The GOP and Their Waterloo Moments

post from LEADERSHIP CULTIVATION on 23 July 2009 01:14:00 AM. © LEADERSHIP CULTIVATION

U.S. Senator Jim DeMint of South Carolina called President Obama's push for sensible health care reform as his Waterloo moment. But wait, for Republicans hasn't everything that the President has tried to accomplish been his Waterloo moment? Do we detect a pattern here for the GOP? Oppose everything and if the President fails, make some ridiculous assertion that the President's agenda is facing widespread rejection by the American people.

Surprise, surprise. President Obama who has a lot of fight in him is not rolling over for DeMint as he hasn't for any of his political opponents. Now it sounds like Sen. DeMint wishes he had chosen his words (or his opponent) more carefully.What's that rule, "to kick butt you have to bring butt." In other words,the good senator from South Carolina should have anticipated that whenhe threw a punch at this President, this President would punch back.I guess with one South Carolina politician out of thepresidential picture, the good senator had hoped to fill the void. Ohwell, all is not lost. With a name like DeMint, he can always open up a candy store. However, I would advise him against stocking jawbreakers. Ouch!

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Life is good, if you are a banker

post from AMERICAblog News| A great nation deserves the truth on 23 July 2009 01:13:00 AM. © AMERICAblog News| A great nation deserves the truth

It's as if nothing happened. The recession doesn't exist and the banking implosion never happened. Morgan Stanley proved yet again why non-binding shareholder votes are a waste as the CFO declared Q2 a "pretty good quarter for the employees, but not so for the shareholders." They don't care. At all. It's all about their bonuses and the rest be damned.

But Wall Street, helped by improving profits, is on track to pay employees as much as, or even more than, it did in the pre-crisis days. So far this year, the top six U.S. banks have set aside $74 billion to pay their employees, up from $60 billion in the corresponding period last year.

The increase in set-asides for employee pay has raised the ire of Washington, where lawmakers denounced financial leaders for returning to old habits and vowed to enact measures governing executive compensation.

"It strengthens our commitment to getting legislation passed," Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, said in an interview Wednesday, adding that a committee vote on a bill to increase oversight of Wall Street pay has been scheduled for Tuesday. "The amounts are troubling."

Troubling indeed that so little action has taken place by Congress or Obama. Very troubling.

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Good Questions

post from jobsanger on 23 July 2009 01:07:00 AM. © jobsanger

Found at the excellent blog of The Atheist Missionary.

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A Disqualification For Government Service

post from jobsanger on 23 July 2009 01:06:00 AM. © jobsanger

In the metroplex Texas city of Grand Prairie, five police department employees have been placed on administrative leave -- four police officers and a dispatcher. The department's chief is now deciding whether the five employees should be fired or retained.

The employees are accused of using department computers to forward a racist e-mail. Sadly, this is happening after the department had "sensitivity training" only two years ago. The questionable e-mail "included a racist reference to the tail number on Air Force One and suggested that Obama will serve only one term because a black man can't hold a job longer than four years." The five were placed on leave for using a city-owned computer for personal use.

Although the e-mail originated from an outside source, these employees forwarded it among themselves. Police spokesman John Brimmer said, "These are some good officers who have worked at the department for a long time that made a serious lapse in judgment. You can't do much about an unsolicited e-mail, but what you do after you open it is on you."

The vice-president of the local NAACP chapter, Preston Dixon, went further saying, "If they view our nation's top officer as an N-word, what do they think about the average black citizen in the community? Since they've gone through diversity training, then they knew better and should be fired."

The question is, should they be fired? I agree with Preston Dixon. The five employees should be fired, but not for personal use of a city computer. That's a fairly minor offense, and could be dealt with with a warning or a write-up. What they should be fired for is their racist attitude.

I have spent most of my adult life in some form of law enforcement -- six years as an officer and supervisor at a college in a particularly rough part of a major city, eight years as a correctional officer and another twelve years working for both adult and juvenile parole. I don't believe I could have done any of those jobs properly if I had been a racist.

In fact, I will broaden that view. I don't think a racist can properly do any government job that requires contact with the public, whether on a local, state or national level. Government workers must treat everyone the same -- no matter their race, ethnicity, sex, religion, age or sexual preference. And it is extremely hard to keep your prejudice out of your work.

There are lots of jobs a racist can probably do, but government service dealing with the public is not one of them. Racism should be an automatic disqualification.

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The Insurance Scrooge

post from jobsanger on 23 July 2009 01:05:00 AM. © jobsanger

Political Cartoon is by David Fitzsimmons in the Arizona Daily Star.

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The Rich Are Greedy Whiners

post from jobsanger on 23 July 2009 01:04:00 AM. © jobsanger

There is a plan to fund health insurance by imposing a small tax increase on the rich in this country. The plan actually makes sense, but the Republicans have been screaming bloody murder. To hear them talk, you'd think the rich are already overtaxed -- to the extent that they simply could not bear to pay more. What stupid nonsense!

As the tax table above shows, the top tax rate in the United States is near it's lowest point since the 1920's (which is incidentally the last time we had an income gap as large as the current one). The current top tax rate is less than 40% -- not for all Americans, but just those making enormous amounts of income.

How does this compare with other times in our history? During the time of the "New Deal" under President Roosevelt, the top tax rate ran from 63% to 79%. Under Presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy the top rate was 91%. Presidents Johnson and Nixon presided over a top rate of at least 70%, and during President Reagan's first term the top rate was 50%.

And you know what? During those times, the rich had no problem getting richer, and many new millionaires were created. In fact, most economists consider the 1950's, 1960's and 1970's to be a very good time for the United States economy. It was not until the 1980's, after Reagan lowered the rates, that the economy suffered a severe recession. The current recession came after Bush made his own unnecessary taxes cuts, c reating the current huge income inequity.

How bad is that inequity? The Wall Street Journal reports that management executives now receive one-third of all pay earned in the United States. The total payroll of the United States was $6.4 trillion in 2007. Of that money, $2.1 trillion was made by management executives (and that doesn't include such lucrative things as stock options). I expect that ratio has probably even gotten higher in the last couple of years.

In fact, since 1979 the income of the top 1% in this country has increased by 256%. That might be OK if everyone's income had increased that much, but of course it didn't. Income for the middle class increased by only 21%. The working class fared even worse, since their income has barely risen at all in this same period.

An interesting sidelight of this new concentration of payroll to the richest folks is that it has gotten so bad that it is hurting social security. While the rich executives make a third of the income, they don't pay anywhere near a third of the social security taxes. Although the rich won't admit it, this is one of the major causes of the impending social security shortfall.

My point with all these figures is that the rich can easily pay a small surtax to help pay for health insurance. They can also afford to pay more in social security taxes. Both of these together would still leave them paying far less taxes that the wealthy have paid in the past (and currently pay in most other countries). The rich are not overtaxed -- they are undertaxed, and it is time Americans cut through the Republican lies and realize this.

That's why I say most of the rich are greedy whiners.

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Salary package includes sonic screwdriver and
attractive assistant: Australian citizens only

post from TPMCafe on 23 July 2009 01:03:00 AM. © TPMCafe

The Australian Department of Defence is advertising for a TARDIS MANGER.

Americans must be falling behind in defence equipment technology. They only have 67 F-22s.

Hat tip: Crikey.

Sponsored Topics: Crikey - Australia - Oceania - Society and Culture - Politics

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Footprints

Political Cartoon is by Cameron (Cam) Cardow in The Ottawa Citizen.

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Contador Strong Thru Tour's 17th Stage

Most riders in the Tour de France knew that stage 17 would be the time to try and snatch the lead from Alberto Contador of Astana. That's because the stage was the hardest one in the Tour this year, and if Contador was going to break, this would be the stage that did it. And they tried their best -- it just wasn't good enough.

The top riders of the day were Andy and Frank Schleck -- the brothers from Luxembourg who ride for Saxo Bank. On the last two climbs of the day, they gave it their all and left everyone else strung out all over the course -- everyone but Alberto Contador. Contador just stayed on their back wheels, and nothing they tried could shake him. He let them take him to the finish line and gain time on everyone else. He then allowed Frank Schleck (pictured) to win out of appreciation for his hard work.

Astana riders Lance Armstrong and Andreas Kloden finished fifth and sixth in the stage, allowing them to remain in the top five riders. Except for the yellow jersey, the overall standings received quite a shuffling today. And that might happen again tomorrow, when the tour holds it's final time trial of the year -- a 25 mile ride with one catagorey 3 climb. Although the Schleck brothers are now in second and third place, they are not really good at time trials. It's quite possible that Armstrong, Kloden and Wiggins could gain a bit of time tomorrow and maybe move up in the standings.Contador is expected to keep the yellow jersey.

There was one oddity today. A sprinter actually lead the race through the first three climbs. It was Thor Hushovd of Cervelo, who wanted (and got) the two six point sprints in the middle of the race. He has now extended his lead for the green jersey to 30 points. Hushovd is the only true sprinter who could have led the race in the mountains, but after getting he sprint points he faded pretty fast as the true climbers got serious about the last two climbs. Here are the current standings:

YELLOW JERSEY (OVERALL LEADERS)
1. Alberto Contador (Astana)
2. Andy Schleck (Saxo Bank)..........2.26
3. Frank Schleck (Saxo Bank)..........3.25
4. Lance Armstrong (Astana)..........3.55
5. Andreas Kloden (Astana)..........4.44
6. Bradley Wiggins (Garmin)..........4.53
7. Vincenzo Nibali (Liquigas)..........5.09
8. Christian Vande Velde (Garmin)..........8.08
9. Christophe Le Mevel (Francaise)..........9.19
10. Mikel Astarloza (Euskadi)..........10.50

GREEN JERSEY (SPRINTERS)
1. Thor Hushovd (Cervelo)..........230 pts
2. Mark Cavendish (Columbia)..........200 pts
3. Jose Rojas (Caisse)..........126 pts
4. Gerald Ciolek (Milram)..........122 pts
5. Tyler Farrar (Garmin)..........110 pts

POLKA DOT JERSEY (CLIMBERS)
1. Franco Pellizotti (Liquigas)..........196 pts
2. Egoi Martinez (Euskadi)..........118 pts
3. Pierrick Fedrigo (Bouyges)..........97 pts
4. Christophe Kern (Cofidis)..........89 pts
5. Mikel Astarloza (Euskadi)..........86 points

TEAM LEADERS
1. Astana
2. Garmin-Slipstream..........16.12
3. AG2R La Mondiale..........16.33
4. Saxo Bank..........24.31
5. Cofidis Le Credit En Ligne..........37.17

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