This Memorial Day, No Millionaire Left Behind

U.S. disparity of income is setting records by some measures

It's 2012 -- the financial crisis happened over four years ago, and the Great Recession is supposed to have been over long ago. After all this time, the American people, or at least the ones with the most juice, don't seem to have learned a thing.

Corporate profits hit record levels in 2011, and with that increase, compensation for CEOs went up about 6% as well. The CEO of a typical public company made (off with) $9.6 million in 2011, as CEO pay was largely in the form of stock awards tied to "performance."

For more particulars about this report, here's a link to an online story in The Seattle Times.

The way some fools have spun this is that shareholder activists can claim a victory of sorts, because the corporate boards aren't just shoveling over as much "pay for pulse" as they once did. More of CEO compensation is tied to "performance," in the form of higher profits.

The U.S. business press, in its usual myopia, does not perceive the hideous structural problem that this represents. The CEOs making a killing now, it appears, are the ones who run their corporations in such a way as to squeeze the maximum profit from American consumers that they possibly can. Bleed them white, milk them dry, and you get more stock awards!

The shareholders are then happy, I suppose. But what of the consumers? Do those schmucks even matter? It would appear that they matter only to the extent that they pay up, to the max -- even if they have to go heavily into debt. And then, of course, the banking companies can own their very souls. It's like a modern version of the company store.

The Seattle story did touch upon the fundamental problem here:

CEOs managed to sell more, and squeeze more profit from each sale, despite problems ranging from a downgrade of the U.S. credit rating to an economic slowdown in China and Europe's debt crisis.

Still, there wasn't much immediate benefit for shareholders. The S&P 500 ended the year unchanged from where it started.

Including dividends, the index returned a slender 2 percent. ...

And the main concern of many shareholders -- that pay is just too much, no matter what the form -- has yet to be addressed.

"It's just that total (compensation) is going up, and that's where the problem lies," says Charles Elson, director of the Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance at the University of Delaware.

The typical American worker would have to labor for 244 years to make what the typical boss of a big public company makes in one. The median pay for U.S. workers was about $39,300 last year. That was up 1 percent from the year before, not enough to keep pace with inflation.

The main problem is that, even after the sobering experiences of a financial crisis CAUSED by the misconduct of financial institutions themselves, and the Great Recession, the U.S. economy continues to grow top-heavy, prolonging a disturbing (and for most people, painful) trend that's been going on since the late '70s and early '80s.

An illustration of the dilemma lies in a labor anecdote involving UAW legend Walter Reuther (1907-70). A Detroit automaker wheel was showing Reuther the new robots that could perform tasks on the assembly lines.

"Let's see you try to get one of these robots to join your union," the wheel told Reuther with amusement.

Reuther's reply: "Let's see you try to get one of these robots to buy one of your cars."

The further these predators keep pushing ordinary Americans into debt, and the less they pay them, eventually the ordinary schmucks can't afford car payments, or fall behind on them. Then what happens to profits -- and then ultimately, CEO compensation?

A pungent Japanese observation about U.S. corporations is that they think in terms of the next 10 minutes (well, perhaps the coming quarter), while in Japan they think in terms of the next 10 years. Popular depictions are that the Japanese economy hasn't fared well in recent years -- but still, it might be wise to start thinking, as they do, more long-term. Their CEOs certainly don't make even remotely what their American counterparts do, and they pay their common workers comparatively well. They can't claim to have achieved utopia, but their way may ultimately prove more sustainable, long-term, than ours.

In any case, it should be clear by now to "the 99 percent" that what we've got going on here -- capitalism reverted back to its most primitive and cannibalistic forms -- can't go on much longer.

As a parting Memorial Day thought, I suppose there are plenty of "patriotic" Republican types out there who will be honoring those who died, and who returned as basket cases, (please check out this link) on and from the deserts and mountains of the Middle East. Yeah -- they got shot to pieces and blown up so that corporate CEOs could rake in $9.6 mil a year, buy their Montecristo cigars by the box and their single-malt Scotch by the case. Such sacrifice.

Postscript: I forgot to mention that two-thirds of U.S. corporations are effectively paying no income tax. Perhaps these patriots could ante up a little better, given all the glorious profits they are making, so that we could cut that deficit!

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

Fracking Could Turn Much Of America Into A Wasteland

By Manifesto Joe

They've already seen a lot of this in rural areas -- the dumping of industrial waste, the fouling of well water, the loss of bucolic hills and trees. But it's not something that just happens in sparsely populated rural areas anymore. It's come to the city.

"Fracking" -- the hydraulic fracturing technique of drilling for fossil fuels -- is now an urban phenomenon. My wife and I live in a large city, and we've got fracking wells less than half a mile from where we live, and in two different directions.

There's still much debate going on about the side effects of this technique, with the Environmental Protection Agency right in the middle. Where we live, what they're exploring for is mainly natural gas, and the gas industry denies any effect on drinking water, and any significant pollution in general.

I've noticed very strong petroleum-like odors in our neighborhood when drilling activity is hot. Also, we've got a large holding pond next to a gas field that's not too far from our house. I haven't noticed any of the neighborhood children trying to go skinny-dipping in that thing.

I suspect that the people who live next to that holding pond have seen their property values plummet, probably far more than any perks they got from selling their subsurface mineral rights. ... Which brings me to another topic.

My wife and I were among the last "holdouts" in our neighborhood. We ignored the landmen for a couple of years, and were getting all sorts of offers in the mail. There's a certain economic logic to this, because we ended up getting about twice as much for our mineral rights as did the schmucks who took the first offer they got.

I wasn't happy about the idea of having gas drilling this close to where I live, anyway. But in Texas, the way I understand the laws governing mineral rights, if you are the last SOB standing in the way of a company's extraction of fossil fuels -- well, in essence, they can just TAKE it from you. If all your neighbors have signed on -- and I know that ours did -- the company has the law on its side to just run right over you.

So, after a long holdout, we signed a lease. Now I almost wish I hadn't done it, since some unpleasant facts about the side effects of "fracking" are coming out.

I don't know very much about the technical end of this, but some areas of America are seeing some very ugly sides of the "fracking" bonanza. Truthout has been doing a lot of good reporting on the subject. Here's a link to one of their most recent posts on this.

A few years into the boom, we're finally seeing city councils and neighborhood associations getting concerned and involved, but in many ways it's far too late. The Trojan Horse, so to speak, is already in the city. I can't understand where a lot of these whiners were when the gas company landmen were tossing all that money around.

There have been serious, lethal explosions result from gas drilling. We're having earthquakes happen all over Texas now, in places that never had them before. People are reporting well water that they can set on fire with a lit match. But to hear the companies tell it, this is all nonsense.

You see, it's common knowledge that rural Texas is rife with rabble-rousing Marxists who live to destroy the lush fruits of unbridled capitalism. They are all making this stuff up, just because they hate to see anybody making a profit.

Well, it's not just in the country anymore. City slickers have gas wells nearby, too. I look at a couple of sites every time I drive to work.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

More Computer Problems -- Hope To Be Back Very Soon

Joe's suspicious that new contributor Geekus Maleekus had something to do with this. He's a confessed computer saboteur.

Hope to have this issue resolved by next week. Hang in there, loyalists! -- MJ

With Slick Willard, Republicans Are About To Nominate Thurston Howell The Third For President

By Manifesto Joe

I confess to being a little stunned when I read what Slick Willard Romney's advice was for young Americans struggling with the job market: Take risks, and don't be shy about borrowing money from your parents.

Um, it's a great big world out there, Willard, and not everybody has a trust fund. What if your parents are dead, or what if they are actually worse off than you are?

The slick one's example was Jimmy John of the renowned sandwich chain, who he said borrowed $20,000 from his parents and started a swell new business that's now a multimillion-dollar enterprise. Like wow, Willard! If my parents had ever had $20,000 to lend me, I could have gone to an Ivy League school and become part of the elite, too! Forget about the entrepreneurship, let's go with what's tried and tested and proven. One of those Harvard or Yale degrees can get you a pretty far piece, from what I've seen.

Another example, one that Slick Willard's wife was supposed to have brought up in an old interview, was that Slick sold some stocks that Daddsy bought for him so that he and wifey could live while they were college students.

Man, too bad I couldn't have sold my stock and traded it in for a meal ticket at the college cafeteria! But, man does not live by Frito pie alone.

To turn more serious, what keeps coming up here is Slick Willard's total disengagement from how the vast majority of people, even reasonably affluent Americans, have to live. From what I've read, Daddsy George had his ups and downs as a youth, and had to do a bit of his share of ass-busting to get ahead in life. But it doesn't appear that he communicated any of this to Sonny Mitt.

I'm not completely confident about this situation, because the American people were stupid enough to "elect" Il Doofus, and his daddy, too. But Romney seems to have a total disconnect with life as it has to be lived by us commoners. The Republicans will nominate him at their own peril.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

Geekus Doesn't Get Why Dogs Have Become A Big Campaign Issue

By G.M.

Dudes and dude-ettes, don't get me wrong. It's not like I don't love dogs. I have one for breakfast every day! (Just kidding, PETA fanatics!)

But like, now, all of a sudden, dogs are a big deal in this presidential campaign. Mitt Romney apparently strapped one in on the roof of his car when he was on vacation, then freaked out when brown seep started coming down on his windshield. Like, you couldn't have figured on that happening, after 14 hours?

And then, the Republicans found something in Obama's book about his younger life in which he says he ate stuff like dog and grasshoppers and such, at the urging of his Indonesian stepdad. Dog was sort of tough, and he reported that the grasshoppers are a little crunchy.

Please, please, people, get a life. An 8-year-old kid is going to eat anything that Daddy puts in front of him. As for Mitt Romney, that didn't sound too good, but a common thing among rednecks (yes, they have them in the North, too) is that they don't regard animals as similar to people in any way. You know, like, they're just these idiot things with absolutely no feelings. But, it's not like Mitt would be the first presidential hopeful who ever had that attitude about stuff. There must have been plenty of others. How else could you get elected? -- GM

For Geekus Maleekus, One More Boring Saturday Night

By G.M.

Dudes and dude-ettes, things just aren't what they used to be here on Planet Grapevine, especially on Saturday nights.

I used to be able to score lots of bitchin weed, but my source got busted, so now I have to settle for MD 20/20. Bummer.

The politics and shit used to be more interesting, too. I used to get cracked up when Bush would say all those stupid things. We just don't have any good fools to put on Wolf Blitzer's TV show anymore.

I mean, look at the people who are going to end up running for president. Obama is just too fucking polished. Everything he says sounds like he's practically had a chance to see video of it first. And then there's Mitt, the Arrow shirt dude. I used to enjoy watching those debates, back when it looked like Al Gore was actually walking over to Bush and acting like he was going to start punching him out and shit. The debates between these two, this fall, are going to be, like, serious yawners. No good sound bites, no UFC action, nothing.

Ron Paul sometimes acts like he's going to start some kind of shit, but he's too old and wimpy. When he gets excited, his voice gets as high as my grandma's. And Newt's just too fat. The only kind of fight he could win would be as the captain of the GOP Eating Team.

Clinton was fun to have around, because you never knew who it would come out that he'd porked. I don't remember times being so bad while he was president. I could get plenty of good weed back then, and Wolf Blitzer's show was always a lot more interesting, at least if you were stoned. But Clinton's not on the tube much anymore, and Hillary just isn't up to being a summer replacement. That woman was just too set on being valedictorian of every fucking thing to be very interesting. Although, it was funny to see her swilling a brewski and cutting up down in South America. That was the most fun I've ever seen Hillary have.

Ted Nugent used to be a bitchin guitar hero, but he's too redneck now. And way too serious.

Another boring Saturday night on Planet Grapevine. -- GM

Introducing Joe's New Contributor: Geekus Maleekus

By G.M.

Hey, dudes. I guess I'd better introduce myself. I don't spell too good, but Joe takes care of that for me.

I was born in 1976 in Grapevine, Texas. I graduated from high school with a 2.01 GPA. I was high most of the time, but I do remember seeing that movie of Hamlet with Mel Gibson. At least I didn't have to read the fucking Shakespeare book. Mel's pretty cool, as long as he stays off those Christian snuff movies. It was pretty boring watching that Jesus dude getting fucked over, hours upon hours.

I got an associate's degree in computer science from the local community college. Worked for a while as a tech, fixing PCs, then got fired. Moved back in with Mom and Dad, and spent most of my unemployment checks on piercings and tattoos. Everybody says they're most cool.

I know how to do computer viruses and other cool shit like that. I will gladly fuck up your computer Tuesday for a hamburger today.

More later, dudes. -- GM

Why Isn't Ted Nugent In Jail Now?

By Manifesto Joe

I don't seriously believe that Ted Nugent ought to be in jail now, because that would confer on him martyr status that he doesn't deserve.

But it's a question to ponder, since the heavy-metal bad boy turned NRA poster boy seems to have threatened the president of the United States during time of war.

Columnist LZ Granderson of CNN.com put it this way:

Nugent's words were: "If Barack Obama is elected, I'll either be dead or in jail this time next year," which sounds to me like he's open to directing his disapproval of Obama in a way that is violent and unlawful. When you see that statement next to Nugent comparing Obama and his colleagues to coyotes that needed to be shot, as well as the need to "ride into that battlefield and chop their heads off in November," I don't see how that rant cannot be looked upon as a threat on the president's life.

Here's a link to the entire commentary.

Not much has generally happened to people in cases like this before. But it's worth noting that in 2007, a federal judge refused to throw out a case in which an Indian national was alleged to have urged the assassination of then-President George W. Bush and threatened other administration officials. Here's a link to that story.

In that case, Vikram Buddhi was sentenced to 57 months in prison.

Perhaps as scandalous as the double standard that may lurk here is the wishy-washy response from Slick Willard Romney's presidential campaign. Nugent has endorsed Slick Willard despite the latter's support for an assault-weapons ban while he was governor of Massachusetts. Nugent explained that at the time, Romney wasn't in America, he was in Massachusetts.

"Divisive language is offensive no matter what side of the political aisle it comes from," said Romney spokesperson Andrea Saul. "Mitt Romney believes everyone needs to be civil."

Here's a link to a Washington Post commentary, with more detail on exactly what Nugent said.

Again, I wouldn't want Nugent to have the kind of martyr status he would have if he's charged with a crime over his remarks. But it may be a question worth pondering.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

Allen West Proves That Joe McCarthy Still Lives!

By Manifesto Joe

Preface: Glad to be back online. Was down with PC issues for over a month. What has the experience taught me? I'll summarize. Outsourcing is one of the most evil and STOOPID things Corporate America ever did, especially where computers are concerned. You people may have thought you were being smart, getting foreign help on the cheap, but it's ended up costing you. There are plenty of Americans who need jobs, and outsourcing just ends up costing the big boys lots of money through poor customer service. But: People don't like to admit when they've made mistakes, and therefore many corporations are still stubbornly pushing ahead with their bad past decisions. Dudes and dude-ettes, it was a monumental fuckup! Please, please, admit it, at long last. And most importantly, CHANGE.

Now, on to the subject.

Rep. Allen West, R-Florida, is a freshman lawmaker who is also a Tea Party poster child. He alleges that somewhere around 80 House Democrats are communists.

Even the actual communists themselves thought that this was absurdly moronic. Here's a link to what they had to say about this:

Click here!

I may be dating myself here -- I'm 55, going on 56 years old. Joe McCarthy was even before my time -- he died of a pickled liver when I was about a year old. But old Joe cast an enormous shadow over Cold War politics of the era. The consensus of hindsight is that, no, he wasn't wrong about EVERYTHING. There was a certain amount of Soviet espionage that reached some higher levels of the U.S. government. (My wife had an uncle who worked for the CIA, and from what he said, it's not like this wasn't working two ways.)

But, McCarthy's foolish allegations were always empty of evidence, and they were always changing. Was it 205 commies in the State Department? Or was it 57? How about 81? He was tossing enough numbers around to have a fair chance at winning the Mega Millions.

The astonishing thing here is that, well over 20 years after the end of the Cold War, we have a fool in the U.S. House who is enough of a shithead to re-enact the follies of Joe McCarthy.

One of the disheartening things about the contemporary U.S. political scene is that we DON'T have any significant radical left here anymore. I've never been much of a joiner, so I'm not a person who could ever be counted in. But given what's been happening in U.S. society at large for over three decades, and especially what's been happening since 2001, there damned sure ought to be a lot more firey, ready-for-battle types out there. The "Occupy" movement is the closest thing we've seen to that, and it seems to be in a nadir right now.

There are no Vito Marcantonios in Congress right now. Bernie Sanders says he's a socialist, "little s," and he's the closest thing we have. And it was questionable that even an old lefty like Vito was a real commie. People speculated that he was, but I don't think there was ever any solid evidence.

What we're seeing here is the electability of right-wing half-wits to high office. Not that the far, far left has never had any half-wits, but when was the last time you heard of one of them getting elected to truly high office? (And please, right-wing kooks, don't suggest Obama. The far left doesn't claim him, and never has. Anybody who thinks Obama is a "socialist" doesn't know what one is. Plus, if you think that a constitutional scholar like Obama is some kind of village idiot, what does that suggest about you?)

No, there are no Marcantonios -- but, it would appear, plenty of Joe McCarthys. Allen West proves that Tail Gunner Joe lives!

A postscript -- I'm going to miss Sanitarium!

Not that there was ever any doubt in my mind that the dude is batshit crazy -- but the Republican show is going to be much more boring without Sanitarium. On a purely personal level, he was always a much more engaging candidate than Slick Willard, the guy who forever reminds you of that well-groomed little Sunday School boy that everybody detested. Rick's demented, but he always came across like a regular guy who actually believed all that far-right Catholic bullshit.

It's going to be a much duller "race" without Sanitarium.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

On Vacation, Courtesy Of My PC

I can't do much posting for a while. My PC is down, and it may be down for a couple more weeks. Thanks to all who visit the blog, and please don't give up on me. I expect to be back by the end of the month.

One thing I have learned from this experience -- don't trust ANYTHING that computer geeks tell you. From three different ones, you can get three entirely different stories (and I did). Oh, and never buy anything from Dell.

Plan to be back ASAP. -- mj

Has Herr Rush Lardbaugh Finally Overreached?

For the first few days since the scandal broke, I wasn't inclined to post about it for one simple reason. Herr Lardbaugh has pulled these kinds of stunts before, and after initial firestorms has consistently gotten away with them.

This time, it looks like he may not. Or might he? As of the latest count, five sponsors have withdrawn sponsorship, and two others have "suspended" ads on Herr Lardbaugh's radio show. The Christian Science Monitor identifies them:

Departing sponsors include LegalZoom, ProFlowers, Citrix, Sleep Number beds, and Carbonite. Others, including AOL and Tax Resolution Services, have “suspended” their advertising on the show. Sears, AutoZone and Allstate have all said they do not sponsor Mr. Limbaugh’s show and advertisements for the companies that appeared on the program were placed there by mistake.

The Monitor has a succinct passage about the controversy, just in case you the reader don't have the particulars:

Limbaugh got the controversy started last Wednesday when he impugned Georgetown University’s Sandra Fluke on the air, calling her a “slut” and a “prostitute” after she appeared before a congressional committee arguing that her school’s health coverage should include birth control. Limbaugh later in the week insisted that the public should have access to video of her sexual encounters in exchange for the alleged funding of her birth control.

The comments struck many as extraordinarily crass, even for Limbaugh, who frequently makes derisive ad hominem attacks against those he disagrees with. A boycott movement quickly took root, spreading across online communities on sites like Reddit and Facebook, and the strong reaction against Limbaugh inspired seven sponsors to pull ads.

Some in the business think that Clear Channel will quickly pick up new advertisers as long as Herr Lardbaugh remains a bankable media figure. But this time seems a bit more serious than past incidents. Herr Lardbaugh said at first that he was only trying to be funny, and he's apologized to Ms. Fluke twice. But his apologies don't seem to be having any effect, as the controversy rages on days later.

It's not that ad hominem attacks are so shocking and awful. I'm doing that to Herr Lardbaugh right now, by making fun of his name and his usual girth.

But what Herr Lardbaugh did this time was quite unfunny, and went well beyond the boundaries of reasonable attempts at politically partisan humor. I've gotten in trouble in the past doing things as crass as making fun of genocide victims, but even I wouldn't subject a person as loathsome as Herr Lardbaugh to these kinds of attacks.

This time, it looks like he may not get away with it. His show will probably continue, but it's looking a lot like the description in the speech that Walter Matthau's character gives to Andy Griffith's "Lonesome Rhodes" near the end of the 1957 movie A Face in the Crowd. It's never going to be quite the same.

It's happened to a few other media figures before. Dr. Laura Schlessinger was riding high for years, until she finally said a few things that were just too stupid. And, how much of a career has Don Imus had in recent years?

It's true that Herr Lardbaugh's listening audience far eclipses those of either the I-Man or Dr. Laura. But he's human, and he's been skating by through shit storms like this for many years. This time, he may finally be taken down.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

'The Artist:' Yet Another Reason The Oscars Can't Be Taken Seriously

By Manifesto Joe

Over the past year, I've actually seen five of the nine films that were nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards. In the 1980s I was a devoted film buff and even aspired to be a critic, but in recent years I've lost interest, in large part because the Hollywood product has become such recycled pablum.

But again, over the past year, I've gotten out to the local cinemas a bit more. There are no "art houses" close to where I live, so for economic reasons I've mostly had to settle for the commercial Hollywood product with the discounts that area theaters provide.

I thought The Artist was a fun and entertaining novelty film, and Uggie the Dog's performance made me want to adopt a Jack Russell terrier.

But, Best Picture? Come off it. This is A Star Is Born with a happy ending tacked on. I regarded The Help and The Descendants as better films, and considered Midnight in Paris and Hugo to be at least as good, perhaps better.

What one tends to see on Oscar night is essentially a popularity contest held among the Academy's voters. Trendiness counts, and if a film such as The Artist offers something that people haven't seen in a while (black-and-white cinematography, a silent movie with titles), it has a leg up on its rivals.

Let's consider, briefly, a history of how much "Oscar" has meant over the years. Citizen Kane is at the top of many critics' all-time-great lists, and it didn't win Best Picture of 1941, though it was nominated.

What were some of the winning "Best Pictures?" Let's see -- we have Love Story (1970), which nobody wants to see anymore, and then the "immortal" tearjerker Terms of Endearment (1983). The latter's victory at the Oscars was when I really stopped taking the Academy Awards very seriously. What those two movies had in common was that audiences hadn't seen old-time tearjerkers in a long while, so those who hadn't grown up watching the old Douglas Sirk melodramas from the 1950s on little black-and-white TVs were often seeing something brand-new to them.

"Best actors?" I don't remember the last time I saw F. Murray Abraham, and Roberto Benigni's career certainly hasn't gone anywhere in recent years.

Somewhat in contrast, Val Kilmer doesn't look like he used to, but he's still getting parts. I thought one of the biggest ripoffs in Oscar history was that he wasn't even nominated for Best Actor for his work in The Doors (1991), in which he seemed to have disinterred the dude from that Paris grave for his performance as Jim Morrison. But Val has a rep for being difficult and isn't popular in Hollywood. (Director John Frankenheimer, before his death, was quoted as saying that one of the things he would never again do in his life was work with Val Kilmer. He had directed Kilmer and Marlon Brando in a very forgettable version of The Island of Dr. Moreau.)

Bottom line -- it's just a popularity contest among U.S. film industry insiders. I can't afford the gasoline and ticket prices to be a "movie snob" anymore, but Oscar night usually makes me wish I could be one again.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

Cletis Stump's GOP Laws Of Power

Cletis Stump is a good buddy who's got a fine blog going (See Joe's Hot Links, The Book of Cletis). Here's a recent post:

The GOP Laws of Power

~ The 1st GOP Law of Power: "The reduction of government services will be met with an
equivalent increase of corporate control."

~ The 2nd Law GOP of Power: "Always praise Jesus as your lord and savior when cameras are
rolling, otherwise kneel before Mammon."

~ The 3d GOP Law of Power: "When beating the war drum, stress the desire to aid those
yearning to be free; never mention their oil."

~ The 4th GOP Law of Power: "Stress patriotism and at all times brand those who oppose our
wars of imperialism as socialist agitators"

~ The 5th GOP Law of Power: "Never credit President Obama; deflect the praise when it is
brought forth and quickly reference his Muslim father."

~ The 6th GOP Law of Power: "In an election year, back off of any aspect of our agenda the
electorate has questioned and change the subject."

~ The 7th GOP Law of Power: "When caught in a lie and all attempts to ignore the public outcry
have failed, speak only to Fox News."

~ The 8t GOP Law of Power: "As the economy improves, and unemployment declines, feign
outrage over social issues & re engage the culture wars."

~ The 9th GOP Law of Power: "When holding a minority of Senate seats, embrace the filibuster
and pass no legislation favorable to the President."

~ The 10th GOP Law of Power: "When President Obama shows grace and courage and refuses
to engage in Brinkmanship, double down."

I'm Sad To Say Obama Is Pandering On Corporate Tax Cut

By Manifesto Joe

The fundamental dishonesty of the Mainstream Media business press tends to come out at times like this, as President Obama is proposing a cut in the U.S. corporate tax rate, down from the stated "35%" down to 28%. Unfortunately, this is when the fundamental dishonesty of many politicians comes out as well.

The MSM business press, while widely reporting that the current U.S. corporate tax rate of 35% is among the highest in the developed world, fails to report that two-thirds of American corporations aren't even paying it -- or anything at all, effectively. They acknowledge that many corporations, because of loopholes, don't pay an effective rate that high. They fail to report how prevalent, and how widespread, that failure to pay is. It's so bad that two-thirds of them basically pay NOTHING.

Don't believe it? Here's a link.

I can provide many others. Suffice it to say that two-thirds of U.S. corporations, according to numerous studies, have been shown to dodge federal income taxes to such an extent that their effective rate is little or nothing.

What Obama proposes, as I understand it, is to cut the nominal rate from 35% to 28%, with the trade-off of closing a lot of the loopholes that have permitted corporate giants in America to get by year after year paying virtually nothing. Sounds like a reasonable trade-off. I'm a political realist. So, on the surface, it sounds quite pragmatic.

But Obama's plan, again, as I understand it, would introduce a new set of loopholes into the mix, after closing some of them. While additional loopholes, for "green technology" companies and such, may seem like a good idea, it's an idea best left for a time when our federal government can actually AFFORD such breaks.

Granted, one of the nastiest pieces of Republican demagoguery is blaming the current accumulation of national debt on Obama. During Reagan's presidency, the national debt TRIPLED, from about $1 trillion to about $3 trillion. During the absurd "presidency" of Il Doofus, the national debt doubled from about $5 trillion to about $10 trillion while this imbecile was busy doing something that was tantamount to -- well, if FDR had decided to invade Argentina after the Pearl Harbor attack. That's about what the Iraq invasion amounted to, in hindsight.

But now is not the time to introduce any new proposals for loopholes. After 20 or so Republican debates, some of us have a general idea of how batshit crazy most of their "hopefuls" are.

(At the most recent debate, Ron Paul was asked to describe himself in one word. His choice: "Consistent." Yeah. Consistently insane.)

Some of us are looking desperately to the president for leadership. I like the man, but I've been disappointed. I hope to see MORE of the best stuff from him.

Contrary to what Darth Cheney once said, deficits DO matter. America can't afford to run up too much more. As nice as breaks for "green" companies would be, we've come to a time in which all and everyone must ante up.

I understand that Obama is running for re-election, and that he must "dance with them what brung him," as the saying goes in Texas. But now is the time to see statesmanship from him, not pandering. Everyone must share the sacrifice. And that means everyone. Close the loopholes for all, and please, please, don't introduce any new ones.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

Jesse Fuller, One-Man Band

I hadn't put a music video up for a while, and this is one I'd been thinking about. Enjoy the great Jesse Fuller!

Rick Perry 'Rearmed, Reloaded' -- Let's Not Forget Retarded

By Manifesto Joe

Forgive me for not resisting the urge to get a few more boot kicks in on a fool who got up on the national stage and made Texans look like buffoons in the bargain. Not that we already didn't look like that to a great extent -- but El Pendejo made it a lot worse.

The reason for my compulsion is that he's back home, and now we have to put up with his moronic ass as governor for nearly three more years.

He's not even ruling out getting his ass kicked again on the national stage. Here's a link to that story. After Reagan and Bush 43, I hadn't thought it was possible for anyone to be too stupid to be the Republican presidential nominee. El Pendejo, and Michele Bachmann as well, seem to have found where the bottom was.

He's back in Austin, ready to do battle in state politics yet again. Isn't it enough of an embarrassment that this dorkus malorkus is now our state's longest-serving governor?

He's not exactly coming back to paradise. A lot of us back here did nothing short of marvel at his talk of the Texas Miracle, and such. Things may be miraculous where he lives, with rent at $9,900 a month. Most of us are trying to figure out how we're going to pay for our next car repair.

El Pendejo did a lot of talking about job creation in Texas, and depicted the state as a capitalist paradise. I suppose that if you're an affluent capitalist, you can carve a certain paradise out of this. You don't have to drive on the rubble that passes for streets, or hear gunshots in your neighborhood, or live next door to people who rely on food stamps to eat and can't afford medical insurance for their children.

Perry represents the class of people who have basically told corporations coast-to-coast that the Texas workforce is a great big whore with legs spread wide. As blogger Robert Ruiz of San Antonio put it in a column:

Essentially our politicians are pimping us out to the lowest bidder. In 2010 Texas tied Mississippi for having more workers earning minimum wage or less than any other state in the country. Some 9.5% of Texas workers earned minimum wage or less compared to a national average of 6%.

Here's a link to a post by Ruiz, who also has much to say about poverty nationally.

People like El Pendejo seem to do an awful lot of talking about "freedom." For the kinds of people he and his spouse have over to dinner, that means the "freedom" of the 1% to fuck over all the rest of us.

But, they have an appalling number of wage-earning slobs fooled. Once, when I was reluctantly in a Wal-Mart, waiting to be checked out, my wife and I were talking to someone, and our checker managed to hear that I work as an editor for an MSM outlet.

I heard him say, "Oh, you mean those biased liberals who suppress dissenting opinions ...?"

I decided that, under the circumstances, it wouldn't be a good idea for me to remark snidely about the general political acumen of Wal-Mart associates. I did mention to him, passing through, that I figured he was probably underpaid. "I can always go somewhere else," was his reply.

My first thought was, why the fuck don't you do just that? What I recall saying was something like, "Yeah, and be a wage slave for somebody else." Yep, he's free alright -- to be a slave who can "choose" masters.

That is a popular opinion in Texas, and seems to be why politicians like El Pendejo just keep getting elected. The people getting screwed seem to want it deeper. For the next three years, they're likely to get it.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

Just When It Looked Like Slick Willard Had It Sewn Up ...

By Manifesto Joe

... Sanitarium makes it a race again!

If I had $10,000 handy to bet, the way Slick Willard apparently has, I would still bet on him. I would do so because I think he's where the most of the really big money of the Republican Party is, and will stay.

Boss Hogg still has his pockets of support -- including the very deep pockets of one of the richest players in Vegas, or anywhere in the world, multibillionaire Sheldon Adelson. That will keep him in the campaign for at least a while.

Ron Paul? Fageddaboudit. As one pundit once put it, he reminds too many people of that mentally ill uncle that every family has. He will keep the support of his loyal ideologues, but they won't exceed 10-15% in that many states.

Sanitarium seems to have emerged as a surprisingly strong second-place contender, which shows two things -- how full of surprises the Republicans are this time, and how astonishingly weak their field is. If anybody had told me six months ago that Sanitarium would still even be in this thing now, I'd have thought they were ready to be committed to one (a sanitarium).

My $10,000 wager, as of now, would be on a Slick Willard/Sanitarium ticket. Wall Street is still the Republican Party's 800-pound gorilla, and I think the "smart money" believes that Slick Willard has the best chance to win in November. Sanitarium would be a good No. 2 to reassure and co-opt Tea Party types, fundamentalists, Catholic Falangists and other far-right creatures.

Boss Hogg might have had a good shot at the No. 2 spot earlier, but he's pissed off too many people. Word is among Washington insiders, even "conservatives," that anyone who knows Gingrich very well generally detests him. That's not the type who makes a good, loyal veep.

But, we've seen plenty of twists and turns in this Rethuglican contest, so stay tuned. There may be a few more coming.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

A Connection Between Conservatism And Stupidity?

By Manifesto Joe

I put a question mark on that title because I think it's a proposition that may go a bit too far. There are definitely brainy conservatives, and I have had the misfortune of knowing a number of very vapid, ungrounded and ironically intolerant liberals.

But a new study does seem to establish a certain connection among factors of low IQ, social conservatism and prejudice. This story made the rounds on the Internet, but in case you didn't see it, here's a link.

Even before this study, this was not entirely new as a general observation. The English political philosopher John Stuart Mill routinely referred to British Conservatives, the Tories of the 19th century, as "the stupid party." A famous quote from Mill was something to the effect that while not all conservatives are stupid, most stupid people are conservatives.

But after 55, going on 56 years on the planet, I've also seen that advancing age does make many people more "conservative." That's not connected with stupidity, despite the inevitable loss of brain cells with age. One does become more cautious and circumspect. Some 35 years ago, I was a hard-core social libertarian, believing that any human activity in which a direct and arbitrary victim cannot be identified should be quite legal and tolerated.

I can't say I'm there anymore. I've never been to Vegas, but I've been to a few casino spots closer to here. Looking around, it was pretty easy to see the very grave social costs of legal gambling.

As for hookers, I have absolutely no personal experience with them. But I've heard of areas of the city in which I live where families have said their teenage son was approached and propositioned, in the front yard of their home, by a local prostitute. Not cool.

While there's still the argument that people are going to pursue gambling and sex-for-money anyway -- they always have -- I've come to see that it's not a bad idea to give communities the option of at least zoning such activities, so that they are legally restricted to specified areas. Over decades, I suppose I've become what could be described as a social moderate.

So I would hesitate to say that there's an entirely direct link between social conservatism and stupid people. It's characteristic of more liberal types to be cognizant of ambiguity, so I'll be "liberal" here, in that way. It's not nearly that simple, and never has been.

I would go so far as to say that, among people I am now aware of who do things like call the president "Barack Osama" and doggedly allege that he was born in Kenya, they are indeed pretty fucking stupid. I think the study is quite on the mark that there is a connection between prejudice and stupidity. And incidentally, virtually all such people are "social conservatives."

I grew up in a libertarian-style, Goldwater-Republican conservative family, so the grounding I had was much more related to neoliberal capitalist economics and a sort of 19th-century rugged individualist way of thinking about the world.

It has been asserted that people's politics and religion are generally fixed by the time they are, say, 10 years old. That was never true of me at all. To me, public philosophy is a quest that one pursues for a lifetime, and the behavior of forever thinking only what Dad and Mom taught you to think -- well, that is the true hallmark of stupidity. Whether it's a "red diaper baby" rebelling against Marxist ideas as an adult, or a Southern reactionary becoming a liberal after going to college -- that shows that at least the person is actively thinking about the issues, rather than smugly hanging onto family platitudes.

In my case, I noticed that my friends were usually more tolerant, liberal types, and that I didn't get along as well with the small-minded philistines I usually found among conservatives. Later I spent much time dwelling on economic questions -- well into my 30s, when I spent three years editing college economics textbooks. After reading all sides of such questions, I came to view laissez-faire as one undesirable extreme, and Marxism-Leninism as the other. The neo-Keynesian, mixed-economy model was the one that made the most sense to me, both historically and theoretically. It seems to be the one that truly delivers the goods to the many, not just the few.

Since libertarian-type conservatives are usually what could be described as civil libertarians, once my economic view had changed it was a very short walk toward liberalism. But I remain reluctant to wear that label. Liberals believe certain things that I do not, and am unlikely to ever embrace.

But as the American political scene has become so stupifyingly reactionary since around 1980, that simplifies things quite a bit. The bottom line has become that anybody who can't watch Fox News for 15 minutes without telling himself/herself that this is bullshit propaganda -- you become a liberal by default.

I personally prefer the term "progressive." That's a label that differentiates one from the capitalist neoliberalism that has become despised the world over, but also from the more knee-jerk sort of leftism that one sees so often among "conditioned" liberals.

In his 1953 book The Conservative Mind, Russell Kirk put forth six "canons" of conservatism that can be summarized as follows:

1. A belief in a transcendent order, which Kirk described variously as based in tradition, divine revelation, or natural law;
2. An affection for the "variety and mystery" of human existence;
3. A conviction that society requires orders and classes that emphasize "natural" distinctions;
4. A belief that property and freedom are closely linked;
5. A faith in custom, convention, and prescription, and
6. A recognition that innovation must be tied to existing traditions and customs, which entails a respect for the political value of prudence.

Kirk had no use for libertarian thinking, which he associated with 19th-century classic liberalism. His most enduring book touched very little on economics at all, so what he was describing was the phenomenon of "social conservatism," which has become a powerful force in contemporary U.S. politics.

Let's take these "canons" one at a time. Some of them seem to make good sense, so why would an intelligent person take exception?

1. Muslims also believe in a transcendent order, as do Hindus. There's quite a bit of diversity on this point among Christians, and there appears to be that among other major world religions as well. Who's got the right formula? I have no idea. And I suspect that anyone who claims to have the right one is either delusional or a liar. That's one thing experience has most decidedly taught me.

2. Hard to argue with that one. In fact, it appeals to the liberal habit of seeing the world as an ambiguous and complex place, rather than a simple, structured and absolute one.

3. Ever suffered a stupid and/or foolish boss? With the world being the kind of capricious and dicey place that it is, it's not uncommon to see the most silly kinds of people sitting in exalted positions, lording it over people who are vastly superior to them on many levels. Conservative canon No. 3 has no relationship to merit, that seems certain.

4. What conservatives -- and libertarians -- routinely forget is that property is a purely human construct. It's a legal artifact that exists on paper, and routinely protects weak from strong. That's great, and I'm all for it on that level -- but then don't hypocritically turn around and argue that it exists because of any kind of natural law. It exists in spite of natural law. NATURAL LAW is survival of the fittest. If I can get the drop on you and yours, murder all of you, bury all of you in the back yard, and take all the property -- according to natural law, it's now MINE. Property rights, as enforced by society's laws, are the very rights that prevent me from doing that.

In other words, property rights are not, and have never been, absolute. They are conditional.

5. There are plenty of "customs" and "traditions" in the Roman Catholic Church. Need I say more?

6. This is another one that's hard to argue with at first. But today's conservatives seem totally out of touch with that. They want to take U.S. society back to a time (the first Gilded Age) in which 1 out of 3 Americans lived in poverty -- and that was 1 out of 2 among the elderly, since there was no pension system. In contrast, they seem to demonize the era from 1935 to 1980, in which poverty was greatly reduced and the U.S. saw its global power multiplied with the creation of our great middle class. Exactly what is "conservative" about their current position?

I suppose I've covered enough ground here for one post. Suffice it to say that I see much wisdom in the J.S. Mill quote mentioned earlier. I've known a few brilliant conservatives in my time. But I've known many more imbecilic right-wingers.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.

Boss Hogg Wins Big In South Carolina!

By Manifesto Joe

Well, shut my mouth! He's popular in the South!!

Newt Gingrich, the former House speaker who bears a resemblance to actor Sorrell Booke (Boss Hogg in The Dukes of Hazzard), didn't merely win the South Carolina Republican primary Saturday. He administered a serious ass-kicking to former Mass. Gov. Mitt Romney, with about 40 percent of the vote to Romney's distant second at about 28 percent.

It's not that Gingrich winning in South Carolina was surprising. It was the margin of victory that was stunning. With news from Iowa that former Penn. U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum was the actual winner of the Iowa caucuses, it's now definitely still a three-person race. (U.S. Rep. Ron Paul of Texas will carry a loyal libertarian following all the way to the convention, but he has no real chance at the nomination.)

The GOP dilemma

All of this seems to leave the Republican Party in a quandary -- some conservatives are calling on their peers to unite behind one candidate, namely Romney, if they are to have a good chance of voting President Barack Obama out of office. But the stalwarts on the far right aren't buying that.

They keep bolting to Gingrich and Santorum. There's a sentiment among them of anybody-but-Romney, as Romney is widely perceived as much too "moderate" for them to stomach.

Also, the questions about the money Romney has squirreled away in the Cayman Islands are likely to come back to haunt him for the duration. As one all-too-representative of the 1 percent of the superrich who've been getting ever richer at the expense of the rest of us, he has little appeal to the working-class redneck element in which the GOP has made such powerful inroads since 1980.

Santorum doesn't seem terribly sullied, but that sweetheart real estate deal will come back to haunt him, too. And then there's all the quid he's made as a lobbyist since leaving the Senate. It's not exactly the resume of a Washington outsider.

Gingrich isn't exactly a Washington outsider, either, but his reign as House bad boy began 17 years ago, and he's been out of elective office for over 13 years. His sins may be the most forgivable of the GOP contenders.

The worst of it, for evangelical types, is that he's a serial adulterer. Yes, many Americans forgave Bill Clinton for that, over and over. But there are a few differences. Clinton, for all his indiscretions, has had only one wife for decades. Boss Hogg goes through them like cars, trading in the old one for a new model after 100,000 miles and repair bills.

First he married one of his high school teachers, a woman 7 years his senior, after he graduated and became eligible. There's nothing very unusual about that age difference anymore, but one can expect a woman with a 7-year head start to show some age eventually. Boss Hogg's first wife, I've read, was hospitalized with breast cancer when he served her with divorce papers.

Then he married his second wife, erstwhile his mistress during the first divorce. Years later, he became involved with an aide who is now the current Mrs. Gingrich. Wife No. 2 now alleges publicly that Boss Hogg asked her for an "open marriage" so that he could have both her and the mistress. Eventually he asked her for a divorce -- by telephone.

It turned out that Wife No. 2 came down with some nasty illness like multiple sclerosis, which she says was exacerbated by the stress of the divorce. Seems like Boss Hogg dumps 'em just as soon as there's a problem like that.

It's the big head that's the problem, not the little one

As cold-blooded as Boss Hogg's behavior has been, that's not what personally bothers me most about him. Having a philanderer for a president doesn't disturb me much -- a few presidents regarded as "good" or "great," namely JFK and FDR, are now almost as well-known for their extramarital affairs as for their performance in office.

It's the schmuck stuff that comes out of Boss Hogg's mouth, like wanting to replace union school janitors with part-time underage kids, that I find far more disturbing. As president, I suspect that he would try to get batshit insanity like that written into law.

There's also the hypocrisy problem. Boss Hogg was going around the country giving speeches on traditional morality and family values at the time he was alleged to be pursuing an open marriage and/or divorce from Wife No. 2. And, after leading the charge to chase House Speaker Jim Wright out of office on an ethics rap over some petty book deal, Boss Hogg later gets hit with a monumental ethics judgment over -- guess what, a much bigger book deal!

In any case, Boss Hogg seems to be largely forgiven and very much back in the fray. But it's looking like anybody that the Republicans are looking over now will have a tough time taking out Obama. They've all got baggage that the president simply doesn't have.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas

As South Carolina Nears: Just When You Think He's Found Bottom, Perry Digs Deeper

By Manifesto Joe

Texas Gov. Rick "El Pendejo" Perry is staying in the presidential race even though few people take him seriously anymore. With his latest ploy, it looks as though he's trying to outflank Romney by being a Republican Party bottom-feeder, scraping up as much of the right-wing Gothic vote as he can.

This time, El Pendejo seems to be defending the four Marines shown, in a widely circulated video, peeing on the corpses of Taliban fighters in Afghanistan.

These were just kids who made a mistake, he says. Here's a link to a story on the subject.

Well, at least the Marines in question didn't piss on these bodies until after the enemy fighters were dead. Perhaps in certain fraternities, this is a hazing practice that occurs while the freshman pledges are still very much alive.

El Pendejo saved his criticism for the Obama administration officials, including Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who condemned this asinine video. Their condemnations, he said, were "over-the-top" and show disdain for the military. While he seemed to stop short of endorsing urination on corpses as a display of patriotism, it seemed more than a bit twisted for him to direct his stream toward those condemning this sort of desecration.

On a mission from God?

Right before the Iowa caucuses in which he fared so poorly, El Pendejo told reporters that he would abandon his presidential bid if God tells him to do so. I suppose we are to gather from this that he and God are on regular speaking terms.

Come off it, El Pendejo. Some key Religious Right figures recently met here in Texas and voted to endorse Rick Santorum for president. Evidently, God whispered to these holier-than-thou types that a sleaze bucket with a brain is better than a sleaze bucket without one.

Anyway, it looks like God told him to forge ahead, and his utterances seem to reek more of desperation with each new one. It looks like one more hammering, in South Carolina, will be needed for El Pendejo to finally hear "the Voice."

I can't say whether God is talking, but I am, and so are a lot of other embarrassed Texans. El Pendejo -- please, please quit.

Manifesto Joe Is An Underground Writer Living In Texas.