February 22nd, 2009 8:44 am
The question in the New York Times today was - should the corporate executives who took huge bonus just before the government gave their companies survival funds, give the money back? I am NOT kidding you. My answer:
Of course the executives of our Fortune 500 companies (maybe "Fortune" meant they make a fortune and the jokes on us?) should return the huge bonuses they took so swiftly when they saw the financial crisis coming. Does ANYONE think they were fair in taking that money? Does EVERYONE cheat at cards?
As a common taxpayer I am sickened by this injustice in our country. Is it part of a free market to compensate the rich and punish the poor? We are two working adults who have managed (carefully) to raise one child who is in college now. We have saved for our retirement too. We have never even taken an extension to pay our %40 of our income in taxes..We are not poor but we do not receive bonus pay as we both work in NPOs. We are not eligible for scholarships for our son. Our tax bracket is the highest there is. We have no extra cash and have stopped eating out and entertaining, even on a small scale. We believe in giving back to our fellow citizens and sacrificing for our country so we don't complain.
The executives that took huge bonus compensations before the bailout are thieves and now we have to pay again to "save" their companies and our banking system.
Will someone tell me what we did to deserve this? Are we just stupid? Are we "bad?" Did we get the wrong instructions and fail the test? How can we continues believing our country will always be on the right side of the law, that our government will always come to our rescue, that all Americans are created equal?
I give up the notion of our nation being any different from the rest of the dictatorships and military juntas around the world. Maybe now is the time to go live on that island under a coconut tree on the beach. So much for fifty years of belief in the good triumphing over the bad. I'm sad.
Sunday, February 22, 2009
Sunday, February 15, 2009
The Two Party Failure
Eric Cantor, the minority whip, is the epitome of conservative republicanism. Intransigent, towing the party line all the way even if it costs his country dearly. There are Democrats who are his equal, adhering blindly to dogma that is outdated. Both political parties should unite under new platforms that are in keeping with the times, as well as the desires of their constituents around the country. Such a collaboration and unity will never be. I firmly believe this is an end of an era, the one where America was king of the world, and that the era before us, where we are already a weak world power, will be dismal if our government can't overcome it's bickering and divisiveness. How sad that the two party system should be so anachronistic and unable to adapt new ways. Who will save us and bring us glory once again?
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Steve Jobs? Can he have some privacy?
The Press, is being despicable. (see The New York Times today) Disgusting, even.
Yes, public figures are forcibly under a microscope. Why are they examined so closely? Because they are famous and the press makes a lot money off them. They also have a responsibility to give us more information if they are having a problem that will effect us, the people, in a meaningful way.
They are NOT responsible to the public about private family members or themselves coping with an ongoing health issue that is life threatening. Beyond disclosing what Mr. Jobs has already (and we do know about his illness,) why does he have to tell us if he is going to live or die?
Would you berate your grandmother about her possible death just to know if she left you money in her will?
Please.
Is it because Apple share holders might lose some money? Come on, you can’t be serious. His life is in question!
LEAVE HIM ALONE.
I too am a cancer survivor, by the way.
Monday, January 5, 2009
Let's fix America!
Dear Americans,
Here are some ideas as to how we should repair America:
1. As for the “financial world as we know it,” throw it away because it is not worth fixing. Good riddance!
2. Restore large and small businesses that are American owned with funds allotted by the bailouts. A multibillion dollar business must help fund programs that help the American people live at a reasonable level of comfort without debt. There should be a cap on their earnings that reflects their equal efforts to help poorer segments of the economy.
3. Subsidized areas of the economy that are essential: lodging, jobs, education, medicine and protection.
4. Provide adequate shelter and food for everyone. Persons with more than one dwelling should help by providing housing to those who have none. They can sell the extra properties or develop them for use as public housing.
5. Provide a “job” to all that can work at a minimum (but higher than it is now) wage so they can feed and clothe themselves.
6. Bailout the American school system. Give money to states and local governments to pay for a completely new educational model. Emphasis should be on the liberal arts, math and science in keeping with the high quality of learning in other countries such as England or France. Teachers and other educators should be valued with a higher pay bracket such as lawyers and doctors and other professionals.
7. Guarantee health care to all. Use a system such as the very successful Kaiser HMO to build a national system so that all Americans can obtain care.
8. Use local police, law enforcement and the National Guard to keep law and order. Local police and fire departments should also be compensated with higher pay and venerated for the extraordinary duties they perform.
9. Insure that everyone is safe, warm, fed and educated.
The present order of the American economy compensates individuals with (income in
the millions and billions) assets that could feed whole countries around the world.
Their earnings are obscene. Why is government regulation so lax? Why is the imbalance so obvious and accepted by such intelligent educated people? The majority of people here in the US struggle to provide the basics for their families, let alone those who are working three jobs to pay for college or training for a trade. The division is classes has grown into a giant chasm that may claim the life blood of the existence of America. America, as we have known it, is dying. We must accept that. New financial models, new systems for organization, new technologies for production, new economic structures for manufacturing need to be built from the ground up. The important priorities such as those delineated above must be addressed by the government and our people. The lesson to be learned is improvement begins at the bottom and grows up, not the old status quo of Reagan’s“trickle down”. This and only this thinking will mean renewed prosperity and justice for us all.
Elizabeth Brady
Here are some ideas as to how we should repair America:
1. As for the “financial world as we know it,” throw it away because it is not worth fixing. Good riddance!
2. Restore large and small businesses that are American owned with funds allotted by the bailouts. A multibillion dollar business must help fund programs that help the American people live at a reasonable level of comfort without debt. There should be a cap on their earnings that reflects their equal efforts to help poorer segments of the economy.
3. Subsidized areas of the economy that are essential: lodging, jobs, education, medicine and protection.
4. Provide adequate shelter and food for everyone. Persons with more than one dwelling should help by providing housing to those who have none. They can sell the extra properties or develop them for use as public housing.
5. Provide a “job” to all that can work at a minimum (but higher than it is now) wage so they can feed and clothe themselves.
6. Bailout the American school system. Give money to states and local governments to pay for a completely new educational model. Emphasis should be on the liberal arts, math and science in keeping with the high quality of learning in other countries such as England or France. Teachers and other educators should be valued with a higher pay bracket such as lawyers and doctors and other professionals.
7. Guarantee health care to all. Use a system such as the very successful Kaiser HMO to build a national system so that all Americans can obtain care.
8. Use local police, law enforcement and the National Guard to keep law and order. Local police and fire departments should also be compensated with higher pay and venerated for the extraordinary duties they perform.
9. Insure that everyone is safe, warm, fed and educated.
The present order of the American economy compensates individuals with (income in
the millions and billions) assets that could feed whole countries around the world.
Their earnings are obscene. Why is government regulation so lax? Why is the imbalance so obvious and accepted by such intelligent educated people? The majority of people here in the US struggle to provide the basics for their families, let alone those who are working three jobs to pay for college or training for a trade. The division is classes has grown into a giant chasm that may claim the life blood of the existence of America. America, as we have known it, is dying. We must accept that. New financial models, new systems for organization, new technologies for production, new economic structures for manufacturing need to be built from the ground up. The important priorities such as those delineated above must be addressed by the government and our people. The lesson to be learned is improvement begins at the bottom and grows up, not the old status quo of Reagan’s“trickle down”. This and only this thinking will mean renewed prosperity and justice for us all.
Elizabeth Brady
The Middle East
World, get a clue!
The Palestinians and the Israelis have been at this conflict since 1947 and the Balfour Declaration that took Palestine away from it's people. Study the history of the Middle East just for five minutes and you will find out that this conflict is deeply rooted in both societies. No one in Israel or Palestine is at fault. Europeans, especially the WWII allies, are at fault for alleviating their guilt after the war by plopping the disenfranchised Jews in the Palestinian homeland. Would you like it if someone came along and said move out of your state, we need it for the American Indians?
Divide the holy land in half, one for Israel and one for Palestine. Divide Jerusalem, where many religions have important monuments, and make the old center a city state like the Vatican in Rome. Put a peace keeping force between the two countries until they give up struggling. Until then, there will always be cycles of violence and poor women and children dying on both sides.
This is the bare truth.
The US, to this day, has backed Israel because the Jewish population in our country is large and financially integral to our economy. So be it. We can support Israel and Palestine both.
As I said, get a clue - like the one I'm giving you now - and gather the world to support and bring about the existence of two free and autonomous states of Israel and Palestine. Gather to bring about peace in the Middle East. Is there anyone for this job?
How about it, Secretary Clinton?
The Palestinians and the Israelis have been at this conflict since 1947 and the Balfour Declaration that took Palestine away from it's people. Study the history of the Middle East just for five minutes and you will find out that this conflict is deeply rooted in both societies. No one in Israel or Palestine is at fault. Europeans, especially the WWII allies, are at fault for alleviating their guilt after the war by plopping the disenfranchised Jews in the Palestinian homeland. Would you like it if someone came along and said move out of your state, we need it for the American Indians?
Divide the holy land in half, one for Israel and one for Palestine. Divide Jerusalem, where many religions have important monuments, and make the old center a city state like the Vatican in Rome. Put a peace keeping force between the two countries until they give up struggling. Until then, there will always be cycles of violence and poor women and children dying on both sides.
This is the bare truth.
The US, to this day, has backed Israel because the Jewish population in our country is large and financially integral to our economy. So be it. We can support Israel and Palestine both.
As I said, get a clue - like the one I'm giving you now - and gather the world to support and bring about the existence of two free and autonomous states of Israel and Palestine. Gather to bring about peace in the Middle East. Is there anyone for this job?
How about it, Secretary Clinton?
Monday, December 8, 2008
Saving the Dinosaurs
December 8th, 2008 12:34 am
I do not favor a bailout for the auto companies so I hope that if the government decides to lend (they have to pay back!) them funds they attach stringent requirement for environmentally friendly auto production and no executive privileges until the money is returned to the taxpayers. The car companies have been producing sub par automobiles for decades, thumbing their noses at consumers, while the executives in charge lined their off shore coffers for such a day as this. I don't care if they are ruined. As usual the workers need to be protected so we will shore up the companies for a while. I say that the government should ask the CEOs to draft a plan to distribute the ownership in bonds or stocks to the employees. Can someone please audit the bosses financial statements? They are richer that anyone imagines. Let them give up their fortunes to save Detroit! Do you really think they would?
I do not favor a bailout for the auto companies so I hope that if the government decides to lend (they have to pay back!) them funds they attach stringent requirement for environmentally friendly auto production and no executive privileges until the money is returned to the taxpayers. The car companies have been producing sub par automobiles for decades, thumbing their noses at consumers, while the executives in charge lined their off shore coffers for such a day as this. I don't care if they are ruined. As usual the workers need to be protected so we will shore up the companies for a while. I say that the government should ask the CEOs to draft a plan to distribute the ownership in bonds or stocks to the employees. Can someone please audit the bosses financial statements? They are richer that anyone imagines. Let them give up their fortunes to save Detroit! Do you really think they would?
Monday, November 24, 2008
Is Barack Changing Right Before our Eyes?
We have worked for four years to put Senator Obama in the White House. The last few months of the presidential campaign were grueling. We celebrated change and the end of corruption in Washington with glee and whooped our good fortune the night Barack Obama won the election. We felt powerful again. Senator Obama, we thought, will save us from losing our life savings and will make our economic system fair. He said he would tax the rich more and let us keep our savings. We've been on a happy high ever since.
Now we are worried and nervous again. Is he really going to bailout more banks and rescue Detroit? Is he truly going to rescind the promise to make our tax system work for "little" main street as well as Rodeo Drive?
If so, this is truly a joke on us, the middle class hard working Americans, who live on an honest days wages. I just cannot believe this will be the picture in Washington again? Did Obama just hear what he wanted and say what he said just to get into the White House?
Yes he has the crème de la crème of the educated elite that he is assembling to help him. Are they more honest that the people G.W. has had with him? Do they care about us, “the living without a million” crowd? Are they going to intellectualize why they must keep taxing us and not the “many millions” clique? Those already rich folk are putting more money in their pockets as the “rescue packages” become available, instead of helping us keep our modest homes, food on the table and child in college.
Many people, especially young new voters, will be crushed. I, personally, will never vote again and I will never again trust a politician or anyone in my government, for that matter. It would mean the loss of our belief that we, the people, have power to effect change Washington and of belief in our constitution as we know it. Dreams will die in my life and other lives across this country. Hope in the hearts and minds of our citizens will be forever extinguished.
Now we are worried and nervous again. Is he really going to bailout more banks and rescue Detroit? Is he truly going to rescind the promise to make our tax system work for "little" main street as well as Rodeo Drive?
If so, this is truly a joke on us, the middle class hard working Americans, who live on an honest days wages. I just cannot believe this will be the picture in Washington again? Did Obama just hear what he wanted and say what he said just to get into the White House?
Yes he has the crème de la crème of the educated elite that he is assembling to help him. Are they more honest that the people G.W. has had with him? Do they care about us, “the living without a million” crowd? Are they going to intellectualize why they must keep taxing us and not the “many millions” clique? Those already rich folk are putting more money in their pockets as the “rescue packages” become available, instead of helping us keep our modest homes, food on the table and child in college.
Many people, especially young new voters, will be crushed. I, personally, will never vote again and I will never again trust a politician or anyone in my government, for that matter. It would mean the loss of our belief that we, the people, have power to effect change Washington and of belief in our constitution as we know it. Dreams will die in my life and other lives across this country. Hope in the hearts and minds of our citizens will be forever extinguished.
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