The Biggest Ponzi Scheme: The American Economy

[Effis]

Get Rich Quick!

Sign up today!!

No down payment!

Low, easy payments!!

...and those are just a few, I'm sure you can name many many more of
the 'enticements' to give your hard-earned money to some banker or
investment advisor, nevermind all the purveyors of crap products and
services for sale.

Witness the greatest disparity between rich and poor, the ever-
decreasing numbers of the middle class. Even when they lose, they
still win and win big time, in the millions, for losing average
citizen's billions.

It's a sure sign the system doesn't work. Rather than reinvent the
system, the government loans them more money.

End of the day, the majority of the investors lose, while the few
running the till get away with millions. And we let them!

It's the biggest ponzi scheme going, in plain view, and nobody is ever
going to do anything about it.

[Eva Douglas]

I'm sorry, I don't remember you posting when George W Bush misled the United States people into invading a sovereign country which cost us 3 trillion dollars and took the budget surplus.  Now I'm not sure, are you complaining about the 1 trillion over ten years that Obama has proposed to help the United States people instead of going into the deep pockets of the Contractors in Iraq?  Or have you forgotten history so fast? 

[Daniel Habtemariam]

Eva, you're being too kind. Healthcare will not cost us $1 trillion.
The CBO has scored both the House and the Senate Finance Committee
bills - they both completely pay for themselves, and on top of that
pay off a portion of the deficit. See table 1:
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/106xx/doc10688/hr3962Rangel.pdf
http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/106xx/doc10642/10-7-Baucus_letter.pdf

And at least this President is committed to paying for healthcare
before passing it. Iraq, Afghanistan, and Medicare Part D were
completely unpaid for when they were passed, and they stand as some of
the most reckless cases of deficit spending ever in America. Everyday
that nothing changes, we add to the deficit. This isn't Obama's
doing; it's his predecessor's.

And I'm no fan of the bank bailout, but cynicism/despondency is not an
option. Nobody is ever going to do anything about it unless you (and
yes, I mean YOU) do something about it. If Americans had your
attitude in 1930s, we would have never won regulatory milestones like
the creation of the FDIC, the passage of the Glass-Steagall Act, the
Reconstruction Finance Corporation, and the Fair Labor Standards Act.

There's a bill in the House Financial Services committee being debated
right now that aims to set up a Consumer Financial Product Safety
Agency, among other things. Keep informed of these things, and call
your Representatives and Senators. Believe it or not, the Wall Street
companies that are posting record profits right now (Goldman Sachs, JP
Morgan Chase, etc.) are the ones that have paid back their bailout
money. I don't quite understand why there's still so much outrage,
TARP was a loan not a giveaway, and it's doing exactly what it was
intended to do -- prevent a financial panice & stabilize the financial
sector. But every time some Democrat wants to use taxpayer money to
invest in the middle class, someone screams socialism and it never
gets done. It's positively infuriating. We tell Obama to fix the
country and give him no money to do it.

[Eva Douglas]

Daniel, the outrage come from those being brainwashed by Karl Rove and Rush Limbaugh.  I watched Stewart's pan on "Faux new"  I did not see the man behind the scenes Karl Rove.  Effis does not understand that the object of Karl Rove and his ilk is to consolidate the wealth of this country to the top 5% of citizens of this country.  Take a Faux War, don't hire the citizens of Iraq to do the Reconstruction, bring in the contractors from this country-Cheney's thugs.  Now put all the money in the contractors pockets from this country.  We pay taxes, Bush designs a war, that tax money plus the budget surplus from before Bush's war now is put back into the hands of the rich in this country.  What a perfect scenario for Rush and his thugs.  And we hire "Faux News" and Limbaugh to keep the people in their place, to accept their lot in life.  "Shop" says Bush. Go deeper in debt on your credit cards.

Now as I have told this group, I did my tax return last year.  I had taxable income, but because of Bush's tax cuts to the rich, I paid no federal tax.  I'm not one of the rich but I had dividends and capital gain not taxed.  I yelled and I screamed.  Not fair to everyone else.  I don't  go to work (work out of my house)  I don't have a mortgage, car payments. I'm debt free; yet I had no tax obligation on my 20K income. 

Whether Medicare D is right or wrong, I had no drug coverage before I went on Medicare D before I went on. I was paying 3k year. I'd call my health insurance company once a year and to get drug coverage would cost me a lot more than the $628 a month I was paying for health insurance.  Luckily every copayment is going to be raised next year.  Medicare will cost a lot more which will help the balance column. And the tax cuts to the rich, Bush and all his cronies, will expire in 2011.  Eva

[Daniel Habtemariam]

Eva, I think you give Karl Rove too much credit. He's a propagandist,
a front man, someone to lie to the camera so that his boss doesn't
have to -- here today and gone tomorrow, there's a vibrant market for
guys like him, and they're all over CNN, CNBC, MSNBC, and especially
Faux News. You're exactly on-point concerning their goals, though.

What I don't understand about guys like Effis is when they rail
against the bank bailout and then keep silent when it comes to
proposing solutions or when the topic shifts to even more expensive
and much less defensible policy decisions like President Bush's
endless wars, which incidentally were the first time in 168 years that
America has entered into war without a draft or a new tax to help pay
for it.

And Medicare D, along with No Child Left Behind and a number of other
Bush initiatives, would have been fantastic for the country if Bush
would've just bitten the bullet and increased taxes a little bit to
help pay for them. His father raised taxes to help pay for Social
Security, and we thanked him by voting him out of office. We've
lowered taxes to historically low levels in this country, and still we
expect things to run as well as they did a generation ago. This isn't
Walmart. You can't run a war on pennies. And you can't run a major
Medicare program without money to pay for it. It's reckless, it's
cynical, Rove's bosses are the only ones who benefit in this
situation, and it's amazing that we keep voting them into office.

[Eva Douglas]

Andrew Mellon was my great great Uncle, secretary of the Treasurer and allowed the banks to deregulate while he was over in Russia buy paintings from the Hermitage.  He led this country in to the great depression.  He overhauled the tax structure.  The very rich like him were paying 50% income taxes.  He lowered that to 35%.  Reagan lowered it ever more.  And Bush W. lowered it to 17%.  Now I have tax clients, single who are actually paying 25% but the rich are paying 17%. 

You and I would like to know if Effis is one of the ones paying 17% so he/she has no right to complain about taxes or is he/she one of the ones who are hurt from the rich paying such low rates.  And if so, why is he/she complaining when the rich aren't paying their fair share?

My son is one of the rich "Anything you need Mom"  I haven't had to fall back on him. He says he pays no where near his fair share of taxes.

[Francis DeGagne]

Well so much for attempting to reply. Twice now both have not appeared on the group. I've been blocked? Will try email instead, at least this way I have a record of it - not so with the online reply.

Your reactions to my post were, dare I say it, ironic? Considering I'm a Canadian and presumably a socialist and definitely not a fan of big business or banks. Closest to a liberal commie than most of you guys, I'd wager. But I guess that's part of my snide remark post in the first place - I find it odd that in any argument people tend to want to categorize you into one or another camp, for or against, with little room for negotiation and plenty of blame and judgement all round. I'd say 'shame' but it's reality and I deal with it. That or risk a shot to the head (virtual albeit).

I don;t have the energy to write (again) my thoughts. Thanks y'all for replying to my post though, I appreciate it. Flippant though it was. Rather than lurk for months I just put myself out there. I enjoy reading the political irony stuff and following American politics to a certain extent. It's more interesting, though I must admit a bit baffling. So goes freedom I suppose, though for such a 'free' society there is plenty of close-mindedness and paranoia.

By the way here is a solution - eliminate the penny, round everything to the nearest nickel, and use the remainder to help fund health care. The billionaires are unlikely to be so miserly as to oppose that, and it's a small enough thing that the poor people can afford it.

ironic that for criticizing me for not proposing a solution that you don't propose one. And how in hell did you think my rant was in support of big banks? Head out of ass, now please.

[Eva Douglas]

Dear Francis, What you did was add interest to this e-mail chain.  I was really appreciating your comments.  But I did propose a solution.  Eliminate the tax cuts for the rich.  My family is the rich.  They don't mind paying taxes. 

Bush took a budget surplus in 2000 and bankrupted us.  Bush also poured the Harvard endowment fund into his oil wells and lost the Harvard endowment fund. 

I don't know how much of this "fundamentalist Christian Religion" you are up against in Canada, but the only correct people in this country are those evangalists who get their fodder from Faux news.  Put your comments here.  You can spur us on to discussion. 

First:  Why 3a.m?  Are you on the West Coast?  Eva

[Eva Douglas]

I just googled some names on this chain.  Google is tracking our comments on this blog.  So beware everyone. 

On Fri, Nov 6, 2009 at 3:06 AM, Francis DeGagne <francis...@gmail.com> wrote:

[effis]

Looks like I stepped into a minefield and I deserve it with such a
poorly thought out post to this group. I've been missing my
entertainment with political irony on vacation. Forgive me for my
'Northern' sense of humour!

First off, you've got me all wrong. I'm not American and I probably
pay double tax for less income than you guys. Am watching the action
'over the fence' as it were, mainly for entertainment value but with a
bit of 'there but for the grace of whatever go us'. Not sure why
things are so polemic in America. Love or hate, rich or poor, democrat
or republican. I don't understand it all but I do recognize trouble
brewing with this lack of seeking for middle ground and compromise.

> You and I would like to know if Effis is one of the ones paying 17% so
> he/she has no right to complain about taxes or is he/she one of the ones who
> are hurt from the rich paying such low rates. And if so, why is he/she
> complaining when the rich aren't paying their fair share?

For the record I believe my tax rate is closer to about 30%. But
that's income tax, so does not include the 'goods and services' tax
and provincial sales tax on stuff. Pays for health care, education,
and tonnes of other 'socialist' programs like welfare, employment
insurance, legal services, the list goes on. Works for me and I'm not
complaining. But I do believe 'the rich' are getting away with not
paying enough, or at least corporations especially those that the
government helps subsidize to encourage them to stay in the country.

> > What I don't understand about guys like Effis is when they rail
> > against the bank bailout and then keep silent when it comes to
> > proposing solutions or when the topic shifts to even more expensive

Hey I wasn't railing against the bank bailout at all! Not sure where
you got that from.

But I will propose a solution. Get rid of the copper penny, round all
transactions up to the nearest nickel, and have the remainder go into
a fund to pay for health care. You'll save money by not having to
produce the penny any more (fairly redundant these days anyway) and
put the money to some good use while not really taking anything away
from anyone.

But it's obvious you are all more familiar with your country's
problems than I am. I'm here to learn, and, well, be entertained. No
offence. I have my opinions but they are only loosely based on any
kind of statistic or 'fact' (they can be so subjective). I totally
agree - focus on solutions. Just consider that anything proposed that
has any hope for success will likely be found riding down the middle
or on some scale between your way and their way. I hope I'm being
clear. This 'right/wrong' approach has never worked, and neither has
blaming.

Flame on! ha ha. Cool, thanks for the feedback.

[effis]

Hello? Does this work? I went to great length the other day to reply
but it still has not appeared! Will this? Mysterious....

On Nov 4, 3:00 pm, Eva Douglas <ebdou...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Andrew Mellon was my great great Uncle, secretary of the Treasurer and
> allowed the banks to deregulate while he was over in Russia buy paintings
> from the Hermitage.  He led this country in to the great depression.  He
> overhauled the tax structure.  The very rich like him were paying 50% income
> taxes.  He lowered that to 35%.  Reagan lowered it ever more.  And Bush W.
> lowered it to 17%.  Now I have tax clients, single who are actually paying
> 25% but the rich are paying 17%.
> You and I would like to know if Effis is one of the ones paying 17% so
> he/she has no right to complain about taxes or is he/she one of the ones who
> are hurt from the rich paying such low rates.  And if so, why is he/she
> complaining when the rich aren't paying their fair share?
> My son is one of the rich "Anything you need Mom"  I haven't had to fall
> back on him. He says he pays no where near his fair share of taxes.
>

[Eva Douglas]

You can understand a lot about this country if you read "Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee; by Dee Brown.  Canada is a lot more tolerant peaceful country than we are.  The Native Americans moved across the border to get away from the Genocide in this country.  Remember the English gave up Catholicism in the 1500s.  Sarah Palin considers herself no longer Catholic, but it is hard to give up your upbringing.  This is a very intolerant country, built on Religious freedom. Sad that that has been forgotten.  I don't know, but I don't believe that Canada, French or English ever had slavery.  You see there are a lot of people in this country who believe or would like to believe that there is an inferior race in this country.  That makes them feel superior.  No "All people are created equal" in this country.  When we had a mass catastrophe in this country that inferior race was left to drown and starve and go without water. When it hit on the home front..............You can imagine how galling this is to me coming from over 200 years of abolitionists.  Or on the other side from slaveowners who felt after the civil war that education for the freed slaves was paramount importance.  Who had a great Grandfather who said, "Black and white should be equal, just separate.  that is just my opinion."  He was on the southern side of the war.  150 years later in the south the black people are not equal.  Can you imagine how galling it is for those bigoted white southerners to see a brilliant part black man running our country?  Can you imagine how it is for Obama to know his life is on the line each and every minute of the rest of his life from now on?  How we who idolize him fear for him constantly?  Who see all these stupid people being brainwashed by Faux News just like Hitler brainwashed people in the 1920s on?  I cry for the Iraqi people who had their country destroyed. I cry for the mother who was with her husband, three sons, two daughters and ran a check point because they didn't understand English and thought they were being held up in their car.  Father, three sons, one daughter killed by the guard at the check point in this the most civilized of countries.  All those people would still be alive had it not been for the brainwashing of 90% of the United states people including our representatives in Congress.  And it goes on and on.  We made no friends by the Iraq war.  Finally we have someone to lead us out of the morass that Bush put us in. And 1/3 of this country is sitting on Obama, destroying him. 

Now you have the Republicans in Congress who can't stand Obama defying the AARP and the American Medical Association because the Republicans aren't going to let a Democrat help the people get health care.  The worst is from Ohio-John Boehner.  He is poisonous.  Very sick situation. 
inf

[effis]

Clearly an understanding of history and past mistakes is essential to
moving forward as a society. Plenty to be said on this topic, not the
least of which is what might be considered a mistake to some is
success to others. Those who can house and feed themselves with a
relative amount of security also have the luxury of being able to
reflect on the past. The greater the number of people who are focused
simply on getting through each day without questioning how they got
there, the better - as far as government or corporate exploiters are
concerned.

From what I see looking at American society over the fence as it were,
people are grouped as rubes or troublemakers or the ruling elite,
depending on the degree of how much they can play the system or
question its role in their success. For a country that prides itself
on individualism and 'survival of the fittest', while at the same time
largely promoting the fairy tale of creationism in denial of Darwin's
theories, I can't imagine why anyone would want to live there other
than for the promise of success, a promise that appeals to those who
are motivated by an overwhelming sense of greed, the satisfaction of
which depends on screwing over your neighbour or bucking the system by
working together with other like-minded groups of individuals.

Having said all that I believe most Americans are well meaning and
sincere, struggling to maintain optimism in a land that thrives on the
worst qualities and a system that rewards the ruthless. You have a bad
day/month/year and you become one of the weak, left to flounder and
die or pick up the pieces and begin again. That drive must come from
within, a personal motivation that perhaps people living in more
accommodating societies don't require to survive when the state will
maintain them at a survival level. It's those qualities that help
individuals to survive that others focus on in their criticism of the
country because living that way fosters exclusion and high minded
priviledge. Co-operation happens between people on the same team, on
the same level of economic status, the same family or corporation,
without acknowledgement of the role played by others and the need to
really work together as a unit in kind, a culture.

No slavery in Canada to the extent to which it was ever recognized as
an industry in the US. Still, people in need were exploited to some
extent most commonly in the industries requiring cheap labour, as the
country began as 'carriers of water and hewers of wood' and is still
that way to a large extent. Feedom existed in the degree that beatings
lynchings and murder are not part of our national lexicon. We don't
have the freedom to bear arms. People generally respect the rule of
law. We don't fear our government and rarely have any reason for doing
so. We might be branded boring or socialist but we love life and
welcome those who share these values.

I like your knowledge of history and the people. Thanks for sharing,
perhaps we can grow through this!

[Eva Douglas]

If global warming continues, I'm moving north.  I live to cross country ski out my back door in the morning.  Love your perspective on things.  This we know: Obama has no alterior motives.  He even admitted that it is heady being President.  He is for the people.

[ironknee]

> I just googled some names on this chain. Google is tracking our comments on
> this blog. So beware everyone.

I'm not sure what Eva means by this. Pretty much everything that is
posted to the web is tracked by Google (they are the largest search
engine company, after all). It doesn't matter that it is a "Google
Group" at all. So you should be careful about anything you post to the
web. Google is doing nothing special with this particular forum.

> > Well so much for attempting to reply. Twice now both have not appeared on
> > the group. I've been blocked? Will try email instead, at least this way I
> > have a record of it - not so with the online reply.

Sorry about any delays posting here while I was on vacation. Google
groups has been the target of spam, and about the only way to prevent
that spam is to manually approve posts from new subscribers.
Unfortunately, internet access in Africa leaves much to be desired
(especially when you are visiting places that have no electricity or
running water!). Now that I'm back, things should be back to normal.

-iron knee

[Effis]

No thoughts about the elimination of the nickel?

What say we make all transactions payable in cold hard cash.

Then the question of security and where to store all those potential
future finances.

What say you lend the money to friends, or pay them to hold it for
you.

This is called illegal laundering, I believe.

Buy up real estate or fee simple land. Lease some swampland in
florida, high carbon values and ocean front galore.

The poor become rich. How?

Sub plots of theories and suggestions, all leading to death and
destruction, desecration.

Bright environmental lights shine out...but still money is to be made.
One, bent on the destruction of earth and all human and or other
sentient life on the planet.

I sit alone with the radio and tv off, listening to other families in
the house. My dinner smells no doubt intermingling with theirs, like
my bass practicing and music when the baby crying picks up a little
bit. Sometimes she starts laughing when she hears it. Makes it easier
to read.

> On Wed, Nov 4, 2009 at 3:00 PM, Eva Douglas <ebdou...@gmail.com> wrote:
> > Andrew Mellon was my great great Uncle, secretary of the Treasurer and
> > allowed the banks to deregulate while he was over in Russia buy paintings
> > from the Hermitage.  He led this country in to the great depression.  He
> > overhauled the tax structure.  The very rich like him were paying 50% income
> > taxes.  He lowered that to 35%.  Reagan lowered it ever more.  And Bush W.
> > lowered it to 17%.  Now I have tax clients, single who are actually paying
> > 25% but the rich are paying 17%.
> > You and I would like to know if Effis is one of the ones paying 17% so
> > he/she has no right to complain about taxes or is he/she one of the ones who
> > are hurt from the rich paying such low rates.  And if so, why is he/she
> > complaining when the rich aren't paying their fair share?
> > My son is one of the rich "Anything you need Mom"  I haven't had to fall
> > back on him. He says he pays no where near his fair share of taxes.
>

[Effis]

Cool! Any good stories?