OBOF TYMHM & MORE Vol 14 No 23

WELCOME TO OPINIONS  BASED  ON FACTS (OBOF)

&

THINGS YOU MAY HAVE MISSED (TYMHM)

YEAR ONE

YEAR TWO

YEAR THREE

YEAR FOUR

 

OBOF YEAR FOUR INDEX
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-01	Jan. 02, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-02	Jan. 09, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-03	Jan. 15, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-04	Jan. 24, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-05	JAN 30, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-06	Feb. 06, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-06 EXTRA	Feb. 09, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-07	Feb. 13, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-08	Feb. 21, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-09	Feb. 27, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-10	Mar. 08, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-11	Mar. 13, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-11    EXTRA	Mar. 15, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-12	Mar.  21, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-13	Mar.  29, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-14	Apr.  03, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-15	Apr.  12, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-16	Apr.  19, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-17	Apr.  26, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-18	May  03,  2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-19	May  10,  2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-20	May  20,  2014
OBOF TYMHM Vol 14 - No 21	May 28,  2014
OBOF TYMHM Vol 14 - Ho 22	June 10, 2014
OBOF TYMHM Vol 14 - No 23	June 20, 2014

 

 

Agenda

1.  WOW.  What a 90th Birthday Party.

2.  WOW.  What a tooth ache.

3.  Real business leaders want to save capitalism.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

W O W

WHAT A BIRTHDAY PARTY

         

I am going to take a little bit of space here to tell you about my 90th birthday party.  Without going back and checking, I don't know if I have explained what my party plan were.  I have eaten daily at our local IHOP for that past 9 or 10 years.  95% of the staff there make up my second family.  My first family is now made up of my Son and two Daughters.  One Daughter lives in Illinois and the other in Washington.  I live with my Son in Oklahoma. 

 

I had an all day, everybody invited, party at the IHOP.  I had three real big sheet cakes, some signs expressing my feelings reaching 90 yrs. and some items depicting my life.  The party started at 9:00 am and continued to 9:00 pm.  I managed to stick out about seven hours of the day.  The local paper ran quite a half page article and picture.  We had 93 guest sign in.  I think there were a few that didn't sign in.  I am sure we had at least 100 guests.  I toughly enjoyed my 90th. 

 

I have lived all my life to reach 90.  Now I'll try for 95.  Some say I should go for 100.  I say that that is not realistic.  I think 95 might have a possibility.  Anyway, I'll go as long as the good Lord says I should.  I'll just keep putting one foot in front of the other.  I have had a good life.  Some good, some bad, but more good than bad.  Three wonderful kids, three great Grandsons, and four Great Grandsons.

~

 

I was pretty worn out frankly, but I have recovered and I think now I might get back on track and get going on 91.  I thank all of you too.  I can tell you wish me well by the numbers of you who hit my blog.  I will keep trying to bring you items that you might have missed that will affect all of us as well as some that will affect smaller special groups, such as veterans.

~~~

wow

What a tooth ache 

 

Right after I wrote the above I developed a truly bad tooth ache.  Had to have emergency tooth pulled and it has laid me low.  Thus, the reason for being so late with this posting.

 

I have some writing that I had planned to for you, but I will let it go till next week.  Some of the dirtiest Fed. corruption that I ever, PERSONALLY, known about and some local Tulsa embezzlement involving $400.000.00+ and a miscarrying of justice.

~~~

Real Business Leaders Want to Save Capitalism

 

Robert Reich

NationofChange / Op-Ed

Published: Thursday 19 June 2014

 

A few weeks ago, I was visited in my office by the chairman of one of the country’s biggest high-tech firms who wanted to talk about the causes and consequences of widening inequality and the shrinking middle class, and what to do about it.

I asked him why he was concerned.  “Because the American middle class is the core of our customer base,” he said.  “If they can’t afford our products in the years ahead, we’re in deep trouble.”

I’m hearing the same refrain from a growing number of business leaders.

They see an economic recovery that’s bypassing most Americans.  Median hourly and weekly pay dropped over the past year, adjusted for inflation.

 

Since the depths of the Great Recession in 2009, median real household income has fallen 4.4 percent, according to an analysis by Sentier Research. 

These business leaders know the U.S. economy can’t get out of first gear as long as wages are declining. And their own businesses can’t succeed over the long term without a buoyant and growing middle class.

They also recognize a second danger.

Job frustrations are fueling a backlash against trade and immigration.  Any hope for immigration reform is now dead in Congress, and further trade-opening agreements are similarly moribund.  Yet the economy would be even worse if America secedes into isolationism.

 

Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of Goldman Sachs, warned recently on “CBS This Morning” that income inequality is “destablilizing” the nation and is “responsible for the divisions in the country.” He went on to say, that “too much of the GDP over the last generation has gone to too few of the people.”

 

Blankfein should know.  He pulled in $23 million last year in salary and bonus, a 9.5 percent raise over the year before and his best payday since the Wall Street meltdown.  This doesn’t make his point any less valid. 

 

Several of business leaders are suggesting raising the minimum wage and increasing taxes on the wealthy.

 

Bill Gross, Chairman of Pimco, the largest bond-trading firm in the world, said this week that America needs policies that bring labor and capital back into balance, including a higher minimum wage and higher taxes on the rich. 

Gross has noted that developed economies function best when income inequality is minimal.

Several months ago, Gross urged his wealthy investors, who benefit the most from a capital-gains tax rate substantially lower than the tax on ordinary income, to support higher taxes on capital gains.  “The era of taxing ‘capital’ at lower rates than ‘labor’ should now end,” he stated.

 

Similar proposals have come from billionaires Warren Buffett and Stanley Druckenmiller, founder of Duquesne Capital Management and one of the top performing hedge fund managers of the past three decades.  Buffett has suggested the wealthy pay a minimum tax of 30 percent of their incomes.

 

The response from the denizens of the right has been predictable:  If these gentlemen want to pay more taxes, there’s nothing stopping them, which misses the point.  These business leaders are arguing for changes in the rules of the game that would make the game fairer for everyone.  They acknowledge it’s now dangerously rigged in the favor of people like them.

They know the only way to save capitalism is to make it work for the majority rather than a smaller and smaller minority at the top.

In this respect they resemble the handful of business leaders in the Gilded Age who spearheaded the progressive reforms enacted in the first decade of the twentieth century, or those who joined with Franklin D. Roosevelt to create Social Security, a minimum wage, and the forty-hour workweek during the Depression.

Unfortunately, the voices of these forward-thinking business leaders are being drowned out by backward-lobbying groups like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that are organized to reflect the views of their lowest common denominator.

And by billionaires like Charles and David Koch, who harbor such deep-seated hatred for government they’re blind to the real dangers capitalism now faces.

Those dangers are a sinking middle class lacking the purchasing power to keep the economy going, and an American public losing faith that the current system will deliver for them and their kids.

America’s real business leaders understand unless or until the middle class regains its footing and its faith, capitalism remains vulnerable.

~~~

If the good Lord is willing and the creek don't rise, I'll talk with you again next week.

God Bless You All

&

God Bless the United States of America.

Floyd

 

 

OBOF TYMHM & MORE Vol 14 No 22

WELCOME TO OPINIONS  BASED  ON FACTS (OBOF)

&

THINGS YOU MAY HAVE MISSED (TYMHM)

YEAR ONE

YEAR TWO

YEAR THREE

YEAR FOUR

 

OBOF YEAR FOUR INDEX
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-01	Jan. 02, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-02	Jan. 09, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-03	Jan. 15, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-04	Jan. 24, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-05	JAN 30, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-06	Feb. 06, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-06 EXTRA	Feb. 09, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-07	Feb. 13, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-08	Feb. 21, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-09	Feb. 27, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-10	Mar. 08, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-11	Mar. 13, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-11    EXTRA	Mar. 15, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-12	Mar.  21, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-13	Mar.  29, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-14	Apr.  03, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-15	Apr.  12, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-16	Apr.  19, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-17	Apr.  26, 2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-18	May  03,  2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-19	May  10,  2014
OBOF TYMHM PART 14-20	May  20,  2014
OBOF TYMHM Vol 14 - No 21	May 28,  2014
OBOF TYMHM Vol 14 - Ho 22	June 10, 2014

 

Agenda

 

1.  Notes from Floyd.

2.  Special bond I needed for a dog.

3.  Senate takes VA bill after scandal.

4.  How the Supreme Court made U.S. illegitimate.

 

 

 

NOTES  FROM  FLOYD

 

First, the big reason for such a delay this week is that this is a big, big week for me.  Today, June 10, 2014 I have been around this great country for 90 years.  I am having a prety big party and haave been getting ready for it.  Tell you more about it next week.  I am a little proud to have made it this far.  I have lived all my life to get to be 90 and I have made it.  Now, I am going to go for 95.  People say to me to just try for 100.  I don't think that is at all realistic, ninety five is possible.

~

 

Obviously, this note was written some time ago, but, for whatever it is worth, I am going to put it in now.  I wonder what your take is this matter? 

 

It is currently, 11:15 pm May 28, 2014.  I am going to jot down some of my thoughts following the one-hour airing on NBC of an interview with Brien Williams and Edward Snowden.

 

I have no black and white reactions to the interview.  I also watched the live, one-hour interview Brien Williams had on the internet with various people from NBC and others around the country.

 

I guess I have some gray areas to consider.  I can't say he is an all out traitor.  To me a traitor is out to do harm to our country.  I don't believe that was his intent.  Based on that point, I guess I am saying that he should not be judged as a traitor.

 

If I am taking that position, is he a patriot?  I have a hard time accepting that.  However, in balancing the scales I guess I am leaning somewhat to the patriot side, BUT not a clear-cut patriot. 

 

Apparently, he provided some information that needed to be known, because some changes have been made since his revelations.  That would fall down on the patriot side.  However, it appears as though, at the same time, he may have revealed some information that has done some harm to the effective manner our intelligence agencies operate.  To what degree that fact weighs on the traitor side would have to be determined, probably in a closed court.

 

His intelligence and mannerism are quite impressive.  He does not feel that he is a traitor and that he was actually trying to help his country.  That leaves a wide birth to look at.  I wonder what all of you think about him?

 

~~~

 

That Special Bond:

 Why I Needed a Dog!

 

 

Azzedine Downes

International Fund for Animal Welfare / News Report

Published: Sunday 8 June 2014

 

 

We know it immediately when we look into the eyes of another species: There can be a special bond.  Many people feel it when they experience a moment with their dog or cat.

For a few lucky people, we have experienced a bond with a creature as magnificent as an elephant, a rhinoceros, a whale, a dolphin, or an ape.

This submission is from my friend Martha Reynolds, who after an accomplished career with the Rhode Island Attorney General’s office began writing novels in 2011.

Her works include her award-winning debut novel, Chocolate for Breakfast, and the best-seller Bits of Broken Glass.  Her fifth book is to be released this summer. 

I didn’t grow up having a dog, or any pet.

In fact, I was apprehensive of those slobbering, jumping beasts well into adulthood. And life seemed just fine without a pet.  I could come and go as I pleased, never one to rush home from a night out with an apologetic “I need to walk the dog.” No dog hair on my clothes, no early morning or late evening walks, and definitely no picking up poop.

Then, a few years into marriage and heartbreaking infertility, my husband looked up one morning over coffee and said, “We need a dog.”

Four words.

And he didn’t have to say anything else.

I knew.

We both needed a dog.

And from the first time that seven-week-old puppy was nestled in my arms, I’ve not been able to imagine my life without a dog in it.  We had a four-month interval after our first dog died, for grieving and regrouping, but it wasn’t long before we knew it was time to bring another puppy home.

Over the past seventeen years, my dogs have provided me with companionship and entertainment.  They have comforted me through grief and depression. She never lets me forget that she is present, ready to please, no matter what kind of day I’ve experienced.

We have a bond, certainly, a timeless bond that’s been shared between humans and animals forever.

The connection I share with my dog has shaped and enforced my love for animals everywhere.  I cry over stories of homeless and neglected dogs and cats.  I am sickened by the slaughter of African elephants for their ivory, and by the needless hunt and decimation of our whale population.

My love and devotion toward a twenty-pound spaniel whose favorite place to sleep is on my lap has helped me to see the larger picture of our responsibility to preserve and protect all wildlife, not just this one domesticated creature who rules my world.  It’s a broad concept for a short blog post, I realize.

But we are the intelligent beings.

We are the ones who make and enforce laws, and we are the only ones who can stop the inevitable extinction of certain animals.

So my little Bonnie is, in some respects, the child I never had.  I am so fulfilled by having her in my life.  Yes, more people treat their pets as family members than ever before.  And while you’ll never see Bonnie dressed in a Halloween costume, she is cared for as well as any dog could be.

That’s the responsibility I take as her owner.  She may be afraid of a fly buzzing around the room (yes, really), but I’ll protect her, from the fly and from anything else that would harm her. Similarly, I’ll consider what I can do to ensure a better future for all the other creatures that inhabit the planet.

It’s what we all should do.

~~~

Senate to take up new

 VA bill after scandal

 

 

WASHINGTON (AP) — Details of a refashioned bill to address the problems plaguing the federally run veterans' health care system were released Sunday by its sponsor, the chairman of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee.

Sen. Bernie Sanders, a Vermont Independent, posted a summary of his bill Sunday and said it would be introduced this week.

The bill includes several new provisions aimed at fixing the long delays for veterans' care.  The long-simmering issue erupted into a scandal in April and led to last week's resignation of VA Secretary Eric Shinseki after a federal investigation into the troubled Phoenix VA Health Care System found that about 1,700 veterans in need of care were "at risk of being lost or forgotten" after being kept off an official waiting list.

The investigation also found broad and deep-seated problems throughout the sprawling health care system, which provides medical care to about 6.5 million veterans annually.

Sanders said in a statement issued Sunday that while the people who have lied or manipulated data must be punished, "we also need to get to the root causes of the problems that have been exposed."

The bill would allow veterans facing long delays to seek care outside the VA, at private doctors' offices, military bases or community health centers.  It also authorizes emergency funding to hire new doctors and nurses and would provide scholarships or forgive college loans for doctors and nurses who go to work at the VA. In addition, it would give the department authority to fire poor-performing executives, but not as broadly as a bill passed in the House and defeated in the Senate last month.

An earlier version of Sanders' bill did not have enough support to pass in February.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said Sunday that the key to fixing the problem was giving veterans the flexibility to get the care they need at the closest, most available place.

"And that's the solution to this problem is flexibility to the veteran to choose their health care, just like other people under other health care plans have the — are able to do," McCain, a Vietnam veteran, said on CBS' Face the Nation.  "Why doesn't that veteran have a card and go to the caregiver that he or she needs and wants?"

The VA spent about $4.8 billion last year on medical care at non-VA hospitals and clinics.  That amounts to about 10 percent of health care costs for the Veterans Health Administration.

~~~

How the Supreme Court Made the U.S. Government Illegitimate

 

Dennis Trainor, Jr.

Acronym TV / Video Report

Published: Sunday 8 June 2014

 

 

Earlier this year, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled, in McCutcheon V. FEC, the court struck down a limit on how much cash an individual could give to all federal candidates during an election cycle.In the 5-4 decision, the majority of justices on the Roberts court ruled that individuals could buy elections. Or, in the words of Chief Justice Roberts,  “government regulation may not target the general gratitude a candidate may feel toward those who support him or his allies, or the political access such support may afford.”

 

In the dissenting opinion, Justice Stephen Bryer, did not hold back in voicing the disgust felt by an overwhelming majority of Americans (if not by a majority of Supreme Court Justices) in writing that the majority’s “legal analysis is faulty: It misconstrues the nature of the competing constitutional interests at stake. It understates the importance of protecting the political integrity of our governmental institutions.  It creates a loophole that will allow a single individual to contribute millions of dollars to a political party or to a candidate’s campaign.”

Furthermore, the dissenting opinion offered up this gem:

 “Taken together with Citizens United v. Federal Elections Commission today’s decision eviscerates our Nation’s campaign finance laws leaving a remnant incapable of dealing with the problems of Democratic legitimacy that those laws were intended to resolve.”  (Emphasis mine)

If we don’t have laws that empower us to deal with the problems of Democratic legitimacy, is our government legitimate?

That question, among others, in one I put to my guests on this week’s Acronym TV.

Christina Tobin is the founder and chair of Free & Equal. She has a long history of supporting ballot access, having gathered and defended over 1 million signatures for the Green Party, Constitution Party, Republican Party, Democratic Party, Libertarian Party, Socialist Equality Party and independents. Free & Equal Elections Foundation is a non-partisan grassroots organization, whose mission is to shift the power back to the individual voter through education.  Their motto, “More Voices, More Choices.”

Daniel Lee is a lifelong activist.  He serves on the national leadership team for the group Move to Amend, which is a coalition of hundreds of organizations and hundreds of thousands of individuals committed to social and economic justice, ending corporate rule, and building a vibrant democracy; Move To Amend is calling for an amendment to the US Constitution to unequivocally state that inalienable rights belong to human beings only, and that money is not a form of protected free speech under the First Amendment and can be regulated in political campaigns.

~~~

If the good Lord is willing and the creek don't rise, I'll talk with you next week.

God Bless You All;l

&

God Bless the United States of America

Floyd