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The Corpse media, a PBS channel of all things, "Nightly Business Report," reported tonight that the economic outlook is becoming dismal because of the possibility that Democrats may gain power in the next election. The report also showed the economic outlook to be much more positive when projections indicated the Teapublic Party would maintain majority control.
However it wasn't reported what a dismal economic outlook truly means, in conservative speak that is..... nope, that wasn't mentioned, so I'll do it......The economy will continue to work well for the 1% at the expense of the 99% if the Teapublic candidates hold on to their seats. If Bernie wins, the 1% will still remain very wealthy, but will have to share economic gain with those who create it......those being the 99%.....and according to the report, that would be a dismal turn of events.
The media has to a great extent lead us down the road to Fascistville....misinformation works very well for the wealthy, but is no less than a dagger in the backs of the working class. That the Teapublic Party still exists is living proof of this. Ask anyone why they would vote conservative? You'll never get an answer based on economic reality, an economy that works for the vast majority.
Conservative......I picture someone hopelessly trapped in their own fear and ignorance, someone controlled by slick billionaires and Fox News, and always on the wrong side of history. I see the Confederate South!
Liberal....someone who desires economic and social justice for all, always on the correct side of history.
The liberty of democracy is not safe
And, part of the issue is... a weird system whereby congress can screw a president because of his skin colour... that is flawed... to be polite
Sorry!
WHERE are those, like FDR, that have any interest in "we the people"?
“The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to the point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in essence, is fascism.” Franklin Delano Roosevelt
It is happening here.
The TPP would take us on a path beyond fascism towards direct corporate rule.
There is not one individual with sufficient testicular fortitude to take on this conspiracy
Sadly, those who tried were assassinated
The only way to defeat this evil is by mass action
The wealthy are creating their own demise
Thom,
I know that you continually repeat that despair is not an option. Nevertheless, I am despairing. I watched the town hall that MSNBC aired which featured Marco Rubio. He denied climate change. He reached back into the past and made the suggestion that if you support Bernie Sanders perhaps your best choice would be to move to a country that has socialism, or the "America, love it or leave it" of the 60s. Ted Cruz wants to enrich the top 1% through his policies and not only that, but his father is telling the evangelicals that Ted should be king. John Kasich is the governor of my state and I have seen first hand how his regressive policies have devistated everyone except CEOs. His claims of greatness are simply not true. And my list of the agony Donald Trump would bring would be excessively long. I have been making phone calls for the Ohio Democratic Party and even though we have been given a list of likely Democratic voters, the apathy is terrifying. Thom, I am frightened that if we can't motivate our support, all will be lost. Sorry for dumping on you, but I needed to tell someone my thoughts.
I’ve noted before that my studes were reading academic-literature ‘way back in the mid-‘70s that we were facing a specific-to-America Fascism. {This was back when the public’s furor screamed instead that we were headed into Socialism. Noop.} {Notice that this was prior to Reaganismo.}
The TPP is fascism on steroids. Hillary Clinton supports these corporate coups. And yet, if Bernie doesn't win the nomination, Thom will vote for her and her climate-destroying fracking and her militarism. Why? Just vote Republican.
Revolutionaries are saying Bernie or bust. http://BernieorBust.org
As a very wise man once said: 'Never wrestle with a pig. You end up covered with mud and the pig actually enjoys it.'
If we're serious and realistic about combatting global warming, nuclear power must be part of our country's power strategy.
Halsted1917, that kind of thing seen at the Trump rally doesn't help us much. Violent means and undisciplined behavior usually hurt a cause, already the media is exploiting Friday's incident.
The protest, like the rally, was a UIC event and the students in the lead were only speaking for themselves. The blue collar worker is usually disgusted by such behavior from students and may vote for Trump just because. Intellectual elitism doesn't help either.
Students need to ring doorbells and knock on doors and to get blue collar workers with the cause not make greater noise themselves or make greater spectacles of themselves.
Most importantly, they need to listen more than speak. Abstract, theoretical knowledge doesn't hold up against worldly understanding.
Take a tip from Bernie and speak with, not at, the blue collar worker. Students don't deserve to be the workers' boss just because they've had it made. Otherwise you're replicating the very injustice you purport to be fighting - and WITHIN your movement.
I recently discovered Thom Hartmann's "The Big Picture" and find it is one of the few media coverage vehicles that provides accurate information, as well as information from both sides.
However, after seeing 3-11-16 episode, I almost quit watching. Horace Cooper's viewpoints, comments, rage, that couldn't be easily fact-checked - he was equivalent to the GOP debate ranting and raving.
Please do not have this type of extremist on your show in the future. You contaminate all the good workyou have done to educate the public on the facts.
Conversely, the information provided by Paul Gunter and Kevin Kamps on 5 years after Fukushima nuclear disaster was extremely helpful reminder that nuclear waste does not go away.
Fact: The Ruling Class aka the One Percent has been ranting about the necessity for forcibly reducing the global population (i.e. genocide) at least since the late 1950s.
Fact: Death camps, ethnic "cleansing" and other obvious forms of genocide are no longer fashionable (save perhaps amongst Donald Trump's supporters and others of the fascist/Nazi persuasion).
Fact: Hence the most effective method of genocide -- especially since under capitalism, the victims themselves can be blamed for their own deaths -- is economic downsizing.
Need I say more?
Here's an idea that probably won't Go down so well. Mandatory retirement for everybody when they reach 55 and a living pension there on after .The overs could take part tme work or do some voluntary endeavours .Or could bring up the offspring off the young and nurture them .So the young are not burdened with looking after children when they are children themselves .In highly evolved cultures it's the elders that do the child raising as great resonsibility is placed on them .
Just an idea as in Europe some countries Spain ,Greece ,Italy ,Portugal have massive amounts of the youth unemployment. Up to 50 % of under 25s are unemployed in some of these countries with no hope of a better tomorrow .
Has anyone figured out how to safely store the waste?
Allow me again to nag that your Rightwing panelists detract from discussions, thereby damaging your otherwise-useful shows. Please contract with Rightists who savvy how-to-Discuss.
Good Points my friend .
Bernie was on Thom's radio show talking about the Native American plight .He said this is one of the first things he will address .Every Human has a right to life with dignity there are enough resources for this to be .
Decent living conditions,clean drinkable water ,health care and education are a right not a priviledge .The thought that there is not enough to go around creates our on the ground reality .We especially need to look after our Native American Brothers ,we can learn so much from their culture and then start to save our own .Their wisdom and cultural understandings are at a very high level but we have not listened and tried through the illusion of superiority and dominator lifestyle to eradicate their culture and forced them to adopt our cultural myths which is unworkable .
The culture from which we emerge is causing the demise of the culture .
Lets all get behind Bernie, the old and the young .Power is never taken its always given .Time to give the power back to we the people and decide what kind of world we want to wake up to in the not to distant future .
Namaste
I believe this wealth gap is irrelevant. Older folks enjoyed the last years of corporate civility. My retiiree income has nothing to do with todays problems. Common wisdom now beliieves that a college education is needed for nearly any job. I believe otherwise. I think skill is far more important for most jobs, and that nearly half the population has a below average intelligence. Young people are now saddled with college debt that very likely won't be of any use. In my day,, a union job was near the top of the chart of worthy goals, and anyone working in a similar job reaped the benefits of union negotioations. HR department had not yet inserted insanity into hiring practices.
The problem now is a system that doesn't recognize the need for mechanics, janitors, welders, etc., but only carreers riguiring higher education. The system does not respect employees. Greed is the main motivator, Young folks are thrown into a system that doesn't work. Shareholder primacy is patently stupid, and causes instabiltiy for employees. Lack of respect for the nintynine percent should not be reflected in our laws or attitudes.
I can relate to what Thom's talking about from the perspective of the older retired person. My income is about $60,000 a year and I don't do anything. I'm retired. I'm 65 and my retirement savings will never run out. That's because I don't have any retirement savings or a 401K plan. I have a defined benefit retirement plan and not a defined contribution plan. When I ask young people if they know the difference between the two, they don't have a clue as to what I'm talking about. For those that don't know a defined benefit plan pays you until you die and my plan will pay my wife the same amount if I die first until she dies. You can't borrow or take money out of a defined benefit plan therefore you can't screw your self out of your retirement. A defined contribution plan is a savings for retirement plan. Internal Revenue tax code section 401 subsection K (401 K) is one of these plans and the most popular plan today. There's no guarantee a savings plan or 401K will last you until you die. You could spend it all in 5 years after you retire at age 65 but if you live to be 90, you will live for 20 years on social security alone after your 401K or savings plan has been depleted. I' m a retired union plumber. I have a cousin who's a retired TVA machinist and a brother-in-law who's a retired Teamster. Counting our social security and our defined benefit retirement plans our incomes are about the same or more than if we were still working. So, yes many of us older retired workers are doing much better than many young working people. Young people need to wake up and smell the coffee. If they don''t get a job with a union or a job with a defined benefit retirement plan they could be relativly poor their whole life or at least very poor retired people for a long time after their 401K or savings plan runs out of money. None of my grandchildren are making much money. I have a step daughter that's a nurse that makes good money but she was unemployed a while back and took money out of her 401K to help pay bills and now she has a 401K but she depleted her 401K and will probably not have enough money in it when she retires to live well and last her until she dies. I have another brother-in law who designs energy efficient climate control systems that has a 401K that he depleted a while back when he was unemployed. He told me two years ago that he will have to work until he dies because of the money he took out of his 401K. Young people don't realize that section 401K was not meant to be a retirement plan. It was meant to lower taxes on capital gains and spur business investment. If the authors of 401K in the tax code knew what they know now, they would not have put section 401 subsection K in the tax code. So, spread the word, explain the difference between these retirement plans to young people and what the consequences of only having a 401K and social security could be because no one knows how long they will live after they retire.
Could this be a major factor in milleniums coming out strongly for Bernie? Tonight I was at the Chicago Trump rally where thousands of anti-Trump protesters gathered. While those of us protesting covered all age groups, the majority were protesters under 35! The diversity protesting reflected Chicago & its kaleidoscope of people: Latinos, Asians, Muslims, Jews for Peace, Whites, Blacks et. al. Win or lose the primary, Bernie has tapped into the economic and social injustices affecting the milleniums. The Revolution has began!
Unfortunately, this is America, and I suspect closing the wealth divide between young and old will most likely involve making sure the elderly are poorer.
MARCH 26TH WASHINGTON STATE CAUCUS: I'm having a hard time getting through nowadays. In WA State the Democrats will only count the caucus results, the primary is just a beauty show that was only just put in place by the Republicans.
The Democratic Caucus in Saturday March 26th, the Republican primary is late in May.
People can register to vote at the caucus, and it's an open caucus, so people can sign in saying they are a Democrat for the purpose of the caucus.
The Democrats have a Surrogate Affidavit form that people can fill out if they can't make it to the caucus. It's good if they have to work, are ill or disabled, have a religious reason not to attend or are in the military. It's available at wa-democrats.org. It can be printed out, filled in and MUST be returned by mail, fax or emailed PDF to the WA State Democrats by 5 pm March 18th, or it will not be included in the precinct caucus packets on the 26th.
The Huffington Post has published my latest article entitled "Bernie Sanders Can Win By Empowering Every Child, Woman, And Man To Become A Productive Capital Asset Owner at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/gary-reber/bernie-sanders-can-win-by_1_b_9441438.html. This article addresses the wealth divide. I believe this article to be significantly timely in light than NONE of the candidates for president are raising the issue of broadening wealth-creating, income-producing capital asset wealth OWNERSHIP in speeches, interviews, press conferences, debates or political ads. This is the issue that can bolster massive support Bernie Sanders during the primaries and the general election.
It is happening to all of us but sad our young are thrown under the bus. We need drastic change. Vote Bernie!!
Quote: He added, “An increasing number of people think children in their country will be worse off financially than their parents.” And, that type of intergenerational inequality only makes the overall wealth divide even worse.
It's that last sentence of that, that is the kicker ... and it's wrong. What we have is not an intergenerational divide, it is an economic divide. The ploy that the older generation "have all the wealth" is used by the 1% to keep the hoi-poloi at each others' throats and distracted from the REAL villains, the 1%. This is only one of the sophisticated tricks that the wealthy have bought from the highly skilled and remunerated PR firms to divert attention from the concentration of wealth in their hands. Another one is "The redistribution" cry whenever anyone calls for income fairness. In fact we've been having massive "redistribution" of wealth upwards sine Reagan and Thatcher.