Open Thread–5/22/2013

 Open Thread, Personal, Politics
May 222013
 

This will be today’s only article, because I had a rough day yesterday.  I wracked up my leg again by stumbling and catching myself on it the wrong way, and the pain interfered with my rest.  So I think I’d better not push myself at this point.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 4:12 ( average 4:45).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From NY Times: The Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday approved a broad overhaul of the nation’s immigration laws on a bipartisan vote, sending the most significant immigration policy changes in decades to the full Senate, where the debate is expected to begin next month.

The 13-to-5 vote came as the committee reached a deal on one of the final snags threatening the legislation — and agreed to hold off on a particularly politically charged amendment, which would have added protections for same-sex couples.

After intense behind-the-scenes negotiations, Senator Orrin G. Hatch, Republican of Utah, struck an agreement with the group of eight senators who drafted the original bill to address his concerns about visas for skilled foreign workers who could fill jobs in the high-tech industry…

It is truly sad that the only way to get this bill past Committee Republicans had to include a hate offering and a greed offering. Gay couples should have the right to apply fore green cards for their spouses. American workers will take big pay cuts or lose their jobs to foreign skilled workers, but there will be no savings for US consumers, just more profit for the 1%. Nevertheless, in spite of all its flaws, it is the most significant step toward immigration reform in a generation.

From The New Yorker: President Obama’s handling of controversies about the I.R.S., the Justice Department, and Benghazi has raised “grave doubts” about his ability to cope if he ever became involved in an actual scandal, prominent Republicans said today.

“If this is how he handles this stuff, Lord have mercy on him if he ever has to deal with a real scandal,” said newly elected Rep. Mark Sanford (R-S. Carolina). “Quite frankly, I don’t think he has what it takes.”

“The true test of a leader is this,” Rep. Sanford added. “When he gets in a fix, does he have the presence of mind to lie about his whereabouts? Sadly, I don’t think President Obama passes that test.”

Mr. Sanford’s concerns mirror those of another leading Republican lawmaker, Sen. David Vitter (R-Louisiana).

Perhaps Trail Walker and Diaper Dave should head up a new federal agency: the Department of Adultery.

From The Nation: Here are just five examples of bogus 501(c)(4) groups that deserve more scrutiny under the law:

The American Action Network is a 501(c)(4) nonprofit run by corporate lobbyists like Vin Weber (of Sallie Mae) and Tom Reynolds (of Goldman Sachs)…

…The Commission on Hope, Growth and Opportunity is a 501(c)(4) organization reportedly set up by lobbyist Scott Reed…

…The American Justice Partnership is a 501(c)(4) group run in part by Republican consultants Dan Pero and Cleta Mitchell…

…The American Future Fund is a 501(c)(4) group set up by a number of Republican operatives, and has aired millions of dollars in attack ads against President Obama and Democratic candidates for Congress…

…The 60 Plus Association is a front group designed by Republican operatives to appeal to senior citizens…

…It’s clear why these Republican operatives used 501(c)(4) organizations as tools to move millions in political money. Big publicly traded corporations have been eager to exploit the Citizens United decision but have avoided Super PACs because Super PACs face regular disclosure requirements. 501(c)(4) never have to disclose donors. For instance, health insurer Aetna accidentally revealed that it had provided $3 million to the American Action Network, a fact the company apparently wanted to keep secret…

Click through for much more, including the details of how these Republican groups are using anonymous donations to fund political activity illegally. Where there are Democratic organizations that do so as well, the extent of Democratic crime does not begin to compare with Republican.

Cartoon:

22Cartoon

Share

Open Thread–4/14/2013

 Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Apr 142013
 

I’m afraid I’m going to need one more day.  I serve as the Treasurer/CFO of the group for which I do volunteer work in prison.  With all the health issues I have had, I had completely forgotten to do the annual paperwork, and at about six AM, I realized it.  That’s most fortunate, because I would have thoroughly embarrassed myself had I not remembered in time.  I spent the entire day yesterday doing our corporate tax return, state registration renewal, and state charitable activities report.  I finished just in time to walk to the post office to mail them, to the bank to transfer funds to pay the fees, and while I was out, to the corner store.  So instead of resting, I tired myself even more.  I’ll catch up on replies to comments either later today or tomorrow, and I should be back tomorrow.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 4:31 (average 5:54).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From MoveOn: The NRA Morphed Into An Ugly Beast And It Will Break Your Grandfather’s Heart

 

I am one of those people who learned to shoot safely as a child in NRA programs. I was a member for most of my life, but cancelled my membership because of their monstrous reaction to the Columbine HS massacre.

From NY Times: As a bipartisan group of eight senators prepared to introduce a plan early next week to overhaul the nation’s immigration laws, Senate negotiators have agreed to a cutoff date that could bar hundreds of thousands of immigrants from the path to legalization provided in the legislation.

Illegal immigrants who arrived in the country after Dec. 31, 2011, could be ineligible to apply for legal status — and potentially citizenship — under the new immigration bill, which will provide a 13-year path to citizenship for the 11 million illegal immigrants already living in the country.

I think that the cutoff date for undocumented immigrants to have a path to citizenship should be the date that whatever immigration reform that passes becomes law, not some arbitrary earlier date.  Also, in this so-called compromise, I strongly object to the part of the guest worker program, demanded by Republicans, to import skilled workers to undercut US workers doing jobs that US workers want to increase profit for the 1%.

From MSNBC: Both parties unhappy with chained CPI

 

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I agree completely with Howard Dean here, but one thing just occurred to me. Both Agent Orange and Bought Bitch Mitch demanded chained CPI, as a precondition for negotiation, before Obama included it. Now Republicans are objecting to chained CPI. By including it in his budget Obama may have done the best thing to ensure that it will not happen. The surest way to turn Republicans against their own ideas is for Obama to propose them.

Cartoon:

14Cartoon

May my addition be prophetic!!!

Share

More Clean Jobs

 Politics
Mar 112013
 

Every once in a great while, the news I have to share is actually good news. and this is one of those occasions.  We not only have more clean jobs than we did before, but also, more than we thought we would have.

11Jobs

A new report by Environmental Entrepreneurs (E2), flagged this past week by the San Antonio Business Journal, found that over 110,000 new clean energy jobs were announced in 2012. The group tracked over 300 project announcements across multiple sectors and in every region of the country.

A few of the noteworthy 2012 trends in E2′s report include:

  • Public transportation drove clean job growth nationwide, clocking in at over 43,000 jobs over the course of the year. Power generation, most of which came from solar, wind, and geothermal, came in second with more than 30,000 jobs.
  • Solar power was a strong and steady job creator throughout the year, and especially in the fourth quarter, providing over 19,000 jobs between the manufacturing and power generation sectors.
  • Investment in energy efficiency hit a record high of $5.6 billion in 2012, according to E2′s analysis of government data, thanks to the announcement of as many as 9,000 new jobs.
  • Uncertainty over the production tax credit hit wind energy, leading to a decline in job creation announcements in the fourth quarter, even as capacity installation ramped up at the end of the year to get in under the anticipated expiration. But now that the “fiscal cliff” deal has extended the credit for another year, 2013 expectations show wind energy regaining some of its momentum.

… [emphasis original]

Inserted from <Think Progress>

The biggest obstacle we face to increasing this trend is the massive subsidies we taxpayers provide to dirty energy, enabling them to maintain obscene profit levels while selling their products at a lower cost than they could in a truly unfettered market.  That means that the best way forward for our society is to shift the subsidies from dirty to clean.

Share

Obama’s Way Forward

 Politics
Feb 102013
 

This coming Tuesday, President Barack Obama will deliver his State of the Union Message.  I’m covering a preview of it, because I will be doing volunteer work in prison that evening, so it will be Thursday, before I can give it the time it warrants.

10sotuPresident Obama on Tuesday will seek to move beyond the politics of the moment to define a second-term agenda built around restoring economic prosperity to the middle class, using his State of the Union address to unveil initiatives in education, infrastructure, clean energy and manufacturing.

Having secured four more years in the White House by arguing that the nation’s economy is tilted against ordinary Americans, Mr. Obama will vow to use the power of his office to recapture robust job growth and economic expansion, according to White House officials who have seen the speech. Both eluded him during his first term.

Mr. Obama will insist that only “a thriving middle class” can stimulate long-term growth and that Americans must be given the tools to succeed, according to the officials, who discussed the speech on the condition of anonymity. His call for new government investments — many of which Republicans successfully blocked in his first term — is an effort to shift the emphasis away from simply reducing the deficit and will serve in part as an answer to Republican criticism that he has not focused enough on jobs… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <NY Times>

So far, I like what I see.  He is focusing on the areas that need focus, and he is correct that only a thriving middle class can stimulate long-term growth.  Republican criticism that he has not focused enough on jobs is absurd.  Obama has focused on jobs.  What has held job growth back is not a lack of Presidential focus.  It is Republican obstruction and sabotage of every job creating initiative that Obama and the Democratic Party have proposed.  It is also the loss of public sector jobs from failed Republican austerity measures.

Share

Recovery Demands More and Better Jobs

 Politics
Feb 052013
 

Right now the US economy is stuck in a vicious circle.  Potential employers are not expanding production, so they are not hiring, because demand for their products and services is low.  Demand for their products and services is low, because so many people are unemployed, and far too many of those that are do not make enough to support their families, let alone consume additional goods and services.  So many people are unemployed and underemployed, because potential employers are not expanding production, so they are not hiring.  Recovery demands more and better jobs.

5US_AVGINCOMES0312_SC

In President Obama’s first term, the fiscal stimulus and the auto-industry rescue of 2009 created and preserved millions of jobs. But the stimulus ended years ago, replaced with temporary measures that have been insufficient to propel the economy forward. Health care reform in 2010 was a major step in the effort to support the middle class, but its broad effects will be felt only in the years and decades to come.

In recent years, the administration and Congress have been consumed with deficit reduction, which is antithetical to job creation because it curbs government spending when the economy is weak. Unless Mr. Obama can shift policy away from premature austerity and toward ways to bolster demand and foster investment, job growth will remain sluggish and unemployment high.

What has been missing for years is a forceful labor agenda — one that calls for more jobs, but also has as its goal rising wages coupled with robust hiring.

Mr. Obama can take an important step in that direction by placing his next labor secretary at the center of his economic team. The first-term labor secretary, Hilda Solis, was largely sidelined, a reflection of the administration’s focus on the recovery of Wall Street, not Main Street. Some of the names that have been floated for the job — including Jennifer Granholm, the former governor of Michigan — show that Mr. Obama is seeking someone of high stature, but any secretary’s ability to be a transformative force will depend on the president’s support… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <NY Times>

Photo credit: A Taxing Matter

Note the differences between recoveries from the great Republican Depression, and the Republican Recession.  So fall all the income growth has gone to the super-rich while the rest of us are losing.  That is why me need programs similar to those instituted by Roosevelt in the 1930s to get people working, give them money to spend, thus creating demand for more products and services to provide potential employers the incentive to increase production.  That will, in turn, increase tax revenue for the government to eliminate the deficit.

Share

Open Thread–12/9/2012

 Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Dec 092012
 

I need to take another day off, because my COPD has flared up so severely that I strained chest muscles coughing.  I’m current with replies.  Hopefully, I shall return tomorrow.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 4:13 (average 5:07).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From MoveOn: Dear Democrats, Please Stick To These 8 Principles From Robert Reich

 

He makes me feel wise, because I have previously endorsed and supported every one of the eight, but then it’s really not rocket science. Even a Republican could understand, if only they were not so determined to choose ignorance.

From NY Times: Instead of smallpox, plagues, drought and Conquistadors, the Republican decline will be traced to a stubborn refusal to adapt to a world where poor people and sick people and black people and brown people and female people and gay people count.

As the historian Will Durant observed, “A great civilization is not conquered from without until it has destroyed itself from within.”

This is a snippet from the middle of an excellent editorial by Maureen Dowd. I encourage you to click through for the rest of it.

From NBC News: The U.S. economy generated a stronger-than-expected 146,000 jobs in November, helping to trim the jobless rate to 7.7 percent, a four year low, the government reported Friday.

“It looks like the job market is holding firm,” said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics. “That’s encouraging in light of the fiscal uncertainties.”

What’s most amazing is that this happened, despite Republicans’ best efforts to prevent it by sabotaging the economy.

Cartoon:

9Cartoon

And it has drawn in idiots ever since.

Share

Why Robert Murray Fired Workers

 Politics
Nov 102012
 

When coal executive, Robert Murray, wasn’t insuring some of his workers will be killed by violating regulations for their safety or forcing his employees to attend Republican campaign rallies without compensation, he was threatening his employees with termination if Obama wins to intimidate them into voting against their own interests.  Now he has cut back on his work force because of market conditions that are not related to Obama’s election, but he is lying to his workers and telling them it’s because Obama won.

10coalminersThroughout the presidential campaign, Republicans repeatedly accused the Obama administration of waging a "war on coal." This despite the fact that the number of coal jobs is actually higher now than it was when President Obama took office, and that many of the reasons the industry has lost jobs in the past year have nothing to do with Obama—like the lower demand for coal because of cheap natural gas or declining quality in reserves.

Now that Obama won, at least one mining executive is aiming to make the "war on coal" real by laying off a bunch of workers. In Carbon County, Utah (yes, that’s really its name), UtahAmerican Energy Inc. announced on Thursday that it has laid off 102 employees in response to Obama’s reelection. It is a subsidiary of Murray Energy Corp., which is, as you may recall, the same company that told Ohio miners that they had to attend a Romney rally in August and that reportedly threatened employees’ jobs if they didn’t support the company’s conservative-aligned political action committee…

…Murray Energy also laid off 54 miners that worked for its American Coal subsidiary in southern Illinois on Wednesday. A Reddit poster says that he was among the workers laid off at one of those mines (he doesn’t mention which). He posted a link to a press release that he says the company distributed to the laid off workers, as well as this statement:

I worked at a coal mine that decided today to layoff over 40 employees and the only reason that was given was that "America has betrayed coal miners" by re-electing President Obama. Despite the fact that nothing has changed in the two days since the election they decide to lay off employees. I’ve seen how corrupt the company can be over the years and am fairly certain the layoffs are just a way to make the President look bad.

… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <Mother Jones>

Ed Schultz discusses Murray’s antics with Larry Cohen.

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I fully agree here. We need to take the approach that Republican assaults on any of us are assaults on all of us.  Standing together is the only way to project our nation from vulture capitalists.

Share
 Older Entries