A repository for Marcospinelli's comments and essays published at other websites.

Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts

Monday, February 14, 2011


You've got no stability without financial security for all citizens.
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Human life is not some sort of race or game in which each person should start from an identical mark.
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But human life in the US is.  
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


I would pick the fairtax.or­g
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There's absolutely nothing 'fair' about that.

Now, if we took all the money back and distribute­d it equally to every man, woman and child, and educated every man, woman and child equally so that each was able to support himself, and then paid each the same wage for the same amount of time put into the work (or adjusted it to physical and mental ability), then a 'sales tax' on what people purchase?

Ok, sure.
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Govt has done this in an expensive bureaucrat­ic way and left / sent the bill to us, our children, grandchild­re and yet-to-be-­born Americans.
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No!  That's where you think the money went?

The money went for off-budget items, like wars.  By the way, Obama and Democrats ran on putting the wars on budget -- It still hasn't happened.

Whether it was the Savings & Loan scandal or the bank meltdown (or Social Security trust fund), it was Americans' money that was stolen.  The taxpayers' bailouts came after.  
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Imagine before you're born you don't know anything about who you'll be, your abilities, or your position. Now design a tax system.

Welcome to America, where everyone is born equal.
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


No man is an island.

What you think you're earning on your own is actually the result of millions who are supporting you.
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


By the way, you can't possibly spend "your money" better, more wisely, more economical­ly, more beneficial­ly, than the government­.

I'd like to see you try spending "your money" better, more wisely, more economical­ly, more beneficial­ly than the US government did between 1931 and 1936 when it 'bought' the Hoover Dam.  

Or in 1933, with the Tennessee Valley Authority.

Or in 1965, when the US government created Medicare.  A massive medical delivery system for less than the participan­ts can get individual­ly.
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


That's not what I asked.

And we're talking about shared resources.  We each have a stake, a share, in the natural resources of this country.  

AND, I think it's naive of you to think that whatever money you have you got as the result of your sole labor.  Those with the lion's share of the money generally got it because the game's been weighted in their favor and against others.
About Barack Obama
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The 2012 Budget

When Democratic voters vote for Democrats, are they voting to transfer control of the economy from public to the private sector, under the belief that it will produce a more efficient government and improve the economic health of the nation?
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The Obama Budget: And Why the Coming Debate Over Spending Cuts Has Nothing to Do With Reviving the Economy

When Democratic voters vote for Democrats, are they voting to transfer control of the economy from public to the private sector, under the belief that it will produce a more efficient government and improve the economic health of the nation?
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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


When Democratic voters vote for Democrats, are they voting to transfer control of the economy from public to the private sector, under the belief that it will produce a more efficient government and improve the economic health of the nation?
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


When Democratic voters vote for Democrats, are they voting for to transfer control of the economy from public to the private sector, under the belief that it will produce a more efficient government and improve the economic health of the nation?
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


Agreed.

You'll get no argument from me on that.
About Most Popular
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


"As a Democrat, it is almost unbelievab­le to see my party in December grant a lengthy extension of the tax cuts for the rich and just over a month later start cutting away at programs for working & poor men and women.


I know I'll get messages from Obama's most ardent admirers saying that Obama "was forced" to extend the tax cuts, but that is simply not so. He says himself that they were necessary to keep us from falling into a double dip. He had the opportunit­y to eliminate the cuts after his election -- when his influence was at its peak -- and he deferred it. He kept deferring it, against the wishes of many Democrats in Congress, until after we lost an election. Then, he simply granted the cuts.


I wish the administra­tion was as worried about the plight of working and poor families -- as they appeared in December to be about reaching out to a more conservati­ve constituen­cy. These proposed cuts will accomplish little in terms of balancing the budget, but they'll do maximum damage to those they helped."

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The 'Rule of Thumb' about when tax cuts make sense:  "When a nation's bills are paid".  When the nation is in surplus.  

You don't go on vacation when you haven't paid the rent.  You don't buy a Rolls Royce when you're living in your parents' garage.  You don't buy Godiva chocolates when there's no food in the fridge or the cupboards to feed your kids.

When a tax cut requires a nation to borrow more money, adding to the deficit, increasing the national debt, that's robbing the People to give to the rich.  Average Americans, our children, grandchild­ren, great-gran­dchildren, for generation­s to come, are getting stuck with the bill.

In 2001, Bush's tax cuts were sold to us as "job creators".  They'd "stimulate the economy".  They didn't.  

The money for Bush's tax cuts had to be borrowed, just as these tax cuts are.  From China, SaudiArabi­a (which then turns around and donates to AlQaeda, Taliban, Hamas, etc.) and IRAN (yes, Iran owns us, too).

The money is all gone.  We're now stuck with cleaning up the party that the rich had (investing overseas, in other nations, outsourcin­g Americans' jobs and closing down US manufactur­ing).  We're not even able to pay off the principal -- We're barely able to pay the 'interest only' on this 'party'-bi­ll.

It's bad enough that working Americans have been paying for the parties of the rich, but it's even worse than that:  We're not only paying for their parties, we're taking out loans so that they can stuff their mattresses.  

If I'm paying for bathtubs full of Dom Perignon, I'd better d@mned well be the one soaking in it.
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Vast sums have been borrowed from China, from Saudi Arabia, which We The People are on the hook for, are paying interest only on (so we will be making payments for the rest of our lives, and our children and grandchild­ren will be doing the same thing), while the borrowed money has gone directly into the offshore accounts of the rich, of the defense contractor­s, etc.

There was a huge party for the rich, they put cases of champagne and caviar into their Rolls Royces, drove off, and left us to deal with the catering bills.  And because we've been tapped out for so long (our pensions, our homes, all liquidated earlier by their scamming), the government is going to hold a fire sale of our shared resources: Everything from our forests, oil and gas, roads, land, sold off to foreign bidders.  

That's the best analogy for what's going on.
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Vast sums have been borrowed from China, from Saudi Arabia, which We The People are on the hook for, are paying interest only on (so we will be making payments for the rest of our lives, and our children and grandchild­ren will be doing the same thing), while the borrowed money has gone directly into the offshore accounts of the rich, of the defense contractor­s, etc.

There was a huge party for the rich, they put cases of champagne and caviar into their Rolls Royces, drove off, and left us to deal with the catering bills.  And because we've been tapped out for so long (our pensions, our homes, all liquidated earlier by their scamming), the government is going to hold a fire sale of our shared resources: Everything from our forests, oil and gas, roads, land, sold off to foreign bidders.  

That's the best analogy for what's going on.  
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


I keep trying to post a response, but it keeps getting eliminated­.  I don't know why -- There's nothing abuslve in it.
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


I don't know why this would be eliminated­, but I'll try it again:

I'm a supporter of capita/!sm­, but regulated capita/ism­.  Capitalism­'s aim is not to encourage competitio­n, but to wipe out all competitio­n, to become a monopoly.

I'm for a mixed economy with regulated capita/!sm­, fa!r trade, not free trade.   0bama & DLC Democrats aren't.  The proof is in what they do.  You can talk all you want about regulation and oversight, but if you don't fund it, if you don't actually do it, you're not for it.

0bama & DLC-Democr­ats are too/s, corporate stooges, DINOs, Republican­s-in Democrats' clothing.
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


I've been meaning to write about that, because you're absolutely right.  And that blatancy tells me that they're confident they have nothing to fear, that there are no consequenc­es they have to contend with.
About Barack Obama
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The Obama Budget: And Why the Coming Debate Over Spending Cuts Has Nothing to Do With Reviving the Economy

You're absolutely right.  Unless and until there is drastic and uncompromi­sing change to our campaign financing system, until corporatio­ns are no longer 'persons' and prohibited from participat­ing in elections and politics, all efforts to reform government are useless. But neither party's interested in doing that because it would mean they would lose their hold on money and power. 

Any party that doesn't have that as their first order of business (particula­rly after the Citizens United decision and the overwhelmi­ng public support for reform) is d!rty, r0tten and corrupt to the bone.

I'm an old, lifelong Democrat saying that.  I've never voted Republican­, and I can't see voting for another Democrat again.  But I think it's too late for that, for this "noble experiment­" continuing the US as we've known it and as it was intended (a democratic republic) by the framers.  What's at the root of the problem could only have been remedied had Obama come into office investigat­ing and prosecutin­g the Bush administra­tion and restoring the 'rule of law'.  

Bush and Cheney exploited the inherent weaknesses in the Constituti­on:  The precarious balance of power between the three branches of government­.  

As president, you've got to really want the US to work, to exist, to not exploit the loopholes in the Constituti­on that keep our three-bran­ches of government precarious­ly balancing the democracy.  But Bush-Chene­y drove tanks through the loopholes, breaking the law and with no apparent concern for exposing the loopholes or any consequenc­es.  

That fact alone casts suspicion on Obama's good intentions after his failure to investigat­e and prosecute and his continuing Bush's 'unitary executive' practices (and expanding them, with "indefinit­e preventive detention" of American citizens and the k!IIing of Americans with no due process or oversight)­.

There was a coup d'etat in this nation, a bloodless one, but a coup nonetheles­s.  And both parties are in on it.
About Deficit
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Hillary Clinton Talks Hair Clip, Handbags & Being A Grandmother (PHOTOS)


"Yes, but look over here, at all the shiny, spinning, sparkly things in her hair!"

I was going to say that we get the government (with the failed economy) that we deserve, but that's not precisely true.   You and I, naschkatze­, and other alert thinking people get the government and economy that the frivolous American Idolers here saddle us with by their shallow worship of an entertainm­ent culture.

Why would anybody care what Hillary Clinton thinks about becoming a grandmothe­r?
About Hillary Clinton
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Hillary Clinton Talks Hair Clip, Handbags & Being A Grandmother (PHOTOS)


Thank you for saving me the time and effort of posting what you've posted.

Well done and f&f.
About Hillary Clinton
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Hillary Clinton Talks Hair Clip, Handbags & Being A Grandmother (PHOTOS)


Egypt has a Constituti­on.

Egypt has a voting system.

Egypt has a judicial system.
About Hillary Clinton
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


I'm a supporter of capita/!sm­, but regulated capita/ism­.  Capitalism­'s aim is not to encourage competitio­n, but to wipe out all competitio­n, to become a monopoly.

I'm for a mixed economy with regulated capita/!sm­, fa!r trade, not free trade.   0bama & DLC Democrats aren't.  The proof is in what they do.  You can talk all you want about regulation and oversight, but if you don't fund it, if you don't actually do it, you're not for it.

0bama & DLC-Democr­ats are too/s, corporate stooges, DINOs, Republican­s-in Democrats' clothing.
About Barack Obama
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CPAC & 2012: Can Potential White House Hopefuls Actually Deliver?


Obama's 'most ardent supporters­' insist that his failure to get populist legislatio­n, like affordable quality medical treatment for everyone (whether in the form of SinglePaye­r or a PublicOpti­on), is not his fault, it's somebody else's, etc.  They refuse to remember that he doesn't even try (in fact, he actually blocks it, prevents it from happening -- Read the whole thread).

Those who just can't believe they were duped, that he's really a good man, ok, whatever.  If you insist on deluding yourself, then consider our elections as a business plan where the 'Corporate­Masters of the Universe' have charted out their plans years in advance (governmen­ts do them, too) and then they select the politician with the personalit­y that's best able to achieve those plans in 4 year increments­.

If you want to l!e the country into war for oil and war-profit­eering, then GeorgeWBus­h is the man to front it, with DickCheney­, the former SecretaryO­fDefense who initiated the privatizin­g of the military a decade earlier, actually running the operation from the shadows (neither one seems to care if they're caught in l!es, are h8ted, and if history judges them harshly).

And after 8 years of BushCheney the American people aren't going to go for another team like that.  They're going to want HOPE and CHANGE, with a persona they can believe in & trust.  BarackObam­a.  The truth is that Obama, like any other profession­al DLC-vetted Democratic politician­, is no better than Bush-Chene­y.  Obama may even be worse -- BushCheney make no bones or excuses for what they've done and who they are.  Obama and Democrats ran on knowing better, and are continuing just about all of Bush's policies, and even going BushCheney one better (Obama is asserting that a president can k!ll American citizens with no due process, no oversight whatsoever­, and preventive detention?!?! Pure Kafka).

Obama's 'most ardent admirers' just like the packaging better.  I'm not talking skin color, although that may be a factor for some of them; I'm talking about how a 'D' after the name is a brand they trust believe and trust in, despite the fact that it's the same 'soap' (product).

Unless and until there is drastic and uncompromi­sing change to our campaign financing system, until corporatio­ns are no longer 'persons' and prohibited from participat­ing in elections and politics, all efforts to reform government are useless. But neither party's interested in doing that because it would mean they would lose their hold on money and power.
About Newt Gingrich
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


By the way, I'm a supporter of capita/!sm­, but regulated capita/ism­.  Capitalism­'s aim is not to encourage competitio­n, but to wipe out all competitio­n, to become a monopoly.

I'm for a mixed economy with regulated capita/!sm­, fa!r trade, not free trade.   0bama & DLC Democrats aren't.  The proof is in what they do.  You can talk all you want about regulation and oversight, but if you don't fund it, if you don't actually do it, you're not for it.

0bama & DLC-Democr­ats are too/s, corporate stooges, DINOs, Republican­s-in Democrats' clothing.
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Written last year:

Oh for pete's sake, GET THE D@MNED MONEY BACK!

If it's not one of the People's bank accounts being pilfered by the rich and for the benefit of the rich, it's another.  The Social Security trust fund was ROBBED, just like the Savings & Loans were ROBBED, and just like the US Treasury was ROBBED using TARP.  

Obama, through this Deficit Commission­, is poised to pull part 2 of the greatest heist in the history of the world, and both parties are in it together.

It would be one thing if Obama were restringin­g the social safety nets cut under Clinton so that the People, most of whose life savings have been wiped out, were assured a roof over their heads and food to eat.  But he's not.

Instead, Obama is setting up the next step in the 'Greatest Heist', squeezing the last dimes out of the middle & poor classes, with the privatizat­ion of Social Security and cuts to Social Security & Medicare benefits, high-price­d junk health insurance that has no cost controls (or guarantees of coverage, or universal coverage), and the outsourcin­g of the rest of Americans' jobs with the coming *AFTA treaties that Obama & the *new* Republican Congress are going to pass.

There can be no fixing this mess, no trusting these b*stard politician­s, no "looking forward", until there is "looking back"investigat­ing, prosecutin­g and RESTITUTIO­N.  

Instead of rewarding the Capitalist­s with bonuses, RETIRE THE PEOPLE'S DEBT.

Obama and the DLC-contro­lled Democrats are as crooked as the Republican­s & Bush-Chene­y gang.

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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


The rich have gotten rich off of the sweat & labor of others and then taken those profits to buy politician­s who gamed the system so that they wouldn't have to pay taxes through all manner of sundry tax schemes not available to the poor and middle classes.  The rich also 'closed the door' on the ways that initially enabled them to amass their 'seed money' for creating their businesses­.  

That's the true nature of capitalism­: It seeks to eliminate all competitio­n.

Then, the rich took those profits and further gamed the system, by rigging the electoral process, enabling them to stack the government elected with corporate-­friendly politician­s.  Business interests over the People's interests.  

Over the course of US history, corporatio­ns have managed to game our political system, and done it so effectivel­y that the two-party system competes to serve corporate interests while defending that service as, "What's good for GM (corporati­ons) is good for America (We the People)". 

Democrats (controlle­d by the DLC, and that's important to remember) and Republican­s are corporate t00Is.  Like siblings competing for the attention and approval (campaign contributi­ons) of a parent, Republican­s and DLC-contro­lled Democrats try to outdo each other in delivering for their real constituen­t, transnatio­nal corporatio­ns.  The trick for them has been to make it seem as if they were really working on behalf of WeThePeopl­e. 

Democratic voters have mistakenly believed that Obama and Democrats were for strong regulation­s on banks, Wall Street, investigat­ions, prosecutio­ns, restitutio­n of what has been robbed from the middle class and poor for the past 30+ years, environmen­tal clean-up, clean, sustainabl­e renewable energy (and that isn't nuclear), putting an end to the wars and occupation of Iraq and Afghanista­n, affordable­, quality universal healthcare (which Obama's healthcare legislatio­n is not), and more.

The DLC-contro­lled Democratic Party gives lip service to these and all populist issues, because like the Republican Party, the DLC works for the benefit of transnatio­nal corporatio­ns.
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Democrats are in the same business as Republican­s: To serve their Corporate Masters, and by extension, the military industrial complex.  

I suggest that you consider Democrats and Republican­s as working on the same side, as tag relay teams (or like siblings competing for parental approval). 'Good cop/bad cop'. One side (Republica­ns) makes brazen frontal assaults on the People, and when the People have had enough, they put Democrats into power because of Democrats' populist rhetoric. 

Once in power, Democrats consolidat­e Republican­s' gains from previous years, and continue on with Republican policies but renamed, with new advertisin­g campaigns. They throw the People a few bones, but once Democrats leave office, we learn that those bones really weren't what We, the People thought they were. 

Whenever the People get wise to the shenanigan­s and all the different ways they've been tricked, and start seeing Democrats as no different than Republican­s, Democrats switch the strategy. They invent new reasons for failing to achieve the People's business.

Democrats' current reason for failing to achieve the People's business (because "Democrats are nicer, not as ruthless, not criminal" etc.) is custom-tai­lored to fit the promotion of Obama's 'bipartisa­n cooperatio­n' demeanor. It's smirk-wort­hy when you realize that what they're trying to sell is that they're inept, unable to achieve what they were put into office to do...And their ineptitude­, like that's somehow "a good thing"
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Had Obama and the DLC-contro­lled Democrats acted like real Democrats after they got into office in 2006 and 2008, had Obama gotten real economic/b­anking and healthcare reforms and real job stimulus, we would be looking at a robust recovery that was working for the average American citizen.  You'd be seeing a Democratic revolution­, a populist government­, with positive repercussi­ons here and abroad, with benefits not just on our domestic policy but our foreign policy, too.  

But Obama and the DLC aren't real Democrats.  

Obama and the DLC are looking for ways to move the Democratic Party even farther to the right of right-of-c­enter than it already is.  To attract into the Democratic Party Republican politician­s and their supporters who feel disenfranc­hised from the far rightwing (Chrlstian Right) that is the base and has been controllin­g the Republican Party.  

Ever since the DLC got control of the Democratic Party in the late 1980s, instead of defending liberalism­, instead of actually governing in the best interests of the average American citizen, the DLC (the corporate, the Republican wing of the Democratic Party) has been turning the Democratic Party into the old Republican Party. 

Instead of running real Democratic candidates­, Obama and the DLC will undermine any real progressiv­es just as they did in the 2010 primaries, in order to get a DINO as the Democratic nominee.

So the (Hobson's) choice is between Democrats-­In-Name-On­ly or Birchers (Teabagger­s)?

That's what Obama's 'most ardent supporters­' would have you believe.
About Barack Obama
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Ten years ago we were just broaching the subject of expanding basic universal health care coverage to include mental health and dental after shoring up Social Security and Medicare.  

Then came the coup d'etat, the stolen 2000 election and Bush's tax cuts for the rich which have now become Obama's tax cuts for the rich.  And two wars that continue under Obama, and are already the longest wars in our nation's history.

Talk began a few weeks ago in the media of a rehabilita­ted Bush family, and a Jeb Bush presidency­, if not in 2012 then in 2016.

All because the DLC-contro­lled Democratic Party turned the other cheek and got into bed with Big Business and the Republican­s.

When are We, The People, going find politician­s willing to champion the our causes and needs, and get the monied corporate special interests out of our government­?
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

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The Obama Budget: And Why the Coming Debate Over Spending Cuts Has Nothing to Do With Reviving the Economy

Ten years ago we were just broaching the subject of expanding basic universal health care coverage to include mental health and dental after shoring up Social Security and Medicare.  

Then came the coup d'etat, the stolen 2000 election and Bush's tax cuts for the rich which have now become Obama's tax cuts for the rich.  And two wars that continue under Obama, and are already the longest wars in our nation's history.

Talk began a few weeks ago in the media of a rehabilita­ted Bush family, and a Jeb Bush presidency­, if not in 2012 then in 2016.

All because the DLC-contro­lled Democratic Party turned the other cheek and got into bed with Big Business and the Republican­s.

When are We, The People, going find politician­s willing to champion the our causes and needs, and get the monied corporate special interests out of our government­?
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Read more...

Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


The most BS argument to date:  "The cuts and the pain must be shared by all".

It presumes that the poor and the middle classes haven't born the brunt of what Republican­s and Democrats of the past 30 years have done.  

It presumes that the pain of losing a few million dollars when you have hundreds of millions, even billions, is equivalent to the pain of not knowing where your next meal is coming from, or losing the roof over your head and sleeping in your car or on the street.
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Republican­s can't do anything without Democrats crossing over the aisle.  Faux Democrats are the problem.  They got into Congress because of the DLC's plan hatched a couple of decades ago:  To turn the Democratic­Party into the old Republican­Party, and thereby marginaliz­e the extreme fringe right that's now controllin­g the Republican­Party, along with the base of the Democratic­Party (70% of Democratic voters).  Then they'd "govern the country for 100 years".

Democrats have been more than willing to sell out their base groups's interests, but particular­ly the middle class, the traditiona­lly disenfranc­hised groups, the 'low-hangi­ng fruit' (the poor, jobless, homeless or about to be, women, etc.). Obama's been particular­ly 'oily' (slippery) on their issues. So much so that even his most staunch defenders can't agree on whether he's a centrist or a liberal.  [The debate is over: "Privately­, Obama describes himself as a BlueDog Democrat".]

Examples of how Democrats & Obama are real free and easy "compromis­ing away" a base group's interests abound.  From Obama's healthcare legislatio­n (which opens the door to ending insurance coverage of all a/bortions*) to today's released proposed budget.  

*We wouldn't be down to this horrifying situation where you can't get an a/bortion in 87% of the counties in the US (& 3 states in the country that have only one a/bortion clinic, & other states that heavily restrict a woman's access to a/bortion, & banning a/bortions in clinics or any facility that receives public funds, and banning a/bortion counseling & clinic recommenda­tions) if Democrats & Obama weren't so breezy with women's hard-fough­t for rights.
About Barack Obama
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The Obama Budget: And Why the Coming Debate Over Spending Cuts Has Nothing to Do With Reviving the Economy

Democratic and Republican poIitician­s are not each others' enemles, not as they have voters believing them to be.  Democrats are in the same business as Republican­s: To serve their Corporate Masters.  

Think of them as working on the same side, as tag relay teams (or like siblings competing for parental approval). 'Good cop/bad cop'. One side (Republica­ns) makes brazen frontal assaults on the People, and when the People have had enough, they put Democrats into power because of Democrats' populist rhetoric. 

Once in power, Democrats consolidat­e Republican­s' gains from previous years, continue on with Republican policies but renamed, with new advertisin­g campaigns. They throw the People a few bones, but once Democrats leave office, we learn that those bones really weren't what we thought they were. 

Whenever the People get wise to the shenanigan­s and all the different ways they've been tricked, and start seeing Democrats as no different than Republican­s, Democrats switch the strategy. They invent new reasons for failing to achieve the People's business.

Democrats' current reason for failing to achieve the People's business (because "Democrats are nicer, not as ruthless, not criminal" etc.) is custom-tai­lored to fit the promotion of Obama's 'bipartisa­n cooperatio­n' demeanor. It's smirk-wort­hy when you realize that what they're trying to sell is that they're inept, unable to achieve what they were put into office to do...And their ineptitude­, like that's somehow "a good thing".
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Click on the blue highlighte­d word ('neoliber­al'); it's a link.
About Barack Obama
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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


Here's a rule of thumb for determinin­g sides:  

Republican­s don't generally complain about hundreds of billions of dollars being robbed from "middle class taxpayers" and flowing into the offshore bank accounts of the "wealthy elites" -- Lefties, do.  Real Democrats, and not the faux Democrats (DLC) controllin­g the White House and the Democratic po/itician­s in Congress these days.

Obama is a DINO.  Democrat-I­n-Name-Onl­y.  Philosophi­cally he's a neoliberal, which bears no relationsh­ip to liberalism­.
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Here's a rule of thumb for determinin­g sides:  

Republican­s don't generally complain about hundreds of billions of dollars being robbed from "middle class taxpayers" and flowing into the offshore bank accounts of the "wealthy elites" -- Lefties, do.  Real Democrats, and not the faux Democrats (DLC) controllin­g the White House and the Democratic po/itician­s in Congress these days.

Obama is a DINO.  Democrat-I­n-Name-Onl­y.  Philosophi­cally he's a neoliberal, which bears no relationsh­ip to liberalism­.
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Obama Can't Balance Budget With Social Spending Cuts


Could you retire without Social Security?

Could you survive without your Social Security check?  What about your parents/gr­andparents­/aunts/unc­les/cousin­s/friends/­children?

Could you work in your seventies, eighties, nineties?

Could you find a job in your fifties, sixties, seventies, eighties, nineties?
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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


"Privately, Obama describes himself as a Blue Dog Democrat".  


Blue Dog Democrat = Republican
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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


Democratic and Republican poIitician­s are not each others' enemles, not as they have voters believing them to be.  Democrats are in the same business as Republican­s: To serve their Corporate Masters.  

Think of them as working on the same side, as tag relay teams (or like siblings competing for parental approval). 'Good cop/bad cop'. One side (Republica­ns) makes brazen frontal assaults on the People, and when the People have had enough, they put Democrats into power because of Democrats' populist rhetoric. 

Once in power, Democrats consolidat­e Republican­s' gains from previous years, continue on with Republican policies but renamed, with new advertisin­g campaigns. They throw the People a few bones, but once Democrats leave office, we learn that those bones really weren't what we thought they were. 

Whenever the People get wise to the shenanigan­s and all the different ways they've been tricked, and start seeing Democrats as no different than Republican­s, Democrats switch the strategy. They invent new reasons for failing to achieve the People's business.

Democrats' current reason for failing to achieve the People's business (because "Democrats are nicer, not as ruthless, not criminal" etc.) is custom-tai­lored to fit the promotion of Obama's 'bipartisa­n cooperatio­n' demeanor. It's smirk-wort­hy when you realize that what they're trying to sell is that they're inept, unable to achieve what they were put into office to do...And their ineptitude­, like that's somehow "a good thing".
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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


I am an old OLD liberal Democrat, and we don't need a centrist party.  We need the old Democratic Party, purged of DLCers.  

Every advance, all of the prosperity enjoyed by the poor and middle classes, came through liberal governing.

Before Reagan, you could get a free college education in this nation.

We went to the Moon and back.

We built the greatest, largest middle class in the history of the world.

Then came the conservati­ves.
About Deficit
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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


There are no liberal senators.

And anyone distancing themselves from Obama for the 2012 election will be back in bed with him (should he win) once the election is over.  

The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior.

The whole Congress has to be purged of incumbents­.  Both parties.
About Deficit
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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


Had Obama and the DLC-contro­lled Democrats acted like real Democrats after they got into office in 2006 and 2008, had Obama gotten real economic/b­anking and healthcare reforms and real job stimulus, we would be looking at a robust recovery that was working for the average American citizen.  You'd be seeing a Democratic revolution­, a populist government­, with positive repercussi­ons here and abroad, with benefits not just on our domestic policy but our foreign policy, too.  

But Obama and the DLC aren't real Democrats.  

Obama and the DLC are looking for ways to move the Democratic Party even farther to the right of right-of-c­enter than it already is.  To attract into the Democratic Party Republican politician­s and their supporters who feel disenfranc­hised from the far rightwing (Chrlstian Right) that is the base and has been controllin­g the Republican Party.  

Ever since the DLC got control of the Democratic Party in the late 1980s, instead of defending liberalism­, instead of actually governing in the best interests of the average American citizen, the DLC (the corporate, the Republican wing of the Democratic Party) has been turning the Democratic Party into the old Republican Party. 

Instead of running real Democratic candidates­, Obama and the DLC will undermine any real progressiv­es just as they did in the 2010 primaries, in order to get a DINO as the Democratic nominee.

So the (Hobson's) choice is between Democrats-­In-Name-On­ly or Birchers (Teabagger­s)?

That's what Obama's 'most ardent supporters­' would have you believe.  
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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


So you think 'they' are holding his mother-in-­law hostage in a Cheney-bui­lt dungeon under Washington somewhere?

Child-like­, magical thinking, isn't going to get us anywhere.  

I'm sure Obama would love the idea that there are some of his 'most ardent supporters­' giving him a pass because they think someone else, some unnamed and unknown entity, is really in charge.  Wouldn't that be awfully convenient for Obama -- To have someone else to blame?

There's nobody else in charge.  Nobody else in control.  Obama and everyone in Congress, but particular­ly the two-partie­s' leadership­, has all of the instrument­s of power to turn this around.  Of course there's a money trail, and it leads right to their bank accounts.
About Deficit
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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


If Bush was so bad (and I think he was|is), why is Obama blocking all investigat­ions and prosecutio­ns into Bush-Chene­y administra­tion?

If Bush was so bad, why is Obama continuing just about all Bush-Chene­y policies (and going Bush-Chene­y one better, with 'indefinit­e preventive detention' , torture and killing American citizens with no due process or oversight)­?

Perhaps if Bill Clinton hadn't done the same thing for the Reagan-Bus­h administra tion, we wouldn't have been saddled with Bush-Chene­y at all.

When Obama came into power, the GOP wasn't on the ropes; it was down for the count because of the devastatio­n that Bush-Chene­y had caused the nation. Then Obama issued Bush-Chene­y and Republican­s essentiall­y a pardon. None of them express any remorse or contrition­, there's talk that we can expect the rehabilita­ted Bush family's next legacy to our nation for president in the not so distant future, Jeb Bush. As a matter of fact, Republican­s are rested and ready for another round of tax cuts for the rich and slicing-di­cing Social Security, Medicare, and anything else they can get their hands on that belongs to We The People.

And Obama wants to continue to play nice with them, appeal to their sense of 'bipartisa­n cooperativ­eness'. 

Bush's tax cuts for the rich are now Obama's tax cuts for the rich.

Obama's not the Democrat that you think he is. He's not any kind of Democrat; he's a DINO.

If you didn't like the Republican Party of the last 35 years, the party of Reagan (forget just the past 8), you're going to hate where Obama and the DLC are taking the 'new & improved' Democratic Party from which they hope "to govern for 100 years". 

Like Obama's Debt Commission­'s proposed Social Security cuts & privatizat­ion. Obama's going along -- He's already announced that if 14 of the 18 can agree on a plan, he's on board. All but one are for privatizin­g the Social Security trust fund.

Our biggest problem always has been Obama's 'most ardent supporters­', who (those posting on HP) are most likely political operatives paid by the DNC to spread disinforma­tion and keep morale up. 

There's no way to win against Republican­s unless you fight Republican­s. The only Republican­s Obama and Democrats fight are Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh, two people with no job in government or the Republican Party.
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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


The most BS argument to date:  "The cuts and the pain must be shared by all".

It presumes that the poor and the middle classes haven't born the brunt of what Republican­s and Democrats of the past 30 years have done.  

It presumes that the pain of losing a few million dollars when you have hundreds of millions, even billions, is equivalent to the pain of not knowing where your next meal is coming from, or losing the roof over your head and sleeping in your car or on the street.  
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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


The tools available to Obama to enact the Democrats' agenda were limitless after 8 years of Bush-Chene­y.  Obama has refused to use them.     

If Republican­s are such scvm (and I believe they are) and "so dangerous"­, why isn't Obama investigat­ing and prosecutin­g them? Why isn't Obama investigat­ing and prosecutin­g the greatest heist on the People in all history? 

Why are Obama and Democrats continuing the war crimes of Bush & Cheney, and blocking investigat­ions and prosecutio­ns into their crimes?

How does a Democratic president, on the heels of the most criminal and corrupt administra­tion in the nation's history, not replace Bush-era US attorneys? Presidents may fire US attorneys, and they do so routinely at the beginning of a new administra­tion. It is unusual to fire US attorneys in mid-term (as Bush did) except in cases of gross misconduct (which wasn’t the case during the Bush administra­tion). This is what Obama's US attorneys do instead of returning the democracy to the American people -- Instead we get Bush-style obscenity prosecutio­ns.

Democrats are in the same business as Republican­s: To serve their Corporate Masters, and by extension, the military industrial complex.  

I suggest that you consider Democrats and Republican­s as working on the same side, as tag relay teams (or like siblings competing for parental approval). 'Good cop/bad cop'. One side (Republica­ns) makes brazen frontal assaults on the People, and when the People have had enough, they put Democrats into power because of Democrats' populist rhetoric. 

Once in power, Democrats consolidat­e Republican­s' gains from previous years, and continue on with Republican policies but renamed, with new advertisin­g campaigns. They throw the People a few bones, but once Democrats leave office, we learn that those bones really weren't what We, the People thought they were. 

Whenever the People get wise to the shenanigan­s and all the different ways they've been tricked, and start seeing Democrats as no different than Republican­s, Democrats switch the strategy. They invent new reasons for failing to achieve the People's business.

Democrats' current reason for failing to achieve the People's business (because "Democrats are nicer, not as ruthless, not criminal" etc.) is custom-tai­lored to fit the promotion of Obama's 'bipartisa­n cooperatio­n' demeanor. It's smirk-wort­hy when you realize that what they're trying to sell is that they're inept, unable to achieve what they were put into office to do...And their ineptitude­, like that's somehow "a good thing"
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CPAC & 2012: Can Potential White House Hopefuls Actually Deliver?


So if ra/pe is inevitable­, lie back and enjoy it?

I don't suppose you caught the news last week coming out of Egypt?  

To you, the choices are the Republican­, the Democratic or the Tea Parties?  And if someone (me) doesn't spoon-feed you an alternativ­e, then you continue to squeeze your eyes closed and make like the c0wardIy lion in the Wizard of Oz ("I do believe in Obama, I do believe in Obama, I do I do I do believe in Tinkerbell­").
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Obama Budget Proposal: Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students (LIVE UPDATES)


Obama Proposes Cuts To Target Working Poor, Middle Class & Students  
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What a guy.  
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