Racial media parity?

In an "ah-ha!" tone, my Republican agents have been feeding me recent news stories about the Australian white guy murdered, and the Oklahoma white guy murdered, both by "racists." Even though there is no indication these were racially motivated crimes.

Then we have FOX rushing to the scene, asking if the media coverage of the Oklahoma murder of Christopher Lane compares to the media coverage of the murder of Trayvon Martin.

None of this makes rational sense to me, I'm sorry.  I'm not being partisan here; this is just dumb.

It seems that we've moved on from insisting on some kind of "objective" left-right balance in news coverage of events, to insisting that we establish a black-white balance of media coverage of crime.

Why is this utterly pointless and stupid?

First, because you and I don't control the media.  But of course FOX and talk radio know that.  They play up the black-on-white crime, then accuse the "liberal" media of downplaying it.  Do I have to explain how self-serving and slanted that is?

Second, because so many thousands of murders escape the national media. We had more than 11,000 firearm homicides and more than 16,000 total homicides in the U.S. in 2012.  How many of them can you recall hearing about on the evening news or talk radio?  Exactly.

Third, these stories on FOX, the Blaze, etc. always mention Trayvon Martin, as in, "The media was so obsessed with Trayvon Martin... but they ignore THIS?!"  

First, refer to point #1.  Second, I challenge you to show me the black George Zimmerman. That's right, show me the case of the black man who murdered an unarmed white man and claimed it was in self-defense, despite police dispatchers telling the black man to leave that white man alone. Then the black man is set free, despite no contest that he shot and killed that white man, a white man who never bothered him or sought him out.

Yes, please, send me the link to that story, my Republican friends.  I can't wait to read all about it.

But until then, please do me a favor and shut up about race.

And fourth, most black crime is black-on-black.  That's a tragedy. Just like all crime is a tragedy. But what the hell does this have to do with the media or political correctness?

White people, stop pretending whites are an aggrieved minority and not an entitled majority who hold the keys to everything valuable in American life. Whining is un-American.

None of you whining whities would trade places with a black or Hispanic American for a minute, and that's all you need to know about race relations in the U.S.  

UPDATE (08.23.2013): OMG, this is so outrageously dumb: "A dead Australian is just the price you pay to be politically correct."  Yep, FOX's Greg Gutfeld said it.  

Oh no, I'd better stop being so liberal and PC, or else piles of dead Australians are going to start washing up on U.S. shores!....

We don't negotiate with terrorists

"We don't want to detonate a bomb in Washington. We really don't!  So why are you threatening to make us detonate a bomb? Just give us what we want and everything will be fine."

If a member of al Qaeda said this to President Obama trying to get his demands met, we would call it what it was: terrorism.

It's a sad attempt at nifty rhetoric (see article below) and nobody's going to fall for it. 

So think: that's just what the GOP Congress is threatening -- to shut down the federal government unless Obama agrees to de-fund a law that was passed by Congress and upheld by the Supreme Court.  

That's not "checks and balances" stuff, folks. Such tactics were not written into the Constitution or ever anticipated by the Founding Fathers. That's political terrorism.  And the hostages are you and I.

Like I said before, for Democrats' political fortunes, I hope the GOP tries to hold us hostage to nullify a law passed by Congress because it will backfire on Republicans. But for America's sake, for our economy's sake, I hope the GOP wises up and steps back from the brink. 

Cruz: Ignore Media, GOP ‘Can Win’ Defunding Obamacare Argument

By Katrina Trinko

August 21, 2013 | National Review

URL: http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/356332/cruz-ignore-media-gop-can-win-defunding-obamacare-argument-katrina-trinko

MB360: Americans unprepared for retirement

MB360 brings us some shocking figures on U.S. retirement savings:

What we find in the above chart is that most Americans are flat broke when it comes to saving for retirement.  You might say that those 25 to 34 years of age have simply avoided dealing with the future.  However, this is the most indebted young cohort of Americans we have ever seen largely due to student debt.  Yet look at the other age brackets.  The median amount saved for those 35 to 44 is $1,400 (one month of rent and food in many parts of the country).  Those 45 to 54 do a little bit better coming in at $10,100.  Those 55 to 64?  About $12,000.

In total, the median saved for retirement by all US households is $3,000.

Even those with retirement accounts (obviously a small figure) have a median amount saved of $40,000.  The $3,000 figure should shock people into realizing that programs like Social Security are going to become the default “retirement plan” for millions.

But should we really be surprised?  How many U.S. generations have experienced what is now considered a real, comfortable retirement, where savings combined with Social Security and Medicare allowed them to live out the last 20 or so years of life in comfort and security?  One generation?  The Baby Boomers are entering retirement now.  Let's see how well they do.  But it doesn't look good for them, not good at all. 

We need to re-think classical retirement, which is not classical at all, just an ideal that one or two generations of Americans managed to enjoy, and which now, thanks to demographics and cuts to Social Security, the Great Recession, fewer pensions and rising health costs, will soon cease to exist entirely.  

The epic crisis in retirement savings: Vast majority of Americans unprepared for retirement. Median retirement savings for those 25 to 34? Zero dollars.

Posted by MB360

August 21, 2013

URL: http://www.mybudget360.com/epic-crisis-retirement-median-retirement-amount-americans-average-savings/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+mybudget360%2FQePx+%28My+Budget+360%29

No GOP alternative to Obamacare

Bernstein notes that the GOP's motto "repeal and replace" has become simply "repeal." 

They haven't got any idea what to do.  

Once again it's all the Tea Parties' fault... Or rather, the TPs are the embodiment of everything gone wrong with U.S. conservatives:

But conservatives have decided that no policy overlap with Obamacare is acceptable. Tea Partiers have chosen to oppose not only Obamacare but any policy which even faintly resembles any piece of that omnibus legislation. We saw this in the House defeat of Eric Cantor’s high-risk poll bill this spring, when conservatives revolted against his effort to propose a GOP plan protecting those with preexisting conditions.

But that refusal to accept any of the substance of Obamacare has run Republicans right into a brick wall. Thanks to the way that the ACA was put together — it really is a mammoth omnibus bill which incorporated practically every plausible policy idea out there — it turns out that practically everything you can do to provide health insurance is now tainted by Obamacare.

The Tea Parties do have an idea so old it's new again: no health insurance at all. That's right, they want to go back to 1776, when people paid the doc for his services with a pig, a pound, or a freshly baked pie.  

The Tea-Party led GOP has become a party of delusional wreckers and hooligans, not a responsible opposition.  

UPDATE (08.25.2013): I loved the image that this excerpt from a recent op-ed by Eugene Robinson conjures up, especially imagining John Boehner:

[Sen. Ted] Cruz gets to preen before a national audience and demonstrate the fervor of his opposition to Obama and all that he stands for. “If you have an impasse, you know, one side or the other has to blink,” he said recently. “How do we win this fight? Don’t blink.”

The GOP establishment is blinking like crazy.

There won’t be any GOP alternative to Obamacare

By Jonathan Bernstein

August 20, 2013 | Washington Post

URL: http://wapo.st/19GOp0p

It's about total compensation

Today it's a three-fer, since each story is about the same thing: the consequences of low U.S. wages and the absence of benefits.

First, my man Harold Meyerson notes that low wages paid by big retailers and fast-food joints are now hurting big retailers and fast-food joints, because low-paid workers don't have money to buy stuff.  (Duh).  Furthermore, Meyerson makes the interesting observation that we've gone back to the pre-WWII era, before big retailers like Federated and Macy's actively backed New Deal-era reforms like the minimum wage, unemployment insurance, 5-day workweek, unions, and co-op banks. Back then, businessmen understood that a healthy middle class was in their own best interest. 

It seems we've forgotten, once again, what actually makes America go. (I blame this all on the historically amnesiac Tea Parties, who don't care about anything that happened in America between 1789 and 1980.)

Next, Heidi Moore reminds us that our recent focus on the minimum wage, while correct, actually obscures the key issue: total compensation.  Wages could theoretically stay flat, but if more employers were to offer health insurance, paid sick leave, vacation and a retirement plan, then wages wouldn't need to be as high.    

Moore also observes that low total compensation, historically speaking, has put a record-high strain on government poverty programs such as food stamps. So, with corporate profits at an all-time high and compensation at an all-time low, welfare becomes a subsidy for Big Business.  (Wal-Mart has long been the national poster child for forcing its employees to go on welfare).

Finally, Sarah Kendzior points out that the feminist debate over whether women should work or stay at home is all rather quaint, considering that women, just like everybody else, make such decisions based on hard economic realities. Paradoxically, due to the high cost of child care, it is often cheaper for a woman to stay at home rather than work; yet staying at home allows her skills to degrade, or at the very least carries a stigma with potential employers when she tries to re-enter the workforce. Educated, qualified women excluded from our workforce reduces our nation's overall productivity. 

So once again, the answer is for Big Government to step in and mandate paternity leave, provide free or subsidized daycare, and make giving birth at a hospital cheaper, so that young families don't start off in debt.  Because the free market has failed to address these failures.

For retailers, low wages aren’t working out

By Harold Meyerson

August 21, 2013 | Washington Post

URL: http://wapo.st/181Hg41

How low can you get: the minimum wage scam

By Heidi Moore

August 20, 2013 | Guardian

URL: http://gu.com/p/3t625

Mothers are not 'opting out' - they are out of options

By Sarah Kendzior

August 19, 2013 | Al Jazeera

URL: http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2013/08/201381615448464851.html