Congratulations to the voters in France and Greece. Your votes against ruthless cuts in public programs should be a lesson to all politicians who have been catering to the rich and ignoring the 99%.
I wish that we Americans had such a choice in our November election. America has been an example of what happens to the people when their so called representatives cater only to rich individuals and rich corporations. Both of our major political parties have sold us out to corporations.
They have chosen to cut funding for education of our children, so they do not have to raise taxes to their wealthy donors. And believe me, the U.S. rich do not pay much taxes now. Most U.S. corporations pay less than 10%, even though the published rates are supposed to be 35%. These corporations have bribed governmental officials to insert all types of tax loopholes into our fragmented tax scheme so that many of our largest corporations pay no taxes for several years.
U.S. corporations not only are able to escape taxes, but they are rewarded by other tax dodges to outsource our jobs and factories. Our taxes are used to persuade our employers to fire us and send our jobs across our borders to exploit poor people around the world.
Rich individuals are also treated differently than the 99%. They pay 15% or less while the rest of us pay twice that percentage on our incomes.
The great inequality of wealth in America exceeds the inequalities in many poor nations. Our middle class is rapidly descending into poverty because of the austerity programs that are increasing in their zeal to demolish all public programs.
Public education has been one of the targets of the agenda of the rich. You see, the rich do not want to pay any taxes. They do not believe that they have any obligation to the 99% who depend on public programs to educate our children.
Austerity programs favor the rich over the 99%. The cuts in public education in America have resulted in the firing of over 300,000 teachers. Classrooms are overcrowded because of the losses of good teachers. Children are being deprived of quality educations because of the selfishness of the rich in America.
When my wife graduated with a Doctorate in Educational Leadership, she faced a wall that had frozen the budgets of all school districts in America. Good teachers were being fired, not hired. Good administrators were being fired, not hired. Crooked politicians were pushing national tests down the throats of struggling teachers. Charter schools were being pushed by an agenda to destroy the public school system.
That is why my wife, who won an award as the “Outstanding Graduate of the University of Colorado’s School of Education” had to move from America to New Zealand to find a fulltime job!
Austerity programs favor the rich and ignore the needs of the 99%. It is that simple. The unemployment rate of over 8% in America is a phony rate. When Ronald Reagan became president, they changed the way we count the unemployed. The current scheme is fuzzy math. They use phony surveys. They do not separate persons who work part-time from those who work full-time. They do not separate those who lost high paying jobs and then took jobs paying just a fraction of what they formerly made. They do not count people who have stopped looking for jobs. The best way to determine U.S. unemployment is by doubling the publicized rate from 8% to 16%. Today’s wages are not only stagnated in America, but they are rapidly declining.
Corporations are using all types of schemes to reduce wages of their employees. Unions are denied a fair method to organize workers. Some governors are trying to smash unions by denying them access to collective bargaining.
The simplest solution is to demand that all elections be funded by taxes. And all contributions be banned. Because political contributions are not donations, they are bribes. Bribery is the cancer of good government. Allowing outside funding of elections opens the doors for rich corporations to buy governments with bribery. That is exactly what happened in America. U.S. politicians do not represent the people. They sell their votes in Congress to the corporations who fund their electoral campaigns.
That is why the American government uses austerity schemes to cut funding for public programs and refuses to raise taxes on rich individuals and on rich corporations. Our priorities are upside down. They are immoral.
In 2008, I was a delegate for Barack Obama in the Colorado county and state conventions. I believed in what he said. Unfortunately, Obama did not believe in what he said. In Obama’s 2013 budget, he has offered to make the George W Bush multi-trillion dollar tax cuts to the rich permanent, and not open to expiration.
At the same time, Obama has placed the most important public safety programs, Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security open to severe cuts of hundreds of billions of dollars. Medicare is the only health insurance for people over age 65 and for people of all ages who are severely disabled. Medicaid is the only health insurance for the very poor. Social Security is the only pension plan for millions of Americans. Needless to say, I no longer trust Obama to protect the interests of the 99%. Democrats and Republicans cannot be trusted.
© Japan Today
27 Comments
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herefornow
Nothing but a rehash of the usual socialist clap-trap.
sunhawk
yep, also the fall the euro is incoming.
Herve Nmn L'Eisa
Herefornow, spot on! Just Socialist jingoism.
Herve Nmn L'Eisa
. As Maggie Thatcher said,"The trouble with socialism is that eventually, you run out of other people's money."
y3chome
Politcal funding; Is it not ones democratic right to donate money to a party in which they believe in ? Granted such system is open to abuse, but state funding only is not the answer ; can:t argue that funding should be based on party size, as number of votes may be a function of spending. It would be ludicrous to have each partys spending the same, as extreme right/left wing nut job parties would gain equal political stage.
AiserX
WTH Is a socialist hard-core left wing article like this doing on a Japan website?
Everything in this post is just so wrong on so many levels.
SenseNotSoCommon
@AiserX, what is a reactionary individual doing (if not living in, then) commenting on a website in Japan, with its emphasis on societal harmony, high corporate taxes, capped executive salaries and social healthcare?
It's just so not you on so many levels.
The author is just as entitled to have his opinion published as you are. Or would you rather censor him, and maybe burn some books over a couple of beers later?
Have a nice day.
GW
The author is pretty bang on imo.
The rich & big biz have been busy the last 3decades destroying the markets they operatein, they pilfer for their own gain, they really show a lot of contempt for the majority of mankind thats for sure.
I have been saying for quite a while now that the rich & big biz had better change their ways because at this rate at some point when enough people are down on their luck, THEY WILL rise up in numbers & it will not be pretty.
It truly amazes me at just HOW STUPID the rich have become, the fact they they cant see this potentially happening is scary.
Pls not I dont condone violence etc BUT I can see this happening if the rich & big biz dont start getting their %$#@ together!!
Johannes Weber
There is a very interesting paradigm in the political arena, which many people on this forum seem to adhere. This paradigm suggests that the free market was a stable system. Even though volatile locally, in the general picture, some people assume that the free market is a self-stabilising system in general. Since the market is highly chaotic system, we can compare it with other chaotic systems and see how it works.
The free market includes necessarily anarchy, strife and civil war, since the entirety of these actions have economic aspects and therefore are part of free market movements (they are allowed points in the configuration space of the the society-market system). Since the free market is a chaotic system (and ergodic, if one neglects the finiteness of ressources), it will reach every possible state if one waits long enough.
Since these outcomes are undesirable, it is obvious that the market has to be regulated. Regulations can be considered as exterior forces applied to the society-market system. Regulations are usually applied in a way that they stabilise market trends, which point towards local concentration of economical and political power. We could call this time evolution a local time evolution in configuration space and it moves the system towards the next local minimum.
When the transition to the anarchy (or revolutionary) phase happens, it causes a restart of the free market cycle. This is a large step in configuration space. Like in any other physical system, such large steps in configuration space require large conjugated momenta, which must be generated by large generalised forces, which will accumulate over time by the imbalance of the system, when it is moved out of the central region into outlying local stationary points.
The anarchy phase is a necessary part of the free market mechanism. If the conjugated momenta due to the inner forces of the system grow too large, they cannot be compensated anymore by external forces (which are limited due to their nature as being imposed by a society in consensus). This will cause lgross changes in the society-market system, which will imply severe damage to many people.
Therefore, there is an obvious need to prevent this anarchy phase by preventing the accumulation of power, which is the trigger for the anarchy phase. The only way to do this is by introducing exterior forces to the society-market system, which drive the configuration instead of the local stationary points towards the central region, where the global minimum and relative stability against perturbations can be found.
Thinking about the market as a physical system, the conclusion that a certain extent of socialism is the only reasonable policy is obvious. The question how much socialism and how to apply it properly remains open to debate. By the way, true communism would be fixed-point of the system. While that might be possible in a system with infite ressources, it can be basically excluded by the dissipative nature of the finiteness of ressources.
SquidBert
Yeah, what he ^^^^^ said, pretty much.
kcjapan
Everyone wants to go to the party no one wants to clean up. - Ronin
The party's over and the rich are All too ready to blame the poor and soon to be poor.
If you don't know there's Problem, you're not part Of a solution.
napoleancomplex
If you make more than $34,000 US a year (convert it how you will).. you are in the 1%
tkoind2
Working people are lost in most countries. They vote for parties that speak to their moral or social issues but care very little about their practical and economic issues. Congratulations on fighting back in those countries.
As for Americans following suit. It is sadly unlikely. The 99% are too divided by nearly irrelevant social issues that will polarize them into parties that do not care for their needs. Neither the GOP or the DEM party in the US cares seriously about working people and their families.
The GOP sells their moralism, libertarian view of government size and the old fashioned value of "stand on your own or die" and legions of ill advised Americans follow them. The same people who the GOP will pass legislation to cut jobs for, reduce education and other critical social supports and send their children off to die in pointless wars.
The DEMS talk a good game about social values and helping working people, but do not in the end deliver much. Like the GOP they work for the wealthy and for corporations.
The new right wing parties are even worst. Libertarians and Tea Party groups represent the 1% just as much.
Americans need to follow in the example of these countries and start new movements targeting their needs, their futures and their communities for a better future. It is time to stop following the BS and propaganda from all the major current political movements.
nath
He mentions both parties are corrupt, which should be followed by the suggestion to vote for a third party Congress. The President is just a figurehead. If the super rich don't wise up, there is liable to be a revolution. A couple of years ago there were fires in Greece which may have been a start.
gaijinfo
The government is always the problem. Free, uncontrolled markets with protection of private property, and the absolute elimination of fractional reserve lending would solve all the problems. This author is right that big businesses bribe government. Government shouldn't exist. Government sponsored counterfeiters shouldn't exist. Government laws created by bribed politicians to protect big companies from competition shouldn't exist. Government is a cancer on society. It starts out small, then gets bigger and bigger until it's tentacles are in every part of society, thereby killing the host. The world is quickly on the way. Dark ages are coming.
The only thing that can save us is a revolution, a removal of government save that which protects private property, and a return to a worldwide gold standard.
That is all.
Johannes Weber
@gaijinfo:
These free markets would necessitate the descent of society into anarchy and violence as I have outlined. This can be directly inferred from the general properties of chaotic systems, since strife and civil war are allowed states of the configuration space of the society-market system. Nothing would become better without regulation. If you want to see the consequences of free market wait a while for the next killing sprees of frustrated US citizens. And that is what the tea party is about - free market at gunpoint. These are natural parts of the free market mechanism. The free market doesn't allow the protection of private property, since its main mechanism is the accumulation of property in the hands of a few until the violence breaks out.
Christina O'Neill
Austerity measures hurt, bankers loaned out cash willy nilly regardless of whether borrowers would have the means in a worst case scenario to meet their commitments. They were able to do this as goverments failed to regulate them. Construction companies made a killing in the first instance as people yearned to possess their own homes, such was the demand that they got greedy, vastly increasing their profit margins, in doing so, the inevitable happened, they priced themselves out of business. Stupidly they did not see it coming and borrowed heavily, with the intention of increasing their gains further. The banks should have had more sense, alas they continued with the cash flow and are now up to their necks in the mucky brown stuff. Hold on a minute, no, its us, the ordinary citizens of Europe who are now having to pay for the mess they created. May 31 we in Ireland are being asked to vote yes to an amendment to our constitution in oreder to allow our future budgets to be approved by the E.U Austerity measures huret those who are not responsible for this fiasco
kcjapan
What if the wealthy wanted to create the disparity that Occupy and many others have described?
What would be the best way to take everything of value and place it under the control of the few?
Maybe loan working people endless funds with no regulation and when the collapse hits, buy the world at fire sale prices. If you could do that you would create the chaos of the current environment in money, then, when cashed up, buy everything . . . the missing element; you'd have nothing left to do other than run an oligarchy while presiding over a world of suffering and destitution.
Power is seductive. The necessary steps to acquire power can be an end in themselves and the sensation of power is the lubricant.
We have all heard of the 'Tulip Madness' of the 1600s. Maybe the 'Tulip Madness' today was houses and banking tranches and the result is calamity and suffering at the hands of a very few all because it was fun and very, very profitable.
Socialism? That’s the fever. The illness is grasping wealth looking to satisfy a masturbatory lust for power. Big surprise at the results. Everyone except the rich gets screwed to the wall. Boo hoo.
Leonard Boyak
Basic no government knows how make money they've taken it.
Neo_Rio
Fact is, everyone believes that the market is "free" and somewhat "random". It just looks that way to the untrained casual observer. Well.... it is not "free" and it certainly isn't "random". In fact most economic news is BS, but you wouldn't know it because everyone's been brainwashed to follow the market news as an economic trading strategy.
If everyone knew exactly how it is done, they would all quit their jobs tomorrow, and make a fortune on the stock market. The thing is, the people who run wall street and liase with the other large world banks know that it isn't random -- because they're big enough to move the markets. They have an overreaching plan and can make money by default. The banks are simply the casinos, and the house always wins.
The right-wing left-wing politics are a red-herring. It doesn't matter which side you want to go down at this point. Not while the banks have owned each and every one of us for centuries, and will continue to do so. I could recap "Atlas Shrugged" and it wouldn't help.
Christina O'Neill
Neorio... I am at the moment contemplating part of your missive, n regards, ( if everyone knew exactly how its done, they would quit their jobs tomorrow, and make a fortune on the stock market) My mind boggles at the thought of that. Results and consequence, yes the banks would be totaly bereft, industry would come to a halt, food stores would have no products, no fuel ect., Austerity measures would pale in comparison and stock exchanges would become none existant in a very short time. It would definately be survival of the fittest. So I guess the system as it stands is far from fair, but, I think until positive and fair alternatives are adopted we have no opton but to pay for the mistakes of those who are actualy running the establishment, ie, the banks
hatsoff
Once again the trolls come out with their completely illogical idea that if you criticize the state of capitalism today then you must be a socialist. Welcome back McCarthyism. I honestly thought people had got smarter over the past few decades. Obviously not.
Shivajirao Tipirneni
Insia has completed sixty years of parliamentary life and still speaks about the need for achieving a social welfare state.Their invitation to multui-national corporations to enter into all fields of development ruins our natural resources and makes india again become a slave country bexcause foreign nations exploit the weaknesses of the most corrupt ministers at the central and state levels including the buraaucrats and bribe them so that inflation is fast increasing as money is spent for unproductive works and consequently all the welfafre measures do not make people happy.for instance the states give rice at a cheap price and collect back that subsidy by increasing the cost of petrol.diesael and energy sources so that people are becoming more poorer day by day.Except scandinavian countries most other nations are cheating the millions of poor people to the detriment of the quality of life and the the natural resources so that sustainable development can never be achieved.Even foreign funding agencies wink at these wrong policies of the countries so long as their business interests are served to the satisfaction of the rich countries