Town Hall Meeting

When it comes to who wins the massive federal spending competition, it’s not even close. Most of your money goes to one thing: the very loosely named “Defense.” In 2012, under a “socialist, anti business, pacifist” (yeah, right) President, “Defense” was given $707 billion. Remember, that is for 1 year! For a little context, spending on housing was $67 billion, and education was $73 billion.

Some people like to confuse the issue of federal spending by bringing up Medicare and Social Security. Those are paid for separately, and should never be part of this conversation. That’s why in your paycheck, you have one line for “Federal Tax” and one for “Medicare” and “FICA” (aka Social Security). The pie chart shows how the “Federal Tax” is divided. And this is the tax that everyone gets so upset about, such as when people say lets raise the top federal tax rate from 35% to 38% on income above $250k (another annoying thing is people don’t realize that income up to $249k isn’t effected at all).

And even worse, if you count other reasonable things as “Defense,” such as veterans affairs, homeland security, and veterans health and pensions, the total number becomes over $1 trillion, again for just 1 year! Isn’t this how countries fail? While people are homeless, unemployed, underemployed and sick, the elites are polishing their fancy new toys.

Wow, this is unbelievable. They call it “SinkEx” for Sink Exercise. The U.S. Navy blows up old warships with missiles and torpedoes, including an aircraft carrier, off the coast of California and Florida. Obviously this could cause lots of problems for the environment.

Check out the AP article here:
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2012/03/03/ap_enterprise_navy_sinkex_raises_pollution_fear/

In the past 12 years, this has been done 109 times. Again, UNBELIEVABLE. While people struggle to meet their basic needs, the military shines its billion dollar toys, and blows up the old ones with million dollar missiles. The whole thing is repugnant. The Navy says its okay what they are doing because it gives them useful testing of their weapons. So…what is more important: sustaining life through a clean environment, or they possibly/maybe/could improve at blowing shit up?

Some reports I read just make my head spin in disbelief. Thanks to the reporters for exposing this story.

CPI is double what it was in 2010. Remember to keep the inflation rate in mind when negotiating wage increases at work, or returns on investments.

2011 Consumer Price Index: 3.0%
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/cpi_01192012.htm

2011 Producer Price Index: 4.8%
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/archives/ppi_01182012.htm

You know when the Muppets are against you, you are in need of some serious soul searching.

Police protect the bull, an inanimate object, while the rest of us are left to be beaten down by filthy rich individuals and corporations. This video is another great action by OWS to show the dirty underbelly of who gets protection and who gets the billy club.

Nina Simone was an amazing talent and also a humanitarian. Props to Nina.

Happy New Year!

Zoom in to see all the specifics. Every state should get one of these!

AP article here on the artist and the reaction.

Thanks G for the link!

Reclaiming wall space with a “we are the 99%” bat signal. For once some outdoor art that isn’t trying to sell us consumer crap!

Thanks G for the link!

The settlement was for $285 million. Which is nothing compared to the billions they made on toxic mortgages they sold as AAA rated loans. This is fraud, and should be treated as a criminal lawsuit. Other than basic justice, trying this case and similar ones with other banks will help clean out the system of rot. This is from the AP article…

A judge on Monday used unusually harsh language to strike down a $285 million settlement between Citigroup and the Securities and Exchange Commission over toxic mortgage securities, saying he couldn’t tell whether the deal was fair and criticizing regulators for shielding the public from details of the firm’s wrongdoing.

U.S. District Judge Jed Rakoff said the public has a right to know what happens in cases that touch on “the transparency of financial markets whose gyrations have so depressed our economy and debilitated our lives.” In such cases, the SEC has a responsibility to ensure that the truth emerges, he wrote.

The settlement would have imposed penalties on Citigroup but allowed it to deny allegations that it misled investors.

Citigroup said in a statement that it disagreed with Rakoff because the proposed settlement was “a fair and reasonable resolution to the SEC’s allegation of negligence” and was consistent with long-established legal standards.

Adam Pritchard, a professor of securities law at the University of Michigan Law School, said courts could become clogged with cases that would normally be settled if other judges adopt Rakoff’s reasoning and deprive companies of their incentive to avoid trial.

The defense of Citigroup is preposterous – they are saying we love the deal we got to pay out $285 million! Now that you reject it, then we’ll say we are innocent! Some mental gymnastics are required to understand that one. And the UM law professor saying this is bad because it clogs up the courts. Wow, interesting legal point of view. We shouldn’t prosecute criminals because it’s too time consuming. How is this person an expert?

Read the full article here.

PS: Sorry I haven’t written in a while, my wife and I had a healthy baby boy and that has taken up about 99% of my time the past several weeks.

“Remember, remember the 5th of November.” A call has been made for all of us to move our savings, no matter how small, to a local bank or credit union. This is in homage to the Gunpowder Plot of 1605 in England, or for us youngsters, V for Vendetta. :)

Go to the Facebook page of Kristen Christian, the woman who started the Nov. 5th idea, or find a community bank or credit union near you at the Move Your Money site. Remember that credit unions are non-profit, which in my experience makes them the better choice.

http://moveyourmoneyproject.org/

Thanks for the image K!

Another sign we live in bizarro world. President Obama carried out the goal of killing Anwar al-Awlaki along with another US citizen today in Yemen. Apparently killing your own citizens is bad when Libya does it, or when Syria does it, but not when the US does it (or Bahrain or Yemen for that matter). Remember the good old days when we would get upset that President Bush would wiretap US citizens without a warrant or detain US citizens without charges. The Peace Prize winner has just taken that to a whole new level by killing without charges. Whoa this one is tough to get my head around.

Constitutional law expert Glenn Greenwald has great analysis on this here.

It’s nice to see someone who is sane running for the U.S. Senate. The best point she makes is that no one gets rich alone.

Somehow this tragedy finally became national news over the past few days, so you probably already know that last night at 11:08pm was the cold-blooded, premeditated execution of Troy Davis. It’s grotesque, repugnant, and evil. Even with all the facts behind you, the U.S. death penalty can still be used. My only hope now is this will lead to the outright abolition of the death penalty, so the U.S. can join the civilized world.

PS: Maybe I should make a list of how many things the U.S. has in common with our great bogeyman, the Taliban/al qaeda/etc, such as the death penalty.

Since things are pretty ugly out there (endless wars, massive income inequality, etc.), I thought I’d share a little Buddhism with ya’ll on this Friday. Most of this information comes from Michael Benner, a great guy who teaches about mysticism and a class called The Ageless Wisdom. I am not religious, but I do believe some of this stuff.

“I teach about suffering and the way to end it.”
— Buddha

The Four Noble Truths are quite simple and straight-forward. They are pragmatic rather than dogmatic, and actually are closer to psycho-therapy than religion.

The basic idea is that we set ourselves up for misery — disappointment, sadness, depression, anger and hatred by desiring material things, money and power. We are so attached to what we desire, Buddha realized, that we miss the majestic beauty and awe in what is happening right in front of you, moment by moment. The unfolding moment is eternal, while everything material is impermanent and unfulfilling.

According to various sources, a simple rendition of the Four Noble Truths is as follows:

Suffering does exist
Suffering arises from attachment to desires
Suffering ceases when attachment to desire ceases
Freedom from suffering is possible by practicing the Eightfold Path

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Noble_Truths

Nouriel Roubini has been explaining basic economics for years now, and gained national prominence in 2008 when he analyzed correctly the housing sector and predicted the housing price drops. People at the time of course called him crazy when he said house prices could fall 35%. Here he explains how capitalism can kill itself: if corporations cut labor and reduce wages, it then reduces demand because people don’t have money to spend, which then leads to more cuts. The downward spiral is reinforced until everyone loses.

You can watch the entire 22 minute interview here.

These are the types of things that the military spending (50% of your federal taxes) go to each year. Note that “the troops” aren’t part of it. Most people don’t realize where the bulk of taxes go, unfortunately. I suspect our much-talked-about existential threat, the al qaeda, isn’t very worried about hypersonic missiles. Although I must admit it is an interesting engineering experiment, and possibly not as ridiculous as the Gay Bomb idea.

“The first HTV-2, launched by Pentagon bleeding-edge research arm DARPA in April of 2010, disappeared over the Pacific after just nine minutes of flight. The vehicle was never recovered.”

“tens of millions of dollars poured into the Falcon program every year”

“Lockheed Martin was paid to build two copies of the aircraft before the first was even flown. If there turned out to be a flaw in the design, correcting it might’ve been near-impossible.”

http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2011/08/pentagons-mach-20-missile/

A pie chart to show the craziness in picture form….
http://www.warresisters.org/pages/piechart.htm

The “Gay Bomb”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gay_bomb

We now get to enjoy their economy, so this video gives thanks.

Just keeping score, I believe the economic accomplishments so far were extensions of the Bush tax cuts for 2 more years, including for millionaires and billionaires, and then slashing government spending (with only surface cuts to the bloated defense budget). Thank you so much, I can’t wait to see the unemployment rate after these changes!

The horrific bombings and murders in Norway are abhorrent. The issues underneath the headlines are pretty upsetting too. Just some basic facts: the suspect is Andrew Breivik, he wrote a 1500 page manifesto which apparently includes anti-immigrant, pro-Christian, take-back-the-government opinions on European life. Lots of hatred toward Muslims and Marxists is in there as well. Glenn Greenwald has made very good points about several prominent newspapers first reporting the bombing was done by Muslims. Then once they found out it was a white Christian, they stopped using the term terrorism! Beyond that, some prominent news media are saying he was just copying Al Qaeda, as though they invented terrorism for crying out loud. It’s amazing to sit back and watch the prism through which current events are filtered through.

Another point that I want to add is this isn’t just a one in a million crackpot, it is an ideology that is getting more and more mainstream in Europe and America. Thankfully it’s still in the deep minority, but it is getting some credibility in the US. It’s roots are in fascism from the 20th century. It’s the superior race stuff, the corporations are our friend stuff, the hatred of anything public/government. Just a reminder, because rose colored glasses make “The West” seem holy and great, that fascism was invented by “The West.” In fact, when people now use the term “Islamic Fascism” its like a slap in the face to Muslims because they were victims of Mussolini and Hitler, especially the Northern Africa nations like Libya and Morocco.

My main point is that we all must follow the law of universality: that we must apply the rules equally to all. If politically motivated murder is not terrorism when it’s a white person, then its not terrorism when it’s anyone else. If you want to condemn all Muslims for 9/11, then you must condemn all Christians for the Norway bombings.

FYI to Facebook users (Google or Yahoo! too). The interview touches on Facebook about 2 minutes in. He also touches on how the NY Times and the Guardian have broken their agreement to only redact things that save peoples lives – they now redact wikileaks info to save reputation and profit.

The interview was done by the Russia Times and the text can be found there.