.

Kend, I said you're too young to have Alzheimer's - anyway, are you young or are you old, now? You have to keep me up on the changes in the narrative of your life.

Anyway, I always thought you only feigned Alzheimer's, you seem quite capable in the art of deceit.

Thom does the smart thing for movement building, he doesn't let himself get too scary to the uninitiated, to the not-already-self-proclaimed lefty - and so, he doesn't scare them away. He keeps everything pretty mainstream in his language so the average American can comprehend it and he can bridge the divide between the average American blue collar worker and the lefty intellectual.

The Republicans do that perfectly, they know just how to do it. They have the best PR and marketing experts designing and executing their campaigns - we have amateurs who don't know what they're doing and get the shit kicked out of us.

We, also, just have a harder job than do the Republicans. Bill O'Reilly or Sean Hannity speak the blue collar workers' language and then they proceed to sow the politics of division. They get people voting against their fellow Americans rather than for their own legitimate concerns or against those who really are trying to harm and take advantage of them, i.e., those one percenters and their lackeys and wannabes.

Our job is much harder, we are trying to build not destroy, as they are. We are trying to unite people not divide them and we have to overcome some deep and, often, ancient animosities between groups of people and can sometimes form, at best, uneasy coalitions. Then all the Republicans have to do is say two words, they could just say (until recently), "gay marriage" or, "Willie Horton" or, "welfare queens" and it's all over, they got us fighting and voting against each other instead of against them and for us.

Palin just picked up a relivant quote from your link

"To attempt an understanding of Muad'Dib without understanding his mortal enemies, the Harkonnens,[BANKSTER] is to attempt seeing Truth without knowing Falsehood. It is the attempt to see the Light without knowing Darkness. It cannot be.
--from "Manual of Muad'Dib" by the Princess Irulan "

Understanding both sides of the path though eternity ..Pesimist /Optimist Left Right Helps us to make the informed choice

Trigger a Ripple for ALL

Good for you Mark, calling Thom and getting through! This problem of stereotyping homeless people as mentally ill is exactly what I would have chosen to address, had I been the one to call. Thanks for stepping up to the plate my friend, and doing it for me! I would have loved to have listened in on your conversation with Thom. Had I been so lucky as to have been tuned in at that moment, I bet I would have recognized you.

Anyway I'm pleased, but not terribly surprised. I never believed Thom intended to stereotype the homeless; he's got way more on the ball than that. But like you, Mark, I would've liked hearing that directly from Thom, rather than just resting on that assumption.

I hope this doesn't escape the notice of Loren Bliss, who addressed this issue before I did. So Loren dear comrade, how about cutting Thom some slack? Believe me, I understand your skepticism all too well. But Thom really is in a class by himself. I don't worship the guy (just as I don't worship anyone) but I'm a big fan nevertheless. I'm grateful Thom's out there countering all the corporate lies and fascist right-wing drivel polluting the airwaves. We'd be worse off without such a strong progressive voice speaking truth to power! One of the things that sets Thom apart is that unlike all other progressive talk show hosts (what few there are), he owns his radio show. Therefore he's free to call more of his own shots, minus the worry of what some higher-ups might think. Way cool in my book, for what it's worth...

Thanks again, Mark! You rock. - Alice I.W.

Aliceinwonderland ~ As a side note on Jim Morrison, I believe it was the differences between himself and his military career father that was behind both his counter culture dedication, and his own death wish. Of course, everything you said about him, Manzarek and the Doors was spot on; however, the way I understand it, it was the conflict of his home life and what was happening to his generation that drove most of his, desires, inspirations, and actions. (I don't think they got along.) Please correct me if I'm wrong.