tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post3354907000779015279..comments2024-03-27T18:00:02.032-04:00Comments on Sardonicky: Torturing Obama Karen Garciahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15612731479365562803noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-15698168238224378472014-10-09T09:59:35.536-04:002014-10-09T09:59:35.536-04:00Martin Smith is the recipient of the 2014 John Cha...Martin Smith is the recipient of the 2014 John Chancellor Award for Excellence in Journalism, presented by the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.<br /><br />Pam Martens @ Wall Street on Parade singles out how Smith’s “The Retirement Gamble” uncloaked Wall Street’s asset stripping of the average worker’s 401(k) plan: <br /><br />“Under a two percent 401(k) fee structure, almost two-thirds of your working life will go toward paying obscene compensation to Wall Street; a little over one-third will benefit your family – and that’s before paying taxes on withdrawals to Uncle Sam.<br /><br />“To put it another way – you work for Wall Street. You are their slave, their lackey and as long as their toadies dominate in Congress, nothing is going to change on the legislative front to stop the looting. Wall Street seized millions of homes through illegal foreclosures and stripped the equity from the owners. They got away with it. Some Wall Street firms further enriched themselves making bets that the housing market would collapse, using their inside knowledge of the bogus loans they had made. They got away with that also. Now Wall Street is busy asset stripping the retirement plans of the working class in America while President Obama proposes to cut Social Security benefits through a discredited calculation called Chained CPI – conveniently causing people to save more in their 401(k) plans to make up for the potential loss. But the more you save, the more Wall Street asset strips.”<br /><br />http://wallstreetonparade.com/2014/10/pbs-producer-who-toppled-eric-holders-criminal-chief-gets-an-award/<br /><br />As well as another Smith program, “The Untouchables,” which revealed that Obama’s Justice Department, under its Criminal Division chief, Lanny Breuer, didn’t even made a pretense of a real investigation against the powerful Wall Street firms for their role in the financial collapse. <br /><br />"Since the finance aristocracy made the laws, was at the head of the administration of the state, had command of all the organized public authorities, dominated public opinion through the actual state of affairs and through the press, the same prostitution, the same shameless cheating, the same mania to get rich was repeated in every sphere, from the court to the Cafe Borgne to get rich not by production, but by pocketing the already available wealth of others, Clashing every moment with the bourgeois laws themselves, an unbridled assertion of unhealthy and dissolute appetites manifested itself, particularly at the top of bourgeois society- lusts wherein wealth derived from gambling naturally seeks its satisfaction, where pleasure becomes debauched, where money, filth, and blood commingle. The finance aristocracy, in its mode of acquisition as well as in its pleasures, is nothing but the rebirth of the lumpenproletariat on the heights of bourgeois society." - Karl Marx, The Class Struggles in France, 1848 to 1850<br /><br />With Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and the victory of Wall Street Democrats, the Democratic Party sold its soul. Ready for Hillary???Denis Nevillenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-89877878009563296562014-10-09T09:23:47.067-04:002014-10-09T09:23:47.067-04:00How can people take Rahm/Rambo Emanuel seriously w...How can people take Rahm/Rambo Emanuel seriously when he launches into one of his theatrical tirades? What keeps them from laughing at him and begging him to do better, that he's only used the f-word 10 times so far! <br /><br />I don't know if it is nature or nurture, but now that I'm aware of his brother-the-doctor's recent attention-getting riff, I'm tempted to believe they both see themselves as actors first and foremost!voice-in-wildernessnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-44506279201643230222014-10-09T03:51:25.232-04:002014-10-09T03:51:25.232-04:00Thanks, Karen, for calling my attention to the abs...Thanks, Karen, for calling my attention to the absurd defense-of-the-indefensible piece by Krugman published in RollingStone. (The RollingStone article subtitle: "The Nobel Prize-winning economist, once one of the president’s most notable critics, on why Obama is a historic success"). Actually, Krugman does a similar dance biennially, at the height of the national elections cycle, but this one is by far the worst. It's part of the now standard-formula schizophrenic Democratic campaign strategy: 1) try to convince the rank-and-file that Democratic politicians are actually pretty good (never mind that they didn't even <i>attempt</i> one-tenth of what they should have in a time of great financial crisis and therefore great opportunity for genuine progressive reform, and in fact were often complicit in reactionary political moves), and 2) scare their base about the opposition, so that even if the base isn't all that fond of the Democratic candidate, they'll vote for him/her as the lesser-of-two-evils.<br /><br />Interestingly, the Republican base, rightly or wrongly, has frequently seemed to have been able to move their party a considerable ways towards representing them (though perhaps only illusorily, simply because of the congruence between the current beliefs of that base and those of the moneyed string-pullers). In contrast, progressive Democrats have been almost completely ineffective, partly because their fundamental beliefs are opposed by many of the Party financial backers and politician-toadies, partly because of the delusions, hopes, and fears that they allow themselves to be controlled by. The progressives have allowed themselves to be both manipulated and taken for granted by the Democratic Party, and as long as such attitudes continue, the rightward slide of both the party and the nation will continue. <br /><br />Regrettably, I think only a significant defeat <i>might</i> progressively revitalize the Democratic party --- and even then, such revitalization might well not occur, the party might just double-down on its move rightward. Regrettably, I've almost definitively concluded that the only solutions to our national problems and the corruption of the political process lie in independent progressive candidates and/or a new progressive political party.Fred Drumlevitchhttp://www.freddrumlevitch.blogspot.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-42817876397059172582014-10-08T18:30:45.041-04:002014-10-08T18:30:45.041-04:00Students Walk Out After Attack on 'Union that ...Students Walk Out After Attack on 'Union that Defends Public Education' - http://www.commondreams.org/news/2014/10/08/students-walk-out-after-attack-union-defends-public-education<br /><br />Let's hope this is the start of a revolution in the ranks of the students who are becoming educated to reality.Pearlnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-14894626827839428212014-10-08T18:11:31.643-04:002014-10-08T18:11:31.643-04:00Part of Obama's problem - perhaps the biggest ...Part of Obama's problem - perhaps the biggest part of it - is the people he trusted. Many of us have had doubts about them, and though Obama's biggest failure is that he has fired no one, no matter how incompetent....or as it turns out, malevolent.<br /><br />With friends like these...Davidhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04505526012134089666noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-974773076690597683.post-65301147161205224632014-10-08T13:24:11.165-04:002014-10-08T13:24:11.165-04:00Barack O-bummer.... the 'Lame-douche' Pres...Barack O-bummer.... the 'Lame-douche' President.....Zarathustrahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18304963843720567083noreply@blogger.com