The Facts of History Paint Such a Different Picture

The Facts of History Paint a Different Picture of the Conservative-vs-Liberal struggle than the one that comes out of the mouths and pens of most Republicans and other self-styled “fiscal conservatives.”

Looking Back as Far as President Jimmy Carter, the presidencies that have given us the biggest deficits by far have been Republicans. Ronald Reagan gave America the biggest up to that time, until the past years of George W. Bush dwarfed even that.

Liberals Believe in Government Doing for us what we can’t do for ourselves—national defense, pensions (Social Security) destroyed by Republican excesses of the Coolidge/Hoover years, health care (Medicare) destroyed by the Great Recession of recent times.

But Liberals, Unlike Conservatives, 
Expect to Pay Their Own Way.
Americans overall pay the least in taxes of any industrialized nation. Yet historically, it is the “spend and spend” Republicans who balloon the debt—from President Reagan’s “Star Wars” to George W. Bush’s two unfunded wars and an unfunded Medicare program with a big “donut hole.” And then Republicans blame the Democrats—such as Barack Obama—for the lengths we must go to, to clean up the disastrous mess.

What a Republican Set-up of the Democrats! What a shame that it’s the American people—unemployed and now without health insurance—who have to carry that weight.

Republicans Want to Bring the Federal Government to its Knees, so that the Democrats will be forced to cut popular programs—loved by Conservatives and Liberals alike—that the Republicans lack the courage to cut themselves

Why Else Was That Side of the Political Divide so silent over the George W. Bush years?

.....And No Wonder “Conservatives” such as those of the Tea Party Movement are angry!

They want their Medicare..........and they want their Social Security.....
     .....They want their national defense..........and they want their roads.....
         .....and the post office..........and the criminal justice system.....

                  .....and Homeland Security..........and thousands of other things 

that the Federal government—made up of “We, the people”—does.

“Conservatives” like to Talk about “Individual Responsibility”:

They Just Don’t Want to Have to Pay for It.....

Regards,

(($;-)}
Gozo!

Americans Who Like Their Current Health Insurance....

....Haven’t Really Needed to Use It Yet.

This Is the Dirty Little Secret of your health insurance:

When the Hospital Charges You $X Amount for an IV medicine, and $X amount for the solution that carries it, and $X amount for the tubing, and $X amount for the needle, and $X amount for the nurse to stick you, and $X amount for the next nurse to change out the medicine, and $X amount to change out the glucose solution—a “disallow” is the part that the insurance company says, “Unh-uh. No way. We’re not going to pay that.”

These Are the Real Death Panels. They exist right now. We have them today. They are in the hand of the for-profit insurance companies. And there’s not much you can do about it.

Your Doctor Prescribes Your Hospital Drugs, the insurance company later “disallows” them, the hospital tries getting you to pay, but also raises prices elsewhere to cover these costs that it can’t collect from you.

Tens of Thousands of Dollars can be written off your bill by your insurance company this way. This is the hidden part of the broken system that you don’t know about until it happens to you.

Regards,
(($;-)}
Gozo!

When Your Shack Is on Fire....

....You Don’t Hold Back the Water Because Your 
Neighbor’s Mansion Might Catch Fire Later....

Fears about the Mushrooming National Debt should concern every American. But a corollary factor looms equally large on the balance sheet of the U.S.A. financial statement:

This Factor, not surprisingly, is:

Healthcare Reform

The Broken Insurance System only affects those of us in the bottom 95% or so of the wealth class.

People Are Dying out Here, needlessly, and can’t really worry about the budget deficit right now.

Our Focused Efforts to Fix the System aim to unite concerns of the wealthy—about the debt—with concerns by the rest of us–over the bankrupting features of healthcare.

So Long as the Debt-related Fears of the Wealthy act at the expense of the bottom 95%, all the Republican shouting about the national debt will continue falling on deaf ears.

When Those Worried Only about National Debt join those of us who also must worry about personal, healthcare debt, then the United States of America will unite in restoring fiscal sanity to the country.

Regards,
(($;-)}
Gozo!

It’s Too Late to Turn Back Now

When You Spend 30 Years taking your neighbors’ water to feed your cattle, you can’t expect the same neighbors to save more for you during the drought.

Times Are Hard All Around—and harder in the middle than at the top. The national debt is unconscionable. The budget deficits are terrifying.

But We’ll Only Get Through This—as one nation, united and indivisible—if we move forward now. While we finally have the chance.

Those Who Think of Themselves First will continue to do so. But it falls to the rest of us—the mainstream of the American people—to make the hard choices and do what must be done.

It’s Too Late to Turn Back Now. The hard process has begun. Congress needs to pass healthcare reform before any more of our middle-income neighbors suffer from the wasteful measures of our wealthier neighbors in the past.

Regards,
(($;-)}
Gozo!

A Healthcare Reform Opportunity

After Months of Wrangling, the hard-wrought House and Senate bills are stalled, but America needs healthcare reform. Meanwhile, the Democratic majority balks at moving the current reform bills into law using reconciliation. Passing reform “provisionally” could get around the gridlock.

Under Such a Plan, Democrats could finalize healthcare-reform now,  through the reconciliation process, but pass it with the stipulation that it becomes law only if Congress doesn’t replace it with a better bill within a year. This way, only continued failure of the two political parties to create a bipartisan bill would move the reconciled bill into law.

We Need Healthcare Reform Too Badly for Congress just to throw the current bills away. America cannot afford this kind of government waste. And yet, when it comes to ending gridlock in Congress, nothing has worked.

Using Such a “Provisional” Law, Congress can pass healthcare reform now and end gridlock, one way or another, on behalf of the American people.

Regards,
(($;-)}
Gozo!

If the Democrats Can’t Deliver on HealthCare Reform....

.....Why in the World Should We Vote for Them?

Republicans Govern by “Win/Lose”

When Republicans win, the “haves” keep  what they have. Those who don’t already have....lose. Tax cuts fail to stimulate the economy. “Trickle-down” turns out to be “trickle up.” We enter the Great Depression (1929). Homeless people appear on the streets for the first time (1982). We enter the Great Recession (2007).

It’s the “Spend and Spend” Republicans who gave us all those years of lower taxes for the wealthy, wars not paid for, and a “trickle-down” economy that makes no sense.

History Proves  Republicans Wrong. But that does not deter them. Being wrong never weakens Republican resolve.

Republicans Govern by Winning, regardless of the cost to the American people, and to our children and to grandchildren. The record on budget deficits over the past 30 years is clear. The record on who brings on great depressions and great recessions is clear. But the “spend and spend” Republicans keep on rolling along. The Republicans keep blaming the Democrats for  messes that Republicans create. They argue  conservatism and fiscal responsibility, while driving the economy and the American people into the ground.

Republicans Govern by “Win/Lose.” And they do “Win/Lose” very, very well.

Democrats Govern by “Win/Win”

To Democrats, if Everybody Just Agrees, Everyone Wins. Democrats don’t like to stick their necks out, so they constantly seek a consensus....no matter how horrible a mess the predecessor administrations have made out of things. The Democrats just need that little bit of agreement....such as a filibuster-proof Congress or a few Republicans to go along. Or else one vote shy of a filibuster-proof majority, so that they have someone else to blame their failures on.

Take the “Dare” of the Filibuster

No Wonder the Republicans Accuse Democrats of not being tough-enough: the Republicans, you will remember, would not let Bernie Sanders introduce an amendment to the healthcare bill without making him read the entire document on the Senate floor. Sen. Sanders read a few hundred pages and then threw in the towel. The amendment did not move forward.

When Was the Last Time the Democrats Made a Republican carry through on a filibuster threat? Did you see it on C-Span? 

The Democrats Have Good Policies for America, but Democrats are spineless. Democrats are more afraid of making enemies—whether with the American electorate or within the halls of Congress—than they are of letting America fall deeper and deeper into the Great Recession. Farther and farther behind in the technology race for alternative energy. Smaller and smaller as a force for good on the global stage in this new, twenty-first century.

Republican Policies Are Disastrous for America. But Republicans will see their policies through. Republicans will win. No matter the cost to America and the Americans.

The American People Want 
Leadership that “Wins”

Come November, if the Democrats have added a cowardly failure at passing healthcare reform, to the arguably unpopular effort of promoting healthcare reform, then the Democrats are sunk. The Republicans will win enough seats in Congress, so that the Democrats can wring their hands and say, “See? It’s not our fault? What can we do?”

America Will Be Back in the Hands of the tough, hardened, ideologically driven and wrong, “Just Say No!” Republicans.

No “Filibuster.”

No “Just Say Yes! for America.”

People Will Continue to Die from the Failure of Healthcare.

And That’s Just “Lose/Lose/Lose” for America:

Any Way You Look at It.

Regards,
(($;-)}
Gozo!

When Did “Tax” Become Another Word for “Punishment”?

Our Current Distortion of Capitalism isolates management from the real ramifications faced by consumers/taxpayers on one side of the equation and shareholders/taxpayers on the other—one or both of whom will pay the “ax.” A defender of taxes on banks, as punishment, recently wrote, “Banks will pass those taxes onto consumers only if consumers let them. We have a free enterprise system enshrining competition. If Bank A raises fees, then we can go to Bank B.” That’s how capitalism should work, but clearly it doesn’t. Why not?

We Believe that “Tax” Equals “Punishment.” We believe that “Bank A” can be made to operate differently than “Bank B.” We believe (on the Left) that “greed” is inherent in capitalism or (on the Right) that “yes, but it’s a necessary component.”

Neither Side Knows What Adam Smith Had to Say About It. We need to learn the value of taxes. We need to learn the price that each line employee at the bottom pays so that each CEO makes the eight-digit salaries—and bonuses—at the top.

If We Continue to Think of Corporations as the Enemy, then we are sunk. But if we continue to think of corporations as equal to citizens under the law (absent the vote, but free of the risk of incarceration), we will continue to feel enslaved by these very entities that are required, by charter, to serve public need.

If We Continue to Think of Government—We, the People—as somehow doing other than what we send it to do, we will continue racing through the rapids with just one oar in the water. We reward elected officials for limiting the amount that they displease us. We continue to act is if our elected officials operate in a vacuum, like dictators or kings, when in truth, their job is to keep the voters as happy as possible, while keeping the ship of state afloat.

It’s Really All a Failure of Education.

We Don’t Know What We Have Here.

We Don’t Know How It Works.

And We Keep Turning to Expressive Communicators—politicians, pundits, commentators—who don’t really know enough more about it than we do.

Before Any of Us Really Do Anything Else, we ought to get out our Wealth of Nations and see if a better title might not be Well-Being of Nations. Adam Smith’s work is predicated on his first volume, A Theory of Moral Sentiments, which sets the foundation for the civic good that capitalism and corporations serve best.

Says Smith, We Humans Are Motivated to Do Good. Capitalism provides the best engine. But no engine runs itself, and it behooves all of us to read the operating manuals.


Regards,
(($;-)}
Gozo!