January 31, 2015

Profits vs. Wages

January 31, 2015

Bernie Sanders Shows How Reagan Helped Destroy The Middle Class

The chart starts by showing that in the decades after World War II, the bottom 90 percent of the country captured most of the growth in income during rebounds from tough times. But then came the Reagan era, and what George H. W. Bush once dubbed "voodoo economics." After Reagan implemented his policies, the top 10 percent grabbed nearly 80 percent of the growth in incomes coming out of the oil crises of the late '70s.


"Whoa! What happens in 1982?" Sanders said, noting the dramatic reversal in his diagram. "Well, Ronald Reagan is president, and the good news is we are into trickle-down economics."

The socialist Democrat is certainly aware that other factors such as technology, the waning of the union movement and globalization all played their roles, but his data makes for an awfully stark portrait.

"Frankly, this is a metaphor," Sanders said. "This is an example of exactly what trickle-down economics is all about."


VIDEO (Chart Included) & MORE:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/30/ronald-reagan-middle-class_n_6578130.html?utm_hp_ref=politics

January 31, 2015

(I am SO disappointed) Michelle Obama gives 'American Sniper' two thumbs up

Michelle Obama gives 'American Sniper' two thumbs up
Ann Oldenburg, USA TODAY 2:40 p.m. EST January 30, 2015


WASHINGTON — Michelle Obama had high praise for American Sniper on Friday morning.

Not from a critical standpoint, per se, but for the film's complex portrayal of veteran Chris Kyle.

The first lady was unveiling a program designed to recognize film and TV content that accurately portrays veterans and military families called 6 Certified, part of a national veteran campaign, Got Your 6, which is a military term meaning, "I've got your back."

...........

"I know there have been critics," said Mrs. Obama of Sniper. "But more often than not, this film touches on many of the emotions and experiences I have heard first-hand from military families over these past few years. This movie reflects those wrenching stories I've heard, the complex journeys that our men and women in uniform endure, the complicated world, the decisions they are tasked with every day, the stresses of balancing love of family with love of country, and the challenges of transitioning back home."


(more)
http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/movies/2015/01/30/michelle-obama-bradley-cooper-veterans-american-sniper-6/22591537/



I respectfully submit this letter to FLOTUS:
And ANYONE Else Who Supports This Movie:
PLEASE read here:
http://www.adc.org/fileadmin/ADC/Pdfs/Cooper_ADC_AmericanSniper_Letter.pdf

Or Better Yet, Do What mr peter did
READ THE BOOK (this is NO hero).

also:
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/01/american-sniper-anti-muslim-threats-skyrocket-in-wake-of-films-release/
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/24/american-sniper-anti-muslim-threats_n_6537950.html
http://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-30972690

January 31, 2015

Why Mitt Backed Out - His $$$ Said: "We need to support someone else.”

“The campaign to deny Mr. Romney another chance began almost immediately after he mused to donors at a Friday get-together in New York City on Jan. 9 that he was open to the possibility of another run. By that Sunday afternoon, William Oberndorf, a prominent California investor who supported Mr. Romney in both of his previous presidential campaigns, had emailed a group of 52 powerful Republicans, including former Secretary of State George Shultz, the investor Charles Schwab, Gov. Bruce Rauner of Illinois and the Michigan billionaire Betsy DeVos with a blunt message: we need to support someone else.”
http://politicalwire.com/2015/01/31/romney-backed/

:large

January 31, 2015

Working Mom On Food Stamps Hits Back At Scott Walker’s Plan To Drug Test Her

“This is not about the workers,” she told ThinkProgress. “This is about Governor Walker playing to the dog whistle politics of the worst of his base as he follows his presidential aspirations.”

...........

“For Governor Walker to put another barrier in front of us is like saying we’re guilty, but we’re not guilty,” Smith told ThinkProgress. “It’s already hard to go down there and file for government assistance. We have to report in every day, fill out papers. Now I have to take the time out of my busy schedule to take a drug test? Come on!”

Epps-Addison, who depended on food stamps when she began law school at the start of the Great Recession in 2008, echoed Smith’s difficult experience in signing up for public benefits.

“There were times even I couldn’t navigate the process, as a law student with a college degree,” she said. “The system is set up to disempower people and make them frustrated enough to give up before receiving the help they need.”

.....................

“I’m willing to work. I’m not lazy at all,” she said. “But the jobs we can get are horrible, low pay, and we can’t get the hours we need. As a parent, it just sucks. I want things that are healthy for her, but the fruits and vegetables she needs to grow as young child are expensive.”


http://thinkprogress.org/election/2015/01/30/3617646/working-mom-food-stamps-hits-back-scott-walkers-plan-drug-test/

January 31, 2015

Jeb ‘Put Me Through Hell’ Michael Schiavo knows what Jeb Bush can do with executive power.

Oct. 20, 2003: Gov. Bush files HB 35E, which would become known as “Terri’s Law," after 8 p.m. It would give the governor the right to issue a one-time stay in a case the facts of which matched identically Terri Schiavo’s. The House passed it within two hours by a nearly 3-1 margin. The Senate passed it by a similar margin the next day.




Jeb ‘Put Me
Through Hell’
Michael Schiavo knows as well as anyone what Jeb Bush can do with executive power. He thinks you ought to know too.
By MICHAEL KRUSE January 29, 2015


CLEARWATER, Fla.—Sitting recently on his brick back patio here, Michael Schiavo called Jeb Bush a vindictive, untrustworthy coward.

For years, the self-described “average Joe” felt harassed, targeted and tormented by the most important person in the state.

“It was a living hell,” he said, “and I blame him.”

Michael Schiavo was the husband of Terri Schiavo, the brain-dead woman from the Tampa Bay area who ended up at the center of one of the most contentious, drawn-out conflicts in the history of America’s culture wars. The fight over her death lasted almost a decade. It started as a private legal back-and-forth between her husband and her parents. Before it ended, it moved from circuit courts to district courts to state courts to federal courts, to the U.S. Supreme Court, from the state legislature in Tallahassee to Congress in Washington. The president got involved. So did the pope.

But it never would have become what it became if not for the dogged intervention of the governor of Florida at the time, the second son of the 41st president, the younger brother of the 43rd, the man who sits near the top of the extended early list of likely 2016 Republican presidential candidates. On sustained, concentrated display, seen in thousands of pages of court records and hundreds of emails he sent, was Jeb the converted Catholic, Jeb the pro-life conservative, Jeb the hands-on workaholic, Jeb the all-hours emailer—confident, competitive, powerful, obstinate Jeb. Longtime watchers of John Ellis Bush say what he did throughout the Terri Schiavo case demonstrates how he would operate in the Oval Office. They say it’s the Jebbest thing Jeb’s ever done.

The case showed he “will pursue whatever he thinks is right, virtually forever,” said Aubrey Jewett, a political science professor at the University of Central Florida. “It’s a theme of Jeb’s governorship: He really pushed executive power to the limits.”

..........................

Read more: (6 pages, well worth the read)
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/01/jeb-bush-terri-schiavo-114730.html#ixzz3QPW7xxz9

January 30, 2015

The Boehner-Bibi Backfire-Eugene Robinson: Note to all foreign leaders-We have 1 president at a time

The Boehner-Bibi Backfire

Posted on Jan 30, 2015

By Eugene Robinson

Note to all foreign leaders: We have one president at a time. Americans respected this fact when George W. Bush was president, for better or worse. And we respect it now.

The speech episode borders on farce, but the larger debate over Iran’s nuclear ambitions could not be more serious. The central issue is whether a negotiated deal will leave Iran with the theoretical capability to build a nuclear bomb if it were to decide to do so. No amount of diplomatic legerdemain, it seems to me, can avoid answering this question with a simple yes or no.

If you say no, as Netanyahu does, then Iran must be stripped of all ability to enrich uranium. It is easy to understand why the Israeli government sees a nuclear-capable Iran as an existential threat—and also worries that other regional powers concerned about Iran’s growing influence, such as Saudi Arabia, might decide that they, too, need to get into the nuclear game.

Iran insists, however, that it has the right to a peaceful nuclear program. The government in Tehran is unlikely to give up that right but may be willing to limit itself to low-grade enrichment that produces material incapable of being used in a bomb. At least some infrastructure for high-grade enrichment would remain, however—and so would some risk of an eventual Iranian bomb.

Is this good enough? If the alternative is war with Iran, it may have to be.




the rest:
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_boehner-bibi_backfire_20150130

January 30, 2015

MATT TAIBI: While Deflategate and Chaitgate Rage, America Quietly Robs Its Elderly

While Deflategate and Chaitgate Rage, America Quietly Robs Its Elderly

A wild new report on the wide-scale scamming of ordinary investors has arrived

By Matt Taibbi | January 29, 2015


Taibbi reports on a memo from Jason Furman, Chairman of President Obama's Council of Economic Advisors, detailing the stings and errors average investors fall prey to from their brokers.

"For instance," Taibbi writes,



Taibbi continues:




MORE:
via: http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2015/01/stings-and-errors-of-outrageous-brokers.html
Bloomberg has more details: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-01-22/white-house-aide-calls-for-stricter-broker-rules-on-401-k-plans
Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/while-deflategate-and-chaitgate-rage-america-quietly-robs-its-elderly-20150129#ixzz3QJZJAnFY
Follow us: @rollingstone on Twitter | RollingStone on Facebook

January 30, 2015

Sen. Sanders Presents $1 Trillion Infrastructure Bill as Job Creator

Sanders says 13 million jobs could be created if Congress taxed the wealthy and corporate tax havens, but taxing the wealthy is a non-starter for Republicans - January 29, 2015






In Washington, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders is trying to do something about it.

BERNIE SANDERS, U.S. SENATOR (I-VT): And what I could tell you: if you turn your back on infrastructure and you don't invest, do you know what happens? It gets worse. It doesn't get better all by itself.

DESVARIEUX: To make infrastructure better, Sanders introduced the Rebuild America Act. The bill would invest $1 trillion over five years and provide 13 million living wage jobs, an issue he says should get support no matter where you stand on the political spectrum.

SANDERS: So what we hope to do--and I'm so pleased that we have different organizations here--is to kind of rally the American people to have the Congress do what they know needs to be done. Now, where the debate will take place, how big should it be, yeah, this is pretty big, but I think America should lead. We should have big ideas. We should put millions of people back to work. Other people may want to be doing this thing in a smaller way. How do you pay for it? That's going to be a real debate.



MORE of the interview here:
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=13091

January 30, 2015

Luckovich Cartoon: Brutal Takedown Of Sarah Palin