republicans

What Is It About the Hungry and Poor House Republicans Just Can't Stand?

People are broke and hungry in America and the food stamp program has been the only thing between many and starvation.  Food stamps are successful, it has an incredibly low fraud rate and most importantly, America doesn't have starvation filling the streets as a result.  Yet for some reason House Republicans, with Majority leader Eric Cantor leading the charge, want to cut food stamps and force people to starve.

A Select Comparison/Contrast of the Democratic & Republican Platforms on Issues Important to U.S. Workers

With the political convention rhetoric soaring and political ads about to carpet bomb the airwaves, we thought it might be useful to comparison/contrast the Democratic and Republican platforms and show for U.S. workers both have policy agendas which will damage the middle class. The Democratic platform is here and the Republican one, seemingly not even indexed by Google, is here, in large pdf form. Let's take economic and labor issues and compare them side by side.

 

Comparison of Democrat and Republican Platforms 

Issue

Democrat

Republican

U.S. Worker Choice
University Green Card ATM Yes Yes Both Bad
More Guest Worker Visas Yes Yes Both Bad
China Currency Manipulator No Yes GOP
Bad Trade Deals Yes Yes Both Bad
Financial Reform Yes No Dem
Student Loans Yes No Dem
Outsourcing Yes Yes Both Bad
Unlimited Migration/Immigration Yes No GOP
Unions Yes No Dem
Taxes on the Rich Yes No Dem

 

Debt Deal Delusions: Debt to Gross Domestic Product Ratio

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The compromise "is a positive step toward reducing the future path of the deficit and the debt levels,” Steven Hess, senior credit officer at Moody’s in New York, said in a telephone interview yesterday. “We do think more needs to be done to ensure a reduction in the debt to GDP ratio, for example, going forward." Bloomberg, Aug 2 (Image: Okko Pyykko)

How many times have you read or heard about the magic numbers concerning the ratio of national debt to gross domestic product (GDP)? This was trotted out by both sides of the debt ceiling debate as a fact: if the debt-to-GDP ratio exceeds 90%, the results will be dire. Therefore, our current situation calls for a crisis reaction and extreme measures to get below the magic number.

Selling Out America

kabukitheater.jpb_.jpegAs you know by now, the jobs crisis reality exploded Friday with only 18,000 jobs created for June and an even lower labor participation rate implying more people are falling out of the labor force count entirely.

While economists scream from the rooftops for policy to put America back to work, we have more debt ceiling games and calls for policy that will lose even more jobs.

The latest is Obama, as part of some debt ceiling negotiation offered to raise the age for Medicare. I kid you not.

According to five separate sources with knowledge of negotiations -- including both Republicans and Democrats -- the president offered an increase in the eligibility age for Medicare, from 65 to 67, in exchange for Republican movement on increasing tax revenues.

Questions for The Money Party: Why Negative Job Growth Since 2000?

The Money Party is a very small group of enterprises and individuals who control almost all of the money and power in the United States. They use their money and power to make more money and gain more power. It's not about Republicans versus Democrats. The Money Party is an equal opportunity employer. It has no permanent friends or enemies, just permanent interests. Democrats are as welcome as Republicans to this party. It’s all good when you’re on the take and the take is legal. Economic Populist

Negative job growth for eleven years is the best evidence concerning our economic troubles. There were 135 million jobs in 2000 for a workforce of 144 million. Today, there are 139 million jobs for a workforce of 154 million. That represents negative job growth when you factor in population growth.
 

Farrell and Stockman - Latter Day Prophets of Doom

Michael Collins
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Paul Farrell of MarketWatch caused quite a stir with his recent article, Reagan insider [David Stockman]: GOP destroyed U.S. economy, Part 2, May 24. Farrell breaks some new ground in the strident critique of long standing policy trends and offers a highly functional description of the destructive personalities controlling Wall Street. This article describes the several high points of the Farrell-Stockman thesis, a frontal assault on the modern Republican Party. It also provides important cautions on key information absent from the Farrell-Stockman broadside. (Image: Art & Perception)

Farrell makes his case by using Stockman's July 2010 New York Times OpEd, Four Deformations of the Apocalypse, New York Times and his recent book, The Triumph of Politics: Why the Reagan Revolution Failed.

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