Stand and Fight

My favorite tweet of this debate season so far was during last Wednesday’s Debate. Perry wants to get rid of three or four or five agencies of the Federal Government. I heard people say he has given this a lot of thought, but as these debates roll one really becomes hard pressed to suggest he has ever given serious thought to ANYTHING. As he fumbled for escape trying to remember the third department a few days ago, one of the other candidates trying to rescue him shouted from stage left, Perry’s right, EPA? Perry sort of went yeah, then realized the further blunder and backtracked with a wave of his hand. Later there it was. Rick Perry = Texas Toast! Who says you can’t say anything important in 141 characters? Give credit to CNBC’s John Harwood, he followed up and asked if Perry really did want to eliminate the EPA.

Leaving the catastrophic stumble aside, in that moment we see a microcosm of the Republican Party today, bent on leaving everything to the free market and tearing everything else down. Other than access to money and power, perhaps alongside the avoidance of actually doing real work one wonders why they even want to govern.

No matter how mindless the suggestion or the motive of whomever throws it out there, the candidates latch onto every draconian obsession like a baby to its mother’s breast-- Sleepy, barely awake, the baby smacks it lips in the air until it finds its mark with half open eyes. Sometimes you can trick babies with your pinky finger but that isn’t very nice.

Weeks ago Bachman actually had the chance to corner Perry on crony capitalism and the various ways the governor of Texas has sold pieces of his integrity and the state for political contributions. Matt Taibi wrote an excellent piece for the Rolling Stone exploring the many layers of Perry’s Corruption (Rick Perry: The Best Little Whore in Texas). Bachman had the chance to explore that story; instead she latched onto the pinky finger, ignorantly trading rumors on a national stage that suggest vaccinations cause retardation. Largely ignored in the hubbub was the cozy relationship between Perry and the vaccine maker Merck.

Ron Paul took a knee on Wednesday when given his chance to represent his principles.  Paul is a hero to some in the electorate. His supporters we hear are the most dedicated, and media bigs, even some from unexpected quarters such as Jon Stewart, have noted the steady permanence of his positions. He does not pander. He believes what he does, and he must know there is no chance. But at last Wednesday’s debate Paul, given the softest of under-hand pitches to address the corruption at the heart of governor’s political life the Texas Republican house member said he “didn’t know anything about that”. Big state, Texas, I guess it’s hard to keep track.

These debates have been a reckless ramble of half-truths, lies and holy crap, do-you-want-cheese-with-that whoppers. We hear that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, aided by Chris Dodd and Barney Frank caused the housing bubble and the subsequent collapse of several too stupid to survive financial institutions such as Lehman Bros, Countywide, Bear Sterns, Merrill Lynch and so forth.

 As is so often the case with lies there is a shred of truth in this narrative, but the whole cloth from which that story is ripped is a tattered bolt of lies and deception.  It is absolutely true that hundreds of thousands perhaps millions of people got into homes beyond their means. Sub-prime loans--one of the primary vehicles for the collapse—rose as a percentage of all mortgage loans from 8% to 20% in just the three years from 2004 to 2006.  Duplicitous predatory banking practices and absurd assumptions that the price of housing would never go down drove financial hysteria. 

Government institutions strongly encouraged the market to be more forthcoming in areas of lower economic circumstances. Starting with the community reinvestment act of 1977, designed to address the issue of red-lining--  the practice by which banks avoided lending in minority and poor areas-- the government through the Department of Housing and Urban Development  (HUD) has tried to address the issue of substandard housing for poor and working people. The Republicans of 2011 of course hate that legislation and have set it and other government policies directed in these areas as enemies of free enterprise.

Anecdotal stories are always so easy to demagogue, but the reality of the programs and the ensuing result are always so much more complex.     

But before we unspool the greater narrative it’s important to access the results of the crisis: Since 2008 almost 11 million people have had their homes foreclosed. Considering the average home occupancy is approximately 2.6 people, that’s about 30 million men, women and children, tossed from their homes. Almost 30% of homeowners still in their homes have mortgages that are under water. That’s another 20 million homeowners in trouble.

Despite the market volatility Wall Street and the banks are actually doing quite well, adjusting as businesses do to new regulations and circumstances. Citibank earned a combined $5 billion in the last two quarters, and Chase earned over $4 billion in the third quarter alone. There are six banks which even Huntsman now calls “Too big to fail”. They largely got there by eating too stupid to survive institutions, often with government backed loan guarantees. Huntsmen, in one of his departures from Republican orthodoxy, wants to break them up. Fat chance.

Meanwhile, the Washington Post reported last week that despite the ongoing friction in rhetoric between the White House and Wall Street, incomes and bonuses are back up to pre-crisis 2008 levels. Obama continues to raise substantial sums from the financial sector. At the time of the Post report Obama’s Wall Street haul was bigger than all the Republicans combined.

From the Republican perspective the bankers, speculators and derivatives designers and traders played no role in the disaster. The Republicans so clearly ignore history, and yet Newt-- with as Jon Stewart says his “high degree of dickishness-- tells everyone how the media and academia don’t know how business and by degrees the economy works.

But the narrative becomes jumbled when the Republicans go down this road. Alas it does not stop them. Remember though how deeply invested the right is in the concept that the greater the availability of capital untouched by government the greater the demand and growth in the economy; this is the foundation of their trickle down theories. Yet in the housing bubble and the cataclysm that followed the waterfall of inexpensive low interest cash, much of it foreign, and then much of that Chinese, in their view did not drive the markets and the economy in any manner towards near collapse. In their buffed up for the election cycle fairytale, the poor bankers were bullied by libs on the Hill and in the executive to give all their money to poor folk. These same bankers who sit on their billions despite receiving hundreds of billions in TARP money, now just won’t loan any of it. The Republicans would have you believe that they’re just so ascared of the government. 

There are several reasons that the housing market, and then subsequently the stock market and the economy collapsed, but the first is greed. American’s sense this now. In almost every poll the awakening can be seen, especially in the only polls that count, this week’s actual elections. Ohio was particularly encouraging in its vote to sustain collective bargaining. In public opinion polls we hear that almost 70% would support increasing taxes on those making a million or more. A recent Washington Post Poll found that by nearly the same number Americans felt the tables were tilted to benefit people with wealth. You have to wonder if Joe the Plumber now realizes how spectacularly he was f***ed.

In the run-up to the crisis both Government institutions and the credit rating agencies failed to regulate the wild investment strategies, the products of the computer finance whiz kids who created it all, and the predatory lending practices of the banks and mortgage companies. Countrywide Finance, one of the most lax and predatory, in an extremely damaging transaction later acquired by Bank of America, issued 20% of all mortgages in the US. Of course there was greed at every level. Even at the credit rating agencies like Moody’s and Standard and Poor’s, for profit companies which make their money from the very institutions they rate, there was a lot of money to chase and that is just what they did.

So there is blame for the investors, the speculators, the banks, the government regulators, the rating agencies, both Democrats and Republican politicians and of course, home owners and home buyers.

So what happened?  

There were a number of reasons for the collapse. As spelled out in Michael Lewis’ excellent book, The Big Short, there was a lot of money in play, easy money at low rates. As the pool of eligible candidates for standard loans dried up, the lending institutions still flush with cash began to lower standards and chase ever less reliable loans. As early as 2004, a very select few started to get wise when they noted the rapidly deteriorating standards for awarding home mortgages.

The ratio of American consumer debt to disposable income sky rocketed from 77% in 1990 to 107% in 2006. In the near hysterical financial circumstances after 9-11, when the Fed dramatically lowered rates while abdicating its regulatory responsibility, the banks allowed all standards for approving all kinds of loans to collapse.

Note to Newt: Some of us do understand how business works. 

Continuing, Wall Street hucksters came up with ever more complex and completely unregulated Collateralized Debt Obligations (CDO’s) and other forms of derivatives and investment vehicles to feed those addicted to cash in the banking, mortgage, financial services and Insurance (AIG)  industry.  By 2006 home loan requirements dropped to a stunning 2% of the value of the average home. Easy capital made no money down loans worth more than the value of the home a common occurrence.

 According to Lewis’ book, one of the first to spot the trend was a finance geek named Michael Burry. Trying to build his own personal wealth he tried in vain to sell Credit Default swaps (CDS)-- basically an insurance policy that CDO’s would not go bad-- to several large banks  such as Morgan Stanley, Deutsche Bank, BOA, Citibank, more than a dozen in total, but they all thought he was crazy. What sort of a nut would you ever think the housing market would soften? This despite ample evidence that the bankers themselves had that mortgage standards had essentially come down to one’s ability fill out a form and draw a breath.

As Lewis says explicitly in his book, people knew or should have known, but everyone-- Wall Street derivatives creators and traders, the banks, the mortgage companies, the pension funds and institutional investors, investors large and small, AND the ratings agencies—EVERYONE—was making so much money, no one wanted to peak behind the curtain at the river of rot that was funding it all. Greed, Simple greed was the cause of it. Romney and the rest of them know this. But they lie and they shift blame to feed the corporate masters which drive their ambition and feed their own greed.

Note to Herman Cain: I saw the debate where you tried to answer 9-9-9 to every question. It certainly is no answer to the under or unregulated and out of control financial sector.

Washington had skin in the game too. Campaign funds flowing from the financial sector to both parties were astronomical, and the increase in contributions mirrors closely the astronomical run up in the cost of elections. The financial industry spent close to $300 million during the run up to repeal of Glass Steagull in the Clinton era alone. In just the few years between 2004 and 2006 a trillion dollar market of opaque investment vehicles was set up under the nose of the regulators, based primarily on a juiced up subprime market. It was a house of cards. A tidal wave of technology overwhelmed whatever switches there were.

In response to this we have Mitt Romney on Wednesday, having his best debate yet according to some, whining, “What do you want federal government to do buy all the houses?” No, but the US government did put up a trillion save the slime that created the mess. Why is it that no comparable plans have been devised to save any of the 11 million that have lost their homes? Is it possible as Cain suggests the whole of the foreclosed underwater Americans are lazy and or stupid?

Romney, Paul, Cain, et al, all said Wednesday that the government should step back. Even though one in  five or six Americans has been severely damaged by the crisis, and millions more have had their options to seek employment by relocating which would  also grow the economy severely curtailed, the Republicans would step back and allow more homes to be foreclosed. They criticize the ineffectiveness of the Obama administration which is not compleytely unfair when discussingactual results, but then they explain to even the most liberal why they would be even worse and sitting out the next election in frustration is no option at all.  The Republicans ONLY answer is the free Market. Thought the Student loan program now administered by the Federal government was widely acknowledged to be laced with corruption perpetuated by Citibank and other major financial institutions, the Republican field now proposes to turn it back to their  masters in the private sector.

There are valid arguments to be had about free market principles vs. government intervention but they cannot be had now, not with this bunch. Today’s GOP stands in defense of immeasurable corruption and their super rich masters. The Republicans only principle is the perpetuation of wealth in the hands of a very small minority, and the perpetuation of their own privilege through the dirty campaign contributions of these people and the corporations they represent.

On Wednesday the candidates all in one way or another made the case that the market needs to correct this and that government cannot. Even the moderate Huntsman with his call to break up the six too big to fail banks, calls for lesser regulation and lower taxes, which by nature of their structure would provide greatest benefit –again- to the 1%, and especially the 400.

As reported by Tim Dickinson in his excellent Rolling Stone article, “How the GOP Became the Party of the Rich. There are 400 earners in the US that take home on average $350 million a year. In a country of 275 million people there are eight million millionaires. It is this very narrow constituency that is funding the vast corruption of both parties in Washington and at the state level. Campaign contributions by the likes of the Koch brothers are nothing more than another business expense designed to create even greater piles of wealth. Meanwhile as Dickinson reports small business and the upper middle class, which typically pull the Republican lever, have been sold tax breaks which have been greatly eroded by the alternative minimum tax. In short all of the money is flowing to the super wealthy.

On Wednesday we saw the entire Republican field call for a tax holiday for cooperate taxes held overseas. Not one of the supposedly aggressive CNBC questioners asked why when this was allowed in 2004 and the corporate rate was dropped from 35 to 5.25%, so few jobs were created. Where did the money go? As reported by Dickinson it went to dividends for wealthy investors, and stock buy backs which further escalated the share prices, which added even more money into the system, restless cash which loved CDO’s and other esoteric derivatives.  

Dickinson writes that in 2004 Congress passed “the little-noticed American Jobs Creation Act. Named in the same Orwellian fashion as Bush's ‘Clear Skies’ and ‘Healthy Forests’ initiatives, the 2004 law allowed corporations to bring home billions in profits they had stockpiled in offshore tax havens – the very flight of capital that Bush had blessed by torpedoing tax harmonization three years earlier. Under the tax amnesty, corporations repatriated $300 billion in profits they had stashed offshore. But instead of paying the nominal corporate tax rate of 35 percent, they were taxed at just 5.25 percent.

The title of the bill notwithstanding, corporations invested almost none of their windfall in new factories or other measures to create the 500,000 jobs that Republicans had promised. In fact, many companies that received the biggest tax break actually slashed jobs. Hewlett-Packard laid off 14,500 workers – one pink slip for every $1 million in profits it shipped back home from overseas. All told, according to an analysis by the National Bureau of Economic Research, up to 92 percent of the "jobs creation" money was handed out to top executives and shareholders in a frenzy of dividend payments and stock buybacks. And thanks to the GOP's cut on investment income the previous year, wealthy individuals who pocketed the offshore profits paid the same rate on their bonanza, 15 percent, that a waitress at a diner might pay on her tips.”

Every dollar contributed by the wealthy and super wealthy legally invested in the political process has been paid back handsomely in these highly favorable government policies. The battle today is not between liberals and conservatives. After his massive giveaway to the rich in 1981 Reagan raised taxes and closed loopholes11 times in the eight years that followed. He still wrote billions in hot checks as Benson noted in the debate with Quayle, but he was at least to some extent restricted by the extent of the deficits his “conservative” polices created.  Today’s Republican Party has no such limitations and as they have already indicated they are prepared to wreck the economy in the name of their corporate and wealthy benefactors.

12 Songs that Deserved to Played at 10

These are not the best 12 songs of all times, though perhaps some belong on that list. These are just loud fast songs that cannot be appreciated at less than ear damaging decibels. Ok, so I’m an old bastard. Can’t be helped.

Every Picture Tells a Story—Rod Stewart, 1971

“I firmly believe that I
Didn’t need anyone but me
I sincerely thought I was so complete,
Lo… Look how wrong you can be”
Sloppy as hell, politically incorrect, but raucous as it gets. Ah, if the kids only knew what they were missing.

Blame It—Rupee-2002

I don’t know diddles about Soca, but through my wife I have discovered dozens of great Caribbean tunes. This is one of the great ones. As a middle aged guy from the suburbs of Chicago, I cannot wine my waste, but every time I hear this I dream I can. Nonetheless, I feel gipped by my upbringing.  

Fortunate Son—John Fogerty-1969

“Some folks are born
silver spoon in hand,
Lord don't they help themselves.
But when the tax man comes to the door,
Lord, the house looks like a rummage sale.”
Anger for the war, but as timeless as “This Land Is Your Land”. Not a folk song though, needs to be played really f’in loud. Add volume, Stir frequently.

American Idiot—Green Day-2004

I remember-- fool that I am -having a conversation about this band a few years back. My friend said musicianship was so, so. Sort of let it go at that. Since then I have thought so many times, yeah but the rage is alright with me. A great angry song, one that despite my inability to understand half of what’s out there, makes me think the kids are alright.

49 Bye Bye’s/ For What It’s Worth- Steven Stills—1970

“Jesus Christ was the first nullified revolutionary…”
Another song where the roiling anger is what it all comes down. For those of you who know it, this baby is more than 40 years old, so if you do know it you’re flipping up there. Dig it…

I Want to Be Sedated—Joey Ramone 1977

In a year when Rita Coolidge demolished the great Jackie Wilson’s Higher and Higher, the boys from Queens got it all right. F***, why not? Seemed like half the world including Rita was sedated.  Mindless silliness, but you can dance to it. Well, us white guys can anyway. Gotta do the overbite thing though.

Death or Glory- The Clash-1979

“We’re gonna fight til you lose”
Reagan wasn’t even president yet, but here we get an intensely personal cry to fight on.

She’s the One—Bruce Springsteen-1975

That Thunder in your heart
At night when you're kneeling in the dark
It says you're never gonna leave her
But there's this angel in her eyes
That tells such desperate lies
And all you want to do is believe her
Emotional & fierce—even though it never really gives you the answer. As with Meeting Across the River one is left wondering how it all came out.

You Can’t Always Get What You Want

A song for former church goers. The chorus at the end fills with rapture even as Jagger relates the most basic of truths.   

Mannish Boy—Muddy Waters—1955

Though I’m partial to a later recoding with Johnny winter from 1977, a great howl of pride.

Pin Ball Wizard—Pete Townend-1969

Here, I def prefer the 1986 recoding on deep end live. Something about Daltrey’s bombast did not always sit well with me, Baba O’Reily, Miles and Miles, My Generation, Magic Bus, notwithstanding. Oh, sorry, I take that back. Anyhow I still love Pete best.

Paradise City—Guns ‘N’ Roses--1987

The guiltiest of guilty pleasures.” Please take me home…”

Thoughts on Herman, Poor Herman

We want him to win. We're not trying to undermine him- James Carville

A liar should have a good memory.- Quintilian

Clever liars give details, but the cleverest don't.- Anonymous

He entered the territory of lies without a passport for return.-Graham Greene

Although one dislikes being deceived, one likes even less to be undeceived. -- Ninon De Lenclos

Turn out the lights, The party's over- Dandy Don Merideth, Rest his soul

It's not a lie if you belive it- Geroge Costanza


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vn_PSJsl0LQ

Is the Damn Breaking?

It appears the silly season is coming to an end in more ways than one. Herman Cain isn’t talking his way out of this one, although I don’t believe he talked his way out of the others. It is starting to ring of a Weiner moment, a guy got his claim of innocence so far out there—all the while knowing it was a lie—that once the truth comes out wintering in Alaska is going to seem like a good idea.

But back in the real world we had three interesting developments on the budget and taxes last week.

Last week Romney, speaking to the Koch brothers funded American for Prosperity meeting in DC put forward his reform plan for Social Security, Medicaid and on Medicare. He blathered on about a lot of other right wing who-hah, but I want to focus on entitlements. Let’s work backwards on his ideas starting with those he threw out for the thugs on the right in the audience and work forwards to the parts that might actually work.

The most heinous platform proposal is to let the States administer the health care program for the poor, Medicaid. Sending 100% of Medicaid back to the states will help control costs, by making dramatically less healthcare available for the poor. State run is well within republican orthodoxy, but owing to the shared federal and state expenditures already built into the program there is currently an uneven distribution of care for the poor by state. This is based on the Scrooge factor of certain state governments like Texas. Elimination of any Federal standards for this program will decimate health care for the poor in the worst of these states, like, oh, I don’t know, Texas.

Rick Perry made a similar proposal in his book Fed Up! The Battle to Save bla, bla, bla. Texas employers covers 52% of their workers vs the national average of 62%. This closely tracks the growth and number of low wage jobs in the state. Texas employers are pretty in avoiding minimum wage laws. Accrodding to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics more than half a million workers in the state did not even make the minimum wage. Low wages and no health insurance, it appears that attracts employers. As a result, Texas has the highest proportion of uninsured in the country, 26.9%. However the cost to employers and insured in states where there are large numbers of uninsured is rarely addressed.

The lack of insurance forces the poor into emergency rooms and other costly methods of treatment. It is so much less costly to diagnose and treat high blood pressure than to deal with the consequences of a stroke. At a national level this is a crisis and should make preventative health care a national priority. Obama’s plan made a major effort in that area. But for the wolves howling on Obama-Care it’s so much easier to blame the unemployed, and crtically in states like Texas the working poor, for their lack of insurance. In the end taxpayers, the insured, and employers pick up the costs of healthcare for the poor through higher bills and higher insurance costs. But don’t pay any attention to that you middle class “centrists” Obama might by bisexual (Long story, funny you tube video called Republican Wisdom). Texas employers save money on the front end but pay it back later at much higher cost. Call it an Uninsured Tax.

Through the guise of better local management Perry and Romney both propose “controlling costs” by allowing states to control Medicaid. If passed Texas would surely race to the bot---Whoops, sorry, they’re already there.

On to Medicare, where Romney also abandons his own plan and his own history. Massachusetts due to Romney care has 5% uninsured, the best in the nation, but continues with spiraling costs and heavy usage of Emergency rooms for medical care.  He does not look at what worked in the plan he pushed through as governor of Massachusetts. He moves, actually careens, to the right and proposes something similar to the privatization plans that Bush pushed to no avail on Social Security. He would let younger people opt out for private health insurance, which I would think it would be highly likely they would do because kids never think they will get sick. Of course later he leaves them in the road to suffer at the hands of the monstrous jackals that shouted “Let him die!” when the question of what to do for a sick man with no insurance came up at the republican debates.  

Health care costs are out of control running at about 17% of GDP in the US, but less than 10% in the Eurozone. Costs rose 50% in Massachusetts, after Romney-Care was enacted, closely matching an increase at the federal level from $2.0 trillion to $2.9 trillion from 2006 to 2009. Romney insured his people for his growth in costs. The percentage of uninsured Americans was essentially unchanged.

For all the good things in Obama’s plan it did not have strong enough provisions control costs. Any plan that does not deal with the business end of healthcare, that is the insurance companies, pharmaceuticals, and the medical establishment, and oh, yeah the lawyers, is doomed to failure on the cost side.  Americans are right to feel that they have excellent healthcare, but as with so many other issues that view is myopic. It is true that in some areas care is outstanding. Saudi Kings that want good healthcare come to the US. At the top end the care is outstanding, but at the bottom and increasingly at the middle healthcare is already rationed by the profit motive. I Googled the phrase “denied health treatment by insurance”. Came up with 55 million results. These very, very large business interests pay handsomely to be protected from reform in Washington (even post Obama-Care, especially post Obama-Care), then they pay even more in the public relations battle to convince America that change is scary and bad.

Romney did have a serious plan on social security. He proposes no action for those near retirement, a higher retirement age down the road, and lesser benefits for those that can afford it. I would emphasize one arm of that over another, and there will be much haggling over the fine points in all three, but a finely tuned three pronged approach with these elements—each painful in its way to libs and conservatives-- is the only one that will pass congress.

So give him credit, Romney’s entitlement plans are not ALL hot air. As noted he pandered to the right wing thuggery assembled before him on a dozen issues, including Medicaid, and to a lesser extent Medicare, where no one on the right has any plan to improve care or control costs. But on Social Security  a plan with these elements will eventually pass. Everyone knows it. America knows it. Whenever Washington decides to be honest and take the heat, this is what they’ll approve. It’s a good sign that at least one republican is talking honestly about Social Security. Obama was willing to touch this also in the “Grand” deal that fell apart. Got a lot of heat. Doubtful he’ll come back to that until after the election.

The other two holes in the damn came from John Boehner and Mike Simpson, a Republican from Idaho.

Of the two Boehner’s is that one that really caught my ear. Taxes are the third rail of right wing orthodoxy. As such nearly every single Republican member of congress has signed a pledge put forward by Grover Norquist who heads Americans for Tax Reform in which they pledge to never raise taxes ever, for any reason, Ever. Ever. Read my lips, Never. George Bush No New Taxes- In. George Bush raise taxes- Out.  Never, ever, ever. Not even on millionaires? Never! Not even on billionaires? That’s class warfare and never!

The Republicans are sort of in a spot now because 64% of Americans in a recent CBS poll said taxes should be raised on millionaires as part of a balanced budget package. In the Senate that’s filibuster proof.  In the Republican Party that’s a public relations problem. So Boehner last week when asked about the impact of Norquist in the party and whether it was hurting the party said, “Our focus here is on jobs… It’s not often I’m asked about some random person in America.” One thing Norquist is not is a “random person”. Many things unite the republican mob, but the one thing that joins them at the hip is taxes.

Reporters chuckled at the absurdity of the remark. I would love to think that some Republicans seeing that 64% number are starting to think the end is near for this strategy of stone-walling on tax increases for the wealthy. Could be, though, that Boehner was just avoiding saying anything about his conferences absolute fealty to the tax pledge, and so Norquist. Hard telling…

Then yesterday on fair and unbalanced Mike Simpson made some remarks. Simpson is urging  the super-committee charged with formulating plan to cut the deficit by $1.5 trillion to “go big” and shoot for a $4.0 trillion reduction.  He went on to say “Well, first the pledge, I signed that in 1998 when I first ran and I didn't know I was signing a marriage agreement that would last forever”.  

He went on , "The reality is you can't get to $4 trillion [in debt reduction and spending control] without including additional revenue. We might have different ideas what that revenue would look like. [It's possible] you could get additional revenue by lowering the tax rates and eliminating all of the exemptions underneath, but more revenue is key to this."

Cold feet? Could it be?

Maybe cold water. Today on MSNBC Senate democratic message guru Chick Schumer said, "I don't think ... the super-committee is going to succeed because our Republican colleagues have said no net revenues."

Confusing, No? Even Norquist said the pledge is about rates, not taxes, a fine but important point as that would allow the lowering of rates—something the republicans could sell, and elimination of a vast trove of special interest deductions which would result in an increase in revenues, what the country needs.

I am often struck when I read about the cordial relationship both Kennedy and Tip O’Neil had with Reagan. Though I think this point is often overstated to the edge of genuflected reverence, bless him Reagan had his hand in tearing down the wall, but on domestic issues, Nicaragua, South Africa, AIDS & HIV and ten other things he was a right wing ideologue, a heartless bastard. Yet and still history suggests he was a likeable guy that got along well with the opposition, which always made me wonder how much of this was theatrics to fire up the base on both sides.

Today the republicans are way to the right of Reagan and the Democratic President is in many ways to the right of Nixon for God sakes. Is it all just theatrics? Notwithstanding the game of chicken that played out over the debt is it possible that both sides know the time for action is near?  Is the damn breaking?

Have a Koch and a Frown

Alright, so Cain gets all the headlines. Yesterday with characteristic bombast at the meeting with Americans for Prosperity Cain blared his close connections to the Koch brothers. This gathering would hit the headlines and the blogosphere later in the day when a confrontation between Occupy DC protesters and an Americans for Prosperity participant resulted in three people being sent to the hospital. Fair-and-Unbalanced-5, DC reported that the vehicle struck two people, kept driving, and then struck a third person sending all to the hospital with serious though non-life threating injuries. The driver won’t be cited because as the police said he had the light. Really? You can use that? How many times I would have loved to while navigating the frustration of NY streets.

In a quote that may come back to haunt him, but probably won’t, Cain nearly shouted that “…This may be a breaking news announcement for the media — I am the Koch brothers’ brother from another mother”. In a clever piece of theatrics Cain created a substantial field of theatrical smoke. In doing so he avoided the thrust of the NY Times article which was Cain’s association with Mark Block, his smokin’ campaign manager. Both were Koch Funded Americans for Prosperity operatives together and spent a considerable amount of time on the right wing rubber chicken circuit before Koch money created the Tea party and gave them both new career paths which have now morphed into this improbable run for the presidency. The NY Times article raised questions as to whether Block, through a splinter group called Prosperity USA had illegally funded various expenses of the Cain Campaign to the tune of $40,000.

Of course there are those that will suggest that this is all just the lame stream media casting aspersions on Cain and his campaign, but the record of illegality on the Koch brothers, and Block is extensive, real and documented. Block was previously barred for three years from Wisconsin politics and paid a $15,000 fine for illegally coordinating state Supreme Court Justice Jon Wilcox’s 1997 re-election campaign with a special interest group that favored school vouchers. In a situation eerily prescient of Cain’s current sexual harassment troubles Block’s settlement did not include an admission of guilt which now allows Block to tell the AP that the charges were “ridiculous”.

The Koch brother’s record of malfeasance and criminality is deeper and eminently more troubling. The Koch Brothers run one of the largest privately held conglomerates in the world. Being privately held company they have no legal responsibility to report much about their company and the intensely private conglomerate does just that. There is no definitive record of either the actual sales or profits of the company, though most estimates are in the neighborhood of $100 billion per year in revenues.

Koch Industries was started as an oil company in 1927 by Fred Koch, an early member of the John Birch Society. Fred was an early adviser to the founder of the anti-communist John Birch Society, which battled the civil rights movement claiming at one point that ”The civil rights movement in the United States... has not been infiltrated by the Communists, as you now frequently hear. It has been deliberately and almost wholly created by the Communists patiently building up to this present stage for more than forty years.”

Fred’s sons Charles and David (the brothers) provided the critical early seed money to the Tea Party. That money is largely responsible for turning the Tea Party which initially mobilized around anger at TARP money bailing out big financial institutions and Wall Street—something exactly on track with the OWS crowd. The TP was at the outset an anti-big business/ anti-government/ anti-Wall Street somewhat “populist” organization, but the source of its funds, the Koch brothers, turned it into an arm of the most conservative arm of the party. Working closely with Dick Armey’s FreedomWorks, another privately (and through some insurance scam highly questionably) funded political organization, the Tea Party, which while exhibiting come real ugliness on its fringes, did originally press some populist thrust. All of that is now lost. But it was that populist anger that caused some to seek a confluence of thought between the OWS movement and the TP-- which to some extent was partially and ironically real-- before the reordering of the TP priorities by the Koch brothers and Dick Armey.

Koch industries is a large conglomerate with holdings in consumer products with well-known brands such as Brawny, Vanity Fair, Mardi Gras, Dixie paper products. There are calls for boycotts of these products, but there is little likelihood that that would have much effect on the kingdom which still draws much of its treasure from energy and large industrial projects where the record of corruption is extensive.

In an extensive piece from early October, Bloomberg Markets of all people summarized the unethical record of Koch:

·         In 2008 an internal Koch Industries investigation turned up a pattern of bribery and other illegal activities in a division working on a contract basis on distillation, pollution control and water filtration equipment in several countries, including Nigeria, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. The whistle blower, Ludmila Egorova-Farines, Koch Industries Compliance and Ethics manager, was fired and is currently in litigation for wrongful termination in France

·         In 1999, a Texas jury imposed a $296 million verdict on a Koch pipeline unit -- the largest compensatory damages judgment in a wrongful death case against a corporation in U.S. history. The jury found that the company’s negligence had led to a butane pipeline rupture that fueled an explosion that killed two teenagers. Trial testimony indicated that Koch employees aware of the danger in the leaks ordered employees to ignore it, thus saving the expense in repair.

·         True American patriots Koch companies worked extensively and illegally with Iran over a ten year period. In contravention of US law, Koch industries worked with the Iranians to build and develop a methanol plant.

·         In April 2001, the Koch Petroleum Group pled guilty to a felony charge of lying to the government about its benzene emissions. A report to the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission disclosed only 1/149th of the actual benzene pollution. The extremely profitable plant earned almost $200 million for the company in 1995, the year of the violation; the benzene emissions would have cost $7 million to control. In an early sign of a pattern that would be repeated again and again the whistle blower, an environmental technician released the information on misreporting. This led to fines, which led to the employee being moved to an empty office with no tasks and no e-mail access.  Of course, she also quit.

·         According to the Senate Special Committee on Investigations Koch industries took 1.95 million barrels of oil from Indian Land and didn’t pay for it from 1986 to 1988. The moneys were actually owed the Federal Government which then passed a portion on to Indian Tribes. The Senate referred the case to the Justice Department, but no indictment followed. In December 1999 in a civil trial, the jury found that "Koch Industries had made 24,587 false claims in buying oil, underpaying the U.S. government for royalties on Native American land from 1985 to 1989." In the end they paid a small civil fine which amounted to a fraction of the actual theft.

The Brothers grim have an interesting record of job creation and philanthropy in addition to their political giving. As reported by Rachel Maddow while the Koch brothers net worth grew by about 50% from 2007 to 2011 ($34B to approx $50 Billion) the number of employees of Koch Industries has shrunk by nearly 20% from 80,000 to 67,000. Think about that the next time you hear Boehner or Cantor talk about job creators. We can be certain that further tax breaks which the brothers advocate with substantial political corruption, I mean contributions, will free them up to employ more people. So as Bill Murray would say, “We got that going for us.”

According to Bloomberg the brothers in the tradition of Rockefeller, Carnegie, and other robber barons of the early 20^th century do have an extensive record of supporting the arts and education at favored institutions. They have supported Kansas Special Olympics, Big Brothers Big Sisters (a charity near and dear to me), the Red Cross, the Salvation Army, victims of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, and ironically considering their flagrant record on the environment the Nature Conservancy.

But according to Mother Jones the brothers through their PAC contributed over $43,000 to the anti-collective bargaining campaign of Scott Walker in Wisconsin. Then, through a legal loophole Koch Industries ceded additional funds well beyond the legal limit by contributing $1 million to the Republican Governors Association, which in turn contributed additional corruption to Walker. The boys supported Scott Brown in Massachusetts, no Cain for sure and certainly liberal for their neo-fascist tastes, but the best they were ever going to be able to buy in deep blue Massachusetts.

According to www.opensecrets.org since the beginning of the 2006 election cycle, Koch’s PAC spent more on contributions to federal candidates than any other oil-and-gas sector PAC. For that period, Koch Industries and its executives spent $2.51 million compared to next three biggest contributors: Exxon ($1.71 million), Valero ($1.68 million), and Chevron ($1.22 million). They contributed to a stunning 62 of 87 members of the 2010 freshman class of Republicans on the house, many of these Tea Party followers, all of whom signed the Grover Norquist “No-Tax-Increases-Ever-For-Any-Reason” Oath. 90% of total Koch corruption/ contributions, went to the “fight for the little guys” Republicans.

The pattern of marginally legal to wholly illegal business activities then funding efforts to influence political races at all levels whether through contributions or lobbying where they spent $20M in 2008, mostly on stopping Obama’s Healthcare reform, and $35 million since, is clear. These are business investments designed to increase their wealth. As evidenced by the growth in their net worth it appears that their strategy has paid off handsomely. The Koch brothers see the United States Government, the governments of the states, the legislative and regulatory arms of both institutions, as business issues to be solved though their political largesse. With a $50 billion fortune their giving is a fraction of their net worth, and from a purely business perspective a totally logical, although deeply corrupting, investment.

This pattern of corruption has not stopped almost every single repub candidate for President from genuflecting at their slimy altar. Perry has received over $50,000 from the Koch brothers. Bachman has received more than $25,000 of their corrupt cash. Cain is the biggest recipient but it may take years to unravel the series of front organizations set up by the Koch brothers which are funding him. The Citizens United decision is the direct reason for this culture being allowed to hide corporate involvement in American politics. 

Romney with a net worth of $200 to $250 million can fund a lot but alas he does not have billionaire-deep pockets. He has been off the radar all week, thanks to the silly season of a drugged up (or whatever) Perry and an amnesia suffering (or whatever) Cain. But Romney is aggressively after the billionaire brothers endorsement. According the Washington Examiner Romney badly wants the endorsement of David Koch by far the most engaged of the two brothers contributing over 2/3 overall of what the family spreads around. An internal Romney campaign memo spotlighted by the examiner calls the Koch brothers the “financial engine of the Tea Party”, something the brothers foolishly deny, though Romney and his staff firmly believe is true.

So there he was on Friday, Romney laying out this platform for the rabid crowd of sliver haired and finely suited thugs and bankers, wall streeters, and conservative middle, lower and working class  rabble so happy to be in the presence of wealth which serves them not at all except in its ability to feed their deep and abiding anger. One of the crowd would later run over three Occupy DC protesters with his car—though, keep in mind, he did have the light. Cain is a side show at this point, a circus act meant to distract. Here’s the real news. Romney proposed:

* Turning Medicaid, the primary healthcare program for the poor--Already uneven in its allocation of resources based on certain (especially southern—read Texas, for example) states record of hostility to the poor—back to the states in its totality.

* Cutting federal spending to no more than 20% of GDP from its current level of 24%

* A constitutional balanced budget amendment

* Reverse Obama’s defense cuts which is the one area for cutting that everyone except the most right wing agree is long overdue. Here Romney panders shamelessly on a point that he knows will never hold up in real budget negotiations.

* Repeal Obamacare, a program that has so often been pointed out closely resembles the program he passed while governor.

* Eliminating all funding for AMTRAK

* Eliminating funding for the National Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities, as well as National Public Broadcasting. While it is well known that all of these targets are frequently raised as budget reduction targets, all are the frequently attacked by the right  because all three are perceived as being liberal and anti-corporate, mostly because their lesser reliance on corporate advertising allows them to report on things which do not find corporations always in a favorable light.

* Reducing money an unspecified amount to Planned Parenthood. Previously Romney has said that he would eliminate completely the $75 million the Fed supplies to the women’s health organization. This is another budget neutral position which mostly provides red meat to the thugs on the right. That is $75 Million with an “M” not a “B”. Romney estimates that In addition to the $75 Mil in PP money the Federal government spends an additional $225 million in other family planning environments and wants to save all that money, all of it.  

* The repeal of Davis Bacon enacted in 1931, which guarantees workers handling federal contacts to be paid the prevailing wage in a community. While it cannot be argued that the repeal of this law would reduce the cost of many government contracts, it should be noted that in absence of any other legislation protecting worker rights, this proposal dovetails with the anti-union efforts which the Koch brothers have championed across the country which would seek to balance government budgets on the back of middle class working men and women.

I am hard pressed to believe Romney, a scion of Liberal Republican  politics from the east, actually believes all this claptrap, but he is convinced that this is the only way to get office and we can be sure that if elected he will believe it will be the way to maintain power. Because in the end this is political power chasing the money of the extremely corrupt, conservative right wing America.

Romney argued that fiscal responsibility is not “heartless”, and pointed to what everyone knows are programs or expenditures weighted down with bureaucratic ineptitude and waste. He noted other places to cut such as pentagon procurement, fraud in government contracts, job training which is wildly inefficient though critical in this technology driven age, the size of the federal work force, and overlapping departmental oversight.  

He did in fairness mention a three stage plan on Social Security which is certain to be something like the real compromise we will eventually see there. Romney’s SS plan included no steps on those near retirement, a higher retirement age down the road, and lesser benefits for those that can afford it.  The Koch family wants to eliminate Social Security, so they probably weren’t that thrilled with this proposal. Romney was a total demagogue on Obama’s plan for Medicare cuts and brought up the old health care “rationing” lie.

Romney made repeated reference to the “immorality” of turning this generations debts over to the   our children and grandchildren but never once asked the group of overfed, overly pampered slugs in front of him to contribute a dollar to the effort of national reconstruction. 

Wouldn’t be prudent to kneel at the altar of greed and explain a truthful or balanced narrative, because where the big money sits, nothing but totally loyalty to the crown will do. As the wildly undisciplined Cain and the slick side show which is Rick Perry fade into the rear view mirror we need to remember the corruption that is at the heart of where the real battle is located and why the movements happening across the country are so important. Occupy!

Corzine's Gamble

As we now see Jon Corzine's firm go belly up with the attendant investigations and potential subpoenas it’s worth noting how corrupted the system has become by the huge amounts of money available on all sides. To those who support the dem party with the fervent belief that things would get better if the damn repubs would just get out of the way, this is reality check time.

Corzine gained favor in political circles by shifting a substantial portion of Goldman’s contributions to the Democratic Party. He rode those investments to power, both in terms of his ability to help Goldman Sachs influence the debate over efforts to remove the restrictions which prohibited banks from using their own funds to make investments, the repeal of Glass-Steagull, as well as his ability to rise in power both as Senator and later as Governor or NJ.

As an elected official Corzine was reliably liberal, supporting universal health care, increased support for pre-school education, taxpayer funding for college, mandatory gun registration, and so forth.

As head of MF Global Corzine bet vast sums of the firms money on derivatives in European bonds. France and Germany in exchange for their willingness to bail out the weaker economies of Europe are demanding that the bond holders take at least part of the hit, something that did not happen in many cases in the US government TARP bailouts. Apparently that demand is sinking Corzine and MF Global.

Money Talks

In 1972 five men were arrested at the Watergate Hotel in Washington, DC, while attempting to break in to the headquarters of the Democratic national committee. As the story unfolded the country would discover that Nixon was using both the CIA, and especially the FBI to spy on domestic opponents of his policies. Nixon’s Committee to Re-elect the President (CRP, or Creep in the vernacular of the day) used ex-CIA to do the break in.

G. Gordon Liddy, an ex-CIA wingnut, and later a right wing talk show host was found to have masterminded much of the shenanigans. But it was also determined that White house aides including Chuck Colson, Edward Haldeman (Chief of Staff at the time) and John Ehrlichman were all aware of the details of the plot and all were eventually convicted for trying to cover up the plot, as was John Mitchell the Attorney General of the United States, who also had a moonlighting job at the time as Chairman of Creep.

In addition to the break ins and surveillance the committee was found to have engaged in dirty tricks designed to shape or tarnish the Democratic Party opposition. In one particularly egregious circumstance it was said that a letter had been faked and then leaked by Creep.  The Canuck letter, as it was known was a silly forged document that suggested Edmund Muskie a candidate for President at the time, didn’t particularly like people with French accents. That letter put then candidate Muskie in a particularly bad light. The candidate handled the whole letter deal pretty poorly, crying in the snow and all, and soon dropped from the race. There was much conjecture at the time that Creep was molding the election to get the candidate they wanted. That was never directly proven, but there was broad consensus that Creep was manipulating the entire process.

It came to light at the time that no less than AG John Mitchel maintained a slush fund in a safe in his office and that the funds contained therein  were provided by among others a fugitive financier named Robert Vesco—then living in Cuba-- trying to curry favor with the administration. Vesco had put at least $200,000 into the fund. Mitchell was found guilty of conspiracy, obstruction of justice, and perjury and sentenced to two and a half to eight years in prison. The sentence was later reduced to one to four years by Judge John J. Sirica. Mitchell served only 19 months of his sentence.

The slush fund itself was…Wait for it… $500,000.

How quaint.

Immediately following the Watergate convictions, Nixon’s resignation and so forth, strict campaign finance laws were passed. Later in 2002 recognizing that the reforms put in place after Watergate had been far outpaced by the lawyers for both parties and that money was pouring into the system, Congress passed McCain Feingold.

Yet the 2008 election for president and Congress cost more than $5.0 Billion (with a “B”) according to the Center for Responsive Politics. The presidential election alone cost more than $2.0 billion with the candidates themselves raising about $400 million each, and $1.0 billion-plus additionally being poured in by business, labor and other special interest PAC’s.

Obama’s top twenty contributors or bundlers raised $14 million alone of his almost $400 Billion haul. Of this top level bundled contributions about 30% came from Wall Street , Banks and Finance firms, 26%  from institutes of higher learning, 16% from tech companies, 12% from lawyers, and  9% from media companies. GE which as someone pointed out paid no taxes this year contributed $500,000 alone.

While it should be pointed out that the money came from employees of the firm or their vendors. There are limits to what the companies can directly contribute to candidates, but those limits were largely eviscerated by the Jan-2010 Supreme Court decision which qualified “money” as speech and so eliminated most restrictions on corporate contributions to campaigns through PAC’s. This court of apparently activist judges from the right overturned elements of the McCain Feingold bill passed by Congress. As we know activist judges are only activist when they overturn your preferred legislation.

McCain, not to be outdone, also rose close to $400 million. Though the overall funds total were similar, Obama’s actually raised more direct contributions than McCain. His top twenty bundlers still raised close to $4.0 million with almost three quarters coming from finance firms including Citibank, Goldman and so forth which funded both candidates.

There are NO labor unions on either candidate’s list of top top contributors. Though we can be sure that democrats especially draw substantial support from unions, we also know that it is no longer their biggest source of funds. Corporations especially those in certain industries far outspend labor.

This is before PAC money is counted. The Supreme Court did maintain the requirement that the corporations had to publish their contributions and how they raised the cash so the info is easily available on the net. Citibank’s PAC raised and spent an additional million dollars, making their total contributions for the cycle close to $2 million dollars. Goldman Sachs, a major proponent of privatizing social security contributed in hard (direct to candidate) and soft (PAC’s) money almost $6 million in the cycle, supporting both candidates and both parties with their contributions. According to Open Secrets the three headed monster of Finance, Real Estate, and Insurance has already committed nearly $100 million this year to candidates and PAC’s with more to come in an election cycle which has barely started and is still more than a year away.

Pharmaceuticals contributed $32 million in 2008 and an astoundingly similar amount in the non-presidential year 2010 of over $30 million. The health care lobby is also quite active on the lobbying side spending over $200 million in lobbying in 2008, 2009, and 2010. That is $600 million in lobbying in three years.

The critics of OWS and apologists for Wall Street know these truths, but they toss Molotov cocktails of smoke and illusion designed to distract or wear down a public that is massively confused by the theatre they have been witnessing. Obama is all over Wall Street and slyly taking up the OWS cause, hoping that no one looks peeks behind the curtain and sees the piles of cash on which he rests.

Romney, a former scion, a founding partner even, of Bain capital an investment fund which puts money into underperforming companies, spruces them up and resells them to the street for a profit now says he understands the OWS protesters, whatever that means. This firm invested in some great, or near great retail giants in the US including Staples, Michael’s crafts, and others, so it cannot be argued that the funds entire growth has rested on the heels of layoffs and deteriorating worker conditions. In the odd way they make the case for why capitalism can be a good thing in America with well-directed and well researched investment capital enhancing companies with great ideas to thrive and grow. But to suggest that Bain is anything other than another Wall Street Player is absurd. The current value of the Bain fund is $66 Billion. Bain through its partners and employees by the way has contributed over $4.0 million since 1989.

Nixon, Creep, and that old gang of black bag men were amateurs. The system is completely corrupted by this wash of cash that soils everything it touches. Perhaps the OWS crowd can’t articulate their rage well, but they know a rat when they see one and as with millions of other American’s there is such a general sense that power lies in someone else’s hands, just out of our line of sight or field of reach. It is the corruption of this money which led the SEC and the Fed to look the other way, which allowed all these firms to engage in a riotous Ponzi scheme investing in sub-prime loans and then bundling them as hi-grade derivative investments, insured by AIG, and sold to Fannie and Freddie. The market, deregulated by Clinton, and heated up by low interest rates put in place right after 9-11 ran amok and everyone was making so much money no one wanted to look at the rot and corruption behind the curtain. Capitalism itself, always morally weak when left on its own, was corrupted by an overabundance of cheap money and lack of regulatory zeal.

The reason that nothing gets done in Washington is that there is always a financial interest on the other side that doesn’t want it to get done. This is not republicans and democrats, tea party and OWS. America built this. We created this system where hard right and hard left squabble while millions in the middle struggle. We fight, we bicker, we lose track, and while we weren’t watching someone stole our house, actually came in during the dark of night and took it away.

Shameless, Utterly Shamless

Re Charles Krauthammer Editorial "Who Lost Iraq"

I cannot state how truly disgusting this is to me. These *&^%$ neocons were all over Bush for having the “courage” to go to Iraq. The months later when it was clear it was a complete disaster I read an article in Vanity Fair where the pig**** mice that they are they all tried to blame bad execution or misplaced policies or whatever. There was little remorse of shame for what they had been directly responsible for perpetrating. Now these same people want to suggest that the whole venture will come down to failure because Obama could not negotiate a deal to keep some soldiers there. This when the final sticking point was Obama’s unwillingness to trade National sovereignty to the Iraqis by refusing to give up the premise that crimes of US soldiers would only be tried by Americans in American courts.  The Iraqis wanted the power to have trails as they chose according to their laws. Obama, sensing the danger in that said no. If he had said yes, god forbid, the repubs would have pilloried him.

 There are two great, well probably more, but two great books that I read. Imperial Life in the Emerald City (Rajiv Chandrasekaran) and Fiasco (Thomas Ricks). I never supported the effort in Iraq, ever. But the history of the thing is that Bush, Rumsfeld and Cheney bollixed it up something terrible, and arrogance to an immeasurable extreme was at the root of much of the failure. All these neocons thought that they too knew better than all the critics—many of which were and are in the military. The waste in human life (both Iraqi & American) and national treasure is obscene.

 Now they have the nerve to come around after all that loss, after all the lies, after all of the failure and talk about how Obama is blowing it. Wow! That takes balls.

Barack Obama was a principled opponent of the Iraq war from its beginning. But when he became president in January 2009, he was handed a war that was won. The surge had succeeded. Al-Qaeda in Iraq had been routed, driven to humiliating defeat by an Anbar Awakening of Sunnis fighting side-by-side with the infidel Americans. Even more remarkably, the Shiite militias had been taken down, with U.S. backing, by the forces of Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. They crushed the Sadr militias from Basra to Sadr City.

Al-Qaeda decimated. A Shiite prime minister taking a decisively nationalist line. Iraqi Sunnis ready to integrate into a new national government. U.S. casualties at their lowest ebb in the entire war. Elections approaching. Obama was left with but a single task: Negotiate a new status-of-forces agreement (SOFA) to reinforce these gains and create a strategic partnership with the Arab world’s only democracy.

He blew it. Negotiations, such as they were, finally collapsed last month. There is no agreement, no partnership. As of Dec. 31, the U.S. military presence in Iraq will be liquidated.

And it’s not as if that deadline snuck up on Obama. He had three years to prepare for it. Everyone involved, Iraqi and American, knew that the 2008 SOFA calling for full U.S. withdrawal was meant to be renegotiated. And all major parties but one (the Sadr faction) had an interest in some residual stabilizing U.S. force, like the postwar deployments in Japan, Germany and Korea.

Three years, two abject failures. The first was the administration’s inability, at the height of American post-surge power, to broker a centrist nationalist coalition governed by the major blocs — one predominantly Shiite (Maliki’s), one predominantly Sunni (Ayad Allawi’s), one Kurdish — that among them won a large majority (69 percent) of seats in the 2010 election.

Vice President Biden was given the job. He failed utterly. The government ended up effectively being run by a narrow sectarian coalition where the balance of power is held by the relatively small (12 percent) Iranian-client Sadr faction.

The second failure was the SOFA itself. U.S. commanders recommended nearly 20,000 troops, considerably fewer than our 28,500 in Korea, 40,000 in Japan and 54,000 in Germany. The president rejected those proposals, choosing instead a level of 3,000 to 5,000 troops.

A deployment so risibly small would have to expend all its energies simply protecting itself — the fate of our tragic, missionless 1982 Lebanon deployment — with no real capability to train the Iraqis, build their U.S.-equipped air force, mediate ethnic disputes (as we have successfully done, for example, between local Arabs and Kurds), operate surveillance and special-ops bases, and establish the kind of close military-to-military relations that undergird our strongest alliances.

The Obama proposal was an unmistakable signal of unseriousness. It became clear that he simply wanted out, leaving any Iraqi foolish enough to maintain a pro-American orientation exposed to Iranian influence, now unopposed and potentially lethal. Message received. Just this past week, Massoud Barzani, leader of the Kurds — for two decades the staunchest of U.S. allies — visited Tehran to bend a knee to both President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

It didn’t have to be this way. Our friends did not have to be left out in the cold to seek Iranian protection. Three years and a won war had given Obama the opportunity to establish a lasting strategic alliance with the Arab world’s second most important power.

He failed, though he hardly tried very hard. The excuse is Iraqi refusal to grant legal immunity to U.S. forces. But the Bush administration encountered the same problem and overcame it. Obama had little desire to. Indeed, he portrays the evacuation as a success, the fulfillment of a campaign promise.

But surely the obligation to defend the security and the interests of the nation supersede personal vindication. Obama opposed the war, but when he became commander in chief the terrible price had already been paid in blood and treasure. His obligation was to make something of that sacrifice, to secure the strategic gains that sacrifice had already achieved.

He did not, failing at precisely what this administration so flatters itself for doing so well: diplomacy. After years of allegedly clumsy brutish force, Obama was to usher in an era of not hard power, not soft power, but smart power.

Which turns out in Iraq to be . . . no power. Years from now, we will be asking not “Who lost Iraq?” — that already is clear — but “Why?”

No Jobs, No Justice- Lies My Representative Told Me

I follow Cantor and Boehner on twitter. Both have them have been going crazy posting that the house has passed multiple bills to create jobs, but Reid won’t move the bills. Reid is sort of a milquetoast, but if he blocked this pile of crapola then my hats off to him.

Here is the list. Everything noted here is NOT proposed legislation. Everything here was PASSED BY THE HOUSE. Even if the Repubs won the Senate, I doubt that any of this would survive senate filibuster, but it is a stunning list of what they really want and a clear record of what they would do if given the chance. Is it deregulation or dismantlement?? Obama has been saying that none of this is serious job creation and especially not in the near to med term. If he's wrong someone needs to point out where that would be. The list comes directly from Cantor's site. The description of the legislation comes from www.govtrack.us. The full text of the bills is available there.

1) HR2018 Clean Water Cooperative Federalism-- The bill amends the Clean Water Act (CWA), which would allocate the primary responsibilities for water pollution control to the states- Holy crap! That's a whopper! This has passed and while not explicitly eliminating the EPA it would eviscerate it's authority in water pollution control. Water and airways do not stop at state borders. F***ing ridiculous!

2) HR72-- Review of Federal Regulations-Directing certain standing committees to inventory and review existing, pending, and proposed regulations and orders from agencies of the Federal Government, particularly with respect to their effect on jobs and economic growth. Obama is endorsing similar though more restrictive legislation.

3) HR 872 The Reducing Regulatory Burdens Act-To amend the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act and the Federal Water Pollution Control Act to clarify Congressional intent regarding the regulation of the use of pesticides in or near navigable waters, and for other purposes.

4) HR 910 The Energy Tax Prevention Act-- To amend the Clean Air Act to prohibit the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency from promulgating any regulation concerning, taking action relating to, or taking into consideration the emission of a greenhouse gas to address climate change, and for other purposes.

5) HJ Res 37 Disapproval of FCC's Net Neutrality Regulations- The specific decision the House Resolution is referring to is in relation to the FCC vote last December on a proposal stating that internet providers could not limit a consumers access to websites. Apparently some internet browser sites are limiting consumer access to sites of the competition, in some cases erroneously stating that the limit is a result of bandwidth restrictions.

6) HR 1315 Consumer Financial Protection & Soundness Improvement Act-- Amends the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act to authorize the Chairperson of the Financial Stability Oversight Council to issue a stay of, or set aside, any regulation issued by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) upon the affirmative vote of the majority (currently, two-thirds) of Council members, excluding the Chair of the Commission of the CFPB (as provided for in this Act). They ought to be ashamed of this one, a complete capituation to Wall Street.

7) HR2587 Protecting Jobs From Government Interference Act-To prohibit the National Labor Relations Board from ordering any employer to close, relocate, or transfer employment under any circumstance.

8) HR2401 Transparency In Regulatory Analysis Of Impacts On The Nation To require analyses of the cumulative and incremental impacts of certain rules and actions of the Environmental Protection Agency, and for other purposes.

9) H.R. 2681: Cement Sector Regulatory Relief Act of 2011 To provide additional time for the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency to issue achievable standards for cement manufacturing facilities, and for other purposes.

10) H.R. 2250: EPA Regulatory Relief Act of 2011 To provide additional time for the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency to issue achievable standards for industrial, commercial, and institutional boilers, process heaters, and incinerators, and for other purposes.

11) H.R. 2273: Coal Residuals Reuse and Management Act To amend subtitle D of the Solid Waste Disposal Act to facilitate recovery and beneficial use, and provide for the proper management and disposal, of materials generated by the combustion of coal and other fossil fuels. Sounds so innocuous…

12) H.R. 674: 3% Withholding Repeal and Job Creation Act  To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to repeal the imposition of 3 percent withholding on certain payments made to vendors by government entities, to modify the calculation of modified adjusted gross income for purposes of determining eligibility for certain healthcare-related programs, and for other purposes.

Now that’s a record of givebacks to industries of all sorts that you can run on if you’re a republican.

We need to register and then we need to vote.

A Letter to An Angry Woman

Bless you, Ms Hartle. I am fascinated by the demonstrations and counter moves happening in social media where everyone takes their crack. Would be fascinated to know who posted their pic and statement first, because it sure has morphed into a tactic for both sides. Understanding that no one is really talking to the other party at the moment—both right and left are largely speaking to their own constituencies—but the heightened sense of dialogue one would hope would be a good thing. That is so long as it does not devolve into the sickening ethos of the Loudoun County GOP in Virginia.

Of course you are right to point out how petroleum dominates our consumer culture and the myriad ways that it does that. It also cannot be argued how interdependent we are on each other.

Elizabeth Warren made such a compelling argument this campaign season, dominated as it is by the various positions over who contributed and who didn’t and who is getting too much, and who needs to give something back. It seems to me that your point (from the right) is very similar to the argument that Warren makes, and in so doing you illuminate the absolute correctness of Warren’s central thesis which is that we all depend on each other on this world.

"There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own - nobody. You built a factory out there - good for you. But I want to be clear: you moved your goods to a market on the roads the rest of us paid for. You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate. You were safe in your factory because of police forces and fire forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn't have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory. Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific or a great idea. God bless! Keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along."

Taken further one could also make the point that if we hope to continue to innovate and lead and create prosperity we need to continue to work together.

By the way I googled the salary of an average oil worker, came up with about $70,000. The President of Exxon Mobile, Rex Tillerson, in 2010 made in salary and bonus—which does not include the long list of additional perks and benefits-- nearly $6 million. He was also awarded 225,000 options of Exxon stock.  At the end of the 2010 when those shares were issued, Exxon’s share price was about $70, so the options awarded would have been about $18 Million, making his combined haul around $24 million.

So Exxon valued the contribution of the CEO at roughly 350 times that of your husband. On a tax basis, the shares are not taxable, so at max, Rex’s tax bill for 2010 would have only been calculated against his $6 million salary, and about 75% of his actual compensation would have been protected from taxation. We can be sure and take heart in the fact that you could have taken advantage of the standard deductions. However, all of that income would have been liable to taxation after deductions. Occupy.

I went to the 53% website. It seems to me that this sort of “democracy” serves the well to do, because it highlights and strengthens the schism between the middle and working class and the poor in this country. So long as these entities argue over where tax or health or jobs policy should be, the people with resources and the influence that purchases are free to legally use their immense wealth to continue to place a heavy thumb on the scales of justice. It really is stunning how many people on the 53’er site are struggling so mightily and yet direct all their anger to people that have even less than them. Actually, it seems that’s the whole point of the site.

I have no reason to doubt the sincerity of the original person who posted, your post, or those that responded in support. It cannot be denied that good corporate citizens pay taxes. I understand that contractors that build homes also often have to build roads and other infrastructure to support the families they hope to sell to. This is part of the investments these companies make to be good citizens in the community and so reach potential customers. Those contractors though did not build the interstate highway system. That was built on the collective tax base of the American public. We all know that much of our infrastructure is funded with federal tax dollars. 

But you seem well informed and must also know that many corporations have gamed the system up to and including the point of actually getting their paid lobbyists to help write legislation which is extremely favorable to them. In 2009 a total of $3.5 billion was spent on lobbying. That money was spent to support narrow economic interests. Almost 10% of it was spent by the healthcare and insurance industries alone, and their lobbying specifically was invested to protect their profits both now and in the future. I understand that there are those that think that their interests intersect with those of the industries, but capital unfettered by regulation tends to grow perversely. Corporations by their nature are there to create profits. They are not there to serve people.  I do not wish that they go away, but I do believe that an unregulated market ran amok.

The system is completely corrupted by this wash of cash, and it soils everything it touches. Perhaps the OWS crowd can’t articulate their rage well, but they know a rat when they see one and as with millions of other American’s there is such a general sense that power lies in someone else’s hands, just out of our line of sight or field of reach. It is the corruption of this money which led the SEC and the Fed to look the other way, which allowed all these firms to engage in a riotous Ponzi scheme investing in sub-prime loans and then bundling them as hi-grade derivative investments, insured by AIG, and sold to Fannie and Freddie. Just this week Citibank, a huge TARP recipient, admitted to and agreed to pay a fine for betting against the derivatives they sold.

The market, deregulated by Clinton, and heated up by low interest rates put in place right after 9-11 ran amok and everyone was making so much money no one wanted to look at the rot and corruption behind the curtain. Capitalism itself, always morally weak when left on its own, was corrupted by an overabundance of cheap money and lack of regulatory zeal. It seems to me that when the TEA Party crowd got started they were pretty angry about the corruption that TARP represented, especially the government bailouts of the big banks and financial institutions. That anger has now been displaced by ever more heated rhetoric against the poor or disenfranchised. Is it just a coincidence that this rhetoric parallels so nicely with the political needs and desires of the rich and super rich?

I see you’re retired now, and I’m sure put in your time. Do you really think that is a good thing? GE earned over $10 Billion and paid no taxes last year? Was there ever a year that you did not pay a dime? I know that since I was 17 there never was a year like that for me. Why all the anger and the poor and none at those with real wealth, those that have abused their power, and who it seems still hunger for a greater and greater piece of the pie, especially those that use taxpayer provided TARP money to start lobbying against any regulation of their markets before the ink was dry on the legislation???

I am confused about the Microsoft reference. Bill Gates is a brilliant guy and spends most of his time now doing good things. Great things even, as I am sure many of those do who made their fortunes on Microsoft. But does that mean that the CEO of Exxon is righteous in accepting compensation at a level 350 times that of the average oil field worker. Is it right that benevolent though he is Bill Gates should sit on a $50 billion pile of cash while a working mother of two has to decide between asthma medicines for her son, or new school clothes for her daughter. Should that mother who now may be exempt from paying taxes be forced to pay more than he Social Security payroll tax as many of these flt tax proposals would require? What message is that? Where is the morality of a country that demands that? Does the republican right really believe that 20 million unemployed and 10 million more underemployed are really just lazy? Is there no sense of the horrible thuggery of it all where selfishness masquerades as fairness?

I see devout Christians  speak in support of the original 53’er that started this all, but it seems to me  obscene to accept without  comment that so many of the least among us suffer so greatly while others amass unimaginable wealth. I am mystified that some with little real wealth of their own would from a Christian perspective defend that in any way. By the way I am neither unemployed nor poor. I am just angry at the absolute indecency of our current political and business environment.

It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God. Mark 10

But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. You will be repaid at the resurrection of the just. Luke 14