Putin's war rhetoric reeks of fascism

These are the characteristics of fascism: 

• claims that ethnic kinship supersedes sovereign national boundaries; 
• (and correspondingly) claims on other countries' sovereign territory;
• control of private media; 
• constant pro-state propaganda; 
• cult of the leader; 
• persecution of minorities (gays and Caucasians); 
• overt militarism; 
• corporatism (control by the state and its cronies of key industries); 
• active and untouchable secret police; 
• an army of "brownshirt" thugs that can be used to stir up trouble; 
• disappearance and imprisonment of dissidents and political opponents.

All these things exist in Russia today. Putin has set Russia on a dangerous path toward toward expansionism and fascism.

Putin wins in Russia only by escalating his war rhetoric

By Masha Gessen

March 14, 2014 | Washington Post

URL: http://wapo.st/1eBXIMp

U.S. defense industry, taxpayers, keep NATO in business

The NATO-industrial complex

In Chicago, the defense industry's grip on NATO was tighter than ever.  Make way for missile defense

By Alexander Zaitchik

May 24, 2012 | Salon

URL:  http://www.salon.com/2012/05/23/the_nato_industrial_complex/singleton/

Report: 'Jobless and wageless recovery' is 'unprecedented'

Everybody should view this report, which clearly shows how Obama inherited a devastated U.S. economy from Bush, but since March 2009 (Obama took office in January 2009), the economy has grown for seven consecutive quarters.

Wrote the authors: "The so-called 'Great Recession' of 2007-2009 lasted for 18 months, the longest in post-World War II history, and the nation's real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) declined by 4.2% between the fourth quarter of 2007 and the second quarter of 2009, the largest relative decline in GDP since the national recession of 1945 as the U.S. began its demobilization from World War Two."

"Given potential annual GDP growth of around 3% per year in recent years, this finding implies a GDP gap of close to 10% of GDP in the most recent quarter. The U.S. economy was likely operating at $1.4 trillion below its potential output in the first quarter of 2011."

The report also clearly shows how, from 4Q 2007 to 2Q 2009, Bush's Great Recession lost 7 million net jobs.

Increased productivity per U.S. worker -- a 9 percent gain from 4Q 2008 to 1Q 2011! -- and increased hours per worker are responsible for the economic recovery, which has remained a "jobless recovery." And so, as real hourly wages have not increased, over the first seven quarters of the recovery corporate profits increased nearly 40 percent. Correspondingly, the Dow Jones average increased 46 percent, and the S&P 500 index increased 44 percent.

Continues the report: "The extraordinarily high share of national income (88%) received by corporate profits was by far the highest in the past five recoveries from national recessions. [...] The absence of any positive share of national income growth due to wages and salaries received by American workers during the current economic recovery is historically unprecedented. The lack of any net job growth in the current recovery combined with stagnant real hourly and weekly wages is responsible for this unique, devastating outcome."

The report's conclusion: "[T]he nation's recovery from the 2007-2009 recession is both a jobless and a wageless recovery. Aggregate employment still has not increased above the trough quarter of 2009, and real hourly and weekly wages have been flat to modestly negative. The only major beneficiaries of the recovery have been corporate profits and the stock market and its shareholders. Most holders of savings and money market accounts also are net losers due to declining real interest rates which have been in negative territory for many interest bearing and money market accounts."

Meanwhile, Republicans in Congress tell us that corporations cannot afford to lose tax breaks on private jets, and the highest marginal income tax rate and corporate tax rate must be cut, as well as capital gains taxes, to spur investment and job creation. They also want a tax-free holiday for corporations to bring their offshored cash to the U.S.

In other words, Republicans in power argue that the people who have benefited the most from the recovery -- large corporations and shareholders -- need the most relief. They don't care that such voodoo/trickle-down economics have proven not to work, pre- and post-recession.

Obama has not been a very good President, and his focus has not been on job creation but rather buttering up to Wall Street sleazeballs and the Chamber of Commerce; nevertheless, there is a clear difference in party ideology here. The choice is stark.

I'm not naive enough to think that most Americans will care about these truths come November 2012 -- if they see a bad U.S. economy, they'll probably blame Obama -- but for those who do care about the truth, look it in the face.

The "Jobless and Wageless" Recovery from the Great Recession of 2007-2009

By Andrew Sum, et al

May 2011 | Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University

URL: http://www.clms.neu.edu/publication/documents/Revised_Corporate_Report_May_27th.pdf

Tax holiday won't create jobs, won't cut deficit

A nonpartisan congressional committee found that this tax repatriation plan would actually cost the government $78.7 billion over ten years, as companies scored a great deal on cash they planned to bring back to the country eventually anyway.

"What's more, an April analysis from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that 10 of the biggest players in the WinAmerica Coalition are sitting on a combined $47 billion in domestic cash. If the companies aren't using their excess U.S. cash to create jobs, they aren't very likely to spend any money they bring in from overseas on jobs, either."

"According to a 2008 report by the Government Accountability Office, 83 of the 100 largest American companies operate subsidiaries in nations identified by the GAO as tax havens. Of the 10 companies currently lobbying hardest for the tax holiday, four -- Apple, Cisco, Microsoft and Pfizer -- were noted in the GAO report. Those four companies operated a combined 572 sub-companies in tax shelter countries at the time the report was published."

So why does this bad idea have legs? Because the so-called WinAmerica Coalition has spent $13.7 million lobbying for it.

Small Businesses Bash 'Tax Holiday' Plan For Corporate Titans

By Zach Carter and Paul Blumenthal

June 22, 2011 | Huffington Post

URL: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/22/small-business-tax-holiday_n_881597.html

ExxonMobil: 'No tengo dinero para los impuestos, Senor!'

According to the analysis by de Blasio's office, ExxonMobil, Bank of America, General Electric (GE), Chevron and Boeing had combined profits of $77.16 billion in 2010 but paid $0 in current federal income taxes in 2009. [...] At the same time, these companies gave a combined $7.86 million in political contributions during the 2010 election cycle -- a 7 percent jump over their 2008 political spending.

This is like the flip side of that conservative caveat which says that the day when the citizens of a democracy realize they can vote themselves a trough to feed from, that democracy is dead. Except that hasn't happened yet in any democracy, unless you want to argue that "citizens" includes only soldiers and senior citizens. Indeed, America's spending problem is really an old people and guns problem: Defense, Medicare and Social Security.

In fact, in a bought-and-paid-for political representative democracy like ours, this flip side is a much greater danger, since folks on "welfare" either don't vote or can't afford big political contributions.

Namely, that danger is that corporations, realizing they can lobby themselves nearly unlimited tax breaks, incentives, and subsidies from the public trough that only their shareholders' heirs will have to pay for partially while current shareholders enjoy the benefits completely, and further realizing that they can spread the cost of all their economic externalities and fuck-ups to you and me and perpetuity (Exhibit A: Wall Street bailouts. Exhibit B: BP oil spill) -- anywhere but to their income statements -- and in return throw back a pittance of the proceeds to politicians' campaigns and families, thereby bankrupt our treasury and pillage our public goods.

Five Biggest Recipients Of Corporate Tax Breaks Spent $8 Million In 2010 Elections (UPDATED)

By Amanda Terkel

May 3, 2011 | Huffington Post

URL: http://huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/03/recipients-corporate-tax-breaks-elections_n_856630.html

Politico: Corporate profits rose faster under Obama than any Prez. since 1920s

"Profits have surged 62 percent from the start of 2009 to mid-2010, according to the Commerce Department. That is faster than any other year and a half in the Fabulous '50s, the Go-Go '60s or the booms under Presidents Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton."

Just a coinkydink, I'm sure.

Corporate profits' big climb

By John Maggs

October 28, 2010 | Politico

URL: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1010/44268.html

BP spill is a teachable moment

Despite the fact that Obama has not been forceful or swift enough in pressuring BP, this spill nevertheless demonstrates why we need Big Guvmint. No matter how wimpy Obama has been, if it weren't for him, the situation would be much worse.

Just imagine if Rand Paul were getting his way right now, and the federal gov't was being all laissez-faire and relying on BP's good conscience and victim's legal claims to resolve the spill. Imagine if Obama had let "the market" solve the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history, i.e. imagine he had done nothing.

Horrific.

This is a teachable moment, folks. We're seeing that, left unto themselves, big corporations have no interest in the public interest. They are simply not set up that way. There is no mechanism or incentive for them to think that way; that's not their job. That's government's job.

Ironically, Obama's pressuring BP to set up a $20 billion fund for victims of its spill has helped BP's stock. Investors hate uncertainty, and now the future of BP looks more certain. It never would have occurred to BP to set up this fund on its own, if it could have done the "smart" thing and dragged this case out in court for years or even decades and delayed any hit to its corporate bottom line.

Obama Making BP Pay Is Good Government, and That's Why Republicans and the Corporate Media Are Freaking Out

Obama's hardline move on BP is exactly what government is supposed to do; whatever it can, within the limits of the law, to protect its citizens' interests.

By Joshua Holland

June 25, 2010 | AlterNet

IRS audits of big corporations down since '05

Even though "on an hour-by-hour basis, IRS audits of all corporations show that misreported tax dollars among the giants came to $9,354 per auditor hour," the big scary IRS has cut back on audits of big corporations (w. assets of $250 M or more) by 33 percent since FY 2005.

Meanwhile, "audit hours for the small companies (less than $10 million in assets) jumped by 30 percent and the hours devoted to examining mid-size companies (assets of $10 million to less than $250 million) increased by 13 percent."

This is not how you win friends, influence people, and fill federal coffers with unpaid taxes. You can call me a class warrior for saying this, but it makes sense both fiscally and morally to spend resources auditing the big fish in our economy first.

The authors attribute this discrepancy to perverse incentives in the IRS to do more, quicker audits, which they can accomplish by focusing on small and medium-sized businesses. A more cynical explanation is that bigger corporations have more political pull that they can use to avoid IRS audits.

Despite Rising Deficits, IRS Audits of the Largest and Richest Corporations Decline

TRAC IRS

URL: http://trac.syr.edu/tracirs/newfindings/v15/

California's budget crisis is a warning to supply-siders

Clearly California's state legislature has a pro-business agenda, and has had for about 20 years. We are now seeing the combined disastrous effects of recession and "supply-side" tax policy in California, the world's 8th largest economy. California is a bellwether for the U.S. and should serve as a warning to those preaching irresponsible fiscal policy in the name of economic growth.

66% of respondents in a recent poll said that Americans are overtaxed. And teabaggers argue incessantly that we are overtaxed, and that the situation is only getting worse.

That's true -- but only if you're poor! For instance, in California, the bottom 20% of earners pays 11.1% of income in local taxes, whereas California's top 1% of earners pays 7.8%. If you added in FICA for the two groups, the disparity would only get worse.

Check out this amazing post by business writer Michael Mandel which shows the average tax burden for the whole U.S. economy is actually the lowest it's been since 1966.

Even the anti-tax Tax Foundation admits that so-called "Tax Freedom Day" (the day in the year when the average U.S. worker starts earning for himself after paying all taxes) is the earliest it's been since at least 1971.

The answer is not to raise everybody's taxes, but to increase taxes on the rich and corporations, who are paying less than their fair share, historically. Indeed, the U.S. Government Accountability Office reported in 2008 that 72% of all foreign corporations and about 57% of U.S. companies doing business in the U.S. paid no federal income taxes for at least one year between 1998 and 2005. And in 2005 about 25% of the largest U.S. companies paid no federal income taxes despite $1.1 trillion in gross sales. Recently Forbes noted that huge global companies like Exxon and G.E. paid no U.S. income tax in 2009.

Supply-siders and business gurus like JPMorgan Chase's chief executive sleazeball Jamie Dimon respond that if gov't raised their taxes from, well, zero to some egregious number greater than zero, that corporations would simply pass on this cost to consumers and hold it back from workers. But workers are being denied the benefits of pro-business, supply-side tax policy right now!

And indeed, very few have mentioned stagnant wages as a cause of the Great Recession, and not a result: without growth in wages, U.S. households have had no choice but to borrow to finance the 70% of U.S. GDP which is private consumption. Wall Street banks were happy to provide them credit, as long as it was speculatively profitable. Then we all know what happened next.

This liberal for one trusts Big Guvmint more to redistribute their wealth than corporations themselves, who are obviously, inarguably, doing a terrible job of it. Social Security and Medicare make up about half of the federal budget and they are overwhelmingly popular programs that nobody -- left, right, or center -- really wants to cut. They are so important that it's hard to make a rational cost-benefit analysis, because we'd only know how much suffering and privation these programs prevented if we abolished them -- a prospect so frightening, nobody wants to contemplate it.

California's poor pay the highest tax rate

By Martin Wisckol

April 13, 2010 | The Orange County Register

California households in the lowest 20 percent of income pay the highest portion of their earnings when it comes to state and local taxes, according to a new report from the California Budget Project.

Additionally, changes in state tax law have benefited corporations while costing individual taxpayers more, according to the report. And the net income of corporations has grown 411 percent from 2001 to 2008, while the adjusted gross income income of individuals has risen just 27.8 percent during the period.

The report rates California a "moderate tax state," noting that in 2008-09 it ranks 21st in the U.S. in terms of state taxes as a percentage of personal income.

At a time when many Republican candidates are calling for more tax breaks for businesses and lower taxes for individuals, the California Budget Project offers a somewhat different perspective. The CBP has a history of presenting data that often supports policies on the Democratic side of the aisle, but its methodology and research are usually sound.

However, the CBP's latest report does not appear to contradict the GOP mantra that the state's problem is not income, but spending.

Among specific findings:

• The bottom fifth in family income pay 11.1 percent of their earnings in state and local taxes.
• The top 1 percent pay 7.8 percent.
• The state's median wage has risen 25.6 percent from 2001 to 2008.

"Over the past two decades, the cost of funding state services has shifted from corporate to personal income taxpayers. The Department of Finance estimates that personal income tax receipts will provide 53.2 percent of General Fund revenues in 2009-2010, up from 35.4 percent in 1980-81. Corporate tax receipts are expected to provide 10.7 percent of General Fund revenues in 2009-2010, down from 14.6 percent in 1980-81."

The report continues, "New, increased, and expanded corporate tax breaks and the 1996 corporate tax rate reduction are responsible for the decline in the share of state revenues provided by the corporate income tax. Additional corporate tax cuts were included in the September 2008 and February 2009 budget agreements that will result in a loss of nearly $2 billion per year when fully implemented."

Meanwhile, the Tea Party activists say everybody is being taxed too much. Read this story about what's ahead for the movement.

First corporation runs for political office

They've even got a "designated human." It's the future now.

First "Corporate Person" Runs for Political Office
By Brooke Jarvis
February 1, 2010 YES! Magazine

URL: http://www.yesmagazine.org/blogs/brooke-jarvis/first-corporate-person-runs-for-political-office?utm_source=wkly20100205&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=descr_mrJarvis

Rush: 'Freedom is coming out of its coma'

Let me ask you: do you feel freer after this Supreme Court decision? Do you feel, like Rush said, "that the muzzle is off the American people now?" Do you seriously feel, like he does, that "freedom is coming out of its coma" thanks to this ruling? Does anybody seriously believe, as the SC majority argued, that the American people are going to make better informed political decisions now that the cap on corporate campaign spending has been ripped off? Is there some vital information we have been lacking about the candidates that corporations are just dying to tell us, but couldn't because 100 years of legal precedent and statutory law have kept them muzzled? We'll soon find out. (Lord save us.)

Corporations have been free to make issue ads; they have been free to inform the public to their heart's content. But they weren't allowed to make the connection between issues and candidates. They were not allowed, under statutory law, to advocate for political candidates without spending and time restrictions. So this ruling is not about free speech; it is about political influence. And now, thanks to Justices Kennedy, Roberts, et al, we have less influence and rich corporations have more.

You know, the right likes to say our Founding Fathers were all geniuses and masters of the English language, so if they had meant for money = speech, why didn't they just say so? If they had meant for corporations = people with all the same rights, why didn't they say so? (Modern limited liability corporations didn't exist in the 18th century, but their forebears, called charter companies, did.)

Even arch-conservative former Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist once warned that treating corporate spending as the First Amendment equivalent of individual free speech is "to confuse metaphor with reality."

This is not to mention that corporations are global; they do not have U.S. "citizenship" like you and I do. Foreign ownership of U.S. corporations more than doubled between 1996 and 2005. So now Islamist oil sheiks and Chinese billionaires will be free to play the ponies and place their bets on their favorite U.S. political candidates. (And you siwwy Wepubwicans thought Charlie Trie, Johnny Chung, Huang and Riady were a threat to our national security!)

What's more, as Justice Stevens in the minority noted, "corporations have no consciences, no beliefs, no feelings, no thoughts, no desires" like real human beings do; and "they are not themselves members of 'We the People' by whom and for whom our Constitution was established."

Anyway, it's no surprise Rush is ecstatic about this decision, because it's a fact that corporations donate more to Republicans. Contributions from unions and not-for-profits are a drop in the bucket. We're all screwed.

Freedom Awakens from Coma
January 21, 2010 | Rush Limbaugh

RUSH: Freedom is awaking from its coma today because of a huge, huge, huge Supreme Court decision -- huge. I cannot tell you how big this is. It's a 5-4 decision. The decision was written by Justice Kennedy. And what it does, it removes limits on independent expenditures that are not coordinated with candidate's campaigns. Meaning corporations and not-for-profits can spend any amount of money they want running ads and there's no limit as to when those ads can be run.

So McCain-Feingold takes a huge hit today. Now, the question of campaign contributions directly to candidates was not part of this decision because it was not before the court. So the issue was issue advocacy ads by nonprofit corporations, the Citizens United in this case, but it covers all nonprofits and all for-profit corporations. I'm going to go through it here pretty much line by line just to show you how profound this decision is.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Now, I want you to hear this from Jeff Toobin. He is the legal analyst at CNN. The left is just agog, they are beside themselves that freedom is coming out of its coma today, is awakening from its coma with this Supreme Court decision, which I'm going to get into after the break. But I want to show you how upset that Toobin is and the left really are. Toobin is in crisis here.

TOOBIN: It's really not just the 20-year-old ruling from 1990, it's more like a hundred years of regulation of the way corporations are prohibited from being involved in the political process. It's really bigger than 20 years, it's more like a hundred years of precedent being overturned. It basically says money is speech and corporations are people, both of which are debatable propositions but both of which seem to be, you know, popular at the Supreme Court at the moment.

RUSH: What's debatable about corporations are people and money is speech? Those two things are inarguable, that's what the court said by 5-4 with Kennedy, who is the swing vote. He wrote the opinion here. That is significant. He's right, by the way. This turns over 100 years of precedent. You know how anti-corporatist the left is; you know how they hate corporations. This, folks, is causing ulcers. I can't tell you what this decision is doing today to these leftists who just a year ago, they had such high hopes that they're going to have every CEO in jail and every soldier in jail and it's just in one year, because the people of this country are not socialists. The people of this country still have roots to freedom and entrepreneurism and liberty, and nothing -- the left, Obama -- nothing can snuff that out.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: The Supreme Court decision is a defeat. I'll tell you, it's a defeat, ladies and gentlemen, for the fascists, the statists who seek to control our property, our bodies, and our speech. It is a defeat for Senator McCain. The muzzle is off the American people now because they, in fact, can spend the money on advocacy ads prior to the general and primary elections. It is a 100-year-old precedent that has been overturned. It is solid in that respect.

Citizens United produced an advocacy commercial about Hillary Clinton, which they wanted to run before the primaries. The question was whether it violated McCain-Feingold's ban as some kind of a political commercial. The Supreme Court said such advocacy by Citizens United and other groups is protected constitutional speech, but the opinion addresses more than that. The court says, "The law provides an outright ban backed by criminal and civil sanctions, including nonprofit corporations to either expressly advocate the election or defeat of candidates or to broadcast electioneering communications within 30 days of a primary, 60 days of a general election." These would be felonies and the court struck these down. The court struck down all the limits on where you can advertise, when you can advertise, and how much you can spend on this advertisement.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

[...]

You gotta understand, folks. See, I know liberals -- I know these cockroaches -- and I'm telling you, this just has them boiling today. You add the fact that everything's falling apart and going wrong for Obama. I mean, you go back one year ago almost to the day. Hell, it is one year ago to the day. No, it's one year plus a day. Nevertheless, they thought they were in power in perpetuity. Forever. They had their messiah and it was going to change this country forever -- and now the American people have said: No way. They've learned what this was all about and they're saying: No way. This court decision has these people fuming. "The government may not impose restrictions on certain disfavored speakers based on the wealth or lack thereof of speakers. The public has the right..." The court said, "The public has the right to obtain all kinds of information from the widest number of sources."

[...]

Liberalism itself has just been struck down, this whole notion of "fairness" based on who has more than somebody else or who has less than somebody else, who's bigger than somebody else. There is no precedent for advantaging certain corporations and disadvantaging others respecting speech. Speech is speech. There's the First Amendment. It doesn't matter how much money you have or how big you are, there is no restriction permitted on it. They are really hammering away here, folks. This is pretty sweeping. This is landmark, I would call it. "The law's purpose and effect is to prevent small and large corporations, for profit and not-for-profit, from presenting facts and opinions to the public. There is no constitutional support for this." Struck down. "The law's purpose..." This is McCain-Feingold they're talking about.

McCain-Feingold's "purpose and effect as to prevent small and large corporations, for profit and not-for-profit, from presenting facts and opinions to the public. There is no constitutional support for this." You know, I think back. One of the things that Senator McCain always said was, "You know, money corrupts the system. These good people come to Washington and money corrupts them." We have perhaps the most corrupt presidential administration I've seen in a long time. What does money have to do with it? Is it not their ideas? Is it not their desires that are corrupting them? Is it not who they are that's corrupt? By the way, another reason you know this is a great, great piece of Supreme Court reasoning is that Chuck-U Schumer is livid. Chuck-U is beside himself over this. Chuck-U doesn't like the Constitution. Only his endless speeches are worthy of protection.

[...]

There's a lot more to this, ladies and gentlemen. But the important thing here is it's a 5-4 decision, and Anthony Kennedy wrote the opinion for the majority, which is significant. It's as good a decision as anybody could have hoped for. It's sweeping, and it is landmark.

BREAK TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: You gotta hear this. Chuck-U Schumer is livid, livid over the Supreme Court decision which takes away all the bans on whatever amount of money corporations want to spend on advertising in political campaigns. He just hates it.

SCHUMER: The Supreme Court has just predetermined the winners of next November's elections. It won't be Republicans; it won't be Democrats. It will be corporate America. Our system of government's the best in the world due to the ability of average citizens to participate and engage their elected officials without the belief that there are corrupting influences at play. I have not seen a decision that more undermines campaign finance and is probably one of the three or four decisions in the history of the Supreme Court that most undermines democracy. We will regret the day that this decision has been issued.

RUSH: Quite the contrary, Chuck-U. Freedom is awakening from its coma today. This does not "undermine democracy." It strengthens it.

Supreme Court decided 5-4 to destory U.S. democracy

Gee, do you think conservatives will bitch about "judicial activism" and "legislating from the bench" after this decision, which will overturn McCain-Feingold and 100 years of legal precedent and statutory law?

Methinks not.

Get ready for an all new America. Kinda like the old America, only more of the same, and worse -- where your views aren't worth two s**ts wrapped in a one-dollar bill.

Rep. Alan Grayson, just about the only Democrat with balls in Washington, has pre-emptively introduced 5 bills in anticipation of Dubya's Supreme Court opening the gates of hell to overrun our democracy. Check it out, and write your Congressmen to get on board, or we're all f***ed.

(Meanwhile, Obama has promised a "forceful response" to the SC decision. Uh-oh. Somehow Wall Street is going to get a few $ billion out of this, I just know it.)

Supreme Court Rips Up Campaign Finance Laws

By Deborah Tedford
January 21, 2009 | NPR

URL: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=122805666

Grayson's pre-emptive strike against SC campaign finance ruling

You know that I believe that all campaigns should be publicly financed. If the SC removes all restrictions on corporate to political campaigns, then we'll have a completely bought-and-paid-for political system. You and I won't matter at all.

Alan Grayson Introduces Bills To Fight Corporate Money In Politics

By Arthur Delaney

January 14, 2009 | Huffington Post

Anticipating a Supreme Court decision that could free corporations to spend unlimited amounts of money on political campaigns, Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) introduced five bills on Wednesday to choke off the expected flood of corporate cash.

"We are facing a potential threat to our democracy," Grayson said in an interview with HuffPost. "Unlimited corporate spending on campaigns means the government is up for sale and that the law itself will be bought and sold. It would be political bribery on the largest scale imaginable."

At issue in the Supreme Court case is whether the government can limit corporate spending during presidential and congressional campaigns. The case is pitting Citizens United, a conservative group, against the Federal Election Commission. The FEC banned ads for Citizens United's film bashing Hillary Clinton during the 2008 election season.

Grayson introduced a handful of bills on Wednesday -- the Business Should Mind Its Own Business Act, the Corporate Propaganda Sunshine Act, the End Political Kickbacks Act, and two other measures.

The Business Should Mind Its Own Business Act would impose a 500 percent excise tax on corporate contributions to political committees and on corporate expenditures on political advocacy campaigns. The Corporate Propaganda Sunshine Act would require public companies to report what they spend to influence public opinion on any matter other than the promotion of their goods and services. The End Political Kickbacks Act would restrict political contributions by government contractors.

The other measures would apply antitrust regulations to political committees and bar corporations from securities exchanges unless the corporation is certified in compliance with election law.

"This case is basically about an effort to get around that. Citizens United took corporate money and tried to influence an election," said Lisa Gilbert of the U.S. Public Interest Research Group. "These are all pieces of good policy. I hope they draw attention to the potential frightening implications of Citizens United."

ABCNews reported on Wednesday that Democratic leadership is hard at work on a legislative response to the Supreme Court's expected ruling. Grayson told HuffPost that he had consulted with leadership before launching his preemptive strike.

Jeff Patch, a spokesman for the Center for Competitive Politics, an organization that advocates for lifting campaign finance restrictions, said Grayson's bills were too focused on corporate spending. "These are totally targeted at corporations, but Citizens United is widely believed to affect corporations and unions and nonprofits equally."

Grayson disagreed. "One year's profit for Exxon is greater than the entire political expenditure of all unions put together," he said.

Grayson added that he wanted to send the message that people are paying attention to the Supreme Court.

"This issue transcends the usual political arguments. I don't think the teabaggers would be very happy if our government was bought and paid for by a huge national corporation," he said.

The Supreme Court's ruling, which has been expected for months, could come as soon as Jan. 20.

Don't let them tell you U.S. economy doesn't suck

Damn, this guy's good.

How the Financially Connected Prospered in a Decade where Wealth Evaporated for the Majority: S&P 500 Down 24 Percent for the Decade, Real Home Values down 3%, U.S. Dollar down 23%, and Unemployment back to 1980 Levels.
Posted by mybudget360

As we usher in the New Year the filthy rich are counting their blessings and must be very appreciative of the massive bailouts that protected their wealth. The top one percent of this country control 42 percent of all financial wealth so it shouldn't come as any surprise that most of the bailouts went to Wall Street and those that are tethered to it for income. As the stock market continues to rally Americans collecting food stamps stands at the highest number ever at 37 million. We also have 27 million Americans looking for work or are simply stringing a few hours together to keep some sort of paycheck coming in. The vast majority of Americans are simply exhaling a sigh of relief that the 2000s are now a thing of the past. Yet if something isn't changed radically in our system we are bound to enter another financial shock in the near term.

First, the S&P 500 is down a stunning 24.1 percent since the start of the decade. Yet Goldman Sachs managed to pull off almost an 80 percent gain during the same time:

So for the poor average American who simply dollar cost averaged into the stock market as every good corporatocracy banker would tell them, they would have fallen behind someone who simply dollar cost averaged into their mattress. Yet if you happened to dump your money with the government sponsored and back stopped Goldman Sachs you would have done much better. Ironically these bankers are the same people who created the financial instruments that sent our economy into a tailspin.

The average American is finally realizing that much of the corporate power in Washington is doing very little for them and doing more and more for Wall Street. So the stock market over the decade brought negative returns to Americans. How did the housing market do?

The median U.S. home price in November of 1999 came in at $137,600 and ended November 2009 at $172,600. This 25 percent gain is wiped out once we factor in the Federal Reserve inflating away the U.S. Dollar. Housing over the decade is actually down 3 percent. This is where the largest store of the average American wealth is stashed and it went negative for the decade. Yet somehow the ultra rich seemed to make out like bandits with all the bailouts even though are economy was still fizzling out from two mega bubbles. There is a reason they call it a golden parachute.

Let us recap. The stock market brought negative returns both nominally and in real terms for the decade and housing is actually down in real terms. So how did Americans do over the decade in the employment front?

The unemployment rate is the highest it has been since the early 1980s. If we look at the employment population ratio we will see that our economy is still trending to the downside. Yet the corporatocracy is happy to feed the propaganda line that the average American is better off. Really? How so? Once the bubble decade wealth imploded the typical American is now in a worse position. The national debt also exploded during this decade. So housing values cratered, the stock market is still massively down, and employment is still in shambles. Yet we are to believe things are just fine. People are now finally waking up to the reality that the current system is designed to rip them off and steal from them at every point in the road.

Take credit cards and bailouts for example. Some credit card companies are hiking fees up on customers before new regulations hit this year. These are the same companies that benefitted handsomely from the corporatocracy bailouts. This money came from the average American yet they are sticking it to them each and every other way. For example, last month I was stuck by a "savings withdrawal fee" from Chase. I never saw this before. So I called up the bank and asked them what this was. It amounted to a $12 fee for each transaction. As it turns out, the wonderful Federal Reserve through Regulation D yanks money out for people making more than 6 ACH transfers per month from savings accounts. So if you wanted to move your money from say your toxic too big to fail bank to say a local community bank, make sure you don't do more than 6 transfers for the month or you are going to be hit with a $12 fee for this. Insane policies like this make me realize that something is going to give in this decade.

But over the decade our U.S. dollar must have gone up right? Let us take a look:

The U.S. dollar is down 23.5 percent for the decade. So if any of you actually left the country and spent abroad you would quickly realize how weak the dollar has gotten. This has to do with the massive government spending over the decade. Over the holiday Congress voted to up the debt ceiling since we are breaking through every imaginable barrier possible. Take a look at this below chart:

We went from $5.7 trillion to over $12 trillion in Federal government public debt in 10 years. And what did we really get? We just went through countless data points and where are we better off? The reality is the money is being dumped into the vortex of the banking and corporate interest that run this country. It is amazing that even with unemployment claims the media is championing this as a good sign yet they don't even bother to look at emergency unemployment claims that are flying off the chart! That is, they are focusing once again on the wrong data.

So it is going to be a challenging decade for average Americans. The economy flew off the cliff and instead of reforming the system things are back to normal and the corporatocracy keeps on stealing from the population. The mega wealthy are doing fine and the gap between rich and poor is the largest it has been since the Great Depression. Welcome to the new gilded age. Our lost decade is now in the bag. Are we up for another one? Let us hope not.

Hybrid socialist-capitalist Monster Fed in the making

This scares me:

... putting the Federal Reserve in charge as super-regulator is the path that leads to the corporate state. A limited circle of privileged players would enjoy a permanent line of credit from Washington, while their competitors in business and finance would struggle at great disadvantage. This top-down economy would combine the worst qualities of both socialism and capitalism.

More Easy Money for Wall Street
By William Greider
December 9, 2009 | The Nation

URL: http://www.thenation.com/doc/20091221/greider