Bits and Pieces for the Week of July 23 - 30

The Deficit: Obama or Bush? (Mike)

How Obama Squandered the High Hopes of Those Who Elected Him "We were inspired by Barack's soaring oratory and believed he would care more about social justice. We expected him to be a hero... Now we recognize that Barack Obama is a realist, not an idealist. We understand that above all else, he is a politician." (7 of 6)

According to Juan Cole, it all started in 2001:

"I take it the American news cycle is dominated by the artificial debate over raising the debt limit. It is a silly season story. The budget was being balanced by Clinton in the late 1990s, and the Republicans were the ones who created long-term structural deficits by slashing taxes on the wealthiest Americans (even Bush argued with Cheney over the second cut), by an unfunded prescription drug give-away to get votes from the medicare crowd, and by two unfunded wars, one of them illegal in international law. "The reason that the Republicans deliberately destroyed the balanced budget and created unprecedented government debt was precisely in hopes that at some point they could use the debt as an excuse to destroy social security, medicare, and myriads of educational and health programs. They represent rich people, and the rich don’t want to be having to bear their fair share of the national burden. What better way to get out of having to pay those pesky taxes than making sure the government doesn’t do anything for anyone but the rich. "The government will find a way to continue to function eventually, and this particular government will find a way to throw ever more public resources to billionaires and to take even what little the middle class has away from them. "Reducing taxes on the super-wealthy and borrowing money for key government functions is just a sneaky way of increasing taxes on the middle class, who will now have to pay taxes to support the billionaires’ wars and corporate welfare plus pay out of pocket for health care, education, environmental protection, and social security– i.e. things they had already paid into the government for. Starving education of funding ensures that people are too ignorant to figure out this scam. They won’t even be able to distinguish between one-time stimulus deficits like Obama’s, and long-term structural deficits of the sort passed by Bush...."

What's really happening with debt ceiling talks in Washington

My favorite quote of 2011

President Obama claims the Republicans can’t say “yes” to anything. Well, apparently he hasn’t asked if he can kiss their ass.

source

TOO BIG

I came across this great comment today:

Here's what we keep hearing, in different forms: "The company is too big for the leadership to be aware of misdeeds and improprieties." "The company is too big to take responsibility." "The company is too big to punish." "The company is too big to fail." ....All of which are ways of saying "The company is too big."

Bits and Pieces for the Week of July 17 - 23

Go Bill!! "Former President Bill Clinton says that he would invoke the so-called constitutional option to raise the nation’s debt ceiling 'without hesitation, and force the courts to stop me' in order to prevent a default...Lifting the debt ceiling “is necessary to pay for appropriations already made,” he added, “so you can’t say, ‘Well, we won the last election and we didn’t vote for some of that stuff, so we’re going to throw the whole country’s credit into arrears.'” (7 of 6)

"ALEC, the American Legislative Exchange Council... is sponsoring a... "legislative training and indoctrination session in New Orleans on August 1st through August 6th... ALEC will teach your reps how to present laws (pre-written by corporations). The legislation runs the gamut from union-busting bills, laws that restrict voting, privatizing and selling off your state’s assets, and laws that rid your state of those onerous environmental protections that make your air clean enough to breathe and your water safe enough to drink... Not only that, ALEC’s donating corporations will give your legislator a $1900.00 ‘scholarship’ to attend." (7 of 6)

"The bottom line is that the debt ceiling is a gun pointed first and foremost at Wall Street's head. And, there is no way on earth that Wall Street is going to let the Republicans pull the trigger." - Dean Baker (7 of 6)

Severe tornadoes, severe snowfall, severe flooding, severe economic destruction by Republicans, severe lengths of U.S. wars, severe tuition prices, and now severe drought. Armageddon?

Obama said this today:

"....Also to put our economy on a stronger and sounder footing for the future, we’ve got to rein in our deficits and get the government to live within its means, while still making the investments that help put people to work right now and make us more competitive in the future. As I mentioned, we’ve had some good meetings. We had a good meeting here yesterday with leaders of both parties in Congress. And while real differences remain, we agreed to work through the weekend and meet back here on Sunday. "The sooner we get this done, the sooner that the markets know that the debt limit ceiling will have been raised and that we have a serious plan to deal with our debt and deficit, the sooner that we give our businesses the certainty that they will need in order to make additional investments to grow and hire and will provide more confidence to the rest of the world as well, so that they are committed to investing in America....."

NOOOOOO!!!!!! Would someone please tell him that fixing the debt and deficit is NOT going to help the economy! We need more government stimulus spending and higher revenue from taxing the wealthy and the corporations. That's it. Please!

Dear Republicans: Government health insurance is good.

Here's the text of the latest pot legalization measure currently awaiting approval by the California AG's office for placement as a ballot proposition. Good luck! UPDATE: Here's the one for legalizing same-sex marriage.

Hunter's comments on this report about 25% of U.S. children living in poverty:

"But by all means, let's piss away the time talking about austerity for the poor and tax cuts for the rich. Let's have state and federal shutdowns while politicians insist that no, in this greatest recession since the Depression, we just aren't interested in creating jobs or continuing support for the poor. We're in a nationwide war against public workers and teachers, and a state-by-state rollback of family planning services—now that puts a fire in political pot-bellies, but jobs? It's not even being discussed. "You know something? This generation of kids is going to grow up hating the people who put them in poverty, and then kept them there. The government doesn't give a damn about them. The Republicans have a fit if anyone even tries to give a damn about them. Their own states certainly don't give a damn about them. You think Chris Christie, Scott Walker, or Rick Scott gives a damn about nearly 25 percent of American children now living in poverty? I sure haven't heard a peep out of them. "A whole generation marked by poverty. Poverty caused by wealthy bankers making crappy bets, but then prolonged excruciatingly by a nation of political leaders who literally could not possibly do less to get out of recession if they tried. Poverty that will have long-term effects on these children's future prospects, and in turn on the American economy that will rely on them. "Forget mere disapproval: I think anyone talking about austerity for these children's families, while simultaneously coddling the rich and the corporate, deserves to be tarred, feathered, and set adrift in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. The more you hear the hard numbers of how bad this "jobless recovery" actually is for people, the more offensive it becomes."