WELCOME TO OPINIONS BASED ON FACTS (OBOF)
&
THINGS YOU
MAY HAVE MISSED (TYMHM)
YEAR THREE
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Name
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Published
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OVERVIEW
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 14
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Dec 18, 2012
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 15
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Jan. 02, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 16
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Jan. 08, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 16
EXTRA
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Jan. 11, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 17
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Jan. 15, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 18
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Jan. 22, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 19
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Jan. 29, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 20
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Feb. 05, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 21
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Feb. 14, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 22
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Feb. 20, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 23
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Feb. 27, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 23 SPECIAL
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Mar. 06, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 24
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Mar. 07, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 25
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Mar. 12, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 25-EXTRA
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Mar. 14, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 26
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Mar. 19, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 27
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Mar. 26, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 28
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Apr. 02, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 29
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Apr. 08, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 30
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Apr. 17, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 31
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Apr. 23, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 32
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Apr. 30, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 33
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May 07, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 34
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May 18, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 35
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May 21, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 36
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May 30, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 37
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June
05, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 38
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June
11, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 39
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June
18, 2013
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OBOF & TYMHM PART 40
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June
25, 2013
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IN THIS ISSUE
1. My
thoughts for today.
2. The US
of ALEC - Privatizing one Statehouse at a time,
3. Getting in
bed with Europe .
4. Green
Shadow Cabinet - defeat TPP.
5. New deal
for Millennials.
6. Randian State
MY THOUGHTS FOR TODAY
By Floyd Bowman
Publisher
"Opinions Based On Facts."
June 25, 2013
"OPINIONS BASED ON FACTS." IT IS GETTING HARDER, AND HARDER TO FIND AND
KNOW WHAT IS FACT.
There is a tremendous amount of articles, commentators,
political pundits, politicians, and others that are proclaiming and pronouncing
various thoughts as to where our country is going and how it is getting
there.
At this point, I am not guaranteeing that these
articles are all factual, BUT I feel that what some of these writers are saying is
based on what they see and believe to be facts. As I said, there are various approaches
relating to the future of our country and the why and how we are headed in a
particular direction.
I, personally, believe that there is a strong
movement to take us in some different direction than DEMOCRACY. There is simply too much evidence to ignore,
that POWER is the goal of a small group, as compared to 99%, that want the 99%
to be their servants or even slaves, if you will.
I read a lot and, of course, I can't give you
everything I read. If I did, you
wouldn't read any of it. I try to pick
out the material that I believe sets forth possibilities, that I don't believe
any of us want. You can certainly agree
or disagree with me, and, frankly, this is my purpose, and regardless of your
position, I just want you to be aware of what some respected people in our
country are thinking. As you go about
your everyday activities, keep these things in mind. Be aware of how they relate to what you are
seeing happen before your very eyes.
These movements have been going on for two decades
or more. The changes that some want,
take a generation or more to get the people to the point of accepting the new
and different government.
This is evident by the universities that are
teaching Ayn Rand philosophy, or the universities that are being controlled by
the Koch Brothers and their attempts to purchase some of the largest newspapers
in the country. The so-called war on
women that takes away their rights to determine what is right for their health
is just another example of ruling over citizens rights. There is no end to it and you are aware of
most of it. NO
MATTER WHAT IT TAKES, WE MUST KEEP DEMOCRACY.
IT'S WORKED QUITE WELL FOR MORE THAN 200 YEARS. WE NEED TO KEEP IT FOR ANOTHER 200
YEARS.
~~~
The United States
America
Bill Moyers
Campaign for America’s Future / Op-Ed
Published: Saturday 22 June 2013
A national consortium of state politicians and powerful corporations, ALEC
— the American Legislative Exchange Council — presents itself as a “nonpartisan
public-private partnership”. But behind
that mantra lies a vast network of corporate lobbying and political action
aimed to increase corporate profits at public expense without public knowledge.
In state houses around the country, hundreds of pieces of boilerplate ALEC
legislation are proposed or enacted that would, among other things, dilute
collective bargaining rights, make it harder for some Americans to vote, and
limit corporate liability for harm caused to consumers — each accomplished
without the public ever knowing who’s behind it. Using interviews, documents, and field
reporting, “United States of ALEC — A Follow-Up” explores
ALEC’s self-serving machine at work, acting in a way one Wisconsin
politician describes as “a corporate dating service for lonely legislators and
corporate special interests.”
Former health care
industry executive Wendell Potter says,
“Even though I’d known of [ALEC] for a long time, I was astonished. Just about everything that I knew that the
health insurance industry wanted out of any state lawmaker was included in that
package of bills.”
Following up on a 2012 report, this update includes
new examples of corporate influence on state legislation and lawmakers, the
growing public protest against ALEC’s big business-serving agenda, and internal
tactics ALEC is instituting to further shroud its actions and intentions.
“United States
In addition to watching the show, you should follow our “Eye on ALEC” blog and
see all of our features and articles related
to ALEC. Also, you can help us build
a national map of
state representatives who are members of ALEC.
~~~
Getting
in Bed with Europe
The biggest trade deal of all time is being
negotiated and nobody’s paying attention.
You may not be interested in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), but TTIP is interested in you. And you may not recall the moment in Barack Obama’s State of the Union address when he called for a free trade pact with the European Union, but policymakers on both sides of the
No
matter how dull it sounds, if it happens, it’s going to be a really big deal.
TTIP
would be the biggest trade pact of all time, by far. It creates a trading bloc far larger than
NAFTA—extending from California to Romania Mexico and Canada
Recent free trade deals between the United States Atlantic .
That’s a very ambitious goal.
The optimist’s case, as explained to me last week by numerous European
Union officials and politicians, is that there’s too much duplication of
regulatory effort on both sides of the Atlantic .
Right now an American tourist can get in a taxi in, say, Berlin New York U.S. Atlantic , they’re actually operating under
very different car safety regulatory schemes.
These divergent regulations aren’t a “barrier to trade” in the traditional
sense, but they do impede international commerce. For big firms, this is about
the cost of complying with multiple sets of regulations. For smaller firms, the
issue is that figuring out a new set of rules is more trouble than it’s worth.
The United States
Related advantages could be seen in food and drug safety. Right now, both
the FDA and its European counterpart insist on inspecting pharmaceutical
manufacturing facilities. That’s sensible, but does any given plant really need
to be inspected by both agencies, or could they work out terms for a mutual
recognition agreement in which a thumbs-up from the FDA would be good enough to
sell a product in Europe ?
According to proponents of TTIP, the gains of broad regulatory
harmonization could be very large, amounting to an economic boost of
more than $100 billion a year in the United States and somewhat more
than that in Europe. But tackling these
kinds of non-tariff barriers to trade is easier said than done. Deals with big
positive impacts for some interests always have downsides for others. The EU, for example, is eager to change rules
that prevent European airlines from flying on U.S.
The traditional case for freer trade—that the gains outweigh the
losses—applies well to TTIP. But there’s also potential for enormous mischief.
Business talks a big game about its desire for simpler and more harmonious rules,
but in practice this means they want laxer regulations. Mutual recognition
could become a platform for a regulatory race to the bottom. America could adopt European-style lax rules
about bank capital while Europe is pushed to
embrace American-style light regulation of hedge funds.
These concerns don’t mean that a trans-Atlantic free-trade zone is a bad
idea. In principle, it really is a great idea. But negotiators in trade
agreements have a tendency to become lobbyists for their respective countries’
entrenched business interests rather than stewards of their citizens’
interests. And that’s especially likely to happen when normal people tune out.
As talks begin this summer, people ought to pay attention and make it clear to
their legislators that open markets are good, but a trade deal shouldn’t be a
vehicle for sweetheart deals.
~~~
Green
Shadow Cabinet Joins Critical Struggle to Defeat the Trans-Pacific Partnership
Green Shadow Cabinet
NationofChange
/ Op-Ed
Published: Tuesday 18 June 2013
The Green Shadow Cabinet stands united in opposition to
the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), and is committed to defeating
this Obama administration effort to enrich and empower global corporations at
the expense of people and planet.
For three years, the Obama administration has engaged in
16 rounds of secret negotiations to develop the TPP. Those negotiations have
included hundreds of representatives of global corporations. The TPP negotiations have excluded
representatives of the vast majority of the American people. It is a fact that
the TPP is global economic policy for the 1%, at the expense of the 99%.
Today, all five branches and 81 members of the Green
Shadow Cabinet begin to act in concert to not only defeat the TPP, but to show
America that another government with another global economic agenda is
possible. There is an alternative to the corrupt political establishment that
produces economic terrors like the TPP. Our Cabinet is proof of that
alternative.
Daily this week, the Green Shadow Cabinet will release
over a dozen statements in opposition to the TPP; these statements describe the
threats posed by the TPP, and offer better alternatives. This month, our Cabinet members will begin
participating in the broader movement against the TPP through actions and
events across the United
States
THE TPP THREATENS ALL OF US
If you oppose the
industrial farming practices of Monsanto, Cargill and other giant food and
agribusiness corporations, with their intense use of toxic herbicides and other
harmful chemicals, production of untested genetically modified food, efforts to
control the seed supply and patent life, their pollution of the water, air,
soil and food supply, then you must oppose the TPP.
If you oppose the actions of the big banks and financial
institutions that led to the world economic crash, exploding wealth inequality,
risky investments that endanger the economic future, and their ability to
dominate national economies, then you must oppose the TPP.
If you are committed to protecting the rights of working
people to a living wage, the right to organize, and to safe working conditions,
then you must oppose the TPP.
If you favor a free and
open Internet where free speech is protected and creativity and communication
flourish, then you must oppose the TPP.
If you understand that healthcare is a human right and
that the inflated prices of pharmaceutical drugs should not be protected by
law, then you must oppose the TPP.
If you want to see the air, waters and lands protected
from toxic chemicals and pollution, and know that the ecological crisis of
species extinction and environmental breakdown must be reversed, then you must
oppose the TPP.
If you would live in a world where local, state, and
national governments are allowed to take urgent action to deal with the global
climate crisis, and to implement a Green New Deal, then you must oppose the
TPP.
We look forward to working with you in the coming months
to defeat the Trans-Pacific Partnership and to prevent its sister trade
agreement, the Trans-Atlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, from following
the same path. The first step is to stop enactment of Trade Promotion Authority
legislation, also known as “Fast Track,” that would prevent Congress from
holding hearings on the TPP or amending the TPP. There must be no end-run
around the Constitution, or the right of the American people to petition the
government for redress.
DEFENDING
THE NEW WORLD
We know that another world is possible. We are building that world every day through
local governments, cooperatives, community organizations, and publicly owned
financial institutions.
Those who defend corporate capitalism also understand
that another world is possible, and the Trans-Pacific Partnership is their
attempt to foreclose our new world. The TPP gives major
corporations legal personhood to sue in transnational courts dominated by
judges who themselves are lawyers for major corporations. Under the TPP,
corporations would be able to claim that environmental, labor, financial,
health and other laws cost them profits, and to extract damages from our
governments - and from us as taxpayers - if they enforce those laws.
The current administration in Washington
D.C. is committed to passing the TPP and to
defeating America U.S.
Statement
of the Green Shadow Cabinet of the United States of America
·
Jill Stein, President
·
Cheri Honkala, Vice President
·
Patch Adams, Assistant Secretary of Health for Holistic
Health
·
Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, Government Transparency and
Accountability, Director
·
Kali Akuno, Secretary of Racial Justice
·
Kris Alman, Assistant Secretary of Health for Data
Privacy
·
Gar Alperovitz, New Economy Advisor to the President
·
Marc Armstrong, Secretary of Commerce
·
Ajamu Baraka, Public Intervenor for Human Rights
·
Bill Barry, Workers Rights Administration, Administrator
·
Roshan Bliss, Assistant Secretary of Education for Higher
Education
·
Leah Bolger, Secretary of Defense
·
Steve Breyman, Environmental Protection Agency,
Administrator
·
Mary Bricker-Jenkins, Aid to Families and Youth, Director
·
Ellen Brown, Secretary of the Treasury
·
Richard Bruno, Assistant Secretary of Health for Medical
Education and Training
·
Shahid Buttar, Civil Rights Enforcement, Director
·
Lee Camp, Commissioner for the Comedic Arts
·
Olveen Carrasquillo, Assistant Secretary of Health for
Health Equity
·
Claudia Chaufan, Assistant Secretary of Health for System
Design
·
Steven Chrismer, Secretary of Transportation
·
David Cobb, Commission on Corporations and Democracy,
Chair
·
Khalilah Collins, Public Intervenor for Social Justice
·
Christopher Cox, Political Ecology Advisor to the
President
·
Michael Crenshaw, People's Culture Bureau, Work Progress
Administration
·
Maureen Cruise, Assistant Secretary of Health for
Community Wellbeing
·
Ronnie Cummins, Administrator, Food and Drug
Administration
·
Tim DeChristopher, Emergency Climate Action Coordinator
·
King Downing, President's Commission on Corrections
Reform, Chair
·
Mark Dunlea, White House Office of Climate and
Agriculture, Director
·
Steve Early, Workers Power Administration, Administrator
·
Robert Fitrakis, Federal Elections Commission, Chair
·
Margaret Flowers, Secretary of Health
·
George Friday, Commission on Community Power, Chair
·
Bruce Gagnon, Secretary of Space
·
Jack Gerson, Assistant Secretary of Education for K-12
·
Jim Goodman, Secretary of Agriculture
·
Philip Harvey, Full Employment Council, Chair
·
Howie Hawkins, Full Employment Council, Vice Chair
·
Kimberly King, Secretary of Education
·
Charles Komanoff, Assistant Secretary for Sustainable
Urban Transportation
·
Bruce Levine, Assistant Secretary of Health for Clinical
Mental Health
·
Vance "Head-Roc" Levy, Poet Laureate
·
Ethel Long-Scott, Commission on Women's Power, Co-Chair
·
Sarah Manski, Small Business Administration,
Administrator
·
Ben Manski, White House Chief of Staff
·
George Paz Martin, Peace Ambassador
·
Gloria Mattera, Assistant Secretary of Health for Public
Health Education
·
Richard McIntyre, U.S. Trade Representative
·
David McReynolds, Peace Advisor to the President
·
Gloria Meneses Sandoval, Secretary of Immigration
·
Richard Monje, Secretary of Labor
·
Suren Moodliar, Global Democracy Programs, Director
·
Jim Moran, Occupational Safety and Health Administration,
Administrator
·
Carol Paris, Assistant Secretary of Health for Mental
Health Systems
·
Sandy Perry, Secretary of Housing
·
Todd Price, Assistant Secretary of Education for
Education Technology
·
Jesselyn Radack, National Security and Human Rights
Advisor to the President
·
Jack Rasmus, Federal Reserve System, Chairman
·
Michael Ratner, Division of Civil, Social & Economic
Rights, Director
·
Ray Rogers, International Labor Rights, Advisor
·
Anna Rondon, Assistant Secretary of the Interior for
Indian Affairs
·
Lewis Rosenbaum, Public Media Administration,
Administrator
·
Daniel Shea, Veteran's Affairs: Chemical Exposure
·
Diljeet Singh, Assistant Secretary of Health for Women's
Health and Cancer
·
Kaitlin Sopoci-Belknap, Bureau of Water Preservation,
Director
·
Robert Stone, Assistant Secretary of Health for Emergency
and Palliative Care
·
David Swanson, Secretary of Peace
·
Sean Sweeney, Climate Change Advisor to the President
·
Clifford Thornton, Drug Policy Agency, Administrator
·
Brian Tokar, Director of the Office of Technology
Assessment
·
Bruce Trigg, Assistant Secretary of Health for Drug
Policy
·
Walter Tsou, Surgeon General
·
Kabzuag Vaj, Commission on Women's Power, Co-Chair
·
Harvey Wasserman, Secretary of Energy
·
Rich Whitney, Office of Management and Budget, Director
·
Richard D. Wolff, Council of Economic Advisors, Chair
·
Ann Wright, Secretary of State
·
Bruce Wright, Commission on Ending Homelessness, Chair
·
Stephen Zarlenga, Monetary Authority Board, Chair
·
Kevin Zeese, Attorney General
~~~
We Need a New Deal for
Millennials
Richard (RJ) Eskow
Campaign for America’s Future / Op-Ed
Published: Tuesday 18 June 2013
What kind of society abandons its own young? What kind of society allows the generations in
power to favor themselves over those who follow them, and then lets them claim
they’re doing it out of selflessness?
Look around you.
This weekend we
reviewed nine ways an extreme-right right social
agenda has harmed the millennial generation. But there’s a cure for that,
a formula that’s rational, sane, wise, and fair. It involves time-tested techniques for jobs,
growth, and education – a New Deal for Millennials.
And a New Deal starts with new values.
Value
Proposition
Our weakening values can be found in the “above the fray”
stance of presidents and pundits who treat Republicans’ ruthless Randianism as
if it were a moderate and reasonable point of view, rather than a morally
bankrupt corporate-funded bid for economic totalitarianism.
Those frayed values can be found in that hollow street
corner strut where GOP politicians holler out to deep-pocketed strangers, Pick
me. No, me! I’ll make your selfish agenda sing with the
voters. Free market? “Yes!” Competition? “Oh, yes!” Contempt for the majority? “Yes, oh yes, God yes!”
But hollow values are also present in Wall Street
Democrats who invert the GOP’s What’s the Matter with Kansas
Social justice and economic justice aren’t “either/or.”
They’re “and/and.”
Those empty values were present at last week’s Clinton
Those hollow values
are present in the countless editorials at political organs like The Washington
They’re present in the argument that we can’t help
millennials with student debt, even as we toss them into a jobless economy. Or
help them find jobs, as their lifelong earnings erode with every passing year.
Run,
Millennials, Run
The millennial generation
doesn’t need us, but here’s a little unsolicited advice: Run! Run from
the radical-right Republicans and demand sanity instead of madness. Run from anyone who tells you corporatist
Democrats are the best you can hope for politically.
Run from Alan Simpson and Erskine Bowles and the other
overpaid sales shills who claims that the way to “preserve entitlements for
you” is to make sure they’re eviscerated before you need them.
Run for the education “reformers” who claim there’s no
money to educate kids unless someone can make a profit.
Run from the people who tell you it’s your fault
jobs are so hard to find.
Run for your lives.
This isn’t generous advice. It’s actually very selfish.
Truth is, we need you. We need your intelligence. We need your strength.
We need your numbers.
The corporatists and extremists don’t realize it, but our
offer to help you is also a plea – one that’s is based on sound economic
principle as well as sound moral reasoning.
Morally and economically,
the answer is the same: When you win, we all win.
Who
Owes Who?
A New Deal for
millennials would relieve the inhumane and unconscionable burden of debt we’ve
imposed on college graduates. Ellen Brown wrote an excellent review of Elizabeth Warren’s
proposal to allow students to refinance through the Federal Reserve at the
ultra-low rates offered to banks and other financial institutions.
There may be ways to modify the Warren
Then GE Capital’s CEO was named head of Obama’s “Jobs
Council.” And Goldman’s COO just shared the stage with Bill Clinton at the
Global Initiative.
Are you telling us you’ll bend the rules for them, but
not for our young people? Well, yeah, come
to think of it you are. That’s not
acceptable.
As Brown points out, the government makes 36 cents on the
dollar for student loans. It shouldn’t
make a nickel. It won’t have to pay a
nickel, either.
Brown offers New Deal programs that succeeded without
costing the federal government a dime.
And some of these loans shouldn’t be paid back at all. They were issued for worthless or highly
overpriced degrees at “paper mills” like the University of Phoenix
Student loan forgiveness would release a trillion dollars
of debt obligation back into the general economy. Millennials would have more to spend on some
of the first purchases of adult life. That’s a stimulus that’s built to last.
And if any tax revenue is needed, here’s a suggestion:
Start with GE Capital and Goldman Sachs.
A
Generation at Work
Jobs come next. Studies show that unemployment at
the start of a career lowers lifetime earnings. We need to end our youth unemployment crisis
now with a millennial WPA that jumpstarts their careers, and our economy, the
way the Works Progress Administration did under Franklin D. Roosevelt.
We also need a major initiative in primary and secondary
education. Millennials are having
children now, and those children need schooling. What’s more, millennials represent a large
part of the workforce that can provide teachers for them. That means
committing to a renewed emphasis on public education.
Lastly, let’s end all this talk about cutting Social
Security and expand it instead, which can be done through
lifting the payroll tax cap and other strategies. The Millennial Generation
has already had its Social Security benefits cut, above and
beyond the gradual rise in the eligibility age already underway.
Benefits are calculated based on lifetime earnings, and
those have already been eroded by youth unemployment. Further cuts in benefits, like
President Obama’s proposed “chained CPI” that reduces the cost-of-living
adjustment, will only add to the injustice created by youth unemployment, while
the erosion of the other elements of American retirement – corporate pensions
and other assets – will leave millennials in a painfully vulnerable position in
their senior years.
Run
For Your Lives
Economically, millennials should run from Randian
Republicanism and its Selfishness Lite Democratic version. Culturally, they
should run from their elders’ ideas about home ownership and consumerism –
ideas which left them in thrall to corporations and banks.
What should they run to?
To politicians like Warren
And they should run for office. The oldest millennials will soon be qualified
to run for president. They can already hold every other office. I’m not a big believer in identity politics –
look where it got us last time – but millennials need candidates who speak to
their needs and are equally invested in their future.
We need them too, because their New Deal will be
everyone’s.
We need the courage of the young. Yours is not the task of making your way in
the world, but the task of remaking the world which you will find before you. May every one of us be granted the courage,
the faith and the vision to give the best that is in us to that remaking!- Franklin D. Roosevelt
9 Ways the Right’s Cradle
to Grave “Randian
State
Richard (RJ) Eskow
Campaign for America’s Future / Op-Ed
Monday 17
June 2013
Conservatives keep claiming liberals want a
“cradle-to-grave nanny state.” That
rhetoric has distracted us from the real social re-engineering taking place all
around us. The right, along with its “centrist” collaborators, is transforming
our nation into a bloodless and soulless Randian State
Their decades-long assault on our core social values is
on the verge of consuming its first complete generation of Americans. Born at
the dawn of the Reagan era, Millennials were the first to be fully subjected to
this all-out attack on the idea that we take care of each other in this
country, and they’ll pay for it from the cradle to the grave.
Some of us are the parents of Millennials. On this Father’s Day it’s hard not to wonder: Who’ll fight with them, and for them?
The
Psychosis
The
Simpsons made
a running joke out of Springfield ’s “Ayn Rand School for Tots,” where toddlers fend
for themselves in playrooms whose signs say things like “Helping is Futile.”
That’s very funny. What is happening to
our country isn’t.
A successful social contract has bound us together since
the FDR era. The Randian State
The Randian State
is built in the morally depraved mold of right-wing über-heroine Rand , who reviled the less fortunate – and even those who
tried to help them – as “parasites,” while at the same time idolizing
sociopathic killers.
That last statement isn’t rhetoric. It’s reporting.
“He has the true, innate psychology of a
Superman,” Rand wrote admiringly of child
murderer and dismemberer William Edward Hickman. “He can never realize and feel
‘other people.’”
As Mark Ames points out, this echoes Rand ’s description of her hero in The
Fountainhead: “He was born without the ability to consider others.”
Hickman’s actions were certainly not those of a “nanny.” But, while most conservatives undoubtedly
disapprove of his deeds, the glorification of sociopathic selfishness
represents the mentality with which the Administration is perpetually seeking
“compromise.” It has infected everything
from the Beltway’s “bipartisan” consensus to the content of our national media.
Where’s
Julia?
Conservatives went into rhetorical overdrive last year
after the Obama campaign released an “infographic” ad called “The Life of
Julia,” depicting ways Obama’s policies help women throughout their lives.
A typical reaction
came from self-declared moralizer, former Reagan official, and chronic excessive gambler William Bennett.
Bennett intoned that “Julia’s entire life is
defined by her interactions with the state … Notably absent in her story is any
relationship with a husband, family, church or community … Instead, the state
has taken their place and is her primary relationship.”
That’s deceptive, of course. The presentation focused on
government because it wasabout government. The Obama campaign
wasn’t proposing to marry her or drive her to church. But reason rarely
intrudes on such arguments. The Romney campaign quickly prepared a
counter-slide show and the “socialist” debate was on.
Obama won.
Curiously,
“Julia’s” story seems to have disappeared from the BarackObama.Com and Organizing
For Action websites now that victory’s been achieved. Old links to it are dead,
and attempts to click on this introduction only lead back to the site’s
main page.
Anti-Social.
Bennett’s phrasing
was drawn from conservative avatar Margaret Thatcher. Thatcher represented a
radically un-American vision of life which lacks either our sense of community
or our bonds of mutual trust, and which denies even the existence of society
itself.
“Who is society?” demanded Thatcher. “There is no such
thing! There are individual men and women and there are families …”
Conservatives went
searching for evidence that centrist Obama was really pushing cradle-to-grave
socialism. The only target they could find for their faux outrage was Michelle
Obama’s campaign to encourage breastfeeding, an
embarrassing right-wing misfire which suggests there may be Freudian overtones
to their “nanny” outrage.
Instead of pushing “cradle to grave” statism, the
Administration pivoted immediately after the election to government-shrinking
Grand Bargains. A “sequester” agreed to by both parties began slashing services
on both ends of life. And the Administration’s attempting to end the sequester,
not by calling for its straight repeal (as it should), but by offering cuts to
Social Security at the later end of that “cradle to grave” span.
Come to think of it, maybe that’s why
“Julia” has disappeared from the Obama website.
The Manifesto
The Randian
State
The commission approached American education in a
self-declared state of crisis, saying it was asked to address “the widespread
public perception” – held by whom, exactly? – “that something is seriously
remiss in our educational system.”
The sternly
ideological report which resulted was called “A Nation At Risk.” Though right-wing in
content, it reads like a Soviet proclamation on industrial production. Students
are redefined as inputs in a system to maximize American corporate
competitiveness, productivity and profits.
“History is not kind to idlers,” says the report. “We
live among determined, well-educated, and strongly motivated competitors. We
compete with them for international standing and markets …”
The rhetoric is hectoring and fierce:
“(T)he educational foundations of our society are
presently being eroded by a rising tide of mediocrity that threatens our very
future as a Nation and a people.”
The “problem” was stated in terms that were both
militaristic – “We have, in effect, been committing an act of unthinking,
unilateral educational disarmament” – and moralistic: “Our Nation’s schools and
Colleges … are routinely called on to provide solutions to personal, social,
and political problems that the home and other institutions either will not or
cannot resolve.”
That was an assault on an idea that had been
uncontroversial among Americans of all political persuasions for generations:
that education can and should help children learn to participate more
effectively in society. The authors had more concrete objectives in mind.
Like Communist commissars plumping next year’s wheat harvest, their goal was
productivity, productivity, productivity.
“Knowledge, learning, information, and skilled intelligence
are the new raw materials of international commerce,” wrote the Commission.
And by “raw materials,” Millennials, they meant you.
The rest of the
Commission’s report is largely taken up by a) platitudes, and b) statistical
studies which soon challenged aggressively. But the Randian State
During the Thatcher years a British punk group called The
Godfathers put out a song called “Birth
School Grave
Randian State
1. Prenatal Nutrition
For some the new
regime began even before they were born. The Reagan Administration moved
to cut nutrition funding for 600,000 pregnant
women, a particularly hypocritical act for a movement which claims to be
concerned about the rights of unborn children.
2. Early Childhood Nutrition
The same cuts also lowered food budgets for children in
4.6 million households, eighty-seven percent of which lived below the poverty line.
3. School lunches
The National School
Lunch Act of 1946 and the Child Nutrition Act of 1966 both promoted healthy
meals for America
Few, if any, parents adopted this approach at the family
dinner table. “Kids, finish your vegetables!” never became “Kids, finish
sucking the factory produced, sugar-drenched condiments out of those little
folding packets!”
4. Cutting education funds.
The Reagan Administration’s cuts to the Department of
Education, some occurring under Education Secretary William Bennett, eventually
totaled $19 billion.
The right has continued to mount an assault on school
funding at every level ever since, from local school boards up to the state and
Federal level. They’ve been joined by “centrist” Democrats like Rahm Emanuel in
their efforts to demonize teachers and privatize schools.
5. Making college unaffordable.
The University of Virginia’s Miller Center conducted a
study for the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education and found
that “Since the mid-1980s” – roughly the start of the Millennial Generation
-”the costs of higher education in America
Median family income have risen by 147% since then, while
college tuition and fees rose 439%, a tripling of education costs in real
dollar terms. The impact has been greatest on lower-income families, sounding a
potential death knell for social mobility.
From the New York Times: “Among the poorest
families … the net cost of a year at a public university was 55 percent of
median income, up from 39 percent in 1999-2000.”
6. Leaving graduates
drowning in debt.
The misguided
‘privatization’ of Sallie Mae, the government’s student loan enterprise, led to
a series of political and financial scandals. (See “Sallie
Mae’s Jets.”) It also contributed to an explosion of student loans,
many of which went to highly dubious ‘colleges’ which issued high-cost,
worthless degrees. Many other students went to more legitimate institutions,
but found themselves drowning in debt.
Now 7.4
million students are about to see a doubling of their interest
rates unless something is done. Elizabeth Warren has proposed given them
access to the Fed’s ultra-low rates for banks, while more modest proposals
would keep current rates in place.
The student debt
situation for Millennials would be morally unconscionable even if rates remain
at current levels. Anything else is shocking to contemplate. The
UPI reports todaythat Sen. Lamar Alexander said the
President and Republicans “agree” on what should be done.
That’s not reassuring.
7. Massive unemployment.
There are 10 million unemployed young people in the United States
The crisis covers everything from high-school-age summer
and after-school jobs to employment after graduation.
Studies show that youth unemployment lowers income for
the rest of a person’s life. That means this crisis is urgent as well as
massive. Every passing month harms the future of an entire generation. What
immediate, major measures are being proposed to address this emergency?
None.
8. An increasingly inequitable, wage-stagnating economy.
When Millennials do find jobs –
hopefully – they’ll enter a marketplace and economy plagued by historic levels
of wage inequality and stagnation.
That’s not an
accident: It’s policy.Tax rates favor inequality. Right-wing Republicans
and “centrist” Democrats have savaged unions, an effective counterweight
against growing inequality. And both parties have served the growing
financialization of our economy (although the GOP does it with more gusto),
making things worse for everybody except Wall Street.
9. Greater fear and insecurity in old age.
Now the President has proposed cutting Social Security
benefits through the cynical “chained CPI.” The “Chain” is also a tax increase,
but only on income below the highest level, which means it will aggravate the
inequalities that are hurting the vast majority of Americans.
Every generation will suffer if it passes, including
those who have already retired. But for Millennials it will be a final
late-life kick from the Randian
State
A
Letter to Millennials
The year was 1984. Wham! and Cyndi Lauper were topping the
charts. The top movie of the year was, appropriately enough, The
Terminator. And the nation was re-electing Ronald Reagan. Americans are now suffering from birth to
death as a result of this triumphal year for Randians, which plunged us deeper
into a red-in-tooth-and-claw world and left millions struggling with its social
consequences.
As they used to say back then: Have a nice day!
Dear Millennials: We tried to stop them. We failed.
We’re sorry. Now we need a party – and more importantly, a movement – that will refuse to allow
the continued destruction of government’s vital role in our social fabric.
Until we do, every generation will suffer. But you, the Millennials, will continue to
carry the dubious distinction of being the first generation of Americans to
have been assaulted from the cradle to the grave. For your sake and everyone’s else, you must
fight back.
This Father’s Day, here’s a promise: Some of us will be right there beside you.
~~~
