EXCERPTS FROM WASHINGTON’S FAREWELL ADDRESS 9/19/1796
“With such powerful and obvious motives to union affecting all parts of our country, while experience shall not have demonstrated its impracticability, there will always be reason to distrust the patriotism of those who in any quarter may endeavor to weaken its bands.”
“All obstructions to the execution of the laws, all combinations and associations under whatever plausible character with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction; to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put in the place of the delegated will of the nation the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common councils and modified by mutual interests. However combinations or associations of the above description may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.”
“Towards the preservation of your government and the permanency of your present happy state, it is requisite not only that you steadily discountenance irregular oppositions to its acknowledged authority but also that you resist with care the spirit of innovation upon its principles, however specious the pretexts. One method of assault may be to effect in the forms of the Constitution alterations which will impair the energy of the system and thus to undermine what cannot be directly overthrown.”
“The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries which result gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation on the ruins of public liberty.”
“It serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the public administration. It agitates the community with ill founded jealousies and false alarms, kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which find a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passions. Thus the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of another.”
“It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free country should inspire caution in those entrusted with its administration to confine themselves within their respective constitutional spheres, avoiding in the exercise of the powers of one department to encroach upon another. The spirit of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one and thus to create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism.”
“With such powerful and obvious motives to union affecting all parts of our country, while experience shall not have demonstrated its impracticability, there will always be reason to distrust the patriotism of those who in any quarter may endeavor to weaken its bands.”
“All obstructions to the execution of the laws, all combinations and associations under whatever plausible character with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction; to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put in the place of the delegated will of the nation the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common councils and modified by mutual interests. However combinations or associations of the above description may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.”
“Towards the preservation of your government and the permanency of your present happy state, it is requisite not only that you steadily discountenance irregular oppositions to its acknowledged authority but also that you resist with care the spirit of innovation upon its principles, however specious the pretexts. One method of assault may be to effect in the forms of the Constitution alterations which will impair the energy of the system and thus to undermine what cannot be directly overthrown.”
“The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries which result gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation on the ruins of public liberty.”
“It serves always to distract the public councils and enfeeble the public administration. It agitates the community with ill founded jealousies and false alarms, kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot and insurrection. It opens the door to foreign influence and corruption, which find a facilitated access to the government itself through the channels of party passions. Thus the policy and the will of one country are subjected to the policy and will of another.”
“It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free country should inspire caution in those entrusted with its administration to confine themselves within their respective constitutional spheres, avoiding in the exercise of the powers of one department to encroach upon another. The spirit of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one and thus to create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism.”
MCDONALD’S WORKERS IN DENMARK PITY US
Danes haven’t built a “socialist” country. Just one that works.
By Nicholas Kristof, The New York Times
Republicans thunder that Democrats are trying to drag America toward “socialism”. Even some Democrats warn against becoming, as one put it, “[expletive] Denmark.”
So, before the coronavirus pandemic, I crept behind [expletive] Danish lines to explore: How scary is Denmark? How horrifying would it be if the United States took a step or two in the direction of Denmark? Would America lose its edge, productivity and innovation, or would it gain well-being, fairness and happiness?
So, here, grab a Danish, and we’ll chat about how a [expletive] progressive country performs under stress. The pandemic interrupted my reporting, but I’d be safer if I still were in Denmark: It has had almost twice as much testing per capita as the United States and fewer than half as many deaths per capita.
Put it this way: More than 35,000 Americans have already died in part because the United States could not manage the pandemic as deftly as Denmark.
Denmark lowered new infections so successfully that last month it reopened elementary schools and day care centers as well as barber shops and physical therapy centers. In the coming days, it will announce further steps to reopen the economy.
Moreover, Danes kept their jobs. The trauma of massive numbers of people losing jobs and health insurance, of long lines at food banks — that is the American experience, but it’s not what’s happening in Denmark. America’s unemployment rate last month was 14.7 percent, but Denmark’s is hovering in the range of 4 percent to 5 percent.
“Our aim was that businesses wouldn’t fire workers,” Labor Minister Peter Hummelgaard told me. Denmark’s approach is simple: Along with some other European countries, it paid companies to keep employees on the payroll, reimbursing up to 90 percent of wages of workers who otherwise would have been laid off.
Denmark also helped hard-hit companies pay fixed costs like rent — on the condition that they suspend dividends, don’t buy back stock and don’t use foreign havens to evade taxes.
Some of the $3 trillion that the United States has poured into unemployment benefits, stimulus payments, business rescues and industry bailouts has gone to worker retention, but the attention to avoiding layoffs is far less serious.
As a share of G.D.P., Denmark’s coronavirus relief spending is a bit less than America’s, but it seems more effective at protecting the population.
The upshot is that Denmark staggered through the pandemic with employees still on the payroll and still paying rent. As the economy sputters back to life, Danish companies are in a position to bounce back quickly without the cost of having to rehire workers.
“We can be up and running in a week, back where we were,” explained Peter Lykke Nielsen, a negotiator for unionized workers at hamburger chains. This European approach to avoiding unemployment won admiration in Washington, and not exclusively from liberals: Senator Josh Hawley, a Republican from Missouri, advocates something similar in the United States.
Some Americans cite Sweden as a model for coronavirus response because it has not imposed a major lockdown. But, in fact, Denmark, separated from Sweden by a bridge, has been far more successful: Denmark’s death rate from Covid-19 per million people is less than one-third of Sweden’s, and forecasters predict that Denmark’s economy will do better than Sweden’s this year.
Denmark, by saving lives, has also saved its economy, at least so far.
Covid-19 will not last forever, and skeptical Americans may think that [expletive] Denmark coddles workers in ways that hobble economic dynamism and ultimately hurt workers themselves. I raised that argument with a McDonald’s worker I met in Copenhagen, Muhammad Abu Sayeed, a Bangladeshi immigrant. He looked at me quizzically.
Nicholas Kristof’s Newsletter: Get a behind-the-scenes look at Nick’s gritty journalism as he travels around the United States and the world.
Starting pay for the humblest burger-flipper at McDonald’s in Denmark is about $22 an hour once various pay supplements are included. The McDonald’s workers in Denmark get six weeks of paid vacation a year, life insurance, a year’s paid maternity leave and a pension plan. And like all Danes, they enjoy universal medical insurance and paid sick leave.
One reason Denmark was more effective than the United States in responding to the crisis is that no Dane hesitated to seek treatment because of concerns about medical bills.
Abu Sayeed knew that Americans working in fast food don’t do so well. “I heard about the movement,” he said, trying to remember its name. “Fight for something. Fight for $20? What was it?”
“Fight for $15,” I explained. “They want $15 an hour.”
There was an awkward silence. He nodded sympathetically. Then he tried not to sound condescending.
“I feel for them,” he said earnestly of American workers at McDonald’s. “We are from the same brand.”
Some American companies scoff that a $15 minimum wage or stronger unions would be a disastrous blow to business. Denmark challenges that narrative, for it shows that it’s possible to have a thriving economy that pays workers decently and treats them respectfully.
Workers get their schedules a month in advance, and they can’t be assigned back-to-back shifts. American politicians speak solemnly about the dignity of work, but you’re more likely to find it in Copenhagen than in New York.
This wasn’t always so. The golden age of American capitalism, from 1945 to 1980, was a period of high tax rates (up to 91 percent for the very wealthy), strong labor unions and huge initiatives, such as the G.I. Bill of Rights to help disadvantaged (albeit mostly white) Americans. This was a period of rapid growth in which income inequality declined — and in some ways it looked like today’s Denmark.
One Republican strategy this year has been to demonize Democrats as socialists who would destroy the economy. Trump warns that Democrats “want to model America’s economy after Venezuela.”
Well, no. In fact, what liberal Democrats have in mind is a step in the direction of the Nordic model found in Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland. But paradoxically, while Americans on both left and right often think of Scandinavia as quasi-socialist, Scandinavians flinch at that characterization. They see themselves as simply pursuing market economies, just with higher taxes and greater social benefits than the United States.
Danes pay an extra 19 cents of every dollar in taxes, compared with Americans, but for that they get free health care, free education from kindergarten through college, subsidized high-quality preschool, a very strong social safety net and very low levels of poverty, homelessness, crime and inequality. On average, Danes live two years longer than Americans.
A Big Mac flipped by $22-an-hour workers isn’t even that much more expensive than an American one. Big Mac prices vary by outlet, but my spot pricing suggested that one might cost about 27 cents more on average in Denmark than in the United States. That 27 cents is the price of dignity.
Americans might suspect that the Danish safety net encourages laziness. But 79 percent of Danes ages 16 to 64 are in the labor force, five percentage points higher than in the United States.
Danes earn about the same after-tax income as Americans, even though they work on average 22 percent fewer hours; on the other hand, money doesn’t go as far in Denmark because prices average 18 percent higher. My own rough guess is that the top quarter of earners live better in America, but that the bottom three-quarters live better in Denmark.
Indeed, polls find that Danes are among the world’s happiest people, along with Finns; Denmark is sometimes called “the happiest country.”
You can agree or disagree that the trade-offs are worth it, but as you sit at a cafe in Copenhagen, sipping coffee and enjoying a Danish (called Viennese bread), Denmark hardly seems like a socialist nightmare.
Indeed, Danes — very politely — express concern for what they perceive as a dystopia on the other side of the Atlantic.
“We look to America for a lot of things,” Nielsen, the labor negotiator, told me. “And then we meet people in the fast-food sector, and. …” He paused, struggling for the right words. “Look, all countries have flaws, right? But you look at labor rights in America, and it’s crazy. If you work full time you should be able to support your family.”
Kristina Hansen, 27, who works at a nonunion hamburger chain called Cock’s & Cows, told me she is now thinking of buying an apartment. Surprised, I noted that few Americans working at hamburger chains are buying their own homes, and we discussed American fast-food pay.
“How can they survive on that money over there?” she asked me. “It’s so expensive to live in New York. I wonder how they live on that kind of money.”
Americans assume that Danish wages must be high because of regulations, but Denmark has no national minimum wage, and it would be perfectly legal for a construction company or a corner pizzeria to hire workers at $5 an hour. Yet that doesn’t happen. The typical bottom market wage seems to be about $15 — about twice the federal minimum wage in the United States, a country with a roughly similar standard of living. Why is that?
One reason is Denmark’s strong unions. More than 80 percent of Danish employees work under collective bargaining contracts, although strikes are rare. There is also “sectoral bargaining,” in which contracts are negotiated across an entire business sector — so in Denmark, McDonald’s and Burger King pay exactly the same — something that Joe Biden suggests the United States consider as well.
Yet there’s another, more important reason for high wages in Denmark.
“Workers are more productive” in Denmark, Lawrence Katz, a labor economist at Harvard, noted bluntly. “They have had access to more and higher-quality human capital investment opportunities starting at birth.”
Think of it this way. Workers at McDonald’s outlets all over the world tend to be at the lower end of the labor force, say the 20th percentile. But Danish workers at the 20th percentile are high school graduates who are literate and numerate.
In contrast, after half a century of underinvestment in the United States, many 20th-percentile American workers haven’t graduated from high school, can’t read well, aren’t very numerate, struggle with drugs or alcohol, or have impairments that reduce productivity.
Increasingly, I came to see that emulating a Danish-style system of high wages wasn’t just about lifting the minimum wage but, even more, about investing in children.
Many Danes see the nurturing of children as part of their nation’s secret sauce, so I dropped in on a public day care center in the city of Soborg. It turned out to be bright and pleasant, with 68 children and 12 teachers, plus a cook who serves mostly organic meals.
This center is open from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m., and some other branches offer extended hours. It costs (a heavily subsidized) $516 per month for children ages 4 months to 3 years, and $354 for children from 3 to 6. Children of low-income parents attend free.
The focus isn’t so much on learning reading or numbers, but rather on using play to learn social skills and creativity. “‘Learning to learn’ is a popular expression here,” explained Helle Olsen, the manager.
One critical purpose of the system is to allow both parents to work, and that’s why day care centers were among the first institutions reopened as the number of coronavirus cases fell. But families commonly send children to the centers even if there is a grandparent or other person at home (nannies are rare), because they are seen as training kids to be good Danish citizens. For that reason, attendance is mandatory for families where Danish is not spoken at home.
If we want to understand why burger-flippers in Denmark earn so much, I realized, part of the answer involves giving little children equal access to the starting line so that they will be educated and become productive workers two decades later.
The success of the Nordic model seems undeniable — although it’s not obvious to all Americans. Last year, Nikki Haley tweeted contemptuously about Finland’s health care system. “Comparing us to Finland is ridiculous,” she said scornfully. “Ask them how their health care is. You won’t like their answer.”
She apparently was unaware that Finns live longer than Americans, that Finnish children are only one-third as likely to die by the age of 5, and that Finnish women are one-fifth as likely to die in childbirth.
Even on the Democratic side, the television personality Donny Deutsch scoffed on Bill Maher’s HBO show that Medicare for All would mean “we are going backwards. We’re [expletive] Denmark!”
At a time when a pandemic lays bare longstanding inequities in the United States, maybe we should approach the Nordic countries with a bit more curiosity and humility. Hummelgaard, the labor minister, is the son of a porter and a cleaner but received an excellent free education and spoke to me in perfect English. He admires the United States but is sometimes baffled by it.
“Danes love America,” Hummelgaard told me. “But there’s no admiration for the level of inequality in America, for the lack of job security, for the lack of health security, for all those things that normally can create a good society.”
Danes haven’t built a “socialist” country. Just one that works.
By Nicholas Kristof, The New York Times
Republicans thunder that Democrats are trying to drag America toward “socialism”. Even some Democrats warn against becoming, as one put it, “[expletive] Denmark.”
So, before the coronavirus pandemic, I crept behind [expletive] Danish lines to explore: How scary is Denmark? How horrifying would it be if the United States took a step or two in the direction of Denmark? Would America lose its edge, productivity and innovation, or would it gain well-being, fairness and happiness?
So, here, grab a Danish, and we’ll chat about how a [expletive] progressive country performs under stress. The pandemic interrupted my reporting, but I’d be safer if I still were in Denmark: It has had almost twice as much testing per capita as the United States and fewer than half as many deaths per capita.
Put it this way: More than 35,000 Americans have already died in part because the United States could not manage the pandemic as deftly as Denmark.
Denmark lowered new infections so successfully that last month it reopened elementary schools and day care centers as well as barber shops and physical therapy centers. In the coming days, it will announce further steps to reopen the economy.
Moreover, Danes kept their jobs. The trauma of massive numbers of people losing jobs and health insurance, of long lines at food banks — that is the American experience, but it’s not what’s happening in Denmark. America’s unemployment rate last month was 14.7 percent, but Denmark’s is hovering in the range of 4 percent to 5 percent.
“Our aim was that businesses wouldn’t fire workers,” Labor Minister Peter Hummelgaard told me. Denmark’s approach is simple: Along with some other European countries, it paid companies to keep employees on the payroll, reimbursing up to 90 percent of wages of workers who otherwise would have been laid off.
Denmark also helped hard-hit companies pay fixed costs like rent — on the condition that they suspend dividends, don’t buy back stock and don’t use foreign havens to evade taxes.
Some of the $3 trillion that the United States has poured into unemployment benefits, stimulus payments, business rescues and industry bailouts has gone to worker retention, but the attention to avoiding layoffs is far less serious.
As a share of G.D.P., Denmark’s coronavirus relief spending is a bit less than America’s, but it seems more effective at protecting the population.
The upshot is that Denmark staggered through the pandemic with employees still on the payroll and still paying rent. As the economy sputters back to life, Danish companies are in a position to bounce back quickly without the cost of having to rehire workers.
“We can be up and running in a week, back where we were,” explained Peter Lykke Nielsen, a negotiator for unionized workers at hamburger chains. This European approach to avoiding unemployment won admiration in Washington, and not exclusively from liberals: Senator Josh Hawley, a Republican from Missouri, advocates something similar in the United States.
Some Americans cite Sweden as a model for coronavirus response because it has not imposed a major lockdown. But, in fact, Denmark, separated from Sweden by a bridge, has been far more successful: Denmark’s death rate from Covid-19 per million people is less than one-third of Sweden’s, and forecasters predict that Denmark’s economy will do better than Sweden’s this year.
Denmark, by saving lives, has also saved its economy, at least so far.
Covid-19 will not last forever, and skeptical Americans may think that [expletive] Denmark coddles workers in ways that hobble economic dynamism and ultimately hurt workers themselves. I raised that argument with a McDonald’s worker I met in Copenhagen, Muhammad Abu Sayeed, a Bangladeshi immigrant. He looked at me quizzically.
Nicholas Kristof’s Newsletter: Get a behind-the-scenes look at Nick’s gritty journalism as he travels around the United States and the world.
Starting pay for the humblest burger-flipper at McDonald’s in Denmark is about $22 an hour once various pay supplements are included. The McDonald’s workers in Denmark get six weeks of paid vacation a year, life insurance, a year’s paid maternity leave and a pension plan. And like all Danes, they enjoy universal medical insurance and paid sick leave.
One reason Denmark was more effective than the United States in responding to the crisis is that no Dane hesitated to seek treatment because of concerns about medical bills.
Abu Sayeed knew that Americans working in fast food don’t do so well. “I heard about the movement,” he said, trying to remember its name. “Fight for something. Fight for $20? What was it?”
“Fight for $15,” I explained. “They want $15 an hour.”
There was an awkward silence. He nodded sympathetically. Then he tried not to sound condescending.
“I feel for them,” he said earnestly of American workers at McDonald’s. “We are from the same brand.”
Some American companies scoff that a $15 minimum wage or stronger unions would be a disastrous blow to business. Denmark challenges that narrative, for it shows that it’s possible to have a thriving economy that pays workers decently and treats them respectfully.
Workers get their schedules a month in advance, and they can’t be assigned back-to-back shifts. American politicians speak solemnly about the dignity of work, but you’re more likely to find it in Copenhagen than in New York.
This wasn’t always so. The golden age of American capitalism, from 1945 to 1980, was a period of high tax rates (up to 91 percent for the very wealthy), strong labor unions and huge initiatives, such as the G.I. Bill of Rights to help disadvantaged (albeit mostly white) Americans. This was a period of rapid growth in which income inequality declined — and in some ways it looked like today’s Denmark.
One Republican strategy this year has been to demonize Democrats as socialists who would destroy the economy. Trump warns that Democrats “want to model America’s economy after Venezuela.”
Well, no. In fact, what liberal Democrats have in mind is a step in the direction of the Nordic model found in Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Finland. But paradoxically, while Americans on both left and right often think of Scandinavia as quasi-socialist, Scandinavians flinch at that characterization. They see themselves as simply pursuing market economies, just with higher taxes and greater social benefits than the United States.
Danes pay an extra 19 cents of every dollar in taxes, compared with Americans, but for that they get free health care, free education from kindergarten through college, subsidized high-quality preschool, a very strong social safety net and very low levels of poverty, homelessness, crime and inequality. On average, Danes live two years longer than Americans.
A Big Mac flipped by $22-an-hour workers isn’t even that much more expensive than an American one. Big Mac prices vary by outlet, but my spot pricing suggested that one might cost about 27 cents more on average in Denmark than in the United States. That 27 cents is the price of dignity.
Americans might suspect that the Danish safety net encourages laziness. But 79 percent of Danes ages 16 to 64 are in the labor force, five percentage points higher than in the United States.
Danes earn about the same after-tax income as Americans, even though they work on average 22 percent fewer hours; on the other hand, money doesn’t go as far in Denmark because prices average 18 percent higher. My own rough guess is that the top quarter of earners live better in America, but that the bottom three-quarters live better in Denmark.
Indeed, polls find that Danes are among the world’s happiest people, along with Finns; Denmark is sometimes called “the happiest country.”
You can agree or disagree that the trade-offs are worth it, but as you sit at a cafe in Copenhagen, sipping coffee and enjoying a Danish (called Viennese bread), Denmark hardly seems like a socialist nightmare.
Indeed, Danes — very politely — express concern for what they perceive as a dystopia on the other side of the Atlantic.
“We look to America for a lot of things,” Nielsen, the labor negotiator, told me. “And then we meet people in the fast-food sector, and. …” He paused, struggling for the right words. “Look, all countries have flaws, right? But you look at labor rights in America, and it’s crazy. If you work full time you should be able to support your family.”
Kristina Hansen, 27, who works at a nonunion hamburger chain called Cock’s & Cows, told me she is now thinking of buying an apartment. Surprised, I noted that few Americans working at hamburger chains are buying their own homes, and we discussed American fast-food pay.
“How can they survive on that money over there?” she asked me. “It’s so expensive to live in New York. I wonder how they live on that kind of money.”
Americans assume that Danish wages must be high because of regulations, but Denmark has no national minimum wage, and it would be perfectly legal for a construction company or a corner pizzeria to hire workers at $5 an hour. Yet that doesn’t happen. The typical bottom market wage seems to be about $15 — about twice the federal minimum wage in the United States, a country with a roughly similar standard of living. Why is that?
One reason is Denmark’s strong unions. More than 80 percent of Danish employees work under collective bargaining contracts, although strikes are rare. There is also “sectoral bargaining,” in which contracts are negotiated across an entire business sector — so in Denmark, McDonald’s and Burger King pay exactly the same — something that Joe Biden suggests the United States consider as well.
Yet there’s another, more important reason for high wages in Denmark.
“Workers are more productive” in Denmark, Lawrence Katz, a labor economist at Harvard, noted bluntly. “They have had access to more and higher-quality human capital investment opportunities starting at birth.”
Think of it this way. Workers at McDonald’s outlets all over the world tend to be at the lower end of the labor force, say the 20th percentile. But Danish workers at the 20th percentile are high school graduates who are literate and numerate.
In contrast, after half a century of underinvestment in the United States, many 20th-percentile American workers haven’t graduated from high school, can’t read well, aren’t very numerate, struggle with drugs or alcohol, or have impairments that reduce productivity.
Increasingly, I came to see that emulating a Danish-style system of high wages wasn’t just about lifting the minimum wage but, even more, about investing in children.
Many Danes see the nurturing of children as part of their nation’s secret sauce, so I dropped in on a public day care center in the city of Soborg. It turned out to be bright and pleasant, with 68 children and 12 teachers, plus a cook who serves mostly organic meals.
This center is open from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m., and some other branches offer extended hours. It costs (a heavily subsidized) $516 per month for children ages 4 months to 3 years, and $354 for children from 3 to 6. Children of low-income parents attend free.
The focus isn’t so much on learning reading or numbers, but rather on using play to learn social skills and creativity. “‘Learning to learn’ is a popular expression here,” explained Helle Olsen, the manager.
One critical purpose of the system is to allow both parents to work, and that’s why day care centers were among the first institutions reopened as the number of coronavirus cases fell. But families commonly send children to the centers even if there is a grandparent or other person at home (nannies are rare), because they are seen as training kids to be good Danish citizens. For that reason, attendance is mandatory for families where Danish is not spoken at home.
If we want to understand why burger-flippers in Denmark earn so much, I realized, part of the answer involves giving little children equal access to the starting line so that they will be educated and become productive workers two decades later.
The success of the Nordic model seems undeniable — although it’s not obvious to all Americans. Last year, Nikki Haley tweeted contemptuously about Finland’s health care system. “Comparing us to Finland is ridiculous,” she said scornfully. “Ask them how their health care is. You won’t like their answer.”
She apparently was unaware that Finns live longer than Americans, that Finnish children are only one-third as likely to die by the age of 5, and that Finnish women are one-fifth as likely to die in childbirth.
Even on the Democratic side, the television personality Donny Deutsch scoffed on Bill Maher’s HBO show that Medicare for All would mean “we are going backwards. We’re [expletive] Denmark!”
At a time when a pandemic lays bare longstanding inequities in the United States, maybe we should approach the Nordic countries with a bit more curiosity and humility. Hummelgaard, the labor minister, is the son of a porter and a cleaner but received an excellent free education and spoke to me in perfect English. He admires the United States but is sometimes baffled by it.
“Danes love America,” Hummelgaard told me. “But there’s no admiration for the level of inequality in America, for the lack of job security, for the lack of health security, for all those things that normally can create a good society.”
Violence begins where knowledge ends. -Abraham Lincoln
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. -Isaac Asimov
Violence is the repartee of the illiterate. -George Bernard Shaw
Violence is an admission that one's ideas and goals cannot prevail on their own merits. -Edward Kennedy
If one's cause is supported by sound reasoning, there is no point in using violence. It is those who have no motive other than selfish desire, and who cannot achieve their goal through logical reasoning, who rely on force. -Dalai Lama
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. -Isaac Asimov
Violence is the repartee of the illiterate. -George Bernard Shaw
Violence is an admission that one's ideas and goals cannot prevail on their own merits. -Edward Kennedy
If one's cause is supported by sound reasoning, there is no point in using violence. It is those who have no motive other than selfish desire, and who cannot achieve their goal through logical reasoning, who rely on force. -Dalai Lama
THERE ARE 661 FRACKING WELLS IN TIOGA COUNTY
CLICK HERE TO FIND OUT WHETHER A FRACKING WELL IS LOCATED NEAR YOU
FRACK ATTACK -- BY THE STATE OF PENNSYLVANIA (CLICK ON DOCUMENT)
PA SUPREME COURT RULES WITH ENVIRONMENTALISTS OVER REMAINING ISSUES IN ACT 13
By Susan Phillips
The Supreme Court struck down a number of provisions in the law governing the state's oil and gas industry.
In a win for environmentalists and municipalities, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has struck down a number of provisions to the state’s oil and gas law. At issue were several items related to the 2013 Supreme Court decision in Robinson v. Commonwealth, the controversial and wide ranging environmental ruling that eliminated parts of the state’s revised oil and gas law, known as Act 13. On Wednesday, a majority of the court ruled that the “doctor gag rule,” eminent domain for natural gas storage facilities, and the exclusion of private wells from notification of hazardous spills is unconstitutional.
The industry no longer has a fast track to commonwealth court when it comes to challenging local zoning ordinances. And the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission will have no role in examining local zoning decisions.
Jordan Yeager, the attorney who argued for the towns and environmental groups involved in the challenging the law, said it’s a big win.
“It’s great,” he said. “And it’s great for the residents of Pennsylvania to have the courts recognize that their rights matter more than the gas industry’s power in Harrisburg.”
Yeager said the court’s 88-page opinion repeatedly stressed the original law had serious flaws.
“It’s a great vindication for citizen’s constitutional rights,” he said. “The court said throughout the opinion, that Act 13 and these provisions were a special law that simply benefited the gas industry.
The gas industry was not as effusive about the decision.
“We’re disappointed in aspects of the court’s ruling,” said the Marcellus Shale Coalition president David Spigelmyer in a statement. “[It] will make investing and growing jobs in the Commonwealth more — not less — difficult without realizing any environmental or public safety benefits. Despite this ruling, our industry remains deeply committed to adhering to the high bar set by Act 13, a common sense bipartisan law that modernized our oil and natural gas regulatory framework and serves as a national model for other states.”
Former Republican Gov. Tom Corbett signed the new law back in February, 2012, and it was soon challenged by local towns wanting to maintain control over where fracking for natural gas could take place. In December, 2013, the Supreme Court ruled in a plurality decision that portions of the law, including one that restricted local zoning rights, was unconstitutional. Much of the decision was based on the state’s environmental rights amendment. But the court also sent some challenges back to the lower courts, and those issues have been working their way back to the Supreme Court.
By striking down the local zoning restrictions in 2013, issues over the role of the Public Utility Commission remained because the original law made the PUC the decider on whether local zoning rules violated Act 13. The PUC will have no such role.
Pennsylvania’s new law was also supposed to make things easier for doctors and patients seeking hazardous material information in case of exposure. The law requires drillers to list the chemicals used to produce oil or gas on a public website that doctors could access.
But the website is not required to list all the chemicals used; it leaves off those considered to be trade secrets. These are ingredients that a company says it has to keep secret in order to maintain an edge over its competitors. Doctors could only get the trade secret chemical names and information if they signed a confidentiality agreement and agreed not to share that information. That caused an uproar in the healthcare community and one doctor filed suit.
Wednesday’s ruling eliminates the required non-disclosure agreement. The court reasoned that because this type of requirement only applied to the gas industry, it was unconstitutional. This could mean the healthcare community would now have no option for gaining that information. But in briefs filed by the plaintiffs, they explain that other state and federal statutes would grant them access to the trade secrets in cases of exposure.
Act 13 requires the Department of Environmental Protection to notify operators of public water supplies in the event of a nearby spill related to gas drilling. But the law left out notification to private well owners, which provides water to about 3 million residents of the state, many of whom live in shale drilling areas. The court ordered the legislature to fix this part of the law, and require notification to private well owners.
The court also struck down the use of eminent domain in the case of natural gas storage facilities, which are located underground. The court said that while some portion of storage may benefit the public, it was primarily beneficial to business interests.
John Dernbach, an environmental law professor at Widener University, called the ruling a “home run” for citizens of Pennsylvania.
“The citizens did a lot better in this case than I thought they would,” he said. “Everything the citizens sought to be declared unconstitutional, was declared unconstitutional.”
The governor’s office and the Public Utility Commission say they’re still reviewing the decision.
By Susan Phillips
The Supreme Court struck down a number of provisions in the law governing the state's oil and gas industry.
In a win for environmentalists and municipalities, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court has struck down a number of provisions to the state’s oil and gas law. At issue were several items related to the 2013 Supreme Court decision in Robinson v. Commonwealth, the controversial and wide ranging environmental ruling that eliminated parts of the state’s revised oil and gas law, known as Act 13. On Wednesday, a majority of the court ruled that the “doctor gag rule,” eminent domain for natural gas storage facilities, and the exclusion of private wells from notification of hazardous spills is unconstitutional.
The industry no longer has a fast track to commonwealth court when it comes to challenging local zoning ordinances. And the Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission will have no role in examining local zoning decisions.
Jordan Yeager, the attorney who argued for the towns and environmental groups involved in the challenging the law, said it’s a big win.
“It’s great,” he said. “And it’s great for the residents of Pennsylvania to have the courts recognize that their rights matter more than the gas industry’s power in Harrisburg.”
Yeager said the court’s 88-page opinion repeatedly stressed the original law had serious flaws.
“It’s a great vindication for citizen’s constitutional rights,” he said. “The court said throughout the opinion, that Act 13 and these provisions were a special law that simply benefited the gas industry.
The gas industry was not as effusive about the decision.
“We’re disappointed in aspects of the court’s ruling,” said the Marcellus Shale Coalition president David Spigelmyer in a statement. “[It] will make investing and growing jobs in the Commonwealth more — not less — difficult without realizing any environmental or public safety benefits. Despite this ruling, our industry remains deeply committed to adhering to the high bar set by Act 13, a common sense bipartisan law that modernized our oil and natural gas regulatory framework and serves as a national model for other states.”
Former Republican Gov. Tom Corbett signed the new law back in February, 2012, and it was soon challenged by local towns wanting to maintain control over where fracking for natural gas could take place. In December, 2013, the Supreme Court ruled in a plurality decision that portions of the law, including one that restricted local zoning rights, was unconstitutional. Much of the decision was based on the state’s environmental rights amendment. But the court also sent some challenges back to the lower courts, and those issues have been working their way back to the Supreme Court.
By striking down the local zoning restrictions in 2013, issues over the role of the Public Utility Commission remained because the original law made the PUC the decider on whether local zoning rules violated Act 13. The PUC will have no such role.
Pennsylvania’s new law was also supposed to make things easier for doctors and patients seeking hazardous material information in case of exposure. The law requires drillers to list the chemicals used to produce oil or gas on a public website that doctors could access.
But the website is not required to list all the chemicals used; it leaves off those considered to be trade secrets. These are ingredients that a company says it has to keep secret in order to maintain an edge over its competitors. Doctors could only get the trade secret chemical names and information if they signed a confidentiality agreement and agreed not to share that information. That caused an uproar in the healthcare community and one doctor filed suit.
Wednesday’s ruling eliminates the required non-disclosure agreement. The court reasoned that because this type of requirement only applied to the gas industry, it was unconstitutional. This could mean the healthcare community would now have no option for gaining that information. But in briefs filed by the plaintiffs, they explain that other state and federal statutes would grant them access to the trade secrets in cases of exposure.
Act 13 requires the Department of Environmental Protection to notify operators of public water supplies in the event of a nearby spill related to gas drilling. But the law left out notification to private well owners, which provides water to about 3 million residents of the state, many of whom live in shale drilling areas. The court ordered the legislature to fix this part of the law, and require notification to private well owners.
The court also struck down the use of eminent domain in the case of natural gas storage facilities, which are located underground. The court said that while some portion of storage may benefit the public, it was primarily beneficial to business interests.
John Dernbach, an environmental law professor at Widener University, called the ruling a “home run” for citizens of Pennsylvania.
“The citizens did a lot better in this case than I thought they would,” he said. “Everything the citizens sought to be declared unconstitutional, was declared unconstitutional.”
The governor’s office and the Public Utility Commission say they’re still reviewing the decision.
Fracking Pollutes Drinking Water, Says Long-Awaited EPA Study
Refuting its own 2004 study, the EPA found that toxic fracking fluids that leak into the water table can contaminate drinking water.
By Anastasia Pantsios June 5, 2015
In 2010, Congress commissioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to study the impact of fracking on drinking water. Yesterday, the EPA released the long-awaited final draft of its report, assessing how fracking for oil and gas can impact access to safe drinking water. The report refuted the conclusion arrived at by the EPA’s 2004 study that fracking poses no threat to drinking water, a conclusion used to exempt the fracking process from the Safe Drinking Water Act.
The stages of the hydraulic fracturing water cycle. Shown here is a generalized landscape depicting the activities of the hydraulic fracturing water cycle and their relationship to each other, as well as their relationship to drinking water resources. Image credit: EPA
The report found that fracking for shale oil and gas has not led to “widespread, systemic impacts on drinking water resources in the United States,” but said fracking could contaminate drinking water under certain conditions, such as when fluids used in the process leaked into the water table, and found isolated cases of water contamination.
The report looked at water use at five stages of the water-intensive process: use of the available water supply for fracking; the mixing of chemicals with water to create fracking fluid; the flow-back of the fluid after it has been injected underground to fracture shale deposits to release oil or gas; treatment of the wastewater byproduct of fracking; and the injection wells frequently used to dispose of fracking wastewater when the process is complete.
“Hydraulic fracturing in combination with advanced directional drilling techniques has made it possible to economically extract oil and gas from unconventional resources, such as shale, tight formations and coalbeds,” the report says. “The growth in domestic oil and gas exploration and production made possible by the expanded use of hydraulic fracturing, has raised concerns about its potential for impacts to human health and the environment. Specific concerns have been raised by the public about the effects of hydraulic fracturing on the quality and quantity of drinking water resources.”
It noted the reason for that concern: “Millions of people live in areas where their drinking water resources are located near hydraulically fractured wells. While most hydraulic fracturing activity from 2000 to 2013 did not occur in close proximity to public water supplies, a sizeable number of hydraulically fractured wells (21,900) were located within 1 mile of at least one PWS source (e.g., infiltration galleries, intakes, reservoirs, springs and ground water wells). Approximately 6,800 sources of drinking water for public water systems, serving more than 8.6 million people year-round, were located within 1 mile of at least one hydraulically fractured well. An additional 3.6 million people obtain drinking water from private water systems.”
Refuting its own 2004 study, the EPA found that toxic fracking fluids that leak into the water table can contaminate drinking water.
By Anastasia Pantsios June 5, 2015
In 2010, Congress commissioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to study the impact of fracking on drinking water. Yesterday, the EPA released the long-awaited final draft of its report, assessing how fracking for oil and gas can impact access to safe drinking water. The report refuted the conclusion arrived at by the EPA’s 2004 study that fracking poses no threat to drinking water, a conclusion used to exempt the fracking process from the Safe Drinking Water Act.
The stages of the hydraulic fracturing water cycle. Shown here is a generalized landscape depicting the activities of the hydraulic fracturing water cycle and their relationship to each other, as well as their relationship to drinking water resources. Image credit: EPA
The report found that fracking for shale oil and gas has not led to “widespread, systemic impacts on drinking water resources in the United States,” but said fracking could contaminate drinking water under certain conditions, such as when fluids used in the process leaked into the water table, and found isolated cases of water contamination.
The report looked at water use at five stages of the water-intensive process: use of the available water supply for fracking; the mixing of chemicals with water to create fracking fluid; the flow-back of the fluid after it has been injected underground to fracture shale deposits to release oil or gas; treatment of the wastewater byproduct of fracking; and the injection wells frequently used to dispose of fracking wastewater when the process is complete.
“Hydraulic fracturing in combination with advanced directional drilling techniques has made it possible to economically extract oil and gas from unconventional resources, such as shale, tight formations and coalbeds,” the report says. “The growth in domestic oil and gas exploration and production made possible by the expanded use of hydraulic fracturing, has raised concerns about its potential for impacts to human health and the environment. Specific concerns have been raised by the public about the effects of hydraulic fracturing on the quality and quantity of drinking water resources.”
It noted the reason for that concern: “Millions of people live in areas where their drinking water resources are located near hydraulically fractured wells. While most hydraulic fracturing activity from 2000 to 2013 did not occur in close proximity to public water supplies, a sizeable number of hydraulically fractured wells (21,900) were located within 1 mile of at least one PWS source (e.g., infiltration galleries, intakes, reservoirs, springs and ground water wells). Approximately 6,800 sources of drinking water for public water systems, serving more than 8.6 million people year-round, were located within 1 mile of at least one hydraulically fractured well. An additional 3.6 million people obtain drinking water from private water systems.”
Fracking’s Total Environmental Impact Is Staggering, Report Finds by Samantha Page
A new report details the sheer amount of fracking in the United States. The body of evidence is growing that fracking is not only bad for the global climate, it is also dangerous for local communities.
And affected communities are growing in number. The report, released Thursday, details the sheer amount of water contamination, air pollution, climate impacts, and chemical use in fracking in the United States.
“For the past decade, fracking has been a nightmare for our drinking water, our open spaces, and our climate,” Rachel Richardson, a co-author of the paper from Environment America, told ThinkProgress.
Fracking, a form of extraction that injects large volumes of chemical-laced water into shale, releasing pockets of oil and gas, has been on the rise in the United States for the past decade, and the sheer numbers are staggering. Environment America reports that at least 239 billion gallons of water — an average of three million gallons per well — has been used for fracking. In 2014 alone, fracking created 15 billion gallons of wastewater. This water generally cannot be reused, and is often toxic. Fracking operators reinject the water underground, where it can leach into drinking water sources. The chemicals can include formaldehyde, benzene, and hydrochloric acid.
Fracking is also bad news for the climate. Natural gas is 80 percent methane, which traps heat 86 times more effectively than CO2 over a 20-year period. Newly fracked wells released 2.4 million metric tons of methane in 2014 — equivalent to the annual greenhouse gas emissions of 22 coal-fired power plants.
“Whether you are already on the front lines of fracking or are simply worried about your children having a safe future, the numbers don’t lie,” Richardson said.
At this point, more than a thousand square miles of the country have been disturbed by fracking activity, the report says, with 137,000 fracking wells drilled or permitted across more than 20 states.
“I think the report paints a frightening picture of fracking’s harms,” Richardson said. “A lot of these harms are things that people living on fracking’s front lines are experiencing first hand.”
It’s not just humans who are being impacted. In one area of Wyoming, the mule deer population has fallen by 40 percent in the past 15 years — coinciding, the report says, with a fracking boom in the Pinedale Mesa region.
The detrimental results of fracking are borne up by a slew of stories and lawsuits documenting the practice’s impact on local communities.
Two families in Pennsylvania were awarded more than $4 million in March — ending a seven-year legal battle against a fracking company they said contaminated local water sources. Last summer, a Texas man was severely burned after methane, allegedly from nearby fracking, caused an explosion in his well shed. Meanwhile, in Oklahoma, earthquakes are on the rise, and at least one woman is suing a local oil and gas company for damages from injuries incurred during an allegedly fracking-related earthquake.
Last summer, scientists in Texas found elevated levels of cancer-causing chemicals in the drinking water in one of the state’s major fracking regions.
Moreover, fracking just one part of a growing phenomenon that is putting Americans at risk: our entire natural gas system. Fracking is just the first step. Natural gas transportation — largely through an extensive pipeline system — also poses serious risks and environmental degradation. In Pennsylvania, a group of farmers is fighting eminent domain claims that have allowed a pipeline construction company to come onto their property and cut down trees to run a liquefied natural gas (LNG) pipeline that will ultimately connect with export terminals along the east coast. Natural gas storage is an issue: The nation’s largest-ever natural gas leak occurred this past winter, when a Southern California storage facility released more than 97,000 metric tons of methane — a potent greenhouse gas — into the atmosphere.
On the distribution side, there are dangers, too. In 2010, an LNG pipeline exploded in San Bruno, California, killing eight people, injuring dozens more, and destroying homes in the Bay Area suburb. The Environmental Defense Fund and Google teamed up on a series of studies of methane leaks and found that older cities, such as Boston, are riddled with leaky pipes.
President Obama recently announced that the EPA will begin a rule-making process for limiting methane from existing oil and gas facilities.
Some states are also fighting back against fracking. New York State has banned fracking, while Maryland has put a moratorium on the practice, pending further investigation into its risks. On Wednesday, a Maryland county became the first in the state to ban fracking outright.
The report's authors are hoping that putting all this data together can help convince policymakers and communities to take the threat of fracking seriously -- and to do something about it.
"The best way to protect our health from fracking is to ban this practice and keep these dirty fuels in the ground," Richardson said.
A new report details the sheer amount of fracking in the United States. The body of evidence is growing that fracking is not only bad for the global climate, it is also dangerous for local communities.
And affected communities are growing in number. The report, released Thursday, details the sheer amount of water contamination, air pollution, climate impacts, and chemical use in fracking in the United States.
“For the past decade, fracking has been a nightmare for our drinking water, our open spaces, and our climate,” Rachel Richardson, a co-author of the paper from Environment America, told ThinkProgress.
Fracking, a form of extraction that injects large volumes of chemical-laced water into shale, releasing pockets of oil and gas, has been on the rise in the United States for the past decade, and the sheer numbers are staggering. Environment America reports that at least 239 billion gallons of water — an average of three million gallons per well — has been used for fracking. In 2014 alone, fracking created 15 billion gallons of wastewater. This water generally cannot be reused, and is often toxic. Fracking operators reinject the water underground, where it can leach into drinking water sources. The chemicals can include formaldehyde, benzene, and hydrochloric acid.
Fracking is also bad news for the climate. Natural gas is 80 percent methane, which traps heat 86 times more effectively than CO2 over a 20-year period. Newly fracked wells released 2.4 million metric tons of methane in 2014 — equivalent to the annual greenhouse gas emissions of 22 coal-fired power plants.
“Whether you are already on the front lines of fracking or are simply worried about your children having a safe future, the numbers don’t lie,” Richardson said.
At this point, more than a thousand square miles of the country have been disturbed by fracking activity, the report says, with 137,000 fracking wells drilled or permitted across more than 20 states.
“I think the report paints a frightening picture of fracking’s harms,” Richardson said. “A lot of these harms are things that people living on fracking’s front lines are experiencing first hand.”
It’s not just humans who are being impacted. In one area of Wyoming, the mule deer population has fallen by 40 percent in the past 15 years — coinciding, the report says, with a fracking boom in the Pinedale Mesa region.
The detrimental results of fracking are borne up by a slew of stories and lawsuits documenting the practice’s impact on local communities.
Two families in Pennsylvania were awarded more than $4 million in March — ending a seven-year legal battle against a fracking company they said contaminated local water sources. Last summer, a Texas man was severely burned after methane, allegedly from nearby fracking, caused an explosion in his well shed. Meanwhile, in Oklahoma, earthquakes are on the rise, and at least one woman is suing a local oil and gas company for damages from injuries incurred during an allegedly fracking-related earthquake.
Last summer, scientists in Texas found elevated levels of cancer-causing chemicals in the drinking water in one of the state’s major fracking regions.
Moreover, fracking just one part of a growing phenomenon that is putting Americans at risk: our entire natural gas system. Fracking is just the first step. Natural gas transportation — largely through an extensive pipeline system — also poses serious risks and environmental degradation. In Pennsylvania, a group of farmers is fighting eminent domain claims that have allowed a pipeline construction company to come onto their property and cut down trees to run a liquefied natural gas (LNG) pipeline that will ultimately connect with export terminals along the east coast. Natural gas storage is an issue: The nation’s largest-ever natural gas leak occurred this past winter, when a Southern California storage facility released more than 97,000 metric tons of methane — a potent greenhouse gas — into the atmosphere.
On the distribution side, there are dangers, too. In 2010, an LNG pipeline exploded in San Bruno, California, killing eight people, injuring dozens more, and destroying homes in the Bay Area suburb. The Environmental Defense Fund and Google teamed up on a series of studies of methane leaks and found that older cities, such as Boston, are riddled with leaky pipes.
President Obama recently announced that the EPA will begin a rule-making process for limiting methane from existing oil and gas facilities.
Some states are also fighting back against fracking. New York State has banned fracking, while Maryland has put a moratorium on the practice, pending further investigation into its risks. On Wednesday, a Maryland county became the first in the state to ban fracking outright.
The report's authors are hoping that putting all this data together can help convince policymakers and communities to take the threat of fracking seriously -- and to do something about it.
"The best way to protect our health from fracking is to ban this practice and keep these dirty fuels in the ground," Richardson said.
HOUSE GOP: STANDING WITH WAGE THIEVES By Keith Ellison
While millions of Americans are struggling to get by and sustain their families, Republicans are trying to make it easier for employers to steal their wages.
Last month during Committee consideration of the National Defense Authorization Act, Representative John Kline inserted an amendment to block the President’s Fair Pay Safe Workplaces Executive Order at the Department of Defense. This Executive Order is the result of years of advocacy by workers, labor rights activists and the Congressional Progressive Caucus. It helps ensure companies with federal contracts are following federal labor laws, like protections against wage theft and unsafe working conditions, and protecting the right for workers to organize.
There are reports of millions of dollars in stolen wages and penalties from government contractors. Now, the President’s Executive Order doesn’t punish contractors – it actually helps them follow the rules. Canceling the contract is the last resort for companies that refuse to correct their behavior. But Republicans don’t like it. Instead of helping companies who are fair to workers, they want to make it easier for companies that steal from their workers.
This week, the Congressional Progressive Caucus Co-Chairs Raul Grijalva and I introduced an amendment to strike Rep. Kline’s language from the bill. But it’s no surprise that the Republican led Rules Committee rejected the amendment. They don’t want to have this debate in front of the American people. They don’t want to admit that they are standing with wage thieves and companies willing to step on working Americans and their families.
Workers aren’t the only ones who should be outraged about this. This provision actually gives a leg up to the contractors that don’t play by the rules, putting companies doing right by their workers at a disadvantage. Think about it: you’re a law-abiding company that earned your contract – now Republicans want to reward your competitors that are willing to steal from their workers?
Americans want fairness. If Republicans want to make it easier for companies to get ahead by shorting their workers, they can since they are in the majority. But they shouldn’t get to without a public debate.
Don’t you agree?
While millions of Americans are struggling to get by and sustain their families, Republicans are trying to make it easier for employers to steal their wages.
Last month during Committee consideration of the National Defense Authorization Act, Representative John Kline inserted an amendment to block the President’s Fair Pay Safe Workplaces Executive Order at the Department of Defense. This Executive Order is the result of years of advocacy by workers, labor rights activists and the Congressional Progressive Caucus. It helps ensure companies with federal contracts are following federal labor laws, like protections against wage theft and unsafe working conditions, and protecting the right for workers to organize.
There are reports of millions of dollars in stolen wages and penalties from government contractors. Now, the President’s Executive Order doesn’t punish contractors – it actually helps them follow the rules. Canceling the contract is the last resort for companies that refuse to correct their behavior. But Republicans don’t like it. Instead of helping companies who are fair to workers, they want to make it easier for companies that steal from their workers.
This week, the Congressional Progressive Caucus Co-Chairs Raul Grijalva and I introduced an amendment to strike Rep. Kline’s language from the bill. But it’s no surprise that the Republican led Rules Committee rejected the amendment. They don’t want to have this debate in front of the American people. They don’t want to admit that they are standing with wage thieves and companies willing to step on working Americans and their families.
Workers aren’t the only ones who should be outraged about this. This provision actually gives a leg up to the contractors that don’t play by the rules, putting companies doing right by their workers at a disadvantage. Think about it: you’re a law-abiding company that earned your contract – now Republicans want to reward your competitors that are willing to steal from their workers?
Americans want fairness. If Republicans want to make it easier for companies to get ahead by shorting their workers, they can since they are in the majority. But they shouldn’t get to without a public debate.
Don’t you agree?
The Supreme Court's Citizens United decision effectively wiped out key campaign finance regulations, so requiring more disclosure of campaign donors may be the only way for the public to have some control over political campaigns By Mary Spicuzza And Jeremy B. White
Politicians in Mississippi have used campaign money to pay for such things as a BMW, an RV and $800 cowboy boots.
In Wisconsin, a railroad executive was caught violating contribution limits after an ex-girlfriend he met on a "sugar daddy" dating website reported him for illegally funneling cash to Gov. Scott Walker's campaign. Key to the investigation, election officials say, was a requirement that donors disclose their employers — but Republican lawmakers have since wiped out the rule.
Meanwhile, "dark money" spending by outside groups that aren't required to disclose their donors is expected to explode during this presidential election year. States can take action to stem the tide at the local level, but few have. Congress could require more disclosure about who is financing campaigns, but it has made no move to do so.
Disclosure may be the public's best and often only remaining way of knowing who is supporting political candidates in the wake of recent court decisions.
"Requiring people to stand up in public for their political acts fosters civic courage, without which democracy is doomed," the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia once wrote in an opinion in favor of disclosing petition signatures.
The U.S. Supreme Court repeatedly has ruled in favor of public disclosure of campaign contributions, even in its earth-moving Citizens United decision. The 2010 ruling found that political spending is protected under the First Amendment, and said that corporations and unions can spend unlimited amounts of money on political activities.
It effectively wiped out key campaign finance regulations that had been in effect for decades. But it also upheld disclosure requirements.
That and other Supreme Court decisions have resulted in unprecedented amounts of money pouring into elections. Because Congress has not acted to require further disclosure, the old limits are gone and new rules have not been passed to take their place, leaving citizens more in the dark than ever about whether elected officials are working for them or for special interests behind their campaigns.
Richard Hasen, a professor of law and political science at the University of California, Irvine, said that despite the highest court's support for disclosure of campaign donors, the Federal Election Commission and Congress remain frozen when it comes to requiring greater transparency about who is funding political groups.
"Political operators often look for ways to shield their donors," Hasen said. "The laws have to be constantly updated."
Congress could quickly require more disclosure, "if there was the political will to do so," said Hasen, author of the book "Plutocrats United: Campaign Money, the Supreme Court, and the Distortion of American Elections."
Groups that advocate for more transparency say the federal stalemate has driven reform efforts to the local level in some states, where they see greater opportunity to push for change.
Targeting states "seems like the only outlet for making change at this level," said David Donnelly, CEO of Every Voice, an organization working to advance state ballot initiatives that would require more disclosure about money in politics.
Donnelly argues state-level efforts, if successful, could restore the faith of voters who perceive an uninhibited flow of money into politics. The changes also could generate interest that would "build the political power, around the country, to eventually press Congress" to require some reporting of donors in national elections, he says.
THE FIGHT OVER DISCLOSURE
More than a century ago, Congress created the legal framework for nonprofit groups devoted to social welfare. Those groups did not have to disclose their donors. But in the 1950s, regulators expanded the exemption from disclosure. Instead of applying only to groups focused exclusively on social welfare, the exemption applied to groups "primarily" engaged in such activities.
In the wake of Citizens United, which allowed these groups to spend unlimited amounts of money on political activities, they have become increasingly popular with donors who want to keep their spending secret.
Candidates themselves are required to provide basic information about donors to their own official campaign coffers: names, addresses and the amounts of their contributions. In many states, those who make contributions over a certain amount must list their employers.
Smith said information about political donors was being used to harass or intimidate them, citing boycotts, Twitter mobs and other activities he believes push "ordinary people" to decide not to contribute.
James Bopp Jr., a conservative attorney based in Indiana, said he supports transparency for public officials, but that it's another matter when people obtain and use information about donors to "punish them and harass them."
"It's a completely different agenda, and what it does is turn the First Amendment on its head," said Bopp, who was part of the Citizens United legal team and represented Wisconsin Right to Life in a case that unraveled provisions of the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance law.
But the requirement that donors disclose their employers played a key role in a Wisconsin case that led to the 2011 conviction of former Wisconsin & Southern Railroad Co. CEO William Gardner. He was convicted of two felonies for exceeding campaign finance limits and giving personal and company funds to railroad employees so they could make political donations to Walker and other Republicans.
In another case, Wisconsin residents learned by accident that a mining company had given $700,000 to an outside group to help Walker and Republican lawmakers during recall elections. Shortly after those elections, the lawmakers and governor approved new laws easing state mining regulations.
The mining company contributions became known only because a Chicago federal appeals court accidentally released a sealed document in a court case challenging a secret criminal investigation into accusations of illegal coordination between Walker's campaign and conservative groups.
A lawsuit by one of the groups argued that the campaign finance investigation was a politically motivated attempt to intimidate Republican activists and limit their free speech rights. The state Supreme Court agreed and ended the investigation, ruling that private groups could coordinate with campaigns, so long as the groups didn't formally endorse candidates with words such as "vote for" or "vote against."
More than $308 million in dark money was spent during the 2012 election cycle, according to a Center for Responsive Politics analysis. Of that, about 86 percent was spent by conservative groups, 11 percent by liberal groups and 3 percent by others.
The center found that, as recently as the 2006 cycle, dark money spending tallied only about $700,000. Four years later, for the 2010 cycle, it reached $127 million.
Smith estimates that dark money makes up only a tiny fraction of total political spending, saying most is still done by candidates and parties.
But Fred Wertheimer, president of the government transparency group Democracy 21, argues there is nowhere near enough information about money in politics.
"Unlimited secret contributions are the most dangerous money in American politics," he said. "There's no way of knowing whether that individual is getting government benefits in return."
Even though the Citizens United ruling upheld disclosure, the 2010 decision triggered a flood of more than $500 million in secret contributions in the various elections following the ruling, Wertheimer said.
When Wisconsin lawmakers passed a measure that formalized the provisions of the state Supreme Court ruling that allowed coordination, they also ended the requirement that donors to candidates provide information about their employers.
Smith applauded Wisconsin's new law, and said he hopes to see further limits to disclosure, such as raising the threshold for when donors need to be made public at all.
"People don't really care about the associate who gives $500. They care about the millionaire," he said. "At least we could raise the (disclosure) limit to $2,000."
But Kevin Kennedy, director and general counsel of the Wisconsin board that oversees ethics and elections, echoed Scalia's comments about the importance of disclosure in politics.
"When we talk about more speech, maybe there should be more disclosure, too," he said. "It's an act of political courage. It's something we foster. You're judged by the company you keep."
Scalia's death has raised new questions about the Citizens United decision, and whether a Democratic nominee to the Supreme Court could mean significant changes to campaign finance law that essentially would overturn the ruling.
"I do think that is a definite possibility," Hasen said.
Politicians in Mississippi have used campaign money to pay for such things as a BMW, an RV and $800 cowboy boots.
In Wisconsin, a railroad executive was caught violating contribution limits after an ex-girlfriend he met on a "sugar daddy" dating website reported him for illegally funneling cash to Gov. Scott Walker's campaign. Key to the investigation, election officials say, was a requirement that donors disclose their employers — but Republican lawmakers have since wiped out the rule.
Meanwhile, "dark money" spending by outside groups that aren't required to disclose their donors is expected to explode during this presidential election year. States can take action to stem the tide at the local level, but few have. Congress could require more disclosure about who is financing campaigns, but it has made no move to do so.
Disclosure may be the public's best and often only remaining way of knowing who is supporting political candidates in the wake of recent court decisions.
"Requiring people to stand up in public for their political acts fosters civic courage, without which democracy is doomed," the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia once wrote in an opinion in favor of disclosing petition signatures.
The U.S. Supreme Court repeatedly has ruled in favor of public disclosure of campaign contributions, even in its earth-moving Citizens United decision. The 2010 ruling found that political spending is protected under the First Amendment, and said that corporations and unions can spend unlimited amounts of money on political activities.
It effectively wiped out key campaign finance regulations that had been in effect for decades. But it also upheld disclosure requirements.
That and other Supreme Court decisions have resulted in unprecedented amounts of money pouring into elections. Because Congress has not acted to require further disclosure, the old limits are gone and new rules have not been passed to take their place, leaving citizens more in the dark than ever about whether elected officials are working for them or for special interests behind their campaigns.
Richard Hasen, a professor of law and political science at the University of California, Irvine, said that despite the highest court's support for disclosure of campaign donors, the Federal Election Commission and Congress remain frozen when it comes to requiring greater transparency about who is funding political groups.
"Political operators often look for ways to shield their donors," Hasen said. "The laws have to be constantly updated."
Congress could quickly require more disclosure, "if there was the political will to do so," said Hasen, author of the book "Plutocrats United: Campaign Money, the Supreme Court, and the Distortion of American Elections."
Groups that advocate for more transparency say the federal stalemate has driven reform efforts to the local level in some states, where they see greater opportunity to push for change.
Targeting states "seems like the only outlet for making change at this level," said David Donnelly, CEO of Every Voice, an organization working to advance state ballot initiatives that would require more disclosure about money in politics.
Donnelly argues state-level efforts, if successful, could restore the faith of voters who perceive an uninhibited flow of money into politics. The changes also could generate interest that would "build the political power, around the country, to eventually press Congress" to require some reporting of donors in national elections, he says.
THE FIGHT OVER DISCLOSURE
More than a century ago, Congress created the legal framework for nonprofit groups devoted to social welfare. Those groups did not have to disclose their donors. But in the 1950s, regulators expanded the exemption from disclosure. Instead of applying only to groups focused exclusively on social welfare, the exemption applied to groups "primarily" engaged in such activities.
In the wake of Citizens United, which allowed these groups to spend unlimited amounts of money on political activities, they have become increasingly popular with donors who want to keep their spending secret.
Candidates themselves are required to provide basic information about donors to their own official campaign coffers: names, addresses and the amounts of their contributions. In many states, those who make contributions over a certain amount must list their employers.
Smith said information about political donors was being used to harass or intimidate them, citing boycotts, Twitter mobs and other activities he believes push "ordinary people" to decide not to contribute.
James Bopp Jr., a conservative attorney based in Indiana, said he supports transparency for public officials, but that it's another matter when people obtain and use information about donors to "punish them and harass them."
"It's a completely different agenda, and what it does is turn the First Amendment on its head," said Bopp, who was part of the Citizens United legal team and represented Wisconsin Right to Life in a case that unraveled provisions of the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance law.
But the requirement that donors disclose their employers played a key role in a Wisconsin case that led to the 2011 conviction of former Wisconsin & Southern Railroad Co. CEO William Gardner. He was convicted of two felonies for exceeding campaign finance limits and giving personal and company funds to railroad employees so they could make political donations to Walker and other Republicans.
In another case, Wisconsin residents learned by accident that a mining company had given $700,000 to an outside group to help Walker and Republican lawmakers during recall elections. Shortly after those elections, the lawmakers and governor approved new laws easing state mining regulations.
The mining company contributions became known only because a Chicago federal appeals court accidentally released a sealed document in a court case challenging a secret criminal investigation into accusations of illegal coordination between Walker's campaign and conservative groups.
A lawsuit by one of the groups argued that the campaign finance investigation was a politically motivated attempt to intimidate Republican activists and limit their free speech rights. The state Supreme Court agreed and ended the investigation, ruling that private groups could coordinate with campaigns, so long as the groups didn't formally endorse candidates with words such as "vote for" or "vote against."
More than $308 million in dark money was spent during the 2012 election cycle, according to a Center for Responsive Politics analysis. Of that, about 86 percent was spent by conservative groups, 11 percent by liberal groups and 3 percent by others.
The center found that, as recently as the 2006 cycle, dark money spending tallied only about $700,000. Four years later, for the 2010 cycle, it reached $127 million.
Smith estimates that dark money makes up only a tiny fraction of total political spending, saying most is still done by candidates and parties.
But Fred Wertheimer, president of the government transparency group Democracy 21, argues there is nowhere near enough information about money in politics.
"Unlimited secret contributions are the most dangerous money in American politics," he said. "There's no way of knowing whether that individual is getting government benefits in return."
Even though the Citizens United ruling upheld disclosure, the 2010 decision triggered a flood of more than $500 million in secret contributions in the various elections following the ruling, Wertheimer said.
When Wisconsin lawmakers passed a measure that formalized the provisions of the state Supreme Court ruling that allowed coordination, they also ended the requirement that donors to candidates provide information about their employers.
Smith applauded Wisconsin's new law, and said he hopes to see further limits to disclosure, such as raising the threshold for when donors need to be made public at all.
"People don't really care about the associate who gives $500. They care about the millionaire," he said. "At least we could raise the (disclosure) limit to $2,000."
But Kevin Kennedy, director and general counsel of the Wisconsin board that oversees ethics and elections, echoed Scalia's comments about the importance of disclosure in politics.
"When we talk about more speech, maybe there should be more disclosure, too," he said. "It's an act of political courage. It's something we foster. You're judged by the company you keep."
Scalia's death has raised new questions about the Citizens United decision, and whether a Democratic nominee to the Supreme Court could mean significant changes to campaign finance law that essentially would overturn the ruling.
"I do think that is a definite possibility," Hasen said.
20% OF BIG COMPANIES PAY ZERO CORPORATE TAXES by Jeanne Sahadi
Nearly 20% of large U.S. corporations that reported a profit on their financial statements in 2012 ended up paying exactly nothing in U.S. corporate income taxes.
As in zero, zilch, zip, nada.
That's according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office, which conducted its analysis at the behest of Senator Bernie Sanders, a vocal critic of corporate America.
Prior to 2012, the GAO estimated that 24% of profitable large corporations owed no income tax in 2011, 22% owed nothing in 2010 and 21% owed nothing in 2009.
How can profitable companies end up with a $0 corporate income tax bill? There could be a few reasons, according to the GAO.
Among them, they may get a lot of tax deductions for losses they had in previous years but carried forward. They also may be able to write off more for depreciating assets than they have to claim on their financial statements. Or, if they made profits offshore and haven't brought them back to the United States, they would not owe U.S. tax on them until they do.
"There is something profoundly wrong in America when one out of five profitable corporations pay nothing in federal income taxes," Sanders said. "We need real tax reform to ensure that the most profitable corporations in America pay their fair share in taxes. That means closing corporate tax loopholes to raise the revenue necessary to rebuild America and create millions of jobs."
But most large corporations -- and about a third of small corporations -- did owe corporate income taxes that year, to the tune of nearly $268 billion. For tax years 2008 through 2012, large profitable companies paid, on average, about 14% of their pretax income in U.S. corporate income taxes, or 22% once foreign, state and local taxes are included. That's well below the 35% top corporate income tax rate.
The GAO conducted its analysis using anonymous corporate tax data from the IRS, and information from a form that large companies must fill out to reconcile the amounts of income and expenses they report for financial statement purposes with those they report for tax purposes. GAO researchers also interviewed IRS officials and various experts.
Broadly speaking, however, unless one has a company's actual tax returns in hand, it's impossible to say exactly what a given company paid in corporate income taxes. And even then it may be hard to unpack given both the complexity of corporate accounting and a byzantine corporate tax code.
Most lawmakers agree that the corporate tax code needs to be reformed. But they don't yet agree on how to do that, or on how the money raised should be used.
At a press conference Wednesday, Sanders said he wants to close corporate "loopholes" that benefit U.S. multinationals and use the money raised to invest in infrastructure.
In the meantime, the U.S. Treasury Department recently introduced a third set of guidelines intended to crack down on corporate tax avoidance among U.S. multinationals, especially those seeking to merge with foreign companies and take advantage of loopholes that let them reduce their U.S. tax bill.
Nearly 20% of large U.S. corporations that reported a profit on their financial statements in 2012 ended up paying exactly nothing in U.S. corporate income taxes.
As in zero, zilch, zip, nada.
That's according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office, which conducted its analysis at the behest of Senator Bernie Sanders, a vocal critic of corporate America.
Prior to 2012, the GAO estimated that 24% of profitable large corporations owed no income tax in 2011, 22% owed nothing in 2010 and 21% owed nothing in 2009.
How can profitable companies end up with a $0 corporate income tax bill? There could be a few reasons, according to the GAO.
Among them, they may get a lot of tax deductions for losses they had in previous years but carried forward. They also may be able to write off more for depreciating assets than they have to claim on their financial statements. Or, if they made profits offshore and haven't brought them back to the United States, they would not owe U.S. tax on them until they do.
"There is something profoundly wrong in America when one out of five profitable corporations pay nothing in federal income taxes," Sanders said. "We need real tax reform to ensure that the most profitable corporations in America pay their fair share in taxes. That means closing corporate tax loopholes to raise the revenue necessary to rebuild America and create millions of jobs."
But most large corporations -- and about a third of small corporations -- did owe corporate income taxes that year, to the tune of nearly $268 billion. For tax years 2008 through 2012, large profitable companies paid, on average, about 14% of their pretax income in U.S. corporate income taxes, or 22% once foreign, state and local taxes are included. That's well below the 35% top corporate income tax rate.
The GAO conducted its analysis using anonymous corporate tax data from the IRS, and information from a form that large companies must fill out to reconcile the amounts of income and expenses they report for financial statement purposes with those they report for tax purposes. GAO researchers also interviewed IRS officials and various experts.
Broadly speaking, however, unless one has a company's actual tax returns in hand, it's impossible to say exactly what a given company paid in corporate income taxes. And even then it may be hard to unpack given both the complexity of corporate accounting and a byzantine corporate tax code.
Most lawmakers agree that the corporate tax code needs to be reformed. But they don't yet agree on how to do that, or on how the money raised should be used.
At a press conference Wednesday, Sanders said he wants to close corporate "loopholes" that benefit U.S. multinationals and use the money raised to invest in infrastructure.
In the meantime, the U.S. Treasury Department recently introduced a third set of guidelines intended to crack down on corporate tax avoidance among U.S. multinationals, especially those seeking to merge with foreign companies and take advantage of loopholes that let them reduce their U.S. tax bill.
Senator Bernie Sanders Exposes 18 CEOs who took Trillions in Bailouts, Evaded Taxes and Outsourced Jobs
by Leslie Salzillo
Sen. Bernie Sanders fired back at 80 CEOs who wrote a letter lecturing America about deficit reduction by released a report detailing how 18 of these CEOs have wrecked the economy by evading taxes and outsourcing jobs.
80 CEO’s raised the ire of Sen. Sanders by publishing a letter in the Wall Street Journal urging America to act on the deficit, and reform Medicare and Medicaid. Sen. Sanders responded to the lecture from America’s CEO’s by releasing a report that detailed how 18 of them have helped blow up the deficit and wreck the economy by outsourcing jobs and evading US taxes. Sanders said,
There really is no shame. The Wall Street leaders whose recklessness and illegal behavior caused this terrible recession are now lecturing the American people on the need for courage to deal with the nation’s finances and deficit crisis. Before telling us why we should cut Social Security, Medicare and other vitally important programs, these CEOs might want to take a hard look at their responsibility for causing the deficit and this terrible recession.
Our Wall Street friends might also want to show some courage of their own by suggesting that the wealthiest people in this country, like them, start paying their fair share of taxes. They might work to end the outrageous corporate loopholes, tax havens and outsourcing provisions that their lobbyists have littered throughout the tax code – contributing greatly to our deficit.
Many of the CEO’s who signed the deficit-reduction letter run corporations that evaded at least $34.5 billion in taxes by setting up more than 600 subsidiaries in the Cayman Islands and other offshore tax havens since 2008. As a result, at least a dozen of the companies avoided paying any federal income taxes in recent years, and even received more than $6.4 billion in tax refunds from the IRS since 2008.
Several of the companies received a total taxpayer bailout of more than $2.5 trillion from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department.
Many of the companies also have outsourced hundreds of thousands of American jobs to China and other low wage countries, forcing their workers to receive unemployment insurance and other federal benefits. In other words, these are some of the same people who have significantly caused the deficit to explode over the last four years.
Here are the 18 CEO’s Sanders labeled job destroyers in his report. (All data from Top Corporate Dodgers Report.)
1). 1. Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2010? Zero. $1.9 billion tax refund.
Taxpayer Bailout from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department? Over $1.3 trillion.
Amount of federal income taxes Bank of America would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $2.6 billion.
2). Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2008? Zero. $278 million tax refund.
Taxpayer Bailout from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department? $824 billion.
Amount of federal income taxes Goldman Sachs would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $2.7 billion.
3). JP Morgan Chase CEO James Dimon
Taxpayer Bailout from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department? $416 billion.
Amount of federal income taxes JP Morgan Chase would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $4.9 billion.
4). General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2010? Zero. $3.3 billion tax refund.
Taxpayer Bailout from the Federal Reserve? $16 billion.
Jobs Shipped Overseas? At least 25,000 since 2001.
5). Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2010? Zero. $705 million tax refund.
American Jobs Cut in 2010? In 2010, Verizon announced 13,000 job cuts, the third highest corporate layoff total that year.
6). Boeing CEO James McNerney, Jr.
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2010? None. $124 million tax refund.
American Jobs Shipped overseas? Over 57,000.
Amount of Corporate Welfare? At least $58 billion.
7). Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer
Amount of federal income taxes Microsoft would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $19.4 billion.
8). Honeywell International CEO David Cote
Amount of federal income taxes paid from 2008-2010? Zero. $34 million tax refund.
9). Corning CEO Wendell Weeks
Amount of federal income taxes paid from 2008-2010? Zero. $4 million tax refund.
10). Time Warner CEO Glenn Britt
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2008? Zero. $74 million tax refund.
11). Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2009? Zero. $55 million tax refund.
12). Deere & Company CEO Samuel Allen
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2009? Zero. $1 million tax refund.
13). Marsh & McLennan Companies CEO Brian Duperreault
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2010? Zero. $90 million refund.
14). Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs
Amount of federal income taxes Qualcomm would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $4.7 billion.
15). Tenneco CEO Gregg Sherill
Amount of federal income taxes Tenneco would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $269 million.
16). Express Scripts CEO George Paz
Amount of federal income taxes Express Scripts would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $20 million.
17). Caesars Entertainment CEO Gary Loveman
Amount of federal income taxes Caesars Entertainment would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $9 million.
18). R.R. Donnelly & Sons CEO Thomas Quinlan III
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2008? Zero. $49 million tax refund.
Eighteen of the 80 CEOs who signed the call for deficit action are actually some of the biggest outsourcers and tax cheats in America. First, they crashed the economy in 2008. They followed that up by taking billions in taxpayer bailout dollars. Their next step was to outsource jobs and evade taxes. Now they are calling for action on a deficit that they helped create over the past four years.
Only by standing together can we tell these CEOs that the bill has come due, and it is time for them to pay. We can tell these gluttons of our dollars that the all you can eat taxpayer buffet is now closed.
by Leslie Salzillo
Sen. Bernie Sanders fired back at 80 CEOs who wrote a letter lecturing America about deficit reduction by released a report detailing how 18 of these CEOs have wrecked the economy by evading taxes and outsourcing jobs.
80 CEO’s raised the ire of Sen. Sanders by publishing a letter in the Wall Street Journal urging America to act on the deficit, and reform Medicare and Medicaid. Sen. Sanders responded to the lecture from America’s CEO’s by releasing a report that detailed how 18 of them have helped blow up the deficit and wreck the economy by outsourcing jobs and evading US taxes. Sanders said,
There really is no shame. The Wall Street leaders whose recklessness and illegal behavior caused this terrible recession are now lecturing the American people on the need for courage to deal with the nation’s finances and deficit crisis. Before telling us why we should cut Social Security, Medicare and other vitally important programs, these CEOs might want to take a hard look at their responsibility for causing the deficit and this terrible recession.
Our Wall Street friends might also want to show some courage of their own by suggesting that the wealthiest people in this country, like them, start paying their fair share of taxes. They might work to end the outrageous corporate loopholes, tax havens and outsourcing provisions that their lobbyists have littered throughout the tax code – contributing greatly to our deficit.
Many of the CEO’s who signed the deficit-reduction letter run corporations that evaded at least $34.5 billion in taxes by setting up more than 600 subsidiaries in the Cayman Islands and other offshore tax havens since 2008. As a result, at least a dozen of the companies avoided paying any federal income taxes in recent years, and even received more than $6.4 billion in tax refunds from the IRS since 2008.
Several of the companies received a total taxpayer bailout of more than $2.5 trillion from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department.
Many of the companies also have outsourced hundreds of thousands of American jobs to China and other low wage countries, forcing their workers to receive unemployment insurance and other federal benefits. In other words, these are some of the same people who have significantly caused the deficit to explode over the last four years.
Here are the 18 CEO’s Sanders labeled job destroyers in his report. (All data from Top Corporate Dodgers Report.)
1). 1. Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2010? Zero. $1.9 billion tax refund.
Taxpayer Bailout from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department? Over $1.3 trillion.
Amount of federal income taxes Bank of America would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $2.6 billion.
2). Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2008? Zero. $278 million tax refund.
Taxpayer Bailout from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department? $824 billion.
Amount of federal income taxes Goldman Sachs would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $2.7 billion.
3). JP Morgan Chase CEO James Dimon
Taxpayer Bailout from the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department? $416 billion.
Amount of federal income taxes JP Morgan Chase would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $4.9 billion.
4). General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2010? Zero. $3.3 billion tax refund.
Taxpayer Bailout from the Federal Reserve? $16 billion.
Jobs Shipped Overseas? At least 25,000 since 2001.
5). Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2010? Zero. $705 million tax refund.
American Jobs Cut in 2010? In 2010, Verizon announced 13,000 job cuts, the third highest corporate layoff total that year.
6). Boeing CEO James McNerney, Jr.
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2010? None. $124 million tax refund.
American Jobs Shipped overseas? Over 57,000.
Amount of Corporate Welfare? At least $58 billion.
7). Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer
Amount of federal income taxes Microsoft would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $19.4 billion.
8). Honeywell International CEO David Cote
Amount of federal income taxes paid from 2008-2010? Zero. $34 million tax refund.
9). Corning CEO Wendell Weeks
Amount of federal income taxes paid from 2008-2010? Zero. $4 million tax refund.
10). Time Warner CEO Glenn Britt
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2008? Zero. $74 million tax refund.
11). Merck CEO Kenneth Frazier
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2009? Zero. $55 million tax refund.
12). Deere & Company CEO Samuel Allen
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2009? Zero. $1 million tax refund.
13). Marsh & McLennan Companies CEO Brian Duperreault
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2010? Zero. $90 million refund.
14). Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs
Amount of federal income taxes Qualcomm would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $4.7 billion.
15). Tenneco CEO Gregg Sherill
Amount of federal income taxes Tenneco would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $269 million.
16). Express Scripts CEO George Paz
Amount of federal income taxes Express Scripts would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $20 million.
17). Caesars Entertainment CEO Gary Loveman
Amount of federal income taxes Caesars Entertainment would have owed if offshore tax havens were eliminated? $9 million.
18). R.R. Donnelly & Sons CEO Thomas Quinlan III
Amount of federal income taxes paid in 2008? Zero. $49 million tax refund.
Eighteen of the 80 CEOs who signed the call for deficit action are actually some of the biggest outsourcers and tax cheats in America. First, they crashed the economy in 2008. They followed that up by taking billions in taxpayer bailout dollars. Their next step was to outsource jobs and evade taxes. Now they are calling for action on a deficit that they helped create over the past four years.
Only by standing together can we tell these CEOs that the bill has come due, and it is time for them to pay. We can tell these gluttons of our dollars that the all you can eat taxpayer buffet is now closed.
TRADE GROUP HID CORPORATE DONORS TO DEFEAT FOOD-LABELING INITIATIVE, JUDGE RULES By Jim Brunner , Seattle Times political reporter
A judge has sided with Attorney General Bob Ferguson, ruling the Grocery Manufacturers Association violated state law by trying to shield corporate donors during a 2013 campaign to defeat I-522.
A food-industry trade group violated “the spirit and letter” of Washington’s campaign-finance disclosure laws by trying to shield the identities of corporations who poured $11 million into a campaign to defeat a 2013 food-labeling initiative, a judge has ruled.
The pretrial ruling, by Thurston County Superior Court Judge Anne Hirsch, came this week in a lawsuit filed by Attorney General Bob Ferguson against the Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA).
Hirsch rejected the group’s arguments that the state disclosure law is unconstitutionally vague, ruling the group purposefully sought to hide donors from public scrutiny.
“There is one, and only one, reasonable inference that can be drawn from the facts before this court: that the GMA intentionally took steps to create and then hide the true source of the funds … from the voting public of Washington State,” Hirsch wrote.
Hirsch did not decide on a penalty, writing that should be determined at an upcoming trial. Ferguson’s office has sought a penalty of at least $14 million
.
In a news release Friday, Ferguson said the ruling sends an unequivocal message that “big money donors cannot evade Washington law and hide from public scrutiny. My office will hold you accountable.”
The Grocery Manufacturers Association said the court’s ruling “will hurt the constitutionally protected right of trade associations to engage in political debate in the state.”
The group noted the judge found some evidence that its officers believed what they were doing was legal — an important question when it comes to setting a penalty. “In the upcoming trial, we believe the facts will show that GMA always intended to comply with the law,” the statement said.
The case goes back to 2013’s Initiative 522, which would have required labels on genetically modified foods in Washington. The GMA was the largest donor to the “no” campaign, which succeeded in defeating the measure after spending a record $22 million.
Ferguson sued the D.C.-based trade association late in the 2013 campaign, arguing it had violated state disclosure laws by soliciting money from big corporations to fight I-522 without properly disclosing its donors.
Internal documents showed the group set up a special fund, called the Defense of Brand Strategic Account, to oppose food-labeling laws while providing cover to individual companies that feared consumer blowback.
At a January 2013 board meeting discussing the effort, the association’s officials said the fund would “shield individual companies from public disclosure and possible criticism,” according to notes of one internal discussion.
As a result, donations to the anti-522 campaign were reported only as coming from the Grocery Manufacturing Association, not the companies who had paid for the effort, including PepsiCo, Nestlé and General Mills.
Ferguson, a Democrat up for re-election in 2016, previously has called the concealment effort “among the worst in state history.”
A judge has sided with Attorney General Bob Ferguson, ruling the Grocery Manufacturers Association violated state law by trying to shield corporate donors during a 2013 campaign to defeat I-522.
A food-industry trade group violated “the spirit and letter” of Washington’s campaign-finance disclosure laws by trying to shield the identities of corporations who poured $11 million into a campaign to defeat a 2013 food-labeling initiative, a judge has ruled.
The pretrial ruling, by Thurston County Superior Court Judge Anne Hirsch, came this week in a lawsuit filed by Attorney General Bob Ferguson against the Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA).
Hirsch rejected the group’s arguments that the state disclosure law is unconstitutionally vague, ruling the group purposefully sought to hide donors from public scrutiny.
“There is one, and only one, reasonable inference that can be drawn from the facts before this court: that the GMA intentionally took steps to create and then hide the true source of the funds … from the voting public of Washington State,” Hirsch wrote.
Hirsch did not decide on a penalty, writing that should be determined at an upcoming trial. Ferguson’s office has sought a penalty of at least $14 million
.
In a news release Friday, Ferguson said the ruling sends an unequivocal message that “big money donors cannot evade Washington law and hide from public scrutiny. My office will hold you accountable.”
The Grocery Manufacturers Association said the court’s ruling “will hurt the constitutionally protected right of trade associations to engage in political debate in the state.”
The group noted the judge found some evidence that its officers believed what they were doing was legal — an important question when it comes to setting a penalty. “In the upcoming trial, we believe the facts will show that GMA always intended to comply with the law,” the statement said.
The case goes back to 2013’s Initiative 522, which would have required labels on genetically modified foods in Washington. The GMA was the largest donor to the “no” campaign, which succeeded in defeating the measure after spending a record $22 million.
Ferguson sued the D.C.-based trade association late in the 2013 campaign, arguing it had violated state disclosure laws by soliciting money from big corporations to fight I-522 without properly disclosing its donors.
Internal documents showed the group set up a special fund, called the Defense of Brand Strategic Account, to oppose food-labeling laws while providing cover to individual companies that feared consumer blowback.
At a January 2013 board meeting discussing the effort, the association’s officials said the fund would “shield individual companies from public disclosure and possible criticism,” according to notes of one internal discussion.
As a result, donations to the anti-522 campaign were reported only as coming from the Grocery Manufacturing Association, not the companies who had paid for the effort, including PepsiCo, Nestlé and General Mills.
Ferguson, a Democrat up for re-election in 2016, previously has called the concealment effort “among the worst in state history.”
WHY REPUBLICANS ARE HELL-BENT ON DESTROYING MEDICARE - By Paul Waldman
One way you can identify politicians' sincere convictions is by looking at the things they do even when they know they're unpopular. There are few better examples than the half-century-long quest by Republicans to destroy Medicare.
As we move towards the 2016 presidential election, it's something we're hearing about yet again. Conservatives know the Democrats will attack them for it mercilessly, and they know those attacks are probably going to work — yet Republicans keeps trying. Which is why it's clear that they just can't stand this program.
When Medicare was being debated in the early 1960s, one of its most prominent opponents was a certain future president, who recorded a spoken word album called Ronald Reagan Speaks Out Against Socialized Medicine. In it, he said that if the bill were to pass, "We are going to spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it once was like in America when men were free." He failed in that crusade, and ever since, conservatives have watched in pain as the program became more entrenched and more popular.
That popularity didn't happen by accident. Medicare is popular because it gives seniors something they crave: security. Every American over 65 knows that they can get Medicare, it will be accepted by almost every health care provider, their premiums will be modest, and it won't be taken away. On the policy level, the program is expensive, but that's because providing health care for the elderly is expensive. It's not because the program is inefficient; in fact, Medicare does an excellent job of keeping costs down. Its expenses for overhead (basically everything except health care) are extremely low, somewhere between 1 percent and 5 percent of what it takes in, compared to private insurance costs that can run from 10 percent to 20 percent and, in some cases, even higher.
That's not to say there's nothing about the program that could be improved, because there certainly is. The Affordable Care Act tried to institute some Medicare reforms, including moving away from the fee-for-service model (which encourages doctors and hospitals to do as many procedures as possible) and toward a model that creates incentives for keeping patients healthy. It's still too early to say how great an impact those changes will have. But Medicare is still in most ways the most successful part of the American health insurance system. And if you care about empirical truth, it's impossible to argue that it's a failure because it involves too much government.
But Republicans do argue that, and it's a belief that springs from ideological faith, not facts. In Wednesday's debate, Rand Paul was asked whether Reagan was right about Medicare, and he responded, "The question always is, what works better, the private marketplace or government? And what distributes goods better? It always seems to be the private marketplace does a better job. Is there an area for a safety net? Can you have Medicare or Social Security? Yes. But you ought to acknowledge the government doesn't do a very good job at it." Paul's ambivalence is obvious — he grudgingly acknowledges that you can have a "safety net," including Medicare, even as he says it's terrible. But if that's so, why not get rid of it entirely?
The presidential candidates who have said anything specific about Medicare all want to move in the direction of privatization, which isn't too surprising. After all, they believe that it's impossible for government to do anything better than the private sector, and if you can take a government program and privatize it, that's what you should do. That's also what new Speaker of the House Paul Ryan believes: For years he's been touting a plan to privatize Medicare by essentially turning it into a voucher program. Instead of being an insurer for seniors as it is now, the government would give you a voucher that you could spend to buy yourself private insurance. And if the voucher didn't cover the cost of the insurance you could find? Tough luck.
When you ask Paul Ryan about this, the first thing he'll say is that he wants a slow transition to privatizing Medicare, one that won't affect today's seniors at all, so they don't need to worry. In Wednesday's debate, Marco Rubio made the same argument. "Everyone up here tonight that's talking about reforms, I think and I know for myself I speak to this, we're all talking about reforms for future generations," he said. "Nothing has to change for current beneficiaries. My mother is on Medicare and Social Security. I'm against anything that's bad for my mother."
In other words: Medicare is a disaster, but we would never change it for the people who are on it and love it so much. They don't have to fear the horror of being subject to our plan for Medicare's future. Which is going to be great.
That contradiction is the essence of the Republicans' Medicare problem. It's one of the most successful and beloved social programs America has ever created, and to mess with it is to court political disaster, particularly among seniors who vote at such high rates. And its success is particularly galling, standing as it does as a living rebuke to their fervent belief that there can never be any area in which government might outperform the private sector.
But grant Republicans this: A less ideologically committed group might say, "We don't like this program, but it's too politically dangerous to try to undo it. So we'll just learn to live with it."
Republicans won't give up. They want to undermine Medicare, to privatize it, to try in whatever way they can come up with to hasten the day when it disappears. And no matter how often they fail, they keep trying.
One way you can identify politicians' sincere convictions is by looking at the things they do even when they know they're unpopular. There are few better examples than the half-century-long quest by Republicans to destroy Medicare.
As we move towards the 2016 presidential election, it's something we're hearing about yet again. Conservatives know the Democrats will attack them for it mercilessly, and they know those attacks are probably going to work — yet Republicans keeps trying. Which is why it's clear that they just can't stand this program.
When Medicare was being debated in the early 1960s, one of its most prominent opponents was a certain future president, who recorded a spoken word album called Ronald Reagan Speaks Out Against Socialized Medicine. In it, he said that if the bill were to pass, "We are going to spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it once was like in America when men were free." He failed in that crusade, and ever since, conservatives have watched in pain as the program became more entrenched and more popular.
That popularity didn't happen by accident. Medicare is popular because it gives seniors something they crave: security. Every American over 65 knows that they can get Medicare, it will be accepted by almost every health care provider, their premiums will be modest, and it won't be taken away. On the policy level, the program is expensive, but that's because providing health care for the elderly is expensive. It's not because the program is inefficient; in fact, Medicare does an excellent job of keeping costs down. Its expenses for overhead (basically everything except health care) are extremely low, somewhere between 1 percent and 5 percent of what it takes in, compared to private insurance costs that can run from 10 percent to 20 percent and, in some cases, even higher.
That's not to say there's nothing about the program that could be improved, because there certainly is. The Affordable Care Act tried to institute some Medicare reforms, including moving away from the fee-for-service model (which encourages doctors and hospitals to do as many procedures as possible) and toward a model that creates incentives for keeping patients healthy. It's still too early to say how great an impact those changes will have. But Medicare is still in most ways the most successful part of the American health insurance system. And if you care about empirical truth, it's impossible to argue that it's a failure because it involves too much government.
But Republicans do argue that, and it's a belief that springs from ideological faith, not facts. In Wednesday's debate, Rand Paul was asked whether Reagan was right about Medicare, and he responded, "The question always is, what works better, the private marketplace or government? And what distributes goods better? It always seems to be the private marketplace does a better job. Is there an area for a safety net? Can you have Medicare or Social Security? Yes. But you ought to acknowledge the government doesn't do a very good job at it." Paul's ambivalence is obvious — he grudgingly acknowledges that you can have a "safety net," including Medicare, even as he says it's terrible. But if that's so, why not get rid of it entirely?
The presidential candidates who have said anything specific about Medicare all want to move in the direction of privatization, which isn't too surprising. After all, they believe that it's impossible for government to do anything better than the private sector, and if you can take a government program and privatize it, that's what you should do. That's also what new Speaker of the House Paul Ryan believes: For years he's been touting a plan to privatize Medicare by essentially turning it into a voucher program. Instead of being an insurer for seniors as it is now, the government would give you a voucher that you could spend to buy yourself private insurance. And if the voucher didn't cover the cost of the insurance you could find? Tough luck.
When you ask Paul Ryan about this, the first thing he'll say is that he wants a slow transition to privatizing Medicare, one that won't affect today's seniors at all, so they don't need to worry. In Wednesday's debate, Marco Rubio made the same argument. "Everyone up here tonight that's talking about reforms, I think and I know for myself I speak to this, we're all talking about reforms for future generations," he said. "Nothing has to change for current beneficiaries. My mother is on Medicare and Social Security. I'm against anything that's bad for my mother."
In other words: Medicare is a disaster, but we would never change it for the people who are on it and love it so much. They don't have to fear the horror of being subject to our plan for Medicare's future. Which is going to be great.
That contradiction is the essence of the Republicans' Medicare problem. It's one of the most successful and beloved social programs America has ever created, and to mess with it is to court political disaster, particularly among seniors who vote at such high rates. And its success is particularly galling, standing as it does as a living rebuke to their fervent belief that there can never be any area in which government might outperform the private sector.
But grant Republicans this: A less ideologically committed group might say, "We don't like this program, but it's too politically dangerous to try to undo it. So we'll just learn to live with it."
Republicans won't give up. They want to undermine Medicare, to privatize it, to try in whatever way they can come up with to hasten the day when it disappears. And no matter how often they fail, they keep trying.
THE REPUBLICAN PARTY by Wes Williams
Liberal radio host Thom Hartmann says that the Republican Party is made up of three types of people: the rich, shills for the rich, and suckers. That’s an accurate description, but not detailed enough. Each of those categories can be broken down further, to give a more precise picture of the makeup of the modern Republican Party. With that in mind, here are the eight types of people who currently call themselves Republicans.
1. The Oligarchs - Example: Sheldon Adelson
The oligarchs are the financial backers of the party. They rarely seek the limelight, but sometimes find themselves thrust into it. They are the “kingmakers,” thanks in large part to the Citizens United decision. Witness the Koch brothers’ recent vetting of announced and likely Republican presidential candidates, trying to settle on the one who will receive a massive infusion of their cash. Ditto Sheldon Adelson, who spent $93 million on the 2012 election, according to the Washington Post. Those are the biggest examples, but there are many more.
2. The Billionaire Industrialists - Example: Mitt Romney
This group of Republicans could also fit into the category of oligarchs, but, unlike the oligarchs, they don’t want to be kingmakers, they want to be king. They see America as belonging to people like them: wealthy, and powerful. If you’re struggling to make ends meet, these guys will tell you that it’s just because you didn’t work hard enough, or weren’t creative enough. Never mind that most of these guys — Romney, Donald Trump, etc. — inherited wealth, positions of power, or both. If you’re poor, or middle class, and struggling, well, just work harder, and more. Sleep is overrated, anyway.
3. The Corporate Shills - Example: The Cato Institute
There are so many individuals shilling for the oligarchs, and financed by them, that it is easier to talk about the organizations they work for, than to identify each person. The Cato Institute, which describes itself as “a public policy research organization — a think tank – dedicated to the principles of individual liberty, limited government, free markets and peace,” is just one of dozens of these groups.
According to Forbes, Charles and David Koch (see “Oligarchs” above) have contributed millions to the Cato Institute. It’s almost laughable to read Cato’s description of how the group is funded, which says:
“In order to maintain its independence, the Cato Institute accepts no government funding. Cato receives approximately 80 percent of its funding through tax-deductible contributions from individuals, with the remainder of its support coming from foundations, corporations, and the sale of books and publications.”
Other groups, that put out pseudo-research designed to promote the interests of the oligarchs who fund them include: Americans For Prosperity (another Koch brothers funded group), the American Enterprise Institute, the Heritage Foundation, and many, many more.
4. The Religious Hucksters - Example: Franklin Graham
This faction of Republicans has an important job: To convince people to vote against their economic self-interest, by using “wedge issues” such as same-sex marriage, abortion, fear of Muslims (or “MOOs-lims” as Graham would say), etc. This group is extensive, and counts as members those with well known names such as Graham, as well as unknown preachers who step into the pulpits of numerous churches every Sunday. But they’re all selling the same message: vote Republican, or God will want nothing to do with you.
5. The “Noise Machine” - Example: Rush Limbaugh
The noise machine is extensive, and it permeates the airwaves. Limbaugh has, for years, been the CEO of the Republican noise machine, but, after a series of gaffes cost him many sponsors, his star seems to be fading. There are plenty more out there, whose names may not be as big, but who are just as good as stirring up the uninformed, including: Laura Ingraham, Michael Savage, Mark Levin, and so on. Of course, this section can’t leave out the entire cast of characters at Fox News. From the curvy couch crew of Fox and Friends, to the evening rants of Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity, Fox News is one 24 hour noise cycle.
Of course, the job of this segment of the party is to tell half truths, and flat out lies, to those who aren’t paying attention, in order to, again, get them to vote against their own self-interests (see “Religious Hucksters”).
6. The War Hawks - Example: Dick Cheney
These Republicans have never seen a war they didn’t like. Some of this group served in the military, such as John McCain. But many of them, like former vice president Cheney, have never worn a uniform. They see the world as a dangerous place that can only be tamed by American intervention. Intervention that might require your child to go fight and die. But not their children. They have more important things to do, like grow up to be leaders, who will then send other people’s children off to fight and die. This group sees any dissent from a Republican president’s war plans as “unpatriotic.” But, they will travel the world to criticize a Democratic president for his handling of American conflicts he inherited from a Republican.
When talking about this group, we can’t leave out their connections to the defense industry. Isn’t it interesting that most of the biggest hawks in the country have the deepest ties to the military-industrial complex?
7. The Country Clubbers - Example: Hundreds of thousands of upper middle class voters
This group includes a lot of educated people, who should be able to see through the claims made by the shills and hucksters. But hey, they live in gated communities. They’re doctors, lawyers, businessmen and women. Republicans keep their taxes low. And those wars Republicans like to start? No worries. The children of this group are in some sort of professional school, or preparing to take over the family business. They’re too busy to do anything like sign up for military service. Even though they don’t make anything close to the money made by the oligarchs and other billionaires, they’re comfortable. They don’t need things like food stamps, so they don’t really see the purpose of them. They take advantage of all sorts of tax deductions, but don’t like the idea of others getting government assistance. Their motto could be “Government program that helps me — GOOD. Government program that helps you — BAD!”
8. The Dumb*sses - Example: The Tea Party
This is an example of one place where something called “trickle down” actually works. Everything done by the members of the first six groups in this summary winds up here — with people who listen to what the shills have to say, and who vote the way the oligarchs want them to. Were it not for this group of terminally uniformed voters, mostly old, mostly white, mostly uneducated, there would be no Republican party, or at the very least, it wouldn’t resemble what it is today.
These people hate the government, but love the largest government agency — the military. They’re quite happy to send their kids off to die in Republican wars, to protect their “freedom.” They opposed the so-called “government takeover of healthcare,” aka the Affordable Care Act (“Obamacare”), but don’t you dare touch their Medicare. They think that President Obama is a Muslim, Kenyan, socialist, who is destroying America, but don’t you dare call them racists.
You have to give the chiefs of the Republican Party credit. They have all of the pieces in place, and the thing runs like the proverbial “well oiled machine.” This is why Democrats can never rest. And why we must always, ALWAYS, get out and vote.
Liberal radio host Thom Hartmann says that the Republican Party is made up of three types of people: the rich, shills for the rich, and suckers. That’s an accurate description, but not detailed enough. Each of those categories can be broken down further, to give a more precise picture of the makeup of the modern Republican Party. With that in mind, here are the eight types of people who currently call themselves Republicans.
1. The Oligarchs - Example: Sheldon Adelson
The oligarchs are the financial backers of the party. They rarely seek the limelight, but sometimes find themselves thrust into it. They are the “kingmakers,” thanks in large part to the Citizens United decision. Witness the Koch brothers’ recent vetting of announced and likely Republican presidential candidates, trying to settle on the one who will receive a massive infusion of their cash. Ditto Sheldon Adelson, who spent $93 million on the 2012 election, according to the Washington Post. Those are the biggest examples, but there are many more.
2. The Billionaire Industrialists - Example: Mitt Romney
This group of Republicans could also fit into the category of oligarchs, but, unlike the oligarchs, they don’t want to be kingmakers, they want to be king. They see America as belonging to people like them: wealthy, and powerful. If you’re struggling to make ends meet, these guys will tell you that it’s just because you didn’t work hard enough, or weren’t creative enough. Never mind that most of these guys — Romney, Donald Trump, etc. — inherited wealth, positions of power, or both. If you’re poor, or middle class, and struggling, well, just work harder, and more. Sleep is overrated, anyway.
3. The Corporate Shills - Example: The Cato Institute
There are so many individuals shilling for the oligarchs, and financed by them, that it is easier to talk about the organizations they work for, than to identify each person. The Cato Institute, which describes itself as “a public policy research organization — a think tank – dedicated to the principles of individual liberty, limited government, free markets and peace,” is just one of dozens of these groups.
According to Forbes, Charles and David Koch (see “Oligarchs” above) have contributed millions to the Cato Institute. It’s almost laughable to read Cato’s description of how the group is funded, which says:
“In order to maintain its independence, the Cato Institute accepts no government funding. Cato receives approximately 80 percent of its funding through tax-deductible contributions from individuals, with the remainder of its support coming from foundations, corporations, and the sale of books and publications.”
Other groups, that put out pseudo-research designed to promote the interests of the oligarchs who fund them include: Americans For Prosperity (another Koch brothers funded group), the American Enterprise Institute, the Heritage Foundation, and many, many more.
4. The Religious Hucksters - Example: Franklin Graham
This faction of Republicans has an important job: To convince people to vote against their economic self-interest, by using “wedge issues” such as same-sex marriage, abortion, fear of Muslims (or “MOOs-lims” as Graham would say), etc. This group is extensive, and counts as members those with well known names such as Graham, as well as unknown preachers who step into the pulpits of numerous churches every Sunday. But they’re all selling the same message: vote Republican, or God will want nothing to do with you.
5. The “Noise Machine” - Example: Rush Limbaugh
The noise machine is extensive, and it permeates the airwaves. Limbaugh has, for years, been the CEO of the Republican noise machine, but, after a series of gaffes cost him many sponsors, his star seems to be fading. There are plenty more out there, whose names may not be as big, but who are just as good as stirring up the uninformed, including: Laura Ingraham, Michael Savage, Mark Levin, and so on. Of course, this section can’t leave out the entire cast of characters at Fox News. From the curvy couch crew of Fox and Friends, to the evening rants of Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity, Fox News is one 24 hour noise cycle.
Of course, the job of this segment of the party is to tell half truths, and flat out lies, to those who aren’t paying attention, in order to, again, get them to vote against their own self-interests (see “Religious Hucksters”).
6. The War Hawks - Example: Dick Cheney
These Republicans have never seen a war they didn’t like. Some of this group served in the military, such as John McCain. But many of them, like former vice president Cheney, have never worn a uniform. They see the world as a dangerous place that can only be tamed by American intervention. Intervention that might require your child to go fight and die. But not their children. They have more important things to do, like grow up to be leaders, who will then send other people’s children off to fight and die. This group sees any dissent from a Republican president’s war plans as “unpatriotic.” But, they will travel the world to criticize a Democratic president for his handling of American conflicts he inherited from a Republican.
When talking about this group, we can’t leave out their connections to the defense industry. Isn’t it interesting that most of the biggest hawks in the country have the deepest ties to the military-industrial complex?
7. The Country Clubbers - Example: Hundreds of thousands of upper middle class voters
This group includes a lot of educated people, who should be able to see through the claims made by the shills and hucksters. But hey, they live in gated communities. They’re doctors, lawyers, businessmen and women. Republicans keep their taxes low. And those wars Republicans like to start? No worries. The children of this group are in some sort of professional school, or preparing to take over the family business. They’re too busy to do anything like sign up for military service. Even though they don’t make anything close to the money made by the oligarchs and other billionaires, they’re comfortable. They don’t need things like food stamps, so they don’t really see the purpose of them. They take advantage of all sorts of tax deductions, but don’t like the idea of others getting government assistance. Their motto could be “Government program that helps me — GOOD. Government program that helps you — BAD!”
8. The Dumb*sses - Example: The Tea Party
This is an example of one place where something called “trickle down” actually works. Everything done by the members of the first six groups in this summary winds up here — with people who listen to what the shills have to say, and who vote the way the oligarchs want them to. Were it not for this group of terminally uniformed voters, mostly old, mostly white, mostly uneducated, there would be no Republican party, or at the very least, it wouldn’t resemble what it is today.
These people hate the government, but love the largest government agency — the military. They’re quite happy to send their kids off to die in Republican wars, to protect their “freedom.” They opposed the so-called “government takeover of healthcare,” aka the Affordable Care Act (“Obamacare”), but don’t you dare touch their Medicare. They think that President Obama is a Muslim, Kenyan, socialist, who is destroying America, but don’t you dare call them racists.
You have to give the chiefs of the Republican Party credit. They have all of the pieces in place, and the thing runs like the proverbial “well oiled machine.” This is why Democrats can never rest. And why we must always, ALWAYS, get out and vote.