Thought for today: âWe are what we repeatedly do.â Aristotle
And some things, we repeatedly do over and over. Take Ferguson, possibly becoming a new Selma. Or take our bad economy, or take Afghanistan.
This month, Americans got some news the media spun as good: The US unemployment rate fell to the lowest level since late 2007. The 5.8% unemployment rate has been seen as proof of economic recovery. But, the jobs created were mostly part-time work, often at low pay. Yes, these jobs provided employment, but did little to improve the overall economy.
As a result, an increasing number of Americans â 800,000 more than last yearâ have taken a second or third job, according to the BLS. This is Americans taking jobs they donât really want, unable to pay their bills despite work, and relying on food banks and welfare to make up the difference.
And the problem is growing. In October, about 7 million Americans had part-time jobs but wanted to work full-time. Over 2.1 million Americans rely on two part-time jobs to see them through. Another 4 million have one full-time job and one part-time job, a number that increased by 444,000 since last year.
These workers earn minimum or near-minimum wage, bringing home less than $1,000 a month. In 2013, 468,000 retail workers earned minimum wage or lower. According to Pew Research Center, 1.4 million cashiers â the most common part-time job â earn less than $10.10 an hour. Part-time Walmart workers often bring home between $200 to $400 every two weeks. This is a weak contribution to our economy. These workers, despite being employed, end up relying on government assistance in the form of food stamps and housing subsidies. And when the food stamps run out, they turn to their communities and the local food banks. So, there were Black Friday demonstrations atWalmart stores all across America, and some cities had this response:
Part of your taxpayer dollars are paying Wal-Mart employees the money that the Waltonâs refuse to pay them. This isn’t complicated. If you have a job at Wal-Mart and you still need Medicaid, food stamps and subsidized housing, then you aren’t just getting shafted by the Waltonâs. You’re also being paid your missing wages by the federal government. Another piece of your tax dollars supported military-style protection at Walmart as a partial response to the Black Friday demonstrations.
As Aristotle said, we are what we repeatedly do. Americans arenât deadbeats. The Waltonâs are the deadbeats.
Black Friday means something radically different to the homeless:
Many have heard about Californiaâs overcrowded prisons. In fact, conditions in Californiaâs overcrowded prisons are so bad that they violate the 8th Amendmentâs ban on cruel and unusual punishment, so ruled the US Supreme Court in 2011. That led to an order to expand Californiaâs parole programs. But the state resisted the order, using two arguments: First, that they wonât have enough minimum security inmates left to perform inmate jobs. Second, that cheap prison labor is essential to the stateâs budget.
The arguments center on a state program that uses inmates to fight wildfires. California is one of several states that employ prison labor to fight wildfires, and it has the largest firefighter program. According to Buzzfeed, prison inmates are paid less than $2 per day, and California will save $1 billion by using prison labor rather than hiring firefighters. Only certain classes of nonviolent inmates charged with lower level offenses are eligible for the inmate firefighter program. They must then meet physical and other criteria.
In exchange, inmates get the opportunity for early release, by earning twice as many credits toward early release as non-firefighting inmates otherwise earn, known as 2-for-1 credits. In February, the federal court overseeing Californiaâs prison litigation ordered the state to expand this 2-for-1 program to some other rehabilitation programs so that other inmates who exhibit good behavior and perform certain work successfully would also be eligible for even earlier release.
Think Progress reported that Californiaâs actions to slow-roll the courtâs orders raises questions about whether using prison labor at the expense of private labor, creates incentives to keep inmates in prison, particularly when the courts have already said that many of them donât need to be there. This doesn’t pass the smell test. Is the purpose of imprisonment to punish and/or rehabilitate, or is it to make money for the state? Is it ethical to do both? Is it ethical to keep prisoners incarcerated longer than the courts require because we can make money on their backs?
To make Californiaâs argument even more repulsive, they apparently need more prisoners to make more money. Yet they can’t be bothered to build facilities sufficient to take care of those already in the system.
Does anyone seriously think it is cheaper to pay an imprisoned firefighter than to pay a private firefighter? That makes economic sense only when the state looks just at the $2 per day that the inmate is paid, compared to the cost of a full-time (union member) firefighter. They should be comparing it to keeping the inmate in prison for the minimum sentence of his/her term, since many of these prisoners would paroled under the Court’s order. California says that the annual cost of keeping someone in a state prison is $49,000. BTW, the typical pay for a beginning California temp firefighter for the wildfire season is $15,240. And, if the money were moved from pot A to pot B, those inmate seasonal firefighters could be hired upon release. That would create more competition for those seasonal firefighting jobs.
Prison labor has been with us since the beginning. It built our farm-to-market roads in the early days of the automobile. It stamped our license plates. Today, it picks up some of our litter and fights some of our fires and harvests some of our crops. Prison labor, whether in firefighter garb, orange jumpsuits, or chains, will remain.
It is our ethics as a people that seems to be going away for a long stay in a concrete room.
Todayâs Monday Wake Up is for the Democratic Party. Trevor LaFauci at The Peopleâs View compared Democrats to a bad first date:
They’re like a bad first date: They know what they want to say, they know they have a lot going for them but when it comes time to talk about themselves they do it meekly and awkwardly, so much so that the other person just assumes this person doesn’t have a lot going for them.
Whatâs worse is the Democrats try hard not to suck at funds-raising. The Wrongologistâs in-box is crammed with pleas by Democrats for more money, even after the Tuesday That Shall Not Be Named disaster.
I Need You. Three magic words. They light up our brain, they grab our attention, and they initiate action. But they’re being corrupted by the ease of reach and the desire by some organizations to grow at all costs… Political fundraisers have turned this from an art to a science to an endless whine.
A loyal reader of the Wrongologist, David Price, replied to an email plea for more money from Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Chair of the Democratic National Committee, saying that more money wasnât the answer for Democrats:
Running away from the progressive agenda may have seemed like smart politics, but it turned out to (1) make once attractive candidates look like phonies, (2) make our party seem apologetic for its accomplishments and ashamed of its ambitions, (3) demoralize those progressives who have traditionally identified the Democratic Party as the most effective vehicle for their hopes and (4) arguably have been bad politics after all, even in the shortest-run, most pragmatic, down-and-dirty sense.
More from Trevor LaFauci:
And so Democrats, the choice is yours: You can cater to the centrist, middle-of-the-road, kinda-sorta progressive voters in your party or you can go all in on issues that the American people actually care about…If you go middle of the road, know that you’re putting the millennial vote in play, especially for a generation that, for the most part, remains politically independent.
If Democrats can’t choose, then the 2016 presidential election is in play for anyone who appeals to independent voters. That could be how we end up with President Romney, or President Rand Paul.
Itâs time for the Democratic Party to wake up. To help them, a song by the late Gary Moore, a great Irish guitarist and former member of Thin Lizzy who is barely known in the US. Here is âStill Got The Bluesâ:
Using a DOJ program called Equitable Sharing, state and local forfeiture restrictions are lifted when the DOJ gets a cut. The practice of seizing a person’s money or property without accusing them of a crime is called civil forfeiture. Some states have tough restrictions on what forfeiture proceeds can be used for, some are very liberal. Agencies enrolled in the Equitable Sharing program can petition a DOJ agency to “adopt” their seizure. In an adoptive seizure, they get to keep 80% of the profits to use for any purpose, while the DOJ takes the rest.
Certain older drugs, many of which are generic and not protected by patents or market exclusivity, are becoming extremely expensive.
The Wrongologist is reading Jay Winikâs April 1865: The Month That Saved America. It is about the end game in our Civil War. Winik describes how Lincoln, Lee and Grant actively decided to save America from the terrible fate that has befallen other countries afflicted by Civil War – countries like Bosnia, or Northern Ireland. Winik also reminds us of how old and durable the political split in this country has been.
And how breathtakingly vehement. And our current bitterness is consistent with our past bitterness. The names change, the parties re-configure, the particular issues in contention vary. And if you think youâve seen the worst of it, well, read some history. They say it tends to repeat:
They say you have a mandate:
Keystone Pipeline looks like it will pass:
We either did, or did not, get an emissions deal with China:
Throughout his campaign for reelection, Kentucky Sen. Mitch McConnell said it would be foolhardy to raise carbon dioxide emissions standards on American companies as long as China was sticking to business as usual. But now that China has agreed to take a big step away from using coal as its primary fuel source, McConnell still wants to fight implementation of the new agreement.
Then there is the collegiality shown by Mr. Boehner:
Veteranâs Day came into being on June 1, 1954 as a date to honor all who served in the US Military. Memorial Day is a day for remembering those who died while serving in the Military. We celebrate Veteranâs Day on the date of the WWI armistice, the 11th day of the 11th month in 1918 that ended the fighting. That was exactly 96 years ago today.
Veteranâs Day brings the reflexive, âthank you for your serviceâ from everyone in America. The two things the average person could do to honor the service of veterans are to vote, and to make sure that Vets get the health care they need when they come home. Sadly, we do neither:
People: If you say that veterans died to protect our freedoms, you dishonor them when you donât vote!
The Census Bureau reports that in 2013, 3.6 million veterans had a service-connected disability, with 957,504 having a rating of 70% or higher. Severity of disability is scaled from 0 to 100%, and eligibility for compensation depends on the rating. Letâs also remember that Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is at epidemic levels among Vets, as is suicide. According to a study by the Department of Veterans Affairs, 22 Vets a day commit suicide. You all know we continue to do a terrible job taking care of returning veterans, and you should be finding out why, and pushing your congressperson to finally fix it!
Veterans rapidly are becoming a two-age group cohort. The Census Bureau report shows that most Vets are getting older, with 47% over the age of 65. Tom Dispatch reports that todayâs military is made up largely of Millennials. In fact, with nearly 43% of the active duty force age 25 or younger, and roughly 66% of it 30 or under, itâs one of the most Millennial-centric organizations around.
How the âentitledâ generation will perform as our protectors is still up in the air. An NIH study determined that people in their 20s have Narcissistic Personality Disorder at a rate three times that of people 65 or older and a recent survey by Reason and pollster Rupe found that 18-24 year olds are indeed in favor of participation trophies while older Americans overwhelmingly favor winners-only prizes.
Millennials may yet surprise even a cantankerous coot like the Wrongologist. Time will tell.
Here are two terrific, but very under-appreciated tunes for Veteranâs Day. We start with â1968â by Dave Alvin.
Sample lyric: And tonight in this barroom he’s easin’ his pain He’s thinkin’ of someone, but he won’t say the name Folks say he’s a hero, but he’ll tell you he ain’t He left a hero in the jungle, back in 1968.
Here is another almost unknown song âIâm Writing in the Marginsâ from the album of the same name by John Gorka about a soldier in Afghanistan:
Sample lyric: I am writing in the margins Notes to me and you Cause the pages are all filled With new orders coming through
There are not a lot of rich boys Wearing DCUs and sand But Iâll think about that later When I make it home again
(DCUs are Desert Camouflage Uniforms)
There is a great story told about a T-Shirt worn long after the war by a Vietnam Vet. On it was the outline of a map of Vietnam, superimposed with:
Participant, Southeast Asia War Games, 1961-1975: Second Place.
Huge thanks to the guys/gals who follow orders, who do really hard and dangerous things and who too often pay a high price for doing so.
OK, we just had our bi-annual vote to rearrange the deck chairs, and boy, people were angry. But what good will come of it is difficult to guess. This we do know: According to a CNN exit poll, 8 in 10 Americans disapprove of how Congress has been handling its job, while almost 6 in 10 are displeased with President Obama; 44% have a positive view of Democrats; 40% have a positive view of Republicans.
So, Americans elected the party they like the least to run the part of the government they trust the least.
There’s a lot of discussion of how and why Democrats did so badly, and much of it focuses on messaging. The litany of excuses is long: Democratic candidates were arrogant. The White House failed to transfer money, or stump effectively. The GOP caught up in the technology race, or the GOP recruited excellent, disciplined candidates.
Democrats ran on everything but?policy. Did the Democrats run the government well? Are the lives of voters better? Are Democrats as a political party credible when they say they’ll do something?
Their message was based on a group of poll-tested ideas that they thought would appeal to mainstream voters. But, the message, “vote for us, we’re not right-wing fanatics” didn’t cause the majority of us to turn out for the election. In fact, turn out was the lowest it had been in 40 years.
Liberal ballot propositions won in various parts of the country last Tuesday, from marijuana products (like https://www.cheapbudcanada.com/marijuana-products/vape-pens/fatboyz-disposable-thc-vape-pen/, for instance) to the minimum wage. Democrats didn’t. That should tell the Democratic Party something. Liberal policies can resonate with the public. It would be nice if there was a party which could embody and fight for those ideas.
So what would be a winning message? The economy. There’s infrastructure work to be done. The private sector could hire people to do it with government money. There are hungry people who need to be fed, and homeless people to be housed. And, ending our adventures in the Middle East would improve our lives.
“Vote for us, we bring peace, prosperity, and weed” – that slogan just might get you somewhere.
Keeping with the spirit of a new politics, here is your wake-up tune of the day. It is “Uprising” by Muse, released in 2009. So get upright and rock out:
Sample lyrics:
Rise up and take the power back
It’s time the fat cats had a heart attack
You know that their time’s coming to an end
We have to unify and watch our flag ascend
(so come on)
They will not force us
They will stop degrading us
They will not control us
We will be victorious
A case for treating health care and hospitals as utilities: Conservatives have won the battle to eliminate much of the government control in quasi-monopolistic markets like telecom and electric power. You be the judge about whether you are better off with de-regulation of those industries. Health care is a de facto monopoly, should it be treated as a utility?
Wikipedia is the sixth most popular website in the world, with 22.5 million contributors and 736 million edits in English. It’s as if the entire population of Australia (23.6 million) each contributed 30 times. 36 people run Wikipedia. Who are they?
Transparent solar panels could make solar power more competitive. CSEM, a Swiss technology company, have developed solar panels that you can see through and have no visible connections, which gives architects a lot of room to incorporate solar power into the walls of buildings without having to give up any aesthetic goals.
Many people believe that medical malpractice reform is the key to cutting cost from the health care system. But evidence shows that belief could be mistaken. However, if you have been affected by medical negligence, you’ll want to consider your options. Some people contact the hospital directly to complain about the medical professional who failed to take suitable care of them. A better alternative to this idea is actually to contact a personal injury lincoln ne service, or a lawyer more local to you. Seeking legal assistance can help you to strengthen your claim against the staff member in question.
The US currently has 30 declared presidential states of emergency. The University of Michigan explains why this is a bad idea. The National Emergencies Act requires the Congress to vote every six months on whether a declared national emergency should continue, Congress has done this only once in the nearly 40-year history of the Act.
Protect us from the media: CNBC’s “Squawk Box” anchor (Joe Kernan) shows complete ignorance of Ireland while talking to Martin Shanahan, head of the Irish Industrial Development Authority. Then he insists he is correct: CNBC: You have pounds anyway don’t you still? Shanahan: We have Euros. CNBC: You have Euros in Ireland? Shanahan: Yes. We have euros, which is eh… CNBC: Why do you have euros in Ireland? Shanahan: A strong recovery…. CNBC: Why do you use euros in Ireland? Shanahan: Why wouldn’t we have euros in Ireland? CNBC: Huh. I’d use the pound. Shanahan: We use euro. CNBC: What about Scotland? I was using Scottish eh… Shanahan: They use Sterling. CNBC: They use Sterling? Shanahan: They use Sterling. But we use euro. CNBC: What? Why would you do that?
And some of you use CNBC for investment advice!
Here is your thought for the week. It is from George Orwell:
The great enemy of clear language is insincerity. When there is a gap between one’s real and one’s declared aims, one turns as it were instinctively to the long words and exhausted idioms, like a cuttlefish squirting out ink. In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible.
Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemisms, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness. Political language is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable…
âDemocracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, they deserve to get it good and hard.â âH. L. Mencken
What has changed in our recent elections is that most American people live lives of barely suppressed ill-feeling. Americans have become hoarders of grudges, with voters believing that current politics bring only a sense of outrage, a feeling of being pushed aside, and made to feel small, or diminished.
They see those in power not as helpers and protectors of our people and our traditions, but as predators, out for whatever they can get. Our politicians see their own ideas for change as blessed, and the ideas of their opponents as damned.
Elections should attempt to bring out the best, not the worse in ordinary people. But in 21st century elections, this superordinate goal exceeds the peopleâs grasp.
Our political process has devolved. We have a deterioration of our public conscience, a smothering of community spirit when it comes to the vital issues of public life. Great ends are to be achieved by tawdry, underhanded or inadequate means.
We now try to reach political heaven mostly using the methods of hell.
Songs for todayâs music break
We start with a song tribute to a guy that doesn’t let democracy mess with his plans. Its âGo Hard Like Vladimir Putinâ by A.M.G. You had to expect there would be a Putin rap, and it comes straight outta Moscow by two black guys who emigrated from Africa. K. King, is from Zimbabwe via London, while Beni Maniaci is from Kenya. Both moved to Russia in the early 2000s to study medicine in Volgograd. It isnât clear if they are still in medicine after this became a huge hit in Russia, but they say they are booked solid through December:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yDIlQ3_lsKE
Difficult to imagine someone saying âGo Hard Like Barack Obamaâ or, âGo Hard Like Mitch McConnellâ.
Next, a song that hopes democracy will solve the world’s problems. It is Jackson Browne who has a new album and a new song both entitled âStanding In The Breach“:
Sample lyrics:
You don’t know why, But you still try for the world you wish to see. You don’t know how, it will happen now after all that’s come undone. But you know the change that the world needs now, is there in everyone.
Regarding our democracy, the Wrongologist simply doesnât get it: Those most at risk of disenfranchisement, more regressive taxation, greater risk of losing their jobs, safety net and reproductive freedom, canât be bothered to go to the polls.
Meanwhile, working class whites vote against the ACAâthe best thing US government has done for working class people since Social Security and Medicare/Medicaid.
A little known fact is that over the past 40 years, the number of fires in the US have dropped dramatically. Consider this chart fromVox, based on data from the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA):
The number of fires responded to by municipal fire departments in 2013, about 1.2 million, is roughly a third of the 3.3 million responses in 1977. Note that these numbers don’t include wildfires, which aren’t dealt with by local fire departments and as Vox reports, keep getting worse.
And since the US population has increased by 44% during that same period, this is a pretty remarkable trend. It seems that most of the improvement can be attributed to things we would expect: stricter fire codes, fireproof building materials, cars that catch on fire less often, and installation of protective devices like smoke alarms.
Yet, during the same period, the number of firefighters has increased:
Paid firefighters have increased by roughly 48%, from about 230k in 1986 to about 340k in 2012, in line with the population growth. The number of volunteer firefighters has remained the same. We now have more firefighters fighting fewer fires. So, what are all these firefighters doing?
Firefighters now respond to many more medical calls per year than actual fires. In fact, the chart below shows that fires and false alarms held steady or declined, while medical calls grew from 5 million to about 22 million by 2012. There is also a slightly better chance that the fire engine is responding to a false alarm than to a fire:
The decline in fires has put firefighters in a curious position. What should they be doing to justify their (in most cases) growing budgets? Vox quotes Libertarian economist Alex Tabarrock of George Mason University:
Firefighters face what I’ve called the ‘March of Dimes’ problem. After polio was cured, the March of Dimes looked around and said ‘what do we do now?â Firefighters have been facing the same problem.
Now, there is little in city life that is more reassuring than walking past the neighborhood fire house. It reminds us that there are people in our employ who are ready to strap on equipment and head into danger to help out one of our neighbors. But it wasnât always that way:
The Wrongologist may be one of the last persons who remembers when homeowners paid a fee to a for-profit fire department to protect your property. That was in Brooklyn, NY in the early 1950âs. The fire company placed a medallion on the homes of their âclientsâ, and didnât protect any homes without medallions. There was no public FD service in that neighborhood until the late 1950âs.
The Boston Globe reports that the Boston FD accounts for 7.5% of the city’s total budget, while NYC spends $1.72 billion on its FD. It is difficult to tell people that fewer firefighters will keep them just as safe, and the political fall-out for any mayor who tries to dramatically reduce firefighter head count would almost certainly be gruesome. Talk about poking the bear.
But what is the highest and best use for idle firefighters? Could cities work to slowly transfer firefighters to EMT, Park Rangers, Inspection Services or other city jobs? What about the pay differences? There are always efficiencies to be gained in public jobs. It seems sensible to start reducing staffing levels and adjust the number of fire stations, given the occurrence of fires.
Efficiencies might be found by using better processes, such as integrating the dispatch services operated by EMT and Fire, or by using different tools. For example, if cities want to use firefighters as extra paramedics, maybe sending smaller trucks or motorcycles equipped with oxygen for cardiac situations, might be workable. The motorcycle would likely get on site sooner, and the crackerbox EMT truck could follow behind for transportation of a patient to hospital. There would always be some extra portly people who canât be carried down 5 flights of stairs by 2-3 people, so they would have to wait for reinforcements. But there should be no need to dispatch a fire truck just to be sure more lifting power is available if needed.
Natalie Simpson, a SUNY Buffalo professor who studies the history of emergency response, says that because of the nature of the demands we put on fire departments, we can’t really shrink their ranks, and there are problems with putting them in different vehicles too:
If you say, ‘there’s very few fires, so we don’t need as many firefighters or fire engines,’ a fire is still eventually going to break out…And without the same response resources, you’re going to have the same number of very few fires, but some of them are going to become catastrophic.
Her view is that we need to have a surge capability to respond in any given area to make sure that the few fires that do occur can be put out quickly. We can model those issues as we ALWAYS do in the private sector, to determine optimal staffing and equipment for the required level of response.
No one should be saying that firefighters aren’t heroes, or that they didn’t show amazing teamwork and bravery when on the scene of a fire. But all that bravery should not by itself, justify inefficient numbers. Every dollar we can save is a dollar that can be better used elsewhere.
Today is Election Day, and it seems even the Main Stream Media circus has limited interest.
And if you look to the left, we finally have a proven case of voter fraud. Its certain that this little Havanese didnât vote using its own ID.
Whatever the results, progressive ideas and politics will continue to decline because todayâs Democrats have moved to the right from where they were 40 years ago.
Based on the content of the 2014 mid-terms, Democrats are seeking to âconserveâ society as a 20th century education, an 18th century government, a neoliberal economic ideology, and contradictory policies in foreign affairs.
There is no energy in the mid-terms behind real reform, even well-protected Senators and Congresspersons are only willing to preserve watered-down versions of marriage rights for all, Social Security/Medicare, some semblance of a non-military expense category in the federal budget. And no one is for healthcare for all or addressing climate change. The Republicans mainly want to preserve wealth, protect large business and continue to go through the motions of appeasing their social conservative base and the gun lobby.
The tactics of both parties more or less âworkâ, if by that we mean to build long, lucrative political careers. There is no sense that any policy means much to Americaâs politicians who mostly speak in platitudes and rarely say what they mean.
Theyâve fooled us for decades and âthe peopleâ seemingly never tire of the BS. The Republicans have a closing argument that the Rude Pundit paraphrases thusly:
The Republican National Committee is up with an ad that throws every scary thing in the world at you. “ISIS gaining ground. Terrorists committing mass murder. Ebola inside the US, Americans alarmed about national security,” says the ominous voice ominously. “Whatâs President Obama doing? Making plans to bring terrorists from Guantanamo to our country. Ignoring the Constitution, the Congress, and the American people. November 4th, Obamaâs policies are on the ballot. Vote to keep terrorists off U.S. soil. Vote Republican.
The Democrats have no closing argument. The great tragedy of the Democrats is that they still believe politics is about competing sermons.
That is a nice fantasy, but that isnât how politics works today. Any attempt by Democrats to engage in a policy struggle with Republicans that fails to understand how powerful people on the right use a multitude of sophisticated techniques that would make Machiavelli faint, is doomed to failure, and the proof of this is right in front of us today.
We live in the mess these people are making. We have to vote, organize, and persuade others to vote if we are to make safe, secure lives for ourselves and for our families.
Here is Tuesday linkage:
Election officials in 27 states have launched a program that threatens a huge purge of voters from the rolls. The Interstate Crosscheck program has generated a list of 7 million names that state officials say represent people who are not only registered, but have actually voted in two or more states in the same election. You be the judge.
Whatever the governor does, whatever your state representative, your state senator does, whatever they do, we are the ones that will decide whether it is constitutional; we decide whether itâs lawful. We decide what it means, and we decide how to implement it in a given case. So, forget all those other votes if you donât keep the Ohio Supreme Court conservative.
The Small Business Majority, an organization of 30,000 small business owners, released the results of a September 2014 Internet survey of 900 small business owners that showed that 78% of their group believe we should change our current election system to one that allows for multiparty representation, a system that could lead to election of parties other than the Republicans and Democrats.
The WaPo reports that US-backed Syria rebels have been routed by fighters linked to al-Qaeda. Half measures donât work. Either we decide to go all-in with Assad, or letâs go home. His is the only force in the area capable of crushing ISIS. At the same time, we should remove the PKK and any other Kurdish forces from the terror list and supply them with the best weaponry. That is, if we really want to win.
When people decide not to vote because the parties are not different from each other, candidates with strong ideological commitments win. That elected person then tries to move the country in the direction of an ideology supported by a minority of voters.
For the past 20 years, that direction has been a death warrant for the American middle class. If you think that the middle class is really what made America âexceptional,â then those political leaders elected to implement and sustain a corporatist agenda have worked to destroy the American Dream, while they hypocritically endorsed and exploited it in order to get elected.
The US is in the middle of a course of corporate political imperialism that has savaged average Americans, while it enriched plutocrats. Wealth has been consolidated, the means-of-production have been concentrated in the hands of a few corporations, and big business has effectively purchased our governments, both state and federal. Mostly because not enough of us take the time to bone up on the issues, or to vote in the off-year elections.
Two things need to change: First, more people need to vote. Second, we must throw off our corporate political masters. As long as we have a situation where corporations have all of the rights, but none of the liabilities of the people, they always have a competitive advantage over the public.
For both your Halloween hangover and your pre-election headache:
Jeb Bush floats idea of continuing the family dynasty:
Ebola Volunteers are heroes and potential disease vectors. Some politicians canât hold both thoughts:
Other epidemics caused by not voting:
Texas has apparently âsolvedâ the voter fraud problem:
