Everything good that Biden tries to do, MAGA Mike and his Republican henchmen try to block in their roles as handmaidens to Treacherous-treasonous-tantruming-traitor-Trump and as proxies for Putin. I wish them to implode further.
Everything good that Biden tries to do, MAGA Mike and his Republican henchmen try to block in their roles as handmaidens to Treacherous-treasonous-tantruming-traitor-Trump and as proxies for Putin. I wish them to implode further.
Great alliteration Linda! I also think that if the S__t Show Caucus is so interested in tying aid to Baltimore to cuts in other parts of government spending, and "unpausing" the development of LNG (Liquid Natural Gas) use, they could propose ways to offset burning more LNG with reductions in the use of other fossil fuels. Not on their radar, I'm afraid.
Their new use of refusals clearly labels for whom they are working. Although WE are paying their salaries, they are working to support Mr Putin. Each individual voter who votes for them also puts a lot of effort into supporting another country, against their own country. It is Trump supporters who are traitors.
Yes. You are correct.We are paying the salaries of the Putin wing of the Republican Party but they are working to aid Putin himself.The stark contrast to how quickly and efficiently Biden is handling the Francis Scott Key bridge disaster compared to how Trump threw paper towels to residents of Puerto Rico a few years ago as his response to a powerful hurricane that decimated the island is a study in contrasts.
I was disgusted by TrumpтАЩs behavior at throwing paper towels, and at many of his other antics and inaction, but Trump is a sociopath and they donтАЩt possess any empathy. President Biden does have empathy, and it shows. Trump is also a narcissist who thinks all attention has to be on him at every opportunity. TrumpтАЩs primary concerns have been himself, his money, and now his political power.
What radar Steve, radar gives you the ability to see beyond what you can see with your eyes, if a person has their head up their ass all the way to their shoulders how are they going to see anything except their own crap. We may very well be having this discussion on the Titanic after it hit the iceberg. We have allowed some of our elected to stop our prevention of WWIII, itтАЩs not going to matter what kind of government you are in favor of, if we no longer have a country, and WWIII will eliminate most countries as we know them. ЁЯд╖тАНтЩВя╕П
Yesterday CSpan featured a Libertarian head and the Green Party presidential candidate. Neither can be dismissed. But I will just say the Libertarian tried to walk the line between her party's absolutely no government and effectively no government wings, tied herself in knots, and fell on her face. Hey boys and girls, let's get together and ... wait, no, whatever it is you'll do it yourself - or someone will.
So on to the inevitable Jill Stein. Whose boilerplate by now is seamless, delivery is hypnotic, and because she said it so many times, really wants you to know - they are "shoving it down your throat." Your throat evidently a capacious ark for everything Stein doesn't like about the duopoly. Stein's ire at RFK Jr splitting her constituency is cute. Stein has said straight-facedly "The answer to neofascism is stopping neoliberalism." And if you can swallow that, all I can say is, gag me with a spoon.
A perpetual candidate since 2002, Stein has won one office, coming in first of 16 candidates to win a seat on the Lexington Town Meeting with 539 votes.
Stein's 2016 financial disclosure, indicated that she maintained investments of as much as $8.5 million, including mutual or index funds holdings in big carbon, big financial (including Trump fave the money laundering Deutsche Bank), big pharma, tobacco, and defense contractors. There's no news that she's divested.
On CSpan, I heard Stein both feint and brag on performing for Vladimir Putin at a Moscow conference and gala dinner celebrating Russia Today's tenth anniversary. (RT widely promoted Stein's 2016 campaign for president. A fact she uses to chastise American media.) Stein was seated at the head table with Putin and Michael Flynn (whom RT had paid $45,000 to speak.) Previously Stein has claimed she had nothing to do with Putin and it was a non-event. On CSpan Stein claimed it was a journalism conference, she just happened to attend the evening event, and that she was there to plead with Putin not to let Russia become an "international bully like the United States." Good thing Putin has the standard issue KGB poker face. It wasn't a journalism conference. Sitting with Putin doesn't just happen. Just imagine if Jill Stein were an independent Russian politician criticizing Russia. Oh wait, we don't have to imagine. We already know. But Jill Stein and the voters who love her may very well give Trump the win, again. And we also know what he will do with anyone opposing him. That's OK with Stein, she's safe.
I never trusted Jill Stein. As for glibertarianism, which is my name for libertarianism, it works on paper but not in real life, much like Communism or Fascism.
тАЬLess self centered тАЬ equals really listening to what the Bible really says. We are, according to the book they say they are following, commanded to take care of each other (everyone), and the earth, which has been given to us to take care of!
It goes to show how few people are really taking to heart the actions Jesus showed during JesusтАЩs earthly ministry. The theocratic and integralist contingent seem to have sacrificed their professed Christianity in the pursuit of political power.
Spot on JL, and good defining name for the era we find ourselves in. *edit > Not funny that "it's the economy stupid" , brought us to this divisive era, and will continue.
I like your a answer. But mine was if only Putin , Trump, Orb├бn, Erdo─Яan, Kim Jung-un, Xi Jinping and a few others along with their loyal cronies and loyal followers would implode, like @Linda Weide suggested.ЁЯдгЁЯдгЁЯдг
Stress must follow all of them, but not the stresses we regular people have of worrying about getting things done or worrying if we will catch the train on time, but those of worrying whether someone in their immediate circle will betray them as they do everyone whom they perceive as not loyal, and stress from a certain sort of isolation. We can only hope for implosion of dictators, but I'd be happy is it started with Treacherous-treasonous-traitorous-tantruming-Trump!
Linda, those quail eggs of Putin reminds me of тАЬlet them eat cake!тАЭ And evidence shows that their entitled children need a taste of the knowledge and empathy of living conditions that Biden possesses. WeтАЩve got problems when students think the average wage is at least $250,000 (itтАЩs closer to $50,000).
To protect American democracy, reach out to millions of unregistered likely Democrats using a dedicated database using every outreach method possible (phone and text, postcard, email and targeted ad, and in-person too), where new Democratic voters will make the most impact тАУ in the most flippable states and districts.
Does these corporate billionaires even have a clue that when this autocrat Mob Don gets in power their taxes may get lowered but their payment to the тАЬBossтАЭ will be significant
Linda, if, as you term it the "Treacherous-treasonous-tantruming-traitor-Trump" regains power there will be a mass migration from the U.S., benefitting the receiving countries with billions of dollars in accounts, just as we are currently benefitting from the labor of immigrants coming to this country. I have already selected the country that I will go to, having a permanent residency card there already. MAGAs are not to be trusted in the least.
No, itтАЩs not. You have to have a sufficient amount of capital and marketable skills the country is seeking. In a way, it reminds me about one aspect of Hungary you donтАЩt hear about, and that is young and educated Hungarians are leaving Orb├бnтАЩs Christian Nationalist тАЬparadiseтАЭ for freer nations like Germany. Orb├бn seems to have modeled himself and his government on the government of Mikl├│s Horthy after the short lived governments of Mih├бly K├бrolyi and B├йla Kun. KunтАЩs origins unfairly led Protestant and Catholic Hungarians to blame all Jews for Kun, when many of them didnтАЩt support Kun at all, and around 5,000 were slaughtered in the wake of KunтАЩs fall.
Horthy called himself тАЬregentтАЭ of Hungary even though he expelled HungaryтАЩs last King Charles IV (Karl I of Austria) on two separate occasions when Charles and his wife Zita tried to return as monarchs. Charles was unwilling to engage in bloodshed to regain his crown, and after CharlesтАЩs death in Madeira in 1922, his son Otto didnтАЩt attempt to reclaim the crown. The victors of World War I were unwilling to see another monarch in Hungary, and Horthy was himself opposed to CharlesтАЩs return. Horthy was essentially dictator of Hungary and ran a national Christian conservative government with anti-Semitic policies. Hitler thought HorthyтАЩs anti-Semitic policies insufficiently stringent, and HitlerтАЩs armies invaded Hungary in 1944, establishing the Fascist Arrow Cross party, killing some Jewish Hungarians (including a notorious slaughter where Jews were forced at gunpoint to jump into the icy Danube, where many drowned,) and deporting many to death in the gas chambers of Auschwitz and other concentration camps. The Communists took over with StalinтАЩs assistance in 1946. Horthy died in the 1950s in Portugal, where he had fled with his wife and most of their family in 1944 after the Nazis invaded.
Orb├бn got into power after the Socialist Party got caught lying about economic conditions in Hungary. Orb├бn and his Fidesz Party were originally pro-democracy and George Soros paid for Orb├бn to study at Oxford in order to how civil democracies are governed. The right wing considers Soros as some sort of bogeyman, but Soros supports civil and social democracies. He does not support fascism, Communism, or Socialism. The real problem is,that the extreme right doesnтАЩt support democratic government. Orb├бn shamefully turned on Soros once he got into power, and he immediately set about to cement his power by turning press ownership over to his cronies, gerrymandering parliamentary districts to guarantee FideszтАЩs dominance and expelling the Central European University from Hungary to Austria. I really donтАЩt know if Orb├бn intended to run Hungary as an тАЬilliberal democracyтАЭ all along, or whether he acquired his ambitions along the way. In my view, heтАЩs dangerous and the EU needs to cut off their funding of Hungary until Orb├бn is expelled.
Thank you for this lesson. All I knew is that Orb├бn is a Roma and an opportunist. I was not aware he was mentored by Soros. Now he has strong opposition by Peter Magyar, who is polished and eloquent. I hope he does not get killed, like Navalny. Hungarians are waking up and Magyar is being listened too.
IтАЩve never heard any talk about Orb├бn being Roma. I have heard that his government is discriminatory toward Roma. His father was an agronomist, engineer and construction engineer and his mother a teacher and speech therapist. His grandfather was a docker and farmer. I am about a week older than he is.
Kathy: I apologize. I have good Hungarian friends in Croatia, who insist they know the family. They told me and I believed it. I have done the research. For three generations there's no evidence of Roma roots but, there are mention of "urban legends. " IT IS NEVER TOO LATE TO LEARN A LESSON.
I wrote you a reply....it is here somewhere. Now I cannot find it.
Summarising, and I double checked.
He was mentored by Soros in 1989. His turning on Soros has labeled him as anti-semitic. But he has stated he will not tolerate antisemitism (2017) and he iis VERY friendly with Netanyahu.
The man is an opportunist and a con man. His government has been labeled as a kleptocracy.
Will Rogers knew on Nov 26, 1932 тАЬMr. Hoover didnтАЩt know that money trickled up.тАЭ But Reagan knew in 1981 when he resurrected that schemeтАж a deliberate scam on the workers at the bottom and a windfall for the takers at the top. The junk bond fiasco of the later 80тАЩs was proof enough.
I recently saw a device depicted that the Roman Catholics used during the Inquisition to crush the hands of those writers and artists who wrote and drew things that the Vatican didn't like. Reagan essentially did the same thing in a sense - he used the tax laws and the power of his position to crush the economic lives of everyday Americans. The war between capital and labor goes on, with capital now having the upper hand.
Yes, Richard, and the Inquisition was a golden opportunity to grab wealth from those you envied by making accusations. Now we just have hedge funds buying up everything and making life difficult for many lesser folks.
I was rereading Ken Follett's A Column of Fire, set in 1558-1605, where the Catholic Church and the Protestants can be so cruel to each other depending which faith the Monarchy supports. They burnt, drawed and quartered, beheaded, stretched on the rack, cut body parts off unanesthetised of course, etc... Yeech. It is mainly the Catholics at first, but the extremes of each group are just vicious. I agree about Reagan. When he became president I was in shock that Americans could vote someone basically for his star power into office even if he had done some seemingly good things as governor of California. I am so grateful that Biden finally is turning Reaganomics around. Yay!
In Spain, the Inquisition was established as a means of making money for the Spanish crown. Even saints like Teresa of Avila and Juan de la Cruz were wrongly regarded with suspicion. Spain ruined itself by expelling Jews from Spain, and as a Catholic it makes me ashamed they did so. Many headed for the Ottoman Empire, where they contributed to Ottoman prosperity and could openly practice their faith, despite having dhimmi status. Religious persecution often causes the persecuted to cling more to their faith. That was true under the penal laws in Ireland and England as well.
Richard, thank you. We can trace the demise of the average person and families to Reagan the petty, lazy minded , punch down charmer. He gave us the тАЬ Welfare Queen тАЬ and the beginning of union busting. George H W Bush nailed it тАЬ voodoo economics тАЬ. Many people never experienced the US economy before Reagan and his buddies began trickling down on the opportunity it offered the common person.And those that do remember are constantly being gaslighted into wondering if it was just our imaginations. Believing is seeing. And they rub our noses in it.
Pres. G.W. Bush (an amateur narcissist when compared to TFFG) was correct when at the White House Correspondents' Dinner on 3/31/2001 he said: "You can fool some of the people all of the time, and those are the ones you want to concentrate on." Thomas Frank researched and proved this point in his 2004 book, "What's the Matter with Kansas?"
"Reagan's revolution" was indeed the point in time that 'all that' accelerated into high gear. Actual revolutions by and for the "haves" in our nation happened again and again following our major wars that had to be paid for by someone. Reagan's 'revolution' was an adoption of a revolution of, by, and for the "haves" from WW2 bill resolution. WW2 bill resolution added steam to resentments of the "haves" from resolutions costs of WW1 and the Great Depression - all of course 'blamed' upon dems to their 'flock.' The flock then spreads the stated disease of disinformation onward to those less educated; add in other large constituencies, stir well, and therein you can see the growing constituencies, and leadership 'coalitions' who strive to produce the foul, misinformed "stew" we suffer today. >>*edit* > As I read further down, I can't help but to re-offer a quotation by GW Bush, offered to us by our fellow Richard Sutherland elsewhere in this string, where he offers this direct quotation; what you need to know is that 'this' quotation 'is' the gop leadership coalition's thoughts and approach to all elections. To whit: "Pres. G.W. Bush (an amateur narcissist when compared to TFFG) was correct when at the White House Correspondents' Dinner on 3/31/2001 he said: "You can fool some of the people all of the time, and those are the ones you want to concentrate on." Thomas Frank researched and proved this point in his 2004 book, "What's the Matter with Kansas?"
Even at 17 I was able to see what Reaganomics would do, destroy the middle class to enrich the wealthy. Unfortunately, not too many wanted to see it. ItтАЩs not a surprise to me weтАЩve reached the point where some plutocrats and the Republicans themselves have come to believe that self-government is no longer desirable to them. This is actually what weтАЩre up against, and manufacturers are engaging in greedflation and price hikes at the pump. They want to have us vote in a sociopath and narcissist who will destroy our republic for good and give them permanent control.
You were a wise teen, some oldsters in my family still haven't figured it out. They were like me, born poor, and had a struggle to make a decent life. Still they think the prosperity gospel is what Jesus advocated. And they can read...
Pastor Jim Wallis, author of the book, "The False White Gospel" said it perfectly. "If it's not good news for the poor, it's heresy. Period."
People mistakenly have believed that the morbidly wealthy will invest their tax cut funds and huge profits in their companies to generate more innovation, jobs, etc. But the morbidly rich don't do that; they buy back stock instead, a practice that used to be considered stock manipulation, which was illegal.
Nothing about supply-side, "voodoo" economics was good news for the poor or middle classes. It was and is reverse Robin Hood economics, stealing from the poor to further enrich the already rich.
I wasnтАЩt poor, but times were hard for us economically then, and my dad had lost at least 2 jobs, and my mother was pregnant with my youngest brother at the time.
My family has never bought into the prosperity gospel, and I think it only works for people like Joel Osteen who sell it. People on fixed incomes send money they can ill afford to people like Osteen and the various televangelists, and itтАЩs no wonder Osteen and televangelists can have such ostentatious lifestyles.
So true, my poor aunt (96) was sending five dollars to every idiot that sent her a "begging" letter. I said please don't do that, it's rich people stealing your money. She couldn't believe that people would lie about poor children. She was from another era.
Milton Friedman also deliberately ignored the spillover consequences of pursuit of shareholder benefit at any cost would have upon our communities. The decline of American manufacturing matters greatly, not only to the communities who lose the jobs, but to the nation as a whole. It leaves great social destruction in its wake.
".... at any cost..." needs placed in some stronger terms somehow Kathy, as it explains so much about the depths and pain of this "race to the bottom" we find ourselves caught within. If "race to the bottom" sounds familiar, it should; Ross Perot sounded that alarm when we approached the NAFTA agreement. He was right, as I soundly agreed at the time. Too much was ignored; 'fast track' of any sort will always ignore too much, and certainly did. The gop leadership deep thinkers laid a clever trap that dems and progressives, who themselves were certain 'they' were the smartest folks in any room, walked right into. Since then, in the privacy of their "self affirming echo chambers" they blame it all on dems, progressives, and lefties. It worked, and moreso because democrats insist on abandoning truth, honesty, and plain dealing, fearing that answers are "too complicated." Sadly, that's where we are still at this moment in time. I fear that if dems don't break out with an extreme case of honesty and forthcoming, even at the great risk of losing, election '24 will be in doubt. Our trade agreements so very deeply harmed the greatest majority of the U.S. psyche, dems may never win back the faith they so badly need to regain of those who saw family generations egregiously harmed economically and it seems irreparably. I'm not in the least being hyperbolic in all this and have not been; I just couldn't get anyone to listen - for decades now. Another related trap has dems merrily skipping to their dooms right now.. One can't help those who won't listen... sigh..
Thomas Frank explains it in his 2004 book, "What's the Matter with Kansas." The wealthy and extreme right wing organizations use wedge issues (abortion, women's rights, homophobia and xenophobia [immigrants]) to induce the white Protestants to vote against their own best social and economic interests. Our school systems over the past 50 years have failed to teach the essence of what a democratic government is and how it operates along with critical thinking skills. In short, our public and private education systems have failed us in this regard.
You are absolutely correct Richard, public education has totally failed to educate the youth of America on how a democracy really works and what the responsibilities of each of its citizens are. The lack of understanding is a colossal failure that is now manifesting and will continue to do so for a long time to come. We canтАЩt blame people for not understanding what they werenтАЩt taught, when you think of how our founders were able to put together this country with the rudimentary education most of them had, todayтАЩs repugnantkin party is is absolutely incompetent when it comes to offering solutions to modern day problems.
I think that our educators took too much for granted. They assumed that all of us would act fairly and with goodwill toward all. Again, the tension between capital and labor will not go away. Neither will the will to impose one's religious/racist beliefs on the body politic.
Or the desire of some to force their religious beliefs on others. Mikey Weinstein of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation rightly explained there are two types of Christians, those motivated by the Great Commissiom, and the Christian Nationalists, including tnose who belong to the military, are motivated to seek more followers for their version of Jesus. The others are more Great Commandment types, and I freely admit to being a member of this group. I donтАЩt think everyone has to share my political or religious beliefs, but believe in action to help others who need it, not words.
Kathy, I was once a Christian, but we parted ways decades ago; but, I never left Matthew 25: 34-46. These few words encapsulate what government should be and do, in my opinion.
Just so you know, Republicans have been making war on public education for years. The Leandro case in NC was a suit against NC for failing to fairly educate students all across the state. NC lost that suit, but the legislature won't comply with school funding and instead gives public funds to charter schools, which do not perform any better than the public schools that have been inadequately funded at all levels from pre-K to higher education.
That was the doing of Paul Weyrich. Weyrich was a Roman-rite Catholic and extreme right winger who joined the Byzantine rite in Catholicism out of disgust with Vatican II. Evangelicals were indifferent on Roe v. Wade and the most prominent early anti-abortion advocates were Catholic, and I myself am Catholic, but also a Democrat. Paul Weyrich convinced the political Evangelicals to oppose abortion to disguise the fact that the political Evangelicals original opposition to Democrats was losing tax exemptions for segregation academies. Weyrich was opposed to ensuring that all Americans had the right to vote for the candidate of their choice, and openly said so. He also observed that his side did better when fewer people voted. The current Republican majority has gutted the Voting Rights Act, given its blessing to political gerrymandering, and is out to undo everything the civil rights movement achieved. Their allies in the states donтАЩt want schoolchildren learning the darker facts in American history, including the truth about the harshness of slavery or the mass slaughter of Native Americans.
Yep; Another "wedge issue" as Richard Sutherland, above тЖС, aptly names; "Wedge issues" that by design, set the bulk of us against each other. The opposition 'think tanks' literally 'brain storm' for this divisive stuff.
Starving public education of funds, steering the money to charter schools where the children are indoctrinated, is part of their plan to have a controllable and uninformed populace.
And they cause such chaos. The economic holes, the stepping stones, are miles apart. If a family isnтАЩt able, there is isnтАЩt anywhere to go. We can feed and help clothe children at school. But where do the children have to go when things are past difficult at home? To the ditches and alleyways, or to a friendтАЩs place. Where do single parents go for support?
The level of arrogance playing out is astounding.
I teach in a very low income neighborhood. For 30 + years, I have been in the classroom. Never have I ever seen a year such as this. Even driving to work has become treacherous. I can handle a great deaI, but these days I am grateful for every day I make it back home.
Not to mention GOP followers spending hard earned money on golden sneakers and poor quality, word of Trump, bibles. I feel pity for the deluded fools who canтАЩt understand where their best interests lie.
Have you ever heard of a president selling trivial like trump does? Presidents are supposed to be dignified not hucksters of Goya products on the Resolution Desk. I do know old actors sell life insurance.
Who would want to buy TrumpтАЩs tacky sneakers or his white nationalist Bible? Trump is as always out for his own well being. Raymond Arroyo of EWTN and sometimes Fox News (he periodically fills in for Laura Ingraham,) embarrassed himself by suggesting African American voters might be more likely to vote for Trump because of his gold sneakers. His racial ignorance was utterly embarrassing. African American voters are intelligent enough to know that voting for Trump is not in their best interests, and as a rule, they vote pragmatically, as Chauncey DeVega notes.
Meanwhile, the President is doing everything he can to improve the lives of the people. while the Mike Maga team is playing obstruction games. If only Joe can find a way to make the majority he's working for "feel superior" to the Big Lying bible grifter's worshippers.
And, I feel sorry for those of us who may be the recipients of the 'deluded fools' beliefs.
And here we are again....I hear people who are holding fast to their stories, who praised Trump for his early economic successes...which were really Obama's, not saying a word about Biden's. Or whose talking point after the undisputable success of Biden's economics is inflation. As it seems...even low inflation is still a talking point for them.
I don't feel pity for them. I try to get through to those I can by putting reality into words. If I get through to even one, it's worth the effort, but I don't pity any of them. I feel disgust more than anything.
In this world of moneyed power, as in the Robber Baron days, itтАЩs time to reverse course. Time to learn from Europe where our childhood poverty would be a scandal.
exactly. no one gets too that level without exploiting others. NO ONE. Years of saying that taxes are theft of one's money go up and down the economic spectrum. The poor that support the conservative /libertarian agenda want to stick to the government not seeing that these same people professing their agenda are sticking it to them(the poor).
Rickey, while Sam Walton (founder of Walmart) did well by his vision of stores that combined groceries, automotive goods and other items, he was not ostentatious (drove an old pickup to drink coffee with folks in Rogers, Arkansas). A friend says that he didnтАЩt employ the dirty tricks used today by his decendants and treated his initial employees well. Now the employees have different shifts weekly so that they canтАЩt have a second job. ThereтАЩs a reason that so many qualify for federal assistance (food stamps, Medicaid, etc ).
Sam had good intentions, however, money corrupts. As the empire grew from those small stores and into the larger and now super, that all changed. That one company was responsible for hollowing out rural America with their market strength. Not so sure that Sam ever meant for that to happen, but it did start while he was alive. I saw in some communities in the plains of Texas where after stores that had been in some communities for years, they began closing shop leaving a wasteland of retail possibilities behind them. This causes residents to have to drive further for goods. Amazon then came in to provide in that void and you can hardly not see Amazon trucks now along with FedEx and UPS delivering goods that people could once get locally. This works well for most things, except fresh food which is the lifeblood of the human body.
The scheduling of workers is right on target for most all retail. In some companies, they offer employees some say in scheduling so they can do other jobs or have family time. A much better solution- pay a livable wage, but that would mean less bloated profits available for shareholders and executives.
Yep....watched the individual owned dress shops, shoe stores, hardware stores disappear from main street after Walmart came to town in rural Kansas. It was so hard to watch those families close the doors of their business which supported their and other families for decades.
Rickey, a major additional downside to the retail deserts beyond fresh food deserts is the effects on the environment of all those additional Amazon, UPS, and FedEx trucks spewing their exhausts and the mountains of added packing materials many of which are not recyclable. Shopping via Amazon and general mail order is bad for the environment!
Oh man Mary, is this a reason why low wage workers are put on rotating schedules? To keep the government money supporting them coming in? I had no idea. Sheesh.
Sam Walton is a union busting shithead. Germany got rid of Walmart quick, because they did not want to follow German labor standards of benefits. Also, Walmarts were buying German cars for less in Italy and then selling them under the price German dealers were selling them for, and they got rid of Walmart quickly. Too many cultural differences of standards. To me Walmart coming into a town and destroying all their businesses is awful. It is a Catch 22 as well. People in these towns are too poor to afford mom and pop businesses, so they go to Walmarts, which makes there be no competition so then Walmart can do whatever it wants, and keep everyone working for them poor, while they live on the obscene wealth they rake in off of everyone's backs.
Sam is dead, and the family owns shares in WalMart, but they donтАЩt run the company any more. That being said, Sam was very antiunion, and so are the executives who run the company. The one thing the current execs do that Sam didnтАЩt do was to eliminate Sam WaltonтАЩs preference to buy American made products in favor of Chinese made products.
BK, this has always been the way of plutocrats who used the idea of white vs. black to make it difficult for poorer whites to make common cause with slaves and free blacks, the old divide and conquer and let's keep the pot boiling with culture wars while large problems go unsolved. As for trickle down, that has always looked to me like something yellow. We have a large sewer/street project going on in front of our house and the length of our street. It is mostly funded with federal dollars, yet large numbers of the workers who aren't doing the scut work have items on their cars that indicate that they are MAGAs. Of course, any scut work is done by people speaking Spanish. They did the finishing work on the cement sidewalks, the roof on the pump house, and the landscaping.
This tactic goes all the way back to the end of BaconтАЩs Rebellion in the 17th century, when slaveholders and landowners set out to destroy any potential solidarity between poor indentured white servants and enslaved people.
BK, you also need to remember that the top 50% of income tax payers bring in almost all federal income tax collected, with the top few percent covering the lion's share of that. This has been true for a long time, and it's also an indication of the degree of wealth inequality in America. The lower third of earners get tax credits and rebates. Payroll and sales taxes on the other hand are a different matter. They are generally regressive, falling as a greater share of spending income on the less well to do. However common grocery items and prescription drugs are tax free.... mixed bag. It remains however that historic tax rates need to be re-asserted and made effective. Lower taxes paid by the super rich remember are legally provided as economic incentives by governments, of all stripes, and have been for the longest time.
Frank, it's good in theory (lower taxes for the wealthy) but in practice it doesn't work. How do we know this? Look at the $34 trillion federal debt. When Reagan took office in 1981 the federal debt was less than $1 trillion. Trump and those formerly known as Republicans, passed a $2 trillion tax break for the wealthy. Trump bragged about it and the debt increased another $8.2 trillion during his four years in office. When the marginal tax rate was 95% back in the 1930's, it didn't deter the wealthy from engaging in economic activity. It may have even made them strive harder. We need to tax the wealthy and the large corporations much, much more. No one in 1,000 lifetimes can spend $1 billion on personal effects.
Correct. The other thing Reagan did was to tax Social Security benefits to make up for that shortfall. We must fight Republican efforts to destroy Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. We also need to remove the tax on Social Security and remove the income cap on the amount of income taxable to Social Security. For many of us, 401ks are not going to help us and we wonтАЩt have enough in benefits to avoid living in poverty. More people will forego retirement, while it will become a benefit available to the wealthy only. Nikki HaleyтАЩs call to raise the age for collecting Social Security is a bad idea because for many blue collar workers who do physical labor, their bodies are worn out by the time they reach their mid or late fifties. Trump is sociopathic enough to eliminate Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid and he will do it. What youтАЩll see is an increase in the number of dying and homeless people unable to afford medical care or housing.
Ours is/are the lucky generation(s) in that we could earn a reasonable living. I read recently from our generation(s) is/are providing financial support to our grown children. I certainly have. A lot.
thanks Richard, but i was in no way advocating lower taxes for the wealthy, actually the opposite. I do remember those days, long ago, when marginal topmost tax rates were 95%.
I agree. The wealthy can and should pay a lot more. They take advantage of the benefits of our government and infrastructure and they can well afford to pay a lot more as their fair share for what they use.
тАЬтАжthe top 50% of income tax payers bring in almost all federal income tax collected,тАЭ
You speak of this like theyтАЩre doing us some kind of favor.
If all that income was not flowing to the top 1-3%, but trickled down (as RтАЩs famously promise ALL THE DAMN TIME!! AND NEVER PRODUCE IT) taxes would still be paid into our government. In fact, MORE taxes would be paid on that pot of income because low/mid income earners do not offshore their money nor do they spend gazillions of $$ looking for ways to avoid paying taxes.
Proving once again that concentrated wealth is a pox on our country.
My concern is that it will wind up costing us our polity and we will become a theocratic dictatorship under a narcissistic sociopath like Trump and his followers.
note, i did say the current situation also reflects wealth inequality, I'm not trying to be an apologetic for this. You might not like to hear this, but most of that wealth is tied up in working capital essential to running these large corporations, not that this concentration doesnt free up a lot of personal luxury spending. Curiously, political spending is a relatively small fraction of all this available wealth, though it certainly undermines the concept of "one person one vote".
We need to reverse the three decisions that helped to tilt the playing field in favor of unlimited funding and dark money. Citizens United, and also Buckley v. Valeo (1976) and First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti (1978.) The Buckley in Buckley v. Valeo was James Buckley, the elder brother of William F. Buckley. James wanted to spend an unlimited amount of his own money on his NY senate campaign, and he lost. It reminds me of how Steve Forbes spent an unlimited amount of his own money on his presidential campaign, but he never could win primaries.
Another thought is about republicans do not to increase funding for the IRS. Basically, it would make it more efficient BUT it would have more auditors to audit the BIG tax payers like trump. This cost more, but the payoff is much bigger. us middle class are prime targets-easy tax returns to check but smaller dividends.
I advocate getting rid of the income tax and replacing it with a VAT similarly administered via reporting requirements that would cover all business transactions including services at a flat rate. See New Hampshire's Business Enterprise Tax. Also the Michigan Single Business Tax, now repealed. A consumption tax, yes, but not a Sales Tax on goods alone at the point of retail sale. The largest component of base being payroll. You could also call this the GNP tax since collectively the tax base sums to private sector GNP. What else is there to tax ?
.....Unfortunately there is no point in discussing tax policy.
Incorrect. Sales taxes on retail goods are regressive. Services make up a proportionally larger share of the rich man's consumption budget than that of the poor. Taxing the provision of services along with goods at every level in the supply chain and across all sectors in the economy is not regressive. Consumption. It's what Americans do. Consume. Voraciously. And since WWII the US economy has steadily shifted to services and continues to do so. Increasingly that is where wealth is generated as the affluent pay other people to do things for them. Lawyers, accountants, cleaning services, psychoanalysts, fortune tellers, tatoo artists, entertainers, captains and crews for private planes and boats. That is where the money is in this economy characterized by great income and wealth inequality. Tax spending on this along with everything else. Tax the generation of wealth in America via consumption. Don't tax wage earners.
"What's mind-numbing is that the low-to-middle-income side of the GOP base cares zero that their billionaires "pay an average of 8.2% [in] federal taxes" while they are paying 2 to 3+ times that to make up for it."
Everything good that Biden tries to do, MAGA Mike and his Republican henchmen try to block in their roles as handmaidens to Treacherous-treasonous-tantruming-traitor-Trump and as proxies for Putin. I wish them to implode further.
Great alliteration Linda! I also think that if the S__t Show Caucus is so interested in tying aid to Baltimore to cuts in other parts of government spending, and "unpausing" the development of LNG (Liquid Natural Gas) use, they could propose ways to offset burning more LNG with reductions in the use of other fossil fuels. Not on their radar, I'm afraid.
Their new use of refusals clearly labels for whom they are working. Although WE are paying their salaries, they are working to support Mr Putin. Each individual voter who votes for them also puts a lot of effort into supporting another country, against their own country. It is Trump supporters who are traitors.
Yes. You are correct.We are paying the salaries of the Putin wing of the Republican Party but they are working to aid Putin himself.The stark contrast to how quickly and efficiently Biden is handling the Francis Scott Key bridge disaster compared to how Trump threw paper towels to residents of Puerto Rico a few years ago as his response to a powerful hurricane that decimated the island is a study in contrasts.
Yet it is rarely mentioned. I was mortified every single day of those four years.
A lot of us were and still are at his horrific antics everyday.
Every hour of every day. Yet the cult slobbers over his stupidity, word salad, and sacrilegious nonsense.
Mortified-and thoroughly disgusted.
Yep
I was disgusted by TrumpтАЩs behavior at throwing paper towels, and at many of his other antics and inaction, but Trump is a sociopath and they donтАЩt possess any empathy. President Biden does have empathy, and it shows. Trump is also a narcissist who thinks all attention has to be on him at every opportunity. TrumpтАЩs primary concerns have been himself, his money, and now his political power.
What radar Steve, radar gives you the ability to see beyond what you can see with your eyes, if a person has their head up their ass all the way to their shoulders how are they going to see anything except their own crap. We may very well be having this discussion on the Titanic after it hit the iceberg. We have allowed some of our elected to stop our prevention of WWIII, itтАЩs not going to matter what kind of government you are in favor of, if we no longer have a country, and WWIII will eliminate most countries as we know them. ЁЯд╖тАНтЩВя╕П
Yesterday CSpan featured a Libertarian head and the Green Party presidential candidate. Neither can be dismissed. But I will just say the Libertarian tried to walk the line between her party's absolutely no government and effectively no government wings, tied herself in knots, and fell on her face. Hey boys and girls, let's get together and ... wait, no, whatever it is you'll do it yourself - or someone will.
So on to the inevitable Jill Stein. Whose boilerplate by now is seamless, delivery is hypnotic, and because she said it so many times, really wants you to know - they are "shoving it down your throat." Your throat evidently a capacious ark for everything Stein doesn't like about the duopoly. Stein's ire at RFK Jr splitting her constituency is cute. Stein has said straight-facedly "The answer to neofascism is stopping neoliberalism." And if you can swallow that, all I can say is, gag me with a spoon.
A perpetual candidate since 2002, Stein has won one office, coming in first of 16 candidates to win a seat on the Lexington Town Meeting with 539 votes.
Stein's 2016 financial disclosure, indicated that she maintained investments of as much as $8.5 million, including mutual or index funds holdings in big carbon, big financial (including Trump fave the money laundering Deutsche Bank), big pharma, tobacco, and defense contractors. There's no news that she's divested.
On CSpan, I heard Stein both feint and brag on performing for Vladimir Putin at a Moscow conference and gala dinner celebrating Russia Today's tenth anniversary. (RT widely promoted Stein's 2016 campaign for president. A fact she uses to chastise American media.) Stein was seated at the head table with Putin and Michael Flynn (whom RT had paid $45,000 to speak.) Previously Stein has claimed she had nothing to do with Putin and it was a non-event. On CSpan Stein claimed it was a journalism conference, she just happened to attend the evening event, and that she was there to plead with Putin not to let Russia become an "international bully like the United States." Good thing Putin has the standard issue KGB poker face. It wasn't a journalism conference. Sitting with Putin doesn't just happen. Just imagine if Jill Stein were an independent Russian politician criticizing Russia. Oh wait, we don't have to imagine. We already know. But Jill Stein and the voters who love her may very well give Trump the win, again. And we also know what he will do with anyone opposing him. That's OK with Stein, she's safe.
I never trusted Jill Stein. As for glibertarianism, which is my name for libertarianism, it works on paper but not in real life, much like Communism or Fascism.
Yes, please. The world would be a better place if only......
If only we were less self-centered and more forthright with each other, I think.
тАЬLess self centered тАЬ equals really listening to what the Bible really says. We are, according to the book they say they are following, commanded to take care of each other (everyone), and the earth, which has been given to us to take care of!
A book of tales is not needed for people to do right for their fellow man.
Strong parenting, family and community plus good education for all gives our population the base it needs. From that we help those with less.
It goes to show how few people are really taking to heart the actions Jesus showed during JesusтАЩs earthly ministry. The theocratic and integralist contingent seem to have sacrificed their professed Christianity in the pursuit of political power.
Yep;.... "And by God those faithless Dems dared to call us out early on; we who've got God on our side"! Sheesh...
Or to put it another way there is no patent on morality.
That in a nutshell is what Christianity means to this former Christian.
Spot on JL, and good defining name for the era we find ourselves in. *edit > Not funny that "it's the economy stupid" , brought us to this divisive era, and will continue.
A lilting litany.
I like your a answer. But mine was if only Putin , Trump, Orb├бn, Erdo─Яan, Kim Jung-un, Xi Jinping and a few others along with their loyal cronies and loyal followers would implode, like @Linda Weide suggested.ЁЯдгЁЯдгЁЯдг
I wish them all toasty warm prison cells- sadly I don't get too many of my wishes.
I will ask the Universe to grant you a change in your luck!!
Agreed. Unfortunately, Putin takes good care of his health in a weird way. Are those quail eggs that he eats as omelets really so great for him?
https://www.afr.com/world/europe/the-private-habits-of-vladimir-putin-20140808-j75jm
Stress must follow all of them, but not the stresses we regular people have of worrying about getting things done or worrying if we will catch the train on time, but those of worrying whether someone in their immediate circle will betray them as they do everyone whom they perceive as not loyal, and stress from a certain sort of isolation. We can only hope for implosion of dictators, but I'd be happy is it started with Treacherous-treasonous-traitorous-tantruming-Trump!
Linda, those quail eggs of Putin reminds me of тАЬlet them eat cake!тАЭ And evidence shows that their entitled children need a taste of the knowledge and empathy of living conditions that Biden possesses. WeтАЩve got problems when students think the average wage is at least $250,000 (itтАЩs closer to $50,000).
https://www.thestreet.com/personal-finance/wharton-students-think-six-figure-salaries-are-american-average
" I'm melting! Melting! Oh, what a world! What a world! Who would have thought a good little girl like you could destroy my beautiful wickedness!"
@ Linda. To block them, we need to sweep.
To protect American democracy, reach out to millions of unregistered likely Democrats using a dedicated database using every outreach method possible (phone and text, postcard, email and targeted ad, and in-person too), where new Democratic voters will make the most impact тАУ in the most flippable states and districts.
https://www.fieldteam6.org/actions
Does these corporate billionaires even have a clue that when this autocrat Mob Don gets in power their taxes may get lowered but their payment to the тАЬBossтАЭ will be significant
HeтАЩll demand large amounts from the plutocrats for protection money, rather like Putin gets large handouts from RussiaтАЩs oligarchs.
Linda, if, as you term it the "Treacherous-treasonous-tantruming-traitor-Trump" regains power there will be a mass migration from the U.S., benefitting the receiving countries with billions of dollars in accounts, just as we are currently benefitting from the labor of immigrants coming to this country. I have already selected the country that I will go to, having a permanent residency card there already. MAGAs are not to be trusted in the least.
I have been wondering if there will be a great exodus between the time he may be elected and the inauguration. I just updated my passport.
We did that in 2020тАж
Can we go with you? ;) I don't even want to think about what we'll do if that man regains power.
ItтАЩs not necessarily easy to immigrate to other countries these days.
No, itтАЩs not. You have to have a sufficient amount of capital and marketable skills the country is seeking. In a way, it reminds me about one aspect of Hungary you donтАЩt hear about, and that is young and educated Hungarians are leaving Orb├бnтАЩs Christian Nationalist тАЬparadiseтАЭ for freer nations like Germany. Orb├бn seems to have modeled himself and his government on the government of Mikl├│s Horthy after the short lived governments of Mih├бly K├бrolyi and B├йla Kun. KunтАЩs origins unfairly led Protestant and Catholic Hungarians to blame all Jews for Kun, when many of them didnтАЩt support Kun at all, and around 5,000 were slaughtered in the wake of KunтАЩs fall.
Horthy called himself тАЬregentтАЭ of Hungary even though he expelled HungaryтАЩs last King Charles IV (Karl I of Austria) on two separate occasions when Charles and his wife Zita tried to return as monarchs. Charles was unwilling to engage in bloodshed to regain his crown, and after CharlesтАЩs death in Madeira in 1922, his son Otto didnтАЩt attempt to reclaim the crown. The victors of World War I were unwilling to see another monarch in Hungary, and Horthy was himself opposed to CharlesтАЩs return. Horthy was essentially dictator of Hungary and ran a national Christian conservative government with anti-Semitic policies. Hitler thought HorthyтАЩs anti-Semitic policies insufficiently stringent, and HitlerтАЩs armies invaded Hungary in 1944, establishing the Fascist Arrow Cross party, killing some Jewish Hungarians (including a notorious slaughter where Jews were forced at gunpoint to jump into the icy Danube, where many drowned,) and deporting many to death in the gas chambers of Auschwitz and other concentration camps. The Communists took over with StalinтАЩs assistance in 1946. Horthy died in the 1950s in Portugal, where he had fled with his wife and most of their family in 1944 after the Nazis invaded.
Orb├бn got into power after the Socialist Party got caught lying about economic conditions in Hungary. Orb├бn and his Fidesz Party were originally pro-democracy and George Soros paid for Orb├бn to study at Oxford in order to how civil democracies are governed. The right wing considers Soros as some sort of bogeyman, but Soros supports civil and social democracies. He does not support fascism, Communism, or Socialism. The real problem is,that the extreme right doesnтАЩt support democratic government. Orb├бn shamefully turned on Soros once he got into power, and he immediately set about to cement his power by turning press ownership over to his cronies, gerrymandering parliamentary districts to guarantee FideszтАЩs dominance and expelling the Central European University from Hungary to Austria. I really donтАЩt know if Orb├бn intended to run Hungary as an тАЬilliberal democracyтАЭ all along, or whether he acquired his ambitions along the way. In my view, heтАЩs dangerous and the EU needs to cut off their funding of Hungary until Orb├бn is expelled.
Thank you for this lesson. All I knew is that Orb├бn is a Roma and an opportunist. I was not aware he was mentored by Soros. Now he has strong opposition by Peter Magyar, who is polished and eloquent. I hope he does not get killed, like Navalny. Hungarians are waking up and Magyar is being listened too.
IтАЩve never heard any talk about Orb├бn being Roma. I have heard that his government is discriminatory toward Roma. His father was an agronomist, engineer and construction engineer and his mother a teacher and speech therapist. His grandfather was a docker and farmer. I am about a week older than he is.
Kathy: I apologize. I have good Hungarian friends in Croatia, who insist they know the family. They told me and I believed it. I have done the research. For three generations there's no evidence of Roma roots but, there are mention of "urban legends. " IT IS NEVER TOO LATE TO LEARN A LESSON.
How could it be that Orban was mentored by Soros? They have completely opposite political views, plus Orban is not fond of Jews.
I wrote you a reply....it is here somewhere. Now I cannot find it.
Summarising, and I double checked.
He was mentored by Soros in 1989. His turning on Soros has labeled him as anti-semitic. But he has stated he will not tolerate antisemitism (2017) and he iis VERY friendly with Netanyahu.
The man is an opportunist and a con man. His government has been labeled as a kleptocracy.
THERE ARE A FEW!! I HAVE BEE.N CHECKING!!
I fear that I am stuck if Trump becomes dictator, and I will lose my job. I wonтАЩt go into details as to why.
Kathy, we need to be afraid, of Trump AND his supporters. They are vicious and vengeful, at least many are.
I am willing to take that chance.
Richard, since my Social Security income doesn't give me a decent quality of life in the USA, I am already there with my permanent resident card.
Love your alliteration!
Will Rogers knew on Nov 26, 1932 тАЬMr. Hoover didnтАЩt know that money trickled up.тАЭ But Reagan knew in 1981 when he resurrected that schemeтАж a deliberate scam on the workers at the bottom and a windfall for the takers at the top. The junk bond fiasco of the later 80тАЩs was proof enough.
I recently saw a device depicted that the Roman Catholics used during the Inquisition to crush the hands of those writers and artists who wrote and drew things that the Vatican didn't like. Reagan essentially did the same thing in a sense - he used the tax laws and the power of his position to crush the economic lives of everyday Americans. The war between capital and labor goes on, with capital now having the upper hand.
Yes, Richard, and the Inquisition was a golden opportunity to grab wealth from those you envied by making accusations. Now we just have hedge funds buying up everything and making life difficult for many lesser folks.
How the nazis were so prosperous. I still heave at the mention of Mnuchin...
I was rereading Ken Follett's A Column of Fire, set in 1558-1605, where the Catholic Church and the Protestants can be so cruel to each other depending which faith the Monarchy supports. They burnt, drawed and quartered, beheaded, stretched on the rack, cut body parts off unanesthetised of course, etc... Yeech. It is mainly the Catholics at first, but the extremes of each group are just vicious. I agree about Reagan. When he became president I was in shock that Americans could vote someone basically for his star power into office even if he had done some seemingly good things as governor of California. I am so grateful that Biden finally is turning Reaganomics around. Yay!
I would be happy to hear what "seemingly good things" Reagan did as governor of California. I was one who did not see him as a savior.
They do it with velvet gloves so the pain will be muted and the perps seemingly innocuous, or even supportive...
In Spain, the Inquisition was established as a means of making money for the Spanish crown. Even saints like Teresa of Avila and Juan de la Cruz were wrongly regarded with suspicion. Spain ruined itself by expelling Jews from Spain, and as a Catholic it makes me ashamed they did so. Many headed for the Ottoman Empire, where they contributed to Ottoman prosperity and could openly practice their faith, despite having dhimmi status. Religious persecution often causes the persecuted to cling more to their faith. That was true under the penal laws in Ireland and England as well.
Richard, thank you. We can trace the demise of the average person and families to Reagan the petty, lazy minded , punch down charmer. He gave us the тАЬ Welfare Queen тАЬ and the beginning of union busting. George H W Bush nailed it тАЬ voodoo economics тАЬ. Many people never experienced the US economy before Reagan and his buddies began trickling down on the opportunity it offered the common person.And those that do remember are constantly being gaslighted into wondering if it was just our imaginations. Believing is seeing. And they rub our noses in it.
Pres. G.W. Bush (an amateur narcissist when compared to TFFG) was correct when at the White House Correspondents' Dinner on 3/31/2001 he said: "You can fool some of the people all of the time, and those are the ones you want to concentrate on." Thomas Frank researched and proved this point in his 2004 book, "What's the Matter with Kansas?"
"Reagan's revolution" was indeed the point in time that 'all that' accelerated into high gear. Actual revolutions by and for the "haves" in our nation happened again and again following our major wars that had to be paid for by someone. Reagan's 'revolution' was an adoption of a revolution of, by, and for the "haves" from WW2 bill resolution. WW2 bill resolution added steam to resentments of the "haves" from resolutions costs of WW1 and the Great Depression - all of course 'blamed' upon dems to their 'flock.' The flock then spreads the stated disease of disinformation onward to those less educated; add in other large constituencies, stir well, and therein you can see the growing constituencies, and leadership 'coalitions' who strive to produce the foul, misinformed "stew" we suffer today. >>*edit* > As I read further down, I can't help but to re-offer a quotation by GW Bush, offered to us by our fellow Richard Sutherland elsewhere in this string, where he offers this direct quotation; what you need to know is that 'this' quotation 'is' the gop leadership coalition's thoughts and approach to all elections. To whit: "Pres. G.W. Bush (an amateur narcissist when compared to TFFG) was correct when at the White House Correspondents' Dinner on 3/31/2001 he said: "You can fool some of the people all of the time, and those are the ones you want to concentrate on." Thomas Frank researched and proved this point in his 2004 book, "What's the Matter with Kansas?"
Even at 17 I was able to see what Reaganomics would do, destroy the middle class to enrich the wealthy. Unfortunately, not too many wanted to see it. ItтАЩs not a surprise to me weтАЩve reached the point where some plutocrats and the Republicans themselves have come to believe that self-government is no longer desirable to them. This is actually what weтАЩre up against, and manufacturers are engaging in greedflation and price hikes at the pump. They want to have us vote in a sociopath and narcissist who will destroy our republic for good and give them permanent control.
You were a wise teen, some oldsters in my family still haven't figured it out. They were like me, born poor, and had a struggle to make a decent life. Still they think the prosperity gospel is what Jesus advocated. And they can read...
Pastor Jim Wallis, author of the book, "The False White Gospel" said it perfectly. "If it's not good news for the poor, it's heresy. Period."
People mistakenly have believed that the morbidly wealthy will invest their tax cut funds and huge profits in their companies to generate more innovation, jobs, etc. But the morbidly rich don't do that; they buy back stock instead, a practice that used to be considered stock manipulation, which was illegal.
Nothing about supply-side, "voodoo" economics was good news for the poor or middle classes. It was and is reverse Robin Hood economics, stealing from the poor to further enrich the already rich.
тАЬMorbidly richтАЭ is so descriptive. How many multi-million dollar yachts do they need anyway?
Boy, did he nail it. My Mom used to say (often), the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. She nailed it too.
тАЬIf itтАЩs not good news for the poor, itтАЩs heresy. PeriodтАЭ. That says a lot, right there.
I want to read Rev. WallisтАЩs latest book. I am a subscriber to Sojourners Magazine.
"If it's not good news for the poor, it's heresy. Period." > I like that a lot Jenn. Thanks
I wasnтАЩt poor, but times were hard for us economically then, and my dad had lost at least 2 jobs, and my mother was pregnant with my youngest brother at the time.
My family has never bought into the prosperity gospel, and I think it only works for people like Joel Osteen who sell it. People on fixed incomes send money they can ill afford to people like Osteen and the various televangelists, and itтАЩs no wonder Osteen and televangelists can have such ostentatious lifestyles.
So true, my poor aunt (96) was sending five dollars to every idiot that sent her a "begging" letter. I said please don't do that, it's rich people stealing your money. She couldn't believe that people would lie about poor children. She was from another era.
Milton Friedman also deliberately ignored the spillover consequences of pursuit of shareholder benefit at any cost would have upon our communities. The decline of American manufacturing matters greatly, not only to the communities who lose the jobs, but to the nation as a whole. It leaves great social destruction in its wake.
Old Milton was at the head of a pack of financial wolves who preyed upon the population, pretending to be the "smartest men in the room."
Kathy, I've always admired your ability to say so much, with so few words. You may have missed your calling.
".... at any cost..." needs placed in some stronger terms somehow Kathy, as it explains so much about the depths and pain of this "race to the bottom" we find ourselves caught within. If "race to the bottom" sounds familiar, it should; Ross Perot sounded that alarm when we approached the NAFTA agreement. He was right, as I soundly agreed at the time. Too much was ignored; 'fast track' of any sort will always ignore too much, and certainly did. The gop leadership deep thinkers laid a clever trap that dems and progressives, who themselves were certain 'they' were the smartest folks in any room, walked right into. Since then, in the privacy of their "self affirming echo chambers" they blame it all on dems, progressives, and lefties. It worked, and moreso because democrats insist on abandoning truth, honesty, and plain dealing, fearing that answers are "too complicated." Sadly, that's where we are still at this moment in time. I fear that if dems don't break out with an extreme case of honesty and forthcoming, even at the great risk of losing, election '24 will be in doubt. Our trade agreements so very deeply harmed the greatest majority of the U.S. psyche, dems may never win back the faith they so badly need to regain of those who saw family generations egregiously harmed economically and it seems irreparably. I'm not in the least being hyperbolic in all this and have not been; I just couldn't get anyone to listen - for decades now. Another related trap has dems merrily skipping to their dooms right now.. One can't help those who won't listen... sigh..
I thought Perot was correct then as well.
You, being you, I'm not the least surprised that you thought so. From my training, I knew so.
Thomas Frank explains it in his 2004 book, "What's the Matter with Kansas." The wealthy and extreme right wing organizations use wedge issues (abortion, women's rights, homophobia and xenophobia [immigrants]) to induce the white Protestants to vote against their own best social and economic interests. Our school systems over the past 50 years have failed to teach the essence of what a democratic government is and how it operates along with critical thinking skills. In short, our public and private education systems have failed us in this regard.
You are absolutely correct Richard, public education has totally failed to educate the youth of America on how a democracy really works and what the responsibilities of each of its citizens are. The lack of understanding is a colossal failure that is now manifesting and will continue to do so for a long time to come. We canтАЩt blame people for not understanding what they werenтАЩt taught, when you think of how our founders were able to put together this country with the rudimentary education most of them had, todayтАЩs repugnantkin party is is absolutely incompetent when it comes to offering solutions to modern day problems.
I think that our educators took too much for granted. They assumed that all of us would act fairly and with goodwill toward all. Again, the tension between capital and labor will not go away. Neither will the will to impose one's religious/racist beliefs on the body politic.
Or the desire of some to force their religious beliefs on others. Mikey Weinstein of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation rightly explained there are two types of Christians, those motivated by the Great Commissiom, and the Christian Nationalists, including tnose who belong to the military, are motivated to seek more followers for their version of Jesus. The others are more Great Commandment types, and I freely admit to being a member of this group. I donтАЩt think everyone has to share my political or religious beliefs, but believe in action to help others who need it, not words.
Kathy, I was once a Christian, but we parted ways decades ago; but, I never left Matthew 25: 34-46. These few words encapsulate what government should be and do, in my opinion.
Just so you know, Republicans have been making war on public education for years. The Leandro case in NC was a suit against NC for failing to fairly educate students all across the state. NC lost that suit, but the legislature won't comply with school funding and instead gives public funds to charter schools, which do not perform any better than the public schools that have been inadequately funded at all levels from pre-K to higher education.
тАЬYouтАЩve got to be carefully taughtтАЭ. They knew it well.
They knew this from the time of BaconтАЩs Rebellion.
Yep, they basically manufactured the whole abortion issue to bring them to the table.
That was the doing of Paul Weyrich. Weyrich was a Roman-rite Catholic and extreme right winger who joined the Byzantine rite in Catholicism out of disgust with Vatican II. Evangelicals were indifferent on Roe v. Wade and the most prominent early anti-abortion advocates were Catholic, and I myself am Catholic, but also a Democrat. Paul Weyrich convinced the political Evangelicals to oppose abortion to disguise the fact that the political Evangelicals original opposition to Democrats was losing tax exemptions for segregation academies. Weyrich was opposed to ensuring that all Americans had the right to vote for the candidate of their choice, and openly said so. He also observed that his side did better when fewer people voted. The current Republican majority has gutted the Voting Rights Act, given its blessing to political gerrymandering, and is out to undo everything the civil rights movement achieved. Their allies in the states donтАЩt want schoolchildren learning the darker facts in American history, including the truth about the harshness of slavery or the mass slaughter of Native Americans.
Yep; Another "wedge issue" as Richard Sutherland, above тЖС, aptly names; "Wedge issues" that by design, set the bulk of us against each other. The opposition 'think tanks' literally 'brain storm' for this divisive stuff.
The funding to public education is dismal. The higher the need, the more they cut. I see it first hand.
Starving public education of funds, steering the money to charter schools where the children are indoctrinated, is part of their plan to have a controllable and uninformed populace.
And they cause such chaos. The economic holes, the stepping stones, are miles apart. If a family isnтАЩt able, there is isnтАЩt anywhere to go. We can feed and help clothe children at school. But where do the children have to go when things are past difficult at home? To the ditches and alleyways, or to a friendтАЩs place. Where do single parents go for support?
The level of arrogance playing out is astounding.
I teach in a very low income neighborhood. For 30 + years, I have been in the classroom. Never have I ever seen a year such as this. Even driving to work has become treacherous. I can handle a great deaI, but these days I am grateful for every day I make it back home.
Holy s***, Jeanie. That is horrifying.
Absolutely. Wish this were not so blatantly obvious.
I think it has failed our children miserably.
It absolutely has. Much of my education was achieved outside the classroom when it came to historical matters.
Yes
Not to mention GOP followers spending hard earned money on golden sneakers and poor quality, word of Trump, bibles. I feel pity for the deluded fools who canтАЩt understand where their best interests lie.
No pity on my part. Instead I am angry that they are so willing to sell out in order to worship an Idiot who makes them feel superior!
I think it isn't always willingness. I think tffg is such an experienced corrupt con artist he actually has conned a bunch of the less informed.
It makes me sad to think the system, which has been stacked against so many for so long, has made people so desperate they would believe this garbage.
I remember asking a friend who the whacko snake oil salesman was that came down a gold looking escalator announcing his presidency.
Have you ever heard of a president selling trivial like trump does? Presidents are supposed to be dignified not hucksters of Goya products on the Resolution Desk. I do know old actors sell life insurance.
Karen, you are so right! There is absolutely nothing dignified about treacherous-treasonous-traitorous-tantruming-Trump!
Who would want to buy TrumpтАЩs tacky sneakers or his white nationalist Bible? Trump is as always out for his own well being. Raymond Arroyo of EWTN and sometimes Fox News (he periodically fills in for Laura Ingraham,) embarrassed himself by suggesting African American voters might be more likely to vote for Trump because of his gold sneakers. His racial ignorance was utterly embarrassing. African American voters are intelligent enough to know that voting for Trump is not in their best interests, and as a rule, they vote pragmatically, as Chauncey DeVega notes.
Meanwhile, the President is doing everything he can to improve the lives of the people. while the Mike Maga team is playing obstruction games. If only Joe can find a way to make the majority he's working for "feel superior" to the Big Lying bible grifter's worshippers.
If by "superior" you mean "brighter" then I think it is working.
And, I feel sorry for those of us who may be the recipients of the 'deluded fools' beliefs.
And here we are again....I hear people who are holding fast to their stories, who praised Trump for his early economic successes...which were really Obama's, not saying a word about Biden's. Or whose talking point after the undisputable success of Biden's economics is inflation. As it seems...even low inflation is still a talking point for them.
I don't feel pity for them. I try to get through to those I can by putting reality into words. If I get through to even one, it's worth the effort, but I don't pity any of them. I feel disgust more than anything.
Celeste, I don't feel pity either in ways because death star has given them carte blanche to be openly the nasty people they have always been.
Hate fueled by all the "truth" they listen to 24/7 and swallow without chewing.
In this world of moneyed power, as in the Robber Baron days, itтАЩs time to reverse course. Time to learn from Europe where our childhood poverty would be a scandal.
Terry, this always reminds me of the scene in Repo Man when the guy's parents are watching a TV evangelist and sending him all the money.
Loved that film. Yes, great scene.
exactly. no one gets too that level without exploiting others. NO ONE. Years of saying that taxes are theft of one's money go up and down the economic spectrum. The poor that support the conservative /libertarian agenda want to stick to the government not seeing that these same people professing their agenda are sticking it to them(the poor).
Rickey, while Sam Walton (founder of Walmart) did well by his vision of stores that combined groceries, automotive goods and other items, he was not ostentatious (drove an old pickup to drink coffee with folks in Rogers, Arkansas). A friend says that he didnтАЩt employ the dirty tricks used today by his decendants and treated his initial employees well. Now the employees have different shifts weekly so that they canтАЩt have a second job. ThereтАЩs a reason that so many qualify for federal assistance (food stamps, Medicaid, etc ).
Sam had good intentions, however, money corrupts. As the empire grew from those small stores and into the larger and now super, that all changed. That one company was responsible for hollowing out rural America with their market strength. Not so sure that Sam ever meant for that to happen, but it did start while he was alive. I saw in some communities in the plains of Texas where after stores that had been in some communities for years, they began closing shop leaving a wasteland of retail possibilities behind them. This causes residents to have to drive further for goods. Amazon then came in to provide in that void and you can hardly not see Amazon trucks now along with FedEx and UPS delivering goods that people could once get locally. This works well for most things, except fresh food which is the lifeblood of the human body.
The scheduling of workers is right on target for most all retail. In some companies, they offer employees some say in scheduling so they can do other jobs or have family time. A much better solution- pay a livable wage, but that would mean less bloated profits available for shareholders and executives.
Yep....watched the individual owned dress shops, shoe stores, hardware stores disappear from main street after Walmart came to town in rural Kansas. It was so hard to watch those families close the doors of their business which supported their and other families for decades.
Rickey, a major additional downside to the retail deserts beyond fresh food deserts is the effects on the environment of all those additional Amazon, UPS, and FedEx trucks spewing their exhausts and the mountains of added packing materials many of which are not recyclable. Shopping via Amazon and general mail order is bad for the environment!
Oh man Mary, is this a reason why low wage workers are put on rotating schedules? To keep the government money supporting them coming in? I had no idea. Sheesh.
That is one reason, another is for the convenience of the employer at the expense of the employees.
Sam Walton is a union busting shithead. Germany got rid of Walmart quick, because they did not want to follow German labor standards of benefits. Also, Walmarts were buying German cars for less in Italy and then selling them under the price German dealers were selling them for, and they got rid of Walmart quickly. Too many cultural differences of standards. To me Walmart coming into a town and destroying all their businesses is awful. It is a Catch 22 as well. People in these towns are too poor to afford mom and pop businesses, so they go to Walmarts, which makes there be no competition so then Walmart can do whatever it wants, and keep everyone working for them poor, while they live on the obscene wealth they rake in off of everyone's backs.
Sam is dead, and the family owns shares in WalMart, but they donтАЩt run the company any more. That being said, Sam was very antiunion, and so are the executives who run the company. The one thing the current execs do that Sam didnтАЩt do was to eliminate Sam WaltonтАЩs preference to buy American made products in favor of Chinese made products.
And ruining educational systems continues to keep those at the financial bottom clueless.
BK, this has always been the way of plutocrats who used the idea of white vs. black to make it difficult for poorer whites to make common cause with slaves and free blacks, the old divide and conquer and let's keep the pot boiling with culture wars while large problems go unsolved. As for trickle down, that has always looked to me like something yellow. We have a large sewer/street project going on in front of our house and the length of our street. It is mostly funded with federal dollars, yet large numbers of the workers who aren't doing the scut work have items on their cars that indicate that they are MAGAs. Of course, any scut work is done by people speaking Spanish. They did the finishing work on the cement sidewalks, the roof on the pump house, and the landscaping.
This tactic goes all the way back to the end of BaconтАЩs Rebellion in the 17th century, when slaveholders and landowners set out to destroy any potential solidarity between poor indentured white servants and enslaved people.
BK, you also need to remember that the top 50% of income tax payers bring in almost all federal income tax collected, with the top few percent covering the lion's share of that. This has been true for a long time, and it's also an indication of the degree of wealth inequality in America. The lower third of earners get tax credits and rebates. Payroll and sales taxes on the other hand are a different matter. They are generally regressive, falling as a greater share of spending income on the less well to do. However common grocery items and prescription drugs are tax free.... mixed bag. It remains however that historic tax rates need to be re-asserted and made effective. Lower taxes paid by the super rich remember are legally provided as economic incentives by governments, of all stripes, and have been for the longest time.
Frank, it's good in theory (lower taxes for the wealthy) but in practice it doesn't work. How do we know this? Look at the $34 trillion federal debt. When Reagan took office in 1981 the federal debt was less than $1 trillion. Trump and those formerly known as Republicans, passed a $2 trillion tax break for the wealthy. Trump bragged about it and the debt increased another $8.2 trillion during his four years in office. When the marginal tax rate was 95% back in the 1930's, it didn't deter the wealthy from engaging in economic activity. It may have even made them strive harder. We need to tax the wealthy and the large corporations much, much more. No one in 1,000 lifetimes can spend $1 billion on personal effects.
Correct. The other thing Reagan did was to tax Social Security benefits to make up for that shortfall. We must fight Republican efforts to destroy Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. We also need to remove the tax on Social Security and remove the income cap on the amount of income taxable to Social Security. For many of us, 401ks are not going to help us and we wonтАЩt have enough in benefits to avoid living in poverty. More people will forego retirement, while it will become a benefit available to the wealthy only. Nikki HaleyтАЩs call to raise the age for collecting Social Security is a bad idea because for many blue collar workers who do physical labor, their bodies are worn out by the time they reach their mid or late fifties. Trump is sociopathic enough to eliminate Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid and he will do it. What youтАЩll see is an increase in the number of dying and homeless people unable to afford medical care or housing.
Ours is/are the lucky generation(s) in that we could earn a reasonable living. I read recently from our generation(s) is/are providing financial support to our grown children. I certainly have. A lot.
thanks Richard, but i was in no way advocating lower taxes for the wealthy, actually the opposite. I do remember those days, long ago, when marginal topmost tax rates were 95%.
I agree. The wealthy can and should pay a lot more. They take advantage of the benefits of our government and infrastructure and they can well afford to pay a lot more as their fair share for what they use.
A lot of the so called tax breaks are meant to be economic incentives or subsidies, it'd be interesting to see a notated laundry list on this
тАЬтАжthe top 50% of income tax payers bring in almost all federal income tax collected,тАЭ
You speak of this like theyтАЩre doing us some kind of favor.
If all that income was not flowing to the top 1-3%, but trickled down (as RтАЩs famously promise ALL THE DAMN TIME!! AND NEVER PRODUCE IT) taxes would still be paid into our government. In fact, MORE taxes would be paid on that pot of income because low/mid income earners do not offshore their money nor do they spend gazillions of $$ looking for ways to avoid paying taxes.
Proving once again that concentrated wealth is a pox on our country.
My concern is that it will wind up costing us our polity and we will become a theocratic dictatorship under a narcissistic sociopath like Trump and his followers.
note, i did say the current situation also reflects wealth inequality, I'm not trying to be an apologetic for this. You might not like to hear this, but most of that wealth is tied up in working capital essential to running these large corporations, not that this concentration doesnt free up a lot of personal luxury spending. Curiously, political spending is a relatively small fraction of all this available wealth, though it certainly undermines the concept of "one person one vote".
We need to reverse the three decisions that helped to tilt the playing field in favor of unlimited funding and dark money. Citizens United, and also Buckley v. Valeo (1976) and First National Bank of Boston v. Bellotti (1978.) The Buckley in Buckley v. Valeo was James Buckley, the elder brother of William F. Buckley. James wanted to spend an unlimited amount of his own money on his NY senate campaign, and he lost. It reminds me of how Steve Forbes spent an unlimited amount of his own money on his presidential campaign, but he never could win primaries.
Another thought is about republicans do not to increase funding for the IRS. Basically, it would make it more efficient BUT it would have more auditors to audit the BIG tax payers like trump. This cost more, but the payoff is much bigger. us middle class are prime targets-easy tax returns to check but smaller dividends.
Very good pointsЁЯСН
I advocate getting rid of the income tax and replacing it with a VAT similarly administered via reporting requirements that would cover all business transactions including services at a flat rate. See New Hampshire's Business Enterprise Tax. Also the Michigan Single Business Tax, now repealed. A consumption tax, yes, but not a Sales Tax on goods alone at the point of retail sale. The largest component of base being payroll. You could also call this the GNP tax since collectively the tax base sums to private sector GNP. What else is there to tax ?
.....Unfortunately there is no point in discussing tax policy.
These taxes are regressive.
Incorrect. Sales taxes on retail goods are regressive. Services make up a proportionally larger share of the rich man's consumption budget than that of the poor. Taxing the provision of services along with goods at every level in the supply chain and across all sectors in the economy is not regressive. Consumption. It's what Americans do. Consume. Voraciously. And since WWII the US economy has steadily shifted to services and continues to do so. Increasingly that is where wealth is generated as the affluent pay other people to do things for them. Lawyers, accountants, cleaning services, psychoanalysts, fortune tellers, tatoo artists, entertainers, captains and crews for private planes and boats. That is where the money is in this economy characterized by great income and wealth inequality. Tax spending on this along with everything else. Tax the generation of wealth in America via consumption. Don't tax wage earners.
"What's mind-numbing is that the low-to-middle-income side of the GOP base cares zero that their billionaires "pay an average of 8.2% [in] federal taxes" while they are paying 2 to 3+ times that to make up for it."
Mindboggling to say the least.