Those Poor Poor Plutocrats.....

This post is in response to a Letter in the DNR titled, "Automakers need to stand up to UAW." In it the author, Aaron Lam, advocates strongly for the Automakers stand against the union. His main point is that the benefits and wages demanded by the union are the cause of the recent demise in the fortunes of the auto companies.

He's given up on American car makers because the foreign makers don't deal with the UAW. It's a fun read, if only to hear this expansive argument for Old South Plutocracy. The argument is clear and the passion is evident. Wages are too high, workers need to be replaced by robots, the true mission of the unions is to protect the employers, it's better to have a low paying job than no job, workers have outrageous benefit plans, almost [but not quite] make as much as TEACHERS, and have "nothing but their own (extreme) well-being in mind."

He's wrong of course. My response:

Radical plutocracy. Welcome to the Old South. Mr. Lam advocates the rule of the wealthy, an elite ruling class whose power derives from their wealth. Welcome to the Plantation. You can work here [for the smallest wage I can get a way with], you'll have a roof over your head [how does an efficiency apartment for you and your family sound?], and we'll give you credit at the company store, [where I can charge any price I want and kindly extend credit to keep you indentured forever!] and of course there's the company health clinic to take care of your health needs [but only in debilitating circumstances and only just to keep you on the job.] Want a pension? Forget it, you're going to die right here.

Now seriously, here are some stories of those poor plutocrats who are getting stomped by the almighty worker: [source]

• Big 3 honchos are guilty of "bad optics" as they fly in on corporate jets with their hands out for loans to save the companies that the "workers destroyed." Never mind that they couldn't even give Congress a clue about how they were going use the money to save themselves.
• 
  
• The Robber Barons of Wall Street led by Hank Paulson swooped down on Congress and demanded and received an astounding guarantee of 8 Trillion, again with no plan or news of where the money was to be spent. Didn't even say thank you to those nasty workers and taxpayers, plebeians all who are now stuck with the bill.
• 
  
• Those poor Wall Street tycoons..... tsk tsk... they are feeling a bit better with their new $$. They went right to doing what they do best... buying up competitors, hoarding the capital, and raising their own banking fees. How much has gone to ease the credit crunch? ZIP! NADA! Thank you very much. Will they even tell us how they are spending the dough? Yes, but they'd have to kill us.
• 
  
• $70 bucks an hour is a hoax, ginned up by Mr. Lam by combining all the health care and pensions plus costs of training and payroll taxes owed by the companies. It's more like 29 bucks an hour. Remember Mr. Lam is advocating that workers are WAYY out of line asking for health care or pensions. [Also remember that Mr. Lam is very strongly against universal health care and Social Security because they are socialist programs.] Mr. Lam would reduce the standard of living, reduce the quality of life in essence returning the middle class to servanthood. Welcome to the 18th century!
• 
  
• The UAW, bad boys all, have already agreed to concessions that would give U.S. Companies labor-cost advantages over the foreigners. Is spreading the gradual return to lower pay and benefits through 2010 too much to ask? To Mr. Lam would say yes! He'd want his cake right now thank you.
• 
  
• Mr. Lam might like to know that labor, pensions and health care only amount to around 10% of the cost of a car. The UAW could work for FREE and still would not solve the current financial crisis. [It would be a day of joy for Mr. Lam, however.]
• 
  
• The Auto CEO's were the ones who decided on the business model that keeps us addicted to cheap foreign oil forever, nice move.
• 
  
• Plutocrats fought tooth and nail against fuel efficiency ratings and emissions controls essentially giving up the territory to the foreigners.
• 
  
• Plutocrats killed the electric car years ago. Another brilliant move.
• 
  
• Plutocrats were so pleased with their own work that they decided to pay themselves salaries ranging from $7,000 to $10,000 per hour.
• 
  
• Back to the bailout..we do know what the Big 3 finally proposed to do with the money. First they'll pay themselves a bonus for being smart enough to drive to Washington the second time and then they'll boot another 25,000 workers out the door. A tax-paid mass firing! Yet another great idea. Let's watch and see what changes are made at the TOP of the organizational ladder.

Mr. Lam is wrong for America. America is NOT about the rule of the wealthy, it's about the rule of "We the People." The American middle class is what brought us to greatness and it is the Corporate Plutocracy that has caused it's recent decline. Mr. Lam has decided to advocate the powerful Masters of the Plantation, not a bad choice if you are selling your soul, but "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," it's not. Mr. Lam, back to the plantation with you. You've declared war on the American worker. You are a royalist tory seeking a return to the monarchy of the wealthy. You lost. American workers ARE every bit as stubborn, strong, willful, and powerful as you fear. You'll lose again.

Kicking the Unions in the pants...

Jim Hightower does a great blog today, explaining the union bashing that's been going on in Congress and in the Media lately. It's worth the subscription cost just to read it. If you want a guest pass leave a comment and an email address and I'll get you a freebie.

Evidently, according to Big Jim, the Big 3 didn't get the bailout they wanted because they aren't a part of the Wall Street royalty. They represent the working class. The Big Banks demanded and got a huge [8 TRILLION DOLLARS when all peripheral costs are counted in] bailout package, no questions asked, no accountability required. The Big 3 asked and Congress squawked and demanded plans, goals, and concessions. It's class warfare, pure and simple.

What's wrong with union members making a good living? What was that stuff we learned in Civics Class in High School about the rise of the middle class being the greatest strength of America.

"Yes, these union workers make a good living--but what exactly is wrong with that? Indeed, they're a tremendous American success story. UAW members define our country's middle-class ideal. They can afford to buy homes (and cars), send kids to college, take vacations--and pay taxes, including those that cover salaries and benefits for U.S. senators.

Sustaining, expanding, and extending such a vibrant, productive middle class ought to be the top goal of economic policy makers. Yet, too many Washington officials keep pushing in the opposite direction, constantly pursuing a cheap-labor America that enriches the few at the expense of our nation's true economic strength."

It's not the payroll costs that burden the auto companies, it's the health care and the pensions. Want to be competitive? Level the playing field by providing Universal health care. Talk about no-brainers. Wingers, let the squawking begin. Fact is only 10% of the cost of an auto is labor, the rest goes to [nod to Jim Hightower]

"bankers, bondholders, investors, executives, suppliers, dealers, and a myriad of others who are part and parcel of every vehicle we drive. The senators could force UAW members to work for free, but that would not begin to solve the industry's financial problems."

Take a page from Henry Ford: [again a nod to Jim Hightower]

The auto pioneer famously outraged his competitors by paying Ford workers $5 a day, more than double the industry standard at the time. As he explained in 1926,

"An underpaid man is a customer reduced in purchasing power. He cannot buy. Business depression is caused by weakened purchasing power. Purchasing power is weakened by uncertainty or insufficiency of income. The cure of business depression is through purchasing power, and the source of purchasing power is wages."

That remains true today. Middle-class wages are the lifeblood of the American automobile industry... and of the American economy.

So where should the real bailout money go? How about building the purchasing power of regular citizens? How about leveling the playing field with universal health care? How about building up the middle class? Why not invest in the American Dream? Corporations! What are you waiting for? It's better business for you and better business for the workers!

McConnell digs in against America... Again

The Southern Plutocrats, led by Mitch McConnell, have vowed to slow, stall, or outright block the Obama stimulus package now being planned for the first hundred days. Under the guise of "protecting the taxpayer" he is willing hang the economy, the workers, the ordinary citizens, not to mention health care, energy and education out to dry.

In the meantime, Mr. McConnell was at the front of the line, leading the charge to bail out the Wall Street tycoons, no questions asked!

So here you go, Fat Cats and corporations get everything they want, America gets nothing it NEEDS. The Master of the Plantation must be taken care of first, no matter the cost, and the workers and common folk will be fine when the Master can get around to them.

Mr. McConnell's famous concern about the taxpayers? hmmm.... Let's decipher that loaded coded bit of double-speak. Taxpayers are bailing out the Masters [banks, plutocrats, and Wall Street] and are assured of NOTHING. Meanwhile, the rest of America gets thrown under the bus? Isn't he just saying that America is ONLY about gathering and maintaining the wealth and power of the Masters? The taxpayers he is really concerned about, not you and me, but the Masters!

Keeping taxes low on the rich, ensuring their profit margin means that you and I get to pay those prices, pay those taxes, and live our lives scrapping for health care, paying for dirty energy, spilling our blood on plutocratic wars of conquest all in the name of preserving the Masters wealth.

Feelin' Po'... Merry Christmas

With all the depressing news about the economy, the billions and billions lost in the stock market, the billions and billions spent on warfare and destruction, you'd think that the Christmas spirit this year would be a little hard to find. I just watched an interesting scene on the news showing a reporter doing a little shopping at a mall in one of America's cities. He had a list all ready to go, but had to make a report first. Shops in the mall are already offering after-Christmas specials, 2 for the price of 1's, and deep discounts on almost everything. The bad news about the seasonal shopping won't hit until next week, but don't hold your breath for good news.

The homeless rate is up, the crime rate is up, the infrastructure is failing, the nation's money is going down the bailout black hole, the Big 3 automakers are facing bankrupcy, the South is rising again [yeeeeehaaaah!], nobody is shopping......

Where's the love people? What are we doing with our chins down and sadness all around? This is the bed we made. Our economic house of cards is falling down. Buying and buying on credit all the while pretending it really is money? It was an illusion and our fantasies have finally caught up with us. And the bad news is......

Folks, we're finally in a national economic state that my family has been in for a long time. We are finally coming to terms with the difference between what we WANT and what we NEED. Look around. How many cars in your driveway, how many computers in your house, how much junk in your garage will you get around to putting away or dealing with some day? What are you doing with all that STUFF you bought? How important was it anyway?

How much have you given away? When was the last time you loaded up the van and took a dozen big garbage bags of old toys, clothing, shoes, used appliances or books to Mercy House or the Salvation Army? Did you send a check to the Children's Cancer Fund AND the other 25 agencies in need that called you during supper? Why not?

The joy and spirit of Christmas is a little bigger than our nation collectively feeling sorry for itself. If you truly want some joy this holiday season, give some stuff away, write some checks, volunteer. Remember the jolliest of all the elves, Santa himself. Why is he so happy? Let Santa be your hero and show you how to spread Christmas cheer. Give some stuff away and smile and laugh while you're at it! Be Like Santa!

Merry Christmas.

Plantations, the Confederacy, and "Good for Business"

Consider the Plantation mentality that has taken hold in the United States over the last fifteen years and especially in the last eight. Not that it hasn't been with us since the beginnings of American history, but considering the successful struggles for liberty and justice during the Civil War, the New Deal, and the Civil Rights era, the fact that this mentality has not been rejected completely is amazing.

The plantation had a master with a family, a trusted staff of servants, a coterie of trusted advisors, a LOT of money, and slaves that worked the plantation. It was a feudal system with each Master the absolute ruler of his domain. If the Master kept everything humming, he got even wealthier. If he was smart, he paid his help with favors, privileges and just enough money to keep them working. It was all in the name of "good business." If the plantation system worked properly, the local government served the Masters in its jurisdiction. Government then represented the local Masters in larger commercial enterprises, always with an eye on what was "good for business."

Government, in this model, served the Masters, the Plantation owners, the big business interests that in turn employed, fed, housed and cared for the workers, helpers, staffs, and trusted advisors on the Plantation. It was a classic top down system, building a huge gap in wealth between the Masters and the general population.

The workers on the plantation, if they were busy, well-fed, had a place to sleep, and could raise a respectable family were quite happy with this arrangement. The house staff and the supervisors were satisfied because they also had good living arrangements and lived a little better than the field workers. All of these folks actually would defend their Master if he showed them at least some minimal respect and took care of their basic needs.

It was largely the abuses of the Plantation system, the arrogance of the oligarchy that was the old Confederacy, that caused the Civil War, the first great rising of the working class. The union movement in the early 20th century, the New Deal in the 30's, the Post War growth of the middle class, and the Civil Rights movement in the 60's were all steps in the overthrow of the old Plantation system.

So today on "Morning Joe" there was an animated discussion about the plight of the working class, sparked by Bob Herbert's op-ed in the New York Times, "Race to the Bottom."

Working men and women are not getting the credit they deserve for the jobs they do without squawking every day, for the hardships they are enduring in this downturn and for the collective effort they are willing to make to get through the worst economic crisis in the U.S. in decades....

We need some perspective here. It is becoming an article of faith in the discussions over an auto industry rescue, that unionized autoworkers should be taken off of their high horses and shoved into a deal in which they would not make significantly more in wages and benefits than comparable workers at Japanese carmakers like Toyota.

That’s fine if it’s agreed to by the autoworkers themselves in the context of an industry bailout at a time when the country is in the midst of a financial emergency. But it stinks to high heaven as something we should be aspiring to.

The economic downturn, however severe, should not be used as an excuse to send American workers on a race to the bottom, where previously middle-class occupations take a sweatshop’s approach to pay and benefits.

The great quote about bailing out the folks that shower before work and not those who shower after work fueled the discussion as the guests railed about the blank check given Wall Street to the tune of 700 Billion and the blocking of the measily 15 Billion bailout for the Big 3 and their workers. Mr. Herbert even wondered aloud if the new Justice Department would follow the money trails greasing the tubes from Wall Street to Congress and instigate prosecutions on behalf of the taxpayers.

It's not just the economic downturn that reminds me of the old Plantation system. Our military is very much an elitist top-down organization especially with the difficulty in recruiting new soldiers. Remind me again, whose sons and daughters are being put in harms way? When soldiers are no longer of use in in the war [profiteering] zone, just how are they being taken care of?

The K street lobby, the health care industry, the military industrial complex, the unregulated investment banks, all are enablers of this modern day Plantation system. Thank goodness a basic awareness is dawning and bloggers, journalists, and now the Mainstream Media are finally sensing a new awareness of the plight of the middle class.

Cowboy George - UPDATED

What could be more illuminating about the George Bush's view of foreign policy that the recent shoe throwing incident in Iraq. President Bush, as usual put a sunny face on it and professed that he found the incident "amusing." “I don’t know what his beef is,” said Bush. “But whatever it is I’m sure somebody will hear it.” Watch it:



Bush laughed it off, as good cowboys do, and went on national TV to declare that the incident was meaningless and didn't represent a "broad movement" in Iraq. Mr. Bush is just laughingly silly! Anyone can look into the incident and find out that the act of throwing a show [and yelling, "This is a farewell kiss, you dog."] is a serious insult and the act actually represented a broad spectrum of Iraqi's who are finally protesting the civilian casuaties of the war. According to Think Progress and the Washington Post the journalist, Muntadar al-Zaidi, is a "hero" and thousands of Iraqis are demonstrating in the streets supporting his actions.

Bush can't change, doesn't want to and is showing that his feckless, good-natured, cowboy world view can still do damage. He holds the key to al-Zaidi's release. If he doesn't drop the charges, look for more demonstrations and a further decline of our nation's reputation. Would he drop the charges? Not likely. Stay tuned.

UPDATE 12/16/08

From Think Progress today:

An Oxfam report from February 2008 put into startling focus what the U.S. invasion has really meant for Iraqis:

– More than four million Iraqis forced to flee either to another part of Iraq or abroad.
– Four million Iraqis regularly cannot buy enough food.
– 70 percent are without adequate water supplies, compared to 50 percent in 2003.
– 28 percent of children are malnourished, compared to 19 percent before the 2003 invasion.
– 92 percent of Iraqi children suffer learning problems, mostly due to the climate of fear.

The Brookings Institute’s Iraq index also notes that the national unemployment rate is somewhere between 25 and 40 percent. Fifty-six percent of Iraqis say things in Iraq are going “quite bad” or “very bad.” Sixty percent rate economic conditions as “poor” and 75 percent rate security conditions “poor.”

These, President Bush, are the issues the Iraqi's are so upset about. These reasons are why a shoe was thrown at you. Yes, you freed 25 million Iraqi citizens....from their homes, food, schools, healthcare, and that famous "piece of mind." Need to hear it again?

Remember the "Clinton Rules?"

Just to prove the party of "don't ever change" never will, Joe Conason writes a thoughtful but sobering opinion piece in today's Salon Magazine. He documents the right wing's joyous reversion to the "Clinton Rules." Remember them? Here's Greg Sargent:

When it comes to the Clintons, many pundits have simply stopped requiring themselves to adhere to the most basic evidentiary standards. It has become acceptable, even normal, to say whatever the hell you want about the Clintons, and if you insist on anything approaching real evidence, you're just a party-pooper. The "Clinton rules" governing punditry about them are that there are no rules.

It seems that the Right Wing Noise Machine, with little else to promote has taken to hunting the President-elect. The unstoppable rumor-mongering about Obama's birth certificate, and the insatiable appetite in the gossipy puntitry, not to mention the right wing blogosphere, concerning Illinois corruption case show us that the RWNM is back to it's old tricks. Conason again:

Questions are raised. Connections are drawn. Conspiracies are theorized. Guilt is imputed, implied, asserted and very widely associated. And more of the same feckless fingerpointing is exactly what Barack Obama should expect from the Republicans, the right-wing propaganda machine and their enablers in the mainstream media...

Tried and true or desperate and stupid? My buddy, Michelle Malkin, recently wrote a piece that declared,

"I believe Trig was born to Sarah Palin. I believe Barack Obama was born in Hawaii. I believe fire can melt steel and that bin Laden’s jihadi crew — not Bush and Cheney — perpetrated mass murder on 9/11. What kind of kooky conspiracist does that make me?"

Was she finally signaling a truce in the political arena? Or maybe it was just a blip, a brain fart, a momentary glimpse of reality? In her very next Op Ed she recovers her lost bearings by declaring,

Fitzgerald says President-elect Obama was not implicated in the plethora of charges against Democrats Blago and Harris. The national media went out of their way to absolve him, too. But declaring Team Obama’s hands clean — especially with Blago crony and indicted Obama donor Tony Rezko in the middle of it all — is premature.

So.... picking up on the Rezco blather, adding in an obscenity-laden rant by the hard core Governor of Illinois, adding the word Democrat and presto! Obama in an orange jumpsuit!

The Clinton Rules have once again been adopted and are in full force. The Right Wing is trading journalism for Conspiracy Theorizing. Here's a great piece by Alex Koppleman. He says basically that the psychology behind conspiracy theories prohibits any contrary evidence or information that contradicts the theory to be believed and any presentation of contrary evidence, no matter how truthful, just makes the theory stronger.

..according to several experts in conspiracy theories, and in the psychology of people who believe in conspiracy theories, there's little chance those people who think Obama is barred from the presidency will ever be convinced otherwise. "There's no amount of evidence or data that will change somebody's mind," says Michael Shermer, who is the publisher of Skeptic magazine and a columnist for Scientific American, and who holds an undergraduate and a master's degree in psychology. "The more data you present a person, the more they doubt it ... Once you're committed, especially behaviorally committed or financially committed, the more impossible it becomes to change your mind."

Any inconvenient facts are irrelevant. People who believe in a conspiracy theory "develop a selective perception, their mind refuses to accept contrary evidence," Chip Berlet, a senior analyst with Political Research Associates who studies such theories, says. "As soon as you criticize a conspiracy theory, you become part of the conspiracy."

This sounds a lot like the pundits and wingnuts who can't let go of the Clinton Rules. It also sounds like many local wingnuts who bend and twist every political maneuver, issue, or statement into a partisan political point. Anything goes, especially with those who would rise to the defense of Obama and the rest of the Democrats. To the RWNM, any defense of any Democrat simply strengthens their resolve.

What to do? I love Obama's response to all of this. He knows that it is just Kindergarten chatter. He plays it by the book, is the adult in the conversation and continues his work with barely a glance or a pause. The famous moment in the campaign when he showed us all how to deal with the nattering nabobs of righteous wingnuttery should never be forgotten... brush it off, just brush it off and move on.

Chutzpah?

A Response to the Editorial in the Daily News Record this morning. [12.12.08]

"And it was Frank and Waters who swore to Heaven above that nothing was amiss with the federal lending agencies, one of them run by Democrat Andrew Cuomo, that helped create the subprime mort-gage crisis, itself driven in large part by racially-driven lending.

If Mr. Dodd and his friends want to lend money to the auto industry, so be it. If they don’t, that is their option. But given their role in wrecking the American economy, they should really refrain from giving advice to anyone on how to run anything."

Would hearing from the horse's mouth be helpful? When "Rep. Edolphus Towns (D-NY) asked the four CEOs whether poor people caused the current financial crisis. All said “no”:

Richard Syron, former Freddie CEO: “I would think that it wasn’t mostly trying to do things for poor people.”

Daniel Mudd, former Fannie CEO: “[W]hen the market goes down, it’s the folks who are the closest to the margin who — who get hurt first and longest every time.”

Leland Brendsel, former Freddie CEO: “I cannot recall ever being forced to make — or to purchase a mortgage loan that I didn’t feel, as a matter of policy at Freddie Mac, was a good mortgage loan, a sound mortgage loan, and an attractive mortgage loan for the homebuyer or the owner of an apartment building.”

Franklin Raines, former Fannie CEO: “I do not believe that poor people are the cause of the current financial crisis. … Most of the losses, as I read the record, have come on mortgages that were made to middle-class and upper-middle-class people, not to poor people.

But hey, these guys are just fat cats, what do they know? Right? According to the Southern Plantation System, it's ok to ALWAYS blame the poor. After all, we must preserve the plantation against all contamination by the more objectionable elements of our society. God Bless the South, suh!

Just for good measure:

Nobel-winning economist Paul Krugman and Center for Economic and Policy Research co-director Dean Baker, have also explained that while Fannie and Freddie made many bad decisions, they weren’t primarily to blame for the financial crisis. At a hearing in September, former top government economic experts agreed that conservatives were pushing myths, rather than facts. [EMPHASIS MINE]

Now with regards to the following:

"But Sen. Dodd’s suggestion that GM fire its top executive may be a nonpareil example of chutzpah. In short, is this man kidding?"

Chutzpah: shameless audacity; impudence.

Mr. editoggor, Chutzpah? Really? Are you talking about the GM CEO who LOST 10 million bucks per quarter for his company when the economy was supposedly humming along nicely? Are you talking about the company that historically has REFUSED to modernize and has INSISTED on selling products that feed our addiction to foreign oil?

Are you accusing, yet again, the Democrats of being unable to stop the Republican Party from feeding at the trough, enriching themselves and their cronies while letting the infrastructure, the health care system, the city of New Orleans, the national defense, and the good will and reputation of our great nation fall in the gutter? Chutzpah sir?? Are you serious?

Loyalty or Incompetence?

The Center for Public Integrity has just put out a report entitled, "Broken Government: An assessment of 128 executive branch failures since 2000." This is the same group the published a report of the 935 lies told by Bush Administration officials in the run-up to the Iraq War.

In many ways this is just old news that keeps getting worse. "Incompetent" was the word most folks agreed that described the Bush regime. It wasn't like they were trying to be stupid, just that competence was not valued, and the "failures" of government were celebrated as "loyalty." In a perverted way, the Bushies STILL THINK that the way Government should be run is the way THEY did it!

Dan Froomkin:

Bush and Vice President Cheney intentionally put into key posts people who didn't support the traditional missions of the agencies they led. Competence or experience often weren't as important as loyalty to the White House, rigid ideological commitment to deregulation, aversion to oversight and allegiance to corporate and special interests over consumers and the general public.

The Full List:

One of the more interesting aspects of the transition period is the Bush Legacy Tour. We can see that the art of spin is still the primary policy and watching the loyalists "spin" in the wind is THE most entertaining show of this political season. Reports of 935 lies and 128 government failures during the Bush Administration will provide a truthful backdrop for the Legacy Tour. Let's watch..