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We Have to Choose What Kind of a People We Are |
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Wednesday, 14 March 2012 09:37 |
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Excerpt: "We can keep going on the path we've been on, or change our course. To do that, Americans will have to mobilize, take on the entrenched interests and demand a change. We have to choose."
Rev. Jesse Jackson says, 'We can't simply tell a young generation that the American Dream is a nightmare for them.' (photo: Ken Krayeske)
We Have to Choose What Kind of a People We Are
Rev. Jesse Jackson, Reader Supported News
14 March 12
 ven while we see jobs coming back, the tsunami created by the Great Recession is hitting cities and counties with full force. Suffolk County, one of the largest New York counties, has declared a financial emergency. Stockton, Calif., a city of 300,000, is on the verge of bankruptcy.
As the cities go belly up, the 1 percent are back. A new report by Emmanuel Saez, the nation's leading academic expert on income inequality, shows that the top 1 percent captured a staggering 93 percent of all the real income growth in 2010. The bottom 99 percent captured only 0.2 percent after losing nearly 12 percent from 2007-09. For the 99 percent, the loses in the Great Recession erased all income gains since the last recession in 2002.
In cities, the crisis is forcing harsh cuts in services. As New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg put it, "Towns and counties across the state are starting to have to make the real choices - fewer cops, fewer firefighters, slower ambulance response, less teachers."
Cities and counties could muffle the effect for a couple of years, but now, the day of reckoning is hitting - and hitting hard.
Lower property values, the result of the housing bubble crash, are now being registered in tax valuations. Millions were lost as the banks trampled the law while dodging recording and transfer fees on mortgages. Unemployment and poverty put greater pressure on budgets, particularly on health care through Medicaid. The losses suffered by pension funds force higher payments by public employers. The high unemployment economy generates lower sales and income tax revenues.
Across America, cities and counties are cutting muscle, not fat. Teachers and police are being laid off. Parks are closing. Sewer and road repairs are being put off. And brutal battles are beginning with public workers, forced to pay for a crisis they did not create.
America is a rich nation, but our wealth is now too concentrated among the few. As in Iraq, we squander trillions in foolish wars of choice abroad. The wealthiest Americans pay lower tax rates than their secretaries.
These should not be controversial statements. We can't simply tell a young generation that the American Dream is a nightmare for them. We can't have a prosperous economy if the middle class is sinking. We will not long be a democracy if the wealthiest pocket the rewards and check out of building the nation.
Yet it is striking how many in both parties are in denial. All of the Republican candidates call for more top-end tax cuts, more military spending and harsher cuts in schools and infrastructure.
Congressional Republicans block even modest support for cities to keep teachers and cops on the job. Democrats like Steny Hoyer call for a grand bargain that begins by raising the retirement age on the next generation, a cruel reform that hits the poorest workers the hardest.
We can't go on this way. Do we assume that a recovery that benefits the few will trickle down to the rest of us? Do we so hate government that we will starve vital services like schools and police? Are we so divided that we don't care if poor children have health care or a fair start?
We face the reckoning. We can keep going on the path we've been on, or change our course. To do that, Americans will have to mobilize, take on the entrenched interests and demand a change.
We have to choose.
Reader Supported News is the Publication of Origin for this work. Permission to republish is freely granted with credit and a link back to Reader Supported News.
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GOP Plans to Sink the Economy |
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Written by <a href="index.php?option=com_comprofiler&task=userProfile&user=5903"><span class="small">Michael Tomasky, The Daily Beast</span></a>
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Tuesday, 13 March 2012 17:25 |
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Tomasky writes: "There are three fronts - gas prices, jobs, and the budget - on which we should keep our eyes open for signs that the Republicans are trying to achieve Mitch McConnell's No. 1 goal for America."
Speaker John Boehner (with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell) has suggested Republicans may renege on last year's debt-ceiling deal. (photo: Win McNamee/Getty Images)
GOP Plans to Sink the Economy
By Michael Tomasky, The Daily Beast
13 March 12
Every month brings improved job news - and bleaker prospects for the Republicans in November. Which is why they're contemplating economic sabotage as their only hope.
 e're just under eight months away from Election Day now, which means that the GOP is starting to run out of time to think up new ways to ruin the economy so that Barack Obama doesn't get reelected. The Republicans have to do this delicately, of course; they can't be open about it lest it become too obvious that harming the economy is their goal. But they have to be aggressive enough about it for their efforts to bear some actual (rotten) fruit. There are three fronts - gas prices, jobs, and the budget - on which we should keep our eyes open for signs that the Republicans are trying to achieve Mitch McConnell's No. 1 goal for America.
Let's take them in order. The Republicans received joyous news Monday in the form of the Washington Post poll that showed Obama's numbers sinking in inverse proportion to rising gas prices. The gas situation is perfect for the GOP for two reasons. First, there's very little a president can actually do about gas prices. Second, even though those prices don't really tell us much about the more general economy, most people have the impression that they do, so for the out-party, it's just a free whack.
No one can blame Republicans for using Obama as a piñata on the issue. But here's what they can be blamed for. What is causing these high prices? Not low supply and high demand, which is what they teach you in school. In fact, supply is high - domestic oil production is at its highest point in years, higher under this allegedly business-hating president than under oilmen Bush and Cheney. And demand has been low because of the economy, although it's now picking up.
No, experts blame a lot of the increase on fervid speculation in the oil markets, and a chief reason for a lot of that speculation is anxiety in those markets about a possible war with Iran. Said anxiety, in turn, is heightened every time a politician blusters about how we have no choice now but to go start that war. So this kind of rhetoric is a nice little two-fer for Republicans, who get to sound like tough guys and can also take comfort in knowing that the more they talk up attacking Iran, the more they're doing their small part to keep prices high.
Now let's look to jobs. As you may know, while we've been getting these hopeful job reports these last few months, there is one sector that's been lagging notably: the public sector. In fact, during 2011 the public sector across the country - state and local governments, in addition to the feds - laid off massive numbers of people. Public-sector job losses averaged 22,000 a month in 2011. State and municipal governments are laying people off mainly for two reasons: the economy, which means they're bringing in less revenue, and the drastic cuts in federal aid, which have forced the layoffs and firings of nearly half a million public-sector workers in the last two years.
True, Republicans want smaller budgets on ideological grounds. But they also know very well that the more domestic discretionary spending cuts they can force, and the more public employees they can make states and cities shave off their payrolls, the greater the negative effect on the overall employment picture. If those nearly half-million people were still working, what would the unemployment rate be? Maybe down to a flat 8 percent.
Lately, though, things are starting to look worrisome on that front for Republicans. In February, the public sector cut just 6,000 workers, well down from last year's average. This indicates that the party might not be able to count for long on the public-sector numbers dragging down the private-sector ones. Hmmm. What to do about that?
Interestingly and conveniently, exactly what the Republicans on Capitol Hill are doing right now! They have been signaling lately that the budget numbers they agreed to with Democrats last year in the debt deal need to be revisited, and the cuts must be even deeper. Speaker John Boehner is open about the possibility of reneging. He has sent some mixed signals - he's also talked about trying to get the House to accept a transportation bill that the Senate has already passed by the eye-poppingly bipartisan margin of 85–11. New York Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer says the bill can create 3 million jobs. The House returns to Washington next Monday. Where would you put the odds that this House of Representatives will vote, less than eight months before the election, to support a bill that Chuck Schumer boasts can produce 3 million jobs?
Every out-party does a little discreet cheering for the economy to be weak. But the GOP has put itself in a unique position. By opposing everything Obama wanted with such ferocity; by saying all those thousands of times that he had no clue about the economy; by sending out a parade of presidential candidates, from the semi-serious to the clown posse, all of whose central criticism of Obama is that he killed the economy - in all of these ways the party has more invested in economic failure than any out-party I can remember in my lifetime. Its best hope for now is gas prices, but even they eventually get lower, usually by late summer. Beyond that, all the GOP has to rely on is Mitt Romney's unstoppable charisma.
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For Obama, an Opportunity on Nuclear Proliferation |
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Tuesday, 13 March 2012 09:23 |
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Intro: "President Obama and his advisers are in the middle of a once-in-a-decade study of the nuclear arsenal and nuclear war plans. For strategic and budgetary reasons, they need to further reduce the number of deployed weapons and the number kept in reserve."
Obama can narrow the role of nuclear weapons in US defense strategy. (photo: Pete Souza/AP)
For Obama, an Opportunity on Nuclear Proliferation
By The New York Times, Editorial
13 March 12
 resident Obama and his advisers are in the middle of a once-in-a-decade study of the nuclear arsenal and nuclear war plans. For strategic and budgetary reasons, they need to further reduce the number of deployed weapons and the number kept in reserve. If this country can wean itself from its own dependence, it will be safer and will have more credibility in its efforts to contain the nuclear ambitions of Iran, North Korea and others.
Twenty years after the end of the cold war, the United States still has about 1,790 strategic nuclear weapons deployed and 2,800 more as backup. (Another 3,500 are retired and awaiting dismantlement.)
In his 2002 nuclear posture review, President George W. Bush declared that nuclear weapons had a "critical" role in defending the United States and its allies against nuclear-armed enemies and might be needed to deter and even punish foes wielding chemical, biological or conventional weapons. In his 2010 review, President Obama downgraded the importance of nuclear weapons, somewhat, to a "fundamental role." He ruled out the use of nuclear weapons against nonnuclear countries, even if they attack the United States with unconventional weapons.
Now Mr. Obama has to make the practical choices to implement his strategy. He took a first step in 2010 when he signed the New Start treaty with Moscow to cut the number of deployed long-range nuclear weapons to 1,550 each, from 2,200, by February 2018.
But that agreement followed the same pattern as all of the cold-war and post-cold-war arms treaties. It said nothing about the estimated 11,000 nuclear weapons that the two sides keep as backups - the so-called hedge. Nor did it address America's 500 short-range nuclear weapons, which are considered to be safely guarded, or Russia's 3,000 or more, which may be vulnerable to theft.
Mr. Obama must lead the way to deeper cuts in all three categories. For deployed strategic weapons, the Pentagon and national security aides have prepared options for the next round of negotiations with the Russians: a new ceiling of 1,000 to 1,100 warheads; 700 to 800; or 300 to 400. Even the lowest number is more than any potential foe, except Russia, possesses.
China, the only major power expanding its arsenal, likely has 240 to 300 nuclear weapons in its arsenal, but experts say no more than 50 are capable of hitting the United States. Pakistan has perhaps 90, all aimed at India; North Korea has fewer than a dozen, none with the ability to hit the United States. Iran has no weapons, so far.
Just how many does the United States need? Many experts believe the United States can easily go down to 1,000 warheads in total - deployed and stored - without jeopardizing security. We agree.
Washington and Moscow have committed to undertaking a new round of negotiations, but domestic politics in both capitals are interfering. The two sides need to get things moving. Another treaty will take years to complete, so Mr. Obama should also look seriously at moving more quickly to the New Start levels and challenge the Russians to do the same. Both countries need to destroy all of their tactical nuclear weapons - no commander would ever use them on a battlefield - as quickly as possible.
The United States and Russia also have about 1,000 weapons each that are ready to fire at a moment's notice. Mr. Obama should take as many as possible off of "hair trigger" alert and urge the Russians to do the same.
Many Republicans have reacted hysterically to the idea of further cuts. Senator James Inhofe has accused Mr. Obama of "catering to his liberal base," which he says wants to "unilaterally disarm." That is absurd. The stakes are too high for this to be treated as a partisan issue. Mr. Inhofe and others ignore the fact that both Presidents Bush made deep cuts in the arsenal - through negotiations with the Russians and unilateral reductions in the hedge.
Right now, the United States is on track to spend billions of dollars over the next 20 years to modernize and replace its aging nuclear delivery systems - submarines, intercontinental ballistic missiles and bombers. Reducing the arsenal will make it easier to rein in that bloated budget and shift resources to more critical needs.
President Obama helped drive up those costs when he promised to spend $88 billion over 10 years on the nuclear weapons labs to win Republican support for the last treaty. He began paring back last month when he delayed funding for a new plutonium facility and for a new class of nuclear submarines. More and deeper cuts are needed.
Senator Tom Coburn is one of the few Republicans who argue that the country does not need and cannot afford its huge arsenal. He has come up with a plan to save $79 billion over the next 10 years, including reducing the number of deployed strategic warheads to 1,220; cutting the intercontinental ballistic missile force to 300 from 500; trimming the "hedge"; and eliminating three of 14 ballistic nuclear submarines. He also favors delaying the purchase of new bombers until the mid-2020s.
A nuclear "implementation review" may sound arcane, and arms control talks may sound like a cold-war anachronism. They are not. This is President Obama's opportunity to reshape the post-cold-war world to make it fundamentally safer. He needs to seize it.
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A Clarion Call for Renewal of Democracy |
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Written by <a href="index.php?option=com_comprofiler&task=userProfile&user=6987"><span class="small">John Nichols, The Capital Times</span></a>
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Monday, 12 March 2012 16:33 |
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Nichols writes: "Vermonters went to their town meetings last week to settle questions about dump fees, snowplowing contracts and utility meters. They also decided to take on the corrupt campaign system that is steering the republic toward catastrophe."
Vermont's famous Town Hall meetings took aim at the Supreme Court ruling that gave corporations rights previously reserved for people. (photo: Forbes)
A Clarion Call for Renewal of Democracy
By John Nichols, The Capital Times
12 March 12
 ermonters went to their town meetings last week to settle questions about dump fees, snowplowing contracts and utility meters.
They also decided to take on the corrupt campaign system that is steering the republic toward catastrophe.
And they have done so in a voice loud enough to be heard all the way to Washington.
By Thursday morning, 64 towns had moved to amend the U.S. Constitution to overturn the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling - as well as the false construct that says, in the words of Mitt Romney, "Corporations are people, my friend."
"The resounding results will send a strong message that corporations and billionaires should not be allowed to buy candidates and elections with unlimited, undisclosed spending on political campaigns," declared U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.
Vermonters are not the first Americans to move to amend. Referendums have already passed in Madison and Dane County. Cities across the country, including Los Angeles, have urged Congress to begin the amendment process. State legislatures in Hawaii and New Mexico have too. (State Reps. Mark Pocan and Chris Taylor are proposing that Wisconsin join the call.)
But what has happened in Vermont is remarkable. Town meetings endorsed what once seemed a radical response.
It is not just liberals who are saying corporations are not people.
"Support for the resolution cut across party lines. Six towns in Republican districts and 13 cities and towns that have sent both Democrats and Republicans to the state legislature voted for the resolution by wide margins," says Aquene Freechild of Public Citizen's Democracy Is for People Campaign. "This bipartisan opposition to the Citizens United ruling mirrors several nationwide polls on the issue."
The Democracy Is for People Campaign played a critical role in organizing the Vermont uprising as part of the "Vermonters Say Corporations Are Not People" coalition, which includes Move to Amend, Common Cause and the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom.
Inspired by the success of the Vermont initiative, the Democracy Is for People Campaign is now launching the Resolutions Week project, which will encourage communities across the country to follow Vermont's lead. The goal is to get as many local pro-amendment resolutions as possible passed in the second week of June. "Already," organizers say, "more than 500 Public Citizen activists in 300 cities and towns have signed up to help pass resolutions in their towns."
Public Citizen is coordinating the Resolutions Week campaign with national groups, such as the Communications Workers of America, U.S. PIRG, the Main Street Alliance, the Move to Amend coalition and People for the American Way, as well as state-based partners.
And they have a partner in the Senate.
Vermont's Sanders is ramping up his advocacy for the Saving American Democracy Amendment, which he proposed last December. It would restore the power of Congress and state lawmakers to enact campaign spending limits like laws that were in place for a century before the controversial court ruling.
"I hope," says Sanders, "the message coming out of the town meetings in Vermont will spark a grass-roots movement all across the United States that a constitutional amendment is needed to overturn the ruling."
John Nichols is associate editor of The Capital Times, where his column appears regularly.
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epublicans have morality upside down. Santorum, Gingrich, and even Romney are barnstorming across the land condemning gay marriage, abortion, out-of-wedlock births, access to contraception, and the wall separating church and state.
