This blog will focus on political images I have found all around the Internet, though I will intersperse some commentary and quotes that I find interesting.
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Headlines that tell a story all on their own...
Pres. Woodrow Wilson on evolution in 1912:"that of course like every other man of intelligence and education I do believe in organic evolution. It surprises me that at this late date such questions should be raised."
Ben Stein on Bill O'Reilly last night: “Mr. O’Reilly, sir, there is no correlation of raising taxes and unemployment. If you can show it to me, I’ll eat your shoe.”
GOP leadership is coming out in opposition to Obama's proposal to extend the payroll tax cut. The clear, unavoidable message: Americans workers should pay more taxes, while the rich should pay less.
While Michele Bachmann fights and opposes anti-bullying campaigns, a 19 year old college student was beaten to death Bachmann's hometown of Waterloo, Iowa this weekend. Witnesses say Marcellus Richard Andrew's attackers shouted anti-gay slurs while kicking him in the head to death
Ben Stein on Bill O'Reilly last night: “Mr. O’Reilly, sir, there is no correlation of raising taxes and unemployment. If you can show it to me, I’ll eat your shoe.”
GOP leadership is coming out in opposition to Obama's proposal to extend the payroll tax cut. The clear, unavoidable message: Americans workers should pay more taxes, while the rich should pay less.
While Michele Bachmann fights and opposes anti-bullying campaigns, a 19 year old college student was beaten to death Bachmann's hometown of Waterloo, Iowa this weekend. Witnesses say Marcellus Richard Andrew's attackers shouted anti-gay slurs while kicking him in the head to death
Friday, August 19, 2011
Thursday, August 18, 2011
This is an interesting take on things....
Why poor people support tax breaks for the rich?
Why do lower middle-class and working class Americans support tax breaks for the rich? New research suggests it might not be about aspirations—i.e., "Maybe I could be rich someday." Instead, says the Economist, people are more concerned with how social programs and wealth distribution might help people worse off than them become better off than them.In other words: Nobody wants to be on the bottom and national economics looks a lot like a junior high locker room.
Read the whole article by clicking HERE.
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Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Headlines that tell a story all on their own...
“Nearly half of… mega-donors received hefty business contracts, tax breaks or appointments under Perry”
FDR Went to Wisconsin to Battle "Economic Royalists" but Obama Avoids the State and the Fight
Pentagon Eyes Slashing Military Pensions - "a radical proposal to overhaul retirement for the nation's 1.4 million service members, once a bedrock guarantee of military service."
Michele Bachmann fail: "Let's all say happy birthday to Elvis Presley today!" (today's the 34th anniversary of his death)
(And as the leader in the race for the Republican Presidential nomination, she's an embarrassment to our country.)
Has our bloated security budget made us safer? - We've spent nearly $8 trillion on counterterrorism since 9/11. It's time to assess the results.
Monday, August 15, 2011
Political headlines (links) that tell a story all by themselves.
Michele Bachmann and Rick Perry aren't just devout—both have deep ties to a fringe fundamentalist movement known as Dominionism, which says Christians should rule the world.
Warren Buffet in NYT op-ed: "We mega-rich should not continue to get extraordinary tax breaks while most Americans struggle to make ends meet." "My friends and I have been coddled long enough by a billionaire-friendly Congress. It's time for our government to get serious about shared sacrifice."
Rick Perry's Texas has the highest rate of people without health insurance at 25%; Texas also ranks 47th in the country for the level of state spending on education; Texas has the highest rate for the levels of toxic chemicals released into the water and carcinogens released into the air
44 percent of Social Security recipients, 41 percent of military veterans, 43 percent of unemployment recipients, 40 percent of Medicare recipients, 43 percent of college Pell Grant recipients and 27 percent of welfare recipients all said they had never used a government social program.
(How many times have we said it? You can't fix stupid (ignorance).
Warren Buffet in NYT op-ed: "We mega-rich should not continue to get extraordinary tax breaks while most Americans struggle to make ends meet." "My friends and I have been coddled long enough by a billionaire-friendly Congress. It's time for our government to get serious about shared sacrifice."
Rick Perry's Texas has the highest rate of people without health insurance at 25%; Texas also ranks 47th in the country for the level of state spending on education; Texas has the highest rate for the levels of toxic chemicals released into the water and carcinogens released into the air
44 percent of Social Security recipients, 41 percent of military veterans, 43 percent of unemployment recipients, 40 percent of Medicare recipients, 43 percent of college Pell Grant recipients and 27 percent of welfare recipients all said they had never used a government social program.
(How many times have we said it? You can't fix stupid (ignorance).
Private vs. Public sector jobs
Unh - yeah - you know that canard about the overpaid government worker? Maybe, like most Republican drivel, it's not true.
and if you include benefits?
and if you include benefits?
A glimmer of hope for progressives?
WASHINGTON -- As the economy worsens, President Obama and his senior aides are considering whether to adopt a more combative approach on economic issues, seeking to highlight substantive differences with Republicans in Congress and on the campaign trail rather than continuing to pursue elusive compromises, advisers to the president say.
-- from "White House Debates Fight on Economy" by Binyamin Appelbaum and Helene Cooper, in today's NYT
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Sunday, August 14, 2011
Andy Borowitz on the Iowa Straw Poll
August 13, 2011S & P Downgrades Iowa’s IQStraw Poll ‘Alarms’ Ratings Agency
AMES, IOWA (The Borowitz Report) – Calling the results of today's Iowa straw poll “alarming,” Standard and Poor’s took the unprecedented action of downgrading Iowa’s IQ. While the effects of such an extraordinary measure are hard to predict, experts say the IQ downgrade could result in Iowans having difficulty completing sentences or operating a television remote. “This downgrade would be very upsetting to Republicans in Iowa,” said an S & P spokesman. “Fortunately, there’s no way they’ll understand it.” The winner in the straw poll, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn), gave a rousing victory speech that was simulcast in English across the state. But there may be tough sledding ahead for Rep. Bachmann, as a new poll shows her losing support to Texas Governor Rick Perry among voters who describe themselves as morons. Gov. Perry kicked off his presidential campaign today in South Carolina, unveiling a new stump speech in which he promised to repeal the twentieth century | |||
Saturday, August 13, 2011
Headlines that tell a story all on their own...
Eisenhower cut defence spending 27% overall, Nixon 29%, Bush Sr 17% and Reagan 10%. The great exception to the rule is George W. Bush, who increased spending by an astonishing 70%during his tenure.
The Voices Faulting G.O.P. Economic Policies Are Growing Louder.
S.F subway operators temporarily shut down cell service in four downtown stations to interfere with a protest over the fatal shooting by a BART police officer
America Is In Decline Because Of The Institutionalization Of Stupidity
There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.” - Warren Buffett
Barney Frank Questions the Questions at NPR. Q: The biggest part of the federal budget is entitlements... FRANK answer: No, wrong. I'm sorry. The Defense budget is bigger than Medicare, and Social Security is, in fact, self-financing, still is.
The Voices Faulting G.O.P. Economic Policies Are Growing Louder.
S.F subway operators temporarily shut down cell service in four downtown stations to interfere with a protest over the fatal shooting by a BART police officer
America Is In Decline Because Of The Institutionalization Of Stupidity
There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.” - Warren Buffett
Barney Frank Questions the Questions at NPR. Q: The biggest part of the federal budget is entitlements... FRANK answer: No, wrong. I'm sorry. The Defense budget is bigger than Medicare, and Social Security is, in fact, self-financing, still is.
What the conservatives are doing to America...
The announcement that a German company is opening a small manufacturing facility in Wisconsin brings up a question that just a few years ago would have been unthinkable:
Is this another case of a European company coming to the United States for the cheap labor?
As contrary to the stature we're accustomed to the United States having in the world, this is a very real trend. Ikea, a company that has done just fine in Sweden with strong unions and a $19 minimum wage, came to Virginia and started its employees at $8 per hour, with many of them temps at lower wages and no benefits. T-Mobile, owned by a heavily unionized German company, fights unions here. BMW recently drove down wages by laying off unionized workers at a California distribution center and outsourcing their jobs to a subcontractor. But in South Carolina, BMW skipped ever having a union, paying its workers $15 an hour, half what German BMW workers make.
Is this another case of a European company coming to the United States for the cheap labor?
As contrary to the stature we're accustomed to the United States having in the world, this is a very real trend. Ikea, a company that has done just fine in Sweden with strong unions and a $19 minimum wage, came to Virginia and started its employees at $8 per hour, with many of them temps at lower wages and no benefits. T-Mobile, owned by a heavily unionized German company, fights unions here. BMW recently drove down wages by laying off unionized workers at a California distribution center and outsourcing their jobs to a subcontractor. But in South Carolina, BMW skipped ever having a union, paying its workers $15 an hour, half what German BMW workers make.
Read more here - Daily Kos
Friday, August 12, 2011
News Item...
The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York called a new city requirement that sex education be taught at all public middle and high schools “troubling” on Wednesday, and some Catholic officials said they would advise Catholic parents not to let their children participate.
Here's the thing: An entity that aided and abetted child rapists shouldn't really be speaking against sex education for children
READ MORE
But what is amazing to me is that the church even has the BALLS to make comment on this.
The Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York called a new city requirement that sex education be taught at all public middle and high schools “troubling” on Wednesday, and some Catholic officials said they would advise Catholic parents not to let their children participate.
And, in response, the blogger added...
Here's the thing: An entity that aided and abetted child rapists shouldn't really be speaking against sex education for children
READ MORE
But what is amazing to me is that the church even has the BALLS to make comment on this.
Tuesday, August 09, 2011
Not all of us love America
The Daily Beast reports 19 GOP congressional freshman met for dinner last week and “reveled in the satisfaction of knowing they had dramatically brought Washington to its knees.”
“This ragtag band of proud obstructionists is already looking down the calendar to its next targets: blocking President Obama’s judicial and federal-agency nominations, radically restructuring Medicare and other entitlement programs, and maybe even killing the gasoline tax.”
Sunday, August 07, 2011
Thursday, August 04, 2011
Why the drop in Stock Prices?
From Time Magazine - click on the link to read more.
Some have said the fact that the debt deal was struck has allowed investors to focus more clearly on the economy, and what they see, now that they're looking again, is bad news. But it's more than just that. In the Aug. 15 issue of TIME, columnist Rana Foroohar argues that the debt deal will increase the level of inequality in the U.S. You can read her very good article here. I agree with Foroohar that it is bad news — and perhaps even worse than she makes it out. Inequality not only caused the financial crisis; it could make the recovery much slower. Here's why:I have written a few pieces about how the debt deal could slow the economy. A cut in spending, be it from consumers or the government, during a recession is sure to cost the economy jobs.
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