Saturday, December 31, 2011
Friday, December 30, 2011
I just can't make this stuff up....................
FRIDAY, DECEMBER 30, 2011
TSA Worker Caught Downloading Child Pornography
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CLICK HERE FOR MORE
This is a great world. Fired TSA pedophiles can become Catholic priests and keep on raping little boys. Defrocked pedophile priests can become TSA agents!
Federal agency tasked with groping travelers, icluding children, is a recruiting ground for perverts and criminals.
CLICK HERE FOR MORE
The Wormwood Express: American War Crime Rolls On
WRITTEN BY CHRIS FLOYD |
THURSDAY, 29 DECEMBER 2011 00:31 |
I had much to say about the recent terror bombings in Baghdad, which were framed almost universally in the American media as the result of the withdrawal of the steadying, beneficent hand of the U.S. military. For example, the New York Times spoke of "a country reeling from political and sectarian turmoil that erupted after the departure of the American military." It is hard to fathom the level of moral blindness -- not to mention the wilful ignorance -- required to write such a statement. To pretend to oneself, much less the rest of the world, that political and sectarian strife has only now "erupted" in Iraq, out of the blue, or more likely, due to the inherent savagery of those poor primitives we liberated -- think what a pathetic, self-deluded wretch you would have to be to hold such an belief. Think what it must be like to lose so much of your humanity and to have your intellect so stunted and diminished. Yet this is the viewpoint of the overwhelming majority of the American political and media elite. No causal connection is made between the unprovoked invasion by U.S. forces and the "eruption" of violence and political chaos in the conquered, broken, blood-soaked land. So yes, there is much to say about the continuing obscenity of the American war crime in Iraq, and its most recent manifestation in the eviscerated bodies on Baghdad's streets. But I think in this instance, I should put my voice aside and let an actual Iraqi speak of the situation and its implications and causes. Sami Ramadani writes powerfully of the hell that has been unleashed in his hometown. From the Guardian: Baghdad, the city of my childhood, is again being terrorised by cowardly attacks aimed at spilling the blood of as many workers, students, shoppers and bystanders as possible. As I write, the facts are becoming clearer: the hundreds of murdered and injured men, women and children are Shia, Sunni, Christian, Arab, Kurd, Turkuman – a cross-section of the mosaic of peoples who have inhabited Mesopotamia for more than 1,000 years. So, who is killing the innocent in Baghdad today, and why? In the rush to provide an explanation for the nihilistic violence, the same old simplistic mantra is trotted out. Thursday's co-ordinated, simultaneous attacks are invariably described by the media as sectarian. Few pause to ask why a "sectarian" attack would be aimed at all sects and ethnicities equally. Only a handful raise the possibility that these attacks are not sectarian in motive, or a reflection of sectarian hatred on the streets, but are instead designed to create sectarian entrenchment and animosity, and ignite street conflict. Similarly, analysts are quick to conclude that both the power struggle within the political elite, and the explosions are the result of the withdrawal of US troops. They portray the US forces as the good Samaritan who prematurely left the scene. Too few examine the legacy of the occupiers' poisonous presence at the heart of Iraqi society for nearly nine years, or ask why the US has built the biggest embassy in the world in Baghdad, staffed by 15,000 personnel and spies. Today's bitter power struggle can be traced back to the measured 2003 decisions made by Paul Bremer . Bremer, a Bush "civilian" appointed to rule Iraq, continued the military occupation under a different guise. Faced with massive popular opposition and armed resistance to the US-led invasion, the US recognised in 2003 that the occupation of Iraq could not continue without a prominent Iraqi component, so Bremer formed the Iraqi governing council while retaining control of all levers of power. The mix of the 25-member council was carefully calibrated, with quotas to reflect Iraq's sectarian and ethnic makeup. That sectarian formula was to be mirrored in all Bremer's appointments. Far from preventing sectarianism, it introduced it to all the political and military institutions created by the occupation. ..... Such is the anger at the occupation that many Iraqis think the US was behind Thursday's attack. This belief is dismissed as conspiratorial, but it is widely held. There is a reason for this. Apart from the horrific violence committed directly by the occupation forces and Pentagon-contracted mercenaries, the US also created Iraqi secret militia, and smuggled tens of thousands of weapons and tons of explosives into Iraq through private firms in Bosnia .... Indiscriminate killings and terrorist attacks were a permanent feature of the US-led occupation, and to many ordinary Iraqis, Thursday's bloodshed is just more of the same. Similarly, ordinary Iraqis see their current rulers, who arrived with the occupation, as self-seeking, corrupt politicians who use religious and ethnic differences to perpetuate sectarianism as a means of creating power bases ... The truth of what happened and is happening in Iraq is well-documented. The illegal invasion based on knowing and deliberate lies; the active fomenting of sectarian militias by the occupation forces; the use of death squads by the occupiers and their local allies; the widespread indiscriminate killing of Iraqi civilians by the occupiers and the local security forces they armed, paid and trained; the world-historical levels of looting and corruption on the part of the occupiers' war profiteers and their local appointees -- all of this and much more of the story of the suffering, anguish and degradation inflicted on the Iraqis by the invaders has been plainly evident for years. I have written about it on this site and elsewhere since the beginning, drawing almost entirely on mainstream sources of information, easily accessible to any ordinary citizen. It requires no specialist knowledge, no insider connections, no secret sources to know and see the horrendous reality that the Americans and their accomplices have created in Iraq. As we noted here the other day, all that it requires is a willful turning away from reality into the maniacal hallucination of fear-ridden righteousness that has swallowed the American mind: a hysterical dream-world where the giving-over to evil bears no fruit, has no consequences, can always be absolved, repaired, reversed. But time's arrow flies in only one direction: the past cannot be undone, and the poison we have served to others -- and poured into our own veins -- will eat through the walls of the hallucination and stain the future deep with horror. |
Imperial Overdrive: Red Alert Over Iran
2011 will be remembered as the year the US, Britain, France and Israel went into Imperial Overdrive in North Africa and the Middle East. Will 2012 be remembered as the year those same Western Allies unleashed World War III?
It is not news anymore to say that the West will soon attack Iran, maybe Syria. They have been threatening to do that for years now, certainly ever since the failed Israeli invasion into Southern Lebanon in mid-2006, when they were routed by Hezbollah.
So what is different today? For starters, general circumstances have changed dramatically in the Region. Genuine popular dissent inside key Muslim countries has been used by the Western Allies to train, fund and arm local criminal and terrorist organizations, dubbed “freedom fighters”, as their proxies.
Country after country has fallen victim to the CIA’s, MI6’s and Mossad’s “dirty tricks departments”, and other Western-style terrorist organizations. Results range from moderate “regime change” in Tunisia and Algeria; via horrendous “violence by our boys” in Egypt, Yemen and Bahrain; all the way to outright military attack, civil war and political assassination. Such as the one in Libya, where Hillary Clinton boisterously laughed when she learned Muammar Gaddafi had been murdered live on TV by “her thugs”.
The whole region has been set on fire. Not that other regions of the world are not on fire too; however the pyrotechnics used by the Global Power Elite vary in nature in each geography. For example, Europe, the US and Britain are being set alight using financial terrorism resembling a neutron bomb, which kills people off while leaving assets and banks standing.
Now in Iran the stage seems set for a final show-down. It has taken so long only because Israeli, British and US planners are not stupid; they know that messing with Iran is not like messing with Iraq or Pakistan or Afghanistan or Libya. Messing with Iran will bring Western Allies very dangerously close to messing with Russia and China. If I were in their shoes, I would not do that. Unless…
Unless World War III is what they are looking for. Now, why would they do that? Perhaps, because they have realized that there is just no peaceful way of achieving their dream of World Government. Perhaps because they have understood that the financial quicksand they have backed themselves into is so devastating that it cannot be cleaned up with purely financial, monetary and “legal” measures, in which case…
Nothing beats a good war! Perhaps, because wildcard Israel is so very much in control (or should I say, out of control) that they are imposing the “Sampson Option” not only on themselves, but also on their controlled Western Allies and the whole planet if need be. “After me, the Flood!”
Things in the Strait of Hormuz are extremely dangerous and volatile. After being systematically threatened with unilateral military attack, invasion, and even nuclear strikes, now the Iranians are showing their muscle too. On 24th December, Iran began a 10-day spate of military maneuvers in the strait that has all but put the US, UK and Israel on red alert. A US aircraft carrier force is now in the area and their helicopters have flown dangerously close to Iranian forces. Any spark could set off a conflagration.
Meanwhile, Syria is falling into meltdown. Meanwhile, Israel is preparing “Cast Lead II” over and inside Gaza. Meanwhile, Hezbollah is ready to strike Israel with tens of thousands of very deadly short-range “Katyushka” rockets.
A key sign of impending war is an article just published in the January/February 2012 issue of Foreign Affairs, the official journal of the New York-based Council on Foreign Relations (CFR). It carried the ominous title of Time to Attack Iran: Why a Strike Is the Least Bad Option, by Matthew Kroenig. This man was, until last July, special advisor to the Pentagon for “Defense Strategy on Iran” – Newspeak for “let’s beat the hell out of Iran”.
The CFR is the key Global Power Elite think-tank, founded in 1919 together with its London sister organization, the Royal Institute of International Affairs (also known as Chatham House). Its more than 4500 members are deeply embedded into the uppermost echelons of public and private power in the US, controlling banking, industry, media, academia, the military and government.
Key government posts are always controlled by one of their lot, irrespective of whether the Democrats or Republicans are in power. The CFR is integrated into an intricate network of similar organizations that includes the Trilateral Commission, Brookings Institution, American Enterprise Group, Project for a New American Century, Bilderberg and others. They all operate in streamlined coordination, consistency, synchronization and – most important – with a common purpose.
In his article, Mr Kroenig, assesses how “American pundits and policymakers have been debating whether the United States should attack Iran and attempt to eliminate its nuclear facilities,” concluding that, “The only thing worse than military action against Iran would be an Iran armed with nuclear weapons.”
He warns against “skeptics of military action (who) fail to appreciate the true danger that a nuclear-armed Iran would pose to US interests in the Middle East and beyond.”
This reflects Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s recent remarks when addressing the Brookings Institution’s pro-Israel “Saban Forum” bringing together US and Israeli military strategists that repeated the usual Baby Bush “all options are on the table” threats.
Mr. Kroenig talks of the “dangers of deterrence” and gives the Obama Administration unequivocal advice: “The truth is that a military strike intended to destroy Iran’s nuclear program, if managed carefully, could spare the region and the world a very real threat and dramatically improve the long-term national security of the United States.”
As these pyromaniacs get ready to ignite the regional and global powder keg, one key question looms ever larger: what will Russia do?
Adrian Salbuchi for RT
Simply Green Washing: Are You Using This Toxic Cleaner?
from Simple Green's website |
Activist Post
Simple Green, a hugely popular household cleaner, is marketed to the consumer as a “non-toxic,” “biodegradable,” and “non-hazardous” alternative to presumably more toxic cleaners. And yet, the material safety data sheet (MSDS) for Simple Green, which is federally mandated to be made available to the consumer by the product manufacturer (in this case Sunshine Makers, Inc.), tells a radically different story.
The MSDS for Simple Green states that the formula contains up to 4% 2-Butoxyethanol by volume. 2-Butoxyethanol is a petrochemical solvent which gives Simple Green, and products like Windex, their characteristic odor.
It is classified, according to the Dangerous Substance Directive (one of the main European Union laws concerning chemical safety), as “Harmful (Xn)," and has recently been recommended by Environment and Health Canada to be added to the Schedule 1 toxic substances list of the Canadian Environment Protection Act (CEPA). It is also listed by the state of California as a “hazardous substance” and a "toxic air contaminant." Hmm? Non-Toxic, really?
The MSDS for 2-butoxyethanol indicates the following:
- Its Domestic and International Proper Shipping Name is: "TOXIC LIQUIDS, ORGANIC, N.O.S. (2-BUTOXYETHANOL)."
- Exposure Controls/Personal Protection: "Confirmed animal carcinogen with unknown relevance to human."
- Potential Health Effects: Inhalation: "Causes irritation to the respiratory tract. Symptoms may include sore throat, coughing, headache, nausea and shortness of breath. High concentrations have a narcotic effect."
- Potential Health Effects: Ingestion: "Causes irritation to the gastrointestinal tract. Symptoms may include nausea, vomiting and diarrhea. Toxic! May cause systemic poisoning with symptoms paralleling those of inhalation."
- Potential Health Effects: Skin Contact: "May cause irritation with redness and pain. May be absorbed through the skin with possible systemic effects."
- Potential Health Effects: Eye Contact: "Vapors are irritating and may produce immediate pain, redness and tearing. Splashes can cause severe pain, stinging, swelling."
- Chronic Exposure: "Prolonged or repeated exposures can cause damage to the liver, kidneys, lymphoid system, blood and blood-forming organs."
- Aggravation of Pre-existing Conditions: "Persons with pre-existing skin disorders, eye problems, impaired liver, kidney, blood, respiratory or lymphoid system function may be more susceptible to the effects of the substance."
Have we had enough? Do we need any more evidence that Simple Green's active ingredient -- and therefore Simple Green itself -- is toxic? If so, here are some additional research links:
View the Material Data Safety Sheet for 2-Butoxyethanol here.
View the Greenmedinfo.com page on 2-Butoxyethanol here
Also, back in 2007, the San Francisco Chronicle did a piece on products containing 2-butoxyethanol, and found that they likely present a health hazard, especially to women, children and the elderly.
Moreover, it was found that "people using some common products containing EGBE could be exposed to levels 12 times greater than California's one-hour exposure guideline." [View entire article].
Addendum: Simply Green Washing In the BP Gulf Oil Disaster
Corexit 9527- now do your remember where you first heard about 2-butoxyethanol?
The active and so-called "non-toxic" ingredient in Simple Green was the very reason why the 9527 Corexit dispersant formula was eventually forbidden for use by the EPA in the BP oil disaster cleanup efforts. It was the absence of the highly toxic and controversial 2-butoxyethanol in the 9500 Corexit formula that made it a "safer" alternative. It is believed that 2-butoxyethanol contributed to the significantly shorter lifespan of Exxon Valdez clean-up workers and is why Corexit 9527 was banned in the United Kingdom.Would you believe Simple Green is actually marketing their 2-butoxyethanol-containing products as safe clean-up solutions in the aftermath of the Gulf Oil Disaster?
Read what they have to say on this here.
Please visit GreenMedInfo to access their vast database of articles and the latest information in natural health.
Thursday, December 29, 2011
40 Hard Questions That The American People Should Be Asking Right Now
December 29, 2011
By Michael Snyder
Blacklisted New
If you spend much time watching the mainstream news, then you know how incredibly vapid it can be. It is amazing how they can spend so much time saying next to nothing. There seems to be a huge reluctance to tackle the tough issues and the hard questions. Perhaps I should be thankful for this, because if the mainstream media was doing their job properly, there would not be a need for the alternative media. Once upon a time, the mainstream media had a virtual monopoly on the dissemination of news in the United States, but that has changed. Thankfully, the Internet in the United States is free and open (at least for now) and people that are hungry for the truth can go searching for it. Today, an increasing number of Americans want to understand why our economy is dying and why our national debt is skyrocketing. An increasing number of Americans are deeply frustrated with what is going on in Washington D.C. and they are alarmed that we seem to get closer to becoming a totalitarian police state with each passing year. People want real answers about our foreign policy, about our corrupt politicians, about our corrupt financial system, about our shocking moral decline and about the increasing instability that we are seeing all over the world, and they are not getting those answers from the mainstream media.
If the mainstream media will not do it, then those of us in the alternative media will be glad to tackle the tough issues. The following are 40 hard questions that the American people should be asking right now….
#1 If Iran tries to shut down the Strait of Hormuz, what will that do to the price of oil and what will that do to the global economy?
#2 If Iran tries to shut down the Strait of Hormuz, will the United States respond by launching a military strike on Iran?
#3 Why is the Federal Reserve bailing out Europe? And why are so few members of Congress objecting to this?
#4 The U.S. dollar has lost well over 95 percent of its value since the Federal Reserve was created, the U.S. national debt is more than 5000 times larger than it was when the Federal Reserve was created and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke has a track record of incompetence that is absolutely mind blowing. So what possible justification is there for allowing the Federal Reserve to continue to issue our currency and run our economy?
#5 Why does the euro keep dropping like a rock? Is this a sign that Europe is heading for a major recession?
#6 Why are European banks parking record-setting amounts of cash at the European Central Bank? Is this evidence that banks don’t want to lend to one another and that we are on the verge of a massive credit crunch?
#7 If the European financial system is going to be just fine, then why is the UK government preparing feverishly for the collapse of the euro?
#8 What did the head of the IMF mean when she recently said that we could soon see conditions “reminiscent of the 1930s depression“?
#9 How in the world can Mitt Romney say with a straight face that the individual health insurance mandate that he signed into law as governor of Massachusetts was based on “conservative principles”? Wouldn’t that make the individual mandate in Obamacare “conservative” as well?
#10 If the one thing that almost everyone in the Republican Party seems to agree on is that Obamacare is bad, then why is the candidate that created the plan that much of Obamacare was based upon leading in so many of the polls?
#11 What did Mitt Romney mean when he stated that he wants “to eliminate some of the differences, repeal the bad, and keep the good” in Obamacare?
#12 If no Republican candidate is able to accumulate at least 50 percent of the delegates by the time the Republican convention rolls around, will that mean that the Republicans will have a brokered convention that will enable the Republican establishment to pick whoever they want as the nominee?
#13 Why are middle class families being taxed into oblivion while the big oil companies receive about $4.4 billion in specialized tax breaks a year from the federal government?
#14 Why have we allowed the “too big to fail” banks to become even larger?
#15 Why has the United States had a negative trade balance every single year since 1976?
#16 Back in 1970, 25 percent of all jobs in the United States were manufacturing jobs. Today, only 9 percent of all jobs in the United States are manufacturing jobs. How in the world could we allow that to happen?
#17 If the United States has lost an average of 50,000 manufacturing jobs a month since China joined the World Trade Organization in 2001, then why don’t our politicians do something about it?
#18 If you can believe it, more than 56,000 manufacturing facilities in the United States have permanently closed down since 2001. So exactly what does that say about our economy?
#19 Why was the new Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial on the National Mall made in China? Wasn’t there anyone in America that could make it?
#20 If low income jobs now account for 41 percent of all jobs in the United States, then how are we going to continue to have a vibrant middle class?
#21 Why do the poor just keep getting poorer in the United States today?
#22 How can the Obama administration be talking about an “economic recovery” when 48 percent of all Americans are either considered to be “low income” or are living in poverty?
#23 Why has the number of new cars sold in the U.S. declined by about 50 percent since 1985?
#24 How can we say that we have a successful national energy policy when the average American household will spend a whopping $4,155 on gasoline by the end of this year?
#25 Why does it take gigantic mountains of money to get a college education in America today? According to the Student Loan Debt Clock, total student loan debt in the United States will surpass the 1 trillion dollar mark in early 2012. Isn’t there something very wrong about that?
#26 Why do about a third of all U.S. states allow borrowers who don’t pay their bills to be put in jail?
#27 If it costs tens of billions of dollars to take care of all of the illegal immigrants that are already in this country, why did the Obama administration go around Congress and grant “backdoor amnesty” to the vast majority of them? Won’t that just encourage millions more to come in illegally?
#28 Why are gun sales setting new all-time records in America right now?
#29 Why are very elderly women being strip-searched by TSA agents at U.S. airports? Does that really keep us any safer?
#30 The last words of Steve Jobs were “Oh wow. Oh wow. Oh wow.“ What did he mean by that?
#31 How in the world did scientists in Europe decide that it was a good idea for them to create a new “killer bird flu” that is very easy to pass from human to human?
#32 If our founding fathers intended to set up a limited central government, then why does the federal government just continue to get bigger and bigger?
#33 Are we on the verge of an absolutely devastating retirement crisis? On January 1st, 2011 the very first of the Baby Boomers started to reach the age of 65. Now more than 10,000 Baby Boomers will be turning 65 every single day for the next two decades. So where in the world are we going to get all the money we need to pay them the retirement benefits that we have promised them?
#34 If the federal government stopped all borrowing today and began right at this moment to repay the U.S. national debt at a rate of one dollar per second, it would take over 440,000 years to pay off the U.S. national debt. So does anyone out there actually still believe that the U.S. national debt will be paid off someday?
#35 If the U.S. economy is getting better, then why are an all-time record 46 million Americans now on food stamps?
#36 How can we say that we have the greatest economy on earth when we have a child poverty rate that is more than twice as high as France and one out of every four American children is on food stamps?
#37 Since 1964, the reelection rate for members of the U.S. House of Representatives has never fallen below 85 percent. So are the American people really that stupid that they would keep sending the exact same Congress critters back to Washington D.C. over and over and over?
#38 What does it say about our society that nearly one-third of all Americans are arrested by the time they reach the age of 23?
#39 Why do so many of our politicians think that it is a good idea to allow the U.S. military to arrest American citizens on American soil and indefinitely detain them without a trial?
#40 A new bill being considered by the U.S. House of Representatives would give the U.S. government power to shut down any website that is determined to “engage in, enable or facilitate” copyright infringement. Many believe that the language of the new law is so vague that it would allow the government to permanently shut down any website that even links very briefly to “infringing material”. Prominent websites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube would be constantly in danger of being given a “death penalty”. The American people need to ask their members of Congress this question: Do you plan to vote for SOPA (The Stop Online Piracy Act)? If the answer is yes, that is a clear indication that you should never cast a single vote for that member of Congress ever again.
Video of US carrier filmed from Iran plane during drill in Persian Gulf
U.S. Fifth Fleet says won't allow disruption in Hormuz
Tags:
The U.S. Fifth Fleet said on Wednesday it will not allow any disruption of traffic in the Strait of Hormuz, after Iran threatened to stop ships moving through the strategic oil route.
"Anyone who threatens to disrupt freedom of navigation in an international strait is clearly outside the community of nations; any disruption will not be tolerated."
Half of America In Poverty? The Facts Say It's True
Recent reports suggest that almost 50% of Americans are in poverty or at a "low income" level. The claim is based on a new supplemental measure by the Census Bureau that includes health care, transportation, and other essential living expenses in the poverty calculation.
The concept of "low income" is controversial. It has been defined as earnings between 100 and 199 percent of the poverty level, a claim which, if true, would place every American family making $50,000 or less at a near-poverty level.
Conservative organizations believe the whole 'poverty' issue is overblown. The Cato Institute blames LBJ and Obama for reversing a declining poverty rate. Forbes blames the calculations. The Heritage Foundation argues, "The average poor person, as defined by the government, has a living standard far higher than the public imagines...In the kitchen, the household had a refrigerator, an oven and stove, and a microwave." The case for a growing "consumption equality" is alternately defended and denied.
With emotions running high on both sides, we need to take a balanced look at the available data to determine how well the highest-earning family of the poorest 50% -- a family with a $50,000 income -- can survive. (The maximum individual income for the poorest 50% is about $30,000.)
Start with taxes. It is frequently noted by conservatives that the richest 1% pay most of the federal income taxes, and indeed they paid about 37 percent in 2009, more than the poorest 90% of Americans. But only the richest 5% of Americans have experienced income growth since 1980. And during that time, their tax rate has dropped from 34% to 23%. As for the 3 percent rate paid by the poorest 50%, the Tax Policy Center sums it up nicely: "The basic structure of the income tax simply exempts subsistence levels of income from tax."
More relevant to the poverty issue is that federal income tax is only a small part of the tax expense for lower-income families. According to a study by The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, the poorest 50% paid about 10 percent of their incomes in state and local taxes (the richest 1% paid 5 percent). Congressional Budget Office (CBO) figures reveal that the bottom 50% pays about 9 percent of their incomes toward social security (the top 1% pays just under 2 percent). CBO also shows that the bottom 50% is paying about 2 percent of their incomes on excise taxes, a negligible expense for the people at the top. Another year of Bush tax cuts will chop another 1-2 percent off the taxes of the very rich.
So total taxes for the poorest 50% are 24 percent of their incomes (3% + 10% + 9% + 2%), as compared to 29 percent for the richest 1% (23% + 5% + 2% - 1%).
Other significant expenses for low-income people, based on the most conservative estimates from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Census Bureau, the National Center for Children in Poverty, the Carsey Institute, and the Economic Policy Institute, include food (10%), housing (27%), transportation (6%), health care (5%), child care (8%), and household expenditures (5%). Expenses for insurance and savings and entertainment, although important to most households, are not being included here.
Energy costs hit low-income families especially hard, taking about 20% of their incomes. At the $50,000 income level the burden is closer to 12%, as generally agreed upon by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the American Gas Association.
Total expenses for the richest family in the bottom half of America?
Critics bemoan the amounts of aid being lavished on lower-income Americans, making dubious claims about $16,800 in government funds going to every poor family and families with $90,000 incomes being classified as "near poor."
The fact is that only 4,375,000 families (out of 70,000,000 in the bottom half) received Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) in 2010, for a total expense of about $36 billion. Current federal budgets include about $350 billion for food, housing, and traditional 'welfare' programs for needy children, elderly care, and energy assistance. This averages out to about $400 per month per family.
Another fact is that earnings have remained flat for most people while productivity has grown 80% since 1980. If a $50,000 family had received a fair share from their contribution to America's growth, they'd be making $90,000, and they wouldn't need a dime from government.
Conservatives complain about the TVs and refrigerators owned by low-income people. But it's the height of insensitivity to admonish people who are trying to survive in a perversely unequal society.
Paul Buchheit is a college teacher, an active member of US Uncut Chicago, founder and developer of social justice and educational websites.
The concept of "low income" is controversial. It has been defined as earnings between 100 and 199 percent of the poverty level, a claim which, if true, would place every American family making $50,000 or less at a near-poverty level.
Conservative organizations believe the whole 'poverty' issue is overblown. The Cato Institute blames LBJ and Obama for reversing a declining poverty rate. Forbes blames the calculations. The Heritage Foundation argues, "The average poor person, as defined by the government, has a living standard far higher than the public imagines...In the kitchen, the household had a refrigerator, an oven and stove, and a microwave." The case for a growing "consumption equality" is alternately defended and denied.
With emotions running high on both sides, we need to take a balanced look at the available data to determine how well the highest-earning family of the poorest 50% -- a family with a $50,000 income -- can survive. (The maximum individual income for the poorest 50% is about $30,000.)
Start with taxes. It is frequently noted by conservatives that the richest 1% pay most of the federal income taxes, and indeed they paid about 37 percent in 2009, more than the poorest 90% of Americans. But only the richest 5% of Americans have experienced income growth since 1980. And during that time, their tax rate has dropped from 34% to 23%. As for the 3 percent rate paid by the poorest 50%, the Tax Policy Center sums it up nicely: "The basic structure of the income tax simply exempts subsistence levels of income from tax."
More relevant to the poverty issue is that federal income tax is only a small part of the tax expense for lower-income families. According to a study by The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy, the poorest 50% paid about 10 percent of their incomes in state and local taxes (the richest 1% paid 5 percent). Congressional Budget Office (CBO) figures reveal that the bottom 50% pays about 9 percent of their incomes toward social security (the top 1% pays just under 2 percent). CBO also shows that the bottom 50% is paying about 2 percent of their incomes on excise taxes, a negligible expense for the people at the top. Another year of Bush tax cuts will chop another 1-2 percent off the taxes of the very rich.
So total taxes for the poorest 50% are 24 percent of their incomes (3% + 10% + 9% + 2%), as compared to 29 percent for the richest 1% (23% + 5% + 2% - 1%).
Other significant expenses for low-income people, based on the most conservative estimates from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Census Bureau, the National Center for Children in Poverty, the Carsey Institute, and the Economic Policy Institute, include food (10%), housing (27%), transportation (6%), health care (5%), child care (8%), and household expenditures (5%). Expenses for insurance and savings and entertainment, although important to most households, are not being included here.
Energy costs hit low-income families especially hard, taking about 20% of their incomes. At the $50,000 income level the burden is closer to 12%, as generally agreed upon by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the American Gas Association.
Total expenses for the richest family in the bottom half of America?
- 24% taxes
- 27% housing
- 34% food, health care, child care, transportation, household needs
- 12% energy
Critics bemoan the amounts of aid being lavished on lower-income Americans, making dubious claims about $16,800 in government funds going to every poor family and families with $90,000 incomes being classified as "near poor."
The fact is that only 4,375,000 families (out of 70,000,000 in the bottom half) received Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) in 2010, for a total expense of about $36 billion. Current federal budgets include about $350 billion for food, housing, and traditional 'welfare' programs for needy children, elderly care, and energy assistance. This averages out to about $400 per month per family.
Another fact is that earnings have remained flat for most people while productivity has grown 80% since 1980. If a $50,000 family had received a fair share from their contribution to America's growth, they'd be making $90,000, and they wouldn't need a dime from government.
Conservatives complain about the TVs and refrigerators owned by low-income people. But it's the height of insensitivity to admonish people who are trying to survive in a perversely unequal society.
Paul Buchheit is a college teacher, an active member of US Uncut Chicago, founder and developer of social justice and educational websites.
Wednesday, December 28, 2011
You Won't Believe How Corrupt, Lazy And Stinking Rich Our Congress Critters Have Become
by Michael Snyder If our founding fathers could see the cesspool that the U.S. Congress has become today, they would roll over in their graves. Most Americans don't realize this, but we already have a "part-time Congress". Members of Congress only "work" a little over a third of the days on the calendar. The rest of the time they have off. It is no wonder why so many members of Congress are involved in so much corruption - they have so much free time on their hands that they are bound to get into trouble. Many members of Congress also use their positions of power and the information they learn during the course of their duties to become fabulously wealthy. At a time when incomes nationally are actually declining, our Congress critters are becoming stinking rich at a staggering pace. Yes, politics in America has always been a game that is funded and played by wealthy individuals, but things have gotten so extreme that it is hard to argue that average Americans have any control over Congress at all at this point. Instead of a government "of the people, by the people and for the people", we now have a government "of the wealthy, by the wealthy, and for the wealthy". If you doubt this, just keep on reading. Over the past couple of decades, the "wealth gap" between members of Congress and average Americans has grown to ridiculous proportions. Things have gotten so bad that now even the New York Times is reporting on these things.... "Largely insulated from the country's economic downturn since 2008, members of Congress -- many of them among the "1 percenters" denounced by Occupy Wall Street protesters -- have gotten much richer even as most of the country has become much poorer in the last six years"So how wealthy have members of Congress become? Many of you won't believe the statistics posted below. The truth is that Congress has become all about money. It takes huge piles of money to get elected to Congress, it takes huge piles of money to stay in Congress, and most members of Congress seem to be able to accumulate gigantic piles of money while "serving" their country.... -Today, there are 250 members of Congress that are millionaires. -According to the Wall Street Journal, the median net worth of members of Congress is now $913,000. -The collective net worth of all of the members of Congress increased by 25 percent between 2008 and 2010. Meanwhile, the standard of living in the United States has fallen farther over the past three years than at any other time that has ever been recorded in U.S. history. -After adjusting for inflation, between 1984 and 2009 the median net worth of members of Congress rose from $280,000 to $725,000 while the median net worth of all Americans actually declined slightly over that same time period. -The collective net worth of all of the members of Congress is now slightly over 2 billion dollars. That is "billion" with a "b". -In 2009, Congress was only scheduled to be in session for 137 days out of the 365 days of the year. In 2010, Congress was also only scheduled to be in session for 137 days out of the entire year. For much more on the pathetic "work schedule" of the U.S. Congress, just check out this video. -The net worth of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi increased by 62 percent from 2009 to 2010. In 2009 it was reported that she had a net worth of 21.7 million dollars, and in 2010 it was reported that she had a net worth of 35.2 million dollars. -The top Republican in the Senate, Mitch McConnell, saw his wealth grow by 29 percent from 2009 to 2010. He is now worth approximately 9.8 million dollars. -U.S. Representative Darrell Issa is worth approximately 220 million dollars. His wealth grew by approximately 37 percent from 2009 to 2010. -The wealthiest member of Congress, U.S. Representative Michael McCaul, is worth approximately 294 million dollars. -Those that won U.S. Senate seats during the last election spent an average of nearly $10 million on their campaigns. -More than 5 billion dollars was spent on political campaigns back in 2008, and it is being projected that 8 billion dollars will be spent on political campaigns in 2012. -When it comes to federal elections, the candidate that raises the most money wins about 90 percent of the time. -Since 1964, the reelection rate for members of the U.S. House of Representatives has never fallen below 85 percent. It is also amazing how deeply corrupt Congress has become. In a previous article, I detailed how a number of Congress critters used confidential information about the coming financial crisis that they received from U.S. Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke in September 2008 to make beneficial stock market moves before the stock market crashed later that fall.... On September 16, 2008 Paulson and Bernanke held "closed door meetings" with members of Congress and warned them that the financial system was about to totally collapse.So has anyone gotten into trouble for any of that? Of course not. Congress critters play by an entirely different set of rules than the rest of us do. At this point, the American people are absolutely disgusted with Congress. According to the latest polls, the approval rating for Congress is sitting at about 12 percent. But of course the vast majority of our Congress critters will be re-elected over and over and over again. Most members of Congress do not care about you. What they do care about is taking care of their political careers and taking care of their big donors. As noted earlier, it takes enormous amounts of money to win national elections in America, and most members of Congress are not about to do anything that will threaten the gravy train. Our system is fundamentally broken. It is time to quit pretending. But of course the mainstream media will never admit this, because mainstream media outlets are owned by many of the same corporations and wealthy individuals that fund political campaigns. For the establishment, the current system is working just fine. So until the American people wake up and start demanding fundamental reforms, our Congress critters are going to continue to live the high life and we are going to keep on getting the same pathetic results out of Washington. |
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That was not the 5th Fleet speaking, metaphorically; that was President Obama.
I wouldn't bet against a false flag happening here, during Iran's military exercises, which would then be used as the justification for a war against it.