When the Dust Settles

Mitch McConnell says they are going to do everything they can to defeat Obama. Sounds like the Republicans really don’t care about creating jobs despite all the talk about taking the country back.  Decrease spending? Not with an extended tax cut for the wealthy—the deficit will continue to grow. Remember, the Republicans killed the surplus that Clinton left and started the rapid growth of the deficit and passed the deficit torch to Obama for him to put on the damper while restoring a broken economy. Let’s get serious about what the Republican agenda really is.

robertreich:

The real message from voters was “Fix this stinking economy.” But Republicans have no intention of doing so.

What is the Republican objective? They are pro big business. Big business is making money—what recession for the rich? They just used the middle class and tea party to get elected. Now, they’ll continue to pass the blame to Obama.

Republicans don’t believe in stimulating economies. They think markets eventually clear — once the pain is sufficient. Or in the immortal words of Herbert Hoover’s treasury secretary, millionaire industrialist Andrew Mellon: “Liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate the farmer, liquidate real estate. It will purge the rottenness out of the system. People will work harder, lead a more moral life.”

Of course, Mellon was dead wrong. Nothing was purged. Instead, the economy sunk into deeper and deeper depression.

More recession ahead? The Fed wants to reduce rates even lower, even if it’s not working. 

Lower rates won’t spur businesses to expand capacity and jobs because there aren’t enough consumers to buy additional goods and services.

Lower rates won’t push down the dollar and spur more exports. They’ll only spur more competitive devaluations by other nations determined not to lose export shares and jobs.

And lower rates won’t allow middle-class and working-class Americans to refinance their homes because banks won’t lend to families whose incomes have dropped, whose debts have risen, or who owe more on their homes than the homes are worth. That is, most of us.

Another burst bubble on the way? 

It’s already started. Stocks are up even though the rest of the economy is still down because money is already so cheap. Bondholders who can’t get much of any return from their loans are shiftin—g into stocks. Companies are buying back more shares of their own stock. And Wall Street is making more bets in the stock market with money it can borrow at almost zero percent interest.

The true Republican strategy is counter-intuitive. They don’t want the economy to improve because that would improve the standing of the Democrats and President Obama. Their strategy is long-term growth of big business and the very wealthy—they want a plutocracy!

Could it be that Republicans want to keep the economy this way through Election Day, 2012?

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: the ultra rich are buying this country for their own interests.  NONE of this is for the benefit of the poor and middle income people who often support these right wing tactics even though the outcomes work against their own interests.

robertreich:

Not only is income and wealth in America more concentrated in fewer hands than it’s been in 80 years, but those hands are buying our democracy as never before – and they’re doing it behind closed doors.

Hundreds of millions of secret dollars are pouring into congressional and state races in this election cycle. The Koch brothers (whose personal fortunes grew by $5 billion last year) appear to be behind some of it, Karl Rove has rounded up other multi-millionaires to fund right-wing candidates, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is funneling corporate dollars from around the world into congressional races, and Rupert Murdoch is evidently spending heavily.

No one knows for sure where this flood of money is coming from because it’s all secret.

But you can safely assume its purpose is not to help America’s stranded middle class, working class, and poor. It’s to pad the nests of the rich, stop all reform, and deregulate big corporations and Wall Street – already more powerful than since the late 19^th century when the lackeys of robber barons literally deposited sacks of cash on the desks of friendly legislators.

Credit the Supreme Court’s grotesque decision in Citizens United vs. the Federal Election Commission, which opened the floodgates. (Even though 8 of 9 members of the Court also held disclosure laws constitutional, the decision invited the creation of shadowy “nonprofits” that don’t have to reveal anything.)

According to FEC data, only 32 percent of groups paying for election ads are disclosing the names of their donors. By comparison, in the 2006 midterm, 97 percent disclosed; in 2008, almost half disclosed.

Last week, when the Senate considered a bill to force such disclosure, every single Republican voted against it – thereby revealing the GOP’s true colors, and presumed benefactors. (To understand how far the GOP has come, nearly ten years ago campaign disclosure was supported by 48 of 54 Republican senators.)

Maybe the Disclose Bill can get passed in lame-duck session. Maybe the IRS will make sure Karl Rove’s and other supposed nonprofits aren’t sham political units. Maybe pigs will learn to fly.

In the meantime we face an election that marks an even sharper turn toward plutocratic capitalism than before – a government by and for the rich and big corporations — and away from democratic capitalism.

As income and wealth has moved to the top, so has political power. That’s why, for example, it’s been impossible to close the absurd tax loophole that allows hedge-fund and private-equity managers to treat much of their income as capital gains, subject to a 15 percent tax (even though they’re earning tens or hundreds of millions a year, and the top 15 hedge-fund managers earned an average of $1 billion last year). Why it proved impossible to fund expanded health care by limiting the tax deductions of the very rich. Why it’s so difficult even to extend George Bush’s tax cuts for the bottom 98 percent of Americans without also extending them for the top 2 percent – even though the top won’t spend the money and create jobs, but will blow a $36 billion hole in the federal budget next year.

The good news is average Americans are beginning to understand that when the rich secretly flood our democracy with money, the rest of us drown. Wall Street executives and top CEOs get bailed out while under-water homeowners and jobless workers sink.

A Quinnipiac poll earlier this year found overwhelming support for a millionaire tax.

But what the public wants means nothing if our democracy is secretly corrupted by big money.

Right now we’re headed for a perfect storm: An unprecedented concentration of income and wealth at the top, a record amount of secret money flooding our democracy, and a public in the aftershock of the Great Recession becoming increasingly angry and cynical about government. The three are obviously related.

We must act. We need a movement to take back our democracy. (If tea partiers were true to their principles, they’d join it.) As Martin Luther King once said, the greatest tragedy is “not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people.”

What can you do?

1. Read Justice Steven’s dissent in the Citizens United case, so you’re fully informed about the majority’s pernicious illogic.

2. Use every opportunity to speak out against this decision, and embarrass and condemn the right-wing Justices who supported it.

3.  In this and subsequent elections, back candidates for congress and president who vow to put Justices on the Court who will reverse it. 

4. Demand that the IRS enforce the law and pull the plug on Karl Rove and other sham nonprofits.

5. If you have a Republican senator, insist that he or she support the Disclose Act. If they won’t, campaign against them.

6. Support public financing of elections.

7.  Join an organization like Common Cause, that’s committed to doing all this and getting big money out of politics. (Personal note: I’m so outraged at what’s happening that I just became chairman of Common Cause.)

8. Send this post to your friends (including any tea partiers you may know).

We have a very vocal minority of people that is very angry about the current situation—the Republican Tea Party. As usual, their rage is fanned daily by those who stand to gain at their expense.  We can follow that path of fear and rage; I think it leads to many hardships down the road.

Or, we can fix the problems—of course, we have to agree on what the problems are. Sure, some of it is government; bad politics made it that way. Fixable. Some of it is business; bad politics made it that way. Fixable. Most of the problems stem from jealousy, envy, abuse of power, and greed—mostly greed.  Greed explains the others. Not easily fixed because those in power don’t want to give up what they got.

Few of the people who are in a terrible rage are greedy people. They, like me, don’t really have enough to be greedy. Since we’ve never had it, we don’t even think about getting what we really don’t deserve.

That means fixing the problem means fixing the bad politics of the bad, greedy people who made the bad politics for their own purposes.

The first step is to start listening to some wiser heads who show tell us that we’ve fixed things before by using our heads, and we can do it again. Stop the rage. Start thinking. Stop following the wrong people.

The second step is to appreciate our accomplishments. The rage hides all the good things and tries to turn the good into a perception of bad.  Good news today? Insurance companies can’t turn you down for a pre-existing condition. Insurance companies can’t throw you out because you cost them too much. People whose adult children (under 26)  still live at home because they are in school or can’t find a job can cover their childrens’ health insurance needs.  Bear in mind, that these good things will be made to look bad by the people who will not get quite as rich from insurance premiums. Too bad!

Watch the video. Click the title for the link.

“AFTERSHOCK: The Next Economy and America’s Future”

How many times do we have to talk about the dangers of accumulating wealth in this country. What dangers lurk?

squashed:

Many self-professed Christians have gotten pretty comfortable with a no-holds-barred free-market capitalism. In a bipolar world when the most visible alternative to our capitalism was an atheistic and totalitarian Communism, I can understand the temptation to cling to the lesser of two evils. Now…

This is an excellent rural and small town tourism blog.

Some of the key points:

1. That personal attention and anticipation of needs in a well run visitor center is something no Internet site can do for a town.
2. Your visitor center staff must be thoroughly trained in all services and attractions in your region.
3. Be sure your visitor center is easy to find.
4. Look closely at your hours. Are you open when visitors are in town?
5. Keep your mission in mind – to keep happy visitors in town longer. Be sure your visitor center is fulfilling that mission.

How are we doing? My thoughts below:

1. Personal attention: B+
2. Training on all services: B+
3. Easy to find: A
4. Center hours: C-
5. Mission: B+

Now here’s an idea being advanced by Robert Reich:

In addition to ending the Bush tax cut for the rich, put forward another proposal for growing the economy that cuts taxes on lower-income Americans.

Democrats should propose eliminating payroll taxes on the first $20,000 of income, and making up the revenue loss by applying payroll taxes to incomes above $250,000.

This would give the economy an immediate boost by adding to the paychecks of just about every working American. 80 percent of Americans pay more in payroll taxes than they do in income taxes. And because lower-income people would get most of the benefit, it’s likely to be spent.

It would also give employers an extra incentive to hire because they’d save on their share of the payroll tax. And most of the incentive would be directed toward hiring lower-income workers – who have taken the biggest hit on jobs and pay during the recession.

It wouldn’t add to the deficit. Lost revenues would be made up by applying payroll taxes to income exceeding $250,000. This is certainly fair. As it is now, the Social Security payroll tax doesn’t apply to any income over $106,000. Having the tax kick in again at $250,000 would draw on the top 3 percent of earners, who (as noted) now rake in a larger portion of total income than they have in more than 80 years.

Call it the People’s Tax Cut, and let Republicans explain why they’re against it.

It’s about time we stopped playing defense and started re-framing key issues to illustrate how greedy the rich have become.