by Steven Whitney

As Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan relentlessly pursue further tax cuts for the top 2% and finagle ways to cut back (or completely jettison) Medicare, Social Security, and myriad other services for the 98%, a few facts and common sense correlations should be considered.

According to economists at the Center on Wage and Employment Dynamics, in 2007 the six heirs to Sam Walton (founder of Walmart) had a net worth equal to the bottom 30% of Americans. Since then, the rich have gotten even richer. When our economy went into the toilet, average families lost 39% of their wealth while business for discount super-chains like Walmart soared, as did wealth for the 1%. As a result, new data from the Federal Reserve suggests that the six Waltons now hold as much wealth as the bottom 41.2%. With the US population right now at just over 314 million, those 6 siblings combined have more wealth than the bottom 130 million.

Stop for a moment and think about that. Six individual people who didn’t build anything have more combined net worth than 130 million other Americans altogether.

As Bernie Sanders revealed on the Senate Floor, the top 1% now own more than 50% of our nation’s wealth. The next 19% of high earners own more than 44%. That means that the top 20% own more than 94% of all American wealth while the lower 80% of Americans have less than a 6% share of the pie.

Even more alarming, right now 93% of all new income in America goes to the top 1%, leaving 310 million citizens to scramble after the remaining 7%.

The fuel accelerating this unjust and massive inequality of wealth distribution is the GOP tax policy from 1981 onward: cut income, corporate, and estate taxes for the rich, raise taxes on and cut services for the poor and middle class, and borrow money for the War on Terror. Do anything at all as long as the rich don’t have to pay for it.

Last year, the top 1% had an average tax base of 16.2% (Romney’s, of course, was lower), compared to the 39% they paid during most of the Clinton Presidency – a Democratic administration that turned a huge Reagan/Bush debt into a surplus largely by taxing the rich a progressive but fair rate.

This frightening gap in wealth distribution widened exponentially during the “W” years, when middle class rates went up, on average, from about 20% to 28% while taxes for the 1% were cut in half and more loopholes were added.

Suddenly, teachers, police, firemen and the entire middle class were paying a higher percentage on their income tax than the 1%. On average, these tax cuts for the rich helped quadruple the wealth of the top 1%. Yet while multiplying their net worth, corporations and the 1% stopped hiring, ostensibly so they would have time to count their money. During W’s last year in office, the nation lost an average of 850,000 jobs per month. None of our nation’s wealth “trickled down.” All of it “trickled up.”

And yet the GOP wants everyone to believe that if only the rich were richer, and the rest of us shared increasingly smaller pieces of the pie, all of America’s economic problems would be solved.

Yeah, right.

The Debt

As of October 12th, the National Debt is just over $16.2 trillion.

The TARP rescue plan gave our six biggest banks over $700 billion. But that’s not all. It was only recently revealed that to stimulate the economy and lower unemployment, the Federal Reserve gave banks another $16 trillion. The banks, of course, got richer, but didn’t free up access to vital consumer loans until the Obama administration pushed them into a corner.

Of course, it was those very banks and their recklessly criminal behavior that caused the current recession, but they were “too big to fail.” Or were they too rich to fail?

Take that 700 billion, add it to the 16 trillion, and give it to our creditors instead and the debt would be completely wiped out. . . with 500 billion, less interest, left over.

Money Politics

Anyone who has been even barely conscious the last six months knows that a lot of billionaires are spending a lot money on SuperPACs in this election. For them, it might not be so much about politics as it is an important part of their overall business plan.

Starting with Charles and David Koch, two of most ethically-challenged men on the planet; The brothers are second-generation oil barons who don’t want any regulatory agency looking over their shoulders, don’t want minimum wage standards, don’t want lawsuits from the toxic damage they spread as casually as farmers toss seeds on their fields, and a lot of other petty nuisances. One can certainly understand their perspective – with rules and regulations in place, the two brothers have made only $45 billion in their family business. And they want, perhaps even need, more. Indeed, Charles has more than once been heard to say: “I want it all.”

In cahoots with Karl Rove and Fox News, they fund SuperPACs and “scholarly” foundations to push their business interests, most often distributing wildly false disinformation. Early on, they secretly funded and helped organize the Tea Party and their extreme ideologies with one caveat: that the wingnuts didn’t oppose or interfere with the billionaires’ business plans.

Casino mogul Sheldon Adelson backed Newt Gingrich’s run in the primary with tens of millions of dollars. Now that Gingrich is gone, he’s doubled down on Romney to the tune of hundreds of millions. When asked why, he answered candidly that he is in both civil and criminal jeopardy for business practices at his Macau gaming properties. A Romney administration, he offers, would be more conducive to helping him escape his legal woes. And besides, he’s so wealthy ($24 billion) the Romney tax decrease for the rich would save him an immediate $2 billion in taxes. So like the Kochs, he gives money – to buy influence and policy, stay out of prison, and make even more money – in the same way Al Capone greased the palms of Chicago police and politicians.

But Capone was small potatoes compared to the Kochs and Adelson, who use Citizens United – which they also backed – to make unlimited donations solely to give their businesses free and unrestricted reign. For them, mega-donations in the billions are just the cost of doing business.

That they are collaterally supporting the Tea Party and the Religious Right doesn’t matter to them in the least. After all, they don’t have to live with those lunatics or suffer any of the consequences their extreme policies would inflict upon the rest of us. The Kochs and Adelson live in another world that now actually has a name – the Global Superclass, a race of superior beings reminiscent of Greek and Roman gods and goddesses of ancient times, living in the mountains or sky above, looking down at we mere and foolish mortals. It’s a world where money can buy anything and narcissists like these don’t have to abide by any one nation’s laws because they are above the concept of sovereignty. They are an autonomous entity of their own – so why can’t they make up their own rules. . . and have it all?

The Real Miss Moneypenny

Somewhere in the past four years, Sarah Palin picked up a real taste for money. Maybe it was all the designer wardrobes the GOP bought her for the 2008 campaign that apparently started her addiction – like a playground dealer giving kids free tastes of paradise until they’re hooked and have to pay.

And when poor Sarah had to start paying for her luxuries, she attacked the problem like the lipsticked bulldog we all admire – garnering million dollar contracts with Fox for television and HarperCollins for books, and millions more gathered from speaking engagements booked by the Washington Speakers Bureau.

But as her star waned in a night sky filled with new stars, other ventures were needed to keep her in the money. So a SuperPAC was created and raised millions of dollars solely for the greater good of Sarah, who relentlessly teased her admirers with vague but seductive hints at a run for the White House. Some of that money funded her gaffe-filled bus tour. And a little more was spent helping host Tea Party events. But that was pretty much it.

So what happened to the rest of the SarahPAC millions? Was it donated to charitable causes? Did she give it to other GOP candidates?

Or did she keep it?

Under SuperPAC regulations, she could have exercised any of those three options. But we heard not a word about the first two. No charity thanked her for ponying up some needed cash and no other candidates expressed their gratitude to Sarah for bulking up their campaign coffers.

If she took the remaining money, she’s right in step with a GOP that runs both real and false campaigns to dovetail with personal income goals. And according to the very loose rules of SuperPACs, it’s not even illegal.

But was it wrong for Sarah to literally scam her biggest, most misguided fans – the people who believed in her the most – out of so much money?

You betcha!

Related Posts:

Interview: Greg Palast – Billionaires And Ballot Bandits
Non-Chemical Dependency
Political Ramblings And Random Thoughts
From Death And Despair. . . Dreams Can Soar
Modest Solutions To Voter Suppression
Character. . . And The RNC
The Do-Damage Congress: Who’s Responsible?
Worse Than A Do Nothing Congress
Forget The Barbeque On Labor Day – It’s Time To Take Care Of Business
Chicken Shits: The Slippery Slopes of Chick-fil-A
The Vagina Solution
Fighting Back Part 4: The Big Liar, Intimidation And Revenge
Fighting Back Part 3: Fighting Fire With Fire
When The Past Is Prologue
Fighting Back Part 2: Defining Rovian Politics
Fighting Back
The Electoral Scam
Being Fair
Occupy Reality
Giving. . . And Taking Back
A Tale Of Two Grovers
A Last Pitch For Truth
America: Forget it, Jake. It’s Chinatown.
Gotcha!

by Symbol

This is the longest period I’ve been single in my adult life. I’m dating, but as I alluded to in my last article, I’ve only met people who aren’t ready for any kind of serious relationship…and for the right now, that’s perfectly fine with me too.



I’m meeting more and more people who are only interested in open or poly-amorous relationships. Perhaps people are finally coming to realize that the monogamous relationship, which has been a cornerstone of our society for generations, just doesn’t work for everyone.



I think, in part, one of the reasons people seem to enjoy open relationships so much is because of how much fun getting to meet new people can be. To be clear, I’m not one of those people who have shunned monogamy. I’ve tried the poly thing, and that green-eyed monster called jealousy just shuts me down every time – but at least I know my limits. So it boils down to where and how you meet people, and what do you do once you’ve met someone? 



I seem to have always met women in one of two places – on campus or in bars. Sometimes those bars were on campus, which just compounds the fact that I’m used to meeting women in a certain setting. A fairly formulaic ritual seems to have formed there too. I’d hang out somewhere, occasionally make eye contact, smile, and see if I could get a conversation going. It’s the conservative Canadian way of doing things, apparently, but it’s been quite successful for most of my life.



I tend to use humor extensively when getting to know women. The self-deprecating kind, especially if I’ve been drinking, or I’m nervous – though it takes quite a lot to make me nervous in front of anyone. If the attraction doesn’t seem to be mutual, I’m never the kind who pushes – I always back off right away. I respect women (and myself) far too much to be that guy.



What I have noticed though is that I’ve rarely (if ever) been what I’d call the pursuer when it comes to romance. I seem to attract strong, outgoing women who know what they want. Honestly, this suits me just fine – in fact when it comes to character traits, the stronger the woman the more attracted I usually am. If a woman knows what she wants and comes after it, that’s entirely all right in my books.



That’s not to say that I’m unfamiliar with how to meet and speak to people, quite the opposite. I’m definitely what you’d call an extrovert, it’s just that meeting new people seems to come much more easily to some than the rest of us. And truth be told, I think my most recent break-up mostly left me lacking one important thing: Confidence.



I spent the second week of October this year visiting Austin, Texas. I was down there for a work-related conference, and had the chance to meet up with some fantastic people – including someone who has been a professional idol of mine for many years. 



I’d been speaking with him via email for a few weeks, putting together notes and chatting about what we’d be talking about at the conference, and when I finally got to meet him in person he just casually walked up and offered his hand.



“Hi, I’m Chris.”



I think I must have heard him say those exact words at least a hundred times throughout the week. The reasoning for this is simple: I’ve never met anyone who makes friends quite so easily in my life as Chris, and he proved that time and time again.



Without running the risk of getting all fanboy, let me just say this: I could easily see how many people would be threatened by Chris. He’s a good looking, articulate, smart, successful guy and he charms his way into people’s hearts and minds. That might threaten some people, as I said, but I found something I’d not been expecting to find – my missing confidence.



Chris introduced me to another fantastically awesome guy, Jim. They’re both from California, and it makes me wonder if people aren’t just different out there. These two certainly have something in common when it comes to making new friends, and it appears to have rubbed off on me ever so slightly. 



They just walk up to people, without fear, and put themselves out there. Hands are extended, introductions are made, and smiles are exchanged. It all sounds really simple, but the teenager inside me, the one who grew up watching John Hughes films, refuses to believe it can be that easy.



So I mostly just sat back, like one of those crew members on a reality TV show about off-shore fishing, watching the guys who know what they were doing reel people in. I don’t want to make it sound like there was some sort of commercial girl-farming operation going on, quite the opposite. All kinds of people joined our little outings and they were always interesting and welcome additions to the conversations we were having. (As an aside, if you’ve never played giant 2×4 Jenga, you really should!)



We stayed together, pretty much, from Monday afternoon until Thursday evening – looking out for each other, keeping tabs on each other, and having a good time. Wednesday evening was the real acid test though, and a true testament to the quality and caliber of the two men I’m now proud to call friends.



One of the people we’d met while down there was a woman whose work I’ve followed now for a few years. I’ve always thought she was whip-smart when it comes to her writing, and a keen mind is a huge attraction for me. It doesn’t hurt that this woman is also staggeringly good-looking; I had a little bit of a crush.



She’s very much an out there kind of gal; it’s easy to be bowled over by her presence, her personality and her looks. She’s loud, shiny, funny and opinionated. If you’re following along you can see where this is going.



We spent the night at a bar on 6th Street – it was some sort of official party with an open bar – but more importantly, the New York Yankees were battling the Baltimore Orioles in the play-off’s and this girl is definitely a Yankees fan. I’ve never actually met someone who was so very passionate about a sporting team, and considering I’ve lived in the three biggest hockey towns in Canada, that’s saying something.



I must have met thirty to forty people that night – I held their presence, shook hands, smiled, made some small talk, but my attention always drifted back to the exuberant Yankees fan that was rarely more than a few inches away from me for the better part of the entire evening. The vexing thing about her, the thing that perplexed me the most, was simply this…



I can’t read her.



I mean, I can. Obviously she was interested in talking to me and we talked about a great number of things. We took some cute Instagram photos, we flirted most of the night until we left that bar for a second destination, walking arm in arm, belting out songs from Les Mis together. 



At some point in there she mentioned she’d be up in Montreal in November – to which I gleefully responded:



“You’ll have to let me take you out for dinner!”



She agreed, I smiled. But I honestly couldn’t tell you if it was a “We’re having a fun time, you’re a lot of laughs, let’s hang out again” kind of acceptance, or a “Sure! And I’ll bring all these other people I know along too and it will be great!” kind of deal. I’m not struggling over an existential crisis here, but I do find it kind of funny that mixed signals could mean the difference between this turning out like a John Hughes film or a Ben Stiller one.



So how does all of this tie back into Chris and Jim? Well, it was pretty evident to me that Chris also found her pretty attractive – and I have no doubt that if he’d wanted to, he could have held her interest in conversation effortlessly. But I think it was pretty obvious I was interested in her. (I may be pretty easy to read in that regard, and I seem to recall telling him I had a tiny crush on her, once or twice, after a few drinks.) So the four of us just spent the night sitting by a window, chatting about things we could all discuss. Conversation flowed easily, and everyone had a good time.



I rarely make meaningful, adult relationships with men, and the ones I have made tend to be permanent. I’ve always had a much easier time making friends with women. Where I’m going with all of this boils down to how two remarkable people shared with me something that I’d never experienced before in an adult relationship – quick and genuine friendship, the likes of which I’ve only ever really seen other people have.



We all had a great time; I got to meet some fantastic people, people that – if things were different – I’d rather spend a lot more time with than what I’ll be able too. I’m also going to start saving my pennies up for a visit to California, whenever that becomes a possibility. I’d hate to go into Big Jim withdrawal. 



I met some remarkable people, who I’m looking forward to getting to know in whichever ways become available. If being friends on Facebook is all that the future holds, then I’m just as happy to take that as I would be with dinner, drinks, or a walk in the park.



I’m not holding my breath that I’ll be standing in the rain at some point holding a boom-box, playing Peter Gabriel.



Not that the idea doesn’t have a certain appeal to it.

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by ChrisSick

Good news, everybody!

I get to keep my job as SuicideGirls’ resident screaming partisan ax-grinder. In my last post, I predicted that:

“This debate will be interesting, and my prediction…is that Obama will be able to successfully fight Mitt Romney to a draw at the very least. He understands the stakes, and has had ten days to analyze his weaknesses, as well as his opponent’s. Failure to achieve at least a draw could potentially be fatal for his election prospects.”

At absolute worst, the President fought Gov. Romney to a fairly bloody draw on stage tonight. At times, it looked like it might get literally bloody as both men interrupted frequently, spoke over each other, accused the other of lying, and moved quickly towards each other across the open stage to make aggressive rhetorical challenges. On numerous occasions the debate was less like a boxing metaphor and more like an actual match.

I, being the reasonable, informed, voting citizen that I am, kept shouting, “FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT!” until the neighbors called the police.

For openly-partisan hacks like me, there aren’t typically many moments in a tightly-fought debate that you can easily point to and say, “See that? That’s where my guy won.” But when the audience applauded after Obama corrected Romney over his characterization of Libya, it was one such moment.

The big takeaway is that Obama did what he had to do: he showed up. He stopped the damage from the Denver debate cold, and built on the good work Crazy Uncle Joe did last week against Paul Ryan. I don’t want to harp on about what Obama accomplished and leave readers with the impression that Romney didn’t do a fine job in his role.

Gov. Romney continued to look Presidential, and will, of course, continue to benefit from being on stage with the President. As opposed to how he spent most of the last decade, as one of many lunatics on stage being cheered on by rednecks for suggesting that we let people without health insurance die. Oh, did you forget about that?

As it turns out, the President did not. He did all but straight-up ask Romney which Romney would be debating tonight. There were frequent references to positions that Romney has changed, with Obama going back into the far past of the end of summer to remind voters of Romney’s serial flip-flopping.

And if you spent the last debate anxiously lifting a shot glass full of tequila to your lips, only to be disappointed when no one brought up Romney’s 47% line, Obama finally snuck it in during his closing remarks:

“I believe Governor Romney is a good man. Loves his family, cares about his faith. But I also believe that when he said behind closed doors that 47 percent of the country considered themselves victims who refuse personal responsibility, think about who he was talking about.”

It was pitch-perfect timing, and showed great rhetorical skills to bring up the line in a non-accusatory way, surely pleasing the base — who are always looking to see blood drawn — and the more strategic supporters who worry about the President going all-in on class warfare/populist rhetoric. He managed to avoid either extreme yet worked the line, and did it when Romney would have no chance to respond or defend.

Romney, for his part, was at his best when highlighting Obama’s failure to live up to his own promises and when he listed the negative characteristics of the current economy. Mitt loves many things, but he particularly loves lists of how bad Obama is doing. And it was a good moment for him, proceeded directly by him bumbling through foreign policy, getting smacked by Obama. And the moderator. And the audience.

That was the turning point.

When Mitt Romney went after the President on Libya, Obama flipped the switch. He stopped being candidate Obama, and stepped into being President Obama. He answered strong and forcefully, called Romney out on a lie, and wielded the power and dignity of his office. That’s a hard stance for any opponent to attack, but even harder when your aim is to go as low as possible. Romney called the President a liar, and was instantly corrected by Obama, then Crowley, and then the audience, who responded with the aforementioned nominally prohibited applause. Within minutes, Democrats were trending #RomneyExposed on Twitter.

Mitt didn’t really get his grove back after that.

Early polling from CBS News has Obama winning by 7 points, 37% to Romney’s 30%, with 33% undecided. It will not be hard — with a third of respondents unsure — for Republicans to spin this as a close tie. Which is the best you can hope for if you’re a Democrat looking for proof your guy won.

The bigger question is what will this do to the polls. There’s clear evidence that the substantial bounce Romney had gotten from his win in Denver was already starting to flatten out before tonight’s debate. In part, the President can thank his Veep for that, in part a bounce generally remains a bounce, and requires work to build on it, something neither campaign could devote much energy to with all their time focused on the next debate.

Polling being what polling is, we won’t know the effect of the debate until week’s end, and before we even have time to catch our breath, we’ve got the final Presidential debate scheduled for next Monday. In the meantime, Democrats are already seizing on any and all good news they can find, so they’re pointing people to the shift towards Obama on Intrade. Which is also good news for me, since I don’t just write about elections, I bet heavily on them.

There’s twenty days left before we go to vote, and I’m taking any and all action I can get my hands on people. Line forms to the left, have your money at the ready.

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by Alex Dueben

“Cheerleading to me says a great deal about femininity, womanhood, girlhood…”
– Megan Abbott

Megan Abbott made her name as a novelist with a series of crime novels set in the mid-Twentieth century. In books like Die a Little, The Song Is You, Queenpin, and Bury Me Deep, Abbott put her female protagonists through hell and back. They were innocents who found that they were darker and more complicated than they imagined, pushed to their limits and out of their comfort zones which often led to blackmail, murder, self-delusion and more. Last year saw the publication of The End of Everything, a book set in the 1980s, featuring a thirteen year old protagonist whose best friend goes missing. The result is a brutal story that spares no one in the town.

Her new novel is Dare Me, a book about a cheerleading squad who gets a new coach and upends the team and the girls’ social dynamics. Sex, drinking, betrayal, kicking another cheerleader in the stomach to purge, broken bones and ruined lives – this is not a warm and fuzzy book, but it is a great read. It’s also one of those books that’s very difficult to talk about without giving anything away, but when we reached Abbott over e-mail, we tried our best.

Read our exclusive interview with Megan Abbott on SuicideGirls.com.

Brewin Suicide in Giverny

• INTO: Happiness, booze, weed, leather, faux fur, fixies, sushi, documentaries, cats, bars, trips without plans, boots, socks, love.
• NOT INTO: Lollipop shaped dicks.
• MAKES ME HAPPY: Positivity, sunshine, bodies of salt water, beaches, windows down a/c off, night rides, thrift store finds.
• MAKES ME SAD: The cold, leaving good things behind, buying something broken.
• HOBBIES: Drawing, painting, drinking, riding, hanging around with my favorite people.
• 5 THINGS I CAN’T LIVE WITHOUT: Caffeine, iPhone, good vibes, spell check/autocorrect, Hello Kitty.
• VICES: Taking pictures of roadkill.
• I SPEND MOST OF MY FREE TIME: Making and spending.

Get to know Brewin better over at SuicideGirls.com!