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NEWS

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Global elite discuss economy failure at World Economic Forum

From 1/26/12 The New York Times op-ed article by Ed Miliband

IS 20th-century capitalism failing 21st-century society? Members of the global elite debated that unusual question on Wednesday at the annual World Economic Forum [in Davos, Switzerland].

There was a time, not long ago, when such a debate would have been held only among the protesters who annually shelter in igloos farther down the Alpine slopes. So it is encouraging that more than three years since the global financial crisis, a belated process of soul-searching has begun in search of the right lessons to learn from it.  

Both the United States and Britain suffered because their economies were overly reliant on the financial sector’s artificial profits; living standards for the many worsened while the economic rewards skewed to the top 1 percent; a capitalist model encouraged short-term decision-making oriented toward quarterly profits rather than long-term health; and vested interests — from giant banks to media moguls —were deemed too big to fail or too powerful to challenge.

We need to recognize that the trickle-down promise of conservative theorists has turned into a gravity-defying reality in which wealth has flowed upward disproportionately and, too often, undeservedly. To address properly the squeeze in middle-class incomes on both sides of the Atlantic requires fresh thinking from governments about how people train for their working lives and what a living wage should be.

Ed Miliband is a member of the British Parliament and the leader of the Labour Party.

The Demagogue

From 1/26/12 The New York Times op-ed article by Timothy Egan

When not holding forth from his favorite table at L’Auberge Chez François, nestled among the manor houses of lobbyist-thick Great Falls, Va., Dr. Newton L. Gingrich likes to lecture people about food stamps and how out-of-touch the elites are with real America.

Gingrich, as he showed in a gasping effort in Thursday night’s debate in Florida, is a demagogue distilled, like a French sauce, to the purest essence of the word’s meaning. He has no shame. He thinks the rules do not apply to him. And he turns questions about his odious personal behavior into mock outrage over the audacity of the questioner.

State of Michigan government brain drain

From 1/26/12 Bridge Magazine article by Ron French

Michele Glinn loved her job, and she was good at it. As the only Ph.D toxicologist working in the Michigan State Police toxicology unit, she analyzed blood samples for alcohol and other drugs — and crisscrossed the state testifying in court.

Frustrated by unpaid furlough days, a shrinking staff and a negative public perception of state employees, Glinn sat down at her computer one day last fall and sent her resume to an employment search firm. “I got a call from the headhunter the same day,” Glinn recalled. “Two days later, I had a phone interview; a week later, I was in St. Louis being offered a job on the spot.”

Her U-Haul crossed the state border in November, leaving Michigan with no one who can provide expert testimony for the prosecution in alcohol and drug cases.

As the state shrinks its work force and has cut pay through unpaid furloughs, those with the most ability to find jobs in the private sector — usually workers with advanced education such as Glinn — leave.

A study conducted in 2009 found that state employees with advanced degrees (above a bachelor’s) earn less than they could in the private sector. State employees with a master’s degree earned 36 percent less; those with a Ph.D earned 24 percent less.

“If you’re a janitor working for the state, you’re probably getting paid pretty well, compared to other janitors,” Ballard said. “But if you’re a doctor or a lawyer, you’re taking a huge pay cut to work for the state.”

“I loved this job,” Glinn said. “This was my favorite job I’ve had. I felt like I was making a difference.”

Today, Glinn makes 30 percent more than she did with the Michigan State Police. She works fewer hours, and is part of a profit-sharing program at a private company.

Internet technology at its best

From 1/25/12 The New York Times article on president's State of the Union Speech

This article regarding the State of the Union speech leverages Internet technology in some unique ways --

The left column of the page has an index that shows the time and topic for the president's speech. When you click an item in the index, e.g. "11:48 Corporate Tax Reform", several things happen on the page:
  1) The video of the speech jumps to that spot in the speech and starts playing.
  2) The middle column on the page jumps to the text for that part of the speech.
  3) The right column on the page jumps to a fact check article regarding the president's assertions.

Massive 83% corporate tax cut hurts the young, old and poor

From 1/5/12 The Detroit Free Press op-ed by Rudy Hobbs

Last year, we saw a massive 83% corporate tax cut to replace the Michigan Business Tax without a shred of proof offered that it will create jobs. Yes, the MBT was broken, but, no, it should not have been fixed at the expense of the elderly, low-income residents and Michigan's homeless shelters and other nonprofits.

U.P. attorney says (R) Congressman Benishek's Norquist pledge tied to special interests

From 1/3/12 Daily Press op-ed by Richard Clark

Congressman Benishek pledged fealty to a Harvard graduate [Grover Norquist] who is the stereotypical Washington, D.C. insider. The congressman signed a loyalty pledge to this ultimate insider and his special interest group [ATR] before he was elected.

What seems plausible is that the pledge made to the ATR connects a candidate to money coming from special interests with ties to Mr. Nordquist.

One must question Congressman Benishek's commitment to special interests who do not reside in his district. Congressman Benishek follows all ATR's positions, even those not involving taxes, but that do increase the power of the wealthy. www.atr.org/issues

In support of the ATR agenda Congressman Benishek voted to reduce Medicare benefits, to increase the tax burden on small businesses that provide their employees with health insurance, to revoke health insurance for young adults, and to permit insurance companies to deny children health insurance for preexisting conditions.

The 1st Congressional District deserves better. It deserves someone whose soul is not in bondage.

Lockouts a record percentage of work stoppages

From 1/22/12 The New York Times article by Steven Greenhouse

America’s unionized workers, buffeted by layoffs and stagnating wages, face another phenomenon that is increasingly throwing them on the defensive: lockouts.

“This is a sign of increased employer militancy,” said Gary Chaison, a professor of industrial relations at Clark University. “Lockouts were once so rare they were almost unheard of. Now, not only are employers increasingly on the offensive and trying to call the shots in bargaining, but they’re backing that up with action — in the form of lockouts.”

The number of strikes has declined to just one-sixth the annual level of two decades ago. Lockouts, on the other hand, have grown to represent a record percentage of the nation’s work stoppages.

Recovery obstructed by Republicans

From 1/23/12 The New York Times op-ed artile by Dr. Paul Krugman

[T]here are reasons to think that we’re finally on the (slow) road to better times. And we wouldn’t be on that road if Mr. Obama had given in to Republican demands that he slash spending, or the Federal Reserve had given in to Republican demands that it tighten money.

[T]here’s evidence that the two great problems at the root of our slump — the housing bust and excessive private debt — are finally easing.  

That’s not what you hear in public debate, of course, where all the focus is on rising government debt. But anyone who has looked seriously at how we got into this slump knows that private debt, especially household debt, was the real culprit: it was the explosion of household debt during the Bush years that set the stage for the crisis. And the good news is that this private debt has declined in dollar terms, and declined substantially as a percentage of G.D.P., since the end of 2008.

But things could have been worse; they would have been worse if we had followed the policies demanded by Mr. Obama’s opponents. For as I said at the beginning, Republicans have been demanding that the Fed stop trying to bring down interest rates and that federal spending be slashed immediately — which amounts to demanding that we emulate Europe’s failure.

And if this year’s election brings the wrong ideology to power, America’s nascent recovery might well be snuffed out.

In 2008, 400 wealthiest paid 18.1% of income to I.R.S., in 2007 16.6%

From 1/20/12 The New York Times op-ed article by Paul Krugman

Mr. Romney’s tax dance is doing us all a service by highlighting the unwise, unjust and expensive favors being showered on the upper-upper class. At a time when all the self-proclaimed serious people are telling us that the poor and the middle class must suffer in the name of fiscal probity, such low taxes on the very rich are indefensible.

Since 1992, the I.R.S. has been releasing income and tax data for the 400 highest-income filers. In 2008, the most recent year available, these filers paid only 18.1 percent of their income in federal income taxes; in 2007, they paid only 16.6 percent. When you bear in mind that the rich pay little either in payroll taxes or in state and local taxes — major burdens on middle-class families — this implies that the top 400 filers faced lower taxes than many ordinary workers.

The main reason the rich pay so little is that most of their income takes the form of capital gains, which are taxed at a maximum rate of 15 percent, far below the maximum on wages and salaries. So the question is whether capital gains — three-quarters of which go to the top 1 percent of the income distribution — warrant such special treatment.

Romneylies at 1/19/12 South Carolina Republican Debate

From 1/20/12 The Washington Post Fact Checker article by Glenn Kessler  

“Four [Bain investments] in particular created 120,000 jobs as of today. We started them years ago. They’ve grown well beyond the time I was there, to 120,000 people that have been employed by those enterprises. There are others we’ve been with, some of which have lost jobs. People have evaluated that since — well, since I ran four years ago, when I ran for governor. And those that have been documented to have lost jobs lost about 10,000 jobs.”

— Mitt Romney

Romney’s math gets a little funny here. In defending his tenure at Bain, he focuses on four companies that now employ 120,000, even though Bain’s investment ended years ago. His number of 10,000 jobs appears to mostly count losses when Bain owned the companies, or shortly after it sold them. But it is really an apples and oranges accounting.

In any case, Romney’s role at Bain was not to create jobs but to provide for good returns for his investors.

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   The Obama plan is “a 2,700-page massive tax increase, Medicare-cutting monster.”

— Romney

Here, the former governor melds together two of his favorite, but misleading, talking points. The size of the health care law actually tells you very little, and the number of pages is inflated because Congress had to pass two bills for parliamentary reasons. (There were also non-health care related items in the bill.) The actual consolidated bill is much smaller, probably about 907 pages.

As we have previously examined, the claim of “cutting” Medicare is dubious too. If the cuts were so bad, why have virtually all of them been adopted in the House GOP budget?   

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“I stood as a pro-life governor and that’s why the Massachusetts Pro-Life Family Association supported my record as governor, endorsed my record as governor.”

— Romney

Almost verbatim, Gingrich recited charges from a TV ad for which we had previously given two Pinocchios. Some of Romney’s actions after he announced he was “pro-life” caused angst among anti-abortion forces but by and large Gingrich’s claims are exaggerated.

As for Romney, he now touts the endorsement from the pro-life groups but when he was running for governor in 2002 he adamantly rejected it, as this video clip [below] shows.

Brendan Curran announces run for Otsego County Prosecutor

From 1/18/12 E-mail announcement

Curran for Prosecutor

I am pleased to announce that, having obtained and filed with the county clerk’s office the maximum number of nominating petition signatures, I am a candidate for the upcoming election for Otsego County Prosecutor.

Please visit my website and share with your family and friends.
www.curranforprosecutor.com

Your support is very much appreciated.

Brendan

Paid for by the Committee to Elect Brendan Curran for Otsego County Prosecutor, P.O. Box 699, Gaylord, MI 49734

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