In the last couple of weeks some of the nationally known pundits, and the Barack Obama campaign, have started talking about how the Gramm-Leach-Bliley banking bill, which overturned the Great Depression-era Glass-Steagall act, has played a major part in the mortgage finance disaster of 2007-2008. I posted an article, Housing, the Credit Squeeze, and Glass-Steagall Act, back on February 4, 2008, when no one wanted to talk about the subject.
During an election, if the economy is bad, there is a tendency to blame everything on the party in power. Senator Obama's attacks on Senator McCain about Gramm-Leach-Bliley are not unjustified. However, Obama's party, the Democratic Party, was just as responsible for repealing Glass-Steagall as the Republican Party. Given Barack's spineless political career we can surmise that he would have voted for Gramm-Leach like everyone else, had he been in the Senate or House of Representatives at that time.
At the shallowest level, we are simply seeing the usual political-economic cycles that have been taking place since the first flint ax was traded for the first sea shell. Mixing ordinary banking (taking deposits, making loans) with Wall Street style banking (creating and trading stocks, bonds, and more complex financial instruments) was clearly a cause of the Great Depression. So Congress built a firewall with Glass-Steagall. At the time the bankers were bankrupt and unable to bribe their way out of the situation.
But when no fire transited from banking to brokerage houses, or vice-versa, for a number of decades, pressures began to build. That firewall did not just prevent fires, it prevent people from making quick bucks. Flexible politicians were found, particularly new ones who did not remember the Great Depression. One of the most flexible modern politicians was Bill Clinton, a Democrat. He named Robert Rubin to be his Secretary of the Treasury, and he kept Alan Greenspan as Federal Reserve Chairman. Think of these men as voracious predators with no respect for anything put power and money. Together they put in place the key "reform" that allowed the rapacious mortgage and derivatives frenzy of 2004-2006. Now taxpayers will be further burdened to clean up the mess.
So what is Senator Barack Obama going to do about it if he becomes President? What will Senator McCain do about it if he becomes President? The standard answer seems to be: make the Federal Reserve more powerful. None of the old "power to the people" solutions are even conceived of, except perhaps by Green Party candidate Cynthia McKinney. But it was the Federal Reserve that helped pressure Congress into repealing Glass-Steagall.
Politicians will say anything to get elected. Congress, not the President, is supposed to write the laws. Most American citizens vote without knowing anything about their representatives in Congress. Until people are better informed and more able to exercise power directly, don't expect any major changes in our system.
Showing posts with label John McCain. Show all posts
Showing posts with label John McCain. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Barack Obama's Dividend Play
Barack Obama has played just about all his cards right so far in the Presidential Poker game. He sounded Progressive early in the game, thus winning the Democratic activist primary pot. But now it is an all-or-nothing game.
On economic issues Senator Obama wants people to think that the Bush regime hurt them one way or another. Just as Herbert Hoover was blamed for the Great Depression when it would have happened with just the same if Democrat Al Smith had taken office in 1929, George W. Bush and the Republicans are being blamed for all of the nation's economic woes. [The Republicans would do the same, of course]
Strangely (until you analyze the game) Barack Obama has endorsed one Bush economic policy, special low tax rates on dividends paid by stocks. John McCain endorses the Bush policy as well, but because the will be a Democratic majority in Congress, supporting Barack Obama is a better strategy for the ultra-rich whose income comes mostly from dividends.
There are some arguments for a low tax rate on dividends, but then there are arguments for low tax rates in any specific category. The basic argument is that the tax amounts to double taxation because corporations (sometimes) pay taxes on profits, and then dividends are distributed out of profits and taxed when passed out to individuals. But money is constantly taxed in our society as it moves around. The money paid to wage earners has been taxed in various ways before they receive it from employers, and it is taxed again when they spend it (sales tax, real estate tax, etc.). So the double-taxation argument is just sophistry.
The bottom line is that only rich people derive a significant proportion of their income from stock dividends. So a tax cut on dividends is a tax cut for the rich, and an increase mainly hits the rich as well.
When George W. Bush took office dividends were taxed like any other income to individuals, which meant the top rate was about 40%. The Bush Tax Cuts for the Rich reduced the rate to 15%. John McCain wants to retain the 15% rate.
Democrats in Congress say they want to reverse the Bush Tax Cuts for the Rich. So if they had their way, the maximum tax rate on dividends would end up around 40%. If McCain is elected they can put that into effect. They don't need to worry about a McCain veto. All they have to do is let the Bush tax cuts expire.
Barack Obama has proposed raising the rate to only 20%. Democrats in Congress would not want to defy a Democratic President, so they would have to pass a new law lowering the dividend tax rate to 20% (the lefty Dems could vote against it, since there would be plenty of Republican congress people to vote for it). The rich will be better off under Obama than under McCain, if this scenario plays out.
Why would Barack Obama want to give the rich a break? Because actually he is from the same economic school as Ronald Reagan, the Chicago School of free-market economics. Barack taught law, a necessary adjunct to free market economics, at the school for years. He is not progressive on economics, but he had to sound progressive to win the Democratic primaries.
Obama apologists (an annoying lot) will ignore the realities and say Obama wants a 20% tax on dividends, McCain a 15% tax, so vote for the Democrat.
On economic issues Senator Obama wants people to think that the Bush regime hurt them one way or another. Just as Herbert Hoover was blamed for the Great Depression when it would have happened with just the same if Democrat Al Smith had taken office in 1929, George W. Bush and the Republicans are being blamed for all of the nation's economic woes. [The Republicans would do the same, of course]
Strangely (until you analyze the game) Barack Obama has endorsed one Bush economic policy, special low tax rates on dividends paid by stocks. John McCain endorses the Bush policy as well, but because the will be a Democratic majority in Congress, supporting Barack Obama is a better strategy for the ultra-rich whose income comes mostly from dividends.
There are some arguments for a low tax rate on dividends, but then there are arguments for low tax rates in any specific category. The basic argument is that the tax amounts to double taxation because corporations (sometimes) pay taxes on profits, and then dividends are distributed out of profits and taxed when passed out to individuals. But money is constantly taxed in our society as it moves around. The money paid to wage earners has been taxed in various ways before they receive it from employers, and it is taxed again when they spend it (sales tax, real estate tax, etc.). So the double-taxation argument is just sophistry.
The bottom line is that only rich people derive a significant proportion of their income from stock dividends. So a tax cut on dividends is a tax cut for the rich, and an increase mainly hits the rich as well.
When George W. Bush took office dividends were taxed like any other income to individuals, which meant the top rate was about 40%. The Bush Tax Cuts for the Rich reduced the rate to 15%. John McCain wants to retain the 15% rate.
Democrats in Congress say they want to reverse the Bush Tax Cuts for the Rich. So if they had their way, the maximum tax rate on dividends would end up around 40%. If McCain is elected they can put that into effect. They don't need to worry about a McCain veto. All they have to do is let the Bush tax cuts expire.
Barack Obama has proposed raising the rate to only 20%. Democrats in Congress would not want to defy a Democratic President, so they would have to pass a new law lowering the dividend tax rate to 20% (the lefty Dems could vote against it, since there would be plenty of Republican congress people to vote for it). The rich will be better off under Obama than under McCain, if this scenario plays out.
Why would Barack Obama want to give the rich a break? Because actually he is from the same economic school as Ronald Reagan, the Chicago School of free-market economics. Barack taught law, a necessary adjunct to free market economics, at the school for years. He is not progressive on economics, but he had to sound progressive to win the Democratic primaries.
Obama apologists (an annoying lot) will ignore the realities and say Obama wants a 20% tax on dividends, McCain a 15% tax, so vote for the Democrat.
Monday, September 1, 2008
Barack Obama and Sarah Palin
Citizens of the United States can't lose in the next election. Either we will have a non-white President, Barack Obama, or we will have a female Vice-President. Either would stand in contrast with centuries of white male dominance of American politics.
On the other hand, citizens of the United States can't win the next election. Unless they are already among the economic winners. Despite being a working-class woman who became Governor of Alaska almost by accident, Sarah Palin, even if she become President, belongs in the Chicago School of economics (free-market capitalist). Barack Obama, despite being a super-educated product of super-educated parents, one of African ancestry, actually taught law at that very Chicago School.
For those sophisticated enough to see beyond Presidential election cycle dog-and-pony shows, this is going to reinforce the most basic lesson in the politics of change in the United States of America. Winning civil rights for groups of people denied civil rights is simply not on a level playing field with economic justice. In the later half of the 2oth century a variety of groups had their rights recognized: African-Americans, Native Americans and other citizens not of European descent, women, the disabled, and homosexuals. That is a good thing. It was not easy. People struggled and quite a few people died getting these reforms.
But in 2008 we have less economic equality of opportunity, much less economic equality, than we did in 1950. There are women and minority CEOs; there is a black middle class. The new discrimination is economic. It is harder today to get out of poverty than it was in the 1950's, regardless of your sex or race. Schools are worse. Destructive cultural habits - drugs, alcohol, negative attitudes towards education and work - are more prevalent among the poor and working class.
The class system has ossified. Requirements for entering professions have been elevated. A college degree is not nothing, it creates opportunities that a high school degree does not, but in most cases to get a chance at a good job you need a graduate degree. The economics of staying in college and then graduate school are daunting even for students from highly-educated families; they are nearly impossible for those who have working class parents and received their early education in public schools.
Tax codes are fiddled with, but in the end the rich must be taxed in the United States. They are the only people with money. Here I do not mean the super-wealthy, I mean the people who have professional and management jobs as well.
The ruling class has not stopped ruling. They have just admitted blacks and women to the club. It is funny to see the partisan froth being whipped up. On the right Barack Obama, a man whose economics are nearly identical to Ronald Reagan's, is blasted as a Communist. On the left Sarah Palin is being called a Neanderthal for her views on abortion, even though she is the first working class person I know of ever to be nominated for the Presidency or Vice-Presidency.
As people go, thinking within the two-party, one ruling class system, I think all four candidates are decent people who would try hard to do a good job. Of the four I like Joe Biden the least because of his ties to credit card companies, but then someone has to pay for people to buy their political offices.
Just don't expect anything beyond the usual posturing once the election is over. The basic economic structure and tax structure will not change. Your status in life will depend mostly on the status you were born with. With great effort, you can prevent yourself from sinking further still.
The vast majority of incumbents will be elected to Congress, as always. Democrats who supported the Republican agenda when that buttered their bread, like Congressman Mike Thompson of California, will still want to eat buttered bread. The Democrats (presuming Barack Obama wins) will throw breadcrumbs to their constituencies. Environmentalists will get some tighter regulations. Women will get a few cabinet posts. Gun control freaks will see a few types of guns added to the banned list.
But the basic attitude of Barack Obama and crew will be: Don't ask what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country. Don't expect Barack Obama or John McCain either to do anything about excessive CEO pay, the fact that capital gains can go untaxed for decades, the lack of sufficient federal dollars to include locally produced, healthy, organic foods in the free and reduced lunch program for public schools, or any other issue that will actually help those at the bottom get a chance at the having the economic privileges of those in the middle; or that would allow those in the middle the same economic privileges as those at the top.
On the other hand, citizens of the United States can't win the next election. Unless they are already among the economic winners. Despite being a working-class woman who became Governor of Alaska almost by accident, Sarah Palin, even if she become President, belongs in the Chicago School of economics (free-market capitalist). Barack Obama, despite being a super-educated product of super-educated parents, one of African ancestry, actually taught law at that very Chicago School.
For those sophisticated enough to see beyond Presidential election cycle dog-and-pony shows, this is going to reinforce the most basic lesson in the politics of change in the United States of America. Winning civil rights for groups of people denied civil rights is simply not on a level playing field with economic justice. In the later half of the 2oth century a variety of groups had their rights recognized: African-Americans, Native Americans and other citizens not of European descent, women, the disabled, and homosexuals. That is a good thing. It was not easy. People struggled and quite a few people died getting these reforms.
But in 2008 we have less economic equality of opportunity, much less economic equality, than we did in 1950. There are women and minority CEOs; there is a black middle class. The new discrimination is economic. It is harder today to get out of poverty than it was in the 1950's, regardless of your sex or race. Schools are worse. Destructive cultural habits - drugs, alcohol, negative attitudes towards education and work - are more prevalent among the poor and working class.
The class system has ossified. Requirements for entering professions have been elevated. A college degree is not nothing, it creates opportunities that a high school degree does not, but in most cases to get a chance at a good job you need a graduate degree. The economics of staying in college and then graduate school are daunting even for students from highly-educated families; they are nearly impossible for those who have working class parents and received their early education in public schools.
Tax codes are fiddled with, but in the end the rich must be taxed in the United States. They are the only people with money. Here I do not mean the super-wealthy, I mean the people who have professional and management jobs as well.
The ruling class has not stopped ruling. They have just admitted blacks and women to the club. It is funny to see the partisan froth being whipped up. On the right Barack Obama, a man whose economics are nearly identical to Ronald Reagan's, is blasted as a Communist. On the left Sarah Palin is being called a Neanderthal for her views on abortion, even though she is the first working class person I know of ever to be nominated for the Presidency or Vice-Presidency.
As people go, thinking within the two-party, one ruling class system, I think all four candidates are decent people who would try hard to do a good job. Of the four I like Joe Biden the least because of his ties to credit card companies, but then someone has to pay for people to buy their political offices.
Just don't expect anything beyond the usual posturing once the election is over. The basic economic structure and tax structure will not change. Your status in life will depend mostly on the status you were born with. With great effort, you can prevent yourself from sinking further still.
The vast majority of incumbents will be elected to Congress, as always. Democrats who supported the Republican agenda when that buttered their bread, like Congressman Mike Thompson of California, will still want to eat buttered bread. The Democrats (presuming Barack Obama wins) will throw breadcrumbs to their constituencies. Environmentalists will get some tighter regulations. Women will get a few cabinet posts. Gun control freaks will see a few types of guns added to the banned list.
But the basic attitude of Barack Obama and crew will be: Don't ask what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country. Don't expect Barack Obama or John McCain either to do anything about excessive CEO pay, the fact that capital gains can go untaxed for decades, the lack of sufficient federal dollars to include locally produced, healthy, organic foods in the free and reduced lunch program for public schools, or any other issue that will actually help those at the bottom get a chance at the having the economic privileges of those in the middle; or that would allow those in the middle the same economic privileges as those at the top.
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
Barack Obama: Will He Dick Nixon Us?
Barack Obama has promised some of his supporters to end the United States occupation of Iraq. Slowly, to be sure, but surely. Recently he has been accused of waffling on the issue, but in any case he appears to be substantially different from John McCain on this issue. Voters trapped in the two party fish net who are against the war have nowhere to go. The idea of voting for Green Party candidate Cynthia McKinney - well, the press is treating her like she does not exist, so the idea cannot even occur to them.
This brings us right back to 1968. For young Obama supporters who skipped over or forgot that period of U.S. history, allow me to recapitulate. We were deep in a war with Vietnam, allied to the government of South Vietnam, which had been set up by the U.S. (and at times rearranged) after the French left in the 1950s. Republican President Dwight Eisenhower had kept us out of an active military role in Vietnam until 1960. Liberal darling (but really a Cold Warrior) President John F. Kennedy sent thousands of U.S. military "advisors," many of whom in fact were observed engaging in combat. Then after JFK was assassinated President Lyndon Johnson was worried that he would be accused by John's brother Bobby, and conservative southern Democrats, and the entire Republican Party of losing Vietnam if the communists took over South Vietnam. So he sent in hundreds of thousands of troops, carpet bombed North Vietnam, and became the U.S.'s best known international war criminal after Harry "I dropped the bomb" Truman (also a Democrat).
Lyndon Johnson decided not to run in 1968, he had become so unpopular. His vice-president, Hubert Humphrey, was the Democratic Party nominee. Richard Nixon, who had been Dwight David Eisenhower's Vice President, was the Republican Party presidential nominee.
Hubert Humphrey said he was for continuing the war. Richard Nixon said he had a plan to end the war. While there were many other issues in the 1968 election, without a doubt Nixon won because he had a reputation for being fiercely anti-communist, yet made hay on an unpopular war by having a plan for "peace with honor."
Nixon was not just deluding the American people; he was deluding himself. The North Vietnamese were not scared by his threat to use nuclear weapons. So Nixon started negotiating, and started reducing American troop levels. At the same time he tried to brush back the communist advance with ferocious military maneuvers up to and including the bombing and invasion of Cambodia, which was a sanctuary for the communists.
The Democrats, and those to the left of the Democrats (a substantial group at the time), were happy to forget Humphrey and Johnson's troop buildup. They hated Nixon with a blinding passion that made rational analysis and action impossible. Ask any 55 to 85 year old Democrat today who was responsible for the Vietnam War, and almost all will blame Richard (Dick) Nixon. By the end of his term in office we were out of Vietnam, but that did not matter. He even made nice with the Chinese Communists, something no Democratic Party president had dared to do, but got no credit for it from Democrats.
Which brings us back to Barack Obama. George W. Bush involved the U.S. in a war against Iraq followed by an occupation. John McCain, though he was not Vice-President, finds himself in the position of Hubert Humphrey in 1968: an advocate for an unpopular policy. There is no reason to think that in practice John McCain will get the troops out of Iraq any slower than Senator Obama. If McCain says the troops are coming out (after he is elected) you know he can take on the Pentagon brass and the golden calf Republicans. Obama, on the other hand, will have to watch his right flank.
Obama has already promised to transfer at least some of the troops in Iraq to the Afghan front, where the war is going badly at the moment. Don't be surprised if he sends some "advisors" to Somalia as well.
If either President Obama, or President McCain, starts withdrawing troops from Iraq, there is the real possibility that there will be a fundamentalist Islamic takeover. I don't care; that would be an internal matter for Iraq; the U.S. has no business there. But both McCain and Obama would be under heavy pressure to recommit.
The most likely scenario at this point is that Barack Obama will become President. I am capable of hope; I hope he is a good President. But I won't be surprised if he just muddles through like most of our past Presidents. I won't even be surprised if he expands the war and is a failure on domestic issues. On the other hand, maybe he'll surprise us like "Tricky Dick," did. China was not an issue in the 1968 campaign. But by getting us out of Vietnam, opening relations with China, and creating the Environmental Protection Agency, in retrospect President Nixon outshines all the Democratic presidents of that era.
Saturday, June 7, 2008
John McCain and Barack Obama Already Failing
The Friday, June 6, 2008, vote to kill the progress of the Climate Change bill in the Senate of the United States of America should be like a cold shower on Monday morning after a long weekend of partying. John McCain may offer experience and Barack Obama may offer hope, but whichever one gets elected will be the President of a quagmire of special interests, giant egos, and partisan back stabbing. The two-party system has failed, or at least the two current parties are both failing to deliver what America needs. Both McCain and Obama promise to bring the two parties together, to end partisan feuding. But they intend to do this by compromise, by standing in the middle of the quagmire and inviting everyone to drown.
The bill is Senate Bill 3036, Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act of 2008, meant to address the issue of global warming. In the Senate, having passed out of committee, the bill needed 60 votes to end debate and proceed to a vote. It gathered only 48 votes. The Democratic Party leadership refused to allow a full debate, and the offering of amendments, on the bill. Four Democrats [Brown, Dorgan, Johnson, Landrieu] voted against the bill and six [Biden, Byrd, Clinton, Conrad, Kennedy, Obama] could not be bothered to vote. McCain was also too busy trying to lead us around the quagmire to vote. Republicans voting Yes included Collins, Dole, Martinez, Smith, Snowe, Sununu, and Warner.
While the bill itself could be criticized from any perspective, mostly not strong enough for environmentalists and too strong for those who don't take global warming seriously, at least it would have gotten the ball rolling. Policy could be tweaked in future bills. Now there will be no action until at least 2009. Given that Al Gore was Vice-President to Bill Clinton and nothing was done about climate change, nothing at all, for those 8 years, you might think environmentalists in the Democratic Party would be wondering about the quality of their party leadership.
There are things, sociopathies if you will, that are wrong with the American people, and those sociopathies are reflected and amplified in the two alternately ruling parties. We have become a lazy, greedy, immoral, and spineless people. We whine about conditions, but won't even vote for independents or third party candidates on the one day a year (or every two years), the five minutes every two years we are given the opportunity to vote.
Don't forget that the Senate is an undemocratic institution by design. States with just a few people in them get as many Senate votes as states like California, Florida, Texas and New York.
Send both the ruling class and your fellow Americans a message this November. Yell it from the roof tops. Vote for Cynthia McKinney for President and for the best candidates in each race regardless of political party. Vote for Cindy Sheehan and Carol Wolman for Congress. I can't vouch for each and every Green Party candidate, but here is a list of California Green candidates [See also my Green Party pages].
And plan on a social system based on anarchism. America is falling apart so quickly, that might be your only real choice anyway when the government collapses. At least when the government collapses the national debt will disappear. Setting up a new national government, which would have to re-assume the national debt, would be economic folly of the first order.
Yes, it is true. If the Democratic Party succeeds in crushing the Green Party, my fallback position is not to become a war crimes supporter by becoming a Democrat. For voting purpose I would become independent, but for organizing purposes I would promote an anarchist social organization.
The bill is Senate Bill 3036, Lieberman-Warner Climate Security Act of 2008, meant to address the issue of global warming. In the Senate, having passed out of committee, the bill needed 60 votes to end debate and proceed to a vote. It gathered only 48 votes. The Democratic Party leadership refused to allow a full debate, and the offering of amendments, on the bill. Four Democrats [Brown, Dorgan, Johnson, Landrieu] voted against the bill and six [Biden, Byrd, Clinton, Conrad, Kennedy, Obama] could not be bothered to vote. McCain was also too busy trying to lead us around the quagmire to vote. Republicans voting Yes included Collins, Dole, Martinez, Smith, Snowe, Sununu, and Warner.
While the bill itself could be criticized from any perspective, mostly not strong enough for environmentalists and too strong for those who don't take global warming seriously, at least it would have gotten the ball rolling. Policy could be tweaked in future bills. Now there will be no action until at least 2009. Given that Al Gore was Vice-President to Bill Clinton and nothing was done about climate change, nothing at all, for those 8 years, you might think environmentalists in the Democratic Party would be wondering about the quality of their party leadership.
There are things, sociopathies if you will, that are wrong with the American people, and those sociopathies are reflected and amplified in the two alternately ruling parties. We have become a lazy, greedy, immoral, and spineless people. We whine about conditions, but won't even vote for independents or third party candidates on the one day a year (or every two years), the five minutes every two years we are given the opportunity to vote.
Don't forget that the Senate is an undemocratic institution by design. States with just a few people in them get as many Senate votes as states like California, Florida, Texas and New York.
Send both the ruling class and your fellow Americans a message this November. Yell it from the roof tops. Vote for Cynthia McKinney for President and for the best candidates in each race regardless of political party. Vote for Cindy Sheehan and Carol Wolman for Congress. I can't vouch for each and every Green Party candidate, but here is a list of California Green candidates [See also my Green Party pages].
And plan on a social system based on anarchism. America is falling apart so quickly, that might be your only real choice anyway when the government collapses. At least when the government collapses the national debt will disappear. Setting up a new national government, which would have to re-assume the national debt, would be economic folly of the first order.
Yes, it is true. If the Democratic Party succeeds in crushing the Green Party, my fallback position is not to become a war crimes supporter by becoming a Democrat. For voting purpose I would become independent, but for organizing purposes I would promote an anarchist social organization.
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Nancy Price v. 10,000 Demon Lawyers
My wife, Jan Edwards, was talking to an activist friend today, Nancy Price of the Alliance For Democracy. Nancy is known (and should be better known) as a water activist. So she gets asked to speak about water issues (especially who owns it and how it should be distributed). But what she really wants to speak about, she says is an extension of NAFTA called the SPP (Security and Prosperity Partnership).
Basically, the SPP is going to globalize parts of the United States. Globalize in the sense of ridding these areas of local control, including environmental and labor regulations. Apparently workers who are not U.S. citizens will be brought to these zones to work for sub-minimum wage.
SPP sounds horrible for people and the planet. It is based on the principle that economies must always expand. It was created with no input from 99.9% of the citizens of the U.S., Mexico, or Canada. It is corporate rule, international corporate rule, pure and simple.
So why don't people know about this? Sure, citizens in the U.S. are used to being ruled like sheep without consultation, but usually once something this big is set up, the New York Times and other hyenas that pretend to be a free press in this country gloat about it, if only in the Business section.
I read the financial pages every day. I have for years. I don't read every article, but I look at the headlines at the New York Times and CNN/Money online. I read The Economist, in the paper edition, every week.
Not only did I know little about SPP (though I did know about the Canada to Mexico superhighways they are building), I did not even know that in 2006 Congress passed, and George W. Bush signed, a law allowing the Federal Reserve to pay interest to banks for the money they are required to keep in reserves. I found this out yesterday because the Fed is thinking of actually implementing this option. It is an outrageous scam. But I'll have to write more about this later, because I want to present an even larger scale picture of our social-economic-political-environmental problem.
The rich people and their corporations have an army of lawyers, lobbyists, consultants and their demonic helpers to pass treaties and legislation, and to litigate in the courts. We have Nancy, an unpaid, volunteer activist. Nancy is a formidable person. In a fair fight I'm sure she could take on 10 spawn of Stanford Law School and defeat them. And there are a few more Nancies in the U.S., and even some paid activists in groups like Public Citizen.
But my side loses, over and over again, because of the Armies of Hell. The campaign donations. The phony "progressive" candidates for high office. Highly paid lawyers who can scare the brave and creep quietly like deadly fungi into the very fabric of American government.
We need to take their money away, first and foremost. By any means necessary. Money has always been the root of their power. Leave them with their money and nothing is safe.
I am tired of hearing from aging ex-corporate lawyers, generals, CIA agents and politicians that the system is bad and they wished they had not done the dirty deeds they did.
If we are going to save this planet and a scrap of dignity for ordinary human beings, it is time to declare war. We seem to be incapable of seizing the government; the two-party system is designed to prevent that. I suggest that we make America ungovernable by the parasitic elite.
You don't have to be a lawyer to disrupt a lawyer. You just have to put in the effort.
People have hopes for Barack Obama. Let us use that hope. Let us give Barack, or Ms. Clinton if she wins, and even John McCain if we wins, a to do list with some deadlines. And if they can't meet the deadlines, let's fire their asses. The whole lot of them. Let's burn their wicked laws and issue new law that is healthy and wholesome.
Six months, I think, is sufficient to dash any reasonable hope. So here is what I demand, and suggest that you demand, that Barack Obama and Congress sign into law within 6 months of Barack's inauguration:
1. All U.S. troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan (except the customary guards at U.S. embassies).
2. A single-payer health insurance plan for all Americans.
3. A required 40 mpg highway fleet average for new non-commercial automobile/SUV sales.
4. Repeal of NAFTA and the WTO trade agreements.
5. An 80% income tax on all persons' income of over $50 million a year, with all securities held by people in this category marked to market for tax purposes.
Of course my list could be longer and more detailed, but if they achieve those five things, I'll be very impressed and have to shut up for a while about what a bad lot the Democrats are.
If I were a betting man, I'd bet 5 to 1 that not a single one of these goals will be achieved by the deadline, and 2 to 1 that none of them will be achieved during Barack's four years in office.
For more of my opinion, visit my Politics page.
Basically, the SPP is going to globalize parts of the United States. Globalize in the sense of ridding these areas of local control, including environmental and labor regulations. Apparently workers who are not U.S. citizens will be brought to these zones to work for sub-minimum wage.
SPP sounds horrible for people and the planet. It is based on the principle that economies must always expand. It was created with no input from 99.9% of the citizens of the U.S., Mexico, or Canada. It is corporate rule, international corporate rule, pure and simple.
So why don't people know about this? Sure, citizens in the U.S. are used to being ruled like sheep without consultation, but usually once something this big is set up, the New York Times and other hyenas that pretend to be a free press in this country gloat about it, if only in the Business section.
I read the financial pages every day. I have for years. I don't read every article, but I look at the headlines at the New York Times and CNN/Money online. I read The Economist, in the paper edition, every week.
Not only did I know little about SPP (though I did know about the Canada to Mexico superhighways they are building), I did not even know that in 2006 Congress passed, and George W. Bush signed, a law allowing the Federal Reserve to pay interest to banks for the money they are required to keep in reserves. I found this out yesterday because the Fed is thinking of actually implementing this option. It is an outrageous scam. But I'll have to write more about this later, because I want to present an even larger scale picture of our social-economic-political-environmental problem.
The rich people and their corporations have an army of lawyers, lobbyists, consultants and their demonic helpers to pass treaties and legislation, and to litigate in the courts. We have Nancy, an unpaid, volunteer activist. Nancy is a formidable person. In a fair fight I'm sure she could take on 10 spawn of Stanford Law School and defeat them. And there are a few more Nancies in the U.S., and even some paid activists in groups like Public Citizen.
But my side loses, over and over again, because of the Armies of Hell. The campaign donations. The phony "progressive" candidates for high office. Highly paid lawyers who can scare the brave and creep quietly like deadly fungi into the very fabric of American government.
We need to take their money away, first and foremost. By any means necessary. Money has always been the root of their power. Leave them with their money and nothing is safe.
I am tired of hearing from aging ex-corporate lawyers, generals, CIA agents and politicians that the system is bad and they wished they had not done the dirty deeds they did.
If we are going to save this planet and a scrap of dignity for ordinary human beings, it is time to declare war. We seem to be incapable of seizing the government; the two-party system is designed to prevent that. I suggest that we make America ungovernable by the parasitic elite.
You don't have to be a lawyer to disrupt a lawyer. You just have to put in the effort.
People have hopes for Barack Obama. Let us use that hope. Let us give Barack, or Ms. Clinton if she wins, and even John McCain if we wins, a to do list with some deadlines. And if they can't meet the deadlines, let's fire their asses. The whole lot of them. Let's burn their wicked laws and issue new law that is healthy and wholesome.
Six months, I think, is sufficient to dash any reasonable hope. So here is what I demand, and suggest that you demand, that Barack Obama and Congress sign into law within 6 months of Barack's inauguration:
1. All U.S. troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan (except the customary guards at U.S. embassies).
2. A single-payer health insurance plan for all Americans.
3. A required 40 mpg highway fleet average for new non-commercial automobile/SUV sales.
4. Repeal of NAFTA and the WTO trade agreements.
5. An 80% income tax on all persons' income of over $50 million a year, with all securities held by people in this category marked to market for tax purposes.
Of course my list could be longer and more detailed, but if they achieve those five things, I'll be very impressed and have to shut up for a while about what a bad lot the Democrats are.
If I were a betting man, I'd bet 5 to 1 that not a single one of these goals will be achieved by the deadline, and 2 to 1 that none of them will be achieved during Barack's four years in office.
For more of my opinion, visit my Politics page.
Sunday, March 16, 2008
Vietnam, Iraq, and the U.S. Senate
"...Congress lagged even farther. The legislature's main instrument was its constitutional authority to appropriate money for the war, but senators and representatives ... consistently balked at using that prerogative, lest they be charged with shunning their patriotic obligation to furnish funds to the fighting men in the fields."
We can say this about the Democratic Party majority in the United States House and Senate post the 2006 elections. But the Democratic Party had an even larger majority in 1967, which is the year intended by this quote from Stanley Karnow's Vietnam, A History.
And who were the leaders of the Senate from 2007 until today? Presumably the three Senators who are still possible presidential candidates, John McCain, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama.
At the end of 1967 Senator Eugene McCarthy declared himself an anti-war candidate for president against the incumbent, Lyndon Johnson. Because he had served almost two full terms, Johnson announced he would not be a candidate on March 31, 1968. Then Vice-President Hubert Humphrey and Senator Robert (Bobby) Kennedy jumped into the race. Kennedy was assassinated in Los Angeles on June 6, 1968. Kennedy, like his big brother and former President John, had been an eager communism fighter earlier, but had turned against pursuing the war in Vietnam. Humphrey became the Democratic nominee, but narrowly lost the election to Republican candidate Richard Nixon, who said he had a peace plan.
Unfortunately Nixon's peace plan consisted of threatening to drop atomic weapons on North Vietnam. When the Vietnamese government called his bluff he just amped up the conventional war. When that did not work he made a deal to withdraw U.S. troops. Not long after troops were withdrawn Vietnam was reunited under the North Vietnamese government.
At this point the U.S. is in Iraq because the U.S. is in Iraq and no one has had the courage to pull the plug on the idiocy. Nothing particularly bad is going to happen if U.S. troops are withdrawn. Maybe democracy will work, maybe a new un-democratic leadership will emerge, maybe the nation will break into pieces.
It just is not any of the U.S.'s business. We can't even fix problems here. We have wasted an astonishing amount of money that we will never get back.
Things might change after the 2008 elections. But don't be surprised if the Iraq War goes on in some form or another. Because George W. Bush is not particularly stupid or cowardly as U.S. politicians go. What we have is a stupid system. Stupid in, stupid out.
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