By Manifesto Joe
Revisionist history has it that Ronald Reagan "won the Cold War" by, in essence, outspending the Soviet Union on a military buildup. Those evil commies just couldn't compete, the myth has it, and they were suddenly forced to fold their empire all over the world.
What utter right-wing hogwash.
Let's look a bit more closely at the situation as it really was in those days. The U.S., typically, has spent perhaps as much as 6% of its GDP on the military. The old Soviet Union often spent as much as 25% of its GDP on military outlays, depriving its civilian population of many basic needs so that lonely, unhappy young men could sit around on military bases in the Soviet part of the world, getting sick on boiled carp and bad vodka.
I remember all the right-wing alarmist BS of the time. I read in the National Review in 1985 (that was when I could still read that rag without tossing my cookies and making the pages stick together) that the Red Army was arguably the most formidable fighting force that the world had seen up to that time.
We know now that, around 1985, the Soviet military was a large, but largely ineffective, fighting force, ill-equipped and with miserable morale. Hell, the Mujahideen in Afghanistan kicked 100,000 of their asses for years and years, finally forcing them out of the country. (And yet, nobody now seems to be arguing that U.S. Rep. Charlie Wilson, D-Texas, won the Cold War. The argument seems at least as plausible.)
After the Soviet Union collapsed, conservatives all of a sudden crowed about the superiority of American fighting forces over those hapless commies. The story kept changing whenever it was convenient. So, which was it, right-wingers? The most formidable fighting force the world had ever seen, or a bunch of homesick clowns who couldn't beat a ragtag guerrilla force in one of the world's poorest countries?
The Soviet economy was at the root of the empire's decline, and it had been in trouble for a very long time. Its centrally planned economy was stagnating by the mid-1970s, when Reagan was still sticking his foot in his mouth as governor of California. Here's a passage from answers.com that summarizes this pretty well:
The vigorous Soviet economy of the late-1960s and early 1970s quickly fell victim to the very factors that had contributed to its success, central planning and raw materials allocation. Brezhnev recognized that the Soviet economy was slowing, and attempted to patch problems rather than completely overhaul the system. His efforts failed. Even if Brezhnev had attempted to overhaul the Soviet economy, the highly entrenched special interests that made their living by manipulating the Soviet Union's centrally planned economy could have defeated Brezhnev's efforts.
Throughout the 1970s and into the mid-1980s, the Soviet Union's GNP and industrial output continued to increase, but at a lessening pace, eventually leading to economic stagnation. The Ninth Five Year Plan (1970–1975) saw a growth rate of approximately 3%. The period of 1975–1980 experienced a growth rate of between 1% and 1.9%, depending on whether revised Soviet numbers or the West's estimate is examined. Likewise, 1980–1985 saw a further decline in economic growth, between 0.6% and 1.8%. Declining economic growth rates were not confined to the Soviet Union. Eastern Europe, with its economies intertwined with the Soviet Union's, suffered a similar fate.
This declining growth rate in the 1970s and 1980s resulted in the Soviet Union receiving a diminishing rate of return on capital investment. This proved disastrous for the Soviet economy, because by 1980, the Soviet Union was spending nearly one-third of its GNP on capital investment, with most of the sum dedicated to the military. The military was consuming such a large portion of the Soviet economy for two reasons: the Soviet involvement in Afghanistan and the arms race with the United States. These two events would weigh heavily in the Soviet economic demise and lead to its inevitable fall. A weak economy prevented the Soviet Union from reacting appropriately to each experience.
Now, what Reagan admirers would have one believe from this is that the U.S. military buildup of the 1980s was what "won" the Cold War. The Cold War had been going on for about 35 years by the time Reagan even took his first oath of office. Did he hasten the Soviet collapse by a year or two? Perhaps -- but it's pretty clear from what we now know that the Soviet Union's economy was already, in essence, a dead man walking by 1980. Just a basic maintenance of the U.S. military for another 11 years was quite sufficient to see them run out of gas.
I've read that when one says something to Russian economists nowadays about Reagan winning the Cold War, they are unable to restrain their laughter. Everybody knew what the problems were in those days, they would say, and they were all right here.
Does this demonstrate the superiority of capitalism? Well, yes and no. Many of those who led the U.S. through the Cold War were Democrats, who advocated a mixed economy and were regarded by capitalism's right-wing ideologues as heretics. The Democrats weren't fans of the Soviet command economy, either, or of its police state. But they recognized a need for a reformist approach to capitalism, which one would be at a loss to explain to the typical Tea Party activist of 2011.
Now, less than 20 years after the final collapse of the Soviet Union, it looks like it is capitalism that is in trouble all over the world, and that seems largely for similar reasons -- its apparent inability to reform itself. For over 30 years in the U.S., wealthy individuals and giant corporations have insisted on gaming the political system to evade taxes, and on demagoguing much of the public into believing that any sort of tax increase will ultimately be a tax increase on them.
We now have the vantage point of seeing, from the second term of the Clinton administration, that it is quite possible for the federal government to raise enough revenue to run comfortably in the black without damaging the economy. But one wouldn't know that, if one listens to rich people and Corporate America, and takes their swill seriously.
Back to the Cold War -- it came to an end because of a general collapse of the Soviet economy, and that was something that was many years in the making. A military empire has to be paid for, and the Soviet empire had their system overextended long before Reagan became president. Less than 20 years later, it looks increasingly like something similar is happening here.
Years ago, there was a saying that the U.S. didn't win the Cold War -- Japan won it. Now I'd say it's looking more and more as though China was the real winner. The U.S. is so deeply indebted to them, and largely because of war expenses, that we aren't likely to get out of that debt within any living American's lifetime.
Now, as for Reagan and Mr. Magoo
Ronald Reagan was apparently an inspirational leader for many people. In contrast, what I generally saw for 8 years was a "Teflon" presidency and the amusing rightness of his critics' comparison to the cartoon character Mr. Magoo.
For those perhaps too young to remember, Mr. Magoo was a cartoon character whose life span was from about 1949 to 1965. The late character actor Jim Backus was his voice. Mr. Magoo doesn't get a lot of retro TV airplay nowadays, because I think he's regarded as far too politically incorrect, sort of like comedian Bill Dana's character Jose Jimenez or advertising's The Frito Bandito. I'll explain.
Mr. Magoo was a rich old dude who had poor eyesight and was hard of hearing, yet he insisted on continuing to drive his outdated flivver and to stroll through life as though there were nothing wrong. He would instigate catastrophes everywhere he went, but would himself walk away unscathed and oblivious about anything that had happened. People who had impaired eyesight and hearing were eventually offended by the character, so despite great popularity in his day, Magoo had a pretty short shelf life on the rerun circuit.
Compare this to a president who cut and ran after hundreds of Marines got blown up in Lebanon, yet today few call him a coward. (If it had been Bill Clinton or Barack Obama, there would have been all kinds of editorial comments about how yellow is not a color that goes with the decor of the Oval Office.)
Compare this to a president who was basically giving his blessings to a tradeoff with terrorists of arms for hostages -- and yet now few seem to remember this.
Compare this to a president whose policies led to the most expensive failure of U.S. financial institutions since the Great Depression. Not many seem to remember that, either.
Compare this to a president who created record deficits by cutting taxes broadly on wealthy Americans and big corporations, so much that now you can't reason with the average shithead on the street about how these people are looting the store and pushing the burden onto him or her.
This is a litany that could go on a long time -- but finally, compare this to a president who just happened to be sitting there, on the edge of dementia, at the time that Mikhail Gorbachev decided that the Soviet system was no longer workable. And now, right-wing revisionist historians are strutting about, posturing as though this were a feat that Reagan pulled off all by himself. Few seem to recall the reality of the situation -- they just remember glittering speeches about the myth of some "shining city on a hill."
Mr. Magoo, I sez. The senile old fool walked away from multiple disasters unmarked. And he's still doing it posthumously.
"Magoo, you've done it again!"
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Monday, February 21, 2011
Friday, February 18, 2011
More Evidence That Fox News Is Like Soviet State TV
By Manifesto Joe
I have sincerely tried to keep an open mind about this. I tried to watch it. The straight news seemed credible for short periods, but would be followed quickly by brazen opinion, with no transitions or labeling. The coverage of Barbra Streisand's brief involvement in politics a few years back was most revealing. The "crawls" leading up to the story said things like "Babs' babble," and "Has Yentl gone mental?" 'Scuse me -- "Fair and balanced"?
Now we're seeing more. Here's the latest on the right-wing answer to Soviet state television:
Here's the link.
I have to admit that I saw a few things on CBS News back in the 1980s that I couldn't say were entirely balanced. But two wrongs don't make a right, especially when the second "wrong" is so baldfaced and blatant. Fox "News" should have absolutely no credibility now. This is the result of the right wing ruthlessly grabbing control of the debate about broadcast news so single-mindedly that they have totally lost any sense of objectivity. Clearly, these people will do anything to advance "the agenda." The bias is now blatantly and shamelessly on the other side of the spectrum.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
I have sincerely tried to keep an open mind about this. I tried to watch it. The straight news seemed credible for short periods, but would be followed quickly by brazen opinion, with no transitions or labeling. The coverage of Barbra Streisand's brief involvement in politics a few years back was most revealing. The "crawls" leading up to the story said things like "Babs' babble," and "Has Yentl gone mental?" 'Scuse me -- "Fair and balanced"?
Now we're seeing more. Here's the latest on the right-wing answer to Soviet state television:
Here's the link.
I have to admit that I saw a few things on CBS News back in the 1980s that I couldn't say were entirely balanced. But two wrongs don't make a right, especially when the second "wrong" is so baldfaced and blatant. Fox "News" should have absolutely no credibility now. This is the result of the right wing ruthlessly grabbing control of the debate about broadcast news so single-mindedly that they have totally lost any sense of objectivity. Clearly, these people will do anything to advance "the agenda." The bias is now blatantly and shamelessly on the other side of the spectrum.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Monday, February 7, 2011
Manifesto Joe's Great Moments In Conservative History, Chapter 10: Reagan Is Still 100
By Manifesto Joe
OK, plus one day. Cut me some slack -- I had to work on Super Bowl Sunday.
Ronald Reagan's presidency seems to have become bogus nostalgia for some people. I suppose that for some, it's appropriate. If you hate labor unions and love union-busting, you'd love Reagan. If you hate poor people and think they ought to be punished for being poor, Ronnie was your man. If you think keeping a country in a state of perpetual war is good for it, then Reagan would happily oblige you.
Let's look at some of the real Reagan legacy.
Supply-side economics
It's not hard to see that the timing for supply-side theory was right. The America of the late 1970s and early '80s was suffering from demand-pull inflation -- too many dollars chasing too few goods. A correction was needed.
What we got was an overcorrection. The misery index of, at one point, 13% inflation and 21% interest rates gave Reagan what he needed to sell a large dose of snake oil to the public. Economist Arthur Laffer's supply-side theory was that cutting taxes would actually increase federal revenue, because (1) with lower rates, more of the wealthy and big corporations would be willing to pay rather than seek tax shelters or be scofflaws, and (2) the resulting economic growth would in itself create revenue.
Well, in 1981, taxes were cut broadly, with the rich and corporate America as the main beneficiaries. So, we sat back and waited. And waited. Almost 30 years later, I'm still waiting for my trickle-down from the first time. It generally felt more like "tinkle-down."
What this did in reality was create a structural deficit, with too many government obligations (including Reagan's defense buildup that amounted to a 40% increase in military spending) versus too little federal revenue. Deficits ballooned to record numbers.
The second year, 1982, Reagan and members of Congress led by Sen. Bob Dole of Kansas overhauled Social Security, raising taxes on it and thereby mitigating some of the revenue-anorexic effects of the tax cuts of the previous year. At least Social Security would be sound enough for another generation or so. But the effect was to raise taxes on less affluent people, and in a way that most of them had no clue thereof. The Social Security tax, you see, is regressive, ceasing after a certain level of income. Rich people don't pay it past a certain income figure. Apparently this was once gauged as a way of getting them on board with the program. But de facto, when Social Security taxes are raised, it's the working class that pays most of it.
Anyway, we kept waiting, and the deficits just got bigger. All that extra revenue that was supposed to come in -- well, it didn't. Supply-side just turned out to be a massive fraud that greatly enriched the wealthy while the incomes of ordinary people stagnated. The mantra we kept hearing from Reagan was simply that "Congress spends too much."
Looking back, there was method in this madness. If you're a laissez-faire economic conservative, you want, as Grover Norquist said, government to be shrunk down to the size that it can be "drowned in the bathtub." That's one good way of accomplishing that.
Self-fulfilling prophesies
Despite the Democratic House of Representives' insistence that much of the social safety net be preserved, big cuts did ensue. The financial deregulation that began during the Carter presidency accelerated under Reagan. Government subsidies for housing and the like were slashed -- the HUD budget ended up something like 40% of what it had been, in real dollars. And regulation of any kind was curtailed as too expensive. What that did was essentially tell all the foxes that the henhouse was theirs for the taking.
Thus, the bromides about government being so inept, being so unable to function efficiently, etc., gain credibility of sorts. Naturally, when you put inept and inefficient political appointees in charge of diminished government regulation, you're going to get inept and inefficient "regulation." With such an approach, government indeed becomes the problem, not the solution, as Reagan famously said.
Rampant corruption
Reagan appointees became notorious, producing a federal government that had more officials either indicted or under investigation than any in recent memory. I believe that the count was over 100 at one point. With the foxes in charge of all the henhouses, how could we have expected anything different?
But obviously, many Americans don't remember any of that now. What they remember, with hazy nostalgia, is a telegenic actor-president who spoke to them about "a shining city on a hill." Some of us -- unfortunately, not enough -- remember that this hill had a curious odor of dung about it.
The savings-and-loan scandal
I'll lift a bit of material from Wikipedia to cover this:
The deregulation of S&Ls gave them many of the capabilities of banks, without the same regulations as banks. Savings and loan associations could choose to be under either a state or a federal charter. Immediately after deregulation of the federally chartered thrifts, state-chartered thrifts rushed to become federally chartered, because of the advantages associated with a federal charter. In response, states such as California and Texas changed their regulations so to be similar to federal regulations.[citation needed]
More important, however, was the moral hazard of insuring already troubled institutions with public dollars. In the view of a savings and loan president or manager, the trend line was fatal over the long haul, thus to get liquid, the institution had to take on riskier assets, particularly land. When the real estate market crashed, the S&Ls went with it. By insuring the risk, the government guaranteed that desperate S&L owners and managers would engage in ever more risky investments, knowing that if they were successful, the institution would be saved, and if unsuccessful, their depositors would still be bailed out.
The S&Ls went on to do a lot of imprudent real estate lending (sound familiar?), among other things that led to the failure of 747 of them. The Resolution Trust Corp. was created to clean up the mess. We have a family friend who worked for the RTC, taking possession of failing S&Ls on behalf of the government. She told us that at one site, she went to the second floor and found a well-stocked wet bar with cut-glass nudes and such decorating the place. Things like this had been apparently done with depositors' money.
Not all of this occurred on Reagan's watch. But for eight years, he championed the sort of deregulation that led to such gross abuses.
More from Wikipedia:
The ultimate cost of the crisis is estimated to have totaled around $160.1 billion, about $124.6 billion of which was directly paid for by the U.S. government via a financial bailout under the leadership of George H.W. Bush. The remainder of the bailout was paid for by charges on savings and loan accounts —- which contributed to the large budget deficits of the early 1990s.
Bogus nostalgia for "Doctor Feelgood"
People like to be told bright, glittering things by politicians, and Reagan was undoubtedly a master of that. My wife and I never quite understood the appeal. She hated him as an actor in his Hollywood days, and always commented on that turkey neck. I saw him similarly to Gore Vidal, who bemusedly called Reagan "grandmotherly."
Sadly, the man was almost all shine and very little substance. I understand that President Obama would like to pick up some of that shine, so as to rally faltering support for his programs. But Obama has the misfortune of being an intellectual, so despite also being a fine speechmaker, he usually ends up telling people a lot of grim truths that they don't want to hear. Reagan, about as far from an intellectual as it gets, never had that problem, and that was a major reason for his political success.
Coming soon: Reagan is still 100, third chapter.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
OK, plus one day. Cut me some slack -- I had to work on Super Bowl Sunday.
Ronald Reagan's presidency seems to have become bogus nostalgia for some people. I suppose that for some, it's appropriate. If you hate labor unions and love union-busting, you'd love Reagan. If you hate poor people and think they ought to be punished for being poor, Ronnie was your man. If you think keeping a country in a state of perpetual war is good for it, then Reagan would happily oblige you.
Let's look at some of the real Reagan legacy.
Supply-side economics
It's not hard to see that the timing for supply-side theory was right. The America of the late 1970s and early '80s was suffering from demand-pull inflation -- too many dollars chasing too few goods. A correction was needed.
What we got was an overcorrection. The misery index of, at one point, 13% inflation and 21% interest rates gave Reagan what he needed to sell a large dose of snake oil to the public. Economist Arthur Laffer's supply-side theory was that cutting taxes would actually increase federal revenue, because (1) with lower rates, more of the wealthy and big corporations would be willing to pay rather than seek tax shelters or be scofflaws, and (2) the resulting economic growth would in itself create revenue.
Well, in 1981, taxes were cut broadly, with the rich and corporate America as the main beneficiaries. So, we sat back and waited. And waited. Almost 30 years later, I'm still waiting for my trickle-down from the first time. It generally felt more like "tinkle-down."
What this did in reality was create a structural deficit, with too many government obligations (including Reagan's defense buildup that amounted to a 40% increase in military spending) versus too little federal revenue. Deficits ballooned to record numbers.
The second year, 1982, Reagan and members of Congress led by Sen. Bob Dole of Kansas overhauled Social Security, raising taxes on it and thereby mitigating some of the revenue-anorexic effects of the tax cuts of the previous year. At least Social Security would be sound enough for another generation or so. But the effect was to raise taxes on less affluent people, and in a way that most of them had no clue thereof. The Social Security tax, you see, is regressive, ceasing after a certain level of income. Rich people don't pay it past a certain income figure. Apparently this was once gauged as a way of getting them on board with the program. But de facto, when Social Security taxes are raised, it's the working class that pays most of it.
Anyway, we kept waiting, and the deficits just got bigger. All that extra revenue that was supposed to come in -- well, it didn't. Supply-side just turned out to be a massive fraud that greatly enriched the wealthy while the incomes of ordinary people stagnated. The mantra we kept hearing from Reagan was simply that "Congress spends too much."
Looking back, there was method in this madness. If you're a laissez-faire economic conservative, you want, as Grover Norquist said, government to be shrunk down to the size that it can be "drowned in the bathtub." That's one good way of accomplishing that.
Self-fulfilling prophesies
Despite the Democratic House of Representives' insistence that much of the social safety net be preserved, big cuts did ensue. The financial deregulation that began during the Carter presidency accelerated under Reagan. Government subsidies for housing and the like were slashed -- the HUD budget ended up something like 40% of what it had been, in real dollars. And regulation of any kind was curtailed as too expensive. What that did was essentially tell all the foxes that the henhouse was theirs for the taking.
Thus, the bromides about government being so inept, being so unable to function efficiently, etc., gain credibility of sorts. Naturally, when you put inept and inefficient political appointees in charge of diminished government regulation, you're going to get inept and inefficient "regulation." With such an approach, government indeed becomes the problem, not the solution, as Reagan famously said.
Rampant corruption
Reagan appointees became notorious, producing a federal government that had more officials either indicted or under investigation than any in recent memory. I believe that the count was over 100 at one point. With the foxes in charge of all the henhouses, how could we have expected anything different?
But obviously, many Americans don't remember any of that now. What they remember, with hazy nostalgia, is a telegenic actor-president who spoke to them about "a shining city on a hill." Some of us -- unfortunately, not enough -- remember that this hill had a curious odor of dung about it.
The savings-and-loan scandal
I'll lift a bit of material from Wikipedia to cover this:
The deregulation of S&Ls gave them many of the capabilities of banks, without the same regulations as banks. Savings and loan associations could choose to be under either a state or a federal charter. Immediately after deregulation of the federally chartered thrifts, state-chartered thrifts rushed to become federally chartered, because of the advantages associated with a federal charter. In response, states such as California and Texas changed their regulations so to be similar to federal regulations.[citation needed]
More important, however, was the moral hazard of insuring already troubled institutions with public dollars. In the view of a savings and loan president or manager, the trend line was fatal over the long haul, thus to get liquid, the institution had to take on riskier assets, particularly land. When the real estate market crashed, the S&Ls went with it. By insuring the risk, the government guaranteed that desperate S&L owners and managers would engage in ever more risky investments, knowing that if they were successful, the institution would be saved, and if unsuccessful, their depositors would still be bailed out.
The S&Ls went on to do a lot of imprudent real estate lending (sound familiar?), among other things that led to the failure of 747 of them. The Resolution Trust Corp. was created to clean up the mess. We have a family friend who worked for the RTC, taking possession of failing S&Ls on behalf of the government. She told us that at one site, she went to the second floor and found a well-stocked wet bar with cut-glass nudes and such decorating the place. Things like this had been apparently done with depositors' money.
Not all of this occurred on Reagan's watch. But for eight years, he championed the sort of deregulation that led to such gross abuses.
More from Wikipedia:
The ultimate cost of the crisis is estimated to have totaled around $160.1 billion, about $124.6 billion of which was directly paid for by the U.S. government via a financial bailout under the leadership of George H.W. Bush. The remainder of the bailout was paid for by charges on savings and loan accounts —- which contributed to the large budget deficits of the early 1990s.
Bogus nostalgia for "Doctor Feelgood"
People like to be told bright, glittering things by politicians, and Reagan was undoubtedly a master of that. My wife and I never quite understood the appeal. She hated him as an actor in his Hollywood days, and always commented on that turkey neck. I saw him similarly to Gore Vidal, who bemusedly called Reagan "grandmotherly."
Sadly, the man was almost all shine and very little substance. I understand that President Obama would like to pick up some of that shine, so as to rally faltering support for his programs. But Obama has the misfortune of being an intellectual, so despite also being a fine speechmaker, he usually ends up telling people a lot of grim truths that they don't want to hear. Reagan, about as far from an intellectual as it gets, never had that problem, and that was a major reason for his political success.
Coming soon: Reagan is still 100, third chapter.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Manifesto Joe's Great Moments In Conservative History, Chapter 9: Reagan Turns 100
By Manifesto Joe
I remember the time well. It was the 1980s, the prime of my young adulthood. He was supposed to be rebuilding America, and millions of jobs went overseas or to Mexico. Suddenly there were all these homeless people on the streets, hitting on you for spare change -- in 1980 they had either been living in Section 8 housing or were in mental asylums. You could see Reaganvilles beneath the bridges and underpasses in every city, with tents pitched and fires burning in garbage cans. He was supposed to be a fiscal conservative, but the deficit ballooned to record numbers. Yet, I noticed that I was suddenly paying more tax for Social Security than I was before.
He was supposed to be this badass patriot, yet hundreds of Marines were blown up in a defenseless position in Lebanon, and then we tucked tail and ran out of there. Arms appeared to be traded to terrorists for hostages. The example of Cold War conquest was overrunning some little halfass country called Grenada, where they found a cache of commie weapons that were, like, World War I vintage.
This is the guy we're supposed to be honoring on what would have been his 100th birthday?
Not the sharpest pencil in the box
We've certainly discovered that it isn't necessary for a U.S. president to be an intellectual of any sort. But Ronald Reagan lowered the bar a lot, and paved the way for the likes of Il Doofus, and now Klondike Hottie, to parade about on the national stage. Here is what some notables (and Reagan himself) said about Uncle Ronnie, courtesy of the website, "The Reagan Years":
"I never knew anything above Cs."
--President Reagan, in a moment of truthfulness, describes his academic record to Barbara Walters, November 27, 1981
"They told stories about how inattentive and inept the President was.... They said he wouldn't come to work--all he wanted to do was to watch movies and television at the residence."
--Jim Cannon (an aide to Howard Baker) reporting what Reagan's underlings told him, Landslide: The Unmaking of the President: 1984-88
"Reagan's only contribution [to the subject of the MX missile] throughout the entire hour and a half was to interrupt somewhere at midpoint to tell us he'd watched a movie the night before, and he gave us the plot from WarGames, the movie. That was his only contribution."
--Lee Hamilton (Representative from Indiana) interviewed by Haynes Johnson, Sleepwalking Through History: America in the Reagan Years
"This President is treated by both the press and foreign leaders as if he were a child.... It is major news when he honors a political or economic discussion with a germane remark and not an anecdote about his Hollywood days."
--Columnist Richard Cohen
"What planet is he living on?"
--President Mitterand of France poses this question about Reagan to Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau.
"During Mr. Reagan's trip to Europe...members of the traveling press corps watched him doze off so many times--during speeches by French President Francois Mitterrand and Italian President Alessandro Pertini, as well as during a one-on-one audience with the Pope--that they privately christened the trip 'The Big Sleep.'"
--Mark Hertsgaard, On Bended Knee: The Press and the Reagan Presidency
"He demonstrated for all to see how far you can go in this life with a smile, a shoeshine and the nerve to put your own spin on the facts."
--David Nyhan, Boston Globe columnist
"an amiable dunce"
--Clark Clifford (former Defense Secretary)
"Poor dear, there's nothing between his ears."
--British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher
"...like reinventing the wheel."
--Larry Speakes (Reagan's former press secretary) describing what it was like preparing the President for a press conference, Speaking Out: The Reagan Presidency from Inside the White House
"The task of watering the arid desert between Reagan's ears is a challenging one for his aides."
--Columnist David Broder
"He has the ability to make statements that are so far outside the parameters of logic that they leave you speechless"
--Patti Davis (formerly Patricia Ann Reagan) talking about her father, The Way I See It
"This loathing for government, this eagerness to prove that any program to aid the disadvantaged is nothing but a boondoggle and a money gobbler, leads him to contrive statistics and stories with unmatched vigor."
--Mark Green, Reagan's Reign of Error
"President Reagan doesn't always check the facts before he makes statements, and the press accepts this as kind of amusing."
--former president Jimmy Carter, March 6, 1984
"Ronald Reagan is the first modern President whose contempt for the facts is treated as a charming idiosyncrasy."
--James David Barber, presidential scholar, On Bended Knee: The Press and the Reagan Presidency, Mark Hertsgaard
"His errors glide past unchallenged. At one point...he alleged that almost half the population gets a free meal from the government each day. No one told him he was crazy. The general message of the American press is that, yes, while it is perfectly true that the emperor has no clothes, nudity is actually very acceptable this year."
--Simon Hoggart, in The Observer (London), 1986
Sage words from the Gipper himself
These quotes are from the same source:
"All the waste in a year from a nuclear power plant can be stored under a desk."
--Ronald Reagan (Republican candidate for president), cited in the Burlington (Vermont) Free Press, February 15, 1980. (In reality, the average nuclear reactor generates 30 tons of radioactive waste per year.)
"Growing and decaying vegetation in this land are responsible for 93 percent of the oxides of nitrogen."
--Ronald Reagan, cited in the Los Angeles Times, October 9, 1980. (According to Dr. Michael Oppenheimer of the Environmental Defense Fund, industrial sources are responsible for at least 65 percent and possibly as much as 90 percent of the oxides of nitrogen in the U.S.)
"Fascism was really the basis for the New Deal."
--Ronald Reagan, cited in Time, May 17, 1976
"I know all the bad things that happened in that war. I was in uniform four years myself."
--President Reagan, in an interview with foreign journalists, April 19, 1985. ("In costume" is more like it. Reagan spent World War II making Army training films at Hal Roach Studios in Hollywood.)
"...a faceless mass, waiting for handouts."
--Ronald Reagan, 1965. (Description of Medicaid recipients.)
"History shows that when the taxes of a nation approach about 20 percent of the people's income, there begins to be a lack of respect for government.... When it reaches 25 percent, there comes an increase in lawlessness."
--Ronald Reagan, in Time, April 14, 1980. (History shows no such thing. Income tax rates in Europe have traditionally been far higher than U.S. rates, while European crime rates have been much lower.)
Well, that's enough to digest for one day. But wait awhile -- there's more.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
I remember the time well. It was the 1980s, the prime of my young adulthood. He was supposed to be rebuilding America, and millions of jobs went overseas or to Mexico. Suddenly there were all these homeless people on the streets, hitting on you for spare change -- in 1980 they had either been living in Section 8 housing or were in mental asylums. You could see Reaganvilles beneath the bridges and underpasses in every city, with tents pitched and fires burning in garbage cans. He was supposed to be a fiscal conservative, but the deficit ballooned to record numbers. Yet, I noticed that I was suddenly paying more tax for Social Security than I was before.
He was supposed to be this badass patriot, yet hundreds of Marines were blown up in a defenseless position in Lebanon, and then we tucked tail and ran out of there. Arms appeared to be traded to terrorists for hostages. The example of Cold War conquest was overrunning some little halfass country called Grenada, where they found a cache of commie weapons that were, like, World War I vintage.
This is the guy we're supposed to be honoring on what would have been his 100th birthday?
Not the sharpest pencil in the box
We've certainly discovered that it isn't necessary for a U.S. president to be an intellectual of any sort. But Ronald Reagan lowered the bar a lot, and paved the way for the likes of Il Doofus, and now Klondike Hottie, to parade about on the national stage. Here is what some notables (and Reagan himself) said about Uncle Ronnie, courtesy of the website, "The Reagan Years":
"I never knew anything above Cs."
--President Reagan, in a moment of truthfulness, describes his academic record to Barbara Walters, November 27, 1981
"They told stories about how inattentive and inept the President was.... They said he wouldn't come to work--all he wanted to do was to watch movies and television at the residence."
--Jim Cannon (an aide to Howard Baker) reporting what Reagan's underlings told him, Landslide: The Unmaking of the President: 1984-88
"Reagan's only contribution [to the subject of the MX missile] throughout the entire hour and a half was to interrupt somewhere at midpoint to tell us he'd watched a movie the night before, and he gave us the plot from WarGames, the movie. That was his only contribution."
--Lee Hamilton (Representative from Indiana) interviewed by Haynes Johnson, Sleepwalking Through History: America in the Reagan Years
"This President is treated by both the press and foreign leaders as if he were a child.... It is major news when he honors a political or economic discussion with a germane remark and not an anecdote about his Hollywood days."
--Columnist Richard Cohen
"What planet is he living on?"
--President Mitterand of France poses this question about Reagan to Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau.
"During Mr. Reagan's trip to Europe...members of the traveling press corps watched him doze off so many times--during speeches by French President Francois Mitterrand and Italian President Alessandro Pertini, as well as during a one-on-one audience with the Pope--that they privately christened the trip 'The Big Sleep.'"
--Mark Hertsgaard, On Bended Knee: The Press and the Reagan Presidency
"He demonstrated for all to see how far you can go in this life with a smile, a shoeshine and the nerve to put your own spin on the facts."
--David Nyhan, Boston Globe columnist
"an amiable dunce"
--Clark Clifford (former Defense Secretary)
"Poor dear, there's nothing between his ears."
--British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher
"...like reinventing the wheel."
--Larry Speakes (Reagan's former press secretary) describing what it was like preparing the President for a press conference, Speaking Out: The Reagan Presidency from Inside the White House
"The task of watering the arid desert between Reagan's ears is a challenging one for his aides."
--Columnist David Broder
"He has the ability to make statements that are so far outside the parameters of logic that they leave you speechless"
--Patti Davis (formerly Patricia Ann Reagan) talking about her father, The Way I See It
"This loathing for government, this eagerness to prove that any program to aid the disadvantaged is nothing but a boondoggle and a money gobbler, leads him to contrive statistics and stories with unmatched vigor."
--Mark Green, Reagan's Reign of Error
"President Reagan doesn't always check the facts before he makes statements, and the press accepts this as kind of amusing."
--former president Jimmy Carter, March 6, 1984
"Ronald Reagan is the first modern President whose contempt for the facts is treated as a charming idiosyncrasy."
--James David Barber, presidential scholar, On Bended Knee: The Press and the Reagan Presidency, Mark Hertsgaard
"His errors glide past unchallenged. At one point...he alleged that almost half the population gets a free meal from the government each day. No one told him he was crazy. The general message of the American press is that, yes, while it is perfectly true that the emperor has no clothes, nudity is actually very acceptable this year."
--Simon Hoggart, in The Observer (London), 1986
Sage words from the Gipper himself
These quotes are from the same source:
"All the waste in a year from a nuclear power plant can be stored under a desk."
--Ronald Reagan (Republican candidate for president), cited in the Burlington (Vermont) Free Press, February 15, 1980. (In reality, the average nuclear reactor generates 30 tons of radioactive waste per year.)
"Growing and decaying vegetation in this land are responsible for 93 percent of the oxides of nitrogen."
--Ronald Reagan, cited in the Los Angeles Times, October 9, 1980. (According to Dr. Michael Oppenheimer of the Environmental Defense Fund, industrial sources are responsible for at least 65 percent and possibly as much as 90 percent of the oxides of nitrogen in the U.S.)
"Fascism was really the basis for the New Deal."
--Ronald Reagan, cited in Time, May 17, 1976
"I know all the bad things that happened in that war. I was in uniform four years myself."
--President Reagan, in an interview with foreign journalists, April 19, 1985. ("In costume" is more like it. Reagan spent World War II making Army training films at Hal Roach Studios in Hollywood.)
"...a faceless mass, waiting for handouts."
--Ronald Reagan, 1965. (Description of Medicaid recipients.)
"History shows that when the taxes of a nation approach about 20 percent of the people's income, there begins to be a lack of respect for government.... When it reaches 25 percent, there comes an increase in lawlessness."
--Ronald Reagan, in Time, April 14, 1980. (History shows no such thing. Income tax rates in Europe have traditionally been far higher than U.S. rates, while European crime rates have been much lower.)
Well, that's enough to digest for one day. But wait awhile -- there's more.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Glenn Beck's Self-Serving Recklessness Endangers Professor's Life
By Manifesto Joe
Frances Fox Piven is a lefty academic, a sociologist who advocates reforms of welfare in the U.S. that would eventually lead to a guaranteed annual income for all Americans. I've read one of the professor's books, and can't say that I agree with her entirely.
But now that TV-radio demagogue Glenn Beck has put her in his ludicrous right-wing crosshairs, I find that I must come to her defense. Because the 78-year-old professor urges a certain level of militancy among America's unemployed, in the form of mass protests, Beck has made her a verbal target, and some of the lunatics who hang on his toxic words appear to be cleaning and oiling their firearms.
Wikipedia summarizes the controversy thusly:
Conservative commentator Glenn Beck has repeatedly criticized Piven, labeling her references to the May 2010 Greek protests a call to violence. Beck stated that she is an enemy of the Constitution, and that the Cloward-Piven strategy would "intentionally collapse our economic system", which in turn has led to multiple death threats against her. Comparing Beck to 1930s fascist broadcaster Charles Coughlin, Piven has replied that her references to riots are "not a call for violence"; that her critics are using "a kind of rhetorical trick that is always used to denounce movements of ordinary people, and that is to imply that the massing of people itself is violent."
When somebody gets on Beck's shitlist, threats often follow. The Care2 Petition Site reported:
After Beck's outrageous remarks against Piven, threatening comments surfaced on his website, including:
"Somebody tell Frances I have 5,000 rounds ready and I will give my life to take our freedom back"
"we should blow up Piven's office and home"
The irony, of course, is that Piven now appears to be a target of potential violence, after Beck drew attention to her by accusing her of advocating violence.
It's not news that Beck is a reckless and dangerous demagogue. The development here is the obvious chilling effect that a braying jackass like him can have on any kind of opposition rhetoric. When an emotionally disturbed man with the power of a mass broadcaster can incite an army of right-wing goons to potential violence, that smells of de facto fascism.
By the way, I'm sure Care2 would be happy for you to sign their petition to Roger Ailes, president of the neo-fascist propaganda TV network also known as Fox News. Here's the link to the petition site.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Frances Fox Piven is a lefty academic, a sociologist who advocates reforms of welfare in the U.S. that would eventually lead to a guaranteed annual income for all Americans. I've read one of the professor's books, and can't say that I agree with her entirely.
But now that TV-radio demagogue Glenn Beck has put her in his ludicrous right-wing crosshairs, I find that I must come to her defense. Because the 78-year-old professor urges a certain level of militancy among America's unemployed, in the form of mass protests, Beck has made her a verbal target, and some of the lunatics who hang on his toxic words appear to be cleaning and oiling their firearms.
Wikipedia summarizes the controversy thusly:
Conservative commentator Glenn Beck has repeatedly criticized Piven, labeling her references to the May 2010 Greek protests a call to violence. Beck stated that she is an enemy of the Constitution, and that the Cloward-Piven strategy would "intentionally collapse our economic system", which in turn has led to multiple death threats against her. Comparing Beck to 1930s fascist broadcaster Charles Coughlin, Piven has replied that her references to riots are "not a call for violence"; that her critics are using "a kind of rhetorical trick that is always used to denounce movements of ordinary people, and that is to imply that the massing of people itself is violent."
When somebody gets on Beck's shitlist, threats often follow. The Care2 Petition Site reported:
After Beck's outrageous remarks against Piven, threatening comments surfaced on his website, including:
"Somebody tell Frances I have 5,000 rounds ready and I will give my life to take our freedom back"
"we should blow up Piven's office and home"
The irony, of course, is that Piven now appears to be a target of potential violence, after Beck drew attention to her by accusing her of advocating violence.
It's not news that Beck is a reckless and dangerous demagogue. The development here is the obvious chilling effect that a braying jackass like him can have on any kind of opposition rhetoric. When an emotionally disturbed man with the power of a mass broadcaster can incite an army of right-wing goons to potential violence, that smells of de facto fascism.
By the way, I'm sure Care2 would be happy for you to sign their petition to Roger Ailes, president of the neo-fascist propaganda TV network also known as Fox News. Here's the link to the petition site.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Bertha Lewis Was Right: Tea Party Is "A Bowel Movement"
By Manifesto Joe
I hate to break it to all you Tea Partiers out there, but even after the results of the demagogued 2010 midterm elections, the Tea Party isn't doodley-squat in Washington. In the Senate, it appears to be some kind of crude joke.
The Chicago Tribune reported that "The first meeting of the Senate Tea Party Caucus on Thursday (last week) attracted just four senators willing to describe themselves as members."
Newly minted Rethuglican senators, including Marco Rubio of Florida and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, passed on the meeting.
Predictably, the first meeting of this "caucus" was organized by Rand Paul of Kentucky. He persuaded three other senators to attend. This sounds like decent news to me, considering what young Mr. Paul wants to do. According to the Tribune, "He recommended gutting the Interior and State departments, eliminating the Energy Department and cutting all funding for public radio and television and the National Endowment for the Arts."
I think somebody left out killing the Department of Education, and also gutting and privatizing Social Security and Medicare.
Fortunately, in view of the Senate turnout, few are taking much of this seriously. The Tea Party attracted a lot of attention just with its smell. I doubt that it's going to have much staying power in Washington.
It's hard to witness mass stupidity and not call it by its rightful name.
Regarding the title of this piece, here's a link to a "fair and balanced" account from Fox News of former ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis' speech last April. Read on, but prepare for resulting bowel movements. And don't say I never left a link to a Fox News article.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
I hate to break it to all you Tea Partiers out there, but even after the results of the demagogued 2010 midterm elections, the Tea Party isn't doodley-squat in Washington. In the Senate, it appears to be some kind of crude joke.
The Chicago Tribune reported that "The first meeting of the Senate Tea Party Caucus on Thursday (last week) attracted just four senators willing to describe themselves as members."
Newly minted Rethuglican senators, including Marco Rubio of Florida and Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, passed on the meeting.
Predictably, the first meeting of this "caucus" was organized by Rand Paul of Kentucky. He persuaded three other senators to attend. This sounds like decent news to me, considering what young Mr. Paul wants to do. According to the Tribune, "He recommended gutting the Interior and State departments, eliminating the Energy Department and cutting all funding for public radio and television and the National Endowment for the Arts."
I think somebody left out killing the Department of Education, and also gutting and privatizing Social Security and Medicare.
Fortunately, in view of the Senate turnout, few are taking much of this seriously. The Tea Party attracted a lot of attention just with its smell. I doubt that it's going to have much staying power in Washington.
It's hard to witness mass stupidity and not call it by its rightful name.Regarding the title of this piece, here's a link to a "fair and balanced" account from Fox News of former ACORN CEO Bertha Lewis' speech last April. Read on, but prepare for resulting bowel movements. And don't say I never left a link to a Fox News article.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Tuesday, February 1, 2011
Saturday, January 29, 2011
More Among Ample Evidence That Lardbaugh Is A Fool: Speaking Gibberish Chinese
By Manifesto Joe
It's hard to understand how this ridiculous tub of lard can still command an audience of millions, yet Herr Lardbaugh can and does. His latest faux pas was speaking infantile Chinese on the air while the Chinese president was in the country, saying stuff like "ching, chong, chang."
Asian-American legislators called on him to apologize, but Herr Lardbaugh is having none of it. Comic license is his defense, even if his comedy wouldn't even play well to most junior-high audiences.
I can't say I'm a fan of the authoritarian Chinese government, but a guy in Herr Lardbaugh's position in life should show a bit more class than this. Of course, he has no clue thereof.
Here's the link to a post from ThinkProgress. Not only did Lardbaugh decline to apologize, one of his listeners sent several racist death threats to the office of an Asian-American legislator this week.
If it hadn't been clear that Herr Lardbaugh is a political bottom-feeder, playing to the prejudices of the pond scum of the reich-wing, it should be obvious now.
Plus, he stopped being funny decades ago. The act is silly and ancient. You don't do stupid better than anybody else does, Rush. Your remaining audience is trailer trash.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
It's hard to understand how this ridiculous tub of lard can still command an audience of millions, yet Herr Lardbaugh can and does. His latest faux pas was speaking infantile Chinese on the air while the Chinese president was in the country, saying stuff like "ching, chong, chang."
Asian-American legislators called on him to apologize, but Herr Lardbaugh is having none of it. Comic license is his defense, even if his comedy wouldn't even play well to most junior-high audiences.
I can't say I'm a fan of the authoritarian Chinese government, but a guy in Herr Lardbaugh's position in life should show a bit more class than this. Of course, he has no clue thereof.
Here's the link to a post from ThinkProgress. Not only did Lardbaugh decline to apologize, one of his listeners sent several racist death threats to the office of an Asian-American legislator this week.
If it hadn't been clear that Herr Lardbaugh is a political bottom-feeder, playing to the prejudices of the pond scum of the reich-wing, it should be obvious now.
Plus, he stopped being funny decades ago. The act is silly and ancient. You don't do stupid better than anybody else does, Rush. Your remaining audience is trailer trash.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Rather Than Raise Taxes On Rich, Texas Republicans Set To Ruin Economy
By Manifesto Joe
This session, the Republican-dominated Texas Legislature is facing a two-year budget shortfall that could run as high as $27 billion. The reaction from Governor Goodhair and the others who are essentially on the corporate payroll has been predictable: slash and burn.
Texas already has a well-earned reputation for being one of the most piss-poor places in the U.S. for social services and other public initiatives. We're already 49th out of 50 states in spending on mental-health services, yet officials in that sector are bracing for marrow-deep cuts. That doesn't make much sense, especially when you consider what just happened earlier this month in Tuscon, Arizona. A bit of mental-health intervention might just have helped that situation some.
Regressive taxation
One of the biggest reasons that state services here are so anorexic is because the revenue base is so narrow. It's estimated that nearly 80% of Texas' revenue comes from sales and excise taxes -- i.e., taxes on poor people and the middle class. And then, the fastest-growing source of revenue in this state is the lottery. That's yet another tax on poorer people, albeit a voluntary one. I've heard it called "a tax on people who are bad at math."
According to one 2009 analysis, Texas is the fifth-worst state in the U.S. for taxes levied on the bottom 20% of earners. And then, since taxes on the upper 80%, and on big corporations, are so low, that bottom 20% gets some of the most feeble social services in the country.
I smell fundamentalist Christians here. The attitude among many of them is that the rich are that way because they are living right. If you're poor, you must be doing something sinful, like drinking and gambling too much, for which God is punishing you. And that fuels the vicious cycle of rich getting richer and poor getting poorer.
All of the above has been going on in Texas for a very long time, even when Democrats were in power. That's not too surprising -- I've met some "Democrats" who seemed more right-wing than some of the Republicans I've encountered here, and that's saying a lot. The GOP state platform that's assembled here every four years reads about like that of the John Birch Society.
But now, the state's entire economy could hang in the balance. Experts are warning that the proposed meat-ax budget cuts, involving as many as 8,000 state employees, could have a very large ripple effect throughout the entire Texas economy.
Governor Goodhair's perennial demagoguery
With Governor Goodhair beginning his 11th year in office, this was predictable. Rick Perry never met a rich dude whom he didn't consider a potential campaign donor. He's all about reverse Robin Hood government, shifting burdens down onto those who can least afford it and openly subsidizing "job-creating" corporations that already rake in unprecedented profits.
Someone with common sense and a minimum of political courage might suggest a state income tax on households with incomes over $100,000. Not Goodhair, who's busy being a demagogue on bogus issues like "sanctuary cities" for illegal immigrants.
But, the voters here re-elected him last November with 55% of the tally, so the masochism of middle-class Texans seems to be continuing unabated. Bubba gets mad, buys a new gun and joins the Tea Party movement whenever he hears anything about a state income tax, but then quietly and tamely pays higher and higher sales taxes when he visits Walmart.
And last year, he elected Republicans to the state Legislature 2-to-1 over Democrats, something that hasn't happened here since Reconstruction. And then, he's going to be surprised when, in two years, his daily life is that much harder and his money doesn't go as far?
I'm indulging in stereotypes, of course. But it's hard not to picture such things while living amid this degree of stupidity.
I don't need a Ouija board to tell you what's going to happen. The state budget will be slashed dramatically, to the delight of Tea Party Republicans. Then, localities will have to raise property taxes and such to keep from cutting into the bare bones of what they provide. Education, already an obvious problem here, will suffer all the more. A new Associated Press report says:
Analysts say schools would lose $9.8 billion and 100,000 jobs over the next two years. Hospitals and doctors are facing $2.8 billion in Medicaid cuts. And sheriffs are worried about cuts to mental health programs that inmates need.
Texans, brace yourselves for the worst. And, about 55% of you who voted last year pretty much brought it on yourselves.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
This session, the Republican-dominated Texas Legislature is facing a two-year budget shortfall that could run as high as $27 billion. The reaction from Governor Goodhair and the others who are essentially on the corporate payroll has been predictable: slash and burn.
Texas already has a well-earned reputation for being one of the most piss-poor places in the U.S. for social services and other public initiatives. We're already 49th out of 50 states in spending on mental-health services, yet officials in that sector are bracing for marrow-deep cuts. That doesn't make much sense, especially when you consider what just happened earlier this month in Tuscon, Arizona. A bit of mental-health intervention might just have helped that situation some.
Regressive taxation
One of the biggest reasons that state services here are so anorexic is because the revenue base is so narrow. It's estimated that nearly 80% of Texas' revenue comes from sales and excise taxes -- i.e., taxes on poor people and the middle class. And then, the fastest-growing source of revenue in this state is the lottery. That's yet another tax on poorer people, albeit a voluntary one. I've heard it called "a tax on people who are bad at math."
According to one 2009 analysis, Texas is the fifth-worst state in the U.S. for taxes levied on the bottom 20% of earners. And then, since taxes on the upper 80%, and on big corporations, are so low, that bottom 20% gets some of the most feeble social services in the country.
I smell fundamentalist Christians here. The attitude among many of them is that the rich are that way because they are living right. If you're poor, you must be doing something sinful, like drinking and gambling too much, for which God is punishing you. And that fuels the vicious cycle of rich getting richer and poor getting poorer.
All of the above has been going on in Texas for a very long time, even when Democrats were in power. That's not too surprising -- I've met some "Democrats" who seemed more right-wing than some of the Republicans I've encountered here, and that's saying a lot. The GOP state platform that's assembled here every four years reads about like that of the John Birch Society.
But now, the state's entire economy could hang in the balance. Experts are warning that the proposed meat-ax budget cuts, involving as many as 8,000 state employees, could have a very large ripple effect throughout the entire Texas economy.
Governor Goodhair's perennial demagoguery
With Governor Goodhair beginning his 11th year in office, this was predictable. Rick Perry never met a rich dude whom he didn't consider a potential campaign donor. He's all about reverse Robin Hood government, shifting burdens down onto those who can least afford it and openly subsidizing "job-creating" corporations that already rake in unprecedented profits.
Someone with common sense and a minimum of political courage might suggest a state income tax on households with incomes over $100,000. Not Goodhair, who's busy being a demagogue on bogus issues like "sanctuary cities" for illegal immigrants.
But, the voters here re-elected him last November with 55% of the tally, so the masochism of middle-class Texans seems to be continuing unabated. Bubba gets mad, buys a new gun and joins the Tea Party movement whenever he hears anything about a state income tax, but then quietly and tamely pays higher and higher sales taxes when he visits Walmart.
And last year, he elected Republicans to the state Legislature 2-to-1 over Democrats, something that hasn't happened here since Reconstruction. And then, he's going to be surprised when, in two years, his daily life is that much harder and his money doesn't go as far?
I'm indulging in stereotypes, of course. But it's hard not to picture such things while living amid this degree of stupidity.
I don't need a Ouija board to tell you what's going to happen. The state budget will be slashed dramatically, to the delight of Tea Party Republicans. Then, localities will have to raise property taxes and such to keep from cutting into the bare bones of what they provide. Education, already an obvious problem here, will suffer all the more. A new Associated Press report says:
Analysts say schools would lose $9.8 billion and 100,000 jobs over the next two years. Hospitals and doctors are facing $2.8 billion in Medicaid cuts. And sheriffs are worried about cuts to mental health programs that inmates need.
Texans, brace yourselves for the worst. And, about 55% of you who voted last year pretty much brought it on yourselves.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Alabama Governor's Bigoted Remark Shouldn't Surprise Anyone
By Manifesto Joe
Christian exclusivism is certainly nothing new. It's what most "conservative" Christians believe -- that only those who have accepted Christ as their savior will go to Heaven.
So, the only thing that should be surprising about what Gov. Robert Bentley, R-Ala., said in an address on the Martin Luther King Jr. birthday holiday is that a practicing politician said it so openly. And even that should only be mildly surprising, given the atmosphere of bigotry that so pervades American life now.
Here's what the Chicago Tribune reported:
Speaking to a large crowd Monday at Montgomery's Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church — where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. once preached — Bentley said that "if you're a Christian and you're saved ... it makes you and me brother and sister," according to a report in the Birmingham News.
"Now I will have to say that, if we don't have the same daddy, we're not brothers and sisters," he added, according to the paper. "So anybody here today who has not accepted Jesus Christ as their savior, I'm telling you, you're not my brother and you're not my sister, and I want to be your brother."
By Tuesday, the comments were reverberating beyond Alabama. David Silverman, president of Cranford, N.J.-based American Atheists, called the remarks "outrageous."
"He is a governor, not a mullah," Silverman said. "This is a diverse nation with a secular government. If he doesn't like it, he shouldn't be governor."
Atheists weren't the only people who were offended. The Daily Mail (U.K.) later reported:
Today (Wednesday) he was forced to issue an apology for his outburst after a critical letter from Rabbi Jonathan Miller. ...
Rabbi Miller, from Temple Emanu-El in Birmingham, Alabama, wrote that Jews were
"faithful people" who pay their taxes and send children to state schools.
He said in a letter to the Governor: "Our great nation, by law and tradition, provides us with religious freedom. And even though we do not believe exactly alike we ought to see each other with brotherly affection, and as equals in conscience and human worth."
A spokesman for the Hindu American Foundation said the comments on Monday were "intolerant, repulsive and wholly unacceptable."
But they don't appear to be hurting Bentley any among Alabamans. Here's a link to an Associated Press report that pretty much says that most people there agree with what the governor said. Some just think he was unwise to say it openly.
Christian exclusivism, again, is very old doctrine, and certainly not unprecedented among many prominent U.S. politicians. Il Doofus, a Methodist, is said to have professed this belief privately but declined to discuss it openly.
I'm sorry to disappoint some of my agnostic or atheist colleagues on the political left, but I've had a few subjective experiences that have led me to believe that there is a deity. But at 54, I remain unchurched, and one of the main reasons for that is Christian exclusivism. Where I live, that tenet tends to be the rule, not the exception, in Christian churches of almost all kinds.
And it simply defies common sense. A Muslim who has spent his or her entire life in Islamabad is very, very unlikely to be persuaded by any Christian missionary. This person may be more virtuous, by any measure, than a given Christian in Alabama. But he or she is very likely, perhaps almost certain, to cling to the religion in which he or she was raised. That's how the typical human mind works -- and an all-knowing God, if such a being exists, would surely know that.
For another example, suppose that a bright child in Alabama is brought up in a Southern Baptist church, and applies common sense to theological questions. And, this child discovers that there are scores of hypocrites in this church. By the time he or she is a teenager, the person is pretty likely to run away, fast and far, and never, ever go back. Perhaps the person will become a believer again, but not that kind of believer.
To hear it told in most Christian churches in these parts, any such people are surely hellbound. I don't profess to know the mind of God, but I hope those who would say such things are in for some surprises.
Religious exclusivism of any kind betrays yet another habit of the human mind, and a very pernicious one. It's the desire to be part of some "chosen" group. "My group, my community, my church, my political party, everything I belong to is absolutely right, and I am certain beyond a doubt that everybody else is wrong." That's what comes out of the mouths of many people, and it doubtlessly makes them feel better about themselves, that they're special. (Ever hear any of this from conservatives?)
Inclusivism isn't new either, nor is it radical
Even among conservative-to-moderate Christians, there is a differing view. Consider these three statements:
C. S. Lewis - "We do know that no person can be saved except through Christ; we do not know that only those who know Him can be saved by Him."
John Stott - "I have never been able to conjure up (as some great Evangelical missionaries have) the appalling vision of the millions who are not only perishing but will inevitably perish. On the other hand… I am not and cannot be a universalist. Between these extremes I cherish and hope that the majority of the human race will be saved. And I have a solid biblical basis for this belief."
Billy Graham - "And that's what God is doing today, He's calling people out of the world for His name, whether they come from the Muslim world, or the Buddhist world, or the Christian world or the non-believing world, they are members of the Body of Christ because they've been called by God. They may not even know the name of Jesus but they know in their hearts that they need something that they don't have, and they turn to the only light that they have, and I think that they are saved, and that they're going to be with us in heaven."
Not exactly religious liberals, any of these fellows, let alone radicals. And they are all considered evangelical Christian icons.
But, at long last, no one should really be surprised that a major Republican politician would make such a statement. Even after the apology, something tells me that Bentley's views are unchanged. He was simply being candid about them at an inappropriate moment.
Given the atmosphere of bigotry and intolerance that the American right wing has resurrected, there's nothing shocking here at all.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Christian exclusivism is certainly nothing new. It's what most "conservative" Christians believe -- that only those who have accepted Christ as their savior will go to Heaven.
So, the only thing that should be surprising about what Gov. Robert Bentley, R-Ala., said in an address on the Martin Luther King Jr. birthday holiday is that a practicing politician said it so openly. And even that should only be mildly surprising, given the atmosphere of bigotry that so pervades American life now.
Here's what the Chicago Tribune reported:
Speaking to a large crowd Monday at Montgomery's Dexter Avenue King Memorial Baptist Church — where the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. once preached — Bentley said that "if you're a Christian and you're saved ... it makes you and me brother and sister," according to a report in the Birmingham News.
"Now I will have to say that, if we don't have the same daddy, we're not brothers and sisters," he added, according to the paper. "So anybody here today who has not accepted Jesus Christ as their savior, I'm telling you, you're not my brother and you're not my sister, and I want to be your brother."
By Tuesday, the comments were reverberating beyond Alabama. David Silverman, president of Cranford, N.J.-based American Atheists, called the remarks "outrageous."
"He is a governor, not a mullah," Silverman said. "This is a diverse nation with a secular government. If he doesn't like it, he shouldn't be governor."
Atheists weren't the only people who were offended. The Daily Mail (U.K.) later reported:
Today (Wednesday) he was forced to issue an apology for his outburst after a critical letter from Rabbi Jonathan Miller. ...
Rabbi Miller, from Temple Emanu-El in Birmingham, Alabama, wrote that Jews were
"faithful people" who pay their taxes and send children to state schools.
He said in a letter to the Governor: "Our great nation, by law and tradition, provides us with religious freedom. And even though we do not believe exactly alike we ought to see each other with brotherly affection, and as equals in conscience and human worth."
A spokesman for the Hindu American Foundation said the comments on Monday were "intolerant, repulsive and wholly unacceptable."
But they don't appear to be hurting Bentley any among Alabamans. Here's a link to an Associated Press report that pretty much says that most people there agree with what the governor said. Some just think he was unwise to say it openly.
Christian exclusivism, again, is very old doctrine, and certainly not unprecedented among many prominent U.S. politicians. Il Doofus, a Methodist, is said to have professed this belief privately but declined to discuss it openly.
I'm sorry to disappoint some of my agnostic or atheist colleagues on the political left, but I've had a few subjective experiences that have led me to believe that there is a deity. But at 54, I remain unchurched, and one of the main reasons for that is Christian exclusivism. Where I live, that tenet tends to be the rule, not the exception, in Christian churches of almost all kinds.
And it simply defies common sense. A Muslim who has spent his or her entire life in Islamabad is very, very unlikely to be persuaded by any Christian missionary. This person may be more virtuous, by any measure, than a given Christian in Alabama. But he or she is very likely, perhaps almost certain, to cling to the religion in which he or she was raised. That's how the typical human mind works -- and an all-knowing God, if such a being exists, would surely know that.
For another example, suppose that a bright child in Alabama is brought up in a Southern Baptist church, and applies common sense to theological questions. And, this child discovers that there are scores of hypocrites in this church. By the time he or she is a teenager, the person is pretty likely to run away, fast and far, and never, ever go back. Perhaps the person will become a believer again, but not that kind of believer.
To hear it told in most Christian churches in these parts, any such people are surely hellbound. I don't profess to know the mind of God, but I hope those who would say such things are in for some surprises.
Religious exclusivism of any kind betrays yet another habit of the human mind, and a very pernicious one. It's the desire to be part of some "chosen" group. "My group, my community, my church, my political party, everything I belong to is absolutely right, and I am certain beyond a doubt that everybody else is wrong." That's what comes out of the mouths of many people, and it doubtlessly makes them feel better about themselves, that they're special. (Ever hear any of this from conservatives?)
Inclusivism isn't new either, nor is it radical
Even among conservative-to-moderate Christians, there is a differing view. Consider these three statements:
C. S. Lewis - "We do know that no person can be saved except through Christ; we do not know that only those who know Him can be saved by Him."
John Stott - "I have never been able to conjure up (as some great Evangelical missionaries have) the appalling vision of the millions who are not only perishing but will inevitably perish. On the other hand… I am not and cannot be a universalist. Between these extremes I cherish and hope that the majority of the human race will be saved. And I have a solid biblical basis for this belief."
Billy Graham - "And that's what God is doing today, He's calling people out of the world for His name, whether they come from the Muslim world, or the Buddhist world, or the Christian world or the non-believing world, they are members of the Body of Christ because they've been called by God. They may not even know the name of Jesus but they know in their hearts that they need something that they don't have, and they turn to the only light that they have, and I think that they are saved, and that they're going to be with us in heaven."
Not exactly religious liberals, any of these fellows, let alone radicals. And they are all considered evangelical Christian icons.
But, at long last, no one should really be surprised that a major Republican politician would make such a statement. Even after the apology, something tells me that Bentley's views are unchanged. He was simply being candid about them at an inappropriate moment.
Given the atmosphere of bigotry and intolerance that the American right wing has resurrected, there's nothing shocking here at all.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Decent Thing For Palin To Do Would Be To Retire From Politics
By Manifesto Joe
No, she didn't shoot anything, at least nothing with any more civil rights than a moose has.
But last year she had a map of 20 congressional districts with "crosshairs" over them, and one of them was the district of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., now recovering from being gravely wounded by a gunman.
It was already quite evident that Sarah Palin is just too f***ing stupid to be a presidential contender. She was too stupid to have been governor of Alaska, or even the mayor of a town. I considered Il Doofus perhaps the dumbest SOB who ever held the highest office in the land, but even he looks substantially brighter than Klondike Cutie.
I've held off for a few days on posting anything on the Saturday shooting in Tuscon, for a variety of reasons. It's hard to know what to say about a hideous event like this, so I thought it would be good to just let the facts unfold for a few days before commenting.
I have enough of a political bias to admit that I'd anticipated that the suspect would be some sort of Tea Party poster boy. He's pathologically anti-government, but his political profile is like, all over the place. Like some other nut cases I've run across in my time, the suspect apparently could be a Marxist one minute and a Nazi the next.
One thing that's clear, though, is that he was attracted to extremes, and to violence. Although the far right certainly has no patent on extremism, they've cornered the market on it in contemporary America. Just listen to AM radio on any given afternoon.
And politicians like Sarah Palin have been shameless demagogues, ruthlessly exploiting ignorant bigots for their own gain. There have been many offenders, but Palin has been the most high-profile of them, raking in big bucks while cynically promoting herself to Tea Partiers with overactive prostate glands.
With the blood of a federal judge, and nearly that of a once-promising young member of Congress, at hand -- no, not directly on HER hands, but -- I'd still say that in view of Palin's violent rhetoric, it would be proper penance if she would simply go home to Wasilla and stay there.
We've seen a bit too much of this kind of behavior in recent years in America, and much of it was during the midterm election campaign. Giffords was on Palin's "hit list," and she was the target of death threats, vandalism and harassment. Elsewhere, in Kentucky, we saw a Rand Paul supporter stomp on the head of an opposition activist, giving her a concussion. And then, the stupid SOB wanted HER to apologize to him.
Enough with the brown-shirt act. For one thing, the right doesn't have a monopoly on that -- they just have been producing the most obvious examples of it. Other people are quite able to fight back, but they may have a lingering fantasy that there is still a process of civil debate alive in the U.S.
Sarah Palin is the one politician I can think of who has consistently gone beyond the boundaries of any civility. If there's going to be a Judas goat in this thing, she looks like the obvious one.
Go home, Sarah, and stay there.
For one thing, you're far too ignorant to have come this far in life. I have seen one person before who used the word "ravished" instead of "ravaged," like you did in an e-mail or tweet or some such thing to Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindall during the oil-spill crisis.
But that person wasn't potentially running for president. The guy I think of who actually did that (at a newspaper I worked for in 1979) was a penis-headed ad salesman who drove a 1960s Volkswagen "bug." It almost got in the paper as a banner Page One headline. ("Storm ravishes county") I had been out all day, and then in the newsroom, writing about storm damage. Then, just before they sent the page, I saw that. It didn't surprise me to have to correct him -- but he clearly couldn't even run his own desk, let alone a small state.
Go home, Sarah. And stay there. You are just too goddamned dumb to be in this arena.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
No, she didn't shoot anything, at least nothing with any more civil rights than a moose has.
But last year she had a map of 20 congressional districts with "crosshairs" over them, and one of them was the district of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., now recovering from being gravely wounded by a gunman.
It was already quite evident that Sarah Palin is just too f***ing stupid to be a presidential contender. She was too stupid to have been governor of Alaska, or even the mayor of a town. I considered Il Doofus perhaps the dumbest SOB who ever held the highest office in the land, but even he looks substantially brighter than Klondike Cutie.
I've held off for a few days on posting anything on the Saturday shooting in Tuscon, for a variety of reasons. It's hard to know what to say about a hideous event like this, so I thought it would be good to just let the facts unfold for a few days before commenting.
I have enough of a political bias to admit that I'd anticipated that the suspect would be some sort of Tea Party poster boy. He's pathologically anti-government, but his political profile is like, all over the place. Like some other nut cases I've run across in my time, the suspect apparently could be a Marxist one minute and a Nazi the next.
One thing that's clear, though, is that he was attracted to extremes, and to violence. Although the far right certainly has no patent on extremism, they've cornered the market on it in contemporary America. Just listen to AM radio on any given afternoon.
And politicians like Sarah Palin have been shameless demagogues, ruthlessly exploiting ignorant bigots for their own gain. There have been many offenders, but Palin has been the most high-profile of them, raking in big bucks while cynically promoting herself to Tea Partiers with overactive prostate glands.
With the blood of a federal judge, and nearly that of a once-promising young member of Congress, at hand -- no, not directly on HER hands, but -- I'd still say that in view of Palin's violent rhetoric, it would be proper penance if she would simply go home to Wasilla and stay there.
We've seen a bit too much of this kind of behavior in recent years in America, and much of it was during the midterm election campaign. Giffords was on Palin's "hit list," and she was the target of death threats, vandalism and harassment. Elsewhere, in Kentucky, we saw a Rand Paul supporter stomp on the head of an opposition activist, giving her a concussion. And then, the stupid SOB wanted HER to apologize to him.
Enough with the brown-shirt act. For one thing, the right doesn't have a monopoly on that -- they just have been producing the most obvious examples of it. Other people are quite able to fight back, but they may have a lingering fantasy that there is still a process of civil debate alive in the U.S.
Sarah Palin is the one politician I can think of who has consistently gone beyond the boundaries of any civility. If there's going to be a Judas goat in this thing, she looks like the obvious one.
Go home, Sarah, and stay there.
For one thing, you're far too ignorant to have come this far in life. I have seen one person before who used the word "ravished" instead of "ravaged," like you did in an e-mail or tweet or some such thing to Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindall during the oil-spill crisis.
But that person wasn't potentially running for president. The guy I think of who actually did that (at a newspaper I worked for in 1979) was a penis-headed ad salesman who drove a 1960s Volkswagen "bug." It almost got in the paper as a banner Page One headline. ("Storm ravishes county") I had been out all day, and then in the newsroom, writing about storm damage. Then, just before they sent the page, I saw that. It didn't surprise me to have to correct him -- but he clearly couldn't even run his own desk, let alone a small state.
Go home, Sarah. And stay there. You are just too goddamned dumb to be in this arena.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Monday, January 10, 2011
Happy 100th, Gypsy Rose Lee
By Manifesto Joe
Saturday would have been the 100th birthday of Rose Louise Hovick (1911-1970), better-known by her stage name of Gypsy Rose Lee. Daughter of a certifiably crazy stage mom and sister of the child star who later became actress June Havoc, Rose spent her youth on the Vaudeville road. Along the way, she discovered that audiences responded delightfully to a Burlesque "stripper" who actually talked to them and made jokes rather than just doing the old bump-and-grind.
By 1931, she was a headliner in New York Burlesque theaters. For four years she was a main attraction at the Minsky brothers' famous theaters. By 1936 she was "mainstream" enough to be in the Ziegfeld Follies on Broadway, and a personality on NBC radio. Rose finally hit the wall after going to Hollywood in 1937. She was likely a victim of the "code" back then, as the producers out there wouldn't even let her use her stage name. (They billed her as Louise Hovick.) The movies didn't pan out well, so she returned to New York. By the early 1940s she was a bestselling novelist and playwright, while continuing to do her stage act for as long as she had the body and looks.
Because I was born in 1956, my main awareness of Gypsy Rose was as a comic TV personality in upper middle age, one of those quick wits who was a regular on the daytime game show Hollywood Squares in the late 1960s. I also saw the movie version of Gypsy, the musical based on Rose's famous 1957 memoir. It was much later that I learned more of the story behind this one-of-a-kind showbiz legend, who in the 1930s counted H.L. Mencken among her many fans. She was a much more complex and troubled person in private than her public ever knew.
Here's a link to an NPR piece about a much-reviewed new book, Karen Abbott's American Rose: A Nation Laid Bare — The Life And Times Of Gypsy Rose Lee.
And, you can actually catch a clip of her very sanitized act on YouTube. Here goes:
Something tells me that the routines she did at Minsky's were a lot more risque. (She was arrested at least once.) But even with that in mind, you could see a whole lot more nowadays, 24/7, in any pole-dance joint in Dallas -- and perhaps not be as entertained.
Here's to you, Rose.
(P.S.: For readers expecting more serious and political content here, never fear. There's one like that coming soon, on a subject you can likely guess.)
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Saturday would have been the 100th birthday of Rose Louise Hovick (1911-1970), better-known by her stage name of Gypsy Rose Lee. Daughter of a certifiably crazy stage mom and sister of the child star who later became actress June Havoc, Rose spent her youth on the Vaudeville road. Along the way, she discovered that audiences responded delightfully to a Burlesque "stripper" who actually talked to them and made jokes rather than just doing the old bump-and-grind.
By 1931, she was a headliner in New York Burlesque theaters. For four years she was a main attraction at the Minsky brothers' famous theaters. By 1936 she was "mainstream" enough to be in the Ziegfeld Follies on Broadway, and a personality on NBC radio. Rose finally hit the wall after going to Hollywood in 1937. She was likely a victim of the "code" back then, as the producers out there wouldn't even let her use her stage name. (They billed her as Louise Hovick.) The movies didn't pan out well, so she returned to New York. By the early 1940s she was a bestselling novelist and playwright, while continuing to do her stage act for as long as she had the body and looks.
Because I was born in 1956, my main awareness of Gypsy Rose was as a comic TV personality in upper middle age, one of those quick wits who was a regular on the daytime game show Hollywood Squares in the late 1960s. I also saw the movie version of Gypsy, the musical based on Rose's famous 1957 memoir. It was much later that I learned more of the story behind this one-of-a-kind showbiz legend, who in the 1930s counted H.L. Mencken among her many fans. She was a much more complex and troubled person in private than her public ever knew.
Here's a link to an NPR piece about a much-reviewed new book, Karen Abbott's American Rose: A Nation Laid Bare — The Life And Times Of Gypsy Rose Lee.
And, you can actually catch a clip of her very sanitized act on YouTube. Here goes:
Something tells me that the routines she did at Minsky's were a lot more risque. (She was arrested at least once.) But even with that in mind, you could see a whole lot more nowadays, 24/7, in any pole-dance joint in Dallas -- and perhaps not be as entertained.
Here's to you, Rose.
(P.S.: For readers expecting more serious and political content here, never fear. There's one like that coming soon, on a subject you can likely guess.)
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Monday, January 3, 2011
Income Disparity Is A Growing Problem
By Manifesto Joe
Socialism for the rich? It looks more and more that way, upon close examination. I remember a job interview (I'm a newspaper journalist) in which the publisher of a medium/small paper talked briefly about competition. "We're all for competition. But not in our particular business. If somebody starts up a paper to compete with us, we're going to do all we can do to beat them and run them out of business."
Fine -- that's the marketplace. You can lose in competition, and the inefficient do. But that points to an inherent contradiction of capitalism. In theory, capitalists laud competition; but in practice, every capitalist wants a monopoly.
But even with that contradiction in mind, the way capitalism is being practiced in America and elsewhere is that many "competitors" are shielded from the rigors of the marketplace. History shows again and again that concentrations of wealth cannot be divorced from political influence: They tend to be parallel. Rich people and giant corporations can afford to hire more and better lobbyists than those who advocate for the poor, labor unions, etc., can ever hope to. It's always been that way, and it probably always will be.
According to journalist David Cay Johnston, over the past 30 or so years, rich people and big corporations have been so lavishly subsidized that they always win. And, subsequently, you, little man and woman, always lose.
Here's a link to articles about Johnston's new book, and to an interview with him.
If you follow the news, it shouldn't be lost on you that cities, counties and states across America are giving subsidies, either in the form of tax breaks or outright payments, to already-rich companies to relocate there, or to expand. What they get in tax breaks, or in flat payments, you have to make up the difference for.
It's reality that a significant number of jobs are generated this way, at least in those localities, as Johnston grants. But the effect on the nation as a whole is nothing short of devastating. The most recent federal deficit figure was $1.3 trillion, a bill we're going to stick future generations with. On the structural deficit, this is the "trickle-up" effect.
Income redistribution doesn't work just one way. The rich are much better at it, and contrary to the prophesy of Karl Marx, history has seemed to be on their side.
The efficiency of the "free market" depends on that which is purely economic functioning independently of political influence. That may have been somewhat possible in Adam Smith's day, but it didn't take long after that for economic power to translate directly into political power. In the halls of Congress or any legislature, money talks; bullshit walks.
How has this affected daily life in the U.S.? Here's another link that illustrates the problem. American workers are vastly more productive than they were in the 1970s, but have gained little in real wages compared to those raking in profits from politically advantageous positions.
So, in practical terms, how can this problem be remedied?
Make the bastards pay
I'm realist enough to know that there's never going to be a real solution to the problem of capitalist success translating directly into political influence. This is one point on which Marx was absolutely correct: There's never going to be any divorce between the two spheres. The only way to address it is to revive the concept of progressive taxation.
There seemed to be a time in America in which many working people more or less understood that capitalism is an insider's game, played with great duplicity. "Traditional" capitalists do plenty of talking about the "free market," but all the while they have Washington and the state capitols overrun with lobbyists seeking all manner of perks. And they get most of them, no matter which major political party is in power. They fare better with Republicans; but Democrats, as we have seen since January 2009, merely talk a better game and usually end up swimming in the same polluted water. Their politicians have to have quid, and plenty of it, to keep their gig going.
Progressive taxation is the only practical answer. Hey, rich guy: You want various governments to subsidize you? Realistically, that's bound to happen. But with that in mind, you must pay commensurately for it, so as to stop shifting the burden down upon those who can least afford to pay.
Let's face the fact that the "free market" is, and has generally always been, a duplicitous sham. The hogs have pretty much always been slopping at the trough, and the biggest ones get the most. It's only when the smaller ones band together that real change is forced upon them.
The people of Dallas-Fort Worth, here in Texas, should be able to see the dilemma quite well. The taxpayers anteed up a pretty penny for Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, subsidizing fabulously wealthy Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones in the bargain. What they got this football season was an NFL team that went 6-10, and that was largely because of Jones' mismanagement, if sports columnists are to be believed. The taxpayers didn't get much of a return on their silly investment.
I don't see an end to such nonsense anytime soon. But I'd like to see Jerry's taxes, and those of others like him, raised dramatically, for all the "little people" to settle up for the price of Jerryworld.
I've got a couple more links that more or less address this subject. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., was a dissenter in the Senate on the recent Obama compromise on taxes. Here's some of what he had to say on the subject.
Here's more of what Bernie said, courtesy of Truthout. It's pretty astonishing that the American people are still taking it up the keester so happily while ExxonMobil rakes in $19 billion in profits, and not only pays no income tax, but gets back a $156 million refund from the IRS.
Bernie is an avowed socialist, the only one now in Congress, to my knowledge. I'm sorry to disappoint some out there, but I'm not a true-believing socialist, and therefore I don't think there's ever going to be a way to effectively stop big corporations and wealthy campaign contributors from twisting the arms of lawmakers. I'd say that's especially true since our Supreme Court recently struck down limitations on campaign finance.
The only answer is what can be done to wake people up. A political groundswell is the sole solution, and it's got to start soon. The sole reason for optimism here is that once people start really being hit in their pocketbooks, that's when they actually do something. The best time for that was in 1985, but it still may not be too late.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Socialism for the rich? It looks more and more that way, upon close examination. I remember a job interview (I'm a newspaper journalist) in which the publisher of a medium/small paper talked briefly about competition. "We're all for competition. But not in our particular business. If somebody starts up a paper to compete with us, we're going to do all we can do to beat them and run them out of business."
Fine -- that's the marketplace. You can lose in competition, and the inefficient do. But that points to an inherent contradiction of capitalism. In theory, capitalists laud competition; but in practice, every capitalist wants a monopoly.
But even with that contradiction in mind, the way capitalism is being practiced in America and elsewhere is that many "competitors" are shielded from the rigors of the marketplace. History shows again and again that concentrations of wealth cannot be divorced from political influence: They tend to be parallel. Rich people and giant corporations can afford to hire more and better lobbyists than those who advocate for the poor, labor unions, etc., can ever hope to. It's always been that way, and it probably always will be.
According to journalist David Cay Johnston, over the past 30 or so years, rich people and big corporations have been so lavishly subsidized that they always win. And, subsequently, you, little man and woman, always lose.
Here's a link to articles about Johnston's new book, and to an interview with him.
If you follow the news, it shouldn't be lost on you that cities, counties and states across America are giving subsidies, either in the form of tax breaks or outright payments, to already-rich companies to relocate there, or to expand. What they get in tax breaks, or in flat payments, you have to make up the difference for.
It's reality that a significant number of jobs are generated this way, at least in those localities, as Johnston grants. But the effect on the nation as a whole is nothing short of devastating. The most recent federal deficit figure was $1.3 trillion, a bill we're going to stick future generations with. On the structural deficit, this is the "trickle-up" effect.
Income redistribution doesn't work just one way. The rich are much better at it, and contrary to the prophesy of Karl Marx, history has seemed to be on their side.
The efficiency of the "free market" depends on that which is purely economic functioning independently of political influence. That may have been somewhat possible in Adam Smith's day, but it didn't take long after that for economic power to translate directly into political power. In the halls of Congress or any legislature, money talks; bullshit walks.
How has this affected daily life in the U.S.? Here's another link that illustrates the problem. American workers are vastly more productive than they were in the 1970s, but have gained little in real wages compared to those raking in profits from politically advantageous positions.
So, in practical terms, how can this problem be remedied?
Make the bastards pay
I'm realist enough to know that there's never going to be a real solution to the problem of capitalist success translating directly into political influence. This is one point on which Marx was absolutely correct: There's never going to be any divorce between the two spheres. The only way to address it is to revive the concept of progressive taxation.
There seemed to be a time in America in which many working people more or less understood that capitalism is an insider's game, played with great duplicity. "Traditional" capitalists do plenty of talking about the "free market," but all the while they have Washington and the state capitols overrun with lobbyists seeking all manner of perks. And they get most of them, no matter which major political party is in power. They fare better with Republicans; but Democrats, as we have seen since January 2009, merely talk a better game and usually end up swimming in the same polluted water. Their politicians have to have quid, and plenty of it, to keep their gig going.
Progressive taxation is the only practical answer. Hey, rich guy: You want various governments to subsidize you? Realistically, that's bound to happen. But with that in mind, you must pay commensurately for it, so as to stop shifting the burden down upon those who can least afford to pay.
Let's face the fact that the "free market" is, and has generally always been, a duplicitous sham. The hogs have pretty much always been slopping at the trough, and the biggest ones get the most. It's only when the smaller ones band together that real change is forced upon them.
The people of Dallas-Fort Worth, here in Texas, should be able to see the dilemma quite well. The taxpayers anteed up a pretty penny for Cowboys Stadium in Arlington, subsidizing fabulously wealthy Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones in the bargain. What they got this football season was an NFL team that went 6-10, and that was largely because of Jones' mismanagement, if sports columnists are to be believed. The taxpayers didn't get much of a return on their silly investment.
I don't see an end to such nonsense anytime soon. But I'd like to see Jerry's taxes, and those of others like him, raised dramatically, for all the "little people" to settle up for the price of Jerryworld.
I've got a couple more links that more or less address this subject. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., was a dissenter in the Senate on the recent Obama compromise on taxes. Here's some of what he had to say on the subject.
Here's more of what Bernie said, courtesy of Truthout. It's pretty astonishing that the American people are still taking it up the keester so happily while ExxonMobil rakes in $19 billion in profits, and not only pays no income tax, but gets back a $156 million refund from the IRS.
Bernie is an avowed socialist, the only one now in Congress, to my knowledge. I'm sorry to disappoint some out there, but I'm not a true-believing socialist, and therefore I don't think there's ever going to be a way to effectively stop big corporations and wealthy campaign contributors from twisting the arms of lawmakers. I'd say that's especially true since our Supreme Court recently struck down limitations on campaign finance.
The only answer is what can be done to wake people up. A political groundswell is the sole solution, and it's got to start soon. The sole reason for optimism here is that once people start really being hit in their pocketbooks, that's when they actually do something. The best time for that was in 1985, but it still may not be too late.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Three Nights At The Movies: The New 'True Grit' Is Excellent
By Manifesto Joe
I've been studiously ignoring politics until the New Year arrives. Being the hardworking sort that I am, I don't make it to the cinema nowadays as much as I once did. But lately I've been going a little more.
True Grit
I was very pleasantly surprised that the new True Grit is an excellent movie. This is the one they should have made in the first place. The old one, with John Wayne and directed by Henry Hathaway, seems like Hollywood gloss in comparison. This one, by the Coen brothers, has a very "gritty" and authentic feel to it.
Jeff Bridges' take on Rooster Cogburn is most interesting. Rooster is a 53-year-old drunk with a literal hair-trigger temper, a guy who has obviously spent about as much time on the bad side of the law as on the good. Matt Damon pretty well matches him as LeBeauff (sp?), the Texas Ranger. He comes across as a lot more authentic than Glen Campbell (In the 1969 flick, I remember Glen still having that perfect hairstyle, mutton chops and all, when he's supposed to be dead of a head injury).
And when it comes to the 14-year-old girl, there's no comparison. Hailee Steinfeld is great, totally lacking the stilted pomposity of Kim Darby. A star may be born here.
The Black Swan
This one is an art film that's doing far better at the box office than art films usually do in America. I thought it was decent. My wife was far less impressed.
The gist is that Natalie Portman plays a ballet dancer who gets cast as the lead dancer in Swan Lake, but must tap into the dark reaches of her psyche to be able to dance as the dark side of the lead character. She's just not ready for it, and becomes hallucinatory and unbalanced as she has to reach into that side of herself. I won't tell more so as not to spoil it for those who want to see it. My wife and I both mused that the only thing this lacks that would gratify film snobs is the subtitles.
Being male, it did not escape my attention that Mila Kunis, in a supporting role, is a very sexy woman.
And, the music from Swan Lake, by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, is an earwig in the best sense of the term.
Boxing Gym
Frederick Wiseman is one of America's great documentarians. He's going on 81, so this may well be his last film.
He took his camera to Austin, Texas, to film at a boxing gym owned and operated by Richard Lord, a one-time pro boxer who also happens to have a degree from the University of Texas. Lord's gym is open to anyone who can pay $50 a month. There were people there who were obviously just trying to lose weight. Fred does most of his work in the cutting room, so he gradually builds a crescendo up to a gym war between two of the pros who work out there.
Meanwhile, you get a good slice of life. Lord tells a person who's becoming a member that, basically, everybody is welcome there. One woman who comes in here is 68, he says, and she hits the speed bag better than some of our pros do.
Wiseman has made many superb documentaries, but is perhaps best-known for Primates in 1974. I remember that one for the disturbing images. They have a box on top of a research monkey's head, with electrodes that penetrate his brain. Activating the electrodes induces all kinds of behavior. They can make him fuck, then stop; fuck, then stop; and so on. By the time the movie is over, you'd like to join the animals in a revolution to kill all the researchers. But, Wiseman never judges -- he just records.
His camera is very unobtrusive. At one point in Primates, he's in a boardroom with the researchers, with a couple of them raising objections and asking if this sort of research is really necessary.
Anyway, Boxing Gym is a good one, as all of Fred's are. Catch it if you can. It's pretty much an art house film.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
I've been studiously ignoring politics until the New Year arrives. Being the hardworking sort that I am, I don't make it to the cinema nowadays as much as I once did. But lately I've been going a little more.
True Grit
I was very pleasantly surprised that the new True Grit is an excellent movie. This is the one they should have made in the first place. The old one, with John Wayne and directed by Henry Hathaway, seems like Hollywood gloss in comparison. This one, by the Coen brothers, has a very "gritty" and authentic feel to it.
Jeff Bridges' take on Rooster Cogburn is most interesting. Rooster is a 53-year-old drunk with a literal hair-trigger temper, a guy who has obviously spent about as much time on the bad side of the law as on the good. Matt Damon pretty well matches him as LeBeauff (sp?), the Texas Ranger. He comes across as a lot more authentic than Glen Campbell (In the 1969 flick, I remember Glen still having that perfect hairstyle, mutton chops and all, when he's supposed to be dead of a head injury).
And when it comes to the 14-year-old girl, there's no comparison. Hailee Steinfeld is great, totally lacking the stilted pomposity of Kim Darby. A star may be born here.
The Black Swan
This one is an art film that's doing far better at the box office than art films usually do in America. I thought it was decent. My wife was far less impressed.
The gist is that Natalie Portman plays a ballet dancer who gets cast as the lead dancer in Swan Lake, but must tap into the dark reaches of her psyche to be able to dance as the dark side of the lead character. She's just not ready for it, and becomes hallucinatory and unbalanced as she has to reach into that side of herself. I won't tell more so as not to spoil it for those who want to see it. My wife and I both mused that the only thing this lacks that would gratify film snobs is the subtitles.
Being male, it did not escape my attention that Mila Kunis, in a supporting role, is a very sexy woman.
And, the music from Swan Lake, by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, is an earwig in the best sense of the term.
Boxing Gym
Frederick Wiseman is one of America's great documentarians. He's going on 81, so this may well be his last film.
He took his camera to Austin, Texas, to film at a boxing gym owned and operated by Richard Lord, a one-time pro boxer who also happens to have a degree from the University of Texas. Lord's gym is open to anyone who can pay $50 a month. There were people there who were obviously just trying to lose weight. Fred does most of his work in the cutting room, so he gradually builds a crescendo up to a gym war between two of the pros who work out there.
Meanwhile, you get a good slice of life. Lord tells a person who's becoming a member that, basically, everybody is welcome there. One woman who comes in here is 68, he says, and she hits the speed bag better than some of our pros do.
Wiseman has made many superb documentaries, but is perhaps best-known for Primates in 1974. I remember that one for the disturbing images. They have a box on top of a research monkey's head, with electrodes that penetrate his brain. Activating the electrodes induces all kinds of behavior. They can make him fuck, then stop; fuck, then stop; and so on. By the time the movie is over, you'd like to join the animals in a revolution to kill all the researchers. But, Wiseman never judges -- he just records.
His camera is very unobtrusive. At one point in Primates, he's in a boardroom with the researchers, with a couple of them raising objections and asking if this sort of research is really necessary.
Anyway, Boxing Gym is a good one, as all of Fred's are. Catch it if you can. It's pretty much an art house film.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
A Brief Thought On Commonality
It occurred to me, after the fact of my latest post, that I mentioned that FDR and LBJ perhaps did more for the common people of this country than any other presidents.
I have an IQ that actually got me into the Mensa Society. (Although, admittedly, I am a relatively dumb Mensan. I got in by all of 2 points.) Anyway, some people would ask me, why in the hell I would want to identify with common people? Shouldn't I regard myself as above them?
I certainly haven't found a position in life that has been above them. I generally work for people who I know are not nearly as smart as I am. Perhaps their EQs (emotional quotients) are higher than mine. I've taken a test on that, and my EQ is very average.
Life is a strange and fascinating journey, and you never know where you're going to end up. God, if he's there, blessed me with high intelligence. But I sense that he also blessed me with a life in which I began poor, and then saw what poor people have to run up against in their struggles for a better life. This, too, was sort of a blessing, and it's a major reason why I trudge on, writing this blog.
There, but for the grace of God, go you. There, perhaps with the grace of God, I have gone. -- MJ
I have an IQ that actually got me into the Mensa Society. (Although, admittedly, I am a relatively dumb Mensan. I got in by all of 2 points.) Anyway, some people would ask me, why in the hell I would want to identify with common people? Shouldn't I regard myself as above them?
I certainly haven't found a position in life that has been above them. I generally work for people who I know are not nearly as smart as I am. Perhaps their EQs (emotional quotients) are higher than mine. I've taken a test on that, and my EQ is very average.
Life is a strange and fascinating journey, and you never know where you're going to end up. God, if he's there, blessed me with high intelligence. But I sense that he also blessed me with a life in which I began poor, and then saw what poor people have to run up against in their struggles for a better life. This, too, was sort of a blessing, and it's a major reason why I trudge on, writing this blog.
There, but for the grace of God, go you. There, perhaps with the grace of God, I have gone. -- MJ
Bring On The Bitch And Boner Show
By Manifesto Joe
The 112th Congress will take office in just a couple of weeks, and America's Millenial Generation may be getting a harsh civics lesson in the bargain. I suspect that some of our young folks may wish they hadn't been texting while the political science teacher was discussing the powers of the legislative branch.
Pardon me for indulging in stereotypes here. But sometimes those can be appropriate and descriptive. William John Cox, writing for Truthout last month (here's a link), went over the numbers that show abysmal participation among young voters since they went overwhelmingly for Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential election.
Cox discusses the disappointment that many young voters feel about Obama, who (surprise, surprise!) has turned out to be a compromising politician, not a crusader for unwinnable causes. A good many of the 18-through-29 folks just didn't vote because they now regard Obama as a sellout. They see him making deals that ultimately benefit Wall Street moguls and corporate CEOs much, much more than they help jobless or underemployed twentysomethings. That's understandable.
I have still another theory about the poor turnout. Because of the failures of our schools, and arguably more so, those of our culture at large, many people, among them the young, are too ignorant and politically illiterate to know how much power the legislative branch can wield over the federal government. Because of my work hours, I was seldom home in recent years during the time when Jay Leno's "Jaywalking" segment of the Tonight Show would be on, but I recall seeing a bit of video in which typical men or women on the street would be at a loss to answer tough questions like, "Who was the first president of the United States?"
So, it's my suspicion that a great many younger people didn't vote in the 2010 midterm elections because they were simply unaware of their importance.
I've got news for the less experienced out there: The president is not a dictator. In our system, change often comes about gradually and as a result of wheeler-dealer compromises. FDR and LBJ got a whole lot more done for the common people of this country than Jimmy Carter. Why? Because they knew how the system works -- how to wheel and deal and compromise when necessary to get something done. Even Bill Clinton was much more effective than Carter, though they were philosophically about the same (neoliberals).
Cox, in his Truthout op-ed article, wrote:
Leading up to last week's election, an October McClatchy-Marist Poll found that only 11 percent of registered voters under 30 were "very enthusiastic" about voting, compared to 48 percent of voters over 60 years of age. An earlier Rock the Vote poll in September found 34 percent of young voters favoring Democrats with another 28 percent rooting for a Republican takeover - but, significantly, 36 percent believed it did not matter which party controlled Congress.
An estimated 20.4 percent of young people voted on November 2, representing about a million fewer than voted in 2006 and less than half of the youth turnout for the 2008 presidential election.
You're about to find out why it matters
The most significant number I glean from this is that 36% who don't think it matters which party controls Congress.
This is where our grim little civics lesson comes in, boys and girls. The Bitch and Boner Show commences in just a couple of weeks. Brace yourselves.
The 112th Congress, featuring Senate Minority Leader Mitch "The Bitch" McConnell of Kentucky and incoming House Speaker John "The Boner" Boehner, takes office bright and early next month. There's already a movement under foot, apparently very well-bankrolled by special interests, to repeal the watered-down Obama health care reforms. Judging from the TV ads with Mike Huckabee, you would think that there was an immense groundswell behind this, but polls show that only about 37% of respondents want outright repeal.
A reflection of our confused electorate is that polls also show that about as many Americans -- 36%, I recall -- have a completely different problem with Obamacare. They don't think it goes far enough.
But the next U.S. House has a solid Republican majority, and assorted court battles are under way. You're going to see a blitz for total repeal of that messy compromise that Obama got, for the next 22-plus months. I have no doubt that the House will vote on it, and then it will be up to Obama and the Senate to block repeal.
You're going to see the Obama presidency hamstrung by numerous House committees and investigations. I'm not sure exactly how they'll do it, but bet on an effort to impeach Obama within the next 18 months. I'd wager on that coming to a head around October 2012, just before the presidential election.
Cox, in the Truthout piece, continued, anticipating the agenda of the more right-wing Congress:
The corporate artillery is lined up and the guns are locked and loaded with high explosive shells. Here are the announced targets: campaign finance reform, consumer-protection laws, expiration of tax cuts for the wealthy, environmental controls on businesses, workers'ability to organize unions, health care reform, unemployment insurance, social security and Medicare.
As Samuel Johnson famously said, "Nothing focuses the mind like a hanging." The young people of America are being hung out to dry politically, and they will continue to flap in the wind as the new Congress rolls back even the modest gains of the Obama administration.
I can well understand many people's disappointment. It's demoralizing to have to choose, time after time, between one party that has turned agonizingly center-right, versus what Bill Maher has called the "crazy party." (A further observation by Maher: "Over the last 30 years, the Democrats have moved to the right, and the Republicans have moved into a mental hospital.")
But it definitely matters which party controls Congress, and our Millenials are about to learn that lesson the hard way.
Bring on the Bitch and Boner Show.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
The 112th Congress will take office in just a couple of weeks, and America's Millenial Generation may be getting a harsh civics lesson in the bargain. I suspect that some of our young folks may wish they hadn't been texting while the political science teacher was discussing the powers of the legislative branch.
Pardon me for indulging in stereotypes here. But sometimes those can be appropriate and descriptive. William John Cox, writing for Truthout last month (here's a link), went over the numbers that show abysmal participation among young voters since they went overwhelmingly for Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential election.
Cox discusses the disappointment that many young voters feel about Obama, who (surprise, surprise!) has turned out to be a compromising politician, not a crusader for unwinnable causes. A good many of the 18-through-29 folks just didn't vote because they now regard Obama as a sellout. They see him making deals that ultimately benefit Wall Street moguls and corporate CEOs much, much more than they help jobless or underemployed twentysomethings. That's understandable.
I have still another theory about the poor turnout. Because of the failures of our schools, and arguably more so, those of our culture at large, many people, among them the young, are too ignorant and politically illiterate to know how much power the legislative branch can wield over the federal government. Because of my work hours, I was seldom home in recent years during the time when Jay Leno's "Jaywalking" segment of the Tonight Show would be on, but I recall seeing a bit of video in which typical men or women on the street would be at a loss to answer tough questions like, "Who was the first president of the United States?"
So, it's my suspicion that a great many younger people didn't vote in the 2010 midterm elections because they were simply unaware of their importance.
I've got news for the less experienced out there: The president is not a dictator. In our system, change often comes about gradually and as a result of wheeler-dealer compromises. FDR and LBJ got a whole lot more done for the common people of this country than Jimmy Carter. Why? Because they knew how the system works -- how to wheel and deal and compromise when necessary to get something done. Even Bill Clinton was much more effective than Carter, though they were philosophically about the same (neoliberals).
Cox, in his Truthout op-ed article, wrote:
Leading up to last week's election, an October McClatchy-Marist Poll found that only 11 percent of registered voters under 30 were "very enthusiastic" about voting, compared to 48 percent of voters over 60 years of age. An earlier Rock the Vote poll in September found 34 percent of young voters favoring Democrats with another 28 percent rooting for a Republican takeover - but, significantly, 36 percent believed it did not matter which party controlled Congress.
An estimated 20.4 percent of young people voted on November 2, representing about a million fewer than voted in 2006 and less than half of the youth turnout for the 2008 presidential election.
You're about to find out why it matters
The most significant number I glean from this is that 36% who don't think it matters which party controls Congress.
This is where our grim little civics lesson comes in, boys and girls. The Bitch and Boner Show commences in just a couple of weeks. Brace yourselves.
The 112th Congress, featuring Senate Minority Leader Mitch "The Bitch" McConnell of Kentucky and incoming House Speaker John "The Boner" Boehner, takes office bright and early next month. There's already a movement under foot, apparently very well-bankrolled by special interests, to repeal the watered-down Obama health care reforms. Judging from the TV ads with Mike Huckabee, you would think that there was an immense groundswell behind this, but polls show that only about 37% of respondents want outright repeal.
A reflection of our confused electorate is that polls also show that about as many Americans -- 36%, I recall -- have a completely different problem with Obamacare. They don't think it goes far enough.
But the next U.S. House has a solid Republican majority, and assorted court battles are under way. You're going to see a blitz for total repeal of that messy compromise that Obama got, for the next 22-plus months. I have no doubt that the House will vote on it, and then it will be up to Obama and the Senate to block repeal.
You're going to see the Obama presidency hamstrung by numerous House committees and investigations. I'm not sure exactly how they'll do it, but bet on an effort to impeach Obama within the next 18 months. I'd wager on that coming to a head around October 2012, just before the presidential election.
Cox, in the Truthout piece, continued, anticipating the agenda of the more right-wing Congress:
The corporate artillery is lined up and the guns are locked and loaded with high explosive shells. Here are the announced targets: campaign finance reform, consumer-protection laws, expiration of tax cuts for the wealthy, environmental controls on businesses, workers'ability to organize unions, health care reform, unemployment insurance, social security and Medicare.
As Samuel Johnson famously said, "Nothing focuses the mind like a hanging." The young people of America are being hung out to dry politically, and they will continue to flap in the wind as the new Congress rolls back even the modest gains of the Obama administration.
I can well understand many people's disappointment. It's demoralizing to have to choose, time after time, between one party that has turned agonizingly center-right, versus what Bill Maher has called the "crazy party." (A further observation by Maher: "Over the last 30 years, the Democrats have moved to the right, and the Republicans have moved into a mental hospital.")
But it definitely matters which party controls Congress, and our Millenials are about to learn that lesson the hard way.
Bring on the Bitch and Boner Show.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Saturday, December 18, 2010
They Don't Make Music Like This Anymore: Be-Bop Deluxe, 1974
No Trains to Heaven
With the great Bill Nelson on lead guitar.
With the great Bill Nelson on lead guitar.
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Governor Goodhair, Texas' Dimwitted Demagogue, Part II
By Manifesto Joe
So, after his bogus comparison of Social Security to a Ponzi scheme, now Rick "Governor Goodhair" Perry wants to pull Texas out of the Medicaid system?
Not so fast, some of his fellow Republicans warn.
Such a move would be a disaster for the state -- at least for everyone who relies on that system for medical care. It would also be very bad in pure fiscal terms.
The Texas Health and Human Services Commission has warned that the state would lose $15 billion in federal matching funds and would have 2.6 million more Texans thrown into the ranks of the uninsured if our state did such a stupid thing.
Our state already faces a budget shortfall that, by some estimates, could exceed $20 billion. This has been a consequence of stupidity in itself, for which Governor Goodhair was somehow not held responsible on Nov. 2 by the voters of this state. More such stupidity would be far more than the taxpayers of Texas could afford.
State Rep. John Zerwas, R-Richmond, a physician from the Houston area, had this to say: "I don't think (opting out) of Medicaid is really viable. If you dropped out today, the human and economic consequences are pretty immediate."
Perry's response was to sort of pull back some, him and haw, and call for "increasing flexibility and innovation in Medicaid."
Here are quotes from the report: "Opting out of Medicaid means giving up federal dollars paid by the state's residents to provide healthcare for our most vulnerable residents."
But the report wasn't without cautions about the status quo: "Staying in the program forces states to pay for a federally-mandated expansion of Medicaid with little control over the program's ever-rising costs ..."
I'm shocked, shocked to be told that things actually have to be paid for. Texas has never been known for its largess for the poor -- much more known for its vast hospitality toward the rich and relocating corporations. Part of that lure is our "low" taxes. We're the second-most-populous state in the U.S., and there's still no personal state income tax here -- just very high sales taxes, user fees, and just about everything else you can imagine that's regressive.
Politicians like Governor Goodhair aim to keep it that way. Their demagoguery comes in when they start talking this sort of neo-secessionism. That plays very well in this state with Ballcap Bubba, and with Bubbette, too. He gets 80% of the vote in some areas of this state.
Granted, the gap between what the state is getting from the federal government in Medicaid dollars, compared with the need, is great. Texas has far more impoverished and uninsured people than it is getting money for. But, please explain to me how opting out of the system is going to solve that problem?
Somehow, Governor Goodhair's office always takes full credit whenever Texas gets federal disaster relief funds, like after hurricanes and such. They never turn down any military-base money or defense contracts, either. The game seems to be getting as many of the perks as possible, and then leaving the poor and sick to die in some shithole. It's all the perks we can get, with as few of the bills as we are forced to pay.
More on Governor Goodhair's moronic demagoguery, coming to this blog soon.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
So, after his bogus comparison of Social Security to a Ponzi scheme, now Rick "Governor Goodhair" Perry wants to pull Texas out of the Medicaid system?
Not so fast, some of his fellow Republicans warn.
Such a move would be a disaster for the state -- at least for everyone who relies on that system for medical care. It would also be very bad in pure fiscal terms.
The Texas Health and Human Services Commission has warned that the state would lose $15 billion in federal matching funds and would have 2.6 million more Texans thrown into the ranks of the uninsured if our state did such a stupid thing.
Our state already faces a budget shortfall that, by some estimates, could exceed $20 billion. This has been a consequence of stupidity in itself, for which Governor Goodhair was somehow not held responsible on Nov. 2 by the voters of this state. More such stupidity would be far more than the taxpayers of Texas could afford.
State Rep. John Zerwas, R-Richmond, a physician from the Houston area, had this to say: "I don't think (opting out) of Medicaid is really viable. If you dropped out today, the human and economic consequences are pretty immediate."
Perry's response was to sort of pull back some, him and haw, and call for "increasing flexibility and innovation in Medicaid."
Here are quotes from the report: "Opting out of Medicaid means giving up federal dollars paid by the state's residents to provide healthcare for our most vulnerable residents."
But the report wasn't without cautions about the status quo: "Staying in the program forces states to pay for a federally-mandated expansion of Medicaid with little control over the program's ever-rising costs ..."
I'm shocked, shocked to be told that things actually have to be paid for. Texas has never been known for its largess for the poor -- much more known for its vast hospitality toward the rich and relocating corporations. Part of that lure is our "low" taxes. We're the second-most-populous state in the U.S., and there's still no personal state income tax here -- just very high sales taxes, user fees, and just about everything else you can imagine that's regressive.
Politicians like Governor Goodhair aim to keep it that way. Their demagoguery comes in when they start talking this sort of neo-secessionism. That plays very well in this state with Ballcap Bubba, and with Bubbette, too. He gets 80% of the vote in some areas of this state.
Granted, the gap between what the state is getting from the federal government in Medicaid dollars, compared with the need, is great. Texas has far more impoverished and uninsured people than it is getting money for. But, please explain to me how opting out of the system is going to solve that problem?
Somehow, Governor Goodhair's office always takes full credit whenever Texas gets federal disaster relief funds, like after hurricanes and such. They never turn down any military-base money or defense contracts, either. The game seems to be getting as many of the perks as possible, and then leaving the poor and sick to die in some shithole. It's all the perks we can get, with as few of the bills as we are forced to pay.
More on Governor Goodhair's moronic demagoguery, coming to this blog soon.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Monday, December 6, 2010
Governor Goodhair, Texas' Dimwitted Demagogue, Part I
By Manifesto Joe
In 1984, I was a hungry young reporter about 6 years out of college and 3 years out of grad school. I have a vivid memory of interviewing a 34-year-old rancher named Rick Perry, who was then at the dawn of his now-storied political career. Rick was running for state representative in our district, as a right-wing Democrat.
I'd have to dig up that clip for particulars, but I got the definite impression of a good-ol'-boy Ken doll, not the sharpest pencil in the box. If you had mentioned something to him about Ponzi back then, I think he would have said that the Ponz was his favorite character on the TV show Happy Days.
Over 26 years later, Rick "Governor Goodhair" Perry has been re-elected by a solid majority to become Texas' longest-serving governor. And, of course, he's now a Republican. Switched back around 1990, when he decided to run for Agriculture Commissioner.
He recently made the rounds on national talking-heads TV, and among other things, he compared Social Security to a Ponzi scheme, unsustainable. You could almost hear him say that down hiear in the great Republic of Texas, we has a better way of pensionin' folks off than that thar Washington federal Democrat nonsense.
A Ponzi scheme?
Let's think this through a bit. Charles Ponzi, back around the 1920s, became notorious for running an investment scam in which new investors put up money to pay the older investors, thus keeping the scam going in a manner sort of like check-kiting.
I suppose that the reason that Governor Goodhair makes this comparison -- and of course it wasn't his original idea -- is that Social Security's current contributors, those now employed and employing, are putting up the money to support the current retirees. And, as the pool of retirees grows larger as more baby boomers retire, that puts an increasingly heavy burden on the current contributors. So, it is supposed to be doomed to fail.
But the differences are being ignored. In the first place, Social Security contributions are not "invested." It's a trust fund. And there are no guarantees of anything. A worker can conceivably pay into the system for 45 years, and if he or she dies just before becoming eligible to collect, they get nothing if no surviving spouse is there to claim it.
It is not, and has never been, an "investment." It is social insurance. And in the world of insurance, one must meet certain criteria in order to collect after the premiums have been paid. That has always been the way the system worked, and it has always been very upfront. I get an annual statement that details how much taxable income the system has recorded for me, and how much I would get if I meet certain conditions. But if I die before I can collect, and if my spouse dies, too, we get -- zip. That's the way it works, and no one has been misled in the least. Someone else who lives a longer time may benefit from what my spouse and I did not have the longevity to need. That's the system, and it always has been. It's not much different from any other insurance program. With, say, a life insurance policy, if I die young, and my spouse/beneficiary outlives me, she collects. If we both live to be decrepit, nobody will generally see much of anything. Place your bets, boys and girls.
Governor Goodhair lives in a house in Austin for which the rent approaches $10,000 a month, while the Governor's Mansion is being restored largely at taxpayer expense. He will never have to depend on Social Security. He has become a wealthy man during his time as a "public servant," and is therefore far above such things. His children won't have to worry about it, either.
His comparison of the system to a Ponzi scheme is the most self-centered and hypocritical sort of demagoguery that one can imagine. But this isn't unusual for Rick Perry. He's built a political career on such right-wing bilge, and now he seems to have his sights set on bigger things. We live in a time in which a dude who pulled a 2.3 GPA at Texas A&M, majoring in animal husbandry, can aspire to some of the nation's highest offices.
Next up on Governor Goodhair: the harebrained notion of pulling Texas out of the Medicaid system.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
In 1984, I was a hungry young reporter about 6 years out of college and 3 years out of grad school. I have a vivid memory of interviewing a 34-year-old rancher named Rick Perry, who was then at the dawn of his now-storied political career. Rick was running for state representative in our district, as a right-wing Democrat.
I'd have to dig up that clip for particulars, but I got the definite impression of a good-ol'-boy Ken doll, not the sharpest pencil in the box. If you had mentioned something to him about Ponzi back then, I think he would have said that the Ponz was his favorite character on the TV show Happy Days.
Over 26 years later, Rick "Governor Goodhair" Perry has been re-elected by a solid majority to become Texas' longest-serving governor. And, of course, he's now a Republican. Switched back around 1990, when he decided to run for Agriculture Commissioner.
He recently made the rounds on national talking-heads TV, and among other things, he compared Social Security to a Ponzi scheme, unsustainable. You could almost hear him say that down hiear in the great Republic of Texas, we has a better way of pensionin' folks off than that thar Washington federal Democrat nonsense.
A Ponzi scheme?
Let's think this through a bit. Charles Ponzi, back around the 1920s, became notorious for running an investment scam in which new investors put up money to pay the older investors, thus keeping the scam going in a manner sort of like check-kiting.
I suppose that the reason that Governor Goodhair makes this comparison -- and of course it wasn't his original idea -- is that Social Security's current contributors, those now employed and employing, are putting up the money to support the current retirees. And, as the pool of retirees grows larger as more baby boomers retire, that puts an increasingly heavy burden on the current contributors. So, it is supposed to be doomed to fail.
But the differences are being ignored. In the first place, Social Security contributions are not "invested." It's a trust fund. And there are no guarantees of anything. A worker can conceivably pay into the system for 45 years, and if he or she dies just before becoming eligible to collect, they get nothing if no surviving spouse is there to claim it.
It is not, and has never been, an "investment." It is social insurance. And in the world of insurance, one must meet certain criteria in order to collect after the premiums have been paid. That has always been the way the system worked, and it has always been very upfront. I get an annual statement that details how much taxable income the system has recorded for me, and how much I would get if I meet certain conditions. But if I die before I can collect, and if my spouse dies, too, we get -- zip. That's the way it works, and no one has been misled in the least. Someone else who lives a longer time may benefit from what my spouse and I did not have the longevity to need. That's the system, and it always has been. It's not much different from any other insurance program. With, say, a life insurance policy, if I die young, and my spouse/beneficiary outlives me, she collects. If we both live to be decrepit, nobody will generally see much of anything. Place your bets, boys and girls.
Governor Goodhair lives in a house in Austin for which the rent approaches $10,000 a month, while the Governor's Mansion is being restored largely at taxpayer expense. He will never have to depend on Social Security. He has become a wealthy man during his time as a "public servant," and is therefore far above such things. His children won't have to worry about it, either.
His comparison of the system to a Ponzi scheme is the most self-centered and hypocritical sort of demagoguery that one can imagine. But this isn't unusual for Rick Perry. He's built a political career on such right-wing bilge, and now he seems to have his sights set on bigger things. We live in a time in which a dude who pulled a 2.3 GPA at Texas A&M, majoring in animal husbandry, can aspire to some of the nation's highest offices.
Next up on Governor Goodhair: the harebrained notion of pulling Texas out of the Medicaid system.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
One More Reason That Single-Payer Health Care Looks Likely Now
By Manifesto Joe
I sometimes hate to use the term "unintended consequences," because what comes to mind is those free-market-dogma economists. But sometimes the term is descriptive, and it seems that way now after health care "reform."
I'm staunchly for single-payer, and a new development makes it look more like that was essentially a no-brainer: Corporations are being advised, somewhat subtly, to eventually terminate their health care benefits, cutting employees loose to seek out taxpayer-subsidized health care insurance on their own after the "pools" are available in 2014.
I suppose it wasn't hard to see that one coming. Corporations have a reputation for being amoral money machines, and they didn't acquire that rep for nothing. Tell them any way that they can maximize profits, and they will do it. Walk over someone's grandmother? It's a dirty job; but have faith, they'll find someone who will. If CEO No. 1 won't, rest assured that CEO No. 2 will. It's said to be a legal obligation.
The talk about the end of job-based health care insurance is just beginning. But as soon as it can be done, rest assured that you will see the Fortune 500 forming a line on this one. Here's a link to an early article on this from AP. There are a lot of pros and cons being tossed about now, but just wait ...
Sit back and envision the scenario. Millions upon millions of American workers will be cut loose from their employer-based plans, forced to go with those subsidized plans that will be available starting in 2014. It's just good business, Corporate Rob, the company spokesman, will tell the press. And hey, now we can afford to give our workers a raise instead, so that they can afford to go insurance-shopping on their own.
But then comes the question I and many others have long been asking: Why did we need a middle man in the first place? Private insurers will offer these plans, helped by federal subsidies. Why didn't we just do single-payer in the first place, since it looks like we'll have to go there eventually anyway?
It wasn't, and ultimately won't be, feasible to leave things as they were, with 47 million Americans uninsured. In other countries of the developed world, people have long thought that we were insane to keep on with the status quo as long as we did.
But if it's going to come to this, wouldn't it have been easier just to make Medicare available to everyone, not just people 65 and older?
I can already hear the fretting out there about big government. And I will grant, the federal government doesn't have a reputation for being the most efficient provider of services.
But, insurance companies do? When was the last time you had to deal with one? Oh, I suppose you could call them "efficient," at least when it comes to their own profits. They definitely know how to tell people "no." And then no some more. And no again. And by the way, no. But of course, they never say no to taking people's money.
Now in the works to perhaps hasten this change is the mania to cut the federal deficit. Instead of the obvious -- raising taxes on rich people and big corporations, who have been getting preferential treatment in the system for decades now, anyway -- a certain tax break is being scrutinized.
Tax breaks have long helped employers provide what health insurance benefits that they do. That credit looks to be on the chopping block, with President Obama's deficit commission proposing to limit or eliminate that deduction. Here's a link to the story.
It's like watching the perfect storm forming. In less than a decade, employer-based health insurance may become the exception, not the rule, and millions of workers will be forced to shop for insurance through the "pools." That is, they will do so assuming that the Republican U.S. House and the Tea Party don't find a way to keep Obamacare from being implemented.
I was reluctantly for Obamacare as an alternative to doing nothing. But now the current overhaul looks like it will merely be a sort of midwife for a very troubled pregnancy and delivery.
Single-payer is where this is all headed, and the insurance bastards will fight that to their last breath. When that battle happens, at least the American people may be privileged to see very clearly what this is all about -- the massive profits of a large sector of Corporate America. If it wasn't already clear that these people are nasty little bloodsuckers, it finally will be.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
I sometimes hate to use the term "unintended consequences," because what comes to mind is those free-market-dogma economists. But sometimes the term is descriptive, and it seems that way now after health care "reform."
I'm staunchly for single-payer, and a new development makes it look more like that was essentially a no-brainer: Corporations are being advised, somewhat subtly, to eventually terminate their health care benefits, cutting employees loose to seek out taxpayer-subsidized health care insurance on their own after the "pools" are available in 2014.
I suppose it wasn't hard to see that one coming. Corporations have a reputation for being amoral money machines, and they didn't acquire that rep for nothing. Tell them any way that they can maximize profits, and they will do it. Walk over someone's grandmother? It's a dirty job; but have faith, they'll find someone who will. If CEO No. 1 won't, rest assured that CEO No. 2 will. It's said to be a legal obligation.
The talk about the end of job-based health care insurance is just beginning. But as soon as it can be done, rest assured that you will see the Fortune 500 forming a line on this one. Here's a link to an early article on this from AP. There are a lot of pros and cons being tossed about now, but just wait ...
Sit back and envision the scenario. Millions upon millions of American workers will be cut loose from their employer-based plans, forced to go with those subsidized plans that will be available starting in 2014. It's just good business, Corporate Rob, the company spokesman, will tell the press. And hey, now we can afford to give our workers a raise instead, so that they can afford to go insurance-shopping on their own.
But then comes the question I and many others have long been asking: Why did we need a middle man in the first place? Private insurers will offer these plans, helped by federal subsidies. Why didn't we just do single-payer in the first place, since it looks like we'll have to go there eventually anyway?
It wasn't, and ultimately won't be, feasible to leave things as they were, with 47 million Americans uninsured. In other countries of the developed world, people have long thought that we were insane to keep on with the status quo as long as we did.
But if it's going to come to this, wouldn't it have been easier just to make Medicare available to everyone, not just people 65 and older?
I can already hear the fretting out there about big government. And I will grant, the federal government doesn't have a reputation for being the most efficient provider of services.
But, insurance companies do? When was the last time you had to deal with one? Oh, I suppose you could call them "efficient," at least when it comes to their own profits. They definitely know how to tell people "no." And then no some more. And no again. And by the way, no. But of course, they never say no to taking people's money.
Now in the works to perhaps hasten this change is the mania to cut the federal deficit. Instead of the obvious -- raising taxes on rich people and big corporations, who have been getting preferential treatment in the system for decades now, anyway -- a certain tax break is being scrutinized.
Tax breaks have long helped employers provide what health insurance benefits that they do. That credit looks to be on the chopping block, with President Obama's deficit commission proposing to limit or eliminate that deduction. Here's a link to the story.
It's like watching the perfect storm forming. In less than a decade, employer-based health insurance may become the exception, not the rule, and millions of workers will be forced to shop for insurance through the "pools." That is, they will do so assuming that the Republican U.S. House and the Tea Party don't find a way to keep Obamacare from being implemented.
I was reluctantly for Obamacare as an alternative to doing nothing. But now the current overhaul looks like it will merely be a sort of midwife for a very troubled pregnancy and delivery.
Single-payer is where this is all headed, and the insurance bastards will fight that to their last breath. When that battle happens, at least the American people may be privileged to see very clearly what this is all about -- the massive profits of a large sector of Corporate America. If it wasn't already clear that these people are nasty little bloodsuckers, it finally will be.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Monday, November 22, 2010
Open Letter To Noam Chomsky: You're Wrong On A Couple Of Points
By Manifesto Joe
Professor Chomsky, you're always an engaging writer, and I found a short essay of yours, "The US Elections: Outrage, Misguided," enlightening as usual. But, I disagree on a couple of points, and I'm going to explain why.
Here's a link to the article I'm referring to.
More than half the “mainstream Americans” in a Rasmussen poll last month said they view the Tea Party movement favorably –- a reflection of the spirit of disenchantment.
The grievances are legitimate. For more than 30 years, real incomes for the majority of the population have stagnated or declined while work hours and insecurity have increased, along with debt. Wealth has accumulated, but in very few pockets, leading to unprecedented inequality. ...
People rightly want answers, and they are not getting them except from voices that tell tales that have some internal coherence –- if you suspend disbelief and enter into their world of irrationality and deceit.
Professor Chomsky, the hard core of people involved in the Tea Party movement are part of about 30% of Americans (from what polls indicate) who are staunch "conservatives." These are people who would vote Republican if Lucifer were the nominee. It doesn't matter how much their income has declined, their work hours have increased or how much debt they are accumulating, while the wealthy prosper more than ever. We're confronted here with Rush-and-Fox brainwashed people who won't be persuaded by any amount of reasoned argument. They don't have to suspend any "disbelief," because among these people, there was never any to begin with. You have to think for yourself before you can entertain doubts.
It's the people in between, the confused and often ignorant ones who are either "swing voters" or who don't vote at all, who comprise the group that progressives must win over if they are to ever to really win power in this country.
You continue: Ridiculing Tea Party shenanigans is a serious error, however. It is far more appropriate to understand what lies behind the movement’s popular appeal, and to ask ourselves why justly angry people are being mobilized by the extreme right and not by the kind of constructive activism that rose during the Depression, like the CIO (Congress of Industrial Organizations).
With all due respect for your obvious moral courage, sir, you are living in the past. The labor movement in America is all but dead, and it is because "the people" here had gotten so lazy and comfortable by the 1970s and '80s that they lacked either the intelligence, the guts, or both, to stand up to powerful institutions and defend their rights.
Big corporate money lined up with the psychos of the far right in an alliance sort of like Frankenstein, only in this scenario, the monster has been kept under control and compelled to do the creator's bidding. Most people, the ones in between, decided that it was easier just to get along and go along. While they were making nice, jobs went overseas, incomes declined, personal debt ballooned, and the rich got much richer.
If you'll pardon another analogy, our in-betweeners were like the frog who sits in a pan of water that gets hotter, degree by degree. They just sat there for decades as the water got hotter. Now it's getting close to the boiling point, and an appetite for frog legs is obvious among our moneyed elite.
For many years, there have been those among us who have been trying, in vain, to tell people this. We have been doomed to failure for a number of reasons. For one thing, we don't have the money to get the message out, and our foes most certainly do. For another, there aren't many of us. "Conservatives" far outnumber committed progressives in this country, and they always have. Some of this is a foolishness that I have to conclude simply rests with Americans, with the particular culture, values and attitudes with which we are usually indoctrinated.
Where I grew up, for example, there were absolutely no Trotskyites. I never knew of Trotsky until I got into reading history as a teenager, and my view of him was predictably negative until I was 20 or so. I've known very few anarchists in my 54 years of living, and they've all been the right-wing variety. Even where I live now, in a large urban area in the American heartland, what little political debate one hears is between centrists and right-wingers, Democrats and Republicans. Maybe Libertarians (another kind of right-winger) chime in now and then. That's about it. There are few voices that could be accurately described as left of center.
You, sir, grew up, and still live, in a part of the country that I would describe as -- well, unique. Out here, the right rules, and usually has. The center upsets them from time to time, preventing a total monopoly. An authentic left almost doesn't exist, and it's almost always been that way.
Out here, it's a way of life for folks to blame the wrong people for their misfortunes. I've tried reasoning with such people, and it usually can't be done. They're too brainwashed.
You have said that the U.S. doesn't really have two political parties -- it has the left wing of the Business Party (Democrats) and the right wing of the Business Party (Republicans). In a perfect world, I wouldn't be forced to make such a choice. But the world in which we live is not merely far from perfect. These days, it seems to just outright suck.
So, when forced to make a choice, I'll take the left wing of the Business Party, thank you. Because of them, I was able to go to college (albeit not one in the Ivy League). Because of them, my mother and grandmother were able to get Medicaid and stay in nursing homes after they ran out of money. And thanks to them, I would be able to get, at least temporarily, a meager weekly sum from the government to eat on if I were laid off from my job tomorrow.
As the political compass of America has swung further and further to the right, it's come down to a national battle between real conservatives -- the ones who want to at least preserve the meager welfare state introduced in this country during the 20th century -- and the radical, reactionary right, which wants to plunge the country back into 19th-century social Darwinism.
I'd love to see some kind of authentic left emerge in this country, but I don't think it wise to hold my breath. I would have admired a president who would have gone down fighting for single-payer health care, but I'll settle for one who did what seemed necessary to at least get something done.
You continue: Amid the joblessness and foreclosures, the Democrats can’t complain about the policies that led to the disaster. President Ronald Reagan and his Republican successors may have been the worst culprits, but the policies began with President Jimmy Carter and accelerated under President Bill Clinton.
True, but ... Carter did want a national health insurance program, and could not likely have forecast what the deregulation that began on his watch would lead to. Clinton helped usher in NAFTA, signed "welfare reform" and also signed destructive financial deregulation. But he also forced wealthy individuals to pay somewhat higher marginal tax rates, and because of that, he left office with a record surplus. Clinton may have been a Republicrat, but I'd say he was the best "Republican" president the U.S. has had since Eisenhower.
By the time Bush was well into his second term, I wished we had Clinton back. "Not-that-good" is better than "much worse." What we ended up with was Barack Obama, who hasn't been what I'd hoped, but at least he's been something of an improvement. I was never a Carter fan, but I'd even take him over Bush 43.
To repeat a line from you: Ridiculing Tea Party shenanigans is a serious error.
For one thing, it's hard to witness mass stupidity ("Impeach the Muslim Marxist" one Tea Partier's sign read) and not call it by its rightful name. For another, making nice with such people has never done a bit of good. Ask Barack Obama.
It's hard to witness mass stupidity and not call it by its rightful name.
Again, it's the in-betweeners, the "persuadables" who comprise the battleground. Even stupid people don't like to think that they are stupid. Showing exactly how stupid the "shenanigans" of the Tea Party movement are is one way to reach the "reachables." Even a person of ordinary intelligence, when presented with enough facts, can comprehend how idiotic it is to refer to Obama as a "Muslim Marxist." Ridicule is one weapon we have that doesn't cost anything, and I fully intend to use it against these morons.
Professor Chomsky, I highly respect the fact that you risked jail while opposing the Vietnam War, and that you have often gone to the very front lines of social conflict as a courageous dissident.
But out here, where I live, being a public dissident means even worse things than jail. It can mean job loss, homelessness, hunger. It can mean losing everything you have.
And, in the battle we have going on now -- perhaps the most important one of this century in the U.S. -- what will be decided is whether people like me will be able to find decent jobs, to draw Social Security and Medicare, to get Medicaid if we become decrepit and broke. The fight is over very basic things. And, some of our opponents are foolish enough to say things at town hall meetings like, "Keep your government hands off my Medicare!"
With all due respect, sir, you are a professor emeritus from MIT, pushing 82. You will never have to face the kind of destitution that middle Americans, whether they realize it or not, are facing right now. That makes it a little easier for you to position yourself slightly above the trenches.
The job of progressives is to persuade the "persuadables" that they are indeed facing destitution, a loss of basics. I intend to do that by any means necessary, including ridiculing Tea Party "shenanigans," and even voting Democratic. It beats the alternative, and if Americans don't see this soon, much will be lost.
Sincerely,
Manifesto Joe
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Professor Chomsky, you're always an engaging writer, and I found a short essay of yours, "The US Elections: Outrage, Misguided," enlightening as usual. But, I disagree on a couple of points, and I'm going to explain why.
Here's a link to the article I'm referring to.
More than half the “mainstream Americans” in a Rasmussen poll last month said they view the Tea Party movement favorably –- a reflection of the spirit of disenchantment.
The grievances are legitimate. For more than 30 years, real incomes for the majority of the population have stagnated or declined while work hours and insecurity have increased, along with debt. Wealth has accumulated, but in very few pockets, leading to unprecedented inequality. ...
People rightly want answers, and they are not getting them except from voices that tell tales that have some internal coherence –- if you suspend disbelief and enter into their world of irrationality and deceit.
Professor Chomsky, the hard core of people involved in the Tea Party movement are part of about 30% of Americans (from what polls indicate) who are staunch "conservatives." These are people who would vote Republican if Lucifer were the nominee. It doesn't matter how much their income has declined, their work hours have increased or how much debt they are accumulating, while the wealthy prosper more than ever. We're confronted here with Rush-and-Fox brainwashed people who won't be persuaded by any amount of reasoned argument. They don't have to suspend any "disbelief," because among these people, there was never any to begin with. You have to think for yourself before you can entertain doubts.
It's the people in between, the confused and often ignorant ones who are either "swing voters" or who don't vote at all, who comprise the group that progressives must win over if they are to ever to really win power in this country.
You continue: Ridiculing Tea Party shenanigans is a serious error, however. It is far more appropriate to understand what lies behind the movement’s popular appeal, and to ask ourselves why justly angry people are being mobilized by the extreme right and not by the kind of constructive activism that rose during the Depression, like the CIO (Congress of Industrial Organizations).
With all due respect for your obvious moral courage, sir, you are living in the past. The labor movement in America is all but dead, and it is because "the people" here had gotten so lazy and comfortable by the 1970s and '80s that they lacked either the intelligence, the guts, or both, to stand up to powerful institutions and defend their rights.
Big corporate money lined up with the psychos of the far right in an alliance sort of like Frankenstein, only in this scenario, the monster has been kept under control and compelled to do the creator's bidding. Most people, the ones in between, decided that it was easier just to get along and go along. While they were making nice, jobs went overseas, incomes declined, personal debt ballooned, and the rich got much richer.
If you'll pardon another analogy, our in-betweeners were like the frog who sits in a pan of water that gets hotter, degree by degree. They just sat there for decades as the water got hotter. Now it's getting close to the boiling point, and an appetite for frog legs is obvious among our moneyed elite.
For many years, there have been those among us who have been trying, in vain, to tell people this. We have been doomed to failure for a number of reasons. For one thing, we don't have the money to get the message out, and our foes most certainly do. For another, there aren't many of us. "Conservatives" far outnumber committed progressives in this country, and they always have. Some of this is a foolishness that I have to conclude simply rests with Americans, with the particular culture, values and attitudes with which we are usually indoctrinated.
Where I grew up, for example, there were absolutely no Trotskyites. I never knew of Trotsky until I got into reading history as a teenager, and my view of him was predictably negative until I was 20 or so. I've known very few anarchists in my 54 years of living, and they've all been the right-wing variety. Even where I live now, in a large urban area in the American heartland, what little political debate one hears is between centrists and right-wingers, Democrats and Republicans. Maybe Libertarians (another kind of right-winger) chime in now and then. That's about it. There are few voices that could be accurately described as left of center.
You, sir, grew up, and still live, in a part of the country that I would describe as -- well, unique. Out here, the right rules, and usually has. The center upsets them from time to time, preventing a total monopoly. An authentic left almost doesn't exist, and it's almost always been that way.
Out here, it's a way of life for folks to blame the wrong people for their misfortunes. I've tried reasoning with such people, and it usually can't be done. They're too brainwashed.
You have said that the U.S. doesn't really have two political parties -- it has the left wing of the Business Party (Democrats) and the right wing of the Business Party (Republicans). In a perfect world, I wouldn't be forced to make such a choice. But the world in which we live is not merely far from perfect. These days, it seems to just outright suck.
So, when forced to make a choice, I'll take the left wing of the Business Party, thank you. Because of them, I was able to go to college (albeit not one in the Ivy League). Because of them, my mother and grandmother were able to get Medicaid and stay in nursing homes after they ran out of money. And thanks to them, I would be able to get, at least temporarily, a meager weekly sum from the government to eat on if I were laid off from my job tomorrow.
As the political compass of America has swung further and further to the right, it's come down to a national battle between real conservatives -- the ones who want to at least preserve the meager welfare state introduced in this country during the 20th century -- and the radical, reactionary right, which wants to plunge the country back into 19th-century social Darwinism.
I'd love to see some kind of authentic left emerge in this country, but I don't think it wise to hold my breath. I would have admired a president who would have gone down fighting for single-payer health care, but I'll settle for one who did what seemed necessary to at least get something done.
You continue: Amid the joblessness and foreclosures, the Democrats can’t complain about the policies that led to the disaster. President Ronald Reagan and his Republican successors may have been the worst culprits, but the policies began with President Jimmy Carter and accelerated under President Bill Clinton.
True, but ... Carter did want a national health insurance program, and could not likely have forecast what the deregulation that began on his watch would lead to. Clinton helped usher in NAFTA, signed "welfare reform" and also signed destructive financial deregulation. But he also forced wealthy individuals to pay somewhat higher marginal tax rates, and because of that, he left office with a record surplus. Clinton may have been a Republicrat, but I'd say he was the best "Republican" president the U.S. has had since Eisenhower.
By the time Bush was well into his second term, I wished we had Clinton back. "Not-that-good" is better than "much worse." What we ended up with was Barack Obama, who hasn't been what I'd hoped, but at least he's been something of an improvement. I was never a Carter fan, but I'd even take him over Bush 43.
To repeat a line from you: Ridiculing Tea Party shenanigans is a serious error.
For one thing, it's hard to witness mass stupidity ("Impeach the Muslim Marxist" one Tea Partier's sign read) and not call it by its rightful name. For another, making nice with such people has never done a bit of good. Ask Barack Obama.
It's hard to witness mass stupidity and not call it by its rightful name.Again, it's the in-betweeners, the "persuadables" who comprise the battleground. Even stupid people don't like to think that they are stupid. Showing exactly how stupid the "shenanigans" of the Tea Party movement are is one way to reach the "reachables." Even a person of ordinary intelligence, when presented with enough facts, can comprehend how idiotic it is to refer to Obama as a "Muslim Marxist." Ridicule is one weapon we have that doesn't cost anything, and I fully intend to use it against these morons.
Professor Chomsky, I highly respect the fact that you risked jail while opposing the Vietnam War, and that you have often gone to the very front lines of social conflict as a courageous dissident.
But out here, where I live, being a public dissident means even worse things than jail. It can mean job loss, homelessness, hunger. It can mean losing everything you have.
And, in the battle we have going on now -- perhaps the most important one of this century in the U.S. -- what will be decided is whether people like me will be able to find decent jobs, to draw Social Security and Medicare, to get Medicaid if we become decrepit and broke. The fight is over very basic things. And, some of our opponents are foolish enough to say things at town hall meetings like, "Keep your government hands off my Medicare!"
With all due respect, sir, you are a professor emeritus from MIT, pushing 82. You will never have to face the kind of destitution that middle Americans, whether they realize it or not, are facing right now. That makes it a little easier for you to position yourself slightly above the trenches.
The job of progressives is to persuade the "persuadables" that they are indeed facing destitution, a loss of basics. I intend to do that by any means necessary, including ridiculing Tea Party "shenanigans," and even voting Democratic. It beats the alternative, and if Americans don't see this soon, much will be lost.
Sincerely,
Manifesto Joe
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
Sunday, November 21, 2010
Republicans, I'll Stop Demonizing You -- If You'll Stop Acting Like Satan
By Manifesto Joe
I know that much of this comes from misplaced priorities, and from anal-retentive values and attitudes. But Thursday's House vote on the extension of unemployment benefits should indicate clearly where Republicans stand on this issue, and how hatefully they are willing to play politics with the futures of millions of men, women and children.
The vote on the proposed extension of unemployment benefits was 258 for, 154 against. Procedurally, a two-thirds majority was needed to pass this measure of emergency spending. And the breakdown by party was predictable: 11 Democrats voted against, 21 Republicans for. Some 237 Democrats voted for, 143 Republicans against.
And after it was over, a spokesman for likely incoming House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, slammed Democrats for "playing politics" with people's jobless benefits.
"Just two weeks after the election, the Democratic Leadership is playing politics with people’s unemployment benefits," Michael Steel, Mr. Boehner’s spokesman, told Fox News. (Reported by The New York Times)
Um, which planet do these people live on?
I think I can answer that. On Planet GOP, if you're "playing politics" on an issue, just accuse the other side of doing the very same thing. Chances are, millions of delusional people (i.e., Fox News viewers) will buy it. For historical precedent, consult one Joseph Goebbels.
Here's a good link for the details about this.
And, AOL News reported this:
Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison also threw in a holiday-season jab at the GOP. "Sadly, the new Republican majority demonstrated today how they view extending unemployment benefits: No, No No," Ellison said in a statement. "To recall Charles Dickens: the new Republican majority wants to give Scrooge a tax break and leave the unemployed Cratchit family out in the cold for Christmas."
The often-cited reason for so many Republican votes against this humanitarian appropriation was, of course, the deficit. The price tag for this extension was estimated at $12.5 billion. That sounds like a lot, but let's put it in perspective. It's a fraction of what Mexican tycoon Carlos Slim Helu is worth. I think some others in the top 10 among world billionaires, like Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, could probably weather the loss.
And the Iraq war, favored by an overwhelming majority of Republicans, has so far cost the U.S. $743 billion (and counting). But, hey, that went for killing a whole bunch of people. Gotta get our priorities straight here.
Millions of Americans are on track to run out of jobless benefits by the end of this month. These people are our long-term unemployed. When they lose benefits, there will be a spike in bankruptcies, foreclosures, evictions and homelessness. Food banks, already stressed, will be overrun with demand. Pets will be sent to "shelters" to be killed, and others will be abandoned.
The stock Republican response? As reported by AOL News:
"We're facing a fiscal crisis in this country. If we're going to choose to extend unemployment again, we've got to find a way to pay for it," Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana said at a news conference Thursday.
And then, there's Sharron Angle. Granted, she failed to win her Senate race in Nevada against current Majority Leader Harry Reid. But she garnered 45% of the vote, and I think she speaks for many Republicans here:
So, it's just a bunch of bums who would rather draw an average of $310 a week than find work? Let's get real here. Most of that money would go just to make my mortgage payment every month, just to keep the bank from foreclosing on me.
And then, there's those tax breaks for rich people. Most Democrats, including the much-too-conciliatory President Obama, realize that it's a bad idea to raise taxes across the board during a recession, or at least the aftermath of a bad one. These people (Republicans) are fighting to keep the Bush-era tax cuts for wealthy individuals -- you know, those tax cuts that turned President Clinton's record surplus into a record deficit early in the Il Doofus administration. Those tax breaks for the wealthy are going to cost an estimated $700 billion over 10 years. And these people are worried about $12.5 billion to keep people from going hungry and homeless?
Republicans, I'd be happy to stop demonizing you all. I'm a moderate progressive. I honestly don't think conservatives are wrong about everything, and I fully realize that we can't go on running $1.3 trillion annual deficits without terrible ramifications. But taxes will indeed have to go up on those with the ability to pay, and especially on those who have been getting preferential treatment in the system for over three decades. There will have to be many painful cuts, but the sacrifice will have to be shared.
Until then, I will be forced to keep demonizing you. Stop playing the Lucifer cards, and then I will cease and desist.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
I know that much of this comes from misplaced priorities, and from anal-retentive values and attitudes. But Thursday's House vote on the extension of unemployment benefits should indicate clearly where Republicans stand on this issue, and how hatefully they are willing to play politics with the futures of millions of men, women and children.
The vote on the proposed extension of unemployment benefits was 258 for, 154 against. Procedurally, a two-thirds majority was needed to pass this measure of emergency spending. And the breakdown by party was predictable: 11 Democrats voted against, 21 Republicans for. Some 237 Democrats voted for, 143 Republicans against.
And after it was over, a spokesman for likely incoming House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, slammed Democrats for "playing politics" with people's jobless benefits.
"Just two weeks after the election, the Democratic Leadership is playing politics with people’s unemployment benefits," Michael Steel, Mr. Boehner’s spokesman, told Fox News. (Reported by The New York Times)
Um, which planet do these people live on?
I think I can answer that. On Planet GOP, if you're "playing politics" on an issue, just accuse the other side of doing the very same thing. Chances are, millions of delusional people (i.e., Fox News viewers) will buy it. For historical precedent, consult one Joseph Goebbels.
Here's a good link for the details about this.
And, AOL News reported this:
Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison also threw in a holiday-season jab at the GOP. "Sadly, the new Republican majority demonstrated today how they view extending unemployment benefits: No, No No," Ellison said in a statement. "To recall Charles Dickens: the new Republican majority wants to give Scrooge a tax break and leave the unemployed Cratchit family out in the cold for Christmas."
The often-cited reason for so many Republican votes against this humanitarian appropriation was, of course, the deficit. The price tag for this extension was estimated at $12.5 billion. That sounds like a lot, but let's put it in perspective. It's a fraction of what Mexican tycoon Carlos Slim Helu is worth. I think some others in the top 10 among world billionaires, like Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, could probably weather the loss.
And the Iraq war, favored by an overwhelming majority of Republicans, has so far cost the U.S. $743 billion (and counting). But, hey, that went for killing a whole bunch of people. Gotta get our priorities straight here.
Millions of Americans are on track to run out of jobless benefits by the end of this month. These people are our long-term unemployed. When they lose benefits, there will be a spike in bankruptcies, foreclosures, evictions and homelessness. Food banks, already stressed, will be overrun with demand. Pets will be sent to "shelters" to be killed, and others will be abandoned.
The stock Republican response? As reported by AOL News:
"We're facing a fiscal crisis in this country. If we're going to choose to extend unemployment again, we've got to find a way to pay for it," Rep. Mike Pence of Indiana said at a news conference Thursday.
And then, there's Sharron Angle. Granted, she failed to win her Senate race in Nevada against current Majority Leader Harry Reid. But she garnered 45% of the vote, and I think she speaks for many Republicans here:
So, it's just a bunch of bums who would rather draw an average of $310 a week than find work? Let's get real here. Most of that money would go just to make my mortgage payment every month, just to keep the bank from foreclosing on me.
And then, there's those tax breaks for rich people. Most Democrats, including the much-too-conciliatory President Obama, realize that it's a bad idea to raise taxes across the board during a recession, or at least the aftermath of a bad one. These people (Republicans) are fighting to keep the Bush-era tax cuts for wealthy individuals -- you know, those tax cuts that turned President Clinton's record surplus into a record deficit early in the Il Doofus administration. Those tax breaks for the wealthy are going to cost an estimated $700 billion over 10 years. And these people are worried about $12.5 billion to keep people from going hungry and homeless?
Republicans, I'd be happy to stop demonizing you all. I'm a moderate progressive. I honestly don't think conservatives are wrong about everything, and I fully realize that we can't go on running $1.3 trillion annual deficits without terrible ramifications. But taxes will indeed have to go up on those with the ability to pay, and especially on those who have been getting preferential treatment in the system for over three decades. There will have to be many painful cuts, but the sacrifice will have to be shared.
Until then, I will be forced to keep demonizing you. Stop playing the Lucifer cards, and then I will cease and desist.
Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.
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