What is wrong?

[kentuck]

With saying that we need to cut the bloated defense budget in half? Congress just passed a defense budget of about $632 billion dollars. I don't think that includes satellite reconnaissance, CIA, or intelligence gathering, or other black book projects? Do we really need every military weapon that can be imagined? Could we not cut the budget in half and still have a strong, reliable defense?

What is wrong with saying that our people should not go hungry and that they should have jobs that pay a decent wage?

What is wrong with saying that income inequality is immoral and needs to be addressed? What is wrong with saying that the wealthy need to pay more in taxes? But, they need to do more than just talk about it, they need to do it.

What is wrong with holding corporate criminals responsible?

What is wrong with making Social Security stronger, rather than talking about putting it on the table to negotiate, so that the wealthy do not have to pay more in taxes?

What is wrong with having different ideas than the Republican Party?

Why does no one talk about taking money out of politics?? Is it because everyone now in office is there because of secret contributions and special interest money, and not the ideas they bring to help the people?

Is this really "populism" or is it just common sense?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

1. Well..you know...political parties are only about winning elections.

Not actually standing for anything is useful in that sense.

"Were parties here divided merely by a greediness for office,...to take a part with either would be unworthy of a reasonable or moral man." --Thomas Jefferson to William Branch Giles, 1795.

[Oakenshield]

50. Yep.

Just look at this video. John Olivier asks "What makes a politician successful?"

The answer came swiftly. "Getting reelected by his or her constituents."

[L0oniX]

64. The same could be said about DU at times.

[Demo_Chris]

2. Hope and Change. nt

[Pretzel_Warrior]

4. That was a really helpful addition

Thanks for taking the time to carefully lay your thoughts out on this issue.

[Demo_Chris]

8. I did. Not every post needs to scream like a chainsaw. nt

[jtuck004]

13. +1 n/t

[RC]

24. +9 to make that an even 10.

[sabrina 1]

47. It was concise and to the point, thank you! n/t

[Skidmore]

60. Especially when some posts are chainsaws.nt

[A Simple Game]

72. And I had always thought of it as a squeaky wheel. I like your analogy better. n/t

[bvar22]

17. The Demo Chris post was complete, and elegant in its simplicity.

"Hope & Change" is DONE.
Nobody will be buying that schtick in 2016.


You will know them by their WORKS,
not by their promises or excuses.

[Cali_Democrat]

54. Warren voted for the latest defense budget

More hope and change.

[rhett o rick]

74. So that makes it ok? Strange logic. nm

[JNelson6563]

62. It's a quick cred-building technique.

the haters eat that shit up.

Julie

[rhett o rick]

77. You call fellow Democrats "haters" because they dont show the unwavering

loyalty, that you do? You dont recognize the frustration with the "Hope and Change" that finds us with obscene defense budgets while the lower classes are being assaulted daily? I guess you are ok with the status quo.

I see people around me living in tents and cars. One man that comes to our foodbank was limping because he had goten frostbite on his foot from living in a tent. He has diabetes so he will probably lose part of his foot. Foodstamps have been cut, unemployment has been cut, yet trillions go to the banksters, doled out by Obama's Bernanke.

And so you call people haters, I guess hoping that they will stop speaking out against the inequality around us.

[kentuck]

79. +1000

Thank you.

[djean111]

3. That is becoming so glaringly obvious that it hurts - it is all about the win, and right after the

win? Start fundraising for the next election.

[liberal_at_heart]

5. exactly.

[Uncle Joe]

6. It's populism and common sense.

Thanks for the thread, kentuck.

[TBF]

7. Nothing is wrong with that -

but Eisenhower warned us and it arguably got Kennedy killed when he rubbed up against it.

We can push but it is going to take some heavy lifting. The politicians are not on our side for the most part.

[Bigmack]

9. Oh... we WILL cut our "defense" budget...

.... eventually....

Of course, by that time, the US will look like a Third World country... starving beggars, no infrastructure, schools falling down... the whole scene.

I take the above as a given.

My only question is....Will Americans just let it happen, or will they fight back?

[bvar22]

19. Here is a taste of what happens when you "fight back" in a Democratic Primary:

The Arkansas Democratic Primary was a heart breaking eye opener for the Grass Roots and Organized LABOR. We were given a Look Behind the Curtain,
and it wasn't very pretty.

[font size=3]We did EVERYTHING right in Arkansas in 2010.
We did EXACTLY what the White House asked us to do to "give the President Progressives in Congress that would work with him."[/font]

We organized and supported Lt Governor Bill Halter, the Pro-LABOR/ Pro-Health Care challenger to DINO Obstructionist Blanche Lincoln.
Halter was:

* Polling BETTER against the Republicans in the General,

*was popular in Arkansas in his OWN right,

*had an Up & Running Political machine,

* had a track record of winning elections (Lt. Governor)

*Had the full backing of Organized LABOR and The Grass Roots activists

*was handing Blanche her Anti-LABOR ass in The Primary until the White House stepped in

*Blanche had NO chance of winning the General in Arkansas

Guess what happened.
Our BIGGEST enemy to bringing "change" to The Senate was NOT The "Obstructionist" Republicans.
NO!
The BIGGEST obstruction to bringing "change" to The Senate was The Obama White House!

The White House stepped in at the last minute to save Blanche's failing primary campaign with an Oval Office Endorsement of The Wicked Witch that Killed the Public Option,,
and Bill Clinton was dispatched on a Campaign Tour for Blanche around the state bashing Organized LABOR and "Liberals" at every opportunity.

White House steps in to rescue Lincoln’s Primary Campaign in Arkansas

"So what did the Democratic Party establishment do when a Senator who allegedly impedes their agenda faced a primary challenger who would be more supportive of that agenda? They engaged in full-scale efforts to support Blanche Lincoln.

* Bill Clinton traveled to Arkansas to urge loyal Democrats to vote for her, bashing liberal groups for good measure.

*Obama recorded an ad for Lincoln which, among other things, were used to tell African-American primary voters that they should vote for her because she works for their interests.

*The entire Party infrastructure lent its support and resources to Lincoln — a Senator who supposedly prevents Democrats from doing all sorts of Wonderful, Progressive Things which they so wish they could do but just don’t have the votes for.

<snip>

What happened in this race also gives the lie to the insufferable excuse we’ve been hearing for the last 18 months from countless Obama defenders: namely, if the Senate doesn’t have 60 votes to pass good legislation, it’s not Obama’s fault because he has no leverage over these conservative Senators. It was always obvious what an absurd joke that claim was; the very idea of The Impotent, Helpless President, presiding over a vast government and party apparatus, was laughable. But now, in light of Arkansas, nobody should ever be willing to utter that again with a straight face.

Back when Lincoln was threatening to filibuster health care if it included a public option, the White House could obviously have said to her: if you don’t support a public option, not only will we not support your re-election bid, but we’ll support a primary challenger against you. Obama’s support for Lincoln did not merely help; it was arguably decisive, as The Washington Post documented today:"

<much more>

http://www.salon.com/2010/06/10/lincoln_6/

When the supporters of Pro-LABOR Lt Gov Bill Halter asked the White House WHY they had chosen to throw their full support behind Lincoln at the last minute, rescuing her failing campaign, the answer was ridicule and insults to Organized LABOR and the Grass Roots.

Ed Schultz sums up my feeling perfectly in the following clip.
http://videocafe.crooksandliars.com/heather/ed-schultz-if-it-wasnt-labor-barack-obama-

After the Arkansas Democratic Primary, many Grass Roots Activists working for a better government concluded that the current Democratic Party Leadership preferred to GIVE this Senate Seat to a Big Business Republican rather than taking the risk that a Pro-LABOR Democrat might win it.
This was greatly reinforced by the Insults & Ridicule to LABOR from the White House after their Primary "victory" over Organized LABOR & the Grass Roots in the Arkansas Democratic Primary.

Of course, as EVERYBODY predicted, Lincoln lost badly in the General Election, giving that Senate Seat to The Republicans.
So what did the White House gain by Stomping Down Labor and the Grass Roots?
We don't know.
The White House has never responded to our questions with an explanation, only insults and more ridicule.

But thats OK.
Chalk this one up to experience.
We will be back.
Union Thugs may sometimes have to take a Big Money Beat Down,
but we never forget a Sucker Punch.


You will know them by their WORKS,
not by their Promises or Excuses.

[Blue_In_AK]

37. It happened here, too, Bvar22, in 2008.

Excellent progressive Diane Benson, who came closer to defeating Don Young than anyone else had in decades in 2006, despite no support from the national or state party, had her candidacy opposed in 2008 by centrist dem Ethan Berkowitz in 2008. Despite having the full support of the party, he was defeated by a greater margin than Diane had been. Even Don Young himself stated that Diane was a better candidate and, building on her 2006 momentum, might have beaten him if she had been our nominee.

It makes me sick the way the party treats progressives, in red states particularly.

[bvar22]

45. Thank You, Blue.

Unfortunately, these are not isolated incidents.
It also happened in Pennsylvania, with the Administration endorsing a Republican who had changed the letter after his name to a "D" so he could run in the Democratic Primary against a REAL Democrat,
and also happened in Colorado, Florida and other states.

I witnessed another incident in Minnesota in 2005.

DCCC King Making in Minnesota
Rahm's henchmen came to town and decapitated the Grass Roots candidate in the Democratic Primary
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=160&topic_id=14207
(The Liberal Democratic Candidate who got SteamRolled by the DCCC participated in that thread,
but he kept is clean. He told us much more in person when he attended our DU Minnesota meet-Up)

After THAT one, I stopped all donations to the DCCC and DSCC after realizing that they were using MY MONEY
against my own financial interests.

The DCCC, the DSCC, the DNC or ANY national Democratic Party Organization
has absolutely NO BUSINESS interfering in local Democratic Primaries.
When they do, it is ALWAYS to derail the Will of the People.

[A Simple Game]

73. When I complained about the quality of Democratic politicians a poster

actually told me if I didn't like them to run someone against them in the primaries. I think they actually believed it was that simple.

Here's the kicker, the poster had a user name that means ultra-conservative. At least they were being honest about that.

[Enthusiast]

42. Great post!

It couldn't be more obvious.

[sabrina 1]

48. Excellent post as usual, Bvar, it needs to be an OP as so many appear to develop anmesia

about these things.

And that is not the ONLY example of the Party Leadership backing the DLC/Third Way/Republican Lite candidate over a good Progressive with a chance to win if they were not pushed aside.

And now we've watched this over and over again and the old ploys 'well s/he's better than the Republican and where else are you going to go', isn't going to work anymore.

Who knows, maybe a new Democratic Labor Party will emerge over the next few years, it's happened before in our history.

I can't think of any Democrat I know right now who is going to go blindly along with this shame any longer.

And don't forget the party coming right out and supporting the Republican in Florida or helping other Republicans who had enough of the extremism in their own party but are certainly nowhere neard being progressives, change the letter after their names and inviting them into the Big Tent, while they push Liberals OUT.

[Demo_Chris]

49. Great post. nt

[think]

51. Reading this doesn't surprise me

But it does disappoint me...

[L0oniX]

66. Message to the left: We only want your votes, not your ideals and principles.

[lake loon]

21. Now more than $20,000 a SECOND

The "defense" scam is now costing just that. More than $1.7 BILLION A DAY!!!!!

Not even the well-dressed bellhops at the Pentagon could spend that much. You know a lot of that is going into the back pockets of the whores in Congress and their masters in order to feed the organized crime system that this nation has become.

THIS is the story of the year. We are so fucked.

[WHEN CRABS ROAR]

46. It's always about the money. Welcome to DU.

[go west young man]

59. Welcome to DU.

Good to have you onboard.

[saidsimplesimon]

10. kentuck, What is wrong?

"It's all right, but it's all wrong?'. Think about it

[ErikJ]

11. Bernie Sanders "Military Budget Has Tripled Since 1997,

Reduce Defense Spending

The President’s plan to achieve $1.1 trillion in savings over the next decade by ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is a critical first step, but we must go further. At a time when the United States has nearly tripled defense spending since 1997, and when we now spend more on the military than every other country on earth combined, it is time to cut military spending. A report that Bernie recently issued revealed the massive amount of fraud and waste which permeates the Pentagon’s relationship with defense contractors.

Here are several ways that we can immediately reduce defense spending:

By eliminating outdated Cold War weapons programs, we can save approximately $100 billion a year at the Pentagon.
By eliminating waste, fraud and abuse within the military and every federal government agency, we can save between $150 billion and $200 billion over ten years.
Four separate investigations by the Government Accountability Office have found that the Pentagon has $36.9 billion in spare parts that it does not need. We must reform the Pentagon’s purchasing practices to be more transparent and cost effective.
By bringing the troops home from Afghanistan as soon as possible, we can bring about substantial reductions in defense spending.
............
http://www.bernie.org/action/bernies-progressive-budget/

[former9thward]

12. Yes we could cut the budget in half and should.

It would require a major refocus of American forces around the world with base closings in most countries. It would also require a massive reduction in military forces -- both personnel and contractors. There would be massive layoffs. And some people would scream bloody murder at that. They think the military should be a jobs program rather than a defense force. And yes it would have to be done by massive layoffs. Most of the military budget is personnel costs. Pensions, benefits, wages, food & clothing. The only way you eliminate those is eliminate people.

[fleabiscuit]

20. I find that premise, "massive reduction in military forces,"

leaves me with a different question. What if that is not true? Historically a large chunk of "military spending" was just another euphemism for subsidized corporate research. I think that a large reduction in military spending is necessary just to see where the money actually goes.

[Scootaloo]

76. Well, any cuts to spending will INVARIABLY be dumped on personnel

Starting at the bottom, of course. The top brass will be fine, the corporate contracts will be fine, but PFC Kelly will be getting his pay cut in half and his deployment doubled.

[kentuck]

80. I thought Congress appropriated the money for different military programs?

[broiles]

14. And still our military is incompetent.

[TwilightGardener]

22. Our military is mostly there to break shit and kill people--and it's pretty competent at that.

Of course, regarding alternate missions, ask the people of the Phillippines how they feel about the US military post-typhoon, and they'd probably disagree with you.

[L0oniX]

67. Oh? Don't you know ...they are fighting for our freedoms.

If they don't fight them over there then the Tallywackers will invade the US and turn our women into slaves and make men grow beards.

"It's all bull shit" - George Carlin

[jtuck004]

15. Very like that first attending to this...

"...our people should not go hungry and that they should have jobs that pay a decent wage..."

would give us a stronger, more secure country than 90% of that defense dept budget.

[Jackpine Radical]

16. You're just another Goddam radical fringe leftist.

You just Don't Get It that true patriotism requires loyalty, fealty, and continued economic support for the few, the brave, the .0001%

and bedamned to any traitors who try to siphon off a greater fraction of the national wealth in behalf of the deadbeats, slackers and unbeloved of God who populate the lower rungs of the Great Ladder of Being.

[cantbeserious]

18. What Is Wrong Answers - Right Wing, Corporatist, Oligarch Point Of View

With saying that we need to cut the bloated defense budget in half? Congress just passed a defense budget of about $632 billion dollars. I don't think that includes satellite reconnaissance, CIA, or intelligence gathering, or other black book projects? Do we really need every military weapon that can be imagined? Could we not cut the budget in half and still have a strong, reliable defense?

- Defense Department expenses are necessary to protect the Empire abroad. That is to keep corporations safe from the local rif-raff and competition. These expenses have nothing to do with Democracy.

What is wrong with saying that our people should not go hungry and that they should have jobs that pay a decent wage?

- Having people go hungry keeps people dependent and living in a state of fear. Fearful and dependent people are more docile, controllable and manipulatable.

What is wrong with saying that income inequality is immoral and needs to be addressed? What is wrong with saying that the wealthy need to pay more in taxes? But, they need to do more than just talk about it, they need to do it.

- The wealthy have no intentions of paying more given that their interests are being protected by the external Defense Department and internal Law Enforcement.

What is wrong with holding corporate criminals responsible?

- The Oligarchs rely on the corporations as part of the controlling mechanism to keep people in line. Thus, any criminality is overlooked as a necessary operating expense.

What is wrong with making Social Security stronger, rather than talking about putting it on the table to negotiate, so that the wealthy do not have to pay more in taxes?

- Making Social Security stronger would undermine the control mechanisms that rely on fear.

What is wrong with having different ideas than the Republican Party?

- The Oligarchs, Corporations and Banks own and control the politicians that own and control us. The Republican Party is the control mechanism in politics for the owners of America.

Why does no one talk about taking money out of politics?? Is it because everyone now in office is there because of secret contributions and special interest money, and not the ideas they bring to help the people?

- Money in politics is the grease that keeps the machine running in support of the Oligarchs, Corporations and Banks. How else can the owners get the minions to do their bidding all the while knowing the consequences.

Is this really "populism" or is it just common sense?

- The relationship between cause and effect is observable i.e. common sense. Changing the paradigm requires Courage versus common sense.

[Enthusiast]

39. We should put you in charge of "something".

Strategy?

[KansDem]

58. Kick this post

It should have its own thread...

[Bernardo de La Paz]

23. What is wrong with "What is wrong with" ...

It's more powerful to phrase issues positively and to not give opponents entries.

Simply state things. Frame the issues. Choose the language.

State "Let's move dead money out of war-mongering into building and re-building infrastructure where it can live and prosper." (Bombs sit in arsenals and don't produce anything. Bridges enhance productivity.)

Asking "What is wrong with cutting the defense budget in half?" opens the door for opponents to say "That makes us twice as vulnerable!" Whether it is true or not, it sways voters.

Even using the phrase "defense budget" plays into the hands of the neo-con military industrial complex. "Defense" sounds good; "war-mongering" has a deservedly bad reputation.

Emphasize powerful concepts like "Money spent on food stamps for the hungry goes immediately and productively into the economy as well as building our future with well-nourished children. Money given to the rich in tax cuts goes into inflating prices of luxury property and art and other non-productive assets."

Say "The Democratic Party is the place for progress, unlike the dead ideas of the do-nothing Republican Party."

[bvar22]

52. The only two Democrats I can remember who came right out on a National Stage and said that

... Corporate Money was destroying the Democratic Party were Russ Feingold and Dennis Kucinich,
and you know what happened to them.


Elizabeth Warren and Alan Grayson are doing a good job carrying this message.
I hope they stay out of small planes.

[L0oniX]

68. Don't forget Mike Gravel: Follow the money.

[ProSense]

25. It seems that

"What is wrong with saying that income inequality is immoral and needs to be addressed? What is wrong with saying that the wealthy need to pay more in taxes? But, they need to do more than just talk about it, they need to do it."

...only Republicans thing saying this is wrong.

Did you catch Obama's recent speech?

Obama's inequality speech: telling the progressive story of American history

by Ian Reifowitz

Barack Obama knows how to tell a story. One of his great strengths is his ability to craft a narrative of our history that resonates with Americans and advances a progressive understanding of who we are as a people. Obama's telling of that history always features both progress as well as our failure to live up to the ideals of equality we lay down at the country's founding. His American history narratives have long centered on two purposes.

The first is to encourage Americans across every possible group line to recognize one another as being part of a single community of Americans based on our shared membership in the civic nation. The President's placing of Seneca Falls, Selma, and Stonewall among the pantheon of the great events in our history is perhaps the best known example of this, among countless other occasions where he has done so throughout his career.

The second, one that featured prominently in yesterday's speech on economic inequality, is to emphasize the long-standing roots—as well as the moral superiority and greater effectiveness—of a common good-centered, progressive economic philosophy. I've never heard President Obama do this better than he did yesterday. He told the story of our country as one in which we moved closer and closer to being a society built around equal opportunity and a notion of the common good that provided a basic safety net for those of us who faced hard times.

Until, that is, we inaugurated President Ronald Reagan. Obama also rightly noted the impact of globalization on our economy, but then specifically highlighted the crucial role of right-wing economic thinking—calling out Reaganite "trickle-down ideology" on taxes and on the lack of commitment to invest in our country's resources—in moving us away from the path on which we'd been traveling for over a century thanks to progressives in both parties.

This is the kind of historical narrative that people can connect with. It is a story that has a clear good guy and a clear villain, the kind of story that, in raw political terms, helps frame the debate in a highly effective way. More broadly, the speech provided an exceptionally strong philosophical and factual underpinning for the progressive ideals we hold dear.

Below the fold is the excerpt of the speech in which the President lays out his narrative of our history.

Now, the premise that we’re all created equal is the opening line in the American story. And while we don’t promise equal outcomes, we have strived to deliver equal opportunity -- the idea that success doesn’t depend on being born into wealth or privilege, it depends on effort and merit. And with every chapter we’ve added to that story, we’ve worked hard to put those words into practice.

It was Abraham Lincoln, a self-described “poor man’s son,” who started a system of land grant colleges all over this country so that any poor man’s son could go learn something new.

When farms gave way to factories, a rich man’s son named Teddy Roosevelt fought for an eight-hour workday, protections for workers, and busted monopolies that kept prices high and wages low.

When millions lived in poverty, FDR fought for Social Security, and insurance for the unemployed, and a minimum wage.

When millions died without health insurance, LBJ fought for Medicare and Medicaid.

Together, we forged a New Deal, declared a War on Poverty in a great society. We built a ladder of opportunity to climb, and stretched out a safety net beneath so that if we fell, it wouldn’t be too far, and we could bounce back. And as a result, America built the largest middle class the world has ever known. And for the three decades after World War II, it was the engine of our prosperity.

Now, we can’t look at the past through rose-colored glasses. The economy didn’t always work for everyone. Racial discrimination locked millions out of poverty -- or out of opportunity. Women were too often confined to a handful of often poorly paid professions. And it was only through painstaking struggle that more women, and minorities, and Americans with disabilities began to win the right to more fairly and fully participate in the economy.

Nevertheless, during the post-World War II years, the economic ground felt stable and secure for most Americans, and the future looked brighter than the past. And for some, that meant following in your old man’s footsteps at the local plant, and you knew that a blue-collar job would let you buy a home, and a car, maybe a vacation once in a while, health care, a reliable pension. For others, it meant going to college -- in some cases, maybe the first in your family to go to college. And it meant graduating without taking on loads of debt, and being able to count on advancement through a vibrant job market.

Now, it’s true that those at the top, even in those years, claimed a much larger share of income than the rest: The top 10 percent consistently took home about one-third of our national income. But that kind of inequality took place in a dynamic market economy where everyone’s wages and incomes were growing. And because of upward mobility, the guy on the factory floor could picture his kid running the company some day.

But starting in the late ‘70s, this social compact began to unravel. Technology made it easier for companies to do more with less, eliminating certain job occupations. A more competitive world lets companies ship jobs anywhere. And as good manufacturing jobs automated or headed offshore, workers lost their leverage, jobs paid less and offered fewer benefits.

As values of community broke down, and competitive pressure increased, businesses lobbied Washington to weaken unions and the value of the minimum wage. As a trickle-down ideology became more prominent, taxes were slashed for the wealthiest, while investments in things that make us all richer, like schools and infrastructure, were allowed to wither. And for a certain period of time, we could ignore this weakening economic foundation, in part because more families were relying on two earners as women entered the workforce. We took on more debt financed by a juiced-up housing market. But when the music stopped, and the crisis hit, millions of families were stripped of whatever cushion they had left.

And the result is an economy that’s become profoundly unequal, and families that are more insecure. I’ll just give you a few statistics. Since 1979, when I graduated from high school, our productivity is up by more than 90 percent, but the income of the typical family has increased by less than eight percent. Since 1979, our economy has more than doubled in size, but most of that growth has flowed to a fortunate few.

The top 10 percent no longer takes in one-third of our income -- it now takes half. Whereas in the past, the average CEO made about 20 to 30 times the income of the average worker, today’s CEO now makes 273 times more. And meanwhile, a family in the top 1 percent has a net worth 288 times higher than the typical family, which is a record for this country.

So the basic bargain at the heart of our economy has frayed. In fact, this trend towards growing inequality is not unique to America’s market economy. Across the developed world, inequality has increased. Some of you may have seen just last week, the Pope himself spoke about this at eloquent length. “How can it be,” he wrote, “that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points?”

But this increasing inequality is most pronounced in our country, and it challenges the very essence of who we are as a people. Understand we’ve never begrudged success in America. We aspire to it. We admire folks who start new businesses, create jobs, and invent the products that enrich our lives. And we expect them to be rewarded handsomely for it. In fact, we've often accepted more income inequality than many other nations for one big reason -- because we were convinced that America is a place where even if you’re born with nothing, with a little hard work you can improve your own situation over time and build something better to leave your kids. As Lincoln once said, “While we do not propose any war upon capital, we do wish to allow the humblest man an equal chance to get rich with everybody else.”

The problem is that alongside increased inequality, we’ve seen diminished levels of upward mobility in recent years. A child born in the top 20 percent has about a 2-in-3 chance of staying at or near the top. A child born into the bottom 20 percent has a less than 1-in-20 shot at making it to the top. He’s 10 times likelier to stay where he is. In fact, statistics show not only that our levels of income inequality rank near countries like Jamaica and Argentina, but that it is harder today for a child born here in America to improve her station in life than it is for children in most of our wealthy allies -- countries like Canada or Germany or France. They have greater mobility than we do, not less.

The idea that so many children are born into poverty in the wealthiest nation on Earth is heartbreaking enough. But the idea that a child may never be able to escape that poverty because she lacks a decent education or health care, or a community that views her future as their own, that should offend all of us and it should compel us to action. We are a better country than this.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/12/05/1260417/-Obama-s-inequality-speech-telling-the-progressive-story-of-American-history

President Obama Praises Phoenix Efforts to End Veteran Chronic Homelessness
http://phoenix.gov/news/080613obamapraise.html

Phoenix Becomes First City To End Chronic Homelessness Among Veterans
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10024217875

[CrispyQ]

26. This vid needs to go viral, but at close to 4 minutes, I guess it's just too long.

53¢ of every tax dollar goes to the military (I think it's 57¢, now.)

[cantbeserious]

29. The Oligarchs, Corporations And Banks Own And Control The Politicians That Own And Control Us

eom

[blkmusclmachine]

27. ,

,

[KG]

28. when it comes to the democratic party establishment, losing has no adverse consequences.

so why make bother putting together a winning populist platform? just go along to get along and meet for drinks at Bullfeathers after a tough day of fundraise and rimming lobbyists.

[Scuba]

30. We did NOT win the cold war. The USSR just lost first.

[Enthusiast]

34. Well said.

[jtuck004]

31. Our administrations, for some time now, have been perps, not just players.

If you are reading through this OP, you probably realize it's not just the tax code. Rather, administrations from Reagan through this one have purposely structured the economy, your life, to benefit and sustain the wealthy at your expense. The rules they make and apply to the working folk are purposely absent from those who are in the higher "professional" classes, and it is by design. Not an accident. And it works to the detriment of all of us. Fair taxes are important, but there is much more to address, a route which addresses the disease, not just the symptoms.

Dean Baker, an economist from Swarthmore and University of Michigan, and Director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research in Washington, DC, lays this out in his latest book, (>> Here: << - Important enough that it's free for the reading, in three different formats, also for sale at Amazon - )

One of many resources worth reading if you want to know more about and be better at recognizing exactly why we are where, and what we must change to get better.

From "The End of Loser Liberalism"

"For the most part, progressives accept the right‟s framing of economic debates. They accept the notions that the right is devoted to the unfettered workings of the market and, by contrast, that liberals and progressives are the ones who want the government to intervene to protect the interests of the
poor and disadvantaged.

But this view is utterly wrong as a description of the economy and competing policy approaches. And it makes for horrible politics. It creates a scenario in which progressives are portrayed as wanting to tax the winners in society in order to reward the losers. The right gets to be portrayed as the champions of hard work and innovation, while progressives are seen as the champions of the slothful and incompetent. It should not be surprising who has been winning this game.

In reality, the vast majority of the right does not give a damn about free markets; it just wants to redistribute income upward. Progressives have been useful to the right in helping it to conceal this agenda. Progressives help to ratify the actions of conservatives by accusing them of allegiance to a free-market ideology instead of attacking them for pushing the agenda of the rich.
...
It is not by luck, talent, and hard work that the rich are getting so much richer. It is by rigging the rules of the game: From a political perspective it is much better to say the progressive agenda is about setting fair rules for the market. The argument that highly paid professionals should face the same international competition as factory workers is a compelling one, and more arresting than the argument that we should redistribute money from the winners to the losers."

Since public debate is so badly misinformed on almost all economic issues, most people will be hearing these arguments for the first time. Few realize that an agency of the government, the Federal Reserve Board, actively throws people out of work to fight inflation. Few know that the loss of manufacturing jobs and the downward pressure on the wages of manufacturing workers are not accidental outcomes of trade agreements but rather the whole basis for them. (The enigma of trade is that it can make a whole country richer and yet most of its people poorer.) And hardly anyone understands that a higher-valued dollar intensifies the hurtful effect of trade by putting further downward pressure on the wages of workers subject to international competition.

The reason I put it here is to add to this OP, because the kind of people reading through it are the kind that are more likely to take advantage of what Baker writes. I think

[Enthusiast]

33. Plus one! Thanks for sharing that............nt

[L0oniX]

69. Excellent!

[Enthusiast]

32. kentuck, it's populist common sense and it's the right thing to do for electoral success.

For a long while now the American people have favored reining in wasteful military spending. They would favor it even more if they only understood the level of thievery.

Raising the minimum wage polls strongly. We shouldn't allow secret Republican operatives to direct Democratic Party objectives.

It is essential that we hold corporate criminals responsible. The malfeasance that wrecked the economy continues because the miscreants were rewarded.

[valerief]

36. The Treasury belongs to the ruling class, not the working class. That's why. nt

[BlancheSplanchnik]

38. what's wrong: he who controls the media, the images, controls the culture.

That's a quote or at least a paraphrase from Allen Ginsberg.

What's wrong is that a lot of bullies have a lot of power. And they have the money to keep a framework in place for disseminating anger, lies and fear throughout the herd. And for rewarding those who work for that structure.

So it can be pretty scary to speak against the herd.

Basically.

[DirkGently]

40. It's apparently wildly radical, Marxo-Commie-Satan ... common sense.

[The Wizard]

41. Bribery

as in cash going to legislators' off shore accounts is the reason we have a government that does not respond and act in the best interests of the governed.

[sulphurdunn]

43. We could easily cut the defense buget

if it was really about defense. It isn't of course. It's about offense.

[DeSwiss]

44. Poor, poor kentuck......

...the military isn't there to protect us. It's there to protect them, from us. So money's no object.

- Of course they're not too bright either -- but then we enabled them. So......

K&R

[niyad]

53. what is wrong with it, as we all know, is that none of these ideas makes tptb any richer, any more

powerful. nothing else is important except that.

[fleabiscuit]

55. Does anyone else keep notes of their recent activity?

From> Noam Chomsky: Media Control

“The public must be put in its place, so that it may exercise its own powers, but no less and perhaps even more, so that each of us may live free of the trampling and the roar of a bewildered herd.”
The Essential Lippmann: A Political Philosophy for Liberal Democracy
http://tinyurl.com/mmzjubq

The specialized Class:
Elections; Your choice > One from column A, or One from column B

Now > Time to sit back and become spectators instead of participants.

How > The media, the schools, and popular culture have to be divided.

Must > Provide some ‘tolerable’ sense of reality; And > Instill the proper beliefs.

Maintain authority > By serving people with real power, those who own society.

Propaganda > Is to a democracy what the bludgeon is to a totalitarian state.

Strike breaking > Mohawk Valley formula
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mohawk_Valley_formula

Deprive organization > Organization causes problems.

Sit in front of the TV > Have the message drilled into you. The only value in life is to have more commodities or live like the rich middle class family you are watching.

Without organization > You assume you are the one who is crazy.

Business run society > US the only industrial state-capitalist society without a normal social contract, not even national health care. No general commitment to even minimal standards of survival.

The media are a monopoly > There are no parties.

Most people don’t vote > it looks meaningless; Marginalized and distracted; Engineering consent.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Bernays

Business people > Are the ones with the power and resources. That’s who you work for.

Public > must be frightened and whipped up for foreign “adventures.”

History > History must be falsified so we are not the aggressors. Easy enough to do when you have control of the media and educational system and scholarship is conformist.

Operation Mongoose http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Project

“It’s whether we want to live in a free society or whether we want to live under what amounts to a form of self-imposed totalitarianism, or with the bewildered herd marginalized, directed elsewhere, terrified, screaming patriotic slogans, fearing for their lives and admiring with awe the leader who saved them from destruction, while the educated masses goose-step on command and repeat the slogans they’re supposed to repeat and the society deteriorates at home.”

===========================

Evey: Are you like a crazy person?
V. : I’m quite sure they will say so.

===========================
Breaking New: Vladimir Putin has asked the United States to not attend the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi Russia.

Putin stated that he “could not in good conscious host a team from a nation with the world’s highest incarceration rate, that uses the death penalty, that deprives women of birth control, that demonizes the hungry, poor, and unemployed, and actively engages in domestic spying.”

[MrMickeysMom]

56. Nothing wrong, that's the truth, ruth...

By the way, common sense does not seem as common these days. Guess that has to do with a complicit press.

[fleabiscuit]

57. That, and common sense is something you have to work at.

[JNelson6563]

61. I'd say there is nothing wrong

with saying the things you list and, here in the real world, I often talk about taking money out of politics. In fact, it's one topic my lefty friends and my tea-bagger co-workers agree on.

Julie

[another_liberal]

63. That budget doesn't include nuke research or nuclear weapons upgrdes either.

If I'm not mistaken, that work is budgeted under a different governmental department entirely.

[ananda]

65. In a just world criminals would be held accountable.

But the criminal foxes own the henhouse.

[L0oniX]

70. Where's all the usual anti left, corporate loving, centrist right responses and attacks?

Nope. They don't want to address these questions. Typical response would be the usual: Don't you know ...all that counts is that you vote for whoever has a (D) after their name?

Message is: Don't try to change the Dem party unless your trying to move it right or just shut up and vote D.

[Harmony Blue]

71. The United States can still be the dominant military power

even if the defense budget was cut in half. The problem is that there are too many people involved to allow that to ever happen.

[raouldukelives]

75. Some people just have slightly different priorities.

For some, your questions and many others of a lasting struggle for equality and justice for all people, of all backgrounds. One of respect and tribute for our fallen ancestors and protection of the ideas and ideals they fought and died for is a consuming passion that drive us to question transgressions against our rights.
For others, reality TV or herbal supplements light the fire that burns within them.

[Prophet 451]

78. I might quibble with the numbers but agree with the gist

I think cutting the military budget in half, all at once, would mean actually making teh lives of individual troopers worse. I DO think that a reduction of, say, 20% can easily be done without affecting the squaddies in the slightest.

I don't think people should go hungry. In fact, I think the US safety net for the poor is a laughable, pathetic joke. The very, very first thing I want my government (and I'm British, BTW) to be doing, before even defence, is providing a real safety net for the poor, sick and old.

I agree that people should have jobs that pay a decent wage. I've been advocating for a while that the federal minimum wage should be moved up to $13 an hour or thereabouts on the grounds that, assuming a 40-hour work week, it takes $13 an hour to keep a family of three above the federal poverty line. That said, I'm told that the poverty calculation is lacking so I think it should be re-calculated, the new minimum wage moved to (poverty threshold for family of 3 / 50 weeks a year = X; X/40-hours = Y) $Y an hour and then pegged to teh rate of inflation or the CPI, whichever is higher..

Income inequality is not immoral in itself but becomes immoral when it gets to a certain level. What I mean is, an income inequality where the poorest person has, say, 10% of what teh richest person has is not immoral. However, when it gets to a thousand or ten thousand times as much, it then becomes immoral.

The wealthy DO need to pay more taxes. Hoever, the wealthy also own your entire media complex so good luck getting any ki8nd of positive press on that.

Corporate criminals SHOULD be held accountable. In fact, I'll go further: If corporations are now people, then they should have to pay personal taxes and can be put to death (shut down) when they have committed an especially heinous crime.

SOcial Security SHOULD be made stronger. And the most direct way to do that is to scrap the cap on contributions.

I don't know what's wrong with having different idea than the GOP. There seems to have been this decision made by the party PtB during the Reagan years that Democrats would only win if they essentially became Republican-lite on economic issues. And that led to Clinton's horribly misguided welfare "reform" bill and leads to the Obama admin pushing the TPP.

The reason no-one talks about getting money out of politics is two-fold. Firstly, again, the wealthy own your entire media complex. Secondly, you got it in your OP. Everyone currently there got there because they courted campaign contributions (which are really just bribery) from very rich people and their corporations. The only way you can stop that is to go to fully public funded elections but see the first point, your wealthy own all the media.