Progress = advance or development toward a better, more complete, or more modern condition.

Think Progress is a News Blog that I read. Perhaps you may like it too. Here are some of the current headlines:

POLITICS
• BREAKING: House Republicans Again Delay Payroll Tax Cut Vote, May Resort To Procedural Gimmicks

JUSTICE

• Gingrich PAC Took $7.6 Million From One Donor, Used Money To Fly Across The Country For Public Events

ECONOMY

• Under Romney, Bain Capital Made Millions From South Carolina Business That Shut Down, Laid Off 150 Workers

POLITICS

• New Hampshire GOP Lawmakers Propose ‘Warning: You Are About To Enter Massachusetts’ Border Signs

ECONOMY

• 70 Percent Of The Cuts In GOP Sen. DeMint’s Deficit Reduction Plan Target Low-Income People

HEALTH

• In 2010, Romney Said He Wouldn’t Repeal The Individual Health Mandate In Obamacare

ECONOMY

• What Happens To The Economy If The Payroll Tax Cut Expires

ECONOMY

• Study: Wealth Inequality In America May Be Worse Than It Was In Ancient Rome

JUSTICE

• Video: 1994 Mitt Romney Explains How 2011 Mitt Romney’s Wall Street Donors Will Corrupt Mitt Romney

SECURITY

• Last Flight Out Of Iraq: ‘It’s Great Being A Part Of History. It’s An Even Better Feeling To Be Going Home’

NEWS FLASH

• PRO-ADULTERY WEBSITE ENDORSES GINGRICH

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

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According to the memo, if Democrats embrace OWS, “This would mean more than just short-term political discomfort for Wall Street. … It has the potential to have very long-lasting political, policy and financial impacts on the companies in the center of the bullseye.”

The memo also suggests that Democratic victories in 2012 should not be the ABA’s biggest concern. “… (T)he bigger concern,” the memo says, “should be that Republicans will no longer defend Wall Street companies.”

Here is a PDF of the actual memo.

In our hurry up, fast food, 24 hour news, what’s your point, modern world, it’s realistic to ask “What do they really want?” But, unfortunately, that’s the wrong question. The #occupy movement is not them or they or those, it is us. We are the 99%. Therefor it’s up to each of us to ask the question correctly, “What do I want?”

For example when I do that some of my questions are:

What do I want for the planet Earth?
What do I want for my county’s government?
What do I want for the economic markets?
What do I want for my food?
What do I want for my shelter?
What do I want of myself?

My answers show me that I have a significant agreement with the #occupy movement. I support them and will stand with them.

One of the better recent attempts to frame the #occupy movement is by Alexis Madrigal writing in the November 2011 issue of The Atlantic. The story is available online

It’s a little geeky with the API metaphor but when you get past that it’s good.

Sunday, 16 October 2011

Dear Tea Party Patriots, which you most certainly are,

We want you to know that we understand your grievances with the Occupy movement. For every kid that blatantly disrespects an officer without just cause, we cringe as much as you do. For every American that burns a flag, we say “you’ve disgraced yourself for nothing.” For every stereotypical “dirty hippie,” we are cursed with the taint of unprofessional behavior.

But these are glaring examples that are easy to see, much like how the Tea Party has been unfairly portrayed because of a sub-section of trouble makers and hysterical pundits.

People accuse the Occupiers of being Communists, Socialists or anti-American. The truth is that the majority of Communists in America will no doubt support the Occupy movement. These people are not, however, representative of the much wider support base that makes up the Occupy movement. This has more to do with our presentation than our actual sympathies.

The same can be said for you.

People accuse the Tea Party of being potentially terrorist because of the fundamentalist militia groups that overwhelmingly support the Tea Party. When people like Ann Coulter, a pundit that no doubt gets lumped in will all other Tea Party Patriots, say “My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times Building.” many of us try to believe that not all of you agree. Statements like that are such a public approval of terrorism. They are wanton delight in the destruction of life over political conjecture. We refuse to believe that these are the heart of Tea Party Patriotism.

We have more in common than not. We believe the government has too much power. Where we might deviate is that we believe corporate interests lobby to inflate government so that government can better serve banks and multinationals rather than the people.

We do not seek to redistribute the wealth, only to remove legalized bribery from government office. We only seek to hold criminals accountable for their misappropriation of the American economy.

How do we truly differ then? Mostly over civil liberties issues. Maybe we differ over two prolonged and costly wars. The Occupy movement is accepting of liberals and makes no judgments on the issues we’re all currently putting to the side for something far more pervasive. It is also accepting of conservatives that have not fallen into the political trap of thinking all corporations have all of our best interests at heart.

To many of us it felt like the Tea Party wanted to outright reject everyone that was socially liberal. It didn’t seem to care if we were fiscally conservative or shared common threads. Maybe that was a lie perpetuated by the media? Nevertheless, suffice it to say that you’re likely being misinformed about how accepting we would be of you if you would just join with us.

We have the same goal. Topple the regime, corporate and political, that is destroying American life. We don’t care what your background is so long as you are a patriot. Whether you’re a Conservative or Liberal, whether you’ve accepted Jesus Christ as your lord and savior or if you’re a staunch Atheist, these personal identifiers have nothing to do with the issues of big government and big corporations.

After this is all over we can go back to bickering about our own personal ideologies. Until then, however, no progress can be made on either side until this hydra headed monster we call our current government is removed from American life.

We believe you to be patriots. Join with us in solidarity

We’re only about 13 months from November 2012, so predictably, depressingly, Washington has turned its attention toward the election. This week, all eyes are on New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who is deciding whether to join the race. That’s the wrong place to look. If you’re worried about the 2012 election — or, more quaintly, just worried about the economy — the politician to watch is Germany’s Angela Merkel.
Merkel isn’t entering the Republican primary, or mounting a challenge to President Obama. But what she and a handful of European leaders do over the next few weeks could well decide whether the American economy tips back into recession this year, and thus, quite inadvertently, decide who wins the U.S. presidency in 2012.

And…

Concurrently the remaining EU countries will suffer with a large devaluation of the euro which will give rise to political instability and additional government rejection of the EU.

Remember in 2008-2009 all those trillions of US dollars that went to European banks? It was to prevent this exact scenario from happening back then. The fact is that Banksters in the EU and the US have debt (betting) that is (covered?) by insurance policies. But who covers the insurer’s? That’s right, the government (aka “Too big to fail). Unfortunately for Europe and the world the EU is made up of sovereign nations that will not (or can not) provide cover when the euro goes into deep trouble.

The EU collapse effects on the US will be sharp and dramatic. Part two of the Great Recession will be hugely painful as the US further devalues everything it owns and sells off its assets.

The rise of China to number one in the world market is almost assured. The economic prognosticators are saying a rough ten years ahead for the US. My gut tells me it will be closer to twenty years before market stability returns. I wonder what will our country look like then?

Here is a link to some deeper facts.

via Public Citizen:

Washington is in the grip of a fever. It’s hard to find a word other than lunacy to describe what’s going on.

We are veering toward potential economic catastrophe.

And Congress is hung up on a debate that shouldn’t be occurring. It is debating an imaginary problem that conjures scary future scenarios but ignores dire existing circumstances. The consensus proffered solution to the imaginary problem would damage our country and further weaken our economy.

Democrats and Republicans are at loggerheads, but they are disagreeing primarily about how much harm they want to impose. That’s a very consequential disagreement, but it ignores the fact that we don’t need to impose any harm at all.

Let’s correct some of the upside-down components of the current debate.

1. There should not be a debate over increasing the nation’s debt ceiling.

Prior approval of increases — more than 100 — have been routine, and this time should be no different. Raising the debt ceiling merely authorizes the U.S. government to make good on spending previously authorized by Congress.

It is true that Republicans in Congress signaled some time ago that they would not easily agree to another increase in the debt ceiling. That’s why Democrats should have passed an increase in the last Congress, a move they declined to make because of fear of electoral consequences. At very least, the administration should have insisted on increasing the debt ceiling as a condition of agreeing to the December 2010 deal to extend the Bush tax cuts.

2. The government should be running larger, not smaller, deficits.

The country has not recovered from the Great Recession. One in six people who would like a full-time job are unable to find one. We don’t have to worry about hard times coming sometime in the future — we are living in hard times right now!

To fuel a stalled economy and put people back to work, the U.S. government should be spending more money. This is basic Keynesian economics. It shouldn’t be controversial.

State governments are starved for cash, and laying off thousands of teachers, librarians, fire fighters and police. If the federal government gave the states block grants, they could keep people employed, and keep delivering needed services. Our country, and our economy, would be stronger.

Much of the country is suffering through a summer of staggering heat waves. This should be an urgent reminder of the need to take radical action to mitigate catastrophic climate change. Especially with so many people out of work, the government should be spending money to employ people to retrofit buildings around the country and to invest in R&D on solar and wind energy.

And, of course, there is no shortage of other pressing needs to which people can be put to work.

By contrast, cutting spending right now will worsen our very severe economic crisis, and push more people out of work.

3. Our economic problems are present, not future.

It is both bewildering and unconscionable that pontificating politicians and pundits express so much concern for imagined future economic problems while ignoring the real and present suffering that pervades the country.

There is also some very fuzzy math that takes over the discussion. If it continues to grow economically, and if it makes wise investments, the country is going to be significantly richer in the years and decades ahead. We’re not going to be poorer, irrespective of the size of the national debt.

4. It’s actually not very hard to find a few trillion dollars.

To say that the debt ceiling debate shouldn’t be taking place, and that we should be running larger deficits, is not to say there aren’t appropriate areas of the budget to cut, and appropriate revenue streams to tap.

On the spending side, among many other things, we could:

Save more than a trillion dollars over 10 years by ending the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Cut more than $500 billion from the Department of Defense budget by replacing private contractors and eliminating weapons systems the Pentagon says it does not need. Hundreds of billions of more in savings are available through modest cuts at DoD. The United States would still have, by far, the world’s largest military. A very modest proposal from the Congressional Progressive Caucus totals $2.3 trillion in savings over 10 years through ending the wars and cutting the Defense budget.

Save more than $150 billion in pharmaceutical costs just by negotiating better prices with Big Pharma. More aggressive moves to fix the broken pharmaceutical development system could offer savings far larger, with the government obtaining a significant portion of well over a trillion dollars in savings on pharmaceutical expenditures over 10 years.

On the revenue side, among many other things, we could:

Tax Wall Street speculation and raise between $1 trillion and $1.5 trillion over 10 years.

End offshore tax haven abuses, and raise a trillion dollars over the next decade.

Close corporate tax loopholes. By way of illustration, getting rid of just two large breaks, deferral of overseas revenue and accelerated depreciation, would raise about $700 billion. The Treasury Department lists $365 billion in corporate tax breaks being gifted annually — that’s $3.65 trillion over the 10-year period talked about in these debt debates! Thanks to all the loopholes and escapes, corporations are benefiting from record low tax rates — 21% on average (this is what they are actually paying, not the nominal rate). For a handful, the tax system is a source of revenue. Citizens for Tax Justice looked at 12 major companies that together made $171 billion in profits from 2008-2010 and found that the dozen companies together paid negative $2.5 billion in taxes, thanks to $62 billion in tax subsidies.

Tax capital gains as ordinary income, and raise $1 trillion.

Many of these and other sensible budget ideas are included in the Congressional Progressive Caucus’s People’s Budget.

A key thing to keep in mind about all these savings and increased revenue is that they should be ploughed back into public investments and public priorities. We need more net spending, not less. Over time, we need to reduce the deficit, but much of that will occur automatically, as the country moves back to fuller employment and more robust growth.

We do not need to touch, nor should we touch, Medicare or Medicaid. Nor should we tamper with Social Security, which is financed separately from the rest of the federal budget and has nothing to do with the debt.

It’s impossible at this point to know how the debt ceiling debate is going to play out. It’s also highly uncertain what happens if the U.S. government defaults — catastrophe may follow, or it may not.

What is certain is that irrationality is ruling the day.

It’s past time to leave behind this orchestrated and false crisis. Our country faces a legion of real and serious problems. It’s time we got to work taking them on.

Onward,

Robert Weissman
President, Public Citizen