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.
Thursday, November 30, 2017
Wednesday, November 29, 2017
Why Aren't Dems in Congress Raising More Hell to Oppose the Worst GOP Tax Bill Ever?
Could congressional Democrats be showing their fealty to corporate America?
By Steven Rosenfeld / AlterNet November 24, 2017, 8:54 AM GMT
Let me offer a theory about why Democrats in Congress are not going after the Republicans' worst tax bill ever with the same visceral vehemence they used to oppose the GOP’s efforts earlier this year to gut Obamacare and Medicaid.
The House and Senate versions of the bill, while differing in some particulars, have been parsed by the country’s best fiscal analysts, and as longtime tax policy investigative reporter David Cay Johnston noted, “share the same basic feature: huge tax savings for big business and the rich, while more than half of Americans may see their income taxes rise between now and the end of 2027. You can read solid analyses by three organizations with track records for accuracy in their tax and spending estimates here, here and here.”
So why are the Democrats not making more noise about a giant reverse-Robinhood scheme, that at least on the Senate side, also includes moves to gut Obamacare by ending the tax penalty for not carrying health insurance. If passed, that provision would allow millions to drop their coverage, which in turn, would raise premiums for everyone else. Remember how last summer Dems rose in the House and Senate to remind Republicans that tens of thousands of voters in their districts would lose their healthcare?
The answer—and it’s a theory, but one honed from covering national politics—is too many Democrats across Congress are still beholden to wealthier constituents, whether individuals who contribute to their campaigns, corporate employers who threaten to leave if they don’t get more corporate welfare, or people in their social circles who get invitations to Kennedy Center galas.
Whatever is really going on in the minds of individual Democratic members of Congress—which might include shoehorning in giveaways for local constituents—there is a growing sense that the opposition in Washington is not being so loyal to mainstream America, which they like to think they are defending. The question is, why?
New York Times op-ed columnist Paul Krugman has noted that Republican talking points about middle-class tax breaks are not just flat-out lies, but have been the standard flat-out lie we've heard for years. Perhaps that reality is numbing Democrats.
“Top-down class warfare, coupled with false claims to be cutting taxes on the middle class, has been standard G.O.P. operating procedure for a long time,” Krugman wrote two weeks ago. He continued:
“In fact, for policy wonks of a certain age, the current tax debate inspires an overwhelming sense of déjà vu, because many of the tricks Republicans are using come right out of the Bush administration’s playbook in 2001 and 2003. Tax breaks that phase in or out to make the 10-year budget impact look smaller? Check. Misleading examples and calculations to give the false impression of a tax cut for the middle class? Check. Pretending that tax cuts come free, that they won’t eventually have to be offset by cuts to popular programs? Check, again.”
But there’s something deeper and more nefarious going on this time around, Krugman observed, which makes the current GOP tax proposals anything but business-and-lying-as-usual.
“This time around, much more clearly than before, the goal seems to be to favor wealth, especially inherited wealth, over work. And buried in the legislation are multiple measures that would make it much harder for the children of the middle and working classes to work their way up,” Krugman said, citing examples.
Read more
https://www.alternet.org/economy/why-arent-dems-congress-raising-more-hell-oppose-worst-gop-tax-bill-eve
Did Jeff Bezos really earn his $100 Billion making him world’s richest?
NOVEMBER 26, 2017 BY EGBERTO WILLIES
Our system teaches us as Americans, as westerners that the wealthy like Jeff Bezos, are deserving of their accumulated wealth. They've worked hard, and that is the reason they are rich. Here is why that just isn't the case.
Jeff Bezos had a great idea. He perfected selling books online and moved on to various other products, making Amazon what it is today. But is his concept worth him having $100 billion of wealth? No, it is not. In as much as many want to believe in some Ayn Randian existence, it is false. That we created an economic system predicated on that fallacy hurts most and is unsustainable over time.
Bezos idea was neither insular or solely implemented by himself. Moreover, the genesis of Bezos' concept did not just originate in his mind. The existence of the Internet created by the American tax dollars, the presence of online selling predated Amazon, and the technology thousands of engineers and scientists built made the idea possible.
An economic system is neither divine or immutable. Our system is humanmade and designed to favor a few. We can transform it. But to change it first requires that we unshackle our mindset. We must acknowledge our worth to society and our economy. Human capital is more important and valuable than financial capital. Movers of financial capital, bankers, stock brokers, etc. are not more valuable than those who produce products and services that are useful to humanity, teachers, engineers, doctors, scientists, nurses, and many other professions.
The rules in our capitalist society where one can enrich themselves by monetizing and not equitably sharing the spoils for an idea, the distribution of product and services, not necessarily their own or one they did not solely create is proof positive it is an immoral system. The fact that a small percentage of people's wealth can grow at a rate faster than that of the vast majority means that mathematically, the system has to collapse. As people, like Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates and others accumulate the wealth at a pace faster than the growth of the economy, we get the reality the majority of Americans are going through, stagnant wages and the inability to accumulate wealth.
Read more
https://egbertowillies.com/2017/11/26/jeff-bezos-deserve-100-billion-worth/
Our system teaches us as Americans, as westerners that the wealthy like Jeff Bezos, are deserving of their accumulated wealth. They've worked hard, and that is the reason they are rich. Here is why that just isn't the case.
Jeff Bezos had a great idea. He perfected selling books online and moved on to various other products, making Amazon what it is today. But is his concept worth him having $100 billion of wealth? No, it is not. In as much as many want to believe in some Ayn Randian existence, it is false. That we created an economic system predicated on that fallacy hurts most and is unsustainable over time.
Bezos idea was neither insular or solely implemented by himself. Moreover, the genesis of Bezos' concept did not just originate in his mind. The existence of the Internet created by the American tax dollars, the presence of online selling predated Amazon, and the technology thousands of engineers and scientists built made the idea possible.
An economic system is neither divine or immutable. Our system is humanmade and designed to favor a few. We can transform it. But to change it first requires that we unshackle our mindset. We must acknowledge our worth to society and our economy. Human capital is more important and valuable than financial capital. Movers of financial capital, bankers, stock brokers, etc. are not more valuable than those who produce products and services that are useful to humanity, teachers, engineers, doctors, scientists, nurses, and many other professions.
The rules in our capitalist society where one can enrich themselves by monetizing and not equitably sharing the spoils for an idea, the distribution of product and services, not necessarily their own or one they did not solely create is proof positive it is an immoral system. The fact that a small percentage of people's wealth can grow at a rate faster than that of the vast majority means that mathematically, the system has to collapse. As people, like Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates and others accumulate the wealth at a pace faster than the growth of the economy, we get the reality the majority of Americans are going through, stagnant wages and the inability to accumulate wealth.
Read more
https://egbertowillies.com/2017/11/26/jeff-bezos-deserve-100-billion-worth/
Welcome To The Class War
Financial capital is people, my friend.
By Zach Carter
The United States has a problem. Over the past decade, most of its families have been spinning their wheels. The median household income, adjusted for inflation, has grown by just 1.5 percent ? $839 ? since the beginning of the Great Recession.
Over the same period, the total annual economic output of the United States has grown at 10 times that rate. The gains are even more impressive on the stock market, which has climbed about 40 percent (also adjusted for inflation). This is not due to the unique savvy of our investors. Business is just good. Corporate profits are booming, and the value of financial assets tied to those profits is booming along with them.
The experience of the past decade shows very clearly that trying to assuage the economic strains on the middle and working classes by pumping up Wall Street only helps people who already own a lot of financial capital. And people who already own a lot of financial capital don’t need help. Half of all gains from the sale of stocks and bonds accrue to households that make over $1 million a year. Less than one-fourth of American households own more than $25,000 in stock. And the 400 wealthiest households take about three-fourths of their very substantial annual incomes from financial investments.
So the tax legislation passed by House Republicans last week shouldn’t really be understood as economic policymaking in any traditional sense. It’s not about stimulating growth or investment or improving incentives. It’s class war. Republicans are assisting the efforts of a very small, very rich faction to take an ever-growing share of the nation’s wealth from the rest of us.
Republicans dialed up about $6 trillion worth of tax cuts. Senate rules require them to offset $4.5 trillion of that with new revenues, or face a Democratic filibuster that would kill the legislation. The tax cuts for the capital class blew a huge hole in their budget. The detritus they threw into that $6 trillion hole is, essentially, you.
A $1.5 trillion corporate tax cut would go straight to people who own stock in corporations. Another $696 billion would go toward repealing the alternative minimum tax ? a provision that is supposed to prevent the super-rich from paying no taxes at all. Another $596 billion tax cut would assist so-called “pass-through” entities ? hedge funds, investment vehicles, law firms and other things rich people use. Best of all is the repeal of the estate tax, which would enable millionaire and billionaire families to pass their fortunes on from generation to generation without ever having to pay taxes on financial assets.
Even the people who would benefit from these windfalls do not generally think it would encourage them to do anything productive. On Wednesday, Wall Street Journal Editor-in-Chief Gerry Baker asked a crowd of CEOs whether they would increase their investments in new equipment or technology if the bill passed. Only a few raised their hands. “Why aren’t the other hands up?” asked an embarrassed Gary Cohn, President Donald Trump’s chief economic adviser.
To realize these wonders for the 1 percent, Republicans have assembled a potpourri of problems for everyone else. The $47.5 billion they would strip from people paying student debt or attending graduate school would all but end post-collegiate education for anyone without a trust fund. By eliminating the deduction for state and local government taxes, Republicans would bleed municipalities and force cutbacks in public education and infrastructure. Local governments would get blasted again by the elimination of a $17.3 billion program to help refinance debt at lower interest rates, and the bill would strike a further $38.9 billion in financing to build hospitals, affordable housing and university buildings. They’d end a $54 billion tax credit for research into rare diseases. And a $300 million credit for businesses that comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act. And the deduction for personal medical expenses. And credits for renewable energy.
Read more
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/republican-tax-plan-class-war_us_5a1431dde4b0bfa88c1cfafa?utm_campaign=hp_fb_pages&utm_source=main_fb&utm_medium=facebook&ncid=fcbklnkushpmg00000063
Trump has tripled the pace of US bombing in Afghanistan
Alex Ward · Tuesday, November 21, 2017, 11:55 am
Trump was skeptical of the Afghanistan War. Now he’s escalating it.
President Donald Trump entered the White House questioning why the US was still fighting in Afghanistan. Now he’s ramping up America’s longest war.
The US Air Force is currently on pace to triple the amount of bombs dropped in Afghanistan this year as compared to last year, NBC News reports. So far, the US has unleashed 3,554 bombs as of October 31. America dropped 1,337 bombs in all of 2016, and 947 in all of 2015.
The escalation is part of Trump’s renewed focus on defeating the Taliban — the hardline Islamist group whose influence and power is growing in Afghanistan. In February, the Taliban controlled 11 percent of the country’s districts; as of August, it’s in charge of about 13 percent, which means an additional 700,000 people now live under some Taliban rule. Part of the effort to curb the Taliban’s rise includes bombing its estimated 400 to 500 drug labs in Afghanistan, since it makes most of its money in the drug trade.
“There are many, many targets that have been identified,” Gen. John Nicholson, the top US commander in Afghanistan, told reporters yesterday in a reference to the Taliban’s drug operation. “We are striking some, and we will continue to strike these targets as we further refine them.”
But the US isn’t just bombing from above. Trump sent around 3,000 more troops to Afghanistan in September instead of completing the withdrawal former President Barack Obama promised. There are now around 14,000 US troops in Afghanistan, many of which advise and help Afghan forces on the ground by providing artillery and air support. The Afghan military is battling nearly 20 terrorist groups in Afghanistan, including the Taliban, ISIS, and al-Qaeda.
That means that instead of ending the war, Trump is only involving the US further in a conflict with no end in sight.
Trump promised to get out of Afghanistan
On August 21, Trump unveiled his new strategy to stay in Afghanistan based on conditions on the ground, not timetables. That means the US will stay in the country until it’s safe to do so without providing a withdrawal date. That’s effectively a recipe for perennial war, especially as conditions in the country deteriorate.
But for years, Trump had vowed to remove the US from the conflict. “84% of US troops wounded & 70% of our brave men & women killed in Afghanistan have all come under Obama. Time to get out of there,” he wrote on Twitter on September 11, 2012.
Read more
https://www.vox.com/world/2017/11/21/16684628/trump-afghanistan-bomb-troops
Trump was skeptical of the Afghanistan War. Now he’s escalating it.
President Donald Trump entered the White House questioning why the US was still fighting in Afghanistan. Now he’s ramping up America’s longest war.
The US Air Force is currently on pace to triple the amount of bombs dropped in Afghanistan this year as compared to last year, NBC News reports. So far, the US has unleashed 3,554 bombs as of October 31. America dropped 1,337 bombs in all of 2016, and 947 in all of 2015.
The escalation is part of Trump’s renewed focus on defeating the Taliban — the hardline Islamist group whose influence and power is growing in Afghanistan. In February, the Taliban controlled 11 percent of the country’s districts; as of August, it’s in charge of about 13 percent, which means an additional 700,000 people now live under some Taliban rule. Part of the effort to curb the Taliban’s rise includes bombing its estimated 400 to 500 drug labs in Afghanistan, since it makes most of its money in the drug trade.
“There are many, many targets that have been identified,” Gen. John Nicholson, the top US commander in Afghanistan, told reporters yesterday in a reference to the Taliban’s drug operation. “We are striking some, and we will continue to strike these targets as we further refine them.”
But the US isn’t just bombing from above. Trump sent around 3,000 more troops to Afghanistan in September instead of completing the withdrawal former President Barack Obama promised. There are now around 14,000 US troops in Afghanistan, many of which advise and help Afghan forces on the ground by providing artillery and air support. The Afghan military is battling nearly 20 terrorist groups in Afghanistan, including the Taliban, ISIS, and al-Qaeda.
That means that instead of ending the war, Trump is only involving the US further in a conflict with no end in sight.
Trump promised to get out of Afghanistan
On August 21, Trump unveiled his new strategy to stay in Afghanistan based on conditions on the ground, not timetables. That means the US will stay in the country until it’s safe to do so without providing a withdrawal date. That’s effectively a recipe for perennial war, especially as conditions in the country deteriorate.
But for years, Trump had vowed to remove the US from the conflict. “84% of US troops wounded & 70% of our brave men & women killed in Afghanistan have all come under Obama. Time to get out of there,” he wrote on Twitter on September 11, 2012.
Read more
https://www.vox.com/world/2017/11/21/16684628/trump-afghanistan-bomb-troops
Wall Street and Trump are about to kill the CFPB, the only government agency that effectively polices bank scams, crimes and frauds
Cory Doctorow · Saturday, November 18, 2017, 2:15 pm
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (previously) is practically the only US regulator we can be proud of -- founded by Elizabeth Warren before she ran for the Senate, the CFRB is a consumer protection agency that has been at the forefront of reining in criminal activities like Wells Fargo's nationwide frauds and Equifax's dox attack on the USA, as well as being the best defense Americans have against predatory loan-sharks masquerading as "payday lenders," abusive debt-collectors, racial discrimination in lending, and the student loan racket.
Read more
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/dLqXoFob_VU/freedom-to-be-ripped-off.html
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (previously) is practically the only US regulator we can be proud of -- founded by Elizabeth Warren before she ran for the Senate, the CFRB is a consumer protection agency that has been at the forefront of reining in criminal activities like Wells Fargo's nationwide frauds and Equifax's dox attack on the USA, as well as being the best defense Americans have against predatory loan-sharks masquerading as "payday lenders," abusive debt-collectors, racial discrimination in lending, and the student loan racket.
Read more
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/boingboing/iBag/~3/dLqXoFob_VU/freedom-to-be-ripped-off.html
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