Carl Gibson begins: "What if there was a group of terrorists holding your family hostage with a gun pointed at themselves, demanding the account number to your pension fund? Would you negotiate with the terrorists by allowing them access to your savings, or would you let them shoot themselves and keep your retirement money intact?"
President Barack Obama, with House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio, take part in a White House meeting, 07/07/11. (photo: AP)
|
THE NEW STREAMLINED RSN LOGIN PROCESS: Register once, then login and you are ready to comment. All you need is a Username and a Password of your choosing and you are free to comment whenever you like! Welcome to the Reader Supported News community. |
Comments
We are concerned about a recent drift towards vitriol in the RSN Reader comments section. There is a fine line between moderation and censorship. No one likes a harsh or confrontational forum atmosphere. At the same time everyone wants to be able to express themselves freely. We'll start by encouraging good judgment. If that doesn't work we'll have to ramp up the moderation.
General guidelines: Avoid personal attacks on other forum members; Avoid remarks that are ethnically derogatory; Do not advocate violence, or any illegal activity.
Remember that making the world better begins with responsible action.
- The RSN Team
You can't get money out of people that are already in poverty.
The rich are not entitled to money. The country needs it is time for the wealthy to pay-up.
The fact the taxes have been too low led to this bubble mess in the first place. By letting too much cash accumulate with no where to go lead to all these bogus gambling investment schemes.
For years the most needed investment with the biggest pay-back has been in our country. Education (like free through college}, health care (not insurance) infrastructure, (not military).
Government does have a job to do believe it or not. Like maybe to serve everyone.
If a parasite kills its host game is over.
It is time to apply taxes where the money is.
It sickens me to even say I'm an American at this juncture in history.
N.
Quoting
Israel is unique among most of the nations that we give financial & military aide to. A strong Israel is an U.S. ally that helps guarantee U.S. control & influence in the region while, at the same time, protecting Israel from the many enemies that surrounds it.
The primary reasons as to why we give foreign aid, both financial & military, to foreign nations are the following:
o They become so addicted to the aid, rather than risk losing it, these countries will do whatever it takes to keep it. They'll do whatever we tell them to do, jump thru our hoops as Greece is doing by blocking that Gaza flotilla just as an example.
o A 2nd important reason, especially when it comes to military aid, the money that we give these nations comes right back to us in the form of supporting the military/industrial complex. The money is like one big free grant with the only stipulation being the country's loyalty to our needs & demands, both political & otherwise.
o A 3rd reason for the military aid throughout the world is to simply maintain a state of chaos between countries & peoples which weakens them & helps the U.S. spread its doctrine.
BBQd please.
I have a better idea...we need to FIRE THEIR ARSES and create a Shadow Government that is a think-tank in the wings that gets massive news coverage. In fact, I think I'm going to start this today. Nothing to lose...everything to gain!
See you on the flipside...I'm the one with the sane ideas FOR the people who work in the trenches...you, me, and your neighbor down the street who's out of work and has no health insurance.
N.
Can I join your think tank? Who is going to go on the MSM and quote us? Can we make sh-t up like Heritage and all those other wacko right wing think tanks.
And most important of all, are we gonna get tanked on Irish Whiskey or Bourbon?
The ER Staff people could not pump my stomach FAST ENOUGH! Not to mention my chlolesterol would FLY TO THE MOON!
Don't worry, tomorrow night President Obama (who may not be a citizen - ya know - born in Australia or some place) will tell all you old folks your social security account (500B taken out in 2010) and a few more billion were requested last Friday to fund our wars for our friends in the Far East so they can get educated to bomb those still around after you old folks won't have those monthly checks and a $1700 / year voucher for your medical. We should complete this cleansing of old people within 3-4 years.
Tell your grandkids to join the GOP so we won't have to spend too much $$ on TV bashing the others.
And to limit the # of children (after they are born bc there will be no more abortions) we've removed all free food (or will soon)
Ed
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FAtJaJf1mUI
GOP and Dems are afraid of losing their purse strings not the Oil Company..they would just have their accountants fix this and fix that.
dominance and submission..they have us or so they think
I would start by firing the sobs that work there now and that would save tons. Most of those caseworkers and their bosses are lazy and deserve to be on the unemployment line like the rest of USA.
Cuts from Politicians, Military (who also said they didnot need some of the prototypes as they are not functional or realistic in terms of upkeep).
Look into Agencies and start cleaning them out, reworking them to fit the needs of today. No more Foreign Aid in USA or to other Countries. Some of our aid to others also puts us into positions we should not be in. Perhaps it is time for Countries who want to rule with a Big Stick to do so on their own. Those who actually need help, well all these Missions and Churches etc groping for your money can start going in and helping just like Jimmy Carter did here and abroad. These Ministers, Rabbis etc can give up their million dollar lifestyles and remember they are supposedly teachers of the Lord not Wall Street
maybe it's time to mount another candidate for POTUS. I would gladly vote for Kucinich, Sanders, Feingold or Alan Grayson... anyone who will stand up to the worst set of Rethugs in our history.
Shadow government in the works, as we speak. Watch for it...it's coming and they'll all be gone, down to the last itchy b.tchy one of them.
N.
If Obama rolls over on this - as he did with the tax cut extension & single payer health care reform - all is lost. His base will not come out to support his re-election and - absent Hilliary Clinton (or jim Webb) making a surprise run at the Presidency - some member of the GOP Clown-of-the-Month Club will be elected by default . . . and that clown will undoubtedly replace one or more Supreme Court Justices with additional Scalia-Thomas types. And that's just the beginning!
This is NOT a democracy; it is capitalism, pure and not so simple, shrouded in the propaganda that "We, the People" have more freedom BECAUSE OF our Constitution.
Uh...NOT! Get a grip. We need a Wisconsin moment, an Egypt moment, and I doubt that the voting in 2012 will be enough to turn any tide. We're a sinking ship for sure.
My biggest thing is that it is OUR money they are asking us to now give up and that they've been using for years. Are you kidding me? I want my money back!! And do NOT ask me, a lowly teacher, to pay taxes on the backs of the richest 1% in America.
I'm outta here...N.
I am 60 years old. When I came of age, Media Enterprises in America were owned and operated by hundreds of different, separate and diverse entities. The TRUTH was easier to find and believe. There were strict Media Ownership Regulations which existed to maintain such large and varying diversity, unlike today after 30 years of endless DEREGULATION OF EVERYTHING FOR THE SAKE OF WANTON GREED AND THE QUEST FOR GREATER POWER AND CONTROL BY A FEW FOR A FEW.
A Fairness Doctrine in Media existed then to maintain an easy flow of differing viewpoints in ways which exposed most Americans to such different views. The very idea that any of Mainstream Media in America would be broadly and almost exclusively used as a political propaganda machine was incredulous.
NOT SO TODAY.
Now, almost all Media Enterprises, and thus, almost all the major pipelines for 'Free Speech' and Our Constitutionall y Mandated 'Free Press is now owned and readily exploited all too often for political purposes by the too much of the very few GLOBAL CORPORATE CONGLOMERATES that own it.
End this antithesis to the very Idea of Democracy and OUR REPUBLIC, which is in grave peril because of it.
This is at the heart of Our Problems.
Yes, this is really important and very few people notice it. Reducing the payroll tax has been recommended by right wing think tanks for a long time, esp. the Heritage Fdn. They see it as a way to defund and eventually destroy Social Security and Medicare. A tax cut for the middle class is the bait.
Why would Obama pick up an idea from the right wing? Doesn't he have any ideas of his own? Apparently not.
PRIVATIZE... THAT MEANS GIVE TO WALL ST.... AND THE COSTS GO UP... BECAUSE OF THE THEFT WE CAN EXPECT.
"Since 1950, capital gains taxes have dropped 10 percent." This is not correct. Capital gains have dropped a lot more than that. Right now capital gains are taxed at 15% with all kinds of loophole deductions so the effective tax rate is near 1-3%.
Overall, corporations pay less than 4% of the money the USG takes in compared to more than 40% in the 1950s. That's a whole lot of money that has been transferred to private accounts. Increasing taxes on the middle class have made up the difference.
But I also question the severity of the failure to increase the debt limit. Who cares? Don't raise it. Obama and his administration will have to pick and choose what to pay. They will have to cancel all Pentagon procurement projects. No more bombs, no more new jets. No more foreign aid to Israel, Egypt, Colombia, Pakistan. No more Homeland Security. No more TSA feel ups. It won’t take long for the republicans to come crawling on their knees begging for a debt limit increase.
Sadly, Obama is part of the terrorist gang, only under cover. His best friends are people like Jamie Diamon. He is not our friend.
Obama under cover? Personally, I think he's an overt enemy to anyone with progressive or even moderate inclinations and it's high time we started treating him as such. I think we should demand that he run as a Republican and insist that he remove the "D" after his name on the ballot.
NOW is the time to go "All In" on these fiscal creeps and make them face the blatant consequences of their folly: CALL THEIR BLUFF!
Wouldn't it be sweet to see that unfold?
Obama would be re-elected in a landslide!
Is this guy for real, was he EVER for real, or is he just the black Jimmy Carter...one term and off the radar screen?
Quoting
Aye, there's the rub, because instead of a principled leader, we have a sniveling, timorous, capitulating corporate catamite eager to sell the poor and elderly down the river if given half a chance.
But don't worry, folks, after he stabs you in the back, he'll deliver an eloquent defense for his treachery.
CHURCHILL ONCE TRIED TO APPEASE HITLER... IT DIDNT WORK THAT WELL
No.....that was Neville Chamberlain.
This is not possible in modern democracies. The ruling elite knows how to manage public opinion very effectively. They know how to stage elections so that people get worked up over non-issues. The ruling elite can marshall an astro-turf rebellion like the Teabaggers and have the media start proclaiming that 2/3 of americans want to cut corporate tax and let the free market solve all the problems.
Phone calls and emails to members of congress don't work. When the ruling elite supports and issue, their mass media claims that phone calls and email support the issue too. But when phone calls and email run 1000 to 1 against an issue, that fact is just ignored.
Things will have to get worse before they will get better. They are going to get a lot worse. The results of the Obama-Boner negotiations will be reduced corporate tax and cuts in social security and medicare benefits to pay for it.
When it is time, the middle class will have to stage a tax strike -- just stop paying. As in all such strikes, when people learn they can refuse to pay and that they have the courage to face down the federal police, then they become scary. Then they have power.
We need to get our recall petitions circulating. That'll get their attention, and maybe clean house before the election.
Yeah, smart taxation to tax money that's held out of circulation - especially that which is being 'off-shored'. Neither my retirement funds, nor I appreciate being held for ransom.
They should all go to DC, round up every Republican. This round up would be mandatory for Tea Party fools. Then teach them arithmetic, not even math; just plain arithmetic.
Drill into their puny brains, the stuff we all learned in the third grade.
The Number Line.
and
Label Your Work.
It seems to me that either they all forgot 3rd grade, or the Tea Party folks are all the ones that were out that day. Another possibility is that all they care about is getting control of the country.
And what is scarier, is that they want the power so bad, they are willing to destory it in order to gain power. What will they do with a decimated USA?
And they own the minds of the tens of millions of idiots who believe they will one day strike it rich--thus vote to favor the rich.
It's as if America has become a massive, teeming satire. Would make a hilarious movie.
Our outrage is not yet known. ruth Mck.
Calling the White House might help, I do it frequently, although when I called on Monday to tell them what I thought about Social Security and Medicare being "on the table" I was on hold for 22 minutes before a recording came on saying "due to unusually high call volume we can't take your call." I live in Texas. All our Senators and Representatives are the perpetrators of these outrages (Republicans)so they never listen to us. And now we're expoting another tarantula-the excrebale Rick Perry. A lying, incompetent, privatizing, bribe taking and, as people in Texas know a hypocritical "me thinks though doest protest too much" anti-gay propagandist. He's about as straight as Marcus Bachmann. It would be their own private business but they are both so "Christian, family value, pray away the gay." They remind me of Ted Haggard.
All true, Karenvista, but nobody's perfect!
Revisit and enter amendments to CAP monetary amounts on Campaign giving. Otherwise, we are beating dead horses to finish the race. Also, we the People need to amend that all legislative brancehs of govt. be put into the same health care plan we have. Or purchase their own!!
THE GLASS STEAGAL ACT WHICH SEPARATED LOCAL SAVINGS BANKS FROM INVESTMENT BANKS AND INSURANCE COMPANIES SHOULD BE EXTENDED AS A BIG TRUST BUSTER AND INCLUDE AND HEDGEFUNDS AND BROKERAGE HOUSES.
In the words of Stalin-"It's not who votes that counts-it's who counts the votes." That's the point we have arrived at here. When Venezuela can have their electronic voting machines, manufactured in Florida & create a paper trail and a receipt for the voters, who do you think is more concerned with having a free and fair election? I just consider my votes as little speed bumps that the election officials have to exert a little extra energy to delete or change. Since we don't demand verifiable voter receipts and paper trails for recounts we'll never have free elections again.
I was working the polls in Texas on election night in 2004 and the conservative radio stations were lamenting that Kerry had won. But, as you said, the next morning everything had changed and you couldn't even find exit poll data on the internet. It had been scrubbed. Funny, we use exit poll data to rate how free and fair elections are in other countries and they are typically on target unless the election is fraudulent. Here we just say the exit poll was wrong. Isn't that odd?
So what good are "America's" rich? Either tax the hell out of them, and if they refuse, deport or ban them forever from setting foot on American soil, or somewhere else where they can fight their wars and battles. politicians too, must be held accountable for betraying, cheating, sending our young men and women to wars they created for the rich! They and those five supreme courts justices must also be charge as traitors to the American people and must be either deported or jailed as criminals.
And if American industries and corporations wish to outsource Americans jobs, they they too must be deported and not set foot on American soil again. But first they must be a heavy fine to the American people.
Problemas solved!
http://cpc.grijalva.house.gov/files/The_CPC_FY2012_Budget.pdf
Tax the wealthy, majority rules...
Concerning Grover Norquist's campaign pledge I think that it's treasonious to agree to tie the hands of representative democracy. I will never vote for anyone who admits they're not willing or prepared to negociate. Signing a pledge is such an admission.
So much for history.
Now to reality; one can't blame really Obama for trying to find a bipartisan solution early on in his term in spite of the overtly obstructionist tactics of his minority opponents. But to continue to try and find middle ground with these enemies of most of the people after all this time under their thrall and shouts of "NO-NO-NO!" is beyond my understanding. -But what do I know as one of the riff-raff???
D'you think that, if the Repug's had had a super-majority for even a short time, they'd have tried to work with anybody or anything?
"O' Tempora-o' Mores!" (Cicero).
RSS feed for comments to this post.