Month: August 2011

At the outset there are two things that I would like to make clear. (1) I  really intended for this to be a short diary. (2) This is NOT an Obama bashing diary. I simply want to offer some opinions from my perspective of the current situation and Obama’s chances to secure a second term in 2012. In my estimation there is still sufficient time to effect some changes in the current political theater. Immediately after Obama won the presidency Rush Limbaugh set the playbook for the devastated Republicans when he said  “I hope he fails!” Since then everybody on the right wing political spectrum in America from the Republican Congress, Talk Radio, Fox TV, Corporate America, Wall Street, and a super rich American plutocracy have been working overtime to bring Limbaugh’s wish to a resounding fruition. Obama is not stupid and I’m sure that he is well aware of the array of forces who stand in opposition to him on every issue. (More below the fold.)
It is my assumption that from the start of his term, Obama took an in-depth analysis of the opposition against him and decided that the chances for his success in the White House were best served by maintaining an obsequious posture of compromise. This aspect of the Obama plan was destined to create a myriad of unresolved problems over the long haul. My disappointment with President Obama set in very early in his administration when I reviewed the people that he had selected for his closest advisors and the people he chose for his Cabinet. There were a few good selections made such as Hillary Clinton to State and several others, but the majority were people from the old Clinton Administration, while some of the others were just political hacks.

I was really disappointed with his selection of Eric Holder as AG, because as the first black president Obama would need a strong resourceful Justice Department. It was obvious to me that a significant part of the battles with the right wing that Obama would have in the future would be legal events. Justice has done less under Obama in terms of investigating civil rights cases than any other Democratic president of recent memory. The success of any Administration is determined by the quality of people with whom the president surrounds himself.

In my estimation the massive amount of political capital that Obama spent on the Health Care bill was definitely an error. Although Obama has signed it into law, its actual political cost cannot be calculated, simply because it provided a cause around which all of the right wing racialist and reactionary groups could rally against Obama. As we all know too well RALLY they did, as demonstrated by the creation of a new political force called the Tea Party, which successfully sent 87 new uncompromising hard right Congressmen to the House. What is constantly lost in all of the talk about the Tea Party is the fact that most of these new House Republicans were successful in defeating “establishment” incumbent Republicans in their respective primaries.

Aside from the problems created by the loss of the House, Obama faces an unbelievable catalog of anti-union and VOTER SUPPRESSION laws in a large number of states around the nation that are controlled by Republicans. The Republicans have dissected every detectable block of voting support for Obama in the 2008 elections and have written laws aimed at hamstringing such support in 2012. Many of these laws are silly and capricious, but they still are currently the law in their respective states. Some states have gone beyond the Voter ID suppression technique and have moved a number of polling places out of black areas, while increasing the number of polling stations in white areas. Legislators have also written legislation manipulating the polling hours in the same manner. Some states have written legislation requiring anyone or any group from another state who is present in the state to assist citizens in voter registration, or providing voter information must register with the Secretary of State’s Office within “X” number days of entering the state. The list goes on and on endlessly. (Just as a note there are 21 Republican controlled state governments versus 11 Democratic controlled state governments. There are 18 split (no one party control for legislature and Governor) control state governments.)

A topic forgotten by everyone except these same state Republicans is the status of the unreliable easily hacked VOTING MACHINES still sitting in the warehouses in many of these states. The current budget crisis in the states will definitely be a rational excuse for reusing these same high criticized voting machines in 2012.

Whereas the Obama Administration has not challenged any of this new voter suppression legislation in the states or taken some action to prevent reuse of well-known defective voting machines, it looks pretty grim for his chances in these 21 Republican controlled states.

Finally in his efforts to be the Compromiser-in-Chief, Obama has steadily chipped away at the enthusiastic support of HIS base. Obama has become a proponent of the old Democratic saw which we hear over and over from Democratic candidates, “If they don’t vote Democratic who are they going to vote for?” Since America is essentially a two party system, this old question implies that there are no reasonable alternatives. However this question overlooks the question of “enthusiasm Suppression”, which is a very effective “campaign worker suppression” technique.

The failure of Obama to deliver on any of his campaign promises to those folks who were energetic enthusiastic members of Obama’s army has created an environment of “enthusiasm suppression” or good old fashioned political turn-off. Unquestionably these people will vote for Obama in 2012, but they WILL NOT provide the ground support that he will so desperately need in 2012. The right wing plutocratic oligarchy will pour billions into videos, advertisements and organizations to fight the Obama campaign on the ground. Therefore Obama’s decision to place his bets on the uncommitted “independent” white voting population at the current time looks very much like a loser’s line. There is something about Obama’s political life thus far that reminds me of an actor playing a character whose psyche morphs from a Cyrano de Bergerac to a Don Quixote, all the while onstage. The interesting thing about this scene is the music coming from the orchestra pit accompanying the Obama character’s transformation shuffle. Gracious me! It’s none other than the Republican National Square Dance band playing the “The Turkey in the Straw, Do Sa Do to the Right” Overture.

Assuming this debt ceiling bill actually passes, the next freak-out is going to be over the composition of the 12-member SuperCommittee that will be making recommendations for an additional $1.5 trillion in budget cuts over the next decade. Now, the obvious choices on the Democratic side are the chairmen and ranking members of the Budget Committees, the House Ways & Means Committee and the Senate Finance Committee, plus someone from the leadership of both houses. That’s basically what went down with the Bowles-Simpson commission, although it had 18 members instead of twelve. In any case, here’s a likely lineup for the Super Committee:

Democrats
Rep. Sandy Levin (D-MI)- ranking member of Way & Means
Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD)- ranking member of the Budget Committee
Rep. Jim Clyburn (D-SC)- Minority Whip [or Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-CA)- Vice-Chair of the House Democratic Caucus]
Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT)- Chairman of the Finance Committee

Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND)- Chairman of the Budget Committee
Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL)- Majority Leader Whip of the Senate

Republicans
Rep. Dave Camp (R-MI)- chairman of Ways & Means
Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI)- chairman of the Budget Committee
Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA)- Majority Leader of the House
Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL)- ranking member of the Budget Committee
Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT)- ranking member of the Finance Committee
Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ)- Minority Whip

That’s not a very encouraging line-up, is it? That’s why we should start asking for someone from the Progressive Caucus to sit on this committee.

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Countries well known for low taxation on its people are Greece, Italy and the United States (24% of GDP).  The average tax burden for OECD countries is 35%. During a recession, many countries use government programs to stimulate job growth, create employment benefits and incentives to companies not to lay-off its employees. Most “socialist” European countries have a tax burden between 38 – 42% of GDP, see chart. The North European countries have well-funded pensions for the retirees. The Mediterranean countries on the other hand do not. The people will not pay their fair share of income tax and the pension funds are lacking in assets.

• Tax revenues fall in OECD countries

 
UNITED STATES TRADITION: TRICKLE DOWN ECONOMIC WEALTH

The debt deal between Congress and President Obama does not break with tradition. The Bush years determine tax care for the wealthy, destruction of the middle-class, lower incomes for main street and salvation for the financial institutions that caused the economic breakdown of 2008. A large part of the deficit was caused by a war of choice in Iraq and relief of taxation for the upper class. For the American people one thing is certain: coming election of 2012 will be tough on incumbents in Congress and the White House!

Cause of decline in U.S. financial position

Bush tax cuts added roughly $2 trillion to the national debt over the last decade. Second, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan added an additional $1.1 trillion or so. And third was the Great Recession, which led both to a collapse in revenue and to a sharp rise in spending on unemployment insurance and other safety-net programs.  A Bloomberg analysis in May 2011 attributed $2.0 trillion of the $9.3 trillion of public debt (20%) to additional military and intelligence spending since September 2001.

The Chart That Should Accompany All Discussions of the Debt Ceiling  

"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."

The debt deal is over. There is nothing we can do about that. Nothing. It’s a bad deal for an economy tipping precariously toward a rapid descent into a deeper recession and more unemployment. It has no stimulus in it at all, and the spending cuts it requires likely will result in less regulation by the EPA, FAA, FDA, SEC and other agencies who will see their budgets slashed. Too bad for us. Our side lost that fight.

But it is not too late to begin discussing what we should be doing next. What’s that you ask, Steven D? What can poor little us do? One very necessary thing: We Can Organize a Public Campaign to Build Support and for, and Pressure Congress and the President to, Let the Bush Tax Cuts Expire.

But aren’t they set to expire at the end of next year, Steven? Technically yes, but then they were supposed to expire at the end of 2010, too, and surprise, surprise, when push came to shove they were extended. We know as the sun rises in the East each day that the Republicans in the House will do something to pressure the President and Democrats to extend those tax cuts next year. It doesn’t matter that most people –72% in a recent poll — support increasing taxes to help bring down the deficits. The Republicans are emboldened by their success with the last two manufactured crises they created to force an unpopular agenda down our throats.

My guess is that sometime next Summer or Fall the GOP will pull a stunt to extend the Bush Tax Cuts, probably as a rider to any further spending cuts that are proposed by the debt deal commission, but maybe through some other bill. It doesn’t really matter what mechanism they will employ. We know it is coming. Preserving those favorable tax cuts for the well off, the people who have felt the least pain (and received the most gain) during the past two years, and indeed, giving the wealthy and large corporations even more tax cuts, is their prime objective.

That means we need to start now – today – to organize a campaign to paint the Republicans as villains that serve only the rich, the very people who must pay their fair share of taxes. A campaign that must include assistance and funding from organizations like Moveon, AARP, Stephen Colbert’s PAC, and anyone else you can think of.

We need video-graphers to prepare YouTube videos slamming the hypocrisy of the Republicans and the need for the wealthy to pay their fair share of taxes — videos all of us can promote and spread via social media (Facebook, Twitter, what have you) to help them go viral. Some of those videos can be funny, some serious, some educational, some hard hitting attacks against Republicans, and so forth. I don;lt do video nut I’ve seen some very effective ones from people like Robert Greenwald and others so I know we have the creative talent to get this done.

We need to recruit prominent spokespersons (especially wealth well-known individuals) to go on talk shows to speak out for raising their own taxes because they too want to sacrifice for the greater good of this country. Hollywood Celebrities, Sports Stars, Rock Stars (Bruce Springsteen, Lady Gaga, Common, are you listening?) and other famous wealthy individuals (Warren Buffet, isn’t it time you became a patriot on this issue?) who will stand up against more tax cuts and make public appearances and advertisements we can run on television. People who will openly say this will hurt my pocketbook, but I can afford it and I want to help my country.

We also need to organize a letter writing campaign to Op-Ed pages of every newspaper in the country, and a Phone and fax campaign to our legislators in Congress and to president Obama that we oppose extending the Bush Tax Cuts ASAP. Heck, anyone can write a short op-ed piece or fax. All it has to say is that its way past time for the rich to sacrifice some of the gains they’ve enjoyed at our expense. Hell, those letters practically write themselves. Just cut and paste rants directly from some of the better writers here aor around the blogosphere if you have to. I’m sure they won’t mind.

We should also organize a door to door campaign to hand out literature and spread our message that the deficit can only be fixed if everyone sacrifices for the greater good, and that includes increasing taxes on the wealthy, who under our system usually pay far less of their income than the Middle Class. Literature that points out how well our economy and the Middle Class did in the past when taxes were higher under Bill Clinton. Literature and one on one conversations that explain that wealthy people haven’t used their tax cuts to create jobs here in America — exactly the opposite.

We mus appeal to the public’s emotions. Ask them: What has giving bailouts and tax benefits to rich people done for you? Make them angry. Why should the rich make out like bandits while everyone else suffers? Consider it a Get Out A Fuck The Rich Effort, if you like or GOAFTR, because we need to make people angry enough to want to “go after” the bastards who are using the Shock Doctrine to destroy the country for their benefit.

What should be our message? Well here’s a few ideas:

1. Fairness: Everyone Should Sacrifice, not Just the Most Vulnerable
2. Raising Taxes Helps the Economy: Lowers the Deficit Without Drastic Cuts to essential Services (bring up Clinton surpluses under the old tax rates)
3. Where are the Jobs: More Jobs Created under Clinton when taxes were higher than after the Bush tax cuts went into effect.
4. Even Reagan Raised Taxes.
5. It’s Patriotic: The Wealthy and Corporations Should Pay More for Government Services that Benefit Them the Most
6. No More Special Privileges for the [Rich, Oil Companies, Health Insurance Companies, Wall Street Bankers, Hedge Fund Managers — just fill in the blank.]

Maybe you can think of better messages. Maybe you have better ideas than I do as to how to create the organizations needed to lead this effort and raise the funds we to get it off the ground. In fact, I’m certain of it. I am not a community organizer. I don’t know a thing about raising money for a political campaign of this kind. I wouldn’t know how to recruit the people we need to lead this effort, or who would be the best spokespeople, or where to find the activists on the ground to write the letters and knock on the doors.

But I bet a lot of you do.

So that’s my idea. You say you’re fed up with a weak President who “capitulates” or you’re mad at Democrats in Congress who allow an unpopular faction to hold up them up for ransom, screwing the people they claim to support? Well, arguing about how bad or weak or corrupt or [insert epithet here] Obama and the Democratic party has shown itself to be is fine and dandy if all you want to do is vent. But when you’re done venting what does that get you? Do you really feel better? Has anything really useful been accomplished?

It’s practically become a cliche to mention this FDR quote, made when he spoke to a group of progressive reformers, but I’m going to bring it up again anyway because it’s true.

I agree with you, I want to do it, now make me do it.

The advantage we have in campaigning against extending the Bush tax cuts is that we are not asking people to say “Yes,” which can be a hard thing to do, but to say “No!” or even “Hell No!” Trust me, it’s a lot easier to get people to say no to something than yes. But we need to start now, because the Republicans are already planning what they are going to do to get those tax cuts extended, unpopular though they may be. We, collectively, waited too long to address the phony debt ceiling crisis, and we failed to stir up enough outrage to prevent what went down. Let’s not wait that long ever again.

And if all this sounds like too much bother or trouble, ask yourself these questions: If not now, when? If not me, who? Yeah, another cliche, but true too.

If you want the most positive spin on the debt ceiling agreement, you can choose between Jay Newton-Small and Deaniac83. Those are both good pieces that make solid arguments. I have to confess I’m a little mystified by the triggers, as they seem to offer almost no incentive to the Democrats on the SuperCommittee to make a deal. Gee, if we have a stalemate that means massive cuts to the Pentagon’s budget and downward pressure on the cost of Medicare? I’ll take that in a minute.

The deal is considerably better than what I feared, but I also think those two pieces are glossing over what a calamity this whole thing has been and what it means for the future. These are huge cuts, yet they don’t even begin to tackle our deficit. So, we’ll keep coming back to this. What we need is something equivalent to the creation of the Internet that will help us grow our way out of this fiscal sinkhole we’re in. With these austerity measures, we’re not going to be stimulating our way out of this mess. And, with Republican dominance of the Senate assured through 2014, we’re not going to accomplish much of anything that we can celebrate.

If you’ve been reading these pages, you know that I’ve been generally supportive of what the president has been trying to do about the fact that the Republicans are threatening to blow the global economy up on purpose. They obviously have the power to do that if they want to, and they’re unruly enough to pull it off even if their leaders don’t want them to. So, the president has the responsibility to prevent it from happening and he’s succeeded, at last, in getting an agreement that will save the global economy from sudden, epic, collapse.

Obviously, it would be a shame if the deal collapsed now. But, having said that, I would have no objection to the progressives in the House withholding their support and forcing Speaker Boehner to sweeten the deal. Now is the time to do that. They can’t be unreasonable and they have to be realistic about what can pass the Senate. But they ought to be able to take the gun away from the Republicans and hold it to Boehner’s head for a little while. What to ask for? Perhaps an extension of the payroll tax holiday. I think that’s gettable. An extension of unemployment insurance might he unattainable, but they should at least ask for it.

This deal is okay considering the circumstances, but it’s going to make it harder to get people back to work. Fighting for a little stimulus is definitely in order because Boehner can’t even come close to passing this bill without substantial Democratic support.

LINK

It seems that the summer heat wave will continue through Friday as sizzling temperatures continue to soar into the 90s.

A heat wave with oppressive temperatures and stifling humidity lingered and intensified in the midsection of the country through last week and the weekend, and is expected to expand eastward as the week continues.

Crowds flocked to waterfronts and swimming pools on the U.S. East Coast and in the Midwest on Thursday to try to cope with a massive heat wave that has killed over 22 people.

In July, over 18 states had heat advisories, including North Dakota, Texas, Mississippi, Georgia and the Carolinas (where temperatures may exceed 100 degrees this week).

Doctors in Tulsa are advising extreme caution:

Doctor Gavin Gardner at the OSU Medical Center in Tulsa has some advice for those who have to be outdoors for any length of time.

“The big thing is fluid intake and try to limit exposure to heat as much as possible.”

The doctor says the OSU emergency room is seeing 10 to 15 patients a day who are suffering from heat stroke. […]

“Particularly elderly and children who have been exposed maybe in a home that hasn’t been equipped with adequate air conditioning.”

Gardner says there are warning signs to watch out for if you have to be out in the heat for more than a few minutes.

“Muscle cramps, nausea, dizziness.”

The doctor says hot weather can make allergies and respiratory diseases worse.

He says also some medications don’t work too well when the patient has to be out in the heat.

The heat has turned many small towns into “ghost towns” because people are afraid to leave their homes:

“I can’t hardly do nothing when it’s this hot,” said Bryce Butler, an 86-year-old World War II veteran who stays in his house every day in this town of 200 people. He usually drives to the county seat in Guthrie, about 15 miles away, for errands but now can’t go out after noon.

“I’m afraid if I had car trouble, I’d have a heat stroke,” said Mary Hasley, 79, who lives in nearby Cashion. She has cancelled her doctor’s appointments. “It’s just too dangerous.”

It’s been over 100 for more than 30 days in a row in many parts of Oklahoma. In the town of Altus, the average high in June — when the weather is normally mild — was 105. In the many dozens of rural communities like Mulhall, where there are no longer any stores or other services, the elderly must drive other places for almost everything, and that has become daunting this summer.

And, oh by the way, climate change is a hoax. The esteemed Senator James Inhofe from Oklahoma says so.