Spintested: 06/26/11

Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

Sunday, June 26, 2011

Americans need to elect progressive Democrats.

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Obama and the DLC worked their butts off to PREVENT more progressives/liberals from getting elected and suppress Democratic voter turnout in the 2010 midterms.

Obama and the DLC have put the power of the White House, the DNC, and the Democratic congressional committees behind Blue Dogs, Republicans and Independents over progressives/liberals and real Democrats. Some, but not all, examples:

Blue Dog Blanche Lincoln over progressive Democrat Lt. Governor Bill Halter.

Republican-turned-Independent Arlen Specter over progressive Democrat Joe Sestak.

Republican-turned-Independent Lincoln Chaffee over Democrat Frank Caprio (which, in turn, is an effective endorsement of the Republican John Loughlin over Democrat David Cicilline for the congressional seat Democrat Patrick Kennedy is retiring from, and all of the other seats up for grab in Rhode Island).

Republican-turned-Independent Charlie Crist over liberal Democrat Kendrick Meek.

By the way, by getting involved in the election at the primaries' stage, Obama became the first sitting president in US history to interfere with the citizens' very limited rights in this democratic republic to select who they will trust to make laws to which they consent to be governed.

Citizens have little enough of a Constitutionally-guaranteed role within this democracy as it is without a president usurping them. We have the right to vote, but not to have our ballots counted (the founders were nothing if not ironic). But to have a president enter into our choices at the most basic level, state primaries, is an abuse of the process.

Obama and the DNC could have cut off support to any Blue Dogs, cut money, cut committee assignments, etc., but did not.

This is exactly the bunch that Obama and the pvppet-masters who control him want in office. On both sides of the aisle. Obama, Ds & Rs in office, working on behalf of transnational corporations.
About Nancy Pelosi
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Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

Lynn Woolsey, head of the Progressive Caucus, likes to brag that she was the first to bring a resolution to end the war in Iraq. She, congressional Democrats, and Obama all ran on ending the practice of paying for the wars through supplemental emergency spending bills, and putting the wars on budget (see why that is significant here).

Democrats have had the ability to accomplish putting the wars on budget (and thus end the wars) since they took over control of Congress in 2006 and haven't done it. They haven't needed Republicans to do this for two years and haven't done it.

As the head of the Progressive Caucus, Lynn Woolsey led 79 of the 82 members of the caucus to pledge that they would not vote for any healthcare reform legislation that didn't include a public option.
Woolsey then led the 79 to renege on the pledge.

Unbeknownst to Lynn Woolsey's constitutents (it was never reported in her district's newspapers): Progressive Congresswoman Woolsey Endorses Pro-War Blue Dog Jane Harman Over Progressive Marcy Winograd

Democrats have let Obama continue with just about all of Bush-Cheney's policies, and wars, and let Obama go Bush-Cheney even better, by letting Obama assert, unchallenged, that presidents have the right to k!ll Americans with no due process or oversight, push for 'preventive detention' and no transparency of anything a president asserts should be his secret.

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About Nancy Pelosi
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Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

There is plenty that a President and a Speaker of the House and a Senate Majority Leader can do to pressure representatives and senators into voting as you want them to vote. We saw that Obama had no problem doing it when he wanted and needed Blue Dogs like Ben Nelson and Mary Landrieu's votes -- He literally bought them.

There is nothing that the Blue Dogs are doing that Obama and the DLC doesn't want them to do.

Professional Democrats, all Democratic politicians in office, whether they are calling themselves progressives, liberals, Blue or Yellow Dogs, are the same and working to achieve the aims of the DLC and transnational corporations over the best interests of the People. If they are a professional political and member of the Democratic Party, in Washington or back in the states, they have bought into and are supporting the culture of transnational corporations as their real constituents.

Their only problem with this is that corporations don't vote, and politicians need votes to get into office. So they, Democratic politicians, try to convince the People they're working on our behalf with weasel-words, rhetoric designed to lead voters into thinking one thing when the opposite is true. Obama can say, "I tried to do it, but those mean/crazy Republicans wouldn't let me."

Democrats in both chambers of Congress work as a team. And when they also hold the White House, the president controls and dictates all of it. They identify what they hope to achieve (pro-corporate legislation) and then strategize how to get it while saving each other's hides with constituents come election time. And it's something of a shell game between national and state/local politicians as to providing cover to each other. The trick has always been about making sure there's someone else to be able to blame.

Democratic politicians in liberal districts are the worst. If their votes are needed to cross over and k!ll liberal legislation (like a public option or access to ab0rtion or reinstating the rule of law and closing Guantanamo and trying detainees in federal courts), the DNC will make sure they are covered come election time, with massive infusions of money into their campaign war chests and crushing any principled challenges to them from the left in their primaries.

Here's an example of how they tag-team us:

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About Nancy Pelosi
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Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

Learn to use language accurately, billyboy:

spam: 1. Irrelevant or inappropriate messages sent on the internet.
2. Junk e-mail, usually of a commercial nature

'Spam' is NOT the posting of comments and opinions with which you disagree. Nor does 'spam' refer to the length of a comment. If you can't focus your attention long enough to read a few paragraphs, you couldn't possibly have an informed opinion on issues.

By the way, your comments are against the comment policy. Read the guidelines here.
About Nancy Pelosi
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Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/social/Marcospinelli/pelosi-republicans-incumbents-economy_n_884708_94389448.html
About Nancy Pelosi
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Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

This same old chant of "oh the Democrats are just as bad as the Republicans" is getting booooooriiiiing.

=======================================

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-Democrats continuing the war crimes of BushCheney, blocking investigations and prosecutions into their crimes?

We have Obama-Democrats to thank for the resurrection of Republicans. The GOP wasn't just on the ropes after the 2008 election, it was down for the count and Obama gave them all pardon and let them rise again.

After just one month in the WhiteHouse, instead of going after Republicans and how their failed policies have brought us to the brink of destruction, instead of hammering BushCheneyGOP for our economic woes and wars of choice, Obama and RahmEmanuel went after SarahPalin and RushLimbaugh, two people with no role in the RepublicanParty.

Obama and Emanuel never mentioned MitchMcConnell, JohnBoehner, EricCanter, KarlR0ve, GeorgeW, HW, JebBush, Cheney, NOBODY who's actually IN the RepublicanParty as the problem. Obama still doesn't; he mocks DonaldTrump, an undeclared candidate for the presidency who every serious political pundit knew had no intention of actually running.

How does a Democratic president, on the heels of the most criminally 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 BushAdministration). Instead of returning the democracy to the American people, Obama's AttorneyGeneral has US attorneys going after legalized medicinal marijuana in the states and Bush-style obscenity prosecutions:

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/s_691667.html

Obama's continuing just about all of the BushCheney policies, even going BushCo one better: How do any of Obama's 'most ardent supporters' explain Obama's doctrine that presidents have the right to k!ll American citizens with no due process, no oversight, and his push for 'indefinite preventive detention' and no transparency of anything a president asserts should be his secret? Pure Kafka.

As a Democrat, I don't know how any Democrat can get behind this. How do Obama's 'most ardent supporters' explain all that to themselves?
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

Then there's Lynn Woolsey, head of the Progressive Caucus, likes to brag that she was the first to bring a resolution to end the war in Iraq. She, and congressional Democrats, and Obama, ran on ending the practice of paying for the wars through supplemental emergency spending bills, and putting the wars on budget (see why that is significant here).

Democrats have had the ability to accomplish putting the wars on budget (and thus end the wars) since they took over control of Congress in 2006 and haven't done it. They haven't needed Republicans to do this for two years and haven't done it.

As the head of the Progressive Caucus, Lynn Woolsey led 79 of the 82 members of the caucus to pledge that they would not vote for any healthcare reform legislation that didn't include a public option.

Woolsey then led the 79 to renege on the pledge.

Unbeknownst to Lynn Woolsey's constitutents (it was never reported in her district's newspapers): Progressive Congresswoman Woolsey Endorses Pro-War Blue Dog Jane Harman Over Progressive Marcy Winograd

Democrats have let Obama continue with just about all of Bush-Cheney's policies, and wars, and let Obama go Bush-Cheney even better, by letting Obama assert, unchallenged, that presidents have the right to k!ll Americans with no due process or oversight, push for 'preventive detention' and no transparency of anything a president asserts should be his secret.

Democrats have abdicated their Constitutionally-required role of oversight of the executive branch; they failed to perform it during the Bush-Cheney administration, and still don't with one of their own in the White House.

Shall I go on?
About Nancy Pelosi
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Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

Then there's the Indian gaming industry and BarbaraBoxer. Few know of Boxer's cozy relationship with the Indian gaming industry (Indian gaming is spun by pro-corporate Democrats as great for the People, both native Americans and patrons, but in truth it's an underbelly industry where the People aren't getting rich, only the corporate non-Indian partners) and the conflict of interest her support creates. Her son is in partnership with Indian casino development. Both Boxer and DianneFeinstein worked to get Indian casinos into California -- Not a good thing; they're exempt from state & federal laws, wreak havoc environmentally, financially & socially on the communities they're in and around.
http://articles.sfgate.com/2003-05-11/bay-area/17489097_1_casino-development-indian-casinos-southern-sonoma-county-pomos
http://www.cfspm.org/files/QuickSiteImages/Jackpot_-_A_short_history_of_Bay_Area_Gaming_Efforts_and_Influencers.doc

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About Nancy Pelosi
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Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

Even the most pro-choice of Democrats in Congress, alleged stalwarts who've spent entire careers, decades in public office, have failed miserably to protect women's rights and have let it get to this point. One example would be Barbara Boxer.

In 2006, Democratic senators and the Democratic machine publicly supported Democratic candidate NedLamont who was running for senator in Connecticut against newly independent JoeLieberman. Privately, working behind-the-scenes, Democratic senators and former president BillClinton were working to help Lieberman raise money to beat Lamont, and Republican AlanSchlesinger. Before Lamont won the primary, when Lieberman was still a Democrat, Boxer stumped for Lieberman. She was asked how she could support him given that Lieberman supports hospitals receiving public monies refusing to give contraceptives to r@pe victims, and instead of dodging Lieberman, dropping him like the bad character he is, she dodged the issue.

During the Bush-Cheney administration, she wrote two murder mysteries, because "It was always something I wanted to do if I had the time."

In the 2010 midterm campaign, I asked rhetorically, "If Republicans win back control of Congress, do you think Democrats will be as effective at stymieing Republicans' agenda as Republicans have been the last two years at stymieing Obama's/Democrats' 2008 agenda?" If what Democratic politicians did during the BushCheney years is any indication, no. Let's look at some of the alleged champions of liberals' issues.

BarbaraBoxer has been a terrible champion of liberal issues, but only those paying attention know this.

For example, as a member of Congress, you can't just be for or against something (like abortion) when it comes up for a vote. You have to be meticulous and actively work to set up the conditions surrounding your vote, to make sure it counts. Your 'yes' vote means nothing if there are more 'no' votes to cancel your vote/voice out.

Knowing that, what did Boxer do the entire 8 years of the BushAdministration? She effectively went on sabbatical. She wrote murder mysteries ("Something I always wanted to do, if I ever had the time"). She, of course, took her senatorial salary all those years.

Boxer's support of JoeLieberman in 2006 exposed Boxer's very 'conditional' support of a woman's right to choose (and her general level of ignorance)
http://firedoglake.com/2006/07/24/the-boxer-meltdown/

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About Nancy Pelosi
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Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

Pro-choice doesn't mean you can be anti-ab0rtlon. It doesn't mean you can be anti-ab0rtlon as long as you keep your mouth shut. You can't have anti-choice politicians in the Democratic Party, receiving money and support from the Democratic Party's members and the party's machinery. Yet just about all professional Democratic politicians want to make the Democratic Party hospitable to anti-choice people (and all 'other siders' of the Democratic Party's different special interest groups) , as noted in this article from 12/04.

The only way to do that is for the party to not take a stance on abortion, to remove any reference to 'choice'. That's certainly true of Howard Dean. During Howard Dean's tenure as chairman of the DNC, he indicated in several interviews that the intent was to move the Democratic Party from referring to abortion at all in its platform. Here's one of those interviews, from 11/1/05: Video | Transcript

January 14, 2005 - Dems May Waver on Choice, Repro Rights
Democrats haven't been taking care of women's issues. They're not vigilant about women's issues. Not reproductive freedom, not on economic issues, not on any issues. They're vigilant about their own careers, which are reliant upon pleasing transnational corporations, not American citizens.

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About Nancy Pelosi
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Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

You want to talk about women's rights and Democrats? Democrats have abandoned reproductive/pro-choice rights. It's out of the business of being pro-choice because it's trying to turn the Democratic Party into the old Republican Party, grow the Democratic Party by attracting into the party anybody it can. It hasn't actually announced it publicly, but it only goes through the motions of seeming to be champions of women's reproductive choice. When it comes to actually championing the issue, Democratic politicians are AWOL, not only at the top, at the party organization, but absent also are the politicians whose talk as women's champions don't match the walk.

At the national headquarters, there have been the party's leaders, like Howard Dean, who have failed to serve women's issues.

Howard Dean's a nice guy, but he's not a liberal and definitely not 'married' to what I would say are sacrosanct Democratic Party positions, like pro-choice and public healthcare. He's a politician, just like all the rest of them.

You do not rise within either political party unless you have run the gauntlet and proven you're one of the team. You have to buy into the group think, and that group think accepts the status quo that they are beholden to transnational corporations.

Political parties have platforms, written documents, that state clearly what the party stands for, with an agenda and list of goals. The Democratic Party's platform is crystal clear on reproductive rights and ab0rtlon; Democrats Democrats "unequivocally support R0e v. W@de and a woman's right to choose a safe and legal ab0rt!on, regardless of ability to pay, and oppose any and all efforts to weaken or undermine that right".

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About Nancy Pelosi
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Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

Democratic politicians talk a good game, but their actions don't equal the talk. Real Democratic policies aren't that hard to sell to the American people, but you'd be hard put to find Democratic politicians out there making the case in the past 30 years.

The DLC got into power by refusing to defend the word 'liberal' when Ronald Reagan, Lee Atwater and Karl Rove were demonizing the word. Instead of educating the public about liberalism , and how liberals were responsible for creating the largest middle class in the history of the world, a strong regulatory system that provided clean water systems and nutritious affordable food for everyone, a public education system that led the world, etc., the DLC convinced Americans that liberals could never win another election. The DLC attributed to ideology what is more accurately explained by lousy campaigns outgunned by election dirty tricks & fraud.

When informed of the issues, most Americans agree with liberal policies. Neither they (nor I) would characterize themselves as far-anything or extreme, but mainstream. For example, nobody likes the idea of abortion, but most Americans do not want the government involved if they find themselves in the predicament of an unwanted pregnancy. And if you frame it as, "You like to kiII babies?!?! ?!?!", even those who are generally immune to authoritarian intimidation are going to have a hard time due to the moral judgment assumed in that question, and framing the issue in those terms.

If the Bush years taught us anything, it's that anyone can sell anything to Americans, if you're stolid and relentless in your sales pitch and tactics. It's not that Bush and R0ve were geniuses and knew something that nobody else knew; Bush and Rove were just more ruthless in doing what politicians and the parties had gone to great lengths to hide from Americans -- If you keep at it, escalate your attacks, don't take 'no' for an answer and never back away, you will wear the opposition down.

Obama didn't get to be the first black president, vanquish the Clinton machine (to get the nomination) and the oldest, most experienced politicians in US history (including the Rove machine) by not having mastered these skills. Nor do Democratic politicians (more incumbents than ever, in office longer) not know how to do it. How do you think Democrats managed to keep impeaching Bush and Cheney off the table, have us still reelecting them and not marching on Washington with torches and pitchforks?

Obama and Democrats know how to do it -- They don't want to do it.

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About Nancy Pelosi
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Sydney Pollack's Cliff May Estate For Sale

Out of Africa
The Way We Were

Just for the 'classics', on the A list of Hollywood movies.

There are also the lesser acclaimed, but known to enthusiastic movie fans with an interest in and knowledge of the movie industry, like This Property Is Condemned, Bobby Deerfield, Sabrina, The Electric Horseman, Absence of Malice, Random Hearts, The Firm.
About Photo Galleries
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Newt Gingrich: New York Gay Marriage Legalization Shows Nation 'Drifting Toward A Terrible Muddle'

There goes the gay vote.
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Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

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 CorporateMasters.

Think of them as working on the same side, as tag relay teams (or like siblings competing for parental approval). 'Good cop/bad cop'. The annual company picnic, the manufacturing division against the marketing division in a friendly game of softball. 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, then 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, when the People 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

Mitt Romney Criticizes Obama Economic Policies In Utah

So here we have a candidate arguing the Republicans' perspective ("tax cuts and spending cuts cure everything, including the common cold").

Who is the candidate representing real Democratic policies, the policies that worked to save Americans from the Great Depression (massive spending and government sponsored public works projects to get money into the hands of the people who need it most, workers, who spend it and grease the wheels of the economy)?

Obama must be PRIMARIED.
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Afghanistan War: A Decade On, No Clear Answers

The answer is quite clear and has always been the establishment of military bases in areas of the world that are considered strategic to the interests of the USA. The USA failed in southeast Asia, but it will not fail in the ME. Iran cannot seriously threaten the USA when it is surrounded on two sides by the US military. The USA will have a presence in Iraq and Afghanistan for a very long time.

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Seymour Hersh has a new article in The New Yorkerarguing that there is no credible evidence that Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons; to the contrary, he writes, "the U.S. could be in danger of repeating a mistake similar to the one made with Saddam Hussein's Iraq eight years ago -- allowing anxieties about the policies of a tyrannical regime to distort our estimates of the state's military capacities and intentions." This, of course, cannot stand, as it conflicts with one of the pillar-orthodoxies of Obama foreign policy in the Middle East (even though the prior two National Intelligence Estimates say what Hersh has said). As a result, two cowardly, slimy Obama officials ran to Politico to bash Hersh while hiding behind the protective womb of anonymity automatically and subserviently extended by that "news outlet":

the Obama administration is pushing back strongly, with one senior official saying the article garnered "a collective eye roll" from the White House . . . two administration officials told POLITICO's Playbook that's not the case. . . . a senior administration official said. . . . "There is a clear, ongoing pattern of deception" from Iran . . ."the senior administration official added" . . . And a senior intelligence official also ripped Hersh, saying his article amounted to nothing more than "a slanted book report on a long narrative that's already been told many times over" . . .

Read the rest of the story here.

Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

Democrats are worthless -- NOBODY is representing the interests of the poor and middle classes.

When the budget process began, Republican congressman Paul Ryan came out with the first number that Republicans wanted to cut ($32 billion). Then there was a TeaParty revolt in the House, and Republicans in the House said "Fine, you win, $64 billion."

So then they were at $64 billion with Democrats having moved all the way over to where Paul Ryan was when the process began. So even if Democrats got that number (which in Washington would be considered a "win" for Democrats), Democrats went all the way over to where the Republican leadership thought their opening bid would be.

Nothing is going to change until and unless Obama and Democratic politicians make the decision to engage. Democratic voters thought they'd made the decision in 2006 and in 2008 when they put Obama and Democrats in power. Democratic voters need to get people into office who will engage, who will be as effective as getting their interests mets as Republicans have been at getting their supporters' interests met.

Obama and incumbents of both parties need to be primaried.

Michael Lerner's very powerful case for primarying Obama.

Ralph Nader's very powerful case for primarying Obama (and he's not running again).

No one in the Democratic Party will do it. It would be suicide for any professional politician in the Democratic Party to run against the party's sitting president (the DLC has gotten too powerful, what with a Democrat in the White House and a Democratically-controlled Senate overseeing an NSA with today's eavesdropping abilities).

Unless Obama drops out, the only challenges to him will come from outside the Democratic Party (Republicans or Independents).
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Joe Biden Warns Republicans On Debt Ceiling Talks

How The RIch Get RIcher And Stick Us With The BIll

Even Warren Buffett admits it.
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Nancy Pelosi: 'The Republicans Are The Incumbents'

The Republicans Are The Incumbents

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Democratic voters have mistakenly believed that Obama and Democrats want what they want. The DLC-controlled Democratic Party gives lip service to all populist issues (like living wages, civil rights protections, restoring habeas corpus, ending the wars, public healthcare, Wall Street reform, environmental and energy issues, etc.).

If the Bush years taught us anything, it's that anyone can sell anything and ANYONE to Americans, if you're stolid and relentless in your sales pitch and tactics. It's not that Bush and Rove were geniuses and knew something that nobody else knew; Bush & R0ve were just more ruthless in doing what politicians and the parties had gone to great lengths to hide from Americans -- If you keep at it, escalate your attacks, don't take 'no' for an answer and never back away, you will wear the opposition down.

Obama didn't get to be the first black president, vanquish the Clinton machine (to get the nomination) and the oldest, most experienced politicians in US history (including the Rove machine) by not having mastered these skills. Nor do Democratic politicians (more incumbents than ever, in office longer) not know how to do it. How do you think Democrats managed to keep impeaching Bush and Cheney off the table, have us still reelecting them and not marching on Washington with torches and pitchforks?

Obama and Democrats know how to do it -- They don't want to do it.

The trick for them has been to keep the many different populist groups believing that they really do support our issues, but they're merely inept. And to get us to keep voting for them despite their failure to achieve our alleged shared objectives.

Getting Democratic voters (and Obama's 'most ardent supporters') to understand that Democratic politicians have been taking us all for suckers and patsies is the most immediate problem and the challenge.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Joe Biden Warns Republicans On Debt Ceiling Talks

Lie number 3) U.S. corporations are over-taxed.

Example: Republican presidential candidate Tim Pawlenty

We have the highest corporate tax rate, or one of them, in the OECD nations.

Actually, as measured in terms of share of GDP, the U.S. has the lowest corporate tax burden of any OECD nation. While the official tax bracket may seems high -- 35 percent -- if one takes into account various loopholes and tax dodges, the effective tax rate is considerably lower, or around 27 percent, which comes in as slightly higher than average for OECD members. And according to ace tax report David Cay Johnston, the bigger you are, the less you pay -- the effective tax rate for the biggest U.S. corporations is only about 15 percent.

There you have it, for future handy reference. Poor people do pay taxes, the biggest corporations don't pay enough, and the United States, as a whole, has a low tax burden overall.
About Republicans
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Joe Biden Warns Republicans On Debt Ceiling Talks

Lie number 2) The U.S. suffers from high taxes.

Example: The Wall Street Journal's Stephen Moore:

What all this means is that in the late 1980s, the U.S. was nearly the lowest taxed nation in the world, and a quarter century later we're nearly the highest.

Totally untrue. As measured in terms of total tax revenue as a share of overall GDP the average tax burden for countries that are members of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in 2008 was 44.8 percent. The U.S. -- 26.1 percent. The U.S. pays less taxes, as a share of GDP, than Denmark, Sweden, Italy, Austria, France, Netherlands, Germany, United Kingdom, Canada, Spain, Switzerland and Japan.

Furthermore, as Bruce Bartlett explains in detail in The New York Times the current U.S. federal tax burden, measured, again, as a share of GDP, is only 14.8 percent -- a 60-year low.
About Republicans
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Joe Biden Warns Republicans On Debt Ceiling Talks

The Top 3 Lies About Taxes:

Lie Number 1) Poor people don't pay taxes.
Example: From The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities:

At a hearing last month, Senator Charles Grassley said, "According to the Joint Committee on Taxation, 49 percent of households are paying 100 percent of taxes coming in to the federal government." At the same hearing, Cato Institute Senior Fellow Alan Reynolds asserted, "Poor people don't pay taxes in this country." Last April, referring to a Tax Policy Center estimate of households with no federal income tax liability in 2009, Fox Business host Stuart Varney said on Fox and Friends, "Yes, 47 percent of households pay not a single dime in taxes."

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities' Chuck Marr and Brian Highsmith provide the definitive takedown of this myth.

In 2009, Congress' Joint Committee on Taxation found that 51 percent of households owed no federal income tax. According to Marr and Highsmith, that figure was inflated by special recession-related factors -- In a more typical year, "35 to 40 percent of households pay no federal income tax."
But that does not mean that these households pay no federal taxes at all. Far from it: Nearly all working Americans pay payroll taxes to fund Medicare and Social Security. In 2007, the poorest Americans -- taxpayers in the bottom fifth of income -- paid 8.8 percent of their income as payroll taxes. The next fifth paid almost ten percent. The top 20 percent of earners paid only 5.7 percent.

And of course, these numbers don't include state and local taxes or excise fees like gas taxes, which tend to have a regressive impact that hits poorer Americans harder. Bottom line: only 14 percent of Americans don't pay either federal income taxes or payroll taxes -- and that group is made up primarily of "low-income people who are elderly, unable to work due to a serious disability, or students."
About Republicans
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Maddow On Gay Marriage Passage In New York: 'President Obama Is Against What Just Happened' (VIDEO)

That's true for many Americans, but not most and certainly not the vast majority of Americans.

There are several factors explaining why a minority who hold these religious perspectives can have (and have had) a stranglehold on American's political system, including a concerted effort to organize and politicalize groups that didn't typically participate in the democracy (Ralph Reed and the Christian Coalition) while suppressing the participation by those which had (college educated, criminalization of drugs and other activities, etc.).

The actual 'Establishment' or political culture that controls and runs the government really doesn't care about the issues of birth control, abortion gay marriage; it cares about MONEY. It has, however, conflated these issues in order to get the only thing it cares about (and cares about the People about) -- Turnout of its voting base to win control of the instruments of power in government in order to get more money.

After it gets our votes, we can go to heII as far as the 'Establishment' is concerned.
About Gay Marriage
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Joe Biden Warns Republicans On Debt Ceiling Talks

The middle class has been crushed. The middle and poor classes are bearing the entire brunt of a full-on virtual crime spree by transnational corporations, Wall Street and the banks' criminal money-making schemes.

Half of the population makes under $30,000, and their taxes were raised while the top tier got a break!
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Joe Biden Warns Republicans On Debt Ceiling Talks

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.

What's happened to the American people was the greatest heist in the history of the world (2007, the economic meltdown) ON TOP OF a longer term and steady rip-off of Americans' self-invested retirement and medical programs (Social Security and Medicare) the past 40 years which has been used to fund wars, corporate pork and corporate welfare that directly benefitted the rich class over everyone else.

Where are the investigations, prosecutions and restitution?
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

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