POZ Community Forums
Off Topic Forums => Off Topic Forum => Topic started by: phildinftlaudy on September 17, 2012, 10:07:53 pm
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This guy just keeps digging the hole deeper and deeper - keep talking Mitt --- please keep talking --- you idiot...
Now he says that 47% of Americans feel they are victims and deserve government help - and he is not worried about them....because they will never vote for him....
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/49063952
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It's almost as bad as this week's SNL sketch
http://www.hulu.com/watch/401544
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This guy just keeps digging the hole deeper and deeper - keep talking Mitt --- please keep talking --- you idiot...
Now he says that 47% of Americans feel they are victims and deserve government help - and he is not worried about them....because they will never vote for him....
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/49063952
And there are still folks in this forum who'd vote for him, or for the local senators and legislators who routinely condemn people with HIV/AIDS/______(insert disease here) to agony, unnecessary suffering, and early death.
Our partisanship in the USA is simply a media-driven, sanitized civil war. And don't for a moment think it's bloodless. Ask anyone with mental health issues who also has HIV.
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I just saw this on NBC News. So, half the country will vote for him, because they feel entitled to everything? Wow. I would have thought he would have been a tad more careful. Nothing is private anymore. That is a lot of people to make such statements about.
Modified:
It is better to hear it straight from his mouth, instead of in print. The link above didn't load a video for me, if it contained one. This video below is what NBC News showed tonight on Nightly News.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/09/secret-video-romney-private-fundraiser
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I'm trying hard to keep the faith alive inside that people will see Romney for what he is .
If its not frightening enough for me what he may do to health care reform its also becoming clear the he and Ryan is a huge threat to us and the rest of the world in the foreign affairs policy department as well , the stakes are high .
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"There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what," Romney is shown saying in a video posted online by the magazine. "There are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe that government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you name it."
"Forty-seven percent of Americans pay no income tax," Romney said.
Romney said in the video that his role "is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives."
LOL! ;D Oh, those whiny little wage slaves expecting things from their government like food and a place to sleep. Smithers, release the hounds!
What a complete tool.
(http://i.huffpost.com/gen/520957/MITT-ROMNEY-OR-MR-BURNS.jpg)
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Romney said in the video that his role "is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives."[/i]
And apparently he said it at the home of a private equity fund manager who likes sex parties.
Where is the outrage from the religious right ?
http://www.motherjones.com/mojo/2012/09/romney-secret-video-marc-leder-sex-parties
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WASHINGTON -- The overwhelming majority of voters who back President Barack Obama do so because they are "dependent on government" and "believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing,"
I don't get the logic about being dependent on government versus human rights.
Romney is correct in that I am sure about 50% of Americans feel that health care, food and housing are HUMAN RIGHTS and we are all "entitled" to them. That word entitlement is a bit of a poison pill.
It's really up to both parties, going forward, to have frank discussions about what is a right and what isn't. It seems clear that the Republicans - half of them probably don't consider health care, food, and housing a "right". The half that do, probably a good many of them think it should be upon the state, not the federal government, to figure out how to secure these rights. I would add education and of course public safety (police, fire).
I really don't care how people want to interpret statistics but i can imagine the majority of Americans are dependent on the government to have access to all the fundamental rights. Even if you have no health insurance, the hospital that finally treats the wreck of you is going to have govt assistance to foot that emergency bill.
If 1 out o 6 (7) need foodstamps to ensure the "right" not to be malnourished, then so be it.
Romney is such a throwback. Practically a royalist. Even the Royals probably assumed their subjects had a right to bread and hovels.
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I really don't care how people want to interpret statistics but i can imagine the majority of Americans are dependent on the government to have access to all the fundamental rights.
Actually 100% of Americans depend on the government to access their fundamental rights, otherwise there is little to stop me or anyone else from killing a neighbor and taking his stuff. People are more willing to cut government services they don't personally need. The rich don't need the government for food, housing or healthcare but they do need the government for military defense and law enforcement so they can keep their land and property, hence they are willing to fund and support those services.
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This guy just keeps digging the hole deeper and deeper - keep talking Mitt --- please keep talking --- you idiot...
Apparently he did keep talking. There is more video, including Mitt wistfully reflecting on being born with a silver spoon.
In one of the other videos, Romney lamented, in a joking way, that he would have a better chance of being elected if his father had been ethnically Mexican, rather than born to white parents living in Mexico.
"My dad, as you probably, know was the governor of Michigan and was the head of a car company. But he was born in Mexico ... and, uh, had he been born of, uh, Mexican parents, I'd have a better shot at winning this," Romney said. "But he was unfortunately born to Americans living in Mexico. ... I mean I say that jokingly, but it would be helpful to be Latino."
In a separate video, Romney talks about his success. "Both my dad and [wife] Ann's dad did quite well in their lives. But when they came to the end of their lives and passed along the inheritance to Ann and me, we both decided to give it all away. So I have inherited nothing. Everything that Ann and I have, we earned the old-fashioned way."
Romney's parents did pay for his boarding school, his college, his graduate school and his first home.
He got closer to the truth in another clip. "There's a perception that all of you were born with a silver spoon. You know, you never had to earn anything and so forth," Romney said to the donors. "Frankly, I was born with a silver spoon, which is the greatest gift you can have -- which is to get born in America."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/17/mitt-romney-video_n_1829455.html?utm_hp_ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false#sb=279778,b=facebook
Unlike Michelle Obama, Ann Romney is really down to earth: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kWdVminV7uY&feature=plcp
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Well gollygee... look where this mythological 47% lives (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/wp/2012/09/18/mitt-romney-will-probably-get-95-electoral-votes-from-moocher-states-obama-will-probably-get-5/?tid=pm_pop)!
Oh, and btw, a little justice for Republicans continually maligning Jimmy Carter lately -- it was his grandson that enabled Mother Jones to obtain these videos in unedited form from the as-yet undisclosed source :)
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Well gollygee... look where this mythological 47% lives (http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/wp/2012/09/18/mitt-romney-will-probably-get-95-electoral-votes-from-moocher-states-obama-will-probably-get-5/?tid=pm_pop)!
Its odd isn't it , the poorest states like the one I live in are the most republican and consistently vote against there own interest . I was actually surprised in 2008 when obama got 40 something % of the vote in Alabama . I feel like I'm one of the only democrats in the sate and sure as hell cant find where that other 40 % is hiding . I call poor southerns who vote republican the penis head envy voters , they want to compete to see who is the biggest dick head .
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It almost seems like they are trying to lose the election. Every week it's something else that is totally bonkers.
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And yet, the polls, the polls. Nothing seems to really matter. Which is worse. These tools running for great offices with great power. Or the tools who will support anyone, ANYONE, who is not their evil enemy.
I just gotta laugh, as long as Obama wins. If Romney wins, I am thinking about that black hole they worried about when they turned on the accelerator in Geneva. If Romney wins I imagine a big black vortex starting at his dead eyes and sucking in half of North "Amercia".
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And yet, the polls, the polls. Nothing seems to really matter.
That's a faulty reading of the polling. There's not been a single week of averaged polling where Romney has held a lead, and in fact it's measurably better in both national and battleground state polling post-convention, and far enough out now at 3 weeks to evaluate a distorting effect of a bump.
Your average voter doesn't bother paying a lot of attention until the conventions, or the last two months of the campaign. And now we're seeing in a new poll today (http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/dc-politics/post-poll-obama-up-8-points-over-romney-in-virginia/2012/09/18/ca691d9a-0193-11e2-9367-4e1bafb958db_story.html) where Obama has substantially pulled ahead in the major battleground of Virginia. I offer that as an example of a state that has been exposed to a lot of news/advertising on the campaign compared to non-contested states, and for a longer duration of time.
Then add that he's up by 4 in Ohio and 3 in Florida. He only needs to win one of those three states, whereas Romney needs two out of three.
And more importantly, there's a down ticket effect of Obama's polling numbers being reflected in Senate races and now showing that Democrats will not lose that chamber.
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Jimmy Carter's grandson, arranged for the release of the video: ;D
http://entertainment.verizon.com/news/read.php?rip_id=%3CDA1CATBG0%40news.ap.org%3E&ps=1018
WASHINGTON (AP) — Midway through a routine Internet search, James Carter IV stumbled upon a video that just didn't seem right.
The grandson of former President Jimmy Carter and a self-fashioned Democratic opposition researcher, the younger Carter had watched countless hours of footage of Republican Mitt Romney and made it a habit to search YouTube every few days for keywords like "Romney" and "Republicans."
But on this day in August, one clip jumped out. There was Romney, in an undisclosed location, bluntly discussing a visit to a Chinese factory with substandard conditions.
"The hidden camera video — it was all burred out at the beginning, and it was mysterious," Carter said. "It piqued my interest."
Something told him there might be more there than the brief clip posted on the YouTube channel "Anne Onymous." Although not affiliated with any campaign or super PAC, Carter had made it a personal mission to help get Democrats elected in 2012 — and to do his part to push back against Romney's relentless campaign-trail mockery of his grandfather.
So Carter, 35, of Atlanta, set out track down the source of the video. He sent a message to the YouTube user seeking details. No luck. But then, after sharing links to the video on Twitter, Carter realized he had a new follower with the same name as the YouTube account. He quickly shot off a direct message.
"They were wary at first," Carter said in an interview with The Associated Press. "But they did respond."
What followed was a delicate, concerted effort to convince the source — still unknown to the public — that Carter could be trusted, and that the world had to see the rest of what was surreptitiously recorded as Romney spoke in May to donors who had paid $50,000 a person to attend the private fundraiser.
In a string of Internet conversations, Carter showed the source evidence that he had helped David Corn, a journalist with the magazine Mother Jones, report a story about Global-Tech Appliances Inc., a Chinese firm that Romney's Bain Capital briefly invested in. Both Carter and the source suspected it was that firm's factory that Romney was speaking about in the video.
"That gave me credibility," Carter said. "They opened up to me a little bit."
Soon after, Carter persuaded the source to trust Corn with the full video — on the condition that he keep the source's identity a secret. Corn ran with it, using clues in the video to triangulate when and where it had been recorded.
Then on Monday and Tuesday, Corn posted the clips to his magazine's website, sparking a firestorm for the Romney campaign over remarks claiming that nearly half of Americans "believe they are victims" deserving government help and that the Palestinians have no interest in peace with Israel.
"James: This is extraordinary. Congratulations! Papa," the former president told his grandson Tuesday morning in an email obtained by the AP.
For Carter, whose Twitter profile notes he's looking for work, his success in unearthing the video was followed by a string of job offers Tuesday, from the Ohio Democratic Party to online news sites like The Huffington Post and ThinkProgress.
But the coup de grace for Carter is the irony that Romney has spent many months assailing the elder Carter's record on everything from foreign affairs to small business policy, hoping to saddle the incumbent president with the less popular vestiges of his Democratic predecessor.
"I've gotten a lot of Twitter messages from people supporting me and saying that it's poetic justice that it was a Carter that uncovered this, considering the way that the Romney campaign has been talking about my grandfather," Carter said. "I agree with that sentiment wholeheartedly."
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With this, Romney has handed the election to Obama.
In recognition of this occasion I give you..
"Change we can Relieve in"
(http://i1018.photobucket.com/albums/af308/IwuvPhilly/a_560x375_zps7cfdde52.jpg)
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You know I like to share my FB debates. My partner's cousin posted how Mitt was right and how he (the cousin) is proud to be the 53%. Many of his friends went on and on how this "47%" are all moochers and want "their asses wiped." Btw, his cousin came from a family with money. He had a huge leg-up. Before he began making his own money, his parents took care of him for years. And, like Mitt, I would love to see his tax reports to see how much he actually paid.
So, I wrote:
Jeff, you are in this group of taking from the govt, because you use child tax deductions. You take a mortgage deduction. Renters don't get tax credits. You get a marriage tax credit. We all get more as Americans than we pay in. While it is technically true 47% don't pay federal income tax, due to not making enough, student, elderly, or unemployed, it was a gross misstatement to say they are lazy moochers. They pay payroll taxes. In fact, the average worker pays more than Mitten's 13.9%. He benefits more from govt than anyone. And, half of those 47% he insulted vote republican, just for the record.
He replied with the typical Repub response with no facts I see so often:
Ted...Ted...where do I start? Ok...your dumb. Haha.. Just Kidding. I don't want to get into a political argument with you. Your points above are wrong/skewed. Thats why we vote. What I wonder is why you feel the need to correct me on my FB because you feel differently. I see many things you write that I wouldn't necessarily agree with, but I don't take it upon myself to set you straight. Just saying...bro. That is a sense of entitlement too...right? Typical Donkey....hahaha Jab/Jab/Uppercut...
I responded:
When I post something, I expect for people to comment, if they are so inclined. Here is why I responded. Brian, with a Masters in Education, doesn't make what he deserves. With a mortgage deduction and charitable deductions, he usually breaks even, and sometimes gets a few hundred back. So, he doesn't technically pay federal income taxes, but does pay payroll. Mitt called him lazy, entitled, and irresponsible. Being a teacher, volunteer firefighter, and more, he is anything but lazy. This is why what Mittens said was offensive and divisive. I apologize for engaging in a dialogue.
He replied:
Sure...and some of those 47% are people that worked their entire life and put money into SS, so they should get paid. There are always exceptions. I think Mitt's point was those people that feel they are entitled to get something for nothing. That is far away from Brian as he is a very hard worker. Brian deserves more in terms of salary and tax refunds, not paying more taxes and breaking even so the woman with 10 kids and no job can't put a condom on (as one example). Less distribution and keep what you earn.
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Ted, you just reminded me I really need to delete my Facebook account.
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Mitt pure and simple is a racist, a classist and a asshole.
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Romney is just scary to me and his wife, she seems like a good woman and I have sympathy for her MS struggles, but I can't get past her 'nose in the sky' attitdue, i think someone described her as a country-club girl. She just seems very fake to me.
I just got back from Denver and the ads on tv are crazy. Thankfully i live in Texas and this is a non-swing state, so we don't get bombarded with these ads. i can only imagine what the folks in Ohio and Pennsylvania are dealing with.
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so the woman with 10 kids and no job can't put a condom on.
Tell your partner's cousin a few things for me, will you?
1. Women don't have a penis on which to put a condom - and as a woman I can tell you that many men refuse to use them. They'll tell us women that it's our responsibility to take the Pill to prevent pregnancy.
2. Many republicans want to refuse women the right to take oral contraceptives. They also want to refuse women the right to abortion - even in the case of contraceptive failure or rape. Then they want no part in making sure children are properly fed or educated.
3. Many republicans seem to think a woman's place is in the home and would castigate a woman who had ten kids (or any kids) and wasn't home taking care of them.
4. Many republicans want to totally remove a woman's control over her own body, but they are perfectly happy to moan about women with children who need a little state help raising those children. Never do I hear them bitch about men who can't keep their dicks in their pants.
I think this is going to be the scariest election ever.
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This just cracked me up. I must point out this is The Onion-- the GOP is so wacky right now they might actually try this.
Romney Campaign Sends In Champion Of The Poor Paul Ryan For Damage Control
http://www.theonion.com/articles/romney-campaign-sends-in-champion-of-the-poor-paul,29608/
BOSTON—Following the widespread controversy over Mitt Romney’s recently leaked comments criticizing Americans who depend on the government, Republican vice presidential candidate and widely beloved champion of the poor Paul Ryan was quickly called in Tuesday to bolster the Romney campaign.
“We’ve obviously been set back a bit, but thankfully we have the perfect guy to the right the ship and win over the nation’s lower class,” said campaign manager Matt Rhoades, adding that Ryan was the first person he thought to call when the video of Romney’s candid discussions with ultra-rich donors emerged yesterday. “Even if we take a hit among lower-income voters in the polls for a day or two, Congressman Ryan will, amazingly enough, win them back to our side, just like he always does.”
“I’ve never seen anything quite like it,” Rhoades continued. “Poor people just love him.”
According to sources, Romney’s advisers have dispatched the modern-day Robin Hood to speak to voters in the most economically downtrodden regions of the country, where thousands of working-class Americans are already lining up outside the venues of Ryan’s upcoming rallies to don T-shirts and wave handmade signs in support of the selfless guardian of the poverty-stricken.
“Paul Ryan sticks up for us when no one else will, everyone knows that,” said 49-year-old unemployed construction worker Vernon Fletcher, calling Ryan a true beacon of hope for the nation’s impoverished. “He’s in it to the last round, fighting tooth and nail for every struggling, blue-collar man and woman in America. He’s done it time and time again, and he’s done it again today.”
“Obviously, I have my reservations about Romney, especially after he basically labeled me as a government-dependent freeloader,” Fletcher continued. “But Paul Ryan—that guy definitely has our back.”
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Tell your partner's cousin a few things for me, will you?
1. Women don't have a penis on which to put a condom - and as a woman I can tell you that many men refuse to use them. They'll tell us women that it's our responsibility to take the Pill to prevent pregnancy.
2. Many republicans want to refuse women the right to take oral contraceptives. They also want to refuse women the right to abortion - even in the case of contraceptive failure or rape. Then they want no part in making sure children are properly fed or educated.
3. Many republicans seem to think a woman's place is in the home and would castigate a woman who had ten kids (or any kids) and wasn't home taking care of them.
4. Many republicans want to totally remove a woman's control over her own body, but they are perfectly happy to moan about women with children who need a little state help raising those children. Never do I hear them bitch about men who can't keep their dicks in their pants.
I think this is going to be the scariest election ever.
I went on FB to relay this, but one of his very bright, female friends beat me to it. She set him straight. Well, he will probably dismiss everything she said, but she let him have it. She made many of the same points you made.
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Ugh...it's scary reading how romney creates a division (even though in his mind) of all the americans on his speech. It's the SAME thing that does the dumbass that is called "president" of my country, Venezuela.
I hope you americans put this Son of a ...gun on it's place on the next elections.
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I went on FB to relay this, but one of his very bright, female friends beat me to it. She set him straight. Well, he will probably dismiss everything she said, but she let him have it. She made many of the same points you made.
Thanks, Ted. Care to share what she said?
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This guy is 100 hypocrite narcissist.
Let's see. He defended not releasing his tax returns, with the argument that he pays as LITTLE as legally possible and that is a mark that he is qualified to be a leader. (Only a dumb rich guy would pay taxes....) Its likely that there are years he has paid no income taxes, only capital gain taxes. And how did he legally get multimillions into his IRA anyway.
Then to a crowd of rich people he feeds them a line he expects they want, that people who pay no taxes are moochers and victims.
Then, when we discover his FATHER received welfare (as did his VP candidate Ryan when his own father died - ss) he goes in front of a hispanic audience and transparently heavily tries to incoporate the cognitive dissonance, and says, that is what America is. We help people to get a leg up but NEVER approve of any permanent "dependency". And a big creepy swarmy smile saying that.
And THAT VILE "bootstrap" story at the convention about how he and Ann are self made, when both daddies paid for luxury education through professional level and bought them their first home.
IT IS CRAVEN. I am flummoxed how blue collar American Republicans can buy this crap enough to give him 45% in the polls.
vile vile vile vile vile vile vile
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Has anyone investigated the possibility that Romney is not very bright, at least for emotional and social intelligence? He's so tone deaf and robotic.
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From comments:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/19/whoopi-goldberg-rips-mitt_n_1898799.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular
dreed231
2 Fans
1 hour ago ( 4:02 PM)
Why don't the people ranting about MR and what he said listen to the whole UNEDITED tape before bashing him. I for one listened and agreed with him. I'm tired of paying taxes on everything and I'm tired of paying high prices for Insurance for myself, my family and my employees, while others live off the government and go to hospitals and DON'T pay and get food stamps while driving really nice cars and living in really nice homes. I know because I've seen it with my on eyes. (sic) Why don't they go to work and pay along with all others that pay? Because they don't have to when they can live for free. Whoopie is a joke along with the rest of the view. I quit watching a long long time ago.
--- Mecch - i guess we live in alternative universes. People really believe this welfare queen shit. Have seen it with their own eyes....
Meanwhile neither candidate has the BALLS to call a spade a spade and say too many new jobs are shit ass jobs paying poverty wages and everyone is on food stamps cause their walmart wages can't fill a refrigerator even with cheap walmart food.
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/20/obama-romney-47-percent-millionaires-taxes_n_1901217.html
(Obama) went on to explain why 47 percent of Americans don't pay federal income taxes, and snuck in a subtle jab at Romney's own wealth.
"There are a whole bunch of millionaires who aren’t paying taxes at all, either," the president said.
When you express a position like the one Romney did in that leaked video, said Obama, "my thinking is maybe you haven't gotten around a lot. Because I travel around the country all the time and the American people are the hardest working people there are."
"Their problem isn't that they aren't working hard enough ... or they are being taxed too little or they just want to loaf around and gather government checks," he added. "Americans work hard, and if they're not working right now, I promise you they want to get back to work."
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highlight added.
See, Obama doesn't have to the balls to say it either. He says what the problem is NOT. But not what the problem is. Doesn't want to talk about unemployment, cause he has to own that.
And can't talk about the low wage job workers - the dirty secret shame nobody in the beltway wants to talk about. And the populists on BOTH sides of the spectrum have to blather on and on and on and ON and on and ON and ON and ON about a bankrupt American myth of the "bootstrapping" land of opportunity where anyone can make it with grit and hard work.
Just say it. Maybe starting with Clinton. Set up an economy that STRIPPED away union and manufacturing jobs with liveable wages and benefits. Gross redistribution of wealth to the investment classes. And VAST undertaxation of the middleclass well on up to the rich. Vast vast vast undertaxation of the wealthy.
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the biggest welfare queens are big businesses which gladly takes billions of dollars from the government for whatever reason to add to their profits.
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http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/20/obama-romney-47-percent-millionaires-taxes_n_1901217.html
See, Obama doesn't have to the balls to say it either. He says what the problem is NOT. But not what the problem is. Doesn't want to talk about unemployment, cause he has to own that.
And can't talk about the low wage job workers - the dirty secret shame nobody in the beltway wants to talk about. And the populists on BOTH sides of the spectrum have to blather on and on and on and ON and on and ON and ON and ON about a bankrupt American myth of the "bootstrapping" land of opportunity where anyone can make it with grit and hard work.
Just say it. Maybe starting with Clinton. Set up an economy that STRIPPED away union and manufacturing jobs with liveable wages and benefits. Gross redistribution of wealth to the investment classes. And VAST undertaxation of the middleclass well on up to the rich. Vast vast vast undertaxation of the wealthy.
Yes Clinton gave away jobs but it was businesses who wanted cheap labor where they can get. The President can do so must but he can't fight the greed of businesses who only concern is their bottom line. If the other guy was put in office it would lead to more jobs going overseas and more unemployment here unless the United States people can afford to compete with wages at fifty cents an hour. In that case problem solved, and after the civil war of rich vs poor, here we go again, this country will be the third world haven that the rich wants it to be.
One more point, why do people forget the trillion of dollars that the last republican president caused to put this country in one hell a debt. What kind of life would this country had if banks and large businesses weren't so fool hardy with money. Remember "To Big To Fail." Yes, the republician party wants the world to forget it ever happened or better yet wants the country to believe it was the current President fault for the hole dug by the republician party. As far as I am concern the republicans are anti United States.
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Yes Clinton gave away jobs but it was businesses who wanted cheap labor where they can get. The President can do so must but he can't fight the greed of businesses who only concern is their bottom line. If the other guy was put in office it would lead to more jobs going overseas and more unemployment here unless the United States people can afford to compete with wages at fifty cents an hour. In that case problem solved, and after the civil war of rich vs poor, here we go again, this country will be the third world haven that the rich wants it to be.
Im not an economist so don't understand my emotional logic that makes things clear to me. Whats clear is neither party is comfortable, at the top level - president and legislative branches - talking about low wage work when there is unemployment to deal with AND cranky dissatisfied investment classes to placate.
But by emotional logic, I don't see a great difference between working in manufacturing from the 40's to the late 70's and having a liveable wage, because in part of unions, and that employee benefits scheme was still working. (as opposed to national health cares installed in Europe after WWII, not attached to jobs).
So it seems to me if the owners of todays service and retail industries are content to be rich americans - the walmarts, targets, the fast foods, starbucks, etc etc etc -- wealth made off paying service workers crap and buying cheap goods, then you simply legislate livable minimum wages. Billed to the fucking companies and their shareholders to figure out the business plan, how to pay.
Livable wages were FORCED upon manufacturing in the US in the first part of the 20th century. Walmart is never going to voluntarily pay a minimum wage. The
worker at Walmart is working just as hard as the worker was at Chrysler.
If Walmart or McDonald's doesn't like having to pay their workers more, TOUGH SHIT.
Secondly, you tax the comfortable middle class and certainly the wealthy at rates comparable to European rates.
If rich investment classes refuse to pay the higher rates, they can go find a better deal and live elsewhere. It won't be Paris or London or Berlin, that's for fucking sure! Even in so called tax haven Switzerland, the middle class and rich are taxed higher than the USA. So fuck the American rich if they want to live in a first world country, they have to fucking shell out. Or they can well all move to Cayman Islands and good riddance.
Furthermore, both parties are being held hostage to this idea that if the corporations and super rich only had a "better deal" they would invest again and hire again. I call bullshit on that, too.
In other words, national health care, that is universal, and liveable wages no matter the job. And anyone who doesn't want to participate in that and make it work, shove off.
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it's a fallacy to say everyone made a "liveable wage" in the 40's and 50's. Ask the African Americans how liveable their wages were then. The past was not filled with unicorns and lollipops -- people stuggled then too -- and with less help from the government than you have today. If you think there were not "haves" and "have nots" throughout history -- well, you skipped some days of history class.
Also -- people scream for liveable wages on the one hand and "cheaper" stuff on the other. Not really seeing the impossibility of that.
Finally -- we are living in a more global economy today than we did 50 yrs ago, so it is a bit wrong to try and make apple to apple comparisons.
So -- I am not supporting the status quo -- but solutions are not quite so simple as some like to lay them out to be.
Mike
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For sure, running the country, running the economy, running being a member part of the global nations, running all the challenges that are part of being President isn't easy. We are just spectators in the "peanut gallery," and as you know the best players are on the bleachers.
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it's a fallacy to say everyone made a "liveable wage" in the 40's and 50's. Ask the African Americans how liveable their wages were then. The past was not filled with unicorns and lollipops -- people stuggled then too -- and with less help from the government than you have today. If you think there were not "haves" and "have nots" throughout history -- well, you skipped some days of history class.
Also -- people scream for liveable wages on the one hand and "cheaper" stuff on the other. Not really seeing the impossibility of that.
Finally -- we are living in a more global economy today than we did 50 yrs ago, so it is a bit wrong to try and make apple to apple comparisons.
So -- I am not supporting the status quo -- but solutions are not quite so simple as some like to lay them out to be.
Mike
Certainly the fallacy you refer to is not one I am making. I'm sure I learned my black history correctly from my 20th C Black History class with Henry Louis Gates where my research paper was on the Great Northern Migration - which in the ideal experience led both to union jobs for some, and definitely the creation of a much larger black middle class.
I'm not imagining a rosey history of an entirely middleclass mid-Century America, not me. Nope. Typically your criticism is motivated by a purposeful misread and ignorance.
What bugs me about Romeny and led to my screed is this: he made hundreds of millions as an agent of the business shifts that have led to such a low wage economy. The current one, where people working full time at crap wages with little to no benefits need food stamps and/or TANF to get by. And this capitalist has the nerve to call these people moochers. When my emotional logic says that the investment class could be slightly less greedy and figure out a business model that permits these new blue-collar jobs to support dignified lifestyles.
I am aware there will always be haves and have nots. But the disparity has increased in recent years. So how does the agent that made this happen, get off saying somehow he can reconfigure his model, and "increase wealth for all." Since he loathes any mention of redistribution.
Just seems more reasonable to me to acknowledge the desperate problem, a working poor that has lost ground, a middle class that has seen its net worth decimated, but an investment class that has hit gold. And the logic seems to be that whatever the blue collar jobs are, in this decade and coming decades, there is no choice but to push wages up somehow by brilliant governance and new business models. So if thats REALLY what Romney is capable of, fine. But he just slipped up and showed, it seems, his true beliefs about social class in America.
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I'm sure I learned my black history correctly from my 20th C Black History class with Henry Louis Gates where my research paper was on the Great Northern Migration
Since when were you either a graduate of Yale or Cornell?
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Two ivies dearie, including one of above. Plus passages in Paris, Montreal, Manchester and Geneva.
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The "Last word' with Lawrence O'Donnell : Mitt Romney the taker...
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45755883/vp/49205834#VpFlash
And for those living in Arizona:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2LnUpHQQ5CM&feature=player_embedded
Ray
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Time out please,
While this has been a lively conversation, the important thing to remember is electing the best candidate who is running at the time.
Progress is slow in changing the world over night.
I am not the brightest guy. I don't have fancy degrees. I didn't serve in the military. (doubt I would have even survived boot camp)
Own my own retail business for 25 years and pay employees what I can afford.
(most of which were far more wealthy than I and needed to keep themselves busy for a variety of reasons)
At 53, still scared to death about being able to retire without the worry of how much a pound of bacon costs.
Certainly understand the passion everyone feels about this election. It just seems to me that we all are kinda on the same page here.
Take my word for it. My neighbors moved here from Sweden about 6 years ago because they admired GW Bush!
Ugh!
Peace be with you.