In previous postings on Barack Bush's Cat Food Commission, I discussed how he created a "deficit commission" to advocate tax cuts for the rich and the corporations they own while cutting government programs for the middle class and the poor. Stopping the wars, raising taxes on the rich/corporations, raising tariffs, and cutting corporate welfare were "oddly" off the table.

Now that Barack Bush's fellow Republicans control the House, he is using that opportunity to go after Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid. This is reprehensible, and it shows the contempt that this administration and its GOP allies have for the non rich.

It's time for some brave Democrat (if such a person even exists in that party anymore) to launch a primary challenge against Barack Bush. Barack Bush has been fucking with the middle class and the poor for far too long.

In the meantime, some progressives are fighting back, I encourage you to join them in doing so.

1) From an Action Alert by Firedog Lake:

The war on our social safety net is now fully underway.

President Obama is offering cuts to Social Security benefits in exchange for GOP support for tax hikes. Democrats in the Senate and Congress will likely be forced to walk the plank and support those cuts, despite being deeply unpopular.

We refuse to sit by and watch the political classes get away with making cuts to Social Security. Firedoglake will make it as painful as possible for any politician from any party to participate in this wholesale looting of the public sphere.

Join us in demanding absolutely NO CUTS to social safety net programs like Medicare and Social Security.

Take the pledge:
"I pledge to withhold support for any politician who participates in cutting social safety net programs like Medicare and Social Security."

2. Bold Progressives Have Their Own Pledge You Can Sign:

President Obama: If you cut Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid benefits for me, my family, or families like mine, don't ask for a penny of my money or an hour of my time in 2012. I'm going to focus on electing bold progressive candidates who will fight to protect our Democratic legacy.

Sadly, it's looking as though the only way protect the policies and values the Democratic Party used to stand for these days is to vote Green. The Democrats are just clones of the GOP these days.

3. Contact the White House:
It's no secret that Barack Bush is a plutocrat who hates poor and middle class Americans, but he does need our votes in 2012. It's important to contact the White House and let them know that you are outraged by the fascist policies he is proposing.

 

"Welfare Reform"
"Free Market Reforms"
"Pension Reform"
"Tenure Reform"
"Tax Reform"

What do all of these have in common? All of them are rightist, deceptive, and harmful to society. Most importantly, all are efforts to roll back reforms in the name of "reform."

Let's look at "welfare reform." Welfare was a reform that was put into place to take some of the suffering out of an economic system where there never was enough employment for everyone. Yet, while Bill Clinton reappointed a Federal Reserve Board Chair who used monetary policy to keep unemployment even higher than it otherwise would be under capitalism, he also pushed through a set of cutbacks in welfare payments that served as a punishment for women, children, and for people of color which made them pay the price for this needlessly high unemployment.

Non Western countries had put in place numerous reforms to keep their economies from being completely dominated by their own wealthy elites and by foreign corporations. Rightist US governments, using economic leverage through the World Bank, IMF, and private banks, pushed through policies that significantly reversed the reforms that those governments had put into place, all in the name of "free market reforms."

"Pension reform," often called "Social Security Reform" here in the US, follows a similar pattern. Social Security and pensions are reforms that have done a lot to relieve poverty and misery among the elderly. Wealthy elites have decided they are done tolerating this, since they want all the money and wealth for themselves. So, they looted most private corporate pensions in the late 20th Century. Now, they are trying to loot Social Security and public employee pensions, all in this Orwellian use of the word "reform."

Then, there's tenure reform. Sleazy politicians like Michael Bloomberg and Scott Walker are trying to engage in the same age discrimination that private sector employers use. They private sector has been laying off older workers disproportionately and hiring younger workers disproportionately because older workers' experience has put them in a position where their work is worth more in terms of productivity, giving them higher salary scales. Also, older workers cost more in terms of health insurance. So, what do these sleazebags do? They create phony "budget crises" in order to justify massive age discrimination in the name of "tenure reform." Public school teachers have tenure to keep corrupt practices from determining who gets those jobs. While the original corruption tenure was meant to fight was patronage, tenure is an equally valid reform to prevent massive age discrimination.

Then, there is the right's biggest Orwellian phrase of them all, "tax reform." The graduated tax is the most important economic and political reform in US history. It is based on the fairest view of taxation. Those who are wealthier benefit more from society, so they owe society higher tax rates as compensation. Graduated tax rates also reduce social stratification, and make the upward mobility inherent in the American Dream a possibility outside of the world of fiction. Yet, the phony "tax reform" movement is attacking this reform by trying to cut taxes for the rich and raise them for the middle class and the poor through the flat tax.

Real tax reform would involve getting rid of tax loopholes used by the rich and corporations. It would involve raising the tax rates for the rich and corporations. It also would involve luxury and windfall profits taxes. Yet, the corporate shills and the corporate media never talk about real tax reform. They just want to distort "tax reform" as a spin term to divert more and more of this nation's income and wealth to the rich.

"Reform" sounds great. Real reform is great. However, the way the rightists abuse the word to attack important reforms is truly reprehensible. The middle class and the poor need to take back the word reform and make sure that it is no longer acceptable to attack real reform in the name of "reform."

 

Ayn Rand, the far rightist who started the bizarre cult of Objectivism, was one of the most fanatical opponents of government programs like Medicare and Social Security which serve the needs of the middle class and the poor. On the other hand, she loved this nation's wildly bloated military industrial complex, which subsidizes the rich.

Yet, guess what the idol of the Randroids actually did. (Alternet 1/29/11)

Ayn Rand was not only a schlock novelist, she was also the progenitor of a sweeping “moral philosophy” that justifies the privilege of the wealthy and demonizes not only the slothful, undeserving poor but the lackluster middle-classes as well.

Her books provided wide-ranging parables of "parasites," "looters" and "moochers" using the levers of government to steal the fruits of her heroes' labor. In the real world, however, Rand herself received Social Security payments and Medicare benefits under the name of Ann O'Connor (her husband was Frank O'Connor).

Take that Randroids!

You may recall that corrupt and incompetent former Federal Reserve Board stooge Alan Greenspan was a disciple of the Randroid cult. This is one of the reasons he fought against reinstituting regulations that would have prevented the Crash of 2008. He also refused to intervene to gradually cool off the housing bubble on the same "free market" grounds. However, he had no problem with manipulating interest rates to benefit the wealthy and powerful.

Here are some anti Ayn Rand/Objectivism Websites and Articles:

What's Wrong with Ayn Rand? (About.com)

Atlas Wanked: From Fiction to Fraud in 52 Years (Crooks and Liars)

Definition of "Randroid" (Urban Dictionary)

The Anti Ayn Rand Society (Facebook)

Ayn Rand Sucks (Facebook)

Why Randroids Will Always Fail (in mala fide)

Why Ayn Rand Sucks... (newspoodle's posterous)

Objectivism Criticism (blog)

Ayn Rand isn't just renowned for being a narcisist. She is infamous for being an absolutely terrible writer. Here are some bad reviews of her notoriously terribleFountainhead.

James Higgs

Ryan (Goodreads)

Brendan (Goodreads)

Foodpie (Goodreads)

Photo: Joe Futrelle

More Democrats should be speaking out against this heinous tax plan. The Greens deserve credit for sending out the following press release today.

WASHINGTON, DC -- Green Party leaders urged House Democrats to stand firm and do what they can to block President Obama's tax package, calling it a capitulation to the Republican Party that will expand the deficit and undermine Social Security.

"The tax cut is evidence that President Obama isn't compromising with Republicans, he's adopting their agenda," said Howie Hawkins, 2010 Green candidate for Governor of New York and co-chair of the Green Party of New York State. "Greens warned that should the President's tax package pass, Democrats will be the ones initiating the half-century GOP plan to dismantle Social Security. Since the plan extends unemployment benefits by diverting some payroll taxes away from Social Security, it weakens the safety-net for working Americans and defers the financial hit a little bit longer."

Green Party leaders praised Sen. Bernie Sanders (Ind.-Vt.) for his eight-and-a-half-hour speech on the Senate floor about the damage that the President's tax package will do to the Social Security trust fund and the safety net for low- and middle-income Americans.

Green leaders said that if either Democrats or Republicans want to reduce the deficit and restore domestic financial stability, they should reduce the military budget and work to end the military occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq. The Green Party has repeatedly called for such action, as well as for requiring the rich to pay their fair share in taxes, since tax breaks for the wealthy have contributed even more to the deficits than bloated military funding, as the CBO has repeatedly documented over the last decade.

Read Full Press Release

The Greens aren't just complaining. They are proposing positive solutions to our nation's problems instead of chasing after big campaign contributions and "independent" expenditures.

Why are so few Democrats doing anything worthwhile? I know why the bought politicians aren't. But, why are so many Democratic bloggers, pundits, and party activists going along with Obama's GOP style economic and foreign policy agenda?

It reminds me of how people wildly root for corporate sports teams, based on loyalties mass marketed centered around television viewing areas. So many Democrats at the grassroots level are rooting for "their team" to the point that they have forgotten why they became Democrats in the first place.

 

Statistics don't lie, do they? (H/T: The Punk Patriot)

Here's an additional reason why rising life expectancies for some don't validate raising the retirement age. Just because people at higher income levels are living longer doesn't mean that the non-lethal health problems facing the elderly have gotten that much better.

Social Security Works has a great video countering lies about Social Security.



I love how they are actually talking about how wealthy and corporate interests are screwing over the rest of this.

The Cat Food Commission is telling some of the very lies being countered in this video. It's important to get the facts out there now, since the timing of the assault on Social Security and Medicare is set to happen during the lame duck congressional session which takes place when people are busy with the holidays and are disconnected from the news.

 

If it really were a legitimate "deficit commission," it wouldn't be meeting in secret.



This video was put up on YouTube by Strengthen Social Security, Don't Cut it. I'm particularly pleased that the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force is a member organization, which demonstrates their commitment to queer seniors issues. This disproportionately effects queers who are much less likely to have children to help us when we get older.

I has previously blogged about Nancy Pelosi's sneak attack against Social Security. In that post, I describe the Catfood Commission.

You may have been reading about Obama's "deficit commission" in DC. The name is misleading. Some people call it the "catfood commission" because its real goals are raising the Social Security retirement age to 70, cutting benefits in that program, slashing Medicare, and putting 20% of the Social Security trust fund in the stock market. Healthcare Now has been fighting hard to resist this attack on the livelihoods of the elderly and the futures of the young.

The last thing we need as a nation is to have future generations of elderly people reduced to eating catfood when meager incomes fail most of us. Alternet isn't going along with this. They have put up a petition on Change.Org against the Catfood Commission. The background information follows.

Right-Wing "Deficit Hawks" and their enablers are on a march to destroy the social safety net we built for our seniors and retirees. Shockingly, some of the most notorious advocates are actually in charge of the presidential commission that will soon determine the future of Social Security and Medicare. We need to stop them in their tracks! Join us in calling on Congress to Stop the Catfood Commission.

The National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform has been dubbed by progressives the "Catfood Commission" because its goal appears to be cutting benefits so drastically that retirees will only be able to afford to eat pet food. It's hard to tell exactly what the commission is planning because its meetings are closed to the public and the press. Based on past statements and the background of its members the proposals are likely to include raising the retirement age to 70, turning large portions of Social Security over to Wall Street, and cutting Medicare benefits.

The commission's co-chairman Alan Simpson, a former Republican senator from Wyoming, has stated he believes the founders of the Social Security program never expected anyone to actually live to 65 and collect. "People just died," he has said. "Social Security was never [for] retirement." Erskine Bowles, the other co-chairman, negotiated a secret but ultimately unsuccessful deal between Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich to cut Social Security benefits. Any chances that the commission would make cuts to the US defense budget in its pursuit of fiscal responsibility seem slim owing to the fact that the CEO of Honeywell, a major defense contractor, is a member of the panel.

We can't sit back and count on a Democratic-controlled Congress to protect our social safety net. Just a day before the July 4th holiday weekend, the House of Representatives passed a measure that would guarantee an up-or-down vote on the Catfood Commission's recommendations in the current session of Congress if they pass the Senate. With this measure House Speaker Nancy Pelosi relinquished her power to prevent the vote from coming to the floor.

Your representatives need to hear from you NOW. Let's stop the Catfood Commission from raiding the Social Security trust fund and slashing medical benefits for current and future retirees.

Please Take Action to Stop This Attack on Social Security and Medicare!

Also:

Please Contact the President and Tell Him to Disband the Catfood Commission!

Photo: Sunfox

 

In case you think that Nancy Pelosi has gotten even slightly less execrably rightist since Barack Obama has been in office, think again. Pelosi just isn't satisfied with pushing through a wealthcare bill that takes money and healthcare away from the middle class, the poor, and the elderly and gives money to the HMOs, the health insurers, and the wealthy speculators who own their stocks. Now, she's engineering a sneak attack against Social Security and Medicare.

You may have been reading about Obama's "deficit commission" in DC. The name is misleading. Some people call it the "catfood commission" because its real goals are raising the Social Security retirement age to 70, cutting benefits in that program, slashing Medicare, and putting 20% of the Social Security trust fund in the stock market. Healthcare Now has been fighting hard to resist this attack on the livelihoods of the elderly and the futures of the young.

Pelosi is really good at engineering ways of pushing through rightist legislation while appearing to be liberal to casual observers in her district. We find out from Firedog Lake that she is pulling another fast one. (Hat Tip: I Can't Believe It's Not Democracy)

Embedded in the rule is the requirement that the House will vote on the deficit commission’s recommendations in the lame duck session if they pass the Senate.

The commission, co-chaired by Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, is packed with members who favor the raising the retirement age to 70, means testing, and private accounts. Many also support investing 20% of the Social Security trust fund in the stock market.

This is a perfect opportunity. The lame duck session would happen during the holidays when people are really busy and aren't paying close attention to politics. That's the most opportune time to slip something in that is wildly unpopular.

Obviously, this isn't a done deal. However, liberals and progressives better do a better job fighting this than we did on the wealthcare bill. If we keep caving and letting corrupt politicians in both parties fuck us over, the poor will keep getting poorer and there will be no middle class left.

Photo: Speaker Pelosi

 

A lot of centrists would agree with the sentiment on this sign.

Yesterday's protest was put together by the Ad Hoc National Network to Stop Foreclosures and Evictions. This shows that some people are fighting to bail out the rest of Americans, not just the super rich.

The listing of demands from the flyer was notable for being more substantive than utopian. The greater power and participation by the poor and people of color has been having a grounding effect on the American left.

IT’S TIME FOR THE GOVT TO DECLARE THAT PEOPLE ARE IN AN ECONOMIC STATE OF EMERGENCY AND GIVE DIRECT HELP TO THE PEOPLE--NOT BANKS INCLUDING:

• An Emergency moratorium on home foreclosures, evictions, job layoffs, & utility shut-offs

• Extend unemployment benefits

• No budget cuts in education, healthcare & all social services

• Debt relief for students, poor and working people

• Insure public & private pensions

• Jobs at a living wage

I personally find it fascinating that they have proposed an economic stimulus package that is far more suited to our current situation than the ones proposed by the Bush regime and Phonycrats like Pelosi and Reid. During our current deep recession, FDR style proposals are precisely what we need.

A particularly productive way to provide the living wage jobs would be to start a public works program focussed on expanding rail public transportation and to rebuilding our nation's crumbling bridges. This would fight global warming. It also would promote long term economic growth while providing immediate economic relief.

While I don't always agree with the far left, I do recognize that the extreme right has been governing our country ever since 1981, with disastrous effects. America desperately needs a far left to balance out the right.

An interesting aspect of our situation is that unregulated capitalism has been discredited in the present, not in a history book that most Americans didn't bother to read. Many people are going to be looking for alternatives to what we have now. If liberals don't become more assertive in pushing our agenda (and if conservatives don't start making lots of concessions), the far left may go far.

 

MoveOn is promoting a Flash animation that offers a solution to a relatively minor long term problem with Social Security during the middle of this century: eliminating the salary cap on Social Security taxation. As the animation points out, CEO’s pay a much lower percentage of their income to Social Security than police officers do.

Check it out