Politics Plus

I’m writing for tomorrow and taking a relatively lazy day, after a hard day yesterday.  The roast beef dinner turned out just right, and in addition to feeding less fortunate friends, I took a plate to the desk clerk, who had to work the holiday.  Shortly, I shall be wrapping myself around some leftovers.  On Friday, I hope to finish squaring this place away.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:39 (average 5:35).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From Think Progress: On Wednesday, nearly four years after President Obama signed the Affordable Care Act, the major provisions of the health law that serve to expand coverage to millions of Americans officially took effect. Insurers are no longer allowed to discriminate against people with pre-existing conditions, or charge sick Americans higher prices than their healthier counterparts. And now, the Americans who have enrolled in new plans under Obamacare — either by picking a private plan on the state-level marketplaces, or by qualifying for Medicaid in the states that agreed to expand the program — may start using that coverage.

According to the Department of Health and Human Services, about six million people signed up for Obamacare’s coverage expansion so far. It’s not yet clear exactly how many of those people gained new insurance on January 1; some of them may not have paid their first premium yet, and ongoing technical problems with the state marketplaces may delay some people’s coverage from kicking in immediately.

Regardless of the official enrollment numbers, however, New Years Eve marked an important milestone for the health insurance industry. “It’s the last day a cancer patient can be told by their insurance company that cancer treatments aren’t covered and it’s the last day people can face limits on their coverage in the future,” White House adviser Phil Schiliro told MSNBC on Tuesday. “That’s just enormous.”

And some of people who woke up to new health insurance options on Wednesday aren’t wasting any time using their new plans.

At long last we will have truly positive examples with which to begin to counter four years of Republican lies.

From NY Times: Bill de Blasio, whose fiery populism propelled his rise from obscure neighborhood official to the 109th mayor of New York, was sworn into office on Wednesday, pledging that his ambition for a more humane and equal metropolis would remain undimmed.

In his inaugural address, Mayor de Blasio described social inequality as a “quiet crisis” on a par with the other urban cataclysms of the city’s last half-century, from fiscal collapse to crime waves to terrorist attacks, and said income disparity was a struggle no less urgent to confront.

“We are called to put an end to economic and social inequalities that threaten to unravel the city we love,” he said to about 5,000 people at the ceremony, many beneath blankets on a numbingly cold day.

I wish de Blasio every success, and think he is the best thing to happen to NYC in a generation or more!

From US News: For the 1.3 million Americans who lost long-term unemployment benefits in December, there may be hope.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., told The Associated Press he will bring legislation to extend long-term jobless benefits to the floor on Monday, the first day the Senate returns to work in the new year. The inaugural vote may signal the Democrats’ 2014 election strategy: to reduce economic disparity between the wealthy and poor.

This is a positive development, because it gives Republicans the choice of supporting it or exposing themselves in an election year. If it passes the Senate, it can then be used to put House Republicans on display.

Cartoon:

I’m writing for tomorrow, the first day of the new year and planning a big roast beef dinner to celebrate the occasion.  Please stay safe.  There are drunks, maniacs and Re3publicans on the road.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 2:44 (average 4:50).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From Right Wing Watch: Ending Aid To Jobless Americans

The perception, revealed in polling, that the GOP does not care about people is doing great harm to the Party…. To people who are flat on their back, unemployed or disabled and in need of help, they do not care if the help comes from the private sector or the government — they just want help.

Republicans in Congress rejected an extension of unemployment benefits, which will not only hurt approximately 1.3 million Americans during a period when long-term joblessness is still high, but will also result in serious harm to economic growth. If Republicans do not waver from their position, up to 5 million people could be affected by the cuts. The party also passed enormous cuts to the food stamp program under the auspices of preventing the tremendously low rate of fraud in an effort to kick 5 million people off of food assistance.

But the GOP continues to give special benefits to millionaires, as earlier this year Republicans once again rebuffed the “Buffet Rule,” which would have ensured that millionaires don’t end up having a lower tax rate than average Americans.

This is just one of five ways that, according to the author, the Republican Party got even worse in 2013. Click through for the other four.

From Robert Reich: Despite do-nothing congressional Republicans, we ARE making progress around the country because Americans are organizing and mobilizing. Together we can make 2014 the year we turn the tide on economic inequality.

 

Spot-on! If you don’t vote in 2014, you are the problem, not the solution!

From Upworthy: A Little Taste Of What Capitalism Is Like When It Has No Limits.

 

This is the kind of vulture capitalism the Republican Party seeks, not just for third world nations, but here in the US as well.

Cartoon:

I’m writing for tomorrow, and trying to finish before the final week of holy days in the Church of the Ellipsoid Orb begins services.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 2:53 (average 5:06).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Religious Ecstasy:

Peyton Manning set the all time NFL records for passing touchdowns and passing yards in a single season, before sitting out the entire second half.  The Broncos set the all time NFL record for storing in a single season.  This makes this year’s Broncos the most potent offense in history.

Short Takes:

From Alternet: Joseph Epstein in Wall Street Journal: The problem with America is the collapse of white rule.

There just are not enough rich, white men in power in America anymore. It is a terrible problem. Instead, what we have is some sort of self-styled meritocracy, where instead of the good old-fashioned ruling elite, people who have overcome adversity and achieved success by dint of hard work and effort, rather than their lineage, are in charge. Ugh! This must be why society is going to hell in a handbasket.

So goes the argument of writer Joseph Epstein, who penned an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal last weekend bemoaning the collapse of white rule. Not just white rule. WASP rule.

The column, which resembles satire, but apparently is not, argues [Murdoch delinked] that modern-day “corruption, scandal and incompetence” are hallmarks exclusive to this new era of non-white rule. Because that shit never happened when whites were in charge. If only, he laments, colleges still admitted more legacies and didn’t encourage applications of non-white students. Then maybe, instead of a Senate that is 95% white, we could go back to the 100%.

And don’t even get him started about the president.

This is just one of the eight worst things Republicans said last week. Click through for the other seven.

From Bill Moyers: For the past 40 years, corporate America has spent untold millions convincing lawmakers and the wider public that government intervention in the private sector results in painful unintended consequences that harm us all. At the same time, corporate-backed think tanks and media outlets have advanced the narrative that public benefits create a culture of dependency, and by doing so ultimately do their recipients more harm than good.

The hypocrisy of these claims is becoming increasingly evident as low-wage employers — notably retailers and the fast-food industry — enjoy profits subsidized by their workers’ reliance on public benefits. These firms are the real “welfare queens” in today’s economy.

In short, our tax dollars are going to give the Walton family, owners of Wal-Fart, more money than the entire bottom 40% of American families.

From Bernie Sanders: (received in email.

I want to take this opportunity to wish you and yours a very happy new year.  I also want to express my gratitude to you for the political support that you have given to me, and for all of your efforts in trying to move our country and the world in the direction of peace, justice and environmental sanity.

 

As we survey our country at the end of 2013 I don’t have to tell you that the problems facing us are monumental, that the Congress is dysfunctional and that more and more people (especially the young) are, understandably, giving up on the political process.  The people are hurting.  They look to Washington for help.  Nothing is happening.

• The middle class continues to decline with median family income some $5,000 less than it was in 1999.
• More Americans, 46.5 million, are now living in poverty than at any time in our nation’s history. Child poverty, at 21.8 percent, is the highest of any major country.
• Real unemployment is not 7 percent. If one includes those who have given up looking for work and those who want full-time work but are employed part-time, real unemployment is 13.2 percent — and youth unemployment is much higher than that.
• Most of the new jobs that are being created are part-time work at low wages, but the minimum wage remains at the starvation level of $7.25 per hour.
• Millions of college students are leaving school deeply in debt, while many others have given up on their dream of a higher education because of the cost.
• Meanwhile, as tens of millions of Americans struggle to survive economically, the wealthiest people are doing phenomenally well and corporate profits are at an all-time high. In fact, wealth and income inequality today is greater than at any time since just before the Great Depression. One family, the Walton family with its Wal-Mart fortune, now owns more wealth than the bottom 40 percent of Americans. In recent years, 95 percent of all new income has gone to the top 1 percent.
• The scientific community has been very clear: Global warming is real, it is already causing massive problems and, if we don’t significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the planet we leave to our kids and grandchildren will be less and less habitable.

Clearly, if we are going to save the middle class and protect our planet, we need to change the political dynamics of the nation. We can no longer allow the billionaires and their think tanks or the corporate media to set the agenda. We need to educate, organize and mobilize the working families of our country to stand up for their rights. We need to make government work for all the people, not just the 1 percent.

 

Before we talk about 2014, let me ask you a favor. Do you know of friends, family or co-workers who might be interested in receiving our email newsletters and updates?  If you do, please forward this email and encourage them to sign-up for occasional updates. They can sign-up for our emails by clicking here.

 

When Congress reconvenes for the 2014 session, here are a few of the issues that I will be focusing on.  

 

WEALTH AND INCOME INEQUALITY: A nation will not survive morally or economically when so few have so much while so many have so little. It is simply not acceptable that the top 1 percent owns 38 percent of the financial wealth of the nation, while the bottom 60 percent owns all of 2.3 percent. We need to establish a progressive tax system which asks the wealthy to start paying their fair share of taxes, and which ends the outrageous loopholes that enable one out of four corporations to pay nothing in federal income taxes.

 

JOBS: We need to make significant investments in our crumbling infrastructure, in energy efficiency and sustainable energy, in early childhood education and in affordable housing. When we do that, we not only improve the quality of life in our country and combat global warming, we also create millions of decent paying new jobs.

 

WAGES: We need to raise the minimum wage to a living wage. We should pass the legislation which will soon be on the Senate floor which increases the federal minimum wage from $7.25 an hour to $10.10 an hour, but we must raise that minimum wage even higher in the coming years. We also need to expand our efforts at worker-ownership. Employees will not be sending their jobs to China or Vietnam when they own the places in which they work.

 

RETIREMENT SECURITY: At a time when only one in five workers in the private sector has a defined benefit pension plan; half of Americans have less than $10,000 in savings; and two-thirds of seniors rely on Social Security for more than half of their income we must expand Social Security and make sure that every American can retire with dignity.

 

WALL STREET: During the financial crisis, huge Wall Street banks received more than $700 billion in financial aid from the Treasury Department and more than $16 trillion from the Federal Reserve because they were "too big to fail." Yet today, the largest banks in this country are much bigger than they were before taxpayers bailed them out. It is time to break up these behemoths before they cause another global economic collapse.

 

CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM: We are not living in a real democracy when large corporations and a handful of billionaire families can spend unlimited sums of money to elect or defeat candidates. We must expand our efforts to overturn the disastrous Citizens United Supreme Court decision and move this country to public funding of elections.

 

SOCIAL JUSTICE: While we have made progress in recent years in expanding the rights of minorities, women and gays, these advances are under constant attack from the right wing. If the United States is to become the non-discriminatory society we want it to be, we must fight to protect the rights of all Americans.

 

CIVIL LIBERTIES: Frankly, the National Security Agency (NSA) and some of the other intelligence agencies are out of control. We cannot talk about America as a "free country" when the government is collecting information on virtually every phone call we make, when they are intercepting our emails and monitoring the websites we visit. Clearly, we need to protect this country from terrorism, but we must do it in a way that does not undermine our constitutional rights.

 

WAR AND PEACE: With a large deficit and an enormous amount of unmet needs, it is absurd that the United States continues to spend almost as much on defense as the rest of the world combined. The U.S. must be a leader in the world in nuclear disarmament and efforts toward peace, not in the sale of weapons of destruction.

 

Let me conclude by once again wishing you a happy and healthy new year — and by asking you to share this email with friends, family and co-workers.  They can sign-up for our occasional emails by clicking here.

 

This is a tough and historical moment in American history.  Despair is not an option.  Let us stand together as brothers and sisters and fight for the America our people deserve.  Thank you for your continued support.

 

Sincerely,

 

Senator Bernie Sanders

This is a bit long for a short take, but Bernie is America’s Senator, so I passed it on.

Cartoon:

I’m writing for tomorrow and waiting for my helper friend to arrive and continue the business of moving.  It’s a slow time for news, because the people woo make it are on vacation, but with a little extra digging, I could come up with articles.

Jig Zone Puzzles:

Today’s took me 3:08 (average 5:08).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From Upworthy: Conversations about the U.S. education system often revolve around misconceptions. Here’s some clarity.

 

This video makes it crystal clear that Democrats are on the right track, but every one of the Republican educational policies will make the problem worse.

From Alternet: You already know that the United States locks up a higher percentage of its population than any other country in the world. If you look at local, state and federal prison and jail populations, the United States currently incarcerates more than 2.4 million people, a figure that constitutes roughly 25 percent of the total incarcerated population of the entire world.

A population of 2.4 million is a lot – enough, in fact, to fill up a good-sized country. If the incarcerated population of the United States constituted a nation-state, what kind of country would it be?

Click through for a fascinating read on the US system if

Click through for a fascinating read on the US system if prison injustice.  Because I spend three days a month working with prisoners, I can confirm this piece.

From Crooks and Liars: As 2013 draws to close, the negotiations over the Iranian nuclear program have entered a delicate stage. But in 2014, the tensions will escalate dramatically as a bipartisan group of Senators brings a new Iran sanctions bill to the floor for a vote. As many others have warned, that promise of new measures against Tehran will almost certainly blow up the interim deal reached by the Obama administration and its UN/EU partners in Geneva. But Congress’ highly unusual intervention into the President’s domain of foreign policy doesn’t just make the prospect of an American conflict with Iran more likely. As it turns out, the Nuclear Weapon Free Iran Act essentially empowers Israel to decide whether the United States will go to war against Tehran.

 

Contact your Senators, and tell them to oppose this. Empowering Israel over war on Iran is like empowering Republicans over war on ________. (Almost anything good will do here.)

Cartoon:

Contrary to Republican lies, this was not handed down from the founding fathers. It was written in 1892, and the words "under God" were not added until 1954.