Worried about government spending? Worried about the deficit? Worried about a balanced budget? Worried about the national debt? Think the USA has a "spending problem" and not a "revenue problem?"
Republicans don't. Otherwise they wouldn't have been sending dozens of funding requests for government projects in their districts.
You know what, I'm down with putting people to work now and getting all these projects funded now. As long as the President publicizes the shit out of the fact that all this government spending is what Republicans ask for when the cameras are turned off. He should sign into law each district's requests and call them Republican Stimulus requests. They are the ones who made stimulus a dirty word, after all.
All that fear-mongering about the state of the country's finances is just talk-talk. They love stimulus and bringing home the bacon just as much as any other politician.
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Showing posts with label cash money. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cash money. Show all posts
Scandal
I'll send y'all over to Georgia Sports Blog for the proper introduction to the college football news that just hit the web.
University of Miami's having a bad day. Please, don't take a picture.
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University of Miami's having a bad day. Please, don't take a picture.
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More Reality With That?
There are still a lot of folks who aren unwilling to accept the reality presented by the loss of the Wisconsin recall effort. I know it is a lot of reality to accept, and it isn't the reality that was thought to exist before the polls closed. But you can take your medicine now and start figuring out how to do things differently, or you can hold fast and keep losing.
Here are six things the Wisconsin votes showed us, the most important of which is that unions, under their current SOP, are finished as a major political force in this country.
As I've been telling people, union-busting, defund public education Republicans hold the government of Wisconsin. They took them in general elections, and survived a mulligan set of special recall elections in which the full force of union political power and money was brought to bear. Again, in Wisconsin.
You don't get more game-set-match than that.
Time to reinvent the wheel.
(HT: Andrew Sullivan)
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Here are six things the Wisconsin votes showed us, the most important of which is that unions, under their current SOP, are finished as a major political force in this country.
As I've been telling people, union-busting, defund public education Republicans hold the government of Wisconsin. They took them in general elections, and survived a mulligan set of special recall elections in which the full force of union political power and money was brought to bear. Again, in Wisconsin.
You don't get more game-set-match than that.
Time to reinvent the wheel.
(HT: Andrew Sullivan)
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Texas A&M to the SEC
Team Speed Kills disects the rumour mill. It all comes down to this:
While I think this probably means things will happen sooner rather than later, I still come back to the same question I keep thinking of: what other team gets the invite?
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The SEC is a great conference the way it is and should not expand just to expand. But if the Big XIIish is going to spin apart -- and it eventually will -- the SEC has to get Texas A&M.
While I think this probably means things will happen sooner rather than later, I still come back to the same question I keep thinking of: what other team gets the invite?
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Keep Your Money At Home
But not under the mattress.
Here's someone with a $15 Trillion stimulus plan for the American domestic economy.
Of course, reverse engineer this idea, and you'll find that most of that money is currently going into the hands ofprofessional gamblers Wall Street financial planners, corporate interests that aren't creating jobs, and real estate oversupply. Is it any wonder why the current American economy is unsustainable and stagnant?
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Here's someone with a $15 Trillion stimulus plan for the American domestic economy.
Of course, reverse engineer this idea, and you'll find that most of that money is currently going into the hands of
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Angry Liberals
Incapable of trying to contain a political loss, some House Democrats are now falling over themselves to multiply the Debt Deal fallout by using hyperbole to make themselves objects of ridicule.
Folks, the Debt Deal was an issue that was 1 part policy to 9 parts politics. This was so much theatre that I now think Washington has more to fear from a writers' strike than Hollywood. "Issues" like this only become issues because the GOP is good at playing politics and making mountains out of molehills, and the Democrats often lose at "king of the (imaginary) hill."
Think about this: after months (if not years) of Tea Party and GOP whining, pouting, getting an inch and taking a mile, victimization mythology, hyperbolic rhetoric, and marketing the snake oil of cultural and economic panic, the Democrats are the ones getting laughed at.
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Folks, the Debt Deal was an issue that was 1 part policy to 9 parts politics. This was so much theatre that I now think Washington has more to fear from a writers' strike than Hollywood. "Issues" like this only become issues because the GOP is good at playing politics and making mountains out of molehills, and the Democrats often lose at "king of the (imaginary) hill."
Think about this: after months (if not years) of Tea Party and GOP whining, pouting, getting an inch and taking a mile, victimization mythology, hyperbolic rhetoric, and marketing the snake oil of cultural and economic panic, the Democrats are the ones getting laughed at.
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Georgia Banks
Back in Georgia, they're still trying to figure out what caused so many of their banks to collapse when the real estate bubble burst. This is an interesting take on the situation. Such mature examinations are far more valuable than the "Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac" narrative so many right-of-center types have parroted since 2007.
It also may answer some of the questions jerztronics was asking on this blog back in March.
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It also may answer some of the questions jerztronics was asking on this blog back in March.
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Cultural Economy
I commented at Cliff's Crib that, if more people truly understood what their tax dollars paid for, our national conversation about government would be completely different.
Instead, the national conversation is awash in complete misconceptions, falsehoods, and made-up theoreticals. One of those is that "the government does not/should not provide funding for the arts." This one has been around for a while, and is a narrative often trotted out as an anecdotal example of pervasive government waste and the largeness of government size. The perception is that government pays artists to create pretty pictures or songs, and that the money never goes anywhere else. People who buy into that narrative seem to think this government money is there simply to subsidize the bohemian lifestyles of liberal, artsy types.
The truth is, arts and culture have tremendous economic impact all over the United States, and any honest discussion of the validity of government funding should take that economic impact into account.
Because if it is worth $400 million to the state of Georgia to land a KIA assembly plant, it may be worth it to the state to fund the arts and culture as well. It all depends on the return on investment per government dollar spent, and the taxpayers deserve to hear the truth about the economic impact of their tax dollars. Unfortunately, all they're getting right now are narratives and platitudes, as return on investment isn't a part of the "Big Government Waste" conversation we so often hear.
(HT: Jeffrey)
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Instead, the national conversation is awash in complete misconceptions, falsehoods, and made-up theoreticals. One of those is that "the government does not/should not provide funding for the arts." This one has been around for a while, and is a narrative often trotted out as an anecdotal example of pervasive government waste and the largeness of government size. The perception is that government pays artists to create pretty pictures or songs, and that the money never goes anywhere else. People who buy into that narrative seem to think this government money is there simply to subsidize the bohemian lifestyles of liberal, artsy types.
The truth is, arts and culture have tremendous economic impact all over the United States, and any honest discussion of the validity of government funding should take that economic impact into account.
Because if it is worth $400 million to the state of Georgia to land a KIA assembly plant, it may be worth it to the state to fund the arts and culture as well. It all depends on the return on investment per government dollar spent, and the taxpayers deserve to hear the truth about the economic impact of their tax dollars. Unfortunately, all they're getting right now are narratives and platitudes, as return on investment isn't a part of the "Big Government Waste" conversation we so often hear.
(HT: Jeffrey)
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Amateur
Georgia Public Service Commissioner Tom Echols needs to step up his game if he wants to join former Alaska governor Sarah Palin & former New Orleans Mayor C. Ray Nagin's Chocolate Moose Party.
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Pro-Free Enterprise
Ask and ye shall recieve. In response to a comment I made last week on WalMart subsidies, Owen Courreges at Uptown Messenger examines the difference between being "pro-business" and being "pro-free enterprise."
Pro-business being another term I associate with "business friendliness," the turn of phrase preferred by so very many Southern Chambers of Commerce as they pick the pockets of some businesses to put cash in the pockets of their more invested interests.
As a Southern Liberal, I can justify subsidies and tax breaks and infrastructure investments that stand to augment all businesses in a place. The Tennessee Valley Authority made a lot of people rich while taking a lot of other people's land. It also provided power for millions. The Port of New Orleans and the Port of Savannah allow any businesses to ship their goods by sea. Farm subsidies can be gamed to make millions for agribusiness, but they've also helped stabilize food prices. There are trade offs, and the people must be vigilant and informed of where their tax dollars are going, who is using them, and who stands to benefit the most.
That's because the free enterprise system requires rules and a just playing field in order for the true market competition to work. On the other hand, using tax revenues generated by some businesses to support their competition is when the government - and their well-connected interests - violate the free market to choose the winners and the losers in unfair competition. That may be "pro-(specific)-businesses" or "business friendly," in name, but it is more akin to feudalism in practice.
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Pro-business being another term I associate with "business friendliness," the turn of phrase preferred by so very many Southern Chambers of Commerce as they pick the pockets of some businesses to put cash in the pockets of their more invested interests.
As a Southern Liberal, I can justify subsidies and tax breaks and infrastructure investments that stand to augment all businesses in a place. The Tennessee Valley Authority made a lot of people rich while taking a lot of other people's land. It also provided power for millions. The Port of New Orleans and the Port of Savannah allow any businesses to ship their goods by sea. Farm subsidies can be gamed to make millions for agribusiness, but they've also helped stabilize food prices. There are trade offs, and the people must be vigilant and informed of where their tax dollars are going, who is using them, and who stands to benefit the most.
That's because the free enterprise system requires rules and a just playing field in order for the true market competition to work. On the other hand, using tax revenues generated by some businesses to support their competition is when the government - and their well-connected interests - violate the free market to choose the winners and the losers in unfair competition. That may be "pro-(specific)-businesses" or "business friendly," in name, but it is more akin to feudalism in practice.
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Profiles in Courage
Let's talk about the successful charter school experiment in New Orleans. I like how the article pops on a Friday afternoon to depress the readership as much as possible.
Don't ever believe the hype. If you allow charters to be run badly, they will have the exact same problems you find in regular schools that are run badly. The only answer is to actually make sure whatever schools your local tax dollars are paying for are run by professionals.
And you damn sure can't put the blame for this on the teachers. If it weren't for some of these courageous ladies (some of whom I know) damning the torpedoes and blowing the whistle, this craziness might never have been exposed.
Bravo, ladies.
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Don't ever believe the hype. If you allow charters to be run badly, they will have the exact same problems you find in regular schools that are run badly. The only answer is to actually make sure whatever schools your local tax dollars are paying for are run by professionals.
And you damn sure can't put the blame for this on the teachers. If it weren't for some of these courageous ladies (some of whom I know) damning the torpedoes and blowing the whistle, this craziness might never have been exposed.
Bravo, ladies.
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Race to the Bottom?
MOAR SOUTHERNERZ BE TAKING URR JOABS!!!
Georgia gets ready to make a bid for the North American Audi manufacturing plant. While this might be exciting that more manufacturing is taking place in the Deep South, I despise the fact that the main discussion centers around which states will offer the most robust subsidies for these industries. According to the article, Georgia offered Kia $400M in breaks, and Tennessee offered Volkswagen $500M.
Yes, I realize that these are subsidies that include tax exemptions for taxes that wouldn't exist if the plant was built somewhere else. Hell, as a Southern Liberal, I'm all about using strategic subsidies to encourage development where appropriate. It just chaps me that people may not realize just how much of the store the state gives away to land these developments, and I definitely want the dialouge to be more honest.
People need to know, after all, how much the state is making off such a robust investment. People also need to know how this sort of thing plays with the "small government" narrative. Such expenditures are often labeled as "pork" or "bailouts" when a less politically-savvy political party makes deals of this kind.
Of course, I am glad to be proven completely correct about the root cause for the Seattle vs. South Carolina Boeing dust-up. It is all about the subsidies, baby.
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Georgia gets ready to make a bid for the North American Audi manufacturing plant. While this might be exciting that more manufacturing is taking place in the Deep South, I despise the fact that the main discussion centers around which states will offer the most robust subsidies for these industries. According to the article, Georgia offered Kia $400M in breaks, and Tennessee offered Volkswagen $500M.
Yes, I realize that these are subsidies that include tax exemptions for taxes that wouldn't exist if the plant was built somewhere else. Hell, as a Southern Liberal, I'm all about using strategic subsidies to encourage development where appropriate. It just chaps me that people may not realize just how much of the store the state gives away to land these developments, and I definitely want the dialouge to be more honest.
People need to know, after all, how much the state is making off such a robust investment. People also need to know how this sort of thing plays with the "small government" narrative. Such expenditures are often labeled as "pork" or "bailouts" when a less politically-savvy political party makes deals of this kind.
Of course, I am glad to be proven completely correct about the root cause for the Seattle vs. South Carolina Boeing dust-up. It is all about the subsidies, baby.
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The "Message"
At what point do you start disregarding facts entirely and start arguing about made up stuff? The farcical national conversation about the Stimulus could be "Exhibit A."
For what it is worth, the Stimulus was a disaster - a political disaster, especially for Democrats and Keynesians. Facing a looming economic catastrophe as our nation's people collectively maxed out their personal debt financed by banks who were maxing out theirs, the government had to spend money it didn't have to avoid getting us into a depression. That money combined with the vaporization of several trillion dollars in Monopoly-money wealth our nation didn't actually have to create some pretty gnarly budget deficits and government debt.
But, instead of hammering home each stimulus need individually (we need $200 billion for infrastructure - who doesn't like planes, trains, and automobiles?; we need $100 billion for schools - who doesn't think children should read?; we need $2 billion for alternative energy sources - who doesn't want cheap, renewable energy? etc.) the brainiacs in charge decided to completely ignore political reality, lump everything together and not talk about it.
Opponents were suddenly free to parade the words "omnibus" and "stimulus" around while waving the total price tag aloft, declaring we were getting this money from "our children." They found endless anecdotes and examples of "pork." Some were real, some were made up, and some were actually valuable government programs that monitor things like floods. It didn't matter what it was, there was so much in the bill it forced most Americans to rely on the lazy media to tell them. We all know how that turns out.
Now, a media-savvy Democratic Congress could have owned the news cycles and won political victories for two straight years just passing parts of the whole. They probably could have got more money for the big stuff, too. All those folks who later argued "the stimulus didn't work because it wasn't big enough," political problems in their own right, simply didn't understand how to gain political support to justify those additional expenditures.
But, noooo, Nancy Pelosi had a chance to destroy the GOP opposition on a host of issues the majority of Americans already agreed with her about and decided instead to do it in a way that actually turned Americans against the program, the party, and drove them into the waiting arms of a "Tea Party" ready to capitalize off the cultural and economic panic being felt across the country. GOP governors across the land decried the bill while taking the cash, and never paid a political price for it. Why would they? They were counting millions while the "Stimulus Ins't Big Enough" crowd took to the Op-Ed pages of the New York Times and got busy telling Americans the stimulus didn't work and that they needed more money.
That moment of decision, when the Democrats decided they didn't need to convince the American voters to agree with them, was when they lost the national argument over how to do something about the economic collapse. That was the moment they decided they would never get another chance to use Keynesian theories to save this economy, and that they'd never get a political chance to recover until the GOP allowed them to have one. That was the moment they assumed blame for the "stimulus didn't work" narrative, and they are still paying for it today.
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For what it is worth, the Stimulus was a disaster - a political disaster, especially for Democrats and Keynesians. Facing a looming economic catastrophe as our nation's people collectively maxed out their personal debt financed by banks who were maxing out theirs, the government had to spend money it didn't have to avoid getting us into a depression. That money combined with the vaporization of several trillion dollars in Monopoly-money wealth our nation didn't actually have to create some pretty gnarly budget deficits and government debt.
But, instead of hammering home each stimulus need individually (we need $200 billion for infrastructure - who doesn't like planes, trains, and automobiles?; we need $100 billion for schools - who doesn't think children should read?; we need $2 billion for alternative energy sources - who doesn't want cheap, renewable energy? etc.) the brainiacs in charge decided to completely ignore political reality, lump everything together and not talk about it.
Opponents were suddenly free to parade the words "omnibus" and "stimulus" around while waving the total price tag aloft, declaring we were getting this money from "our children." They found endless anecdotes and examples of "pork." Some were real, some were made up, and some were actually valuable government programs that monitor things like floods. It didn't matter what it was, there was so much in the bill it forced most Americans to rely on the lazy media to tell them. We all know how that turns out.
Now, a media-savvy Democratic Congress could have owned the news cycles and won political victories for two straight years just passing parts of the whole. They probably could have got more money for the big stuff, too. All those folks who later argued "the stimulus didn't work because it wasn't big enough," political problems in their own right, simply didn't understand how to gain political support to justify those additional expenditures.
But, noooo, Nancy Pelosi had a chance to destroy the GOP opposition on a host of issues the majority of Americans already agreed with her about and decided instead to do it in a way that actually turned Americans against the program, the party, and drove them into the waiting arms of a "Tea Party" ready to capitalize off the cultural and economic panic being felt across the country. GOP governors across the land decried the bill while taking the cash, and never paid a political price for it. Why would they? They were counting millions while the "Stimulus Ins't Big Enough" crowd took to the Op-Ed pages of the New York Times and got busy telling Americans the stimulus didn't work and that they needed more money.
That moment of decision, when the Democrats decided they didn't need to convince the American voters to agree with them, was when they lost the national argument over how to do something about the economic collapse. That was the moment they decided they would never get another chance to use Keynesian theories to save this economy, and that they'd never get a political chance to recover until the GOP allowed them to have one. That was the moment they assumed blame for the "stimulus didn't work" narrative, and they are still paying for it today.
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Systems Failure
Patrick Appel at the Daily Dish ponders how little protections are afforded at-risk populations.
Looking at the story as is, this seems like a case of many patholgies that are crushing our society these days under weight of our own making.
The race and economic status of the guy thrown in jail. The bank incompetently refusing to honor its own check, and its inability to verify that check's accuracy in house. The inability of a criminal justice system to work swiftly while the parking police can sweep down and impound a car in a matter of hours. The litigation for the damage this has done to one man's life is dragging along. For want of a nail...
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Looking at the story as is, this seems like a case of many patholgies that are crushing our society these days under weight of our own making.
The race and economic status of the guy thrown in jail. The bank incompetently refusing to honor its own check, and its inability to verify that check's accuracy in house. The inability of a criminal justice system to work swiftly while the parking police can sweep down and impound a car in a matter of hours. The litigation for the damage this has done to one man's life is dragging along. For want of a nail...
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$64,000 Question
So you're telling me a couple that makes $64,000 a year, including Social Security benefits, might qualify for Medicare and that's a bad thing?
I'll admit that might be a little bit high. Median household income in the United States is around $45K a year, so I guess folks who earn around that number might consider themselves "middle class." But with the price of food and gasoline going up, the value of homes decreasing, and the astronomical costs of medicine in this country, maintaining a household of two + individuals at $64,000 a year isn't a walk in the park.
Hit with almost any major medical emergency, that $64,000 can vanish quickly.
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I'll admit that might be a little bit high. Median household income in the United States is around $45K a year, so I guess folks who earn around that number might consider themselves "middle class." But with the price of food and gasoline going up, the value of homes decreasing, and the astronomical costs of medicine in this country, maintaining a household of two + individuals at $64,000 a year isn't a walk in the park.
Hit with almost any major medical emergency, that $64,000 can vanish quickly.
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How Not to Build Stuff
Maybe they should have thought of this, or something like it BEFORE they declared imminent domain and bulldozed the neighborhood that existed there before. You want to talk about government waste?
Step 1: Your city has a teaching hospital run by the public state university that treats a high volume of at-risk patients. The system has big problems, but the building is solid and would be viable given some serious renovations.
Step 2: Man-made disaster seriously damages the teaching hospital.
Step 3: Agents of the government attempt to repair the teaching hospital. It is a hospital in the middle of a disaster area. Such facilities tend to be useful.
Step 4: Agents of the public state university allegedly stop repairs and close the teaching hospital. They want to declare the old hospital a loss, collect insurance money, collect national disaster money and build a new teaching hospital.
Step 5A: Powers that be know where they would put a new hospital. Friends, family, and connections begin buying cheap land in and around that area. These properties are left to moulder because they'll all get torn down when the new teaching hospital gets built.
Step 5B: Regular citizens who live in that area move back into their homes, and use what little insurance and government disaster aid they can apply for to renovate their homes. They aren't informed by the powers that be that all of their properties will be seized by imminent domain and torn down to make way for a new teaching hospital.
Step 6: Argue in public over the option to renovate the old teaching hospital (for $600 million) or build a new teaching hospital (for $1.2 billion). Ignore homeowners and businesses and other government agencies who have sunk money into properties that will be demolished. Let several years go by without much action, because who really needs a public hospital in the middle of a disaster area to serve at-risk populations?
Step 7: Convince the US Department of Veterans Affairs that the new teaching hospital is a done deal, and that they should start building their new hospital nearby.
Step 8: Convince developers and investors that the new teaching hospital is a done deal, and that they should start building new retail and residential use facilities as if the new hospital is guaranteed to be built.
(Seriously, I have a friend in another city, and some NOLA booster organization gave them a sales pitch that this hospital would be ready to open this fall or winter, with 5,000 new professional jobs coming to town.)
Step 9: Win the argument despite divisive local opionion and viable, cheaper alternatives. A Shiny New Hospital Will Be Built! Begin declaring eminent domain and bulldozing buildings. Move a few historical buildings to shut up the most agitating homeowners and preservationists. Clear dozens of city blocks of structures.
Step 10: Have state and federal officials representing competing intereststs attempt to derail the project at the last minute under the name ofhostage taking fiscal conservatism.
Because if you think anything above describes fiscal conservatism (or fiscal liberalism, for that matter) you watch too much cable network news and don't understand the definition.
As a whole, words just fail.
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Step 1: Your city has a teaching hospital run by the public state university that treats a high volume of at-risk patients. The system has big problems, but the building is solid and would be viable given some serious renovations.
Step 2: Man-made disaster seriously damages the teaching hospital.
Step 3: Agents of the government attempt to repair the teaching hospital. It is a hospital in the middle of a disaster area. Such facilities tend to be useful.
Step 4: Agents of the public state university allegedly stop repairs and close the teaching hospital. They want to declare the old hospital a loss, collect insurance money, collect national disaster money and build a new teaching hospital.
Step 5A: Powers that be know where they would put a new hospital. Friends, family, and connections begin buying cheap land in and around that area. These properties are left to moulder because they'll all get torn down when the new teaching hospital gets built.
Step 5B: Regular citizens who live in that area move back into their homes, and use what little insurance and government disaster aid they can apply for to renovate their homes. They aren't informed by the powers that be that all of their properties will be seized by imminent domain and torn down to make way for a new teaching hospital.
Step 6: Argue in public over the option to renovate the old teaching hospital (for $600 million) or build a new teaching hospital (for $1.2 billion). Ignore homeowners and businesses and other government agencies who have sunk money into properties that will be demolished. Let several years go by without much action, because who really needs a public hospital in the middle of a disaster area to serve at-risk populations?
Step 7: Convince the US Department of Veterans Affairs that the new teaching hospital is a done deal, and that they should start building their new hospital nearby.
Step 8: Convince developers and investors that the new teaching hospital is a done deal, and that they should start building new retail and residential use facilities as if the new hospital is guaranteed to be built.
(Seriously, I have a friend in another city, and some NOLA booster organization gave them a sales pitch that this hospital would be ready to open this fall or winter, with 5,000 new professional jobs coming to town.)
Step 9: Win the argument despite divisive local opionion and viable, cheaper alternatives. A Shiny New Hospital Will Be Built! Begin declaring eminent domain and bulldozing buildings. Move a few historical buildings to shut up the most agitating homeowners and preservationists. Clear dozens of city blocks of structures.
Step 10: Have state and federal officials representing competing intereststs attempt to derail the project at the last minute under the name of
Because if you think anything above describes fiscal conservatism (or fiscal liberalism, for that matter) you watch too much cable network news and don't understand the definition.
As a whole, words just fail.
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How's That Moratorium Working For You?
Maitri engages in some media criticism over the announcement that ExxonMobil has hit vast new oil reserves in the Gulf of Mexico.
Depending on your political bent and which talk-radio blowhard you listen to, you might have thought TEH EBIL COMMUNIZMS of KENYAN ANTI-COLONIALIST OBAMA were trying to keep anyone from drilling oil in the Gulf of Mexico, and that this "moratorium" was somehow affecting gasoline prices and killing jobs.
Or you could be surprised that any oil companies were allowed to think about fossil fuels within 200 miles of the Gulf of Mexico, much less have already resumed drilling. Wasn't this stuff shut down with the BP "shakedown?"
If so, congratulations! You've been misled by someone with an agenda. What I find interesting is that people on both sides of the issue (Drill, Baby, Drill vs. Spill, Baby, Spill) appear to have been misled into believing nearly the same things.
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Depending on your political bent and which talk-radio blowhard you listen to, you might have thought TEH EBIL COMMUNIZMS of KENYAN ANTI-COLONIALIST OBAMA were trying to keep anyone from drilling oil in the Gulf of Mexico, and that this "moratorium" was somehow affecting gasoline prices and killing jobs.
Or you could be surprised that any oil companies were allowed to think about fossil fuels within 200 miles of the Gulf of Mexico, much less have already resumed drilling. Wasn't this stuff shut down with the BP "shakedown?"
If so, congratulations! You've been misled by someone with an agenda. What I find interesting is that people on both sides of the issue (Drill, Baby, Drill vs. Spill, Baby, Spill) appear to have been misled into believing nearly the same things.
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I'mma Do Me
More GOP elected officials sounding like gangsta rappers.
What happens in the Paul Ryan End Medicare Plan when your private employer does not offer retirees medical benefits? Here's what GOP Representative Rob Woodall of Georgia's 7th Congressional District had to say:
As if the woman hadn't been paying into Medicare and Social Security and Medicaid through her years of work at a private company. Someone needs to explain to these fools that the woman did take care of herself by working and paying into the program. A program enacted through popular legislation, executive signature, and supported over judicial challenges since the 1930's.
And that GOP representative has the temerity to call her a freeloader in front of a town hall meeting. Because that's what he did. And the "handout" narrative is so deep at this point, he gets applause for saying it. As if Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are all programs forced upon the middle class by a government controlled by a bunch of laughing, lazy, good for nothing layabouts in their Welfare Cadillacs.
Every place I have worked professionally has employed some measure of custodial staff (mostly through contractors) that show up to work at crappy times, work long hours on their feet, pitch in to help other members of their working families, and still have to recieve some sort of food stamp benefit to make ends meet. I can guaran-damn-tee you that the "private company" they work for doesn't offer them retirement benefits. And they're going to be shit out of luck and a burden on their families once they aren't able to work anymore - because they're going to work until their health gives out. They have no real recourse for retirement or medical care once retired, after all.
Somebody needs to explain to me how, exactly, they haven't been taking care of themselves after paying into their Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid benefits their whole working lives. Somebody needs to explain to me how the Ryan plan deals with those people. Because I haven't heard a good explanation so far.
I've been trying not to drink too deeply of the "Ending Medicare Forever to Pay for Our Newly Minted Feudal System of Subsidizing the Already Uber Wealthy" Demagougery flavored Kool-Aid, but at what point should I start taking this more seriously? At what point do I have to listen to the very words of the GOP Congressmen themselves when they say "Ending Medicare Forever" and question the morality or philosophy or work ethics of people who are depending on the system they've paid into like they were supposed to.
At what point can I begin to accept that Ending Medicare Forever to pay for tax breaks is not a demogouging fear tactic to win elections, but the GOP's stated philosophical and legislative goal.
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What happens in the Paul Ryan End Medicare Plan when your private employer does not offer retirees medical benefits? Here's what GOP Representative Rob Woodall of Georgia's 7th Congressional District had to say:
"You want the government to take care of you, because your employer decided not to take care of you. My question is, 'When do I decide I'm going to take care of me?'"
As if the woman hadn't been paying into Medicare and Social Security and Medicaid through her years of work at a private company. Someone needs to explain to these fools that the woman did take care of herself by working and paying into the program. A program enacted through popular legislation, executive signature, and supported over judicial challenges since the 1930's.
And that GOP representative has the temerity to call her a freeloader in front of a town hall meeting. Because that's what he did. And the "handout" narrative is so deep at this point, he gets applause for saying it. As if Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are all programs forced upon the middle class by a government controlled by a bunch of laughing, lazy, good for nothing layabouts in their Welfare Cadillacs.
Every place I have worked professionally has employed some measure of custodial staff (mostly through contractors) that show up to work at crappy times, work long hours on their feet, pitch in to help other members of their working families, and still have to recieve some sort of food stamp benefit to make ends meet. I can guaran-damn-tee you that the "private company" they work for doesn't offer them retirement benefits. And they're going to be shit out of luck and a burden on their families once they aren't able to work anymore - because they're going to work until their health gives out. They have no real recourse for retirement or medical care once retired, after all.
Somebody needs to explain to me how, exactly, they haven't been taking care of themselves after paying into their Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid benefits their whole working lives. Somebody needs to explain to me how the Ryan plan deals with those people. Because I haven't heard a good explanation so far.
I've been trying not to drink too deeply of the "Ending Medicare Forever to Pay for Our Newly Minted Feudal System of Subsidizing the Already Uber Wealthy" Demagougery flavored Kool-Aid, but at what point should I start taking this more seriously? At what point do I have to listen to the very words of the GOP Congressmen themselves when they say "Ending Medicare Forever" and question the morality or philosophy or work ethics of people who are depending on the system they've paid into like they were supposed to.
At what point can I begin to accept that Ending Medicare Forever to pay for tax breaks is not a demogouging fear tactic to win elections, but the GOP's stated philosophical and legislative goal.
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House of Cards
Here's a cautionary tale if there ever was one.
You want to know how Georgia's economy fell apart, read it. That kind of development situation, replicated over and over again - maybe not to scale - combined to crush the state's banks. Though not every situation was big enough to thoroughly derail the Jekyll Island redevelopment.
You'll also notice the absence of federal government culpability, so loudly touted as a way to explain the economic collapse. Instead, this is a story of a previously successful private developer borrowing hundreds of millions from banks while recieving tax breaks from the state government specifically to inflate the prices of real estate oversupply.
The collateral for the loans? Real estate oversupply with inflated prices.
I'd also like to point out how the state government (dominated by the GOP) directly subsidized the already wealthy development company to the point where the state would be losing money on the deal.
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You want to know how Georgia's economy fell apart, read it. That kind of development situation, replicated over and over again - maybe not to scale - combined to crush the state's banks. Though not every situation was big enough to thoroughly derail the Jekyll Island redevelopment.
You'll also notice the absence of federal government culpability, so loudly touted as a way to explain the economic collapse. Instead, this is a story of a previously successful private developer borrowing hundreds of millions from banks while recieving tax breaks from the state government specifically to inflate the prices of real estate oversupply.
The collateral for the loans? Real estate oversupply with inflated prices.
I'd also like to point out how the state government (dominated by the GOP) directly subsidized the already wealthy development company to the point where the state would be losing money on the deal.
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