To all you ingrates who claim taxation and support of society in kind to the advantages derived from the social system is theft, and that caring for those less fortunate is unfair to those who have a job, take heed:
It is the civic duty, moral obligation and ethical requirement for everybody who derives benefit from living in a society, especially those who extract disproportionate advantage, whether financial, psychological, real or figurative, to give back to that society in direct proportion to what they get out of the society. It is further imperative, at minimum, to maintain the society for the next person coming along at the level at which it was taken advantage -- and in proportion to profit extracted -- to advance the society for future commercial and social health. Nobody makes their forturne in society without the help of everybody else among whom they live and operate. Profit is only possible because consumers have the resources that provide the extra return in an exchange that reders a profit to the seller of goods or services.
Taxes are the dues owed, the price of admission, for living in a society that offers the opportunity for profit and fortune building. Corporations and individuals who extract huge profits from society are honor bound, morally and ethically obligated to return huge support, both financial and in attitude, to return their fair share to society in proportion to the benefit they've received from the system. Denial of this responsibility, rejection of this obligation, is unsustainable, dysfunctional, anti-social by definition, and evidence of textbook psychopathic behavior. Not giving back one's fair share is selfish, immature, unsustainable, self destructive and destructive to society, sociopathic and, all too often, psychopathic (See Bank of America et. al. mortgage foreclosure fraud, Goldman Saks et. al. financial instrument fraud, Tea Party/GOP presidential candidate delusions, paranoia, issue fabrication, revisionist history.)
Corporations and the elite one-half of one per cent at the top have enjoyed decades of loop holes, tax breaks, deregulation, specail rights and disproportionate immunity from civic responsibility. A miniscule segment have abused the system of enhancing their take from social good will and the value of the marketplace to the point of ruining the work, savings and good will of the overwhelming majority of society's members. The corporate welfare and immunity from responsibile culpability built into the system by their disproportionate influence is at an end. Restitution of Corporate and 1% abuses is in order and long overdue. Consolation and compensation is required in proportion to the abuse suffered and endured by the 99%.
Everything corporations accumulate in profit is on the backs of their employees without whom they'd have no product to sell and customers without whom they'd have no revenue. If workers were paid what their jobs are actually worth, no corporation or company would do better than break even.
Sunday, February 12, 2012
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Friday, January 6, 2012
Dissipating Our Power
Political opinion is informed on how one attributes weight to only a few criteria. Conservatives hold authority and loyalty above fairness and consequence. Progressives kick authority, and seconarily, loyalty, to the curb in favor of fairness and the consequences of actions. The old chestnut is "Liberals fall in love, conservatives fall in line." It's not surprising that no matter what remedial damage control and repair to the state of the nation our President is able to achieve, his supporters remain disappointed that more hasn't been accomplished. Liberals question authority and pay closer attention to the current fairness quotient and how the state of things effect status of all the crises all around us. Liberals squabble a lot among ourselves. And, that disspates much of the energy and attention that might otherwise be focused on changing things.
The difficulty challenging Obama "apologists" and apparently disappointed Democrats who might be labelled cronically malcontent is that there are huge repositories of information and details to which none of us are privy that would change everybody's outlook on the matter.
First of all, the reality of our bicameral legislative system and the separation of powers makes it inherently difficult, by design, to make huge changes.That's why it's taken the Republican party, actually since Nixon but shifted into 2d & 3d gear under Reagan, and into overdrive by GWBush, decades to reach the level of inside power, overwhelming support of irresistible money, and relentless pressures on every representative to toe the (literally) Corporate line or face annihilation. And, you can't plausibly suggest that corporate stongarms are limited to the Legislature. Look at how the Supremes subverted the Constitution to place GWBush into the Oval Office in 2000. Look how mercenary contracts have taken over huge swaths of military support once fulfilled by enlisted personnel. Notice how former special forces and special ops retirees become executives among armament manufacturers, switching to lobbyists, some running for and winning legislative offices, branch off to create and run mercenary armies for hire on the world market. See how Wall Street execs take posts with various regional Federal Banks, back to the boardrooms, spend a few years in International banking, European national banks, and back to the Fed or Cabinet portfolios/undersecretary positions. Are you really telling me you can't envision regular channels relaying warnings to incumbents to play by the long established rules or lose a parent/sibling/spouse/child to some unexplainable accident? A warning by well placed insiders under secret obligation to well heeled moneyed interests is all it takes. Withdrawal from Afghanistan is delayed, closure of an offshore detention center, unhampered by the Constitution and unbound by civilian courts, is canceled, corporate owned news outlets fail to point out false equivalences, political non sequiturs, mischaracterizations of fact by adversaries, outright Right wing fabrications and Republican doublespeak in daily reports...and on and on. We are demonizing each other which is exactly how the powers-that-be want it. The only solution is to force transparency of government machinations, the reversal of Bush era (and current administration) secrecy, and holding each and every representative accountable each and every day on each and every issue.
These corporate funded, elite few have been setting us up and have been controlling us for a very long time. They're very good at it. Just as they can't ship all eleven million undocumented Hispanics back over the border, they can't threaten the entire electorate. Nor, can they keep us fooled forever, try though they may. Their subterfuge only lasts so long, and the longer it's applied the more gently the pushes have to be. They bit off 'way more than they could chew, 'way too fast for their own good with their boy George W. who just couldn't tell from appropriate, from just enough or too much and who may have actually believed the magical thinking, snake oil formula they were pushing was real. For all their cash, they only have so many votes, and their buying power is the least effective its been, thanks to the likes of OWS, Pacific Radio, some on MSNBC, Jon Stewart, Current TV and a host of alternative news sources, for a very long time. They win when we stay quiet and complacent, or when we're too busy arguing among ourselves. Our only viable course is to quit this internecine squabbling and focus on the true threats to our representative democratic republic: Wall Street, Armament manufacturers, telecom giants, Big Oil/Pharma/Finance, The Federalist Society (description), the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)...All the guys at Bohemian Grove, at the Koch seminars, the Hoover institute genre think tanks...all the people who need the Middle Class quiet, obedient and complacent.
The difficulty challenging Obama "apologists" and apparently disappointed Democrats who might be labelled cronically malcontent is that there are huge repositories of information and details to which none of us are privy that would change everybody's outlook on the matter.
First of all, the reality of our bicameral legislative system and the separation of powers makes it inherently difficult, by design, to make huge changes.That's why it's taken the Republican party, actually since Nixon but shifted into 2d & 3d gear under Reagan, and into overdrive by GWBush, decades to reach the level of inside power, overwhelming support of irresistible money, and relentless pressures on every representative to toe the (literally) Corporate line or face annihilation. And, you can't plausibly suggest that corporate stongarms are limited to the Legislature. Look at how the Supremes subverted the Constitution to place GWBush into the Oval Office in 2000. Look how mercenary contracts have taken over huge swaths of military support once fulfilled by enlisted personnel. Notice how former special forces and special ops retirees become executives among armament manufacturers, switching to lobbyists, some running for and winning legislative offices, branch off to create and run mercenary armies for hire on the world market. See how Wall Street execs take posts with various regional Federal Banks, back to the boardrooms, spend a few years in International banking, European national banks, and back to the Fed or Cabinet portfolios/undersecretary positions. Are you really telling me you can't envision regular channels relaying warnings to incumbents to play by the long established rules or lose a parent/sibling/spouse/child to some unexplainable accident? A warning by well placed insiders under secret obligation to well heeled moneyed interests is all it takes. Withdrawal from Afghanistan is delayed, closure of an offshore detention center, unhampered by the Constitution and unbound by civilian courts, is canceled, corporate owned news outlets fail to point out false equivalences, political non sequiturs, mischaracterizations of fact by adversaries, outright Right wing fabrications and Republican doublespeak in daily reports...and on and on. We are demonizing each other which is exactly how the powers-that-be want it. The only solution is to force transparency of government machinations, the reversal of Bush era (and current administration) secrecy, and holding each and every representative accountable each and every day on each and every issue.
These corporate funded, elite few have been setting us up and have been controlling us for a very long time. They're very good at it. Just as they can't ship all eleven million undocumented Hispanics back over the border, they can't threaten the entire electorate. Nor, can they keep us fooled forever, try though they may. Their subterfuge only lasts so long, and the longer it's applied the more gently the pushes have to be. They bit off 'way more than they could chew, 'way too fast for their own good with their boy George W. who just couldn't tell from appropriate, from just enough or too much and who may have actually believed the magical thinking, snake oil formula they were pushing was real. For all their cash, they only have so many votes, and their buying power is the least effective its been, thanks to the likes of OWS, Pacific Radio, some on MSNBC, Jon Stewart, Current TV and a host of alternative news sources, for a very long time. They win when we stay quiet and complacent, or when we're too busy arguing among ourselves. Our only viable course is to quit this internecine squabbling and focus on the true threats to our representative democratic republic: Wall Street, Armament manufacturers, telecom giants, Big Oil/Pharma/Finance, The Federalist Society (description), the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC)...All the guys at Bohemian Grove, at the Koch seminars, the Hoover institute genre think tanks...all the people who need the Middle Class quiet, obedient and complacent.
Friday, December 9, 2011
How Much Do You Care?
On Dec 8, The Ninth Circuit Court of Appleals, Northern California Division heard arguments about the release of video documentation of the challenge to the constitutionality of California's Proposition 8 in then-Chief Judge Vaughn Walker's court. Kate Kendall, Exec. Director of the National Center for Lesbian Rights reported on the proceedings for Advocate.com. Her account is stirring and evokes the spectrum of emotions anybody whose life has been changed by even the threat of denial of basic human rights has every justification to feel.
In the comments section, a Christian complained that people of faith are all lumped together as haters for being a part of one among the cast of organizations that all parties agree are largely behind the whole anti-equality affiar.
I'm of the opinion that it's a forest-for-the-trees situation. Almost anybody in the midst of antisocial behavior will opine of onesself an exculpatory detail that exhonorates them of culpability. Bullies don't see themselves as bullies. Theives have a reason why they must do as they do. If only at the moment of truth, even murderers are convinced they are doing what is left of them without choice. Haters don't think they hate. Haters are convinced their gaud commands them to act, righteously so, in ways that those who don't understand might misconstrue as hateful.
So, I offered her a test to see if she is worthy of a get out of jail free pass.
Whom among the righteous would move to prove me wrong? Of course, those who wouldn't could always claim they refuse out of faith, the universal catch all justification for doing evil. They can always claim that giving my suggestion the time of day would equate commission of the worst, the single unforgivable sin.
How convenient.
Bonnie MacKenzie · Owner at Cen Cal Solutions
Why is it that Christians are called haters when they don't agree with something? I don't hate anyone. I have my beliefs concerning issues going on in the World, Country, State, County, Town, but if I express those beliefs there is a good possibility that many are going to say I am a hater, or worse a racist, which I am neither. I am just as entitled to my beliefs as everyone else. Yes, Christian's have rights too!
I'm of the opinion that it's a forest-for-the-trees situation. Almost anybody in the midst of antisocial behavior will opine of onesself an exculpatory detail that exhonorates them of culpability. Bullies don't see themselves as bullies. Theives have a reason why they must do as they do. If only at the moment of truth, even murderers are convinced they are doing what is left of them without choice. Haters don't think they hate. Haters are convinced their gaud commands them to act, righteously so, in ways that those who don't understand might misconstrue as hateful.
So, I offered her a test to see if she is worthy of a get out of jail free pass.
Nathan Garcia · Top Commenter · Big Fish in a Little Pond at Writer, Broadcaster, Entreprenuer
For anybody who truly cares if what they profess is actually true, Christians who condemn homosexuals as immoral on any level just for being gay would do well to examine for verity the fact that the two most often used verses in Leviticus to villify gays don't mention or even hint at homosexuality in the Talmud, the original Hebrew texts from which the Old Testement derives. The verse in Leviticus 18 actually refers to the use of Temple prostitutes, either male or female, which were quite common then. It was also a social misstep, a faux pas, not even close to an abomination. And, the capital punishment ascribed in translations doesn't even appear in the original.
The verse in Leviticus 20 refers to the common practice of spouses sleeping separately in different beds, and when possible not even in the same room. The only time a husband would occupy his wive's bed(s) would specifically be meant for procreative congress. The prohibition is the use of a woman's bed for any other use, whether it was sex with somebody else (including an alternative wife), or another man, or any other reason, just wasn't done. It, too, was frowned upon. An abomination? No, not in the Talmud. Frowned upon, not punished by stoning at the city gate.
My point is that every Christian who condemns the morality of homosexuality based on either passage in Leviticus is led astray, and every repeated utterance of condemnation of LGBTs is a repeated bearing of false witness, whether willingly or because they've swallowed, albeit in good faith, the traditional lie passed from generation to generation since King James II instructed his bevy of religious and language scholars to inject the Anglican attitude into their labors.
So, tell me, just how serious are you about being without a doubt that which you affirm is actually true? Will you give it an honest appraisal, check it out, prove conclusively through your own indepenant research whether what I've presented is indeniably, unequivocally true or false. If you fail to honestly, comprehensively and completely follow this up, then you are a hater. If you seek and answer to the end, then you are righteous and fully justified in denying you're one among the haters.
Whom among the righteous would move to prove me wrong? Of course, those who wouldn't could always claim they refuse out of faith, the universal catch all justification for doing evil. They can always claim that giving my suggestion the time of day would equate commission of the worst, the single unforgivable sin.
How convenient.
Monday, November 28, 2011
Obama, The Economy, History & Election 2012
Here's the online story from my hometown broadsheet, the San Francisco Chronicle.
Democrats grab momentum on volatile GOP contest which describes the the state of the GOP nominee field and how it stacks up with the incumbent with the inclusion of economic and foreign policy factors. A lively discussion in the comments section ensued, including the following:
mwrg 9:06 AM on November 28, 2011
[...]
Do you honestly see this President being re-elected with these kinds of unemployment and consumer confidence numbers? Seriously?
Do you think the economy is going to magically get better over the next year under this guy? It may be above your pay scale to pay attention to what's happening in Europe right now, for instance?
He's finished, and even most Democrats know it. The country is ready to cut its losses. If you haven't noticed the Conservative wave of the last 3 years, you're willfully blind. But then we knew that, didn't we?
And...
mwrg 9:02 AM on November 28, 2011
Wow, color me shocked that a Chron "political writer" just wrote another piece slanted against Republicans and for Democrats.
Apparently she doesn't read her history however. The economic and political dynamics of this country are so akin right now to 1979, it's uncanny. Economics works in cycles, and politics follow. Carter 2.0 is in the White House right now. Remember what happened next?
About which, in response, I wrote:
Oh, my freaking gaud, look how gobsmacked I am that yet another perennially malcontent, cafeteria-style pseudorealist conservative grabs at minor circumstances that service his wishful narrative while ignoring the big picture that blows his playbook out of the water.
The early 1930s are more similar to the current crisis than 1979, where it took from October 1929 'til November 1932 to vote out enough of the anti-working class, pro-Wall Street/corporation Republican obstructionists in favor of FDR. That was three years and three weeks, which is just about exactly how long its been, now, since the investment bankers took their failed banks to be saved on the backs of American tax payers. FDR and new Democratic majorities, over time, ushered in real economic stimulus like the Work Projects Administration (very much like Obama's American Jobs Act) and the Civilian Conservation Corps (aka Roosevelt's Forest Army, the New Deal, twenty years of Democratic adminsitrations and forty years of Republican near irrelevance and unprecedented American prosperity. The almost universal Republican overreach in continued policies favoring corporations over the vast majority of working class, lower class voting American has awakened the current electorate's recognition and acknowldegement of the vivid destructiveness of the neo-conservative/religious right movement of the past thirty years.
In the 30s, Europe had been in economic ruin for over ten years similarly to Iceland ,Greece, Spain, Portugal & Ireland's current state, somewhat presaging what world class economists predict is an inevital replay of the financial catastrophe of eighty years ago that gave rise to political envirnonments that brought the world Mussolini, Franco, Nazi, and Bolsheviks fifteen years before that. Now, we have the Arab Spring and possible Arab League prominence in Egypt, The American Autumn.
The current circumstances bear a mere shallow comparison to 1979 which made Reaganomics and neo-con policies possible, & a whole lot greater resemblence to fifty years prior. That time brought us the New Deal, World War II, and paved the way for the rise of the Middle Class, The Great Society and major civil rights legislation which, in turn, enabled the way for bigoted Democrats' defections to the Republican party, the rise of the Religious Right and corporate cooptions of regressive groups and emergence of Reagan, et. al.'s Objectivist policies now utterly exposed for the hoax and fraud they are.
Democrats grab momentum on volatile GOP contest which describes the the state of the GOP nominee field and how it stacks up with the incumbent with the inclusion of economic and foreign policy factors. A lively discussion in the comments section ensued, including the following:
mwrg 9:06 AM on November 28, 2011
[...]
Do you honestly see this President being re-elected with these kinds of unemployment and consumer confidence numbers? Seriously?
Do you think the economy is going to magically get better over the next year under this guy? It may be above your pay scale to pay attention to what's happening in Europe right now, for instance?
He's finished, and even most Democrats know it. The country is ready to cut its losses. If you haven't noticed the Conservative wave of the last 3 years, you're willfully blind. But then we knew that, didn't we?
And...
mwrg 9:02 AM on November 28, 2011
Wow, color me shocked that a Chron "political writer" just wrote another piece slanted against Republicans and for Democrats.
Apparently she doesn't read her history however. The economic and political dynamics of this country are so akin right now to 1979, it's uncanny. Economics works in cycles, and politics follow. Carter 2.0 is in the White House right now. Remember what happened next?
About which, in response, I wrote:
Oh, my freaking gaud, look how gobsmacked I am that yet another perennially malcontent, cafeteria-style pseudorealist conservative grabs at minor circumstances that service his wishful narrative while ignoring the big picture that blows his playbook out of the water.
The early 1930s are more similar to the current crisis than 1979, where it took from October 1929 'til November 1932 to vote out enough of the anti-working class, pro-Wall Street/corporation Republican obstructionists in favor of FDR. That was three years and three weeks, which is just about exactly how long its been, now, since the investment bankers took their failed banks to be saved on the backs of American tax payers. FDR and new Democratic majorities, over time, ushered in real economic stimulus like the Work Projects Administration (very much like Obama's American Jobs Act) and the Civilian Conservation Corps (aka Roosevelt's Forest Army, the New Deal, twenty years of Democratic adminsitrations and forty years of Republican near irrelevance and unprecedented American prosperity. The almost universal Republican overreach in continued policies favoring corporations over the vast majority of working class, lower class voting American has awakened the current electorate's recognition and acknowldegement of the vivid destructiveness of the neo-conservative/religious right movement of the past thirty years.
In the 30s, Europe had been in economic ruin for over ten years similarly to Iceland ,Greece, Spain, Portugal & Ireland's current state, somewhat presaging what world class economists predict is an inevital replay of the financial catastrophe of eighty years ago that gave rise to political envirnonments that brought the world Mussolini, Franco, Nazi, and Bolsheviks fifteen years before that. Now, we have the Arab Spring and possible Arab League prominence in Egypt, The American Autumn.
The current circumstances bear a mere shallow comparison to 1979 which made Reaganomics and neo-con policies possible, & a whole lot greater resemblence to fifty years prior. That time brought us the New Deal, World War II, and paved the way for the rise of the Middle Class, The Great Society and major civil rights legislation which, in turn, enabled the way for bigoted Democrats' defections to the Republican party, the rise of the Religious Right and corporate cooptions of regressive groups and emergence of Reagan, et. al.'s Objectivist policies now utterly exposed for the hoax and fraud they are.
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Magic vs Elbow Grease
It started with a post on Facebook referencing a story about complaints that the President's Thanksgiving radio message didn't mention a magical deity.
To which I responded:
Nathan Garcia I dunno, but you gotta hand it to a guy who finds equal worth, under intense pressure to the contrary, in freedom FROM religion. I'm pretty damned thankful for that.
The deterioration of the thread lead to this:
M****** E L**** S*.[...] Remember, Jesus said the things HE could do, his followers could do, and greater. He was spiritually developed to the point of being able to control the weather, walk on water, and rasie the dead to life. What the people are being fed as Chrisitanity is OBVIOUSLY not the true teachings of Christ, since not one person has raised anyone fron death back to life so far. Ressurecting the dead, by the way, did not originate with the advent of Jesus into the world. Several of the prophets of Israel were recorde as having deone so. Therefore I must cocnclude there is some spritual methoddology, missing in the teachings we currently have available to us. Jesus indicated we are to primarily seek the Kingdom of God within ourselves, and NOT from the sky. Therefore as long as we continue to concieve as God as some being outside ourselves, we are looking in the wrong direction. Naturally your prayers weren't answered, you were sending them in the wrong direction. But you must acknowlege there was some kind of spiritual connection…however weak and misdirected, that was actualized in the fact that you survived.
Nathan Garcia It is recorded that I have raised the dead by the simple fact that I just wrote it down. It means nothing. The deity within ourselves is what we make of it; there is no supernatural anything going for us. Assertions that it's within and we just don't have control of the magic is wishful thinking. Hocus pocus. Superstition. Old wives' tales. It takes a special kind of antisocial pathology to deny our intrinsic, psychological interdependence on each other. We are social animals, and are genetically and psychologically bound to help each other in order to help ourselves overall. Rejection of that fact undermines the fabric of a functional society. Sociopaths such as Ayn Rand and her Objectivist philosophy, followed by Alan Greenspan, Ronald Reagan both Georges Bush, Newt Gingrich, John Boehner, Justices Roberts, Alito, Thomas, Scalia and the entire neo-con, right wing, religious/Tea Party/Republican collective are exactly what brought our planet and our country to the sad state we're in. It's all based on discredited, reality disproven magical thinking, hocus pocus, wishful assertions that claim we just don't believe the lies stongly enough and that's why they don't work. In reality, religion, unregulated free markets and the rest of Reaganomics/trickle down economics don't work because they're false, antisocial and intrinsically self destructive.
J*** J***** @Nathan. " Unregulated free markets." Is that a new, left wing, oxymoron, talking point or what? LMFAO!
And, immediately:
J*** J***** Two words you'll never hear from the left are, personal responsibility. It's there belief that only a nanny state, federal government, can take care of you because you're to stupid to do it yourself. Now, don't you feel insulted?
I know, I know. But, I just couldn't let it go.
Nathan Garcia @J*** J*****: Nearly unregulated free markets are what let investment banks take investor money to gamble away, destroying by as yet uncompensated fraud countless mutual funds and individual retirement savings accounts. Millions of seniors are suddenly without the retirement they saved all their lives to provide themselves (aka personal responsiblity), some of them slipping into poverty so severe they must choose between eating and rent, paying for medical care or paying for heating oil. The term is not a buzz word, left wing talking point or anything close to an oxymoron. Unregulated free markets are exactly the goal corporate oligarchs wish to achieve, and have been very nearly successful in getting for themselves since the 1980s neo-con grip on policy. The Glass-Steagal Act, enacted in June, 1933, specifically to avoid the large banking practices that led to both the Great Depression in 1929 and the current too-big-to-fail bank failures and bailouts. Credit default swaps, collateralized debt obligations and the other fraudulent financial instruments that sank Bear Stearns, Leman Bros, Citibank, AIG, Goldman Sachs, Washington Mutual to name but a few could not have happened without rampant deregulation at the hands of Reaganomics, neo-con policies. Good gaud, man, pay attention!
Personal responsibility extends beyond an individual's well being into supporting the very society from which one derives benefit. Denigrating and dismissing one's social responsibilities is antisocial. The extent to which the right has abdicated responsibility for society at large in their quest of abject selfishness is pathological. Ask any qualifed psychology professional about the parallels of what is termed corporate feduciary responsibility and sociopathic behavior and you'll get an accurate, one-to-one correlation. It is willful ignorance to deny the fact that, as a society, everybody shares a responsibility to the extent of one's ability to contribute, especially in proportion to the benefit one derives from that society, to uphold the welfare of each and every individual in that society. For instance, corporations that benefit from publicly educated workers are responsible for contributing forward into the next generation of worker's educations. Corporate taxes to pay for schools, colleges and trade schools is the appropiately right and responsible thing to do. There are, indeed, degrees of responsibility dependant on the benefit a person or organization recieves from that society. Gouging the public without compensation is destructive, perverse and doomed to failure. History has unequivocally proved that time and again. Randian Objectivist selfishness is proven false in practice and is a thoroughly failed ideology. In other words, Reaganomics is a very well orchestrated hoax that got the entire world economy in the fine mess we're in.
What psychological needs are filled for the likes of John Jensen in undermining even his own wellbeing in service of sick, universally destructive ideas that have been completely proven false? What drives one to ignore the proof of reality staring him or her in the face? You may claim whatever your convictions are, but there's nothing in your freedom of speech that obliges others to enable your delusions or behave as if you even have a point. You may continue ignoring reality, but don't expect the resto of society to agree, much less follow you in cutting your own throat.
Later on in the thread, I recieved some compliments on the last post and I suggested I'd repeated these points enough that the thoughts should at least, by now, be conherent, and I should perhaps post the thoughts to my blog and just link to it in future. So, here it is.
Then, these came across
J*** J***** @Nathan " The government dosen't solve problems, it subsidizes them." Ronald Reagan
J*** J***** " You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich. You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong. You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift. You cannot lift the wage earner up by pulling the wage payer down. You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred. You cannot build charactor and courage by taking away a men's initiative and independence. You cannot help men permanently by doing for them, what they could and should do for themselves." Abraham Lincoln
Nathan Garcia J*** J*****: Oh, yeah, the guy who ran on balancing the budget and improving Social Security, but spent so much on military boondoggles he raided the Social Security fund to cover his tracks and then claimed Social Security was a financial failure. Quoting the President that started the raid on the middle class as some kind of metric for virtue is the same kind of appeal-to-authority logical fallacy as quoting a book of ancient myths about a despotic, pernitiously cruel deity as a model of kindness and mercy. It's absurd and willfully ignorant in the face of proof to the contrary. That's hold-in-your-hand, unequivocal, indisputable proof, and not just contrary opinion, hyperbole or bloviation.
Applying the Lincoln quote to critique redress of the vast inequities of Reaganomics and the neo-con policies of the past thirty years is nothing more than an absurd list of false equivalencies. It's odd, don't you thnk, how the country prospered when the progressive tax rate was up to 70% above $2 million and 90% above $10M -- you know, during those idyllic 50s of unprecedented prosperity Republicans and right wing ideologues keep wanting us to return to socially but not fiscally -- and the country has faltered into despair since Reagan gratuitously declared governement as the problem as an excuse to dismantle public policy safeguards to the benefit of corporate interests. No one is suggesting, nor has there been any time in American history, a destruction of the rich to aid the poor. The proposed three percent raises in taxes, or even a return to the 35% top tier would ruin nobody. Claiming it would is fantasy, disingenuous, outright fallacy. Nobody is suggesting indescriminate waste, and every person in Congress agrees waste must be eliminated. It's just that the New Deal and the Great Society programs are not waste and even strengthen the country. And, any study not paid for by the Hoover Institute, Heritage Foundation, American Enterprise institute or the Chamber of Commerce -- that is, independant without a preordained agenda -- bears that out. Are you really suggesting the wage payer will be crippled by hoarding only a few percent less among their billions or even millions, or better yet, paying the same percentage of all their income as the salaried and minimum wage earner? It is the upper class, led by Richard Nixon (Southern Strategy) Ronald Reagan (Trickle down economics) GHW Bush (Wllie Horton), the Republican Party and billionaire funded, propagandaizing think tanks that have engaged in class warfare, and then hypocritically use the term on their economic victims when those so effected call them on it. No where and at no time have social programs removed individuals' initiative and independence as proven countless times by the millions of American of all ethnicities, races and creeds who have pulled themselves out of poverty, each to his own abilities, after recovery from rough times. The whole point of the social safety net is to provide help for those who are physically, mentally, emotionall unable to help themselves.
The brush with which you paint is as wide as it is false. Not one single one of your points is applicable to the real world. Every comparison you make is itself an indictment of your own brand of class warefare, attempts at underemining the dignity of those whom you label as other than yourself. History has already proven your positions false, unworkable and unsustainable. The vast majority of the population, worldwide and domestic, are on to the distortions, mischaracterizations, fallacies, magical thinking absurdity that are instrinsic to right wing propaganda which right wing despots and ideologues have been spouting so effectively these recent thirty years. Empty, corrupt, unsustainable, self-destructive. Say as you wish in whatever terms you care to use. Just understand you are exposed as one who substitutes conviction for reality, assertions for fact, and opinion for truth.
Obama Thanksgiving Speech Didn't Mention God
www.aol.com
President Obama drew heat from critics for who he didn't thank during his Thanksgiving speech. The Las Vegas Review Journal reports that the Presidient didn't mention God in his address and that's not sitting well with some conservative pundits, as seen in the video above.
Nathan Garcia I dunno, but you gotta hand it to a guy who finds equal worth, under intense pressure to the contrary, in freedom FROM religion. I'm pretty damned thankful for that.
The deterioration of the thread lead to this:
M****** E L**** S*.[...] Remember, Jesus said the things HE could do, his followers could do, and greater. He was spiritually developed to the point of being able to control the weather, walk on water, and rasie the dead to life. What the people are being fed as Chrisitanity is OBVIOUSLY not the true teachings of Christ, since not one person has raised anyone fron death back to life so far. Ressurecting the dead, by the way, did not originate with the advent of Jesus into the world. Several of the prophets of Israel were recorde as having deone so. Therefore I must cocnclude there is some spritual methoddology, missing in the teachings we currently have available to us. Jesus indicated we are to primarily seek the Kingdom of God within ourselves, and NOT from the sky. Therefore as long as we continue to concieve as God as some being outside ourselves, we are looking in the wrong direction. Naturally your prayers weren't answered, you were sending them in the wrong direction. But you must acknowlege there was some kind of spiritual connection…however weak and misdirected, that was actualized in the fact that you survived.
Nathan Garcia It is recorded that I have raised the dead by the simple fact that I just wrote it down. It means nothing. The deity within ourselves is what we make of it; there is no supernatural anything going for us. Assertions that it's within and we just don't have control of the magic is wishful thinking. Hocus pocus. Superstition. Old wives' tales. It takes a special kind of antisocial pathology to deny our intrinsic, psychological interdependence on each other. We are social animals, and are genetically and psychologically bound to help each other in order to help ourselves overall. Rejection of that fact undermines the fabric of a functional society. Sociopaths such as Ayn Rand and her Objectivist philosophy, followed by Alan Greenspan, Ronald Reagan both Georges Bush, Newt Gingrich, John Boehner, Justices Roberts, Alito, Thomas, Scalia and the entire neo-con, right wing, religious/Tea Party/Republican collective are exactly what brought our planet and our country to the sad state we're in. It's all based on discredited, reality disproven magical thinking, hocus pocus, wishful assertions that claim we just don't believe the lies stongly enough and that's why they don't work. In reality, religion, unregulated free markets and the rest of Reaganomics/trickle down economics don't work because they're false, antisocial and intrinsically self destructive.
J*** J***** @Nathan. " Unregulated free markets." Is that a new, left wing, oxymoron, talking point or what? LMFAO!
And, immediately:
J*** J***** Two words you'll never hear from the left are, personal responsibility. It's there belief that only a nanny state, federal government, can take care of you because you're to stupid to do it yourself. Now, don't you feel insulted?
I know, I know. But, I just couldn't let it go.
Nathan Garcia @J*** J*****: Nearly unregulated free markets are what let investment banks take investor money to gamble away, destroying by as yet uncompensated fraud countless mutual funds and individual retirement savings accounts. Millions of seniors are suddenly without the retirement they saved all their lives to provide themselves (aka personal responsiblity), some of them slipping into poverty so severe they must choose between eating and rent, paying for medical care or paying for heating oil. The term is not a buzz word, left wing talking point or anything close to an oxymoron. Unregulated free markets are exactly the goal corporate oligarchs wish to achieve, and have been very nearly successful in getting for themselves since the 1980s neo-con grip on policy. The Glass-Steagal Act, enacted in June, 1933, specifically to avoid the large banking practices that led to both the Great Depression in 1929 and the current too-big-to-fail bank failures and bailouts. Credit default swaps, collateralized debt obligations and the other fraudulent financial instruments that sank Bear Stearns, Leman Bros, Citibank, AIG, Goldman Sachs, Washington Mutual to name but a few could not have happened without rampant deregulation at the hands of Reaganomics, neo-con policies. Good gaud, man, pay attention!
Personal responsibility extends beyond an individual's well being into supporting the very society from which one derives benefit. Denigrating and dismissing one's social responsibilities is antisocial. The extent to which the right has abdicated responsibility for society at large in their quest of abject selfishness is pathological. Ask any qualifed psychology professional about the parallels of what is termed corporate feduciary responsibility and sociopathic behavior and you'll get an accurate, one-to-one correlation. It is willful ignorance to deny the fact that, as a society, everybody shares a responsibility to the extent of one's ability to contribute, especially in proportion to the benefit one derives from that society, to uphold the welfare of each and every individual in that society. For instance, corporations that benefit from publicly educated workers are responsible for contributing forward into the next generation of worker's educations. Corporate taxes to pay for schools, colleges and trade schools is the appropiately right and responsible thing to do. There are, indeed, degrees of responsibility dependant on the benefit a person or organization recieves from that society. Gouging the public without compensation is destructive, perverse and doomed to failure. History has unequivocally proved that time and again. Randian Objectivist selfishness is proven false in practice and is a thoroughly failed ideology. In other words, Reaganomics is a very well orchestrated hoax that got the entire world economy in the fine mess we're in.
What psychological needs are filled for the likes of John Jensen in undermining even his own wellbeing in service of sick, universally destructive ideas that have been completely proven false? What drives one to ignore the proof of reality staring him or her in the face? You may claim whatever your convictions are, but there's nothing in your freedom of speech that obliges others to enable your delusions or behave as if you even have a point. You may continue ignoring reality, but don't expect the resto of society to agree, much less follow you in cutting your own throat.
Later on in the thread, I recieved some compliments on the last post and I suggested I'd repeated these points enough that the thoughts should at least, by now, be conherent, and I should perhaps post the thoughts to my blog and just link to it in future. So, here it is.
Then, these came across
J*** J***** @Nathan " The government dosen't solve problems, it subsidizes them." Ronald Reagan
J*** J***** " You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich. You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong. You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift. You cannot lift the wage earner up by pulling the wage payer down. You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred. You cannot build charactor and courage by taking away a men's initiative and independence. You cannot help men permanently by doing for them, what they could and should do for themselves." Abraham Lincoln
Nathan Garcia J*** J*****: Oh, yeah, the guy who ran on balancing the budget and improving Social Security, but spent so much on military boondoggles he raided the Social Security fund to cover his tracks and then claimed Social Security was a financial failure. Quoting the President that started the raid on the middle class as some kind of metric for virtue is the same kind of appeal-to-authority logical fallacy as quoting a book of ancient myths about a despotic, pernitiously cruel deity as a model of kindness and mercy. It's absurd and willfully ignorant in the face of proof to the contrary. That's hold-in-your-hand, unequivocal, indisputable proof, and not just contrary opinion, hyperbole or bloviation.
Applying the Lincoln quote to critique redress of the vast inequities of Reaganomics and the neo-con policies of the past thirty years is nothing more than an absurd list of false equivalencies. It's odd, don't you thnk, how the country prospered when the progressive tax rate was up to 70% above $2 million and 90% above $10M -- you know, during those idyllic 50s of unprecedented prosperity Republicans and right wing ideologues keep wanting us to return to socially but not fiscally -- and the country has faltered into despair since Reagan gratuitously declared governement as the problem as an excuse to dismantle public policy safeguards to the benefit of corporate interests. No one is suggesting, nor has there been any time in American history, a destruction of the rich to aid the poor. The proposed three percent raises in taxes, or even a return to the 35% top tier would ruin nobody. Claiming it would is fantasy, disingenuous, outright fallacy. Nobody is suggesting indescriminate waste, and every person in Congress agrees waste must be eliminated. It's just that the New Deal and the Great Society programs are not waste and even strengthen the country. And, any study not paid for by the Hoover Institute, Heritage Foundation, American Enterprise institute or the Chamber of Commerce -- that is, independant without a preordained agenda -- bears that out. Are you really suggesting the wage payer will be crippled by hoarding only a few percent less among their billions or even millions, or better yet, paying the same percentage of all their income as the salaried and minimum wage earner? It is the upper class, led by Richard Nixon (Southern Strategy) Ronald Reagan (Trickle down economics) GHW Bush (Wllie Horton), the Republican Party and billionaire funded, propagandaizing think tanks that have engaged in class warfare, and then hypocritically use the term on their economic victims when those so effected call them on it. No where and at no time have social programs removed individuals' initiative and independence as proven countless times by the millions of American of all ethnicities, races and creeds who have pulled themselves out of poverty, each to his own abilities, after recovery from rough times. The whole point of the social safety net is to provide help for those who are physically, mentally, emotionall unable to help themselves.
The brush with which you paint is as wide as it is false. Not one single one of your points is applicable to the real world. Every comparison you make is itself an indictment of your own brand of class warefare, attempts at underemining the dignity of those whom you label as other than yourself. History has already proven your positions false, unworkable and unsustainable. The vast majority of the population, worldwide and domestic, are on to the distortions, mischaracterizations, fallacies, magical thinking absurdity that are instrinsic to right wing propaganda which right wing despots and ideologues have been spouting so effectively these recent thirty years. Empty, corrupt, unsustainable, self-destructive. Say as you wish in whatever terms you care to use. Just understand you are exposed as one who substitutes conviction for reality, assertions for fact, and opinion for truth.
Friday, November 25, 2011
My Letter to President Obama, 26 November 2011
Dear Mr. President:
What's going on here? Brutal police crackdowns on OWS protesters simultaneously across the land, an 18 mayor conference call with DHS, suppression of press coverage, intimidation abridging Speech, Assembly, Due Process, Equal Protection, Redress of Grievances rights. These police forces answer to you. Are you part of this?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/nov/25/shocking-truth-about-crackdown-occupy
What's going on here? Brutal police crackdowns on OWS protesters simultaneously across the land, an 18 mayor conference call with DHS, suppression of press coverage, intimidation abridging Speech, Assembly, Due Process, Equal Protection, Redress of Grievances rights. These police forces answer to you. Are you part of this?
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/nov/25/shocking-truth-about-crackdown-occupy
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