The Pentagon has far MORE than they need to protect America. What is a military without the foundation? It's just a shell. Don't you get it? If our people can't drive on roads that cross bridges that can carry heavy weight, and if our towns and cities have no safe evacuation routes for catastrophies, and if our lands cannot grow crops and build things to export that can aid our military or other places, what are we? WE'RE DOOMED... There's no one left to protect. Just land, and forests to cut down/animals to kill. Who is going to protect that?!

Yes, I see what you mean about Chris Van Hollen...this web site says that Van Hollen has indicated his opinion in favor of cutting social security and medicare...and he's a "democrat"! Bad dog...bad bad dog...bad blue dog!
http://boldprogressives.org/chris-van-hollen-indicates-hes-open-to-cutti...

What I'm afraid of is that Obama and those politicians who decide to "compromise" will end up making it look like the top 1% gets their taxes increased but in reality, after they will have made "compromises" on our social programs, and the 1% will find some way of recouping their "loses"...and we will all be stuck with cuts to SS and MC...with no way to recoup our losses. And the Pentagon will continue raking in the big bucks to waste. The damn Republicans will get just what they wanted all along...and wimpy Obama and the other Democrats will just let them have it. They'll put up a big show, talk big, and then say they had to compromise. Smoke and mirrors......watch the little pea...aww, too bad...you lose!

Unless Obama closes the gates on money transfers and closes the loopholes on tax havens, raising tax rates for the rich will have NO effect at all. All that will happen will be a rush of flight capital offshore. I agree BTW that it is long past time that those who benefit most from our sociecty also start to pay their fair share of running it.

And NO, rich people, with the miserly amounts of taxes you pay, You DIDN'T Build this nation. All you did was sit on your well padded a**es and let the wage slaves build it.

Finish them off, burn'em to the ground !!! Vote out double agents like Chris Van Hollen.

I sure hope Van Hollen is just warning us all about a few blue dogs drinking bad tea. Maybe Senator Sanders needs to conduct a little info seminar for some misguided souls over in the house.

First of all, LOWERING the age of eligibility is the correct thing to do.....this would open up the job market and at the same time stimulate greatly, the economy.

Secondly, most of the new earnings are occurring above the current cap, while wages below it remain stagnant. This alone is a good argument for raising the cap and ending the problem forever. The republicans hate social security because it's a NON PROFIT social program that is well loved and works, and they're thinking what's next, socialized healthcare, energy, education???

That's exactly right! Social Security and Medicare, at least, should not even be considered by anyone to be "on the table". Hands off! Should be absolutely not even considered. We all paid into the system and by Zod we should all get what we paid for....what we slaved for! If they renege on these social programs, what WE PAID FOR, they will have committed an egregious mistake...a sinister robbery from hard workers who spent their lives paying for their retirements. Stealing from the social programs will amount to cold blooded murder of many senior citizens. Obama should never, ever, use the word "compromise" in the same sentence or even paragraph or even the same speech with raising taxes on the wealthy. They can talk about cutting Pentagon spending!

The problem with the argument that we should all "keep all of the money that we earn" and that "we can spend our money more efficiently than the government" is that no one really believes that everyone else is as deserving of all that money as you are..and that everyone else should pay for our infrastructure. And the higher up the economic latter, the more they are deluded into believing that they earned and deserve all they earned. And being at the top, having all the power, they will make all the people at the bottom pay all the taxes.

If we had a system, like libertarians want, instead of taxes providing the means to fund the construction and maintenance of our roads...you'd have to pay a toll to a privately owned company to drive on these roads or even to walk down the sidewalk. Even our neighborhood streets would be owned by private companies. Everything would be owned by private companies and you, the individual, would have no real say in how much you would have to pay these companies. They would form total monopolies...even worse than what exists today.

Our government would be a lot more efficient if it wasn't for the element of corruption that is constantly being forced upon our government by mega corporations that have gotten too big and powerful. And these corporations are not really more efficient...they waste scads of money paying off their sinecure CEOs and other top executives and all of the major stockholders who don't care a whit about anything except a quick profit. And in order to make the quick profits to satisfy the top execs and stock holders, they usually end up screwing the workers and produce inferior products. Then they rely on psychological trickery in their marketing to make people think they are buying something worth buying.

It’s not a mandate

Not a landslide

More like an electoral tectonic shift. Yes as in a geo-tectonic shift. With inspiration, and perhaps a little help from the Aether, maybe our mother earth is angry too. The win is with the Democratic Party and the Republicans are having a fit. The statistics show a most unusual force took place, all swing states went to Obama including Florida. The cable pundits’ way off. Sure by an edge but every swing state by an edge is unique. Beyond unique, more than a mandate a total electoral shift.

The reason for the Republican loses, endless, relentless, and obnoxious, with in your face, Republican Pedaling, with a Purpose of Rapture, hate, and economic Armageddon. The end is near if you vote for Obama. Now, the new expression opens discussion and the Money Cliff. The drama of political theater of course it’s the mountain of money the Republicans will lose, that which was sacked from the treasury. So it’s Monty Hall let’s make a deal. Isn’t it interesting that people with money, not only in America but around the world feel a pressure from the middle class. A World wide effect of change is happening. It’s interesting how in science we all accept the natural redistribution if nature calls. But if man asks his fellow man for fair distribution there is an endless argument. Redistribution in nature is ongoing, always happening, especially in a conservative way. You who, Republicans did you get that. LOL.

It all reminds me of the story and history in the evolution of chemistry and calculus. The classical math carried over from the old world. Isaac Newton rejected the original theory of the atomic structure of molecule in constant motion. He proposed a static model which was wrong. But considering Newton and likely political connections that “wrong rejection” held for a century. Newton’s authority was so great other scientists were more or less ignored.

So here we are, climate change, oh the rhetoric now changing for America to be the largest oil producer in the world. One might think the Republicans have a tectonic plate in their heads shifting every time they lose an election. With a chuckle it seems possible America might just might dig deep into the core of corruption of our one percent leadership, our Congress and Senate the Supreme Court, and of course the cable and radio media hacking away for investigations into General Petraeus tightly connected to the Bush administration. War profiteering, and Iraq cover ups likely to be outed. Or the Republicans might just say no problem to tax increases. From my view either way the Republicans will eventually lose the Congress then the real fun begins.

hey ken i replied to you on yesterdays post in respect to your misperception of my ranting so i want to be clear. simply put i want every dollar earned, regardless of how, to be taxed "equally". so if cap gains is 10-15% or sometimes none at all why should my ilk of folk that just pull a w-2 have to pay 18-27%. Get it? And just a little FYI, did you know that the IRS estimates 400-500 billion a year in lost revenue all because of cheaters? Does that not make you just a bit upset? And who do you think those cheaters are, hmmm? Me a republican? hyuk,.hyukl,hyuk...

I am interested in your politics because 70% of our exports go to the US. But we just signed trade deals with India and China so i think that will change a little. I personally have some investments down there so I need to keep on top of what happens. But you are right as a Canadian it really is none of my business. No one said America will be self sufficent they all said "North American self sufficent". Canada is and will always be Americas largest supplier of Oil and Gas. Canada has the best government regulations in the world when it comes to the Energy industry. Most oil companies hate doing business here for that reason but we do have the second largest oil reserves in the world second only to Saudi Arabia so they don't have much choice. And just think unlike the middle east we are a very ethical country. Equal rights for all like you.

Come on Ken be nice "frozen lake" yes it is true one third of the worlds fresh water is in Canada but is is the second largest country in the world we do have a few trees and mountains as well and yes there is only one tenth of the population of the US here but with these cold nights there isn't much to do in the winter but try to increase our population so we are working on it. I was just trying to be nice about the job thing. You know just in case.

Just out of curiosity what state do you like in ken?

Let's see... the world is getting more polluted every day, climate change (regardless of why it's happening) is upon us for the foreseeable future; we're not allowed to know if the food we're buying is genetically modified, my graduating class of 1964 has had more deaths in the past ten years from cancers, gastrointestinal problems, obesity, and exposure to (wink-wink) Agent Orange and military-related suicides, than any previous generation.

Gee, if the government raises the Social Security retirement age another 4 years, and allows Medicare to be delayed for another couple or 3, pretty soon NONE of us will be living long enough to COLLECT anything... Perhaps that's been the plan, all along. Just phase the hard-working non-elites out of collecting our benefits (no matter how sick we become at even earlier ages), and the Government Welfare we've paid into all our working lives can be used by both the parties - for surplus!