Debates: Obama Doesn’t Explain the Reason Government Matters

I am not one of those who’s disappointed that Obama chose not to go hammer and tong with Romney in the debate over the 47% insult, Bain Capital, and his shifty and misleading maneuvers regarding the release of tis tax returns. I guess it might have been personally satisfying for Obama to call Romney out for the elitist snob he has so often shown himself to be. But I was not that motivated to hear cathartic bloodletting. What I was anxious to hear was the rationale for government and the good that it does. Perhaps we could hear an explanation of silliness of the Tea Bagger slogan: “KEEP GOVERNMENT OUT OF MY MEDICARE”.

The biggest problem, bigger in my mind than a fussy attitude or allowing his competitor to get away with several medium to gigantic whoppers  was the fact that the President did not make the case for why government matters. This is so much bigger than Romney. After an ugly bitter primary season when almost every effort of Government has been called into question, besmirched at the altar of Ayn Rand individualism, the President’s silence allowed big lies to linger.

Medicaid

Medicaid is the government sponsored Health Care for the poor. After the recession on 2008 enrollment spiked from just over 42 million to current levels of about 50 million people. According the Kaiser Foundation 2/3 of the people on Medicaid are working. Another huge chunk of benefits goes to seniors who have exhausted their life savings and require nursing home care. The Republicans talk about what we can afford and what we can’t and the argument that the standard of what we can afford should be based on what we want to borrow money from China to pay is a clever one in that it distracts voters from the fact that the man making that case paid 14% in taxes in 2011 on income of nearly $14 million, partially a gift to government that he can take back some time in the future (after the election). 

The Ryan Budget plan calls for turning the entire Medicaid program over to the states, and then applies a 20% cut in spending. The effect this would have on the poor and seniors is unconscionable.

Providing Health Care for the weakest among us and dignified nursing home care for seniors, that is what government does.

Social Security and Medicare

Social Security and Medicare are funded by payroll tax deductions throughout every working person’s entire working life. Seniors who are now enjoying the benefits of Social Security and Medicare, paid for by deductions from their salary, are a huge junk of the 47% of the freeloading electorate pointed out by Romney, and underlined repeatedly by the Radio Right. The fact the right sees these programs as giveaways of “taxpayer” money displays the greed which is at the core of so much of their rhetoric. I know that poor and middle class Republicans will dispute that, but it is one of the reasons that the Koch Brothers, Sheldon Adelson and others are putting tens of millions into this campaign.

The demographic boom means that adjustments will need to be made to both programs. This may come in the form of means testing or adjusting the retirement age, or a mix of the two.

No one with a senior parent believes Medicare is a government takeover of Health Care.  We have seen our parents visit the doctor of their choice, fight the challenge of getting all their prescriptions taken on schedule and to the prescribed dosage. This is what government does.

Obamacare

Obamacare steers a lot more customers towards the Health Insurance Industry. The Federal government will pay for some, and subsidize some. Others who can afford it will pay their own way or pay a now Supreme Court authorized tax. In return for all these customers the Health Care industry, and insurers specifically, are required to do certain things like provide coverage for children on parent’s policies until age 26, cap lifetime costs, provide basic preventative care including many important women’s diagnostic procedures at low or no cost as part of the basic policy, guarantee that 85% of premiums would go to patient care or refund the difference to the policy holder, and of course to cover those with pre-existing conditions. In sum the changes are designed to direct more people to medical providers before they are seriously ill, which in practice and over time should reduce costs. All these extra customers allow insurers to extend costs over a vastly larger pool of people. It’s what makes the regulations acceptable to them.

Shape shifting an industry that accounts for nearly 20% of GDP, while leaving millions without coverage or care and emphasizing far too little preventative medicine which exacerbates inflationary pressure on the system, that’s a big deal.  That’s what government does.

Energy

Oil imports were at 60% of US consumption under President Bush. Republican rhetoric aside, as of 2010 imports were down to 49% of consumption in 2010, and according to the Energy Information Agency of the US government imports are projected to drop to 35% of consumption by 2035. In addition a larger and larger segment of imported fuel is coming from Canada. The trend, driven by the economics of the energy industry is evident and will likely continue under Democratic and Republican administrations.

That said, The US, will continue to be at the mercy of international markets when it comes to the price of fuel. The much discussed Keystone pipeline is NOT intended to bring oil to the US. Most of the oil from it will be targeted to Asia, China in particular. With our without the pipeline the oil will flow.

So the strategy of Drill, Baby, Drill seems unencumbered by the policies of the Democratic administration. That leaves us with the utter hypocrisy of those who proclaim the immorality of passing massive debt onto our children and grandchildren while denying climate science and so passing on to our descendants a melting planet. This week the U.S. National Snow & Ice Data Center reported the summer ice melt resulted in the polar ice cap shrinking to the smallest ever recorded. Just in the last five years satellite imagery shows that the cap has shrunk by nearly 20%. After the record heat and intensifying storms (Katrina and Irene) we have been seeing those who believe that the cure could be worse than the disease ought to tell us in what ways exactly this is so.

The Energy Department distributed about $90 billion of the total $787 billion in stimulus funds in support of green energy. But according to CNN, not even half of the $90 Billion went to green energy  firms. $29 Billion went to retrofitting homes with better weatherproofing and windows, $18 billion went to mass transit, and $10 billion went to the modernization of the electrical grid. That leaves about $35 billion for loan guarantees and other support of companies generating green energy. Exactly three of the 26 companies that received any of this support went bankrupt. If 3 of 26 is equal to “half” as Romney claimed, then perhaps he needs a new calculator and a new accountant. At any rate nothing like $90 billion went to support new technology.

Making risky investments in areas critical to the health of our economy and our planet, that is what Government does.

So I don’t worry about a single debate performance or the impact it has the race. For now I put the somnambulant performance of the President at the bottom of a list of concerns. Next, I count Obama’s unwillingness to mix it up with Romney.  I’m not asking Obama to sling mud to and fro, but the President walked off the stage in Denver looking like the football player with the impeccably clean, impossibly white uniform. If you hadn’t seen it with your own eyes, you might ask, “Did he even play?”

The enemy of middle class recovery and the availability of opportunity to the poor is not Mitt Romney. The Republican challenger is merely the front man with the fancy suit and the shiny shoes. There are principled small government devotees out there, but the vile, vicious, ugly rhetoric being driven today is at the behest of a small group of extremely wealthy oligarchs, bent on shrinking government, their tax bill, and regulation of their business interests, purely for the purpose of increasing their ability to enlarge upon their vast and ever increasing wealth. These oligarchs are the enemy of American values, and thanks to Citizens United they are out of control.

The primary argument of these oligarchs is that government is broken, in the way, and incompetent. For all the problems we face, this argument carries weight, even with me. But when some of us say government is broken it is not because we see regulations run amok. On the contrary we see an unprecedented Wall Street calamity brought on by lax regulation, a disaster for the middle class and a catastrophe for the poor as evidenced by the shattering number of people in need of food stamp support. We see Global Climate change as a proven scientific fact and understand that politicians on the right who repeat ad nauseum their belief that the science is open to question do so at the behest of their corporate masters.  We believe the tax code is broken, but know that Romney did not get to a 14% liability--actually 10% because he overpaid and can get the balance back later-- because of the policies of one or two administrations. Rather we know that the accumulative policies of administrations stretching over decades have led to a distortion of tax policy that now impinges on the government’s ability to function.

China invested $35.0 billion in renewable energy in 2010, about twice what the US did, and it’s spending on high speed rail dwarfs American outlays. Consequently they are developing the technologies at a much more rapid pace and have become the world’s leading exporters. This, too, is what governments do in a competitive global marketplace. 

In foreign policy there is increasing evidence of unrest in Iran caused by the sanctions. The Israelis are hardly unified behind their right wing President. This President has steered us away from what could easily have been America’s third war in the last 15 years, even as we implore him to bring our troops home from Afghanistan sooner than 2014. We recall that entry is often so much easier than exit when it comes to military matters. Preventing war, while addressing the World’s problems, this is what governments do, and one of the many reasons the Election in November is crucial.

Maybe the real disaster wasn’t that the president lost the debate, maybe the real calamity is that the American people were given no clear and compelling reason to believe, no real understanding of why Government matters and what government does.

When it Comes to Iran: Question Authority

The press has spent endless streams of ink overt these past weeks dissecting the deteriorating relationship between Israel and the United States. The Obama Administration has become reflexive in response. Last week a conference call between the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, an Iran Hawk, was trumpeted a day before it took place, Phone calls between leaders of state are seldom reported on with such breathless anticipation.

There are a couple of aspects to this story, however, that get scant reporting.

Israeli Public Opinion

The Israeli newspaper Haaretz reported polling among Palestinians and the Israeli public showed that 80% believe a military confrontation with Iran could lead to a major regional conflict. 77% of Israelis drew that conclusion and 82% of Palestinians did. 65% of Israelis do not want the Israelis to strike unless the US joins in the action.

Netanyahu polls very well among the Israeli public. This would seem to indicate the Israelis don’t particularly mind him nudging the US so long as he doesn’t go off and do something crazy or impulsive as the Israeli’s did disastrously under conservative leadership in in 1982 and 2006 in Lebanon. As in America one sure way to drive your poll numbers is do saber rattle in the face of perceived threats. Bush and Rove did this brilliantly in 2004. A cynic might conclude that Netanyahu’s UN presentation of the “Willie Coyote” (as John Stewart called it) bomb was for Israeli consumption as much or more than for American audiences.  

Haaretz also reports that Netanyahu and Romney, both hawks on the Iran issue,  draw substantial campaign contributions form Shelley Adelson and his fellow travelers. “A Haaretz investigation found that 19 of Netanyahu's wealthiest American donors have also given to Romney, the Republican Party, and/or other Republican candidates.” According to Haaretz though Netanyahu’ s donation list for his recent party leadership shows 37 American donors, not one of them is Democratic”.

“Meir Dagan, Former Mossad Chief, Says Attack On Iran 'Stupidest Idea' He's Ever Heard”—60 Minutes

Well, you can’t really say that the views of the former Mossad chief haven’t been well publicized—they were on 60 Minutes—but with all all the recent hysteria about the Iranian crisis the interview should get more attention.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qi6YDTC0Rb4

According to an article printed in the NY Times Speaking at Tel Aviv University in 2011 Dagan said that attacking Iran “would mean regional war, and in that case you would have given Iran the best possible reason to continue the nuclear program. The regional challenge that Israel would face would be impossible.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/04/world/middleeast/04mossad.html?_r=0

What Would War with Iran Look Like

Americans now calling for red lines and preparing for war have ridiculously short memories. We forget the promises of a smooth and easy transition in Iraq. America unleashed a chaos in Iraq, which some in retrospect called inevitable. 500,000 Iraqi civilians died from hunger, disease and civil conflict. Today we hear Republicans talking about the “chaotic” events in the Middle East. With every breath Romney advisor Dan Senor and other architects of the disastrous invasion and post war management or Iraq try to erase American memory of what happened after the statue was toppled in Bagdad. They suggest, without quite mentioning the rejected policies of the previous administration that the terrorist attack in Libya or the Egyptian Embassy confrontation some can be equated to the absolute destruction for which the US is directly responsible in Iraq. They are wrong, politically, and morally.  

The Right in Israel and the US calls for red lines, which may not lead to war, but certainly are designed to lock the US into military confrontation in the event the Iranians do not capitulate on a schedule and under circumstances of their choosing. Has America already forgotten the looting in Bagdad, Rumsfeld’s famous utterance that “Democracy is messy”, Moktada Al Sadr? Did we already forget Tikrit, Samara and other cities which became death traps for Americans supposedly bringing democracy to Iraq, long after the WMD turned out to be non-existent and the Bush administration had to scramble to rationalize the death and destruction they had visited on Iraq? What about Abu Ghraib, Americans charged with killing Iraqi civilians indiscriminately in Haditha, and American contractors being desecrated on a bridge in Fallujah? Does any of this ring a bell? The fog of war? Nothing?

Iran comprises an area four times the size of Iraq, and the population is about 2-1/2 times that of Iraq. The army, mostly poorly trained conscripts has about 350,000 personnel. There are also more than 125,000 Revolutionary Guards which are likely to be more committed to the fight. America “defeated” a much larger military force in Iraq, but as we saw in Bagdad, Fallujah, and Basra, and Sadr City, defeating an armed force is one thing, calming a hostile civilian population with endless amounts of weapons is quite another. Beyond that the inventory of Iranian missiles poses a substantial threat to Israel and has the potential to spill conflict across the map of the Middle East. Exact numbers are difficult to come by but Haaretz reports that Iran’s client, Hezbollah, had about 14,000 missiles when Israel attacked in 2006 and launched about 4,200.

Election years are not, typically a good time to calm fears of foreign enemies. Candidates, especially those on the downside of the polls, can be counted on to try to raise fears and play on voter anxiety. It is clear that the circumstances of the Iranian Nuclear program are complex and worrisome, but America would do well to seek toned down rhetoric or less brightly drawn lines, especially those designed to draw America into an unnecessary war.

I am not certain that the Obama Administration is on the right rack in Iranian policy, but I deeply suspect the motives of the Likud Israelis and Conservative Right Wing Republicans who advocate a different more militarist path. Their solutions are always easier until lives are at stake and the fog of war seeps through our TV screen. America has learned the lessons of over extending ourselves even in what almost everyone believed was a righteous cause in Afghanistan: Getting in and declaring “Victory” is easy, getting out? Not so much.

Nixon Reconsidered

In many ways Obama is to the right of Nixon, who created EPA AND OSHA, both of which became  targets for right wingers in the past 20 years. He signed the legislation which initiated the Earned Income Tax Credit, and made the opening to China. Politically he was a race-baiter and invented the Southern Strategy to politically separate southern whites from their economic interests. He tried repeatedly to appoint Federal and Supreme Court judges which were sympathetic to the white back lash against the civil rights movement. His policies on busing and particularly his rhetoric were inflammatory and egregious, but the percentage of children attending all black districts shrunk dramatically on his watch. Nixon implemented the first federal programs which considered race as a factor in hiring and placement, Affirmative Action, which later Republicans came to use as a cudgel against Democrats. Nixon extended the Food Stamp Program started in 1964, and after much delay protected the Legal Services Corporation which provides legal protection for the poor, from Republican efforts to eliminate it. In general his rhetoric was white hot, but his policies were cool, even progressive.

Of course Nixon was a mean, paranoid, little shit, politically and he is personally and directly responsible for a massive and disastrous expansion of the Vietnam War into Laos and Cambodia. As with the President that preceded him, fealty to Cold War ideology, and personal torment, made Nixon a tragic figure. What could might have been a historically positive Presidency is now remembered mostly for its various and scabrous sins.

But when one tallies what the perverse Nixon presidency created on the progressive side of the ledger and lines it up against President Obama it is, at least of today, NO Contest. This is not a knock on Obama. It is merely to point out the obvious: Republicans who claim Obama is a Socialist are just plain wrong, ill-informed maybe, willfully ignorant more likely.

What Republicans propose is a sprint like race back to a time before Nixon when blacks, knew their place, woman were more ladylike, and had no access to healthcare decisions regarding their own body, and upper crust white folk could count on the quiescence of the rabble. Conservatives long for a time of Ward and June Cleaver and their Beav’, where the problems of the world did not exist. Beaver came into our living rooms in 1957 and left in 1963. In that six year span, Elvis and The Beatles bore their way into a somnambulant American culture and the Rolling Stones released their first single. The Cuban Missile Crisis nearly brought the world to an end, four little girls were killed in a Church in Birmingham, Marines are sent to Lebanon, The Berlin Wall was built and breeched by John Kennedy’s airlift, and Betty Freidan’s book The Feminine Mystique was released. A gay man named Bayard Rustin took a seminal role in organizing the March on Washington.  

Republican policies and rhetoric expose nothing so much as their fear of the world we now occupy. This is not the most liberal presidency in our lifetime, as Hannity and the rest foolishly and endlessly claim. It isn’t liberal at all compared to Nixon, and with the possible exception of the Affordable Care Act isn’t particularly liberal even when compared to Clinton. Poor Conservatives, Leave it to Beaver turned out to be just a TV show. The endless march of history is in the direction of expanded civil rights for women, minorities, immigrants, the LGBT community. That all these communities have so much to do with who we are as Americans today, and in so many ways represent the richness of our culture and our workplaces is lost on those who now cower in fear to the change they have seen. The country is more dynamically diverse and engages a broader cross section of our population on all manner of societal endeavors than any time in our history. We have alog way to go, but we have come a long way thanks in part to the pragmatic and often progressive policies of Richard M Nixon.

Emergency Room Healthcare

I missed 60 minutes last night. In the last week or two I have started to avoid the  news. I can't watch anymore. Reading is enough, and in many ways that goes for Obama too. However, I see that that the Mittster thinks emergency room is medical care for the poor, a more ill-informed statement I cannot imagine. He cited the case of a person that had a heart attack and noted how an ambulance will pick up and take you to the hospital for care.

Plavix Oral is a medicine commonly prescribed for people with Heart conditions. A simple google search shows the cost of this medicine for about one month at about $75. Recently my son had to visit an emergency room for a few stitches. It was such a minor incident he did not even see a doctor. He was in an out in about an hour. The bill was $800. Assuming a heart attack victim could get in and out for $800, which is unlikely since he or she for sure needs to see a doctor, the mythical emergency room visit that Romney referred to would have-- if avoided-- paid for a year’s supply of Plavix. I do not think Romney is a stupid man, but the ideology to which he now tacks endlessly has made him stupid. It just can't be argued at this point that he is monstrously ill-informed on some subjects.

This statement is ideology masquerading as policy. Emergency  rooms, visited long after ill cared for symptoms have escalated to an emergency, are the MOST costly health care possible. Moreover, emergency rooms do not dispense preventive care for chronic patients so the likelihood of a repeat visit is high. This takes an inhumane toll on the patient, his family, and of course means repeat visits from which point the costs escalate.

Would Mr Romney also suggest the emergency room as the proper venue for cancer treatment or rehabilitation after a stroke?

Even a conservative should be trying to reduce emergency room visits. I expect the right to miss the moral issue of letting people suffer endlessly when cost is the only impediment to good health, but from a fiscal standpoint it is just stupid. How did he miss that? Team Obama can be slippery on what their plans are for second term, but Team Romney might be the dumbest that ever ran. This is certainly the most mean spirited campaign in my lifetime. The candidate himself may not be the mean little shit that Nixon was, but the principles on which he stands are the most heartless and dumb in recent memory.

Mitt Romney Gives Up

Everyone is piling on at this point, so maybe there isn’t much point in further parsing Romney’s words. He has shown throughout this campaign that he has little empathy or understanding for the lives of the middle class, let alone the poor, working or otherwise. He speaks of those hurting and unemployed but his patrician ways and frequently clumsy syntax make any real connection on his signature issue—fixing the economy for the middle class- seem hollow.

Whatever percentage of Americans that were cited by Romney to the money changers and CEO’s in the Palm Beach Temple of Self Satisfaction we can be certain that class and racial codes were dash-dot-dashed by the Republican Presidential candidate, and then received and deciphered by the largely white, largely male contributors at the dinner. Romney regularly travels in this world. This is not the first time he has belched the words victims and entitlement with contempt. These are more than knocks on the middle class. They are clarion calls to the Ayn Rand moneyed class, warnings that the rabble are after their money and their “liberty” and they need to fight back. Bless her little Social Security drawing heart, Atlas still shrugs. Jon Galt, the whining hero of the epic novel and political treatise would have loved Romney’s  backgrounder for the moneyed class.

 For all the tumult in the press it is the Us Against the Vile, Disgusting, Them posturing that is the most revolting. The media gets that he ate his shoe again, but seldom mentions that this is class warfare, the elites defining the have-nots or have-little as half the population and also the enemy. Those simply drawing from their well-earned government investment, whether Social Security & Medicare recipients or disabled vets are all part of the victim class with no stake in the country or responsibility for their role in society, their only desire, their only aspiration to suck at the government teet so loftily funded by the money changers and CEO’s in that room in Palm Beach.

The language is not new, not unique to Romney, nor exceptional in this political cycle. Limbaugh, Hannity and Mark Levin regularly describe what they see as culture of dependency and have often articulated similar views using remarkably similar language. To them Obama is growing government so he can buy votes with Federal dollars through the programs he advocates and has expanded.  The staggering number of people on Food Stamps has become exhibit A in their indictment. In the radio right’s world view the fact that 50 million people utilize food stamps to subsidize their purchase of food is not an indictment of a capitalist system which nearly derailed through limitless greed or willful lack of oversight.  No, no, no, for the $135 a month the average Food Stamp recipient receives in supplemental support to buy food Obama is buying millions of votes for the future. I find it ironic that in a year when a few dozen billionaires are trying to buy an election, the results of which will be returned to them many times over in tax breaks and deregulation of their businesses, that their media cohorts have decided to make these claims about government programs being an inducement for votes.  If $1,620 per year can buy a vote, then tell me how many votes can be bought with the $100 million being splashed around by  Adelson or the Koch brothers.

Ironically the biggest freeloaders in Romney’s cramped and bitter world are retirees, in the polls his strongest supporters. Almost half of the households Romney referred to as not paying Federal income tax are receiving Social Security or Medicare support, both programs financed by Payroll Tax deductions which almost everyone pays. Conservatives have been repeating the mantra that only half of all households pay Federal Income Tax for years, the suggestion being that half of all Americans don’t pay taxes and the rich subsidize the freeloaders.  Irony piled on irony Conservatives make the case that entitlements like Social Security and Medicare are turning us “into the next Greece”. Yet, when it comes to the collection side of the ledger these same Conservatives suggest that Payroll taxes which directly fund these two programs do not count as tax payments. I get so confused.

Seventy Five percent of the people on the Romney-dole have incomes below the poverty level, meaning that the overwhelming majority of those who Romney and the acolytes on the right see as refusing to take responsibility are the working, and here I emphasize the word working, poor.  Only about one in six of those households receiving government aide and not paying Federal income tax are actually unemployed but not retired. Romney seems to both blame these people for their lack of drive and the drag they maintain on the economy while he simultaneously blames the government for ruining the economy which would feed what he claims is all restless ambition waiting to be unleashed once Obama is run from office.  I know, I know. It gets confusing.

On the other side of the scale there are two groups who really ought to be scrutinized for their limited to non-existent contributions to the greater good. The Atlantic Monthly reports that in 2011 7,000 millionaires paid no taxes by virtue of the number of deductions they were able to claim or the amount of wealth they were able to hide in oh, I don’t know, the Cayman Islands! Citizens for Tax Justice reports that General Electric earned more than $10 billion in profits between 2008 and 2010. Yet they received tax credits in that period, paid no corporate income taxes, and actually got a tax refund. The same goes for Pacific Gas and Electric ($5 Billion), DuPont ($2 Billion), Verizon ($32 Billion) and dozens of other large corporations all avoided paying taxes on multi billions of profits. Many received tax credits against future earnings. I’m curious as to whether Romney believes these people and these companies ought to take more responsibility for their role in American society or whether he endorses their “Cayman Islands” strategy.

These companies claim that they pay plenty of taxes and that is true. Like the working poor they pay Payroll taxes (Social Security and Medicare) and also like the working poor they pay a variety of other taxes and fees, including sales, state and local taxes. It just seems that the language parsing goes one way but seldom the other. Poor corporations explain away their lack of a Federal tax bill by talking about all their other contributions.

Meanwhile conservatives make the argument that anyone not paying federal income tax is “dependent on government”. These are the ones Romney said “who believe that, that they are victims, who believe that government has the responsibility to care for them. Who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing…” For the working poor payroll, sales and local taxes are not mitigating factors in their engagement and commitment to the greater good.  The efforts made to educate their children in difficult circumstances, to get to and from work on public transportation weary with neglect, and even to vote in a hostile environment for both the poor and minorities do not indicate a sense of responsibility to the money changers in the Palm Beach Temple of Self Satisfaction.

Since the states with the highest ratio of non-payers are solidly Republican and Deep South: Mississippi, Alabama Georgia, Arkansas, Louisiana, Texas, Florida, and Arkansas, with New Mexico and Idaho in the mix as well it would suggest that the inability to pay taxes is not a Democratic or Republican issue, but rather a matter of means and deeply ingrained, chronic, cross-generational P-O-V-E-R-T-Y. Neither party has proposed policies to correct that. How many generations will go by before poor whites and poor blacks across the South will hear another politician like Bobby Kennedy, who famously said, “I believe that, as long as there is plenty, poverty is evil.”

Romney I guess would have us believe that the poor are lazy and not worthy of attention. Obama I guess would have us believe those statements are mean spirited. They are. But before Pro-Obama voters swell with pride that their candidate does not regularly stumble into making comments that even Bill Kristol called “stupid and arrogant” we might ask our own questions. What is our candidate’s plan to dramatically reduce the number of working people earning wages so far below sustenance levels that the Federal Government must provide a provide a safety net to maintain their lives and that of their families and children?  

The NY Times reports that “Lower-wage occupations, with median hourly wages of $7.69 to $13.83, accounted for 21 percent of job losses during the retraction. Since employment started expanding, they have accounted for 58 percent of all job growth.” Democrats and liberals regularly point to the fact that Obama has produced a lengthy string of private sector job increases, but jobs at or slightly above the minimum wage are not going to prime the economic pump, help kids pay off their student loans, or getting the housing market back on its feet.

On Saturday it was reported that Obama has now created more private sector jobs than Bush did during his full eight years in office. Were it not for the dramatic cuts in government workers at the Federal, State and local level unemployment would look quite a bit better. But the overall employment picture, not just the unemployed by the wages of those who are employed, makes you wonder whether Romney has thought about the structural challenges we face including the decimation of manufacturing jobs, the sinking performance of schools, and increased international competition. Obama's rhetoric sounds substantially better. But unlike Johnson who rassled a recalcitrant Congress into submission (granted, better economic times gave everyone more room to maneuver) even Obama’s most fervent supporters have no idea how he will govern in a way to bring his lofty ambitions something closer to reality. Blaming a hostile-- to the point of near psychosis-- Congress makes excellent politics, but it leaves behind a bitter residue from which to govern. There will be no moral victory if the next four years closely mirror the past three and a half.

But for all the lack of knowledge that Romney’s statements represented, and for all the real lack of concern the media firestorm belies, there is something darker in the Romney’s heart, something worse even than being a rich fuck defending his money. Romney has given up. His statement belies no aspiration for greatness, no desire to speak to and much, much, less convince some of those who do not agree with him. We and they are lost to him. On the Palestinian issue, a genuine cause of Western hatred in the Arab world, he talks of kicking the can down the road even before he even enters the voting booth, forget the Oval office. I guess that goes double for the working poor. Do we just kick them down the road as well?

I am a cynical person, perhaps more so with each passing year. I ask myself sometimes why I continue to pour so much energy into a political dialogue which is corrupted on both sides with repetition, group-think, and in my view a complete unwillingness to challenge old orthodoxies right and left.  I do not have an imagination large enough to consider how either party governs after this ruthless, idealess campaign. But something in me still aspires to a better day for Americans and for the citizens of the world. I still feel the battle is worth fighting even though some days it seems all for naught.

But consider this: An Obama 55 to 45% victory, a landslide in modern politics would be unlikely to give Obama any mandate for change, mostly because he like Romney has called for so little sacrifice and spoken so little truth. Entitlements must be reined in. Raising taxes on the millionaires and billionaires will not generate enough revenue to trim the Federal deficit to sustainable levels. Programs must be cut and taxes must go up even for some making below $250,000. Yes, all of this needs to take place. In the short term government needs to spend more, more than we are even spending now, but in the long term we need to spend less, perhaps a lot less.

But before all of that, Americans needs to aspire to greatness. Running for his second term Obama does not ask for greatness. That is deeply disappointing to me. Romney though, has the nerve to tell America that greatness is not in him, and worse it is no longer in us. He can’t even be bothered with lofty rhetoric. Say what you will about Representative Ryan, I do not believe even he is that cynical. Reagan was not that cynical. Nixon, constipated little criminal that he was, also engendered the most progressive domestic agenda of any Republican in the last century. Nixon was not that cynical. Romney is that cynical.  Romney may still become President and that can be called a victory for him, but as a leader, as President he is already defeated. How much worse can it get?

Causes of the Deficit

According to the Heritage Foundation , “When the tax cuts were enacted in 2001, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) forecast a $5.6 trillion surplus between 2002 and 2011. Instead, Washington is set to run a cumulative $6.1 trillion deficit over that period. “ Let’s go with that.

They go on to break it down:

• Bush Tax cuts are responsible for $1.7 trillion, 14%

•Two recessions, two stock market crashes, and other economic/technical factors (33 percent)

• Other new spending (32 percent)
• Net interest on the debt (12 percent)
• The 2009 stimulus (6 percent)
• Other tax cuts (3 percent)

Would it not be fair then to assign Republicans responsibility for the 47% of the deficit caused by the tax cuts and the recessions? Of the remaining 53%, they also own some of the other new spending which is I guess is where The Heritage Foundation put the Afghanistan and Iraq wars, and Medicare Part-D, unfunded and  enacted under Bush. So let’s be generous and give the Republicans just 10% of the “Other new spending.” That still pushes them to 57% of the cause of the deficit, according to the Heritage Foundation.  That would make them responsible for more than half of the new expenditures to service the debt. Add that in and I have the Republicans according to the Heritage foundation owning about 2/3 of the deficits which appear to be the centerpiece of their campaign.

The single biggest growth factor in Federal spending is Healthcare, which has grown from 11% of GDP to over 18% of GDP in the last three decades.

The CBO projects Medicare spending at $7.7 trillion for the ten years ending 2022, about $770 Billion per year. Medicare spending in 2012 is projected at just over $500 Billion. Medicaid costs are also on the rise.

When Republicans talk about increased spending it is important to note that their Repeal Obamacare speechifying would enshrine the status quo on Healthcare.  Moreover, while Ryan proposes a radical restructuring of Medicare to transform it to a voucher system from the current “Government Insurance” model his budget calls for nearly the same amount if spending over the next ten years, literally a $10 Billion dollar difference against multi trillion dollar expenditures.

The real cuts are in Medicaid, the health care program for the poor. There Ryan proposes nearly 20% less spending and turning it over to the states, which means the folks in Mississippi and Texas and other states with horrific records on medical care for the poor, might has well starting checking into the place they'd like to spend the forever. These are draconian heartless cuts, required by Ryan’s plan to stimulate the economy by doubling down on the Bush tax cuts. 

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Why is it that no one seems to take notice of the fact that the Bush Tax cuts are still in place in this jobless environment. Why would anyone think that extending them would accelerate job growth? Considering the poor record of job creation under Bush where is the historical empirical data that  tax cuts, especially those targeted on those who have more money than they could ever hope to spend, creates jobs?

The Business of Guns, America 2012

Following Are statistics from the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, The World Health Organization, The Wall Street Journal , The Center for Disease Control, and the  Community Against Violence report on Gun Laws by State. Yesterday I posted a piece that underreported gun violence in America. Today I wanted to get source driven data.

·         Business Wire reports that about 300 US companies generate close to $5 billion in revenue

·         Gun sales are sky-rocketing. In 2000, approximately 9 million National Instant Criminal Background Check System gun checks were performed. In 2009 there were 14 Million. NRA claims that Obama is coming to get Americans guns have meant a boon for American gun manufacturers. As with most other debates what appears on the surface to be grass roots debate is really funded on one side primarily by BIG business interests.

·         According to OpenSecrets. Org, the NRA spent $7.2 in the 2010 election cycle, and spends an additional $2.0 Million a year in lobbying efforts at the federal level

·         In addition top gun makers such as Remington and Smith and Wesson spend hundreds of thousands per year in both lobbying and direct campaign contributions

·         In 2012 NRA’s top donation of $600,000 game from Crossroads GPA, Karl Rove’s unregulated SuperPac

·         Beyond the regulated trade in guns it is estimated that up to 40% of the total availability of guns is made possible through the unregulated secondary market of gun shows where no background checks are performed

·         The US DOJ reports that up to 40% of all guns used in crimes are purchased illegally in the streets, though nearly all guns are sold “legally” the first time

·         Straw purchases and gun trafficking are a critical part of the problem. The ATF reports that in 2011 of almost 9,000 guns seized in NY in 2011, only about 1,600 were purchased in NY. S1973, The Gun Trafficking Prevention Act of 2012, Sponsored by Sen Gillibrand of NY would make that Federal crime. Currently there is little hope that this legislation will pass.

·         In 2008, 31,593 people died from gun violence (National Center for Injury Prevention and Control- NCIPC)

·         Of that number 12,179 people were murdered, and over 18,000 took their own life with a gun

·         In 2009 more than 70,000 people  were shot but survived (NCIPC)

·         Of that number about 3,000 survived a suicide attempt with a gun and 18,610 were shot unintentionally but survived (NCIPC)

·         Suggesting other causal effects beyond accessibility to guns World Health Organization statistics indicate wide variances in suicide rates from country to country

o   US                          17.7 Per 100,000

o   Brazil                     7.7 Per 100,000

o   El Salvador          12.9 Per 100,000

o   France                 24.7 Per 100,000

o   Mexico                 7.0 Per 100,000

o   South Africa       1.4 Per 100,000

o   Sweeden             17.7 Per 100,000

o   Switzerland        24.8 Per 100,000

o   UK                          10.98 Per 100,000

·         In 2008 592 people who were killed unintentionally (NCIPC)

·         In 2009 66,769 people survived gun injuries, 44,466 people shot in an attack (NCIPC)

·         In 2011 there were 326 self- defense gun deaths (Wall Street Journal)

·         There are no Government supported and unbiased surveys of the number of times per year that guns are used in self-defense. Gun control proponents suggest anywhere between 100,000and 2.5 million.

·         Over a million people have been killed with guns in the United States since 1968, when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated (Childrens’ Defense Fund)

·         U.S. homicide rates are 6.9 times higher than rates in 22 other populous high-income countries combined, despite similar non-lethal crime and violence rates. The firearm homicide rate in the U.S. is 19.5 times higher (Journal of Trauma, Injury, Infection, and Critical Care)

·         Among 23 populous, high-income countries, 80% of all firearm deaths occurred in the United States (Journal of Trauma, Injury, Infection, and Critical Care)

·         Keeping a firearm in the home increases the risk of suicide by a factor of 3 to 5 and increases the risk of suicide with a firearm by a factor of 17 (New England Journal of Medicine)

·         Keeping a firearm in the home increases the risk of homicide by a factor of 3 (New England Journal of Medicine)

·         In a 2010 survey only about 1/3 of all American households reported owning guns (UPI), a continuation of dramatic drops since the 1970’s, but gun ownership per family is raising with the average owner now possessing on approximately four weapons

·         A gun in the home is 22 times more likely to be used in a completed or attempted suicide (11x), criminal assault or homicide (7x), or unintentional shooting death or injury (4x) than to be used in a self-defense shooting. (New England Journal of Medicine)

·         Guns are used to intimidate and threaten 4 to 6 times more often than they are used to thwart crime (Journal of Trauma, Injury, Infection, and Critical Care)

·         Every year there are only about 200 legally justified self-defense homicides by private citizens (FBI) compared with over 30,000 gun deaths

·         A 2009 study found that people in possession of a gun are 4.5 times more likely to be shot in an assault (American Journal of Public Health)

·         It is estimated that over forty percent of gun acquisitions occur in the secondary market. That means that they happen without a Brady background check at a federally licensed dealer (Phillip J Cook Oxford University Press)

·         Sales from federal firearm licensees (FFLs) require a background check. Sales between individuals, under federal law, do not require a background check. This means that felons can “lie and buy” at gun shows and other places where guns are readily available

Here is a ranking of states based on the gun deaths per 100,000 figure provided by the Center For Disease Control. The leniency of gun laws is somewhat subjective, but this analysis is by Legal Community Against Violence's state-by-state comparison of firearm laws (http://smartgunlaws.org).

#1, Mississippi, Gun deaths per 100,000: 18.3, Permissive gun laws: 4th out of 50

#2, Arizona, Gun deaths per 100,000: 15, Permissive gun laws: 1st out of 50

#3, Alaska, Gun deaths per 100,000: 17.6, Permissive gun laws: 11th out of 50

#4, Arkansas, Gun deaths per 100,000: 15.1, Permissive gun laws: 7th out of 50

#5, Louisiana, Gun deaths per 100,000: 19.9, Permissive gun laws: 23rd out of 50

#6, New Mexico, Gun deaths per 100,000: 15, Permissive gun laws: 6th out of 50

#7, Alabama, Gun deaths per 100,000: 17.6, Permissive gun laws: 27th out of 50

#8, Nevada, Gun deaths per 100,000: 16.2, Permissive gun laws: 22nd out of 50

#9, Montana, Gun deaths per 100,000: 14.5, Permissive gun laws: 10th out of 50

#10, Wyoming, Gun deaths per 100,000: 14.5, Permissive gun laws: 8th out of 50

#11, Kentucky, Gun deaths per 100,000: 14.4, Permissive gun laws: 5th out of 50

#12, West Virginia, Gun deaths per 100,000: 14.8, Permissive gun laws: 25th out of 50

#13, Tennessee, Gun deaths per 100,000: 15, Permissive gun laws: 31st out of 50

#14, Oklahoma, Gun deaths per 100,000: 13.4, Permissive gun laws: 17th out of 50

#15, Idaho, Gun deaths per 100,000: 12.5, Permissive gun laws: 2nd out of 50

#16, Georgia, Gun deaths per 100,000: 13.1, Permissive gun laws: 13th out of 50

#17, Missouri, Gun deaths per 100,000: 12.9, Permissive gun laws: 12th out of 50

#18, South Carolina, Gun deaths per 100,000: 13.4, Permissive gun laws: 20th out of 50

19, North Carolina, Gun deaths per 100,000: 12.3, Permissive gun laws: 28th out of 50

#20, Florida, Gun deaths per 100,000: 12.5, Permissive gun laws: 41st out of 50

#43, Illinois, Plagued by an orgy of gun violence in Chicago, actually ranks near the bottom in gun deaths per 100,000: 8; largely as a result of its gun safety regulations. Permissive gun laws: 45th out of 50

#45, New York, where FBI statistics indicate roughly 1 in 2 gun crimes is perpetrated with an out of state purchased gun, also ranks near the bottom. Gun deaths per 100,000: 5.1, Permissive gun laws: 43rd out of 50

Oak Creek, Wisconsin

The President should say we cannot legislate insanity out of existence, but we can legislate the amount of guns in circulation (about 250 million). He should say he is going to try to move legislation that closes gun show loopholes. He should acknowledge the power of NRA and note the specific cases where they have stood against even moderate reforms. He should note that many cases that the weaponry in circulation is beyond any practical use for sport or protection, and call the lack of legislation what it is: A National Security threat that must be addressed. Americans need neither armor piercing bullets nor automatic weapons to hunt their deer or protect their homes. He should point out the dangerous effects of weak state laws which allow multiple straw purchases which feed gun violence. States with weak law as allow purchases of dozens of guns which then show up on the streets of in places like New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. These cities have strong laws, but still suffer the effects of limited nationwide coordinated legislation. AP reports that “Most guns recovered from New York crimes last year (2011) originated in states with fewer legal restrictions, though the largest single source is still New York, where nearly 1,600 were first purchased. The report by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives traced 8,793 guns from New York crimes or investigations. They include 407 guns originally bought in Virginia, 368 in Pennsylvania, 349 in North Carolina, 328 in South Carolina, 341 in Florida and 332 in Georgia.” Finally he should say these moderate steps will not eliminate extreme gun violence but that he is committed to doing what he can personally do to limit these incidents in the future. He should acknowledge the political cost, but stand up on principle.

Blues For Ayn Rand

Abraham Lincoln, Gettysburg, November 19, 1863

“Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. “

Lincoln packed so much into 285 words. How America cries out for such visionary leadership and wisdom now.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/wp/2012/08/02/romneys-defense-of-his-tax-plan-doesnt-add-up/

The cat's sort of out of the bag. Alas, Mitt's "Tax Plan for My Wealthy Friends In America" has been shown to be the fraud so many of us knew it was.

Willard Mitt Romney, Lost, August 2012

“All that other stuff -- and that government of the rich, by the rich, for the rich, shall not perish from the earth. “

A couple things here…1) Anyone that buys the line of bull that Romney is dispensing which suggests that the main flaw in the Tax Policy Center analysis is that it fails to take into the account the economic boost the tax cuts would generate ought to go look at the job growth created by the Bush tax cuts. How stupid does he think people are? As I say that I am reminded that 45% to 48% of us appear poised and ready to vote for Romney regardless of whatever he says or does. Nonethless, even before the Bush authored great recesssion, Bush engineeered taxes cut for his rich friends brought the lowest rate of job growth of any post World War II President.2) Every American needs to know and remember that the entire tax battle is over whether taxes will be raised on those earning MORE THAN $250,000 per year. Joe , the friggin’ plumber were he, let’s say, to be an earner in the $280,000 range would only see his tax bill increase on the $30,000 over $250,000 according to the Obama plan. The first $250,000 would be taxed at current levels. When Republicans talk about the impact of the Obama tax increases on small businesses, they neglect often to note that 98% of the small business would not see any increase in their tax bill.

Going further, this from FactCheck.org: “House Speaker John Boehner claimed that ‘small-business people’ make up more than half of those who would be hit by a tax increase on “millionaires.” Not really. Only 13 percent of those making over $1 million get even as much as one-fourth of that income from small business, according to government tax experts.”

While we are at it, Here is small excerpt of what FactCheck,org says about Republicans claims on Obama’s Healthcare Bill:

“The exaggerated Republican claim that the new health care law “kills jobs” was high on our list of the “Whoppers of 2011”…

“All of this is health-care hooey, aimed at exploiting public concern over continuing high unemployment, with little basis in fact. As we’ve said before (a few times), experts project that the law will cause a small loss of low-wage jobs — and also some gains in better-paid jobs in the health care and insurance industries.

“It’s also expected that more workers will decide to retire earlier, or work fewer hours, when they no longer need employer-sponsored insurance and can obtain it on their own with help from federal subsidies. But that just means fewer people willing to work — and it will free up jobs for those who want them. If anything, that could reduce the jobless rate.

“Claims about the alleged devastation of small business are also off base. The fact is, businesses with fewer than 50 workers are exempt from the requirement to provide coverage, or pay a penalty to the government. Furthermore, some small businesses with fewer than 25 employees are already getting tax credits under the new law to help defray the cost of providing worker coverage.”

Republicans are creating a billionaire-funded smoke machine of massive and epic proportion to cover up this basic point: Their entire campaign is a full frontal attack on working men and women, the poor and those less able to take care of themselves, all in the name of protecting and/ or creating ever greater wealth for a few tens of thousands Americans with more wealth and privilege than most Americans have or will ever see.

When the Republicans tell you that they are not the Party of the Rich, they are the party of those who aspire to be so, know this: The America of 2012 ranks at the bottom of industrialized nations in terms of upward mobility. In plain terms the poor in America tend to stay that way, even when compared to the highly stratified and class-conscious Europeans. Republicans who talk about an opportunity society while they defund public schools, pre-natal healthcare, and Pre-K to High School education, all the while proposing to allow healthcare and college costs to create their own discipline through the fairy dust of magical market forces are selling a lie.

When Americans hear Tea Party, or Americans for Prosperity, Cross Roads, or Restore Our Future, They ought always remember that each of these groups garners at least 50% and in some cases as much as 90% of all contributions from a couple dozen or so of the wealthiest men in America. If only the perpetually whiney Ayn Rand had lived to see this; she would be so happy.

As it is she missed this orgy of cynicism, and selfishness by a couple of decades. She died in 1982.  

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/wp/2012/08/02/romneys-defense-of-his-tax-plan-doesnt-add-up/