Occupy Wall Street, Like the Left, is Perpetually Stuck in 1968
moorehn:
“The truth of America is understood only when you listen to voices in our impoverished rural enclaves, prisons and the urban slums, when you hear the words of our unemployed, those who have lost their homes or cannot pay their medical bills, our elderly and our children, especially the quarter of the nation’s children who depend on food stamps to eat, and all who are marginalized. There is more reality expressed about the American experience by the debt-burdened young men and women protesting in the parks than by all the chatter of the well-paid pundits and experts that pollutes the airwaves. What kind of nation is it that spends far more to kill enemy combatants and Afghan and Iraqi civilians than it does to help its own citizens who live below the poverty line? What kind of nation is it that permits corporations to hold sick children hostage while their parents frantically bankrupt themselves to save their sons and daughters? What kind of nation is it that tosses its mentally ill onto urban heating grates? What kind of nation is it that abandons its unemployed while it loots its treasury on behalf of speculators? What kind of nation is it that ignores due process to torture and assassinate its own citizens? What kind of nation is it that refuses to halt the destruction of the ecosystem by the fossil fuel industry, dooming our children and our children’s children?”
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For those who are wondering why there are protests across the the country, these are good reasons why people feel disenfranchised and angry.
Chris Hedges (via azspot)
Nobody denies that there are big and systemic problems in our country today.
But that quote does way too far, and is full of emotionally charged words backed by an anti-American viewpoint espoused by a known anti-American Leftist, Chris Hedges. It’s a big bowl of “we suck”.
And to the extent any of it is even close to true, most of those problems can be blamed squarely on government intervention in places it either doesn’t belong, or doesn’t understand well enough to affect change. The Left continually refuses to accept this essential fact, and stubbornly continues to believe — despite decades of contrary evidence — that government does everything well, and is the right and proper solution for every problem.
Government is more often the cause of our problems than the solution to our problems.
Again, we get that there are problems in our country today, and we get that young people face huge obstacles, we get that $140K of student loans for an Anthropology degree is criminal, we get that Wall Street has some nefarious characters, we get all of that.
But when looking for solutions, you have to identify the major problem first, and the major problem behind most of that rant up there is too much government, screwing up the economy and killing jobs and funneling cash to connected friends of government. That’s how we got here, and that’s what needs addressing to fix it.
President Obama has Tour Buses Flown to Stump Speeches
virtualanarchy:
by Ben Howe
President Obama has been touring all over the midwest these past few weeks, giving speeches to crowds of fans, anxious to hear what’s next on his agenda. One could be forgiven for believing that these are less about pushing the president’s current agenda, and more about launching the reelection campaign, however this is a charge that the administration adamantly denies.
But there is a very simple reason that this is viewed as more of a campaign effort. Boasting bulletproof windows, five inch thick doors, and it’s own oxygen supply, the President has made the rounds for these speeches in a multi-million dollar bus, dubbed “The Beast” by it’s critics. There’s been no shortage of opinions from people and pundits on this bus and how having the President tour around the midwest in a caravan of cars and seated on a tour bus sends the message that he is on the campaign trail and using taxpayer dollars to do it.
It appears however, that this might not be the case. According to some sources he hasn’t really been riding these buses much at all. They say, he’s been flying them.
Apparently President Obama only rode the buses for a couple of miles at a time, spending the rest of the time flying from community to community in Air Force One. What’s more, the buses were flown from stop to stop as well. It’s normal practice for the President’s entire motorcade to be loaded up on cargo planes and flown from destination to destination. The buses were just a new part of that motorcade.
But why wouldn’t the presidential limousine have sufficed? Or one of the other armored vehicles that routinely travel with the President? Apparently because the President wanted the imagery of a bus. And buses are what he got.
So good news America! If these reports are true, then not only do you get the pleasure of having a $1.1 million dollar bus carting the President around to “enlist” voters to fight for his reelection, but you get to marvel at the hypocrisy of an administration hell bent on destroying industries with carbon footprints too large for comfort, while they themselves are flying entire caravans of SUVs and buses in giant 747s flanked by fighter jets.
All so the president can travel a couple of miles per stop with the image that he’s on the ground with the people when in reality, he couldn’t be more detached from them, their problems, or this continually declining economy. You couldn’t ask for a better metaphor.
This is pretty damn funny, or else its really sad. Kinda depends on how you want to look at it.
Obama promised so much to so many but has delivered so little to so few. This will be his legacy.
(via thedailyfiona)
Raising Taxes Will NOT Help the Deficit
Tax revenues are mainly a function of GDP, and almost independent of tax rates (with conditions, e.g., existing rates are not uber-low). If somebody has evidence that proves that statement wrong, I’d like to see it.
So assuming that premise is factual why do people who should know better, like David Stockman, continue to confuse the public about this issue? I.e, since higher tax rates WILL hurt economic growth, how is it a good idea to raise tax rates in order to achieve the goal of lowering deficits by increasing government revenue? How can that possibly work?
You must grow the economy to increase government revenues and therefore help with deficits. Raising taxes will NOT grow the economy. The way to grow the economy is to CUT tax rates.
Again, if somebody has evidence to the contrary, I’d like to see it. I’m open to discussion on this point, but the reading I’ve done points to this conclusion.
We need to understand what are, and what are not, the relevant factors in a complicated system like this, so that we change the right ones and make it better instead of worse. This is rule #2 of problem solving, right after defining the problem itself.
