HOW TO DESTROY THE AMERICAN WORKING/MIDDLE CLASS

Step by Step Transfer Of  Wealth from

 The Working/Middle Class to the Extremely Wealthy

1.     Systematically shift the tax burden from the rich by enacting laws based upon the notion that Wealth will trickle down if the wealthy are not taxed.

2.     Systematically do away with a Century of American Labor Law.

3.      Eliminate all of the regulatory mechanisms in the Financial and Banking sectors and declare them subject to the free market.

4.     When the Banks and Financial Sector fails bail them out with public money amortized onto the taxes of working and middle class people.

5.     Decimate all consumer protection laws and legitimize usury as a legitimate business practice.

6.     Enact laws that encourage US companies to move manufacturing offshore, and engage in “Free Trade” with countries that have no;  labor unions, or labor laws, or safety, or quality standards.

7.     Encourage the immigration and employment of low paid illegal foreign workers, by insuring that enforcement does not target those that employee them.

8.     Appoint judges to the Supreme Court who will overturn more than a century of judicial precedent with a ruling that holds that; corporations are persons and have the right to contribute unlimited amounts of money to political campaigns.

9.     Engage in endless foreign wars, to maximize a continuous flow of profit to the Military Industrial Complex.  Use the sons and daughters of the working and middle class as your military.

10. Devise a financial derivatives instrument that encourages poorly collateralized mortgages and the quick maximization and profits from those mortgages.  Design them so that they are so complex no one will understand them.

11. After the Mortgage and Housing bubble’s burst, foreclose on the last vestige of working/middle class wealth, the American Home.  Make enormous profits from those foreclosures, make sure those profits are not understood.

12. Eliminate the obligation of Social Security, by privatizing it in such a way that Wall Street will make billions while individual small investors will be subject to the whims of the market. 

13. Eliminate the obligation of health insurance for the elderly by passing laws that will privatize eldercare and shift the expenditure from providing protection for the elderly to a profit making engine for private insurance companies.

14.  Engage in alliances with fundamentalist Christian organizations to gain their voting support.

15.  Use alliances with fundamentalist Christian organizations to divert the public debate toward moral issues and away from working and middle class economic issues.

16. Eliminate costly life saving or maintaining health procedures for the elderly by making them participate in a voucher system where out of pocket cost will be prohibitive, or coverage simply unavailable.

17. Realize a death obligation synergy dividend from the working and middle class as a result of impacts of lost retirement income, and loss of Medicare coverage.  The benefit will be in direct proportion to the inevitable decrease in life expectancy.

18.  Maintain a permanent working underclass by privatizing public schools so that they can be resegregated.  Do this in such a way, as to insure that quality education will be reserved only for the wealthy.

19. Restrict access to private colleges to those students who can afford to attend elite private preparatory schools.

20. Completely privatize postsecondary education by systematically defunding public colleges while maintaining community colleges to train the permanent working underclass in specific job related skills.

21. Continue the control of elections by using fear as a propaganda tool, and systematically eliminating or restricting access to voting for working and middle class people.

22. Fight for the right of congressional redistricting that will allow right wing politicians to maintain their control (Gerrymandering) over the State and National legislatures.

23. Install a Corporation CEO as Presidents by manipulating information and flooding targeted politicians with unlimited campaign finances.

FINAL TWO STEPS

Build Large Gated private enclaves with the latest security systems and state police forces to deny access to those who you might have reason to fear.

Enclose those gated communities in domes that will create artificial biospheres to protect those fortunate enough to inhabit them from; the ever warming, more volatile and toxic climate.

FINISH

SOCIALIST IMPERATIVE OF OUR ECOSYSTEM

SOCIALIST IMPERATIVE OF OUR ECOSYSTEM

If America accepts the dictates and policies of the extreme right we will deny that the environment that we all live in is a socialist entity.  Even an elementary understanding of biology reveals that Ecosystems are interdependent.  These interdependencies are complex and include all elements, biological and environmental.  This reality of Socialist Ecosystems dictates our acts of consumption have an impacton all living organisms and upon the physical environment in which we and those organisms exist.

The world we inhabit has been incredibly forgiving. But it does not require great sophistication to realize that there are limits to the ability of the Ecosystem we inhabit to absorb our insults. If you put a family of cats in a closed cat box, continue to feed and water them, but do nothing to clean the box they inhabit, the result will eventually be their death.  Our unwillingness to endure common socialistic sacrifice to take steps to spare our ecosystem is comparable to failing to clean the cat box.

Right Wing politicians do not want you to think that we live in a socialist ecosystem.  They want you to believe that we can continue to violate the ecosystem without consequence.  Their Think Tanks (CATO, Heritage, Hudson, Mackinac,) devise strategies to keep people confused about the possible outcomes.  Their primary strategy is the simple denial of all scientific evidence that our Cat box is in trouble.  They use the propaganda resources of Fox, Rush et al, to hammer endlessly for that denial. They use Political Action Committees (PACs) to funnel money in the campaigns of politicians who have no moral or ethical problem of voting against any environmental regulation. 

A REALITY YOU CANNOT DENY; If the Right Wing is able to leverage all of these political factors to allow the despoiling of our socialist ecosystem; the people who will suffer will be your children and your grandchildren. 

Ryan's Medicare Prescription and Ayn Rand

Ryan’s Medicare Prescription and Ayn Rand

Ayn Rand’s 1000 page tome is about to be released as a movie.  Make no mistake “Atlas Shrugged” is a Religious Manifesto.  In Atlas Shrugged, Rand established the Doctrine, made herself the godhead, and Atlas Shrugged became the Randian bible.   All citizens of the of the United States should be concerned about the release of this movie and the Disciples of Ayn Rand who are striving to take your government and remake it into their interpretation of her vision.  Current power brokers like Eric Cantor, Paul Ryan, the Pauls, and the recent gang of  four Republican Govenor’s, are all religious adherents of the Randian doctrine.  Mr. Cantor has listed Atlas Shrugged as required reading for his staff.

To understand Rand’s writing you must know that she and her Bourgeoisie (social class of people with capital) family were persecuted by the Bolsheviks during the 1917 communist revolution.  Socialism to her meant life lived in the fear of a Kafkaesque novel.  Rand’s (AKA, Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum)  family money and property was seized and they fled mother Russia.  That was a traumatic experience for a young girl. 

Her response to the tyranny of the Bolsheviks was to create her own tyranny of mind, Objectivism.  Randian Objectivism relies on her version of rational thought as an ethical compass, and holds that; (1) Producers make what they consume; (2) Looters live off of the initiative and industry of the Producers (3) Producers must take the initiative to put themselves in a position to control what they produce, so that others cannot consume it.  If you are not a Producer you are a Looter and should have nothing to consume.

In Rand’s mother Russia the Producers would have been the Royalty and those like her family the capitalist elite, the Looters would have been the working people that became Bolsheviks and violently seized power and property (the power and property of the Producers).  Rand responded to the trauma of the revolution in her personal life by proposing a doctrine based upon caricatures of factions from the Russian revolution, she fashioned a philosophical Bolshevik Revolution in reverse.  Capitalist of the world, rise up and take your rightful power.

Eric Cantor, Paul Ryan, the Paul’s and many other extreme conservatives base their political actions upon categorizations of people that flow from Randian thought.  Inherent in their policies is the notion that some people are Producers and some people are Looters.  In practice their refusal to tax the obscenely wealthy is a reflection of that philosophical reverence for the monied elite (Wealthy).  The attacks on Unions, Fire Fighters, Police, and Teachers is a direct expression of the belief that people who are not entrepreneurs are of less value.  If they are salaried workers collecting paychecks from the government they are Looters and not worthy of the government’s protection.  This thinking has lead them to propose continued reduction of taxes on corporations and the wealthy.  They have proposed and enacted policies to balance this on the revenue side by a tax on government workers through the devices of wage reduction, benefit reduction, and requirements for increased contributions.

Congressman Ryan believes that people who will need medical coverage in old age are Looters, if they participate in Medicare.  He would base that upon the fact they have not produced the money to pay for astronomically priced private insurance in their old age.  Though he may not say it in public he believes that by accepting Medicare America’s retired workers are looting the rightful property of America’s Producers, the wealthiest 1%.

The vouchers he is proposing for the purchase of medical insurance will either be woefully inadequate or meaningless.  Medicare was originally passed because elderly people could not get medical insurance due to their age and pre-existing conditions.  That circumstance will remain once Medicare is eliminated.  That fact is not discussed by Mr. Ryan’s budget.  As Looters you and I will just have to do without.

The Ryan Budget; Pigs, Apples, and Milk

The Ryan Budget; Pigs, Apples, and Milk

 (The Pigs Have Every Right to The Windfall Apples

 and the all of the Milk, Just look to the Overton Window)

Paul Ryan in Your Pockets: Government by People Who Hate You.  On April 11, 2011, Dean Baker wrote in the Huffington Post about the Ryan Budget Proposal. In the title he asserts that the far right hates us.  I do not agree, I believe Ryan’s draconian proposal is not about hate but a device for controlling what you think and what you are willing to accept.  Hate is not required just the willingness to manipulate your perceptions of reality. 

The right wing talkers all know how this game is played.  Beck has written a book titled The Overton Window.  This is pure Any Randian manipulation of the thought of the body politic.  Fox news will now devote a massive effort to getting people to see that Ryan’s budget is actually a reasonable solution to our financial crisis. Charles Krauthammer, O’Rielly, Beck, Hannity, and Limbaugh began moving the Overton Window of political possibilities before Ryan had released his budget.   They know how to begin building momentum to shift thinking to the extreme right, they do it for a living.

The MACKINAC CENTER for Public Policy,  http://www.mackinac.org/7504, is a Private “Think Tank”  where Overton developed the notion of his window for shaping public thought.  It is a think tank devoted to deregulation and privatization of our government.  They advocate using techniques to change what people think they think. 

In a blog on The Mackinac Center’s website Nathan Russell provides An Introduction to the Overton Window of Political Possibilities Jan. 4, 2006.   Mr. Russell explained: “Imagine, if you will, a yardstick standing on end. On either end are the extreme policy actions for any political issue. Between the ends lie all gradations of policy from one extreme to the other. The yardstick represents the full political spectrum for a particular issue. The essence of the Overton window is that only a portion of this policy spectrum is within the realm of the politically possible at any time. Regardless of how vigorously a think tank or other group may campaign, only policy initiatives within this window of the politically possible will meet with success”.

It is the task of the shaper of thinking then,  to move the window of possibilities as far as possible to insure that the desired policy is “within the realm of the politically possible”.  Russell quotes Milton Friedman in his preface to the 1982 edition of Capitalism and Freedom: "That, I believe, is our basic function: to develop alternatives to existing policies, to keep them alive and available until the politically impossible becomes politically inevitable."

Friedman was a major force in using the Overton Window to help deregulate our financial markets and banks.  He was an advisor to all Republicans presidents and was especially influential on Reagan’s thinking.  The use of the Overton Window, as described by Milton Friedman, played a major role in the ultimate collapse of our economy because of deregulation.

In his Huffington Post article about Ryan’s Budget proposal, Dean Baker says that.:”When it comes to redistributing money upward, the bar for intellectual coherence is set very low. Pundits from across the political spectrum had a hard time containing their enthusiasm for”.  Mr. Baker you are simply  witnessing the effective use by the right of the Overton Window.

Mr. Baker, Intellectual Coherence Does not need to be high when  you are in the process of shifting the Overton Window of Political possibilities further to the right.  This may ring a bell or two if you have ever read Orwell’s Animal Farm: “The importance of keeping the pigs in good health was all too obvious. So it was agreed without further argument that the milk and the windfall apples (and also the main crop of apples when they ripened) should be reserved for the pigs alone."

Mr. Baker, Ryan’s budget insures that the milk and the windfall apples (Animal Farm’s Version of Wealth) will be reserved for the wealthiest 1% of us.  The rest will have to grovel for what is left.  If they employ the Overton Window well, we will believe that it was our own idea.

Radical Spew Causes Amnesia: What Was It Like To Be American?

                                    Tom Joad and Ma from Grapes and Wrath

                       What It Was Like To Be A Working American - Out Of Work

In Huffington Post on  4-8-11 author Will Bunch discussed Beck, and Limbaugh’s favorite propaganda tool the Overton Window: “the Overton Window is a notion that you can radically move the parameters of political debate by pushing talk to the outer limits, so that ideas that were once deemed as extreme suddenly appeared to be normal.”  Their purpose, of course is to radically cleave the body politic into two separate groups that believe the nation’s ills imamate from two completely different sources.  Beck and Limbaugh’s target groups believes that government is the source of all evil while many of the rest of us believe that corporate influence on government is the problem.  Once convinced that target group of working and middle class voters can be used to swing close elections to benefit wealthy funders.  The polemicist, Beck and Limbaugh, have been handsomely rewarded for this valuable service.

            Beck and Limbaugh’s have so effectively used this device to radically shift what is considered normal by their working and middle class demographic, they have even

created amnesia about what is was like to be an American.  As a result, many working and middle class people are now able to believe that; it is OK to systematically destroy the rights of the working and middle class to a fair wage, and safe working conditions.  Such rights were won by our great grandfathers, grandfathers, and fathers through a long and bloody struggle against the same corporate foes that we faced then and now.  They are the rights that have defined America since the 1930s and have insulated working and middle class people from abuse by the wealthier and more powerful for more than 80 years.

By being subjected to this device of rhetoric, Beck and Limbaugh’s audience of working and middle class people are now able to believe that allowing union organization and attempts at providing low cost medical care to all Americans, constitutes socialism and class warfare, waged by the poor against the very wealthy.  This target group of working and middle class people are now able to believe that it is normal for 1%  of the Nation’s population to  holds 40% of the Nation’s wealth (the greatest top to bottom wealth disparity since the great depression).  They have been told that hard work and innovation should have unlimited rewards, not just reasonable or ample rewards.  They believe this even though most of the wealthy 1% do not work at all.

       These are fundamental changes in our national psyche that we would not have entertained until the Radical Spewers gained the support and tools necessary to shift our sensibilities and redefine what is ethical, fair, and inherently American. They have caused the grandsons and granddaughters of the men and women who fought for fair wages and reasonable conditions to forget how hard life was in the early 20^th century.  Also lost, is the memory that unbridled greed and unregulated corporations caused those hardships and that our government helped us climb back from that abyss.

  They have forgotten the America accurately depicted in John Steinbeck’s epic novel of the great depression and dust bowel, The Grapes of Wrath.

Tom Joad’s dialogue with his mother:

Tom:  I've been thinkin' about us too. About our people livin' like pigs and good rich land layin' fallow. Well, maybe one guy with a million acres and a hundred thousand farmers starvin', and I've been wonderin' if all our folks got together and yelled...

Ma:  Oh, Tommy. They'd drag you out and cut ya down just like they done to Casy.

Tom:  They're gonna drive me anyways. Sooner or later, they'd get me for one thing if not for another. Till then...

Tom Joad’s Soliloquy:

Well, maybe it's like Casy says. A fella ain't got a soul of his own, just a little piece of a big soul - the one big soul that belongs to ever'body. Then...then, it don't matter. I'll be all around in the dark. I'll be ever'-where - wherever you can look. Wherever there's a fight so hungry people can eat, I'll be there. Wherever there's a cop beatin' up a guy, I'll be there. I'll be in the way guys yell when they're mad - I'll be in the way kids laugh when they're hungry an' they know supper's ready. An' when the people are eatin' the stuff they raise, and livin' in the houses they build - I'll be there, too

                                                                                                            Trent Rager

                                                                                                            Perishable Democracy

THE PURCHASE OF INFLUENCE OVER ELECTED OFFICALS IS AS AMERICAN AS APPLE PIE

The allegiance of our elected officials is being bought through campaign financing and the promise of lucrative positions once an elected politican leaves.  The basic issue that is plaguing this country is the financial influence of corporations over our government.  The Republican are more direct about their support for corporations over middle and working class people. They continue to support tax cuts for the wealthy in the face of ample evidence that it does not create jobs.  Democrats acquiesce by never taking a true stand against raising those taxes.  When George W Bush was president the House and Senate voted a medicare prescription drug benifit into law that stipulated that there would be negotation of drug prices.  The government, the largest purchaser of drugs, under the bill was required to pay the prices set by the pharmaceutical industry.  When Harry Reid explains an element of the New Health Care Bill he says that; the bill was written in order to get it by Big Pharma.  Our congress, and perhaps our President, are working in service of corporate America.

In Linda Keenan and Janine R. Wedel Article,Published in the Huffington Post on April 7th titled; "How the Richest "1 Percent" Keep Rewarding Themselves for Epic Failure" they say that: 

The personal and the political are today in perfect alignment. Virtually all U.S. senators, and most...[House] representatives...are members of the top 1 percent....are kept in office by money from the top 1 percent, and know that if they serve the top 1 percent well they will be rewarded by the top 1 percent when they leave office. By and large, the key executive-branch policymakers on trade and economic policy also come from the top 1 percent. When pharmaceutical companies receive a trillion-dollar gift--through legislation prohibiting the government...from bargaining over price--it should not come as cause for wonder....Given the power of the top 1 percent, this is the way you would expect the system to work.

 

 

Class Warfare Waged by Working People, or Corporations?

On this date in America we are engaged in class warfare.  The folks that have been elected through the Teapublican revolution have openly attacked the American Worker and the American Working/Middle Class.  They have done this by pursuing an agenda that benefits their corporate donors and supporters.  To set the stage for  this blatant advocacy for corporations and against working people they had their propaganda folks set the stage by talking about class warfare.

Their spin on this battle is the characterization of Barak Obama as a Muslim/socialist imposing socialism and Sharia law on our society.  In other words the battle is on because of this incursion into our freedoms on behalf of the people is suspect because the President that the American People elected is a Socialist and a non-Christian.  This spin is meant to divert attention away from the jist of the struggle and focus energy on the fears of the target audience

The truth is somewhat different.  Professor Michael Schalbe has outlined what Capitalist/Corporatist want from government.  Read what he says below. See if you find anything that is not now being imposed on State Governments by this organized assault on working/middle class people.  Do you believe that this should be a government of-by-for the people, or a government of-by-for corporations?

From: Michael Schwalbe is a professor of sociology at North Carolina State University. Published on Common Dreams

"Capitalists want laws that weaken and cheapen labor. This means laws that make it harder for workers to organize unions; laws that make it easier to export production to other countries; laws that make it easier to import workers from other countries; laws and fiscal policies that keep unemployment high, so that workers will feel lucky just to have jobs, even with low pay and poor benefits.

Capitalists want tax codes that allow them to pay as little tax as possible; laws that allow them to externalize the costs of production (e.g., the health damage caused by pollution); laws that allow them to swallow competitors and grow huge and more powerful; and laws that allow them to use their wealth to dominate the political process. Workers, when guided by their economic interests, generally want the opposite."