The rising income inequality in the U.S. is, according to a recent study by the National Bureau of Economic Research, the result of government policies. Very likely this comes as no surprise to many. And while it isn’t directly related to the big national conversation of the moment, there is a connection that can be [...]
Tag Archives | 1%
Top Story — Obama Moves Grand Bargain Into the Budget, and Women Will Be Hurt the Most
“You can’t call yourself a Democrat and support Social Security benefit cuts. The president is proposing to steal thousands of dollars from grandparents and veterans by cutting cost of living adjustments, and any congressional Democrat who votes for such a plan should be ready for a primary challenge. Social Security is the core of the [...]
Cyprus Big Bank to Give “Haircut” to Large Depositors
WHAT AN odd way to phrase stealing people’s money. Desperate times. Desperate measures. Reuters: Depositors in Bank of Cyprus stand to lose 30 percent on their holdings over and above 100,000 euros, the chairman of the island’s parliamentary finance committee has said. “I haven’t heard a formal announcement about the haircut, but this is the [...]
Paul Ryan Austerity a Good Target for Democrats
Second, health care. Our budget repeals the president’s health-care law and replaces it with patient-centered reforms. It also protects and strengthens Medicare. I want Medicare to be there for my kids—just as it’s there for my mom today. But Medicare is going broke. Under our proposal, those in or near retirement will see no changes, [...]
Obama Invites Ryan to Lunch to “Sell ‘Grand Bargain’”
President Barack Obama –seeking to sell Republicans on a revival of “grand bargain” talks — has invited 2012 GOP veep candidate Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), the chairman of the House Budget Committee, over to the White House for lunch on Thursday, POLITICO has learned. [Politico] POWERFUL allies that could shift the discussion on the budget, [...]
Let’s Make a Deal Meals and Unequal Wealth Distribution [VIDEO]
We Americans have an ideal in mind, about a fair distribution of wealth. We know it isn’t reality, and have an idea about what that reality is like. We don’t, however, have an accurate perception of that reality. The video below uses animated infographics to reveal a by-the-numbers look at, as the Occupy movement popularized [...]
It’s Great to Be A Corporation in The Golden Age of Profits
THE GRAPH above says it all and there’s more where it came from over at The Atlantic, in a post by Derek Thompson. Here are two things that are true about the economy today. (1) The Dow Jones industrial average is poised to set a new record as corporate profits stretch to all-time highs. (2) [...]
“It’s Good to be a Banker” (VIDEO)
That’s the analysis of Peter Schiff, president of Euro Pacific Capital: “It’s good to be a banker.” With the DC self-created financial crisis of the moment, it seemed like a good time to consider a bit of the context of the Super Sequestration sequel to Fiscal Cliff, Grand Bargain, etc. The video below is of [...]
The ‘2nd American Revolution’ Explained by Way of a Graph
Discussion of “income inequality” is considered an out of date topic by some, but it’s as real, as significant and if we’re looking with open eyes and not through Duopoly supplied blinkers, as in-our-faces at this moment as it was when, for the obvious example, the Occupy movement made it “news.” The graph is via [...]
House Democrats Call On President Obama To Reject Benefit Cuts To Medicare, Medicaid, And Social Security Benefits
HOUSE PROGRESSIVES and Democrats sent a letter to President Obama opposing entitlement benefit cuts, demanding he reject these cuts at a time when the 1% are the only ones benefiting from the recovery. The press release and letter are below. WASHINGTON—107 House Democrats, a majority of Democrats in the House of Representatives, wrote President Obama [...]
Elizabeth Warren Fillets Regulators: “Too Big to Fail” Becomes “Too Big for Trial” [Video]
“They violated every goddamn law in the book,” says Jack Blum, an attorney and former Senate investigator who headed a major bribery investigation against Lockheed in the 1970s that led to the passage of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. “They took every imaginable form of illegal and illicit business.” – Gangster Bankers Too Big to [...]
Some Stuff I’d Like to Hear Seriously Addressed in the State of the Union, and Even Better, on a Day to Day Basis in DC
I can think of a lot of stuff I’d like to hear DC Electeds having serious conversations about. More unlikely yet, it would be cool if they’d take serious actions aimed at helping the majority – you know, that “99%,” – of people. I don’t expect to hear such things in the State of the [...]
News Desk: Study Confirms Tea Party Was Created by Koch Brother Billionaires
Study Confirms Tea Party Was Created by Big Tobacco and Billionaires (via Desmogblog) A new academic study confirms that front groups with longstanding ties to the tobacco industry and the billionaire Koch brothers planned the formation of the Tea Party movement more than a decade before it exploded onto the U.S. political scene. Far from [...]
Chris Hedges on ‘Debt Peonage’: That 1% – 99% Chasm Didn’t Disappear With the Corporate State Suppression of Occupy
“Stop beating the dead horse,” I was chastised when I kept paying attention to the Occupy movement beyond that sliver of attention deemed newsworthy. The movement evolved, still continues in various projects. I’ve never stopped paying attention. And for good, or really bad, reasons: the inequalities it helped reveal remain. Chris Hedges has also continued [...]
Top Story — Obama’s Inaugural Week, Reid and Schumer’s Weaknesses Follow
The joint budget resolution could also call for Medicare reforms and using the chained CPI formula to curb the cost of Social Security benefits. These entitlement reforms combined with tax reform would give Republicans political cover to accept tax increases — or at least more cover than if tax increases were merely packaged as an [...]
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