1/ Your scribe recently gave a presentation locally to a group of about 40 people, and the theme was loosely based on the recent article I sent out as a special - "Economic Terrorism - how the Superrich have declared war on the middle class". It was quite well received despite the pessimistic theme, and I was happy to try to let people know what is really happening to them..... Anyway part of the presentation was "not all billionaires are bad", and I cited Warren Buffett, Bill Gates among others so I was pleased to read this Times Editorial Saturday morning..... I must have been psychic...... EDITORIALThe Enlightened Rich Want to Be TaxedPublished: September 9, 2011Some of the world’s wealthiest people are calling for higher taxes on the rich. They seem to recognize that the burden of the economic downturn cannot be borne entirely by the poor and middle class. Related in News
Related in Opinion
After the American billionaire investor Warren Buffett urged Congress last month to raise taxeson millionaires, the call echoed across Europe. Sixteen of France’s wealthiest individuals urged the government to raise their taxes. The Italian Formula One magnate Luca di Montezemolo publicly backed Mr. Buffett’s idea “for reasons of fairness and solidarity.” About 50 of Germany’s richest people have been campaigning for a higher top tax rate since 2009. The suggestion is motivated, no doubt, by a sense of justice — that the very rich, who have survived the financial crisis very well, should contribute more to shrinking public coffers to reduce the spending cuts that would hurt the most vulnerable. 2/ I hesitated before including this article about the grip that corporate power [trolls] has on all levels of our society, because the columnist Chris Hedges is so angry he goes a little over the top....but not that much. The trolls are the superrich and their puppets... See what you think...... The trolls dominate or have neutralized every major institution in the country on behalf of their corporate paymasters. The press, education, Wall Street, labor and our political parties are managed by trolls or have been destroyed by them. Sometimes these trolls speak like liberals. Sometimes they speak like conservatives. Sometimes they are secular. Sometimes they are Christians. But the language they use is a cover for the relentless march toward a totalitarian capitalism and a kingdom where the trolls, if not the rest of us, live happily ever after. Rick Perry and John Boehner overtly make war on Social Security. Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi say they would like to save Social Security but are sadly powerless before the decisions of a congressional super committee they helped form. The result, of course, is the same. We get to choose the rhetoric and manner in which we are deceived and disempowered. Nothing more. 3/ Matt Taibbi wrote this just before President Obama's jobs speech on Thursday, and it's not a happy read for Democrats .....but maybe he's changed his mind a little after hearing Barry get a little pissed off...... It's not just that he hasn't done those things. The more important thing is that the people he's surrounded himself with are not labor people, but stooges from Wall Street. Barack Obama has as his chief of staff a former top-ranking executive from one of the most grossly corrupt mega-companies on earth, JP Morgan Chase. He sees Bill Daley in his own office every day, yet when it comes time to talk abut labor issues, he has to go out and make selected visits twice a year or whatever to the Richard Trumkas of the world. Listening to Obama talk about jobs and shared prosperity yesterday reminded me that we are back in campaign mode and Barack Obama has started doing again what he does best – play the part of a progressive. He's good at it. It sounds like he has a natural affinity for union workers and ordinary people when he makes these speeches. But his policies are crafted by representatives of corporate/financial America, who happen to entirely make up his inner circle. I just don't believe this guy anymore, and it's become almost painful to listen to him. 4/ This month's compilation of stupid people doing dumb things, and a few just plain accidents....."August Fails".....10 minutes..... For me it's like channel surfing and watching "Hoarders" or "Cage Fighting" or 'Sumo Wrestling" for a few minutes.....fascination with all that's ugly..... 5/ And on the subject of Thursday's "the speech", here is Charles Blow with praise for the President's message, but with a warning as well. If he caves or compromises on this as he has many times before under Republican pressure.....welcome President Perry...... Very good article..... President Obama was champing at the bit during Thursday night’s speech to a joint session of Congress. He’d had it with those do-nothings. He was going to show everyone that he could be tough — and he did. So why does it feel as if we’ve been here before? Why does it feel as if we’ve heard him “give it to them” before only to have him lighten up and give in later? Because we have, that’s why. Yes, Thursday’s speech was an encouraging shift in tone with a meaty jobs plan of the president’s own design. But, in the end, it was just another speech. It didn’t answer definitively the larger questions that remain for this president: Has he truly shifted strategy or is his tonal shifting merely temporal? Has he finally realized that you can’t rub the belly of the beast that wants to eat you, that you have to fight your way off the plate and bring the monster to heel? Has he come to understand that Americans value valiant struggle over bloodless surrender? Does he have any interest in becoming the Obama of people’s imaginations, the one they thought they saw through the showers of streamers, and explosions of confetti in 2008 — the man who only ever existed in their own minds? Is the “transformative president” more than an opportunistic transformer, shifting shape to suit the moment, but truly settling on none? And can any adjustment halt the precipitous slide in the number of people who see him as an effective leader? According to a NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released last week, the number of people who rated the president “very good” at having strong leadership qualities has steadily dropped from 70 percent the month he took office to 42 percent last month. It’s not that people don’t believe him, it’s that an increasing number don’t believe in him. And that is far more dangerous politically. Obama can and must answer these questions, and quickly. He isn’t only battling a calcifying cynicism about the inefficacy of government in general, he’s battling the rapidly hardening public perception that he himself is a product of what I call the doughnut doctrine of leadership — soft, glazy, hollow in the middle and ideally suited for getting dunked. Americans want him to clearly identify his core beliefs. It’s simple: They want to fully understand his values and how they apply to us as individuals and as a country. Moreover, they want to be completely convinced that he is willing to defend it all. The vacillation between hot and cold, stern and pliable, resolute and accommodating hasn’t inspired that confidence. Americans respect authenticity and conviction even when they don’t fully agree with it. Conviction bespeaks strength; strength bespeaks power; and, for better or worse, this is a culture that applauds and is comforted by power. Obama has a list of accomplishments as long as your arm. But a less-than-masterly use of the bully pulpit has allowed both opponents and supposed allies to minimize them. A very vocal part of the progressive base has painted many of his successes as capitulations, while many on the far right have painted them as a threat to the security and solvency of the republic. That’s the problem with lingering too long in the middle: you take fire from both sides. .............................. Whatever the reason, it’s hard to imagine a successful re-election bid for a president who can only muster a third of the white vote and half of the Hispanic vote. That should send ice-cold shudders of fear through every Democrat because the leading Republican contenders for the job are either hopelessly hokey, obviously plastic, horribly misguided or some other form of terrible. Gov. Rick Perry, the newly minted Republican presidential front-runner, participated in his first presidential debate on Wednesday and did his best imitation of Andy Griffith on acid. He said that he believes Social Security is a Ponzi scheme, global warming is based on shaky science and hasn’t struggled at all with executing more inmates in Texas than any governor in recent American history. This man shouldn’t even be allowed to traipse his boots and spurs into the White House for a visit, let alone take up residence there. And even beyond re-elections, it will be hard for the president to accrue enough political capital to effectively finish out this term with approval numbers like the ones he has had. Thursday’s jobs speech was a good start toward a positive change if, indeed, it was a genuine start and not part of a pattern of fits and starts. The president was on fire, but the jury is still out on whether that fire was just another flash of light or a source of sustainable heat and whether some people would rather freeze than warm to him. 6/ Some of this old comedy was priceless - here's a clip from the Carol Burnett show with Tim Conway.....five minutes of laughter...."The Dwarf Elephant Trainer"...... 7/ This is another disturbing article for Democrats from todays Times......there is growing concern at the state and local level President Obama's unpopularity will drag the entire party down with him...... Democrats are expressing growing alarm about President Obama’s re-election prospects and, in interviews, are openly acknowledging anxiety about the White House’s ability to strengthen the president’s standing over the next 14 months. Elected officials and party leaders at all levels said their worries have intensified as the economy has displayed new signs of weakness. They said the likelihood of a highly competitive 2012 race is increasing as the Republican field, once dismissed by many Democrats as too inexperienced and conservative to pose a serious threat, has started narrowing to two leading candidates, Mitt Romney and Rick Perry, who have executive experience and messages built around job creation. And in a campaign cycle in which Democrats had entertained hopes of reversing losses from last year’s midterm elections, some in the party fear that Mr. Obama’s troubles could reverberate down the ballot into Congressional, state and local races. 8/ And Tom Tomorrow sums it all up....... 9/ Here's a DDD favourite - Christina Perri with "Jar of Hearts".....quite an atmospheric video with the premise that her ex boyfriend collects girls hearts, then breaks them.... Interesting song, and she's got great pipes as well..... 10/ Onion News reports on the strange behaviour of the nations climatologists at a recent conference.....Brooke Alvarez has the story..... 11/ There is a decision coming down the pike that the President has to make - whether to approve the Keystone Pipeline from the toxic oil tar sands of Alberta all the way to Texas. This should be a no-brainer as the main beneficiaries from the pipeline will be the Koch Brothers, who are doing everything they can to destroy this President. But the Kochs have allies - the energy oligarchs, the Republicans, lobbyists galore and they are all out with pressure to approve this environmental calamity. So Mr. President - what's it going to be? Charles Koch, one of our country's most prolific conservative donors, was recorded praising his oil, energy and Wall Street friends who contributed millions of dollars to his political causes. That Koch likely referred to President Obama as Saddam Hussein and framed the upcoming election as the "mother of all wars" overshadowed the real news. These are the disclosures from the Koch brothers' secret strategy sessions. The recording at the centre of the controversy was taken from the most recent Koch seminar in June – and we now know the litany of polluting tycoons and industrialists who are allied with the Kochs in ideology and corporate greed. And like the Koch brothers, this millionaires' and billionaires' club stands to gain from the hazardous and unnecessary Keystone XL oil pipeline, which passed a critical assessment in Hillary Clinton's state department. The billionaire brothers are the subject of our activist community that's taking action to stop the Kochs on this controversy and other critical policies that affect our society and health. The Koch brothers would profit from this oil pipeline at the expense of working families, who live and work along the approximately 2,000 miles of the pipeline's route. The brothers own almost all of the $100bn Koch Industries, which is "among Canada's largest crude oil purchasers, shippers and exporters", according to a Koch subsidiary's website. The Kochs also operate an entire business line called Koch Exploration Canada, LP, which is devoted to exploring and refining one of the most toxic energy sources on Earth. Koch Industries handles 25% of this oil, and the brothers stand to make millions of dollars from the pipeline's construction, which could generate $15tn for special interests in North America. 12/ Excellent comedy this week - a trifecta. Here's Jon Stewart with his take on "President' Perry, and the second segment is his commentary on the Republican debate....both 5 minute clips are very funny..... And Steven Colbert has his take on Rick Perry as well.....so clever, so funny.....about 5 minutes..... 13/ Some scientists are concerned that we are decimating the deep water fish with deep trawling, because the fish at the lower depths of the oceans breed much more slowly than other fish species..... However, the chances of anything happening are slim to none.... Industrial fishing in the deep sea should be banned because it has depleted fish stocks that take longer to recover than other species, according to a paper to be released this week by an international team of marine scientists. The article, published in the scientific journal Marine Policy, describes fishing operations that have in recent decades targeted the unregulated high seas after stocks near shore were overfished. Describing the open ocean as “more akin to a watery desert,” the scientists argue that vessels have targeted patches of productive areas sequentially, depleting the fish there and destroying deep-sea corals before moving on to new areas. Certain deep-sea species have gained widespread popularity — including orange roughy and Patagonian toothfish, otherwise known as Chilean sea bass — only to crash within a matter of years. Elliott Norse, president of the Marine Conservation Institute and the paper’s lead author, said the world has turned to deep-sea fishing “out of desperation” without realizing fish stocks there take much longer to recover. “We’re now fishing in the worst places to fish,” Norse said in an interview. “These things don’t come back.” As vessels use Global Positioning System devices and trawlers, which scrape massive metal plates across the sea bottom, the catch of deep-water species has increased sevenfold between 1960 and 2004, according to the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization. “What they’re doing out there is more like mining than fishing,” said Kevin Hassett, director of economic policy studies at the American Enterprise Institute. Todays video - a Molson ad from Canada..... Todays oldies joke Three golfers are walking down the fairway. "Sixty is the worst age to be," said the 60-year-old, "You always feel like you have to pee. And most of the time nothing happens." "Ah, that's nothing," said the 70-year-old. "When you're 70, you don't have a bowel movement anymore. You take laxatives, eat bran, you sit on the toilet all day and nothing happens." "Actually," said the 80-year-old, "Eighty is the worst age of all. "Do you have trouble peeing too?" asked the 60-year-old. "No, I pee every morning at 6.00 am. I pee like a racehorse; no problem at all." "Do you have trouble having a bowel movement?" asked the 70-year-0ld. "No, I have one every morning at 6.30 am." Puzzled with this the 60-year-old said, "Let's get this straight. You pee every morning at 6.00 am and poop every morning at 6.30 am. So what's so tough about being 80?" "I don't wake up until seven." Todays doctor joke When my doctor asked me about what I did yesterday, I told him about my day: "Well, yesterday afternoon, I waded across the edge of a lake, escaped from a mountain lion in the heavy brush, marched up and down a mountain, stood in a patch of poison ivy, crawled out of quicksand, and jumped away from an aggressive rattlesnake" Inspired by my story, the doctor said, "You must be an awesome outdoors-man!" "No," I replied, "I'm just a shitty golfer." |
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Davids Daily Dose -Sunday September 11th
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