General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsLook at the Offers. Look at what was never on the table. Real change cannot happen
Last edited Sun Dec 23, 2012, 05:16 PM - Edit history (3)
until we are honest about what we are being fed here. Look at the Offers and how tremendously skewed toward the rich they were, even from Democrats, and even from the start of this process.
This is how thick and ludicrous the corporate propaganda has become, that any Democrat can look at these numbers and claim that we are winning or being honestly represented in any way.
Don't forget that this entire process was rigged from the outset to give us austerity.
That is how it began last spring, and that was the corporatists' goal from the outset: to ensure that austerity and budget slashing are guaranteed as an outcome of this process. That was the purpose of the faux Kabuki Theater debt ceiling Shock Doctrine "crisis" in the first place: to set up a faux crisis and closed door meetings to create a chain of events in which massive budget slashing, or a trigger with slightly less massive budget slashing, were the only possible outcomes.
The ONLY possible outcomes.
It is the stale, familiar, old "lesser of two evils" game by corporatists who own both parties now. Corporate Democrats will ostentatiously withhold a threatened assault on some portion of Social Security or Medicare so that they can point to it and claim to be working hard for us, but the goal all along was to force austerity on America, and they have already guaranteed that.
Look again at the offers from the Democratic side, even after we won this election. They are Absurd. They are so heavily tilted to the rich that this could be a Monty Python skit.
We live in a corporate illusion of representative government. Tell us that these offers make any sense at all from a party that supposedly won this election by a landslide and that pretends to be representing the people. Nothing from Democrats about cutting the MIC. Nothing about cutting corporate welfare. Nothing about cutting the police state. And in a country where Americans overwhelmingly oppose austerity and favor protecting Social Security and Medicare.
Austerity is damaging to economies and deadly to people. Democrats should not be feeding this budget-slashing narrative at all.
Is it time to demand real representation yet?
It is a travesty. Look at the Offers.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=2055232
$160 billion a year in tax cuts for the top 20%
$42 billion a year in tax cuts for the bottom 40%
clearly a plan that favors the rich
= new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight:
NoneDon't highlight anything
5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
Dyedinthewoolliberal
(16,199 posts)what are our options?
leftstreet
(39,862 posts)
That's all I can think of
KansDem
(28,498 posts)The rich caused the deficit; make them pay for it!
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Seriously. Please explain that. Because that is the illusion that we are fed each and every day in our media and from corporate politicians.
"It cannot be any other way."
Why? Look at the numbers. Why on *earth* would Democrats start there? Why is the MIC not even mentioned? Why is corporate welfare absent? Why is Social Security even offered, by Democrats, as part of this discussion?
Because we have a problem. We have a systemic problem of corporate money and power driving policy in Washington, and owning our media, to such an extent that we have been taught not even to question numbers as ludicrous as these.
We suuposedly have two sides bargaining here, but that is the big lie. Shake off the blinders and look at the actual numbers, the actual offers, and what will inevitably be the actual outcome of this process. The entire process was rigged to ensure austerity, against the will of the people.
We have been pulled so far to the right that we look at shit and see sparkly gifts. We are trained to the lesser of two evils game. We have been in the corporate box for so long that we forget what terms that actually represent the people might look like. We don't even blink when they are absent.
Wake up and look at the Offers.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)"Why do you assume that our offers must start where Republicans are?"
...trying to distort where the negotiations started:
Obama offers GOP an ambitious, progressive debt-reduction plan
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021905787
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Why do you start at Step 2? Why do you pretend this started now, instead of last spring, when the trap was set that would require an outcome of either austerity, or slightly less severe austerity?
Why do you never address the reality of the content of the offers we see in print from our Democratic President, over and over again? They are so skewed toward the wealthy that this process of "negotiation" should be a national joke. Look at them.
And why do you ignore the questions about what was never on the table at all, and will never be on the table? Why do you not question why our Democratic President has never, ever mentioned corporate welfare through this process? Why he chose to ensure that the national debates were about Social Security, rather than Military Spending or the growing Police State?
Why do you claim a "debt reduction plan" as a victory, in an economy which has already obliterated its middle class and which hundreds of economists have warned needs stimulus and investment rather than starvation? Why do you avoid the fact of the real outcome here: that we face triggered, across the board budget slashing in January, when what we needed was exactly the opposite?
Nothing will change until Americans look clearly at how the game is rigged from the start in every single negotiation, how the possible options are artificially narrowed from the start, and how every negotiation moves us rightward.
Every. Single. One.
Americans need to learn to think again outside the corporate narrative that has been carefully constructed for us, in which we lap up the options that are presented and express gratitude that the less painful one was implemented.
Look at the Offers. Look at how absolutely ludicrous they are. Look at what is STILL not on the table.
PufPuf23
(9,758 posts)Obama On Charges Of Socialism: 'My Policies Are So Mainstream' I'd Be A 'Moderate Republican' In 1980s
President Barack Obama rejected the notion that his policies rang of socialism on Thursday, arguing that his platform was more similar to a "moderate Republican" of the 1980s and that most Americans realized that.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/12/14/obama-socialism_n_2300998.html
Most of the Nation's problems are the result of "Moderate Republican policies of the 1980s" compounded for the last 30 years.
TreasonousBastard
(43,049 posts)all revenue bills must originate in the House, according to the Constitution, so the President can, and does, propose revenue bills but is limited by what the Houses chooses to do.
So, bargaining is the essence of a president getting anything he wants done, and it would be a complete waste of time for any president to seriously propose any legislation that he knows has no chance of passage.
In this particular case, the House has become pretty much the worst den of assholes in its over two century history so the President's options are even more limited.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Last edited Sun Dec 23, 2012, 07:06 PM - Edit history (1)
We should embrace austerity, narrow the terms of the debate, and produce Offers like the ones below, because the Republicans are crazy?
We should collude in this process, avoid even *mentioning* a panoply of options that might actually help this nation, and produce offers that are THIS heavily skewed toward the rich and that will impose damaging austerity on our economy, just because they would pass?
Look at the offers. Look at them. It is well past time to acknowledge what is really happening here.
TreasonousBastard
(43,049 posts)and the way things have to be done.
We can't wish it away like they do in Wonderland.
socialist_n_TN
(11,481 posts)nm
Dyedinthewoolliberal
(16,199 posts)and to that I have to ask;
how exactly are we going to do that? How are we going to get Congress to end corporate welfare? How are we going to get money out of politics? How are we going to cut the wasteful, bloated, obscenely huge military pork barrel budget?
Are your prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice? I'm not sure I am.......
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Stop celebrating it and pretending it is real representation instead of the scam it really is. Demand a real offer. Demand real policies. Call a rigged game what it is.
This is a ridiculous, cynical game, pretending that it cannot be otherwise. The nation is against austerity. The only ones who keep pushing this shit are the politicians and the oligarchs who benefit from it, yet we get this ridiculous mantra that anything else is just not possible.
If the people rose up and spoke out and quit being apologists for policies that we would never accept from the other side, they would have to listen to us. But over and over and over and over again it is the ones pointing out that we are being shafted, deliberately shafted, who are challenged, rather than the cynical politicians offering the unconscionable and getting away with it merely because they have a "D" after their names. They divide us, and we circle our wagons around our teams and accept the unacceptable, and they laugh.
Stand up TOGETHER and they will have to hear us.
They will have no choice.
___________________
Nothing will change until Americans look clearly at how the game is rigged from the start in every single negotiation, how the possible options are artificially narrowed from the start, and how every negotiation moves us rightward.
Every. Single. One.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)<...>
If the people rose up and quit being apologists for this garbage, they would have to listen to us. But over and over and over and over again it is the ones pointing out that we are being shafted, deliberately shafted, who are challenged and berated and mocked. They divide us, and they laugh.
Which people?
Do you plan on storming the Republicans in Congress?
There was a real offer (http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021905787). A more real offer would have the same chance: none!
"Stand up TOGETHER and they will have to hear us. "
Boehner and the teabaggers in Congress don't give a shit. Do you think the assholes who voted for Mitt Romney are going to "rise up"?
You're yelling rebellion with nothing to back it up.
Congress returns on December 27. What's your plan?
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)ProSense
(116,464 posts)House Republicans pass a progressive proposal?
Get on it!
Hurry!
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022060449
(That's the Democratic-controlled Senate.)
ProSense
(116,464 posts)Now, get on with it. Stand up and demand House Republicans pass a progressive proposal.
You appear to think that it's possible to get such a deal, and you also hate the idea of going over the cliff.
So present your brilliant solution for avoiding either of those alternatives, and it can't be yelling "stand up" on the Internet.
Skittles
(170,639 posts)EXHIBIT A INDEED
JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)Those of us now on Social Security paid high marginal tax rates (on income over a certain amount) from the beginning of our working lives. Those marginal tax rates were reduced bit by bit through the years. Now those who are working and earning generous salaries do not want to do what we did -- pay high marginal rates.
They prefer to cut our Social Security.
Honestly. We did our part for our country. And now they don't want to do theirs.
This is not about working people earning just enough to get by.
This is about people earning big salaries refusing to support their country.
This is about younger people whose parents paid taxes for education, to support public housing, etc. not wanting to pay what their parents paid in taxes.
Romney is an excellent example. I'm sure the Koch Brothers are too.
When I was growing up, the estates of the rich were heavily taxed. Now they aren't.
The tax rates of the poor and middle class improved slightly under Bush. The tax rates of the Romneys and the Koch Brothers improved greatly. That is what needs to be changed.
xtraxritical
(3,576 posts)Voting Democratic is also a good option. If we had had majorities in Congress none of this would be happening in the first place.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)You keep posting the same nonsense over and over:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=2059880
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=2059596
I responded here: http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=2059688
Obama's first offer was strong (http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021905787). He should have stuck with that.
His third offer sucks, and the problem is he is negotiating with Republicans.
Any, and I mean any, deal out of this Congress is going to suck in some ways. You don't have to be happy, but don't pretend there is an alternative.
I mean, you can close your eyes and pretend that Republicans don't exist and that they're not the majority in the House. You can also play a game in your head where you envision them doing anything to make you happy.
There are only three things coming out of this Congress: a half-bad (or half-good, depending on your perspective) deal, a bad deal or nothing.
You can push for nothing if it's bad, but for the rest you have to decide what's good enough to accept. If that's unacceptable, go back to pushing for nothing.
That's the reality.
An offer is not a deal, which means both sides agree.
The first offer was a really good one that was never going be accepted by Boehner. Anything Boehner accepts that's not out desperation is going to suck, and that's why going over the cliff is seen as the better path.
We can go on all day about the logic behind the President's third offer, but the end result is: no deal. Boehner rejected it.
The President knows something you obviously can't wrap your head around: Boehner can't accept any deal that raises taxes on the rich. He doesn't have the votes.
Report: White House Considers Smaller Fiscal Cliff Deal
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022049743
After a dramatic week, Social Security is again off the table
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022052075
"clearly a plan that favors the rich "
P is for propaganda.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=2055558
Obama’s “small deal” could lead to bigger tax increases
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022059947
coalition_unwilling
(14,180 posts)makes it seem as if Chained-CPI is still on the table. WRONG! Obama and we won that pot when the chump Boner folded his hand like the putz we always knew he was.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)nonsensical "austerity" meme is absurd.
The President's original proposal included $425 billion in stimulus and most of the spending cuts are savings. This is why Boehner is having trouble accepting the spending cuts side of the President's offer. Making programs more efficient means savings and spending money wisely helps reduce inefficiency. You can reduce waste and increase spending.
Increasing Medicaid Primary Care Fees for Certain Physicians in 2013 and 2014...
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022047642
Common sense.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Triggered spending cuts go into effect January 1. We get austerity either way, which is how the game was rigged to work. Where are these cuts coming from?
Anyone who believes either party will allow big cuts to the Military Industrial Complex has been smoking something that Obama's DOJ is likely to put you away for.
Stop defending, and look honestly at the Offers. All the contortions in the world do not explain the ludicrous one-sidedness of the actual numbers here, and the they do not explain the complete absence from this debate of what Democrats really should be talking about.
coalition_unwilling
(14,180 posts)little reason to pile on.
As of Jan. 1, the Bush-era tax cuts for the rich are gone to the dustbin of history. Then let the Rape-publi-scum vote against restoring the tax cuts for those making less than $250,000/year. They will soon be on the fast road to historical oblivion.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)We face massive, triggered, across-the-board budget cuts on January 1, by design. Those will hit the poor and the middle class overwhelmingly. And if you believe that either party will allow them to damage the MIC, you have not been listening to President Obama's own Defense Secretary.
And they are *unconscionable* in this economy. Hundreds of economists warned against them. The events in Europe warned against them. But the corporatists in both parties ensured that we go there anyway.
And you still have not addressed the issue of what is not on the table and was never even brought to the table by Democrats, while they ensured that fights over SS would be.
Look at the Offers.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)"We face massive, triggered, across-the-board budget cuts on January 1, by design. "
...against $500 billion in defense cuts and a tax increase on the rich?
You repeat a lot of stuff that makes no sense.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)You know as well as anyone here that neither party will allow that to happen. President Obama's own Secretary of Defense has opined passionately about the need to cut social programs instead of the military. Both sides started working on ways to avoid them right after the trigger was set. And the military said after the Kabuki last year that they were not even going to bother to prepare.
Let's be realistic now.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Seniors are "safe" from a contrived threat to Social Security, an axe that was carefully placed over their heads, twice, by a Democratic President.
Rich people's taxes go up a tiny bit.
And the people get austerity.
It's always better than the alternative. That's the game. But look at what was never on the table, and look at what we actually get.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)...Rich people's taxes go up a tiny bit. "
Rich people's taxes go up more than under Clinton, so that's a good thing.
Still, what else besides nothing do you see happening that would be better?
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Look at the whole package. Do not pretend that the rich will suffer in any real way here.
The plan was to impose over a trillion dollars in austerity on the PEOPLE, and that is what will happen, deal or no deal. Austerity was guaranteed as an outcome. That is the point.
Keep in mind that austerity is not only unnecessary here, it is understood by all honest economists to be a *malignant* move, one that will cause damage to the economy and extend the pain of a nation that is already suffering.
Yet that is how the game was played. That is the outcome that was ensured, from the very beginning, by both sides. Look at the Offers.
Nothing will change until Americans look clearly at how the game is rigged from the start in every single negotiation, how the possible options are artificially narrowed from the start, and how every single negotiation moves us rightward.
Every. Single. One.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)"Compare to Clinton? No, look at the whole package."
I responded. Ending the tax cuts above $250,000 means a slight increase for the top one percent beyond returning to Clinton era rates because there are also tax increases built into the health care law. In fact, it's a very slight increase beyond Clinton's even without the health care law.
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/numbers/displayatab.cfm?Docid=3210&DocTypeID=2
Under Clinton, the top 1 percent paid 33.4 percent; under Bush it paid 29.8 percent; and under Obama it would go back up to 35.3 percent, less than two points than under Clinton.
Meanwhile, under Clinton, the top 0.1 percent paid 36.9 percent; under Bush it paid 32.8 percent; and under Obama it would go back up to 39.7 percent. By contrast, every other group would be paying lower rates under Obama’s proposals than under Clinton. (A table detailing these numbers is right here.)
It’s true that the top 1 percent and the top 0.1 percent would be paying more. But the significance of those hikes shrivel dramatically when you consider how much better these folks have fared over time than everyone else has. The highest end hikes shrivel in the context of the towering size of their after-tax incomes — and the degree to which they dwarf those of everyone else, something that has increased dramatically in recent years.
- more -
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/post/how-obamas-tax-hikes-will-really-impact-the-rich-in-three-easy-charts/2011/03/03/gIQAmbbLIL_blog.html
AnotherMcIntosh
(11,064 posts)Some people will not see (or at least claim to not see) what is directly in front of them.
Austerity, under either of two approaches, is still anti-middle class austerity which will do further damage to the country.
indepat
(20,899 posts)a corporatist-fascist government imnsho in which the typical Democrat has moved right of center, far to the right of Eisenhower, and the Republicans have moved so far right, they are outside the far reaches of the right edge of the bell curve. Democrats could easily trim a trillion dollars or so from the budget over a ten-year period by ending corporate welfare and shearing a bloated MIC budget geared to maintaining global hegemony rather than just providing for our national security. But Democrats are abandoning much of the constitutional mandate to promote the general welfare so the MIC, large corporations, and the most affluent can continue slopping mightily at the public welfare trough. The sacrifice Democrats have proposed is in no way balanced, does not in any manner really address the major drivers of the $15 trillion national debt that has inured since the Gipper foisted his voodoo economics upon us. 
MotherPetrie
(3,145 posts)Because I have yet to see where that is still not in any "compromise" Obama is still willing to make with the Repugs.
Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)And when has Obama claimed that chained CPI is off the table? All I've seen is a plan for stop-gap measures to avoid the fictional fiscal cliff. Do you think that there will be zero negotiations for permanent solutions? I do. And I liked to see the Dems starting point for those negotiations.
byeya
(2,842 posts)ProSense
(116,464 posts)If you cap the cuts at any tax bracket, there is still a benefit for the rich up to that amount.
It's the tax code. Deal with it.
byeya
(2,842 posts)will do OK as they use their capital to seek profits in others countries.
As austerity brings down wages and uses up the last of the workers' savings, we'll see even lower wages in the USA and the ones who control the political economy can come back with their capital and profit here while Americans work for near Chinese wages.
It's happening across the ocean in Europe - it's free to observe.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)expanding Medicaid is not auterity. Increasing taxes on the rich is not austerity.
Savings is, but unless you have a problem with cutting waste, there is your austerity.
I agree that more spending is necessary, but it's simply bullshit to try to frame the proposal at hand and the spending by this administration as European-style austerity.
Skraxx
(3,177 posts)Day one.
Therefore, the goal posts must be moved in a panicked and dramatic way to being OUTRAGED at the thought crime of even discussing possible hypothetical changes to programs during a negotiation process.
Never mind if any cuts actually materialize, doesn't matter. Even if they never do, which it's becoming apparent they won't, it's still, to some, a crime to even discuss certain things hypothetically.
OffWithTheirHeads
(10,337 posts)Only when enough people are willing to take it to the streets and keep it in the streets in spite of the corporate thugs ( see how Occupy was delt with) do we the people gain any ground.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Look at the actual numbers. Look how outrageous they really are. Look at what is *actually* guaranteed as an outcome.
Look at what is purposely left off the table and omitted from the debate.
Look at what passes now for representing our interests.
We will keep hearing that the chocolate ration has been increased. People will not seriously demand change until we look clearly at what the outcome of these games is, every single time, and remind ourselves of what is purposely being omitted from this "debate."
ProSense
(116,464 posts)
OldDem2012
(3,526 posts)...when the GOP Tea-Nazi controlled House passes legislation that includes the elimination of the tax cuts for those earning annual incomes of $250,000, then we may have the start of something real. Even then, the Senate will have to produce their own legislation which will no doubt include protections for the earned benefit programs. At that point, the negotiations between the two houses of Congress will get really serious and we may eventually see a compromise bill that will be placed on the President's desk for consideration. If he likes it, he signs, if he doesn't, it goes back to the drawing board.
Or, the House will fail to act before December 31st and we will all do a Thelma and Louise off the fiscal cliff. The GOP Tea-Nazis will be blamed big-time by the Republican rank and file if they allow this to happen
Until then, it's all nebulous pie in the sky and not worth acting like Chicken Little.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Look at the numbers, from a Democratic President, following a landslide Democratic victory. Look at what is on the table, look at how insanely the numbers are skewed to benefit the wealthy and punish the poor, and, more importantly, look at what is not even mentioned.
We live in a corporate Wonderland, in which every option presented to us will move us further rightward.
Noam Chomsky:
ProSense
(116,464 posts)Look at the numbers, from a Democratic President, following a landslide Democratic victory. Look at what is on the table, look at how insanely the numbers are skewed to benefit the wealthy and punish the poor, and, more importantly, look at what is not even mentioned.
...to distort where the negotiations started:
Obama offers GOP an ambitious, progressive debt-reduction plan
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021905787
You're constantly trying to keep the focus on things that are no longer relevant. Here's the reality:
In January, it only gets worse for Republicans
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022054555
No one knows President Obama's negotiating style.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022058579
Posted by Ezra Klein
<...>
But the most important insight into the White House’s strategic thinking comes when Boehner says to the president, ”I put $800 billion (in tax revenue) on the table. What do I get for that?” Obama’s response is cold and telling. ”You get nothing,” the president said. “I get that for free.”
That, right there, is the central fact of negotiations for the Democrats and the central problem for the Republicans....The White House already has some $700 billion in the bank, as they see it. The reason to negotiate with Boehner is that an agreement with him could, in theory, push that number well above $1 trillion while stabilizing the debt and avoiding the economic pain of falling off the fiscal cliff. But there’s no reason to cut a deal with Boehner in which the White House gives up spending cuts in order to get a tax increase they can have anyway.
<...>
The talk in Washington now is about a “small deal.” That would likely include the Senate tax bill, some policy to turn off at least the defense side of the sequester and a handful of other policies to blunt or delay various parts of the fiscal cliff...Some time in the next month or so, the small deal would pass and the White House would pocket that $700-plus billion in tax revenue...But pressure would quickly mount to strike a larger deal, both because there would be another fiscal cliff coming and because the debt ceiling would need to be raised...The White House would insist that the next deal includes a 1:1 ratio of tax increases — all of which could come through Republican-friendly tax reform — to spending cuts. So a subsequent deal that included $600 billion or $700 billion in spending cuts would also include $600 billion or $700 billion in tax increases, leading to total new revenue in the range of $1.2 trillion to $1.4 trillion.
<...>
All of which is to say, if Boehner had taken the White House’s deal in 2011, he could’ve stopped the tax increase at $800 billion. If he took their most recent deal, he could stop it at $1.2 trillion. But if he insists on adding another round to the negotiations — one that will likely come after the White House pockets $700 billion in tax increases — then any deal in which gets the entitlement cuts he wants is going to mean a deal in which he accepts even more tax increases than the White House is currently demanding.
Today, Boehner wishes he’d taken the deal the president offered him in 2011. A year from now, he might wish he’d taken the deal the president offered him in 2012.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/12/22/obamas-small-deal-could-lead-to-bigger-tax-increases/
byeya
(2,842 posts)It'll bring another recession here too with another upward redistribution of wealth.
You're feeling poorer now? Wait til the austerity and "shared" sacrifice kicks in.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)When you let corporate morality into governments and give it power, it kills by the millions. People in other countries know this. Americans are just beginning to learn.
We are heading down a deadly serious path.
Also Sabrina's excellent post: http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=2053255
JEB
(4,748 posts)Last edited Sun Dec 23, 2012, 03:38 PM - Edit history (1)
should be working to expand and strengthen effective programs like SS, Medicaid, Medicare. How can anybody honestly want no cuts to the DoD, the most wasteful, corrupt, overfunded part of our Government? We are letting John Birchers dictate the agenda.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)it's hard not to see how ridiculous it is, and how rigged the game is, even from our side.
We have a problem, and it will persist for as long as we tolerate it.
Tierra_y_Libertad
(50,414 posts)woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Bookmarking it now.
Thank you.
zeemike
(18,998 posts)Good cop puts his arm around your shoulder and says not to worry cause he is there to protect you.
Bad cop says he wants murder one against you and life in the slammer...good cop says no way...he will plead to a misdemeanor...then bad cop says he wants the death penalty and good cop sighs and tells us all we can do is plead to manslaughter....and so it goes till you are in jail for something that was not of your doing.
What you don't realize is both cops work for the same people.
I believe Obama is a real person...and wants and perhaps even believes he is working for us....but that is a fantasy, when you have so much money involved in politics that it is money that rules and the people that have the most money call the shots...and Obama is working for them whether he knows it or not...and I suspect he has learned that over the last 4 years.
There is only one way out of this, and that is to starve the beast...and the cor[orate structure is the beast....and while it is on a diet, cause a political revolution where non political candidates are elected to congress...hopefully they will resist being bought out.
And all of this takes unity of purpose and connections and organization.
And what we face is a system that is expert by now in dividing us and keeping us divided and fighting amongst ourselves, and providing us with one distraction after the other.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)look at the Offers, and be clear about what is really going on here.
backscatter712
(26,357 posts)woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Last edited Sun Dec 23, 2012, 06:41 PM - Edit history (1)
from apologists for policies that cause real despair.
Lack of empathy and right-wing policies go together, as they always have. We see that every single day.
backscatter712
(26,357 posts)Isn't that how this works? You bash me, I bash back, the whole thread goes diagonal?
That game bores me.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Last edited Sun Dec 23, 2012, 07:03 PM - Edit history (1)
with an observation on its content, and you accuse me of flaming you?
Is that the same sort of logic that claims Obama didn't put SS on the table first?
It's like being in Wonderland sometimes, around here.
byeya
(2,842 posts)to allow the validity of the debt of the United States to be put into question.
There's an answer to those who question a president's ability to function without benefit of a debt ceiling law.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022060906
Wouldn't want anyone to miss this.
sulphurdunn
(6,891 posts)was a four party contest. Eugene V. Debs, the Socialist Party candidate won 6% of the popular vote. In 1918 he was sentenced to ten years in prison for violation of the unconstitutional Sedition Act. While serving time he received 4% of the popular vote in the 1920 presidential election. By 1926 1,000 socialists had been elected to state legislatures. Today Bernie Sanders is the only socialist, but there is a fifth column of socialist sympathizers within the Democratic Party of perhaps 90 House Members. It's simple really, either socialists or corporatists will control the Democratic Party in our present duopoly. I'm for the socialists. What say you?
byeya
(2,842 posts)Debs was jailed for years for objecting to US involvement in WW1, a very Jeffersonian stand.
Wilson did as much to deny contitutional rights during this period as any president has.
There were police roundups of men going about their business under the pretext of looking for "slackers"
Wilson was OK with all the mob violence he unleashed.
sulphurdunn
(6,891 posts)it's the socialists.
NoOneMan
(4,795 posts)Yeah, but strong economies are more deadly to people. A worldwide slowdown may be the best thing for our ecological system that our lives depend upon.
In any case, I agree with the argument you make in the context of continuing mindless production. Politics are increasingly irrelevant. You will not find answers there.
stupidicus
(2,570 posts)that has existed for a very long time now in DC.
There appears to be better ways of skinning this cat that really has no business on the menu to begin with http://strengthensocialsecurity.org/colacut that appears to be being used as much as a distraction as anything else, to keep the focus off of the bigger picture you're addressing here.
we see a great deal of denial on the part of many that their dem leaders have any role whatsoever in the screwing we'll all be taking as a result of the currect class of dems not collectively resembling that of our fathers, mothers, etc knew and supported, much like say the republicans are now far removed from this http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=republican%20party%20platform%20of%201956&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&ved=0CDQQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.presidency.ucsb.edu%2Fws%2Findex.php%3Fpid%3D25838&ei=fHLXUMPnOsLNrQGM-4CIAw&usg=AFQjCNGRPsHP6839164kqHxhwTDNN1Kx_Q&bvm=bv.1355534169,d.aWM not that you need go back that far for either case to see the concerns and policy pursuits weighted towards the masses as opposed to the rich asses.
"Too many of us have been interested in defending programs as written in 1938″ BHO - 2006
The new, "New Deal" is by design an undermining of the old one imo as well.
good post
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Also, defending a long-term strategy for cutting these safety nets: "This is not a bloodless process."
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x1540315
Thank you for clarity.
Evergreen Emerald
(13,096 posts)He promised SS was not on the table. And it is--simply for the sake of compromise--not for the good of the nation. There is no reason to take money from seniors to allow the rich continued economic breaks.
And, if you mention this truth on DU, you are demonized.
JEB
(4,748 posts)with terrorists. Even drunk crybaby terrorists.
Egalitarian Thug
(12,448 posts)and employed agents to help me — has ever lost money by underestimating the intelligence of the great masses of the plain people. Nor has anyone ever lost public office thereby.”
Mencken wrote that in 1926. Nothing much has changed since then.
byeya
(2,842 posts)worrying if that medical condition you've been putting off having a doctor look at(expensive and a day without pay) will turn out to be bankrupting; politicians who "forget" their campaign promises; and the general hassle of making a living and caring for the kids doesn't leave time to ferret out the truth when Fox, NBC, CNN, The Washington Post, etc are dominating the political analysis space.
snot
(11,629 posts)Things like, not bailing out Goldman. Prosecuting bankers. Stimulus big enough to do the job, given to the people who most need and deserve it. Protecting instead of eviscerating our civil rights. And many, many other things, in many areas.
Republicans have no problem squawking about what they want, regardless of whether it's "realistic." Even if we accept that we'll have to compromise from time to time, it's "Negotiation 101" that we MUST keep making the case for what's right.
But as things are now, it's left to just a handful of people to do that; and those people are vilified even on DU.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)and corporate lies and propaganda are ubiquitous as a result, down to discussion boards like this.
It is like a drumbeat. North Korea has nothing on the US when it comes to stagecraft.
We are in deep, deep shit in this country. We are bought and sold.
Demeter
(85,373 posts)We need more like this, and like you, wmws!
grahamhgreen
(15,741 posts)Why is Social Security in ALL of Obama's offers, when it ADDS NOTHING to the deficit???
Seriously, does anyone have any facts coming out of the White House (not speculation from pundits) to dispute this?
Call the White House 202-456-1111, and your rep (202) 224-3121! Tell them not cuts to Social Security, it does not add one nickel to the deficit!
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)Nobody ever answers that question, do they?
Thank you.
mgraveman
(13 posts)SSI does add to the deficit, since the "trust fund" is comprised of intergovernment loans. It's like me borrowing $20 from my wife who takes it as a cash advance on the credit card and saying that my spending of the $20 doesn't increase our household deficit.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/merrillmatthews/2011/07/13/what-happened-to-the-2-6-trillion-social-security-trust-fund/2/
SSI has been mostly self funding through the years, but the money collected has been spent for other things. It is not currently self funding and projections show it will continue NOT to self fund until most of the boomers are dead unless we have a tax increase. If you want to be mad at someone about this you should look up WHO raided the SSI fund. Hint: we elected them.
mgraveman
(13 posts)The way I see it we have two options long term - either raise taxes or cut spending. The plans presented by both sides are just posturing. Neither plan comes close to solving the goal that it should, which is a meaningful reduction in deficits. Obama should be asking for an increase in capital gains taxes but he isn't. Instead he wants a 4.9% increase on incomes over 250k. It's a drop in the bucket, and chasing earned income is a losing battle, because it disincentives work.
IMHO, the only to float this ship that is our government is comprehensive spending cuts or tax increases on every man, woman, and child here. Quite honestly, the plan closest to approaching this is the fiscal cliff itself. It features tax increases on the rich and everyone else and big spending cuts too. The only thing missing is an increase on capital gains.