Republicans Just Cost Me $1000 A Year!

They cost you too…

The drop in payroll tax from 6.2% to 4.2% results in a savings of about $1000 a year to every wage earner.

(If truth were widely known, that tax cut is actually a bad idea. It hemorrhages a dying social security fund, requiring the eventual death of the program or an expensive emergency last ditch surgery in the future.)

But it is hard not to give a $1000 present to every voter. Even if it only comes out as $19 dollars and change each week… But, still again, if your electric bill is $198 and you only have $189 in your account, that additional amount is, well, a lifesaver…..

But, Republicans in the House, even after Republicans in the Senate voted passage, overwhelmingly voted….. not to vote on the measure…

They didn’t vote against it… THEY VOTED NOT TO VOTE ON IT……
(speculation is that they lacked the votes to keep it from passing)..

So, how does that relate to you?

House Republicans (read Tea Party) just voted NOT TO VOTE on whether or not you will be losing an extra $20 a month out of your next paycheck.

Imagine what this is doing to payroll clerks around the country?
Imagine what this is doing to family budgets around the country?
Imagine what this is doing to businesses who rely on consumer spending around the country?
Imagine what this is doing to businesses heavily involved in the financial sector, around this country?

So what would normally happen?

Normally a group that can’t find agreement, acknowledges the sad fact, and long before the deadline, announces that they failed to reach agreement and that things would continue as they were on a temporary basis, to unfortunately allow for more time to solve differences.

But NOOOOOOOOOOOO, …. WE ARE STUCK WITH A TEA PARTY THAT FUCKS THINGS UP.

Instead, we have a vote not-to-vote, then get all sorts of very lame excuses from those who are delaying, none of which apply to the real problem that Social Security is doomed unless drastic action gets taken (higher rates, not lower), and we get nothing….

The tax cut will expire…

It is like sequestering a jury in a room, where everyone after much fact-covering argument has agreed to a judgment, except for one person who’s been bought off. And nothing, nothing, logic, emotional appeal, bullying, snuggling up to, befriending, produces any change. And you go years, every working day, to the same court house, the same jury room, they same chair at the same table, hear the same arguments, hoping against all odds, that today, he will see the light and switch. You go the next day.

That is today’s Congress. Held hostage by Tea Party Republicans who live in a dream world untouched by the reality of living under $185,000 a year. Like that bought-out juror, every day, they hold up progress with the unjustified belief that, if they wait long enough, the other 11 jurors will give up and sway over to the sole juror’s way….

Two things can happen… 1) return to the public and announce a hung jury, and do a complete retrial.. or 2) sneak up to that one juror, put a gun to his head, say nothing, pull the trigger, clean up the mess, dispose of the body, then go out to the public and announce what the 11 of you have decided…..

One is the nice way, sanctioned to due process of law. The other is the American Way.

It’s time to initiate the kavipsian policy of expression or what is otherwise known as “Show Us How You Really Feel”… Who knows? It could become the next great movement? The next time someone you know (or don’t), says anything about how millionaires should keep their tax cuts and the poor should pay, nod your head in agreement, smile a little bit, then hit them as hard as you can in their mouth, I mean as hard as you can! Put them flat on the ground holding their jaw… Then loudly say, “Don’t every talk that stupid way to me again!” Who knows, if 99% or all 303,930,000 would respond that way to our fellow congressional delegates, and the other 3.9 million of their like who advocate such madness, we might actually get the very progress we need, not because of intimidation, but because such policy is right….

For those who argue expression of violence is un-American, I’ll remind them that tonight, is John Wayne Night on AMC: view it!… I argue that such action is VERY American and perhaps it has been the lack of such spontaneous expressions of frustration from working American people, that has caused the logjam where nothing gets done because of one holdout, who thinks he can sway the world to his opinion and face no consequences… ….

Practice now, by punching brick walls.

Have You Seen The Little Piggies….

This is just so rich…  It is what is wrong with America encapsulated in one tiny story?

Remember those silly people wearing red and holding up signs that said “Drill, Baby, Drill”? Remember our local political candidate who stood up to argue we should be drilling oil on the beach at Rehohoth? Remember the huge push to open all environmentally sensitive areas in Alaska and off Florida immediately, so oil companies could scoop up rights?

We needed it desperately then… or so we were told… Not everyone agreed or course…

So what’s happening now? Courtesy of WDEL and CBS news, we see that oil companies aren’t drilling any more…

But despite making record profits, today, oil companies are drilling on less than one-third of the acreage in this country that they have the rights to.

The answer given by those who cannot be trusted? “The leases aren’t being used because there’s probably no oil there,” said Felmi, the chief economist with the American Petroleum Institute.

The true answer is different. A recent U.S. Government Accountability Office report suggests otherwise. Bottom line: oil companies only “develop leases when it is most profitable to do so.”

“There are clearly oil and gas resources that are undeveloped in some of the existing leases,” said Frank Rusco, with the GAO.

The Department of the Interior estimates 68 billion barrels of oil lie in areas already accessible to drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska. But today, nearly half of the existing rigs sit idle.

Yes, half of the EXISTING rigs sit idle…. Were we schmoozed? Obviously.

The oil industry, which made nearly a quarter of a trillion dollars in profits in the last two years, an all-time high, argues that its hands are tied to shareholders. Bullshit.

When Exxon-Mobil’s earnings last year were a staggering $45 billion – the largest corporate profit ever. and while Exxon is increasing its spending on oil production by $3 billion, it is pumping over 10 times that – $35 billion – back into its stock, shareholder dividends and cash reserves. At a time when America needs more energy, needs more oil, Exxon is raking in record profits and stashing away $35 billion.

Todays reality renders moments like the cheering at the Republican National Convention virtually meaningless – at least until Exxon decides the price is finely high enough to “drill baby, drill”..

Anyone who stood up to argue in Exxon’s favor last summer… can NEVER be trusted again….They are bought out. They are just too stupid and don’t belong in government….

They should remain at home, clutching forks and knives… to eat their bacon….

Who Is This?

This is a guessing game. It’s supposed to be fun. You do the guessing. I’ll reveal the answer at some point in the future. Bottom line, I am interested in how this plays out. (To keep answers out of moderation, no links please.) You may use the categories above for some helpful hints, but knowing me, don’t expect to find the answer that easily.) 🙂

1) Foreign policy/defense: I want American imperialism rolled back and American interventionism halted, as the same time we begin to pull free from the military/industrial complex by slashing the budgets for defense and homeland security to reasonable levels.

2) Civil libertarian issues: I want to see gay marriage legalized; drugs decriminalized; Real ID abolished; the Patriot Act gutted; and immigrants viewed as human beings. I want intrusive government the hell out of my life.

3) Fiscal sanity: I want a government that stops growing and taking an ever-expanding bite out of my paycheck; I want to see wasteful programs cut, and to have Congress faced with the same sort of imperative the Delaware General Assembly had to face this year: balancing the budget.

Why We Blog

Because that……. is what we do.

Britney Spears and Marylin Monroe

Somehow I came across a blog about Ryan Seacrest’ s interview with Britney Spears. The line that bothered me was how she was quiet and her “handlers” answered all the questions for her…..

As I was thinking “that’s sad” I had a nudge within my memory bank that said this has happened before…..It took some time to burn through the slow fog over memories past but eventually I remembered reading that before her end, Marylin Monroe had acted the same way…..

Towards her end there were attempts by Marylin to retake control over her own life, but eventually she was out-foxed and re-boxed by her “trusted” handlers. There were similar rages, (no shaved head) that were tsk’d tsk’d as signs of a coming “breakdown”…Sedate her was the answer…..And find a quiet sanitarium……

Then one day she was gone…………and many a young man, who understood her frailty, would pine if only he had been there for her…………..

There is still time for Brittney…So what’s the big deal you might wonder? If one basks in the sun too long, it goes to ones head….Celebrities are so spoiled these days…….No one cares for the average victim, the runaways in the same situation……

Thats a good point, But I guess it can be said that if Britney Spears goes, then part of us goes as well…..Similar to the typical Ming vase, lasting for centuries, that often gets shattered on Hollywood’s floor, the loss of any piece of art that inspires someone, is a loss indeed.

And Britney inspired many…So many prayed she would get back on track at the MVA awards………she didnt…….For ten years she has been the inspiration for so many girls. She’s occupied the thoughts of a few guys as well….

We can say this episode is not important and move on. But in doing so we set another tragedy in motion….A better alternative would be to offer love and support, and forgive past discretions based on our appreciation of her young artistry…..A young artist has a hard time. Mozart, Van Gogh, Jim Morrison come to mind. For at that young age, once the peak has past it is a long downward slide…..Britney evolved the new art form of song and dance into the mainstream ….Put a mike on anyone and they say “I look like Britney Spears.” Now she should stick to just singing. just as the Stones should probably stick to studio sessions.

Instead of a person I think she sees herself as an icon, a possession, as was Marylin Monroe. A board of directors, demanding something new, more return for the dollar….and she feels she has already given…much more than many who have gone before her…

I recommend a trip to India. Not as did Paris, to meet up with drunken elephants, but to do what the Beatles did, and to a certain extent, doing so kept them from going off the deep end,…..the same one as is facing this popular icon now. For as silly as it sounds, the new perspective given by the Maharishi, kept the Fab Four producing for a long, long time…….

Currently it seems as if Britney has no floor to stand on…..If she does not want to follow Marylin, she needs to lose her “flunkies” and “get a life.