Miscalculation
What? We’re still here? Well, hell’s bells. I guess Harold Camping was wrong about that end of the world thing. I’m sure he’ll figure out where he went wrong, though, and come back with the real date for the end of the world. But unless he comes up with something a few million years from now, we can be quite certain that he’s wrong again.
Now, that doesn’t mean that we won’t blow up the place ourselves before Earth’s natural end comes about. We’ve sure got the capacity to do that, and our own politicians seem to have no problem edging us in that direction whenever and wherever possible.
Getting our house in order
No one likes it, but for the country to keep paying our national debts and to uphold American living standards, we need to raise taxes, especially on the millionaires and billionaires.
Let’s face it: There’s no free lunch in America these days. These are hard times. Unemployment is at 9 percent. My solution to earn billions back for the United States Treasury is for us to get out of these no-win wars. Let’s save American, Iraqi, Afghani and Yemeni lives. The U.S. can do more good when it gets its own house in order.
All the wrong lessons
The Republicans are rushing to claim credit for George Bush’s interrogation techniques in the demise of Osama bin Laden. Someone being “interrogated” gave up the name of the courier who eight years later was tracked painstakingly to the Osama compound in Pakistan.
The last time this Republican demand for retroactive credit happened in a big way to my recollection was when many Republicans, and media cheerleaders like Larry Kudlow of CNBC, were giving Ronald Reagan all the credit for the economic boom under Bill Clinton. Reagan’s last year in office was 1988. The boom began in 1996. More on this tragicomedy in a moment.
A Medicare phase-out by any other nam...
The Republicans voted to phase out Medicare and use the money for even more tax cuts for the rich. The public found out and turned out. So now they are coming up with new ways to mask the same thing. They call them “triggers,” “across-the-board cuts” and “spending caps” but these are all really just about cutting Medicare and Social Security and education and giving more and more tax cuts to the rich. Please don’t be fooled. And please get active and let them know you do not like what they are up to.
A Republican named Paul Ryan came up with a plan to phase out Medicare and use the money to give even more tax cuts to the rich. Hence the name “Ryan Plan.” The plan replaces Medicare with a “premium support” voucher that covers some of the cost of insurance, (as if an ill 80-year-old can get insurance at all. The trick was to start the phase-out in 10 years, hoping people won’t notice.
Did Koch Industries write the budget ...
Did Koch Industries write the budget deal? Or is it just a coincidence that so many of the the things Republicans demanded — and got — just happen to line up with the financial interests of the billionaires who fund the Tea Party and much of the “conservative movement?” Cutting money for the EPA, alternative energy efficiency, high-speed rail, efforts to fight climate change — even prohibiting NOAA from creating a Climate Service … it reads like an oil tycoon’s wish list.
Before you read this, remember that they just finishing pushing through another huge tax cut for the rich. Always remember that tax cut deal any time you hear about “deficits” — which were caused by tax cuts for the rich and increases in military spending. And before reading about the cuts below you should know that this buget “cut” deal increased the military budget by another $5 billion.
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