Monday, September 10, 2012
WHAT WHERE THEY THINKING!
When President George W. Bush instituted huge tax breaks overwhelmingly slanted toward the wealthiest Americans, that seemed fine with Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan. It never seemed to bother them that it drastically reduced revenue without any offsetting spending cuts.
Then Bush put the hugely expensive Afghanistan war on the tab, and that seemed fine with them, too. When
Then Bush put the hugely expensive Afghanistan war on the tab, and that seemed fine with them, too. When
he p
ut a second even more expensive war in Iraq onto the tab, Romney and Ryan seemed to cheer.
Finally, Bush added the Medicare prescription drug benefit, yet another hugely expensive budget item conveniently unfunded and left for our kids and grandkids to worry about. That seemed to sound great to Romney and Ryan.
President Bush’s follies doubled the national debt and greased the skids for the fiscal calamity that followed. Yet they incurred not a peep of protest from Romney or Ryan. Somehow the moment a Democrat became president, though, these gentlemen miraculously turned into deficit hawks. Like St. Paul on the road to Damascus, they were suddenly overwhelmed by a brilliant vision of fiscal responsibility. And somehow that made the budgetary train wreck President Obama’s fault. Nice try. But few will be convinced by their shameless display of hypocrisy.
James J. Amato
Duluth
ut a second even more expensive war in Iraq onto the tab, Romney and Ryan seemed to cheer.
Finally, Bush added the Medicare prescription drug benefit, yet another hugely expensive budget item conveniently unfunded and left for our kids and grandkids to worry about. That seemed to sound great to Romney and Ryan.
President Bush’s follies doubled the national debt and greased the skids for the fiscal calamity that followed. Yet they incurred not a peep of protest from Romney or Ryan. Somehow the moment a Democrat became president, though, these gentlemen miraculously turned into deficit hawks. Like St. Paul on the road to Damascus, they were suddenly overwhelmed by a brilliant vision of fiscal responsibility. And somehow that made the budgetary train wreck President Obama’s fault. Nice try. But few will be convinced by their shameless display of hypocrisy.
James J. Amato
Duluth
What Should Frighten Every Person in America!
It is very likely that President Obama will be re-elected as president in November. What Democratic Party will join President Obama? What Democratic Party will be going back to Washington D.C.?
The party of "The People"?
or
The party of "The Club"?
Who Owns the Senate?
Listen to one of America's great broadcasters, Bill Moyers, discuss the election, socialism, and politics in general, with one of the greatest politician's in America, Independent Bernie Sanders at :
http://billmoyers.com/episode/full-show-challenging-power-changing-politics/
You can just click on the image below to view the website above:
Sunday, September 9, 2012
September 2, 2012
When Capitalists Cared
By HEDRICK SMITH
Washington
IN the rancorous debate over how to get the sluggish economy moving, we have forgotten the wisdom of Henry Ford. In 1914, not long after the Ford Motor Company came out with the Model T, Ford made the startling announcement that he would pay his workers the unheard-of wage of $5 a day.
Not only was it a matter of social justice, Ford wrote, but paying high wages was also smart business. When wages are low, uncertainty dogs the marketplace and growth is weak. But when pay is high and steady, Ford asserted, business is more secure because workers earn enough to become good customers. They can afford to buy Model Ts.
This is not to suggest that Ford single-handedly created the American middle class. But he was one of the first business leaders to articulate what economists call “the virtuous circle of growth”: well-paid workers generating consumer demand that in turn promotes business expansion and hiring. Other executives bought his logic, and just as important, strong unions fought for rising pay and good benefits in contracts like the 1950 “Treaty of Detroit” between General Motors and the United Auto Workers.
Riding the dynamics of the virtuous circle, America enjoyed its best period of sustained growth in the decades after World War II, from 1945 to 1973, even though income tax rates were far higher than today. It created not only unprecedented middle-class prosperity but also far greater economic equality than today.
The chief executives of the long postwar boom believed that business success and workers’ well-being ran in tandem.
Frank W. Abrams, chairman of Standard Oil of New Jersey, voiced the corporate mantra of “stakeholder capitalism”: the need to balance the interests of all the stakeholders in the corporate family. “The job of management,” he wrote, “is to maintain an equitable and working balance among the claims of the various directly affected interest groups,” which he defined as “stockholders, employees, customers and the public at large.”
Earl S. Willis, a manager of employee benefits at General Electric, declared that “the employee who can plan his economic future with reasonable certainty is an employer’s most productive asset.”
From 1948 to 1973, the productivity of all nonfarm workers nearly doubled, as did average hourly compensation. But things changed dramatically starting in the late 1970s. Although productivity increased by 80.1 percent from 1973 to 2011, average wages rose only 4.2 percent and hourly compensation (wages plus benefits) rose only 10 percent over that time, according to government data analyzed by the Economic Policy Institute.
At the same time, corporate profits were booming. In 2006, the year before the Great Recession began, corporate profits garnered the largest share of national income since 1942, while the share going to wages and salaries sank to the lowest level since 1929. In the recession’s aftermath, corporate profits have bounced back while middle-class incomes have stagnated.
Today the prevailing cut-to-the-bone business ethos means that a company like Caterpillar demands a wage freeze and lower health benefits from its workers, while posting record profits.
Globalization, including the rise of Asia, and technological innovation can’t explain all or even most of today’s gaping inequality; if they did, we would see in other advanced economies the same hyperconcentration of wealth and the same stagnation of middle-class wages as in the United States. But we don’t.
In Germany, still a manufacturing and export powerhouse, average hourly pay has risen five times faster since 1985 than in the United States. The secret of Germany’s success, says Klaus Kleinfeld, who ran the German electrical giant Siemens before taking over the American aluminum company Alcoa in 2008, is “the social contract: the willingness of business, labor and political leaders to put aside some of their differences and make agreements in the national interests.”
In short, German leaders have practiced stakeholder capitalism and followed the century-old wisdom of Henry Ford, while American business and political leaders have dismantled the dynamics of the “virtuous circle” in pursuit of downsizing, offshoring and short-term profit and big dividends for their investors.
Today, we are all paying the price for this shift. As Ford recognized, if average Americans do not have secure jobs with steady and rising pay, the economy will be sluggish. Since the early 1990s, we have been mired three times in “jobless recoveries.” It’s time for America’s business elites to step beyond political rhetoric about protecting wealthy “job creators” and grasp Ford’s insight: Give the middle class a better share of the nation’s economic gains, and the economy will grow faster. Our history shows that.
Hedrick Smith, a former correspondent and Washington bureau chief of The New York Times, is the author of “Who Stole the American Dream?”
See why middle class taxpayers are having to cover for tax rates on the very,very wealthy of from 0% to 14%thttp://www.facebook.com/#!
What you won't hear from the Republicans!
The following is typical of other things I have written but this time I included my sources and/or sites. Please let me know if you find anything in error or anything that is less than accurate.
What you won't hear from President Obama's detractors!
What you will hear from President Obama detractors is that President Obama has been president for 43 straight months of unemployment over 8 %,(1) while that is true, what they won't tell you is that when the recession was at it's worst the unemployment was near 10 %(2) and now it stands at 8.1%(3). When President Obama took office the United States was LOSING jobs at a rate of over 700,000 jobs (4) per month. They won't bother to mention that the United States has now had 30 straight months of job GAINS (5) with the most recent month of August 2012 being a gain of 90,000 jobs (6). Is that drop in unemployment too small to suggest that President Obama should be re-elected to another four years? President Regan was in office when unemployment increased from 7.5% in January of 1981 to 10.8% in January of 1983 (7).
(1)http://www.washingtonpost.
(2) http://www.bls.gov/spotlight/
(3) http://www.suntimes.com/
(4) http://www.whitehouse.gov/
(5) http://content.usatoday.com/
(6) http://www.seattlepi.com/news/
(7) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
What you will hear detractors say is that the U.S. economy is tanking, following a tanking housing market, but what you won't hear is that the United States is officially in a RECOVERY (8), albeit a very slow, steady recovery and the housing market is in positive territory in 29 of the 30 largest housing markets (9) in the entire United States. Prices are on the rise, time on the market is on the decline, and interest rates remain at the lowest level in many years in each of those 29 markets.
(8) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
(9) http://www.builderonline.com/
What you might hear is that President Obama is against corporations and businesses but what you won't hear is that United States corporations and business have had the best 3+ years EVER! No president in over 75 years (10) has seen more positive results for the first term of a presidency. You won't hear that big businesses and corporations are paying the highest dividends EVER in the history of the U.S. economy! President Obama is one of only five presidents, ever, who have witnessed the blue-chip index surge more than 50% during their first three years in office. Is the trickle down theory working for middle class citizens as Republicans suggest it should be?
(10) http://blogs.wsj.com/
What you might hear is that President Obama has taken $719 billion out of Medicare (11) to fund the Affordable Health Care Act - commonly known as Obamacare. What you won't hear is that the $719 billion is not cuts in Medicare or services but, instead, is savings to the program due to increased numbers of individuals paying into the system, and avoidance of duplication, and they won't tell you that Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney use same $719 billion (12) in their cost analysis figures for their plan towards the privatization of Medicare!
(11) http://web.ebscohost.com.
(12) http://www.ncpssm.org/
What you might hear is that President Obama has brought about socialized health care in just 3+ years of his presidency but you won't hear that the mandatory health insurance was first developed by the Heritage Foundation, a Republican think tank. You won't hear that prominant Republicans lobbied for the exact same mandatory health care process (13) as the Affordable Health Care Act in answer to President Clinton's single payer system. You won't hear that Republican, Mitt Romney, championed that very same mandatory health insurance as the Affordable Health Care Act, instituted it in Massachusetts, when he was governor of that state. You won't hear that republican, Mitt Romney, championed that very same mandatory health insurance, instituted it in Massachutetes, when he was governor of that state, and he encouraged the federal government to use his state as a model. Mitt Romney is, justifiably, proud of that accomplishment.
(13) http://www.forbes.com/sites/
What you will hear from detractors of President Obama is that our country can't stand another four years of uncontrolled spending on the part of the Obama Administration. What you won't hear is that President Obama has been in charge of the presidency when there has been the least increase in federal spending since Eisenhower (14). You won't hear that when inflation is taken into account, President Obama is the only president in recent history to be in charge when there was an actual decrease in federal spending.
(14) http://www.forbes.com/sites/
What you might hear is that President Obama believes in bigger government and is reckless with the growth of our government. What you won't hear is that the Obama Administration has been in charge when there has been an actual decrease in the number of government workers (15), which is a first in many decades and includes both Democrat and Republican administrations. You won't hear that the largest increase in government workers took place during the eight years of a Republican administration and that that administration was in charge when the greatest number of government workers existed, EVER (16).
(15) http://mediamatters.org/
(16) http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.
What you will hear is that President Obama has not lived up to his promise of reducing the federal deficit. What you won't hear is that President Obama inherited an economy on the brink of disaster. You won't hear that President Obama should get credit for the fact that the economy did not collapse, the recession has actually ended and unemployment is has gone down from a high of 10% to 8.1%(17) and we are officially in a recovery with 30 straight months of positive job growth (18).
(17) http://data.bls.gov/
(18) http://www.insperity.com/
What you will hear is that gas prices are very high (19) and that it is his policies that are to blame. What you won't hear is that the policies of President Obama have affected natural gas and propane prices and they are at the lowest they have been since 2004 (20) and that that is helping to keep the overall cost of energy down. Gas prices rose to a high of $4.12 per gallon during the previous republican administration compare to the $3.87 per gallon in September of 2012(21).
(19) http://gasbuddy.com/gb_retail_
(20) http://ourfiniteworld.com/
(21) http://gasbuddy.com/gb_retail_
You will hear that President Obama's policies are going to result in the devaluing of the U.S. dollar and inflation is going to go through the roof. What you won't hear is that, while President Obama has been in charge, inflation has been held at bay with the yearly inflation rate below 2% (22), one of the lowest increases in inflation of any recent Republican or Democratic president in over 60 years.The average rate of inflation under the previous republican administration was about 60% greater than it has been under Obama (23). The U.S. dollar continues to remain strong (24) and has done so throughout the term of President Obama.
(22) http://www.
(23) http://answers.yahoo.com/
(24) http://fxtrade.oanda.com/
Detractors of President Obama will suggest that President Obama is working against the oil industry but the fact is that domestic oil and gas production are at historic highs since President Obama has been in charge compared to all Democratic and Republican presidents ever. You won't hear that President Obama was in charge when the United States became an oil and gas producer such that oil companies are now producing more United States oil and gas than the United States needs, and thus, are now exporting oil and gas to other countries (25). America is producing more oil today than at any time in the last eight years (26).
(25) http://www.washingtonsblog.
(26) http://www.whitehouse.gov/
Detractors of President Obama will suggest that he doesn't support the military but you won't hear them mention that the President and First Lady traveled to Fort Stewert to meet with over 10,000 soldiers and families to sign an Executive Order that such that our servicemen now have their Post 9/11 GI Bill extended. With that Executive Order more than 550,000 veterans and 325,000 service members pursued education last year and an additional 38,000 military spouses used their Military Spouse Career Advancment Account benefit to advance their education(27). President Obama has been commander-in-chief for over three years and military personnel seem to appreciate HIS service. They are contributing to his re-election campaign at five times the rate that they’re contributing to Mitt Romney’s (28).
(27) http://www.whitehouse.gov/
(28) http://www.topix.com/forum/
You might hear detractors of President Obama suggest he wasn't born in the United States, won't wear an American flag pin, is a communist or socialist, that he turns his back on the American flag, or that he had the American flag removed from Air Force One. Even Mitt Romney has participated in some of these attacks such as the attack ad accusing President Obama of dropping welfare-to-work requirements that were found to be "Blatantly False" Wildly Misleading", "False", Widely Debunked", Mind-Boggling", and "Pants on Fire False" by online fact checkers. Even Mitt Romney's and Paul Ryan's repeated charge that President Obama stole 716 billion dollars, resulting in the cutting of Medicare services, has been proven to be blatently false - see http://www.youtube.com/watch?
What you will hear from President Obama detractors is that President Obama has been president for 43 straight months of unemployment over 8 %,(1) while that is true, what they won't tell you is that when the recession was at it's worst the unemployment was near 10 %(2) and now it stands at 8.1%(3). When President Obama took office the United States was LOSING jobs at a rate of over 700,000 jobs (4) per month. They won't bother to mention that the United States has now had 30 straight months of job GAINS (5) with the most recent month of August 2012 being a gain of 90,000 jobs (6). Is that drop in unemployment too small to suggest that President Obama should be re-elected to another four years? President Regan was in office when unemployment increased from 7.5% in January of 1981 to 10.8% in January of 1983 (7).
(1)http://www.washingtonpost.
(2) http://www.bls.gov/spotlight/
(3) http://www.suntimes.com/
(4) http://www.whitehouse.gov/
(5) http://content.usatoday.com/
(6) http://www.seattlepi.com/news/
(7) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
What you will hear detractors say is that the U.S. economy is tanking, following a tanking housing market, but what you won't hear is that the United States is officially in a RECOVERY (8), albeit a very slow, steady recovery and the housing market is in positive territory in 29 of the 30 largest housing markets (9) in the entire United States. Prices are on the rise, time on the market is on the decline, and interest rates remain at the lowest level in many years in each of those 29 markets.
(8) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
(9) http://www.builderonline.com/
What you might hear is that President Obama is against corporations and businesses but what you won't hear is that United States corporations and business have had the best 3+ years EVER! No president in over 75 years (10) has seen more positive results for the first term of a presidency. You won't hear that big businesses and corporations are paying the highest dividends EVER in the history of the U.S. economy! President Obama is one of only five presidents, ever, who have witnessed the blue-chip index surge more than 50% during their first three years in office. Is the trickle down theory working for middle class citizens as Republicans suggest it should be?
(10) http://blogs.wsj.com/
What you might hear is that President Obama has taken $719 billion out of Medicare (11) to fund the Affordable Health Care Act - commonly known as Obamacare. What you won't hear is that the $719 billion is not cuts in Medicare or services but, instead, is savings to the program due to increased numbers of individuals paying into the system, and avoidance of duplication, and they won't tell you that Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney use same $719 billion (12) in their cost analysis figures for their plan towards the privatization of Medicare!
(11) http://web.ebscohost.com.
(12) http://www.ncpssm.org/
What you might hear is that President Obama has brought about socialized health care in just 3+ years of his presidency but you won't hear that the mandatory health insurance was first developed by the Heritage Foundation, a Republican think tank. You won't hear that prominant Republicans lobbied for the exact same mandatory health care process (13) as the Affordable Health Care Act in answer to President Clinton's single payer system. You won't hear that Republican, Mitt Romney, championed that very same mandatory health insurance as the Affordable Health Care Act, instituted it in Massachusetts, when he was governor of that state. You won't hear that republican, Mitt Romney, championed that very same mandatory health insurance, instituted it in Massachutetes, when he was governor of that state, and he encouraged the federal government to use his state as a model. Mitt Romney is, justifiably, proud of that accomplishment.
(13) http://www.forbes.com/sites/
What you will hear from detractors of President Obama is that our country can't stand another four years of uncontrolled spending on the part of the Obama Administration. What you won't hear is that President Obama has been in charge of the presidency when there has been the least increase in federal spending since Eisenhower (14). You won't hear that when inflation is taken into account, President Obama is the only president in recent history to be in charge when there was an actual decrease in federal spending.
(14) http://www.forbes.com/sites/
What you might hear is that President Obama believes in bigger government and is reckless with the growth of our government. What you won't hear is that the Obama Administration has been in charge when there has been an actual decrease in the number of government workers (15), which is a first in many decades and includes both Democrat and Republican administrations. You won't hear that the largest increase in government workers took place during the eight years of a Republican administration and that that administration was in charge when the greatest number of government workers existed, EVER (16).
(15) http://mediamatters.org/
(16) http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.
What you will hear is that President Obama has not lived up to his promise of reducing the federal deficit. What you won't hear is that President Obama inherited an economy on the brink of disaster. You won't hear that President Obama should get credit for the fact that the economy did not collapse, the recession has actually ended and unemployment is has gone down from a high of 10% to 8.1%(17) and we are officially in a recovery with 30 straight months of positive job growth (18).
(17) http://data.bls.gov/
(18) http://www.insperity.com/
What you will hear is that gas prices are very high (19) and that it is his policies that are to blame. What you won't hear is that the policies of President Obama have affected natural gas and propane prices and they are at the lowest they have been since 2004 (20) and that that is helping to keep the overall cost of energy down. Gas prices rose to a high of $4.12 per gallon during the previous republican administration compare to the $3.87 per gallon in September of 2012(21).
(19) http://gasbuddy.com/gb_retail_
(20) http://ourfiniteworld.com/
(21) http://gasbuddy.com/gb_retail_
You will hear that President Obama's policies are going to result in the devaluing of the U.S. dollar and inflation is going to go through the roof. What you won't hear is that, while President Obama has been in charge, inflation has been held at bay with the yearly inflation rate below 2% (22), one of the lowest increases in inflation of any recent Republican or Democratic president in over 60 years.The average rate of inflation under the previous republican administration was about 60% greater than it has been under Obama (23). The U.S. dollar continues to remain strong (24) and has done so throughout the term of President Obama.
(22) http://www.
(23) http://answers.yahoo.com/
(24) http://fxtrade.oanda.com/
Detractors of President Obama will suggest that President Obama is working against the oil industry but the fact is that domestic oil and gas production are at historic highs since President Obama has been in charge compared to all Democratic and Republican presidents ever. You won't hear that President Obama was in charge when the United States became an oil and gas producer such that oil companies are now producing more United States oil and gas than the United States needs, and thus, are now exporting oil and gas to other countries (25). America is producing more oil today than at any time in the last eight years (26).
(25) http://www.washingtonsblog.
(26) http://www.whitehouse.gov/
Detractors of President Obama will suggest that he doesn't support the military but you won't hear them mention that the President and First Lady traveled to Fort Stewert to meet with over 10,000 soldiers and families to sign an Executive Order that such that our servicemen now have their Post 9/11 GI Bill extended. With that Executive Order more than 550,000 veterans and 325,000 service members pursued education last year and an additional 38,000 military spouses used their Military Spouse Career Advancment Account benefit to advance their education(27). President Obama has been commander-in-chief for over three years and military personnel seem to appreciate HIS service. They are contributing to his re-election campaign at five times the rate that they’re contributing to Mitt Romney’s (28).
(27) http://www.whitehouse.gov/
(28) http://www.topix.com/forum/
You might hear detractors of President Obama suggest he wasn't born in the United States, won't wear an American flag pin, is a communist or socialist, that he turns his back on the American flag, or that he had the American flag removed from Air Force One. Even Mitt Romney has participated in some of these attacks such as the attack ad accusing President Obama of dropping welfare-to-work requirements that were found to be "Blatantly False" Wildly Misleading", "False", Widely Debunked", Mind-Boggling", and "Pants on Fire False" by online fact checkers. Even Mitt Romney's and Paul Ryan's repeated charge that President Obama stole 716 billion dollars, resulting in the cutting of Medicare services, has been proven to be blatently false - see http://www.youtube.com/watch?
Here is a very good analysis of the Obama Administration. I don't think it includes any "spin". It is rather long but I didn't see anything to agree or disagree with. It seems to present the past 3 years fairly honestly looking at positi
ve and negative elements of President Obama's presidency. It seems that most writers start with a pro or con process. I don't think this writer has a pre-determined idea about what he thinks should be said. It is neither a white wash nor an attack piece from the Boston Globe:
Check out this site to see how the Republican's supported an individual mandate before they were against it! It was a great idea when they suggested it. Only when President Obama suggested it did they back away from what they had originally supported!
http://www.forbes.com/sites/aroy/2012/02/07/the-tortuous-conservative-history-of-the-individual-mandate/
http://www.forbes.com/sites/aroy/2012/02/07/the-tortuous-conservative-history-of-the-individual-mandate/
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