Folks, it is as bad as us cynics on the Left are saying it is. Don't believe the hype, the American Century is coming to an end & the Age of Prosperity is no more. We are in an economic recession. A good look at our economic plight is all that is needed to convince any sane person that I am right.
* BBC News reported that another 62,000 American jobs were lost in the month of June, following the 62,000 jobs lost in May, and the losses of the past six straight months. These aren't people becoming unemployed, these are jobs that no longer exist in the United States because they've been shipped overseas, the company had to downsize, or what not. Department of Labor statistics show the U.S. economy is, on average, dropping 73,000 jobs per month and has already suffered the loss of 438,000 jobs this year.
* When the investment bank Bear Sterns was teetering on the brink of bankruptcy in March of this year, the Federal Reserve stepped in with a loan (of sorts) and kept the mammoth lender from capsizing. Why? Because the Feds were concerned that Bear Sterns' failure would cause widespread disruption of financial markets. This notorious case of corporate welfare signified the begriming of the end for the economy. You know it's bad when the largest economy ever is endangered by the collapse of a single business. The ensuing collapse of the subprime mortgage industry, the bank credit crisis, and the resulting foreclosure crisis have bitchslapped the American stock market into quite a sorry state & it has yet to recover. Predictions for recovery aren't suggesting an upturn until at least 2014.
* There are laws intended to keep the market stable by regulating what companies can & cannot do, but Washington hasn't been terribly concerned with enforcing them. They are supposed to be preventing monopolies and trusts from manipulating prices to increase profits. Big Oil is a clear example of the Feds failure to uphold anti-trust law.
* The price of oil has surpassed $150 per barrel & the effects on the economy are in no way minor. At the very least, oil price fluctuation results in inflation. Before 2005, inflation rates had been steady for a decade at 2.5%, but a jump to 3.3% in 05-06 prompted the Federal Reserve to increase interest rates many times in an attempt to curb increased inflation. Now, economists are pointing to these rate cuts as royal faux pas that have added to the economic woes we face. More on this subject can be found HERE, because I lack the background in economics to effectively explain the problem.
* A worldwide food price crisis has already created a rice shortage in the U.S. The cost of dairy products, fruit & veggies, grains, meat... all of it is rising through the roof. Droughts & floods are impacting the supply, increasing populations have impacted the demand, and commodities speculation is driving up prices while lining the pockets of an elite few investors.
* The unemployment rate is currently at 5.5% and more losses are expected. That is bad enough at face value, but when you consider what the number actually measures, it gets worse. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the definition of an unemployed person is one that does not have a job but did actively look for one in the past 4 weeks. This 5.5% statistic does not include unemployed folks that haven't sought employment in the last month, those that have given up hope of getting a job, or those people that are underemployed.
* The U.S. dollar is plummeting in value, falling like a rock. Our exploding deficit (currently at 7% of the entire economy) isn't helping the matter. So far Saudi Arabia, South Korea, China, Venezuela, Sudan, Iran, and Russia have abandoned the dollar to protect their own economies.
Obviously the indicators of economic downfall are there. What is the government intending to do about it? Obama's economic plan is to repeal Bush's tax cuts to the wealthy, exempt working class families from payroll taxes on the first $8,100 of income, provide a 10% mortgage credit, and expand access to health insurance so that health costs aren't monopolizing consumer spending. McCain wants to cut the corporate tax rate, give Americans a $5000 tax credit for health insurance, & expand upon Bush's tax cuts.
Yup, it's pretty clear we're fucked.
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A vote for John McCain is a vote for Bush IF he could serve a third term. Visit a veteran's hospital to see the price that fellow Americans will pay the rest of their lives for the lies, that Bush used to sell America and the world on going to war with Iraq. His policies resulted in:
ReplyDelete180,000 Iraqi dead with over four million displaced civilians.
4,500+ service personnel dead
30,00 to 100,000+ wounded service personnel.
50% suffer, brain, emotional and psychological damage.
The highest suicide rate of any past military conflict. CBS news reports: "Suicide
Epidemic Among Veterans." War Veterans are committing suicide after they leave the
battlefield and return home. McCain/Bush, refuse to extend benefits to these veterans.
Thousands of divorces, bankruptcies, and broken careers.
26% of the homeless are veterans with mental problems and destroyed lives.
Hundreds with lost limbs, hearing, memory, sight and suffer disfiguring burns.
Time magazine 06/16/08 headlines: "The secret weapon of the Military is PROZAC" PROZAC is an anti depressant that contributes to the suicide rate.
A wall bulletin in a VA Hospital reads:
"Help Our Veterans
TBI Screenings
Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) is the "signature injury" of the Iraq/Afghanistan Wars. 63-80% of hospitalized combat-injured veterans suffer brain injury.
A VA nurse told me that the VA was not prepared to handle such large numbers.
Bush's/McCain's policies have:
Ruined our economy to the point where some experts predict a 1929 type DEPRESSION
Reversed many environmental protection gains.
Created hatred and disrespect of the United States in the eyes of the world.
Failed economic policies resulted a devalued dollar, contributing to increased oil prices.
Afghanistan not Iraq was a terrorist haven before Bush's war. Afghanistan was
secured, then neglected. Now both Iraq and Afghanistan are terrorist havens.
Bush's lies of weapons of mass destruction and mushroom cloud rhetoric deceived us into supporting him when we were emotionally charged up after the 9/11 tragedy. Bush had reliable intelligence that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. He punished Ambassador Joseph Wilson the husband of CIA agent Valerie Plame by publicly revealing her CIA identity (a felony offense) for exposing his lies that Africa was supplying Saddam with uranium. "Former Bush press secretary Scott McClellan published a political memoir entitled What Happened: Inside the Bush White House and Washington's Culture of Deception. He suggested that both President Bush and Vice President Cheney discussed the CIA identity of Valerie Plame prior to leaks to the press as part of their efforts to discredit criticism of their administration by her husband, Joe Wilson, and to continue to mislead the American public about the necessity of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and that George Bush should have fired former White House strategist Karl Rove for Rove's own involvement in leaking Plame's identity." These facts are easily available.
McCain boasts "we will be in Iraq for one hundred years" and "I will never surrender in Iraq." The president of Iraq said. "In my opinion, at least from 40,000 to 50,000 American troops can be [withdrawn] by the end of this year." That assessment differs dramatically from those offered by Bush and US military commanders in Iraq.
Without the cover of the UN Mandate which ends in December of 2008, the continued presence of coalition troops in Iraq would become, in law as in fact, an armed occupation, at which point it would no longer be politically tenable to support it. A 2004 survey by the Independent Institute for Administration and Civil Society Studies show that 92 percent of respondent Iraqis consider US forces to be occupiers rather than liberators or peace keepers. THE IRAQI PEOPLE WANT US OUT OF THEIR COUNTRY.
VP Dick Chaney, former CEO of Haliburton, the Oil Company's and the "Military Industrial Complex", that Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower, warned us to not trust are making billions in windfall profits by squeezing it out of the American economy, and the blood and suffering of Americans and Iraqis.
The war has cost American tax payers over 528 BILLION DOLLARS, and is increasing daily by 341.4 million dollars costing every tax payer $4,681. Bush charged you $4,681 for his war and gave you back $300/$600, he borrowed from China, for his economic stimulus package. Future generations will pay for Bush's excesses and pandering to the wealthy minority who pay less taxes and Bush insists on giving them another tax break. Thanks George.
Thomas Jefferson said that a democracy cannot survive unless the citizens are educated and well informed. Please take his advice. Mister Bill from West Virginia
Nobel Prize winner Albert Schweitzer, was asked by a reporter "What is the major short coming of mankind" Schweitzer's answer was short and to the point, he said; "Man doesn't think."
ReplyDeleteMy challenge to McCain/Bush supporters is this. THINK; The economy was in good shape when Bush came to office. We did not have a deficit, we had a $127 billion surplus. The federal deficit has skyrocketed under the Bush Administration. Goldman Sachs boosted their deficit forecast for year 2008 to $425 billion and to $440 billion in 2009.
The last year Clinton was in office the nation borrowed 18 billion dollars. The first year Bush II was in office he had to borrow 133 billion. The Congress has raised the federal debt ceiling three times in three years to increase the government's borrowing authority by as much as $800 billion. The hike in the debt limit amounted to a grand total of more than $2 trillion during Bush's first term. These deficits force the United States to borrow money from governments such as China and foreign investors. The more the government has to pay for interest on its debt, the less it has for health care, education and other programs. The debt is currently on track to reach the $6.5 trillion mark by 2011.
Bush Tax Cuts has created the largest deficit ever, leaving future generations to pay the bill. The first tax cut Bush pushed through a willing Republican Congress caused an upswing in government borrowing that was supposed to stimulate the economy. Two years later Bush had to push through another tax cut because it was clear that the first one did not work. In 2003, President Bush set a record for the biggest single yearly dollar increase in debt in the nation's history with his tax cutting with no cutting in spending. He did it again in 2004, increasing the debt more than half a trillion dollars. Since 2003 total borrowing has exceeded $500,000,000,000 per year. Even Mr. Reagan never increased the debt that much in a single year; Mr. Reagan's biggest increase was only 282 billion, half of GWB's outrageous spending.
The Post reported that White House budget director Joshua B. Bolton attributes 23% of the nation's deficit to the three successive Bush tax cuts. Sources: Washington Post, The "White House Foresees 5-Year Debt Increase of $1.9 Trillion" Two recently released Census Bureau reports show that median household income declined 1.1 percent in real terms from the 2001 figure to $42,409. The number of people in the US living in poverty has risen for the second year in a row to 34.6 million, an increase of nearly 3 million people since 2000. The proportion of Americans living in poverty increased to 12.1 percent in 2002 from 11.7 percent in 2001—an additional 1.7 million people in poverty. Sources: Frederick, Md. News-Post, Bush Tax Cuts Lead to Largest Deficit Ever, Leaving Future Generations to Shoulder the Burden.
Multimillionaire Bush Claims He's Not Rich. Bush and first lady Laura Bush had income totaling $822,126 last year, and according to the Wall Street Journal, their net worth is somewhere between $7.7 and $18.9 million. Under Bush, The Rich Get Richer. The Associated Press reports that the total net worth of America's richest people rose 10 percent to $955 billion this year from 2002.
McCain's lifetime rating from the ACU, considered the authority on conservative rankings, is that 82.3% of McCain's votes supported Bush's policies. McCain/Bush is a strong supporter of the Iraq war which is a major contributor to the deficit and supports a long term military occupation of Iraq.
THINK! Do you want more of the McSame. (AKA McCain)
Mister Bill, West Virginia
I prefer to approach the subject matter as I have experienced it in the past 7, nearly 8, years. There is no money for the social services that held many of our communities together in the 1990's, there is no financial aid for many of us college students, the cost of living is out pacing our wages by leaps & bounds, AND many people my age are either in Iraq, Afghanistan, or Kuwait playing Toy Soldier for some armchair general that can't even deliver a decent fucking speech (even a half-assed decent one)? It's clear what the catalyst to destruction was here. King George & his magical band of morally bankrupt cronies! No need to preach to the choir (especially on her own blog).
ReplyDeleteDear Foxie,
ReplyDeleteI am not preaching to the choir. I am futilely attempting to get the mass of people who are uninformed about the most fundamental issues affecting their lives to do the unthinkable and that is to think. They are asleep and impaled to the mindsets that are programed to them by the media and like sheep bleat baa baa on cue. You can rant and rave about the injustices in the world to this flock of zombies and it will not penetrate their stupor. The only hope is to attempt to awaken them. I do not pretent to be up to the task of awakening them from their stupor but if my inept yammering causes one person to start thinking about what a sham this administration is, it will be worth my pathetic effort. It's an uphill chore like Sisyphus pushing his rock uphill. On the subject of rocks you seem to have a large one on your shoulder which may blind you from recognizing an ally. If you do not want a dialog to your rants do not give the readers of your blog the opportunity to respond to them.
Regards,
Mister Bill West Virginia
P.S.
ReplyDelete"It's clear what the catalyst to destruction was here. King George & his magical band of morally bankrupt cronies! No need to preach to the choir (especially on her own blog)."
Dear Foxie,
The issues that concern you (I would like to be included) ARE NOT
CLEAR to the large numbers of sleep walkers that have voted for, with 29% still supporting, King George. They are clear to you as you appear to be awake as manifested by your loud and raucous oratory. Most are unaware that the King has the legal right to go to war and congress cannot do anything for six days when it is too late and that scares the poop out of me. If this greed and power crazed maniac does start a war with Iran you can flush all of the positive solutions to the issues you espouse down the john.
Mr. B.WV
8/30/2008
ReplyDeleteHey Foxie,
Your long winded diatribes aren't getting much attention. You are competing with a lot of hot angry loud shouting feminist screaming for attention. However your boisterous muttering's are in the right direction which is the reason I am taking the time to respond to your blog. If we are going to live in a rational egalitarian country somewhere along the way we have to stop being mired down in the mindset of schismatic thinking of her against him, black against white, yellow (I don't think I have ever seen a yellow person) against black and white, Hispanic against ........ etc., etc., etc. It takes both the black and white keys on the piano to play the star spangled banner and it took my mom (bless her wonderful soul) and dad to make me as yours did to make you. The point is that we are all in this mess together and it is the stupid, dumb, idiotic, inane, dangerous, small minded weltanschuung that is perpetuating the ignorance that one group is better, more important than or superior to the other and is therefor entitled to a greater say on how things should be and deserve a bigger piece of the pie.
Those of us who seem or claim to be more aware of the of gross injustices in our world should join together as one voice and drop the egocentric mindset that divides us. You could consider starting a movement based on a few critical universal issues dealing with the injustices that you are concerned with rather than litany of complaints. Baby steps. However I feel that I am pissing in the wind with this response because I opine that your blog is not really about the issues, it is about Foxie.
Presumptuously your friend,
Mister Bill West Virginia
Ouch.
ReplyDelete