Category: Politics

Happy Days are here again: and the banks roll on

obama

If you’ve been watching the headlines on the economic front, you may have seen the news about record bank profits in the first quarter of the year to the tune of $40.3 billion, an all time high.  In fact, profits surged 15.8% over the same quarter a year ago. This marks the 14th straight quarter of bank gains. In short, the bailed out banks (you and I paid for that), are making money hand-over-fist.  Not so, mainstream America.

Meanwhile, in the past 12 months, scandal- ridden JP Morgan has garnered $24.4 billion in net profit, evidencing once again that banks could evade laws with impunity.  The precedent, after all, had been the release of the 2000 page examiner’s report on Lehman Brothers in 2010,  suggesting fraud had brought about its bankruptcy, yet nothing was done.

You’d never have expected hand-outs from the Obama administration, given their campaign pledges to look out for us po’folk and their left of center politics.  Their hand-outs, not loans, to banks and other fiscal institutions, are shockingly in the trillions, with $85 billion dished out every month from the Federal Reserve.

But then again, we can better understand the forces in play when we look at the cohorts Obama gathered about himself:  Jacob Lew, former Citigroup executive, appointed deputy secretary of state, with a cool $900,000 bonus in his pocket from Citigroup;  Mark Patterson, Goldman Sachs lobbyist, made chief of staff at the Treasury, despite a ban on lobbyists;  Timothy Geithner, who became the architect of the bailouts, appointed as Treasury secretary, even after it was discovered he hadn’t fully paid his taxes;  Larry Summers, who authored many of the pro-bank policies of the nineties, recruited as a mainstay economic advisor; and Rahm Emmanuel, appointed Chief of Staff, after gleaning $16.5 million as a Chicago investment banker in just 30 months in-between government jobs. All of them Democrats.  All of them with dirty hands.  

At the present moment, Larry Summers is being touted as the next Federal Reserve Chairman, replacing the retiring Ben Bernanke.  A long time Goldman Sachs executive and trader, he played a primary role in deregulating Wall Street in the Clinton administration.

So far, and probably never will happen, not a single bank or CEO has been brought to account for their criminal mismanagement of the people’s money, leading to the 2008 meltdown and consequent suffering for millions of Americans. Their suffering continues.

Now you would think from the President’s major address on the economy this month that happy days are here again for you and me, what with his boast of 7.2 million new jobs created in the business sector in the last four years.  But politicians do prevaricate, and it’s up to you and me to hold their feet to the fire.  Fact is, long term unemployment is at its highest level since the Great Depression, and of the newly minted jobs, most are low wage (often in the service sector), temporary, or part-time.

Curiously, nowhere did the President mention the plight of Detroit facing bankruptcy and the possible erosion of pension and health benefits for the city’s workers, including police and fire personnel.

To give him his due, he did allude to the growing income disparity between the rich and the majority of Americans:

Even though our businesses are creating new jobs and have broken record profits, nearly all the income gains of the past ten years have continued to flow to the top 1 percent. The average CEO has gotten a raise of nearly 40 percent since 2009, but the average American earns less than he or she did in 1999. And companies continue to hold back on hiring those who have been out of work for some time.

But how did this happen?  He didn’t mention government’s largesse to the wealthy through bank bail outs, corporate tax breaks, and reduced wages for autoworkers.  In the first two years of the President’s tenure, or after the downturn of 2008, the richest one percent enjoyed an 11% increase in income, unlike the rest of Americans whose incomes declined.

Again, nobody’s been minding the store.  In 2011, the Senate Permanent Subcommittee  noted Wall Street’s culpability just prior to the 2008 market collapse as “a financial snakepit rife with greed, conflicts of interest and wrongdoing.”

While it may appear that things are humming along nicely, the banks booming, the real estate market up, stocks at their peak, the reality is that more than 3 million of us can’t find work.  Those who do, work for less, often part-time.  Many, particularly those 50 and over, may never work again.  Black youth unemployment is currently at 42 %.

Several million Americans have been foreclosed upon by the banks, losing their biggest investment stake and, sometimes, a whole lot more.  Many others owe the banks for houses purchased at inflated prices, now worth considerably less.

But the banks roll on, too big to take on, as Attorney General Eric Holder recently let slip. What’s more, their lobbyist legions do their work well, busy button-holing members of Congress.  It’s a game of money, always has been, money spelling influence.  It’s America, you know.

This just  in:  The President remains committed to slashing Medicare by $400 billion and Social Security by $130 billion in his projected 2014 budget.  (In 2008, candidate Obama had pledged, reiterated by Biden in 2012, that he wouldn’t cut Social Security.)  Apparently, the bankers are a privileged class; the people, expendable to the exigencies  of  power and influence.

-rj

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When media masquerades

Following Tuesday’s State of the Union speech, the Republicans delivered the customary rebuttal, this year, featuring Senator Marco Rubio as their spokesperson.  Then came the now infamous water bottle moment, washing away not only Rubio’s thirst and whatever substantive remarks he made, but possibly notions of his fitness to seek higher office in 2016.  Mind you, I’m not a Republican, nor a Democrat either, having voted the Green Party last November.  I do, however, have a sense of fair play and I found the media’s persistent, even gleeful replay of a human moment thoroughly annoying and partisan.

I don’t know  about you, but sometimes I prefer avoiding the mass media altogether, since it frequently seems to thrive on the negative and sensational to the point of hinting at animosity, or an underbelly of petty meanness analogous to an undercurrent of daily life manifesting itself in the personality that enjoys another’s fall, the venom of daily gossip with fondness for spilling confidences, speculation, insinuation, ridicule and invasion of privacy or creeping over every fence and peering into every window. Its dynamics, whether public or private, are worth exploring, since they have a human origin. The media likewise strays when it embraces advocacy journalism driven by concealed biases or panders to special interest groups or omits asking the right questions.

Like many of you, Karen and I have recently caught-up with Downton Abbey, TV’s highbrow soap opera that has hooked millions in Britain and America (second in viewers to this year’s Superbowl).  Weaving its spell through subtle intra-episode suspense played out in a facsimile of Edwardian elegance contesting with working class aspirations, its characters, all of them, major or minor, are remarkably chiseled into a sharpened relief, foregrounding their composite individuality, and avoiding stereotype.  As with Shakespere’s Iago, insinuation rather than outright deed works its scourge among some of them. Thomas and O’Brien come to mind as primary instigators, motivated by malice, fomenting innuendo.

As such, they’re not strikingly different from an errant press.  Appropriately, one of Downton Abbey’s other candidates for “dishonorable mention” is Sir Richard Carlisle, hard-ball, newspaper mogul who thrives on scandalizing adversaries, influence peddling, and unbridled intimidation.  He decides what makes or doesn’t make news, as his personal needs dictate.  We are not far from how real media works to manipulate opinion or affirm its biases or cast its critics into disrepute.

While I fervently believe in a free press, devotee that I am of John Stuart Mill (On Liberty), I’ve become wiser with the vintage of my years as to its capabilities for abuse as in outing a CIA operative and endangering intelligence sources in adversary nations; or of unbalanced reporting, whether by design or neglect; or of slanting the news through connotative nuance; or of a more sinister modus operandi of interpretive journalism pursuing an a priori agenda of prejudices.

I wish I had time and space to write more fully on the press, both as to its assets and liabilities; but suffice it to say, there lies a latent psychology underlying its behavior, since it’s so human in its making.  Putting ourselves on the alert, we diminish its power to manipulate us.

Be well,

rj

Is government planning to nationalize the pension system?

Currently, rumors have been floating like broom-seated witches in the wind that the government wants to not only overhaul America’s pension system, but replace it with its own.  Nationalization then is the buzz word here.  Private plans such as IRAs and 401(k)s would ultimately be eliminated (National Seniors Council).

How tenable are such rumors?  We do know that the Labor Department has been looking at pension reform, soliciting input from several interests such as the AFL-CIO, who are urging more government regulation of private retirement accounts and maybe replacing 401(k)s, for example, with government annuities.  Some on the Left argue that 401(k)s and IRA’s discriminate against the poor.

Those on the right, however, fear that the government would set-up its pension annuities similar to Social Security, which is invariably used as a slush fund to buoy up government spending.  Benefit taxes would be subject to a sliding scale based on individual or family income. In short, redistribution would be built in.

Now let me give my view, not necessarily pleasant, but hardly fraught with fear-mongering conspiracies of a Marxist coup d’etat.

Yes, government is seeking to overhaul the pension system, but only to generate more revenue.   Huge deficits can’t continue without having to pay the piper.  Ask the Europeans.  Washington isn’t interested in nationalizing the pension system, though Argentina is about to do it, or eliminating private pension options.

Let’s take your IRA or 401(k), for an example of the way government sees them as potential sources for increased revenue.  At age 70.5, you have to make regular withdrawals known as “required minimum distributions”.  You pay a tax on those withdrawals, but they can be strung out over a very long duration, depriving the government of revenue.

As is, present contributions to 401(k)s are anticipated to swell tax deferrals by the billions in coming years.  For instance, backtracking to fiscal 2011, deferrals resulted in an estimated $111.7 billion revenue loss.  For 401(k)s alone, the loss is put at $67.1 billion (egis.ebscolhost.com).

Then there’s that issue of fairness I mentioned at the outset.  While you’re currently allowed in 2013 to contribute as much as $17,500 and a catch-up contribution of $5,500 for those age 50 or over, how many of us can actually contribute anywhere near the maximum?  But the rich can and do, reaping substantial tax benefits.  It’s the old formula perhaps that money makes money.

I think you get the picture.  Even here in Kentucky where I live, state government is looking for increased revenue sources too.  Currently, it’s on the drawing board to tax Social Security benefits just like the federal government.  By the way, while some states may seem tax havens for retirees,  know that laws can change.  Right now, Kentucky’s Homestead Exemption Act provides a break in taxes on property assessed value for senior citizens at age 65.  Even that isn’t chiseled in granite.  In 2011, Minnesota dropped their provision.

Conspiracy?  Socialist take-over?  No way!  The fact is that we live in lean times.  The challenge is then to cut spending meaningfully and fairly and safely.  But how you do that in a long-term marginal economy has thus far eluded resolution.

rj

My conversion to the Left

Let me tell you of my conversion to the Left

1.  The Great Recession:  Our worst economic crisis since the stock market collapse in 1928, its genesis clearly lies with Wall Street speculators and the banking industry.  With dollar signs for eyeballs, they lured many home buyers, often minorities, into high end mortgages fabricated by a bubble market swelled by over investment.  Subprime and adjusted rate mortgages flourished.  Ultimately, there were too many houses out there, reducing home mortgage values and, boom, the stock market debacle of 2008.  I believe government banking reform might have preempted this crisis.

2.   The transfer of wealth:  Whatever gains in wealth we’ve made over the last 30 years have largely benefitted the wealthy.   The collapse of the housing market is just one  recent example, with middle class buyers exchanging their already limited capital for long-term indebtedness on over priced homes.  While they may think they own their own homes, the reality is the banks own them for up to the next 30 years; in most cases, at huge profit.  Just do the math.  Ironically, the financiers responsible for the collapse have gotten away with their greed, some of them bailed out with tax payer money, even as they show no such charity towards those who default.  Their current vogue is to buy up these foreclosures for potential investment, particularly by foreigners.  Meanwhile, millions of other below-water “homeowners” struggle to honorably meet their monthly payments on houses no longer worth their purchase price in states where they have no recourse.

3.  Tax inequity:  Is it fair that a candidate for the presidency worth $240 million, owning several mansions, and with $100 million invested for his sons,  should pay at a tax rate of only 14% on his income in the last two years while many of us with median middle class incomes pay proportionately more?  This is but one example that surely could be multiplied by the thousands privileged to enjoy loopholes you and I can’t access.  Even social security gets rigged in their favor, with the salary max for social security taxes on 2012 income capped at $110, 000.  Talk about a windfall for the rich!

4.  Deficient health care:  Even the progressive Health Care Reform Act (to be fully implemented in 2014),  fails to remedy what ails us–the lack of a single payer system such as Canada enjoys with consequential lower costs and universal access.  As a fallout, you and I pay more for health care than in any of the developed nations,  concurrently with limited options.  I’m a retiree on Medicare, for example, yet must pay out of my pocket fully for eye glasses and hearing aids.  And then there are the ever escalating medical costs for all Americans far in access of annual inflation.  I say we can do better.

5.   Foreign policy:  We’re meddlers strutting our imperialism with a Daddy knows all approach.  We lavish more on the military than all the world’s countries combined, including Russia and China.  We’re beholden to Israel, an apartheid nation that would happily snare us into waging their conflicts for them and is busy killing Gaza civilians as I write.   In America, every decade seems to threaten a new war.  Now there’s pending trouble with Iran.  Our children bleed and die.  Iraq was a terrible folly and Afghanistan seems increasingly pointless.  We got our man.  Let’s go home.  Now!

6.  Environment:  Those on the Right simply laugh off or prove indifferent to climate change, some even proclaiming it a hoax.  For them, it’s business as usual, with profits their end-game.  As such, they remind me of those anti-evolution die-heads of years ago, still latent in today’s creationists.  While a few may admit to climate change, they downgrade its human component.  More coal, more oil.  Now their rage for Keystone. For the sake of a wounded Earth and for future generations, I cast my lot with the Left in its vibrancy as to what’s at stake..

7.  The crazies:  Conservatives, neo-cons, tea party devotees–they make me shiver–all those tirades against pro-choice, gays, immigrants, stem cell research, health care reform;  denigrators of the UN, deniers of global warming, the need for cap and trade, alternative fuels, they wed themselves to the past.  I dislike, too, their moral politics fettered to a religious view:  the creationists conflating theism with science, the zealots for capital punishment while decrying abortion; the unfeeling purists on death with dignity legislation, which they defeated in my native state of Massachusetts two weeks ago.  It’s company I choose not to keep.  I  prefer the affirmers, not the deniers; those who foster fairness and reconciliation, not callousness and division; those who champion change, not stultifying tradition; those who embrace optimism, not pessimism.

While I love my country dearly,  I think it can do better.  Like Bruce Springsteen, I’m proud to be born in the USA.  It’s a really great place. That is, if you’re on top.

Be well,

rj

Gov. Jerry Brown confronts global warming skeptics

The election may have ended two weeks ago, but it’s back to business as usual as politicians weigh-in on those crucial bread and butter issues like the environment.

Earlier in the week, our President, usually more astute on global warming and its serious implications, said he’d not prioritize environment over job generation in a down economy.  Two days later, a bipartisan delegation met with the President, urging he approve the Keystone pipeline, a project currently in delay mode pending rerouting to protect sensitive habitat such as Nebraska’s Sandhill Crane Sanctuary.

In all of this, I have to pinch myself to see if I’m awake.  I had thought Romney lost the election!

I can’t speak for you, but I created Brimmings to speak out candidly, come hell or high water, on the salient issues affecting the quality of life for all of us.  As for politics, I can’t say I’m overwhelmed with surprise at these Capitol happenings, given the inveterate chicanery of that sector.  It’s just that I desperately want to find a window I can open to escape the foul air of political expediency bent on kicking the can down the road when it comes to the insidious challenge of climate change, a quandary that isn’t going to vanish simply by ignoring it.  The debates themselves, four of them, yet not one question on the implications of global warming on public policy!  I think the media just plain fell asleep at the wheel.

Occasionally I do find a leader such as California  governor Jerry Brown, willing to open a window on a new vista.  This isn’t a new thing for the governor who has spoken boldly and consistently in cadenced rhetoric on the cruciality of facing-up to this Gorgon that  ultimately threatens to swallow up both Man and Beast.

In August, the Brown administration launched a web site (see under Blogroll/Climate Change), replete with data to refute those denying global warming or our contribution to it.  Find me another governor who’s done something like this.  Find me one Senator or Rep who’s spoken out so boldly, apart from Al Gore, our should-have-been president, now vaporized from the political scene.

Buoyed by the California election results of November 6, which daringly called for a tax increase to reduce the state’s bruising deficit, Brown acknowledged to attendees at last week’s Greenbuild Expo in San Francisco that while “dealing with the environment seems more a luxury than a necessity, my message is the two go hand-in-hand.”

Brown might have equivocated on green issues such as California’s cap and trade legislation, now under legal challenge by business interests in the state, but he did not, again setting him apart from the political herd.

When it comes down to the bottom line, authentic leaders excel in what Vergil called Pietas, or virtue based on self-discipline. I would add ethos, or integrity, a sensibility for total commitment.  I just happen to think Jerry Brown defines these leadership virtues, not just by words, but through example.  This is the governor who, after all, declined residing in the governor’s mansion.

And now, Mr. President, back to you, since the ball’s in your court.  You’ve won a second term, which means you can focus on your place in history, joining a handful of great presidents who chose to lead and hence transform this great nation.

Open a window for us, Mr. President.  Stand fast.  Stand tall!

rj

A Green’s after thoughts

In every election it’s a given someone loses.  My candidate, Jill Stein, didn’t win, but I’m not disappointed.  Four years ago, I couldn’t vote the Green Party option.  It wasn’t a ballot alternative in Kentucky.  This year, the Green Party appeared on 38 state ballots.  Just 12 more to go.

America needs a third party alternative to provide focus on pivotal issues commonly overlooked by Democrats and Republicans relying on expedience rather than principle on issues that include global warming; alternative energy; single payer health care;  corporate and banking reform; tax equity; the growing income gap; immigration reform; and budget management.

On a related front, the Green Party needs to expand its canopy to include support of “Death with Dignity” legislation.  My keen disappointment is the narrow loss of this humane initiative in my birth state of Massachusetts.  In a genuine democracy, personal sovereignty should be a given.  Thus, I had high hopes for Question 2 in a progressive state like Massachusetts.  Its narrow defeat by largely religious interests, however, suggests it will ultimately succeed.

This long campaign, often harsh in its rhetoric, has finally come to its close.  However our candidates fared, we need to seize the higher ground in relentless resolve to fully realize the American Dream of   “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

I wish Obama well.

rj

A choice that matters

And here we are, Election Day, at last.  As I see it, the results will be in, or nearly so, by 9 or 10 pm, EST.  Today’s sophisticated tracking methodologies are such that they rarely fall short of measuring their targets.  While Romney may garner an impressive percentage of the popular vote, he will lose decisively in the electoral one that matters, with Obama snagging  300 electoral votes, maybe more.  In fact, the Electoral College, based on the last five elections, may well doom the party of Lincoln regaining the Presidency any time soon, unless it can broaden its base.  Unfortunately, the Tea Party zealots are not going to vanish any time soon, as Tom Brokaw reminded us yesterday.

For me, the interesting items to monitor embrace my native state of Massachusetts; for example,  the see-saw Senate race between Elizabeth Warren and incumbent Scott Brown.  Normally, Brown would be likely to win, but not in an election to decide the presidency.  Vastly outnumbered by registered Democrats, a Republican Scott victory would require a considerable surge in vote splitting.  That’s one steep mountain climb for the personable Scott, though polls show the race to be remarkably close.

Another nail biter is the public referendum vote before Massachusetts voters on the Death with Dignity, or Question 2, initiative.  Modeled after Oregon’s 15-year old legislation, it boggles my mind that it even got on the ballot, given the state’s heavy Catholic (44%) constituency.  Nationally, as well, Catholic leadership has pummeled the initiative and contributed big money.

My candidate, Jill Stein (Green Party), who also happens to reside in Massachusetts, isn’t going to impact voters very much today, so no suspense there.  But this initiative, characterized by its compassion and intelligent respect for human dignity, deserves passage, regardless of one’s party affiliation.  Two arguments are largely employed by those urging its defeat: the moral and potential abuse.  The latter, however, stems from distortion, since only those with a life-expectancy of six months would be eligible.

What disturbs me most are the lack of empathy and the imposing of religious belief, notably by the Catholic church and many evangelicals, on others.  As such, these interests are not that removed from those of Islamic advocates of Sharia law.  They are certainly not democratic interests in their overriding the individual’s sovereignty to choose for herself.  These elements had fervently opposed even passive euthanasia several decades ago until the Supreme Court changed the landscape.

What’s at stake here is poignantly captured in the testimony of Tim Kutzman, a Unitarian-Universalist pastor in Reading, MA.  In seminary, he was outspokenly anti-physician-suicide.  Then, while visiting his hospitalized congregants, he came upon a new realty in their interminable suffering and desire for release.  Kutzman relates the story of his close friend’s death, theater critic Arthur Friedman, who languishing from Parkinson’s disease, ultimately refused water and food.  “It rocked my world,” says Kutzman, now a staunch advocate of Question 2.  ( Asssociated Press)

In final retrospect, though I’ve lived elsewhere for many years, I’ve never lost my pride in hailing from Massachusetts, a bellwether state renowned for its achievements in education, medicine, high tech and front row advocacy on progressive issues such as Gay Rights.  Thus, what happens in Massachusetts on this issue carries resonance far beyond its boundaries. The opposition knows this well.

And so, knowing the likely outcome of the presidential race, I will nonetheless excitedly be monitoring the results for the initiative in Massachusetts, willing to believe that reason and empathy can once again trump parochial interest and promote human dignity.

Finally, someone I can vote for

“The Green Party is no longer the alternative; the Green Party is the imperative.” (Rosa Clemente)

Hey, I’m only one individual, but isn’t that where we begin–ourselves? The light just popped on. Me, I’m voting Dr. Jill Stein on Tuesday!

I wanted to vote Green Party here in KY back in 2008, but it wasn’t a ballot option then, so I voted Nader. This time, I’ve the option to pull the lever for a better nation and a greener world. I’m voting for transparency, economic equity, corporate and banking scrutiny, alternative energy, single payer health reform, a more peaceful world.

Lincoln famously spoke at Gettysburg of a government “of the people, by the people, for the people.” Come Tuesday, I’m voting not for oil, corporations, hedge funders or banks. I’m voting for the people.

Vote for Obama? Don’t bet he’ll deliver. If you ask why I say this, just scroll down to my September 12 post that gives instances of 500 promises he made in 2008, but didn’t keep.

Romney? Let’s not get silly. This guy’s worth $250 million, yet paid an effective tax rate of only 14% on his 2010 and 2011 income. By the way, Romney owns several luxurious homes, including a $10 million New Hampshire retreat on the shores of Lake Winnipesaukee along with a La Jolla $12 million residence he wants to replace with an 11,000 square foot version, replete with an elevator garage costing 50,000K. But, oh, he cares about you!

The shame of these four debates has been the absence of humanity’s greatest challenge posed not by a nuclear Iran or an expansionist China, but climate change. Excuse the oxymoron, but it’s a silence that echoes a continuing callousness to what is already eroding our future. Meanwhile, hurricane Sandy portends still more to come.

And just who is Jill Stein? You can, of course, go to her website JillStein, but just a few biography tidbits:

Age 62, she hails from Illinois, but has resided in Massachusetts since graduating from Harvard University (magnum cum laude) and Harvard Medical School. A long time instructor in internal medicine and mother of two grown sons, she lives with her husband, Richard Roher, also a physician, in historic Lexington. Dr. Stein first entered into politics when she ran for governor in 2002. She’s authored two well-received medical reports, one of them translated into several languages. Active as a citizen, Dr. Stein has been twice elected to Lexington’s Town Meeting and been in the forefront of health and environment reform efforts. She’s appeared on TV shows such as Today and Fox.

Some would argue a vote for Stein is a vote for Romney, since it’s likely one less vote for Obama. I beg to differ. In some states already in the electoral column for Romney, like Kentucky where I live, casting a Green Party ballot isn’t going to supplant destiny. It does, however, allow me a voice. What it helps assure as well, should we Greens poll 5% nationally, is the infusion of $20 million in federal funding that will help build momentum for building the party and setting the agenda for meaningful social and economic justice. In this year’s tedious march to the election, Greens have been left out of the conversation. A vote for Stein voices our demand for a seat at the table.

Additionally, third parties have their place in the political arena, even though they don’t win. The most recent example was Ross Perot, who gleaned enough of the vote to put Bill Clinton into the White House in ’92. The same again in ’96, when Perot captured 18% of the vote. By the way, Clinton never achieved a 50% majority in either election. On the other hand, Bush, the son, won because there wasn’t any substantive third party opposition, resulting in an election thrown into the Supreme Court in 2000.

Third parties help us draw distinctions. If you took away the party and candidate labels in the recent debates, could you really discern the differences between the candidates?

Third parties, in close elections, teach losers not to play the expediency card. Had Gore tweaked his positions just a bit more to the Left in 2000, he would have conceivably nullified Ralph Nader’s 1%, winning the election outright. Iran? Afghanistan? Conversely, Nader with just that one percent may have altered history. This year’s election doesn’t pose a serious challenge to Obama’s reelection. While the ballot numbers may be dead even, Obama leads in nearly all of the battleground states and will likely achieve a plurality of at least 20 electoral votes beyond the required 270. Rest assured, your vote won’t be wasted in its underscoring of the salient issues.

Let me close with a quote from Pulitzer Prize winning reporter Chris Hedges:

The November election is not a battle between Republicans and Democrats. It is not a battle between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney. It is a battle between the corporate state and us. And if we do not immediately engage in this battle we are finished, as climate scientists have made clear. I will defy corporate power in small and large ways. I will invest my energy now solely in acts of resistance, in civil disobedience and in defiance. Those who rebel are our only hope. And for this reason I will vote next month for Jill Stein.

rj

Update: Police arrested Dr. Stein Wednesday evening in Texas when she brought food and supplies to protestors at the Keystone XL pipeline construction site in Wood County. In a later statement, Stein said that Obama and Romney were only talking of the symptoms, not the causes of disasters like Sandy.

Note: For specific Green Party goals, see Jill Stein

Assets and liabilities of the candidates

The NYT is reporting that the Labor Department will release its October jobs report, on time, tomorrow morning. The last before the election, it could influence any undecided voters that may still be out there. I know I’ll be giving it close scrutiny. Yes, I’m one of the undecided, as I find it a stalemate when it comes down to weighing the assets and liabilities of each candidate.

I’ve pursued this election campaign daily, watched the debates, scrutinized the media feedback. Using a ledger approach, I find the issues, pro and con, come down to mainly those I list here:

Obama assets:

Environmentally aware

Clean energy proponent

Economic stimuli

Health care reform

Tax equity

Return to 1967 borders for Israel

Banking reform efforts

Pro choice

Obama liabilities

Big government

Failure to initiate immigration reform

Apologist for America

Possible Administration cover-ups

May allow Iran the bomb

Supports the Employees Free Choice Act

May appoint additional activist Supreme Court members

Less business friendly

Romney assets

Small business advocate

Strong military

Would appoint constructionist Supreme Court members

Balanced budgets

Opposed to The Employee Free Choice Act

Less government intrusion

Strong on non-nuclear Iran

Romney liabilities:

Pro life

Less compassion for the poor

Would replace current social security index

Beholden to Israeli lobby

Insensitivity to global warming

More dirty coal and oil advocacy

While economy analysts are anticipating tomorrow’s report will indicate continuing gains in jobs, manufacturing, and housing, this may not help me get past my stalemate as a voter caught in an eclectic mix of liberal and conservative purviews, in keeping with my mindset that truth usually falls somewhere in the middle of the spectrum.

In 2008, I voted for a third party candidate. I may do so again.

rj

Gone with the Wind? Sandy’s election impact

“The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men, Gang aft agley.” (Robert Burns)

The October surprise arrived this evening in Sandy’s windy assault on the Northeast. How it factors into next week’s election is anybody’s guess, and you can work varying good or bad scenarios for either candidate. Provided he doesn’t make any mistakes, the President can be seen being presidential. It’s also a safe bet that most folks on the receiving end are likely to be grateful. The storm, moreover, relieves Obama from the incessant focus on a still languishing economy along with the emerging reality of the government’s grievous misfire in preempting the Benghazi debacle.

As I write, the Labor Department may delay Friday’s crucial job report until after the election. Probably no conspiracy here, since we don’t know how the report would break in favoring Obama or Romney, though you’d think the Administration would push for its release we’re it favorable, come hell or high water. After all, the economy has been showing inklings of improvement in several sectors, ie., housing and employment.

Perhaps the most potent advantage for the President is that the storm may corral the incipient surge towards Romney even in battleground states like Ohio, now rated a toss-up.

You might argue that Sandy has handed Obama the election on a silver platter. But hold on: there’s one thing the speculative press may be missing that favors Romney. Vast as Sandy is, with winds extending 175 miles from its center, it mainly impacts those states, apart from Virginia, that are foremost in the Democratic column anyway.

Whatever happens, the media will have plenty to chew on following next Tuesday’s voting results.

rj