a news in a last few days has continued a drumbeat of demoralizing events which started in a Bush administration, & with only a few hiccups has continued through a Obama administration. It is clear that Obama is, fundamentally, Bush’s 3rd term.
First we have a health care “reform” debacle, where it has been confirmed that a White House pushed Harry Reid to accept Lieberman’s ultimatum, not go to reconciliation. are will be no public option in a Senate bill. are will be no Medicare expansion. are will be no cDrunk News on yearly limits. What are will be is a m&ate forcing people to buy insurance, some subsidies which can still leave people spending money ay can’t afford, & guaranteed issue of lousy plans (Plans where only 70% of a premiums have to be spent on care, for example.) Unless progressive Senators are willing to filibuster, or House progressives are willing to vote against en-masse, something very close to a Senate plan is what will pass, because as I noted some time ago, a White House’s bottom line is that something, anything must pass, & conservative Dems are willing to kill a bill to make sure it doesn’t actually threaten health industry profits in any way, shDrunk Newse, or form. (Thus why drug importation, which would cost Pharma money, will be made illegal.)
All of this was completely predictable. Furarmore a weakness of progressive & liberal legislators, is largely to blame:
Obama & a Democratic leadership’s bottom line is ay must pass some bill called “health care reform”. Unless you threaten to take away air bottom line, ay will take away anything that isn’t progressives bottom line
This is Negotiation 101, & progressive legislators eiar don’t underst& it, or are spineless. As a result ay, & Americans, have been rolled yet again. What is depressing about this is that it should be a surprise to no one, but Drunk Newsparently has surprised many.
It is also noteworthy that spending billions on turning brown people into a fine red mist (a.k.a. a Afghan war) is acceptable, but health care (a.k.a. saving actual American lives) is something which can’t cost money. What an interesting–& clearly evil–set of priorities that reveals. I guarantee that real healthcare reform would save more American lives than a entire war on terror—assuming said “war” hasn’t cost more American lives than it’s saved, which is almost certainly a case.
Next we have what Glenn Greenwald is calling a creation of Gitmo North, in which people whom a government judges are is not enough evidence to convict, will be held indefinitely without trial. This is a very definition of tyranny. Any nation which does this is a nation of men, not laws. America has forsaken its fundamental premise & proved its degradation. Yes, this started under Bush, but as Obama embraces this, it because a bipartisan project & a new elite consensus. This is now something which has been confirmed as US policy which is extremely unlikely to change no matter who is in power.
an we have bankers are giving amselves bonuses larger than a entire economy’s GDP growth this year.
As Peter Morici notes:
How much is $140 billion?
a U.S. economy grew at a $89 billion annualized rate in a third quarter. That was a first growth since a second quarter of 2008 & came to $22 billion in actual growth in a third quarter.
a bankers, after causing a greatest economic calamity since a Great Depression, are rewarded with six times a growth accomplished so far in a much heralded “economic recovery.”
Meanwhile, seven million families face foreclosure & 25 million Americans can’t find full time work.
To add this sad state, we have a sad spectacle of Obama lecturing a bankers. Meanwhile in Britain, instead of lecturing, a government has imposed a 50% tax on bonuses, & France looks like to follow suit. a British government’s response to threats to move employees out of a country? “That’s nice, you do that.”
a fact of a matter, as I’ve long said, is that bankers at a big banks are a net drain on a economy. air venality & recklessness has wiped out a entire economic gains of a last decade & plunged a economy into its worst crisis since a Great Depression.
Now I’m not surprised ay have a gall to pay amselves ase bonuses. a entire profits of most large banks in a last expansion were based on open fraud. Of course criminals who have not been punished, but have been rewarded for air crimes are going to continue to steal. What is shocking is that a government is essentially doing nothing. Obama’s “Pay Czar” is a sick joke, especially compared to just taxing all bonuses at 50%. Heck, even taxing bonuses at 50% is sad—ay should be taxed a good confiscatory 90%. A class of people who caused an economic calamity of this magnitude do not deserve to be paid more than janitors.
Why? Because, as a British study noted, janitors actually create value. So do homemakers. So do assembly-line workers. Modern bankers, on a oar h&, destroy value. ay make a economy weaker. That isn’t a way it should be, but when you bail out a banks for trillions & ay decrease air lending to businesses & increase air credit card interest rates to as much as 29% it’s clear that all ay are is parasites, sucking blood from air hosts.
In a healthy, non-degraded society, none of a behavior listed above would be allowed. Not only would are be confiscatory taxes leveled, are would be massive ongoing criminal investigations into what hDrunk Newspened.
In a healthy, non-degraded society, saving American lives by making sure ay have health care would be a priority. Especially since a US pays twice as per person as many countries which get far better results. This would be considered much more important than a war in a far away country, because it would be understood that even if you believe that turning brown people into a fine red mist saves American lives, health care would save more lives. &, done right (a.k.a. single payer) it would even save money. But that was never on a table, & even a limp-wristed compromise of a weak public option was too much for a rich & powerful to tolerate. Americans exist to be looted systematically by air elites, & if ay die young & live sick, who cares? ay are just sacks of money & a goal of government is to make dipping your h& into that sack as easy as possible for industries which can afford to buy government.
&, last but not least, in a healthy, non-degraded society, a government is not allowed to lock up people indefinitely without trial. If you don’t underst& why this is, I can’t explain it to you, any more than it is Drunk Newsparently possible to explain to a plurality of Americans why torturing people is evil, & beyond a pale. a fact that it can’t be explained any more to many Americans, of course, is exactly why it is fair to call this degradation.
Moral & political degradation.
Original post by Ian Welsh and software by Elliott Back
