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Today's Top News
The People's Budget vs. The Plutocracy
Increasingly, the debate in Washington about budgets and deficits is looking like little more than a kabuki dance, with each Party playing its part, and the press orchestrating the choreography to make it appear authentic. The real issues and questions America faces are being ignored, while hypocrisy and duplicity take the stage. This raises questions that are begging for answers. Here’s a few worth considering.
How have the people been convinced that debt and deficits—medium and long-term problems to be sure – have suddenly become a short-term crisis? Especially since every economist not employed by a right-wing think tank is practically screaming that austerity in the midst of a jobs crisis is a form of self-destructive economic insanity.
Why are we locked in a dance with disaster – a full-fledged economic disaster – over defaulting on our national debts? At a minimum, a default would increase interest rates on everything, acting like a giant brake on our economy, and according to the CBO adding to our national deficit. Republicans claim to be playing this dangerous game of brinksmanship because the deficit poses a dire threat to our economy, yet their policies, their tactics, and a default will increase the deficit. Can you say hypocrisy?
How can Republicans get away with cynically posturing about the debt ceiling, after nearly unanimously voting for the Ryan bill, which requires raising the debt ceiling by trillions of dollars several times over the next decades? For that matter, how in the hell can they have even a scrap of credibility on this issue when they ran up the vast majority of our debt. Oh, and while we’re at it, why were Republicans silent on the debt for decades – indeed, Cheney famously said, “Reagan proved deficits don’t matter.” Apparently, deficits aren’t a problem until a Democrat assumes the Presidency.
Why are people blithely unaware of the dire implications and extreme hypocrisy of the Ryan Budget? This compilation of plutocratic pornography doesn't balance the budget until 2063 and runs up an astounding $62 trillion in additional debt in the meantime, mostly on giveaways to the uber-rich, paid for by cuts to programs that benefit working and middle class Americans. The press reacted to this plutocratic wet dream by calling it “courageous.”
Why is a perfectly sound and popular solution to our budget crisis and our long-term debt ceiling being ignored? The People's Budget eliminates the deficit by 2021, while protecting Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and a variety of other social programs, using policies that the majority of Americans support. Yet it is being virtually ignored by the Press and both Parties, while Ryan and the gang of six’s budgets get big play. Both of these budgetary absurdities actually cut taxes in the name of balancing the budget. Huh? Look, if the goal is simply to eviscerate government, then let’s have that debate, instead of trying to achieve it through a stealth attempt in response to a faux crisis.
Finally, how can deregulation and tax cuts for the rich be posited as a solution to the recent economic catastrophe, when these were the very policies that caused it? Is the antidote for cyanide more cyanide? We’ve tried this approach three times, first in the late 1800’s, next in the 1920’s, and more recently, over last thirty years. Each time it ended in disaster. The first time resulted in the Panic of 1893 and the depression which followed it. The second caused the Great Depression of the 30’s. And our latest sojourn into rightwing madness resulted in the Great Recession. That’s three times we tried conservative, laissez-faire policies featuring deregulation, low taxes for the rich and weak governments, and three of the biggest economic collapses in our history to show for it. At what point do empirical facts trump rightwing talking points?
The answer to these questions is both sad and simple.
Republicans have been running a 30-year scam to vilify government, glorify the private sector, distract the public with wedge issues, and take over the press, while Democrats have run like sissies from any hint of confrontation.
But Republicans have only been carrying their plutocratic overlords’ water. Indeed, corporations have funded a coordinated takeover of the Republican Party, the media, and the machinery of government.
This fact, ultimately, explains the answers to the questions above.
But there’s one question remaining. What is the source of Democratic complicity in this toboggan ride to national hell? Are they as cowardly as they seem, or are they simply playing their pre-appointed role in the whole sordid scheme.
With every new pre-emptive compromise by Obama, with every weak-sister protest by Congressional Democrats – followed closely by capitulation – and with their collective silence on the People’s Budget, the answer to that question gets increasingly clearer by the day.
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45 Comments so far
Show AllI love to see a pole done to see how many Amerikans have even heard of the peoples budget. My guess is the number would be in the single digits or low teens at the best. A few weeks back someone called into NPR's Diane Rehm show and mentioned it and she had not even heard of it.
As far as I can tell the Amerikan public is one of the most heavily propagandized populations on the planet, and they don't even know it.
I'm afraid you're right on all counts.
Not exactly... as it would be a POLL that would need to be done. The other kind of pole might make for a decent offensive, if enough people used one to knock down the door to one of those closed-door, corporations only, serious policy discussions.
Pole vs Poll. You got me. Oops...
Agree on all accounts. I wonder whether M$M and the remaining Democrats' silence on the "People's Budget" is because they know the proposal is just a marketing tool by the Democrats to attract independent supporters. My problem with the proposal and who submitted it is that the Congressional Progressive Caucus uses its name to call itself "progressive" which it isn't and now it presents a "People's Budget" when the "people" know little about it. In other words, marketing gimmicks. I'm not saying the proposal is good or bad, but it could have been presented when the Democrats controlled the House, and I question the timing.
That's a pretty safe guess, I'd say.
It is truly astounding to see the American people sitting on their hands while our most important social programs are placed on the chopping block. Why is there no popular rebellion as we saw in Greece? Don't Americans know that they are going to grow old some day and are going to have to live on Social Security and Medicare? What are they going to do then, once they are too old to fight back?
I've been living outside of the US for a few years now, and every day, I find a new reason never to go back to that place. It's a fascist shithole, and the propaganda you have to deal with is unbearable.
Note to author: the democrats had the largest majorities in decades and held the House, Senate and White House and still rolled over to the rethugs. After the last election instead of actually passing a budget in the lame duck session what happened? They extended the Bush tax cuts and said let's make the repub's actually try governing and Here We Are.
Are people really surprised by this sham game of 3 card monte?
Even when the dems are pushing cuts to Social Security - and are such pathelogic liers they can't even articulate that SS is Not adding to the federal debt and that spending excess SS funds spent in the General Fund is a tax increase on the working and middle class.
All the while spouting Shared Sacrifice while cutting taxes on the richest EVEN MORE.
And people that can still support EITHER party are the true fucking retards.
I'd have to agree.
Mt Don:
You said:
"are such pathelogic liers"
How about they are such pathological liars.
RVR Walker was on record, here in this forum, for pointing out from the get-go, that the very metrics you've related would pose a major PROBLEM for Obama. That he'd wait until there was a Republican majority to grant him cover, that way the right-wing policies he was in office to satisfy, would be done under the cover of "The big bad right wing bullies made me do it."
When we run the videotape backwards, it becomes ominous and chilling to recognize that the 911 trigger set up the pretext for a massive Homeland Security operation. Then, when those who planned all of this, down to letting The Chicago School Disaster Capitalism Doctrine loose on U.S. citizens, they'd have the goods on any would-be trouble makers or potential rabble-rousers in advance, thanks to all those domestic spy programs alleged to make us all safer.
One of the scariest movies I ever viewed was a Hitchcock (I think?) based on a serial killer who targeted nurses. The story followed a nurse administering to a patient on home care. He was inside an oxygen tent. At one point she was to be relieved by another nurse, and so she told her assistant that she would go down into the basement to get some supplies (to get things ready for the substitute nurse). Once she entered the basement, she saw that a window had been left open, and footprints in the snow indicated an INTRUDER was in the house. The serial killer was disguised as her assistant, and had already murdered the person who was supposed to relieve her.
The analogy is.. Obama is that disguised nurse's assistant, in a metaphorical way. Here, all along, citizens think the "nurse" is taking care of them, when in actuality, another serial killer has entered "the house."
Dear SiouxRose, I don't know about the movie but the original story was written by Agatha Christie.
I really enjoy your posts.
mtdon,
Exactly.
We don't need a third party; we need a SECOND party!.
We've only got one corporate party with two different size right wings.
We need to rebuild "the entire system of civilization" via a massive organized movement. We need all brand new party's that will naturally evolve out of that likely tumultuous and long-term process. And the sooner we get busy, the better for future generations and the health of the planet. At this point wasting time and energy tinkering with reforms (e.g., 3rd party's) is a recipe for long-term disaster.
Why is the "People's Budget" being ignored? Not a hard question to answer. Because it contains tax increases. Tax increases are now as unpopular as tobacco. Neither side wishes to be associated with them including our President. He'd rather accept increased poverty and "austerity" for the majority of his citizens then be seen as promoting tax increases for those that can and should be forced to pay their real share. But then his contributors are his first priority not the citizens or the health of this nation.
More realistically and effectively, articles should be titled and address: "People's democracy vs. disguised Empire":
Or ---- then we could just recognize that our former country (and others like UK, Israel, et al) have now been totally captured and are now fully controlled by a disguised global corporate/financial/militarist EMPIRE, which hides behind the facade of its bought and owned TWO-Party "Vichy" faux democratic government (aided by its corporatist media), and that this causal cancer is the source of all our "identity politic", "symptom issues" --- which the ruling Empire loves to see gutless and complicit liberals waste their time chasing around (like dogs chasing their tails) in stead of simply exposing, confronting, and surgically excising the cancerous tumor of EMPIRE.
Apparently gutless-wonder, Obama and his motley crew of Demo fools, are doing a great job, as the second-team "Vichy" cons, in keeping most of the people confused and hoping for the best most of the time, while they continue the help disguise this global corporate/financial/militarist EMPIRE by never even whispering the word 'empire' -- except as Obama did in his deceitful speech on the reasons to invade Libya, when he claimed the exact opposite by lying and saying, "we're not there for Empire" [which reminded me of the old SNL skit in which the land shark knocks on the door and replies to the question of "Who's there" with the obvious lie, "It's not the land-shark".
These FOE's (friends of Empire) are lying through their teeth in the insane sham of pretending that our country is a democracy rather than what it really is --- an EMPIRE.
By merely getting this well disguised occupying Empire out in the open, we, the vast majority of average, middle-working/class Americans, can begin to do what the French resistance did to the occupying Nazi Empire that installed a crude, first-generation, and single-party "Vichy" government to hide that earlier and less guileful controlling Nazi Empire.
Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine
Liberty & democracy
over
violent
empire
New America People's Party 2012 (our last chance)
PS. once we get rid of the GD Empire we can rationally address budgets -- since the budget won't be being defined and set entirely by the global corporate/financial/militarist EMPIRE for its exclusive benefit, and by its Empire-whore politicians of both "Vichy" parties!
On another thread, someone (der) posted this is all about "buypartisanship". Perfect nutshell.
Mike Ruppert, who used to run the website fromthewilderness and whose posts introduced me to the concept of PeakOil,(amongst other concepts) now runs the website collapsenet which has free and subscriber content. He says forget politics of every stripe,it is time to hunker down, building lifeboat community. I don't have $ to subscribe and haven't come up with a suitable barter yet but the free content is great. MR has always been prescient and is a survivor, so I'm proceeding on the premise he's right, to the degree I am able. I think it is extremely important to spiritually prepare for this. We are going to need a whole new paradigm to construct and maintain relationships to EVERYTHING not just people but the entire Earth. Derrick Jensen and many others are on this track, as well. That's why I L.O.V.E. your party name as it shows its intent. I just pray it's very well established up there where you live amongst my cousins :-)
netminnow, thanks for your comments and continued concern for Mainers.
Yes, we have lots of L.O.V.E. here in Maine because despite what Michelle Bachman said about the First American Revolution starting with the 'shot heard round the world in Concord, NH, here in Maine the Second American Revolution is already starting!
Hope you get the chance to visit your relatives in Maine. Maybe you can time your visit to enjoy the recall of our royalist governor, LePage?
Best, to you and yours,
Alan
NET: You're onto something, and thanks for the link. It's a Trifecta, and hard to say which will hit hardest first:
1. The collapse of the US economy... as the rich steal the lifeboats and everyone else's supply before heading off... leaving the rest of us to the icebergs waiting on the course THEY set.
2. The collapse of nature, loss of harvests, vicious storms, polluted waters, and other radical variables that will increasingly destabilize key elements of our lives.
3. The collapse of any indication of a legitimate government, apart from that which invents laws to make theft, murder, and sabotage quasi-legal.
My sister and I have purchased water filters and seeds. A lot will have to come down to barter. Whether they pass this debt deadline, or not, world markets probably understand that the U.S. economy is tethered to two things: Wall Street & the MIC, and neither produces anything worth a shit. Meanwhile, nature burns, writhes, and rumbles...
What's amazing is how many on this site, would prefer to babble on about elections as utlimate race, rather than speak about the things that matter far more... long after Obama's body is laid inside a tomb, the radioactive embers now exposed for all sentient life to breathe, will still gather in the winds.
P.S. ALAN: Great post!
I too have started to filter all my water here while I am visiting my son in Saskatoon. We have a great community garden on very rich black river deposit loam that has not seen toxins since it is at the top off our local drainaige basin. I just filled our veggie bin with; kale, basil, large leaf lettuce, carrots, beets, swiss chard, and assorted other herbs. Made a stir - steam fry .... all local except for BC wild salmon (frozen).... vvv good.
Glad to hear you are preparing for what we at common dreams have been sharing for a good while.
glendon
What's going on today? We seem to have a lot of local "militia" fanatics on the board today.
I wouldn't fear for Israel's sovereignty, I suggest they are the global financial interests of the world today. Their survival and dominance in their area of the world is totally ensured. And they hold sway over the western world as well. As was recently demonstrated by the Greeks in delaying and holding off the Gaza Flotilla.
I suggest you've seen too many Star Wars movies.
Yes, they have members in the global oligarchy of unlawful owner/operators of global EMPIRE. That is all. They have no more loyalty to Israel, or Israelis, or Jews, than do the wallstreet faction of oligarchy have to us in the U.S. Israel is a chesspiece on the board. Nothing more. They serve as the fuse for WWIII, should that scenario be deemed "needful". They will be sacrificed without the oligarchs even bothering to look up from their spreadsheets. Just another move in the empire game.
We MUST understand that EMPIRE is totally divorced from national/tribal/cultural/ethnical colorations. It is even divorced from class considerations. It is a pathology. Indeed, they use this diversity as a weapon to divide and conquer "we the people", everywhere. They are a group of traitors to humanity in all of its' diversities.
Hmmm
cutting social welfare programs is a tax increase for the poor. Cutting taxes to the rich is a tax increase for the poor (the money still must be generated from somewhere) The FEDS criminal 100 year manipulation of the US dollar which has lead to its value declining by 98% since 1913 is a massive TAX INCREASE for the poor. Lowering pollution and safety standards is a TAX INCREASE to the poor. Bailing out wall street is a TAX INCREASE to the poor. The phony wars on drugs terror etc. are TAX INCREASES to the poor.
In short the 1% is in the process of stealing every single penny earned by the working class above the amount required for subsistence. And in short order they will have achieved 95% of their goal. Wake up people START SAY NO!!
Loving the Re-frame. I will be using this, ddearborn. Thanks.
After Martial Law and the takeover of all communications systems, the massive, nation-wide death by starvation and disease taking place will only be learned of by word of mouth and ... personal experience. However, perhaps there's another turning in the offing. Time and events will tell.
What you mean with all the broadband subscribers pay for connectivity they can be cut off at any time? I'd think they could negotiate for lesser fees if that's the case.
And why exactly would martial law be instituted? Are we all seen as "terrorists"?
"But there’s one question remaining. What is the source of Democratic complicity in this toboggan ride to national hell? Are they as cowardly as they seem, or are they simply playing their pre-appointed role in the whole sordid scheme."
Politicians need corporate bribes to get re-elected and keep their jobs. The people have no money to bribe politicians, hence they have no representation. What is so mysterious about that?
Direct democracy
"But there’s one question remaining. What is the source of Democratic complicity in this toboggan ride to national hell? Are they as cowardly as they seem, or are they simply playing their pre-appointed role in the whole sordid scheme."
That is the real question isn't it? I've been asking myself that since they confirmed Bernanke.
"The people have no money to bribe politicians, hence they have no representation."
But the people DO have the money!
Obama got 69,456,897 votes in 2008.
He wants $1billion for 2012.
Split evenly, that comes to $14.40 (rounded to the penny) per voter-donor.
But suppose he can't get everyone from 2008 to shell out for him (unsurprisingly). :
50% Obama vote payout : $28.79 per voter-donor
25% : $57.59 per voter-donor.
10% : $143.97 per voter-donor.
1% : $1439.74 per voter-donor.
Even that last high $ amount can be made easier by dividing the donations over time. How about one donation per month for one year? That will get Obama his goal by the convention at least.
1% : $1439.74 / 12 = $119.98 per voter-donor per month.
Or,
10% : $143.97 / 12 = $12.00 (rounded) per voter donor per month.
25% : $57.59 / 12 = $4.80 per voter-donor per month.
50% : $28.79 / 12 = $2.40 per voter-donor per month.
100% : $14.40 / 12 = $1.20 per voter-donor per month.
Obama and the Blues can get their $ from the people if they want to. They just don't want to. ;)
-matti.
"Obama and the Blues can get their $ from the people if they want to. They just don't want to.."
Not any more and not as reliably. Big Money comes easily to politicians. They don't need to campaign for it.
Sure they do.
They have to suck up to the lobbyists constantly to get it!
Do you deny my numbers?
Do you deny that if Obama would just do the simplest thing -what the folks who voted for him want him to do- he could raise his $ from small Citizen donations no problem?
If you do not deny these two things, do you then accept that Obama, and the Blues, and the Reds, choice to succor "Big Money" is a CHOICE to raise the $ they want one way when another is available to them?
This is the crux of the point:
Obama doesn't even have the bad excuse of reneging on his promises to the 2008 voters to gain Corporate $ if he can gain equivalent $ by KEEPING HIS PROMISES to them.
Answer?
-matti.
Politicians get over 90% of their funding from WS. Why should Obama be any different?
That's not good enough.
I'm afraid I'm going to have to count that as an evasion. ;)
Answer my questions, and I'll answer yours.
We really need a regime change and if these oligarchs touch Social Security or Medicare we shall have it. Note that Obama has already defunded half of our FICA savings. There is no way I will vote for this GOP lackie in 2012.
John Atcheson asks the question, "What is the source of Democratic complicity?"
even as he participates in maintaining the illusion which conceals the answer.
The answer is that Washington is the main church of the religion of so-called Free Market Capitalism and the democrats are acolytes who work in tandem with the republicans.
This church celebrates predation and wanton greed.
The democrats are not hapless or cowardly. They are liars.
The main difference between the democrats and the republicans is that the republicans do not see any reason to lie as much as the democrats.
The communion chalice is filled by bleeding the less powerful and participation in the communion is restricted to those who accelerate the bleeding.
If you do not have the ability to see this fact or you choose to not see this fact, then your writing has to be seen as being proselytizing.
This church is catastrophe.
Fine analysis of the situation--I would add this:
The Democrats who seem to be sissies are simply taking the same bribes from the same sources as the Republicans and are playing us for suckers. They expect us to work for them in elections, donate our money and vote for them. I have a new tact, I've voted, donated and volunteered for over forty years to the Democrat cause. In the future I plan to just vote the straight Republican ticket in the hope that once they have screwed over the worker class to starvation a revolt will come--the only method for change for powerless citizens in this corrupt cesspool of governance!
The point everyone seems to miss: The lawmakers and the corporate interests that pay them off are doing just fine the way things are. There is absolutely no reason to change anything, unless it would be to cut back on social programs--always a winner with the Simon Legree crowd. You can wave the "people's budget" around as much as you like, the people making the laws hold you in disdain and contempt and will do nothing to change the status quo--they like the status quo--and the only thing you can do to make them happy is quietly die without putting a burden on the healthcare system. Short of revolution, nothing changes (for them, for you it just keeps getting worse).
Number One, the people's budget would not come close to solving our long-term problems, which are potentially very severe.
>
Number Two, the people's budget has no chance of passing in a plutocracy.
>
As a result, what is the point of this article? Another unwitting exercise in avoiding more personally demanding but potentially "real" solutions?
>
Standard liberals and progressives are very good at wasting time and effort on "soft" and "academic" ideas that have no chance of solving anything of real import. Standard conservatives on the right are not even worth mentioning because their values are typically so venal and uncompassionate that it's enough to make one question the human race.
>
The constant highfalutin dance around extremely important issues by leaders of academia, business, nonprofits, and government while "Rome is burning" is now becoming literally nauseating.
>
We KNOW WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE. We need to start doing it. Believe it or not, the water is about to boil, Mr. and Mrs. Frog.
Without fundamental monetary reform, what we've got is what we'll continue to get and it will keep getting worse.
HR 6550 The National Emergency Employment Defense Act.
An email I just got from the American Monetary Institute. I sent the requested message to my "representatives" and few others as well. I used the body of their message with a few minor modifications.
My message;
Next Tuesday, July 26th from 10:00 am to 11:30 am in the Cannon House Office Building in Room 402, Congressman Dennis Kucinich will host Dr. Kaoru Yamaguchi to give a presentation of his paper that concludes how HR 6550 will solve the national debt problem and function far better than our current debt-based money system.
Genuine progress on economic and budgetary issues cannot possibly be made without fundamental monetary reform.
This briefing is intended specifically for Congresspeople and their aides. I strongly encourage you to attend.
Richard William Posner
The email;
AMI
show details 2:13 PM (8 hours ago)
Dear Friends,
We need your help.
Our best opportunity for educating our Congress and the public is next week! Next Tuesday, July 26th from 10:00am to 11:30am in the Cannon House Office Building in Room 402, Congressman Dennis Kucinich will host Dr. Kaoru Yamaguchi to give a presentation of his paper that concludes how HR 6550 will solve the national debt problem and function far better than our current debt-based money system.
This briefing is intended specifically for Congresspeople and their aides. We ask you to strongly encourage your Congresspeople to attend. Call their offices Friday or email them at:
House https://writerep.house.gov/writerep/welcome.shtml
Senate http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm?OrderBy=state&Sort=ASC
You have asked us how you can help gain monetary reform. This is how!
American Monetary Institute
--
"Over time, whoever controls the money system
controls the nation."
Stephen Zarlenga
Director
American Monetary Institute
To receive notices for free AMI materials,
sign up for our email list at http://www.monetary.org/
(224) 805-2200
You're very right. It is one of eight pillars needing rapt attention to try and save the planet. We are literally screwed with this monetary system. The banking cartel is usurping the people's money in GREAT quantities. It is not only grossly immoral, being the biggest heist in all of world history, but it is preventing the people from leveraging THEIR OWN money (money that is created), and lending it to themselves at low, manageable interest so that we may massively fund very expensive infrastructure projects in the whole area of "energy" transformation. If we don't start heavily funding this gargantuan project soon we'll be toast in a matter of decades.
Hell, I'm just wondering how much longer we are going to keep on kicking around this god-awfull dung pile. In the event that I, a person who has worked all my life, and paid into this CORRUPT GOV'T Ponzi Scheme, do not get my check by the 3rd of August, will go to my nearest Kroger store and demand a cart full of food.I WOULD HOPE THIS LITTLE COMMENT SPREADS ALL OVER THE NET. I WOULD ALSO LIKE TO INVITE EVERYONE IN THE US TO JOIN ME. JUST PACK EVERYBODY UP AND HIT THE GROCERY STORES AND FILL YOUR CART....... AWWWW JUST KIDDING....Q
Billionaire’s Bonus ePie July 22cnd, 2011
Lookin for my buddy bonus
A Billionaire's bone is us
bone is us in US time
bonus time
bonus time
bogus & soft ... soft ... sweet slime
can’t even feel a pee (the astronaut diaper shakes off in glee)
the story of princes and princesses to be .....
of now of late nothing is out of date.
"Why are people blithely unaware of the dire implications and extreme hypocrisy of the Ryan Budget?" Because they're stupid?
"How can Republicans get away with cynically posturing about the debt ceiling ...?" Because they're hypocrites and their constituents are stupid?
"How can deregulation and tax cuts for the rich be posited as a solution to the recent economic catastrophe, when these were the very policies that caused it?" Because people are stupid?
On a related matter, noting the 9.2 percent unemployment rate, the associated suffering, the general call-to-arms that such an economic calamity implies, AND recognizing the improbability of doing anything to reduce the power of Wall Street or to expect the U.S. government to do anything useful to address the crisis, I've devised a somewhat cynical plan to incentivize Wall Street to transfer massive amounts of investment funding to Main Street through the creation of a massive number of new entrepreneurial ventures. My plan effectively "piggy-backs" onto existing financial industry architecture to allow the barons of Wall Street to securitize the entrepreneurial investment process to enable them to make boatloads of cash in the secondary market (a la the trading associated with the mortgage-backed security and its many many derivatives). The net result of the plan is the massive creation of new jobs to jump-start the U.S. economy back to full employment.
You can read the proposal ("A Modest Proposal to Save the American Economy: Entrepreneurial Blitzkrieg as Job Creation Vehicle") and its companion piece ("The 75 Percent Solution? A Moral and Economic Imperative to Create Good Jobs NOW!") here: http://jpbulko.newsvine.com/
Joseph Patrick Bulko, MBA
Mr Atcheson's fictional work is obviously attractive to the paranoid left. I'm glad he learned a new word "plutocracy".
It is evident that Barrack Hussein Obama no longer sends a chill up your leg. His arrogance and color continues to satisfy only people of like color and ignorance. Now the left maintains that the debt crisis was manufactured by a mysterious plutocracy. A plutocracy, which Mr. Atcheson believes can thrive and control the world regardless of which political hacks we choose to lead us.
This thread seems to be represented by all factions. There are the anti-semitic and the revolutionary leftist on the same side. Good luck as you herd your cats.
Did anyone notice that the economy seemed to get precipitously worse from the day that BHO was elected and the liberals gained control of nearly all of the US government?
You are wrong about so many things. The debt doubled last year and there was no stimulation to any economy. Keynsian economics is dead. The EPA is waging war on America's energy industry allowing the OPEC thugs to triple the cost of oil. That alone will cause a recession in the US economy. To quote Pogo, "You've met the plutocracy, and it is you."
The only mysterious hand at work is the one described by Adam Smith. We either learn or we perish for lack of vision (i.e. ignorance).
Ahhh... a burp from Fox World. Hi there ;)
While I totally agree with the core points of this article, I can't help but have my stomach churn when the author shames the spineless Democrats with slurs: "run like sissies" and "weak-sister." As a courageous gay woman, it is difficult for me to listen past such straight male condescension. Furthermore, I postulate that the deeper question here is: as long as money completely controls our so-called electoral process, why would any politician of any party stand up for the people? They inherently serve the wealth that buys them the job and controls the media. Period. Unless we change that, we will never have anything remotely resembling a representative democracy.
PROPOSED LEGISLATION THAT WOULD PRESERVE SOCIAL SECURITY INTO PERPETUITY
By John Bachar
The analysis of Social Security (SS), not to be found anywhere else, for the 16 year period, 1993 through 2008, has been done. The central result is that easy structural changes can be made to the SS taxation system by an act of Congress that will easily provide for sufficient annual contributions and Trust Fund assets growth to take care of the retirement needs of the increasingly aging population into perpetuity, as well as the replacement of the existing 73-year old regressive SS taxation system (only salaries/wages are taxed below a certain amount called the “cap”) by a progressive one (i.e., the taxation of all income, not merely salaries/wages, at a rate that increases with increasing income), and without reducing retirement benefits nor increasing the retirement age. Please click on:
1. Complete analytical version (November 2010) http://www.absentlinks.com/uploads/6/6/4/2/6642350/four_analytical_papers_on_preserving_and_strengthening_social_security_by_john_bachar.pdf
2. Comprehensive updated version without analytical tables (July 2010)
http://www.absentlinks.com/uploads/6/6/4/2/6642350/july_2011_comprehensive_version_social_security_exposing_the_destructive_fixes_and_showing_how_to_preserve_it_into_perpetuity.pdf
3. Comprehensive updated version with analytical tables (July 2010)
http://www.absentlinks.com/uploads/6/6/4/2/6642350/july_2011_with_tables_social_security_exposing_the_destructive_fixes_and_showing_how_to_preserve_it_intp_perpetuity.pdf
4. Brief version
http://www.absentlinks.com/uploads/6/6/4/2/6642350/social_security_taxation_system_revision_from_regressive_to_progress_on_all_income_november_2010.pdf
John M. Bachar, Jr.
Emeritus Professor of Mathematics
California State University Long Beach (CSULB)
Bio
I am a Mathematician with a 50+ year record of research and university teaching (to summarize; Ph.D. UCLA, 1969; M.S. Northwestern University, 1955; 36 years teaching at CSULB; dozens of research conferences; director of research conferences; research papers). In addition to the world of pure mathematics in academia, I have analyzed and written about dozens of issues that are in the Public Interest, with particular emphasis on the inherent mathematical content of such issues.