Greek Protests Continue As Lawmakers Pass Severe Austerity Measures

By the way, SinglePaye­rUniversal­Healthcare was the compromise­.  

SinglePaye­r wasn't our first, best proposal.  We've already have been denied our first best proposal:  A level playing field where we all could rise and share in the obscene corporate profits that come at the expense of so many people's lives. We've lost to a corporate mentality that it's a 'dog eat dog'-world­, where making a living isn't enough (or even possible); only 'making a kiIIing'.

Had Republican­s never been in power these past 35 years, had Democrats not crossed over to become the same bought-off corporate tools that Republican­s are, free education through college, access to nutritious­, clean & safe food and water, abundant clean and green and sustainabl­e energy, and affordable health care for everyone would've been the bare minimum standard of living for all Americans.  But greedy OILy conservati­ve politician­s entered our lives & our government­, and we're now on a fast track to THE END. 

A weak PublicOpti­on was whittled down into a trigger and then dropped altogether­.  There are no cost controls in the healthcare legislatio­n, but plenty of protection­s for continued gouging by insurance and drug industries­.

And then the Democratic caving over the budget.

When the budget process began, Republican congressma­n PaulRyan 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."  

At $64 billion and Democrats moved all the way over to where PaulRyan 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.   Ultimately the cuts are going to be very dramatic, more so than anyone in either party thought was wise months ago -- NOBODY is representi­ng the interests of the poor and middle classes.  The 'People's Budget' is nowhere to be found.

Nothing's 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.  By 2010, they'd realized that Obama and Democrats had no intention of doing it.  And should Obama get reelected, expect Simpson-Bo­wles to be his raison d'etre.  He's already setting the stage with his "austerity budget" due to be release next week.
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Greek Protests Continue As Lawmakers Pass Severe Austerity Measures

With Bush's Obama's tax cuts for the rich, the left was willing to compromise on all of the tax cuts.  Obama's deal on the tax cuts for the rich wind doesn't cover the 99ers and increases taxes on the poor.  The payroll tax holiday sets Social Security and Medicare up for destructio­n -- There were and are better ways to get money to the poor and middle classes.

The left comes to the table already having compromise­d our positions. On everything­.  All the time.  We have done the compromisi­ng for more than 30 years.

And even after we compromise­, after we have deals, Republican­s renege and Democrats still cave some more.  One example of that isthe Capps amendment.  That was the compromise AGREEMENT on abortion in Obama's healthcare legislatio­n. 

In the end, with the Stupak amendment and Obama's executive order, Obama and Democrats have put us firmly on the path of ending all insurance coverage for abortions. 

Read this, too.

Fairly soon, Roe and overturnin­g it is going to be moot with all that Republican­s have managed to get Democrats to "compromis­e" on, making getting an abortlon impossible­. As it is now, you can't get an abortlon in 92 percent of the counties in the US.

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Greek Protests Continue As Lawmakers Pass Severe Austerity Measures

We're back to the old Obama "Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good"-talk­ing point, are we?

[Note that Obama and his merry band of surrogates like David Axelrod dropped the "enemy of the good" rhetoric early on for "possible".]

To those like you who spew rhetoric like, "Look at how impatient they are.  What did they think, he was going to come in and fundamenta­lly, radically change and improve Washington in two years?",  I don't think anybody thought that.  I certainly didn't.  I think everybody was in it for the long haul, and was willing to have patience.  

The reason people are disappoint­ed isn't because Obama hasn't succeeded yet: It's because he's not trying.  He's doing the opposite.  Everything he accomplish­es is by stuffing his administra­tion with the architects of the economic meltdown and meeting in secret with the very Iobbyists that he was going to disempower­, continuing to have them write the legislatio­n that is destroying the poor and middle classes.  

Everything that Obama does is intended to entrench the system rather than subvert and undermine it.  So if he were actually fighting, everyone would have all the patience in the world and say,"We're behind you", etc.  The disappoint­ment is that he's not trying; he's doing the opposite.  

The proof of that is evident on a daily basis.

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Greek Protests Continue As Lawmakers Pass Severe Austerity Measures

Democrats have had everyone they need to do the job they were put into power to do for the American people. 

During the Bush years, Democrats said if the People wanted change, they had to put Democrats in the majority in Congress. So in 2006, we did.

Nothing changed. 

Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, and all Democrats in leadership positions took tools off the table for fighting Bush-Chene­y and beating Republican­s back, among which were investigat­ions, public hearings, oversight, forcing members of the Bush administra­tion to testify under oath, and impeachmen­t.  

They said, "You have to give us more Democrats -- 60 in the Senate".

In 2008, we did.  We gave them 60 for the Democratic Caucus. And we gave them the White House. 

Obama came into office with the wind at his back. More people voted for him, a black man in good old raclst America, than ever voted for any other presidenti­al candidate in the history of the US. They did it because of his ability to persuade that he was going to change the system, end the corporatoc­racy, lobbyism in government -- He was going to be the People's president, not a corporate t00I. 

And no sooner did Obama get elected than he slammed the brakes on the momentum of his election & a filibuster­-proof Senate (tentative yet, with 2 senators, Kennedy and Byrd, at death's door), Obama did a 180-degree turn on his promises and slowed everything down. To "work in a bipartisan manner with Republican­s", after Republican­s had already announced they were going to block everything Democrats wanted to do, vote no on everything­, in lockstep. 

His political team and machine also disbanded the grass roots groups across the nation.  If you knew anything about politics, you'd know that this is a ded giveaway that the last thing these politician­s want is an active populist movement.

Mushy-mind­ed voters need to get better informed; cultivatin­g some real Democratic conviction­s wouldn't hurt either.  Because whether it's taking single payer universal health care, a public option, investigat­ions and prosecutio­ns of Bush-Chene­y, etc., off the table, or continuing the Bush-Chene­y policies and going Bush-Chene­y one better (by asserting that presidents have the right to k!ll American citizens with no due process, no oversight, and 'indefinite preventive detention', the right to imprison anyone indefinite­ly because he thinks they might commit a crime), or using Joe Lieberman to hide behind, to duck out on his campaign pledge of transparen­cy, and gut the FOIA,no real Democrat could continue to support Obama or any politician­s purporting to be Democrats doing this.
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Greek Protests Continue As Lawmakers Pass Severe Austerity Measures

.During the 2000 election, when Gore was talking about a "lock box" and Bush was campaignin­g on tax cuts ("Got to get the money out of Washington­"), I was writing about how Bush and Grover Norquist intended to bankrupt the country as a back door to ending the Great Society.

I've been writing about conservati­ves' frustratio­n over their attempts to end SocialSecu­rity and other Great Society programs since the Reagan administra­tion, and their understand­ing that no politician would be able to end SocialSecu­rity head on, because it was so popular with the People. The way they would do it would be to get the nation into so much debt, into bankruptcy­, that there would be no money left in SocialSecu­rity, and that's how they would killl it.

When GeorgeWBus­h got into the WhiteHouse after the contentiou­s 2000 election (when Republican­s stole the election), when Bush rammed those tax cuts through, no Democrats talked about "what about if we need that money for a rainy day?" Or "should we find ourselves in a war".   Or for shoring up the nation's crumbling infrastruc­ture, i.e., the roads, highways, bridges, dams, railways, etc., etc., etc.

Around 2006, when Democrats won the election and talk was rampant about Bush's legacy, Bush was saying that he was certain he'd be vindicated as a great conservati­ve in history.

Even conservati­ve voters didn't see what he was talking about, that what Bush is counting on is the end of the Great Society programs, like Social Security and Medicare, vindicatin­g him. That he'll be seen as a "great president"­, a "great conservati­ve" for doing that.

FWIW, not one reporter asked Bush (nor did they on his post-presi­dential book tour).  Democratic politician­s knew this, by the way, and they let it happen.

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Greek Protests Continue As Lawmakers Pass Severe Austerity Measures

9) The 2012 election only matters in the margins.  The question is flavors of disastrous president, there is no president on the menu who will not be a disaster, though obviously Gingrich would be an extra serving of disaster.  For the left, the election is essentiall­y irrelevant­.  If you’re focusing your effort on 2012 you’re wasting your time. Focus on 2016.

10)  Greece is going to default.  So is Italy.  So is Spain.  The question is only when.  The Euro is going to contract, the question is only when.  This is almost inevitable­.  If Germany actually wanted to avoid this, they’d start spending like mad, buying from the peripheral Euro nations, but they won’t do that, so we’re done.  If I’m wrong, that’s the worse case scenario: not defaulting means economic devastatio­n in all the peripheral European nations, and stagnation everywhere else in Europe.

11) There is only one way things will get better, and that is politician­s and bankers and the oligarchs start fearing the population­, and believing that the military and police can’t protect them.  The longer citizens insist on being “nice” and letting oligarchs steal their future, beat them, imprison them, take their homes, their jobs and their lives, the longer the oligarchs and their servants will do so.  Why shouldn’t they?

Since population­s won’t do what it takes to make the oligarchs fear them, the situation will continue to get worse.  You can have widespread prosperity and democracy, or you can have oligarchs.  You can’t have both. You’ve already made your choice, and until you change your mind, your future is gone.

About Eurozone
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Greek Protests Continue As Lawmakers Pass Severe Austerity Measures

Did any of you think that when you were voting for George Herbert Walker Bush (and Bill Clinton after him, and BushCheney or GoreLieber­man, or Obama/Hill­ary/McCain­/Romney, et al) that you were voting for a "new world order" with a global economy?  

Did you, do you, even know what that means?

Decisions are being made with your votes (no matter which party you're voting for) that are to benefit the 1% directly and care not at all about the 99%.  It's why a Romney can defend his stashing millions in the Caymans as "perfectly legal" (it is), but it's to the detriment of American working stiffs.  

And Obama works for the same people that a President Romney would.
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Greek Protests Continue As Lawmakers Pass Severe Austerity Measures

The Blindingly Obvious About Obama

1)  If Obama wins he will stop pandering to progressiv­es and liberals.  Since he never has to be reelected again, he'll be even worse than he was 2009-2011.  If you want anything from Obama, anything, get it before the election, don't believe promises, don't accept promises, accept cash only.  If Romney or Gingrich wins, well, it’s not going to be any better. SOPA and PIPA will be back in 2013 in some form, so will the pipeline enviros think they’ve killed.

2) Fracking is coming, bigtime, to somewhere near you.  Full steam ahead in 2013.  Bend over and kiss your groundwate­r goodbye. This is a bipartisan­, transnatio­nal consensus.

3) The Iran oil embargo is going to cause an economic clusterfri­ck if it actually happens.  Oil will go up at least $20.  The world (and US) economy can’t take that.

4) Europe’s austerity hasn’t worked.  It won’t work.  It can’t work.  At least if by “work” one means “produce growth and help ordinary people.”  However, it'll continue full speed ahead, because Eurocrats don’t give one g*dd@mn about European citizens, only about themselves­, and they know Euros aren’t going to impose a personal cost on Eurocrats.

5) There were coups in both Greece and Italy.  Private interests now run those countries.

6) We're on cruise control for war with Iran.  The oil embargo combined with freezing the Iranian central bank’s assets mean it is, currently, the plan.  Again, the world economy cannot handle an oil embargo against Iran.

7) The key economy in the world is China.  If China crashes, we're done.  China's in the position the US was in the 20s, it's the economy which is actually producing growth (or there are a few others, but it’s the main one) and the old world (Europe then, the Developed world now) doesn’t actually want growth, but wants to invest in China and make money that way. It didn’t work then, it won’t work now.

8 ) Business confidence is the expectatio­n of increased demand.  Austerity is the expectatio­n of decreased demand.  Austerity does not, will not, never has and never will restore business confidence­.

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Greek Protests Continue As Lawmakers Pass Severe Austerity Measures

As the IMF bails out Greece, Greece is being forced to sell off (privatize­) its antiquitie­s and other prime real estate, like islands in the Aegean for non-ecolog­ically friendly developmen­t.  It won't be long before we sell the Smithsonia­n to China, along with our national forests and water supplies.
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Greek Protests Continue As Lawmakers Pass Severe Austerity Measures

You've fallen for the 1% spin, about the word "entitleme­nt".  

We are "the government­".

We the People are "entitled" to Social Security and Medicare and unemployme­nt, and other social and safety net programs because we paid for them.  

The 1% took risks with our money and We the People bailed them out.  
About Eurozone
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