Week In The News: Elections In Egypt, Europe Limps, Facebook Stock Chaos

Roy Mac

Re: Euro. This is not news; there hasn’t been any “news” about this soap opera since DSK was revealed not to be the new arbiter. Please don’t waste any air time on this so-called news story. We suspect that it is being fed solely by journalists who are having too good a time living on expense account in France.

You_Can_Keep_The_Change

Plus, reporting on the ‘imminent’ collapse of the Euro, helps to prop up the ever sinking dollar.

A 10 year U.S. Treasury bond has a yield of 1.7%, that’s less than the rate of inflation.

No wonder the privately-owned, for-profit, ‘Federal’ Reserve is being forced to buy up most of the U.S. Treasury bonds being issued.

Mrs. Thurston Howell IV

I am preparing my tax documents to send to the IRS. But I have a dilemma. I am a stay-at-home mom without earned income (although I work plenty, believe me!), and yet I have loads and loads and loads of unearned income (called “dividends”). A lot of this income is “offshore”, meaning not located in the U.S. I really do not know how to handle my problem: reporting my income to the IRS, while preserving my wealth by all legal means possible.

At times like this, I ask myself, “What would Ann Romney do?”

Maybe I will find the answer in Ann’s and Mitt’s joint 1040 tax return from 2010:

https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/286400-romney-2010-1040.html#document/p140/a42989

Mrs. Thurston Howell IV

Oh, yes, I can see plenty now. I see the Ann D. Romney Bling Trust (oops, typo error: I meant Blind Trust, silly me!) on Form 8621 with the passive foreign investment company being Bain Capital, located in Luxembourg; Here is another Form 8621, sponsored by Goldman Sachs, based out of Ireland, and there is Form 5471 out of Bermuda. Too many Form 8621s for me to keep track of. There also are some Blind Family Trusts located all around the world (hmm, but strangely, I don’t see too much located in the U.S.). And this is kind of interesting, here is one that is not a blind trust, but has actual signature authority over a bank account in Switzerland! I sure hope Ann reminded Mitt to file their FBAR! Hey, no earned income either on their 1040, but lots and lots of capital gains and interest, just like me! OK, their’s was over $21 million, and mine is closer to $2K, but so what? I gotta start some where.

I feel so relieved that I can handle this challenge. I just need to set up a Blind Trust and to hire a worldwide team of bankers and accountants, ready to make my dreams come true. I kind of am looking forward to Ann’s and Mitt’s 2011 tax return. Just in case they found other creative ways to shelter their income from good old Uncle Sam. Hey! Creative destruction (of the U.S. economy)! Cool! Just like Bain Capital! �
- Gregg
  
  So, are you saying raising taxes on the rich won’t bring in revenue dollar for dollar? Congrats, you’re seeing the light.
  - Ray in VT
    
    It probably wouldn’t as long as there are so many loopholes written into the tax code, and as long as there are so many interests advocating for these loopholes, then they’ll probably continue to exist.
    - Gregg
      
      Thanks, you’re honest.
  - Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
    
    Darn, you got me there. OK, forget the IRS, forget the deadlocked Congress,forget the organized church and all the rest. Maybe two of the Paypal founders have the right idea, Elon Musk working toward colonizing outer space, and Peter Thiel building a floating community of entrepreneurs in international waters, off the coast of San Francisco:
    
    http://www.seasteading.org/
    
    No taxes, no government regulation, hey, no government! Truly a Libertarian Paradise awaits us all…
- http://www.richardsnotes.org Richard
  
  Brilliant again.
- Guest
  
  Oh dear! I am worried about making my tax return public because the tax code is so complicated that idiots like Mrs. Thurston Howell IV won’t be able to understand it. You told me that she would never think the blind trust is located in another country because that’s the shareholder’s name on Form 8621, but I don’t think you realize how stupid she is; she’ll probably think that there are trusts all over the world, and not just the ones located in the US that have some foreign investments! I guess I should be thankful that we set up the blind trust, because if we hadn’t, the name on Form 8621 would have been “Mitt & Ann Romney” and she’d think that we had cloned ourselves in other countries! You asked me if Mrs. Thurston Howell IV would look at the schedules of business income or the self-employment tax schedule and think that we didn’t have earned income, and I told you that she would do that too. One of these days you’ll believe me when I tell you that the Mrs. Howells of the world are incredibly uneducated and uninformed.
  - Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
    
    Ouch, how are we going to be next door neighbors in our Peter Thiel Libertarian Paradise when you have such anger oozing from your pores? Mix yourself a Manhattan and b-r-e-a-t-h-e deeply…There you go, Guest. Feeling better?
    
    Kumbaya,
    
    Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
    - TFRX
      
      A Manhattan!
      
      Kudos for going into the role-playing full-tilt.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Nice patriotic investments, aren’t they? Mrs. Romney, ( and Mr.?) invest in the countries they care about?
  Wouldn’t it have been simpler for Romneys to invest in companies here in the U.S.? Oh, they might have paid U.S. taxes, that would help the country that they want to rule?
  - Guest
    
    Do you know the reason for a blind trust? Blind trusts are created so that the owners will not have input into or knowledge of the specific investments being bought and sold; it removes their decisions from being influenced by their personal investments.
    
    We live in a global economy, and many investments generate foreign and US income. Foreign income is not sheltered from US income tax; the taxpayer simply gets a credit for foreign taxes paid so that the income isn’t taxed in two countries. I bet I can make you not care about how “patriotic” foreign income is: on the Romney’s 2010 tax return, their foreign income was about 5% of their reported income; on the Obama’s 2011 tax return, their foreign income was about 34% of their reported income. Do you still care about foreign income, and think it’s unpatriotic?
    - Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
      
      I am sure clients can guide their blind trust advisors in very general aspects as to how their funds are to be invested, to avoid conflicts of interest or even for personal moral reasons. For example, I would be very surprised if the Romney blind trusts are significantly funded in tobacco or alcohol industries, even though they pay very attractive dividends. Prediction: when the Romneys get around to releasing their 2011 tax return, the Swiss bank account will have been scrubbed out of existence. I will bet you all my money in my blind trust located in the Cayman Islands.
http://www.richardsnotes.org Richard

Brilliant.

You_Can_Keep_The_Change

President Obama won’t be returning his donations from Bain Capital

http://politicker.com/2012/05/president-obama-wont-be-returning-his-donations-from-bain-capital/

So Obama is out criticizing Bain Capital on a daily basis, yet he’s keeping the money he got from Bain? Talk about hypocrisy.

Mrs. Thurston Howell IV

Maybe we need to ask those three Bain Capital executives why they decided to each donate their federally mandated limit of $2500 to Obama2012. I think maybe they were drunk texting, and accidentally hit the DONATE button for Obama. Hope Mitt doesn’t find out that he is $7500 short on the $2 million his Bainsters (Banksters?)have raised so far this election season!
ana

Obviously, you have missed the whole point. President Obama has not objected to private equity firms such as Bain and has in the past praised them.
However, Romney’s claim that they exist as job creators rather than money makers is untrue. His claim that heading a firm that maximizes profits for a few prepares him for the Presidency is questionable and Obama is questioning it. The Presidency requires concern for the common good, not just the elites.
- TFRX
  
  Your patience and cogence are appreciated, even if lost on the OP.
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  Keep making lame excuses for Obama lady,
  
  if you repeat them enough times, you might believe them.
  
  If Obama thinks that Bain Capital is so horrible, then why doesn’t he give back all the money he took from them?
  - TFRX
    
    Let’s see: Bain gave him money, he’s slamming them anyway, and they’re whining about it? (This is, if you’re telling the truth.)
    
    Sounds like the Masters of the Universe at Bain just got played by President Obama.
    - ana
      
      Obama has nothing against Bain Capitol!�
      It is the misrepresentation of their business model by Romney that is in dispute. Making millions for
      a select group does not necessarily prepare one for the Presidency!
    - TFRX
      
      As a media crit wannabe, I simply wait for the results of the proverbial fight in the locked room, and listen to the winner. Right now, nobody at Bain is rebuking Romney, making him their defacto spokesman.
      
      (Cory Booker has designs on a Senate Seat and that explains his crap, by the way, in the NYC metro area.)
      
      My long-held thought is that the biggest shock awaits the businessman who gets to the White House and realizes “Hey, I’m president of all these poor people. Can’t I just fire them?”
  - ana
    
    He does not think Bain is “horrible” !!!�
    He has praised Private equity many times!
    You must have missed it.
    They just do not exist as job creators as Romney claims, but as profit maximizers.�
    That is the point of the discussion, not whether Pres Obama likes Bain Capital.
    
    Your comments reveal how really willfully misinformed you are.
Mary

Unbeknownst to Romney.. he may like firing people, but you can’t fire Congress, and you can’t fire the Supreme Court.
- Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
  
  That is 100% true, but unfortunately for the Democrats: Congress and the Supreme Court rest currently in the deep, deep pockets of the extreme conservative segment of the Republican party. And they don’t plan going anywhere soon.

Ed

The Catholic Church has sued the federal government over the HHS mandate in 43 law suits. The administration won’t budge from their position: I knew that they were guided by Planned P., that they were guided by the homosexual lobby, I didn’t realize they were also guided by the ACLU. And all three groups are self-declared deadly enemies of God and religion.

There are many acceptable definitions of religion in government regulations, in this bill the definition is that used by the ACLU.

The mayor of Bridgeport told Bishop Lori that ‘Without the services of the Catholic Church – education, health care, social services – this city would be in choas’. The government partners with the Church to bring services to the poor for the common good. And this radical administration is threatening this partnership which has existed from the start of the country.

Still Here

Obama’s war on religion isn’t getting any MSM coverage. It’s just more of Obama’s vampire secularism. America needs more hope and change this November!
- ana
  
  Please reference “war on religion”. If you mean the Catholic Church-it’s actions hardly qualify as religious. The depth of it’s hypocrisy is stunning.
  It is rife with deceit and power mongering.
  - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
    
    The Obama Presidency could hardly be called ‘Constitutional’ with Obama’s signing of the NDAA, which has turned this country into a police state.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Where are you in the War on Children, waged for decades or hundreds of years, by the Catholic clergy. You only concerned about MORE VICTIMS for them?
AC

i’m almost falling for this, but i’ll just laugh instead.
Alan in NH

Easy Ed. Enemies of God and religion? I think, given the historical record of the Catholic Church throughout the world – the wars instigated, the persecutions, the inquisitions, the outmoded beliefs and sometimes hideous adherence to dogma – I think one could make an equal claim that the Catholic church is an enemy of God and religion.
- AC
  
  well done, i couldn’t think of anything w/o sounding snarky but you handled it the right way.
- Gregg
  
  Yea, they got it coming. It’s payback time even if we have to flush the Constitution down the crapper. Obama won, he can do what he pleases. Gotcha.
  - J__o__h__n
    
    Churches are not required to provide contraception. Other services they provide have to follow the same rules as everyone else. This is not unconstitutional.
    - TFRX
      
      …and it goes without saying that some people wish to conflate “church” with “religious institution-run school which competes in the marketplace”.
      
      Such confusion is by design, not a quirky misunderstanding.
    - Gregg
      
      What does “church” have to do with anything?
      
      “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof”
    - TFRX
      
      “Church” has everything to do with the Fox News and other pukefunnel merchants feeding your brain with the idea that religious liberty is under attack.
      
      You want to pretend people like me are attacking a church-church, not a religiously-affiliated school which competes, not a charity or something else which is bound (and has agreed) by law to not discriminate in hiring, but which you seem dedicated to let them discriminate against in providing insurance.
      
      You’re a well-spoken hack. For a non-believer, you should stop giving away your rights to people who don’t give a crap about you. They realize you simply don’t exist in the numbers you think you do, and your fealty to their ability to tyrannize Americans with their own religious beliefs will gain you no liberty.
    - Gregg
      
      I don’t care if it’s a homeless guy living in a phone booth, he should not be prevented from practicing his religion. Church is irrelevant.
    - TFRX
      
      Then that homeless guy can discriminate all he wants hiring nurses for his hospital, and see what that gets him.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    What a twisted interpretation of Alan’s comment?
  - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
    
    “Flush the Constitution down the crapper”
    
    Careful Gregg,
    
    don’t give Barack Obama, Eric Holder, and Janet Napolitano any ideas.
    
    At least we still have the First and Second Amendments for now, but if Obama gets re-elected, forget about it.
    - denis
      
      Give one instance where the President and his team have attacked the constitution – I am speaking of President Obama not the last President Bush.
    - Gregg
      
      You need to get out more. He famously complained the Constitution did not go far enough with it’s negative liberties. He said it should tell government what it must do as opposed to what it can’t do. Obamacare has been appealed to the SCOTUS on the chance it survives (it won’t) this latest lawsuit will end up in the same place.
      
      There’s 3. Your turn, when did Bush attack the Constitution?
  - Alan in NH
    
    Missed the point, Gregg. I was attempting to point out that, whereas some parishes and parishioners do good works for the needy, the leadership of this church is historically reactionary, punitive, aggressive and often immoral, and one needs to make a distinction between what individuals do and what Church doctrine and actions are.
    - Gregg
      
      And my point is that does not mean their right to practice their religion is not protected by the Constitution.
Gregg

The media blackout on this is absolutely appalling. Shame on “On Point” for not even a mention of it. Unbelievable. The University of Notre Dame, the Archdiocese of New York and 41 others filing suit is big news. Obama trumps up some phoney “war on contraception” and it’s the lead story for a week but a real live war on religion gets nothing.

“This should be seen as a very dark cloud on Obama’s political horizon.
The Catholic Church, with 60 million Americans describing themselves as
Catholic, has unleashed legal Armageddon on the administration,
promising “we will not comply” with a health law that strips Catholics
of their religious liberty. If this isn’t “news,” then there’s no such
thing as news.”

http://www.mrc.org/bozells-column/shameless-bias-omission
- Hidan
  
  http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Media_Research_Center
  
  MRC views the media “through a funhouse mirror that
  renders everything–even the facts themselves–as manifestations of
  insidious bias.”
  - Gregg
    
    The historical lawsuit is real, Sherlock. So is the accompanying media blackout. It has nothing to do with MRC.
    - Hidan
      
      You used MRC for your source(an rightwing source btw quoting Bill O on the facts) so of course it does.
      
      Try again.
    - Gregg
      
      I’ve made my point. You, not so much.
- Hidan
  
  “Media black out”
  
  Catholic Groups Sue Obama Administration Over Birth Control Rule
  
  http://www.wbur.org/npr/153218446/catholic-groups-sue-obama-administration-over-birth-control-rule
  
  (same link)
  http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2012/05/21/153218446/catholic-groups-sue-obama-administration-over-birth-control-rule
  
  CNN
  
  http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2012/05/21/catholic-groups-sue-over-federal-contraception-mandate/
  
  MSNBC
  
  http://video.msnbc.msn.com/now-with-alex-wagner/47521901/#47521901
  - Gregg
    
    There has been nothing on ABC and NBC. CBS gave it 19 seconds. There’s no screaming headlines in the New Your Times. There’s no mention on this blog header. Yea, blackout.
    - nj_v2
      
      Poor Greggg’s got his panties twisted again.
      
      Here’s “nothing” on ABC:http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/notre-dame-sues-obama-birth-control-mandate-16395444#.T7-EWa7XZyg
      
      Here’s a Times story:
      
      http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/22/us/catholic-groups-file-suits-on-contraceptive-coverage.html
      
      The headline seems about the same size as their other headlines.
      
      What are the requirements for a headline to “scream,” Greggg? Is there an instrument to measure headline volume? Do you have one?
    - Gregg
      
      Admit it NJ, you had no idea about the lawsuit. You can thank me later.
      
      I was clearly talking about the television newscast on ABC. No mention there. And regarding The NYT, for a headline to scream it needs to be on page 1 above the fold not buried on page A17. Did you read your own link?
      
      “A version of this article appeared in print on May 22, 2012, on page A17 of the New York edition with the headline: Bishops Sue Over Contraception Mandate.”
      
      And the headline should be more accurate. It wasn’t just Bishops and they were suing Obama.
      
      Smarty pants.
  - feettothefire
    
    I remember when the enormity of the Catholic clergy sexual abuse scandal was first coming to light at the beginning of this century. The media was accused of a war on the Catholic church then, also. “Pandering to anti-religious bias,” “sensationalism,” “mainstream medias hatred of religion.” These were the claims we heard from the religious folks then. They wanted to be left alone. “Don’t make too much of a big deal about the sexual abuse of children, but please give us blanket coverage of our stupid little snit with Obama. My, how time can change people.
    - Gregg
      
      What are you talking about? The press rightly should’ve covered the abuse as they should cover this lawsuit. Catholics are not demanding coverage. I’m talking about the press doing their job, that’s all.
- denis
  
  Your logic is so flawed it is beyond belief. How has individual Catholics religious liberty been “stripped?” No one is mandating that Catholics use any form of contraception. Of course if you had your way you would deny religious freedom of non-Catholics their right to choose the religious rules they wish to follow. Until such time as the Catholic Church choses to hire only Catholics in their profit making business enterprises they need to allow their insurance to cover the needs of their employees. [And do not forget a very large % of their Catholic employees also want this insurance coverage.]
  - Ray in VT
    
    I wonder if they’d be willing to give up the public dollars in exchange for being able to exclude contraception or whatever else they want from their health insurance plans?
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      AND pay back ALL public dollars?
    - Gregg
      
      I’m not sure I understand the question but the bottom line is Catholic institutions are not providing insurance at all now. I don’t think that’s progress.
  - Gregg
    
    They are mandating Catholics pay for it.
    
    “Of course if you had your way you would deny religious freedom of
    non-Catholics their right to choose the religious rules they wish to
    follow. “
    
    That’s nuts, please don’t tell me what I think.
    - denis
      
      They are mandating that all businesses pay for it.. not those institutions that are truly churches.
      I did not tell you what you think [I've noticed this is your new favorite line]. My comment is that if your stated goal of not requiring the businesses within the catholic umbrella to carry a full insurance package the religious freedom of those choosing to believe differently than the catholic church will be forced to follow catholic doctrine.
    - Gregg
      
      Does the constitution say “church” or “religion”?
- Sean
  
  Whats appalling is the churches assault on contraception despite the massive use by it’s own congregation. What is also appalling is the way the church has influenced the non use of contraception in developing countries despite its success in preventing sexual diease and unwanted pregnancy. Also..Why would anyone be forced to buy health insurance from a church. Nuts I say. We need single payer and then the church can go back to it’s hole in the ground.
  - Gregg
    
    That makes no sense at all. First, Catholic doctrine is what it is but that doesn’t mean everyone follows it to the tee. Clinton is Baptist but he broke a couple of Commandments often. Does Islam condone flying jets into buildings? I think not but it happened. Even Atheist when faced with dire peril mutter “please God” under their breath.
    
    A question: If all those Catholics are using contraception already then why does government need to mandate it be provided?
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  WHY isn’t there MORE info about the Organized Crime actions of the Catholic clergy, in their decades-old Pedophile Crime Ring?
  Don’t children matter, AFTER they are born?
Terry Tree Tree

Ed’s usual distraction from the CRIMES of his clergy, against innocent and vulnerable CHILDREN?
- Joe
  
  Barack Obama,
  
  when he was in the Illinois Senate, supported legislation that if a baby survived an abortion, then that that baby could be aborted if it survived birth.
  
  That’s why I say, Barack Obama is ‘your’ President.
  - TFRX
    
    I was gonna say something clever, but all you deserve is “You’re a lying hack.”
    - Gregg
      
      It’s true, he did.
    - brettearle
      
      Back it up with a credible source.
    - Gregg
      
      How is it you don’t know about this?
      
      http://www.washingtontimes.com/blog/watercooler/2012/feb/24/picket-obamas-bad-moves-infanticide-come-back-haun/
    - TFRX
      
      Gregg and the Washington Times: Made for each other.
  - brettearle
    
    Back it up with credible source.
Terry Tree Tree

You Catholics DEMAND more VICTIMS for the clergy Crime Ring?
- Still Here
  
  It’s no wonder your wife dumped your sick azz. You are messed up.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    Do YOU admit that there is evidence that Catholic clergy Molested Children?
       Do YOU admit that there is evidence that Catholic clergy Abused Children?
       Do you admit there is evidence Catholic clergy covered up these CRIMES against Children?
       Do YOU admit Catholic clergy moved the MOLESTERS, and ABUSERS, without informing the new parish of their crimes?
    ARE YOU a Molesting priest?
       Why else would anyone continue to protect them?

Joe

I hope that On Point can bring back Mona Charen and Byron York as guest panelists for the weekly news round up. This program is in dire need of political balance.

Gregg

Why are Democrats bashing Romney because of his wealth?

“From January to April 2004, the ABC and CBS evening news shows only
mentioned Kerry’s wealth once each. And NBC didn’t mention Kerry’s
finances or his wife’s wealth at all. Those same three networks have
discussed Romney’s wealth a total of 27 times during the same time
period in 2012. That’s more than 13 times more than the coverage given
Kerry’s wealth (27 stories to 2 stories).” http://newsbusters.org/blogs/mike-ciandella/2012/05/21/networks-target-romney-s-wealth-13-times-more-richer-sen-kerry#ixzz1vsgOhdjZ

Hidan

newsbusters? if the rightwing newsbusters says so it must be true. Good thing it relies on the O’reily Factor for it’s Facts. Cause we all know how truthful O’reily is. Gotta love it’s selective use of evidence.

Parent company of Newsbusters

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Media_Research_Center
- Gregg
  
  Clockwork.
  - Hidan
    
    Glad you agree your sources are junk, it must of took alot of courage to admit such.
Terry Tree Tree

I remember quite a lot of attention about Kerry’s wealth, and the wealth of his wife. I don’t remember the news sources, but it wasn’t kept secret that he had married into the Heinz fortune!
- Gregg
  
  It was not demonized. He’s far richer than Romney. He inherited and married into it. It’s not like he earned it. He’s a filthy rich greedy SOB by your standards, right? Dare I mention he’s also a Catholic. I’m sure you could not have voted for him. You must hate him with a passion.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    No, Gregg. I decided decades ago, that I don’t hate individuals, just the bad things they do, and their continuing to do harm to others.
    I try to keep attention on the CRIMES and distractions from the crimes of the Catholic clergy, that claim to be ‘men of God’! They have gotten away with those CRIMES and SINS for TOO LONG!
  - ana
    
    The right demonized Kerry plenty, memorably, frequently calling him a “gigalo” for marrying into wealth along with the Swift Boaters and the wind sail mockers.
    - Gregg
      
      I meant the MSM, my bad.
Worried for the country(MA)

The media is so in the tank for Obama it is pathetic.

Hidan

Ever notice NPR and the MSM reporting on Egpgyt as opposed to say Saudi Arabia? How many times has one heard Islamist? and no separation between the Muslim Brotherhood and the salafists. While than NPR and the MSM reporting on Saudi Arabia one never hears the term Islamist but Conservative or Ultra Conservative instead. While the media has often brought up the boogeyman as to what the MB wants to do, it totally ignores the actions of real Islamist in Saudi Arabia.

My thinking is that the U.S. and the U.S. media (with the except of Tom and a few others) are against democracy in the middle-east and prefer despot like in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.

Hidan

Also in the News after Human Rights Groups have reported Bahrain civil and human rights abuses the U.S. decided to sell the government Weapons to suppress it’s citizens with the blessing of the White House and SOS Clinton. What’s even worst is the Saudi’s are trying to form it’s own Nato (again with the help of the U.S.) to maintain and keep it’s despots in power.

Want a laugh look up the reasoning the White House gave to selling arms to Bahrain than read the complaints the White House and SOS Clinton have leveled at Russia.

Hidan

As for the EU. It’s extremely undemocratic and the block has on multiple occasions not respected the members citizens votes or wishes. Either refusing to allow citizens to vote if they wish to allow the EU to do something or the countries that can (Ireland) after the citizens voted the “wrong way” forcing them to vote again the “right way”. The EU was against the Greek’s being able to decided what they wanted to do for there country and paint anyone not cow-toeing to the EU as radical.

Hidan

Any dummies out their who bought Facebook Stock? As WS is rigged many of the big banks were able to get the shares for half the price than an additional day was given for people to buy in before the vast unwashed commoners were able to buy.(right after the stock fell 11-13%)

Terry Tree Tree

Romney should be giving SPECIFICS on EACH of his ‘better plans, that he KNOWS that Republicans WILL pass, instead of the general crap of vague terms that sound good, and have NO SUBSTANCE!

Gregg

Substance like: “Hope and Change”, “Yes we can”, “Forward”, “Fair share”?
Hidan

No Substance? Add No Base, No morals, No belief other than winning. For all of obama’s faults Romney is worst on about every level. It’s hard to believe that people actually believe in the guy or what he says.

Found this

Hot Problems – feat. Mitt Romney

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6txmM8M9Iw&feature=relmfu
- TFRX
  
  But winning is all the press asks of Republicans. Mitt’s naked ambition is the pure distilled essence of the relationship our media overlords have had with the GOP since Reagan.
  
  The flipside: When the mainstream press starts repeating the rumbles about any Democrat’s “tone”, you can bank that that Dem is saying something more popular with voters than with Beltway Inbreds.
Alan in NH

I remember well Nixon’s plan to end the Vietnam war. Seems to me it involved escalation of the war into Laos and Cambodia. Why would I want to trust Romney on anything? Based on past statements which he has contradicted or will shortly?

Joe

U.S. terror drones kills 5 innocent civilians in NW Pakistan

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2012/05/23/242600/us-drone-kills-nw-pakistan/

I sure am glad that all those ‘rumors’ (put out by the C.I.A.) about Pakistan having between 100-200 nuclear warheads are just ‘rumors’,

otherwise I’d be getting pretty nervous about Obama’s constant drone strikes in Pakistan (which Pakistan has stated they want to end).

Still Here

Time for another Peace Prize!

Terry Tree Tree

Monsignor William Lynn, assigned to PROTECT VICTIMS OF PRIESTS, instead PROTECTED CRIMINAL PRIESTS? At least 35 perverts? Average number of VICTIMS of pedophiles is 180! How many lives were DESTROYED by the CRIMINALS this CRIMINAL protected? Higher Catholic clergy? It goes ALL the way to the TOP? Catholics keep trying to distract from their attrocious crimes?

Joe

President Obama and his Attorney Generals Eric Holder’s illegal operation, ‘Fast and Furious’,

were thousands of AK-47 assault rifles were sold to Mexican drug cartels, which resulted in three U.S. Border Patrol agents being killed with those weapons,

that’s CRIMINAL.

You dyed in the wool Obama supporters are the ones trying to distract from Obama’s and Holder’s despicable crimes.

Not to mention Obama’s CIA led war in Libya (which wasn’t authorized by Congress) which resulted in about 30,000 innocent Libyan civilians being killed by NATO bombs.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  I thought Fast and Furious sounded questionable, when it was first announced. I haven’t heard anything about it, to change my mind.
  - Joe
    
    Operation ‘Fast and Furious’ is very real.
    
    Obama and Holder broke the law, they are involved in a cover-up, but they will one day answer for their heinous crimes in a court of law.
    - Charles Vigneron
      
      Unlike the memory deficient Alberto?
    - Alan in NH
      
      Just wondering Joe (not to dispute what you say about Obama and Holder right now) if you are as vigilant with the Bush Administration’s prosecution of the foolishness in Iraq where the carnage to civilians makes both Libya and Mexico look like a playground spat.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  THIS is your distraction from the Catholic clergy CRIMES?

Terry Tree Tree

Mitt Romney says that school class sizes can be BIGGER, and HE will PROVE it, by teaching a class of 50 unruly children, with a variety of disabilities, MOSTLY Attention Deficit Disorder, while campaigning, and for ten years after, since HE says it’s so easy?
He MUST raise EACH individual student at least 1 1/2 grade level!

Worried for the country(MA)

… and Obama killed the voucher program that allowed poor DC kids to go to the same elite school his two daughters get to go to. Why?
The answer is political support from teachers unions at the expense of the children.
- nlpnt
  
  YES, the teachers’ unions are an interest group. They have as much right to exist and participate in politics as every other interest group.
  
  The conservative movement wants to break them not to improve education but to destroy one of the few big-money lobbies that contributes mainly to Democrats, so that pro-GOP corporate money will have a clear field.
  
  For the children, they want to replace the teachers’ unions with for-profit charter schools and their lobby, simply replacing one interest group with another. A school-industrial complex, if you will.

Terry Tree Tree

MEMORIAL DAY is about the people that served this nation in, and out of uniform!�
I placed U.S. flags on, and saluted the graves at 3 cemeteries. What have YOU done to honor my comrades-in-arms, that served to protect YOUR freedoms?

Joe

Those veterans gave their lives to defend this country and the Constitutional rights of every American,

just so Barack Obama could transform this country into his N.D.A.A. police-state.
- Ray in VT
  
  I’m not a fan of the President’s record in the field of civil rights, just as I was not a fan of his predecessor in that same area, but riddle me this, how was he able to single handedly? Perhaps it was due to the support of 80% of the House GOP and half of the House Democrats.
  
  http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2011/roll932.xml
  
  Go ahead and criticize the President if you like, and I certainly will on this measure, but just make sure that you spread the blame around to everyone involved.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Reminds me of the self-admitted AWOL Drunk, that technically deserted, bringing us the ‘Patriot Act’, and MANY other acts AGAINST U.S. Patriots, and citizens!
- jimino
  
  Saying obviously loonie things is not a good way to build credibility.
- jefe68
  
  Yeah, they died and were wounded so the likes of you have freedoms to say BS on forums such as this. Police state…

Terry Tree Tree

Because Mitt Romney uses his ‘business experience’ as proof of his ability to lead the country, NO ONE has the right to WHINE, when that ‘business experience’ is used against him!
John Kerry served two Vietnam tours, and LIES about that was used against him!

Worried for the country(MA)

Whine? How about pointing out that ole Mitt was running the Olympics when the company the Obama campaign spotlighted went bankrupt. Also, that steel plant spotlighted in the Obama ad would have gone bankrupt 8 years earlier without Bain’s $100M investment. Is that ‘whining’ or just bringing up ‘inconvenient’ facts?

The reason prominent Democrats are attacking the attack on Bain is:
a) Democrats (including Obama) get plenty of money from Bain and other private equity firms
b) Bain and other private equity funds are critical for public union pension funds to succeed.
c) They understand that private equity is important for the growth of the economy

The Obama campaign must believe the voters are stupid. It looks like that’s all they have because they are increasingly desperate.
- TFRX
  
  Keep telling us you’re unaffiliated, and a swing voter.
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    Yup.
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    The current Democrat party is making my choices very easy these days.
    - TFRX
      
      Keep saying “Democrat party”.
- ana
  
  If there is a choice between maximizing profits and saving jobs, the profits win.
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    And that is why Obama closed all those auto dealerships when he took over GM.
    - ana
      
      Obama does not close dealerships.
      Part of the GM problem was that it was supporting too many dealerships. CEO Rick Wagoner was not doing well.
- denis
  
  Once again Worried for the Country’s comments truly make me worried for the country!
  The truth is President Obama gives the voters’ credit for their ability to look at facts and do individual analysis…. folks like “worried” only regurgitate Fox 24/7.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  Poor Rick Waggoner, ONLY got a paltry ‘performance BONE-US’, of measly $20 MILLION, for bankrupting GM, in addition to his ‘miniscule’ pay package of $28 MILLION?
  HOW MANY GM workers, actually building cars, could THAT have paid for?

Terry Tree Tree

SpaceX has accomplished SO MUCH, and probably will make HISTORY!
A peacful accomplishment for MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND!!

Hidan

Also in the news,

NPR admits per the CIA IRan is not seeking Nuclear weapons (http://www.npr.org/2012/05/23/153428611/a-peek-inside-the-cia-as-it-tries-to-assess-iran) of course for the sake of fake “Fair and Balance” it has on John Bolton to claim otherwise.

Terry Tree Tree

Interesting that Banksters TAKE $ MILLIONS, whether they crash an economy or not?
BAINsters TOOK profits, whether the companies survived or not?

Mary

True and that’s one thing that is missed by most if not all fo the media except for Charlie Rose. He mentioned that the thing that ticks off people is the fact that in that steel mill that Bain got involved with, the steel mill closed, everyone lost everything, EXCEPT for the Bain investors.. They still got their money. That’s an example of several things. 1. Only a chosen few get to win.. 2. Heads you win, tails I lose. 3. the system is rigged.. so that only a few win.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_C2STBLZJK4VKQBV27DVQX3I6CU FAX68

iOnePoint:
�
Thank you to the American soldiers, the veterans of WW2 for fighting shoulder to shoulder with Filipino soldiers in Bataan and Corregidor.

Lee from Worcester, MA

What I think is interesting about the news on the economy:

When growth was accelerating, the consensus was that the global economy was integrated and that all the countries were rising together, albeit each at their own pace.

Now that we see Europe falling apart, and today it is revealed that China’s growth is slowing quite dramatically, we read that this won’t impact the U.S. economy because we don’t export to to China and our trade with Europe is minimal.

I couldn’t help think how this reminded me of the language of disease, like an epidemic AIDS or flu.

It’s amazing how quickly words and phrases like “one world,” interconnected and integrated care themselves contracted along with national economies.

Lee

woops.. corrected

It’s amazing how quickly words and phrases like “one world,” interconnected and integrated are themselves contracting along with national economies.
TFRX

Language of disease is the tip of the iceberg, just a way to relate things.

Maybe there’s a Nobel prize coming up for the new field of epidemiolconomics.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Y6CO5C2HE4WM2OYGCDVWGPRXXM oldman

On the Falcon 9 and commercial space flight – Robert Heinlein was grinning in his grave this week. He was a few decades off, but it’s happening.

feettothefire

I grok that.
Terry Tree Tree

Jules Vern was vindicated over 40 years ago!

You_Can_Keep_The_Change

Vice President Joe Biden

West Virginia voters who chose felon over Obama are frustrated, angry

http://thehill.com/video/administration/228385-biden-wva-voters-who-chose-felon-over-obama-are-frustrated-angry

President Obama lost 40% of the WV vote to a guy sitting in jail.

I don’t think the jail-bird could be any worse than Obama as President, especially with Joe Biden as his VP.

Terry Tree Tree

The percentage of votes for the convict, versus the votes for Romney?
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  Your President lost 40% of the WV democratic primary vote to a guy sitting in jail and you’re proud of that?
  - Ray in VT
    
    He’s your President too. I think that it says way more about West Virginia voters than it does about Democrats or the President. Plus, if he’d been a known felon, I’m gonna guess that he would have gotten fewer votes. People didn’t know who they were voting for. It was a protest vote in a state that Obama won’t carry anyways.
  - TFRX
    
    The Appalachia situation represents the future of very little in this country, demographically: Lower-educated, lower-earning, lower-informed, lower part of the population now than 20 years ago and will be even lower than 20 years hence, and dedicated in abject fealty and subservience to crony corporations like Massey Mining, the crooks who are in large part destroying the state with mountaintop removal mining to “create” as many jobs as the number of West Virginians working in flower shops.
    
    Your need to fluff this is pretty telling. By your math, Mondale made Reagan sweat bullets.
jimino

The great state of West Virginia, which gets back over $2.50 in federal benefits for every dollar paid in federal taxes. What are they so pissed off about? More likely a bunch of ignorant brainwashed voters. Ain’t democracy grand?
- Ray in VT
  
  It is interesting to see that the states that get the most back relative to what they pay tend to vote GOP, while the opposite also tends to be true. Texas is a big exception there, but it’s a decent generalization. I wonder what would happen if those small government voters got their way?
  - jimino
    
    You’re right. Here in Nebraska, the Republican/Tea-Party-backed candidate for US Senate gets over $100,000 per year in federal grazing subsidies. She’s another small-government-free-market worshiper whose very livelihood depends on being propped up by taxpayer dollars. Of course, she’ll get the vote of all those so-called conservative farmers who are equally beholden to taxpayer financial support.

Terry Tree Tree

CONGRATULATIONS TO EGYPT on their FIRST free election!

You_Can_Keep_The_Change

The Muslim Brotherhood with known ties to terrorist groups is very thankful as well, being as they’ll be running the country.
- Ray in VT
  
  So should be continue to support oppressive regimes who support our interests? Such tactics and strongmen often serve to fuel the very groups that we want to keep out of power, like with the Shah.

BHA in Vermont

Read an article in yesterday’s paper regarding Romney trying to get in with the female voters. Referenced several stories about (unnamed) women). Some were successful, one was graduating college and going back to school to get another undergraduate degree so she wouldn’t have to start paying on her $40K student loan because she couldn’t find a job. Is taking on MORE debt a path to success?

My response? “So….. what is the point?” He expressed admiration for the successful, ‘empathy’ for the student. He said nothing about WHAT he would do to fix the “got a degree, can’t get a job” problem. Didn’t say squat about the environment that allowed the successful to become successful.

Still the same – all talk, WHERE IS THE BEEF!

Tina

I believe I have this correctly:

– Mitt Romney wants to END the mortgage interest rate tax deduction.

– Mitt Romney wants to START TAXING employee health insurance.

If I am correct, WHY would ANY MIDDLE CLASS American want to vote for him?!!

MrNutso

Because we should all want the opportunity to become incredibly wealthy even there’s only a snowballs chance in he!! of it happening.
- Tina
  
  If those proposals I mentioned were enacted, people would be struggling even more than they are now!! The pipe dream of becoming wealthy that you mention is blinding people to the realities of what is at stake in this election.
  - MrNutso
    
    Absolutely. Republicans have been using fairness as propaganda for years.

feettothefire

I’m sorry. I just heard Romney speaking on the show. He just can’t stop sounding like Darrell Hammond doing a bit on SNL.

TFRX

Isn’t that Jason Sudeikis?
- feettothefire
  
  It is, but Hammond would have done a much better job.
  - TFRX
    
    Hammond is impressively rubber-faced, but does he have the ability to look enough like Mitt to do it?
    
    Let’s wait until September and the conventions.
    
    (I’m reminded of the “find the new Bill Clinton” sketch SNL had, with Chris Elliott pitching a W.C. Fields angle-a winner in my book.)

Greyman

For the many of us not residing in insolvent California: just how hot is the war getting between Hollywood and Silicon Valley? Obama showed his Hollywood flair and appeal recently, but are Silicon Valley-types (with and without Wall Street-types) hedging as energetically against Obama? How might the ongoing dispute between Hollywood and Silicon Valley play out in (insolvent) California? and what longer-term ramifications could the H/SC divide hold for the US?

TFRX

I must be not doing enough reading; I totally missed the Serious People’s Talking Point of the Day.
- Greyman
  
  It’s at least as relevant as the death of Robin Gibbs, I mean, come on . . . . oh, and my dreadful typo: H/SV divide. It’s a new world every day.

BHA in Vermont

Romney understands how the investment capital business works.
- They PERSONALLY make money when the companies they take over succeed, so do the people who gave them the money.
- They PERSONALLY make, and the investors LOSE, money when the companies they take over fail.

I don’t think that model goes very far for nationwide job creation.

BHA in Vermont

And let’s not forget that the Investment capitalists wrangled the tax code so their income is ‘deferred interest’ and taxed at 15%.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_HUHWX4TIAZRFNFYCWUE43OZDUQ 7LeagueBoots

What Romeny seems to not understand is that the government is not a corporation. Corporations exist to make a profit, the government is supposed to exist to serve the needs of the people. Governments must act in an ethical manner, corporations do not need to have ethics. The thought of having someone running the country with a corporate mindset is highly disturbing.

feettothefire

If Romney wins the presidency, he’ll soon be shaking his head in disbelief when he realizes he’s not the CEO and the country isn’t part of the Fortune 500.

Michiganjf

Did Diane say “there’s a sense the game is somehow rigged??!!!”
�
…the game is UTTERLY rigged, set up for the wealthy to bleed the middle class without restraint or consequence.
�
Unfortunately, approximately 50% of “likely voters” are easily enough duped (Republicans) by the elite’s propaganda machine (the media), that the rest of us are stuck with a situation which is getting ever more difficult to correct: hear On Point’s “Predator Nation,” aired two days ago.

http://onpoint.wbur.org/2012/05/23/charles-ferguson

TFRX

“We don’t want these regulations, we don’t trust Obama,” says Dickey.

Glad Tom was here to mention “demand”.

Kantafa

If you apply for a janitor position , the employer checks your stated skills. Why wouldn’ t that be appropriate at the presidential level ?

Lee

The Wall Street Journal reported today that the national econmies are shrinking in a synchronized way-

even China, the second biggest economy.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Y6CO5C2HE4WM2OYGCDVWGPRXXM oldman

Making money involves minimizing costs – hiring, training, infrastructure improvements are the course of last resort, only done when absolutely necessary and reduced as much and as soon as possible.

This is Romney’s record.

brettearle

While Romney’s web site might articulate his positions more comprehensively, the Republican candidate spends all his time–for many, many months, now–criticizing the President for everything he does and says.
�
Former Governor Romney almost never articulates his own positions and what he would specifically do.
�
What kind of presidential candidate speaks to the American people, this way, by being an Attack Johnny-One-Note.
�
That speaks of shallowness, impulsive character, knee-jerk reactions to challenges, by trying to beat others, at all costs…..without thinking of principles, beliefs, and integrity.
�
From the day, Mr. Romney started to take off from his job as Governor of Massachusetts–half of the days of the his last year in office, he was out of state because he was running for President–we knew that we were dealing with a politician whose obsession is ambition and only ambition……at the expense of citizens.

BHA in Vermont

He’ll slow the attacks once he has the nomination. The attacks will then come from the VP running mate. Same tune, different singer.
- brettearle
  
  I don’t necessarily agree.
  
  I think that the polls are going to be so close that Romney will listen to those close advisors who will tell him to stay on the attack, no matter what.
  
  And not only will Romney listen to these expedient warnings, but it will BE his downfall.
  
  Additionally, Romney will be exposed in the debates–I think, mercilessly–and this will make him more and more defensive and will make him feel that he is ON the defensive.
  
  All cornered cobras attack.
  
  But a Romney cobra has no sting.
TomK in Boston

Etchacketch has spent his life running from office and scamming people out of their wages and retirement. However, he has one legit accomplishment – “Obamacare”! C’mon, Etcha, stand up and brag about your one good thing Let’s hear it!
- TomK in Boston
  
  Sorry, I meant running for office.
  - brettearle
    
    Actually he’s spent his life running FROM office, too…..if you catch my drift.
    
    You’re `Freudian slip’ was even MORE accurate….
    
    how……ironic…..

You_Can_Keep_The_Change

President Obama’s administration ran a deficit of $5.6 trillion last year! Accounting tricks were used to hide the real numbers

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/story/2012-05-18/federal-deficit-accounting/55179748/1?csp=hf

BHA in Vermont

The house and senate voted to spend all that money.
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  That’s why Congress has an approval rating of 9 to 11%, depending on what poll you’re using.
  - Ray in VT
    
    Then why will 95% of the incumbents who run get re-elected? Most everybody thinks that it’s the other guy’s guy who’s the problem.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    Republicans use the 2-year-old’s answer “NO!” to anything they don’t approve, and the fillibuster in the Senate to get their way, and you show us the result? Thank YOU!
brettearle

Are you trying to say that the Interest on the Debt–which is a Huge Liability with regard to the Deficit–began on January 20th, 2009…..and that the malignancy which gets compounded and compounded on itself, was never enabled before the Obama Administration?
TomK in Boston

Those Bush tax cuts are a b**ch, aren’t they?

http://images.huffingtonpost.com/2012-05-23-chart_annualized_spending.jpg
- Worried for the country(MA)
  
  The $3.7T in unfunded liabilities have nothing to do with the Bush tax cuts. However, the payroll tax cut DID contribute to the SS shortfall.
Ray in VT

Maybe I’m in the wrong here, but take a look at this bullet and tell me if you stand by your point:

Deficits from 2004 to 2011 would be six times the official total of $5.6 trillion reported

The 1.3 official number would be different when other figures are factored it, but your 5.6 number doesn’t apply to last year, but, rather, to a range of years of actual deficits, unless this article links to a source with that figure.
- Worried for the country(MA)
  
  The article claims last years deficit was $5T IF you account for the $3.7T of unfunded liabilities.
  
  The article then goes on to state that the government can change rules at anytime so it is ‘different’.
  
  Isn’t this just generational theft and dishonesty for the government to be running up these unfunded liabilities?
  - Ray in VT
    
    True, and we’ve been doing it for a long time. The problem is that we don’t want hard realities. The electorate will vote for people who will tell us that we can have it all, and for that reason alone we may be screwed.
    - TFRX
      
      But the press only gets a stiffie for spending less when the Democrats are in power.
      
      When it’s the GOP, they trust the Birthrighteous quality of “fiscal rectitude” (which every Republican or conservadem is granted at birth) makes everything they do fiscally conservative, no matter what.
Terry Tree Tree

And the country that you favor? That Communist China flag, shows us all where YOUR alliegance is!

john in danvers

Thank you Tom for defending us against the fear mongers, the confidence fairy promoters. You put two people like that on your show and you go a long way toward endorsing great errors. I know you can’t run the show with just you and Jack, but really, well-spoken people with flat-earth beliefs do not help.

Michiganjf

Sean, the brainiac who called into the show, basically says:

“I don’t see that the wealthy overspend, only the poor overspend.”

How’s THAT for logical??!!!!

BHA in Vermont

Exceptionally logical:
- When you couldn’t possibly spend all your money in a hundred lifetimes, you don’t overspend.
- When you don’t have enough money for the basic needs of life, you spend it all then borrow more to buy food.
- Michiganjf
  
  Exactly! Impressive brainstorm of a comment, wasn’t it???
MrNutso

He’s right that many fall into the trap of sending on non-essential consumer goods. However, what does he think will happen if people stopped buy these things?
- Ray in VT
  
  It’s funny, I do see many rural poor people spending too much money on cell phones, dirt bikes and other garbage, but the result for our consumer economy would be bad if they stopped. On the other hand, if they put that money to use fixing their often dumpy homes, then that would stimulate another sector.
Terry Tree Tree

Newt didn’t have a BIG bill at Tiffany’s, EVEN though he got paid $1.4 MILLION as a ‘historian’?�
HOW MANY $1.4 Million ‘historian’ jobs are there?
Is that the going pay for Historians?
- Ray in VT
  
  I wish! If it had been then I probably would have stayed in the field.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    Newt, the ‘honest’, ‘compassionate’, ‘conservative’, ‘Family Values’, Republican, SAYS that’s what it pays?

Sapineiro

It is absurd to suggest that rich people are not spending, when large homes have not dropped as much as middle income homes, Ferrari keep selling at ever growing rates, Tiffanys sales keep increasing. It is the middle class that creates the jobs. Every penny we make we have to spend on food, gas, to support our kids, education, home maintenance, etc.

TFRX

They are spending, but at some point they just get tired of buying more stuff. The 100th vintage car in Jay Leno’s garage or 10th mansion for John McCain doesn’t bring the same frisson of emotional meaning when my empty-nest neighbor gets back into motorcycling with a 5-year-old Suzuki Bandit, or my aunt and uncle gets a little cabin on the lake.

Also, that X amount of money doesn’t have the multiplier effect concentrated in that one person’s hands than it does spread out among the riffraff like me and (perhaps) you.

(And of course it doesn’t naturally end up there; that’s the result of choices the government has mande.)

Scott B, Jamestown NY

How are tax breaks for the wealthiest people and companies going help the middle class and poor? Once again it’s the rich saying it’s raining when they’re pissing down our backs. They’re not spending that money, claiming “uncertainty”, though I have a niggling suspicion that they’re hoping Romney gets in and they’ll get way to make even more and sit on that, too.

Not everyone wants to be filthy rich, and they don’t hate those that are. But how much money do they need? When’s the last time the 1% had to budget to the penny for the necessities of life, vs. what the taxes are on there’s new vacation home, car, European vacation, car elevator? Romney apparently has so much money that he can’t keep it all in one place, and has to scattered throughout the Caribbean in the Caymans and Bahamas, and in Swiss banks.

BHA in Vermont

“How are tax breaks for the wealthiest people and companies going help the middle class and poor?”

I guess you haven’t been paying attention the last 30 years. The money will trickle down.

Oh, wait, you covered that in your second sentence.

Lost Cat 00

I am glad to hear for the first time someone saying loud, but not too clearly stated, that the plutocracy is doing to President Obama, what its Chilean counterpart and international financial interests did to the Allende government in Chile, which is the systematic sabatoging of all initiatives so the government will fail. Don’t call them patriots!

Regarding Romney’s plan for ‘fixing’ the American economy, probably it boils down to issuing stocks, spread them as stock options among himself and his buddies, laid off teachers, nurses, and police officers, cash its their “added value”, and sell the school desks, the hospital beds, and the police cars to the Chinese.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1816544 Dan Trindade

If you are a self made 1 percenter then you have earned the right to pay a higher percentage in taxes than the rest of us. You got there because of the American system of education, innovation, and infrastructure and lets face it you wouldn’t have made it anywhere else. As a result you must put money back into that system, not starve it so as to horde your wealth for your kids and grandkids.

TFRX

Tangent: These same “selfmade” folks don’t need to go everywhere in armored limosines and live in compounds with machine-gun-toting guards.

Not that there’s a dollar value one can put hope to put on that.
Guest

The American system of education, innovation, and infrastructure is there for everyone in the country. As a result almost everyone should put money back into that system, and nearly 50% shouldn’t get a free pass and pay 0% federal income tax.
- Ray in VT
  
  Does that include the elderly who live on Social Security and the working poor? A lot of people who don’t pay federal taxes don’t make very much, and many of them pay plenty of other taxes into the system. Most are hardly getting a free pass.
  - Guest
    
    Even if we limited tax increases on the 0% groups in the attached chart to a minimal 5% US income tax, it would raise over over a trillion dollars in 10 years, compared to $500-$600 billion in a decade if the “tax breaks for the rich” was repealed. We could exclude the 0%ers making less than $50,000, and tax the remaining 0%ers at 15% and still get more than from “tax breaks for the rich.” The US income tax system is broken and hopelessly corrupt, and many, many people who are not poor do not pay a “fair share.”
    - TFRX
      
      It’s true that the best thing to do for the deficit 15 years hence is to increase GDP ~2% now.
      
      In the same manner, the best way for these “lucky duckies” to pay federal income taxes is to actually have an increase in income. We were not all worried about that for a strata of Americans who’ve been waiting for a raise since the beginning–the beginning!–of the Bush 5-year expansion.
- jimino
  
  Over 80% of our population is under 20 or over 65, so the fact that they are not making much federally taxable income should be expected and understandable. Schools are paid for primarily by local property taxes, paid directly by owners and indirectly by renters. everybody who lives in the district pays. You’re talking apples vs. oranges.

TFRX

The combination of Jack saying “implicit capital strike” and the idea that “poor white voters think Silver Spoon Mitt gives a crap about them” begs for a real economist on the panel.

It was proved that the mainstream media, including NPR, called up very few economists to cover the debt ceiling “crisis” last year. On Point would be well served to do what it can to not repeat the error.

Lee

China has been slowing for quite some time according to today’s Wall Street Journal.

Why have we have heard practically nothing about this in the media?

If Chinese manufacturing is slowing, does that mean that their own demand is falling or is it world demand?

Lee

Here’s an excerpt of the WSJ article:
BY JON HILSENRATH AND JOSHUA MITCHELL

“New signs of a global slowdown are darkening the economic outlook.

On Thursday, the U.S. reported that businesses were slowing their orders of
computers, aircraft, machinery and other long-lasting goods. Measures of
business sentiment in Europe slipped, and reports from purchasing managers at
manufacturers around the globe turned down. Among them, China, the world’s
second-largest economy, registered its seventh straight drop in an important
manufacturing index.

With the latest reports, a new economic threat is emerging: That activity is
slowing in sync around the globe and not just in a few markets with their own
isolated problems. Europe, struggling with …”

Jim

I bet your pardon with regards to the caller deeming Romney as a successful governor of Massachusetts. No, by far. He is dead wrong. His administration oversaw one of the biggest public spending disaster, the Big Dig. And he did not create many jobs in Mass as he and many of his supporters claim.

What’s more troubling. He and his aids repeatedly destroy records of his administration. His administration has absolutely no transparency in Boston. If he does not want to be transparent with his record, such as how he rewards public money, HOW can you suggest i should vote for him if there is absolutely NO TRUST???

Bottom line: This guy (Romney) supports crony capitalism which is the last thing this country needs.

Worried for the country(MA)

Memo to Jim:

Romney did not oversee the big dig.

The big dig was started by Dukakis and Dem legislature put oversight into an ‘independent’ agency.

However, he did step in and manage the crisis when the tunnel collapse.
- brettearle
  
  Memo to Worried:
  
  The Big Dig death occurred on Romney’s watch.
  
  You’re basically excusing his responsibility, simply because he didn’t START the project.
  
  Me thinks you write with blinders on….
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    It is clear that you don’t understand the structure of the big dig at the time. The project did not report to the governor but to an independent agency with oversight by the legislature — not the governor.
    
    This structure was put in place prior to Romney (but during previous GOP governors) because the legislature wanted to limit power of GOP governors. A cynic would say they wanted political control for their own patronage.
    
    After the crisis, the legislature did give Romney the authority to clean up the mess and everyone said he did a great job.
    - brettearle
      
      Sorry.
      
      You are suggesting that Romney could COMPLETELY forget about oversight–even though he’s the CEO of the state.
      
      To suggest that a Governor can completely ignore a potential fatal boondoggle in his state–simply because it’s not in his job description, is laughable and disturbing, at the same time.
      
      What’s more, Romney’s PROFESSED promises, in his campaign for governor, was to overhaul and consolidate the Highway and Turnpike Authorities.
      
      He did no such thing.
      
      YOU CAN’T HAVE IT BOTH WAYS.
      
      What’s more, Romney came into office, on the heels of blistering attacks against a sitting Republican Governor, Jane Swift for proposals of increases in highway tolls to pay for Big Dig cost overruns.
      
      You’re `official’ announcement, above–with regard to Romney’s political autonomy and isolation, vis a vis the Big Dig–flies in the face of the disastrous consequences that Romeny faced in office……consequences that were reported by national media, as being one of the most expensive public projects in history.
    - brettearle
      
      Is there a Reply from “Worried For the Country”?
      
      I guess not….
      
      Why?
      
      Because on this major, major issue, he can’t adequately defend Romney’s deplorable record–a record that should make all responsible voters stand up and take notice.
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      The Boston Globe trashes Romney at every chance yet they don’t make the false claims that you are making up. Why is that?
    - brettearle
      
      (1) Have you plumbed the Globe archives to back up your claim?
      
      (2) The Globe hasn’t raked Romney over the coals for being a drive-by- governor, and for being out of state. for half of the year, when he campaigned for President.
      
      You think the Globe is ALWAYS compre
      hensive, even when spotlighting their politcal opponents?
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      Romney was blocked in his reform attempts by the democrat legislature. They were protecting their hack fiefdoms. The truth is Romney lost his leverage with the legislature because he had solved the financial crisis. This is what happens with a tuned out electorate and an 80+% dem legislature.
- Markus
  
  Plus his vetoes were overridden many times. One former legislator said over 120 times, but I think he was exaggerating.
  
  The mass legislature is overwhelmingly democratic. It’s a stretch to either blame or give credit for legislation to a republican governor.
  - Ray in VT
    
    I agree. It’s like laying the blame for our current mess on the President.
    - Markus
      
      Odd comparison. The big dig was run by an independent agency that Romney tried to get rid of, but couldn’t because it’s independent and any changes would require support from a democratic legislature.
      
      Obama has been in office for 3 years and he and Congress have spent 6 Trillion (give or take) and gotten the worst recession out of the 20 that have occured. I certainly don’t blame Obama for causing the collapse. I blame Congress and Bush. I blame Obama and the Congress for making the situation worse.
      
      Is there any point at which Obama and his followers accept any blame?
    - Ray in VT
      
      Certainly the debt situation has gotten worse, but on the measure I think that we’re in a far better place than we were three years ago. Given that that is my view, then mass criticism of the President and his policies looks to me like blaming him for not making things better faster.
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    I think the big dig was transferred to the independent agency prior to Romney (but it was with a different GOP governor).
- Don_B1
  
  When William Weld replaced Michael Dukakis as Governor, Dukakis’s Secretary of Transportation, Frederick Salvucci warned that Bechtel should not be allowed to act without independent supervision, which the Weld, Cellucci, Swift and Romney administrations ignored.
  
  That Romney “took charge” was basically to take the spotlight but the actually work was done by those he took the spotlight away from:
  
  “He was all sizzle and no steak,” said former Massachusetts governor Michael Dukakis, the 1988 Democratic presidential nominee.
Worried for the country(MA)

Crony capitalism? Like Solyndra?

Sorry Jim but you have confused your candidates.
- Ray in VT
  
  Is there any evidence that connected people got favorable treatment in the Solyndra deal? A company that tanked? Yes. A company that paid to play and got rewarded? I’m not so sure about that. A company that had an innovative product that got undercut by cheap Chinese labor? Yeah.
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    Yes.
    
    They redid the loans so the government would not be the primary creditor (ie -paid back first). Also, it is documented that Solyndra’s primary investor (George Kaiser) is a billionaire Obama supporter. Much of the Solyndra management contributed to Obama.
    
    I haven’t seen definitive proof of corruption. However, there is evidence that they accelerated the loans even though there were major financial warning signs.
    
    The best you could say is this is incompetence.
    
    This is the poster child for why you don’t want the government picking winners.
    
    btw – I am rooting for solar to succeed. Steven Chu said it best when he said we need breakthroughs that make solar competitive with coal and natural gas. Chu violated this principle when he put $550M of tax payer money into a company (Solyndra) that need a solar market of $2/W to be viable.
    - denis
      
      who is “they”
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      DOE
brettearle

I agree strongly with the Big Dig point and the Shredding Records point.

They absolutely must be discussed in detail–and so far, Romney’s enjoyed Teflon-status, on these two matters.

However, on the issue of job creation, I only WISH you were accurate–although I may be wrong in my point, here:

Unemployment was relatively low in Massachusetts, when Romney was governor–relative to the rest of the country.

Maybe what we should be attacking is how good Romney was at New Business Development, when he was governor.
- Worried for the country(MA)
  
  Do you blame Obama for the actions of the Fed?
  That is the equivalent of blaming Romney for the big dig. He was trying to get control of the big dig so he could consolidate overlapping bureaucracies but the legislature wouldn’t give up their hackdoms.
  
  You are correct that MA had close to ‘full’ employment under Romney’s tenure – 4.7%.
  
  I’m not sure where you are going with the records. Did Romney violate any public disclosure laws? Is he accused of any sort of corruption? The guy is so squeaky clean that it frustrates career politicians who wanted him to ‘play ball’.

DonnyT

I hope this is the beginning of the private sector rocketing us up into a people in peaceful exploration of the universe!

Terry Tree Tree

Elon Musk will continue to make news, as he has with Pay Pal, Tesla Motors, SpaceX, and more!

Terry Tree Tree

CONGRATULATIONS DRAGON! SpaceX just DELIVERED! Commercial operations in space!

Mary

The doctor who was jailed, was according to reports, offered an exit or help leaving the country, but he chose to stay, thinking that he would be thanked by Pakistan.. Boy was he wrong!!

Ej Hans

Why wasn’t that Pakistani doctor given a US visa??

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Y6CO5C2HE4WM2OYGCDVWGPRXXM oldman

On the Pakistani doctor – the Pakistani government knows the US is not going to make a stink over a single individual.

Terry Tree Tree

$ 1 Million per year sentence, per year, is a small start.

nlpnt

“Choice” in schools inevitably leads to selection, where “good schools” get to choose their students and there are sink schools where kids’ of unconnected parents go.

Worried for the country(MA)

Tom, interesting that you played the one clip that Powell criticized Romney’s comment on Russia but did not play clip where Colin said he has known Mitt for many years and praised him.

Balance?

Still Here

Wrong place for that, Tom’s got a narrative to maintain.
- jefe68
  
  Just as you do.
  - Gregg
    
    So you admit it, sweet!
    - jefe68
      
      Everyone has an agenda Gregg.
      Some are more noble than others.
      Some are skewed in partisan garbage.

TFRX

Where’s this money going to come from for charter schools?

Romney’s speech smells like the “compassionate conservative” crap from 2000: The bloc of 20-30ish white women (mainly suburban and married and with kids) need to be told something, anything, that makes the Republican candidate seem less beholden to the right wing than he actually is. And the press couldn’t be bothered to check it.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Y6CO5C2HE4WM2OYGCDVWGPRXXM oldman

Republican spending doesn’t require justification or funding – the defense bill the House just passed had $8 billion more that they had originally agreed to – and no indication of where the money was going to come from.
- Ray in VT
  
  I think that they’re getting it by cutting Meals on Wheels, WIC and CHIP.
  - Edith
    
    No. It’s going to be paid for with the revenues from Iraqui oil.
    - Ray in VT
      
      Will there be any left after it pays for the war and reconstruction?
    - Don_B1
      
      Absolutely! That is the money pocket in Republican fantasyland from which all support for the 99% will come from eventually.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_Y6CO5C2HE4WM2OYGCDVWGPRXXM oldman

Romney’s speeches about what will happen as soon as he is elected are getting a bit annoying – and very unrealistic, unless he’s planning to become king or a dictator.

MrNutso

There’s always money to give to private/charter/religious schools, but never enough to fully support public schools.

Greyman

Public education as we know it in the US is barely a hundred years old, though, and the institution has been in need of perennial reform for at least half of its life. Even after all these years, our public schools still cannot reliably produce graduates who are literate and numerate. Hardly a system devoted to the efficient delivery of pedagogy or training, public education has had every kind of sociology-driven, sociology-laden policy (and numerous politics-driven, politics-laden protocols) heaped upon it decade-in decade-out, year-in year out. Public education is now so appealing to Americans that, depending on locality, only about 80% of students are graduating (as much as only 60% in many locales). Endless ongoing curriculum guideline debates and state textbook adoption sagas show plainly enough how political disputes and conflicts can only modestly improve or have arguably impaired the ability of public education to function. Although NPR/APM/PRI/CPB regularly warns its auditors of the sexual predations committed by Roman Catholic clergy (who help staff parochial schools, after all), we seldom–VERY seldom–hear of the many numerous cases of public school employee sexual predation of students (many states now have dozens and scores of such cases adjudicated every year) that break out with at least as robustly stunning a regularity (just as we never hear that public school teachers’ unions are doing one thing to address the subject or police themselves). Haven’t even gotten to local taxation and millage rates for school construction and all the political chicanery attending thereto. Sufficient grounds to call for the outright abolition of public education, not least because of its disservice to the poor we mouth our generous concern for.
Still Here

You’re kidding right, public schools do less with more; charters the opposite. Public schools are full of incompetent teachers there to collect paychecks and get free viagra.
- Don_B1
  
  Public schools in wealthy suburbs do just fine and graduate some of the most accomplished students in the world; it is in the poor sections of the inner cities that there are the worst problems:
  
  1) The burned out and poorest performing teachers get assigned there.
  
  2) Many of the students come from dysfunctional homes and miss a lot of classes.
  
  3) A big portion of the money for these poor neighborhood schools is spent on safety, nutrition and family counseling. These are not the primary mission of helping students learn but they ARE necessary for the students to have the desire to learn. Other countries provide these functions external to the schools, not as a subfunction of the school
  
  That does not mean that the Obama program to help schools is the best approach although it has some good attributes. See the MITUL Case Studies at:
  
  http://www.mooneyinstitute.org/resources
  
  particularly the Broad Acres Elementary – School Transformation Study.
  
  But this country has effectively given up on school desegregation and even when it was solely race desegregation it never really tried for economic desegregation. In the history of public education, begun in 1830 in Massachusetts, the only time and places the classroom was truly desegregated was in small communities where ALL the students in the whole town went to the same school and each student had at least one class with every other student.
  
  Unfortunately too many middle class parents have assumed that when students from poorer neighborhoods are in classes with their child, their child will suffer when more resources are devoted to the “other” students. There is virtually no data to support this and students who go to this type of school have a much better ability to relate to people of different backgrounds which benefits them and society in general for the rest of their lives.
Zing

Public schools broke the social contract to produce graduates who would build the country…now they must pay until they prove otherwise.

Markus

I’m always amazed that democrats are not rabidly in favor of greater choice for parents in where their kids go to school. If you can’t get rid of bad teachers from public schools, and you can’t. At least give parents the option of not having to send their kids there.

I applaud Romney for taking this on. Would love to see Obama do the same, though I don’t think he can afford to offend any union.

brettearle

I’m a Democrat–but I think you’re right.

So does Robert Reich.
http://www.facebook.com/people/Tim-Brown/1227104716 Tim Brown

Totally agreed on the basic level. There is still the basic issue that private k-12 capacity is not nearly high enough to solve this problem for the vast majority of children, so there needs to be more done than just tying funding the students rather than school systems.

Also, looking for a pragmatic standpoint, a number of states have done things very similar to what he is proposing and it hasn’t made major changes in educational outcomes, where as MA, a state very much oriented towards public funding, takes the cake for #1 in education. There’s a ton of demographic issues and economic issues behind how states do on education, so I don’t mean to draw a conclusion from that example except that privatizing more has not proven to be a magic bullet and we need more solutions than just that. Philly is privatizing on an epic scale and it will be interesting to see what happens there. I know one critique is that mass privatization always happens in failing systems (makes sense to do it there) and so in a way we are experimenting on our poorest and generally black and brownest students without the data in hand. At the same time the current situation is untenable. I wish he would take on the massive resegragation trends in public schools as well though because there is good research on that front.
Terry Tree Tree

MANY Charter Schools have FAILED, or been exposed as scams!�
What kind of answer is that, when they close down the public school?
- Still Here
  
  Name ten, you’re full of it.
- Zing
  
  7:04 PM…still waiting

Scott B, Jamestown NY

Romney’s plan for any student to go to any school is going to cost how much to taxpayers? Transportation costs alone are going to cost billions. Is School X going to send a bus to get one kid out in East BFE? Or will they accept the student but make the parents pay; or make them find a way to get their kid to school, and the costs incurred to the parents from that?

NPR’s done several stories on how charter schools are supposed to
accept handicapped students and those students are being scared away, if
not flat out denied admission.

Schools certainly aren’t going to all charge the same price – and those that run the most desirable schools are going to be savy enough to jack up prices to wring more money out of parents and the government, and will simultaneously keep the “undesirables” (read – poor and handicapped) out of their class rooms.

Romney’s on video telling a future college student to find a school on a budget because government shouldn’t help him. Isn’t this idea of his hypocrisy, then? Moreover, this idea of his would make schools a business, and would now fall under his ideas of free-market competition, and free of government intrusion. Romney supporters might as well vote for Ron Paul, who’s idea is to let those that are able to afford education pay for it.

Terry Tree Tree

Romney, the guy his own Republican opponents kept showing flip-flops of, a HYPOCRITE?
- Zing
  
  HA!
Tina

Thanks, Scott, for your excellent analysis! Now, I don’t mean this against you, at all!, but, really, it takes about 2 seconds of thinking by any thoughtful person to realize the points that you make, yet Romney comes out with this scheme (it HAS been suggested before, wholly or in parts, by others; but he just put it out there on the platform, kaplunk!). HOW can Romney just come out with these hair-brained ideas and get away with them….THE ANSWER to that question is at the heart of the what will prove to be the problem area of this (and future) elections! What people are willing to buy into without proper analysis or understanding is truly frightening. This matter isn’t even about complicated mathematical issues and schemes (like credit default swaps); yet there are major complications to his simplistic proposal and he just ACTS AS IF there are not! Appalling! Insulting! He patronizes us as if we are all idiots!
- Zing
  
  You love a kook..there goes YOUR cred
- Don_B1
  
  Right on! I liked the analysis I heard this afternoon: this is Romney’s attempt to sound softer after his outrageous comments during the “clown-fest” that characterized the Republican primary debates. He has no intention of providing enough funds to make those vouchers work for the poor; they are a “dog whistle” to the (“white”) upper middle class and up who would use them to supplement their spending for elite private schools like Romney attended.
Zing

You’re still a partisan kook and have NO cred.

Jamestown…been there and couldn’t wait to leave.
- Don_B1
  
  Beyond an ad hominem attack, what has your comment contributed?

feettothefire

What the Hell is wrong with us? Will we never stop letting two-bit half-assed nations set our foreign policy for us? Why is it so hard for the country that successfully stared down the Soviet Union to free itself of it’s ridiculous preoccupation with banana republics, corrupt dictatorships, and stone age societies? Afghanistan??? Pakistan??? Iraq??? In the eighties it was El Salvador and Nicaragua. Let me repeat that. EL SALVADOR and NICARAGUA, for God’s sake. Seriously? Of course, we had Viet Nam in the sixties and early seventies. The grandaddy of them all. That was sure a close call. God only knows how we’d deal with a real threatening power these days.

Alan in NH

Dear Feet: I think you forgot to mention Granada…that was a biggie.
- feettothefire
  
  I also forgot Panama. Shame on me.
  - feettothefire
    
    I must be losing my game. How could I have forgotten Chile, Argentina, and Cuba?
    - Gregg
      
      I know you are an absolutist, are you a pacifist who believes war is never warranted?
    - feettothefire
      
      Not at all. But I believe the ease with which we allow ourselves to be frightened by the dubious threat presented by backwater entities like the ones I’ve named is pathetic. It is possible to learn from history, despite the fact we keep refusing to do so. On the day the Cuban government was overthrown and Communism took over, Castro became existential threat #1. We had the Bay of Pigs fiasco. Successive administrations plotted his assassination. Embargoes have been in place for decades. Here we are, more than a half century later. What’s been the upshot? How has anything about Cuba or Fidel Casto’s rule had any effect on anything? I’ll save you the effort. It hasn’t. Nada. Bupkus. Zip. Zilch. The same applies to Central America. The Reagan administrations obsession with some imaginary danger presented by Nicaragua and El Salvador highjacked the headlines for several years in the mid-eighties. How did that end? Once again, a big do-nut. All that fretting and hand wringing over a threat that didn’t exist. Viet Nam is now a trading partner and a popular travel destination, despite it’s dreaded Communism. It’s as if we can’t consider ourselves complete unless we’re afraid of someone, and it’s always some pipsqueak nation as threatening as Iceland.
    - Don_B1
      
      It comes down to the fact that Republicans can get votes from ill-informed Americans who can feel threatened and thus vote for them. If fewer people would let their initial emotional response dominate their decision process, the country could be a lot better off.
brettearle

I assume you’re being half-facetious?

After all, this country was founded on paranoia and fear-mongering:

Puritans and religious persecution, No?

This anxiety is endemic in our culture–and has been for centuries.

There will ALWAYS be a political bogeyman.

McCarthy is to Communism,
As Demint is to Islamic Fundamentlaism.

Why should VietNam or Reagan’s Central American secret wars surprise you?

[Or maybe these actions don't surprise you; you simply believe that we need to adopt a new way of thinking. Only way that's going to happen is if there's a political revolution. As the New York Times wrote recently, Obama's one of the most hawkish Chiefs in recent memory.]

It’s par for the course of any super power/empire.

I’m not a Chomskyite, per se, but on these matters I am more a Chomskyite than a Cheneyian.
- feettothefire
  
  No facetiousness intended. Nor am I surprised by any of this foolishness. What will forever puzzle me, is our unending need to continue down this road. I can think of no instance in which any of these “preoccupations” wound up serving us well or advancing any tangible cause. But we keep doing it. Who’s next, Abu Dhabi ?
  - brettearle
    
    You strike me as being uncommonly thoughtful and well-informed.
    
    The only thing I don’t understand is why you think it’s going to stop.
    
    Super Powers and Empires act like the United States does.
    
    But it doesn’t mean that everything the US does is wrong or immoral.
    
    I’m sure you agree with that, nest-ce pas?
    - feettothefire
      
      I don’t think it’s going to stop. In fact, I know it’s not. That’s what’s so sad. We pretend we’re tough guys while worrying about El Salvador. There’s a disconnect there. And I think very little of what the U.S. does is wrong or immoral. Just the stuff that is.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Several of us feel the same way?
Zing

We’re afraid to melt ‘em. It’s simple as that.
- feettothefire
  
  My, aren’t you a fucking genius.

You_Can_Keep_The_Change

Under Obama:

Worst 30 months of employment in past 25 years

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/under-obama-30-worst-months-employment-past-25-years_645771.html

That explains why President Obama lost 40% of the WV democratic primary vote to a convicted felon sitting in jail.

AC

o for god’s sake, you are one note annoying.
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  Fine, then go back to your soap opera.
  - AC
    
    what is this? 1990? they don’t make soap opera’s anymore, i don’t think.
    i’m not Pres. obama’s number 1 fan but your constant, non-stop righteousness may make me one out of spite!
    too much is too much, you’re crossing the line into fanaticism-which makes anything you say totally useless, that can’t be your goal is it?
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      You’re obviously incapable of having an intelligent conversation in regards to politics or current events.
      
      I suggest you stick to neutral, non-threatening topics and web-sites were you can converse with other people without having an emotional breakdown.
    - AC
      
      i try not to respond to passive-aggressive criticism, plus i know myself, but thank you for the suggestion.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      Duly noted.
      
      I apologize for the soap opera comment as well,
      
      and I promise not to make anymore references to WV democratic primary.
      
      Shalom.
    - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
      
      Glass House – Stones
      
      I would avoid them if I were you.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      Likewise.
TFRX

More jobs created under Obama, much under a recession, in three years than “Businessman Shrub(TM)” did in eight, with five years of expansion.

Your media consumption habits are revealing.
Ray in VT

Like my teacher in high school said, there are lies, there are damned lies, and there are statistics. It’s true enough as an aggregate number, but is it a surprise that a conservative publication, or Obama bashers conveniently forget, or choose to ignore, that the economy started to hemorrhage jobs under a Republican President. I guess that we should fault the President for not waving a magic wand and instantly fixing it, like Romney or Paul would do.

A far more revealing and honest look:

http://www.commonsensedemocracy.com/2012/01/03/president/jobs-creation-under-the-obama-administration/
- Ray in VT
  
  I also realize that these are job creation numbers versus % of the pop working. We also have an aging population and the “problem” that technology and productivity eliminated the need for many jobs.
  - Gregg
    
    With all due respect Ray, there are always mitigating factors. You’re making excuses.
- Gregg
  
  I don’t think anyone expected President Obama to instantly fix the economy. No one but the ideologues believed him when he said his “stimulus” bill would keep unemployment under 8%. We even gave him a pass for inventing the new category of “jobs saved” and lumping it into “jobs created” without distinction. During the campaign the mantra was “the worst economy since the great depression” but at the time it was not at all true. So it’s odd seeing him now say it was worse than he realized when he said it was worse than it was. Cool, we’ll let that slide too. No one reports on the labor participation rate or the U6 unemployment but they tell a far more accurate picture. Fine.
  
  But he made things so much worse in so many ways. That’s my beef.
  - Ray in VT
    
    And I don’t care for how some things have gone, but I think that a McCain/Palin administration would have been far worse. Dislike the current administration if you like, and I know that you will and on some points I think that your criticisms are valid, but if our alternatives were likely to be some sort of austerity-like deal, with massive spending reductions that would likely have hurt the poorest most, mixed with tax cuts, then I think that we’d still be a total wreck. One can’t say for sure, of course.
    
    How has the President made things so much worse? Debt? I don’t like the debt or the deficits, but what’s the alternative. If we’re going to cut the budget down without raising revenues, then that is going to hurt a lot of people a lot, and let’s be real, it would be political suicide, so it probably wouldn’t make it out of Congress.
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      He could have pushed for Simpson-Bowles.
      
      He could have had a budget –instead of continuing resolutions that lock in wasteful spending levels.
      
      He could have cut wasteful spending and directed other spending into truly ‘stimulative’ endeavors. Remember the ‘shovel ready’ promise?
      
      Even Ryan’s budget is not austerity. Ryan’s budget calls for 3% spending increases and Obama’s calls for 4.5%.
      
      There is too much politics and not enough competence.
    - Don_B1
      
      Yes, he “could” have; IF he had an opposition party that was willing to genuinely work on the problem instead of playing Lucy holding the ball for Charlie Brown to kick.
      
      Note that Paul Ryan did NOT vote for Simpson-Bowles. The Republicans were just going to move the goal posts as they did on “sequestration” last week: they took the amount required to be cut from the Defense Department and moved it to cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, etc.
      
      The Republicans WERE NOT SERIOUS!!
    - Gregg
      
      When it was pointed out to Obama that Capital Gains tax cuts have always brought in more revenue he did not dispute that fact and said it was a matter of fairness. He recently said his job was to make sure everyone gets a fair shot. That is not the Presidents job.
      
      I believe a ton of jobs would have been saved if on day he announce he would extend the tax cuts. Instead he waited until the last second to do what he was always going to do. Businesses did not know what their tax liability would be literally 3 weeks before the fiscal year began. It was 2 years too late. That does not encourage expansion and hiring, it kills it.
      
      TARP was enough to settle things down, the “stimulus” was money down a rat hole. I just don’t but the “it could have been worse” theory…. at all.
      
      New regulations under Obama cost business $46 billion a year.
      
      The war on oil has cost us dearly, he inherited gas prices at $1.62/gal.
      
      Obamacare is a disaster for business and will likely be struck down by the Supreme Court. That’s the elephant in the room.
    - Ray in VT
      
      Gotta run for the weekend, so I can’t fully respond, but the one thing that I will cherry pick is the oil price. Gas was low, due to a historic crash in prices. Prices are lower now than a year ago by a bit, and probably about the same as before the collapse. Will you also credit him with doubling the stock market? My retirement account has done fabulously better under Obama than it did under Bush. Have a good one.
    - Don_B1
      
      That was ONLY because he wanted to emphasize FAIRNESS. It is true that cutting Capital Gains taxes have increased revenue for a year or so, but the longer view shows that revenues then decline, and the total revenue is decreased. The initial increase is because people who have held stocks accumulating a lot of gain sell them immediately instead of over a longer period at a higher tax rate.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    Cheney said Deficits don’t matter?
    SO MUCH else!
    - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
      
      Indeed. And did not dear old Dickey tell us that Iraqui oil would pay for the war?? More lies from those criminal Republicans.
    - feettothefire
      
      Let’s not forget his claim that the Iraq insurgency was in it’s “last throes” in the summer of 2005. Did this guy get anything right? And to think, he was Bush’s boss. How frightening.
    - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
      
      Yes, and were were going to be greeted as liberators too. What Republican LIES!
    - Don_B1
      
      Actually it was Paul Wolfowitz in testimony (with Donald Rumsfeld) at a Senate Appropriations Hearing on paying for the Iraq “reconstruction.” But Cheney obviously agreed.
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      Terry you are correct and he was dead wrong but he did come out for gay marriage 3 years BEFORE Obama.
    - Zero
      
      Cheney coming out for gay marriage made every liberal roll their eyes. It is so typical of conservatives to find compassion when something happens directly to them.
    - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
      
      On this we agree!
    - TFRX
      
      There are limits to that. Say, abortions.
      
      A little issue that nobody needs to know about, like terminating an unwanted pregnancy, and all that ballsy individual liberty stuff which doesn’t need to be spoken of in public goes out the window.
      
      Because their daughter can always spend a “semester abroad”, while the rest of American women get to run the gauntlet of “Christian pharmacology” in Missltucky.
    - notafeminista
      
      No individual liberties for all the aborted fetuses.
    - TFRX
      
      And forcing a woman to carry a dead fetus to term at the risk of her own health is so libertarian.
      
      Quit while you’re behind.
    - Zero
      
      No doubt.
    - Gregg
      
      Republicans give far more to charity than Democrats by every study. That’s compassion.
    - Zero
      
      BS
    - Gregg
      
      http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/21/opinion/21kristof.html?_r=3
    - Zero
      
      But perhaps a better term is needed instead of compassion like cognitive empathy.
      
      For example, I defy you to show me that there is equal opportunity in this country. Yet, a bunch of rich boy republicans tell people of less fortunate birth to “work harder,” as if everybody endures the same hardships. So instead of working for equal opportunity, republicans make the problem worse and go on assuming all are equal.
      
      All republicans should cognitively empathize with people in lower socioeconomic position. Then again, there are republicans in those low socioeconomic positions who flat out vote against there economic interests.
    - Gregg
      
      If you are poor and don’t like it then make yourself rich.
    - jefe68
      
      Donating to the NRA is not what one thinks of as compassion.
    - Gregg
      
      1) Democrats donate to the NRA bigtime.
      
      2) The NRA is not a charity.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      His choice: Disown his own daughter, that came out as lesbian, or stick to the ‘compassionate’,'conservative’, schtik of Republicans.
      Worked so well for Larry Craig, too!
    - Gregg
      
      They don’t matter much when spending is well below 20% of GDP. If you make $250K and by a million dollar home, mortgaged for 25 years then you have a deficit that doesn’t matter much. If you do the same but make only 35K it matter’s a lot. It’s a nuance thing, you wouldn’t understand.
  - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
    
    If you expected miracles from Obama, pray to your non-existent god for them. In the real world it takes hard work and years to UNDO THE DAMAGE CAUSED BY THE CRIMINAL GEORGE BUSH AND HIS CONTROLLERS ON WALL STREET.
  - Don_B1
    
    Obama has outperformed the GWB administration by more than DOUBLE, anyway you want to slice it. (I’m sure you are smart enough to find a way, but it will be more twisted than the biggest gerrymander and no one will accept it as a valid comparison.) See:
    
    http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/18/presidential-job-records/
    
    Your claim is hogwash. Sure the economy is still below its peak employment in 2007-8, but is above the employment level when Obama took office. And when you exclude the first years of their terms, Obama has double the employment gain in 2.5 years over GWB in 7 years.
    - Gregg
      
      True, Obama’s unemployment rate is double what Bush’s was.
      
      Pop quiz: What’s more impressive finding a needle in a haystack or finding 100 in a needle factory?�
      Unemployment was below 5% for most of Bush’s 2 terms.
Pointpanic

If Obama must take any blame for that ,it is only because of his ties to Wall St. which crashed the economy in the first place. it’s the big mltinationals who were laying off people despite record high profits.
http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

Another Republican AMNESIAC. Full of spin and lies.
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  Just because you claim something to be spin and lies, doesn’t make it so.
  - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
    
    Just as you rightists believe the Earth to be flat.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      You’ve really got stop believing everything they tell you in those A.C.O.R.N. meetings.
    - Zero
      
      And you should get off the Fox Box.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      When have I ever used a link from Fox?
    - Zero
      
      Your phraseology gives it away.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      It looks like you’re the expert on Fox News.
    - Zero
      
      I have a Master of Rhetoric. I’m currently an analyst for a corporation I rather not name. Most of what I do is study phraseology to see what sticks and how and why.
      
      For starters, read some media ecology theory. Phrases are just the surface of propaganda.
  - jefe68
    
    In your case it does.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      I applaud you for having the courage to put your I.Q. score next to your name.
Zero

You do realize that republicans blocked a jobs bill…?
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  Obama got his $800 billion dollar (stimulus) jobs bill through in 2009.
  
  Don’t you remember what a complete failure that was?
  
  The voters didn’t forget in the Fall of 2010 when the Democrats lost the House and several seats in the Senate.
  - TFRX
    
    Who to believe, you and your softsoap, or every mainstream non-beholden economist out there?
  - Zero
    
    GDP was contracting at 8% before the stimulus. Would you rather GDP continue to contract, eight banks and the auto industry fail? Do you have any idea what the economy would look like if that had happen?
    
    Do you know any of the economic numbers?
    
    Perhaps, you should do some research before having an opinion.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      Obama got his $800 billion dollar stimulus bill passed in 2009 and the economy still went in the toilet.
      
      The problem with you liberals, is that you believe that goverment has the solution for all of lifes problems,
      
      instead of letting the free market and American ingenuity help to lead this country to economic prosperity.
      
      If big goverment is the key to prosperity as you believe it is, then Cuba and North korea should have the highest standards of living in the world.
    - Zero
      
      You realize that your economic ideas are completely faith-based…?
      
      You also named examples of “big government.” But what about Germany, the Nordic Countries, South Korea, Japan, and perhaps even Brazil as economic models. All of those countries are to the left of America, and they are all capitalist countries (although Brazil seems to be moving to actual socialism).
      
      But seriously, Germany has free health care, free college, and a renewable energy initiative. What’s wrong with that? Why are you keeping us from being like Germany?
      
      And name one country that is implementing your economic and political vision!
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      You’re a socialist who believes in the re-distribution of wealth,
      
      just like your President in the White House.
    - Zero
      
      If you would actually read economic theories, every economic theory including supply side economics works for redistribution of wealth. In fact, one of the leading theorists of supply-side economics said a government would have to redistribute wealth through the individual tax code for the theory to work.
      
      Plus, I have never advocated for a straight out redistribution. I think Welfare is a must, unless you want to have a revolution. I don’t see what is wrong with taxation for a free college education and free health care. I don’t see how that is in any way wrongheaded, immoral, and economically impractical. In fact, you have no argument against it other than saying the word “socialism.” Which you use very loosely, and you really don’t know what socialism is, but that’s not a big deal because the word has been used in so many ways that its meaning has been evacuated.
      
      If you actually look a history, communist, totalitarian states have terrible social programs, high inequality, and no union rights. These are the very conditions that you are indifferent to, if not fight for. Totalitarian societies are anti-intellectual, anti-journalism, and use religion for political gain. Slap whatever tittle you want on it, but power is power. If you put your ideological vision before science, academics, and data, you will come to bad ends.
  - jefe68
    
    I’m going to start a drinking game based on every time you contradict yourself. I’ll be shit faced in about 6 or 7 comments.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      At least you’ll be in your true state of mind.

AC

now this is newsworthy:
http://news.sciencemag.org/sciencenow/2012/05/asian-brown-cloud-threatens-us.html

Gregg

We seem to be much more concerned about CO2 (breath) and cow flatulence.
- AC
  
  yes, there’s a whole study! i’m glad i wasn’t involved in that; collecting the data must have had some serious drawbacks!!

Pointpanic

I resent Diane Brady’s comment that “America loves it’s billioniares”
With such a sizeable minority of people sleeping in the streets of our major cities , tens of millions still unemployed, and others struggling to make ends meet, there are some serious class issues which are as taboo to speak of as are feces at a dinner party. THis hour largely spoke to the agenda of the 1%. Where were the voices of Robert Reich or ,say, John Bellamy Foster, editor of Monthly review ,to speak for the 99%? So much ofr “independent journalism” on “public” raido.

You_Can_Keep_The_Change

Afghanistan’s Karzai thanks Obama for ‘your taxpayers money’

http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/afghanistan-karzai-thanks-obama-taxpayers-money-182925141.html

I’m sure that the Taliban, who allowed Al-qaeda to train in Afganistan before 9-11, really appreciate money from the American taxpayers as well.

Terry Tree Tree

The $ BILLIONS that ‘disappeared’ in Afghanistan and Iraq, under ‘W’ admin?
Ray in VT

I’m sure that they do. Are you arguing, then, for a quicker withdrawal?
Zero

What’s with your icon? Do you think communism is on the rise? If so, can you name one politician who does not believe in private property?
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  This country is looking more and more like the old Soviet Union.
  
  It didn’t start with Obama, but under Obama, this country has taken a hard turn to the left.
  
  Obama believes in the re-distribution of wealth, large centralized goverment, plus his signing of the NDAA has turned America into a Gulag like police-state.
  
  One can’t forget that Obama launched his U.S. Senate campaign in the home of Bill Ayers, the self confessed marxist who bombed the Pentagon.
  - Zero
    
    You are nuts. Take an American history lesson. Eisenhower taxed the top 91%. What a commie that republican was….
    
    You obviously don’t know what communism is. And this one is really going to bend your mind into a pretzel: Marxism and Communism aren’t the same things (as you are implying).
    
    But perhaps you are correct because down the street there is a tent city where a bunch of rednecks live. They do some kind of labor. People whip them. I guess it’s the Gulags.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      Thanks to Obama’s terrible economy,
      
      more and more Americans are being forced to live in tents or out on the streets
      
      Under Obama: 30 worst months of employment in past 25 years
      
      http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/under-obama-30-worst-months-employment-past-25-years_645771.html
    - Zero
      
      But republicans blocked the jobs bill….
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      Correction,
      
      they blocked wasteful spending on the part of your President which was meant to funnel money to his financial contributors.
    - Zero
      
      So putting the construction industry back to work is politically insidious…?
      
      Helping teachers, fire-fighters, and police officers is politically insidious…?
      
      If only people like construction workers, teachers, police officers and any other average American controlled political financing…we might have a democracy.
      
      Second, the main reason why businesses hire and fire henge on demand. Demand is currently in the toilet. Laying off 600,000 public employees have only weakened demand more. The jobs bill would have rehired those people and even more, which would in turn add new demand to the private markets, which would in turn force employers to hire more employees to produce enough to cover demand.
      
      This is the simplest thing to understand, but republicans just don’t get it.
  - jefe68
    
    Oh boy, I’m shaking in my boots.
    I better go make sure I have enough canned goods and water stocked up in the bunker.
    
    Get a life.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      Record numbers of American citizens are renouncing their U.S. citizenship
      
      http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2131225/Record-number-American-citizens-renouncing-citizenship-avoid-paying-taxes.html

Gregg

I don’t hear the show until 7PM. Considering WBUR is in Boston, I was wondering if Elizabeth Warren and her plagiarism and lies about her heritage were brought up?

She was embarrassing here:

http://www.myfoxboston.com/video?autoStart=true&topVideoCatNo=default&clipId=7325295

It was on page 1 of the Boston Globe.

http://www.myfoxboston.com/video?autoStart=true&topVideoCatNo=default&clipId=7325295

Surely Tom brought her up.

Worried for the country(MA)

Not even smoke signal from Tom.
Worried for the country(MA)

Granny Warren has a primary opponent but she needs to get 15% in convention next month to be eligible for the primary ballot in September. We’ll see if the Dem power players block her from competing with Chief Warren in the primary.
- feettothefire
  
  Why do you refer to Warren as Granny?
  - Worried for the country(MA)
    
    Well, she is.
    
    Relevant — NO.
    
    OK, it is a bit over the top.
    
    Maybe I should have gone for one percenter since she is worth at least $15M.
    
    That is much more relevant.
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      Why? Because she claims to provide the ‘intellectual foundation” of the occupy movement.
    - feettothefire
      
      Nice try. “Over the top” was the better answer.
  - Gregg
    
    I don’t know, I see a resemblance.
    
    http://blogs.wickedlocal.com/somerville/2012/03/22/speakout-of-the-week-elizabeth-warren-granny-clampett/#axzz1vuNjgpUF
  - TFRX
    
    Someone told him to.
- J__o__h__n
  
  Mitt has grandchildren too. Is that going to be used to belittle him or is that just done to women candidates?
- Zero
  
  Granny Warren, Chief Warren…which one is it?
TFRX

She didn’t lie; she has some native American heritage, and she wasn’t the one to make a to-do about it.

It’s getting boring knocking down your crap. I say this because the internet is notoriously unable to transmit my non-verbal language cues.
- Worried for the country(MA)
  
  Why is she unwilling to submit to a DNA test? Her Harvard colleague, Skippy Gates, is more than willing to oblige.
  
  Her latest defense is her that “my mommy told me”.
  - http://chacal-la-chaise.tumblr.com/ chacal la chaise
    
    That’s condescending to both Gates and Warren. I’d say ‘lighten up’ but you’re already grasping to that already.
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      Condescending to Gates? Why? He is offering a valuable service. Maybe he will give her a discount.
      
      If you want to be serious for second, Elizabeth Warren’s character problems are completely self inflicted. The cover up is always worse than the crime. It may have all started with an innocent family lore error. The problem is now how she handled the situation.
      
      Also, consider this. IF she got her U Penn or Harvard job because of fraud in her minority status what about the ‘real’ minority whose place she took? It isn’t a victimless crime.
  - TFRX
    
    DNA test?
    
    Wow. I guess you unaffilliated, independent, centrist voters have a new Birther-riffic axe to grind.
    - Gregg
      
      Okay forget DNA, how about something… anything? Just one document.
    - TFRX
      
      This isn’t Fox Nation. NPR isn’t yet so piss-pants scared of being called liberal that that crap flies on its message boards.
    - Gregg
      
      Huh?
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Documentation of Native American blood, is difficult, because a LOT of it was NOT documented!�
      A LOT was left, packing for the Trail of Tears Death March?
      Proving you were part Native American was as popular as proving you were part African, until just recently. It was DANGEROUS to the Native American decendant!
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      Lighten up a bit. Apparently you haven’t seen Mr. Gates show on PBS.
- Gregg
  
  Lame.
mxlplx

It would be interesting to hear how her possible Native American heritage effects her suitability as a candidate according to you. Is it because she isn’t NA and lied about it? Is it because she is and used it for her advantage? Is it because she is and let Harvard use it to make the university appear more diverse?
- Gregg
  
  A combination: It’s because she isn’t (or can’t prove it) and used it to her advantage and willingly let Harvard use her as a pawn to put up false impressions. The plagiarism is a lie in itself. That’s on her and reflects, as all of the above does, on her integrity.
  
  Regarding her suitability for office, I hate that anybody judges her a wit by her heritage.
  - denis
    
    Gregg, sometimes you bring an interesting and intelligent counterpoint to the discussion… this is not one of those times!
    - Gregg
      
      I just call’um like I see’um, you don’t have to agree.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    YOU live in N. Carolina? NOT native, evidently! You’d have heard, or witnessed MANY obvious Native Americans, that did NOT have ‘documentation’, for MANY reasons?
    - Gregg
      
      Question marks after poorly cast statements make no sense to me. I try not to play grammar cop but I can’t make heads nor tails out of your comment.
J__o__h__n

A poll released yesterday indicated that 69% of voters don’t care about this non-issue.
- Gregg
  
  I saw that. IMHO integrity should matter but Ted Kennedy had that job for decades, it’s clear it doesn’t in Massachusetts. Sad.
- Zing
  
  Because Warren IS a non-issue, now and forever
Worried for the country(MA)

Ms. Warren dumped her BMW 528i for a Ford Hybrid just before she announced her run for senate.
- Pointpanic
  
  so what?
- Still Here
  
  Apparently she thinks MA voters care more about appearances than substance. She of little faith.
Pointpanic

what palgiarism or lies? This is a non-issue. UNlike Brown Ms Warren understands what democracy is.
- Gregg
  
  She plagiarized recipes for her “Pow Wow Chow” book. She reminds me of Ward Churchill except he’s a real Indian. Biden is a known Plagiarizer too.
  - Heaviest Cat
    
    Even if that’s true , ( and I don’t know why an intelligent women like her would bother to do that) that’s nothing compared to Scott brown representing himself as the “everyman” using his pick-up as a prop when he’s a favorite of many Wall St. Firms.
Still Here

No, Tom didn’t bring it up. No surprise there. Warren is a hack.

Mattyster

I just heard a panelist say that the private space flight today cost a fraction of a NASA flight. Remember that NASA did all the research and development that the private sector can now build upon.

Greyman

Remember, too, that NASA conducted its R&D with the explicit and extensive participation of the “private” aerospace and weapons industries over the decades, which helps show the velocity of the moving line we know as the “public/private divide”. An analysis of market performance in SpaceX’s success could reveal something about proportionality in mixed/hybrid economies (the broad western model of market economies linked with ambitious state/socio-political functions).
Pointpanic

Not to mention that despite having it’s budget cut, NASA is still funding (partially anyway) those “self strating innovators”at Space X.

Mrs. Thurston Howell IV

Greetings Fellow 1 Percenters (the rest of you 99% can just skip down to the next posting below, thanks),

I want to alert you to important tax changes just around the corner in 2013: If you are a U.S. citizen, resident or green card holder then you have to be aware of U.S. gift and estate tax laws. If you are thinking of helping your children financially and you prefer a gift, you could be subject to U.S. gift taxes UNLESS the gift is below the annual gift tax exclusion (currently $13,000 per year per beneficiary) OR you utilize all or part of your lifetime gift tax exemption which is $5.12 million in 2012, but here is the scary part: due to drop to only $1 million in 2013!

Quick, Tagg, Matt, Joshua, Ben, Craig, Sasha and Malia, have a chat with your parents and your preferred tax professional before it’s too late. Just think of it as our way of “spreading the wealth around”.

And the rest of us should call our preferred lobbyist to beg Congress: please, do not slash our gift tax exemptions in such a drastic and unfeeling way.

Mrs. Thurston Howell IV

I forgot to give a special shout out of support to our good friend, Susan Gore of Delaware and Wyoming. As you all know, she recently suffered the tragedy of losing her court case to legally adopt her ex-husband Jan Otto as a means to increase her family’s share of the Gore-Tex fortune. Sadly, the entire extended family has been battling for years over how to divide their stake in the $3-billion privately held company. Susan Gore and Jan Otto were blessed with three lovely children during their marriage, however Susan’s four siblings each had four children of their own; thereby introducing an uncomfortable situation where Susan’s children stood to inherit a smaller portion of the available shares than their cousins. The obvious and fair solution was for Susan to go to a Wyoming court and secretly adopt Jan Otto when he was 65 years, for the good of the children. Unfortunately again for these Baudelere waifs- in-training, their father/brother had a change of heart a year later and decided to keep the potential distribution from the trust for himself. Never mind, the Delaware Supreme Court ruled that this unusual adoption did not entitle anyone in Susan’s family to inherit an increased portion of the Gore-Tex fortune.

Sorry for your loss, Susan. We will have you in our thoughts and prayers…

(Thank you to the Reuters news service for sharing this information with us.)
- Ping1
  
  whatthe?
  - Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
    
    (Sorry to cause any confusion with my postings. It is just to point out that the rich are very different from you and me,…well, from you, anyway…as my cousin, five times removed, F. Scott Fitzgerald once wrote. Everything I posted today is something that I found in mainstream media, and it is just to illustrate that these are the normal everyday concerns of the 1%: How and where can I shelter my dividends when I don’t actually do anything to earn that income; the gift tax that is under threat of being cut from $5-million to a pedestrian $1-million; billionaires feeling forced to try to grab their fair share of the inheritance by scheming to adopt geriatric “children”; . I could go on and on…)
- Gregg
  
  So, would that make Lovie your mother-in-law?
  - Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
    
    Ah, yes, the late, great Natalie Schafer…I still miss her to this very day…(By the way Gregg, (I’m coming out of character here) have you heard the sad news about Doc Watson? Now there is a great musician and gentleman.)
    - Gregg
      
      No, I hadn’t heard. Thanks for the news. When I first read your comment I thought he had died but evidently he is responsive after surgery. He lives close to me and a good friend has a flea market in Deep Gap. Doc used to come in several times a year to visit his old friend Denver who was a vendor. Denver passed on 7 or 8 years ago. As great a picker as he is, his voice is just incredible up close. The last I saw him he was pretty feeble physically but when he talked… wow. It was hard to imagine that voice coming out of that frame. He’s 89, recovery will be hard. Thanks again.
    - Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
      
      That is good news to hear, indeed. I only caught a quick report on the radio that he had had a fall, and his condition at the time was characterized as critical. We got a chance to hear him in person at a small roadhouse in Pennsylvania about 20 years ago. Love his music.
    - Gregg
      
      I just got off the phone with my friend in Deep Gap. Doc’s daughter Nancy was in the flea market this morning but there is no new news. He’s responsive but still in critical condition. Evidently he has been very depressed lately. His wife Rosa has been in a rest home for a couple of months now and his spirit is low. Growing old is a bitch.
    - Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
      
      Thank you for that insight. Doc Watson is a national treasure.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      But the alternative to growing old, is early death. THAT’S no longer possible for me, and I ENJOY my grandchildren, and other children WAY too much!
- Zing
  
  You are the lamest of the lame
  - Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
    
    Relax, Zing, and pass me that pitcher of dry martinis…

Ray in VT

I’m headed out for the weekend. Enjoy it if you can or have the time. Thank a vet, hug your kids and have a burger or hot dog for me.

Gregg

Have a good’un Ray.

Dee

Tom, I disappointed with the responses of your guests to the�
various events of the week…..Let’s take them one by one.

How can Diane Brady not agree with you on Romney’s remedy
for the economy as more of the same reckless policies of the Bush era–the deregulation of the markets, and the giving tax cuts and incentives to the richest Americans while the other 99% percent went without? Even Alan Greenspan admitted he was wrong trusting in the markets following the crash 2008 (see Frontline, The Warning ) http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/warning/view/

And as Paul Krugman (NYT) wrote this week in his column ,�
the JP Morgan losses of between 2-4 billion dollars (when all
is said & done )was the Deja Vu Debacle, once again…
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/21/opinion/dimons-deja-vu-debacle.html

Still, even to take this one step further surely Diane Brady is aware of the more recent outlandish claims by Romney & Eric Cantor on the stimulus & debt. Read columnist Donna Brazile on this http://www.uexpress.com/printable/print.html?uc_full_date=20120517&uc_comic=brzNext ,the comment by Christopher Dickey on Al Qauda and the US drone attacks into Yemen….I always thought a jour-nalist role was to afflict the comfortable and comfort the afflicted…Thus when I heard him ponder the effect of the drone attacks into Yemen and Obama lack of options to seek out Al Qauda in that country, I wondered what plan-et he resided on. In 2006 , the American electorate said “enough ” to the blood bath the Bush Camp waged illegally against Al Quade in Iraq and WMDs. Today, nearly 6 yrs later people are going out of their mind with this endless war and violence and bankruptcy waged intheir American name…So just when is Christopher Dickey going to get it and advocate to stopping this madness of chasing a group of bandits who are no more capable of wag-ing a war against a state like the US? Perhaps he should have read a long time ago a place for 9/11 in American History and stopped supporting this unGodly war crime http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/28/opinion/28ellis.htmlOr as Ron Paul suggested he should laid the blame on US policies in the Middle East -supporting dictators like Mubarak in Egypt and others in Arab states who suppress their peoples’ over American aid. (And let’s not forget the land thieves & war mongers in Israel whom it seems will do anything to avoid doing what is lawful and just and withdraw to the 1967 border as is mandated in the UN, Security Council ,Resolution 242…..http://67.23.4.161/fpmatters/201008160003 And lastly, there was Jack Beatty’s comment on the Doctor who turned in BIn Laden’s to the US authorities instead of Pakistan’s authorities….This was wrong–and while I agree with Jack that this will harm the credibility of the vaccinat-ion program–his responsiblity first was to acknowledge thiswrongful act. No state would have accepted this…Plus, it was “cold blooded murder of an old man” who could havebeen taken into custody as Pakistani officials pointed outin a BBC World service broadcast….Dee

Dee

addendum: URLs corrections

Donna Brazile, Tell the truth about the recession and debt http://www.uexpress.com/printable/print.html?uc_full_date=20120517&uc_comic=brz

Christopher Dickey, Finding a place for 9/11 in American Hx.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/28/opinion/28ellis.html

Neocon, not mullahs who would blow up the Middle East http://67.23.4.161/fpmatters/201008160003

Still Here

Donna Brazile, you’re joking right.
The NYT, more lefty propaganda.
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  The same NYT that’s facing bankruptcy.
  - Zero
    
    How does “facing bankruptcy” reveal whether NYT has poor empirical methods or not?

Gregg

Maybe my liberal friends can agree with Penn Jillette’s Obama rant. Profanity warning:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wWWOJGYZYpk

Zero

Yeah. I can site a lot of videos where it is obvious Obama backs certain policy to avoid conservative criticisms.

One of the biggest criticisms on the left is that Obama backs certain policy so conservatives would not criticize him. It seems he is now waking up to the fact that no matter what he does conservatives are going to criticize him.
- Still Here
  
  Please, Obama’s been asleep for three years; nothing will wake him up to the disaster his presidency is.
  - Zing
    
    Squatter in the White House…thought I’d die laughing…
  - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
    
    A delusional amnesiac.
    - Gregg
      
      Bravo!
  - Zero
    
    Go to the CBO and look up the leading drivers of the deficits. Look who is trying to remedy them, and then look who is trying to keep them in place. The result may surprise you.
- Gregg
  
  The point wasn’t about the stupid policy, it was about the dichotomy between his policy and his rhetoric. He tries to have it both ways and make a joke about something that’s not funny. Sorry you missed it.
  - Zero
    
    I see the disconnect. Do you want me to start citing liberal media criticizing Obama for saying one thing, and then doing things for conservatives so they won’t criticize him.
    
    This has been the most infuriating thing about Obama: he actually does conservative crap.
    - Gregg
      
      You’ve brought this up more than once now. Do you really think he gives a wit about trying to please Republicans?
    - Zero
      
      At one time, he certainly did.
      
      Go watch the Young Turks on youtube. They are some of the toughest critics of Obama, and the criticism actually has substance. But they come from the left. They constantly show Obama stating a progressive position before he was president and then adopting the conservative position. He has caved to stupid republican position so many times, and that video you stumbled upon is one of many.
      
      I know you republicans think that Obama is our “Messiah,” but you should actually look for criticism of Obama from the left. The main guy from the Young Turks is Cenk Uger. He was briefly on MSNBC. He criticized Obama a lot on the show. The higher-ups told him to stop, but he continued and they took his show away. MSNBC offered him a role of floating around from show to show, but he turned it down.
      
      Go watch the stuff. At the very least, it will make you rethink the Fox News propaganda that he’s some puppy-eating autocrat.
    - Gregg
      
      Please, enough with the Fox monster. You have no idea. I am quite familiar with Uygur. I don’t know what specifics you are referring to but I can tell you many of the things Obama said he would do, he either never intended to do or the ideas were too stupid to do. These include: Not extending the tax cuts, accelerating the Iraq withdrawal, ending indefinite detention, trying KSM in NYC, no lobbyist, no signing statements, putting new legislation inline 5 days before a vote, getting Congressional approval before going to war and closing Gitmo. Most of us knew all of this from the beginning, before he was immaculated.
      
      “Don’t deal in things that aren’t real. Don’t get yourself worked up about something that isn’t gonna happen. We got real things to get worked up about here. But closing Gitmo isn’t gonna happen. It is not gonna happen. It is not going to happen. They’re not gonna close Gitmo.” -Rush Limbaugh Jan. 16, 2009
    - Zero
      
      All of that stuff you listed about Obama not doing…it should have been done, except that there is a republican will keeping us from doing the right thing.
      
      As for Gitmo, the inhumane conditions are no longer a problem. The prison has been restructured physically and legally. In essence, it has transformed into the standards of the American penal system.
      
      I know we are splitting hairs here, but this is the stuff that should happen. Iraq and Afghanistan Operations was draining the budget, second to only the Bush Tax Cuts (as the CBO says), and Obama broke the promises of eliminating tax cuts for the rich that didn’t work, and getting out of Iraq faster than the official withdrawal date because of whom?
      
      He’s not a dictator. He says the right things, and I wish he would fight harder for his policies, but ultimately he needs more political capital to do the right things.
- JonS
  
  What Greg says is one of my biggest issues with Obama. Comparing what he says and how he actually governs is simply mind boggling. He is either the most cynical president ever or delusional. My guess is he gets away with this because the mainstream media only plays his sound bites and never critiques his actions. And with such an uninformed or ill-informed electorate that is too narrow in their world view to look beyond the idiocy of MSNBC, the laughable NYT editorial pages, or the joke columns of EJ Dionne or On Point’s favorite “economist” Paul Krugman, he might pull it off.
Brett

Oh, yeah, a second-rate magician/third-rate comedian making political commentary…that’s always fun; Penn Jilette is the Bill Mahr of magic kingdom…he’s about as insightful (and intelligent) as the Amazing Randy! I’d say Romney might know a few card tricks, but I don’t think Mormons are supposed to be into such activities; dancing and card tricks are verboten!
- Gregg
  
  So his point is bogus?

Antony

There is a difference between getting rich by creating value (e.g. Silicon Valley innovations increasing business efficiency) and getting rich by shuffling assets (e.g. Financial Services).

Still Here

Not if the assets are shuffled to you and your more productive endeavor.
- Zero
  
  Yeah, that’s what’s happening….
Zing

Whoa! Dude…you are so perceptive!
http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

Yes, the former is honest work, the latter is criminal smoke and mirrors and should be a felony with Romney as the poster child behind bars.

You_Can_Keep_The_Change

1996 ad: Obama event sponsored by socialist group

http://www.wnd.com/2012/05/ad-shows-obama-event-sponsored-by-socialist-group/

It’s easy to see why Obama is so secretive about his past, especially when you take into account that all of his school, medical, and visa records are sealed.

Alan in NH

I know you are particularly down on Obama, but I’m not clear what tack you’re taking from post to post. This time it’s linking Obama to socialists (by the way, is that like being a spreader of Bubonic plague?) and in another post you’ll talk about how he’s a captive of Goldman Sachs or such. Seems like the two would have a hard time co-existing.
- feettothefire
  
  Now, Now. Let’s not confuse the poor soul.
  - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
    
    I would agree that you’re confused.
    - feettothefire
      
      Address the question, jackass. Is he a Goldman Sachs, Wall Street darling or a socialist? He can’t be both, despite your idiotic claims that he is.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      ‘Jackass’?
      
      That’s a great description of you and your incoherent rants.
    - feettothefire
      
      Okay. I’m a jackass. That’s fine. Now will you answer the question? Of course you won’t, you foolish coward.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      ‘foolish coward’?
      
      another apt description of you.
    - feettothefire
      
      Still no answer, I see. Oh, well. Case closed.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      Shalom.
- jefe68
  
  Interesting, is it not. It’s all about mud slinging.
  These right wingers keep on throwing everything and the kitchen sink and when you call them on it they cry like little babies. Calling it unfair, that you’re name calling. While all the while their act is as nasty as a privy in the noon day sun.
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  Under Obama:
  
  30 worst months of employment in 25 years
  
  http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/under-obama-30-worst-months-employment-past-25-years_645771.html
  
  In the light of such facts, comparing Obama’s economic policies to the Bubonic plague, is an accurate analogy on your part.
Terry Tree Tree

This Chinese Communist is WHICH one of the banned commenters of the right-wing? Familiar, but I can’t place the former screen name. I believe they used a lot of profane language before. I remind people that this forum is open for children to look at.
Ex-Navy, and construction worker, so the limited, unimaginative language doesn’t affect me, per se.
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  Don’t fault me because you’re incapable of handling the truth?
  
  Why won’t your President make his sealed school, medical, and visa records available to the public?
  
  Every other American President has made their records available to the public.
  
  One can only conclude that Obama has something in regards to his past that he’s trying to conceal.
  - Camk2
    
    I suppose that the records are somewhere next to Baby Bush’s service records, Cheney’s energy meeting records, Laura Bush’s killing of a pedestrian record, and all of the secret war records from the Reagan/Daddy Bush era when they negotiated with Iranian terrorists to sell them missiles and sensitive data while supplying Saddam Hussein with weapons to fight the Iranians to pressure them to buy our missiles to defend themselves from the Iranians, next to the weapons of mass destruction that led to the death of thousands of American and Iraqis, next to the secret negotiations between Hank Paulson and the banks that led to Tarp and trillions in bailout loans.
    
    Does that give you any clue to where you might find those records. Oh wait a minute – we have already had the records released so we’re probably just hearing your paranoid rants at this point. Get a life Dude!
    - Gregg
      
      Bush certainly did release his military records. Laura Bush did release the accident report. What are you talking about?
    - Camk2
      
      You mean the doctored, incomplete reports with all the attendant gaps? I certainly don’t know if I agree with the controversy about the Bush records but I can tell you that the left never hounded Bush to the same extent that Obama has been (or Clinton for that matter). The right has a big bucket of conspiracies that they keep digging into but there is one important distinction between how the left pursues their conspiracies and how the right pursues theirs – the right takes their conspiracy theories right into the halls of governance while the left leaves them on the fringes. Arizona and a number of other jurisdictions have actually passed legislation to pursue this birther nonsense to it’s most extreme conclusion including excluding Obama from the presidential ballot this Fall. Name one conspiracy theory against Republicans that has ever made it to the legislative stage. I double-dog dare you!
    - Gregg
      
      Speaking of conspiracy theories: “You mean the doctored, incomplete reports with all the attendant gaps?”
      
      I had to show my birth certificate to get a passport. Why shouldn’t any candidate have to prove his eligibility for office? I’m not a birther, it’s just common sense. O well, at least you didn’t call it racist.
    - JGC
      
      I do not have any problem with making it a new requirement that U.S. presidential candidates must file their citizenship documents on-line. It seems like a reasonable requirement, and Obama has done this repeatedly, in response to the birther idiots.
      
      The reason why I would like to see it enacted this year, is not only the birther nonsense over Obama, but because of the curious coincidence that �
      Romney’s parentage is foreign,as well. It sounds like a level playing field.
    - camk
      
      Gregg, you are the worst kind of birther – one who denies being a birther while taking the exact position as a birther. Could you please explain the difference between you and a birther?
    - Gregg
      
      Simple, I believe Obama was born in Hawaii.
      Birthers don’t.
      
      Are you a truther?
  - Zero
    
    Hey Gregg. The comment above is an example of what I was talking about with the issue of empirical methods and the Iraq war.
    
    We can clearly see that “You_Can_Keep_The_Change” uses absence of evidence as culpability. Sadam must have been hiding something because he won’t let you into his room. There was actually no physical evidence involved (just like in the comment above).
    
    Now do you see my point about republicans needing to reevaluate their empirical methods?
    - Gregg
      
      There was all kinds of evidence not the least of which was 500 tons of yellowcake and the fact he had used them before for genocide.
      
      Your question is built on a false premise. Democrats also believed the same thing in large numbers, on the record. Clinton even made regime change in Iraq US policy with “The Iraq Liberation Act of 1998″.
      
      I agree with YCKTC. My only quibble would be with the word “only”. There may be some other sinister conclusion but I can’t think of one given the precedent.

Roy Mac

So, Willard has a 59 point Power Point presentation about how he will fix the economy. Oh shit, oh dear! I can hardly wait to hear all 59 points–do they include magic underpants?

Gregg

Hussein certainly doesn’t have a plan.
- Zero
  
  Yeah, he just tries to pass what a consensus of top economists say, but the republicans don’t like anything outside their ideology.
  - Gregg
    
    Did he take the advice of Simpson/Bowels? Did he advocate “Cut, Cap and Balance”, which would have prevented the downgrade? There are no top economist who recommend Obama’s policies save krackpot Krugman. But then again he is hardly a “top economist”.
    - Camk2
      
      Gregg, SB never passed a final report. They could not muster the necessary, super-majority, 14 votes required for submission to the house. The report you keep referring to is the report issued by the co-chairs and not that of the full panel. I would also submit that the report, as originally articulated in the panel’s charter, was to have been voted on by the House, which was clearly in the control of the radical-right. They never voted on it. They have voted on every petty social issue they could find and have even voted on lunatic-fringe budgets such as those by Paul Ryan. They could have easily voted on the failed commission report but chose not to – those pesky tax increases got under their skin I suppose. I would also submit to you that most economists agree that Obama’s stimulus most certainly saved the economy from going over the edge. The least effective parts of the stimulus were the tax breaks as proposed by the Republicans. Also keep in mind that Obama has tried to keep teacher and public employees from getting pink slips while the right has vilified, those pesky, overpaid teachers and tried to ax them. In case you haven’t heard, the private sector has been adding lots of jobs but the layoffs in the public sector has kept unemployment number up there. I suppose you could also blame Republicans for our dismal recovery from our high unemployment. I guess we should ask the question that facts will inevitable lead you to – why do Republicans hate America and their citizens? Get a clue Gregg and wake up and realize that you should stop bashing America and help to build a proud nation for all of us instead of trying to win elections.
    - Gregg
      
      The President created the Simpson/Bowles commission, he could have taken something from it. He rejected it totally. Paul Ryan’s “Cut,Cap and Balance” would have prevented the downgrade. The grandma over the cliff ad was hideous. Nancy Pelosi is calling for an extension of tax cuts for millionaires. The ONLY reason they weren’t raised is because there were not enough Democrat votes despite control of both chambers. It’s a horrible idea and Democrats knew it. Do you realize we have not had a budget in 3 1/2 years? Obama budgets that did get a vote were unamimously defeated. Not a single “yea” from ANY Democrat of Republican. Is that leadership? Obama spent 20 years listening to Rev. Wright’s “Goddamn America” rhetoric, don’t tell me Republicans hate America. The best thing that can happen to build a proud nation is to unseat Obama and repeal Obamacare.
    - Camk2
      
      Once again you show how selective you are in your fact recollection. Obama created the commission by executive order after the bill to create the commission failed to pass in the senate after the six Republicans who co-sponsored it, voted against it (sound familiar?). Republicans care not one bit about America so much so that they vote against their own proposals and ideas. The commission is one example. You can’t have it both ways guys. Either you’re for the commission or you’re against it. Your words say one thing (you want a commission) while your actions say the complete opposite (we’ll do all we can to stop the commission). I suppose that you’ve also forgotten how your disciplined Republicans embraced the commission’s unofficial report by rejecting it in 2012 when it was presented to Congress during the debt-ceiling debate. They rejected it because it contained 2 trillion dollars in tax increases and 800 billion in defense cuts. Since we’re talking about how disciplined the Republicans and their Tea Party overlords are, one has to ask – why did they reject the formation of a commission they themselves wanted? Why did they fail to pass it’s recommendations when it finally hit the Senate? They make the most noise about how Obama ignores it only to reject it at every turn themselves. Stop being hypocrites Republicans!
    - Gregg
      
      Who said I supported the commission? I don’t think it went nearly far enough but I suppose it would have been a start.
      
      “You can’t have it both ways guys. Either you’re for the commission or you’re against it. “
      
      Tell that to our President.
    - camk
      
      So Gregg, does that mean you want more tax increases? WOW, you failed the 2012 Republican Tea Bag profile test. I never said that you explicitly supported SB but your hate for Obama leads me to believe that you would. Apparently you have some misunderstanding of how arguments work. The Republicans have been haranguing Democrats about adopting the SB report so they now own the position of being FOR it. Otherwise, just shut up and move on. Even if Obama shouted to heaven above that he loves the report, Republicans have no intention of ever adopting it and therefore creates another pretzel-logic hostage situation – we’ll shoot the victim if you don’t give us what we want and by the way, we’ll never take what we want as long as you are offering it. There is a vast difference between the things Republicans ask for and the things they want. You can’t blame Obama for just giving the Republicans what they really want – nothing at all. It’s like a rabid dog who’ll take your hand if you hand it a treat. I’d also like to comment on your “spiking the ball” comment. You realize that you spike the ball in the end zone which is where the commenter said that the Republicans were, not the Democrats or Obama. I know reality is tough for you Tea Baggers but you can’t keep on creating your own fiction and peddling it as reality.
    - Worried for the country(MA)
      
      The problem is Obama showed ZERO leadership on Simpson-Bowles.
      
      And your charge against Gregg about ‘winning’ elections is ludicrous. Almost everything Obama has done in the past two years has been a careful calulation to ‘win’ elections instead of for the good of the country.
      
      He could have been like Clinton IF he had pivoted after being trounced in the midterms.
      
      It is clearly a combination of incompetence and ideology.
    - Gregg
      
      So true. Clinton was pragmatic enough to listen to the will of the people and pivot. “The era of big government is over”. Obama gave us the finger and doubled down on failure after the historic 2010 elections.
    - Zero
      
      Clinton also repealed Glass-Steagall to what ends?
      
      By the way, there was some research done on policy positions. Using football terms, Obama met republicans on his 40 yard line. Most democrats were on the 25 yard line. And republicans were behind the goal post.
      
      So, I don’t know how you can say Obama “doubled down” when republicans have been autocratic.
    - Gregg
      
      Why is he spiking the football?
    - Zero
      
      Actually, go read the CBO recommendations. Obama is far closer to them than the republicans.
      
      You think economists are saying to cut individual taxes for the rich, deregulate, and cut from the consumer class in a demand-crippled economy? The only thing economists are saying that helps your side is to lower the corporate tax rate to the G20 average and simplify the code (which is exactly what Obama and Romney say they want).
- Zero
  
  “Hussein”…really Gregg? I expect that out of the more paranoid group of conservatives on here.
  - Gregg
    
    It’s his name, if Roy Mac want to call Romney “Willard” (his name) then what’s the problem?
    - Still Here
      
      Using that reminds them of his Muslim inclinations.
    - Camk2
      
      you are most certainly what is wrong with America today.
    - Zero
      
      But you forget, liberals are accepting of Muslims in this country because we believe in our first amendment.
    - Zero
      
      Okay. My bad.
- jefe68
  
  Funny how Mitt Romney is now saying that cutting spending the way the tea party GOP want to will cause a deep recession or a depression.
- Still Here
  
  I thought it was tax our way to prosperity.
  - Gregg
    
    … and spend our way out of debt. I stand corrected.
    - TomK in Boston
      
      …and you think Ryan’s plan to reduce the debt with tax cuts makes sense.
    - Gregg
      
      It was a revamping of the entire code not tax cuts.
  - TomK in Boston
    
    The middle class was much more prosperous when taxes were high, so taxing our way to prosperity is certainly an obvious thing to try
- Alan in NH
  
  Just wondering why you like to refer to Barack as Hussein from time to time. Is it some islamophobia thing, a way of midely insulting him by using his middle name, or a more general derogatory comment similar to when people refer to GWB as the shrub? Or perhaps some other…
  - Gregg
    
    None of the above. It was a response to Roy Mac. I have never used it before.
    - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
      
      All of the above for you pal.
    - Gregg
      
      Why are you so hateful? I mean it’s cool, it doesn’t bother me but why?
  - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
    
    By referring to BHO as “Hussein”, it is a coded dog whistle word that the right wing nuts use, to let their fellow nuts know where they stand. Kinda like Obamacare…for the ACA. Typical Republican nonsense and propaganda. They love code words and empty slogans….cant get enuf of the Frank Dunce crap.
Zero

I’ve seen it. Go to wikipedia and type “Supply-Side Economics.”
Worried for the country(MA)

Daylight is the best disinfectant for bigotry.
- http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
  
  Then shine plenty of it in DC and the black churches, across the nation. Might just as well include MOST churches…phony Christians.

feettothefire

By Lt. Col. (ret) Brian F. SullivanFor The Patriot LedgerPosted May 25, 2012 @ 06:42 AM

Read more: http://www.patriotledger.com/features/x1982678168/Vietnam-veteran-reflects-on-the-war#ixzz1vw5avOBLQUINCY —
The dying boy’s eyes pleaded with me as he gasped, “GI, I be OK?” I lied. “Ya, you be OK, no sweat.” His blood soaked the shirt of my jungle fatigues and dripped from my hands. As I lifted him into the ambulance, life slowly ebbed from the limp body, while mortar rounds slammed into the Army Republic of South Vietnam induction center in Qui Nhon.
It was the night of Feb. 22, 1971. Emotions had to be submerged. The image of a tough, seasoned military police lieutenant had to be portrayed. But, back in the solitude of my hooch, it was different. There it all came rushing back and I just kept repeating over and over again, “It don’t mean nothin’!”
It was a coping mechanism that allowed me to survive the horror, bury my rage and go on with the task at hand.
By then the war was increasingly seen as un-winnable. Military morale was as low as at any point in our history. “Ticket punchers,” who needed to knock off a tour of duty in country to enhance their careers, infested our military leadership. Meanwhile, back home, our politicians failed to support us and the peace movement led to disgust for the war and our soldiers who fought it.
In 1971 we had started to withdraw our units and transfer missions to the forces of South Vietnam. In the minds of many the war was all but over. We weren’t fighting to stem the tide of communism. Patriotism had waned. Who wanted to be the last American soldier to die in Vietnam? We were now fighting for each other – our brothers in arms.

On Sept. 11, 2001, some 30 years had passed, but the rage returned. Once again a failure of leadership would cost American lives. Five months earlier I had helped arrange for a television exposé of security shortcomings at Boston’s Logan International Airport. Despite the warning, nothing was done and now two planes commandeered by terrorists would slam into the World Trade Center and close to 3,000 people would die. Shortly thereafter our nation would begin its conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Initial success was diminished by failed attempts at nation building. More of our young men and women would be killed or maimed and for what? Iraq is now in turmoil and we are withdrawing from Afghanistan. Like in Vietnam, who wants to be the last soldier to die in an un-winnable war? The soldiers there aren’t fighting to stem the tide of Middle Eastern terrorist fanatics. They are fighting for each other – their brothers and sisters in arms. And now the sad story of Staff Sergeant Robert Bales and 17 dead Afghan innocents. It is so reminiscent of the My Lai massacre during the Vietnam conflict. And, where’s the military leadership that allows for a fourth tour of duty for a trained sniper who’s had a brain injury and suffers from anxiety and depression? As the administration and Congress fiddle and diddle, American blood and treasure continues to be spent on a losing effort. We see the same lack of political will and courage that we saw exhibited during the Vietnam War. If we are not going to win, then we should get out. Stop putting our young men and women needlessly in harm’s way. As the 50th anniversary of our country’s involvement in the Vietnam conflict approaches, I ask myself what lessons have we learned. Are we simply repeating the same mistakes? The rage returns as I process the Bales incident in PTSD group sessions at the Brockton VA hospital. I look at what’s happened and consider the failed leadership which now has our country on the edge of economic ruin. I watch an inept Congress so hung up on political brinksmanship that they can’t get the job done for the American people. Quietly I go to my room, hang my head and repeat over and over, “It don’t mean nothin’!” Once again, it seems like the only way to get by. The Department of Defense has announced plans for the nation to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of the Vietnam War, beginning with a Washington, D.C. event on Monday. The major focus is to thank Vietnam veterans and their families for their sacrifice. During the commemoration period, which will run until 2023, their service and contributions will be recognized. Back in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s disgust, for the war and our soldiers who fought it, peaked. Many returning veterans didn’t receive the “welcome home” they deserved. In my case, I was the officer in charge of a prisoner shipment from Long Binh Jail to the Presidio in San Francisco and then on to the Castle at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. When I landed in California, in July 1971, my MPs and I met with jeers and derision, while our prisoners were greeted with empathy by the “flower children” at the airport. Today, I’m hoping Americans will realize that the 50th anniversary provides an opportunity to make amends and recognize the sacrifice made by our Vietnam veterans who served with honor in Southeast Asia. This Memorial Day let’s remember those soldiers and let’s also ponder the lessons we should have learned from that long, dragged out, dreadful war. Maybe then, just maybe, the 50th anniversary can provide sufficient reflection for us all to move forward towards a better future. I hope so, because I’m tired of having to say, “It don’t mean nothin’!”
Have a nice Memorial day, everyone. – Feet.

http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

To bad you folks cannot see the futility of war. You aer blinded by your love of it.
- feettothefire
  
  Did you even read the piece? It’s all about THE FUTILITY OF WAR. That’s why I posted it. I think a re-read might help.
  - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
    
    Apologies.. Yes, I did read it the first time, and second. I guess I put 2 & 2 together and came up with 5.

You_Can_Keep_The_Change

Jon Corzine,

the former Democratic Govenor and U.S. senator from New Jersey,

and the former C.E.O. of Goldman Sachs and MF Global (which has since filled for Chapter 11 bankruptcy)

raised $897,232 dollars for Pesident Obama’s re-election campaign.

http://www.opensecrets.org/pres12/bundlers.php

That would explain why Corzine isn’t being prosecuted for ‘misplacing’ $1.6 billion dollars of customer funds from segregated accounts.

Which proves it pay$ to have friends in high places, or to raise a ton of money for Obama’s re-election campaign.

Zero

Good, now call your congressman and tell him or her you want a constitutional amendment limiting campaign contributions to a couple thousand dollars by living, breathing individuals.
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  That sounds reasonable, but both parties would never go for that.
  - Zero
    
    There are people on both sides that want it to happen. Obama and McCain have spoken out against campaign finances quite passionately. Mitch McConnell has worked to facilitate corporatocracy. Buddy Romer, a republican, is/was running for president on the platform of establishing strict campaign finance laws. I would actually vote for him over Obama if I came to the conclusion that he is more serious about it than Obama. If Obama gets reelected and doesn’t at least mitigate the corporatocracy, I’m done wit democrats. Seriously.
    
    Democrats are, however, trying to pass a disclosure act, but House republicans are blocking it. I think there would be enough Senate republicans to vote for it.
    
    But seriously, both parties would go for it, if there is a political movement for it. Right now it is only the left that wants this stuff gone. The right wing actually wants it gone, but they are just unconscious to the mechanism that enable corruption. They are for keeping Citizens United simply because the liberals are against it, but the right wing turns around and criticizes the democrats for taking campaign funds from entities such as corporations and unions.
    
    I want it all to end, and it will end if the right wing gets in bed with the left. Don’t be a defeatist! Talk to your conservative friends and lets reestablish our democracy.
    - You_Can_Keep_The_Change
      
      I applaud your optimism, but at the end of the day, the rule is
      
      ‘money talks and merit walks’.
    - Zero
      
      That’s slave mentality.
    - Uprising!
      
      America is looking more and more like a plantation.
http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

You are completely blind if you do not realize that BOTH parties are bought.
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  I never said that they weren’t bought off.
  - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
    
    Sorry, I wrote my post, then saw an earlier one of yours. Too bad we cannot delete posts.

JonS

Jack Beatty-Axelrod/Plouffe is at it again with his predictable support of Obama’s campaign against Bain capital. Jack just can’t shake his union label. The real story is the growing backlash from Democrats such as Corey Booker who called it ” nauseating”, Obama’s car czar Steven Rattner called it “unfair”,former Pa governor Ed Rendell called it “disappointing” and Senator Evan Bayh who called it “wrong” . I just call it pathetic. It may appeal to Obama’s coalition of the hopelessly stupid who believe that a community organizer who has never hired a single person in the private sector is better qualified because he has “empathy” for the downtrodden. Sorry but empathy never created a private sector job. Obama is an unmitigated disaster and totally undeserving of a second term unless of course you happen to be uninformed , ill-informed , a green energy parasite , public employee , or dependent on government handouts.

Bain uses its own risk capital (and that of its investors , which include union pension money), Obama uses taxpayer money. Consider a few examples of Obama’s record in public equity ( better known as crony capitalism): Raser technologies–received $33 million grant to build a power plant and filed for bankruptcy in 2012; ECOtality–received $126m grant and CEO sat in Michelle’s box at the 2010 State of the Union address, now facing insolvency and insider trading investigation; Nevada geothermal power–received $98m loan guaranty and now in “financial turmoil” per NYT article; First Solar received $3billion in loan guaranties and recently laid off 30% of its workforce; Abound Solar received $400m loan guaranty and halted production in February and laid off its employees; and Beacon Power received $43m loan guaranty and filed bankruptcy in 2011. Did I even say Solyndra and its $535m loan guaranty and 1000 laid off employees?

Gregg

I notice your comments don’t get many responses. I think that’s because there is little Conservatives can add or liberals can refute. Nice work.
- http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
  
  Wrong again. No sense replying to Republican spin, lies and propaganda.
  - JonS
    
    Why not address the points I’ve raised rather than engage in an ad hominem attack. I have no respect for anyone who can’t debate and chew gum at the same time. Frankly all it does is make you sound quite (hopelessly) stupid. Everyone is entitled to their opinions (no matter how ignorant they are) but not their own set of facts.
    - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
      
      I would not waste the effort debating an elitist snob such as you. You could not handle the defeat well.
TomK in Boston

Bane does not take risk. They suck enough out of the victim company to pay themselves. At that point it’s gravy if the company does well, but it’s OK if it goes bankrupt too. A lot of the victims do go bankrupt, as it is difficult to compete while paying off the junk bonds Bane has issued to pay the romney types.

Bane is a poster child for the “financialization” of the economy. Its main function is to redistribute wealth to the top. It’s what we need LESS of if we ever hope to regain a strong middle class.There is no comparison between vulture capitalism and the LBO con game. Despite free market ideology, there are a lot of valuable areas that the private sector will not touch because they don’t promise a payoff fast enough. It is very good for the gvt to fund them. I don’t care if there are mistakes and failures, the payoffs are so huge it doesn’t matter. Gvt funding gave birth to biotech and the internet. I couldn’t begin to list the spinoffs from the space program we once had. If we had something like the space program now, the economy would be a lot stronger.
- TomK in Boston
  
  Sorry, I meant “There is no comparison between VENTURE capitalism and the LBO con game. ” Wish this board had “edit”.
Zero

Bain isn’t taking that much risk. They still make money if the business goes under. I would like to see a regulation where if the business doesn’t succeed, then any profited accrued by Bain goes to the recently disenfranchised people of the company. That way there would actually be risk involved.

Second, you say Solyndra; I just say Iraq. $535M; $1T. 1,000 laid off employees; Thousands of Americans dead. I wonder how much the oil companies that fill republicans pockets are making now that Iraq is more accessible. Not to mention the weapons manufactures that also contribute to the republicans.

You know, if America would have stayed with Carter’s energy plan, we would be a lot better off today. Look at Germany. Germany started a renewable energy initiative in 1970–they will be completely on renewable energy by 2050. Look at their economy.

How many times do I have to say it republicans? Quit keeping us from becoming like Germany.
- TomK in Boston
  
  It’s too bad that our righties don’t understand how the LBO game works. I think some don’t know the difference between a LBO vulture capitalist and a venture capitalist, and they sure don’t know anything about how technologies that are a few years away from showing a profit are incubated.
JGC

I can’t believe you did not mention the auto industry “bailout”, or were you purposely avoiding its mention? Taxpayer money helped save the automobile manufacturing industry in the U.S.,and this is not just the actual car companies like General Motors, but all the subordinate small and middle industries that manufacture for automobile plants worldwide. And we have been repaid, and more. Repaid not only in $$$, but in jobs and pride and renewal of hope in a future for the middle class.

New energies are more problematic. Part of that is the “try, then succeed or fail” paradigm that all new industries go through. Some of it has to do with unfair competition. But Reuters reported that our friends at Goldman Sachs are “in a dash to invest in renewable energy projects”. They said Goldman Sachs “isn’t above self-serving spin, but it’s also never far from the money.” There is a lot to mull over in the article (25 May 2012) but one thing that caught my eye was”An added major selling point is that once generation equipment is installed, these prices are locked in for decades since the sun and wind are free. The same cannot be said of U.S. gas or coal, let alone oil.” With renewable energy close to the point of holding its own soon competitively, “Goldman’s latest $40-billion promise is one it should have little trouble keeping.”

That again is $40-billion. U.S. taxpayer money that you mention as $43 million in loan guarantees, etc. is not significant; just the cost of doing business in our great Capitalist state. Jamie Dimon’s group dropped $2 billion
minimum last week.
Terry Tree Tree

Bain’s ‘risk capital’, that was NOT risked, if they took profit, whether the company they bought into survived, or NOT. What’s the risk in that?

Gregg

“All Things Considered” dedicated 4 1/2 minutes to the trial of Monsignor William Lynn. That’s good. But still no mention of the unprecedented lawsuit by Catholic institutions. They should change the name of the show.

Worried for the country(MA)

The media blackout is not limited to NPR. Very disappointing for a such a major story.
- Gregg
  
  In fairness, the search for the perfect tomato is important too.
- You_Can_Keep_The_Change
  
  That’s why NPR (National Pinko Radio) has to go around begging for funds so that they can keep their pro-Obama ‘news’ on the air.
  - Roy Mac
    
    That’s just silly.

Zero

Gregg, you wrote, “If you are poor and don’t like it then make yourself rich.”

I grew up in a wealth community, and had lots of opportunity. Am I on moral grounds if I tell someone who grew up on food stamps to work harder?

When every body has the same secondary education environments and a free trip to college, then I will be less sensitive to people struggling in this country.

Gregg

“Am I on moral grounds if I tell someone who grew up on food stamps to work harder?”

I would say that depends on how hard they are working. Doesn’t it? Working smarter is also important as is nurturing skills. College, not so much IMO. If one is 30 years old and has not made themselves more valuable than earning minimum wage then they are a total looser.

I am very sensitive to people struggling in this economy, it has nothing to do with anything.
- Zero
  
  When I was in college, I did my laundry and a laundromat. I saw a poor man tell his toddler son to “quit being a pussy.” The father wasn’t preparing his kid for college; he was preparing his kid for the streets. That attitude does not turn itself around. It takes a compassionate community to help. I know republican politicians tell their voters that democrats just want to tax the rich and hand poor people a check, but that’s not what we want. And I can use the word “we” when I say that. We want social programs, community organization, and a clear path to a college education for the poorer community. I don’t see how that kid has a chance to become more valuable than minimum wage.
  
  Republicans solution of “work harder” has never worked. It’s like a teacher blaming the parents for their stupid kids. Yes, the blame is mostly on the individual, but it doesn’t solve anything. Teachers aren’t helping anybody by pointing the finger at parents, just like republicans are not helping anybody by pointing the at people who never had the same opportunity as them.
  
  And what does IMO stand for?
  
  Anyway, college education is increasingly tied to economic success. And this is where I start to think republicans are maniacal with their attitude. All I hear is the platitude “work harder,” but it’s mixed with anti-intellectualism. When the two mix, it comes out sounding like Arbeit Macht Frei.
  
  The problem for the republicans is that the chief avenue to success is a college education, but a college education makes people more secular and literate, and by virtue of that, people become more democratic and progressive.
  - Gregg
    
    “I don’t see how that kid has a chance to become more valuable than minimum wage. “
    I have much more faith than that in humanity. I remember when I told my dad I was going to quit the football team so I could play more piano. He called me a pussy and whipped my ass. I’ve made a comfortable living playing piano for the last 35 years. We choose our destiny, we choose our income, we have a voice in the matter. Government just creates dependence.
    - Zero
      
      Any one person can make it. But that one person because an example of social mobility, while social mobility numbers decrease. The one person making it becomes a delusion of social mobility for the whole of society, and an excuse to keep implementing the same economic policy that is strangling equal opportunity.
    - Gregg
      
      People beat the odds all the time.
      
      No arms? No problem
      
      One leg? Be a champion
      
      No limbs? Be happy
      
      Born black, raised in a ghetto, and raped at age 9? Become an icon
    - Zero
      
      You just proved my point.
    - Gregg
      
      You are not going to convince me America is full of helpless victims being held down. I do a lot of work with handicapped kids. The last thing they need (or want) is pity or someone making excuses for them. We set the bar high and expect excellence no matter the circumstances. No excuses. Some are spoiled coddled whiny-assed brats. That doesn’t cut it around here. I have seen countless triumphs like the 7 year old boy paralyzed from the waist down who won a blue ribbon at a horse show. The judge did not know of his condition. It was a long hard tedious slog for him to learn to ride. It took many volunteers but mostly it took gumption on his part. We didn’t tell him he would win just by being in the arena with able bodies kids. We told him he should beat them and take first prize. He did. No excuses. I have a 100 stories just like it. They are not isolated occurrences. It’s what happens in America every day.
    - Steve_T
      
      I’ll put money on the fact that that kid did not come from a poor house hold. Poor kids don’t have horses, No excuses.
    - Gregg
      
      It was not his horse. the service wasa free.
    - TomK in Boston
      
      Irrelevant and disgusting. You just use those cases as a smokescreen for allowing the odds for the non-elite to get longer and longer. The real question is, will we have a society with high or low probability of success for average folks who try hard.
    - Gregg
      
      We already know the answer. That’s why folks like me are so worried at what we are seeing. Does anyone check how hard you are trying before you get your gub’ment check? It used to be you had to prove you were trying to get a job before collecting unemployment. Moving ahead in the public sector has zip to do with merit or work ethic. It’s all about seniority and not ruffling feathers. I think it’s absolutely insane that we don’t drug test welfare recipients.
- Heaviest Cat
  
  It has alot to do with everything ,Gregg. There are social and economic forces that overwhelm individual intitiative. The large numners of unemployed bear that out.
  - Gregg
    
    And there are individual initiative that overwhelm social and economic forces. Sensitivity plays no part.
TomK in Boston

What he and a lot of our righties won’t see is that making yourself rich can be easier or harder depending on the playing field. An American who works hard is a lot more likely to succeed than a Haitian who works just as hard. A mediocre rich white boy is more likely to succeed than a genius from the ghetto. We’re arguing about whether we have a society where hard work by an ordinary American is likely to bring success, like in the 50s and 60s, or a hunger games society where you literally have to be superman to succeed, if you’re not born into the oligarchy.

I grew up with a lot of advantages and I’m a workaholic. My success came from both. I wouldn’t be where I am without hard work, but I know dam well that those less privileged would have to work even harder and smarter to get the same results. People with the same head start who think they did it all by themselves make me sick.

My wish is that the USA be a society where the odds are the same for everyone who really tries. I thought that was the whole point of the USA. Voodoo econ has taken us in the opposite direction.
- Zero
  
  I think Simone de Beauvoir’s “The Ethics of Ambiguity” should be required reading in high school. It’s not all on the individual and it’s not all on society. Life is ambiguous, and there are hardly any (if any at all) definite terms. But when we delude ourselves to think that it is one way or the other, we get robust individualism or robust collectivism, Fascism or Communism….�

Zero

Gregg, you wrote, “Why is he spiking the football?”

Is this in reference to killing bin Laden? Or is this in reference to the policies he has tried to pass?

I think you got a little knee-jerky in the comment below. Obama has clearly been, for better or worse, more flexible than the republicans. As for “spiking the football,” I don’t see what is wrong with Obama taking credit for doing exactly what he said he would do when he was candidate Obama. In fact, he better “spike the football” because you republicans have already tried to give credit to Bush.

This is what I have been hearing the last three years from the republicans: “It’s Obama’s economy, but Bush got bin Laden.” And then there’s the: “Bush was a closet liberal, while Clinton was really a republican.” Oh politics. It would be so much easier to reevaluate your positions instead of doubling-down on them because the latter strategy is looking a little twisted.

Gregg

I was referring to both Bin laden and his jumping all over the bogus MarketWatch report. He is constantly saying how he saved the economy, he’s made it worse. Regarding Bin Laden he released classified information to Hollywood for the movie. Unbelievable arrogance.

http://dailycaller.com/2012/05/23/rep-king-slams-white-house-for-sharing-bin-laden-secrets-with-hollywood/

It was so bad SNL did a skit:

http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/the-situation-room-cold-open/1327352

It was Rumsfeld who put the emphasis, training and big buck to dramatically increase the capacity of our Special Forces and it was enhanced interrogation that got us the leads. Obama deserves credit but these are 2 thing he clearly would not have done. He derides them. There is no way Bin Laden would have been killed without the work of many many patriots. Obama is happy to take all the credit. It’s arrogant as hell but he as a campaign to run that trumps all. It is very easy to connect the dots for over a decade to show how much was done in the lead up to the assassination. Are you really going to deny this?

There is no way to logically and specifically make the connection from Bush to Obama’s economy. 1 year, maybe but 3 1/2, not a chance. And note, no one ever does they just spout off about 2 wars (that inspired the Arab spring) and tax cuts (that saved the economy from the tech bubble and 9/11).

He is a rigid ideologue. If he wasn’t we’d at least have a budget. If he’s reelected he’ll be more “flexible” … to the benefit of our enemies at the expense of America. He must be defeated.
- Zero
  
  “Obama is happy to take all the credit.” You should really watch Jon Stewart. He did a montage of the times Obama gave credit to the troops.
  
  And also, I have stated many times that if Bush had forced the banks to refinance bad mortgages and loans during TARP, the economy would be much better today. And I promise I would have given Bush credit for doing that if only he had done it. So there’s your logical and specific connection from the Bush economy to the Obama economy.
  
  Also, you give Bush a ton of latitude for a “Clinton caused recession” (which my many measures was not a recession), but give Obama zero latitude for a recession where GDP was contracting at 8%.
  
  Even in that one data chart that showed a recession at the beginning of the Bush presidency, also showed that the Obama recession was far far worse than anything Bush dealt with. Where’s your consistency?
  
  And the republican budgets are propaganda pieces. Talk about unrealistic! Here’s a budget I’m offering, tax millionaires and up 49%, tax $250,000 and up 42%, cut the military in half (which would still be 3 or 4 times larger than the next biggest military), get out of Afghanistan within the year, and cut anything else that doesn’t weaken demand.
  
  There, there is a balanced budget proposal that would not get one vote form a republican (and it doesn’t cut from the consumer class in a demand-crippled economy). You see how that works? You see how tedious and useless that is? But is it useless and politically unreasonable to tax the rich 3%? Was it unreasonable to end the Iraq war?
  
  The budget I just ad lib created is more reasonable than the republicans’ budgets. And at least my tax rates have historical presidencies from economies that actually thrived.
  - Gregg
    
    I disagree, we need to “eat our peas”. Tough measures are called for. Really Zero think about it, “Cut, Cap and Balance” passed the House 234-190. Obama’s last budget was defeated 414-0. The last Obama budget to be voted on in the Senate went down 97-0. Forgive me if I don’t buy into which plan was unrealistic.
    
    BTW, I don’t consider one “if/then” statement to be connecting the dots. I consider it fantasy.
    - Zero
      
      You seriously don’t think that if banks were forced to refinance bad mortgages and loans the economy would be better today?
      
      That is one of the leading reasons why our economy is struggling.
      
      And you know why Obama’s budget was hated amongst republicans and democrats? Because it raises taxes 3% on the rich like the democrats want and cuts medicare like the republicans want.
      
      This is in line with the study I read about Obama being on the 40 yard line, dems on the 25, and republicans behind the goal post.
      
      Now Obama is paying politically for trying to compromise with uncompromising ideologues. He should have been more vocal about his economic vision and only his economic vision. If he would have called the republicans morons for cutting from the consumer class in times when the economy needs demand, he may have forced to republicans to move a little. Maybe.
      At the very least, Obama would have taken his arguments to the next election, which is what is happening anyway.
      
      Give it up, Gregg (although I know you won’t), Obama tired to reason with people who would trash this country to make him a one term president.
    - Gregg
      
      I don’t know what would have happened. I don’t know if government could force banks do to what you suggest. I don’t even know if TARP was a good idea but most think so. But I feel sure the economy would be better without the “stimulus” and Obamacare.
      
      THERE HAS BEEN NO CONSTITUTIONALLY REQUIRED BUDGET IN 3 1/2 YEARS!!!!
      Don’t make excuses for that shameful record. If you can’t condemn that it seriously hurts your credibility.
    - Zero
      
      First off, budgets are traditionally drawn up in the Budget Comity, not the White House. Traditionally, Congress is to pass budgets and laws that are relatively near to the ideological position of the president but closest to the data provided by economists and other academic studies (to which republicans are now where near either).
      
      Your last comment falls purely in the republican political strategy the last 3.5 years. There budgets are nothing but ideological nonsense. Hardly any academic and noted economist agree with them, and they had a snow-cone’s chance in hell of passing. I tried to tell you this, but it didn’t work. If all Obama did was try to pass far left budgets, you would say the same thing.
      
      Obama has made clear the kinds of things he looks for in a budget, which ought to come out of the Budget Comity…and his suggestions have been far more reasonable than any politician in Washington. And what do the republicans do? They play politics, and you fall for it.
    - Gregg
      
      I can’t believe you are excusing the lack of leadership. The House has done their job, the Senate won’t even vote and the Presidents budgets are laughable.
    - Zero
      
      You know republicans are trying to put Obama in catch 22. If Obama writes a budget that compromises with both side, which he did, he is damn because both sides won’t vote for it. If he writes a budget with only what he wants, he is damned for being partisan. If he goes the traditional rout and lets the Budget comity write something that will be close enough to his ideological preference, he’s damned because that will never happen, he damned with lack of leadership.
      
      You can’t lead people who don’t believe in compromising, let alone democracy.
    - Gregg
      
      Excuses.
- Zero
  
  Was this the MarketWatch report you were referring to:
  - Zero
    
    Never mind. The image didn’t appear.
    
    Anyway, I have read the various rationales. And independent fact-checkers agree with the MarketWatch analysis. Only right wing blogs and think tanks are in a tizzy.
    
    But it makes sense. Obama started off with a $1.2 trillion dollar deficit. So there wasn’t much room for Obama to increase the spending rate. The Bush Tax Cuts accounted for at least half of the deficit, according to the CBO charts I have cited on here before. 1/3 of Obama’s stimulus was tax cuts, which isn’t counted as spending. Republicans like to talk about cutting the deficit, although they don’t want to cut the leading drivers of the deficit….
    
    Whatever. I told myself that I would dedicate my day off from work and family to reading from my secular scripture. Obviously, the gravity of political blogs were too strong. But now I’m out until anon.
    - TomK in Boston
      
      Right on.
      
      When Obama entered the WH, the Bush budget was set for the next year, the Bush TARP was in place, the Bush tax cuts and wars were amping up the deficit, and the Bush economic crash was decreasing tax revenue and increasing use of the safety net, and requiring big expenditures to stabilize the system. Now, I understand that it’s politics to lay all that on BHO. It is a lie, however.
    - http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
      
      Republican amnesiacs…hate to be reminded of facts they have conveniently forgotten. Good going for you.
- TomK in Boston
  
  “I was referring to both Bin laden”
  Wow, you must have had a heart attack when Bush landed on that aircraft carrier, huh?
  
  “…..and his jumping all over the bogus MarketWatch report. He is constantly saying how he saved the economy, he’s made it worse.”
  
  You have no idea whether he made it worse or not. Real economists argue about that, and you don’t understand economics well enough to do anything but parrot what you read on righty blogs. If you look at the chart of job losses over time, without ‘splainin away the obvious to fit your ideology, it sure looks like he made it better. IMO he made it better but failed to make it a lot better by not spending enough and by not taking bold action on foreclosures. Of course, the TeaOP would have made it very difficult even if he had tried to take strong steps.
Guest

Two speeches (emphasis added)

A portion of the George W. Bush speech after capture of Saddam Hussein: The success of yesterday’s mission is a tribute to *OUR MEN AND WOMEN* now serving in Iraq . The operation was based on the superb work of *INTELLIGENCE ANALYSTS* who found the dictator’s footprints in a vast country. The operation was carried out with skill and precision by a *BRAVE FIGHTING FORCE*. *OUR SERVICEMEN AND WOMEN* and our *COALITION ALLIES* have faced many dangers in the hunt for members of the fallen regime, and in *THEIR EFFORT* to bring hope and freedom to the Iraqi people. *THEIR WORK* continues, and so do the risks. Today, on behalf of the nation, I thank *THE MEMBERS OF OUR ARMED FORCES* and I congratulate them.
�
A portion of the Barack H. Obama speech, Sunday, May 1, 2011: And so shortly after taking office, *I* directed Leon Panetta, the director of the CIA, to make the killing or capture of bin Laden the top priority of *MY WAR* against al Qaeda, even as *I* continued our broader efforts to disrupt, dismantle, and defeat his network.Then, last August, after years of painstaking work by *MY* intelligence community, *I* was briefed on a possible lead to bin Laden. It was far from certain, and it took many months to run this thread to ground. *I* met repeatedly with my national security team as we developed more information about the possibility that we had located bin Laden hiding within a compound deep inside of Pakistan. And finally, last week, *I* determined that *I* had enough intelligence to take action, and *I* authorized an operation to get Osama bin Laden and bring him to justice. Today, at *MY* direction, the United States launched a targeted operation against that compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan.

In the entire speech of George W. Bush, the word “I” appears three times: twice when he personally thanked our forces, and once when he consoled the Iraqi people; the word “my” does not appear in his speech. In the entire speech of Barack H. Obama, the words “I” and “my” appear 13 times. George Bush gives the credit for the capture of Saddam Hussein to our armed forces and intelligence services; Barack Obama makes sure that he himself gets a lot of the credit. That’s spiking the football.
- http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
  
  The criminal George Bush should be in jail for the rest of his life. Aside from his financial crimes he has the blood of thousands of our young people on his hands. He should rot in hell.
  
  Ever hear of the term: speech writer? None of presidents write their own speeches…even the criminal Bush.
  
  You are about as off base as possible. Typical for a right wing nut.
- TFRX
  
  You’re just cutting and pasting from Fox and Friends.
  
  And nice equivocating Saddam Hussein and OBL as threats to us.
  
  Why don’t you brag about “Mission Accomplished” while you’re at it.
  - Gregg
    
    You’re getting lamer by the day.
- Zero
  
  http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-may-1-2012/victory-lapse
  
  http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-may-1-2012/victory-lapse—the-anniversary-of-osama-bin-laden-s-death

Zero

Hey Gregg, I also have some issues with the article on charity you posted. (1) The research counted dropping money in the Sunday collection plate as charity. (2) It does differentiate between the kind of donations that, for example, the ones Romney gives to the ones Obama gives:

“In any case, if conservative donations often end up building extravagant
churches, liberal donations frequently sustain art museums, symphonies,
schools and universities that cater to the well-off. (It’s great to
support the arts and education, but they’re not the same as charity for
the needy. And some research suggests that donations to education
actually increase inequality because they go mostly to elite
institutions attended by the wealthy.)”

This actually speaks to my point about the education environments in secondary education. I can tell you from my experience growing up in Florida that rich liberals do indeed support the schools closest to them, but rich liberals live closer to lower socioeconomic conditions. That’s why in a liberal town like Gainesville (where you once lived) Gainesville East Side High School has a stellar IB program. Whereas the rich republicans isolate themselves in Hill Plantation in gated communities and support the schools that only rich kids go to. The same if thing happens in Jacksonville and Tampa/St. Pete areas.

I’m also sick of people donating to athletic departments.

Nonetheless, I think all people have charitable nature, but that nature can be directed more productively.

(3) The article said that blood donation is in the red states more than the blue states. Yeah, but the donation centers and blood mobiles are usually in college towns that turn the county blue. But, the article doesn’t account for the fact that people sell their blood for a small amount. In poorer states, such as the red states, people line up around the corner to sell some blood.

So, I think there are some floating variables this Op-ed isn’t taking into account.

Gregg

Churches give to charity from the plate, I don’t know why you would dismiss that. In fact, I don’t know what or whose nobleness standard to use to determine what is charity and what is not. I did not dissect the article but the concept is not new. I purposely used an article from Nicholas Kristof because he’s lefty. I was not intending to make an issue of this, I do it to myself all the time and will take the blame for taking the bait.

You wrote:”It is so typical of conservatives to find compassion when something happens directly to them.”

So I pointed out that Republicans give more to charity than Democrats. To which you replied, “BS”

It’s not BS. That was my point. Even if you want to insist it’s not true, it has a basis that I backed up with lefty support. I should know better than to respond to being told without evidence my comment is BS. It’s better to let it go because your rebuttal (“BS”) really spoke for itself in its lack of substance. I say that with all due respect, you usually display more depth.

Let’s just agree that charity is good and not a partisan affair. I don’t see a need to argue about it.
- Zero
  
  I was also, later on, thinking about the issue of organ donation. Every organ saves a life, right?
  
  Anyway, when I wrote the line: “It is so typical of conservatives to find compassion when something happens directly to them.” As I explained in a later comment, conservatives have a tendency to not understand the various conditions people live within. They think life is universal, and they can’t see beyond their own nose. This is why rich people who have came from nothing tend to be liberal–Obama, Clinton, Buffet, Jobs, etc. Whereas, your party is filled with people who have live their entire lives in the upper class. (I know you will take issue with that, but look around.)
  
  Our social mobility has fallen dramatically since 1980, but according to republicans, it’s because 99% of the populations has stopped working hard. Do you see how narrow sighted that is? Why can’t you see that republicanism has created financial inequality, halted social mobility, and by virtue of that, divided the country.
  
  I hear constantly from Mitt Romney and people on Fox News: “My dad worked hard for his money.” Yeah, in a Pre-Reagan America. They obviously haven’t gone through nor considered the hardships of a lot of Americans. That is the lack of compassion I am talking about. I guess, it is not so much that republicans don’t have compassion, but they have a mis-compassion. I do agree with your last sentence and you can tell that much from the previous comment. All people have a charitable bone.
  
  But it is pretty narcissistic to think that a persons wealth is solely due to an individual hunger. In a society, we are all interdependent upon each other, not independent. Your ideology disregards various economic conditions, education systems, racism, history, and how other countries are developing strong economies that work for everyone. According to your ideology, everybody has an equal shot no matter how askew the conditions are. Not once have you acknowledged that opportunity is unequal in America when it is painfully apparent!
  
  And I didn’t lay any bait. My comment about Cheney understanding the need for gay rights was about how provincial right wing ideology is, and how right wing ideology is broken when they go out into the world or the world comes to them. That is all. You brought up charity, which is not the same issue. That’s why I changed the phrase “compassion” to “cognitive empathy.” I hope you can see why I used the world “compassion” first.
  - Gregg
    
    First, let me say I could not disagree more with your characterization of Republicans. I find the notion that they “have a tendency to not understand the various conditions people live within”. In my opinion (IMO) that is the Democrat’s problem. I don’t think Obama relates to the average American at all. We won’t agree.
    
    I never said life was fair. I never said everyone had equal opportunity. I never said it was all about hard work.
    
    I will say, we all have equal opportunity under the law. I strongly oppose legislating equal outcome which is what you seem to endorse. President Obama recently said it’s his job to make sure everyone has a fair shot. That is not his job and the notion scares the hell out of me. He is not a referee deciding what is fair and what is not using whatever criteria he chooses and punishing/rewarding as he sees fit. It’s an emotion based sound byte.
    
    Our destinies are largely determined by our choices. Working hard is but one of those choices and will show few results in and of itself. How hard is it to choose not to drink or do drugs? How hard is it to choose not to have children before you have a job? How hard is it to read a book and learn something valuable? How hard is it to avoid buying a new car when you can only afford a used one? Why would anyone be satisfied working for minimum wage? How easy is it to loose your motivation and passion when you are paid not to work for 99 weeks? Half of American households receive some kind of Government aid.
    - Zero
      
      Where have I said legislation of equal outcome? Quit listening to what republicans say the democrats say, and listen to us. It’s about equal opportunity! Equal education environments and college education. Your politics are making people start off on unequal grounds.
      
      Wealth is only possible within a society. No man is an island unto himself. You are not independent, but interdependent. That is reality. Your position is an emotional and narcissistic one. The wealthy should pay back to the society that makes their wealth possible. No one is saying people can’t be wealthy. Capitalism requires some inequality, but it breaks when things get too unequal.
      
      All the things you list are contingent family background, peer pressure, socioeconomic conditions, racism, educational environments, and the individual. It’s not all on the individual. In fact, you seem to be a believer of freewill. There is no such thing as absolute freewill. Some people are free than others, but the simply reality of cause and effect challenges freewill and we should all be able to see that.
      
      Your identity, your individuality is mostly a product of your environment, of your time and place. Your mind is not isolated from the outside world. There are biological, linguistic, and even geographical influences shaping who we are. You said, how hard is it to read a book, but you are ignoring scores of social theory, economic behaviorism, and history. Not to mention, marketing and legal influences.
      
      You talked about equal protection under the law. Did you see that story about a young man accused of rape, but the accuser recanted? It was out of California I believe, and the man served 5 years.
      
      Poor people don’t have equal protection. Court appointed lawyers are there to get their 3 years of experience and move on to a firm. They don’t want to take on cases, and they try to talk their defendants into taking the plea deal because it is just more work to try the case. Every lawyer knows this. Was the innocent young man’s choice clear?
      
      I don’t know how old you are, but you have to know that life is more complex than “Just Say No.” It’s almost like republicans don’t want to think about complex issues. Faith is nothing but not-thinking-about-things, so I guess that’s why people of faith gravitate towards republicanism. I’m not saying that you personally don’t think things through, but you constantly dodge the challenges to individualism.
      
      Mark Twain: “Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts.”
    - Gregg
      
      I said, “which is what you seem to endorse”. I stand by it. It still seems that way to me. I am all for equal education environment but we can’t fire lousy teachers and vouchers are opposed by unions, so they are opposed by Democrats. Parents should be able to send their children to whatever public school the want. College education is over rated. It used to be any degree was better than no degree. Today that is not true. We have idiots going 100′s of thousands into debt for degrees in fields where there are no jobs. And they expect someone else to bail them out of their loans. It’s selfish as hell. Do you want more of that? Anyone can go to college if they choose, the opportunity is equal.
      
      The idea that the wealthy owe government is IMO nuts. It’s the other way around. Lost is, they already contribute GREATLY to society. And you want more. Nothing gets broke when things are unequal. Even if it did, how do you make it equal with out legislating equal outcome? The same opportunity given to 100 people will yield 100 different outcomes. Income is largely a choice.
      
      My identity is what I choose to make it. My environment will overcome my will only so long. An adult at some point has to become their own person. You talk about marketing, legal influences and behavior but those are not chains. You have a say… unless you’re just stupid. Stupidity is also a choice.
      
      How do you recommend we have a justice system that is perfect every time? Look at the Trayvon Martin case. Zimmerman must serve hard time because of mob rule. Why are so many on the left
      so unconcerned with treating him equally under the law? We have an AG that tolerates a racist bounty on his head.
      
      We provide defense for anyone who wants it. Equally. Keep your nose clean and it’s highly unlikely you will get in that kind of predicament. If you want to cite instances of innocents being wronged and project that onto the entire justice system then you are doing what you disavowed earlier regarding personal triumph.
      
      In my 52 years I have determined fulfillment really isn’t that complicated. It doesn’t come from government.

TomK in Boston

I’m fascinated by how the righties have their knickers in such a twist about BHO. He is a moderate republican by the metrics I grew up with. The ACA is Romneycare straight out of the Heritage Foundation. He continues Bush foreign policy. He nailed bin Laden. Oil production is at a new recent high. Corporate profits are soaring. He’s done almost nothing to regulate wall st. Shouldn’t the wingnuts love him?

I’m afraid I can only conclude that the extreme hatred is racist. It can’t be policy. Strip away some moments of liberal talk, there is nothing but compromising conservatism.

So, we have an election between a Rockefeller republican and a – what? As we all know, Romney, aka Etchasketch, aka chameleon, “has no core”. The moderate MA gov – definitely to the left of BHO – became a “severe conservative” for the primaries, and is now redrawing the Etchasketch. Who is brave enough to say he knows what will appear on the screen? Etcha has recently admitted that cutting spending now would be bad for the economy! DOH, but it is not the TeaOP Party Line and a rare bit of common sense. It will be interesting to see how far it goes.

Gregg

That’s sick.
- http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
  
  Only in your twisted version of reality.
  - Gregg
    
    Okay, let’s see. TomK said, “The ACA is Romneycare straight out of the Heritage Foundation”. I assume he’s talking about the mandate Heritage at one time endorsed. That’s quite a leap. I realize the jackhammer nuance thing about liberals but really, is Romneycare being debated in the SCOTUS? Was it ever even challenged in court? Has Romney every said he would force it on America? Does he support Obamacare? Is the 10th amendment completely irrelevant? The answer to all of the above is unequivocally no.
    
    TomK said Obama has continued the same foreign policy as Bush. Obama has not set foot in Israel. Bush was in favor of capture and enhanced interrogation, Obama prefers targeted assassination. Bush said over and over that he stood with the people of Iran. When the 2009 revolution came (on Obama’s watch), he gave the revolutionaries the finger. Bush supported Mubarek, Obama told him to step down. Now we have the Muslim Brotherhood running the show. Obama sent the bust of Churchill back, Bush didn’t. Obama gave Russia everything they wanted by killing Bush’s missile defense plans for Poland. He got nothing in return. Bush got a unanimous verdict in the UN Security Council and Congressional approval to go into Iraq. Obama went to Libya with none of it. Bush envisioned changing the face of the entire Middle East as the only real solution. Obama emphasized petty albeit symbolic revenge which did not make us safer.
    
    TomK said oil production was high. Bush increased drilling and gas prices dropped from the announcement alone. Obama imposed a moratorium. Bush’s expansion is now coming online and Obama is taking credit. The same fools who argued against the expansion under Bush because it had no short term gain are now giving Obama credit for producing oil overnight. It’s stupid.
    
    Obama signed the sweeping Dodd/Frank bill and TomK says he has done “almost nothing”.
    
    But be crazy and dismiss all of the above. Say it’s all BS I got from Fox. Obama has added more debt in 3 1/2 years than all previous President combined. He has held more fundraisers than the past 5 Presidents combined. He told Republicans to “sit in back”. He told them “don’t do a lot of talking”. He has waged war on Catholics and now 42 institutions have sued him. Don’t even get me started on “Fast and Furious”. It’s despicable.
    
    But TomK says: “I’m afraid I can only conclude that the extreme hatred is racist.”
    
    Really? Who could be that shallow? It makes no sense on any level. It’s incredibly vacuous. It’s ideology over truth. It is real racism. It’s sick and you agree.
    
    Terrific.
    - Hidan
      
      Stuart Butler of the Heritage Foundation had a piece in USA Today over the weekend defending his opposition to the individual mandate and the ACA in spite of advocating for an individual mandate in the past. In fact, virtually all of the undergrads in my Fall 2011 Intro to the U.S. Health System class identified Butler and the Heritage Foundation as the ‘intellectual fathers’ of the mandate in their final semester long research paper on the mandate and the ACA (post at semester beginning, follow up post at the end).
      
      http://theincidentaleconomist.com/wordpress/stuart-butlers-change-of-mind/
    - Hidan
      
      One of the most interesting things about Stuart’s piece in USA Today is that it doesn’t actually link to the initial document he wrote on the individual mandate in 1989
      (his piece contains many other links). You can read it for yourself and
      his reasoning for changing his mind and then decide for yourself
      whether you think his (and Heritage’s) consistent and vociferous
      opposition to the ACA is consistent with their past views.
      
      http://healthcarereform.procon.org/sourcefiles/1989_assuring_affordable_health_care_for_all_americans.pdf
      
      http://theincidentaleconomist.com/wordpress/stuart-butlers-change-of-mind/
    - Hidan
      
      Stuart M. Butler, who at the time was Heritage’s Director of Domestic Policy Strategies, wrote the second chapter of a position paper with the title A National Health System for America. [Heritage has a PDF version of this document you can download from their website.] The document was over 100 pages long, and envisioned a “consumer-oriented, market-based, comprehensive American health system” that would become “the model for the entire industrialized world.” It was a strictly conservative plan, as evidenced by the inclusion of the idea of replacing Medicare with a voucher system (the same thing Paul Ryan is now championing, in other words).
      
      In his chapter “A Framework for Reform,” Butler lists three elements which would be required to remold the American health care system into his conservative vision for the future. The very first of these, in full (chapters referenced are from the same document):
      
      In his chapter “A Framework for Reform,” Butler lists three elements which would be required to remold the American health care system into his conservative vision for the future. The very first of these, in full (chapters referenced are from the same document):
      
      Element #1: Every resident of the U.S. must, by law, be enrolled in an adequate health care plan to cover major health care costs.
      
      This requirement would imply a compact between the U.S. government and its citizens: in return for the government’s accepting an obligation to devise a market-based system guaranteeing access to care and protecting all families from financial distress due to the cost of an illness, each individual must agree to obtain a minimum level of protection. This means that, while government would take on the obligation to find ways of guaranteeing care for those Americans unable to obtain protection in the market, perhaps because of chronic health problems or lack of income, Americans with sufficient means would no longer be able to be “free riders” on society by avoiding sensible health insurance expenditures and relying on others to pay for care in an emergency or in retirement.
      
      Under this arrangement, all households would be required to protect themselves from major medical costs by purchasing health insurance or enrolling in a prepaid health plan. The degree of financial protection can be debated, but the principle of mandatory family protection is central to a universal health care system in America.
      
      http://articles.businessinsider.com/2012-03-28/politics/31248569_1_individual-mandate-health-care-american-health
    - Gregg
      
      The Butler didn’t do it, Obama did.
    - TomK in Boston
      
      The point being?
    - Gregg
      
      Heritage did not pass a law that has been challenged all the way to the Supreme court. Obama did. I suppose the devastating point Hidan is trying to make is one of Hypocrisy. Who cares about hypocrisy? Not me, I’m more concerned with government taking over 1/6 of the economy.
    - TomK in Boston
      
      The point is simply that it’s a conservative health care policy. Why are you repeatingthe ridiculoustalking point that a system run by private corporations is a gvt takeover of any part of the economy?
    - TomK in Boston
      
      Don’t spin too much, you’ll get dizzy. Look I KNOW you can explain away every moderate republican policy of BHO and find things he didn’t do or assign them to Bush while you assign all Bush’s econ disaster to Obama, but, really, sometimes if it walks like a duck it really is a duck.
      
      ps our liberal governor Etchasketch did say his Romneycare could be a model for the USA. Actually he was hoping it wd be his big claim to fame. I KNOW the Party Line is that he only wanted it for one state. Maybe some people are stupid enough to think that absolves him of the “mandate”.
http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A

I think you are pretty close to being on target. Do not let the rightist nuts on this site discourage you.

As a GAY MAN, BHO did big favors me and my kind. May the religious nuts burn in their hell. And I will always be grateful.

Ban the Republican party. And banish that FRAUD Romney to Europe..where his money is. Or is it the Cayman Islands…or both.
- TomK in Boston
  
  Thanks Jason, and no worries about the righties, the worst they can do is bore you to death parroting the same scripts since 1980.
JGC

I agree with you that the extreme opposition is racist in nature. (Again, I say the extreme opposition.) There was such visceral disgust from day 1 from a small (yet very vocal and very organized) voting group which took over all the airspace from the moderate Republicans.

I have used this forum before to have my say on this topic of racism and the Obama presidency, and so I won’t go further now other than to say: it exists.

McCain and Romney were both essentially true and principled folks to the original fiscal conservative side of the party until the extreme far right Ringwraiths twisted them into unrecognizable shadows of their former selves, to garner the acceptance of the voting minority.
- TomK in Boston
  
  Wonder if we’ll ever see another example of McCain telling the woman questioner that Obama is really a decent man? Etchasketch didn’t feel the need to object to the statement that he should be tried for treason.
JonS

I find your post to be offensive in the extreme. The real intolerance practiced today can be found on the left where all too often the attempt is made to demonize opponents rather than engage in a civil and constructive exchange of ideas. When you have nothing to support your argument other than a ludicrous laughable comment that Obama is some moderate republican, cry racism and hope that ends the conversation. The failure of Obama’s presidency has nothing to do with racism. Obama is failing because of his inexperience, poor political skills, and rigid adherence to some very bad ideas reinforced by unbridled arrogance. America is ready to be led by a black president –indeed we elected one with 53% of the popular vote. The problem is that the particular man we elected president turned out not to be, and still is not , ready to lead this great nation.
- http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
  
  Formerly great Nation…thanks to folks who think like you.
- Zero
  
  Ha! There was a forum on civil discourse aired from this website and viewable on youtube. Tom Ashbrook was the moderator. And they discussed how why no conservatives would come on the forum.
  
  Republicans, such as yourself, constantly talk about Obama being some sort of dictator, but you don’t even know what democracy is. You don’t even use the world. You don’t know what an autocrat is, nor totalitarianism.
  
  I know it sounds hard, but you need to think. Who champions being uncompromising? Diplomats compromise. Autocrats do not yield. That is the destructive nature of republicanism.
  
  Why are republicans so religiously against a 3% tax hike on people who can clearly afford them? Is a 3% tax hike radical? Because the only thing radical is taking a religious stand against a modest proposal.
  
  Get your head out of your ass.
  - Zero
    
    Sorry for the grammatical and spelling mistakes. I typed this one pretty fast, because the comment above is so damn stupid.
  - TomK in Boston
    
    We’ve taken the top tax rate down from 90% to 15% since the end of WW2, and, predictably, the net effect has been a money flow to the top. Yet, the right screams that a 3% tax hike, which would be nothing but a baby step back toward the center, is “radical”. They accuse BHO of being a socialist for timidly proposing tax rates that are not the lowest but simply very low. Meanwhile, they continue their chicken little routine about the big bad deficit. As you say, their heads are where the sun don’t shine.
    
    BHO the socialist, the dictator, attempting a radical transformation of the USA, ROTFL. Health care plan from Romney, Gingrich and the Heritage Foundation. Neocon foreign policy. Nails OBL. Drone strikes everywhere. Extends Bush tax cuts. In the face of the biggest econ disaster since 1929, timid, minimal re-regulation of wall st. Economic team from wall st. Top 1% richer than ever. Corporate profits soaring.
    
    A veritable Karl Marx, huh?
Hidan

Guy below complains and calls your post offensive to the extreme. Yet in his previous post uses such words as

“pathetic” ” hopelessly stupid” ” unmitigated disaster” “uninformed” ,” ill-informed “, “a green energy parasite” , “dependent on government handouts.”

Don’t forget “ludicrous laughable”

But according to Jon your the offensive ones.

P.S.

I would say “don’t you love it when rightwing conservatives prove your point?” But really it shouldn’t bring one any joy how hateful and often racist such are. But boy did those focus groups help with the dog whistles on being overtly racist while having the ability to deny it.

Obama has in almost all levels been an moderate Republicans even a neo-con with some of the bush’s previous policies. Yet he’s portrayed as an leftist pinko.
- TomK in Boston
  
  LOL, Obama the lefty. He talks some liberal talk but is all moderate republican and neo-con walk. So, what’s got them so upset? Obviously, JonS isn’t going to tell us.
Terry Tree Tree

Fuel prices have dropped significantly, too!

Jmgcon

Hi Tom,

I don’t know if this message will hold any weight, but I think it would be wonderful if you all could do a spot on the Marisa DeFranco US Senate campaign. She’s been ignored by the majority of media outlets up until this month. Today she was featured in the NYTimes! She’s a strong, intelligent and outspoken woman. It would be more than appropriate to have her on your show. You can read more about her at marisadefranco.com. Thanks for reading.Best,Joanna

Hidan

Cool thanks,

She sounds far better than the ones running now.

Hidan

Check page 8 below

By Stuart M. Bulter, PHD

http://healthcarereform.procon.org/sourcefiles/1989_assuring_affordable_health_care_for_all_americans.pdf

2) Mandate all households to obtain adequate insurance

The mandate is based on two important principles, first that health care protections is a responsibility of individuals not business . Second it assumes that there is an implicit contract between households and society

Gregg

3) It trashes the Constitution.
- http://profile.yahoo.com/PQOCSU3NJ5J6SSQBEM5YBFCPZY Jason__A
  
  The Constitution, like your thinking, is an 18th century concept. That is why it has been amended. In the modern world health care is a right. I know that is something you rightists hate because you love your money more than anything else, and the thought of parting with some of it to help others is an alien concept. Deal with it.
  - Gregg
    
    The Constitution matters, if you want to amend it, fine. Good luck. Until then you just sound greedy.
  - Zero
    
    I disagree with the first part. The Constitution is a document borne out of the Enlightenment. Most republicans have counter-Enlightenment viewpoints. They believe secularism is evil, but secularization created the modern world.
    
    But I realize that’s beside the point of your greater argument with Gregg.
    - Warren
      
      The Father of the Republican party freed the Democrats slaves.Frigginj secularists
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      Come up to the Twentieth Century, at least, please?
      Since you are so stuck in the 19 th Century, we can’t expect you to make it to the 21 st?
    - Gregg
      
      How about,GWB liberated 50 million in Iraq and Afghanistan?
  - Warren
    
    You remind me of the kid in Peanuts,the one witgh the black cloud over his head.You must be the life of the party
- TomK in Boston
  
  You don’t understand the Constitution. It was written to create a strong federal gvt after the disastrous, unworkable experiment with the Articles of Confederation. The commerce clause is important, not a minor point. Your views are in line with the Articles, not the Constitution. Washington would be amazed by the quibbling about the “mandate”.
  - Gregg
    
    Do you really believe the Commerce clause validates the mandate? Next you’ll pull out the ol’ “mandated to buy guns” thing. Oh well, we’ll find out soon enough.

Gregg

I predict Walker will win the recall and Wisconsin will go red in November.

Mrs. Thurston Howell IV

I don’t “like” this comment, but it has substance from what I read in the (Toronto) Globe and Mail, by Konrad Yakabuski, 26 May, 2012:

” …If Mr. Walker survives, as the polls predict he will, Wisconsin will be in play in the fall presidential race… Only a few months ago, the Obama campaign considered Wisconsin a lock. After all, he won it by double digits in 2008. But that was before rich Republican backers were freed by the Supreme Court to spend willy-nilly on elections.”

So, now what….?
- Gregg
  
  I wouldn’t make a prediction if I didn’t have some substance to base it on. Walker turned a huge deficit into a huge surplus. His policies worked and Wisconsin’s future is bright.
  - Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
    
    As to your first statement, maybe sometimes you could give the source as the basis for your commentary, since many folks reflexively dismiss your short form. As to the latter half, I am not at all convinced.
    - Gregg
      
      The source is my gut, that’s all. I assumed that was clear.
    - Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
      
      That is exactly what I mean. GW was a guy who called it by his gut instincts, and he was proud of that. Dems also know how that worked out for them,and for the rest of the country. If all we need to proceed is how our gut instincts take us, why do we need the Census Bureau and their statistics, why do we need scientific evidence that is peer reviewed, why do we need any information provided from credible sources before our opinions are stated? I just feel how I feel, and to hell with anyone who doesn’t agree with me. I don’t have to prove anything to anyone before I take action on my opinion.
      
      Good night, Gregg. Good night Moon. Good night to SpaceX who will again take us to the Moon (and maybe beyond, if we can agree on scientific, research-based information)…
    - Gregg
      
      Now you’re sounding like Gilligan. Do you want proof or peer reviewed science to show Walker will win and Wisconsin will go red? There is none. I have no idea what you mean by “proceed”. I understand some need to use any opportunity they can to slam Bush but really, this is a bit over the top. It’s just an opinion. I could be wrong, lighten up.
    - Mrs. Thurston Howell IV
      
      Like Gilligan?! Hmmph! OK, I’ll lighten up. Next week, instead of Gilligan’s Island, let’s re-enact Mayberry R.F.D.
      I can be Aunt Bee, and you can be Barney Fife!
    - Gregg
      
      I prefer being Goober.
    - Terry Tree Tree
      
      With ALL the information available, to PROVE, or DISPROVE, you rely on your ‘gut’, for important decisions?
    - Gregg
      
      News flash TTT, if I make a guess about who will win a recall in a state I don’t even live in, I AM NOT MAKING AN IMPORTANT DECISION!!
      
      What are you smoking… seriously?
    - Greyman
      
      Dear Lovie (if that’s hereditary, too): Compare Wisconsin with California for the interim. Californians still boast that their state economy can be construed as the eighth largest in the world, though they never tell us what to make exactly of their $16 billion+ hole and exactly how they came by it. To many of us who are neither Californian nor Wisconsinite, Scott Walker seems to have a much better handle on state management that Jerry Brown can boast.
    - Don_B1
      
      Jerry Brown is hamstrung by the rules for passing a tax package through the legislature where it takes a two-thirds majority to raise taxes. Thus a minority in the legislature can prevent a reasonable resolution to budget problems.
      
      In Wisconsin, Republicans have control of the legislature as well as the governor’s office.
      
      It is a structural difference, not a better program difference.
    - Greyman
      
      But with California’s self-imposed rules governing raising taxes (staggering belief that some court out there hasn’t invalidated those provisions), how is it that the legislature, KNOWING its practical inability to raise taxes, persists year-in year-out in finding new ways to spend tax revenues that are not being collected? Sounds as if California’s legislators are irresponsible in not limiting their appetite for spending to their tax collection ability.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    DID Scott Walker give ‘No-Bid Contracts’ to his rich supporters, BEFORE declaring the budget problems? THEN using THAT deficit, to declare war on union workers, that don’t make NEAR as much as his high-paid cronies?
    THAT was what I was reading when Walker started on the teachers’ union etc…

Warren

The first act of Pres.Obama was the rescinding of the D.C.Voucher-scholarship program.This program allowed 15,000,mostly poor,to escape the heinous public schools.Pres.Romney promises vouchers,Pres.Obama says Nyet!!!The unions destroyed Eastern Airline,American Airline,GM.,the public schools,the Post Office,California ….They almost got Wisconsin.Next week the citizens of Wisconson will say no to rampaging Union thuggery(the NEA givers 100% to the Dems.).All hail the latest of the Liberated States.All hail,”Right To Work”

Greyman

You mean: the heartwarming public schools that Obama does not send Sasha and Malia to? The same lovely public schools that Bill and Hil did not send Chelsea to? Yeh, I think those are the very schools elite Democrats do not send their children to. Talking the talk is sufficient for elite Democratic parents unwilling to walk the walk, and has been for a good long while. If Mama Obama (I speak here of BH hisself) were concerned with the poor quality of public schools, he’d've canned Arne Duncan and the Dept. of Educational Mismanagement already.

Dee

To Diane Brady

The dishonesty of Romney’s claims of Obama as a job destroyer and his own record at Bain as as a job creator….See the URL . http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/06/opinion/bain-barack-and-jobs.html

Gregg

Romney is working the language a bit but I have less problem with his claims than I do Krugman’s characterizations. Obama sucked the confidence out of the economy on day one by refusing to extend the tax cuts. Within six weeks he got his bogus “stimulus” bill through. Obamacare is a disaster for the economy. Romney is right. And regarding Staples, they would be out of business without Bain. I don’t see a problem with taking some credit for their current job numbers.
- Terry Tree Tree
  
  ONE sucess story for Bain?�
      How about some FULL disclosure?
      The TOTAL number of jobs created, to jobs eliminated, or lost?
      The AMOUNTS Bain GOT, versus what happened to EACH company?
      The TIMES that Bain ‘PROFITED’, when the company went under, or was stagnant?
      Don’t religious types ascribe to ‘THOU shalt NOT bear FALSE witness!’?
      WHY NOT FULL HONESTY?
  - Gregg
    
    Companies that go out of business fire all their employees. Obama fired 50,000 at GM.

Gregg

I read lots of liberals say the wealthy owe the Government for their success. They couldn’t succeed had the government not built a bridge or some such nonsense. Leave aside the fact the wealthy DO pay more and for the sake of this argument let’s say the libs are right. The rich owe their success to the State and should pay dearly, fine. I could almost buy into the notion concerning infrastructure, wars and a modest safety net. But do they owe the poor? What the libs are talking about is redistribution of wealth, pure and simple. They just couch it in do-goody terms. That is not what this Republic is built on.

Gone fishin’!

Steve_T

If you try to fish with what your feeding us you won’t get a bite.
- Gregg
  
  I got a mess for dinner.
TomK in Boston

You have a narrow perspective Our broadest prosperity was during the period of strong progressive taxation. What do you think a progressive income tax is? The fortunate not only pay more but pay at a higher rate. Then what happens is we have a society in which the poor do better and buy the products that make the rich richer, and everyone wins.

If you’re concerned about “redistribution”, just have a look at the income of the top 1%, and you’ll see that voodoo econ has redistributed the income of the middle class to the top. Redistribution is indeed a problem, but it’s going in the opposite direction from what worries you.

The top 1% now have the largest share of the income and close to the lowest taxes since 1929. For the romney types who can claim the 15% rate, it is THE lowest taxes. Don’t you think it’s a little ridiculous to be worrying about “redistribution” to the poor at a time when a tidal wave of redistribution is flowing to the rich?
- brettearle
  
  TomK,
  
  One of the reasons that the Radical Right digs in their heels more and more, as more of the facts roll in about a growing Plutocracy, is that to the degree that they are proven wrong more and more, to that degree, their entire belief system is not only threatened, but in danger of evisceration.
  
  To protect themselves and the insecurity of their egos–partially driven by a denial of guilt–they need to overcompensate.
  
  Underneath it all, Conservatives lack the necessary compassion and vision to run a country–whether the country’s in trouble or not.
  
  And this country’s in trouble.
  - TomK in Boston
    
    brettearle, I’m afraid there is a simpler explanation – growing the Plutocracy is the real agenda. The oligarchs aren’t playing nice anymore. They’re simply trying to grab every $ they don’t have already, with the help of bought legislators and “useful idiots” who still believe in trickle down. What you say helps explain why the idiots are still on board.
    - brettearle
      
      Well, I appreciate your point.
      
      The fundamental difference is that I think some of these sell-out profiteers have the semblance of a conscience.
      
      Not all, but some.
  - Gregg
    
    November can’t get here soon enough.
  - Terry Tree Tree
    
    GREAT ANALYSIS!! CONCISE!
    - brettearle
      
      Thanks, Terry….
- Gregg
  
  I don’t care how much anyone has. There was no redistribution upwards. No money was exchanged.
  - TomK in Boston
    
    That’s funny. The emperor has a nice new suit, too.
    
    Don’t care how much anyone has, huh? So you’ll be happy in a medieval aristocracy of lords and peasants? Who knows, maybe I’ll throw you a groat.
    - Gregg
      
      No need to throw me anything. If you want to obsess about others who have more than you, have at it. Envy is not my thing.
jefe68

This is a great example of a straw-man argument.
You’re a real piece of work. And you call yourself a Christian?
- Gregg
  
  No, I’m not a christian and there is no straw man.

brettearle

Your perception of the United States–including its political system and economic MO–is skewered, jaded, and is a deplorable rationale for the country’s growing plutocracy and Washington’s own entrapment for special interests, lobbyists and Big Business fundraising.
�
Your phrase, “redistribution of wealth”, is a tired, hackneyed bit of infectious propaganda that has inundated the election cycles, since Obama has been in office.
�
The United States has always had a tradition of recognizing its poor, underprivileged, and disadvantaged.
�
And everybody knows it.�
�
That’s what part of a Democracy is ALL ABOUT.
�
What’s more, our economic system of capitalism provides the opportunity for individuals to pursue dreams and fortunes–according to their ability and capacity.
�
To whom much is given, much is expected.
�
People who have much more, can, and should, offer opportunities for the country to function more optimally by supporting a safety net and contributing to the quality and greater good of its citizens.
�
At the same time, Liberals should recognize that when the United States passes through severe economic stress–as the country is now experiencing–an innate sense of compassion and vision must be mitigated against an economic system, which stability is notably mercurial. �
�
To suggest that the rich should rebuff such moral/ehtical/legal/pragmatic obligations, by exploiting the alien, fear-mongering rhetoric of COMMUNISM and SOCIALISM–when apllying the phrase, “redistribution of wealth” to the debate–is a typical, malignant example of base, Right Wing propganda. �
�
We’re exhausted by this thin, one dimensional, primitive argument.

brettearle

The above comment is a response to Gregg at 7:00 AM
Gregg

“From each according to his abilities to each according to his needs.” Is that your dream?

Democracy is NOT all about redistribution of wealth. It helps no one. I have not suggested the rich rebuff squat.

“Democracy is 2 wolves and a lamb voting on what to eat for lunch. Liberty is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote.”
- brettearle
  
  Ability in a communist system and ability in a capitalism are two distinct entities.
  
  Because ability could lead to wealth in a capitalistic system does not mean that a wealthy individual needs to ignore a legal framework that may very well require him/her to contribute to the system, more than others.
  
  Regardless of who’s in Congress, or in the White House, such policy could very well be perenially true.
  
  With you, it’s all orr nothing, either you’re with us or against us.
  
  You don’t see shades of grey or nuances.
  
  If the White house wishes to tax the rich more heavily, you come across with a knee-jerk reaction of the Commander-of-Chief either being a communisat or a socialist.
  
  This is rediculous, banal, radical propaganda, politically bigoted, and a serious threat to rational discourse.
  
  You pollute the discussion. Big Time.
  - brettearle
    
    Where is it written, or understood, in the American credo that the poor should be ignored?
    - brettearle
      
      Where?
    - Gregg
      
      Where is is written that wealth should be redistributed more and more and more and more and on and on with no limits nor regard to economic impact?
    - Gregg
      
      Nowhere, they shouldn’t be and they sure as hell aren’t.
  - Gregg
    
    That’s sick.
    
    P.S. – Please don’t tell me what I think.

TomK in Boston

Gregg, your citations of success against the odds is a smokescreen. If enough people try someone will win, no matter how long the odds. I understand that it’s good class warfare tactics to advertize the rare successes even as the odds get longer and longer, eventually leading to the hunger games scenario, but it’s bad for the USA.

Nobody is talking about gvt handouts. That’s more of your smoke. The question is, what are the chances that hard work by an average American leads to a good payoff? In the 50s and 60s those chances were very good, with the middle class steadily moving up. Now, after years of voodoo economics, the odds are longer. Plenty of Americans are working very hard and sinking. I’d like to reverse that.

Gregg

Don’t have kids before you can afford them, don’t drink or do drugs, be dependable, work hard, passionately pursue excellence (all free) and the odds for success are highly in your favor. Big time, this is America… so far.

Worried for the country(MA)

Obama is too moderate for the progressives. He is too socialist for the right.

We can agree on one issue that Obama has united both sides.

Obama is incompetent.

No budget in 4 years while running up $6T in new debt is grounds for impeachment.

TomK in Boston

The debt comes from the tax cuts, the wars, and the economic crash itself. How can that be “grounds for impeachment” to anyone but a partisan fanatic?

If by incompetent you mean that BHO didn’t end the tax cuts for >$250K and stop the wars, then we can agree on something, bearing in mind the difficulty of getting anything done. Do you think he cd get a tax hike through congress?

I would give him low marks on no foreclosure relief, an economic team from wall st, no major REregulation of wall st, and nowhere near enough stimulus spending.
jefe68

That’s real funny. You can’t impeach a sitting president on those grounds. By the way Congress is also responsible here. You have these right wing ideologues who do not believe in compromise. Well news flash, politics is all about compromising.
- TomK in Boston
  
  “high crimes and misdemeanors” becomes “incompetent according to Worried”

Mrs. Thurston Howell IV

Quebec’s student protest for free higher education continues, but it has now morphed into a larger societal protest. After the some of the striking students performed certain thuggish and possibly terrorist acts last week (from spitting on professors trying to enter the schools and physically blocking entrance by those students who are not striking and want to pursue their education, to throwing smoke bombs in the Montreal subway to shut it down, to lighting fires in the downtown sector, to rampaging through the classrooms of a university, grabbing female students by their arms, shouting obscenities at the instructors and non-striking students and vandalizing the classrooms, etc.), the provincial government responded by suspending classes in the 14 affected schools and quickly voting in an emergency law, Bill 78, which was intended to prevent striking students from infringing on the rights of the non-striking students and provide more security for the population. It enacted demands that all protest gatherings of 50 people or more register at least 8 hours before with the police, and provide a map of their itinerary; That they conduct any protest at least 50m from the doors of the educational institution; That anyone arrested for breaking these laws to be subject to hundreds of dollars in fines, and the organizations behind the planning of the event to be subject to thousands of dollars in fines. The law could be revoked upon resolution of the student strike, or by July 2013.

Now even many people who don’t necessarily agree with the striking students are provoked by what they feel is an overreach by the government to squash their free speech and right to assemble and protest. The result has been a series of spontaneous marches based on the Chilean caceralazos, known more locally as the Movement Casserole, filled with pot-and pan-banging grandparents, parents with their kids, Occupiers, lawyers, unions, the United Church of Canada, anarchists, non-striking students and (from Monique Muise’s article in the Montreal Gazette, 28 May 2012) “In addition to families, students, and many grey-haired marchers, the usual colourful cast of characters was on hand…including the protestor known as Anarchopanda, who donned his usual panda costume and attempted, somewhat unsuccessfully, to elicit hugs from the riot officers, and a woman who pedalled through the crowd completely naked, except for a pair of shoes. Police left her alone.” Try to watch it on a You-Tube video or on Huffington Post, if you can.

So these are peaceful protests, if you can call the sound of hundreds of pots being whacked with a spoon peaceful, and quite a large cross-section of the population is participating. It started out as a protest against an increase of $350 in tuition, and now has swelled into a general feeling of disgust over official corruption, lack of freedom to speak and assemble, impatience over wait times for hospital procedures, anything and everything and not any particular single cause, but some kind of overwhelming frustration. “I’m mad as hell and I’m not going to take this anymore!”

Coming to your neighborhood soon?

Mrs. Thurston Howell IV

I just saw on CBC News that American folk legend Doc Watson has died. I hate to lose the best ones. Our family feels devastated, even if he reached those stately years. He is truly one of a kind.

Slipstream

I see there is a follow-up show on this issue, and I havent listened to that yet, but I have to comment here on Romney’s “school choice” idea. This sounds like an attempt to bring marketplace thinking into education. “Hey, you wanna charge me $1.29 for onions? The guy down the street’s got ‘em for 99 cents. What are you gonna do for me?” If adopted it would have the effect of ruining many teachers’ lives and cutting their incomes, but I doubt it would lead to better schools.

Public education is not marketplace commodity, and treating it like one would be a big mistake. There would be chaos to be sure as busy people struggle to decide what schools to send their kids to, whether to change midyear, etc. It would lead to more school closures and startups and make-overs. Quite possibly – and this might be the secret dream behind these efforts – it would lead to corporate take-overs of the schools, outsourcing public education to profit-making businesses, and the destruction of teachers’ unions.

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