Author: Brian

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seats for sale

There’s more than 60 members of the House Finance Committee.

Why so many? Because Wall Street lobbyists make their votes pay !

It’s time to erect a wall. A wall we really need.

Why? Because our Representatives aren’t !

  • Few Americans want Washington to adopt a laissez faire approach to energy issues.   Only about one in four Americans (27 percent) – including 47 percent of Republicans, 27  percent of Independents, 11 percent of Democrats and a surprisingly small 57 percent of Tea Party supporters  — say “Congress and the President should stay out of the energy markets and let private enterprise have a free hand in picking energy sources and setting prices.”
  • Excessive corporate influence may explain the gap between where some in Washington are on energy policy … and where mainstream America is.   More than seven in 10 Americans (72 percent) – including 62 percent of Republicans, 74 percent of Independents, 83 percent of Democrats, and over half of Tea Party supporters (54 percent) — think that “America’s oil, coal and natural gas companies have a disproportionate influence on Congress and the White House when it comes to making national energy policy.”
  • Americans do not see more clean energy as a roadblock to economic recovery.  More than two thirds of Americans (69 percent) – including 59 percent of Republicans, 73  percent of Independents, 78 percent of Democrats and a plurality of Tea Party supporters (48 percent) – think it would be a “bad idea” for the U.S. ” to ‘put on hold’ progress towards cleaner energy sources during the current economic difficulty.”
  • Most Americans want continued movement away from fossil fuels.   About three in four Americans (76 percent) – including 62 percent of Republicans, 76 percent of Independents, 90 percent of Democrats and half of Tea Party supporters – agree strongly or somewhat with the following statement:  “Smarter energy choices are the key to creating a future that is healthy and safe because fossil fuels create toxic wastes that are a threat to our health and safety.”
  • Most Americans would favor a moratorium on coal-fired power plants.  Nearly two thirds of Americans (65 percent) – including 55 percent of Republicans, 68 percent of Independents, 72 percent of Democrats, and about half (49 percent) of Tea Party backers — would support a phase-out of coal fired power plants in the United States” if “increased energy efficiency and off the shelf renewable technologies such as wind and solar could meet our energy demands.”
  • Concerns about water are present in America on a strongly bipartisan basis.  More than three in four Americans (78 percent) – including 68 percent of Republicans, 80 percent of Independents, 85 percent of Democrats and 61 percent of Tea Party backers — agree with the following statement:  “Water shortages and clean drinking water are real concerns.  America should put the emphasis on first developing new energy sources that require the least water and cause minimal water pollution.”
  • Few Americans dismiss a connection between extreme weather events and climate change.   Fewer than one in five Americans (17 percent) think that “climate change is not a factor” in “at least 10 weather related disasters caused by so called extreme weather – (that) have occurred so far in 2011 involving $1 billion or more each in damages – now totaling about $45 billion.”   Fewer than half (45 percent) of Tea Party members fall into the climate change denial camp on this question.

Other findings include the following:

  • Nearly three in five (58 percent) of Americans are now aware of “the natural gas drilling process sometimes referred to as ‘fracking.'”   About four in five Americans (79 percent) – including 66 percent of Republicans, 78 percent of Independents, 91 percent of Democrats, and 55 percent of Tea Party supporters — say they are very or somewhat concerned “about this issue (fracking) as it relates to water quality.”
  • Roughly three out of four Americans (74 percent) – including 68 percent of Republicans, 72 percent of Independents, 81 percent of Democrats, and 58 percent of Tea Party backers – agree with the following statement:  “The cost of electricity paid by consumers is only part of the price of energy. We have to look at the whole picture — including water quality, environmental damages and human health problems — when we talk about what a particular source of energy costs America.”

Full survey findings are available on online at http://www.CivilSocietyInstitute.org.

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slog payroll

Catherine Rampell catches a report from the Resolution Foundation [pdf], a British research organization that focuses on workers with low income. The report covers 10 rich countries, and looks at the growth rate of median pay versus economic growth per capita from 2000 to the start of the Great Recession [GWBush, remember him?].

Of the 10 countries analyzed, Finland showed the closest relationship between the living standards of the typical worker and improvements in the overall economy. The United States is on the lower end.

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occupy thinking

“We’re a small team trying our best to improve the way the world learns.”

:::woot:::
Are you interested in turning this into a business? Maybe with some VC funding?

“I’ve been approached several times, but it just didn’t feel right.

“When I’m 80, I want to feel that I helped give access to a world-class education to billions of students around the world.

“Sounds a lot better than starting a business that educates some subset of the developed world that can pay $19.95/month and eventually selling it to some text book company or something. I already have a beautiful wife, a hilarious son, two hondas and a decent house. What else does a man need?

“With that said, if you are a social venture capitalist and are looking to deploy capital with the highest possible social return per dollar invested, we should talk. I think you’ll find that there is no more measurable, scalable and high impact way to educate the world.”

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age of greed

“We’ve allowed finance to dominate the American economy and the world economy as a consequence.

When finance dominates an economy, it begins, I think it’s become quite clear, to play games among themselves to make money…It becomes paper shuffling.”

Republicans in a picture:

  • top 1%: 8% in 1979 to 17% in 2007, more than doubling
  • next 19%: 35% in 1979, 36% in 2007, barely changed
  • middle 60%: 50% in 1979, 43% in 2007, down 7 points
  • poorest 20%: down 2 points, from 7% to 5%

Former economics editor at the New York Times, Jeff Madrick is easy to listen to, easy to read:

The top 1 percent pay federal income taxes at a rate of 23 percent.

If we raised it to their rate only ten years ago, we’d collect about $100 billion a year. If we reversed the Bush tax cuts on those who make $250,000 a year, we’d raise about $830 billion over ten years. If we reversed all the tax cuts, including on the middle class, which I’d favor, we’d raise about $3.5 trillion over ten years.

We have plenty of taxing capacity to take care of our needs.

We simply refuse to act as a modern nation, driven by myths that we can somehow return to the simplicity of colonial America.

We are still being told that greed is good.

“…contrary to the claims of some analysts, the federally regulated mortgage agencies, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, were not central causes of the crisis. Rather, private financial firms on Wall Street and around the country unambiguously and overwhelmingly created the conditions that led to catastrophe.

“Yet thus far, federal agencies have launched few serious lawsuits against the major financial firms that participated in the collapse, and not a single criminal charge has been filed against anyone at a major bank. The federal government has been far more active in rescuing bankers than prosecuting them.”

Age of Greed …the single-minded pursuit of huge personal wealth has been on the rise in the United States since the 1970s, led by a few individuals who have argued that self-interest guides society more effectively than community concerns.

These stewards of American capitalism have insisted on the central and essential place of accumulated wealth through the booms, busts, and recessions of the last half century, giving rise to our current woes.

…these politicians, economists, and financiers who declared a moral battle for freedom but instead gave rise to an age of greed, Madrick traces the lineage of some of our nation’s most pressing economic problems.

The men whose ideas were responsible for our current economic problems.
C-Span Video Library.

More than day-to-day media will tell you.


Which do you trust more: democracy or financial markets?

Americans weren’t really consulted. It was an inside job.

As a result, Wall Street has prospered but the rest of the nation hasn’t. One out of four homeowners is underwater, owing more on their homes than the homes are worth.

And with the worst economy since the Great Depression, we’re now embarking on fiscal austerity. Either Congress’s super-committee comes up with $1.2 trillion of federal budget cuts that Congress agrees to – going into effect a little over thirteen months from now – or $1.5 trillion of cuts are made across the board. Meanwhile, states and cities have been slashing public services for the past three years.

So which is it? Rule by democracy or by financial markets?

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another myth we can fix

Hey kiddos,

Let’s talk turkey – specifically about those turkeys who want to cut Social Security benefits. What’s up with that?

http://www.justscrapthecap.com/

Well, it sure as heck isn’t because of the deficit. Social Security’s trust fund has a $2.6 trillion surplus right now, which is enough to pay everyone’s benefits in full for another 25 years.

If anyone tells you Social Security is going broke, they’re blowing more smoke than a chimney.

Here’s the reality: Social Security would pay full benefits forever – not just to us, but to you, and even your kids (hint, hint) — if millionaires simply paid the same Social Security tax rate as most people.

Heck, we could even afford to improve Social Security benefits a bit.

Right now, everyone pays Social Security taxes on the first $106,800 they earn, which means most people pay Social Security taxes on their whole paycheck. But since $106,800 is the cap, a whole lot of wealthy people don’t pay a dime in Social Security taxes on most of what they make.

Not to get all parental – it’s your life – but this is important stuff. Because unless you tell Congress to “Just Scrap the Cap,” they could cut Social Security benefits — and we might be movin’ in.

Tell Congress no cuts to benefits – Just Scrap The Cap.

Love,

Mom and Dad

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rights we neglect

The Seventh Amendment. Do you know the Seventh Amendment is one of our most important?

In Suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.

Yes folks. You may bring any complaint more than $20 to a jury of your peers. Guaranteed.

Then why is there a steady increase in mandatory arbitration?

“Corporate America does not trust the jury.” —Morris Dees, co-founder of the Southern Poverty Law Center

Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick asks, Will corporations continue to immunize themselves against ordinary people? Can consumers sue credit repair companies for excessive fees? Can investors bring securities fraud suits for insider trading? Can oil and gas workers injured on the job sue to receive workers’ compensation?

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the finery of denial

“Anyone who has the power to make you believe absurdities has the power to make you commit injustices.” -Voltaire

How did we get here?

Consider this thought experiment. If you were really, really, really rich — say, not just part of the routinely opulent 1%, but a card-carrying member of the eye-poppingly decadent .01% — what part of your life would be American?

If you had the money, I’d bet you’d drive a German car, wear British shoes and an Italian suit, keep your savings in a Swiss bank, vacation in Koh Samui with shopping expeditions to Cannes, fly Emirates, develop a palate for South African wine, hire a French-trained chef, buy a few dozen Indian and Chinese companies, and pay Dubai-style taxes.

Were to you have the untrammeled economic freedom to, I’d bet you’d run screaming from big, fat, wheezing American business as usual, and its coterie of lackluster, slightly bizarre, and occasionally grody “innovations”: spray cheese, ATM fees, designer diapers, disposable lowest-common-denominator junk made by prison labor, Muzak-filled big-box stores, five thousand channels and nothing on but endless reruns of Toddlers in Tiaras — not to mention toxic mega-debt, oxymoronic “healthcare,” decrepit roads, and once-proud cities now crumbling into ruins. Sure, you’d probably still choose to use Google on your iPhone to surf the web — but that’s about far as it’d go.

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price of civilization

Ponder this:

When you think you are the highest point, you don’t look up !

 
Ponder this:

“…the energy, the optimism, the altruism and the humanity that won the admiration and devotion of so many of my generation who found in America in the postwar decades the idealism and excitement of a society that looked to the future with high hopes and moral purpose.
 
“This perspective has alas threatened to turn sour over the last 30 years as cynicism, greed and fundamentalist clap-trap have been mobilised to occupy the temple of enlightenment.”

 

86 percent of New York voters agree with the protesters’ views.

When it comes to social justice the USA ranks near the bottom.

 

 

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the national interest

New York Magazine:

Rising income inequality, like climate change, is an ideologically inconvenient issue for conservatives. They would prefer not to discuss it altogether. If forced to discuss it, they will generally either deny its existence or simply carry on as if it doesn’t exist.

The underlying facts, like the facts of climate change, are stark.

Over the last few decades, income growth for most Americans has slowed to a crawl, while income for the very rich has exploded. That’s a reversal of the three decades following World War II, when all income groups got richer, with the poor and middle class rising at a faster rate than the rich.

Crucially, the Congressional Budget Office’s new analysis shows that changes in government policy over this period have made inequality worse. (In CBO-speak: “The equalizing effect of transfers and taxes on household income was smaller in 2007 than it had been in 1979.”)

We’re not having a debate about how to reverse or even stop the growth of inequality. Nobody has a real plan to do that.

The Democratic plan is to slightly arrest the growth of inequality by hiking taxes on the rich a few percentage points, so as to minimize the need to cut the social safety net. The Republican plan is to slash taxes for the rich and programs for the poor, thereby massively increasing inequality.

That is a hard position to defend in the context of exploding inequality, and conservatives would rather not defend it. Instead the right’s response has been to persistently deny or ignore the facts.

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destructive stuff to prosperity

Umair Haque’s snippets & tweets:

It wasn’t just what America did that made it great. It wasn’t just what it believed. It was why we believed it.

This isn’t just money, jobs or income that we’re talking about. It’s human life.

So basically, the American national discussion alternates between mocking and blaming the powerless….

It’s funny how we’re at the mercy of dolts, buffoons, and sociopaths. Actually, it’s not.

History will remember what happened to the American middle class as an illustration of the fatality of nihilism.

The sense of despair–no jobs, no opportunities, no security, total fear–pulses out from the American ruins like a tsunami.

Shattered cities, boarded up neighborhoods, crumbling ruins, squandered lives. So inexpressibly sad.

A society that wishes to remain civilized cannot allow such extreme misery and squalor to grow at it’s very heart.

Inside the glass and steel, another world. Suits and ties, in furious pursuit of extracting the last morsels of prosperity.

I don’t know how to express it. But it’s so, so disturbing to see the juxtaposition of great wealth right next to implacable misery.

It’s not just the level of injustice in America that’s seriously disturbing–but the garishly exaggerated glorification of it.

It’s not just that a tiny few are getting rich. It’s that they’re getting super-rich by doing super-destructive stuff to prosperity.

Why Money Won’t End the Great Stagnation

Harvard’s Umair Haque offers an interesting ‘thought experiment’ to help us understand how our economy is structured; that it sucks prosperity from most of the population.

Try this. Imagine aliens are listening to our politics and protests. Imagine a miracle. They give each & every American $500,000. Will this help?

What happens next? Have we fixed the problem? Well, it depends.

If Americans then proceed to hit the mall, fill their coffers with lowest-common-denominator faux-designer junk, buy several SUVs, a membership to the VIP room at an ultra-trendy nightclub or five, and a McMansion–well, then, in a few short years, they’re likely to be right back to square one: broke and jobless. For the simple reason that the above don’t create much more than McJobs and capital flowing upwards, from the collapsing middle to the super-rich.

Worse, because they haven’t invested in public goods, they’re likely still to be absent the basic safety nets of health, life, and unemployment insurance, not to mention working infrastructure. If, in short, people choose the post-modern American dream of opulence, this crisis will recreate itself —forever.

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reformed broker

Dear Wall Street:

“We bailed out Wall Street to avoid Depression, but three years later, millions of Americans are in a living hell.”

“In no uncertain terms, our leaders told us anything short of saving these insolvent banks would result in a depression to the American public. We had to do it!

“At our darkest hour we gave these banks every single thing they asked for. We allowed investment banks to borrow money at zero percent interest rate, directly from the Fed. We gave them taxpayer cash right onto their balance sheets. We allowed them to suspend account rules and pretend that the toxic sludge they were carrying was worth 100 cents on the dollar. Anything to stave off insolvency. We left thousands of executives in place at these firms. Nobody went to jail, not a single perp walk. I can’t even think of a single example of someone being fired. People resigned with full benefits and pensions, as though it were a job well done.

“The American taxpayer kicked in over a trillion dollars to help make all of this happen.

“But the banks didn’t hold up their end of the bargain.”

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dance in the rain

In 1932 L. P. Jacks said,

A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play, his labour and his leisure, his mind and his body, his education and his recreation. He hardly knows which is which.

He simply pursues his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself he always seems to be doing both. Enough for him that he does it well.

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force of menace

In 1967 Rod Serling said,

“I happen to think that the singular evil of our time is prejudice. It is from this evil that all other evils grow and multiply.

“In almost everything I’ve written there is a thread of this: a man’s seemingly palpable need to dislike someone other than himself.”

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wisdom’s wake

Alanis Obomsawin said in 1972:

“Your people are driven by a terrible sense of deficiency.

“When the last tree is cut, the last fish is caught, and the last river is polluted; when to breathe the air is sickening, you will realize, too late, that wealth is not in bank accounts and that you can’t eat money.”

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these that run the world

Revealed – the capitalist network that runs the world.

There’s 1318 transnational corporations that form the core of the economy.

As anti-capitalist protesters take to the streets, mathematics has teased apart the global economic network to show who’s really pulling the strings.

An analysis of the relationships between 43,000 transnational corporations has identified a relatively small group of companies, mainly banks, with disproportionate power over the global economy.Science may have confirmed protesters’ worst fears.

 

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occupy designs

They tell you we are dreamers.

The true dreamers are those who think things can go on indefinitely the way they are.

We are not dreamers.

We are awakening from a dream which is tuning into a nightmare.

We are not destroying anything.

We are only witnessing how the system is destroying itself. –Slavoj Zizek

 

Occupy Design is a grassroots project connecting designers with on-the-ground demonstrators in the Occupy Together movement. The project’s goal is to create freely available visual tools —the Occupy Design Toolkit— around a common graphic language to unite the 99%.

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our best industry

Try this search.

+ “the skin I want to be in” 

Try this search.

+ “the dream I give you”

(function(){})();

::: burp ::: 

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turning pyramids

The New Order Pyramid | October 2011

Is a monument to remember those who have given their lives and spirit standing up to injustice and inequality. It is a space to celebrate our unalienable human right to life and liberty.

The site we propose for the New Order Pyramid would be Tahrir Square. We propose the construction of an inverted pyramid shaped auditorium for people to come and talk and participate to share ideas and to have a focal point.

Steps flow downwards for you to sit and voice your ideas, listen, participate and occupy.

We are seeing sites popping up around the World, they start as make shift campsites demarcating the space where a collective human spirit has chosen to voice dissent.

These spaces in time will grow into architectural signifiers, marking the dawn of the new age of global human co-operation, overturning inappropriate systems of governance, finance and trade.

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the extraction hunters

Paul Fussell in his book Class:

“In the United States everything is coated with a fine layer of fraud.”

Speculation identified as gas, food price driver

“Research analyzing commodity markets for the last 27 years shows that Wall Street’s speculative trading through commodity index funds is causing market disruptions, interfering with price discovery, increasing the costs for businesses to hedge, and needlessly pushing prices higher for all Americans.

“It shows how the biggest banks, all bailed out by the taxpayers in 2008, are lining their pockets at the expense of America’s families and farmers.”

 

Frank Schaefer:

These protesters have not come to work within the system.

They are not pleading with Congress for electoral reform. They know electoral politics is a farce and have found another way to be heard and exercise power. They have no faith, nor should they, in the political system or the two major political parties. They know the press will not amplify their voices, and so they created a press of their own. They know the economy serves the oligarchs, so they formed their own communal system. This movement is an effort to take our country back.

This is a goal the power elite cannot comprehend. They cannot envision a day when they will not be in charge of our lives.

The elites believe, and seek to make us believe, that globalization and unfettered capitalism are natural law, some kind of permanent and eternal dynamic that can never be altered. What the elites fail to realize is that rebellion will not stop until the corporate state is extinguished. It will not stop until there is an end to the corporate abuse of the poor, the working class, the elderly, the sick, children, those being slaughtered in our imperial wars and tortured in our black sites. It will not stop until foreclosures and bank repossessions stop. It will not stop until students no longer have to go into debt to be educated, and families no longer have to plunge into bankruptcy to pay medical bills. It will not stop until the corporate destruction of the ecosystem stops, and our relationships with each other and the planet are radically reconfigured.

And that is why the elites, and the rotted and degenerate system of corporate power they sustain, are in trouble. That is why they keep asking what the demands are. They don’t understand what is happening. They are deaf, dumb and blind.

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fix the fixable

Angry Bear: So to elaborate a little, let’s take two people who make exactly the same amount:  $100,000 in taxable income.

‘Worker Taxpayer’ earns her money by working (getting compensation by way of a W2) and ‘Investor Taxpayer’ earns her money from dividends in a $4 million stock portfolio she holds (its about 2.5% in yield – about right).

Let’s say they are both unmarried.  Investor taxpayer does not work and has no compensation income.  They are otherwise ‘equal’. Right? (Except that investor taxpayer fits the description of those who vituperate about lazy welfare recipients who sit on the couch all day and watch TV, right? I’ll keep the rhetoric down, because the facts are outrageous enough to speak for themselves.)

Worker taxpayer will pay $7650 in payroll tax, plus $21,617 in income tax for a total tax burden of $29,267.

Let’s look at investor taxpayer.

You would think they would be taxed at the same rate as worker, right?  Wrong.

Because investor taxpayer receives all of her income from qualified dividends, they get a “special” tax treatment.  Bear with me, we’re almost done.  Generally, the maximum tax rate for qualified dividends is 15%, BUT HERE it is actually 0% because investor’s other income (remember she doesn’t work) is taxed at the 10% or 15% rate.

To refresh: Worker making $100K pays about $30K in tax.
Investor making $100K in qualified dividends pays $0 – no – tax.  Huh?  Yup. 

What this means is that rich people – who are incented by tax policy to remain on their couches (too much earned income would otherwise trip them into the 15% dividend tax bracket) – are now getting off their couches and going to tea-party rallies to maintain this unfair redistribution of wealth in their favor.