I wrote Representative Lynn Jenkins from Kansas. Yes Kansas did vote for the GOP this election, but the Kansas school children voted for Presidents Obama by a big margin. So that tells me there is hope here. Anyway I received back the form letter she probably has sent to everyone. Which actually told me nothing. Why don't they understand that the majority of the American voters want to go back to the higher tax rates for the rich? Why shouldn't the rich pay the most in taxes? Is it all about those who control the money that can buy which ever canidate will back their policies? What happened to being elected to represent what is best for America instead of lining their own pockets?
Global, and whom it may concern; If I said to you that everyone should be given three meals a day, shelter, healthcare and a college or trade school education, and that it should be based on selflessness, sacrafice, and service rather than greed, you'd say "That's socialism."
But that's the military. And yet the majority of conservative Republicans who think socialism is the ultimate evil admire the military.
You know in the military we have Universal Healthcare, and the military teaches you to never leave a fallen comrade behind...You take care of everyone. When I was at West Point back in 1991 I didn't really know what socialism was, but Iknew that West Point was different from how I had grown up. There is a sense in America that you're all alone; it's survival of the fittest. But at West Point they have a saying: "Cooperate and Graduate." Your classmates will help tutor you in whatever subjects you need. Every professor has to give you their phone # and alot 2 hrs a day to additional instruction for any student(s) who need it. You have a sense that people care about you and want you to advance. If someone fails a class because of not understanding the material, his or her fellow students are partly responsable, because they didn't aid a classmate who needed help. There is a sense of comraderie and solidarity. No one is trying to suceed by way of allowing another to fail.
I'm not saying that the military is a Utopia, far from it. Our military as an institution has a lot of things wrong with it, but it also has some admirable characteristics.
SO ANSWER THIS Global and anyone else; Why do you have such disdane for those less fortunate? Why are you against helping those fellow comrades (Americans) that need a helping hand?
If History has taught us anything it has taught us the evil of our selfish greedy ways...Time to learn the lesson and change our way of thinking. Life is not cheap; it is worth more than its weight in gold.
The other thing was in the first few minutes of the Thom Hartman show..the host said that the reason why there was a shift in the 2010 elections was because of all of the massive outside spending to influence those elections. Dentists Encinitas
"Everyone in the US is under virtual surveillance"--says NSA whistleblower William Binney who just won the Callaway award for civic courage "awarded to those who stand out for constitutional rights and American values at great risk to their personal or professional lives."
If I had a dollar for every email that has been stored by the NSA over the years...I could easily pay off the National Debt...some 20 trillion emails. And while they are trying to take away social programs they are spending $2 billion just on the Utah spy facility alone.
get rid of corp. welfare close half of military bases overseas & that would cut budget almost in half by getting rid of deductions like our mortgages means middle class pays more the rich own 4-5 houses with no mortgages so they don't have them deductions.the rich are not job creaters you mean like slavery they liked that didn't have to pay them at all.they are creating jobs overseas not here.the gop are only closing loopholes for middle class.how anyone who truelly works for a living which means they get their hands dirty building things could vote gop is mind blowing.the gop said they were going to move out of country hope they go to uk just saw a piece saying they are paying 73% taxes.
“The Japan national railways were privatized in 1987. They were able to pay back their construction debt, and make capital improvements to their networks Thom! Listen! They reversed their stagnation and decline.” Austin Petersen 21:27 minutes.
Libertarian Austin Petersen lied when he said the Japan railways are privately owned. When the facts contradict ideology, they lie—to themselves more than anyone. We could give an even better explanation to Petersen’s false characterization of the Japan railway—a very important explanation that signifies a dangerous trend in American society. Petersen is a Libertarian ideologue that believes government owned infrastructure are by definition failures or bad. He reasons that if the Japanese magnetically levitated train is successful, then it must of been privately owned and developed. Libertarians are masters of this kind of ideological circular reasoning. Extreme ideologues cannot tolerate any reality that contradicts their beliefs.
Before mass leaders seize the power to fit reality to their lies, their propaganda is marked by its extreme contempt for facts as such,27 for in their opinion fact depends entirely on the power of man who can fabricate it. The assertion that the Moscow subway is the only one in the world is a lie only so long as the Bolsheviks have not the power to destroy all the others. In other words, the method of infallible prediction, more than any other totalitarian propaganda device, betrays its ultimate goal of world conquest, since only in a world completely under his control could the totalitarian ruler possibly realize all his lies and make true all his prophecies. Arendt, Hannah, The Origins of Totalitarianism (Harvest Book, Hb244) (Kindle Locations 7252-7257). Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. Kindle Edition.
...they know that when they are told that only Moscow has a subway, the real meaning of the statement is that all subways should be destroyed, and are not unduly surprised when they discover the subway in Paris... Without the elite and its artificially induced inability to understand facts as facts, to distinguish between truth and falsehood, the movement could never move in the direction of realizing its fiction. The outstanding negative quality of the totalitarian elite is that it never stops to think about the world as it really is and never compares the lies with reality. Its most cherished virtue, correspondingly, is loyalty to the Leader, who, like a talisman, assures the ultimate victory of lie and fiction over truth and reality. (Ibid., Kindle Loc: 7868-7880).
What makes a truly totalitarian device out of the Bolshevik claim that the present Russian system is superior to all others is the fact that the totalitarian ruler draws from this claim the logically impeccable conclusion that without this system people never could have built such a wonderful thing as, let us say, a subway; from this, he again draws the logical conclusion that anyone who knows of the existence of the Paris subway is a suspect because he may cause people to doubt that one can do things only in the Bolshevik way. This leads to the final conclusion that in order to remain a loyal Bolshevik, you have to destroy the Paris subway. Nothing matters but consistency. (Ibid., Kindle Loc: 9199-9203).
Eamonn Fingleton author of “In The Jaws Of The Dragon” says
-The Maglev Railway system (trains that ride on a magnetic field) was first developed in the 1970s by state owned Japan Airlines and the Japan National Railway Corporation. Both were nominally privatized in 1987, but are effectively regulated by the Japanese government.
-Government determines train routes.
-Employees are the principle holders not outside share holders.
-Government infrastructure projects upgrades airports and are 100% government owned.
- Dr. Fingleton should have emphasized more that the Maglev train system is a magnetically levitated transportation system. The United States does not have a single levitation transportation system. Welcome to the American Dark Ages.
If the Democratic Party remains where they currently are........ pulled far to the right by the evil gravitational forces of big money, I intend to vote for the Socialist Workers Party's presidential candidate in four years.
"Does not meet the test of balance"? How does one expect a balanced solution when dealing with the Tea-Cantor and his merry band of Feudal Fascists? Their mission remains unchanged, its simply enabling and defending a few obsessive individuals in their quest for endless wealth and power while simultaneously placing in jeopardy the general welfare and FREEDOM of, We the People.
As I've said before, expect obstruction for two more years at which time we have another shot at removing the Norquist from...... The House of Norquist.
I would like to thank all of you conservative Republicans for signing the White House petition for succeeding from the Union, especially those of you in the South. Now the Secret Service, F.B.I.,T.S.A. and every other agency that fights terrorism has your name, number and computer information thanks to the cookies they placed on your computer when you logged on to the White House web site. And, when there is any problem in America with domestic terrorists your name will be on their list of suspects. That is one way to rid the nation of radical conservatives. Thank You!
Has nothing to do with kindness. Has everything to do with my conscience. I am tired of the same political deck-O-cards being plaid and having to decide between two evils. This time was different for me. Both Obama and Romney are one in the same. They are Coporate Opportunist who work for Wall St. Neither of them support renegociating trade agreements to bring back jobs lost to other countries. Neither of them support prosecuting Wall St. fraud, war crimes, and illegal spying on U.S. citizens. Neither supports a single-payer-medicare for all healthcare system. Neither supports public financing of campaigns and a constitutional ammendment overruling Citizens United. Neither supports breaking up of the "to-big-to-fail" banks, and moving the federal reserve to the treasury Dept. Both support our Military Industrial Complex and increased deffense and military spending. Both support Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthiest 2%. The list goes on...Romney + Obama = Obamney.
I did campaigned for and voted for Rocky Anderson of the newly founded Justice Party. You may have heard that Democracy Now did a live broadcast of the Presidential debates and had Jill Stien of the green party and Rocky Anderson (justice party) on doing a real time debate right along with the Presidential one. If you like Ron Paul...you would love Rocky.
If you happened to be one of the many who didn't hear about Rocky Anderson...I recommend that you look him up @ voterocky.org
Syria, Egypt, Libya, Bahrain in America soon to come? And then it might be Obama threatening to use inhumane weapons of mass destruction upon his dissenting subjects. After all, it really is more like a kingdom than a democracy. The king being just the puppet whose strings are pulled by the wealthy ruling elite. But, of course, it will start out much more subtle..using drones and draconian white shirted bully boys from the police cracking heads. They already have the practice of using tear gas on the masses of demonstrators...wouldn't be much of a leap to resort to more lethal forms. Just how far would OUR government go if masses of Americans rioted in the streets all over America? Would Obama, like Bashar Assad, see fit to defend the realm at all costs?
Will Obama give in to the greedsters? He said “We’re going to have to see the rates on the top two percent go up. And we’re not going to be able to get a deal without it.” But is he also just as adamant about not cutting the social programs? Doesn't sound like it. Sounds like he's going to wimp out again and he'll agree to accept big cuts to social programs in exchange for "just pretend" tiny reduction in the Bush tax breaks of the wealthy. And even then the wealthy will have loopholes and ways of circumventing having to pay extra taxes....while those of us on Social Security, Medicare, etc will have our benefits cut.
Moving the Medicare eligibility age from 65 to 67 is unacceptable. There are those who are barely hanging on hoping they can last the extra year or so until they reach 65 so they can finally get medical attention. Many people just don't have healthcare coverage and even if you pay cash to see a doctor they seem to be "making you pay" (ie: punishing you) for not having healthcare insurance because they will not prescribe the medicines you need to say...reduce your blood pressure. After paying hundreds of dollars to doctors they refuse to write prescriptions. What do you do? Take them to court? Oh, but you had to sign an agreement, before seeing the doctor, where you give up your right to sue in a court of law...you have to agree to arbitration...with an arbitrator hired by the doctors. Yeah, right!
If they push back the medicare retirement age then many people will die....literally! And there will be a lot of really ticked off loved ones if they do.
From what I hear on MSNBC, many of these top Republicans don't think that the votes of minority people count, that these minority people really can't think for themselves, and that the white men know best, and that the white vote is the vote that counts. They can't see how they look to others, but from the outside, we all see them as they really are. They are showing their true colors.
What is truly amazing is that republicans refuse to believe that there is anything wrong with their message. They blame not having a Hispanic on the ticket. They blame not "verbalizing" their message correctly to Blacks, Hispanics or women. Not one inkling that THE MESSAGE MIGHT BE ABSURD!!!.
Next cycle expect the following: Whatever Democrats say - they agree and promise to do it better. Whatever you want - we will do it but do it better. In other words lie , lie, lie. Then when (if) they win - do what they always wanted - privatize SSA, abolish DOE, EPA, etc., outlaw abortions, outsource every function of government, build a 100' wall along the border, end all welfare, end public schools, and of course - outlaw ObamaCare.
Then expect a major change in voting procedures so they can never lose power.
We have been expecting the wrong type of apocalypse. It will really be extinction by money in politics.
What I think will happen is that we lower-income people -- elderly, disabled, chronically unemployed -- will (again) be (deliberately) savaged by cuts in Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, unemployment compensation, food stamps and energy assistance.
Food stamps, energy assistance and Medicaid have already been slashed radically. The cutbacks -- particularly the loss of winter heating fuels -- are potentially death-dealing, exactly as the One Percent and its DemoPublican toadies intend. Medicare was cut in a more stealthy manner.
Less obvious but just as devastating are the cuts to the Social Administration's operations budget, which was hit so hard, access to its services is now severely restricted. Because this deliberate obstruction was imposed just as Baby-Boomer retirements are beginning to soar, it will radically slow the agency's ability to process claims. For some newly disabled people, this will undoubtedly be fatal -- obviously the One Percent/DemoPublican purpose.
This cutback in particular proves beyond a scintilla of doubt the Democrats' share the Republicans' murderous intent toward lower-income peoples. Had I known of it the before the election -- the reduced access was carefully concealed until the votes were counted -- I would have voted for the Socialist Workers Party's presidential candidate. (The Greens where I live -- Washington state -- tend to be viciously anti-labor.)
Face it, people, what is being done to us is genocide, just as I said in "Seasons Greetings: Why December Is 'the Cruelest Month'" (for which see http://lorenbliss.typepad.com/loren-bliss-outside-agitators-notebook/201... ). The One Percent is achieving by abandonment and neglect -- and by the heart-stopping terror of abandonment and neglect -- what the Nazis did with their death camps. But this new, no-death-camp mode of genocide is a lot less internationally embarrassing.
As to President Obama's role in all this, in 2009 he shape-shifted from Obama the Orator into Barack the Betrayer. To imagine the same transformation will not take place again in 2013 is to imagine a capitalist -- an avowed disciple of the Ayn Rand creed of infinite greed as ultimate virtue -- will not fatally rob the poor and afterward dance with glee while we die. Such is the forthcoming "grand bargain" behind its smokescreen of euphemisms and rhetoric: the continued pampering of the One Percent, the continued extermination of those of us cast aside as unprofitable.
Once we go over the 'cliff' we will never have to hear the term "BUSH ERA TAX CUTS" again. We will enter a new ERA of "OBAMA ERA TAX CUTS"!. I am willing to suffer in the short term to never hear the name BUSH mentioned again.
Encourage your congressmen and women to jump over this 'cliff' into a new ERA!
Please explain to me why the Republicans should have any say as to how to address the deficit and revenue sources needed. Bush inherited a surplus and then left Obama with a huge deficit by not only failing to increase taxes to fight two wars, but actually authored hugh tax cuts without paying for them nor the wars, as well as not paying for Rx drug coverage for seniors. They allowed banks and Wall St. to self reguate which disastrously nearly produced the Second Great Depression. Republican Governors fired millions of teachers, police officers, and firemen to pay for tax cuts for Corporations. Under Bush, Republicans helped the Chamber of Commerce close 50,000 manufacturing operations and export 3.5 million jobs. The Republicans allowed the oil and gas business to self regulate and we had the largest oil blowout in history in the Gulf of Mexico. Republicans tried to pass legislation that would criminalize taking birth control pills. Can someone explain to me who has been a greater threat to this country more than the Republican Party?
To our heh? sistern and brethren to the north--its amazing what clarity one can achieve when you havent eaten for a week. People south of you are still arguing we have no hunger in the USA and don't realize W changed all the places in the CFR hunger appeared to "food insecure!" I been food insecure for many years and my belly would argue this point. As to infant mortality, the US rate is dismal at best. People are living longer too but I argue that quality is more important than quantity and I got too little of the first and way too much of the second.
The GOP has lost so much credibility within their own ranks, they're too busy grasping at straws to be thinking rationally, these days. They're all angry; they're all bitter; and the only people to blame are themselves. But they insist on taking it out on all the rest of the taxpayers, and those of us who collect any source of government income or benefits, even though we've served our country or worked long enough to retire, and have paid into those programs - either with our sanity or with our deductions. They continue to make themselves irrelevant players on the American Stage of Decency.
I think raising the retirement age again is circumspect. The weather cycles are changing, we're consuming pollution in everything we breathe, eat and drink, and we have no idea if we're really going to be "living longer" in another 15 years. Also, to cut back Social Security payments to those who are too old or infirmed to find a way to supplement the meager payments we currently receive, will do great harm to those who have already exhausted their retirement savings - from expensive health treatments to economical losses - if they had any other means of income aside from Social Security checks, would put them even further below the Poverty Level income bracket.
The GOP seem to all be wealthy enough to not have to worry about such matters, themselves. Might I suggest that someone ask the House and the Senate to accept being PAID for only the days they actually plan to work for us, next year? I doubt it would hurt many of their economical statuses, but it might wake them up to the fact that we're tired of their pettiness, and we don't want to have their ridiculous demands balanced on the back of the rest of us, any longer. They broke the bank; now they should give up non-working days to help rectify their recklessness.
To avoid the meltdown of the American economy, we need to reform the tax system to encourage both production and consumption. For example:
• Make dividends tax deductible at the corporate level, but fully taxable at the individual level unless used to make debt service payments on a loan used for capital acquisition.
• Treat all income the same, whether from wages, dividends, or inflation-indexed capital gains.
• Eliminate virtually all personal deductions, tax credits, and so on, but give each person an exemption large enough to meet ordinary living expenses, including education and healthcare.
• Impose a single rate tax on all income above this exemption, no exceptions.
• Allow a limited tax deferral, say up to $1 million over a lifetime, on income used to make debt service payments on dividend-paying capital assets.
We also need to change how we finance economic growth, i.e., shift from financing using past reductions in consumption (savings), to using future increases in production (earnings). Businesses can then expand by issuing new shares or other means of sharing ownership, which people could purchase by monetizing the present value of the shares they are buying, i.e., buy a share in a business on credit, and pay for it out of the future earnings attributable to the share itself.
As tea-baggin Republicans implode into their fantasy-reality of misinformation and lies, ya kinda hate to throw them a logical life-line. Just let them sink into their own putrid quagmire.
Yet the big-finance patrons funding them from the top are just as well organized as they were before the election -- as evidenced by the current antics of the Big-Boehner and the other gladiators serving the supra-nationals above the top.
We say "They lost." Well don't bet on it. When living in a fantasy-space where lies are truth and loss is win, what was yesterday has no relevance to what is today. "Lost? -- Nah, the Democrats stole the election; everybody knows that. -- I heard it on the news. . . . Dems was flipping the votes in Ohio and Florida."
Meanwhile clueless Libs and Dems wander around, wondering "How can they say that?" Well Duhhh. they own the microphones, dipwit; that's how they can say that, over and over until it's true. And now the FCC is giving Rupert Murdock even more monopoly control of news-media. Boggles-the-mind.
Not only have they lost seats the battle inside the party has started. We the people have spoken. People are not living longer the number of infants deaths have decreased. That is what has driven the average death higher.
I wrote Representative Lynn Jenkins from Kansas. Yes Kansas did vote for the GOP this election, but the Kansas school children voted for Presidents Obama by a big margin. So that tells me there is hope here. Anyway I received back the form letter she probably has sent to everyone. Which actually told me nothing. Why don't they understand that the majority of the American voters want to go back to the higher tax rates for the rich? Why shouldn't the rich pay the most in taxes? Is it all about those who control the money that can buy which ever canidate will back their policies? What happened to being elected to represent what is best for America instead of lining their own pockets?
Never leave a fallen comrade...
Global, and whom it may concern; If I said to you that everyone should be given three meals a day, shelter, healthcare and a college or trade school education, and that it should be based on selflessness, sacrafice, and service rather than greed, you'd say "That's socialism."
But that's the military. And yet the majority of conservative Republicans who think socialism is the ultimate evil admire the military.
You know in the military we have Universal Healthcare, and the military teaches you to never leave a fallen comrade behind...You take care of everyone. When I was at West Point back in 1991 I didn't really know what socialism was, but Iknew that West Point was different from how I had grown up. There is a sense in America that you're all alone; it's survival of the fittest. But at West Point they have a saying: "Cooperate and Graduate." Your classmates will help tutor you in whatever subjects you need. Every professor has to give you their phone # and alot 2 hrs a day to additional instruction for any student(s) who need it. You have a sense that people care about you and want you to advance. If someone fails a class because of not understanding the material, his or her fellow students are partly responsable, because they didn't aid a classmate who needed help. There is a sense of comraderie and solidarity. No one is trying to suceed by way of allowing another to fail.
I'm not saying that the military is a Utopia, far from it. Our military as an institution has a lot of things wrong with it, but it also has some admirable characteristics.
SO ANSWER THIS Global and anyone else; Why do you have such disdane for those less fortunate? Why are you against helping those fellow comrades (Americans) that need a helping hand?
If History has taught us anything it has taught us the evil of our selfish greedy ways...Time to learn the lesson and change our way of thinking. Life is not cheap; it is worth more than its weight in gold.
What is wrong with shopping around for a better school. Isn't it parents job to get the best for their children. Sean Bean
The other thing was in the first few minutes of the Thom Hartman show..the host said that the reason why there was a shift in the 2010 elections was because of all of the massive outside spending to influence those elections. Dentists Encinitas
"Everyone in the US is under virtual surveillance"--says NSA whistleblower William Binney who just won the Callaway award for civic courage "awarded to those who stand out for constitutional rights and American values at great risk to their personal or professional lives."
If I had a dollar for every email that has been stored by the NSA over the years...I could easily pay off the National Debt...some 20 trillion emails. And while they are trying to take away social programs they are spending $2 billion just on the Utah spy facility alone.
video and transcript:
http://rt.com/usa/news/surveillance-spying-e-mail-citizens-178/
get rid of corp. welfare close half of military bases overseas & that would cut budget almost in half by getting rid of deductions like our mortgages means middle class pays more the rich own 4-5 houses with no mortgages so they don't have them deductions.the rich are not job creaters you mean like slavery they liked that didn't have to pay them at all.they are creating jobs overseas not here.the gop are only closing loopholes for middle class.how anyone who truelly works for a living which means they get their hands dirty building things could vote gop is mind blowing.the gop said they were going to move out of country hope they go to uk just saw a piece saying they are paying 73% taxes.
“The Japan national railways were privatized in 1987. They were able to pay back their construction debt, and make capital improvements to their networks Thom! Listen! They reversed their stagnation and decline.” Austin Petersen 21:27 minutes.
Libertarian Austin Petersen lied when he said the Japan railways are privately owned. When the facts contradict ideology, they lie—to themselves more than anyone. We could give an even better explanation to Petersen’s false characterization of the Japan railway—a very important explanation that signifies a dangerous trend in American society. Petersen is a Libertarian ideologue that believes government owned infrastructure are by definition failures or bad. He reasons that if the Japanese magnetically levitated train is successful, then it must of been privately owned and developed. Libertarians are masters of this kind of ideological circular reasoning. Extreme ideologues cannot tolerate any reality that contradicts their beliefs.
Eamonn Fingleton author of “In The Jaws Of The Dragon” says
-The Maglev Railway system (trains that ride on a magnetic field) was first developed in the 1970s by state owned Japan Airlines and the Japan National Railway Corporation. Both were nominally privatized in 1987, but are effectively regulated by the Japanese government.
-Government determines train routes.
-Employees are the principle holders not outside share holders.
-Government infrastructure projects upgrades airports and are 100% government owned.
- Dr. Fingleton should have emphasized more that the Maglev train system is a magnetically levitated transportation system. The United States does not have a single levitation transportation system. Welcome to the American Dark Ages.
If the Democratic Party remains where they currently are........ pulled far to the right by the evil gravitational forces of big money, I intend to vote for the Socialist Workers Party's presidential candidate in four years.
"Does not meet the test of balance"? How does one expect a balanced solution when dealing with the Tea-Cantor and his merry band of Feudal Fascists? Their mission remains unchanged, its simply enabling and defending a few obsessive individuals in their quest for endless wealth and power while simultaneously placing in jeopardy the general welfare and FREEDOM of, We the People.
As I've said before, expect obstruction for two more years at which time we have another shot at removing the Norquist from...... The House of Norquist.
I would like to thank all of you conservative Republicans for signing the White House petition for succeeding from the Union, especially those of you in the South. Now the Secret Service, F.B.I.,T.S.A. and every other agency that fights terrorism has your name, number and computer information thanks to the cookies they placed on your computer when you logged on to the White House web site. And, when there is any problem in America with domestic terrorists your name will be on their list of suspects. That is one way to rid the nation of radical conservatives. Thank You!
???? Are you serious about holding elections because of a budgetary disagreement! Do your brains freeze up during the winter?
Has nothing to do with kindness. Has everything to do with my conscience. I am tired of the same political deck-O-cards being plaid and having to decide between two evils. This time was different for me. Both Obama and Romney are one in the same. They are Coporate Opportunist who work for Wall St. Neither of them support renegociating trade agreements to bring back jobs lost to other countries. Neither of them support prosecuting Wall St. fraud, war crimes, and illegal spying on U.S. citizens. Neither supports a single-payer-medicare for all healthcare system. Neither supports public financing of campaigns and a constitutional ammendment overruling Citizens United. Neither supports breaking up of the "to-big-to-fail" banks, and moving the federal reserve to the treasury Dept. Both support our Military Industrial Complex and increased deffense and military spending. Both support Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthiest 2%. The list goes on...Romney + Obama = Obamney.
I did campaigned for and voted for Rocky Anderson of the newly founded Justice Party. You may have heard that Democracy Now did a live broadcast of the Presidential debates and had Jill Stien of the green party and Rocky Anderson (justice party) on doing a real time debate right along with the Presidential one. If you like Ron Paul...you would love Rocky.
If you happened to be one of the many who didn't hear about Rocky Anderson...I recommend that you look him up @ voterocky.org
Syria, Egypt, Libya, Bahrain in America soon to come? And then it might be Obama threatening to use inhumane weapons of mass destruction upon his dissenting subjects. After all, it really is more like a kingdom than a democracy. The king being just the puppet whose strings are pulled by the wealthy ruling elite. But, of course, it will start out much more subtle..using drones and draconian white shirted bully boys from the police cracking heads. They already have the practice of using tear gas on the masses of demonstrators...wouldn't be much of a leap to resort to more lethal forms. Just how far would OUR government go if masses of Americans rioted in the streets all over America? Would Obama, like Bashar Assad, see fit to defend the realm at all costs?
Will Obama give in to the greedsters? He said “We’re going to have to see the rates on the top two percent go up. And we’re not going to be able to get a deal without it.” But is he also just as adamant about not cutting the social programs? Doesn't sound like it. Sounds like he's going to wimp out again and he'll agree to accept big cuts to social programs in exchange for "just pretend" tiny reduction in the Bush tax breaks of the wealthy. And even then the wealthy will have loopholes and ways of circumventing having to pay extra taxes....while those of us on Social Security, Medicare, etc will have our benefits cut.
Moving the Medicare eligibility age from 65 to 67 is unacceptable. There are those who are barely hanging on hoping they can last the extra year or so until they reach 65 so they can finally get medical attention. Many people just don't have healthcare coverage and even if you pay cash to see a doctor they seem to be "making you pay" (ie: punishing you) for not having healthcare insurance because they will not prescribe the medicines you need to say...reduce your blood pressure. After paying hundreds of dollars to doctors they refuse to write prescriptions. What do you do? Take them to court? Oh, but you had to sign an agreement, before seeing the doctor, where you give up your right to sue in a court of law...you have to agree to arbitration...with an arbitrator hired by the doctors. Yeah, right!
If they push back the medicare retirement age then many people will die....literally! And there will be a lot of really ticked off loved ones if they do.
From what I hear on MSNBC, many of these top Republicans don't think that the votes of minority people count, that these minority people really can't think for themselves, and that the white men know best, and that the white vote is the vote that counts. They can't see how they look to others, but from the outside, we all see them as they really are. They are showing their true colors.
What is truly amazing is that republicans refuse to believe that there is anything wrong with their message. They blame not having a Hispanic on the ticket. They blame not "verbalizing" their message correctly to Blacks, Hispanics or women. Not one inkling that THE MESSAGE MIGHT BE ABSURD!!!.
Next cycle expect the following: Whatever Democrats say - they agree and promise to do it better. Whatever you want - we will do it but do it better. In other words lie , lie, lie. Then when (if) they win - do what they always wanted - privatize SSA, abolish DOE, EPA, etc., outlaw abortions, outsource every function of government, build a 100' wall along the border, end all welfare, end public schools, and of course - outlaw ObamaCare.
Then expect a major change in voting procedures so they can never lose power.
We have been expecting the wrong type of apocalypse. It will really be extinction by money in politics.
What I think will happen is that we lower-income people -- elderly, disabled, chronically unemployed -- will (again) be (deliberately) savaged by cuts in Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, unemployment compensation, food stamps and energy assistance.
Food stamps, energy assistance and Medicaid have already been slashed radically. The cutbacks -- particularly the loss of winter heating fuels -- are potentially death-dealing, exactly as the One Percent and its DemoPublican toadies intend. Medicare was cut in a more stealthy manner.
Less obvious but just as devastating are the cuts to the Social Administration's operations budget, which was hit so hard, access to its services is now severely restricted. Because this deliberate obstruction was imposed just as Baby-Boomer retirements are beginning to soar, it will radically slow the agency's ability to process claims. For some newly disabled people, this will undoubtedly be fatal -- obviously the One Percent/DemoPublican purpose.
This cutback in particular proves beyond a scintilla of doubt the Democrats' share the Republicans' murderous intent toward lower-income peoples. Had I known of it the before the election -- the reduced access was carefully concealed until the votes were counted -- I would have voted for the Socialist Workers Party's presidential candidate. (The Greens where I live -- Washington state -- tend to be viciously anti-labor.)
Face it, people, what is being done to us is genocide, just as I said in "Seasons Greetings: Why December Is 'the Cruelest Month'" (for which see http://lorenbliss.typepad.com/loren-bliss-outside-agitators-notebook/201... ). The One Percent is achieving by abandonment and neglect -- and by the heart-stopping terror of abandonment and neglect -- what the Nazis did with their death camps. But this new, no-death-camp mode of genocide is a lot less internationally embarrassing.
As to President Obama's role in all this, in 2009 he shape-shifted from Obama the Orator into Barack the Betrayer. To imagine the same transformation will not take place again in 2013 is to imagine a capitalist -- an avowed disciple of the Ayn Rand creed of infinite greed as ultimate virtue -- will not fatally rob the poor and afterward dance with glee while we die. Such is the forthcoming "grand bargain" behind its smokescreen of euphemisms and rhetoric: the continued pampering of the One Percent, the continued extermination of those of us cast aside as unprofitable.
Once we go over the 'cliff' we will never have to hear the term "BUSH ERA TAX CUTS" again. We will enter a new ERA of "OBAMA ERA TAX CUTS"!. I am willing to suffer in the short term to never hear the name BUSH mentioned again.
Encourage your congressmen and women to jump over this 'cliff' into a new ERA!
Ask yourself: What would FDR do?
Please explain to me why the Republicans should have any say as to how to address the deficit and revenue sources needed. Bush inherited a surplus and then left Obama with a huge deficit by not only failing to increase taxes to fight two wars, but actually authored hugh tax cuts without paying for them nor the wars, as well as not paying for Rx drug coverage for seniors. They allowed banks and Wall St. to self reguate which disastrously nearly produced the Second Great Depression. Republican Governors fired millions of teachers, police officers, and firemen to pay for tax cuts for Corporations. Under Bush, Republicans helped the Chamber of Commerce close 50,000 manufacturing operations and export 3.5 million jobs. The Republicans allowed the oil and gas business to self regulate and we had the largest oil blowout in history in the Gulf of Mexico. Republicans tried to pass legislation that would criminalize taking birth control pills. Can someone explain to me who has been a greater threat to this country more than the Republican Party?
My bad No Fraud, forgot you were at least kind enough not to vote for Obama.
To our heh? sistern and brethren to the north--its amazing what clarity one can achieve when you havent eaten for a week. People south of you are still arguing we have no hunger in the USA and don't realize W changed all the places in the CFR hunger appeared to "food insecure!" I been food insecure for many years and my belly would argue this point. As to infant mortality, the US rate is dismal at best. People are living longer too but I argue that quality is more important than quantity and I got too little of the first and way too much of the second.
The GOP has lost so much credibility within their own ranks, they're too busy grasping at straws to be thinking rationally, these days. They're all angry; they're all bitter; and the only people to blame are themselves. But they insist on taking it out on all the rest of the taxpayers, and those of us who collect any source of government income or benefits, even though we've served our country or worked long enough to retire, and have paid into those programs - either with our sanity or with our deductions. They continue to make themselves irrelevant players on the American Stage of Decency.
I think raising the retirement age again is circumspect. The weather cycles are changing, we're consuming pollution in everything we breathe, eat and drink, and we have no idea if we're really going to be "living longer" in another 15 years. Also, to cut back Social Security payments to those who are too old or infirmed to find a way to supplement the meager payments we currently receive, will do great harm to those who have already exhausted their retirement savings - from expensive health treatments to economical losses - if they had any other means of income aside from Social Security checks, would put them even further below the Poverty Level income bracket.
The GOP seem to all be wealthy enough to not have to worry about such matters, themselves. Might I suggest that someone ask the House and the Senate to accept being PAID for only the days they actually plan to work for us, next year? I doubt it would hurt many of their economical statuses, but it might wake them up to the fact that we're tired of their pettiness, and we don't want to have their ridiculous demands balanced on the back of the rest of us, any longer. They broke the bank; now they should give up non-working days to help rectify their recklessness.
To avoid the meltdown of the American economy, we need to reform the tax system to encourage both production and consumption. For example:
• Make dividends tax deductible at the corporate level, but fully taxable at the individual level unless used to make debt service payments on a loan used for capital acquisition.
• Treat all income the same, whether from wages, dividends, or inflation-indexed capital gains.
• Eliminate virtually all personal deductions, tax credits, and so on, but give each person an exemption large enough to meet ordinary living expenses, including education and healthcare.
• Impose a single rate tax on all income above this exemption, no exceptions.
• Allow a limited tax deferral, say up to $1 million over a lifetime, on income used to make debt service payments on dividend-paying capital assets.
We also need to change how we finance economic growth, i.e., shift from financing using past reductions in consumption (savings), to using future increases in production (earnings). Businesses can then expand by issuing new shares or other means of sharing ownership, which people could purchase by monetizing the present value of the shares they are buying, i.e., buy a share in a business on credit, and pay for it out of the future earnings attributable to the share itself.
Support the Capital Homestead Act at http://www.cesj.org/homestead/index.htm and http://www.cesj.org/homestead/summary-cha.htm
As tea-baggin Republicans implode into their fantasy-reality of misinformation and lies, ya kinda hate to throw them a logical life-line. Just let them sink into their own putrid quagmire.
Yet the big-finance patrons funding them from the top are just as well organized as they were before the election -- as evidenced by the current antics of the Big-Boehner and the other gladiators serving the supra-nationals above the top.
We say "They lost." Well don't bet on it. When living in a fantasy-space where lies are truth and loss is win, what was yesterday has no relevance to what is today. "Lost? -- Nah, the Democrats stole the election; everybody knows that. -- I heard it on the news. . . . Dems was flipping the votes in Ohio and Florida."
Meanwhile clueless Libs and Dems wander around, wondering "How can they say that?" Well Duhhh. they own the microphones, dipwit; that's how they can say that, over and over until it's true. And now the FCC is giving Rupert Murdock even more monopoly control of news-media. Boggles-the-mind.
Check back next year, and ask "Who lost?"
Not only have they lost seats the battle inside the party has started. We the people have spoken. People are not living longer the number of infants deaths have decreased. That is what has driven the average death higher.
got C-dif?