My husband thinks we should invade those countries/tax havens and get back the money that belongs to OUR ECONOMY. That money does NOT BELONG to those unpatriotic greedy creeps; it belongs to the American people who MADE that money, not to the few who TOOK the money and are hiding it "under the mattress."

As far as electing law makers who work for the rest of us goes, good luck on getting politicians from either side of the political isle to exclusively work for us. Having said that, FACTA was voted into law on Mar. 18 2010, by the Democrats when they held the Senate and House. So it seems the Democrats do tend to favor laws that are good for all of us and not just the wealthy and the corporations. In any event, we all know the Dem.'s will continue to vote for their candidates and the Repub.'s will continue to do the same. From my prospective this law does a good job in preventing people from hiding profit income in foreign banks and institutions primarily by imposing a tax on any foreign financial institution that does not comply with this new law. The law does the following; (copied from the wpc website.) FATCA, which was enacted as part of the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment (HIRE) Act of 2010, requires financial institutions to use enhanced due diligence procedures to identify US persons who have invested in either non-US financial accounts or non-US entities. The intent behind FATCA is to keep US persons from hiding income and assets overseas.

A foreign financial institution (FFI) could face significant consequences if it fails to enter into an agreement with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), which is merely the first step; the ability to align all the key stakeholders, including operations, technology, risk, legal, and tax, will be paramount to successfully comply with FATCA. The institution would be subject to a 30% withholding tax on any “withholdable payment” made to its proprietary account for failing to comply with FATCA.

This appears to be a good law and I have yet to read anything that provides a logical reason why this law should be repealed. But I am without doubt that a Republican will come up with some type of reasoning that claims this law will hurt our economy or the wealthy/corporations will move to another country with less tax regulations. If anyone believes this, please give a reference where you viewed such information, so we can all read it. To me this law is a win/win for America. It will make tax cheaters pay their legal share of taxes and it could help stave off the cutting of domestic programs that help people in the middle class and the lower class on the income scale. K.W.

Off topic:

The Presidential Commission on Election Administration report, issued yesterday, makes no mention of the problem with recounting machine voting results. One can only reprint the vote tallies which are subject to alteration by officials or by hacking. I had hoped for better. Paper ballots were good enough when I voted as a baby; it ought to be good enough now.

AIW -- This reply is talk about critical thinking being taughtl. However, I first would like to remind people, that according to what Thom has said, the average work day for native americans was 2 hours. That was before the mentally diseased Europeans arrived.

Now to critical thinking. IMO, I think you were taught critical thinking from kindergarden to the end of your formal education. I think you would believe the same thing if you were to compare the teachings in a fundamentalist religious school to how you were taught. I think the Texan repug party had fundamentalist Christian schools in mind when they entered that plank about no teaching of critical thinking.

Dweinstein says "Human progress should be defined as more leisure time and less materialism." And I say YES!

Excellent article, Gary. Thanks.

It's really odd how people who were lucky enough to get a pile of wealth always claim they worked hard for their money. I believe that is a "Kroc of sh!t" (pun intended). Of course, I no longer eat sh!t burgers (that's what I call them because of what's in them...what! you didn't know? where do you think the e-coli comes from?)

In many cases they don't even work as hard as the lowly peons sweating in the fields or the service people who sweep the floors. Many of these wealthy people were just lucky to have made the right decisions, investments perhaps, accepted a position perhaps, that led to opportunities that they took advantage of. They were just plain lucky! I think we can find at least a few examples where education sure didn't help them "get lucky". ;-}

And, by the way...don't overlook all of those acts of violence that occurred in our history. Nothing would have changed were it not for those downtrodden and exploited finally fighting back against those who were beating the crap out of them for daring to protest against their conditions.

It is no accident that the ruling elite propaganda machine tries to down play those historic acts of self defense and try to emphasize the icons of peace as the vehicle of change. They would much rather you go out and get your heads cracked open by the fascist police than for you to actually fight back. They want you to be like Gandhi and MLK and not like those who stand their ground and inflict as much pain as the bullies inflict upon them. That's why they, after these icons are dead, use them as models of the way they want us to act...non-violently...the thing that never really works unless it was coincidental with major acts of violence.

And the masses could very well overwhelm the few jackals that are dressed as jackbooted Nazis. And that's what they don't want us to know. Look what's happening in the Ukraine. Look what happened in Egypt and Libya. Look what happened in the French revolution, in the Iranian revolution, the Russian Revolution. The people amassed and violently overthrew their corrupt leaders.

It always starts out with people getting really fed up and taking to the streets in protest. Then the cops or company bullies are hired to crack heads of the protestors. Eventually, insurrections break out like at Matewan. This puts the exigency of realizing that the capitalist-industrial bullies and their toady politicians had to finally relent a bit.

The alternative is complete breakdown and potential mob violence against the criminal elite who stand to lose everything they have stolen. But now, they use the corrupt two-party ruse to keep hope alive always to be shot dead after their newly elected Democrat "savior" wins the election. They know that if they can keep fooling people with false hope they will continue to push us all into slavery all without having to fire a shot.

Kend, bully for them. Most people in minimum wage jobs nowadays aren't getting a stepping stone; they're stuck in a trap with no exit. For you to use Mr. Walton as an example is patently absurd, since he owned the friggin' business. (HELLO) I can't give an answer regarding Jeff Bezos or Ray Kroc, who I know nothing about (altho Mr. Kroc's name seems vaguely familiar). But you are missing my point. I'm not saying any job is below anybody, as long as there is reasonable opportunity to improve one's lot in life and move up the socioeconomic totem pole. At this time, and in this country, those opportunities no longer exist. Social mobility is dead in the good ole USA.

When it comes to the issue of taxes, you conservatives remind me of five-year-olds throwing a massive hissy fit whenever they're told to share anything: "Waah! That's mine!" It's about being an adult, Kend, and paying your fair share for infrastrastructure we all use. As Thom keeps pointing out, the wealthier one is, the more that person uses the courts, the roads, airports, etc. So why shouldn't they pay more, then? These things all cost money. And shouldn't the amount of tax be based on a person's ability to pay?! My only problem with taxes is the unfairness of our tax system in this country, which routinely places the heaviest burden on those who can least afford it. Meanwhile approximately 25% of major, privately owned corporations pay no taxes at all; not to mention how much of our tax $$ gets sucked into the war machine, instead of going to things that are useful and actually benefit us. But you seem resentful about paying regardless of where the tax $$ goes, which is extremely shortsighted. And selfish. Anyone who owns as much property and stuff as you do has nothing to complain about, and frankly Kend, I don't give a damn how hard you worked for it. Time to grow up, put on your big-boy panties and stop whining. - Aliceinwonderland

@chuckle8 wrote "Things were much worse in the late 1800's and the early 1930's than they are now"

Agreed and fair point. However when things are heading south at a rapid rate of knots, what does it benefit us to say "things are not yet as bad as they once were"?

"Others see things as they are and ask 'Why?'. I see things as they could be and ask 'Why not?'"

Must we wait until our living standards and our wealth inequality are on a par with the poorest countries before we decide to do something about it? If we wait much longer will we be able to do anything about it? Short of some kind of overthrow of the plutocracy, are we able to do anything about it now?

Yes, things were worse in the 1800's and there was a kind of revolt against the robber barons, but the robber barons now have much more pervasive and sophisticated propaganda machines. Witness the power of the Murdoch media on uncritical individuals like Kend.

Even in the 70's we revolted against a government that had dragged us into an unjustified and unwinnable war. When W and Cheney dragged us into Iraq on false pretences, where were the protests? Where was the critical journalism to expose the lies and deceptions? The corporatised media can no longer be relied on to give us the critical scrutiny of the powerbrokers anymore. The media are now part of the problem rather than part of the solution.

Over the past 30-odd years our political position has been shifted so far to the right it is barely distinguishable from Fascism. This is the role of the Tea Party. To be a party that is so far out in the extreme, they make the modern Republican party look moderate by comparison. They are anything but moderate.

Finally, every call for some form of moderation is met with responses like Kend's that "this is a move toward Communism" (where they mean Totalitarianism rather than actual Communism). In actual fact, the concentration of wealth and power has brought us closer to Totalitarianism than all but the worst of the dictatorships.

Alice, Ray Kroc worked the floor at McDonalds when he started, Mr Walton greeted people coming into his first store, and Jeff Bezos stocked the first shelves at Amazon. It wasn't below them. It was a stepping stone.

what do you call tax increases. That is taking someone's god damn money. Isn't it?

those same fire dept. , infrastructure, law etc are delivered equally just the same in a capitalist system, health care ihas a way to go Down there but even in Socialist Canada it's not delivered Equally.

List of members of the American Legislative Exchange Council http://bit.ly/L0zmws

Note: most on the board of directors and every other level are Republicans and most of the companies are big corporations... i.e., government by the corporation for the corporation ...with lobbyists accepting super PAC $ for legislated favors such as tax loopholes etc.

PS: ALEC almost all are Republicans & big corporations... https://twitter.com/RACmoveToAmend