working People

One thing has become clear as we end this year. In this country producing something through hard work is no longer valued. Congress has made that very clear through the distribution of the billions of bail out dollars they have appropriated during this economic crises. The banks and insurance company's have asked for help and they got 700 billion with out much debate. However when the auto industry asked for a measly 13 billion they were put through many hoops and in the end turned down. This sent a very clear signal to most of the working people of this country. If you work and actually produce something that's tangible you will not be protected or valued by the people who are responsible for the running of this country.

We have lost our manufacturing base in this country and we could be in trouble if we're forced to go to war with one of the countries that are responsible for providing most of the manufactured items we need to conduct operations of our defense. We have no steel industry in this country and the electronics device manufacturing is largely done by foreign powers. What our legislators should be doing is protecting our meager manufacturing base. Our workers should not have to be paid the small wages that other county's offer their workers. Instead we should protect our higher paid workers and build the middle class. This country has stayed free because of the large middle class and as the "rich" of this country attack the middle class so do they attack our freedoms. 

Fairness Doctrine

The other day I received an email from a conservative friend. In this email the subject of the fairness doctrine was discussed. The email called the possibility of a return to that doctrine instituting censorship. This email startled me because I couldn't understand how fairness translated to censorship in the minds of my friends that are conservative. After all if your airing all sides of an issue aren't you allowing all opinions to be heard and not censoring anything. When you only allow one side of an issue and do not allow diverse opinions isn't that censorship? Lastly, on most talk stations isn't that what we have today? 

The radio and television airwaves are limited resources that are in the hands of a few corporations. Unlike the printed media that is unlimited in scope and can have an infinite number of outlets. The airwaves are finite. Further the airwaves belong to all the people and the government leases these airwaves and  has an obligation to make sure they are of benefit to all the people. The Fairness Doctrine was established by the FCC in 1949 to insure that the fair use of the airwaves were followed. 

The Fairness doctrine was in play until 1987 when the then commissioner Dennis R Patrick ended the regulation. Patrick was a Ronald Reagan lawyer and was newly appointed as FCC commissioner. Since that time more and more time has been devoted to the right wing of society on radio and television following the dictates of the conservative captains of that industry. Today you couldn't find a country run by a dictator that has a more one sided discussion of issues than the United States.  

Personally, I don't understand why the right is so exercised by the re-institution of the fairness doctrine. If your ideas are valid, a free discussion can only enhance the righteousness of your issues. I know personally I have modified my views over the years by hearing what people who have different opinions than mine have to say. In a democracy, the people can only make wise decisions by listening to open discussion of the issues that confront them

To see a fuller discussion of this issue you might follow this link http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0212-03.htm

A Thought about how lower Taxes ruined our economy

So the conventional wisdom about taxes all these year has been lower taxes are better. We've been living with this assumption since Reagan has been president. President Reagan followed the advice of Arthur Laugher and his supply side economics. But since that time we've experienced two phenomenas. 

First is that the middle class seems to be shrinking during this period of time. That also includes a decrease in jobs available to the middle class and a devaluing of the work that the middle class does. While the middle class is shrinking the upper class is not expanding they are simply increasing the gap between them and the classes below them. Our wealth as a country is gathering into fewer and fewer hands. This can be clearly demonstrated by the increase of the compensation of executive salaries while the workers at the middle and bottom of the cooperate salary structure have lost benefits and pay. 

Second, since the upper levels of society has received tax breaks we've experience several periods of boom, bubble and Bust. These periods have resulted in recessions and depressions. We've had the dot com bust, Saving and loan bust, Banking failures and stock market crashes. All of this has lead to an uncertain future for the people of the United States. Today for the first time in our history people feel the their futures aren't as bright as their parents felt their future were. 

So WHAT TO DO ABOUT THIS? It seems reasonable to revert back to a time when the upper class had less available money if they chose not to put their money into actual productive use. Raise the tax levels and give incentives to pay less taxes if they invest it in companies that actually provide jobs and value to our economy. This might result in a lesser growth rate, but it will also result in a steadier growth rate and allow all the classes to have a steak in our Countries future. 

The Wrong Way

 So last week the auto bailout failed because of a few Southern Republicans. Strange as it seems, these silly people would rather give 700 billion dollars to groups that really produce nothing than give a few billion to companies that actually produce something. We've lost our steel industry, clothing industry, and most of out consumer appliance industry. the list if manufacturing industries left in the US continues to dwindle. There are very few manufacturing industry's left in our country. 

So what's wrong with this? Our congress and presidents have allowed us to be vulnerable to the whims of foreign governments that have an agenda of protecting their own industries at the expense of ours through the ruse of free trade. While we allow these foreign countries to export goods to the US without any strings attached these countries (such as China, Japan,) put restrictions on our exports. 

We need to protect our industries and the workers in those industries. We need to equalize labor coast by adding tariffs to the imports. If we allow all of these industries to disappear when time of war or pestilence come we'll have no manufacturing base to build to protect us. What does it matter if we have to pay another $2,000 for a Mazda, or Toyota. WE NEED TO PROTECT U.S. WORKERS. We need to make sure our workers have jobs. We need to make sure we have a strong manufacturing base for the good of our country. 

Post election thoughts

So since the election certain things have become clear. 

1) Energy prices have declined at an unprecedented sped. Its my guess that since the next two leaders are no oil people the oil companies don't feel they can do what ever they want as far as pricing goes. Shortly after Bush and Cheney became the leaders of the country gas prices went over $2:00 and have not looked back until now. Perhaps we should try and find out how much was in it for the people in charge. we should know that this was one sign of the looting of America.

2) The war missions are becoming clearer. The Iraqi government has asked us to leave and we should. It would seem just irresponsible to continue to spend 12 billion dollars a month when that money is desperately needed at home. 

3) The kind of candidate that really turns on Republicans are rather happy dumb people. While McCain is a nice guy ...... he definitely isn't the smartest light bulb in the tree. And Palin is just Dumb, Dumb, Dumb. And she is a super star of the republican party.