So why should I care if I live up here in the Gold-Country? We have plenty of water.
Remember Owens Valley? They had a "Water Police" That prevented well drilling, tapping into streams and such. Farmers who sat in a rich green valley had NO water for their cattle.
Remember last year? Record rainfall? Yet, the Governor declared it a "Drought Year."
What did that mean? That meant that communities such as Georgetown Divide, with reservoirs still spilling were told to cut their water use by 20%.
We weren't short of water. But the controlling agencies were, and they had the law on their side. Do we want to go down that path?
Local Legislators are fighting for their water
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Sy Hersh's articles about Iran's nuclear program
I have always been a fan of Sy Hersh. He gets inside information and it always ends up being so far from the "Talking Points" coming out of the government (Clinton, Bush or Obama).
In the interview with "Democracy Now" he talks about the REAL Iranian program:
Video.... http://www.democracynow.org/2011/11/21/seymour_hersh_propaganda_used_ahead_of
Then he goes on CNN Wolf's "The Situation Room" and talks about how Sy's information was accurate in the past. Crook and Liars link
Then I found this great TIME LINE of the NIE story...
NIE time line
In the interview with "Democracy Now" he talks about the REAL Iranian program:
Video.... http://www.democracynow.org/2011/11/21/seymour_hersh_propaganda_used_ahead_of
Then he goes on CNN Wolf's "The Situation Room" and talks about how Sy's information was accurate in the past. Crook and Liars link
Then I found this great TIME LINE of the NIE story...
NIE time line
- November 2006: NIE "completed"
- January 5, 2007: John Negroponte resigns as DNI, reportedly because of fight over NIE; Negroponte would move to become a top official at State
- January 11: US takes six Iranians in custody after a raid on a diplomatic building in Irbil, Iraq
- February 2007: NIE completed; Cheney objecting to content
- February 7: Iranian Revolutionary Guard General Ali Reza Asgari arrives in Turkey; he disappears there, and is presumed to have defected or been kidnapped; in March he was reported to be cooperating with western intelligence
- April 26: Thomas Fingar announces NIE will be delayed due to Ahmadinejad’s demagoguery
- May 12: Cheney meets with Saudi Arabia
- July 2007: Intelligence community intercepts communications that verify claim Iran’s nuclear program remains suspended; Senior Administration Officials briefed
- August 2007: Bush claims he learned new intelligence exists
- August 9: Bush substitutes the claim that Iran was seeking nuclear technology for earlier claim that they were seeking nukes. (h/t Froomkin)
- They have expressed their desire to be able to enrich uranium, which we believe is a step toward having a nuclear weapons program. That, in itself, coupled with their stated foreign policy, is very dangerous for world stability. . . . It’s a very troubling nation right now.
- August 29-30: Six nuclear warheads "accidentally" get flown from Minot AFB to Barksdale AFB in Louisiana
- September 6: Israel strikes site in Syria
- October 2007: BushCo considers spiking the NIE
- October 14: Putin meets with Germany’s Angela Merkel; news reports of assassination attempt planned in Iran
- October 16: From Iran, Putin says an attack on Iran is an attack on Russia
- October 17: Bush makes World War III comments
- October 19: Benazir Bhutto returns to Pakistan
- October 24: McConnell writes memo outlining conditions for declassifying NIEs
- October 27: David Shedd reveals Mike McConnell has made it harder to declassify NIE judgments–leading most observers to believe the Iran NIE would not be released
- November 3: Pervez Musharraf declares martial law
- November 9: The US releases prisoners captured in Irbil in January
- November 13: McConnell says NIE will be done "in about a month" but that judgments will not be released; he also says he would resign if results were "cherry picked"
- November 16: At OPEC, the Saudi Foreign Minister refuses to make a public statement about ditching the dollar–but he says the economic ministers should discuss it
- November 22: Mohammed el Baradei states Iran is cooperating, though IAEA still has questions about its nuclear program
- November 23: The Saudis confirm attendance at Annapolis Conference; on the same day, they send the conservative Nawaz Sharif back to Pakistan to contest elections
- November 25: Nawaz Sharif returns to Pakistan
- November 26: Syria confirms attendance at Annapolis Conference
- November 26: Per Seymour Hersh, Bush tells Ehud Olmert what’s in the NIE.
- November 27: The Annapolis Peace Conference
- November 28: The day Hadley claims Bush was briefed on the NIE; Bush meets with Olmert again; in Pakistan, Musharraf relinquishes military position
- November 29: Khalilzad submits a resolution endorsing Annapolis at UN; Condi calls Khalilzad in the middle of the meeting to ask WTF he’s doing
- November 30: A Khalilzad deputy withdraws the UN resolution while Khalilzad is in "previously scheduled" meeting in DC with Condi; Iranian nuclear negotiator Saaed Jalili tells Javier Solana that all previous negotiations are meaningless (h/t Danger Room)
- December 1: Mohammed el Baradei states that bombing Iran would ensure it gets the bomb more quickly
- December 3: Unexpected public release of NIE showing Iran has given up nuke program; Nawaz Sharif barred from participating in election
- December 4: Israelis say the NIE is wrong; Bush announces his first trip to Israel as President (h/t Laura); both Annapolis and Iran’s purported nukes are on the agenda; Khalilzad calls the claim that he had submitted the resolution without vetting it bull
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Who is Lewis F. Powell?
From Wikipedia:
Lewis Franklin Powell, Jr. (September 19, 1907 – August 25, 1998) was an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He developed a reputation as a judicial moderate, and was known as a master of compromise and consensus-building. He was also widely well regarded by contemporaries due to his personal good manners and politeness. He has become infamous for drafting the Powell Memo, a confidential memorandum for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that describes a strategy for the corporate takeover of the dominant public institutions of American society.
Powell's Memo:
Based in part on his experiences as a corporate lawyer and as a representative for the tobacco industry with the Virginia legislature, he wrote the Powell Memo[2] to a friend at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The memo called for corporate America to become more aggressive in molding politics and law in the U.S. and may have sparked the formation of one or more influential right-wing think tanks.[3]
In August 1971, prior to accepting Nixon's request to become Associate Justice of Supreme Court, Lewis Powell sent to the leadership of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce the "Confidential Memorandum", better known as the Powell Memorandum.[4] It sounded an alarm with its title, "Attack on the American Free Enterprise System." The previous decade had seen the increasing regulation of many industries. Powell argued, "The most disquieting voices joining the chorus of criticism came from perfectly respectable elements of society: from the college campus, the pulpit, the media, the intellectual and literary journals, the arts and sciences, and from politicians." In the memorandum, Powell advocated "constant surveillance" of textbook and television content, as well as a purge of left-wing elements.
In an extraordinary prefiguring of the social goals of business that would be felt over the next three decades, Powell set his main goal: changing how individuals and society think about the corporation, the government, the law, the culture, and the individual. Shaping public opinion on these topics became, and would remain, a major goal of business.
Footnote references:
Lewis Franklin Powell, Jr. (September 19, 1907 – August 25, 1998) was an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. He developed a reputation as a judicial moderate, and was known as a master of compromise and consensus-building. He was also widely well regarded by contemporaries due to his personal good manners and politeness. He has become infamous for drafting the Powell Memo, a confidential memorandum for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that describes a strategy for the corporate takeover of the dominant public institutions of American society.
Powell's Memo:
Based in part on his experiences as a corporate lawyer and as a representative for the tobacco industry with the Virginia legislature, he wrote the Powell Memo[2] to a friend at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The memo called for corporate America to become more aggressive in molding politics and law in the U.S. and may have sparked the formation of one or more influential right-wing think tanks.[3]
In August 1971, prior to accepting Nixon's request to become Associate Justice of Supreme Court, Lewis Powell sent to the leadership of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce the "Confidential Memorandum", better known as the Powell Memorandum.[4] It sounded an alarm with its title, "Attack on the American Free Enterprise System." The previous decade had seen the increasing regulation of many industries. Powell argued, "The most disquieting voices joining the chorus of criticism came from perfectly respectable elements of society: from the college campus, the pulpit, the media, the intellectual and literary journals, the arts and sciences, and from politicians." In the memorandum, Powell advocated "constant surveillance" of textbook and television content, as well as a purge of left-wing elements.
In an extraordinary prefiguring of the social goals of business that would be felt over the next three decades, Powell set his main goal: changing how individuals and society think about the corporation, the government, the law, the culture, and the individual. Shaping public opinion on these topics became, and would remain, a major goal of business.
Footnote references:
- ^ Powell's inclusion in the Sigma Society is acknowledged by Chief Justice William Rehnquist: Rehnquist, William H "A tribute to Lewis F. Powell, Jr." Washington and Lee Law Review. Feb 1, 2011. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3655/is_199901/ai_n8829121/.
- ^ Bob Woodward; Scott Armstrong (1981). The Brethren: inside the Supreme Court. Avon Books. p. 188. ISBN 9780380521838.
- ^ Frank Snepp, Irreparable Harm: A Firsthand Account of How One Agent Took On the CIA in an Epic Battle Over Secrecy and Free Speech (New York: Random House, 1999), 349–350.
Bill Moyer's speech on Occupy Wall Street
Bill Moyer's speech is powerful. If you can't watch it, I will post the whole speech below.
One of the most interesting parts of his speech was his reference to Associate Justice Lewis F. Powell to the Supreme Court.
Journalist Bill Moyers was the keynote speaker at the 40th anniversary celebration of Ralph Nader's Public Citizen. In his speech, Moyers discusses the Occupy Wall Street movement and chronicles the history of America's middle class.
(As seen on Huffington Post Blog)
I am honored to share this occasion with you. No one beyond your collegial inner circle appreciates more than I do what you have stood for over these 40 years, or is more aware of the battles you have fought, the victories you have won, and the passion for democracy that still courses through your veins. The great progressive of a century ago, Robert LaFollette of Wisconsin - a Republican, by the way - believed that "Democracy is a life; and involves constant struggle." Democracy has been your life for four decades now, and would have been even more imperiled today if you had not stayed the course.
I began my public journalism the same year you began your public advocacy, in 1971. Our paths often paralleled and sometimes crossed. Over these 40 years journalism for me has been a continuing course in adult education, and I came early on to consider the work you do as part of the curriculum - an open seminar on how government works - and for whom. Your muckraking investigations - into money and politics, corporate behavior, lobbying, regulatory oversight, public health and safety, openness in government, and consumer protection, among others - are models of accuracy and integrity. They drive home to journalists that while it is important to cover the news, it is more important to uncover the news. As one of my mentors said, "News is what people want to keep hidden; everything else is publicity." And when a student asked the journalist and historian Richard Reeves for his definition of " real news", he answered: "The news you and I need to keep our freedoms."
You keep reminding us how crucial that news is to democracy. And when the watchdogs of the press have fallen silent, your vigilant growls have told us something's up. So I'm here as both citizen and journalist to thank you for all you have done, to salute you for keeping the faith, and to implore you to fight on during the crisis of hope that now grips our country. The great American experience in creating a different future together - this "voluntary union for the common good" - has been flummoxed by a growing sense of political impotence - what the historian Lawrence Goodwyn has described as a mass resignation of people who believe "the dogma of democracy" on a superficial public level but who no longer believe it privately.
There has been, he says, a decline in what people think they have a political right to aspire to - a decline of individual self-respect on the part of millions of Americans. You can understand why. We hold elections, knowing they are unlikely to produce the policies favored by the majority of Americans. We speak, we write, we advocate - and those in power turn deaf ears and blind eyes to our deepest aspirations. We petition, plead, and even pray - yet the earth that is our commons, which should be passed on in good condition to coming generations, continues to be despoiled.
We invoke the strain in our national DNA that attests to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" as the produce of political equality - yet private wealth multiplies as public goods are beggared. And the property qualifications for federal office that the framers of the Constitution expressly feared as an unseemly "veneration for wealth" are now openly in force; the common denominator of public office, even for our judges, is a common deference to cash. So if belief in the "the dogma of democracy" seems only skin deep, there are reasons for it. During the prairie revolt that swept the Great Plains a century after the Constitution was ratified, the populist orator Mary Elizabeth Lease exclaimed: "Wall Street owns the country...Our laws are the output of a system which clothes rascals in robes and honesty in rags. The [political] parties lie to us and the political speakers mislead us...Money rules." That was 1890.
Those agrarian populists boiled over with anger that corporations, banks, and government were ganging up to deprive every day people of their livelihood. She should see us now.
John Boehner calls on the bankers, holds out his cup, and offers them total obeisance from the House majority if only they fill it. That's now the norm, and they get away with it. GOP once again means Guardians of Privilege. Barack Obama criticizes bankers as "fat cats", then invites them to dine at a pricey New York restaurant where the tasting menu runs to $195 a person. That's now the norm, and they get away with it.
The President has raised more money from banks, hedge funds, and private equity managers than any Republican candidate, including Mitt Romney. Inch by inch he has conceded ground to them while espousing populist rhetoric that his very actions betray. Let's name this for what it is: Democratic deviancy defined further downward. Our politicians are little more than money launderers in the trafficking of power and policy - fewer than six degrees of separation from the spirit and tactics of Tony Soprano. Why New York's Zuccotti Park is filled with people is no mystery. Reporters keep scratching their heads and asking: "Why are you here?" But it's clear they are occupying Wall Street because Wall Street has occupied the country.
And that's why in public places across the country workaday Americans are standing up in solidarity. Did you see the sign a woman was carrying at a fraternal march in Iowa the other day? It read: "I can't afford to buy a politician so I bought this sign." We know what all this money buys. Americans have learned the hard way that when rich organizations and wealthy individuals shower Washington with millions in campaign contributions, they get what they want. They know that if you don't contribute to their campaigns or spend generously on lobbying, ...you pick up a disproportionate share of America's tax bill.
You pay higher prices for a broad range of products from peanuts to prescriptions. You pay taxes that others in a similar situation have been excused from paying. You're compelled to abide by laws while others are granted immunity from them. You must pay debts that you incur while others do not. You're barred from writing off on your tax returns some of the money spent on necessities while others deduct the cost of their entertainment. You must run your business by one set of rules, while the government creates another set for your competitors...
In contrast the fortunate few who contribute to the right politicians and hire the right lobbyists enjoy all the benefits of their special status. Make a bad business deal; the government bails them out. If they want to hire workers at below market wages, the government provides the means to do so. If they want more time to pay their debts, the government gives them an extension. If they want immunity from certain laws, the government gives it. If they want to ignore rules their competition must comply with, the government gives it approval. If they want to kill legislation that is intended for the public, it gets killed.
I didn't crib that litany from Public Citizen's muckraking investigations over the years, although I could have. Nor did I lift it from Das Kapital by Karl Marx or Mao Tse-tung's Little Red Book. No, I was literally quoting Time Magazine, long a tribune of America's establishment media. From the bosom of mainstream media comes the bald, spare, and damning conclusion: We now have "government for the few at the expense of the many." But let me call another witness from the pro-business and capitalist- friendly press.
In the middle of the last decade - four years before the Great Collapse of 2008 - the editors of The Economist warned: A growing body of evidence suggests that the meritocratic ideal is in trouble in America. Income inequality is growing to levels not seen since the (first) Gilded Age. But social mobility is not increasing at anything like the same pace....
Everywhere you look in modern America - in the Hollywood Hills or the canyons of Wall Street, in the Nashville recording studios or the clapboard houses of Cambridge, Massachusetts - you see elites mastering the art of perpetuating themselves. America is increasingly looking like imperial Britain, with dynastic ties proliferating, social circles interlocking, mechanisms of social exclusion strengthening, and a gap widening between the people who make decisions and shape the culture and the vast majority of working stiffs.
Hear the editors of The Economist: "The United States is on its way to becoming a European-style class-based society." Can you imagine what would happen if I had said that on PBS? Mitch McConnell and John Boehner would put Elmo and Big Bird under house arrest. Come to think of it, I did say it on PBS back when Karl Rove was president, and there was indeed hell to pay.
You would have thought Che Guevara had run his motorcycle across the White House lawn. But I wasn't quoting from a radical or even liberal manifesto. I was quoting - to repeat - one of the business world's most respected journals. It is the editors of the The Economist who are warning us that " The United States is on its way to becoming a European-style class-based society." And that was well before our financiers, drunk with greed and high on the illusions and conceits of laissez faire ("leave us alone") fundamentalism, and humored by rented politicians who do their bidding, brought America to the edge of the abyss and our middle class to its knees. How could it be? How could this happen in the country whose framers spoke of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" in the same breath as political equality? Democracy wasn't meant to produce a class-ridden society.
When that son of French aristocracy Alexander de Tocqueville traveled through the bustling young America of the 1830s, nothing struck him with greater force than "the equality of conditions." Tocqueville knew first-hand the vast divisions between the wealth and poverty of Europe, where kings and feudal lords took what they wanted and left peasants the crumbs. But Americans, he wrote, "seemed to be remarkably equal economically." "Some were richer, some were poorer, but within a comparative narrow band. Moreover, individuals had opportunities to better their economic circumstances over the course of a lifetime, and just about everyone [except of course slaves and Indians] seemed to be striving for that goal." Tocqueville looked closely, and said: "I easily perceive the enormous influence that this primary fact exercises on the workings of the society." And so it does. Evidence abounds that large inequalities undermine community life, reduces trust among citizens, and increases violence. In one major study from data collected over 30 years (by the epidemiologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett in their book: The Spirit Level: Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger ) the most consistent predictor of mental illness, infant mortality, educational achievements, teenage births, homicides, and incarceration, is economic inequality.
And as Nobel Laureate Kenneth Arrow has written, "Vast inequalities of income weakens a society's sense of mutual concern...The sense that we are all members of the social order is vital to the meaning of civilization." The historian Gordon Wood won the Pulitzer Prize for his book on The Radicalism of the American Revolution: If you haven't read it, now's the time. Wood says that our nation discovered its greatness "by creating a prosperous free society belonging to obscure people with their workaday concerns and their pecuniary pursuits of happiness." This democracy, he said, changed the lives "of hitherto neglected and despised masses of common laboring people." Those words moved me when I read them.
They moved me because Henry and Ruby Moyers were "common laboring people." My father dropped out of the fourth grade and never returned to school because his family needed him to pick cotton to help make ends meet. Mother managed to finish the eighth grade before she followed him into the fields. They were tenant farmers when the Great Depression knocked them down and almost out. The year I was born my father was making $2 a day working on the highway to Oklahoma City. He never took home more than $100 a week in his working life, and made that only when he joined the union in the last job he held. I was one of the poorest white kids in town, but in many respects I was the equal of my friend who was the daughter of the richest man in town. I went to good public schools, had use of a good public library, played sand-lot baseball in a good public park, and traveled far on good public roads with good public facilities to a good public university. Because these public goods were there for us, I never thought of myself as poor. When I began to piece the story together years later, I came to realize that people like the Moyers had been included in the American deal: "We, the People" included us. It's heartbreaking to see what has become of that bargain.
These days it's every man for himself; may be the richest and most ruthless predators win! How did this happen? You know the story, because it begins the very same year that you began your public advocacy and I began my public journalism. 1971 was a seminal year. On March 29 of that year, Ralph Nader bought ads in 13 publications and sent out letters asking people if they would invest their talents, skills, and yes, their lives, in working for the public interest. The seed sprouted swiftly that spring: By the end of May over 60,000 Americans responded, and Public Citizen was born.
But something else was also happening. Five months later, on August 23, 1971, a corporate lawyer named Lewis Powell - a board member of the death-dealing tobacco giant Philip Morris and a future Justice of the United States Supreme Court - sent a confidential memorandum to his friends at the U. S. Chamber of Commerce. We look back on it now as a call to arms for class war waged from the top down. Let's recall the context: Big Business was being forced to clean up its act. It was bad enough to corporate interests that Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal had sustained its momentum through Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, John Kennedy, and Lyndon Johnson. Suddenly this young lawyer named Ralph Nader arrived on the scene, arousing consumers with articles, speeches, and above all, an expose of the automobile industry, Unsafe at Any Speed. Young activists flocked to work with him on health, environmental, and economic concerns. Congress was moved to act. Even Republicans signed on. In l970 President Richard Nixon put his signature on the National Environmental Policy Act and named a White House Council to promote environmental quality. A few months later millions of Americans turned out for Earth Day. Nixon then agreed to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency. Congress acted swiftly to pass tough new amendments to the Clean Air Act and the EPA announced the first air pollution standards. There were new regulations directed at lead paint and pesticides. Corporations were no longer getting away with murder.
And Lewis Powell was shocked - shocked! - at what he called "an attack on the American free enterprise system." Not just from a few "extremists of the left," he said, but also from "perfectly respectable elements of society," including the media, politicians, and leading intellectuals. Fight back, and fight back hard, he urged his compatriots. Build a movement. Set speakers loose across the country. Take on prominent institutions of public opinion - especially the universities, the media, and the courts. Keep television programs under "constant surveillance." And above all, recognize that political power must be "assiduously (sic) cultivated; and that when necessary, it must be used aggressively and with determination" and "without embarrassment." Powell imagined the U.S. Chamber of Commerce as a council of war. Since business executives had "little stomach for hard-nose contest with their critics" and "little skill in effective intellectual and philosophical debate," they should create new think tanks, legal foundations, and front groups of every stripe. It would take years, but these groups could, he said, be aligned into a united front (that) would only come about through "careful long-range planning and implementation, in consistency of action over an indefinite period of years, in the scale of financing available only through joint effort, and in the political power available only through united action and united organizations." You have to admit it was a brilliant strategy.
Although Powell may not have seen it at the time, he was pointing America toward plutocracy, where political power is derived from the wealthy and controlled by the wealthy to protect their wealth. As the only countervailing power to private greed and power, democracy could no longer be tolerated. While Nader's recruitment of citizens to champion democracy was open for all to see - depended, in fact, on public participation - Powell's memo was for certain eyes only, those with the means and will to answer his call to arms. The public wouldn't learn of the memo until after Nixon appointed Powell to the Supreme Court and the enterprising reporter Jack Anderson obtained a copy, writing that it may have been the reason for Powell's appointment. By then his document had circulated widely in corporate suites.
Within two years the board of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce formed a task force of 40 business executives - from U.S. Steel, GE, GM, Phillips Petroleum, 3M, Amway, and ABC and CBS (two media companies, we should note). Their assignment was to coordinate the crusade, put Powell's recommendations into effect, and push the corporate agenda. Powell had set in motion a revolt of the rich. As the historian Kim Phillips-Fein subsequently wrote, "Many who read the memo cited it afterward as inspiration for their political choices." Those choices came soon. The National Association of Manufacturers announced it was moving its main offices from New York to Washington. In 1971, only 175 firms had registered lobbyists in the capital; by 1982, nearly twenty-five hundred did. Corporate PACs increased from under 300 in 1976 to over twelve hundred by the middle of the l980s. From Powell's impetus came the Business Roundtable, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), the Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute, the Manhattan Institute, Citizens for a Sound Economy (precursor to what we now know as Americans for Prosperity) and other organizations united in pushing back against political equality and shared prosperity. [Thanks to Charlie Cray for a succinct analysis of the Powell memo and to Jim Hoggan for calling attention to it more recently.]
They triggered an economic transformation that would in time touch every aspect of our lives. Powell's memo was delivered to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce at its headquarters across from the White House on land that was formerly the home of Daniel Webster. That couldn't have been more appropriate. History was coming full circle at 1615 H Street. Webster is remembered largely as the most eloquent orator in America during his years as Senator from Massachusetts and Secretary of State under three presidents in the years leading up to the Civil War. He was also the leading spokesman for banking and industry nabobs who funded his extravagant tastes in wine, boats, and mistresses. Some of them came to his relief when he couldn't cover his debts wholly from bribes or the sale of diplomatic posts for personal gain. Webster apparently regarded the merchants and bankers of Boston's State Street Corporation - one of the country's first financial holding companies - very much as George W. Bush regarded the high rollers he called "my base." The great orator even sent a famous letter to financiers requesting retainers from them that he might better serve them. The historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. wondered how the American people could follow Webster "through hell or high water when he would not lead unless someone made up a purse for him." No wonder the U.S. Chamber of Commerce feels right as home with the landmark designation of its headquarters. 1615 H Street now masterminds the laundering of multi-millions of dollars raised from captains of industry and private wealth to finance - secretly - the political mercenaries who fight the class war in their behalf. Even as the Chamber was doubling its membership and tripling its budget in response to Lewis Powell's manifesto, the coalition got another powerful jolt of adrenalin from the wealthy right-winger who had served as Nixon's secretary of the treasury, William Simon. His polemic entitled A Time for Truth argued that "funds generated by business" must "rush by multimillions" into conservative causes to uproot the institutions and "the heretical strategy" [his term] of the New Deal. He called on "men of action in the capitalist world" to mount "a veritable crusade" against progressive America. Business Week magazine somberly explained that "...it will be a bitter pill for many Americans to swallow the idea of doing with less so that big business can have move." I'm not making this up. And so it came to pass; came to pass despite your heroic efforts and those of other kindred citizens; came to pass because those "men of action in the capitalist world" were not content with their wealth just to buy more homes, more cars, more planes, more vacations and more gizmos than anyone else. They were determined to buy more democracy than anyone else. And they succeeded beyond their own expectations. After their 40-year "veritable crusade" against our institutions, laws and regulations - against the ideas, norms and beliefs that helped to create America's iconic middle class - the Gilded Age is back with a vengeance. You know these things, of course, because you've been up against that "veritable crusade" all these years. But if you want to see the story pulled together in one compelling narrative, read this - perhaps the best book on politics of the last two years : Winner Take All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer and Turned Its Back on the Middle Class . Two accomplished political scientists wrote it: Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson - the Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson of political science, who wanted to know how America had turned into a society starkly divided into winners and losers. Mystified by what happened to the notion of "shared prosperity" that marked the years after World War II; puzzled that over the last generation more and more wealth has gone to the rich and superrich, while middle-class and working people are left barely hanging on; vexed that hedge-fund managers pulling down billions can pay a lower tax rate than their pedicurists, manicurists, cleaning ladies and chauffeurs; curious as to why politicians keep slashing taxes on the very rich even as they grow richer, and how corporations keep being handed huge tax breaks and subsidies even as they fire hundreds of thousands of workers; troubled that the heart of the American Dream - upward mobility - seems to have stopped beating; astounded that the United States now leads in the competition for the gold medal for inequality; and dumbfounded that all this could happen in a democracy whose politicians are supposed to serve the greatest good for the greatest number, and must regularly face the judgment of citizens at the polls if they haven't done so; Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson wanted to find out "how our economy stopped working to provide prosperity and security for the broad middle class." They wanted to know: "Who dunnit?" They found the culprit: "It's the politics, stupid!" Tracing the clues back to that "unseen revolution" of the 1970s - the revolt triggered by Lewis Powell, fired up by William Simon, and fueled by rich corporations and wealthy individuals - they found that 'Step by step and debate by debate America's public officials have rewritten the rules of American politics and the American economy in ways that have benefitted the few at the expense of the many." There you have it: they bought off the gatekeepers, got inside, and gamed the system. And when the fix was in, they let loose the animal spirits, turning our economy into a feast for predators. And they won - as the rich and powerful got richer and more powerful - they not only bought the government, they "saddled Americans with greater debt, tore new holes in the safety net, and imposed broad financial risks on workers, investors, and taxpayers." Until - write Hacker and Pierson - "The United States is looking more and more like the capitalist oligarchies of Brazil, Mexico, and Russia where most of the wealth is concentrated at the top while the bottom grows larger and larger with everyone in between just barely getting by." The revolt of the plutocrats has now been ratified by the Supreme Court in its notorious Citizens United decision last year. Rarely have so few imposed such damage on so many. When five pro-corporate conservative justices gave "artificial entities" the same rights of "free speech" as living, breathing human beings, they told our corporate sovereigns "the sky's the limit" when it comes to their pouring money into political campaigns. The Roberts Court embodies the legacy of pro-corporate bias in justices determined to prevent democracy from acting as a brake on excessive greed and power in the private sector. Wealth acquired under capitalism is in and of itself no enemy of democracy, but wealth armed with political power - power to shake off opportunities for others to rise - is a proven danger. Thomas Jefferson had hoped that "we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and [to] bid defiance to the laws of our country." James Madison feared that the "spirit of speculation" would lead to "a government operating by corrupt influence, substituting the motive of private interest in place of public duty." Jefferson and Madison didn't live to see reactionary justices fulfill their worst fears. In 1886 a conservative court conferred the divine gift of life on the Southern Pacific Railroad. Never mind that the Fourteenth Amendment declaring that no person should be deprived of "life, liberty or property without due process of law" was enacted to protect the rights of freed slaves. The Court decided to give the same rights of "personhood" to corporations that possessed neither a body to be kicked nor a soul to be damned. For over half a century the Court acted to protect the privileged. It gutted the Sherman Antitrust Act by finding a loophole for a sugar trust. It killed a New York state law limiting working hours. Likewise a ban against child labor. It wiped out a law that set minimum wages for women. And so on: one decision after another aimed at laws promoting the general welfare." The Roberts Court has picked up the mantle: Moneyed interests first, the public interest second, if at all. The ink was hardly dry on the Citizens United decision when the U.S. Chamber of Commerce organized a covertly funded front and rained drones packed with cash into the 2010 campaigns. According to the Sunlight Foundation, corporate front groups spent $126 million in the fall of 2010 while hiding the identities of the donors. Another corporate cover group - the American Action Network - spent over $26 million of undisclosed corporate money in just six Senate races and 26 House elections. And Karl Rove's groups - American Crossroads/Crossroads GPS - seized on Citizens United to raise and spend at least $38 million that NBC News said came from "a small circle of extremely wealthy Wall Street hedge fund and private equity moguls"- all determined to water down financial reforms designed to prevent another collapse of the financial system. Jim Hightower has said it well: Today's proponents of corporate plutocracy "have simply elevated money itself above votes, establishing cold, hard cash as the real coin of political power." No wonder so many Americans have felt that sense of political impotence that the historian Lawrence Goodwyn described as "the mass resignation" of people who believe in the "dogma of democracy" on a superficial public level but whose hearts no longer burn with the conviction that they are part of the deal. Against such odds, discouragement comes easily. But if the generations before us had given up, slaves would still be waiting on these tables, on Election Day women would still be turned away from the voting booths, and workers would still be committing a crime if they organized. So once again: Take heart from the past and don't ever count the people out. During the last quarter of the 19th century, the industrial revolution created extraordinary wealth at the top and excruciating misery at the bottom. Embattled citizens rose up. Into their hearts, wrote the progressive Kansas journalist William Allen White, "had come a sense that their civilization needed recasting, that their government had fallen into the hands of self-seekers, that a new relation should be established between the haves and have-nots." Not content to wring their hands and cry "Woe is us" everyday citizens researched the issues, organized to educate their neighbors, held rallies, made speeches, petitioned and canvassed, marched and marched again. They ploughed the fields and planted the seeds - sometimes in bloody soil - that twentieth century leaders used to restore "the general welfare" as a pillar of American democracy. They laid down the now-endangered markers of a civilized society: legally ordained minimum wages, child labor laws, workmen's safety and compensation laws, pure foods and safe drugs, Social Security, Medicare, and rules that promote competitive markets over monopolies and cartels. Remember: Democracy doesn't begin at the top; it begins at the bottom, when flesh-and-blood human beings fight to rekindle the patriot's dream. The Patriot's Dream? Arlo Guthrie, remember? He wrote could be the unofficial anthem of Zuccotti Park. Listen up: Living now here but for fortune Placed by fate's mysterious schemes Who'd believe that we're the ones asked To try to rekindle the patriot's dreams Arise sweet destiny, time runs short All of your patience has heard their retort Hear us now for alone we can't seem To try to rekindle the patriot's dreams Can you hear the words being whispered All along the American stream Tyrants freed the just are imprisoned Try to rekindle the patriot's dreams Ah but perhaps too much is being asked of too few You and your children with nothing to do Hear us now for alone we can't seem To try to rekindle the patriot's dreams Who, in these cynical times, when democracy is on the ropes and the blows of great wealth pound and pound and pound again against America's body politic - who would dream such a radical thing?
Transcript courtesy of Nieman Watchdog.
Bill Moyers' new show, Moyers & Company, premieres in January.
(As seen on Huffington Post Blog)
I am honored to share this occasion with you. No one beyond your collegial inner circle appreciates more than I do what you have stood for over these 40 years, or is more aware of the battles you have fought, the victories you have won, and the passion for democracy that still courses through your veins. The great progressive of a century ago, Robert LaFollette of Wisconsin - a Republican, by the way - believed that "Democracy is a life; and involves constant struggle." Democracy has been your life for four decades now, and would have been even more imperiled today if you had not stayed the course.
I began my public journalism the same year you began your public advocacy, in 1971. Our paths often paralleled and sometimes crossed. Over these 40 years journalism for me has been a continuing course in adult education, and I came early on to consider the work you do as part of the curriculum - an open seminar on how government works - and for whom. Your muckraking investigations - into money and politics, corporate behavior, lobbying, regulatory oversight, public health and safety, openness in government, and consumer protection, among others - are models of accuracy and integrity. They drive home to journalists that while it is important to cover the news, it is more important to uncover the news. As one of my mentors said, "News is what people want to keep hidden; everything else is publicity." And when a student asked the journalist and historian Richard Reeves for his definition of " real news", he answered: "The news you and I need to keep our freedoms."
You keep reminding us how crucial that news is to democracy. And when the watchdogs of the press have fallen silent, your vigilant growls have told us something's up. So I'm here as both citizen and journalist to thank you for all you have done, to salute you for keeping the faith, and to implore you to fight on during the crisis of hope that now grips our country. The great American experience in creating a different future together - this "voluntary union for the common good" - has been flummoxed by a growing sense of political impotence - what the historian Lawrence Goodwyn has described as a mass resignation of people who believe "the dogma of democracy" on a superficial public level but who no longer believe it privately.
There has been, he says, a decline in what people think they have a political right to aspire to - a decline of individual self-respect on the part of millions of Americans. You can understand why. We hold elections, knowing they are unlikely to produce the policies favored by the majority of Americans. We speak, we write, we advocate - and those in power turn deaf ears and blind eyes to our deepest aspirations. We petition, plead, and even pray - yet the earth that is our commons, which should be passed on in good condition to coming generations, continues to be despoiled.
We invoke the strain in our national DNA that attests to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" as the produce of political equality - yet private wealth multiplies as public goods are beggared. And the property qualifications for federal office that the framers of the Constitution expressly feared as an unseemly "veneration for wealth" are now openly in force; the common denominator of public office, even for our judges, is a common deference to cash. So if belief in the "the dogma of democracy" seems only skin deep, there are reasons for it. During the prairie revolt that swept the Great Plains a century after the Constitution was ratified, the populist orator Mary Elizabeth Lease exclaimed: "Wall Street owns the country...Our laws are the output of a system which clothes rascals in robes and honesty in rags. The [political] parties lie to us and the political speakers mislead us...Money rules." That was 1890.
Those agrarian populists boiled over with anger that corporations, banks, and government were ganging up to deprive every day people of their livelihood. She should see us now.
John Boehner calls on the bankers, holds out his cup, and offers them total obeisance from the House majority if only they fill it. That's now the norm, and they get away with it. GOP once again means Guardians of Privilege. Barack Obama criticizes bankers as "fat cats", then invites them to dine at a pricey New York restaurant where the tasting menu runs to $195 a person. That's now the norm, and they get away with it.
The President has raised more money from banks, hedge funds, and private equity managers than any Republican candidate, including Mitt Romney. Inch by inch he has conceded ground to them while espousing populist rhetoric that his very actions betray. Let's name this for what it is: Democratic deviancy defined further downward. Our politicians are little more than money launderers in the trafficking of power and policy - fewer than six degrees of separation from the spirit and tactics of Tony Soprano. Why New York's Zuccotti Park is filled with people is no mystery. Reporters keep scratching their heads and asking: "Why are you here?" But it's clear they are occupying Wall Street because Wall Street has occupied the country.
And that's why in public places across the country workaday Americans are standing up in solidarity. Did you see the sign a woman was carrying at a fraternal march in Iowa the other day? It read: "I can't afford to buy a politician so I bought this sign." We know what all this money buys. Americans have learned the hard way that when rich organizations and wealthy individuals shower Washington with millions in campaign contributions, they get what they want. They know that if you don't contribute to their campaigns or spend generously on lobbying, ...you pick up a disproportionate share of America's tax bill.
You pay higher prices for a broad range of products from peanuts to prescriptions. You pay taxes that others in a similar situation have been excused from paying. You're compelled to abide by laws while others are granted immunity from them. You must pay debts that you incur while others do not. You're barred from writing off on your tax returns some of the money spent on necessities while others deduct the cost of their entertainment. You must run your business by one set of rules, while the government creates another set for your competitors...
In contrast the fortunate few who contribute to the right politicians and hire the right lobbyists enjoy all the benefits of their special status. Make a bad business deal; the government bails them out. If they want to hire workers at below market wages, the government provides the means to do so. If they want more time to pay their debts, the government gives them an extension. If they want immunity from certain laws, the government gives it. If they want to ignore rules their competition must comply with, the government gives it approval. If they want to kill legislation that is intended for the public, it gets killed.
I didn't crib that litany from Public Citizen's muckraking investigations over the years, although I could have. Nor did I lift it from Das Kapital by Karl Marx or Mao Tse-tung's Little Red Book. No, I was literally quoting Time Magazine, long a tribune of America's establishment media. From the bosom of mainstream media comes the bald, spare, and damning conclusion: We now have "government for the few at the expense of the many." But let me call another witness from the pro-business and capitalist- friendly press.
In the middle of the last decade - four years before the Great Collapse of 2008 - the editors of The Economist warned: A growing body of evidence suggests that the meritocratic ideal is in trouble in America. Income inequality is growing to levels not seen since the (first) Gilded Age. But social mobility is not increasing at anything like the same pace....
Everywhere you look in modern America - in the Hollywood Hills or the canyons of Wall Street, in the Nashville recording studios or the clapboard houses of Cambridge, Massachusetts - you see elites mastering the art of perpetuating themselves. America is increasingly looking like imperial Britain, with dynastic ties proliferating, social circles interlocking, mechanisms of social exclusion strengthening, and a gap widening between the people who make decisions and shape the culture and the vast majority of working stiffs.
Hear the editors of The Economist: "The United States is on its way to becoming a European-style class-based society." Can you imagine what would happen if I had said that on PBS? Mitch McConnell and John Boehner would put Elmo and Big Bird under house arrest. Come to think of it, I did say it on PBS back when Karl Rove was president, and there was indeed hell to pay.
You would have thought Che Guevara had run his motorcycle across the White House lawn. But I wasn't quoting from a radical or even liberal manifesto. I was quoting - to repeat - one of the business world's most respected journals. It is the editors of the The Economist who are warning us that " The United States is on its way to becoming a European-style class-based society." And that was well before our financiers, drunk with greed and high on the illusions and conceits of laissez faire ("leave us alone") fundamentalism, and humored by rented politicians who do their bidding, brought America to the edge of the abyss and our middle class to its knees. How could it be? How could this happen in the country whose framers spoke of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" in the same breath as political equality? Democracy wasn't meant to produce a class-ridden society.
When that son of French aristocracy Alexander de Tocqueville traveled through the bustling young America of the 1830s, nothing struck him with greater force than "the equality of conditions." Tocqueville knew first-hand the vast divisions between the wealth and poverty of Europe, where kings and feudal lords took what they wanted and left peasants the crumbs. But Americans, he wrote, "seemed to be remarkably equal economically." "Some were richer, some were poorer, but within a comparative narrow band. Moreover, individuals had opportunities to better their economic circumstances over the course of a lifetime, and just about everyone [except of course slaves and Indians] seemed to be striving for that goal." Tocqueville looked closely, and said: "I easily perceive the enormous influence that this primary fact exercises on the workings of the society." And so it does. Evidence abounds that large inequalities undermine community life, reduces trust among citizens, and increases violence. In one major study from data collected over 30 years (by the epidemiologists Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett in their book: The Spirit Level: Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger ) the most consistent predictor of mental illness, infant mortality, educational achievements, teenage births, homicides, and incarceration, is economic inequality.
And as Nobel Laureate Kenneth Arrow has written, "Vast inequalities of income weakens a society's sense of mutual concern...The sense that we are all members of the social order is vital to the meaning of civilization." The historian Gordon Wood won the Pulitzer Prize for his book on The Radicalism of the American Revolution: If you haven't read it, now's the time. Wood says that our nation discovered its greatness "by creating a prosperous free society belonging to obscure people with their workaday concerns and their pecuniary pursuits of happiness." This democracy, he said, changed the lives "of hitherto neglected and despised masses of common laboring people." Those words moved me when I read them.
They moved me because Henry and Ruby Moyers were "common laboring people." My father dropped out of the fourth grade and never returned to school because his family needed him to pick cotton to help make ends meet. Mother managed to finish the eighth grade before she followed him into the fields. They were tenant farmers when the Great Depression knocked them down and almost out. The year I was born my father was making $2 a day working on the highway to Oklahoma City. He never took home more than $100 a week in his working life, and made that only when he joined the union in the last job he held. I was one of the poorest white kids in town, but in many respects I was the equal of my friend who was the daughter of the richest man in town. I went to good public schools, had use of a good public library, played sand-lot baseball in a good public park, and traveled far on good public roads with good public facilities to a good public university. Because these public goods were there for us, I never thought of myself as poor. When I began to piece the story together years later, I came to realize that people like the Moyers had been included in the American deal: "We, the People" included us. It's heartbreaking to see what has become of that bargain.
These days it's every man for himself; may be the richest and most ruthless predators win! How did this happen? You know the story, because it begins the very same year that you began your public advocacy and I began my public journalism. 1971 was a seminal year. On March 29 of that year, Ralph Nader bought ads in 13 publications and sent out letters asking people if they would invest their talents, skills, and yes, their lives, in working for the public interest. The seed sprouted swiftly that spring: By the end of May over 60,000 Americans responded, and Public Citizen was born.
But something else was also happening. Five months later, on August 23, 1971, a corporate lawyer named Lewis Powell - a board member of the death-dealing tobacco giant Philip Morris and a future Justice of the United States Supreme Court - sent a confidential memorandum to his friends at the U. S. Chamber of Commerce. We look back on it now as a call to arms for class war waged from the top down. Let's recall the context: Big Business was being forced to clean up its act. It was bad enough to corporate interests that Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal had sustained its momentum through Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, John Kennedy, and Lyndon Johnson. Suddenly this young lawyer named Ralph Nader arrived on the scene, arousing consumers with articles, speeches, and above all, an expose of the automobile industry, Unsafe at Any Speed. Young activists flocked to work with him on health, environmental, and economic concerns. Congress was moved to act. Even Republicans signed on. In l970 President Richard Nixon put his signature on the National Environmental Policy Act and named a White House Council to promote environmental quality. A few months later millions of Americans turned out for Earth Day. Nixon then agreed to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency. Congress acted swiftly to pass tough new amendments to the Clean Air Act and the EPA announced the first air pollution standards. There were new regulations directed at lead paint and pesticides. Corporations were no longer getting away with murder.
And Lewis Powell was shocked - shocked! - at what he called "an attack on the American free enterprise system." Not just from a few "extremists of the left," he said, but also from "perfectly respectable elements of society," including the media, politicians, and leading intellectuals. Fight back, and fight back hard, he urged his compatriots. Build a movement. Set speakers loose across the country. Take on prominent institutions of public opinion - especially the universities, the media, and the courts. Keep television programs under "constant surveillance." And above all, recognize that political power must be "assiduously (sic) cultivated; and that when necessary, it must be used aggressively and with determination" and "without embarrassment." Powell imagined the U.S. Chamber of Commerce as a council of war. Since business executives had "little stomach for hard-nose contest with their critics" and "little skill in effective intellectual and philosophical debate," they should create new think tanks, legal foundations, and front groups of every stripe. It would take years, but these groups could, he said, be aligned into a united front (that) would only come about through "careful long-range planning and implementation, in consistency of action over an indefinite period of years, in the scale of financing available only through joint effort, and in the political power available only through united action and united organizations." You have to admit it was a brilliant strategy.
Although Powell may not have seen it at the time, he was pointing America toward plutocracy, where political power is derived from the wealthy and controlled by the wealthy to protect their wealth. As the only countervailing power to private greed and power, democracy could no longer be tolerated. While Nader's recruitment of citizens to champion democracy was open for all to see - depended, in fact, on public participation - Powell's memo was for certain eyes only, those with the means and will to answer his call to arms. The public wouldn't learn of the memo until after Nixon appointed Powell to the Supreme Court and the enterprising reporter Jack Anderson obtained a copy, writing that it may have been the reason for Powell's appointment. By then his document had circulated widely in corporate suites.
Within two years the board of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce formed a task force of 40 business executives - from U.S. Steel, GE, GM, Phillips Petroleum, 3M, Amway, and ABC and CBS (two media companies, we should note). Their assignment was to coordinate the crusade, put Powell's recommendations into effect, and push the corporate agenda. Powell had set in motion a revolt of the rich. As the historian Kim Phillips-Fein subsequently wrote, "Many who read the memo cited it afterward as inspiration for their political choices." Those choices came soon. The National Association of Manufacturers announced it was moving its main offices from New York to Washington. In 1971, only 175 firms had registered lobbyists in the capital; by 1982, nearly twenty-five hundred did. Corporate PACs increased from under 300 in 1976 to over twelve hundred by the middle of the l980s. From Powell's impetus came the Business Roundtable, the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), the Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute, the Manhattan Institute, Citizens for a Sound Economy (precursor to what we now know as Americans for Prosperity) and other organizations united in pushing back against political equality and shared prosperity. [Thanks to Charlie Cray for a succinct analysis of the Powell memo and to Jim Hoggan for calling attention to it more recently.]
They triggered an economic transformation that would in time touch every aspect of our lives. Powell's memo was delivered to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce at its headquarters across from the White House on land that was formerly the home of Daniel Webster. That couldn't have been more appropriate. History was coming full circle at 1615 H Street. Webster is remembered largely as the most eloquent orator in America during his years as Senator from Massachusetts and Secretary of State under three presidents in the years leading up to the Civil War. He was also the leading spokesman for banking and industry nabobs who funded his extravagant tastes in wine, boats, and mistresses. Some of them came to his relief when he couldn't cover his debts wholly from bribes or the sale of diplomatic posts for personal gain. Webster apparently regarded the merchants and bankers of Boston's State Street Corporation - one of the country's first financial holding companies - very much as George W. Bush regarded the high rollers he called "my base." The great orator even sent a famous letter to financiers requesting retainers from them that he might better serve them. The historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. wondered how the American people could follow Webster "through hell or high water when he would not lead unless someone made up a purse for him." No wonder the U.S. Chamber of Commerce feels right as home with the landmark designation of its headquarters. 1615 H Street now masterminds the laundering of multi-millions of dollars raised from captains of industry and private wealth to finance - secretly - the political mercenaries who fight the class war in their behalf. Even as the Chamber was doubling its membership and tripling its budget in response to Lewis Powell's manifesto, the coalition got another powerful jolt of adrenalin from the wealthy right-winger who had served as Nixon's secretary of the treasury, William Simon. His polemic entitled A Time for Truth argued that "funds generated by business" must "rush by multimillions" into conservative causes to uproot the institutions and "the heretical strategy" [his term] of the New Deal. He called on "men of action in the capitalist world" to mount "a veritable crusade" against progressive America. Business Week magazine somberly explained that "...it will be a bitter pill for many Americans to swallow the idea of doing with less so that big business can have move." I'm not making this up. And so it came to pass; came to pass despite your heroic efforts and those of other kindred citizens; came to pass because those "men of action in the capitalist world" were not content with their wealth just to buy more homes, more cars, more planes, more vacations and more gizmos than anyone else. They were determined to buy more democracy than anyone else. And they succeeded beyond their own expectations. After their 40-year "veritable crusade" against our institutions, laws and regulations - against the ideas, norms and beliefs that helped to create America's iconic middle class - the Gilded Age is back with a vengeance. You know these things, of course, because you've been up against that "veritable crusade" all these years. But if you want to see the story pulled together in one compelling narrative, read this - perhaps the best book on politics of the last two years : Winner Take All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer and Turned Its Back on the Middle Class . Two accomplished political scientists wrote it: Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson - the Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson of political science, who wanted to know how America had turned into a society starkly divided into winners and losers. Mystified by what happened to the notion of "shared prosperity" that marked the years after World War II; puzzled that over the last generation more and more wealth has gone to the rich and superrich, while middle-class and working people are left barely hanging on; vexed that hedge-fund managers pulling down billions can pay a lower tax rate than their pedicurists, manicurists, cleaning ladies and chauffeurs; curious as to why politicians keep slashing taxes on the very rich even as they grow richer, and how corporations keep being handed huge tax breaks and subsidies even as they fire hundreds of thousands of workers; troubled that the heart of the American Dream - upward mobility - seems to have stopped beating; astounded that the United States now leads in the competition for the gold medal for inequality; and dumbfounded that all this could happen in a democracy whose politicians are supposed to serve the greatest good for the greatest number, and must regularly face the judgment of citizens at the polls if they haven't done so; Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson wanted to find out "how our economy stopped working to provide prosperity and security for the broad middle class." They wanted to know: "Who dunnit?" They found the culprit: "It's the politics, stupid!" Tracing the clues back to that "unseen revolution" of the 1970s - the revolt triggered by Lewis Powell, fired up by William Simon, and fueled by rich corporations and wealthy individuals - they found that 'Step by step and debate by debate America's public officials have rewritten the rules of American politics and the American economy in ways that have benefitted the few at the expense of the many." There you have it: they bought off the gatekeepers, got inside, and gamed the system. And when the fix was in, they let loose the animal spirits, turning our economy into a feast for predators. And they won - as the rich and powerful got richer and more powerful - they not only bought the government, they "saddled Americans with greater debt, tore new holes in the safety net, and imposed broad financial risks on workers, investors, and taxpayers." Until - write Hacker and Pierson - "The United States is looking more and more like the capitalist oligarchies of Brazil, Mexico, and Russia where most of the wealth is concentrated at the top while the bottom grows larger and larger with everyone in between just barely getting by." The revolt of the plutocrats has now been ratified by the Supreme Court in its notorious Citizens United decision last year. Rarely have so few imposed such damage on so many. When five pro-corporate conservative justices gave "artificial entities" the same rights of "free speech" as living, breathing human beings, they told our corporate sovereigns "the sky's the limit" when it comes to their pouring money into political campaigns. The Roberts Court embodies the legacy of pro-corporate bias in justices determined to prevent democracy from acting as a brake on excessive greed and power in the private sector. Wealth acquired under capitalism is in and of itself no enemy of democracy, but wealth armed with political power - power to shake off opportunities for others to rise - is a proven danger. Thomas Jefferson had hoped that "we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and [to] bid defiance to the laws of our country." James Madison feared that the "spirit of speculation" would lead to "a government operating by corrupt influence, substituting the motive of private interest in place of public duty." Jefferson and Madison didn't live to see reactionary justices fulfill their worst fears. In 1886 a conservative court conferred the divine gift of life on the Southern Pacific Railroad. Never mind that the Fourteenth Amendment declaring that no person should be deprived of "life, liberty or property without due process of law" was enacted to protect the rights of freed slaves. The Court decided to give the same rights of "personhood" to corporations that possessed neither a body to be kicked nor a soul to be damned. For over half a century the Court acted to protect the privileged. It gutted the Sherman Antitrust Act by finding a loophole for a sugar trust. It killed a New York state law limiting working hours. Likewise a ban against child labor. It wiped out a law that set minimum wages for women. And so on: one decision after another aimed at laws promoting the general welfare." The Roberts Court has picked up the mantle: Moneyed interests first, the public interest second, if at all. The ink was hardly dry on the Citizens United decision when the U.S. Chamber of Commerce organized a covertly funded front and rained drones packed with cash into the 2010 campaigns. According to the Sunlight Foundation, corporate front groups spent $126 million in the fall of 2010 while hiding the identities of the donors. Another corporate cover group - the American Action Network - spent over $26 million of undisclosed corporate money in just six Senate races and 26 House elections. And Karl Rove's groups - American Crossroads/Crossroads GPS - seized on Citizens United to raise and spend at least $38 million that NBC News said came from "a small circle of extremely wealthy Wall Street hedge fund and private equity moguls"- all determined to water down financial reforms designed to prevent another collapse of the financial system. Jim Hightower has said it well: Today's proponents of corporate plutocracy "have simply elevated money itself above votes, establishing cold, hard cash as the real coin of political power." No wonder so many Americans have felt that sense of political impotence that the historian Lawrence Goodwyn described as "the mass resignation" of people who believe in the "dogma of democracy" on a superficial public level but whose hearts no longer burn with the conviction that they are part of the deal. Against such odds, discouragement comes easily. But if the generations before us had given up, slaves would still be waiting on these tables, on Election Day women would still be turned away from the voting booths, and workers would still be committing a crime if they organized. So once again: Take heart from the past and don't ever count the people out. During the last quarter of the 19th century, the industrial revolution created extraordinary wealth at the top and excruciating misery at the bottom. Embattled citizens rose up. Into their hearts, wrote the progressive Kansas journalist William Allen White, "had come a sense that their civilization needed recasting, that their government had fallen into the hands of self-seekers, that a new relation should be established between the haves and have-nots." Not content to wring their hands and cry "Woe is us" everyday citizens researched the issues, organized to educate their neighbors, held rallies, made speeches, petitioned and canvassed, marched and marched again. They ploughed the fields and planted the seeds - sometimes in bloody soil - that twentieth century leaders used to restore "the general welfare" as a pillar of American democracy. They laid down the now-endangered markers of a civilized society: legally ordained minimum wages, child labor laws, workmen's safety and compensation laws, pure foods and safe drugs, Social Security, Medicare, and rules that promote competitive markets over monopolies and cartels. Remember: Democracy doesn't begin at the top; it begins at the bottom, when flesh-and-blood human beings fight to rekindle the patriot's dream. The Patriot's Dream? Arlo Guthrie, remember? He wrote could be the unofficial anthem of Zuccotti Park. Listen up: Living now here but for fortune Placed by fate's mysterious schemes Who'd believe that we're the ones asked To try to rekindle the patriot's dreams Arise sweet destiny, time runs short All of your patience has heard their retort Hear us now for alone we can't seem To try to rekindle the patriot's dreams Can you hear the words being whispered All along the American stream Tyrants freed the just are imprisoned Try to rekindle the patriot's dreams Ah but perhaps too much is being asked of too few You and your children with nothing to do Hear us now for alone we can't seem To try to rekindle the patriot's dreams Who, in these cynical times, when democracy is on the ropes and the blows of great wealth pound and pound and pound again against America's body politic - who would dream such a radical thing?
Transcript courtesy of Nieman Watchdog.
Bill Moyers' new show, Moyers & Company, premieres in January.
Monday, October 17, 2011
Why is there anger across the world?
This has got to be the best explanation on what is happening around the world.
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Sunday, September 25, 2011
The Unequal tax burden on the Public
The Mother Jones article shows some great graphics explaining the inequality of the TAX-Code in America.
How Rich Are the Super Rich?
How Rich Are the Super Rich?
Wednesday, September 21, 2011
Greenwood store on trial for opening his business
Cal’s Market trial postponed (Mt Dem)
Vincent Cal of Greenwood appeared in court before Judge James Wagoner on Friday, Sept. 16, to continue his ongoing fight with El Dorado County to keep Cal’s Market from being shut down. He previously was in court before Judge Thomas A. Smith on Sept. 2, when he was arraigned and released by Judge Smith on his own recognizance. On Sept. 2, Cal also was ordered to complete the booking process at the El Dorado County Sheriff’s Office by the end of that business day.
At last week’s hearing, Cal’s attorney requested that his trial, set for Sept 20, be postponed to a later date to await the outcome of a Board of Supervisors meeting. Cal is trying to have his case put on the agenda so that the board can possibly waive his rezoning fees or reduce them.
The 70-year-old man has requested a trial by jury. He is being prosecuted for allegedly operating a business without a license.
Before adjourning last Friday, the prosecuting attorney requested that Judge Wagoner shut down Cal’s Market until after trial.
“I will refrain from shutting you down for now, but no more prepared foods or I will have no choice in shutting you down if you do not adhere to this court’s ruling,” Judge Wagoner said to Cal.
Wagoner rescheduled Cal’s trial for Oct. 17 at 10 a.m. at the courthouse on Main Street in Placerville.
El Dorado judge James Wagoner admonished
Sac Bee article (I cut and pasted it because sometime the Bee takes them off line.)
Read more: http://www.sacbee.com/2011/09/14/3908503/el-dorado-judge-james-wagoner.html#ixzz1Yd9apJBr
El Dorado judge James Wagoner admonished by judicial commission
Published: Wednesday, Sep. 14, 2011 - 12:00 am
| Page 3B
El Dorado Superior Court Judge James R. Wagoner has been
publicly admonished by the California Commission on Judicial
Performance.
The admonishment is the lowest of three levels of public discipline administered by the commission. It carries no further sanctions and cannot be appealed, said Victoria B. Henley, director-chief counsel for the commission.
The commission's investigation showed that Wagoner, currently assistant presiding judge in El Dorado County, acted outside his authority in having Penny Arnold jailed on July 16, 2010.
According to the commission, Wagoner left his second-floor courtroom in the Main Street Courthouse in Placerville after hearing that Arnold was using a cellphone to take photos on the first floor.
He recessed his court and went to the first floor with two bailiffs and ordered Arnold to report to his courtroom for a hearing on her conduct.
He warned her she would be held in contempt if she did not comply and had the bailiffs arrest her.
Arnold was held in a jury room and then transported to jail.
Wagoner later found her guilty of direct contempt and sentenced her to five days in jail, with credit for one day and a stay of the other four.
"The commission found that the judge's order to Ms. Arnold to immediately report to his courtroom for a hearing was not a valid order on which a contempt charge could be based," according to a release from Henley, "and that the judge was without jurisdiction over Ms. Arnold, and further, that the judge gave the appearance of having assumed a law enforcement role in violation of the Code of Judicial Ethics."
It also found that Wagoner acted improperly in four other respects:
• Remanding Arnold without a hearing.
• Adjudicating the matter as direct contempt.
• Imposing unlawful conditions in her sentence.
• Failing to issue an order with facts supporting the contempt finding.
In deciding to issue a public admonishment – more severe than two levels of nonpublic confidential discipline – the commission noted a 2009 confidential advisory issued to Wagoner for abusing his authority. The advisory is the lowest disciplinary level.
Wagoner was elected in 2002.
The admonishment is the lowest of three levels of public discipline administered by the commission. It carries no further sanctions and cannot be appealed, said Victoria B. Henley, director-chief counsel for the commission.
The commission's investigation showed that Wagoner, currently assistant presiding judge in El Dorado County, acted outside his authority in having Penny Arnold jailed on July 16, 2010.
According to the commission, Wagoner left his second-floor courtroom in the Main Street Courthouse in Placerville after hearing that Arnold was using a cellphone to take photos on the first floor.
He recessed his court and went to the first floor with two bailiffs and ordered Arnold to report to his courtroom for a hearing on her conduct.
He warned her she would be held in contempt if she did not comply and had the bailiffs arrest her.
Arnold was held in a jury room and then transported to jail.
Wagoner later found her guilty of direct contempt and sentenced her to five days in jail, with credit for one day and a stay of the other four.
"The commission found that the judge's order to Ms. Arnold to immediately report to his courtroom for a hearing was not a valid order on which a contempt charge could be based," according to a release from Henley, "and that the judge was without jurisdiction over Ms. Arnold, and further, that the judge gave the appearance of having assumed a law enforcement role in violation of the Code of Judicial Ethics."
It also found that Wagoner acted improperly in four other respects:
• Remanding Arnold without a hearing.
• Adjudicating the matter as direct contempt.
• Imposing unlawful conditions in her sentence.
• Failing to issue an order with facts supporting the contempt finding.
In deciding to issue a public admonishment – more severe than two levels of nonpublic confidential discipline – the commission noted a 2009 confidential advisory issued to Wagoner for abusing his authority. The advisory is the lowest disciplinary level.
Wagoner was elected in 2002.
Read more: http://www.sacbee.com/2011/09/14/3908503/el-dorado-judge-james-wagoner.html#ixzz1Yd9apJBr
Thursday, September 8, 2011
When are the Republicans going to wise up?
2002 California gubernatorial election:
-- Gray Davis ran for re-election after the 2001 rolling black outs which were caused by GREED
Primary in March 2002. Gray Davis faced no major competitor in the primary and won the nomination. Simon defeated former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan in the Republican primary
-- Riordan was the middle of the road but non-republicans couldn't vote for him
-- Simon was part of the crazy right.
Simon lost by 5% where Riordan would have beat Davis.
When are these clowns going to wake up and be human? Now we have Perry who says that 1/4th of his state does NOT have Health Care because the Federal Govt did something. He never said what that something was. It makes no sense...but he doesn't have to.... He's the flashy object the GOP is swimming after right now.
Now we have Huntsman -- the only sane candidate -- but he's going down because only the Crazy-hard liners will vote in the primary -- no outsiders.
Not all Republicans are idiots...but Idots are running the ship...
-- Gray Davis ran for re-election after the 2001 rolling black outs which were caused by GREED
Primary in March 2002. Gray Davis faced no major competitor in the primary and won the nomination. Simon defeated former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan in the Republican primary
-- Riordan was the middle of the road but non-republicans couldn't vote for him
-- Simon was part of the crazy right.
Simon lost by 5% where Riordan would have beat Davis.
When are these clowns going to wake up and be human? Now we have Perry who says that 1/4th of his state does NOT have Health Care because the Federal Govt did something. He never said what that something was. It makes no sense...but he doesn't have to.... He's the flashy object the GOP is swimming after right now.
Now we have Huntsman -- the only sane candidate -- but he's going down because only the Crazy-hard liners will vote in the primary -- no outsiders.
Not all Republicans are idiots...but Idots are running the ship...
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
Timeline Of A Right-Wing Media Smear: Hoffa's Call To Vote Became “ A Call For Violence“
How can FOX Cable NEWS get away with slamming people with edited tapes? How can this be legal?
Timeline Of A Right-Wing Media Smear: Hoffa's Call To Vote Became “ A Call For Violence“
Timeline Of A Right-Wing Media Smear: Hoffa's Call To Vote Became “ A Call For Violence“
Sunday, September 4, 2011
65% of Small Business Owners say the problem is JOBS!
When did you hear the word "jobs" pass the lips of a TeaPot person?
This article on "regulations and taxes aren't killing jobs" reports on this.
When did you hear the word "jobs" pass the lips of a TeaPot person?
This article on "regulations and taxes aren't killing jobs" reports on this.
Friday, September 2, 2011
Antitrust = Fair "Competition" Law
The Antitrust law started way back in Roman Times. They set laws in place to protect the grain traffic. People were fined if they stopped or interfered with grain traffic.
Antitrust laws were put in place to keep the market place open to anyone -- and -- free to sell their product. --> Open competition. So if you were a small mom and pop oil company, you could sell your oil along with Standard Oil.
People who say they are Against Government Regulation are saying:
-- They are OK with REPRESSION of the free market caused by CARTELS.
-- They are OK to COLLUSION among business communities to prevent any one else competing.
I found this graft interesting. It is the economist's depiction of deadweight loss (inefficiency) to efficiency that monopolies cause.
There comes a point when monopolies create a loss of people buying their products due to "Lack of competition."
When you have a favorite brand of ice cream say "X" ice cream, you tend to buy only that brand, but you do buy others occasionally.
Another ice cream business, say "R" ice cream, wants "X's" customers to buy "R" ice cream. Instead of making a better product, they buy out the competition, X.
Does R make ice cream like X? No, that's too expensive and they have to cut costs because it cost so much to buy up all X's stock so the company's board would sell the company -- and then "R" had to pay for "X's" company after that. So now you are left with only R's ice cream that had to cut quality to cut costs.
How is that creating open competition? It didn't. It wasn't meant to. That is Reducing the Market. Now we are left with lousy ice cream, so we just stop buying it.
After all, if you worked at the "X" ice cream factory, you've lost your job and can't afford to buy any ice cream.
Antitrust laws were put in place to keep the market place open to anyone -- and -- free to sell their product. --> Open competition. So if you were a small mom and pop oil company, you could sell your oil along with Standard Oil.
People who say they are Against Government Regulation are saying:
-- They are OK with REPRESSION of the free market caused by CARTELS.
-- They are OK to COLLUSION among business communities to prevent any one else competing.
I found this graft interesting. It is the economist's depiction of deadweight loss (inefficiency) to efficiency that monopolies cause.
There comes a point when monopolies create a loss of people buying their products due to "Lack of competition."
When you have a favorite brand of ice cream say "X" ice cream, you tend to buy only that brand, but you do buy others occasionally.
Another ice cream business, say "R" ice cream, wants "X's" customers to buy "R" ice cream. Instead of making a better product, they buy out the competition, X.
Does R make ice cream like X? No, that's too expensive and they have to cut costs because it cost so much to buy up all X's stock so the company's board would sell the company -- and then "R" had to pay for "X's" company after that. So now you are left with only R's ice cream that had to cut quality to cut costs.
How is that creating open competition? It didn't. It wasn't meant to. That is Reducing the Market. Now we are left with lousy ice cream, so we just stop buying it.
After all, if you worked at the "X" ice cream factory, you've lost your job and can't afford to buy any ice cream.
Thursday, June 30, 2011
The Ayn Rand Business Community running the government
I was just reading about how the Founding Fathers REQUIRED all businesses to contribute to the Country's needs. They helped with roads, and buildings. It was an agreement with the business communities to help the country.--Payment
In 1935 when the homeless were roaming the country looking for jobs and food, once again it was the business community who work WITH Pres. Roosevelt to establish ways to get people back to work. Yes the business community.
Now we have the Ayn Rand's business community. Rand believes in Self-love and Self-interest. The poor are Evil. (Look at the posted 1950 interview with Mike Wallace)
If the Legislators from the Ayn Rand's business community looks at people with disgust because they want, we will NEVER be the country our founding fathers wanted. (Just read Common Cause--We CAN'T go it alone.)
Cutting everything and taking food off people's tables to protect the Ayn Rand Business community will lead to the same RIOTS in 1933-1934.... (Just look at the word Community --> Common + unity A community includes residents and schools and businesses.)
I have Ted Gaines for State Senator and his wife for State Assembly. They own and operate a Insurance Brokerage business in Sacramento.
Why can't the Gaines think about the people they are suppose to represent instead of the profits they can accumulate with gutting the government's protect to you and me? Where are their ideas for JOBS? To make this country STRONG again?
Saturday, June 18, 2011
WI Sup Court told Lawmakers before court acted
When the Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice writes a 2nd paper saying that he supports the GOP.... How can this be anything BUT Political??
Email suggests lawmakers knew court would act - WKOW 27: Madison, WI Breaking News, Weather and Sports
Email suggests lawmakers knew court would act - WKOW 27: Madison, WI Breaking News, Weather and Sports
Why Labor Unions?
Why labor Unions? 1932 --> People were fighting for jobs and food.
NIRA (National Industrial Recovery Act) of 1933 --> Roosevelt worked WITH businesses to fix prices and production to HALT deflationary trends. Violent price cutting and wage cutting which led to riots in the streets. (Schlesinger pg 162)
It granted labor to bargain collectively. US Supreme court struck NRA down--States can't bargain.... Each Business had to bargain with its workers.... Business power = Worker power.... That's how you solve problems...
Oppression never solved problems...only creates problems... Maybe that's why FOREIGN businesses WANT a labor union...clears up safety, worker disputes.... Greed never does...
NIRA (National Industrial Recovery Act) of 1933 --> Roosevelt worked WITH businesses to fix prices and production to HALT deflationary trends. Violent price cutting and wage cutting which led to riots in the streets. (Schlesinger pg 162)
It granted labor to bargain collectively. US Supreme court struck NRA down--States can't bargain.... Each Business had to bargain with its workers.... Business power = Worker power.... That's how you solve problems...
Oppression never solved problems...only creates problems... Maybe that's why FOREIGN businesses WANT a labor union...clears up safety, worker disputes.... Greed never does...
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Lies to scare people again
Sen Pete Sessions said, "Our nation's Social Security Trust Fund is depleting at an alarming rate."
That is a FALSE statement...
Social Security is collected from those making less than $109,000............Every dime OVER $109,000 does not have anything pulled out of it for Social Security nor does it collect any Medicare $$$ after $109,000.
The money collected used to pay the Social Security payments for this year. The money left over..... YES, there is money left over, is put in a BOND and held for years when the funds fall short.
The trust fund is not depleting unless he is talking about the times the federal government BORROWED $$$$ from the bonds.
House Republicans propose Social Security opt-out - The Hill's Floor Action
That is a FALSE statement...
Social Security is collected from those making less than $109,000............Every dime OVER $109,000 does not have anything pulled out of it for Social Security nor does it collect any Medicare $$$ after $109,000.
The money collected used to pay the Social Security payments for this year. The money left over..... YES, there is money left over, is put in a BOND and held for years when the funds fall short.
The trust fund is not depleting unless he is talking about the times the federal government BORROWED $$$$ from the bonds.
House Republicans propose Social Security opt-out - The Hill's Floor Action
Monday, June 6, 2011
Supreme Court: Halliburton Class-Action Lawsuit Can Proceed
Wow, the Supreme Court Chief Justice said that Shareholders did NOT have to prove a loss BEFORE proceeding....
That is so Un-Republican.... I thought it was.... Too bad to the middle class....and protect "Cheney's" Haliburton at all costs....
Supreme Court: Halliburton Class-Action Lawsuit Can Proceed
That is so Un-Republican.... I thought it was.... Too bad to the middle class....and protect "Cheney's" Haliburton at all costs....
Supreme Court: Halliburton Class-Action Lawsuit Can Proceed
Sunday, June 5, 2011
Face The Nation slams Pelosi....
Wow, Nancy Pelosi the MINORITY leader of the house has MORE control over what happens than Boehner or last week's guest Cantor??? WOW....
Also look at the ### of jobs generated in 2005 compared to 6-months of 2011.... OH, I see, it was her fault in 2005.... that the CORRECTED ###s ended up to be a loss-in-jobs....WOW, that sure makes her more powerful than any other Legislator....
So if we say she is "Lying to the Nation" about the Boehner's NO-JOB-Agenda and calling "Health Reform" Obamacare..... It will cover up the fact that insurance companies (29% gain in profits in 2010) had to hire 200,000 new jobs to process the paperwork...(to stop the run on emergency rooms).
WOW, she really is powerful...No wonder Bob jumped in her S%@# about stopping the HOUSE from getting anything done.... Good thing he didn't ask Boehner...it would've made him cry...
Also look at the ### of jobs generated in 2005 compared to 6-months of 2011.... OH, I see, it was her fault in 2005.... that the CORRECTED ###s ended up to be a loss-in-jobs....WOW, that sure makes her more powerful than any other Legislator....
So if we say she is "Lying to the Nation" about the Boehner's NO-JOB-Agenda and calling "Health Reform" Obamacare..... It will cover up the fact that insurance companies (29% gain in profits in 2010) had to hire 200,000 new jobs to process the paperwork...(to stop the run on emergency rooms).
WOW, she really is powerful...No wonder Bob jumped in her S%@# about stopping the HOUSE from getting anything done.... Good thing he didn't ask Boehner...it would've made him cry...
Dirty politics on BOTH sides...
Back in Nov., California voters passed Prop. 25 calling for an end of missed State budget deadlines (State workers and small businesses don't get paid until a budget is settled.) by stopping Legislator's pay if a budget isn't passed.
Now, the L.A. Times says that the State Legislators are going to try and pass a "partial Budget deal." They haven't agreed on a budget in Years....but for their pay, they can do this?
History
Gov. Jerry Brown has tried to get approval to hold an election letting the voters decided if they want to KEEP the present Tax-rate to help prevent further taxcuts to schools and such.
Polls say that 70 to 80 percent of the voters said yes they wanted a vote. (I polled the people at three grocery stores in Gaines' district -- Ran
69% in El Dorado Hills,
71% Auburn
78% Cameron Park.
Yes, I left these ###'s with his staff. He's the party Whip, so he doesn't have time for his constituents. (He was meeting with Grover Norqust at the time. Gee, I wonder what they were talking about?)
The hang up is 14 Senate Republicans (One is mine Ted Gaines) will not let it go to the people. I have asked him why? He said that the "People decided they didn't want any raises in their taxes a couple of years back." A couple of years back? He doesn't care what they have to say TODAY? Believe me, he won't take calls -- only messages on this.
Link
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-cap-legislature-20110523,0,6466271.column
Now, the L.A. Times says that the State Legislators are going to try and pass a "partial Budget deal." They haven't agreed on a budget in Years....but for their pay, they can do this?
History
Gov. Jerry Brown has tried to get approval to hold an election letting the voters decided if they want to KEEP the present Tax-rate to help prevent further taxcuts to schools and such.
Polls say that 70 to 80 percent of the voters said yes they wanted a vote. (I polled the people at three grocery stores in Gaines' district -- Ran
69% in El Dorado Hills,
71% Auburn
78% Cameron Park.
Yes, I left these ###'s with his staff. He's the party Whip, so he doesn't have time for his constituents. (He was meeting with Grover Norqust at the time. Gee, I wonder what they were talking about?)
The hang up is 14 Senate Republicans (One is mine Ted Gaines) will not let it go to the people. I have asked him why? He said that the "People decided they didn't want any raises in their taxes a couple of years back." A couple of years back? He doesn't care what they have to say TODAY? Believe me, he won't take calls -- only messages on this.
Link
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-cap-legislature-20110523,0,6466271.column
No-pay loophole: Legislators risk voter backlash from no-pay loophole - latimes.com
I almost gave up posting on my blog but then I read how our state legislators are trying to circumvent the voter approved Prop. 25 last November.
Now both Republicans and Democrats agreed..... to a "partial budget plan" so then they can still get their pay. This makes me SICK!!!
No-pay loophole: Legislators risk voter backlash from no-pay loophole - latimes.com
Now both Republicans and Democrats agreed..... to a "partial budget plan" so then they can still get their pay. This makes me SICK!!!
No-pay loophole: Legislators risk voter backlash from no-pay loophole - latimes.com
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Michigan GOV takes over city
Benton Harbor is around 83 percent black with an average annual income just over $10K
Jean Klock Park was left to the city as long as it remained a "Park." It's along the lake. (You can see the developers licking their chops, now can't you?)
Some Whirlpool land was swapped with the city, and then the city was left to clean up the contaminated land....
A Developer, who is also a State Senate staffer, tried to get the land to build a PRIVATE golf Course. He couldn't get voter's approval.
The GOV declares the city in an Emergency Financial situation and throws out ALL elected officials. Who does he appoint as the "Financial Manager"? None other than the developer who tried to get the land for his GOLF COURSE.
Legalized MARSHALL LAW
Maddow on Benton Harbor EFM takeover | Michigan Messenger
Jean Klock Park was left to the city as long as it remained a "Park." It's along the lake. (You can see the developers licking their chops, now can't you?)
Some Whirlpool land was swapped with the city, and then the city was left to clean up the contaminated land....
A Developer, who is also a State Senate staffer, tried to get the land to build a PRIVATE golf Course. He couldn't get voter's approval.
The GOV declares the city in an Emergency Financial situation and throws out ALL elected officials. Who does he appoint as the "Financial Manager"? None other than the developer who tried to get the land for his GOLF COURSE.
Legalized MARSHALL LAW
Maddow on Benton Harbor EFM takeover | Michigan Messenger
Monday, April 18, 2011
Ayn Rand Mike Wallace Interview 1959 part 1
This video comes in three or four parts, but it helps to understand what it is that the "New Conservatism Republicans" are aiming for. They believe in "freemarket" as long as they can manipulate the market in their direction.
A must see video:
A must see video:
Saturday, April 16, 2011
Michigan towns Taken Over by Corporations
Michigan Gov passed this law.... Now he can declare an emergency and put in a Corporation's Manager -- who is paid more than the Gov with tax $$$$
He throws out the people who were voted in....
The Taxpayers have to pay that "New" manager... I thought the town was in trouble because they didn't have Money???
Using New Emergency Financial Manager Law, They Start Dissolving Governments in Michigan | Emptywheel
He throws out the people who were voted in....
The Taxpayers have to pay that "New" manager... I thought the town was in trouble because they didn't have Money???
Using New Emergency Financial Manager Law, They Start Dissolving Governments in Michigan | Emptywheel
Friday, April 15, 2011
This is why we need to watch was is going on
The election officials said only "156,804 ballots had been cast" but this former employee of the Republican candidate said she found another 14,000 votes.... Well guess what? the total ballots the candidate's friend submitted to the capital "174,074" ballots tallied... Even if there isn't anything crooked... this woman should be fired.
Wisconsin Dems Demand Further Investigation Into 2006 Waukesha County Election | Crooks and Liars
Wisconsin Dems Demand Further Investigation Into 2006 Waukesha County Election | Crooks and Liars
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Trying to understand our Republican Candidate
OK Beth Gaines, wife of the former Assembly member Ted Gaines, is running for his old seat.
So who is she and what does she have to say about that position?
After researching for a whole day, going thought all the newspapers, I found out she hasn't said anything.
The Mt. Democrat's Editorial Board did an interview and Jim wrote a nice piece on March 3, 2011 -- just before the election...long after I sent my Mail-in-Ballot.
Another thing that I find very difficult to understand; Why doesn't Beth Gaines have to talk to the voters? She did not show up for the forum in El Dorado Hills in February. When the newspapers wrote about her, they didn't have a single quote from her--all through her spokeperson.
So who is she and what does she have to say about that position?
After researching for a whole day, going thought all the newspapers, I found out she hasn't said anything.
The Mt. Democrat's Editorial Board did an interview and Jim wrote a nice piece on March 3, 2011 -- just before the election...long after I sent my Mail-in-Ballot.
Another thing that I find very difficult to understand; Why doesn't Beth Gaines have to talk to the voters? She did not show up for the forum in El Dorado Hills in February. When the newspapers wrote about her, they didn't have a single quote from her--all through her spokeperson.
Monday, March 14, 2011
Wis. GOP have taken away the State Senator's right to vote??
Do these Wisconsin Republicans ever think? To say that ALL members of the opposing party can't vote on anything other than a floor vote is "Punch-Drunk" with power.
Is this the kind of Democracy we want? Where one party can run over another party just because they have the majority?
The forefathers didn't think so. They gave EQUAL leverage to each and every state, no matter how big or how small, by giving two (2) Senators for each state. That way the state with a small population say Wyoming has the same voice as the state with larger populations such as New York or California.
It's giving a voice to the minority. NOT all our way or else! Remember U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell and his 179 filibusters??
Wis. GOPer Scott Fitzgerald: Dems In Contempt, Not Allowed To Vote In Committees | TPMDC
Is this the kind of Democracy we want? Where one party can run over another party just because they have the majority?
The forefathers didn't think so. They gave EQUAL leverage to each and every state, no matter how big or how small, by giving two (2) Senators for each state. That way the state with a small population say Wyoming has the same voice as the state with larger populations such as New York or California.
It's giving a voice to the minority. NOT all our way or else! Remember U.S. Senator Mitch McConnell and his 179 filibusters??
Wis. GOPer Scott Fitzgerald: Dems In Contempt, Not Allowed To Vote In Committees | TPMDC
Hackers From Anonymous Post Bank of America Documents -- Daily Intel
Wikileaks leaked the documents that showed how Bank of America tried to remove the tracking information on loan documents. By doing this, banks cannot properly foreclose on the owners.
Now if only we had laws that would protect the homeowner... Oh but we do, but the Banks aren't going to tell us that.
Hackers From Anonymous Post Bank of America Documents -- Daily Intel
Now if only we had laws that would protect the homeowner... Oh but we do, but the Banks aren't going to tell us that.
Hackers From Anonymous Post Bank of America Documents -- Daily Intel
Sunday, March 13, 2011
Huge Crowds At Wisconsin Pro-Union Rally Saturday BLACKED OUT BY MOST MEDIA
The only station that covered the Wisconsin Protests was FOX "News"....
I tried watching them but when they showed video of the "Santa Cruz Harbor" and labeled it "Crescent City," I had to turn it off.
If it wasn't for bloggers, these pictures wouldn't be available...
UPDATE: Huge Crowds At Wisconsin Pro-Union Rally Saturday
I tried watching them but when they showed video of the "Santa Cruz Harbor" and labeled it "Crescent City," I had to turn it off.
If it wasn't for bloggers, these pictures wouldn't be available...
UPDATE: Huge Crowds At Wisconsin Pro-Union Rally Saturday
Friday, March 11, 2011
Republican's Toxic Tea will Hurt Education, Lautenberg Says
GOP gave the money away and then act like a drunken 13-year-old with a credit card. Maxed out and expecting Mama to pay it off...with her food money...
Why do we think they are going to be responsible? They weren't back in the 1980s and again in 2000.
The Democrats always have to pay-off a GOP drunk spree...
Why do we think they are going to be responsible? They weren't back in the 1980s and again in 2000.
The Democrats always have to pay-off a GOP drunk spree...
Daily Kos: Psst! This Joe Arpaio Security News Is Embargoed
Joe Arpaio sends out a press release telling the media he is going to do a surprise shakedown at the jail.... But OOPs.... He sent it too early.... It was because he was SO excited about Steven Seagal coming to watch....
You can't make this stuff up....
Daily Kos: Psst! This Joe Arpaio Security News Is Embargoed
You can't make this stuff up....
Daily Kos: Psst! This Joe Arpaio Security News Is Embargoed
Thursday, February 17, 2011
John Allard accused of "Double-Dipping" his expenses
The Auburn Journal had an article about Assembly candidate John Allard "Double-dipping" expenses for a trip to D.C.
REVOLT --Responsible voters for lower taxes is out of San Diego
What surprised me in this article is that Ted Gaines said he would not take "future" per diems. He told me he wasn't taking per diems and didn't take the raises. Both statements now appear to no longer be true.
Link to Full Auburn Article
REVOLT --Responsible voters for lower taxes is out of San Diego
What surprised me in this article is that Ted Gaines said he would not take "future" per diems. He told me he wasn't taking per diems and didn't take the raises. Both statements now appear to no longer be true.
Link to Full Auburn Article
D.C. trip expenses put Assembly candidate Allard on hot seat with tax watchdog
Friday, February 11, 2011
Who are these people with the raises?
I tried to do a search and see who these people are that got raises.... I only got the first four...
Annette Porini -- Chief of Staff for State Senator Joe Simitian of the 11th District (Palo Alto and Santa Cruz) a Democrat
Kevin Bassett -- Was Chief of Staff for State Senator Dave Cox (He's dead and Gaines is in his seat. Gaines has not listed his staff's names.) That was a Republican office.
Christopher Wysocki -- Was Chief of Staff for California Assembly Leader Bill Leonard but now a spokesman for the Small Business Survival Committee and worked with a Republican committee on the "Recall Gray Davis" campaign.
Ivan Altamura -- Chief of Staff for State Assembly Republican Caucus (GOP Consultants)
Dillon Gibbons – Chief of Staff for Assemblywoman Connie Conway (Republican) San Diego. (GOP Leader)
After Doolittle
Gaines won the State Senate seat while he was running for his old Assembly seat. Since he took the Senate seat, now the state is on the hook to run a special election (remember the new law...the two top winners run again.) so I guess that will be another $900,000 for that part...
The "Sacramento News and Review" has a great article about how Republican politics in the Gold Country has run into some trouble...
The link to the article is here .
The "Sacramento News and Review" has a great article about how Republican politics in the Gold Country has run into some trouble...
The link to the article is here .
 With former GOP Rep. John Doolittle (left) out of the picture, foothill Republicans are fighting each other. The Assembly contest between Beth Gaines (center) and John Allard (right) and five other Republicans is just one example. |
Staffers getting a pay raise at this time?
I am totally shocked that 250 legislative staffers are getting a pay raise... One is getting a monthly $6792 raise to bring her salary up to almost $143,000..........and in the same breath these legislators are asking Californians to pay more taxes and loose benefits. (Sorry it's not just Democrats asking for more money out of your pocket. A Republican legislator wants to let Local governments have the authority to raise the Vehicle Licensing Fee VLF to finance their needs. That doesn't sound like "lowering taxes" to me.)
The link to the article is here .
* Monthly pay. Source: California Assembly and Senate
The link to the article is here .
MORE PAY FOR SOME LEGISLATIVE AIDES
Here are highest wage earners among those receiving heftier paychecks this year in the Assembly and Senate. Most of the increases are due to promotions or for people promoted during a wage freeze:ASSEMBLY
| Name | 2010 job title | 2010 pay* | 2011 job title | 2011 pay* |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ivan Altamura | Chief of staff/GOP leader | $12,367 | Director/GOP consultants | $13,338 |
| Dillon Gibbons | Chief of staff/member | $6,555 | Chief of staff/GOP leader | $10,417 |
| Kimberly Rodriguez | Senior consultant | $9,276 | Principal consultant | $10,203 |
| Eric P. Swanson | Principal consultant | $8,833 | Chief consultant | $9,893 |
| Nicole Vazquez | Senior consultant | $8,331 | Principal consultant | $9,164 |
| Erika Contreras | Senior assistant | $7,419 | Chief of staff | $8,333 |
| Kevin Morley | Senior consultant | $6,672 | Principal assistant | $8,006 |
| Joe Stephenshaw | Senior consultant | $7,209 | Principal consultant | $7,929 |
| Nick Hardeman | Principal assistant | $6,078 | Chief of staff | $7,500 |
| Eric Astacaan | Senior consultant | $6,625 | Principal consultant | $7,288 |
SENATE
| Name | 2010 job title | 2010 pay* | 2011 job title | 2011 pay* |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Annette Porini | Chief of staff | $11,330 | Chief of staff | $11,896 |
| Kevin Bassett | Chief of staff | $9,582 | Exec. staff dir./GOP | $10,808 |
| Christopher Wysocki | Exec. staff dir./GOP | $9,566 | Exec. staff dir./GOP | $10,294 |
| Scott Bain | Principal consultant/exec. | $9,636 | Principal consultant/exec. | $10,118 |
| Pamela Schneider | Exec. staff director | $9,338 | Exec. staff director | $9,804 |
| Kellie Smith | Principal consultant | $9,066 | Exec. staff director | $9,804 |
| Brian Annis | Principal consultant/exec. | $9,066 | Principal consultant/exec. | $9,636 |
| Randy Pestor | Principal consultant/exec. | $9,006 | Principal consultant/exec. | $9,636 |
| Jacqueline Kinney | Principal consultant | $9,066 | Principal consultant/exec. | $9,636 |
| Cori Ayala | Legislative director | $9,066 | Chief of staff | $9,582 |
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
A letter to the Editor about McClintock
Dear Blog Editor:
Congressman Tom McClintock left his Elk Grove home (he never moved in the district) to attend a couple of meetings with his constituents last week, none of which included El Dorado County people. I guess he doesn't feel he needs our input.
It's not like he has a tough work schedule. He did the PEOPLE'S work six (6) days last month and is only scheduled for four (4) days this month. He has two budget meetings this week, but nothing scheduled for his other committees for the rest of the month. According to the House schedule, the House will be dismissed on the 17th of Feb. and not go back until 3 pm on Tuesday March 1st.
McClintock is paid a nice wage in this environment of "government mismanagement at its worst." He got a $11,900 RAISE from last year's pay and is now being paid by the taxpayers $174,000 a year.
But what is he doing for this pay? The house is only in session from 10 am to 3 pm (Budget meeting has the same hours) Wednesday and Thursday. At this rate, McClintock gets paid $172.80 an hour to do the people's business. On top of paying his salary, taxpayers pay his staff close to $100,000 a year, and EVERYONE in McClintock's office gets taxpayer-paid health insurance--minus a co-pay, something that he doesn't want for the rest of American citizens. In addition to all this, McClintock does not pay for car or plane or gas...That's all covered by an expense account paid by the taxpayers.
Since Mr. McClintock does not feel the need to communicate with El Dorado County Residents (Letter, calls and emails continue to be unanswered) in his very tight schedule between Elk Grove and Washington DC, maybe the paper can ask this for me: Why are you talking about how my sisters and my mother have to take a cut in Social Security, something that they paid into with each and every pay check they earned?
When my paycheck went over the max, $109,000, it was like a raise -- my pay check for the rest of the year was LARGER. After McClintock pays Social Security for the first $109,000, he pays nothing for the $65,000.
Why Mr. McClintock are you asking that only the people who make less than $109,000 have to be FISCALLY responsible and take these cuts, but people like you who will be paid $864 a day for 6 days of work this month and pay nothing on the last $65,000 do not have to be fiscally responsible?
Dink Lane
Garden Valley
Congressman Tom McClintock left his Elk Grove home (he never moved in the district) to attend a couple of meetings with his constituents last week, none of which included El Dorado County people. I guess he doesn't feel he needs our input.
It's not like he has a tough work schedule. He did the PEOPLE'S work six (6) days last month and is only scheduled for four (4) days this month. He has two budget meetings this week, but nothing scheduled for his other committees for the rest of the month. According to the House schedule, the House will be dismissed on the 17th of Feb. and not go back until 3 pm on Tuesday March 1st.
McClintock is paid a nice wage in this environment of "government mismanagement at its worst." He got a $11,900 RAISE from last year's pay and is now being paid by the taxpayers $174,000 a year.
But what is he doing for this pay? The house is only in session from 10 am to 3 pm (Budget meeting has the same hours) Wednesday and Thursday. At this rate, McClintock gets paid $172.80 an hour to do the people's business. On top of paying his salary, taxpayers pay his staff close to $100,000 a year, and EVERYONE in McClintock's office gets taxpayer-paid health insurance--minus a co-pay, something that he doesn't want for the rest of American citizens. In addition to all this, McClintock does not pay for car or plane or gas...That's all covered by an expense account paid by the taxpayers.
Since Mr. McClintock does not feel the need to communicate with El Dorado County Residents (Letter, calls and emails continue to be unanswered) in his very tight schedule between Elk Grove and Washington DC, maybe the paper can ask this for me: Why are you talking about how my sisters and my mother have to take a cut in Social Security, something that they paid into with each and every pay check they earned?
When my paycheck went over the max, $109,000, it was like a raise -- my pay check for the rest of the year was LARGER. After McClintock pays Social Security for the first $109,000, he pays nothing for the $65,000.
Why Mr. McClintock are you asking that only the people who make less than $109,000 have to be FISCALLY responsible and take these cuts, but people like you who will be paid $864 a day for 6 days of work this month and pay nothing on the last $65,000 do not have to be fiscally responsible?
Dink Lane
Garden Valley
Monday, February 7, 2011
Pacifc Bell cared about their customers--AT&T (SBC) cares about their profits
After 15-days to get our phone service back... This story on Crooks & Liars pisses me off. (I condensed it to just AT&T)
Obama meets with U.S. Chamber of Commerce (Gave Karl Rove's non-profit PAC $75 Million)
Today, President Obama addressed the leaders of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, a right-wing trade association representing large international corporations.
Obama asked these business executives to “get in the game" and spend some of the trillions of dollars of STRAIGHT profit on job creation.
In fact the leaders of the Chamber such as AT&T has spent the past few years rewarding themselves with millions in additional compensation while eliminating American jobs.
– AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson was awarded a compensation package valued at $20.3 million in 2009, a jump of 35% from 2008. Last year, AT&T devoted an extra $8.99 million into Stephenson’s pension plan, ensuring that his retirement will include a pension “equal to 60 percent of his highest average salary and bonus in three of his last 10 years at the company. Although he’s not currently eligible for retirement, his pension is valued at an estimated $31 million today.”Here is the BEST part....a comment posted to this story. I had heard about this back when it happened:
– In recent years, AT&T has aggressively downsized its American workforce. In 2008, the company killed over 16,000 jobs as the recession hit. But in the last two years as AT&T enjoyed record profits, the company announced layoffs of “hundreds” in Kansas, 96 in Reynoldsburg, Ohio, 150 in Connecticut, 525 technicians in California, and 140 jobs in Oklahoma. These are LAYOFFS not retirements.
Comment by Lori: "I was one of those 16,000 laid off by ATT in 2009. ATT laid off 5K in 2008, right before Xmas. I remember at the time, right when the 2008 lay-offs were beginning, that our Director spoke to us on a conference call about Stephenson's big concerns were at the time. Apparently, he was concerned that no one would ride in the elevator with him. The story went that he got on the elevator and the first time the elevator stopped, everyone that had been on the elevator when Stephenson got on, got off - even though buttons had been pushed for floors that had not been reached yet. Stephenson's solution? He encouraged all of the people on his 'team,' VP's most of them, to impede on rank-and-file employee's breaks in the cafeteria by sitting down with them and starting conversations. Randall Stephenson - winning hearts and minds wherever he goes! These are the minds that run our largest corporations today. Morons."
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Is the media pushing stories?
Remember when the Iraq War was building up? Things didn't look right. How did "the 9/11 attack" --> "Iraq"
It didn't connect. But I trusted my government. They loved this country as much as I do. I was sure of it. So I trusted them.
Then I read this Jessica Yellin interview on CNN. The interview talked about how the Corporate Bosses to the three (3) different networks actually pressured the press corps to present the stories on the war were supportive.
Is that what is happening today?
It didn't connect. But I trusted my government. They loved this country as much as I do. I was sure of it. So I trusted them.
Then I read this Jessica Yellin interview on CNN. The interview talked about how the Corporate Bosses to the three (3) different networks actually pressured the press corps to present the stories on the war were supportive.
Is that what is happening today?
Sunday, January 23, 2011
CBO: Economy stronger, revenues up - UPI.com
I didn't read this in the Papers or hear it on the news broadcasts...
$18 Billion is a nice reduction.... Lets hope we can get more people back to work.
The link:
CBO: Economy stronger, revenues up - UPI.com
$18 Billion is a nice reduction.... Lets hope we can get more people back to work.
The link:
CBO: Economy stronger, revenues up - UPI.com
Saturday, January 22, 2011
Water, water everywhere... except for California's farms (Rep. Tom McClintock) - The Hill's Congress Blog
McClintock lived down in the Thousand Oaks area for years until he ran for Northern California's Congressional seat. He moved back up to Elk Grove. A little closer to the District he represents but not quite. See in California someone who runs for a Congressional Seat only has to be a Registered Voter in California. He doesn't have to live in the district. He doesn't have to vote on the issues that affect the people he represents. He doesn't have to shop at the same stores or drive on the same roads. He only has to have enough people to put a mark next to his name every two years.
This fight for the 4th Congressional District's water is NOT for the people he represents. This is a fight for the right to the water captured in Northern California's mountains and send it down to his old buddies down in Kern County.
The water from California's Northern Sierras is clean clear water, purer than anything they pump out of the ground or capture from Colorado River.
McClintock is NOT fighting for the people he represents, he's fighting for the Business Communities in Southern California. They have a lot more money to put in his campaign than any retiree or logger who lives in his district.
A link to The Hill's article --
Water, water everywhere... except for California's farms (Rep. Tom McClintock) - The Hill's Congress Blog
This fight for the 4th Congressional District's water is NOT for the people he represents. This is a fight for the right to the water captured in Northern California's mountains and send it down to his old buddies down in Kern County.
The water from California's Northern Sierras is clean clear water, purer than anything they pump out of the ground or capture from Colorado River.
McClintock is NOT fighting for the people he represents, he's fighting for the Business Communities in Southern California. They have a lot more money to put in his campaign than any retiree or logger who lives in his district.
A link to The Hill's article --
Water, water everywhere... except for California's farms (Rep. Tom McClintock) - The Hill's Congress Blog
Corporate contributions have surged for new Republican leaders in House
A link to the Washington Post article:
Corporate contributions have surged for new Republican leaders in House
Let's put on our thinking caps. What does this mean to you and me?
The first line to the Preamble of the Constitution says:
We, the people of the United States, . . .
(NOT -- We, the business communities of the United States, . . .)
If our legislators are putting the Corporation's interest OVER what is good for the People, then are they really Representatives, or are they paid spokesmen?
Corporate contributions have surged for new Republican leaders in House
Let's put on our thinking caps. What does this mean to you and me?
The first line to the Preamble of the Constitution says:
We, the people of the United States, . . .
(NOT -- We, the business communities of the United States, . . .)
If our legislators are putting the Corporation's interest OVER what is good for the People, then are they really Representatives, or are they paid spokesmen?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)