Thank you Republicans for all the wonderful gifts under my tree

http://www.laconiadailysun.com/story/james-veverka-12-27

Thank you Republicans for all the wonderful gifts under my tree

Dec 28, 2011 12:00 am

To the editor,

On Christmas Eve I decided Santa might need some bribing so my wife and I baked some fabulous fresh cookies to leave out. I wasn't sure if Santa considered me a good boy in 2011 so we even left chocolate milk for him! Whether the bribe worked (it works in Congress!) or I was actually a good boy in 2011 I will never know but when I awoke Christmas morning I was amazed at what lay under the tree! The mountain of presents was matched only by my childhood Christmas mornings. Honestly, I couldn't decide on which gift to open.

Well, why not open the biggest one first? It was what I always wanted! The Tea Party GOP brought the approval of Congress to a new low of 11-percent as the president's approval was rising. The fringe of the GOP was helping re-elect the president! Spending a year fighting a tax hike for every dollar over a million made, the now moldy tea party insisted a tax cut for working families and the extension of unemployment benefits would not help the economy! That is Crazy Talk! Watching the GOP cave in only made the gift more to be treasured. They had aided and abetted the Occupy movement; the 99-percent!

The next gift I opened was something I had been hoping for recently. Called the "Kiss Heard Around the World", the U.S. Navy poked right wingers and the GOP field in the eyes! The first-kiss is a Naval tradition for ships returning to port and this year a lesbian couple was chosen. While most of the GOP field gives in to the radical religious fundamentalists, the United States Navy moved easily into the future as other navies have. Bravo! Our social conservatives are like the autocrats and religious fundamentalists who fight the changes demanded by the Internet savy students and middle classes of the Arab and Iranian world.

The next gift I opened was splendid. Goodies! Being his turn, Newt Gingrich had floated to the top only to sink under his own weight. Sane Republicans were seeing that the Newt Gingrich of today was the same pugnacious pseudo-intellectual adulterer-in-chief of the past. And like so many on the right, he demonstrated his total lack of constitutional knowledge by suggesting we drag judges before the Congress or just ignore the decision if they didn't like the ruling. Heck, let's just get rid of Article III, Newt. It was 1990s Newt that cured me of ever considering voting Republican again. Newt and Rick Perry also failed to get on the Virginia Primary ballot which just reaffirmed my feeling that this year has been Amateur Hour in America.

After opening many more gifts, I finally made it to the last little box. Never judge a gift by its size! The federal court of the 9th district joined other courts in making the birthers look irrelevant again by denying them any credence. The court would not waste its time with hearing frivolous birther nonsense.

Happy New Year and heartfelt thanks again to Eric Cantor!

James Veverka

Tilton

Obama has arrested & deported record number of illegal aliens

http://www.laconiadailysun.com/story/james-veverka-1-3

Obama has arrested & deported record number of illegal aliens

Jan 06, 2012 12:00 am

To the editor,

Just when I thought there was hope for Don Ewing, he blows it again. In using examples of rich people denying the poor some help he eventually arrives to blame the president! Not the obstructionists, the president! His first implosion occurs when he whines about the president supposedly caring more about his political ideologies than people. What a pantload! The president's original jobs bill put before the floor of the House was defeated while the CBO, Moody and many more financial institutions claimed about 2-million MORE jobs would come of it, which would stimulate the economy. What the GOP offers is like scraps compared to the president's proposal.

Cryin' over a pipeline delay! Then Donny Boy blames the president for rising energy prices! Sheesh, it never ends! Ever hear of Wall Street speculators? Ya know, Don, the ones you don't want to ever regulate that are the cause of high energy prices? Ever hear of Middle East turmoil which always drives prices when the speculators get their hands on the crisis. Iran's latest threats about blocking oil exports through the Straits of Hormuz sent the price over $101 after the speculators got to work.

It's the GOP that is playing the cheap, conniving, heartless scrooge. What about those rich folk the GOP are protecting in order to put the weight of change on the backs of the middle class families, the poor, the sick, and the disabled? Just a tiny hike in every dollar made over a million dollars would fund the latest demand-side tax cut for working families. But those who smoke the poison tea just don't care. The GOP spends a whole year fighting any pragmatic useful rise in the taxes of the wealthy but then are the first to stop middle class tax relief and the extension of jobless benefits. Unemployment compensation stimulates the economy (even better than some tax cuts), so the Republicans surely want to kill it. If it will help the economy recover, the tea party GOP wants to kill it in order to defeat the president. Get it yet? Its the GOP right wing that is copying the failed austerity plans in Europe. Cut-cut-cut the working class to shreds. Burn the social safety net!.

Well, here comes another dishonest xenophobic rant! Don Ewing is wrong in repeating Harry Accornero's dishonest psycho-talk about immigrant invasions. The fact is that President Obama has arrested and deported more illegal aliens than any president in American history. Google it.

James Veverka

Tilton

http://www.laconiadailysun.com/story/james-veverka-1-3b

Since Obama took office the American economy has grown

Jan 04, 2012 12:00 am

To the editor,

Leave it to a right winger to go on a class war/xenophobic rant during an election cycle. In his December 1 letter, Tony Boutin makes the claim, reported by the WSJ, that Obama's re-election strategy involves throwing white middle class voters under the bus. That is hilarious because the 99-percent strategy has taken hold in the Obama administration. Not whites, not blacks, not Hispanics, union and non-union: Its the 99-percent! It is a winning strategy.

Then Mr Boutin repeats the endless Fox Lemmings' chant that we have a failed economy and the auto industry crashed. Since Obama took office the economy has grown. NON-FOX economists like Moody and the non-partisan CBO claim up to 3-million jobs have been saved or created and we now have 21 straight months of adding jobs. Finally, after finally getting our head above Bush's catastrophic economic tsunami — AND the auto industry is doing quite fine thank you, as a result of the government loan to GM and Chrysler.

On the other side of the coin where the darkness resides, "Earlier this year, Political Correction.org" published a report detailing the total number of jobs House Republicans have tried to eliminate. Since then, the House has passed the Cut, Cap, and Balance Act. With that addition, measures passed or introduced by House Republicans would, if signed into law, potentially eliminate up to 7.4-million jobs." Traitors! The enemy within! Granny get yer gun!

In his next literary lump of coal of December 16, Mr. Boutin claims that socialist, Veverka-style Europe will crumble to financial dust. There is nothing socialist about the IMF demands on European countries. Socialists don't tell nations to privatize industries. Socialized nations don't make the poor and the middle class shoulder the burdens of austerity measures. Europe has continually tried AUSTERITY measures and they have failed every time. Austerity plans are never a good idea except during a time of boom, not bust. Consequently, due to the mindless conservative slashing and burning strategies, the GDP in Greece and Ireland began double digit slides in depression earlier this year.

Greece and Ireland have proven Keynes right again by implementing austerity at just the wrong times! One patiently waits till economic booms before austerity plans are enacted. Just recently the new technocrats running Italy have imposed austerity measures that put most of the weight on the working class and pensioners. The word in the streets of Italy is that the wealthy aren't paying their fair share. Austerity is typical obsessive-compulsive behavior locked pitilessly within an ideology that will fail. European austerity measures at the exact wrong time are not liberal, demand-sided, ethical, or in any way an economic stimulus just as no House GOP plan is. With the House GOP though, it's deliberate sabotage by fighting successful strategies of the past. Paul Krugman is so right that the European Union's continual use of austerity measures fits the definition of insanity. Europe and its IMF junkies shun Keynesianism just as right wing Americans do and we are all going to pay for it if we don't sack the GOP House.

Keynes was right!

James Veverka

Keynesianism isn't socialism

http://www.laconiadailysun.com/story/james-veverka-1-17

Keynesianism isn't socialism & it's not intended to be long-term

Jan 18, 2012 12:00 am

To the editor,

In Steve Earle's recent letter, "Keynesians fix a broken bubble by folding it into an even bigger one", Steve misrepresents what I have written. Mr. Earle implies that I think things are "fine". On the contrary, I have always said that things are 'improving'. The president's strategies are working, albeit slower than the people would like. The stimulus package was too small and the GOP fights everything Obama so things will continue to go slow with "the worst Congress ever" with its 9-percent approval. They endanger recovery so things are not "just fine".

Mr. Earle also says, " I'm hoping people have enough sense to recognize that Keynes doesn't work long-term, socialism has never, ever worked anywhere and that it's time to pay down the credit cards." Keynesianism is not socialism. There is no such thing as "long-term Keynes". Keynesian strategies are always short-term applications to prime the pump of an anemic economy. Keynesianism is like a crowbar for dislodging trapped liquidity then gets put back in the tool box after its short use.

Roger Davis also seems to get his economics from Fox & Friends. In regards to unemployment benefits, Roger asks, "how does paying people not to produce grow an economy?". Unemployment benefits AND food stamps, (even more so than demand-side tax cuts), help pump up the economy because most of these benefits are spent quickly. Purchases create demand which require supply. Every cent of the benefits spent helps retailers in almost every sector and those retailers need suppliers. Ending or cutting jobless benefits would harm an already fragile economy. In states with the highest rates of unemployment, cutting unemployment benefits would hurt families, then the retail economy which would then effect farms and factories that supply them.

In Russ Wiles' recent letter there is also another misrepresentation of what I have said. Contrary to Russ's claim, I have never specified the cause of the European meltdown. I have only addressed the present remedies of austerity which have failed. Austerity by itself will not only make economic matters worse, society will react strongly, further impacting the market. Stimulus plans with austerity measures that kick in at certain designated points are wiser.

Compounding the failure of austerity measures, S&P downgraded the credit rating of nine European nations on Friday the 13th. Part of S&P's statement reads, "As such, we believe that a reform process based on a pillar of fiscal austerity alone risks becoming self-defeating, as domestic demand falls in line with consumers’ rising concerns about job security and disposable incomes, eroding national tax revenues."

The plans in Europe are as foolhardy as the GOP House plans. Austerity only, no real job bills, slash slash slash. Do you realize that according to the latest Internet meme, the GOP House in 2011 introduced 44 abortion bills, 99 religion bills, 71 family relations bills, 36 marriage bills, 67 firearms bills, 522 tax bills, 445 government investigation bills — AND NOT ONE JOBS BILL. Good job! What an obsession!

James Veverka

DEBUNKING RIGHT WING ECONOMIC TALKING POINTS

THE CRASH OF 2008:

Tony's #1 claims that consumer confidence is the lowest in 30 years. Have you ever noticed that righties never mention the Crash of 2008? 
Even before the crash, the market was on its way down fast. From October of 2007 to the Crash in October 2008, the market lost 46% of its value. Almost half of the market wiped out Tony forgot! Tony's #1 isn't even true because from 2006 to Dec 2008 consumer confidence dropped off a cliff. From late 2007 to January 2009 consumer confidence was lower than it had been for many years and lower than it is now. When the President took office it soon shot up a notch. It's still not high enough but that is due mostly to the Road Block Congress which 10% of Americans now approve of. 

In #2, Tony reminds us that unemployment has been above 8% for quite a while but again forgets the job destroying Crash of 2008.  Almost half of our net worth lost and Tony doesn't seem to remember how that would effect investment, production and jobs. Hello! Anyone home? Mr Boutin also neglects to note we have had 22 straight months of adding jobs since we got our head out of the water in late 2009. Unemployment dropped again last month and over 200,000 jobs were added. 

In the matter of Tony's #3, poverty levels rose steadily under Bush and continued after ther crash of 2008 into the Obama Presidency. I 

even remember the news articles then. Note that the Clinton years were marked by a steady dropp in poverty levels.Bush was a corporatist that did the bidding of those who seek to corner America's capital through legislation. The OCCUPY movement is a response to such anti-democratic aristocratic behavior of righty wing corporate power and the US Supreme Courts Citizen United decision.

Then Tony really steps in it on #4. He blames the President for the Credit downgrade when Moody's statement made clear it was the recalcitrant Congress, especially in regards to raising revenue that warranted the downgrade. You can't pay the bills without raising capital. Never in our history has Congress held raising the debt ceiling hostage to other demands. Tony forgot that, too. How convenient.

Tony's #5 is that Obama has the worst job record in 50 years. Did Tony mention that the unemployment during the Reagan recession went from 7.2% in 7/81 to 10.8% in 12/82?  Those supply side tax cuts really worked! Then Reagan raised taxes 11 times and the debt ceiling 17 times. Tripled our national debt, too. And don't forget the crash of 1987 which wiped out 23% of the market's value and $500 billion in one day. The fact that in the last year of Bush's presidency we lost at least 2.6 million jobs is also forgotten by Mr Boutin  In the last four months of 2008 the country bled over 2 million jobs. It was the worst job loss since 1945 and the first time in 70 years that there were two months in a row of over 500,000 jobs lost. That is the economic wasteland Obama inherited and Tony blames it on Obama. 

In #6, Tony mentions the unemployment rate of African-Americans. It peaked around 16% in this recession but peaked at 22% under the Reagan recession of 7/81 - 6/83. In his "Obama worst in history" letter, Tony must have forgotten that along with the recession of 81-83 and the crashes of 1987 and 2008. In fact, the unemployment rate of blacks began to rise as soon as Bush was inaugurated. It flattened slightly in 2006 but shot straight up in 2007. increasing from 8% to 13% before Obama took office. It has risen a bit more, leveling out in 2010.

Tony's #7 states:"Worst HOUSING CRISIS since the great depression, with home values STILL IN FREE FALL, down more than 35-percent on average." The freefall began in 2004 in the biggest cities and in 2005 nationally after home prices had been over-inflated.  From 2005 to President Obama's inauguration, home prices dropped about 35% - DURING BUSH'S TERM. When Obama took office, home prices rose 23% until the middle of 2010 when they stalled and dropped some. 

In the matter of #8 claim on food stamps, again, Tony still forgets there was a crash in 2008 and almost every indicator began to drop off a cliff by 2007. Almost 3 million jobs lost in a year and millions losing homes and Tony doesn't think the newly unemployed might need some food stamps. Food stamp participation jumped under Bush I, dropped under Clinton and began a sharp climb under Bush II which continued right into and beyond the crash of 2008. 

In #9, Tony claims Obama compares to the Depression rates. The Depression wasn't just one period; it was several. From 1929 to 1932 was one. The data from 29-32 mirror the last years of the Bush terms. CRASH! Obama does much better than President Hoover, stopping the jobs bleeding far quicker. The next chapter was from 1932 to 1938. By 1934 the unemployment rate had reached 25%. FDR then applied Keynesian strategies and the unemployment rate dropped to 11% by 1937. Wow! Conservatives in 1937 then demanded austerity measures, which FDR agreed to. Then we dove into another deep recession and unemployment shot back up to 20%. FDR immediately applied another stimulus plan and a year later we were back on track. Unemployment dropped steadily for almost a decade. Today's Congress is anti-Keynes & anti-Obama so they will block the same plans that could bring similar improvements. 

In #10 Tony claims its "The SLOWEST recovery from ANY recession since WWII". Well, Tony, that's because we are recovering from the biggest crash since 1929-1932. During Bush's second term, 46% of the market's value and 35% of housing values were wiped out. No other recession compares with the depth of this one.  Recovery will naturally take longer because the crash was deeper and the problem is now made tougher by the GOP obstructionism. The original stimulus was too small and the present jobs act is being thwarted. Every recovery since the crash of 1929 has been aided by Keynesianism yet righties rail against Keynes. They tell you that the present recovery is slower than other's but then they fight the same strategies that worked in the past. The Tea Party says no to everything that could help Americans.

As you can see, since the Great Depression, this is the deepest recession in American History