How Can the World's Richest Country Let Children Go Hungry? 6 Tricks Corporate Elites Use

[xchrom]

http://www.alternet.org/economy/153531/how_can_the_world%27s_richest_country_let_children_go_hungry_6_tricks_corporate_elites_use_to_hoard_all_the_wealth/

How Can the World's Richest Country Let Children Go Hungry? 6 Tricks Corporate Elites Use to Hoard All the Wealth

'Squeezed by rising living costs, a record number of Americans, nearly 1 in 2, have fallen into poverty or are scraping by on earnings that classify them as low income.'

“Study: 1 in 5 American children lives in poverty."

“In 2010, 17.2 million households, 14.5 percent of households (approximately one in seven), were food insecure, the highest number ever recorded in the United

States.”

What’s going on here? Aren't we the richest country on earth?

Day in and day out we are told that if the government doesn’t tighten its belt, we’re all headed for debtor’s prison. Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are under attack. State budgets are in disarray. Teachers and firemen are getting canned. Public services are slashed. This is the new America and we'd better get used to it, the pundits proclaim. You would think we were a poor country.

But we’re not. We’re filthy rich, but the money is hidden away by the 1 percent while poverty rises all around. Here’s why.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

1. I love you, xchrom. Great post.

[xchrom]

4. Aw thanks. Back atchya. Nt

[Starry Messenger]

2. k&r

[RKP5637]

3. Yep, "The richest country on earth" doesn't include the 99%, especially not when approx.

50% of the entire country now lives below or near poverty. It's like when the stock market goes up and people cheer thinking that means more jobs, whatever ... all it means is some people holding the wealth of the country got richer.

Our economic system is obsolete ... it rewards cheating, lying, greed, criminal activities and some of the most despicable traits of mankind.

I have no idea how it's going to be cleaned up and improved. We have a bought gov. and those holding all the wealth aren't going to do anything to improve the situation in this country and a declining standard of living for many.

One way is for OWS to get stronger and stronger.

[Zalatix]

5. Because the Plutocrats want to kill off the poor.

Occam's Razor simply fails to deliver any credible explanation that falls short of this.

This is not being done for the sake of Capitalism. This is a quiet, passive attempt at mass extermination.

Yes, this is hard to believe, but if you go with that premise you can predict everything that comes next, and you won't ever be surprised again. As I said, it's a classic case of Occam's Razor fail.

[greytdemocrat]

6. Your post is asinine.

[Zalatix]

8. Your "reasoning" is short-sighted.

Welfare cuts. Job cuts. Proposed cuts to Social Security, school meal programs, and every OTHER type of safety net designed to take care of the poor. Where in there do you see proof that my claim is asinine? Come on, you made the claim, back it up.

You have people being cut off from organ transplant lists in Arizona and food banks overwhelmed by needy people, and welfare being cut in Michigan and proposed cuts everywhere else. Occam's Razor doesn't even cut this. This isn't negligence. This is totally consistent with a slow systematic extermination.

Every basic program or political move that could be made to help the poor and unemployed are being opposed by the Plutocracy: unemployment extensions, Medicaid, even mercury pollution controls. Workplace safety laws are always under attack.

Asinine? You gotta be kidding me. You don't even have a ghost of an argument - I have mountains of evidence for mine.

[CTyankee]

10. I think capitalists call this "wringing the excess out of the system." Or, if you will,

it is the Dickensian "Let them die, then, and decrease the excess population."

[Zalatix]

11. Exactly. It isn't like this is the first time this has happened.

Social Darwinism, Germany's "Useless Eaters" concept, heck this "reduce the excess population" meme goes all the way back to the days of the Roman Empire.

[CTyankee]

16. I just read somewhere that income inequality was less than ours in the Roman Empire!

I didn't see just where in the Roman Empire they were talking about but it's that bad...

This is getting scary...

[Zalatix]

18. You read Robert Reich's conspiracy theory, didn't ya?

I posted the link here. It's a frightening read, and his logic is utterly unassailable.

[CTyankee]

34. I can't recall seeing it, altho I read Reich as regularly as possible.

Can you send me the link? Thanks...

Oops! I see it further down...sorry...

[CTyankee]

36. I need help in knowing how to respond to your PM! I wanted to thank you!

I can't figure out where is the "reply" button on PMs...ack...

[Zalatix]

37. Reply link should be on the bottom right of all PM boxes! hope it helps :)

[CTyankee]

39. Great...why didn't I go further into this???

Thank you kindly!

[arbusto_baboso]

31. The problem is that this frequently backfires on the ultra-wealthy.

Remember how the Renaissance started? Yup, the Black Plague.

The Plague killed off huge number of "undesireables" but it also killed off the elite (their money couldn't save them then, and it won't save them from the plagues that are coming in future, or from the effects of global warming...).

In fact, such huge numbers of people were killed off, that skilled laborers were in short supply. The elite had little power to refuse demands for higher wages, and even less of that power once the trade guilds formed. Thus, a strong merchant middle class was born.

Too bad today's elite are too goddamned stupid to see where their current course might lead them...

[TBF]

9. lol - ridiculous conspiracy theories are unnecessary

rich folks are just not that into us

they pocket whatever money they get and if we don't tax them we have to deal with the realities of the budget

this is capitalism - no fancy conspiracy theories needed

[Zalatix]

12. See post #10 and #11

This is not the first time in history we've seen what I am saying is happening.

[TBF]

13. I do think people will die but I don't think they plan that -

they just don't care. I don't think they even think about it ... they just do their thing & put away their money and enjoy their luxuries.

[Zalatix]

15. Robert Reich explains how Occam's Razor fails to cut this.

Read that article and see how he explains this.
All explanations of negligence hits a self-contradicting snag, and he shows them up.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-reich/republicans-social-darwinism_b_1124379.html

Listen to today's Republican debates and you hear a continuous regurgitation of Sumner. "Civilization has a simple choice," Sumner wrote in the 1880s. It's either "liberty, inequality, survival of the fittest," or "not-liberty, equality, survival of the unfittest. The former carries society forward and favors all its best members; the latter carries society downwards and favors all its worst members."

Sound familiar?

[TBF]

19. I do like Reich and will read this -

I can see republicans wanting to get rid of "undesirables" - I think they would gladly rid the country of any minorities and non-Christians. That is where Ron Paul comes in - folks see his anti-war stance and think they might like to hear more about him. The "more" of course is his pining for an earlier time - there's enough of his writing out there that it will scare the crap out of you if you really look seriously at him.

I don't think the very wealthy think much about this though (except where there is overlap - such as the Koch republicans). The CEO's, the top investment bankers - I don't think they care about that at all. But they also will step over a dead protestor in the street to get to their desk - no doubt about that.

[RKP5637]

28. Thanks for this link! What you've said makes a lot of sense to me. It's planned

neglect, letting many in a civilization die through neglect of the civilization.

It's painfully obvious if one stops and looks around at what is occurring. ... problem is, many don't climb out of their box to see what's really occurring keeping their head stuck in the sand.

[Zalatix]

35. As one other poster put it elsewhere, it's too terrible to contemplate.

People never want to believe other human beings can be that malicious. There are no cattle cars or smallpox blankets being handed out, so it has to be simple negligence.

Problem is, how many times does negligence have to keep happening before it's seen for what it is?

[closeupready]

21. Thank you - that's what I was going to say.

+1000 They don't care, that really is the truth. They don't care that children are hungry or that old people are going to freeze to death.

They. Don't. Care.

[Zalatix]

25. Please read what Robert Reich has to say.

Excerpt:

Other Republican hopefuls also fit Sumner's mold. Ron Paul, who favors repeal of Obama's healthcare plan, was asked at a Republican debate in September what medical response he'd recommend if a young man who had decided not to buy health insurance were to go into a coma. Paul's response: "That's what freedom is all about: taking your own risks." The Republican crowd cheered.

In other words, if the young man died for lack of health insurance, he was responsible. Survival of the fittest.

[TBF]

26. That's how I see it.

I think you have to be a bit of a sociopath to be a very successful capitalist.

The republicans are a different matter - many of them would gladly rid their neighborhoods of all non-Christians, etc...

The point being that the very rich - the top 1% - are not always republicans, and many republicans have fewer resources than many of us.

That's where it gets difficult ... if everyone voted their pocketbook we wouldn't have these issues.

[Zalatix]

27. Ask yourself this

If the point of Conservatism is to weed out the poor quietly, without fomenting a mass rebellion, what would they do? Compare this to what is happening now.

Also, if the problem is that the rich don't care, this is negligence. How many times does an act of negligence have to keep getting committed at the cost of lives, before it is counted as malice?

[Remember Me]

33. ah, yes, malice

What's that old sayng -- "Once is a mistake, twice is a pattern."

[Bluenorthwest]

7. Christian leadership, it shines, their Sanctity and Holy nature, it shines!

Yes, when some gasbag politician tells me that they oppose equal rights due to their Christianity, I do in fact think of words of the Christ they mention, who said that what is done to the least among us, including children, is done directly to him. So, those 'Christians' who are shouting Sanctity are also letting Jesus go hungry, keeping him in prison untended, letting him go without health care when sick. In short, I look at the nation these 'Christian Leaders' make and I see that they hold the Christ himself in contempt.

[dawg]

17. This is what I keep trying to emphasize.

Usually, if I start a thread about this, it sinks like a stone.

But this is a rich country - richer than it has ever been! Look around. See the mansions. See the fancy imported cars. See all the shiny upscale stores.

The notion that we need to "tighten our belts" and trim our social spending is ridiculous.

The government may be short on money, but the nation itself is flush with cash. So much cash that they don't even know what to do with it. That's why they are still willing to buy 10-year treasuries at 2% and Japanese sovereign debt yielding even less. That's why corporations are piling up billions of dollars in cash on their balance sheets.

The real estate bubble was allowed to inflate because rich people had nothing to do with all their cash so Wall Street found somewhere for them to put it - securitized mortgages. The lending standards fell because there was so much cash to invest that there weren't enough good mortgages to soak it all up.

And with all this wealth, they are telling us we must accept Medicare cuts, Social Security cuts, worsening infrastructure, fewer police, firefighters and teachers. Hell, they're even trying to take the damn post office away.

This is all bullshit, and anyone paying the least little bit of attention should realize that.

Our social spending as a percent of gdp is near the bottom of the 30 OECD nations. We are comparable to South Korea and Mexico.

But so many, even among Democrats, are willing to accept this with a "tut, tut .... times have changed ... everything is different now and we have to deal with reality".

But reality is that this descent into third-world status is something that we, as a country, are choosing to do to ourselves. It is totally unnecessary.

[xchrom]

20. +1

[closeupready]

22. This post is really a terrific summation of where we are in America today.

And where we are going to go, all-in. Brilliant.

[dawg]

24. Thank you.

[TBF]

23. Agree - and this is where smart taxation comes in -

inheritance tax, capital gains, payroll tax (which should be adjusted so the wealthy pay on all their income - not just the first 100K) ...

the reason the repubs loved GW so much is that he cut their capital gains taxes substantially and that all needs to be reversed imo

[RKP5637]

30. +1000 +++ n/t

[woo me with science]

32. Thank you.

Please keep reposting this as an OP. It needs to be seen, over and over again, until it sinks in.

Thank you.

[sarcasmo]

38. Which is why I often post

Worst industrialized nation on the Planet.

[Agony]

41. Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

to all of what you said.

as to this, ----> "Usually, if I start a thread about this, it sinks like a stone." don't feel all alone

If I start a conversation about this with coworkers or friends I am immediately labeled as negative and depressing...

Thanks for this... at least here, occasionally, I don't feel so lost in the March of the Stupid People.

Cheers,
Agony

[Stuart G]

29. Thanks For Posting, k and r..nt

[WillyT]

40. K & R !!!

:kick:

[Agony]

42. Kick + Rec

Happy Solstice! (dire crap aside)

Cheers,
Agony