Maybe the Story Pirates can Explain How the Banks Crashed our Economy

Dylan Ratigan had as his guests, the Story Pirates, a bunch of Wall Street savvy puppets with their latest kid video on the need for finance reform. Great stuff:

With The Rising Number of Low Income Poor People, Why Shouldn't they Pay More in Taxes? say Tax Cutting Republicans.

With taxes on the middle class at a 50 year all time low, I felt sad for America when I heard read this story the other day:

The Tax Policy Center, an independent tax research organization, estimates that 47 percent of all U.S. households will pay no federal income tax for 2009. The center speculates that it’s a result of a large number of low-income families and those getting tax credits.

Wait a minute! What their estimate is telling me is that we have a wage problem in this country. Too many families now are not making enough, not getting ahead that is, and therefore pay fewer taxes because they're dirt poor. That's bad news. But to hear the conservative media report it, poor families who are desperately falling behind aren't pulling there weight. Oh, and don't forget about that huge wave of baby boomers collecting Social Security checks.

Phyllis Schlafly, founder of Eagle Forum, said “There are the people who pay taxes to run the government and the people who don’t pay federal income taxes to run the government,” she said. “The ones who do not pay taxes have the same vote as the people who do, so it doesn’t cost them anything to vote ‘bigger-spending’ and ‘spread-the-wealth.’”

A note to Schlafly, according to jsonline: "Terrence Wall, a Madison developer (and millionaire), defended his record of paying no personal state income taxes for several years, saying he took advantage of legal tax breaks recommended by his accountant." And my guess is he's not trying to "spread the wealth" either. A recent study found that nearly two-thirds of U.S. companies don't pay federal taxes. Funny, no ones included them in the discussion.

According to The Heritage Foundation, the top 1 percent of income-earners paid 40 percent of all federal income tax, in 2007.

Wait a minute! What that tells me is the wage disparity is growing wider, concentrating wealth at the top 1 to 3 percent. Sure they pay taxes, but they make hundreds of times what average Americans do. But to hear conservatives whine about this in the media, you would think the wealthy are somehow "shouldering" the "burden."

Scott Hodge, president of the Tax Foundation, said that means a select group of Americans is shouldering an incredible financial burden. “Does it make sense to have a majority of Americans get more from government than they’re paying in taxes – to have no skin in the game anymore?” he asked.

Wait a minute! The fact that people don't make enough to pay taxes is no reason to believe they "have no skin in the game anymore." They do have families to raise, bills to pay, a job to do and a life to live. Isn't that "skin in the game?" What the hell are these greedy bastards talking about?

Hodge said, “Far too many Americans now get tax credits. They get a check back even if they don’t pay any income taxes.”

Wait a minute! I hope Republicans run on this platform. Isn't it about time to make these low income parasites, pay out of their meager salaries, a whole lot more in taxes?

Jon Stewart said it best recently on the Daily Show:

Google Search on Scott Walker Comes up Empty

Blogging Blue found this gem about gubernatorial candidate Scott Walker. It's the best "google search" type video I've seen so far. The Google service allow you to choose a subject and tell a story with the list of search results, all the while recording it. Not great but as you'll see below, it can succeed where many others have failed.

Did you know Democrats are longing for Authoritarianism-Bill Whittle.

The following freedom and liberties rant, from PJ Afterburners Bill Whittle, is so over the top P.T. Barnum would be proud.

With meaningless references to "values of freedom" and the "blessings of liberty," Whittle claims Democrats are dreaming of authoritarianism. I wish someone had told me. Here's another liberal wish list of government dependence. Who knew?

Whittle: "They long for an escape from them, responsibilities, the responsibilities to feed and cloth, and house and care for ones own self...and simply do not see how abandoning their responsibilities means the abandonment of their freedom. And we can't let that happen."

He "can't let that happen?" I'm glad we have our authoritarian conservative masters watching out for us.

Racism, What Racism?

In this post-racial age, thanks to President Barack Obama, we no longer have to think about our horrific racial past. Now, we can just read about it like it never went away. And it didn't.

Washington Post: Federal Senior judge Tom S. Lee of the U.S. District Court of Southern Mississippi, ordered a rural county in southwestern Mississippi to stop segregating its schools by grouping African American students into all-black classrooms and allowing white students to transfer to the county's only majority-white school, the U.S. Justice Department announced.

Here are the amazing, racist, Southern segregationist facts:

For years the local school board has permitted hundreds of white students to transfer from its Tylertown schools, which are about 75 percent African American and serve about 1,700 students, to another school, the Salem Attendance Center, which is about 66 percent white and serves about 577 students in grades K-12. The schools are about 10 miles apart. Salem became "a racially identifiable white school while the student enrollment of the Tylertown schools has become predominantly black" because of the transfers, U.S. officials alleged in December, based on data from the 2007-08 school year, according to Lee's order. At the same time in Tylertown four K-12 schools, "District administrators group, or 'cluster,' disproportionate numbers of white students into designated classrooms . . . resulting in significant numbers of segregated, all-black classrooms at each grade level," the judge wrote, summarizing the Justice Department lawyers' case.

And now the tea parties are completely denying race has anything to do with the current uprising spurred on by...health care reform?

Electing a black president brought about real post racial change, huh?

Thanks to The Frustrated Teacher for the heads up.

Republicans to Democrats on Finance Reform: "Let's get back to the table." The same "let's start over" Stall.

Like the health care debate, the Republicans are creating a list of make believe issues to oppose Wall Street reform. Why else are they meeting with Wall Street bankers behind closed doors?

NY Times: The president rejected the contention of Republicans — and notably … Mitch McConnell, that the measure offered by Senate Democrats would only make bailouts of gigantic, risk-laden institutions more likely.

Democrats aren't about to support future bailouts, but Republicans must convince voters otherwise, by fabricating an imagine alliance between conservative free market bankers and Democrats. Good luck. Republicans arecreating out of whole cloth, a fiction to appear populist, and please Wall Street Bankers by blocking reform. They've also framed the phony debate with the following comments.

“Democrats are beginning a new season of spending on Capitol Hill and a new season of bailouts,” Representative Mike Pence of Indiana, chairman of the House Republican Conference, said. “This so-called financial services bill is nothing more than a permanent bailout."

McConnell repeated his assertion that the bill would merely enable future bailouts … “We cannot allow endless taxpayer-funded bailouts … McConnell acknowledged his own support for the $700 billion bailout in 2008 when the Bush administration warned of an imminent crisis … "My message to the president, quite simply, was, ‘Let’s get back to the table."

“This is the same stall we got on health care,” said the Senate Democratic leader, Harry Reid of Nevada.

What McConnell and Pence are calling "a bailout" is spelled out below. Rachel Maddow and Howard Fineman point out the hypocrisy and lie that taxpayers will ever bailout the banks again.

The aspect of the regulation that Mr. McConnell most focused on — the creation of a “resolution authority” to seize and dismantle a financial institution … A $50 billion “orderly liquidation fund,” created from fees charged to the largest banks, would help pay for the takeover. The House version of the bill, approved in December, would create a $150 billion fund.

The Democrats’ senate bill would let the Treasury secretary take over any giant company that posed systemic risk to financial stability, and essentially force it out of business.

The Republican strategy … is carefully calibrated for a highly competitive midterm election year … Republicans seek to oppose the Democrats’ bill while not appearing to side with the banks at a time when popular anger at Wall Street is high.

Jen Psaki, the deputy White House communications director, wrote in a blog post on Tuesday, rebutting the criticism from Mr. McConnell: “The Senate bill explicitly mandates that a large financial firm that faces failure be allowed to fail.”

Wall Street Journal:

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) rebuffed the Republican argument, calling it "such a diversion from the facts it's almost laughable, it's sad."

"For them to say it's a bailout for financial institutions just defies credibility," Ms. Pelosi said.

Republicans Tout their "Hope for Failure" Campaign for Upcoming Elections.

Radio host Scott Hennen confirmed to all of us that Republicans care more about Obama failing as president, than how that failure will end up harming Americans. It's a twisted death wish for America.

This is the philosophical difference between the parties. I didn't hope Bush policies failed, but had a nagging feeling that they would, and that he was about to destroy our economy. If Bush policies had worked, the debate would have changed, to who's ideology best serves the public interest.

But to hope for failure, and the pain and suffering that goes with it, exposes the cruel streak in conservative politics, and its win at all costs game of politics.

To add insult to injury, Hennen then plays the victim of liberal criticizism, or "smeared" as Michele Bachmann puts it, for taking such a position. Hennen and Bachmann couldn't be clearer in the radio exchange below:

Hennen: "I’m proudly accepting that label of rooting for failure for his policies, not for any one personal individual or anything else, but, I mean, should we, is that what Republicans are doing? Are we rooting for failure? Is David Axelrod right?"

Bachmann: "We’re, we’re, we’re hoping that President Obama’s policies don’t succeed, exactly as you said. And of course, David Axelrod unfortunately seems to be wanting to smear people who disagree with the president. We’ve seen that over and over at Tea Party events, at gatherings where people say, “look, I don’t like this idea of out of control spending and accumulating deficits that our kids have no possibility of paying back.” And to think that those of us, we who disagree with that very ill-thought out idea are being smeared, I think that’s really wrong."

When Bush was criticized by minority Democrats, they were ignored and discounted as "Bush haters." Do Republicans hate our illegitimate, Kenyon, Muslim, socialist, black, racist, terrorist sympathizer, fascist commander and appeaser?

Kinda hard to tell so far.

The Repubican "No We Can't" Campaign Themes. Thank you Rep. John Boehner.

"Yes We Can," "No we can't" to music...

Here's a look at Auto Tunes "No We Can't"

Rep. Ryan says Forget the Constitution, God and Nature Gave us our Rights.

Leave it to Glenn Beck to bring out the worst in people, thank god, so we can see how wildly screwed up some people are. Take Rep. Paul Ryan for example. If you look past the admiring press, the actual economic break down of Ryan's "Road Map" never comes close to balancing budgets and dramatically short changes Social Security and Medicare, or at least what's left of them.

Ryan let's it all hang out with Beck:

Ryan: "What I've been trying to do is indict the entire vision of progressivism. Because I see progressivism as the source, the intellectual source of the big government problems plaguing us today. So to me, it's really important to flush progressives out into the field of open debate, so people can actually see what this ideology means, where it's going to lead us, and how it attacks the American idea.

Ryan's goes on to bash the states educational economic engine, the University of Wisconsin,

Ryan: "I grew up hearing about this stuff. This stuff came from these German intellectuals to Madison, the University of Wisconsin, and sort of out from there, at the beginning of the last century. So this is something we are familiar with where I come from. It never sat right with me, and as I grew up I learned more about the founders, and reading the Austrians and others, that this is really a cancer."

It's at this point Ryan argues AGAINST the constitution, rely only on what God and nature bestows upon us:

Ryan: "...because it basically takes the notion that our rights come from God and nature, and turns it on its head and says, no, no, no, no they come from government. We here in government are here to give you your rights and therefore ration, redistribute and regulate your rights."

Besides the hot button use of "ration," Ryan disagrees with taxpayer support of the government. He disagrees with laws that regulate our rights. For Ryan, we can decide what rights work for each of us, what God gave us, kinda like a formula for chaos, segregation, discrimination and criminality. So the idea the constitution outlines and protects our rights, including the "Bill of Rights," is a foreign concept for Ryan, as he states clearly below.

The Atlantic Right:

In a speech he gave to the Oklahoma Council on Public Affairs on March 31, Ryan praised “progressivism.” This ideology, he said, had influenced both parties. It was, when it first came to the forefront of American politics, populist and it aimed at empowering the people. Only later did it morph into an authoritarian ideology, with no respect for individual rights, or so Ryan argued.

Crash the Tea Party Patriots!

Thanks to the press' desire to stoke a good political fight for ratings, they have allowed to go uncontested the multitude of fictions, lies and opinion that has now created the irrational tea party movement. The media coverage has "legitimized" a tea party movement that is challenging our sanity, the rule of law and cramming an absolutist view of the constitution down our throats.

So what can be done now, so late in the game, to weed out the racist, bigoted fear mongering antigovernment hoards poisoning the body politics? Crash the Tea Party.

AP: Opponents of the fiscally conservative tea party movement say they plan to infiltrate and dismantle the political group by trying to make its members appear to be racist, homophobic and moronic. Jason Levin, creator of Crash the Tea Party.org, said Monday the group has 65 leaders in major cities across the country who are trying to recruit members to infiltrate tea party events for April 15 … "Every time we have someone on camera saying that Barack Obama isn't an American citizen, we want someone sitting next to him saying, 'That's right, he's an alien from outer space!'" Levin said. "Do I think every member of the tea party is a homophobe, racist or a moron? No, absolutely not," Levin said. "Do I think most of them are homophobes, racists or morons?Absolutely."

So what would be the response from a movement that that believes health care covers illegal immigrants, pays for abortion, is a government takeover, has death panels for the elderly, Obama is a socialist, Muslim, not born here, doing what Hitler did, may be the antichrist, didn't know they got a tax cut and flips logic and reality on its head?

Tea party members said the backlash comes from ignorance. "They can't actually debate our message and that's their problem," said Bob MacGuffie, a Connecticut organizer for Right Principles, a tea party group that also has members in New York and New Jersey.

Yes, we're the ignorant ones who can't debate the phoney list of fear mongering issues. That's the ticket. And so the "debate" continues...

Oklahoma Lawmakers and Unhinged Tea Party Organizer's want to create a new volunteer militia to protect state sovereignty. No, really.

So where did you think all of this was going?

Right now, polls show the public is seriously considering putting the guys who tanked the economy and wiped out 4 million Americans jobs, back in control of the government.

The last straw; giving people access to affordable health care. It's time for an armed revolt.

With the help of the tea party movement, Republicans have stoked the anger and ant-government crazies to offer up their final solution, a way to save their country from the liberal cancer Glenn Beck warned us about.

AP - Frustrated by recent political setbacks, tea party leaders and some conservative members of the Oklahoma Legislature say they would like to create a new volunteer militia to help defend against what they believe are improper federal infringements on state sovereignty … several supportive lawmakers hope to get legislation next year to recognize a new volunteer force. They say the unit would not resemble militia groups that have been raided for allegedly plotting attacks on law enforcement officers.

"Is it scary? It sure is," said tea party leader Al Gerhart of Oklahoma City, who heads an umbrella group of tea party factions called the Oklahoma Constitutional Alliance. "But when do the states stop rolling over for the federal government?"

Even the proponents say they don't know how an armed force would be organized nor how a state-based militia could block federal mandates. Critics also asserted that the force could inflame extremism, and that the National Guard already provides for the state's military needs.

"Have they heard of the Oklahoma City bombing?" said Joseph Thai, a constitutional law professor at the University of Oklahoma. Such actions could "throw fuel in the fire of radicals," he said. But the militia talks reflect the frustration of some grass roots groups seeking new ways of fighting recent federal initiatives, such as the health reform plan, which requires all citizens to have health insurance.

Providing health care for every American citizens is the driving force to behind a possible armed revolt against the government? It wasn't the war of choice, allowing 9/11 to happen, running up a $1.2 trillion budget deficit, wire tapping phones, torture, tanking the global economy, secret meeting to develop U.S. energy policy, politicizing the justice department and supreme court, corruption and corporate campaign influence.

Health care!

State Sen. Randy Brogdon, a Republican candidate for governor … believes the citizen unit would be authorized under the Second Amendment to the Constitution. The founding fathers "were not referring to a turkey shoot or a quail hunt. They really weren't even talking about us having the ability to protect ourselves against each other," Brogdon said. "The Second Amendment deals directly with the right of an individual to keep and bear arms to protect themselves from an overreaching federal government."

Tea party leader J.W. Berry of the Tulsa-based OKforTea began soliciting interest in a state militia through his newsletter under the subject "Buy more guns, more bullets."

"It's not a far-right crazy plan or anything like that," Berry said. "This would be done with the full cooperation of the state legislature."

Below, Chris Matthews talks to Al Gerhart, who basically admits the "regulated militia" proposal is symbolic. Despite Gerhart's wildly contradictory statements, he comes across as a more reasonable person, who recognizes the problems of forming a militia and the illogic of trying to protect Oklahoma from an over reaching federal government. If the whole idea wasn't so crazy, I'd feel a little sympathy for Gerhart's point of view.

The Truth About Wisconsin Taxes. How the Republicans

After looking at the following breakdown of figures, to determine if Wisconsin is really a tax hell, I can see why the Republican Party is able to contort the figures enough to scream bloody murder about taxes. Unfortunately, they are more interested in bad mouthing the state and try to win elections, than statistically spinning the numbers to make the state look really good. Shame on the Democrats for not trying hard enough to counter the GOP.

Your head may spin, but take a look at the real breakdown jsonline.com put together. If we wanted to, as a state, we could help the middle class, lower taxes and statistically rank right up there with the best business friendly states. But we need the Republicans to help make the change, and they're only interested in gaining power, using fear and wiping out liberals.

At the end of last year, one Midwestern state emerged carrying its lightest total tax burden since the early 1960s. Only six states nationwide saw a bigger drop in the percentage of taxpayer income taken for government spending over an eight-year period. Once labeled a top 5 tax hell, the state's spending level dipped below the national median after years of restraints on schools and local governments under its past three governors.

The state is Wisconsin.

Fact: Wisconsin ranks 26th in total spending by all levels of state and local government based on the latest figures (as compared with 20th in population, 24th in Gross Domestic Product and 24th in personal income for the same year). Fact: Wisconsin ranks 14th in total tax burden.

Why the gap between spending and tax rankings? Wisconsin relies less than many states on user fees, including things such as tollways, school activity fees and garbage collection charges. It leans much more than most states on property and income taxes. The state's unusual insistence on taxing all types of property at equal rates puts a larger share of the tax burden on middle-class homeowners. The result: Taxes on industrial property owners rank in the bottom half and sometimes the bottom third nationally. In contrast, residential taxes are still easily top 10, and residential owners pay more than two-thirds of all property tax collections, up from half in 1970.

In Iowa, a recent economic surge has turned heads. Unlike Wisconsin, the state has weathered the recession without raising rates on major taxes and has a big reserve fund. Iowa, it turns out, is a national leader in user fees, including school busing charges, parking fees, non-tuition expenses in higher education and school lunches. Its combined ranking on taxes plus fees is 14th. Wisconsin is lower at 19th. Iowa, though, trumps Wisconsin on the image front because national studies don't identify any of its taxes as notably high. Wisconsin's property tax, by contrast, gets attention.

Iowa has successfully developed bio-fuel and wind-energy sectors and does a better job than Wisconsin getting federal funds, receiving $240 more per person from Uncle Sam. When it comes to receiving federal dollars, Wisconsin ranks in the bottom six on that measure. Wisconsin's business climate generally gets subpar grades overall in national studies. But business taxes represent just 39% of all state and local taxes here, 12th-lowest in the country, according to a 2008 study prepared for the Council On State Taxation, a group of big corporations. Wisconsin ultimately will have to decide how low to go on tax and spending.

The first challenge will be to get the facts in front of residents who have seen little relief even as spending increases have moderated. "The overall moderate cost of government in Wisconsin appears to the middle class as a myth because they're the ones carrying the burden," said Jack Norman, research director at the Institute for Wisconsin's Future, a liberal think tank.

Lightbourn, president of the conservative Wisconsin Policy Research Institute, sees the recession as a chance to further drop the state's tax ranking in hopes of attracting jobs and residents. State Rep. Robin Vos (R-Caledonia), member of the Legislature's Joint Finance Committee, endorses a bottom 10 tax ranking and spending freezes on programs for the less fortunate.

Others disagree. "Aiming for the bottom 10 in taxes would put Wisconsin on a path to become a cold weather version of Alabama," said Jon Peacock of the Wisconsin Council on Children and Families. "That's not the way to improve our economic competitiveness or to maintain the high quality of life that Wisconsinites expect."

Screw the iPad, I'm waiting for HP's Slate

Here's the latest on a better e-reader, finally, leaving the iPad to wallow its own exclusive little world of Jobs approved technology. Wouldn't be nice to buy something that works just like your computer and search engine, and doesn't try to force the internets to adopt new standards to function fully? Go to hell Apple!

NY Times: Microsoft is flirting with the idea of selling its own version of a slate (iPad), joining traditional computer companies like Hewlett-Packard that have already committed to such products.

H.P.’s version of the iPad is expected to be released by midyear. Notably, it will have a camera, as well as ports for add-on devices, like a mouse. Also, it will, the company says in a promotional video, “run the complete Internet,” including videos and other entertainment.

Google — a search and advertising company — is soon expected to begin selling its version of a slate computer, like Apple’s iPad, while Nokia — the world’s biggest cellphone maker — is planning to enter the digital book market through a slate-cum-e-reader as well.

Juneau County DA Southworth's Threat to Arrest Sex Ed Teachers also applies to Parents "Advocating Sexual Assault" Too.

Only in Wisconsin could the Healthy Youth Act get a sex ed teacher arrested. Never mind the comprehensive sex ed courses world wide that have been in place for decades that pose the same legal risks.

Why would the Juneau County DA Scott Southworth arrest a sex ed teacher:

Southworth said … "Basic education on what a condom is - there's nothing illegal about that," he said. "[When] you have to instruct [children] how to use it - that's where you get into the advocacy issues. Since it is illegal for children to have sex, why are we teaching them how to use contraceptives?" Southworth said he fears the bill will potentially give the parents of teens engaging in sexual acts legal grounds for filing complaints against teachers.

DA Scott Southworth isn't threatening to arrest teachers, just "warning" them that he could if he wanted to, according to the Juneau Star Times:

"I'm not threatening anyone," he said. "The letter was designed to warn them of the law when this act was put into place."

Necedah Area School District Administrator Charles Krupa (said) "He's just stated that this is the law and this is what I'm going to do."

"When you teach a kid to use a condom, you are either saying you think he's going to have sex or you know he's going to have sex," he said. "Since it is illegal for children to have sex, why are we teaching them how to use contraceptives?"

But instructing kids on how to use condoms and girls on the pill, or even providing them with these products, could land PARENTS in jail, not just teachers. If kids get caught "breaking the law" having sex, parents could be arrested for promoting the sexual assault of children and exposing them to criminal liability. Should the legislature be required to pass a law giving legal protection to parents too?

Southworth is also claiming kids can and will be prosecuted for having illegal teen sex, which a Tomah Journal editorial points out:

"…teachers won’t encourage sexual predators as commonly defined; they will encourage sex between teen-agers of similar age (albeit with less risk of pregnancy). Does Southworth remember the 1997 case of Kevin Gillson, an 18-year-old Port Washington man who was prosecuted as a sex offender for impregnating his 15-year-old girlfriend? The community overwhelmingly sided with Gillson, not with the District Attorney. Does Southworth intend on prosecuting such cases in Juneau County? If not, then how can he threaten a teacher for indirectly encouraging an activity that his office either can’t or won’t prosecute?

From WPT's Here and Now:










In a related issue, and just as important, Southworth's other argument:

Janet McCauley, a speech pathologist in Mauston schools and a member of the Mauston Ministerial Association, (says) "It tramples on the rights of the school board to choose their own curriculum," she said. "Once the state comes down and starts dictating what a local community has to include - it is very dangerous."
Southworth … "I found it insulting the state Legislature doesn't believe that we have the ability to decide what to teach our children."

Southworth and McCauley appear to be arguing against all statewide educational standards, since communities are so much better at deciding these things. Why have schools at all, since parents know what's best for their kids and can figure that out themselves.

The Tenth Amendment Twist

This Tenth Amendment insanity has picked up steam, or hot air, by the tea partiers who don't really have a plan and conservatives trying to drum up money. A quick search explained everything for me, because again, the whole argument is based on nothing, zero, a misdirection play and BS. Check out what I clipped from Wiki:

The Necessary and Proper Clause (also known as the Elastic Clause, the Basket Clause, the Coefficient Clause, and the Sweeping Clause[1]) is the provision in Article One of the United States Constitution, section 8, clause 18:

“ The Congress shall have Power - To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.

The clause provoked controversy during discussions of the proposed constitution, and its inclusion became a focal point of criticism for those opposed to the Constitution's ratification.

After the Constitution was ratified, some wanted to add a similar amendment limiting the federal government to powers "expressly" delegated, which would have denied implied powers.[2] However, the word "expressly" ultimately did not appear in the Tenth Amendment as ratified, and therefore the Tenth Amendment did not amend the Necessary and Proper Clause.

The Tenth Amendment, which makes explicit the idea that the federal government is limited only to the powers granted in the Constitution, is generally recognized to be a truism. In United States v. Sprague (1931) the Supreme Court noted that the amendment "added nothing to the [Constitution] as originally ratified."

Got that, added nothing. Just like the conservative party today.

What Happened on Wall street? Listen to the Song.

Check out this great song, "Bet against the American Dream:"




Music and Lyrics: Robert Lopez
Vocalists: John Treacy Eagan and Christian Borle
Music Supervisor/Producer: Stephen Oremus
Orchestrator: Bruce Coughlin

This American Life:

A hedge fund named Magnetar comes up with an elaborate plan to make money. It sponsors the creation of complicated and ultimately toxic financial securities... while at the same time betting against the very securities it helped create. Planet Money's Alex Blumberg teams up with two investigative reporters from ProPublica, Jake Bernstein and Jesse Eisinger, to tell the story. Jake and Jesse pored through thousands of pages of documents and interviewed dozens of Wall Street Insiders. We bring you the result: a tale of intrigue and questionable behavior, which parallels quite closely the plot of a Mel Brooks musical.

Republicans Confirm: "Empathy" and the Filibuster Strategy to Agitate the Base.

Forgetting the past, rewriting it or just plain ignoring it, Republicans will now be completely against the "empathy standard" Obama set for the next supreme court justice. Forget about the fact that Sam Alito and John Roberts have been the two of the most "activist" justice in American history.

What matters now is arguing and exaggerating the liberal qualities of a Democratic pick for the supreme court, firing up the base and raising tons of campaign money to elect more Republicans. It’s a strategy and nothing more. It's a demand to install more conservative justices, and as Rush pointed out before, an attempt to wipe out liberals. An odd demand by a party screaming for political balance and bipartisanship during the health care reform debate.

So will there be a filibuster? Obama's on notice.





According to Media Matters research:

Sam Alito highlighted the importance of his personal experience. During his confirmation hearing in 2006, Alito highlighted his compassion for people involved in immigration and discrimination cases and discussed the importance of his personal experience, saying: "When I get a case about discrimination, I have to think about people in my own family who suffered discrimination because of their ethnic background or because of religion or because of gender. And I do take that into account."

Clarence Thomas: "I can walk in the shoes of the people who are affected by what the Court does." About why he wanted to serve on the Supreme Court, Justice Clarence Thomas stated in part: "I believe, Senator, that I can make a contribution, that I can bring something different to the Court, that I can walk in the shoes of the people who are affected by what the Court does."

Bush cited Thomas' "great empathy." Sen. Kit Bond cited Thomas' "compassion and understanding." "Though his skills as a lawyer and a judge are obvious … Just as important is his compassion and understanding of the impact that the Supreme Court has on the lives of average Americans." Attorney John Yoo touted the unique perspective that he said Thomas brings to the bench. Yoo wrote that Thomas "is a black man with a much greater range of personal experience than most of the upper-class liberals who take potshots at him" and argued that Thomas' work on the court has been influenced by his understanding of the less fortunate acquired through personal experience.

Sen. Strom Thurmond, during the confirmation hearings for Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Thurmond stated that "compassion" was one of the "special qualifications I believe an individual should possess to serve on the Supreme Court," adding that "[w]hile a nominee must be firm in his or her decisions, they should show mercy when appropriate.

Sen. Al D'Amato cited Sotomayor's "compassion" in supporting her nomination as an appellate court judge. Sen. Mike DeWine wanted Roberts to "bring to the court your compassion." And we need you to always remember that your decisions will make a real difference in the lives of real people."

And what about judicial activism...?

Maddow has a little bit of history on the judicial filibuster:

What about the Bush...I Mean Obama Tax Cuts...You know, the ones you got but didn't know about.

Finally, Obama is taking the time to brag about the administrations middle class tax cuts, you know, the ones no one knows about. If this were a Republican administration, we would have all been required to tattoo a reminder on the palm of our hand. But as usual, this important election year message has to pass through the conservative media filter, and it came out like the following from the Wall Street Journal:

President Barack Obama said that Americans who have filed their taxes so far have discovered the average refund has risen 10% this year to an all-time high of $3,000 because of 2009's Tax Recovery Act. "In fact, one-third of the Recovery Act was made up of tax cuts -- tax cuts that have already provided more than $160 billion in relief for families and businesses, and nearly $100 billion of that directly into the pockets of working Americans," the president said.

vs

In the GOP's weekly address, Sen. Jon Kyl of Arizona focused on Bush tax cuts that are set to expire at year's end, and the price of recently passed health-care legislation in a time of record deficits. "Under current law, unless Congress acts, taxes will rise dramatically on Dec. 31," Kyl said. "Taxes will increase on families with children, on married couples, on income, on capital gains and dividends, and even after death. It comes to a total of $2 trillion in new taxes over the next 10 years. And that doesn't include the more than $500 billion in new taxes in the health spending law."

The Wall Street Journal's Market Watch failed to mention that some middle class tax cuts won't expire, as Kyl tried to insinuate.

An oversight?

AP News Tries to Equate Palin with Obama!!! Does "He said/She said" Work With "nucular" Weapons Treaties?

AP reporter Liz Sidoti,wrote this headline: "Palin, Obama spar from a distance" as if to suggest there existed some equivalent comparison between the two politicians. A dumbass half term governor with a speech writer, and a president with experienced advisors that include the secretary of Defense and the Joint Chiefs of Staff?

Are Americans on a collective bad trip? Sidoti surrealistically writes:

"President Barack Obama and Republican Sarah Palin sparred from a distance over nuclear policy with each questioning the other's experience on the issue in a potential preview of the 2012 White House race."

It's as if Palin has any credibility, one shred of understanding, on the issue of "nukular" reduction treaties.

And Obama didn't really directly respond to Palin's bizarre opposition to the treaty, but was instead answering a question asked by an ABC News reporter about Palin's recent statement, like it really mattered.

Palin statement:

"No administration in America's history would, I think, ever have considered such a step that we just found out President Obama is supporting today."

I recall President Ronald Reagan saying once:

"We're not just discussing limits on a further increase of nuclear weapons, we seek to instead reduce their number. We seek a total elimination one day of nuclear weapons from the face of the earth."

What earth is Palin referring too? As far as Obama's answer:

"I really have no response. Because last I checked, Sarah Palin's not much of an expert on nuclear issues ... If the secretary of Defense and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff are comfortable with it, I'm probably going to take my advice from them and not from Sarah Palin."

Mocking the president, she (Palin) dismissed

"all the vast nuclear experience that he acquired as a community organizer."

How wrong is Palin? Check out Obama's EXTENSIVE experience below. Getting mileage now before Palin's bullshit completely disproved is a common conservative ploy. Obama is taking the advice of experts, by the way, he's not drawing from his experience as a community organizer.



And this is how the media will be treating the crazy lunatic anti-government Ayn Randers and Milton Friedman wanna-be's, the ones who had the ideological balls to create the Great Recession, and ignore it.


Simply put: What Palin, Gingrich and every other tea partier and Republican authoritarian wants to do is direct the threat of nuclear inhalation to anyone who dares to challenge us. The power of Lex Luthor on steroids.



Media Matters: In Senate, Obama worked on non-proliferation policy, co-authored "next critical step" on issue

Obama took fact-finding trip to former USSR to examine WMD stockpiles. In 2005, in his first foreign trip as a U.S. senator, Obama traveled to Russia, Ukraine and Azerbaijan with Sen. Richard Lugar (R-IN), then-chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee. The purpose of the trip was to examine facilities for the storage and destruction of conventional, biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons. Obama and Lugar subsequently co-wrote a December 2005 Washington Post op-ed on the issue and appeared together in a discussion at the Council on Foreign Relations on "Challenges Ahead For Cooperative Threat Reduction," in which Obama detailed ways to improve the U.S. program to control, secure, and dismantle weapons of mass destruction in the former Soviet Union.

With Lugar, Obama co-authored non-proliferation initiative signed into law by President Bush. Obama and Lugar co-authored the "Lugar-Obama non-proliferation initiative," which "enhances U.S. efforts to destroy conventional weapons stockpiles and to detect and interdict weapons and materials of mass destruction throughout the world." The legislation was signed into law by President Bush in January 2007. According to a June 28, 2007, press release from Lugar, he and Obama subsequently secured "$36 million for programs to destroy heavy conventional weapons, $10 million for efforts to intercept weapons and materials of mass destruction, and $2 million for rapid response to proliferation detection and interdiction emergencies."

Lugar praised Obama's "productive" work on nonproliferation that took "next critical step" on the issue. In an August 2008 Fort Wayne Journal-Gazette op-ed (retrieved from the Nexis database), Lugar wrote that "Sen. Obama has worked with me, productively, on non-proliferation issues. We jointly introduced a bill that strengthened U.S. defenses against proliferation of weapons of mass destruction."

He further wrote: Sen. Obama joined me in developing legislation in 2005 -- long before he was a presidential candidate -- to address emerging proliferation risks. After significant study and site visits, it became clear to us that additional safeguards were required to strengthen the lines of defense between unsecured weapons of mass destruction and U.S. borders and to deal with vulnerable stockpiles of conventional weapons and hand-held anti-aircraft missiles. The Nunn-Lugar program has provided a solid foundation, valuable experience and measurable results. With the Lugar-Obama legislation, we took the next critical step forward to refocus and reinvigorate our country's non-proliferation mission.

In 2005, I traveled with Sen. Obama to Russia, Ukraine and Azerbaijan to oversee a number of proliferation projects. In Russia, we visited Nunn-Lugar sites where nuclear weapons were being dismantled and stored. In Ukraine, we inspected the Donetsk State Chemical Production Plant, a conventional weapons destruction facility where the U.S. has taken the lead in a three-year NATO program to destroy the weapons. At that facility, more than 117,000 tons of ammunition and 1.1 million small arms and light weapons are slated for destruction within 12 years. During the visit we encouraged Ukrainian officials to expedite destruction efforts and expand cooperative threat reduction of conventional weapons. In Azerbaijan, we observed sea interdiction exercises in the Caspian Sea and encouraged leaders there to continue their cooperation with the United States.

These programs are ongoing. For a relatively small investment they are making a huge difference to U.S. and global security.

Wisconsin's Democratic Governor Lowered taxes for people and businesses. Luckily it Won't Affect GOP Campaign of Lies.

Republicans have had to put up with a "tax and spend" liberal governor for nearly a whole decade. So what has Governor Jim Doyle done to improve life in this "anti-business" tax hell?

Enough to force the GOP to come up with lies, stereotypes, liberal caricatures, red herrings and black helicopters in their race for the governorship. What will they say now? Biztime.com:

Wisconsin’s state and local tax ranking has dropped to its lowest level since 1961, according to an annual report released today by the Wisconsin Department of Revenue.

Wisconsin ranks 15th among the states as measured by taxes per $1,000 personal income and ranks 21st on a per capita basis - the lowest since Wisconsin adopted the general sales tax. Wisconsin’s rankings are their lowest in nearly 50 years and have improved for six consecutive years, unprecedented in state history, the report stated.
When considering all revenue sources, Wisconsin ranks 24th per $1,000 personal income and 25th per capita.

“Gov. Doyle held the line on taxes and provided tax cuts that will total $3.7 billion for businesses, middle class families and senior citizens. The governor lowered our state’s tax rankings while providing for priorities like education, health care and economic development.”

It will be interesting to see how the Republican candidates work around this extraordinary news. Oh god it must be killing them right now. But it gets worse...

In addition, a recently released Ernst and Young study prepared for the Council on State Taxation shows Wisconsin’s business tax ranking now ranks 30th – well below the national average.

Fear not, Republicans will just ignore the new findings, lie and count on the media to never ask about it. They know their low information voters won't be the wiser either, or more likely, won't believe a word of it the liberal press.