A radical environmentalist is someone who doesn't want their tap water to catch fire!

http://www.laconiadailysun.com/story/james-veverka-12-15


A radical environmentalist is someone who doesn't want their tap water to catch fire!

To the editor,

To folks like Don Ewing, a radical environmentalist is someone who doesn't want their tap water to catch fire, the water to reek of chemicals and their air to be sickening. Recently, in Bejing, the Chinese government finally admitted the fog covering the city was really smog. Duh! Who wudda thunk it? I suppose the Chinese admission was a big surprise to Don. Its harmless! Its just fog! And so what if your water catches fire. Its now sterile enough to drink! And so what if its a little brown; extra hydrogen!

The reason why the pipeline is on hold is because of the pipeline's route. This delay was initiated by the State Department, not the president. The problem is the educated people in the states where the pipeline passes through are very concerned about the environmental havoc that would be caused by cracked pipes, etc. It would have major implications for the quality of drinking water. Plus there was leaked from the European Commission a study that says emissions from fuels made with tar sands contain 23-percent more pollutants than standard fossil fuels. That's good news to Fox News! And we can all wear cool masks!

Mr. Ewing claims 20 jobs bills have been passed by the GOP house and with bipartisan support! Yup, 10 Democrats voted with the kindergarten class this week! Bipartisan! That is not bipartisan but that is the spin the right wingers put on it. Its a typical right wing lie. Did he also note that 14 Republicans voted with the opposing Democrats? Bipartisan opposition! And I have to ask, what 20 jobs bills? Thats BS. Anything the GOP has offered has been a hostage bill...as usual. This time the hostage was the continuation of the payroll tax holiday.

The real jobs bill; the one supported by a strong majority of Americans, is the plan Mr Obama put forth this fall. In an October NBC/WSJ poll, 63-percent supported passage of the bill the GOP BLOCKED and 64-percent thought it was a good idea to up the taxes on the rich. Revenue! And listen to what the chief economist at Moody's says. From Postandcourier.com 9-9-11: "Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, estimated that the president’s plan would boost economic growth by 2-percentage points, add 2-million jobs and reduce unemployment by a full percentage point next year compared with existing law."

Mr. Ewing cries about 20,000 jobs when his party of do-nothing brats deliberately blocks the president's bill that could create 2 MILLION jobs! Its that forest and the trees thing I guess. Its Obama Derangement Syndrome. By the way, Don, 20,000 is 1-percent of 2-million. One percent. Thinkin' big, eh Don?

Be an adult, support the big plan. It won't hurt!

James Veverka

Tilton

When it comes to the economy GOP has an ideology but no plan

Dec 13, 2011 12:00 am

To the editor,

Regarding Marc Abear's "Simple: payments on debt will preclude spending on something else": it is NOT simple and requires a multi-faceted plan to stimulate a stuck economy. Mr Abear simply repeated everything he said last time like the comical notion that the "free" market is ultimately rational. And he still refuses to accept the importance of raising revenue. The most effective way to deal with an economic downturn is NOT to address debt first. Doing that further injures the economy. Payments on debt precluding spending is the worst thing we can do in a downturn. The debt-first ideology is impotent in freeing "trapped liquidity". Freeing trapped capital is primary to an economic recovery. It needs a shove.

In a CBS News/New York Times Poll. October, 2011, people were asked what their priority was. 57-percent said JOBS. 5-percent said the debt and deficit. 57-5! The CBO has warned Congress that cutting spending in the middle of economic downturn would have a negative impact. The CBO pointed out the most effective way out of this mess is to create programs that spark economic activity, joined with "long term" debt payoff. The CBO recently pointed out that hundreds of thousands of jobs could be lost and economic growth would be hindered with the GOP's latest alternative to the president's jobs and tax holiday plan. Marc, like the GOP, has it backwards. Like Andy Boutin, he watches too much Fox brainwashing. Fox refuses to talk about revenues, too!

Small business tax cuts and credits, jobs and building programs, benefit extensions, and demand-side tax cuts pump capital into the economy. Ending the Bush tax cuts and loopholes for the wealthiest, repealing corporate welfare like oil subsidies would raise trillions in revenue over a decade. And no more Mr. Nice Guy to companies that move our manufacturing base overseas.

In economic downturns, the Keynesian pump-priming has worked quite well while Mr Abear's cut-cut-cut ideas have always drowned. Europe's IMF austerity plans made their situation worse. A good Keynesian stimulus plan includes points in time down the line where specific debt related policies kick in. Not one recovery in the past employed the misguided debt pay down prescription yet Keynesianism has worked just fine. Seemingly unknown to Mr Abear, it's quite difficult to pay your debts and build for the future if you're not raising substantial revenue.

How was it all done then? FDR began work projects, returning millions to work. On top of that, with the Revenue Act of 1935, taxes went up for the $75,000 and $5,000,000 tax brackets. Tax loopholes the wealthy were using to avoid paying taxes were closed. Corporate taxes were cut for small businesses and hiked for large ones. With these tools, FDR brought unemployment from 25 to 14-percent in three years because he had a good plan and a mentally fit Congress he could work with. Trouble reappeared in 1937 when he was swayed by conservatives to cut spending. An immediate downturn that erased much of the gains resulted. It was too soon for that part of the plan. FDR then introduced and signed another stimulus plan and the country was back on track 11 months later. With the recessions of 1945, 1948-1949, and 1953, counter-cyclical fiscal policies in place since FDR worked. But the recession of 1957-1958 was much deeper than those above. According to the DOT webpage, "In August 1957, the country had slipped into a recession that would increase unemployment by 7-percent and reduce corporate profits by 25-percent by April 1958. One of the reasons the president had promoted the interstate (highway) system was just such a situation — that he would have a public works program that could be expanded or contracted to control the economy. To stimulate the economy and avoid losing momentum, Congress passed the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1958." Eisenhower knew the plan.

The sluggish economy of 1961 led Kennedy to present Congress with a sizable stimulus program. By June, 1961, all parts of the plan had passed. Social Security payments and the minimum wage increased. The stimulus provided 420,000 construction jobs under the new Housing Act, $175M in higher wages, $400M for over 1,000 depressed regions, $200M to $750,000 children on welfare, and $800M in extended unemployment benefits for three million unemployed workers. The economy stayed strong until the Nixon years. When Bill Clinton sought to raise revenue with a modest tax increase for paying down the mountain of debt created by Reagan and Bush, tea party economist Dick Armey warned that it would mean the end of American prosperity. History tells us that the revenue raising worked and Bill Clinton handed the next president a SURPLUS after a period of unequaled prosperity. Dick Armey is still stupid.

Economists with half a brain know what to do but the Republicans are doing everything they can to stop it. It's deliberate because Obama is right on the mark; jobs programs, demand-side tax cuts, ending the Bush tax cuts, extending unemployment benefits, etc. These are proven methods yet the cut-cut-cut crowd can't see past their noses. Right wingers have an ideology, not a plan.

James Veverka

Tilton

Christmas is actually a latecomer to year end revelries

http://www.laconiadailysun.com/story/james-veverka-12-5

To the editor,

I was sincerely hoping to get through the holidays without any Christmas Wars. But Barbara J. Perry insists otherwise. She tells us holiday fairs are not holiday fairs; they are Christmas fairs. Continuing, she tells us that without Christmas and December NOTHING would be happening.

Nothing could be farther from the truth about December celebrations. They have been around for thousands of years and specifically in late December. There was no official Christmas holiday until the 4th century when the Emperor Constantine decreed that all the pagan holidays around the Winter Solstice and the New Year would become the celebration of the birth of Jesus.

Previous to this in the Roman Empire and the northern tribes, late December to the new year was a time of excessive partying, get-togethers and a good deal of drunken revelry. People celebrated the Solstice and the Sun God because "the long nights" were over and the Sun with its life giving rays had returned to begin the renewal of life. Some folks took most of the month of December to Celebrate Saturnalia, too. It was a very festive period of family get-togethers and feasts, intoxication, singing, artful decorations, the lighting of candles and the tradition of exchanging gifts. AND THE GOVERNMENT SHUT DOWN FOR THE HOLIDAYS!

The Birth of Mithrais, Son of the Sun God, was celebrated for centuries before Christianity on December 25th. At that time the calendar was a little off with the Winter Solstice being on December 25th. Mithras was a "saviour" who was born of a virgin and shepherds witnessed this. He healed the sick and even said in order to be saved we had to drink of his blood and eat of his flesh. He was called the Son of God, the way, the life and the truth. He even interceded for the righteous in Hades. In the northern parts of Europe is where evergreen trees and red berries were used in solstice renewal celebrations. Gifts were placed under them, too. Kissing under the Mistletoe is an ancient Celtic tradition far older than Christianity.

So really, its none of anyone's business what other's decide to celebrate. In historical terms, Christmas is a late comer to the year end revelries. December's family gatherings, feasts, exchanging of gifts, festive intoxication, candles, decorations, dancing and the rest of it would still dominate December even if there had never been a Jesus. Nobody OWNS December. December celebrations are in our DNA because of the sun and the seasons!

We have our pagan lights and candles, our heathen Tree and Celtic Mistletoe, our Saturnalian drinking, our exchange of gifts, our Roman family feasts and we celebrate the Solstice, a far more ancient celebration that is rooted in the cycles of nature and our bodies.

Keynesian strategies brought us out of economic troubles Six Times!

http://www.laconiadailysun.com/story/james-veverka-12-2

To the editor,

The first thing that struck me in Marc Abear's "Loss of freedom is implicit with carrying too much debt" was his statement "in the long run, the market is absolutely rational". To me that is like saying "in the long run humans are absolutely rational. Neither are guaranteed. This belief is an article of faith in the religion of so-called free market. There is no such thing as a completely free market that is rational because of human nature. Keynes criticized the Hayek/Mises economic model because it ignored the elephant in the room he called "Animal Spirits". IT IS US! Because of human irrationality, manic speculation, mood swings, emotional instabilities, and zealous avarice, there can never be a free market without regulations of the "animal spirits". Just as we humans need rules and regulations in a free society, so does the market which we operate with our wills. Its never "free".

Free market solutions have never brought us out of deep recessions or depressions in a timely fashion. In the last century, the chosen method has been the Keynesian method, whether it be conservative or liberal versions of such. Furthermore, economic turmoil has usually been caused by these "animal spirits". Industrial leaders, moneychangers and politicians sequester the nation's wealth through corporate political methods. This is how the gulf between the rich and the poor increases. The most insidious is the corruption resulting from corporate buyouts of politicians. This truly destructive alliance creates laws and the lack of them whereby there is a massive redistribution of wealth upward to a corporate monarchy.

In the last 30 years, wages for working class families have been almost flat. while the income of the top 1-percent has grown almost 300-percent. Back in the 1970s a CEO made about 70 times as much as his workers. Now he makes several hundred times as much. If one looks at a typical chart of the last 30-50 years you will see middle class wages are fairly stagnant but the line designating top earner's pay looks like a steep mountain climb! If the trickled-down supply sider model worked you would see in charts a corresponding rise in the wealth of the middle class. Its absent. The reason why the wealth of the nation is being heavily redistributed to the very top is that they own the politicians who make the laws. Chart after chart provides powerful evidence that supply-side corporatism is a road to serfdom; a world where we all work for lower wages. The richest job creators are setting the agenda of their servants in Congress and you are paying for it in every one of your paychecks.

Let me ask a simple question. Have you become a slacker? Do you produce less and less each year? Of course not. And have the top earner's work ethics and productivity gone into cosmic overdrive? Of course not. Its the corporatist sleazery that has exploded. Nothing has changed in how we all work. The reason why the data show such a discrepancy in income rise that refutes the trickle down model is that politicians are in the pay of powerful lobbyists and their corporations. This is not a free market; its a rigged market fashioned by corporatists who consider themselves America's Monarchy. We are all Walmart employees to the Koch Brothers! When income is adjusted for the cost of living, some of you are making LESS than you made 20 years ago. Not so for the folks who have bought the politicians and set their agendas. While the job-creator's wealth has exploded, they seem to have forgotten to create jobs.

Contrary to Mr Abear's claim that Keynes was constricted, the years 1945-1975 were called "The Age of Keynes". Keynesian strategies brought us out of the economic troubles of 1945, 1948-1949, 1952-1953, 1958, and the early 1960s. The recession of 1990-1992 is another example of successful Keynesian applications. Demand-side tax cuts, benefit extensions and jobs programs worked in every case just they did in the mid-1930s. Cuts never help in hard times which leads me to this: Mr Abear wants us to employ failed strategies; he not once brings up raising revenues to lower the debt when it is the most practical method when joined with prudent cuts. As long as GOP prohibits raising revenues, rebuilding America, and other jobs programs, we will move out of these hard times at a snail's pace — which was their plan all along. Ending the Bush tax cuts for top earners would pump a minimum of ten trillion dollars into the economy in a decade. They were supposed to expire so let 'em!

"BUT NO!" say the politicians, "we must babysit and protect the rich at all costs because they own us! They are the job creators!" I say then, where are the jobs?

ORLY TAITZ IS INSANE: BIRTHERS PROVEN WRONG AGAIN!

When zip codes were assigned, 06184 was reserved for military

To the editor,

I always get a twinkle in my eye when someone attempts a rebuttal but provides no evidence for their own claim. In regards to William Lolli's claim on the 19th that there was no zip code 06184 in 1977 he offers no evidence of that. There's no butt in his rebuttal! Like many conservative debators, he backs up nothing or just lies "for the good of the cause". Because he says its so, then it must be so. What evidence? No 1977 zip code lists or anything else. If I am wrong, Mr Lolli should present more than coffin air.

The fact of the matter is that when zip codes were first assigned in 1963, the zip 06184 was set aside as many were for the military mail service. Zip 06184 is an APO/FPO#. Danbury proper was 06180 and over the years more were added but the APO# zip code was not one.

It should also be noted that since 1972 it was the first 3 digits that were used as general area locators so the last two number really didn't matter at all. So when the error occurred, whether by Obama or a clerk in confusing 961 for 061, the young Obama got a Social Security number with a "general locator" number for CT. The SSA is adamant that the three numbers are just a reference point ; that there is nothing that makes it a mandatory rule. Birther pawns act otherwise.

With two of Honolulu's newspapers announcing the boy's birth, combined with an official birth certificate and the State of Hawaii's Certificate of Live Birth which many high officials have seen in person, the entire birther zip code conspiracy theory seems like a concoction from a special-ed Kinderegarten sandbox. It's all meaningless and leads nowhere. Even when Clinton was president the wingnuts threw eight years of tantrums. Its the right wing way.

Who is the one who is actually foreign born? Being that John McCain was born in Panama, how is he a natural born citizen as Article 2 demands? How does he qualify as a natural born citizen when he was not born here? According to the State Department Foreign Affairs Manual, U.S. government installations abroad are NOT part of the United States. So by that reasoning, McCain is not natural born.

But alas! According to the Congressional Research Service, the weight of scholarly legal and historical opinion indicates that the term means one who is entitled under the Constitution or laws of the United States to U.S. citizenship at birth or by birth, including any child born "in" the United States, the children of United States citizens born abroad, and those born abroad of one citizen parent who has met U.S. residency requirements.

There are laws supporting this opinion by scholars. The first law was passed in 1790 and sought to define natural born citizens. This is the same Congress that crafted the Bill of Rights. The Naturalisation Act of 1790 provided that "the children of citizens of the United States that may be born beyond the sea, or out of the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born citizens: Provided, That the right of citizenship shall not descend to persons whose fathers have never been resident in the United States". (Act of March 26th, 1790, 1 Stat. 103) Later on as in Title 8, Section 1401, natural born laws included children of citizen mothers or any one parent.

McCain saved! Laws have changed language over the years but the basic law of 1790 set the foundation to why John McCain could be considered naturally born. Strictly speaking in "birther", McCain (and George Romney in 1968) is not a natural born citizen and is not qualified to be president. But the law says otherwise. If our Hawaiian born President had been born overseas as John McCain was, he would have been afforded the same rights to natural born citizenship as McCain. The President could have been born on the Moon!

Title 8, Section 1401 defines who are "citizens of the United States at birth" One of the conditions besides being born on American soil which President Obama was, states, 

"Any one born outside the United States, if one parent is a citizen and lived in the U.S. for at least one year and the other parent is a U.S. national".President Obama twice meets the criteria. so even if you fall for the Birther nonsense about American soil, he meets the requirement of having a citizen mother and a national as a father. 1790, folks! No matter how you cut it, the birthers lose.

So you see, by birther "constitutionality", it should have been John McCain that was labeled foreign born.

There's Nothing wrong with being rich except using the power to buy politicians

Nothing wrong with being rich except using the power to buy politicians

http://www.laconiadailysun.com/story/james-veverka-11-23

To the editor,

In his letter, "Bush didn't blame Clinton for the dot.com crash he inherited", Bob Meade complains about politicians making war within our borders. He is right about this being a war but he neglects to remind the public that it is mostly his side of the isle that has come charging in to undo the gains of the 20th century. War? Attacks on long fought for worker rights. Attacks on a woman's right to choose. Ignorant theocratic attacks on gay rights. War? Police brutality against protesters, batons-a-smashing and tear gas canisters striking vets in the head. Pepper spraying seniors, a pregnant woman and kids sitting on the ground. War? Death threats to people collecting recall signatures. War? Challenging a senior in Wisconsin who was collecting signatures — to a fist fight in the woods! War? Pretending to be signing a recall petition, suddenly ripping it up and driving off. War? The destruction of the middle class and its social safety net. People should be careful what they start in America.

Then Mr Meade goes off on the usual Fake News talking point about blaming the rich. If one reads nothing but right wing talking points, one will be completely in the dark. If you listen to CATO, Rush, or Fox Snooze you will be brainwashed by all the orchestrated pathological lying. People are not blaming the rich for being rich. What people are angry about is how wealth is used to influence our political system. It is not that people may be rich but what people and corporations are doing with the power they have with wealth. Money is political power in a corporatocracy; it destroys the "democratic republicanism" of a government for the people by the people. With corporatism, whoever has the most money has the most influence on our government. Republicans worship at this altar. Getting rich is fine but using your wealth to buy lobbyists and politicians is morally wrong and undemocratic.

Mr. Meade then attempts to give us a lesson in history. The dot-com bubble and burst was caused by wild-eyed, avarice filled Wall Street speculators. On top of this, "conservative think-tanks" (oxymoron!) and publications like Forbes urged people to buy without thoughtful restraint. People ignored both time tested investment strategies and the law. This is the power intoxicated whirling-dervish culture of Wall Street when it is unregulated. Conservatives chanted buy, buy, buy, till ya die.

You may be wondering what the Smoot-Hawley Act was? Mr. Meade is using this example of government intervention as an example to prove intervention in economic matters is wrong-headed. Sometimes it is. What he fails to tell you is that this tariff act was Republican, isolationist, protectionist, and "pro-business". Enacted in 1930, it fulfilled a campaign promise by Republican President Herbert Hoover to farms and industries. Like the Fordney-McCumber Tariff Act of 1922, it was opposed by Democrats, progressives, and a few smart industrialists while it was supported by Republicans and conservatives. Not surprisingly, both Smoot and Hawley lost their re-election bids in 1932.

Combining Keynesian priming of the pump and the reduction of tariffs under the FDR administration, factory output returned to mid-1929 levels by 1937. The sudden downturn of 1937-1938 was caused by FDR's caving in to conservatives to enact austerity measures and a more balanced budget. It was too soon and caused a severe recession after unemployment had dropped from 25-percent to 14-percent. With another stimulus package in 1938, the nation emerged from that recession in a little over a year. One can only speculate what would have happened if we weren't deceived by the Republican pro-business tariff acts and the conservative's austerity measures of 1937. If you want to see what irresponsible austerity measures do to economies, look at Greece and Europe. Comparing Keynesian interventions with austerity measures or tariffs simply doesn't work in this story.

The Bush economy was a false bottom, one destined to fail. It is not a coincidence that the two worst crashes since the Great Depression occurred due to Reagan and Bush II economic policies. Invading two countries while at the same time slashing revenue with irresponsible tax cuts, and enacting an unpaid for prescription drug act reaches the pinnacle of economic stupidity. Like the Smoot-Hawley act, the Bush policies were in the end destructive and caused great pain. Now its payback time.

The next thing ya know, Mr. Meade will be telling us that pepper spray is a vegetable in children's school lunch programs.

This is not GOP overreach, it is just who they've always been

http://www.laconiadailysun.com/story/james-veverka-11-15

To the editor,

It wasn't a couple of months after the 2010 election before a serious case of buyer's remorse spread across the land. It began in Wisconsin when Governor Scooter Walker began enacting an agenda that was never campaigned upon. The people were angered and they protested in the tens of thousands. Governor Kasich in Ohio can be charged with the same deceptions against the voters. Not once in his campaign, like Scooter in Wisconsin, did he say he would trash unions and worker rights. All over the nation, right wing leaders who had obviously signed on to the Koch Brothers' corporate aristocracy and "ALEC" began their push.

It isn't a coincidence that attacks on workers, rights and social safety net policies began simultaneously throughout the nation where tea party extremists won. What kind of anti-democratic group attacks voting rights? Who would burn the social safety net only to replace it with a corporate one based in profit? Who? Right wingers and their pseudo-Christian factions. And hidden in their Trojan Horse's so-called economic agenda was a war on women's rights and the LGBT community. Planned Parenthood would be cut so corporations could get more tax cuts. In Missouri, GOP legislators were going to cut tax credits for the elderly, poor and disabled homeowners so they could give a tax break to a corporation.

As of September of this year, those who look unfavorably upon the tea party has risen to 53-percent while favorability has dropped to 28-perecent; that's 2-1 against. Other polls show even lower numbers (20-percent) but 28-percent reflects a huge drop and its still dropping. In fact, polls show the ideas of the Occupy Movement have twice the approval rating of the tea party.

Corporate takeover of our government's strikes a nerve in most of America. On the heels of Wisconsin and Ohio, Americans then saw that their Social Security and their Medicare was on the chopping block. The immediate backlash was amazing and Ryan's bill is now dead. Workers in America didn't cause the recession. Unions and public workers had nothing to do with it. The unregulated religion of avarice found in the financial markets' gambling casinos created the whole mess. Playing with our nest-eggs and investments in their financial gambling schemes, they wrecked our economy. They cared nothing for workers, shutting plants and moving the jobs overseas, thus turning their backs on the nation who made them great. So when Americans saw lawmakers willing to cut your Social Security benefits, smash your health care, and blame public workers in order to give more tax cuts to the people who destroyed the economy, anger swept through the sane population in this nation.

The amusing part of this story is that all the while the tea party was plummeting due to their war against workers, voters, women's choices and gay rights, people like Don Ewing, Tony Boutin, and Steve Earle were completely unaware of this reality. Like Speaker Boehner, they kept telling us "the American people spoke" in 2010 but forgot to add that when Americans SOON figured out the right wing agenda they loudly said NO. This year in Wisconsin, two union-busting GOP Senators were recalled and that put an end to Scooter's union busting because there is still a GOP senator who opposes Walker's union busting. In Ohio, more than a million signatures collected to repeal Kasich's union busting law led to a total repudiation of his attack on public workers. The vote on Nov. 8 was 63-percent to 37-percent. OUCH! In Maine, the people repealed their governor's attack on voting rights. Same day registration is again the law in Maine.

What kind of people attack democracy? In Arizona, the first Senate president ever to be recalled lost his job. Russel Pearce's anti-immigrant extremism was his downfall. In Mississippi, a major attack on the right of a women to choose was attacked. Religious extremists proposed a law that would have banned several forms of contraception outright. But surprise, surprise, a Bible Belt state had the audacity to see how crazy this law was and killed it 55 to 45-percent. In North Carolina, the Board of Education was returned to Democrats as they swept the GOP out. In the Kentucky governor's race, a Democrat won by 19-percent. In Iowa, gay marriage will remain the law of the land because a Democrat was elected to the state Senate, giving them the majority.

This week the recall of Wisconsin's Governor Scott (Scooter!) will begin. On November 15th begins the 60 day period to collect signatures. I have a feeling Scooter Walker will be another enemy casualty if they find a good opponent in Wisconsin. Let nobody fool you; this has not been GOP over-reach, its simply who they've always been and what they've always wanted.

For the best in Progressive News in economics, the changing world, culture wars, and civil liberties, go to ALTERNET.ORG. Its time to stop the corporatists and the theocrats.

THE LESSONS OF THE GREAT DEPRESSION

Let's relearn the lessons taught by handling of the Great Depression
http://www.laconiadailysun.com/story/james-veverka-11-11


To the editor,


After reading Tony Boutin's "Audacity of Despair", I think the Fox News spin needs a rebuttal. The present state of economic affairs is largely due to the Bush economic policies. Unemployment, hunger, economic growth, bankruptcies, and foreclosures as they stand are part of our most recent plummet created by GOP economics. In September of 2008, CNN/Opinion Research Corporation Poll showed that by a 2 to 1 margin, Americans blame Bush for this economic mess. In a more recent poll last Summer by the Quinnipiac Poll, the 2 to 1 margin stands. Clearly, Mr Boutin spends too much of his time watching Fox.


Let's take a look at the only crash worst than Bush's crash and see how they handled it. In the first year after the stock market crash in 1929, when banks imploded due to malfeasance, the unemployment rate was around 8-percent. A year and a half later it was over 16-percent. What was set in motion in 1929 was like a downhill freight train with no brakes. By 1932 the unemployment rate went above 24-percent. That year, 43,000 people, including 17,000 troops owed money, marched on Washington, DC. They set up camps but were dispersed by General McArthur's troops using bayonets and tear gas. In 1933, when FDR became president, unemployment hit 25-percent. The unemployment rate then dropped in 1934 to around 22-percent. The first national general strike was called in 1934. Not surprising,


In 1934 President Roosevelt finally took the economist John Maynard Keynes seriously and created a public works project to put millions back to work. The project included schools, bridges, dams and highways for starters. In 1935 the unemployment rate was still at 20-percent when in August FDR signed The Revenue Act of 1935. It also taxed high-earning Americans, and closed tax loopholes that the wealthy were using to legally avoid paying tax. It sharply raised taxes on income over $75,000 with those exceeding $5,000,000 paying 75-percent instead of 59-percent. Corporate taxes went down for small businesses and up for large ones.


By 1937, unemployment had dropped to 14-percent from the 25-percent peak. Wages, profits and production had finally returned to 1929 levels! The stimulus package was working. But then trouble appeared. Friends of Wall Street in FDR's cabinet urged spending cuts and a more balanced budget. What happened was the Works Progress Administration (WPA) was drastically cut and the Public Works Administration (PWA) nearly stalled. The economy dove into a harsh recession, unemployment shot back up from 14-percent to 19-percent, and manufacturing dropped 37-percent. FDR retaliated with attacks on the monopolists, who were deemed the major cause of the depression and this sudden downturn in 1937.. So in 1937 FDR sent to Congress another large stimulus package to re-fund the WPA, the PWA and other relevant programs. It passed and the economy recovered to its early 1937 levels by the end of 1938.


Tony Boutin tells us that the Obama stimulus was a failure, which is false. Most economists say about 2 to 3-million jobs were saved or created.. The truth of the matter is that the stimulus should have been bigger and the reason why we are climbing out of this hole so slowly is because the stimulus was too small and the GOP is deliberately obstructing economic success. Like FDR, Obama has proposed a new stimulus/jobs bill that would target bridges, schools, and roads but the GOP is obstructing again. Top economists say another 2-million jobs could be created.


Tony says that 81-percent of Americans are not happy with the direction of the country. With a 20 to 30-percent approval for the Tea Party, around a 10 to 12-percent approval for the Congress, the numbers suggest that Americans are far more troubled by the obstructionists than they are President Obama. Another distortion of the facts that Mr Boutin uses is blaming Obama for the debt ceiling fiasco. In a post debt fight CNN poll on August 9, 2011, Republicans had a disapproval of 59-percent while the approval for Democrats increased. Americans blamed the House Tea Party.


FROM the S&P Press Release: "We lowered our long-term rating on the U.S. because we believe that the prolonged controversy over raising the statutory debt ceiling and the related fiscal policy debate indicate that further near-term progress containing the growth in public spending, especially on entitlements, or on reaching an agreement on raising revenues is less likely than we previously assumed and will remain a contentious and fitful process. ....Our lowering of the rating was prompted by our view on the rising public debt burden and our perception of greater policy making uncertainty,.."


A very important part of recovery, "raising revenues" (with appropriate spending cuts), is an impossibility as long as the GOP controls the House and that is why our rating was lowered. That's the idea.


James Veverka


Tilton

A Message from the Millionares who care

IF IT WALKS LIKE A GOOSE, ITS PROBABLY A GOOSE

Here's what fascism was about in Europe. 

The radical right likes to throw around the word socialist indiscriminately as if they actually know the definition of socialism. Socialism is when the people, through the government, own the bulk of the companies of its nation. Seen that lately? Probably not. Venezuela for sure; Cuba, too. Fascism on the other hand involves a corrupt marriage between big business and government. The right doesn't know the definition of fascism either thanks to snake-oil historians like Glen Beck and Jonah Goldberg. 

Mussolini said "Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the merger of state and corporate power". With the Citizens United ruling, Corporations are people and can influence elections with mountains of money. Democracy is losing to the corporate aristocracy which is buying our politicians and determining many of their decisions. 

Mussolini was a socialist until around the end of WWI when he vehemently renounced socialism in favor of his new political ideology of fascism that emphasized militant patriotic nationalism. Ring a bell? Mussolini relentlessly attacked liberalism and socialism. You can read it all HERE. In his manifesto he mentions liberalism and socialism in a negative way 43 times. In contrast to the materialism of socialism, Mussolini claims Fascism is spiritual and uses the term 23 times to define Fascism. Materialism and spiritualism are opposites  Socialism is concerned with the proletariat; fascism is concerned with the power of the state. Fascism is government without any intention of representation. It runs on ideology, not people. Certainly, people are easily confused because no political ideology holds completely unique beliefs.

I read in a local newspaper "Liberals do love to associate conservatives with Nazis but since facts might muddle the charge they never offer any"  Facts? Okay.

In 1920 and 1921 the Italian streets were filled with protesting workers. Mussolini's fascist "blackshirts" were used to crush unions or any other perceived socialism, disrupting their meetings and committing violence in the streets. Mussolini took advantage of the situation by forming alliances with industrial giants and together they finally trade unions to crumble and socialists mayors to resign. In 1927, Mussolini gave some rights back to unions as long as they were state or party controlled. Hey, Scott Walker!

In 1933, when Hitler gained dictatorial powers with the "Enabling Act", he abolished labor unions and replaced them with the Nazi Party's "Labor Front". Trade unions were socialist and Hitler, like Mussolini and Franco, hated socialism. Mussolini abolished trade unions, too. Sound familiar? Hitler used "law and order" to destroy individual rights. Fascists ended collective bargaining rights. Together, Mussolini, Hitler and Franco arrested hundreds of thousands of communists, socialists and democratic socialists because socialism was the enemy of fascism.

Hitler's fascism emphasized "real Germans" like our right wingers emphasize "real Americans". Fascists supported laws that would attack any cultural diversity in the press, the arts or radio in Germany. They thought any foreign cultural influence would strip Germany of its soul, so they mounted a cultural war just as our right wingers do. Liberal professors were targeted. Any use of a non-German language was unpatriotic. Note the vehemence of the English-only crowd.

German Fascism was vehemently anti-immigrant. Mussolini declared universal suffrage was the greatest of lies. If you follow America's right wing you will notice the harsh anti-immigrant rants. Conservatives also have a long history of opposing universal suffrage from religious equality, abolition and women's suffrage, to child labor laws, reproductive freedom and gay rights.

In 1936 Hitler and Heinrich Himmler created the bureaucracy, THE REICH OFFICE FOR THE COMBATING OF HOMOSEXUALITY AND ABORTION. The Reich, as soon as it was empowered by dictatorial powers raided every gay business in the nation and shut their doors. Between 1936 and 1939, 100,000 gay men were imprisoned at one time or another. A Tea Party dream I'd say. What remains of records from concentration camps like Buchenwald evidence the gassing of at least 15,000 gay men. In his speeches, Himmler bragged about pretending to allow gays to escape the camps so they could kill them. In the camps certain doctors were tasked with finding a way to cure gays. One way was to force them to have sex with prostitutes. Straight porn, too, Homosexuals that found themselves in the concentration camps at Buchenwald and Neuengamme were experimented upon by the Danish SS doctor, Carl Vaernet. The SS gave him a research position, a staff, laboratories, financial support, and camp inmates with which to experiment upon. His treatments included castration for the incurable, and hormones for the others. Under the Nazi doctrine of re-education, Vaernet had developed a hormone implant for homosexuals

Fascism was about family values! Contraception and/or abortion were outlawed by Mussolini, Hitler and Franco. Family planning clinics disappeared. Hitler awarded women with the the Motherhood Cross who had given birth to the largest number of children. Lesser Medals were the Golden Cross for eight children, the Silver Cross for six children, and a Bronze for those who had four children. Four kids! Shameful! Mussolini's government paid extra benefits to the exceptionally reproductive! Are you catching on yet? Women were supposed to be the helpmates and babymakers of men. Before Hitler came into power there were 100,000 female teachers but that ended with Hitler's rise to power. Women went home until so many of the men were killed they had to go back to work. 

If it walks like a goose, its probably a goose. 

There is plenty more to address but this was originally for a printed newspaper so space was an issue. 

THE DOCTRINE OF FASCISM by BENITO MUSSOLINI (1932) The only complete one on the internet)
http://www.worldfuturefund.org/wffmaster/reading/germany/mussolini.htm

Homosexuals and the Holocaust
http://frank.mtsu.edu/~baustin/homobg.html

The Reich Office for the Combating of Homosexuality and Abortion - by me 2006
http://www.stopthereligiousright.org/reichoffice.htm

GOP HAS NO JOBS BILLS SO THEY VOTED ON "IN GOD WE TRUST". JUST WHAT WE NEEDED!

'In God We Trust' wasn't added to our money until after Civil War

It is entirely possible that a majority of Americans accept the motto "God We Trust" on our currency because they think it been with us for a long time. The same with "under God" I would like to present some facts as to how and when this all began.

The Pledge of Allegiance was written in 1892 by a Christian socialist named Francis Bellamy and was adopted as our national pledge in 1942. It did not contain the phrase "under God" in it when written nor when adopted. The phrase was added by the right-wing Congress during the reactionary red scare years in June, 1954. The Constitution had left the room in the era of Joseph McCarthy and the cold war fear-mongering gave the right wingers many excuses to subvert the Constitution. If you didn't agree, you were unpatriotic.

Our money did not have any religious mottos during the founding era. In fact, my favorite is the 1792 half dime that has the motto, "LIBERTY PARENT OF SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY". That should be a comfort to the anti-science folks on the right. The 1776 Continental Dollar had "MIND YOUR BUSINESS" for a motto. Another coin minted in 1783 had the motto "NOVA CONSTELLATIO", which means New Constellation, containing an enlightenment meaning of a new order of things. The Fugio Cent of 1787 and afterward also had the motto "MIND YOUR BUSINESS".

New York State issued the Excelsior coin in 1787. On the obverse in bold letters is EXCELSIOR, meaning "ever upwards". On the reverse around the outside is written E PLURIBUS UNUM, Latin for One From Many. Nowhere on our currency did any religious notion, except for a plethora of pagan goddesses like Minerva, Justitia and Libertas, appear during the founding era. That did not happen until right at the end of the Civil War when guilt and mourning swept the nation. From 1938 onward the motto appeared regularly but was not mandated by Congress until a month after the red scare congress put "under God" in our pledge.

James Veverka

Tilton

   

COINS OF THE REPUBLICS

This site features pictures of America's first currency coins and how they were fashioned after Classical coins just as Washington DC was fashioned on Greek and Roman classical pagan architecture and statuary

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