ProgressiveDem

FYII, Wednesday, February 8, 2012

2012-02-08T20:15:43Z

"From gung-ho to uh-oh: charting the government's moves on fracking"

"What NASA's Blue Marble photo reveals about climate change"

"Construction work: still deadly, still badly regulated"

"Repulsive progressive hypocrisy"

"Jim Messina visits Wall Street"

"Iran's bomb: haven't we been here before?"

Washington Wallows In Deliberate Ignorance About The Jobs Crisis

2012-02-08T20:05:44Z

While Republicans, in belief and action, are anti-worker and anti-union, many Democrats aka DINOs, including the president, are deliberately or otherwise clueless about the jobless crisis in this country, and act gobsmacked when told that even college educated engineers have been unemployed for several years.

Washington is controlled by the corporatocracy and does its best to maintain a government of, by, and for the wealthy few, the 1%, therefore .the majority of the elected officials of both parties, influenced by the big money that calls the shots, ignore the following facts.

Heidi Shierholz at the Economic Policy Institute writes: "Today’s Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) release from the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the number of job openings increased by 258,000 in December, to 3.4 million. The total number of unemployed workers in December was 13.1 million (unemployment is from the Current Population Survey). Therefore the ratio of unemployed workers to job openings was 3.9-to-1 in December, an improvement from the November ratio of 4.3-to-1.

"To put this figure in context, it’s useful to note that the highest this ratio ever got in the early 2000s downturn was 2.8-to-1, and in December 2000, the month the JOLTS survey began eleven years ago, the ratio was 1.1-to-1. While the job seekers ratio has been slowly improving since its peak of 6.9-to-1 in the summer of 2009, today’s data release marks three years and three months that the ratio has been above 3-to-1. A job seekers ratio of more than 3-to-1 means that for more than two out of every three unemployed workers, there simply are no jobs. In December, there were 9.7 million more unemployed workers than job openings. Furthermore, the lack of job openings is in no way limited to particular industries such as construction—unemployed workers dramatically outnumber job openings across every major industry."

And in another posting Shierholz points out that:

"These days we often hear the claim that one of the reasons hiring remains so low in this recovery is that employers can’t find workers with the education and skills they need. For example, in his State of the Union address last week, President Obama said that he hears from many business leaders who “want to hire in the United States but can’t find workers with the right skills.”

"While there are always changes taking place in any labor market that will create a degree of mismatch between the workers employers need and the workers who are available, the relevant question given the current crisis in the labor market is whether this mismatch is a key part of today’s unemployment. And the answer a resounding no. The unemployed currently far outnumber job openings; even if every job opening were filled immediately, there would still be more than 10 million unemployed workers in this country. Further, if employers’ inability to find suitable workers were a significant part of today’s unemployment problem, you would expect to find labor shortages in some sectors. But there are no major sectors where that is happening—unemployed workers dramatically outnumber job openings across the board, as can be seen here.

"It's thus clear that the main story isn’t that the economy is lacking the right workers, it is instead, across the board, lacking sufficient job openings.....there has been a dramatic drop in demand for workers with even the highest levels of education.

"The low demand for workers across industries and education levels underscores the fact that while job training programs can help specific individuals and communities they are not going to solve our national unemployment crisis. For that we need to boost demand so that employers have a reason to hire. Again, it is not the right workers we are lacking, it is work."

FYII, Tuesday, February 7, 2012

2012-02-07T20:40:52Z

"Another bad day for labor, as anti-union FAA bill passes Congress" and the president is expected to sign this anti-union bill proving his DINO bona fides and those of the Senate DINOs like Reid, Schumer, and Durbin who voted for this monstrosity"

"BP more adept at legal maneuvering than operating safety may avoid criminal trial criminal trial over the US Gulf of Mexico oil spill disaster."

"The right's stupidity spreads, enabled by a too-polite left"

"How a handful of progressive activists brought liberal talk-radio back to Washington, DC"

"Obama follows GOP into Super PAC swamp" and what is this big outside money gonna want from Obama???

"The Post Office is not broke" but the Republicans sure want to break it.

"US appeals court rules [California's] Proposition 8 unconstitutional"

"For the first time in 10 years, GE workers vote in union"

"Essence of Newt"

Mortgage Fraud Settlement Deadline Was Yesterday

2012-02-07T20:39:18Z

For the latest news about the foreclosure fraud settlement check out the following:

Naked Capitalism's "Is the Mortgage Settlement Deal Starting to Unravel?"

David Dayen at Firedoglake with "Justice Democrats still angling for changes in foreclosure fraud settlement deal" opens with this:

"Well, the deadline for state Attorneys General to sign on to the foreclosure fraud settlement came and went yesterday, and the major holdouts – the Justice Democrats, the AGs from the five states who have objected to the settlement all along (Nevada, New York, California, Delaware, and Massachusetts), still aren’t signed on."

And from R.J. Eskow at Campaign for America's Future, "How to score a foreclosure fraud settlement deal" that includes this:

"We keep hearing about what is and isn't possible, practical, or politically feasible. Media discussions of the topic keep mixing the quotidien problems of the process with the underlying principles involved. So let's take a second to perform a moral and legal reset and put this issue in the right context.

"Legally, banks stand accused of securities fraud, investor fraud, racial discrimination, tax evasion, defrauding borrowers, and perjury (in the filing of false "robo-signed" documents). Each of the major banks has already settled charges with the SEC involving these crimes and more.

"Banks committed a number of moral offenses, too, some of which may also have been illegal. Here's a quick overview:

"We know that bank executives fueled the housing bubble, convinced borrowers to take out loans based on inflated home values, sold deceptively packaged mortgage-backed securities to investors (including state and local governments and working people's pension funds), concealed their true financial situation from investors while taking massive secret assistance from the Federal Reserve, were bailed out by taxpayers, took huge bonuses anyway ...

".... and never even said they were sorry.

"That's what we're dealing with here. But if that's the context, how do we evaluate a settlement proposal?

"Any deal should be measured against five basic principles: openness, justice, restitution, deterrence, and reconciliation.

"Openness: Do we know what happened? Has the truth been brought to light? Do we finally understand what happened to us, why it happened, and who's responsible?

"Justice means exactly what it says: Is the deal just? The American people should be able to review it and know in their hearts that justice has been served. The guilty have been held responsible, laws have been upheld, and we know once again that we live in a society of laws.

"Restitution: Have those that were wronged been made whole?

"Deterrence: Has the punishment been proportional to the crime? Is it severe enough to deter future criminal behavior?

"Reconciliation: When major crimes disrupt a nation, the final element is reconciliation -- the restoration of social calm, renewed trust between the parties involved, and a return to confidence in the institutions of government."

And part of his conclusion contains this:

"....these principles and ideals offer a way to interpret and measure whatever deal is announced. The deal may not be perfect, but it will have to be a whole lot better than the ones that have been proposed over the past few months or it will be completely unacceptable.

"The politicians and others who are negotiating this deal understand the "real world" of bankers, bank influence, and obstacles that make it hard work at times to prosecute bank fraud. But the world of justice is the real world, too. So is the world of morality. And those obstacles didn't prevent the conviction of thousands of people after the much-smaller savings and loan scandal of the 1980s."

FYII, Monday, February 6, 2012

2012-02-06T20:19:24Z

"Do the job numbers really add up?" and "Things are not O.K." and, in addition, job numbers hype is "bad politics, worse policy, callous and insensitive to the misery of millions."

"Wall Street's secret spy center, run for the 1% by the NYPD"

"Chrysler Super Bowl ad edits out Wisconsin union signs" and "Corporate front group airsmisleading anti-union ad during Super Bowl"

"Exploited Hershey workers win small victory against guest worker exploitation"

"Top [US] official: drone critics are Al Qaeda enablers"

FYII, Friday, February 3, 2012

2012-02-03T20:24:23Z

Stifle premature Pollyanna horse patooties served by some of the media today regarding unemployment numbers: it's still "four available workers competing for every job opening and.......a long, slow climb ahead."

"The Apple connection"

"America's largest breast cancer advocacy group has been forced to make a self-abasing retraction of its plan to cut funding for Planned Parenthood following a huge outcry against the decision." But is the reversal just smoke and mirror "weasel words" ?

And even more Komen hypocrisy......a "right wing fog shop"

Indiana's right to work law[s]: “right-to-become-hypocritical-unAmerican-blood-sucking-parasite agreements."

"FAA 'compromise' bill" still an assault on unions"

"The chief Twinkie at Hostess goes Ding-Dong"

Corporatocracy Rules

2012-02-03T20:20:27Z

The GOP mantra calls for even more corporate tax cuts and some of the 99% will vote for these GOP one percenters!!!! You sure can fool some of the people all of the time. The GOP has done so ad nauseum, inciting ignoble impulses and lying to these gullible dupes so that they vote for the interests and profits of the controlling 1% and against the common good.

Pat Garafalo at Think Progress writes: "In recent decades, corporate tax revenue has plunged, falling from about 6 percent of gross domestic product in the 1950′s to less than 2 percent today, due to a proliferation of corporate tax breaks and the use of offshore tax havens. According to the Congressional Budget Office, in fact, corporate tax receipts as a share of corporate profits have hit their lowest point in 40 years:

Corporate tax receipts as a share of profits are at their lowest level in at least 40 years.
Total corporate federal taxes paid fell to 12.1% of profits earned from activities within the U.S. in fiscal 2011, which ended Sept. 30, according to the Congressional Budget Office. That’s the lowest level since at least 1972. And well below the 25.6% companies paid on average from 1987 to 2008.

"Even the 25.6 percent share of profits that went to corporate taxes over the last quarter century comes in below the top statutory corporate tax rate of 35 percent. Meanwhile, corporate profits are currently at a 60 year high, rebounding back to above where they werebefore the Great Recession hit.

"At the same time that corporations are pulling in huge amounts of money, workers are seeing their wages shrink. Last year, real wages fell by 2 percent, and “many employees are also working longer hours and getting more done without raises or overtime pay.” “Part of the reason why business profits are so high is it is a zero-sum game, so labor is on the losing end of that,” said Aaron Smith, senior economist at Moody’s Analytics. “Businesses are getting more out of each worker they have.”

FYII, Thursday, February 2, 2012

2012-02-02T22:35:50Z

"The Democrats who unleashed Wall Street and got away with it"

"Keystone XL opponents need a jobs program"

"The deal that saved Detroit and banned strikes"

"FAA bill still anti-labor"

"White House delays another workplace rule that could save lives"

"How the GOP is resegregating the South"

Groundhog Day and Global Warming

2012-02-02T22:34:33Z

And on Groundhog Day, 2012 we have the following......

From Brad Johnson at Think Progress:

"This morning, Punxsutawny Phil came out of his burrow on a unseasonably warm, sunny day, and predicted six more weeks of winter — but much of the United States has skipped the season entirely. Punxsutawny, like most of the United States, has been experiencing a freakishly warm winter, as our planet’s climate heats up from greenhouse pollution. A record high of 59°F was set in Punxsutawny on Tuesday — the mean high based on previous decades is 34 degrees. Today, instead of the chilly, snowy 17-degree morning that was normal when the Bill Murray film was made in 1993, the crowd cheered on the groundhog at above-freezing temperatures.

"Much of the country is experiencing a “year without winter,” with thousands of daily record highs set in January. Even including Alaska — which has been seeing some record-cold temperatures as the Arctic climate grows more unstable — there were 22 times as many record highs as there were record lows in January. (Without global warming, one would expect about the same number of record highs as record lows.) Excluding Alaska, the lower 48 states saw 29 times as many record highs as record lows.

"Many people in the United States are enjoying the warm weather, but it’s also bringing weird and dangerous change. In Washington DC, cherry trees are already budding. WIth hibernation signals disrupted, suburbs are seeing an influx of bears. Wheat crops are threatened as the warmth saps soil moisture. With the acceleration of global warming due to ever more fossil fuel pollution in the atmosphere, these disruptions are only a small hint of what is to come in future decades.

"The year 2006 will probably remain the record warmest winter for the United States, with 2011 coming in close behind."

FYII, February 1, 2012

2012-02-01T20:51:22Z

"It becomes clear that the US economy has had no recovery and has now been in deep recession for four years despite the proclamation by the National Bureau of Economic Research of a recovery based on the rigged official numbers."

"Jobs in the US auto parts industry are at risk due to subsidized and unfairly traded Chinese auto parts"

"6 examples of capitalism is failing working Americans"

"Mortgage refinance plans more about stimulus than housing"

"Komen anti-abortion VP promised to defund Planned Parenthood and she has......don't forget Komen's other hypocrisy....

How Many More Americans Must Suffer and Die For Corporate Profits

2012-02-01T20:49:25Z

Because of the greed robber barons of the 19th century, through the 20th century and continuing into the 21st century.....how many more regular Americans must suffer and die at the altar of corporate profits and massive amounts of money for the wealthy few????

As Susie Madrak at Crooks and Liars writes:

"The gas companies insist fracking has nothing to do with the wave of illnesses in the Marcellus Shale communities, yet people with strange symptoms continue to die. We don't know how many more, because when the people whose water was contaminated by the drilling get a clean water supply, they sign a legal agreement not to talk about it anymore:

Fracktivist Carl Stiles, of Bradford County, PA, died last night, after living with illnesses caused by shale gas drilling. Mr. Stiles was forced to move away from his Bradford County home as an environmental refugee.
Carl Stiles had intestinal cancer which he blamed on Chesapeake’s gas drilling. He and his wife abandoned their home last November at the urging of a toxicologist who found barium, arsenic, and VOCs (volatile organic chemicals) in Carl’s blood. Strontium, uranium and radium were found in their water. They’ve been told to expect to get leukemia within two years.
The radioactivity level in their home was almost 7 times the EPA standard limit. The Stiles were forced to abandon their home and all the possessions in it. Carl died of intestinal cancer on January 26, 2012.

Dee Fulton reminds readers at Frack Check WV: "Life is precious. Health is precious. The loss of one life or injury to the health of one person is too high a price to pay for irresponsible natural gas development."

And in a related story: House Republicans trashed First Amendments rights and had journalists arrested for trying to film at a public hearing about natural gas procurement....fracking.

Zach Carter reports at Huffington Post:

"In a stunning break with First Amendment policy, House Republicans directed Capitol Hill police to detain a highly regarded documentary crew that was attempting to film a Wednesday hearing on a controversial natural gas procurement practice. Republicans also denied the entrance of a credentialed ABC News news team that was attempting to film the event.

"Josh Fox, director of the Academy Award-nominated documentary "Gasland" was taken into custody by Capitol Hill police this morning, along with his crew, after Republicans objected to their presence, according to Democratic sources present at the hearing. The meeting of the House Subcommittee on Energy and Environment had been taking place in room 2318 of the Rayburn building.

"Approximately 16 officers entered the hearing room and handcuffed Fox amid audible discussions of "disorderly conduct" charges, according to Democratic sources present at the arrest.

" 'Gasland' received strong critical acclaim and takes a critical eye toward the practice of hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," a process in which several tons of highly pressurized water and chemicals are injected into the ground, allowing valuable natural gas to escape. The practice is decried by ecological experts for destroying ecosystems and polluting groundwater. The energy industry keeps the actual content of fracking chemicals secret.

"Fox did not have formal Capitol Hill credentials, but such formalities are rarely enforced against high-profile journalists. Temporary passes are easy to obtain, and if Republicans had objected on procedural grounds, they could have simply sent the the crew to the front desk, rather than ordering police to arrest journalists. The right to a free press is protected by the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Documentary crews are almost never denied access to public meetings of elected government officials."

FYII, Tuesday, January 31, 2012

2012-01-31T21:12:08Z

A Bush clone: "Obama argues that he has authority to bomb sovereign nations and 'drones have not caused a great deal of civilian casualties' "

"OWS stands with farmers, says enough! to Monsanto." (which has become a revolving door to this administration).

"The people party of Wall Street"

"The ongoing war on Iran"

"UK shows that austerity does not grow the economy" but the idiots in Washington are deliberately ignoring the facts.

US Leads The Developed World In Income Inequality

2012-01-31T21:10:41Z

In case you missed this yesterday, here's another "We're number one" (the inane chant of fatuous fans) statistic of which this country should be ashamed.

From Tula Connell at AFL-CIO Now Blog:

U.S. Tops Developed World in Income Inequality

There’s income inequality, and then there’s the United States. New research shows that within the developed world, no nation has seen the income share of the top 1 percent grow faster over the past three decades than the United States.

To qualify for the elite status of 1 percent in annual income, an individual makes somewhere in the mid-$300,000s per year (or way more, like Mitt!).

(H/t to the Institute for Policy Studies.)

FYII, Monday, January 30, 2012

2012-01-30T21:08:33Z

"US elections: no matter who you vote for, money always wins"

"The siren call of austerity"

"83 year old activist priest in solitary confinement in Washington state federal detention center"

"Sorry, bigots, you're dumb"

"Violent big government tyranny continues against Occupy movement as fake 'grass roots', Tea Party' movement continues not to give a rat's ass"

"Bernanke's low-rate crapshoot"

"Eric Schneiderman: hero or goat?"

That Leon Panetta interview: "Panetta's authoritarian decree...." 'once the President accuses you of being a Terrorist, a decision made in secert and with no checks or due process, we can do anything we want to you, including executing you wherever we find you.' " and "what happened to the war powers act?"

"Who's watching whose back?"

"Do GOP candidates and the press have a 'gentlemen's agreement' not to discuss Social Security in Florida?"

FYII, Friday, January 27, 2012

2012-01-27T20:54:02Z

"Republicans' promotion of 'right-to-work' laws, designed to undermine basic union functions, is pure ideological vendetta"

"Is Obama's 'economic populism' for real?

"GDP growth disappointing in the last quarter of 2011"

"Romney may have paid zero taxes in 2009"

"Banks weren't meant to be like this"

"Colombia remains violent for trade unionists, even after US free trade deal"

"The Iranian oil embargo blowback"

Ignoring Union Busting and So Called "Free Trade's" Role In Creating Inequality In The US

2012-01-27T20:51:31Z

What about the role of union busting and so called free trade in helping to create the rampant, massive inequality in this country?

That's a question Roger Bybee at In These Times asks since most liberal mainstream politicians and pundits' inequality narrative deliberately excludes those issues.

".....many of America’s most liberal mainstream politicians and pundits have narrowed the debate over inequality, perhaps out of a desire to shield President Obama from any pressure coming from his left......

"They almost never refer to the 35-year campaign of union-busting by Corporate America, in which 90 percent of union organizing drives are greeted with high-pressure resistance from management, according to Christopher Martin's 2003 book on media coverage of labor, Framed!. The crucial fact that 31,358 workers get fired in a typical year while trying to unionize thier workplace, according to author Philip Dine, is almost uniformly omitted from liberal pundits' explanations of U.S. inequality. Only in their coverage of public-employee battles in Wisconsin did MSNBC hosts like Rachel Maddow and Ed Schultz discuss union-busting and its role in pushing down wages and eliminating workers’ voice on the job.

"The other central weapon in the class war against workers—the threat or actual relocation of production to brutal low-wage conditions found in Mexico and China—has been almost entirely absent from the comments of MSNBC hosts and guests.

"John R. MacArthur, publisher of Harper's and author of the superb 2000 book on NAFTA,“The Selling of Free Trade, believes that too many liberal and progressive commentators and pundits have been afraid of criticizing President Obama on a fundamental issue of loyalty to working-class interests. “The so-called liberal media and even its leftish fringe are almost all in the bag for Obama,” said MacArthur, whose book extensively details the almost-unanimous endorsement of NAFTA by the US press corps in 1992 and 1993.

"Obama has been terrible on these issues of globalization,” says MacArthur, pointing to his abandonment of his promise to re-negotiate NAFTA. (The President has even failed to enforce the weak side agreements on labor and environmental issues, following in the footsteps of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush).

"Others seem to be operating from the notion that any criticism of Obama will weaken his chances for re-election. “Meanwhile, Obama’s raising money from all the corporate interests who benefit [from free trade],” MacAruthur notes. “People who should be speaking out—like Sen. Sherrod Brown [D-Ohio]—are just not doing it."

"To be a bit more specific: Obama’s “bailout” of the auto industry has been portrayed by liberals, especially Ed Schultz, as an unalloyed success. Led by Wall Street financier Steven Rattner, the program caused tens of thousands of GM and Chrysler workers to lose their jobs; federal funds allowed a Chrysler engine-production unit to be shifted from Kenosha, Wis. to Saltillo, Mexico; the number of GM cars imported into the country from Mexico, China, and elsewhere is almost doubled; and no vacant plants were converted to the domestic manufacturing of mass transit equipment.

"The valid criticisms of the bailout, raised by the Rev. Jesse Jackson, auto industry expert Prof. Harley Shaiken and others have been borne out, but nonetheless almost entirely forgotten. In his State of the Union address this week, President Obama highlighted the auto industry bailout as one of his signature achievements.

"MacArthur notes that when Obama aide David Axelrod was interviewed by CNN’s Candy Crowley, she asked him how the auto bailout was different from what Mitt Romney had done at Bain Capital, a private-equity firm that laid off workers and shut down plants. “Axelrod was really left fumbling for an answer,” he said.

"The point is not to sink Obama with a fusillade of criticism about the offshoring of jobs promoted by the free trade agreements he pushed through Congress, but to hold him at least minimally accountable on issues that are crucial to workers so that we do not see an electoral re-run of 2010 this year, when alienated blue-collar workers stay at home, and some vote Republican.

"Without any audible and visible pressure to aggressively move to lift wages and control the export of jobs, Obama will simply fall back on pleading with executives to engage in “insourcing” jobs, and then exaggerate the importance of a minor, perhaps inconsequential, trend.

"But most of the public, wary of free-trade agreements, knows that the trickle of jobs returning to the U.S. is far smaller than the torrent headed to China and Mexico, a torrent that continues to decimate the families and communities that were once part of the nation’s strong industrial base."

FYII, Thursday, January 26, 2012

2012-01-26T21:07:55Z

More smoke and mirrors: "There's already a financial fraud task force"

"Obama's faux populism sounds like Bill Clinton"

"State of the Apple (Rotten)"; as its profits skyrocket, workers die at its plants"

"State of the Union address barely mentions unions"

Britain faring worse under Conservative austerity, than it did during the Great Depression

Yes, the rich are definitely different from you and me: "Romney gave $100 million to his sons and paid no gift tax

FYII, Wednesday, January 25, 2012

2012-01-25T19:37:23Z

"The president can thank Occupy for making his new economic populism possible. But will it be enough, come November?"

"Getting stuck on America's economic ladder"

President's speech highlighted an "agenda focused on mostly symbolic measures of populist appeal; but no call for urgent action on jobs; as for taking on banks, taxing the rich, investing in our future, reviving manufacturing, the president was putting out markers rather than calling for initiatives at the scale of our challenges."

"Best actor nominee dedicates his Oscar nod to undocumented immigrants"

"The Obama administration's economic blueprint was fatally flawed: it led to a weak stimulus and premature deficit reduction."

"Corporate rule breeding 'global class war' "

"Obama trying to pull another fast one: financial fraud unit designed to fail......grease skids for grievously flawed foreclosure settlement"

"Unions say choice of Daniels for State of the Union response is scary"

"Troublesome passages for progressives in Obama's State of the Union"

"Dirty laundry"

"President Obama: 'Government should do for people only what they cannot do for themselves, and no more.' Really?"

What About The Ongoing Jobs Crisis?

2012-01-25T19:35:41Z

President Obama's State of the Union address was woefully lacking in any imperative action about the ongoing massive jobless crisis.

As Robert Borosage Campaign for America's Future commented: "...his agenda focused on mostly symbolic measures of populist appeal......but no call for urgent action on jobs.......as for taking on banks, taxing the rich, investing in our future, reviving manufacturing, the president was putting out markers rather than calling for initiatives at the scale of our challenges."

Regarding the continuing jobs crisis, Jonathan Tasini at Working Life points out:"Politicians bickering over private equity's impact on jobs and how to bring down the high unemployment rate are entirely missing the point about the crisis facing working Americans. The predicament we face isn't simply that there are too few jobs; it's also that an increasing number of workers don't have the kind of job that can pay the bills.

"The rest of this point is here in my op-ed for The Los Angeles Times."

FYII, Tuesday, January 24, 2011

2012-01-24T20:31:20Z

"The Washington-Wall Street revolving door just keeps spinning along"

"An ugly surprise from big oil"

"Rules of American justice: a tale of three cases"

GOP hypocrisy: "Delivering the GOP rebuttal to President Obama’s State of the Union, Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels is hailed as a “fiscal conservative,” but his actual record as George W. Bush’s budget director was one of fiscal recklessness, taking America from surpluses to massive deficits"

No surprise: Willard, the gazillionaire, "pays lower taxes than average American." and this captures the hypocrisy and lack of integrity of Willard, who with government collusion, maintains the inequality and unfairness in this country.

Pathetic: That We Must Tell This So Called Democratic President To Hold Bank Fraudsters Accountable

2012-01-24T20:30:07Z

If you need more information about the foreclosure fraud settlement and the Obama White House's plans for a less than satisfactory monetary amount and fails to hold bankers accountable, head over to Campaign for America's Future and its "No Sweetheart Deal for Big Banks" which explains it all.

The segment asks Obama to "ditch the deal with the banks" and invites readers to email Obama with the message: "No sweetheart deals in the State of the Union for big banks. "

Here's just an example of what you'll find.

From R.J. Eskow:

"The Obama White House continues to push for a settlement that would let bankers avoid being punished - or even investigated - for a wave of mortgage-related crimes that includes perjury, tax evasion, and several types of fraud.[1]

"Despite the President's new-found populism - rhetorically, anyway - officials in his Administration continue to push an unfair deal designed to conceal the financial Crime of the Century.

"The Financial Times reported on new details of the proposed settlement, whose stated purpose is to punish banks and reduce the amount of money owed by underwater homeowners. But it's increasingly clear that the deal wouldn't help homeowners very much and wouldn't punish bankers at all.

"Banks could lower those loan balances by reducing the amount owed on mortgages owned by investors and not by the bank itself. [Note: for more details on this aspect check out Naked Capitalism's "Obama to use pension funds of ordinary Americans to pay for mortgage 'settlement' "] That's what Bank of America is accused of doing as part of an $8 billion settlement it reached in 2008. This deal would set the stage for a repeat performance.

"This proposed deal is still unfair, unjust, and very unbalanced. And it has the Administration's fingerprints all over it."

And while this action campaign is on target, it also speaks volumes about this DINO president that people must demand that this nominally Democratic president uphold the common good.

However, Obama surrounds himself with one percenters as I indicated on Friday with this:"Reuters discovers that AG Holder deeply linked to big banks" as the 1% protect the 1%.

Those one percenters do the bidding of other one percenters, so it is with good reason I called this "The Wall Street Administration" in a recent posting.

FYII, Monday, January 23, 2012

2012-01-23T23:28:45Z

"Obama to use pension funds of ordinary Americans to pay for bank mortgage 'settlement' "Again, Obama favors a "slap on the wrist" for his big money controllers"

"The next housing bailout aka Geithner’s sordid concoction designed to take John Q. Public to the cleaners one more time."

"Reagan's hand in Guatemala's genocide"

"Expect more arrests in Scott Walker corruption probe"

"America's class divide"

FYII, Friday, January 20, 2012

2012-01-20T21:47:27Z

"Working and poor in the USA....what ever happened to a fair day's pay for a fair day's work"

"We must stop this corporate takeover of American democracy"

"Bush tax cuts increased income inequality"

This is no surprise since Obama's Clintonites/Rubinites just like GOP:: "Reuters discovers that AG Holder deeply linked to big banks" as the 1% protect the 1%.

"Bad bankers, bad fraud deals, and the president's 'Great Gatsby' problem"

After massive online protests, PIPA and SOPA bill delayed.

"Surveillance city: New body scanners head to NYC"

You get who/what you vote for: "[Rahm] Emanuel's protest squashing 'sit down and shut up' ordinance passes in Chicago"

"After ten years of war, sex crimes, domestic abuse and suicides on the rise for US soldiers"

"Memo to Supremes: Got ethics?"

Corporatist President's Jobs Council Reflects Its Corporate Dominance In Its Report

2012-01-20T21:45:43Z

Sometimes it takes labor leaders much longer to grasp what many of the rank and file understand from the git go. Some of them never comprehend the obvious, even though their union members do, yet they are in these so called "leadership" positions.

From abandoning EFCA to creating a travesty called a Jobs Council dominated by corporate executives headed by Jeffrey Immelt, CEO of GE that sends American jobs overseas and pays little in taxes, this corporatist DINO president continues to deceive working class Americans.

Mike Elk's piece, "Trumka Voices Dissent From Obama's Corporate Backed Jobs Council Report" at In These Times highlights the hypocrisy of this administration towards labor and American workers and that perhaps some union leaders have finally had enough of the consistent betrayal by the DINO president and his crew.

"In a sign of what could be growing political independence from the White House, AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka on Tuesday strongly criticized the latest report issued by the President's Council on Jobs and Competiveness. The Council's "Roadmap to Renewal" report, released that day, recommended corporate tax cuts, deregulation and government budgets cuts.

“ '[R]eforming our regulatory system and reducing the statutory corporate tax rate are not not crucial elements of “competitiveness” for the United States going forward, nor does empirical evidence support the claim that significant net new job creation would result from such “reforms,' ” Trumka said in what he called "constructive dissent."

"He didn't attend the Council's Tuesday meeting at the White House because he was sick, according to the AFL-CIO. The other labor leader on the 25-member Council, United Food and Commercial Workers President Joe Hansen, did attend the meeting. But on this videoof the meeting, Hansen appeared to be the only Council who abstained from approving the report, saying, "I certainly think there's been an awful lot of good work in the report, but I choose to abstain at this time. ... My concern is with the tax reform."

"President Obama issued a laudatory statement, saying “I’m proud that we’ve taken action on a majority of the Council’s recommendations on issues ranging from insourcing to permitting to clean energy.”

"Trumka also criticized the composition of Obama’s Job Council, which is made up of 23 corporate executives and two labor leaders, saying, “I believe strongly that the Jobs Council’s membership is simply too narrowly representative of our country to provide a balanced set of recommendations to the President in these critical areas…. As a result, the report addresses regulatory issues as if we were not in the midst of a prolonged economic crisis whose proximate causes clearly included inadequate regulation of business, and in particular financial markets and institutions.” [Bold added]

"The labor federation president added,

" 'Perhaps most profoundly, the report does not ask the critical question: why is our country suffering a manufacturing crisis, complete with massive job loss and a structural trade deficit, when countries with higher overall taxes, higher wages, and more robust health, safety and environmental regulations are enjoying trade surpluses?
" 'The answer lies in the view that we share with so many of our fellow Americans: that our country has become dominated by the interests of the wealthiest 1% at the expense of the remaining 99%. It turns out that a country run in the interests of the wealthiest 1% systematically underinvests in public goods; systematically silences, disempowers, and underinvests in its workers; and in the end is less competitive and creates fewer jobs than a country that focuses on the interests of the 99%.' "

"UE Political Action Director Chris Townsend, who last year criticized Trumka for not publicly denouncing the Council's leader, GE CEO Jeff Immelt, when GE was pushing concessions on UE workers, applauded Trumka's dissent.

" 'I applaud brother Trumka's refusal to sign on to the jobs council report. I urge brother Hansen to refuse likewise. ... President Obama and his inner circle had better own up to the fact that the business model of most U.S. companies is to cut jobs, cut wages, and cut benefits.' ”

"Trumka's refusal to sign onto the Jobs Council report maybe a sign of new political indepenence for the AFL-CIO. The AFL-CIO has not endorsed President Obama for re-election, unlike unions including AFSCME, SEIU, NEA and UFCW."

FYII, Thursday, January 19, 2012

2012-01-19T22:19:26Z

"US recovery hasn't done much for employment"

"Obama rejects giant Keystone Pipeline scheme"; however, the key word is 'now' because what Obama did do is leave open the possibility of authorizing the construction of a pipeline any time in the future,and a warning about GOP claims: "oil companies, not green alternatives, are making a killing from the government"

"An unprecedented wave of online opposition to the Sopa and Pipa bills before Congressshows the power of a free internet"

"The US-GCC fatal attraction"

"Blood on whose hands?"

"For the US Navy to put dolphins in harm's way in the Persian Gulf is a form of speciesist enslavement we should be ending"

A Dose Of Reality About US Unemployment

2012-01-19T22:17:43Z

And now a dose of reality about the terrible unemployment in this country.

From Mark Weisbrot at the Center for Economic and Policy Research (some excerpts):

"The U.S. recession officially ended in June of 2009, but most Americans don’t feel like we are in a recovery. That’s because it’s been a weak recovery, with the size of the economybarely bigger today than it was four years ago, when the recession started.

"Since America is a rich country, it is not growth itself that matters most but employment and, of course, the distribution of income. And the employment numbers are just terrible.

"The simplest measure is the percentage of the working-age population that is employed. That peaked at 63.4 percent in December 2006. It plummeted to a low of 58.2 percent last July and is hardly different now – 58.5 percent in the latest figures.

"What this means is that we need about 10 million jobs to get back to full employment.....

"And as my colleague Dean Baker pointed out, the latest jobs numbers have probably been over-optimistic. Realistically, he notes, at present trends of job growth we will not hit full employment until 2028. This would be an economic failure of disastrous proportions.

"Looking at it from the unemployment side, the U.S. government has a broader measure of unemployment that includes people who are involuntarily working part-time and people who have given up looking for work. This is currently at 15.2 percent of the labor force, or 23.7 million people who need work.

"To make matters worse, we have had record numbers out of work for more than six months – more than 40 percent of the unemployed over the last two years. Long-term unemployment is much more devastating for workers and their families. And recent research shows that even this measure underestimates the current long-term hardship in the labor market.

"Although there has been some fear of the economy lapsing into recession again, the more likely scenario in the foreseeable future is slow growth with intolerable levels of unemployment, along with rising poverty and inequality, and accompanying social ills.

"The biggest burden we are carrying is the economic illiteracy of our leaders, for which Americans are paying a very steep price."

FYII, Tuesday, January 17, 2012

2012-01-17T20:47:29Z

"Obama administration’s new budget for fiscal year 2013 (begins October 2012) is apparently going to be so bad they have decided to start warning some liberals ahead of time."

"Time is on our side: the future of Social Security"

Willard doesn't live under the same tax rules as the rest of us

"The GOP's race problem"

"Who are the victims of civil liberties assaults and Endless War"

"Walker recall effort delivers more than 1 million signatures"

"In a signal to Israel, US delays war games"

Hold These Powerful People Accountable

2012-01-17T20:45:56Z

Chronic high unemployment with a 4 to 1 job seekers ratio for nearly three years, stagnant wages, continuing housing foreclosures and other dire news dominate the grim economic picture for many of the 99% have nots struggling to stay afloat. Unfortunately, almost half the people in the United States live in poverty or near poverty.

Yet, GOP and DINO administrations during the last thirty years caused or helped maintain destructive policies that changed government of, by, and for the people into government of, by, and for the wealthy few.

Matt Stoller at New Deal 2.0 offers this example about the Federal Reserve.

"The latest release of the Federal Reserve’s Open Market Committee transcripts is a doozy. Binyamin Appelbaum read through the transcripts and wrote a great article on what he found. The people on the FOMC straight up did not understand the economy, and that becomes very obvious when you parse their nonchalance through the pivotal year of 2006. That’s true as far as it goes, but there’s a political angle here as well.

"My question is, why don’t we have the transcript for 2007? Or 2008? Or beyond that? Why didn’t Congress have the evidence that Bernanke was an incompetent central banker when he was up for reconfirmation in late 2009? Why didn’t Congress know any of what was revealed yesterday while it was tasked with rewriting the rules governing our entire financial architecture?!? It might have been useful to know that the Fed was staffed by an inept, embarrassing group of fools fiddling over inflation while Rome was being set ablaze.

"I wrote a piece on this back in May of 2011:

" 'we still do not know what top Fed officials were debating from 2006 through 2010 as the housing bubble ballooned and the banking system collapsed. Were Fed officials privately worrying about the housing market? Were they aware of leverage in the system? Did they understand the dangers of credit default swaps?

'The democratically elected Congress should have known these things before attempting to fix the financial system. Several congressional postmortems on the crisis should have had access to these records....' "

"Why doesn’t Congress issue a subpoena to get the information about FOMC meetings from 2007-2010, so that we know what the Fed is thinking? They do not deserve the presumption of competence anymore......

"Many people did get what was happening — 2006 was the year that the big banks began cutting warehouse lines of credit to mortgage originators, which would eventually topple the whole housing ponzi scheme. Dean Baker had been trying to sound the alarm about a housing bubble as early as 2003. Yves Smith started her site Naked Capitalism in 2006 and Josh Rosner began noticing what was going on that year; moreover, the dangers of leverage had been recognized as far back as the early 1990s by such economic luminaries as Jane D’Arista.

"It’s not just that the people on the Federal Reserve’s Open Market Committee — the real rulers of America — are insultingly out of touch with reality. It’s also that the public does not even get to see what they are doing and that Congress doesn’t really want to know.

"The reality of our times is that the people in charge of powerful institutions are driven by nothing so much as a desire to be the maintainers of consensus. That is what the FOMC participants were. And if we don’t fix this state of affairs and hold powerful people accountable for being incompetent and wrong at least some of the time, America is done for."

FYII, Friday, January 13, 2012

2012-01-13T23:58:59Z

"Many Americans gave up hope last year----2012 will be worse"

Heading towards another oilpocalypse? "Shell's Arctic drilling plans move forward"

Another bank bailout: "The only thing we know for sure is that the “fix is in” and that Bernanke will do what he always does when the banks are in a pinch. Throw them a lifeline."

"It's easy to cut public education funding when your kids go to private school."

"The Fed guilty of disastrous incompetence"

The media's "selective stenography".

A 20th Century Visionary.......A 21st Century Movement

2012-01-13T23:57:58Z

As we observe Martin Luther King, Jr. Day on Monday, there will be numerous articles about the civil rights/human rights leader. Here is a piece that you should read that is on target for 2012.

The following are excerpts from Richard (RJ) Eskow at Campaign for America's Future'spiece: "Today's visionary: Dr. King's insights for a 21st century movement.

"Here it comes again. This weekend we'll see a lot of media coverage of Martin Luther King, Jr. on the occasion of the holiday in his honor. But we'll hear very little about what he really was - a brave and visionary leader whose vision is as relevant today as it ever was.

"One year ago I listed ten quotes by Dr. King and mourned the lack of a movement that would advance his kind of vision. Then came the strike in Madison and the Occupy movement, which began a long-overdue national debate about economic, as well as racial inequality.

"In this new environment, Dr. King's insights can help us move than debate forward in the year to come, and will provide inspiration for today's movement activists - and tomorrow's. Here they are, updated for today's political, cultural, and economic changes:

"True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it is not haphazard and superficial. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring." Where Do We Go From Here? August 1967 speech.

"A long chain of corporations and banks enriched itself by triggering the events that led to the Great Recession, and many of them took Federal bailout money when it happened. Each of them has a Corporate Social Responsibility policy, designed to show they're good citizens who give back to the community. And each of them has a fleet of lobbyists working to protect their privileged status and tax benefits.

"The poverty rate, which had been declining, started to rise again in 2000. That year it stood at 11.3%, but by 2009 the Census Bureau reported that it had climbed back to 14.3%. At last count, 46 million Americans lived in poverty, more than 15 percent of the population. More than 16 million of them are children, which means that nearly one in four American kids (22 percent) is living in poverty.

"Is that okay with you?

"The situation has become so grave that The Nation responded by allocating an entire page to poverty, which is managed by Greg Kaufman. Sadly, it is now essential reading if we're to understand the real state of our union. As Kaufman points out, one study suggests that 340,000 children joined the ranks of the impoverished last year.

"As the New York Times reported last September, another 2.6 million people slipped below the official poverty line in 2010. The official total of impoverished Americans was the highest it's been in the 52 years that it has been reported. For white Americans, the figure was 9.9 percent. The poverty rate for African Americans surged to 27.4 percent. For Hispanics the figure was 26.6 percent. For African American children the figure was 39 percent.

I"s that okay with you?"

"A true revolution of values will soon look uneasily on the glaring contrast of poverty and wealth." Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence, April 1967 speech.

"Hello, Occupy!

"The gap between the wealthy and the rest of society is greater now than it was when Dr. King spoke those words in April, 1967. The progress we made toward reducing poverty is being eroded as the result of increasingly maldistributed wealth, Wall Street's reckless gambling, and the cost of the Great Recession that followed. Wall Street's doing fine, now that it has been rescued by the American public. But the American public isn't doing so well. We threw a life preserver to the drowning bankers, and now they're sitting on the shore as millions of their rescuers go down for the third time.

"Income inequality in this country is worse than it is in Egypt. As economist Edward Wolffexplains, wealth inequality has more than doubled in this country since the mid 1970s. The GINI coefficient, which measures economic inequality, has risen nearly 20% since it was first measured in this country (coincidentally, the same year Dr. King's speech was given.)

"This increasing disparity in wealth has been greatest for the top 0.5% of earners - the wealthiest of the wealthy - yet their tax burden has dropped from 70% in 1967 to 35% today (it was scheduled to "soar" to 39.6% until the Obama/McConnell tax deal of December 2010). And hedge fund managers - including the billionaires - continue to pay 15% instead of the 28% commonly paid by teachers, nurses, and police officers. (One hedge fund manager likened the possibility of a change to Hitler's invasion of Poland.)

"The Federal minimum wage, however, has dropped from $6.58 in fixed-dollar terms (1996 equivalent) to $5.29 since this speech was given. When Dr. King gave his speech, it was possible to support a family of three on this wage and stay out of poverty, but that's no longer possible."

Go read the rest.

As Eskows writes: "See you at the demonstrations."

FYII, Thursday, January 12, 2012

2012-01-12T23:07:12Z

"Poverty in America likely to get worse, report finds"

"State legislatures attack jobless workers rather than create jobs"

",,,,a classic example of revolving-door politics took place in Washington......from top futures regulator to top futures lobbyist"

"A new bill in Congress would make you pay if you want to read the published results of the biomedical research that your own tax dollars paid for...."

"NLRB: workers have a right to class action lawsuits against bosses"

"A military-first policy on a destabilizing planet"

"The GOP's blatant racism"

"The enduring shame of Guantanamo and on its tenth anniversary---- by the numbers

"Uranium mining projects banned around the Grand Canyon but US trade partners pursuing responsible stewardship may face corporate lawsuits?

"America's top ten polluters.....EPA database for greenhouse gas polluters"

Corporate Tentacles Reach Into State Capitols

2012-01-12T23:05:18Z

Corporate tentacles controlling government aren't just limited to Washington, but reach into state capitols throughout this country.

Some Davids representing the 99% are trying to fight the inequality and unfairness that the Goliaths, the rich corporations among the 1%, are inflicting on rest of the people in the US, making government of, by, and for the people a shameful mockery.

As Beau Hodai writes at In These Times:

"With the 2012 legislative season and another episode of the Great American Campaign Circus dawning over the nation, Arizona may find itself the proving grounds for possible reform in the age of “pay-to-play” politics.

"In January, Arizona Rep. Steve Farley (D-Tucson) will introduce the “ALEC Accountability Act of 2012,” which is aimed squarely at the less-than-transparent American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a national organization that advances corporate-authored model legislation at the state level through the use of a hidden distribution network of special interest cash.

"This network, known as the ALEC “scholarship fund,” holds more than $1 million for state lawmakers to attend various functions (commonly referred to as “junkets”). At these functions, lawmakers are literally wined and dined by lobbyists seeking to advance the legislative agendas of their clients.

"To Farley and proponents of the bill, the problem is absolutely clear. In a nutshell: ALEC is a lobbyist organization, but its corporate backers operate out of public view. “If voters knew that [their lawmaker] was receiving a huge donation from BP, for example, then they might be less likely to vote for them,” Farley says. “They would understand that their best interests were not necessarily being looked after. We should be as transparent as possible. … We can’t pretend that [legislation] was our idea when it came from ALEC and from a multinational corporation that had its own interests in mind.”

"When was the last time you flew your representative off to dinner in your private jet?

"Given the strength of anticipated opposition to the ALEC Accountability Act, Farley hopes members of the public will contact lawmakers to make their support for reform known. “ 'They should send more e-mails than ALEC does,” he says. “They should send them to [lawmakers] and tell them directly: We are watching you. … We want to know who’s wining and dining you.' ”

And from Jim Hightower:

"Let's hear it for American Tradition Partnership! It's an organization that stands up for the politically dispossessed in our land. It goes to the highest courts to assert the fundamental rights of a minority that's been denied its full voice in America's political and governmental power circles. Yes, American Tradition Partnership is a tenacious advocate for (cue the patriotic music): corporations.

"Huh? Despite its grandiose name, American Tradition Partnership is a front group that funnels money from corporations into various political ads attacking candidates whom the corporations don't like – without identifying the corporate backers. Hoping to expand its laundry services for these secret donors, ATP filed suit in Montana to overtrun the state's century-old ban on spending corporate funds in state and local elections. The front group argued that the ban restricts corporate influence over government policies.

"Wow. That's so twisted and anti-democratic that it'd make an American eagle scream in pain. But for arrogant corporate elites and their political lackeys, too much is never enough.

"The good news is that corporate lackeys don't yet control Montana's Supreme Court. On December 30th, The Court's majority sided with democracy, common sense, and state Attorney General Steve Bullock, who argued for the people of Montana that corporations already have beaucoup ways to assert their oversized political power, without needing to funnel secret money into our elections."

FYII, Tuesday, January 10, 2012

2012-01-10T21:00:45Z

"Tumultuous times for democracy compelled Moyer's return to TV"

"Occupiers target 'Mayor 1% Emanuel's anti-protest ordinance"

"America's lost decade"

"Fracking linked to earthquakes"

"Access to contraception is an economic issue"

"Austerity for dummies..."

"GAO attacks 'TARP worked' meme"

Same old song: military myopia costs taxpayers plenty, again

This Wall Street Administration

2012-01-10T20:59:48Z

On Friday, I wrote the following: "Last month, 200,000 jobs were added, according to the Labor Department. And today mainstream media hopped to their role as corporate cheerleaders with descriptive phrases like upbeat jobs report, jobs picture brightened, economic recovery gains momentum and other misleading drivel masking the still grim reality of massive unemployment in this country.

Economist Dean Baker had this commentary about the situation: "Does the Obama administration really want people to celebrate job growth that will get us back to full employment in 2028?

"That's what reporters should have been asking as the Obama administration put a positive spin on the 1.6 million job growth in 2011. The economy has to create roughly 1 million jobs a year to keep pace with the growth of the labor force. With a shortfall of jobs that is currently near 10 million, it will take more than 16 years to get the economy back to full employment at the 2011 rate of job growth.

"Reporters should have been ridiculing the Obama administration for their poor grasp of arithmetic for celebrating such a dismal job performance. They certainly should have pointed out to readers the absurdity of their boasts about the recent pace of job growth."

But it's a presidential election year and this DINO administration wants to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear by pretending that this DINO Clintonite/Rubinite Republican lite rhetorician, panel moderator president is a Democratic populist leader.

After filling his administration, especially his economic team, with one percenters doing the bidding of the 1%, we also have this recent news viaGlenn Greenwald:

"When President Obama last January announced the departure of Rahm Emanuel as White House Chief of Staff, many liberals were furious that his replacement was the Midwest Chairman of JP Morgan and Boeing Director William Daley, who was also an opponent of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and a critic of Obama’s health care bill as too leftist. As but one example, Rachel Maddow harshly condemned the choice, noting Daley was a hedge fund manager and “business lobbyist” and “is known for pushing Democrats toward business interests”; said “liberals are banging their heads against the wall as they try to comprehend this choice”; and then sardonically observed: “mmm – a banker and a lobbyist: smells like change.”

"Yesterday, the White House announced Daley’s departure — he will now co-chair Obama’s re-election campaign, which basically means raising huge amounts of money from his Wall Street friends — and unveiled his replacement as Chief of Staff: Jacob Lew. In 2010, Lew became head of the Office of Management and Budget when Peter Orszag left and then, a couple months later, accepted a multi-million dollar position as a high-level Citigroup official. Lew has spent many years in various government positions, but he has his own substantial ties to Citigroup.

"For his work at Citigroup, work that included betting on the housing collapse, Lew received a salary of $1.1 million. After Citigroup received its $45 billion taxpayer bailout, Lew — two weeks before joining the Obama administration — received another $900,000 from Citigroup as a bonus.

"Lew (like so many key Obama officials) also participated in the orgy of Wall Street de-regulation that took place in the 1990s when he served as Clinton’s OMB head; after leaving Citigroup to join the Obama administration, he unsurprisingly said in response to questioning from Sen. Bernie Sanders that he does not believe deregulation contributed to the financial crisis.

"All of this reflects what Matt Taibbi meant when he wrote last week that “once the primaries are finished, we’re going to be left with one 1%-approved stooge taking on another” and that the election will present “a choice between two different versions of the status quo.”

FYII, Friday, January 6, 2012

2012-01-06T21:26:28Z

"Now, about that foreclosure fraud settlement", Mr. President (but he shouldn't be congratulated for finally doing his job and in the case of the NLRB appointments taking 14 months to do it....unfortunately, it's primarily this DINO's throwing a bone for labor's vote in an election year.)

"Fracking will poison New York's drinking water, critics warn"

"Wall Street, we can hold YOU hostage"

"A recent 2009 GAO study showed that the safety of the sites under the [OSHA] Voluntary Protection Program was not much better than sites that OSHA was continuing to inspect."

"WalMart blacklisted by major pension fund over poor labor practices"

"The US-Iran economic war"

"Ron Paul's strange bedfellows mainly ignore the fact that his anti-interventionist positions can't salvage a reactionary philosophy"

Cut the Little Mary Sunshine Routine

2012-01-06T21:25:17Z

Are they delusional, illogical or deliberately stupid? Their Little Mary Sunshine happy talk can sicken any thinking person.

Last month, 200,000 jobs were added, according to the Labor Department. And today mainstream media hopped to their role as corporate cheerleaders with descriptive phrases like upbeat jobs report, jobs picture brightened, economic recovery gains momentum and other misleading drivel masking the still grim reality of massive unemployment in this country.

As Roger Hickey at Campaign for America's Future writes:

"Today's report of 200,000 jobs created in December means that the economy is barely growing at the rate needed to keep up with the growth of the labor force. Economists estimate that the U.S. will have to create more than 350,000 jobs per month – for the next three years – to get the unemployment rate down to 6 percent.The fact that the unemployment rate has declined to 8.5 percent has got to mean that many more people have become so discouraged that they stopped looking for work (and thus are not counted as part of the labor force).

"The U.S. economy needs 4 percent to 5 percent growth to replace the 5.2 million jobs lost since 2007 and to keep up with new people who need jobs. But most forecasters predict that our economy will be lucky to grow at a 2 to 3 percent rate this year.

"Clearly, if we don’t want to stay stuck at high levels of unemployment – and the growing inequality that comes with stagnant growth -- our government needs to take stronger steps to create jobs.

"In summary, today’s jobs report shows that our economy continues to struggle to create jobs. After more than two years of official `recovery,’ we are still not growing fast enough to make significant dents in the unemployment rate (and much of this month’s decline comes from discouraged workers giving up on their job search)."

FYII, Thursday, January 5, 2012

2012-01-05T22:04:07Z

"Obama waited 14 months to make recess appointments to the NLRB.....Is it enough for an AFL-CIO endorsement?"

"A nightmare on Wall Street"

"Tea Party House members even wealthier than other GOP lawmakers"

"Indiana workers call for hearings on right to work for less"........the phony claims about right to work laws which don't confer any right to work and are anti-union.

This is a surprise? Americans enjoy less economic mobility than their peers in Canada and Western Europe.

"The Pentagon's biggest overrun: way too many generals"

"The Rick Santorum that America doesn't know"

"What Romney's unreleased tax returns certainly hide"

FYII, Wednesday, January 4, 2012

2012-01-04T21:17:39Z

Montana Supreme Court "opinion takes aim at Citizens United decision"....meanwhile California lawmakers introduce legislation to overturn Citizens United.

"America's skimpy minimum wage and the bogus case against minimum wage hike"

"Iowa: the meaningless sideshow begins the official presidential race"

"Obama tries to distance US from any Israeli attack on Iran"

"Nordic whoring: US workers get cheap"

"Report says ALEC wields 'disturbing level of influence' in Virginia"