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Have I mentioned recently that I NEED a FREAKIN’ JOB?
Well, I do. As do many millions more of my fellow citizens. I’m feeling a bit too lazy to go get the official figures but just last week, the official Unemployment rate was 9.9% (roughly 15 million). Add in another few million for the Underemployed and a few million more to cover the folks who have given up, "self-employed," and the other groups not counted and the figure is probably doubled or more.
So what do we get? Scaling back of the so-called Jobs Bill to appease the Deficit hawks.
Under fire from rank-and-file Democrats worried about the soaring national debt, congressional leaders reached a tentative agreement Wednesday to scale back a package that would have devoted nearly $200 billion to jobless benefits and other economic provisions while postponing a scheduled pay cut for doctors who see Medicare patients.
Nothing about scaling back on fighting two wars of choice. Nothing about raising taxes on Hedge Fund managers who pocket Billions and pay taxes at the Capital Gains rate. (Parenthetically, why is "unearned income" felt to be so much more valuable than "earned income" that it is taxed at less than half the rate of earned income? Doesn’t that fly directly against the traditional Horatio Alger effect that hard work is one of the primary positive attributes in the US and should be rewarded?)
David Dayen yesterday picks up on Harold Meyerson’s column from yesterday morning:
Of all the gaps between elite and mass opinion in America today, perhaps the greatest is this: The elites don’t really believe we’re still in recession. Or maybe, they just don’t care.
My bold. For years, I’ve described myself as a "cynically pessimistic optimist" because I want to believe that those we elect actually do have the best interests of all in mind. Now, I’m just becoming a cynical pessimist. (Yes, I’m one of those who bought into the myths as a child and losing those beliefs is difficult.)
The original stimulus package was used to save a lot of teaching jobs. The White House reported the figure of 650K jobs saved (not all of these being teaching jobs). But now we’re back to needing to pass another emergency bill to save 100K teaching jobs. Again. And this will be an on-going need since most states are still struggling to balance their budgets so we will be back here again next year.
So what does all this have to do with the President’s "Deficit Control Commission" (aka the Cat Food Commission)?
Glad you asked.
We are in the worst economic times since the Great Depression of the 1930s; a time when getting people back to work at meaningful jobs with living wages should be the highest priority of everyone in office right now. It seems to me, that one real good way to increase federal revenues is to get more people working, paying both federal, state taxes and FICA. Unfortunatley, it appears that it is mainly the Unions such as AFSCME and AFL-CIO that recognize this. Gerald McEntee, the President of AFSCME says it best:
“Right now, jobs matter more than deficits,” Mr. McEntee said at a news conference at the Capitol. “And even if the deficit is your top concern, imagine what will happen to it if hundreds of thousands more Americans lose their jobs.”
President Obama set the charter of the Deficit Commission that "everything has to be on the table." Including Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and even the just passed subsidies for health care.
Just as the Clinton Administration provided cover to the Republicans in destroying the welfare safety net, so will the Obama Administration provide cover for the destruction of Social Security. Isn’t it a good thing that billionaire hedge fund operators are so concerned with Social Security that the only way they can see to save it is to destroy it? (/snark)
And because I can:
Cross Posted from Just A Small Town Country Boy
10 Comments
I understand what you mean by a cynically pessimistic optimist. I’m not at all naive and I know that people can be corrupt and self-interested, but until recently I’ve generally expected that enough people would do enough of what’s right that we’d bumble forward anyway. Also, it seemed to me that doing what was in the best interest of the country as a whole was ultimately in their own self-interest. Lately, it looks like the people in power in this country think that their interests are so unaligned with those belonging to the rest of us that they really believe that the consequences of their actions won’t touch them. Frankly, I’m beginning to think they enjoy kicking us.
I think they’ve all bought into Milton Freidman’s idea’s that self interest produces the optimal results for society.
Here’s what Louis XI had to say on this topic:
And yeah, I agree that interests are unaligned. The trade agreements of the 1990′s severed the ties between Corporations and the American workforce. Government used to at least indirectly serve the people by helping the corporations. Now it’s either or… and most politicians chose the status quo of helping the corporations.
Oh my. I certainly didn’t mean to evoke Milton Friedman. It’s just that it seems to me that fewer and fewer people have the sense that “we’re all in this together.”
The few at the top of the world don’t care about humans. We know that–look at the way they’ve trashed country after country over the last 60+ years. We kept forgetting about it because we had a Constitution and Bill of Rights that protected us, sort of, whereas most other regular schmucks weren’t lucky enough to be able to appeal to something similar.
And those few at the top have been relentlessly and methodically breaking down the Constitution and Bill of Rights until it has become nearly meaningless in our government. We’re just like everyone else, now.
The few at the top are not so stupid as to think it will last forever but they are out to get ALL they can for as LONG as they can and then they’ll retreat into sweet la-la-lands wherever in the globe there is least damage and most protection. They think this will work for them.
If we don’t organize soon and become as efficient, broad, clever, and diligent as they are, we’ll be too trashed, spending all our time scrambling to get our next meals and paying the taxes/debt that “those few” have landed on our backs. And we’ll watch our dear planet crumble around us.
It isn’t enough to sign things, support the occasional mostly-honest politician, go on now-and-then demonstrations. We must gather all of us together and establish/enact a plan, ruthless and focused and broad and efficient.
I’m immensely grateful that you are here, all of you, working hard at exposing what’s going on and trying to find ways to go forward. I’m grateful for you: arguments, personality-conflicts and all. But we need to build on what you’re doing, we have to take the next steps. And quickly. We’re way way behind them.
Between the Great Vampire squid and the Great Oil Monster Blob, I feel the weight, the oppression bearing down on what is left of our American souls. This oppression is making for major depression. Gotta figure out how to get out of my crouch. Wasn’t it Gramsci that said you have to fight the pessimism of the intellect with the optimism of the will? But I’m pooped. I do need somebody to stand up and lead. That whole “the leaders we are waiting for are you” is just more smoke. I’ve tried being a leader and I’m exhausted from being bullied by the party bosses and crazy wing nuts. My liberal talk radio show of five years was cancelled and replaced with teabaggers. But we never got one iota of support from local Democrats, so I’ve had it with them too.
There is the U.S. Social Forum in Detroit in late June. Over 50,000 activists have signed up. I’m thinking I need some solidarity and a way to get up off the floor. So maybe I will see you there.
We’ve been here before and prevailed. Never forget that our nation has already proven that it is capable of overcoming these difficulties. Where there is potential, there is hope.
When FDR took office, the scene was even worse than today. The banks had already all shut down, 1 in 4 American workers were unemployed and had been for some time. There were machine gun nests on the rooftops in Washington DC. The president elect had already survived 1 assassination attempt and would soon be faced with a right wing coup plot. It was an economic and political apocalypse.
Granted, we don’t hava anything close to an FDR in the Whitehouse today. And we don’t have the strong organized labor movements. But what we do have is the memory of what is possible, actions that a credible government can perform to reverse the situation. Back in FDR’s day, they didn’t even have that… they were literally flying blind… making it up as they went along. And, we still have some of the safeguard reforms of the FDR era…. Social Security, FDIC insurance.
We may not have a national leader yet but it appears that we already do have some champions. William Black and Elizabeth Warren being amoungst the notables. And some good people in our government who have taken a stand such as Brooksley Born and Admiral Fallon.
Plenty of reasons to be optimistic so long as we are willing to take a stand.
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Thanks, cap. We can’t lose heart. But it’s hard for MM, who lives out in Montana, where things are a lot “redder” than in other areas of the country, to find social support in everyday life. So, I empathize.
As the caveat is in the financial world, “Past Performance is No Guarantee of Future Results”; Corporations did not rule the world back in FDR’s day and there were few multinationals.
It’s going to take more than just being willing to take a stand; think wobblies.
It is wrong to wear people down until they’re fighting depression. I see it in a friend who’s been working foster care in social services and in another friend after decades of working neighborhood associations in Detroit. Please take a deep break from it all, for as long as it takes, no matter how long that is. There’s no point in breaking one’s heart over the shit. There is a tremendous amount of goodness out there, too, for restoration.
I’ll be at the forum. I’ll be so glad to see all the people gathered.
Are we sure Obama doesn’t want teachers laid off, permanently? He sure was excited about all those teachers being fired at that Rhode Island high school. And he does love him those charter schools….
I realize it took a while for FDR to realize that he had to offer jobs to the unemployed, but I’m not sure that’s within Obama to even contemplate. Not a thing St. Ronnie would have done.