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Perhaps you’ve had the dubious experience of interviewing someone for a job for which they were clearly inappropriate, or disinterested, or just plain too stupid to hire.
The wrong candidate might have done no homework at all about the job, by which I mean they have not researched what the company does or what the position does within that firm.
And sometimes even with internal job postings, one might interview candidates who know a little about the company, but can’t muster the alacrity to research the department to which they want to transfer let along dig for information about the job they claim to want badly.
If you haven’t done this kind of interview, well, look no further. In the video posted here, current Federal Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke is applying for his own damned job; the confirmation hearing is a interview with his prospective employer’s management representative team.
And he’s basically telling the team he is too stupid for the job – just fire him now.
What moron interviews with a Democratic-majority – even if a slim one – and tells them they need to look at cutting the most successful social programs Democrats have ever instituted for the public good?
Yet that’s exactly what this man does more than twice during the course of the confirmation hearing in front of the Senate Finance Committee.
Worse, the man distorts the budget outlays, right to the Senators’ faces. You can see what the budget actually looks like in the first of three charts in this post, showing the outsized portion allocated to military spending.
Did you know that the U.S. spends more on its military than the next 46 countries COMBINED? Yes, that’s worth shouting about; as of 2003, the amount the U.S. spent on its military was equivalent to the next 14 countries combined – but we’ve outstripped that ratio and are now on our way to spending more every year than the rest of the entire world COMBINED.
See the chart at the lower left and note the size of the American portion of the pie.
Agh…I can feel my blood pressure causing the vessels underneath the skin on my forehead to throb. I don’t know how these senators managed not to show similar signs of distress as Ben “I’m Too Stupid To Work For You” Bernanke says that entitlements – conservative code-speak for Social Security and Medicare, the money spent on poor folk – must be reined in to control our runaway deficit.
The Bernanke-version of the budget chart looks more like the one here at the bottom of this post; that’s because money withheld for Social Security and other “trust fund” spending is NOT the federal budget, but it’s often lumped in with the federal budget. In the simplest terms, Social Security and other “trust fund” amounts are a completely separate bank account. They were not established to fund anything but the services for which they were established. Bernanke is right in this respect, that this is where the money is – but it’s never been intended for anything but the services this massive bank account was designed to preserve.
The distortion Bernanke uses is an old one, going back to the Vietnam War era, when all the money withheld and paid out by the government was shown in a single pie chart like the one here at the bottom, in order to make military spending look reasonable compared to other outlays.
But those days are long gone; the simple, straightforward truth is that more than half of our tax dollars are going to military spending. That’s 54%, while all other non-military spending comprises the rest.
And Ben Bernanke just told our senators in his job interview that he doesn’t understand this, or that he chooses to ignore the $1.449 billion dollar elephant in the room. He’d rather your grandparents cut back on their household income than rein in military spending.
Don’t even get me started on his pick-and-choose attitude toward the role of the Fed Reserve on matters which are Congressional in nature. He wouldn’t take a stand on tax policy because he says that’s up to Congress, but he’ll spill this grossly inaccurate tripe about entitlement spending and take a position that something needs to be done about it. And guess which branch of government both established the trust funds and programs and is responsible for enacting the will of the people with regard to those funds and programs? It’s not the Fed Reserve.
One has to wonder what else this nominee wouldn’t get right while in this job. Or what he’s already screwed up during his tenure.
Just fire the stupid son of a bitch already.
Call in the next candidate for Fed Reserve Chair, please.
(Note: do show some love to the sources whose charts appear here in this post by following the links to their sites, War Resisters League and Global Issues. They do some nice work!)
104 Comments
Thanks, Rayne! Bang-on, as usual.
Bernanke has a different agenda, Rayne. It’s the Shock Doctrine that Obama, Summers, Geithner, Bernanke, and others are applying full bore right now to destroy the middle class, labor unions, entitlements, and the rest of the safety net.
I say, fire Obama.
Then fire his whole fucking team.
Yup, exactly, said that in a thread over at DailyKos this past week. It’s the Shock Doctrine all the way.
I wish you would really spend more time thinking before spouting reactionary comments.
Who would you “hire” instead? How exactly do you propose to get them into that spot? What should we do in the mean time?
And where will we come up with different team members who aren’t indoctrinated into the Shock Doctrine and the Chicago School of Economics when the entire school system in this country bases its curriculum upon the teachings of Milton Friedman and his predecessors?
Really, spend a little more time thinking. Bernanke’s proof enough we don’t have enough time spent on careful thought.
I’m all for careful thinking, which is why I see Bernanke as more of an odious symptom than a cause.
Even if Bernanke were to go down in flames in the senate, which I do not expect, Obama would simply put up another candidate in the same mold.
You want a better person running the Fed? Get a better president.
Rayne,
I could not believe it when I read here and there that Bernanke had actually said “that’s where the money is.”
I think it was on HuffPost that someone cited Willie Sutton, who’s famous for maybe having said that about banks.
Of course, now that banks are in trouble, they may not have enough liquid assets for any self-respecting bank robber to say that about them.
Where is Robin Hood, now that we really need him?
recommended
“Obama would simply put up another candidate in the same mold.”
Okay, then name names. Give me an example — several would be better — of people who are competent enough to manage the Fed AND will survive the confirmation process through the Senate.
It’s really easy to spout off, especially when you have a rabid, reactive dislike of a president. It’s another to actually have to do the hard thinking, and I’m still not seeing it.
Yeah, “that’s where the money is.”
BECAUSE THE PEOPLE PUT IT THERE OUT OF YOUR REACH, BERNANKE!!!
What a moron. He really is extremely clueless, a meat puppet.
Dean Baker, for one.
Come on, buddy, it’s like pulling damned teeth with you. I don’t know how it is we have ever gotten this far with people who refuse to do the work necessary to make this democracy work.
Why Baker? What makes him exceptionally qualified over any other economist — like Paul Krugman, who has not only taught but actually worked for the Reagan administration?
And why would the Senate we have today find him a compelling candidate, one they would choose to confirm?
What about vetting? Does Baker have any baggage, like mistresses and unpaid taxes? Have you done the homework on that front? what about any unseemly political affiliations?
You appear to have forgotten that candidates are only nominated by the administration; they don’t simply walk in and get their gigs without what one would hope is a rigorous confirmation hearing by the senate exercising their prerogative to “advise and consent.”
No, it’s easier to blame the president. It’s all his fault when you can’t even name more than one candidate nor provide compelling reasons why the senate should approve them.
What you’ve shared so far won’t even make a compelling blog post to persuade anybody from the administration who might be reading here at Firedoglake. How much of what’s going on is your fault, because you only do the very minimum required of citizens in a democracy — and I’m being generous since I don’t know your voting habits.
All that military speding on a Military that doesn’t protect us.
All that Bank spending on Banks that are out to break us.
No even attempts to fix any of our problems.
The whole Government needs to go, but I’m afaid were stuck with it.
This is a government of, by and for the people.
The reason it is so jacked up is that the people forgot this fundamental fact and left it to the corporations and the entrenched powerbrokers to run the government. The people basically decided they could mentally and physically check out of the democratic (little d) process. They have grown to believe that their power as a consumer is real democracy, when it’s only the path to their enslavement. They have grown to believe that shaking their fist and blaming the president is all it takes to be a participant and that change is no longer possible.
Change is possible; it’s always possible. It often happens in the form of a revolution. But no bloodshed is required. It only takes showing the hell up and doing the actual work of democracy.
Democracy ain’t easy. You’ve got to want it badly. Our forefathers wanted it badly enough to risk life and limb. We only have to commit time and energy to showing up and exercising our brainpower and our rights. November 2008 was only the culmination of 5 years of work; it’s going to take a lifetime to realize the rest of the dream of democracy.
Krugman. He’s the only one. Not Volcker, please.
Volcker’s too old. He’d probably have the good sense to turn it down, too.
Krugman I wouldn’t mind, but he’d have one helluva time getting through the confirmation process. There are too many moderate Dems who’d buck this, and the Republicans would pretend Krugman had never worked for Reagan.
There are two candidates I think would actually do a decent job and would survive the confirmation process if they didn’t have any political baggage.
Roger Ferguson has already been the Vice Chair of the Fed Reserve nominated under Clinton, which means he’s got his sea legs already. His cred shouldn’t give the Republicans heartburn, nor the moderate Dems. He’s got the right background and experience. Bonus: first African American Fed Chair — but that would be seen as a downside, even though the man has got the chops. Republicans would have a problem with too much diversity, can tell you that now, and they’d have to raise hell because of it.
Laura Tyson is another one; she and Ferguson both were on Obama’s team of economic advisors, so she’s familiar with the administration as is Ferguson. While she’s got some fairly traditional credentials under her belt, they are phenomenal and rare for a woman. She’s also a potential diversity hire — would be the first woman Fed Chair. I am certain she would bring a different perspective to the Fed as she has already differentiated herself by establishing the Center for Women in Business. But again, the caveat is baggage, and I don’t know enough to know if this is an issue.
Wow, Bernanke is batting 3 for 3 on this scale!
Bring back The Decider!
one problem rayne, Obama agrees with benake, his behavior, record and hiring candidates indicate he does not think the public should be a part of any market
we elected a republican disguised as a democrat
sorry
notice how bernake uses the pejorative term “entitlements” when describing any and every government run program
Cut the frigging military’s entitlements, not mine!
This just infuriates me.
Any high-level official serving under Obama who wants to gut Social Security should be out on his ass.
According to http://www.investopedia.com/university/thefed/fed2.asp
the job of the Fed is to: “to promote sustainable growth, high levels of employment, stability of prices to help preserve the purchasing power of the dollar and moderate long-term interest rates.”
In other words, the Fed’s job is to foster a sound banking system and a healthy economy. To accomplish its mission, the Fed serves as the banker’s bank, the government’s bank, the regulator of financial institutions and as the nation’s money manager.
Let’s look at that in terms of both Bernanke and his predecessor:
Promote sustainable growth: Grades: F and F
Promote high levels of employment: Grades: D- both – only promoted high levels of employment in certain sectors and trashed others; destruction of the middle class rates special consideration.
Promote stability of prices: Complete failures in almost every area
Totally worthless. The American taxpayer has been hosed consistently for the last 25 years. Not only should the current guy be given a cardboard box and 5 min. to clean out his desk, but I’m thinking some claw back should be applied to both of them on their pay and retirement.
Show me the data, perris. Lay out your case. I want to see quotes and links to places where Obama said, “I agree with Bernanke and here’s why.”
Just because he got the nomination doesn’t mean he’s Obama’s boy. It may well mean there are concerns about disrupting the market with discontinuity.
You want to bitch about the market calling the shots, go ahead — but the markets also lock down and make credit tighter for small business owners when they are worried, and credit is already ridiculously tight and hurting opportunities to increase employment.
[edit: Oh, and while you're at it, do something constructive. Come up with names of better candidates and explain why they are the best people for the job to replace Bernanke. I'm really sick and tired of citizens just bitching and not doing the work required to keep a democracy. After eight years of Bush, I can understand the gut reaction to just plain bitching, but change begins at home.]
You point to a number, Toby — 25 years. Care to elaborate on how and when this generational shift happened, and what it’s going to take to reverse that lock-in?
“I don’t know how these senators managed not to show similar signs of distress,,,”
Um…because they’re just as stupid and/or corrupt as he is?
Great post. In your face, Bennie Boy…
Excellently said:
I’m as frustrated with Obama as any liberal, but I’m afraid, he’s the best we’re going to get in the current political environment. If that’s not good enough for you (which it’s not for me) then we all need to do the work to change the environment. And we’re talking a sustained, long-term kind of work here, not a really intense, but short sprint.
It’s a tough row to hoe, and we all need to vent, and even an occasional vacation (or sabbatical) but we can’t lose sight of the goal.
I watched part of the hearings. Bunning, a republican, really tore ol’ Ben a new one. I couldn’t believe my ears! then Dodd, perhaps feeling he was being a bit too sweet to “Mr. TakeDowntheEconomy”, drubbed him a little bit.
But I was shocked, I tell you when Evan Bayh, that ultimate turncoat to Democratic values, oozing lurve, told Bennie he would vote to confirm him. You should have seen Bernanke’s face light up when Bayh started talking to him “At Last! a FRIEND!!!!”. It was truly sickening.
Some of these Democrats are as bad/worse then the Repubs.
I’ve thought for years that our military spending is the reason we can’t have universal healthcare and other countries can…..THEY don’t have to pay for an army because the American people are providing them one.
Now, this renewed attack on Social Security. And we’ll prolly lose it. This is the first year since it started that there is no COLA and not for TWO FREAKIN’ YEARS!!! Because of the tricksy way they figure inflation. And it’s happened under DEMOCRATS.
Obama goes over to the Senate and doesn’t breathe a word about the public option and Liebermann sidles up to Reid and snickers.
We’re going down the tubes. Our masters don’t need the American people anymore, they can import/export jobs and skilled workers.
I remember in the 60′s Crosby, Stills and Nash sang “It’s been a long time comin’, gonna be a long time gone.” No truer words ever spoken. Because not only was that generation of enlightenment a flash in the pan, so too, will be the dream of America.
Are the America people to become the next “insurgents”?
I submit that Obama gave US hope only to snatch it cruelly away; thereby giving whoever time to consolidate totalitarianism and the police state while everybody thought “give him time”.
Yeah! enuff time to hang US with.
A year ago, at his book salon here, Krugman vigorously defended Bernanke (who hired him at Princeton). That alone should disqualify Krugman.
Yes, exactly. Everyone on the left who reflexively bitches about Obama needs to either do something constructive about the problems we have now, or do something constructive about electing a better government, because the reflexive bitching is what will thwart turn out for real progressives next year during mid-terms.
Just plain sick of it. I want to tell people what I tell my kids: You got enough energy to flap your mouth? Grab a mop. There’s no freaking fairy to clean up this mess.
Krugman !
You’ve just highlighted one of the benefits of the confirmation process. Assholes like Evan Bayh expose themselves for what they are, DINOs.
This is where the energy must be focused if you want real change; Democrats must have a farm team in Indiana prepared to primary DINOs like Evan Bayh.
I said all through the 2008 election cycle that the Senate was just as if not more important than the presidential election. Well here’s yet another example of why this was and remains true. It shouldn’t matter who is in the White House if there’s a firm grip on Congress.
Yes, but I keep thinking “they stole it twice, they know how to do it now”. I think we’re in alot more hot water than the idea of voting them out or working toward a inside political goal would indicate. Plus we’ve got the Christains to deal with too…and the general ignorance of the American public who walks around denying reality with their Ipods and texting going thru their heads.
Not only do people reject reality, they actively pursue pretending it doesn’t exist…whatever disturbs them.
Don’t ask me, I’ve been fighting this corrupt system all my life; I haven’t come up with an answer yet.
And I certainly agree. By the way, thanks for getting down in the mud with us here.
Many of the larger actions that Obama has taken are worrying to me in the sense that he’s positioning himself to be a one-term Prez, to be succeeded, I’m afraid, by something radically to the right of him. He needs to change course – and PDQ – to preclude that from happening. I, for one, am not optimistic. While I had high hopes for the guy, I still must admit that those hopes are fading. On the other hand, I’d never be so dejected as to refrain from entering a polling booth.
See my 26.
let’s see now
first he asked the democrats to vote for bush’s rediculous gift to banks marketed as “a stimulous” when every one knew it should not be passed, next was to do it again when he got into office
he does not have a single progressive economist on his staff
he hired everyone who got it wrong, he did not hire anyone who got it right
his entire “stimulus” translated into bailing out private companies
as far as suggestions, hows this rayne;
“anyone who did not get it wrong”
You are making such good sense. Yes. It is going to take an aroused public to save itself. Most have sat back and turned our rights and welfare over to the corporate power brokers, just assuming things will go along alright, just as they have seemed to in the past.
I was thinking the other day about just how the quality of life for average good guys has deteriorated in the past 30-49 years. (an advantage, or maybe disadvantage to living so long)
However my sense is nothing much is going to happen until more individual oxen are gored. Economic collapse may just do it.
I don’t mind the bitching so much as long as you do the work too.
And just so everyone knows, Evan Bayh is up for election in 2010. So far there’s no primary challenger, but there are plenty of us in Indiana who would support such a challenge.
Most Democrats in Congress are even bigger morons than Bernanke.
Obviously the understanding of the degree of crisis we were in at the time of the election and the Inauguration has really not sunk in with the public.
We were literally on the verge of global economic chaos of a scale and nature we’ve never seen.
It was definitely not the kind of situation where one does a wholesale change of all persons involved because it would have triggered a global bank run. I am not understating this one iota. Give some thought for a moment as to what would have happened to this country if there had been such a collapse; would we really have wanted martial law? could our government withstand the pressure of an entire economy which had no cash?
That’s what was going on, perris. That’s why there hasn’t been a sea change — yet. It cannot be done as quickly as you like.
As for progressive economists: name any which would survive the confirmation process if he were to promote them. Name any who would be able to convince the financial industry already in a panic to make a wholesale migration to a completely different model of operations inside weeks and months. It’s completely unrealistic and discloses a shocking lack of knowledge about the change you’re demanding.
The real change happens right there on the Senate floor; they beat the stuffing out of Bernanke verbally, they set the tone for the next candidate and the next administration’s Fed Reserve Board.
By the way, the bailing out of private companies was set in motion by Bush; Obama was already committed by the time he took office. Without the bailout — in the form of a mixture of loans, loan guarantees and a public-ownership position in some cases, I might point out, making them no longer private companies in the purest sense — there would be several million more unemployed today for years. What exactly do you think was going to be a better solution?
Good post, Rayne. Minor nitpick. In this sentence
…the word is “rein” not “reign.” /grammar
I mind the bitching because it’s gotten to a point where it discourages people who are beginning to do the real work.
In customer service, there’s a rule of thumb that every disgruntled customer spawns six people who won’t buy a product. That same rule can apply in the progressive blogosphere, transferring to progressive politics. Instead of bitching about the politics, demonstrating real leadership and doing the work will help encourage others to participate and make real change happen.
Doing nothing but ineffectual bitching merely suppresses the nascent urge in others to do the right thing.
Thanks, msmolly, will change now. Actually thought I had used “rein” in the first draft…
rayne, the public did indeed understand the economic problems, it’s one of the reason the went anti republican
bush set the first gift to bankers up and obama had the democrats vote for it, obama owns it
as for “a progressive economist wouldn’t make it through the confirmation hearings” this is obama speak
we were in a catastrophe and something needed to be done, it was before the republicans organized to opose anything obama did
IF there was a time to get a progressive in THAT was the time, it’s called “seize the day” and obama “ceded the day”
I am not going to give him a pass, we elected him to change the failed system not to throw money at it
sorry, obama gets no play for following the neo-con script, not from me anyway
bernake had to go long before ago, there did not need to be some kind of “setting the stage”
I usually agree with everything you write but on this, sorry, obama has proven he is a republican not a democrat
don’t tell this to republicans because if they find it out then obama is going to have a ball continuing everything bush put into motion, not stopping at the war but going on socially and economically
if you mind the bitching because it impedes those who do the real work I disagree, we need to bitch so they do the “real work” and not the reagan/bush/obama work
They went anti-Republican because they had eight years of war, had to live through $4/gal gasoline and increasing unemployment.
Dude, if you seriously think a progressive economist has a snowball’s chance in hell, what are you going to do about it?
Because right now you have a seriously deep track record of bitching and doing jack.
Okay, now I’m off to go and meet with a real progressive and talk about how we’re going to get some real progressive change done. Any of the rest of you who actually work in the trenches making change happen, don’t put up with any bitching unless there’s some concrete evidence of work getting done.
*(insert string of swearwords at Rayne’s obtuseness.)
Fact: Obama likes what he hears from Bernanke.
THAT’S WHY HE GOT THE JOB IN THE FIRST PLACE.
Fact: Obama is of the breed of Democrats who’ve been pistol-whipped from the cradle into believing that anything labeled an “entitlement” is bad and is to be avoided at all costs.
And not dealing with that simple fact first is just denying reality.
It was correct in one place, incorrect in another. I think you just were typing too fast….but it is a mistake I see ALL the time!!
Thanks for the advice, Rayne. Obama stiffed us on gay rights and the public option, he appointed the robber barons to run the economy and now he looks like he’s ready to help the Pukes pull the rug out from under Social Security, but I’ll just keep my mouth shut and join in the Obama personality cult along with the rest of you.
As far as grabbing a mop, I suggest we find a protest candidate to support in 2012. Maybe the Green Party candidate, as long as it isn’t Ralph.
Thanks Rayne.
Although it has been 2 weeks since I looked at a check stub it seems to me that both Social Security and Medicare were with held, by name, as seperate from Federal Income Tax. Why, oh why, is it so fucking difficult for these morons to understand that We The People like, want and PAY FOR these successfull and needed social programs.
maybe now he doesn’t have a chance but when he took office, of COURSE he had a chance
PLUS he does NOT understand, you field your best hope and then compromise, you DO NOT field the people who got it wrong, then wrong again, and finally wrong once more
we’re not gonna gree on this one
what are we gonna do about it now?
that begs the question, we did something about it getting obama in, that didn’t work out so good
OBAMA is not going to hire a progressive, there are NONE on his advisory staff
so, in order to get one into the fed we are going to have to make certain this is a one term president’
sorry bout that but obama is not the man for the job and if we don’t give him a primary challenge and run someone else then we are doomed
I don’t suppose you have any idea what I do or do not do getting things done the way I see it, nor do I have any idea what jack you do but I accept it’s quite a bit becuase of your passion.
Well said. Remember when Ted Kennedy cut Carter’s legs out from under him? We can do better than a center-right leader like Obama.
Who do we have? Sheldon Whitehouse? Sherrod Brown? Alan Grayson?
What are the chances of finding enough progressives to gain leadership in the local parties? If we are going to prevail within the Democratic Party I think it has to involve that. Good candidates need local support. I tried some in my state but the entrenched power was too much to counter in the short term.
It was interesting how many of the ordinary members of our county party are progressive/liberals but our leadership could not listen. I think with more time and as Rayne says dedicated effort we can get the party back..
and of course kucinich
*waves hand vigorously in the air*
Cannot bear to look at Bayh’s smirking face. UGH.
Jane’s upstairs with:
She’s kicking some centrist ass.
she notes;
because obama, along with all republicans believe government is better left out of it, and if he didn’t see the political liability of oposing it he would have oposed it overtly rather then covertly
case;
rested
I’m off for the next thread
Yeah, Kucinich would be a good protest candidate but I think he diminished himself by shopping for a girlfriend on the campaign trail. But he certainly says the right things from a progressive viewpoint.
BTW… you are all aware, are you not, that St. Ronnie done already raided the Social Security trust fund dry?
Despite the apparent surplus it’s actually as barren as the Sahara desert with a few scraps of IOUs swirling in a corner.
… IOUs that no sitting president dares be caught having to own up to.
THAT’S what this is really all about, just so you know the score.
Agree wholeheartedly so far, and esp. love the recognition of the Shock Doctrine.
But I wouldn’t say we forgot. We believe what we’re taught to believe.
John Pilger’s 09 July 09 article puts it very well:
Our dear leaders don’t want citizens, they want consumers. TPTB want is not an actively engaged, informed, and formidable electorate; they want to deliver consumers to advertisers. It bugs me to no end, to hear politicians reduce us self-sovereign citizens to mere appetites on two legs.
I’m not a consumer, I’m a citizen. I don’t want a meaningless, robotic, stultifying job, I want a livelihood that contributes to the vibrancy of my community. I don’t want to be forced into buying crappy coverage, I want single payer.
The propaganda that reduces citizens to consumers didn’t mesmerize us in a day, we won’t overcome this week, but we are, right here and now, governing from within.
It’s not that we’re all stupid lazy know-nothings. We’ve been dumbed-down now for going on 60 years by active propaganda, and who knows how long before that.
So IMO, as embodied in this effort were engaging right now, we have to learn to be citizens, not consumers, if we want a genuinely representative democratic republic, instead of the disaster capitalism we’ve got now.
It looks like the bank bailout might be turning out better than expected.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34307191/ns/business-the_new_york_times
This is absolutely true, however, from one end of the political spectrum to the other, people think they have been paying attention, and now intend to speak, and loudly.
The country as a whole has almost no awareness of how ill-informed it is, and is certainly not in the mood for a lot of listening.
The fact that we can’t even imagine a list, even a short list of alternative candidates for Chairman of the Fed is indicative of our lack of real information as opposed to well-fed attitude.
The saddest thing to realize is how many of our leaders are perfectly happy with this situation.
I agree with Uncle Ben, we should have entitlement cuts. The only difference is whose entitlements?
Let us start with eliminating all government contracts with offshore companies who do not pay federal taxes. Why should they be entitled to government contracts?
What about the use of child and slave labor? We need to eliminate that entitlement as well.
Next we can eliminate all of the Bush tax cuts on the wealthy and re-institute the Regan taxes. Then we should close all of the tax loopholes in favor of companies and individuals earning more than $100,000. Why should they be entitled pay small taxes relative to their incomes and the average cost of living?
How about a transaction tax on financial transactions? With the exceptions of a few states, we all pay a tax on our transactions, sales, excise, gasoline to name a few. Why should financial transactions be entitled to special tax treatment?
I think an audit should be performed on all government contracts to determine if the government can do the work cheaper. Why should they be entitled to charge more and not be audited?
Of course we need to beef up the SEC, IRS, and FBI to have enough manpower to go after the white collar fraudsters. Even though we know who they are we are told that our federal agencies do have enough manpower to deal with them. Why should the fraudsters be entitled to cheat?
On health care, let us start with the elimination of the anti-trust protection of health care companies. Surely, that is an entitlement that they can live without?
Looking at Social Security, an elimination of the government’s entitlement to use the trust funds as part of the general revenue and a return to the pre-Johnson era of accounting for the trust funds is in order.
Eliminating the entitlements for Creditors over Debtor in the Bush Bankruptcy Reform Act by changing the law is warranted. Why should creditors’ be so entitled?
I am sure that I have missed many of the entitlements that should be looked at first instead of those that benefit the vanishing middle class. There are many more entitlements, that I have not mentioned. This is but a small sample of the entitlements that were created by Congress to favor one class over another.
Word! (WTF? This is supposed to be a reply to Watt4Bob @59)
Nail on the head, the American people believe they are well informed, but they are totally mis-informed, pickled in propaganda.
We have a long ways to go, just to find a good place to start doing the right thing, and we’re facing a lot of people with their fingers in their ears chanting nah nah nah nah nah …
After reading your back and forth with ART45 and then this comment, I don’t really understand the purpose of this post. Comment 13 is nothing but platitudes. But ART45 was apparently out of line blaming the mess on Obama, who you’re defending? What action are you calling for here, or are you merely Chicken Little?
Sort of OT but Kassandra brought it to mind here– Speaking of the no COLA adjustment, (senior here) if medicare fees go up as they have each year, (done by automatic withdrawal) I think there will actually be less in the monthly disbursal. So practically speaking, a reduction . I will be interested to see the notification when it comes later this month. I did call my POS Rep. Duncan HunterJUNIOR and he was clueless and besides did not care.
Elizabeth Warren for one.
We need to get someone in the FED that isn’t part of the Wall St./FED Bank Bankster mob. We need to take back our economy and end the class warfare that has been destroying America’s middle class and re-creating a new Robber Baron class.
Geez, Rayne, I agree with your original post but am a little appalled at your “moral scold” tone with a lot of these postings. Part of what’s happening here is venting, and you shouldn’t take such a supercilious attitude toward it. You’re acting like a nasty nun upbraiding the errant schoolchildren. Maybe you don’t know how your snarky your responses seem to the average reader.
I’m intricately involved with leadership in my local party – and YES, the local Dems tend to be more progressive than the leaders in the state capitol. I’ve never heard a good word about Bayh in my local county party, but we’re not in central Indiana where his power base is either.
Online activists, MoveOn members, people on the DFA list, etc. need to get involved with the local Democratic party if we want real change. You need to show up for meetings and develop relationships with the members of your local party. That’s how influence happens at the grass roots level.
I can’t comment on every county party, but from my experience in a couple of different counties, they would love to have some new blood get active, even if they’re also a bit resistant to change at the same time. It’s easy to get your foot in the door, then you just need to be persistent.
Progressives need to show up and take the bull by the horns to take back the Democratic Party at the county level – or maybe a better phrase would be take the donkey by the ears.
Agreed.
See, even Firedoggers fall for the lie that we actually NEED the Fed in the first place so your answer is not the correct answer, ELIMINATE the Fed, but just a perpetuation of the false answer of merely rearranging deck chairs. This country has eliminated the central bank 6 times in its history. In EVERY case the country did swimmingly well without the Fed (or its equivalent by a different name, ie, the 1st Bank of the United States, followed by the 2nd Bank of the United States, etc). The colonies managed VERY well without a central bank and, in fact, it was the British forcing colonists to give up their “Colonial Script” money that was THE root cause of the Revolution. It was NOT taxes on tea and other odds and ends, it was the Stamp Act that not only eliminated the VERY good and popular Colonial Scrip, but also mandated payment in gold, which meant banks were to be in control rather than the colonial government and its people.
Lincoln financed the Civil War with Greenbacks, federally produced money that was SPENT into circulation directly rather than BORROWED into circulation as we always get with a central bank. The Greenbacks were anathema to bankers because it was debt-free money and it promised to gut their profits so they all acted in concert to, ultimately, get rid of the Greenbacks and get the government to re-instantiate a central (private) bank by and for bankers. Greenbacks survived Lincoln’s assassination and were popular from the beginning until their ultimate end. In fact, the People were PISSED at the loss of the Greenback because the introduction of its follow-on, DEBT money put a crushing debt weight upon the people as it always must do.
Andrew Jackson, a true hero, eliminated the Central Bank again, and the People did well without it until, again, the bankers acted in concert to pressure Congress to re-create the cursed central bank. EVERY time we get a debt-based Central Bank, the rich get richer, the workers and real humans in the country get very very screwed.
The answer is not to simply replace Bernanke with someone else. The answer is to fire Bernanke and ELIMINATE the Fed and take up what is actually one of the core functions of a proper government: the direct creation and management of debt-free currency. There should NEVER be a “national debt” or a “deficit”. Never. But for so long as we have a private central bank, run by and for private bankers, and a debt-based money supply (money is “borrowed” into existence when it can actually be directly spent into existence instead) then we will have a national debt and deficit spending. Under the current system, all money IS debt that can NEVER be paid off. Every dollar in circulation is one dollar of debt because of the current unnecessary, criminal, and anti-sovereignty based monetary system.
End the Fed, fire Bernanke (and then arrest and investigate him for theft, fraud, and collusion with other criminal bankers) and quit worrying about cutting the safety net ever again. It is the best, proven way (6 times!) to handle the money supply.
That is simply one of the best comments I have have EVER read here at FDL….and there are many superlative posts here.
Thank you.
In fact, I was posting just yesterday about the Stanford Research paper done in the ’70′s entitled,The Changing Images of Man,in which the use of propaganda is one of the lynchpins in controlling and subduing the masses for the transition from old order to the new.
This was commssioned by the US government,and yes, the Shock Doctrine was all delineated over 30 years ago.
(BTW, the Montana Maven’s thread is entitiled,”We are all Bolivians now.”)
We have all been “Monarched”.
Medicare and Social Security are not “money spent on poor people. It’s money that all of us, yes, almost all of us put into a trust account each and every working week. We were sold the idea in 1984 that the Boomers needed to pay extra into Social Security to pay for our pensions. The government bought government bonds with our money i.e they borrowed it and promised to pay it back. George Bush was right when he said that there was nothing but IOUs in the lockbox now. But Social Security is a pay as you go plan so it cannot go bankrupt. Its excess cash that we paid in should be paid back. The government can issue its own money and buy back the government bonds and put the cash back in the lock box. No inflation would probably occur because the money would be put where it should have been along.
Then I would cut the payroll tax back to where it should be and use more money for Medicare for All.
The Fed should be truly made a national bank and be put under Treasury. I would not put Krugman in there. He is also Chicago School but more contrite lately. I would put in Michael Hudson or anybody that Stephen Zarlenga of the American Monetary Institute and the author of “The Lost Science Of Money” recommended. Dennis Kucinich gets his advice from these guys.
Volker is a horror and I hold responsible for thousands of deaths due to the world wide depression he caused. Farmer suicides were rampant in the early 1980s as high interest rates made it impossible to operate small farms. Big agribusiness bought most of it up. Read William Greider’s “Secrets of the Temple” for the thorough indictment of Volker.
I would nominate James Galbraith to take over too. There are economists who have been frozen out who are excellent. Good article on this is Chris Hayes’
“Hip Heterodoxy”
Here’s another one by Jamie Galbraith himself “Hip Heterodoxy and the History of Economics”
Oh, don’t be so Homeric. Reading, writing, debating–these, too, are actions.
Your answer is right here: “We only have to commit time and energy to showing up and exercising our brainpower and our rights. November 2008 was only the culmination of 5 years of work; it’s going to take a lifetime to realize the rest of the dream of democracy.”
In other words, we need to learn how to exercise our sovereignty as citizens by exercising it.
Or, like Homer, do you think only action (esp. militaristic) can be heroic?
Doing the right thing requires discerning it to begin with. We’ve explicitly modeled ourselves after the empires of old. Unless we learn our lessons in time, and act on them in time, we shouldn’t be surprised if we suffer their fates.
After all, we can’t just go off in any random direction and call it good, right?
Wonderful reminder of Bernays, nephew of Freud. This is why I’m a Jungian. Someone said that the twentieth century was the century of Freud. And with any luck, the twenty-first century would belong to Jung. So far, so bad. Making people feel bad about themselves continues to rule the day. And that is done through propaganda aka marketing. We are all not thin enough, not pretty enough, not young enough, not endowed enough,not rich enough….and on and on.
Thanks, very kind of you to say. I’ve been worried about sounding like a broken record, always going on about the power of myth and narratives and such.
It is amazing, isn’t it, the purposeful degradation of humanity by carefully crafted propaganda? I’m appalled at the participation of social scientists, esp. practitioners of my fair scientific art, psychology, in weaponizing the things that make us most human.
Richard Berman(uber PR Machiavell-aka Dr.Evil)-and his ilk,are paid millions upon millions by big business and union busters for their proven ability to provide “perception persuasion “.
And,oh how it has worked!
Today, most people consider themselves consumers first,citizens second.
AND, their sense of community is no larger than the dimensions of their WalMart shopping cart.
The pleasure is INDEED all mine. Nothing wrong with the “right” broken record.
If you have the time,please read the Online Journal synopsis of the Changing Images of Man study.It is linked over at Montana Maven’s thread.
Praedor, that’s a bullseye-as usual!
Obama and all his minions, just as were Bush and his minions, as were Clinton, etc, are full-on Friedmanites who ARE following the script delineated in The Shock Doctrine. They have (the US government) exported that poison to every 2nd and 3rd world nation we got our “aid” hands on for the last 30 years or so and now they are inflicting it upon us right here.
Obama is as dirty as was Bush as was Clinton as was Bush as was Reagan. Obama is NOT the “change agent” (not even remotely) that his lovers and swooners thought (and STILL think) he is. He is literally of the same mold as all previous neoliberal/neocon Friedmanites. They despise the real humans (the vast majority of us) and loves them some bankers, ceos, and other robber barons. For the sake a few, the many MUST suffer. OUR living standards MUST decline so that theirs may increase more and more.
Burn them all down. It’s the only way to get it back for us, the real humans.
Yes, our fate was sealed when John and Jean Q. Public became Joe and Joan Six Pack. Citizens became consumers; workers became human resources that could be traded once they were fattened with cheap crap from China and envy from watching the TV.
I recommend again from my diary yesterday Sheldon Wolin’s “Democracy Inc: Managed Democracy and Inverted Totalitarianism”. In it he uses the Archer Daniels Midland motto “The customer is the enemy and the competitor is our friend.” Substitute “citizen” for customer. and “other party” for competitor and you’ve got our business party system that is disguised as having two parties.
You’re welcome, my pleasure. I’m Jungian too. Freud was all about bowing down at the altar of the ego.
Their trick is to get us to implode our psyches into quantum singularities of egocentric pain, cellf-imprisoning our selves in cellves of our own mistaken making.
An ego is a nice place to visit, just don’t get attached. That’s what generates the experience of terror for your so-called “eternal soul.” Pray tell, how do we divide souls, one from the other? Where’s the boundary, the self – other divide? Of what is it made? How does it function?
Clearly, the Freudian ego is modeled after Newton’s atom, a billiard ball in empty space whose actions are determined ever and always by external forces. Ever since the 1950something convention, when APA ignored Oppenheimer and adopted that outdated physics as its model, we’ve been machining human psyches into cogs in economic machines.
Take high school graduation. Do we mature instantly into fully informed and capable self-sovereign citizens? Obviously not. Instead, we’re left at the stage of late adolescence, convinced, as you say, that our power comes from spending money earned at jobs, however meaningless.
It’s no wonder so many of us are effed in the head, eh?
Sorry knowbuddhau, I’m going to have to ask for a clarification?
Wow, I have really been missing out, thanks for the recommendation.
Funny, huh? Comments 61, 62, & 63 were all posted at 7:49. I didn’t expect a new comment, I thought I was replying to you @59, agreeing completely, with just “Word!” On this end, it took me a while to notice that your were replying to me @57. It’s all good.
As Jung would say, there’s an awful lot of synchronicity occurring on this thread! *G*
Speaking of splitting the personality, synchronistically enough, is what I was referring to,upthread, when I mentioned being “Monarched”*.
*Induced psychological trauma to splinter personality and become more easily programmable.
Well said! You raise a concern I’ve had for some time now.
Recall that the infamous Chicago Boys were all said to have gone back to Chile, to “prepare the battlespace” for our ensuing coup. Did they? Wouldn’t it make sense to have a crew go to work on a similar coup right here at home?
Naomi Klein described the process on Democracy Now! in October of last year.
I’m seeing a lot of convergence on the post-WWII period: Bernays, Friedman, the APA decision (leading directly to psychology’s purposeful Pentagonization, IMO).
Top it all off with the start of Joseph Campbell’s decades of lectures at State’s Foreign Service Institute, and you come up with our updated, upgraded method of jacking nations to war, whether they will it or not.
So do we have any home-grown Chicago Boys? Is the recent collapse a decades-long Perkinsian economic hit job coming to fruition?
I’m just waiting for a Gooper proposal to tax homeless pandhandling income in order to pay for some fucking war.
Thanks, Rayne.
It’s really quite simple:
Lead, follow or get the fuck out of the way.
Or, start charging us for the air that we breath.
Exactly. Audit the FED and then kill it.
Please do not forget that all concepts are artificial constructs imposed on an external reality that does not exist. All is consciousness and concepts are traps for the unwary because they are composed of boundaries and limitations that do not exist.
Also, keep in mind that Friedman’s ideas have never worked anywhere. They enriched a few right-wing wackos at the expense of incalculable massive human suffering and death, however.
This truth bears repeating.
@85
I RARELY hear anyone speak of Leo Strauss in relation to the Chicago School.
He emigrated here from Nazi Germany during the WWII era,went to the U of Chicago becoming a Professor, and was the God father of today’s NeoCons like Wolfowitz and Perle to name a couple. “The ends justifies WHATEVER means ” ,thinking.
Here’s an interesting link:
Francis Boyle: The University of Chicago is a Moral Cesspool… theories of Professor Leo Strauss, who taught political philosophy at the University … I entered the University of Chicago in September of 1968 shortly after … Does anyone seriously believe that the Chicago/Strauss/Bloom product …
http://www.counterpunch.org/boyle08022003.html – Cached – Similar
Obama taught Constitutional Law at the law school at the University of Chicago, the anvil of evil.
that’s a great link, we’ve had a few posts on strauss and his depraved sociopathy
that link you posted is a must read as far as I am concerned
Thanks,Perris.
Incidentally, the University of Chicago was founded with money supplied by John D. Rockefeller .
Google Rockefeller and South America sometime.
“They despise the real humans (the vast majority of us) and loves them some bankers, ceos, and other robber barons. For the sake a few, the many MUST suffer. OUR living standards MUST decline so that theirs may increase more and more.”
Allow me to play Devil’s Advocate here for a moment.
With the Freidmanian notion of “production chasing the lowest labor costs” and with the current “Globalization”. How can we not suffer, here in the US, loss of our standard of living?
As manufacturing moves offshore to find cheaper labor and Americans have to compete with others willing to work for 1/4 of what Americans would expect in wages, is there no way to maintain some semblance of our once strong and growing middle class? Are we doomed to slip to an equilibrium with workers around the world while those in power positions continue to prosper in the Global marketplace?
I worry about the opportunities for my kids and grandkids.
Founded by John D. Rockefeller
——————————————————————————–
In 1856, Senator Stephen A. Douglas offered a grant of ten acres of land to Presbyterians “for a site for a University in the City of Chicago.” The Presbyterians declined the offer, which the first Baptist church of Chicago immediately accepted…. however, the great fire of 1871 and the panic of 1873 rendered wortheless a large proprotion of the subscriptions which had been secured without conditions. These calamities left the University heavily in debt, which it never achieved to pay back and the commencement of June 16, 1886 marked the end of the first University of Chicago.
A few trustees tried to keep the University alive and decided to ask John D. Rockefeller, a wealthy well-known Baptist, for his financial support. At the time, Jonh D. was willing to create a great Baptist University in New York. John D, opted for Chicago.
In all likelihood, one of the major reasons for this choice was that in the atmosphere of the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887 and of the coming of the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890, John D. wanted to convince the public that he was not trying to create a “corporate” school. Chicago had the advantage to be relatively far from Wall Street and would prevent people from seeing a relationship between the latter and the University.
You should be worried because that’s Obama’s plan.
The real Obama is a blend of Strauss and Friedman. That makes him the most dangerous man in the world right now.
Our first task is to remove the blush from the rose.
A “thorny” task,to be sure.
Remember when Former Secretary of the Treasury Paul O’neil stated in Ron Susskinds book “The Price of Loyalty” that he and Greenspan had decided to push for some of the Bush administrations tax cuts for the fat cats as well as flipping a sizable amount of the Bush 41/Clinton surpluses over to upcoming shortfalls for the boomers social security needs being met. We know what happenned to that surplus. Can you say Iraq and Afghanistan, tax cuts etc
“entitlement” to age issue. Sound like they may decide to allow the 50/60 somethings to rot.
I don’t recognize your moniker, so forgive me if I seem a bit terse.
BUT…we have more than a few community members at this site who like to do nothing but bitch. And moan. And whine.
And that’s it, that’s all they do. And they’re very good at assigning blame for our current situation on anybody but themselves.
I became politically active in 2003 for the first time in my life, volunteering to do the actual scut work necessary for candidates to get elected. In 2004 I joined the local party and became even more engaged in the process. In 2005 I became a founding member of another organization because the local party wasn’t getting it done and was being obstructive. And since that time our organization has supported real progressives who held or ran for office, done it all for them.
That six years of work opened my eyes to the real problem with our democracy — and that is most Americans are lazy, mouthy, whiners who will not do the work required to keep a democracy.
I gave about 300 hours to working on a state budget problem between Oct-Nov this year; I know about 8 other people who made similar commitments. And that’s it — that’s the extent of the progressive effort to save the budget for a state with just under 10 million citizens.
Excuse me if I have absolutely had it with the freaking whiners who can’t be bothered to their damned homework and come up with viable names for candidates for office let alone actually do work in their own back yard.
What we have right now is the result of six years of work. Unfortunately it’s going to take a freaking lifetime to win back this democracy after decades of slackerdom.
When I read Susan Jacoby’s brilliant book “The Age of American Unreason” (2008), I bookmarked p. 139 where she talks about Alan Bloom’s “The Closing of the American Mind”. His railing about the terrible sixties and the awful students who dared to criticize their universities made me wonder if Barack Obama had been influenced not by Bill Ayers or Jeremiah Wright, but more likely by this fascist prick. By the time I read Jacoby’s book I was already convinced of Obama’s Chicago Boy tilt, but I’d love a reporter to ask him about whether he had ever met him or read Alan Bloom’s book.
That we are at the mercy of the vast forces of globalization is a myth. Strong unions in Germany forced Bosch to keep their workforce in Germany stable. It turned out that Bosch was able to expand overseas while it kept its German workers employed. So they are making more money, but not hurting their German workers. Are they making as much money as they would if they could have closed down German factories. Probably not. But the point is that it’s the inequality that hurts nations. And those with the most equality like Denmark turn out to be very prosperous and very happy. While banana republics like the U.S. have terrible inequality and rising misery.
We can stop this by ending the Federal Reserve which isn’t “federal” nor filled with loads of reserves. Stop paying private bankers all this interest. Tell your constitution friends that only the government has the right to make money, not the Fed.
We can use tariffs to protect our remaining industries. We can strengthen unions which force the greedsters to put profits back into wages and research and development instead of using it to gamble.
There’s lots we can do. But we first have to get real about the bunch of bandits that are in the White House and in Congress. These are bad people who are absolutely willing to shock us into submission.