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“I am often asked what I would like to see happen above all else in our country and in our world.
So many things to pray for, so many things to work for,
But certainly my answer would be a world, where all children are loved and cared for–
first by the families into which they were born, then by all of us who are linked to them and to one another.
When we are reminded of the bounty and protection we enjoy, most of us are … grateful.
Our gratitude has its roots in a view of government that dates back to the days of the Pilgrims, and the successive waves of immigrants who came to this country, seeking religious and political freedom, and better economic opportunity.
In this view, government is an instrument, both to promote the common good and to protect individuals rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
There is nothing more important to our future than the well being of our children, for children are at our core==
Not only as vulnerable beings in need of love and care, but as a moral touchstone amidst the complexity and contentiousness of modern life…
Just as it takes a village to raise a child, it takes children to raise up a village.– to become all it should be.
The village we build with them in mind, will be a better place for us all…..
Hillary Clinton — “It Takes A Village”
You have to vote for Hillary, to otherwise not,… is to destroy America. Let me make the case.
There have been 4 “real” crises in our nation threatening our existence.. Of course, one can make the case everything is a crises and to some level they have a point….
But as looking back over ones personal life, there lie different degrees of crises. Dividing everything one owns with ones former life-partner, for example, is not on the same scale as missing the deadline for a utility payment. though in real time to some, both may seem equal.
The four crises (bypassing the American Revolution since we weren’t framed yet) are the war of 1812 which if successful would have ended independence and we’d be a commonwealth now; the Civil War which came closest to splitting us apart into two Americas; the Great Depression, where we dodged a bullet by sailing through it under FDR without becoming either Fascist or Communist as did most every other nation…. and finally the unrest of the 60’s which split America by age and race….
The remarkability is that through these fires we ran and emerged to continue building our legacy after they’d been reduced to smoking embers… There is a valid reason behind it too… We had all the good people on our side….
In 1812, the Brits found themselves a handful in a land of multitudes. Able to overwhelm outposts and structures, they were then unable to rule the masses they inherited with the territory and packed up and went home.
In 1860 large sections of the country split off to become independent… A war ensued and the rebels were brought back under the umbrella.
In the 1930’s the forced transfer of wealth from the top 1% to the bottom 99% and 100% taxation rates imposed during the war guaranteeing full employment, put America on sound footing as the rest of the world emerged out of ash heaps of WWII.
The late 60’s and early 70’s we asked our enlightened youth to fight a war just because we asked. Their outrage overflowed to all injustices of society and political force was applied to all our system’s weak points: discrimination, Civil Rights, minority rights and women’s rights…
In any of these courses we could have gone a different path… For some reason good people prevailed and the America we have stands today; for better or worse is the direct result of their effort…
Back when the British invaded in 1812 there were two trains of thought… One was to continue to fight for our independence, the other was to capitulate and reap the rewards that Britain was promising. It was a close fight in Congress but by a slim majority, we overrode the merchants and chose to fight and defend the nation instead of letting ourselves be reabsorbed. The business class, their counterparts of Donald Trump lost, and the 99% won..
The Civil War was a bit more complicated, but it also had its Donald Trumps in the preceding election egging on the South. And an election was held to determine the nation’s future. Abraham Lincoln won and the South immediately succeeded. Abraham was under great pressure to allow the successions. They had been voted on by their own citizens. But drawing from a higher calling, he chose to maintain the survivability of the nation and to war we went… It was rather unpopular and had to have draconian curtailing of liberties just to ensure the North’s survival… And up to a point the war was very close… But in the end the Donald Trumps lost and the Abraham Lincolns won. And America came together as if it had never been apart, and life went on…
The Great Depression did not split us, but we were in grave danger of losing Democracy either to the wealthy in a Fascist oligarchy or to Communists who were at their strongest at organizing during that time… Communists had already taken over the great expanse of Russia to the fear of capitalists everywhere. But America overwhelmingly put its trust in Roosevelt, who then forced an economy upon the American people which divided profits between business and labor (a forced action which was later tossed by the Supreme Court), but not before it had stopped the financial plunge to the bottom and started up the economy… Then a war of immense magnitude descended and to pay for it, tax rates soared nearing 100%, which all but guaranteed a thriving economy to make up the losses incurred during the Great Depression.
The 60’s was the last time (until now) when both sides thought the other side completely unreasonable. Values didn’t transcend generational lines and America had its own come-to-Jesus meeting… and realized that success after WWII, and fear of Soviet Russia had blinded itself to values embedded in its Constitution… Open discussion in our press, yielded the one true solution… No, we were not going to go backwards. Our salvation was in moving forwards… The Donald Trumps of that era were eclipsed at the polls, disabling any access to power by those who’d supported him, all bigots and racists.. They were forced to find another alternative…
And so we are here….. again… America gets to decide…. On one hand we have an Abraham Lincoln in female form, who like him has been a frequent associate behind real power and an outspoken advocate for those who were not in power, giving powerful voice to large segments of our society.
On the other hand, we have someone with no qualifications. with no experience, with no ideas worthy of mention, who is only the candidate because he let himself become the symbol of bigotry and the anti-Americanism prescient in the KKK. Whereas his party’s other candidates would secretly allude to their dark past with dog whistles, Trump has taken Hitler’s route and made butt-kicking of scapegoats the central part of his campaign…
There is no compromise… There can only be one winner, and we get to decide it…
Do we chose the most experienced person ever to be elected a candidate for president (no other candidate has ever lived in the White House prior to running), or do we choose someone who is only a cartoon to which hate groups hold up and salute with arms outstretched…
There is no compromise… There can only be one winner, and we get to decide it…
Do we choose someone who got minorities to read or do we choose someone who wants to send even literate and high paid minorities out to a non-white concentration camp for alleged deportation…
There is no compromise… There can only be one winner, and we get to decide it…
Do we choose someone who was in the White House during a time when all incomes levels got wealthier, who will improve our economy by following tried and true practices, or someone who wildly promised deep tax cuts for the wealthy and an additional $37 trillion in national debt?
There is no compromise… There can only be one winner, and we get to decide it…
Do we choose someone who got Israel and Hamas to agree on something that is working to this day, or someone who just by visiting a foreign nation, pisses all of them off to the point we have to deal with economic fallout?
There is no compromise… There can only be one winner, and we get to decide it…
Do we choose someone who has been playing Blackjack all her life and knows that bad cards get dealt and knows how to fold, or do we chose someone at the table for the first time, who bets everything on getting a 21 on his first hand….
There is no compromise… There can only be one winner, and we get to decide it…
Do we choose someone who will grow America by making sure all people here comply to the rules, including the 1%, or do we choose someone who gets rid of all rules and makes everything a free for all.
There is no compromise… There can only be one winner, and we get to decide it…
Do we choose someone who knows how to negotiate for stable outcomes, or someone who does whatever Putin tells him to…
There is no compromise… There can only be one winner, and we get to decide it…
Do we choose someone who will keep America strong, or someone who will tell Putin all our secret codes and secret plans?
There is no compromise… There can only be one winner, and we get to decide it…
Do we choose someone who can make America great again, by causing taxes to rise on the top 1%, by closing loopholes that siphon most of America’s wealth oversees, or do we choose someone who can’t say the same thing twice within the span of two minutes.. Someone who said they would give Domestic and Foreign policy to their Vice President candidate while they barnstormed America to “make it great again”..
There is no compromise… There can only be one winner, and we get to decide it….
That America, is where we are…
Now I know some of you still say you don’t like the Clinton’s. and I’m telling you it’s all about the learning curve. I myself just became convinced during the Democratic convention. I didn’t choose her against Obama in 08… I didn’t choose her against Bernie… But my side this time did not get enough votes and so she is the nominee. But it was her convention to which I turned to as the ultimate skeptic, that turned me from a nose-holding luckluster voter, to a enthusiastic believer that out of all human beings existing on this planet right now as I write this, not one, has the capacity to lead America where it NEEDS to go, except Hillary Clinton… Not Obama, Not Bernie, No one… There is no one out there who can rise to the occasion the next four years will demand, except… Hillary Clinton.
What does America need to do?
We need to reverse global warming, damn the torpedoes.
We need to raise the cost of being rich… they need to give more to build America.
We need everyone to be earning $10,000 more than they are now per year by next election.
We need a government beholden to human beings, not the overseers to greenbacks in the billions.
We need to limit the power of corporations. Their power must lie only in the numbers of people who they employ. not the whims of their randomly picked leaders.
We need a great retirement plan for all Americans..
We need a great free health-care system for all Americans
We need to forgive all student loans and to make sure future generations never have to go through that process again.
These are Just to name a few… which means we are in possibility of another great divide, or war, or mass internal conflict which by our ultimate decision, we determine the direction and future outcome of whether we last much further in perpetuity…
It is that classic battle between people versus wealth, …. again… If you choose wealth, which is now being offered by a real clown, seriously, then you choose to deny America it’s proper place in history… But if you resolve to choose We, The People, we will somehow survive…
We always have survived so far… but that is because during each past crises, we have always chosen the right path to go down… We are being called to choose again… Will you?
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If one listens to media (seriously, why would they) or looks at opinion pieces on the Democratic contest for the Presidency, one sees a lot of people talking about the race… yet no one expressing any vision of what the landscape would look like if either of them won.
So in plain language, here it is…
If you think the rich have too much and the poor have too little, nothing will change unless enough of you vote for Bernie Sanders in the primaries on June 7th.
If you think there is something inherently wrong with 1/10th of one percent owning more than the bottom 90% (you), recognize nothing will ever change unless enough of you vote for Bernie Sanders in the primaries on June 7th.
If you think there is something wrong with 58% of all new income generated going to the top 1%, (they get raises; you don’t) then you must realize nothing will change unless enough of you vote for Bernie Sanders in the primaries on June 7th.
If you think there is something wrong with America having the highest child poverty rate (32.2%) of any developed nation, and we continue to cut back on programs designed to alleviate poverty just so billionaires can keep more of their money, then you must realize nothing will change unless enough of you vote for Bernie in the primaries of June 7th.
If you think that the wealthy and large corporation should at least pay the same rate as you and even more on their inordinately high incomes, then you must realize nothing will change unless enough of you vote for Bernie in the primaries of June 7th.
If you think that no one who works 40+ hours a week should live in poverty and that by 2020 minimum wages across America should be at $15 an hour, then you must realize nothing will change unless enough of you get up, go out, and vote for Bernie in the primaries of June 7th.
If you believe we should put Obama’s original idea of investing 1 Trillion towards rebuilding our infrastructure and create 13 million jobs for those in our inner cities, then you must realize nothing will change unless enough of you vote for Bernie in the primaries of June 7th…
If you believe we should make tuition free at public colleges and universities across the US, then you must realize nothing will change unless enough of you vote for Bernie in those primaries taking place on June 7th.
If you think we should expand the social security cap above $250,000, so those billionaires and large corporations earning most of America’s new income, continue to pay the same rate as you and your employer, helping to keep Social Security solvent far into the future, then you must realize that nothing positive will happen, unless enough of you vote for Bernie in Tuesday’s primaries.
If you think it is time for the US to join the rest of the civilized world and make healthcare a right, guaranteeing every American the right to a Medicare-for-ALL single plan health care, then you must realize it can never happen, unless enough of you vote for Bernie in Tuesday’s primaries….
If you think that all human beings are important enough that employers should pay up to 12 weeks of family or medical leave, should have 2 weeks of vacation, and 7 sick days a year, please realize this will never happen, unless enough of you vote for it by choosing Bernie Sanders on June 7th….
If you think we should have a universal childcare and early childhood healthcare program for all children ages 0-3, then you must realize this will never happen unless enough of you vote for it by choosing Bernie Sanders on June 7th….
If you think we should have more unions instead of less, to increase our clout when bargaining for a share of the new profits being made hand over fist by our record productive work, then you need to realize only one person is capable of changing the status quo and making that happening, and he is on the ballot in the Democratic Primaries on June 7th..
If you think Big Banks who call themselves “Too Big To Fail” and count on Federal Taxpayers bailing out their bad investments, should be broken up into a lot of smaller banks which then can be allowed to fail, putting the financial responsibility on their investors, then you must realize the candidate who did not receive hundreds of thousands of dollars in speaking fees from these banks, is the only one who is able to make this happening, and he needs your vote on June 7th to prove to America that most of us want positive change…..
If you feel any of these are important, and even if you dream of how much better your life could be “if only” these things were in effect instead of the corporate driven economy we find ourselves…. then you must realize that no matter what anyone else besides you says… whether on TV, magazines, opinion pages, or blogs, that your job or even duty to your children, is to vote for the America you want to see happen in your lifetime….
It is revealing that in the week leading up to California and New Jersey and other final states, that Hillary and Trump are calling each other names and attacking personalities while Bernie is still running on his (and your) dream…
Here is the kicker. Even if Bernie doesn’t ultimately win the nomination, if enough of you still vote for him in this final push, it is very likely that the winner will have to bow to popular appeal and incorporate his platform as part of her plan…That is what has happened in many of the past 58 presidential elections in our history. Your stronger than expected showing on June 7th is not just an affirmation for the courage and vision of the man you love and trust, it is an affirmative vote, a big YES for all the policies he has proposed, which we as a nation can easily afford, just haven’t because we’ve all been too scared of the blustering rich guys…
Well the rich guys are Donald Trump. We see how they act and don’t have to be scared of them anymore.
When they come after the nominee and say: you can’t implement Bernie’s Plan on us, she can point to your votes for Sanders and say, “that is not what large numbers of the American People say” and you have given her the cover to stand up to the oligarchs.
America is a nation of ideas. We worship a document, not a charismatic founder… Our basis of government is little ink scrawls on parchment or more importantly, the ideas those little cursive letters express. Although our media has done its best to put faces in front of us (often in contorted poses), most of us accept the reality that those faces are interchangeable; it is the ideas being expressed by those faces that are important… Another face putting forth the same ideas will be just as effective implementing them if voted in office, as the face running right now…
This is Bernie’s revolution, a return to the dominance of ideas. And his is being fueled differently than the other two campaigns, both of which for lack of a better word, are personality cults:.. “I” will build a wall and “I” will make Mexico pay for it/ “I” am the most experienced executive of all the candidates” Against which Bernie is saying: “We” need this now; “We” need that now; and with your votes, “We” can really do this now/ now is the time….
And that is why every vote for Bernie on June 7th is an affirmation for the ideas he has personified. That is why if you want real change, you will still need to vote for the ideas that appeal to you and not be swayed by political noise which primarily I believe, is aimed at you to confuse you and distract you from following your agenda….
Voting for people supported by the status quo and bankrolled by interests opposite of yours, will do nothing to change your predicament, no matter how much you love them… By them I’m sure you will be offered new programs, but those offerings really benefit the investors who are providing them, not help those needing help. But if you are in the camp who thinks that all it takes for America to be great again is to get a little more income into your pocket, to not worry about affording college, to not worry over having medical bills, not worrying about what happens to you when you retire, to actually be able to make more money when your companies profits rise solely because of your collective hard work, then there is only one candidate worthy of your vote, for real.
The last great hope in anyones lifetime like this was JFK (by November 2008 most of us knew Obama’s campaign agenda would be bogged down by the economy). We’ve been waiting 56 years for this new breath of fresh air. If you don’t show this guy your support, based on how things work, it becomes very hard for those ideas to ever become reality… The rich will say: “See? Even poorest of the masses don’t want his dreams passed into law….”
It’s your vote; making it collectively, your call. Same way it has always has been in America for 58 presidential elections and despite multiple ups and downs, by miracles and close votes we will have survived 240 years from our conception this upcoming July 4th.
Forget all noises in your ear (including this one). Vote for the America YOU want to see. Don’t throw your one great opportunity away…..
Perhaps due to the abrasive nature of politics in New Jersey, its citizens will not be as beholden to having “royalty” tapping their ruby slippers with their wand, as were the squeamish citizens of their sister state across the bay, who tend to blindly follow whatever direction those with more money in their pockets, tell them ….
New Jersey has always been a knock-down, drag-out, state when it comes to political fighting… Which means, I hope its citizens who are immune to fighting entirely, don’t get sucked up in it, and do stay clear to vote their self interests….
It’s like if you never see your parents argue, then see a heated discussion involving anger as the prime force of reason, it scares you… But if you see the same stuff every other day, you think: “crap, I’d better see if I can get a seat at Beth’s family’s table today….”
Because, ever since Wisconsin, the media redundant focus on the Democratic race has been on Hilary’s fights with Bernie… who said what, and how did Twitter respond, and how much time can our news milk this topic so we don’t have to tell voters about what really matters…. Which like parents arguing… affects us squat…
So what is important? Our money. Everything, and I mean, everything else is a distraction….
Oh no. I don’t mean to imply we should forget about everything else… We are under a lot of problems now… Global warming for one; it needed to be addressed 16 years ago instead of shuffling arguments with hired skeptics defending its denial. Racial injustice… Certainly important.. Having a good economy for only one color of skin is a scenario we do not want to have return. Public Education being corporatized? Heavens! That’s our nation’s future we’re talking about. Certainly it is important… Police responsible to “We, The People”, and not themselves? Absolutely, that is important…..
So what am I talking about when I say other than our money, everything else is a distraction?
What I’m talking about: is how money and power go together…. What I’m talking about is how even you, in whatever capacity you find yourself, when you have to choose between opposing views of people who a) can really fvck your life up, or b) people whose only hold on you is their moral persuasion, in order for yourself not to get royally fvcked up, you side with those who could do you the most damage…
What we are talking about: is whether you matter any more!….
Let’s waltz through all those distractions we get tossed, ok? One by one?
Global warming may happen or it may not, but unless you have power to make change, it is out of your hands. If you are a 2nd class citizen who can’t or won’t vote because it truly makes no difference, then that resolution will be decided by those who do… Just for the record, how many lobbyists can you hire to lubricate passage of laws limiting carbon’s use through your state and national legislatures? If you yourself have no assets to speak of, no stocks, no clout, if you still rent, and don’t own, if you make so little you can’t support your own necessary expenses, much less financially fund some progressive cause, why would someone listen to you over someone who has demonstrated the capacity to promise them a $500,000 a year job after their term expires?…
You need to elect someone right now to whom you will matter.
Racial Injustice? How does having equality on paper, translate into having fewer of your color in prison? Fewer of your color in jobs? Fewer of your gender in executive positions? How does yourself being poorer year, after year, after year; of having less money to spend on yourself, help others of your color, of your gender, of your sexual persuasion? How does you getting poorer and poorer and poorer and poorer help anyone really, if you can’t even help yourself? And if you can’t even help yourself, why would anyone sane ever listen to you again, once you’ve received their vote? Are the vows of commitment you make before you have sex, ever the same strength long after you’ve gotten it? Or are you ready to make new vows of the same ardency, to the next target who crosses your sights?
You need to elect someone right now to whom you will matter.
Public Education being corporatized? How does having corporations tear apart your public schools affect you, when all the choices given you are bad? Like slaves on a plantation you really have no choice because you really have no income with which to make a choice; you simply have to put your child on the bus hoping the interest of others keeps him from being thrown under the bus, and have him taken to “where-ever” school someone wants him in You have no say, because you have no money with which to get your “say” noticed. Why should anyone even care that you object to businessmen raking in millions of your tax dollars and giving nothing beneficial in return? Uhh, who are you, minimum wage person, with a credit rating of under 325, living week to week off your crappy job?… Who are you professional teacher, behind on your bills, fired for your low rating, who has “loser” in the shape of an albatross around your neck? Really who even cares what you say, where you say it, what you wish for you child when you can’t even put up two pennies for a candidate who would otherwise take you side of things? You expect people to ignore millions of dollars offered them, simply on moral grounds? What do you smoke btw?
You need to elect someone right now to whom you will matter.
Police accountability? Ha… Police run themselves… If they want to shoot a black.. they do it.. If they want a live target, they get one… NO ONE WHO HAS MONEY CARES! “Oh, tsh, tsh! So sad Trayvon died… Whoa! The bid is only $300 for the gun that killed him? That’s my investment in the future… some billionaire collector will want it.” “Oh look, my stock value in gun manufactures has soared double what I expected it to be before Trayvon was murdered… ‘Bout time we kill another black kid to shoot it up even higher.. ” So really you who have no money, no clout, no pull; how much money are you going to throw at legislatures to counter laws like that? You who have no job? You who live on less than $100 in cash a week? You, whose housing is paid for, whose food is paid for, whose phone is paid for by people who won’t hire you, won’t pay you a fair wage, who won’t give you the respect of a decent job, because your government is run by people to whom you don’t matter? To whom those with only big money matter because you can give two extra pennies to help them fight your battle….. What warped world do you live in where people will hold police accountable to the law at their own peril, when they could do quite well by leaving the police alone to kill in cold blood, anyone they want?
How is anyone going to change that over to what whatever it is you do want, YOU WHO DO NOT MATTER?
Seriously; social issues are distractions. They are panacea. They are offered to get you all excited so you forget how little money you now have; how much smaller money you will have in the future, and how little money your children will have to fight over among themselves if ever they have a future,… because YOU… yes, YOU, totally dropped the ball when it came to YOU YOURSELF making more money, and YOU, yes YOU, simply let them take it from you because YOU YOURSELF was concerned too much about Global warming; because YOU YOURSELF was too much concerned about racial injustice; because YOU YOURSELF was concerned too much concerned about educational deformity; because YOU YOURSELF was too much concerned about the inconsequences of police brutality……
So while you were distracted…. you simply scrolled through financial La La land and let them take your money, money that was to have been yours….
It is your money they now use to buy your state and local representative, your governor, your US House Representative or US Senator, so he/she must listen now to them, not you. It’s true. You are made to believe you are being listened to, but in truth, do you really have a voice? How’s your bank account?. People with money have awesome bank accounts, do you? All they have to do is whine: I’m not making money and it gets handed to them; when was the last time that ever worked for you?… They can act with impunity, take your property, your children, your pension, only because somewhere deep down in your soul, you were emotionally persuaded NOT to vote in someone who would dramatically change the rules so you could again begin to earn more and those with money might have to live with less….
These rules we are mentioning are not something new… They are the ones in existence across most of the rest of the world, and existed here up until 2002. They were the ones in play when the US had a roaring middle class, when every income level made more each year than they did the last, when it was unheard of to make less this year than you did last, when even when you lost your job, you still made more the next year because someone hired you paying you more money. That life is not a dream.. That life is memory for anyone over 45.
But every year, across those lifetimes, we took one or two planks off the House that Roosevelt built, called the New Deal, which guaranteed financial opportunity for all people.. Rich or poor. you would do alright in this life, as long as you lived in America; nothing bad would happen to you.
In that house with every new contract, your union would negotiate your wage based off a percentage of the success your work was providing your employers… Profits were split 50/50 between workers and investors, not 0/100… Then suddenly we “changed” the law to allow states to ban unions… pffft…. good bye profit sharing… “Sorry, kiddo, if you want to live, as in eat, you’ll have to work for $7.25 and hour and no benefits…That’s all this state offers; no, we don’t do raises.. Take it or starve..”.
Employer pension funds used to belong to the employees… Companies could not be bought and have their employee’s pensions dissolved sending the money straight to investors. You worked, you retired, you would live very comfortably in your old age… Today, many grandparents are subsidizing their children and grandchildren through the largess of these pension plans they were luck to retire on before the law was changed…
Marginal tax laws were also higher… meaning there was strong incentive NOT to gouge or bleed a business for high profits. With more than 50% of your top dollars handed over to the treasurer of the Federal Government, it made good sense to invest in your employees. and get a return on that investment instead of just handing the money over. Today, that is the craziest thing any company exec can do… (President of the Corporation): “Our profits are lower this year because I gave good raises to my employees to keep them on board to continue our success, and also because I opened up a new department to research and develop new products instead of buying out competing companies and firing all their employees. I will be sad to leave but do accept the stockholders’ decision..” We passed low tax laws letting corporations keep all their profits, requiring none to be invested back into our economy… We could have easily used our tax laws to provide incentives to invest in America instead of China, but since Americans were so preoccupied with social issues, no one cared. Prophets of doom were contemporarily ridiculed as pessimists, yet they predicted exactly the world we have today.
With more tax revenue available, the public sector was much more effective in controlling excessive corporate behavior, and large numbers of people had good jobs making good money monitoring Corporate America to make sure all existing laws were being followed. If a corporation was found to be violating American law, they were charged and punished… Now, only after a city’s whole water is poisoned, does anyone even begin to look for a culprit and usually blame falls on that person least able to defend themselves; not the real culprit who is allowed to continue their business. The Freddie Macs and Fannie Maes get blamed; not the Wall Street firms who knowingly sold very bad investments, then bet correctly they would fail… getting richer while we lost everything we had.
The point? The point is that we did this to ourselves… We did this by not paying attention to the rules by which our financial system was run, and by favoring rules that benefited corporations and those with lots of money, and by removing protections that served the middle class.
We put a gun to our head, spun the chamber, and lost.
But it is not yet over. Just as we voted rules to favor the elite class. we can also vote in new rules to favor the middle class…
But unless you start with electing and supporting someone who understands that being comfortably well off and having certain inalienable rights, is far better than being impoverished so you can’t even fight to maintain the rights you once had, it won’t change. Never. Never. Never… for how could it? How is it even possible that in a nation where 1% of the people now own more wealth than the other 99%.. the poorer segment can ever get that power back in their grasp?
So New Jersey… They will do their best to confuse you… But anyone who sticks out their tongue to lick the frozen pole put out by Wall Street, loses skin off their tongue… When people distract you by saying that “other” candidate “only” talks about Wall Street and that they couldn’t give a damn about Wall Street, remember that without money in your pocket you have no power… And today without someone fighting for you, you will never have money in your pocket… Across the entire history of this world, Wealth has always stayed in the hands of those to take the power to keep it in their possession.
If you want more wealth, there is only one way to get it… Take it from those who have it and are fighting you hard to keep it in their possession….
There are three candidates remaining… Two of them are part of the 1%…. One of them isn’t and it it only that one who is fighting for you. Don’t let the other two distract you.
With the passing of the Sanders’ campaign’s high mark, it becomes clearer than ever that one can fight back against Big Money. Instead of being disappointed in a setback, we should take joy that for once this message finally resonated in the American People.
No one really expects a first attack or probe to successfully take down a giant. That rarely happens. The fact that it is so rare, is often what ramps up the hope and anticipation when possibilities align predicting it could happen.
And of course, hope and anticipation were ramped up as we saw success after success pile on to Bernie’s campaign.
So the take away from all of this is that Big Money is vulnerable. They don’t always win. Sure they have odds stacked in their favor because they can buy what they need. But they are not invincible….
It is this knowledge that must now run rampant in the large sector of the population that is now being polled saying they want Sanders as our president.
Yes, those polls do include independents and it is fact that both major parties blocked independents from 4 of the last primary contests…
It was that rule that broke the revolution, not Big Money.
Rules can be changed and that rule does not apply in general elections. What this means is that if you are a progressively inclined person of either party, now is the time to run to put Big Money back into its box…
Bernie showed America that we can still be in charge of our country, but, we need to act now because we are losing control fast… But, we can…
It just takes involvement… Which means it will take you. You can’t sit this one out like you have all those in the past…. You will need to “do” something…
Because we have just seen with our own eyes, that it can be done.
It looks like Bernie’s strength is in Kent and Sussex Counties. Hillary is very strong in Wilmington’s precincts. Newark is closer to 50-50… Claymont is 50-50.. Hockessin leans slightly in favor of Clinton.
it is funny that large numbers of people did not know Hillary was in state today. I wonder if they were aware Bernie landed here Saturday?
This election will depend on turnout (as most elections do). If you are a Hillary supporter, you really don’t have the push to get to the polls because if you fail, Hillary is going to win it anyway… But… If you believe in what Bernie says, about student loans, free college, stopping global warming, getting billionaires out of our government, Medicaid for all, this is the last ditch time to vote. If he loses this round, it’s like the other team being two touchdowns up at the two minute warning…. We have seen miracles happen, but rare it is, when they do…
If you vote for Bernie, you give him life… If you don’t, there is no one left to carry your water for you… You lost your chance at ever getting a better life.
This election has too many variables to predict. But by this time tomorrow we will know if…
- it is still possible to get out of student loan debt.
- If it is still possible to go to state colleges tuition free
- If it is still possible to begin the squeeze on fossil fuels to save the planet.
- If it is still possible to get billionaires out from running our government for themselves.
- If it is still possible to have a single payer healthcare system.
- If love still outweighs hate…..
Vote. it will never happen unless you vote for it to happen….. Only one candidate is running for the people…
Briefly, because that is the length of attentions spans until after Tuesday.
But despite Hillary touting Obama’s great job record, many people don’t see things working out very well today…
And that is because most people don’t rate their well-being by whether or not they have income incoming… but by how much the have left over for discretionary spending after all mandatory and necessary expenses have been met.
When over 50% of all income coming in is going to the top 1/10th of one percent, it is pretty obvious to everyone that only by increasing taxes on those stratospheric incomes, will money ever return to the middle class which is where it needs to be.
If any of you follow corporate financial reports, you are by now, aware and worried that domestic demand has dipped below critical levels. If any of you follow corporate financial reports, you too are skittish that we are on track for another very nasty correction this fall.
Only one candidate is addressing the problem. Only one candidate can make a difference to the middle class… All other four running are billionaire appeasers who like Chamberlain before Hitler, sell us out and offer us an empty plate of words, telling us we will have prosperity in our time.
It is past time I’m afraid, to stop believing their words and start believing our eyes…
Only when the billionaires are put back under control of We the People, will We, the People, ever get our fair share too….
The only hope for America, is to fix this huge problem of over 50% of our wealth sucked out of our economy, and only one presidential candidate is uncompromised, … who can do it.
Wow, that’s a shocker, isn’t it? Of course I don’t mean in bed; I mean in economic policy..
One of the reasons blacks have such fond memories of the Clintons is because as a group, they benefited during the policy changes of the Bill Clinton Presidency. There was a big difference from where they were before Clinton was elected, to where they were when he turned over the reins of power to his successor.
Today due to the influence of a misguided press, they seem to be mixing fiction with fact in their overwhelming support for Hillary over Bernie Sanders… ( In NY it was split 75/25). Such is understandable. The explanation of the difference between fact and fiction, is that the Bill Clinton upon leaving office, did not have the same outlook as the one who entered. Hillary has continued his same line of financial maturity, (most notably after the presidency, when they became wealthy). Whereas, Bernie as a poor Senator is very similar to the young Bill Clinton as a poor governor, both having far greater empathy for the middle and problems of the lower class, than they do or did to the top 1%.
Both the policies of Bill and Bernie were and are aimed at correcting the flaws embedded in the economics of a growing middle class, no matter how hard it hurt the rich. By contrast, Hillary pays lip service to the middle class’s economic hardships, but her views appear to be compromised and tempered by her connections to the upper 1% who definitely seem to have her ear…..
So let’s compare Bill’s achievements piece by piece?
The economy added almost 23 million jobs under Bill Clinton’s 8 years. The GDP grew 35% over the same time. Unemployment hit a 30 year low.
Average hourly wages grew 6%. Medium average household income grew 14%. The median income of African American families increased by a third and Hispanic families saw their median incomes rise by almost $7,000. Poverty rates dropped to near record lows. And of course the federal budget went from enormous deficits to enormous surpluses,
How was this done? Basically,…. by getting rid of Reaganomics and establishing “sound” economic policy.
Fundamentally, the middle class is the engine of U.S. economic growth and prosperity. When it grows; the national economy grows. When it contracts; our economy contracts.
Bill strengthened the Middle Class by seriously hiking the minimum wage!!!!! 20%. Next, Bill pushed and got the Family Medical Leave Act, which meant that having a baby would no longer cost you your job. This is something we simply take for granted today; it is almost unbelievable to think that firing pregnant moms was the norm prior to that bill’s passage and signature. Third, establishment of Child Tax Credits, a necessary plank for middle class families still to this day…
Bill Clinton made entering the Middle Class easier for those on the bottom by strengthening the Earned Income Credit, a credit whose amount grew as ones wages grew up to a certain point, offering strong incentive to work more. Welfare reform up to $3 billion dollars yearly, continued to push people out of poverty and into the middle class. This included housing vouchers for those working their way out of welfare , as well as business tax breaks for businesses hiring them.
To help young families, more money than every before was directed to Head Start and child care. The Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) was founded to bridge the lower incomes after Medicaid incomes cuts kicked in. WIC funding increased 45% over his tenure. Food Snap funding initially got a $3 billion boost, then fell off rapidly as the economy boomed. As well as Federal Housing Assistance growing $9 billion per year enabling many lower middle class owners to realize home ownership for the first time.
Together, these dropped poverty level rates among Blacks from 33% at the time of Bill’s swearing in, to 22% at his swearing out….
As millions of more Americans entered the middle class and as real wages grew, President Clinton also met his goal of spending less on tax breaks for the wealthy and debt services—and giving the middle class more room to spend and grow the economy instead.
And for the first time in 30 years, incomes of the bottom 20 percent of the workforce rose nearly as much as the top 20 percent, and the number of people living in poverty actually declined.
Furthermore, for the first time, Afro Americans had opportunity equal to their white peers. With equal access to education, and federal money being spent on poorer schools as well, many Afro Americans were equally poised alongside their white counterparts, to engage in middle class opportunities as technology opportunities suddenly blew up with the growth of internet technologies. Suddenly there WERE lots of blacks making lots of money. Locally, Delaware call centers pretty well hired out all Wilmington to staff their offices.
In the quality of life category, violent crime which peaked just before Bill Clinton came into office, fell significantly over the course of his tenure, and has continued long afterwards.
But all these changes were instigated, and completely made into realization,… by the increase of the top marginal rate on top incomes…
Clinton’s 1993 budget, passed over the vociferous opposition of congressional Republicans, included revenue enhancements focused almost exclusively on those who benefited most from President Reagan’s tax reductions 12 years earlier—large corporations and America’s most affluent earners. These included:
- An increase in the top ordinary income tax rate from 31 percent to 39.6 percent
- Repealing the cap on earnings subject to the Medicare payroll tax
- Increasing the corporate income tax rate for profits above $10 million
- Reducing the deductibility of business meals and entertainment expenses
These “paid for” all the improvements Bill Clinton used to strengthen the Middle Class and then went on to paying down the federal debt, thereby decreasing cost of the portion of debt servicing …. Had these policies not been overturned by the successor George W. Bush, the entire national debt was on scheduled to have been eliminated by 2009….
By turning the federal budget around, President Clinton accomplished three critical things. First, he reduced federal borrowing as the economy improved, allowing that capital to flow to more productive uses and giving the private sector a needed boost. Second, he allayed the fears of an impending debt crisis, taking that issue off the table. And third, the fiscal improvement allowed the government to focus on the other economic matters listed above—investing in the future, growing the middle class, mitigating poverty, and strengthening Afro-America’s communities.
Undoubtedly President Clinton’s policies are what spurred the economy out of the Reagan doldrums by focusing on the middle class and by making targeted public investments directly in the neighborhoods of Afro-Americans. I just wanted fellow white Americans to first understand WHY black Americans were and still are so loyal to the “Clinton” name…..
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Which brings us now to 2016. Exactly twenty fours years after that election featuring Ross Perot making a “giant sucking sound”. (Can you believe it’s been that long)….
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If you are Afro American over 35 you probably already know of what I just told you; you lived it. So naturally everyone should see where there should be a lot of loyalty still deserved by the wife of the man who created so much good.
But!
Do you know that the policies now espoused by Hillary Clinton are very similar to those espoused by George W. Bush’s father, George Herbert Walker Bush when he ran against Bill Clinton? (“Stay the course.”) Do you know that the policies now espoused by Bernie Sanders are much closer to what Bill Clinton ran on in 1992, than are those of his wife today?
The crux of Bill Clinton’s success was his quick passage of the higher taxes on the top one percent. That allowed a return to the proper balance of wealth and investment to America. Everyone knows no wealthy person is going to invest in a poverty area. Which is why to eradicate poverty areas, you first need federal investment directly into those people who live in those areas. When they are no longer living in poverty, that area is no longer a poverty area. This in a nutshell, is why allowing MORE investment credits to wealthy people with the sole purpose to entice them to invest, is a no-go… No one willingly loses a million dollars to get a reward of $10,000 extra dollars for doing so.
Which is all that Republican ideas offer. They merely let the rich keep all their money and do nothing to invest in poor neighborhoods. But, if you tax the rich so much it tortures them (MAKE IT STOP)!), then say, … no taxes if you invest in South Bridge Wilmington, you actually do get people to invest in South Bridge Wilmington. Like ShopRite. 🙂 But you have to first have very high taxes to make tax breaks the incentive they once were and again should be…
(If you’ve noticed, incoming corporations now no longer ask for tax breaks for an incentive to move into Delaware; they ask for cash up front. Tax breaks are no incentive anymore because taxes are way, way, way too low. Lower tax breaks? Pffft. It’s no big deal).
Therefore, you NEED higher tax rates to
a) generate private investment back into the economy
b) fund public sector projects no private investor would sink money into.
c) raise wages.
None of which ever happen when tax rates are too, too, too low on the top 1%. You may wonder how this works?
Higher taxes tax profit… That is all. They tax all the money that is left over after every other expense has been accounted for… If you have a business and put money back into it to grow your business, it is quite possible you have no profits left over. If you have no profits, you cannot be taxed on them… Therefore higher marginal tax rates provide the best incentive currently known to mankind, (otherwise known as greed), to convince a business owner to either repair or expand his business. This action done by all business owners everywhere at the same time, is what we all call “economic growth”…
Now taking the contrary course, that of cutting taxes to spur investment, does not give you more investment.. Instead it makes you buy up what is already there… It is way more profitable to “buy” a bank for example, than start one from the ground up. You “buy” a bank, fire its president, vice presidents, and officers and replace them with those on your payroll, presto, you’ve already earned profit… which incidentally, will not generate much tax revenue because of the lower rates which gave you so much money to buy the bank in the first place. Why would anyone invest in something which after 15 years, has a total payoff of 3%…. when they can selectively put that money in stocks and make 8% in 4 weeks? This explains why we have great gains in our stock markets and very little physical investment in the infrastructure, when taxes are low; and the opposite when tax rates begin climbing… Ironically the obvious way to spur more physical investment in our economy, is to make “making money” too expensive so you have to “hide” it before it gets taxed…. Higher marginal tax rates do that…
Bill Clinton raised taxes on the top 1% from 31% to 39.6%, a jump of 8%. The economy took off like a rocket and over the rest of his term we had the best economy ever in America’s history. Bernie wants to raise rates on our highest income earners from 39.6 to 52% (12.4%); it would only hit those making more than $10 million a year, and then it is only on those amounts over that $10 million to which this rate will apply… By contrast, Hillary is stating that she only wants to generate only 3% of what Bernie will….or show an increase of 0.3%…..
This is why Bernie is more like Bill than his wife Hillary.
Hillary said she wants minimum wage at $12 dollars by 2020.. Bernie is advocating $15 dollars. Bill Clinton jumped minimum wage 20%… If one takes the $10 wage already voted on by Delaware’s legislature, her cap would stop it at $12 dollars, roughly a 20% level of increase. Yet Bernie’s takes it up to $15 dollars or a 50% increase over the current $10 dollar amount… something some localities and states have made it into future law already.
So in daring, Bernie is more like Bill than Hillary is.
When it comes to putting through more blacks through college, Bernie is more like Bill than is Hillary. He advocates tuition-free college for all.
When it comes to health insurance, Bernie is more like Bill than is Hillary.
When it comes to infrastructure investment and jobs, Bernie is more like Bill than is Hillary.
When it comes to caring more for Black children, Bernie is more like Bill than Hillary.
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And it makes perfect sense. When Bill ran for president he was an governor of a poor state comprised of many blacks, making $35,000 a year. Except for his free governor’s mansion, he was very middle class. From 2007 to 2014, the Clinton’s earned $141 million. It is not hard to understand why they won’t be such strong supporters of the middle class if it comes at the rich’s expense.
Bernie Sanders has a net worth of $300,000. If he weren’t a Senator, he’d be living on Social Security. That makes him the poorest of all presidential candidates. That makes him so much more like Bill Clinton, than Bill’s wife Hillary is today…
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There is no denying Black loyalty exists for Hillary Clinton. She was beside Bill when all this went down 20 years ago. But, her interests no longer rest as strongly with the black peoples of America, as they once did. Now, out of necessity, and new friends, she has to balance what is best for poor blacks in our cities, with what is best for her new friends who are very well to do…
If any of you have a spouse that has ever had a mistress or homey on the side, you know exactly what I mean when we are talking about rationing down the amount of attention being given to you.
Bernie is running for a mission: to make all Americans better. If you are black and American, you are still an American… Under Bernie, your life will get better. Bernie can benefit you faster and better and more like did Bill Clinton, than can his wife…..
Because, Bernie,… actually is a lot more like Bill, than is Hillary.
First they backed Jeb, then Marco, then Cruz, and now, it looks like Wall Street is pinning their hopes on Hillary.
Bernie is not an avuncular Socialist anymore. He is a threat to the capitalistic system of today, a system that has put 90% of America near poverty… The reason? He wants to return America to the capitalistic system we had 20,30,40 years ago… when to borrow a phrase from Donald Trump, “America was great.”
And most of America hopes he succeeds. The anger behind Donald Trump is also anger against the current capitalism which has emasculated the American worker. You add Donald’s followers to Bernie’s followers and you have a majority of America who wants some very big changes to quickly affect the daily lives of 90% of Americans… They need more income.
The capitalist system of today is bigger than America… Most of America’s profits are quickly moved off-shore doing Americans no good for all the work they’ve done for their bosses.
American workers are past their breaking point and only two candidates understand and address their issues. Donald and Bernie. There are opposite differences in addressing the same theme. One is diverting attention away from those big businesses by pointing to Mexicans, Muslims, and Megan (something with M’s?). The other is aiming to control big business by putting it back into the box from which it escaped during George W Bush’s presidency…. But depending on who you mistrust, both are doing exactly the same thing in the grand scheme of things: organizing against today’s form of capitalism.
So, with Wisconsin going to Bernie, there is now some fear that New York may do the same. And that has unleashed all the tricks to blank out both Bernie and Donald so regular Americans continue to be blocked from any say in how their government gets run… something that keeps Wall Street up at night.
Which is why, with the Wisconsin Win, we now have The Daily News of New York and the Washington Post follow-up, excoriate presidential candidate Sanders…
I read the Daily News transcript and you should too. You will understand that headlines quite often these days, do not an accurate description of the article, make.
I was very pleased with Bernie’s answers and was rather shocked that some have said otherwise….
The leader of the negative articles is none other then mega-giant Amazon.Com’s own newspaper, the Washington Post… Remember this paper is owned by Jeff Bezos, 5th richest Forbes designated person in the world, who is worth $52 billion.
There is one reason he would not want Bernie to win and that would be because Bernie would put him in the highest tax bracket. Which is 58% I believe. Though he will cry, cry, cry about paying high taxes, Americans will get far more benefit from his $52 billion portfolio if correctly taxed, then they would from letting him keep even more of his profits, as is being proposed by every other candidate…
So, imagine you had $52 billion in assets… Would you attack someone who would cost you money??? Or someone who would give you money??
Here are the Washington Post’s flurries off that great interview (read the transcript)-=- remind one of Fast and Furious?
9 things Bernie Sanders should’ve known about but didn’t in that Daily News interview
This New York Daily News interview was pretty close to a disaster for Bernie Sanders
Bernie Sanders picks a dangerous New York fight with Hillary Clinton
The case against Bernie Sanders, according to Barney Frank
Clinton questions whether Sanders is qualified to be president
About that Bernie Sanders ‘momentum’ …
Writers for The Atlantic, Vanity Fair, CNN, Slate and Talking Points Memo concluded as well that Sanders had botched the interview.
But the transcript shows a different story…..Sanders’s conversation with the Daily News was more nuanced than some of the criticism might suggest.
Here is one example…. Sanders was faulted for not having formed an opinion on a recent ruling in federal court. “It’s something I have not studied, honestly,” he said.
When asked how to break up JP Morgan, Sanders answered he’d leave it up to the banks.. That is exactly the right answer. The government doesn’t know the most efficient way to break up JP Morgan, JP Morgan does. If the point is to downsize the banks, the way to do it is to give them a size cap and let them figure out the best way to reconfigure themselves to get under it… It is no different than requiring seat belts in every car, but not specifying how they must be constructed…
The same applies to Sanders not knowing the specific statute for prosecuting banks for their actions in the housing bubble. Knowingly passing off fraudulent mortgages in a mortgage backed security is fraud. And the fact that Sanders didn’t know a specific statute, who cares? How many people know the specific statute for someone who puts a bullet in someone’s head? It’s murder. Specific statute? Are you serious?
Although he did not know, he did argue that the federal law enforcement should devote more manpower to investigating the largest financial firms to determine whether any particular laws were violated, something Clinton has also promised to do, putting both of them at odds with Obama, who chose instead to seek large payments to settle, instead of aggressively prosecuting what could be very involved, risky and unsuccessful at the Supreme Court.
With the exception of the subway token thing, gracefully ending with an image of Bernie jumping a turnstile and gracefully eluding the subway police, it often appeared that the Daily News simply had inexperienced reporters asking vaguely open questions to which Bernie was hearing different parts….
Bottom line is that reading the entire transcript, makes Bernie not someone out of touch with the big picture of running America; which means that those saying he was, ARE out of touch with how America needs to be run….
Look. Mom says: Be home for Thanksgiving… She doesn’t say: get out of work early, pack the night before, take the number 5 bus to the station at 7:45; get on the 8:11 train to Philly and get of at Suburban station and take at 9:22, the 102 bus north….
Bernie got it right… Bezos obviously has a $52.2 billion agenda…. If you are smart (Allan Loudell gets fooled every time), don’t believe any media this campaign, but use them to read the transcripts…. for you are smarter than they are.
Brilliant strategy for any voter: go the source; ignore headlines and commentary.
kavips 