Are the Rich Paying More Than Their Share? Are Others Not Paying Their Fair Share? No, and No!

We always hear how the rich are being overburdened with taxes and how a progressive tax system is unfair to the rich. It's such a common talking point in the media that it is almost never questioned. Here's why it's completely false.

First, a few facts: 400 households have 50% of the wealth in the US. These top 400 billionaires own half of everything - money, property, ...Everything.

The rest of us get to share the remaining 50% of the wealth. That means that just 400 get one half, and 310 million share the other half.

But the rich pay a lot of taxes, right? ...Right?

The total amount of the income taxes collected from the billionaires who own half of everything in the US is less than 2%.

So who makes up for the rest? You guessed it ... we do.
The total income taxes paid by the poorest Americans who share the other half of the wealth is 98.2%!

In short, the richest people who own half of everything in America pay 1.8% of the income taxes, while the poorest who share the other half pay over 98% of the income taxes. That's so hard to imagine I made a picture.

The 'common wisdom' talking point that the rich are getting a bad deal is just plain wrong.

How come 40% of people don't pay any income taxes?

The short answer is: because they don't have anything. The poorest 40% of Americans have to share 0.02% of the wealth. That's not two percent, that's point zero 2 percent - or 0.0002.

To put this in perspective, if all the wealth in the US was $100, then the poorest 40%, or 124 million Americans, would split 2 cents between them. That's why they don't pay taxes. You can't get blood from a stone.

So the next time someone whines that it's not fair that 40% of people don't have to pay income tax, remember this picture, and tell him that he's looking the wrong way. Instead of looking down the income scale, he should be looking up the income ladder. Trying to tax those who don't have anything is stupid.

So who else doesn't pay taxes?

Those who have too little income to pay taxes are in good company. It turns out that some that have a lot of income - many in the Billions of dollars - don't pay taxes either.

Amazon(.com) and Boeing aircraft company have income tax rates less than 5%. That seems very low, except when compared to other corporations, they are suckers.

According to the Government Accountability Office, two out of three U. S. corporations paid no federal income tax from 1998 to 2005.

These include many huge corporations. ExxonMobil is the most profitable company in the history of the world. They pay no tax. Nothing. Zilch.

General Electric also pays no tax. But what makes this fact even more unbelievable is that they even get billions in "tax credits" back from the government. That's correct, they actually get money BACK!

So when you hear in the media about the rich being overtaxed, or how tough it is for the rich right now, you now know this 'common wisdom' is completely wrong.

It's always a good time to be rich!

Fellow Americans: We Need to Reflect

"If ballots don't work, bullets will" was shouted by Joyce Kaufman, former Chief of Staff to Republican Representative Allen West, in her speech to the crowd at a Tea Party rally.

It a sad time in America when this anti-American statement and hundreds more like it are not met with widespread and immediate condemnation.

The media likes to portray this issue by reporting both "sides" in a political he-said, she-said style with no real analysis, and certainly no indication of the truthiness of either position.

"False equivalence" in this case refers to the often heard claim in the media that everyone is equally guilty of inciting and dangerous rhetoric. It is a false equivalence because the inciting and dangerous rhetoric comes predominantly from the right-wing of the political spectrum, and not equally from both "sides".

The reality is that Democrats and liberals will reflect on their speech and rhetoric, but Republicans, tea partiers and the right-wing TV & radio shockers will not. Already we have seen the right-wing defend their past inflammatory rhetoric and insist that they will continue it. So the call to "tone it down" will only be heard by those who don't really need to hear it, and ignored by those who really do need to tone it down.

Everyone is NOT equally guilty of inciting and inflammatory rhetoric. But we all have a responsibility to work against it.

In the end, the two "sides" are really those who support open democracy and American principles, and those who agitate against these ideals. The underlying principle of democracy is that we can make the best decisions for the many, without resorting to violence to achieve selfish and narrow political objectives.

If there is one thing that should unite all of us as Americans it's that the vote is the foundation of our democracy. The idea that bullets should ever - ever - be more powerful in our democracy than our votes is something we can all unite against.

So the answer from all Americans to Joyce Kaufman and people like her is: No, bullets will not work. Ballots will.

President Obama Was Right to Cut a Deal

For 23 1/2 months Congress has failed to act on the expiring tax cuts. President Obama stepped in and provided some desperately needed leadership, and now the Democrats are all ready to fight...Obama?

Do you really think Congress can do in 2 weeks what it utterly failed to do in 23 1/2 months?

You can't say President Obama caved without recognizing that the Democratically held Congress has caved for almost 2 years. And now, at the eleventh hour, they think they can get a better deal. But they have put forward no bills either before of after Obama's negotiation with the Republicans.

President Obama was right to cut a deal. The reasoning he gave in his speech was pragmatic and made good sense.

Obama's deal will put food on the table for the unemployed. Tax cuts will pump billions into the economy just when we need it most. That money, if collected as tax, would never be allowed into the economy by the Republicans. The best way to get money to the middle class to spend it is to not collect it in the first place.

It's true that we liberals and progressives didn't feel like it was a "win" because Obama and other Democrats didn't "sell it". I think that this could have been framed more competently to make us feel victorious while doing the right thing. This is not a new issue; it has been a perennial problem for Democrats.

Democrats should not be disappointed with Obama for stepping in at the last minute to do something that the Democrats in Congress utterly failed to do for the 2 years they held both Houses of Congress.

Some of the Democrats in both the House and the Senate were actually in Congress to vote on the original Bush Tax Cuts in 2001. When were they planning to act? They waited 9 years, 11 months and 14 days before decrying the President for dealing with the issue at the last possible moment - while Democrats still held both Houses.

Democratic enthusiasm for a better tax plan is just too little, WAY too late. This should have been a priority a year ago.

Obama did the right thing. We should do the right thing and support him.

Midterm Election 2010: Another Unreported Headline

The "Southern Strategy" was applied nationally, and it worked.

The Republicans used a national campaign this election season. The Southern strategy is a common strategy employed by the Republicans in the southern states, and it works in those states.

The Southern Strategy is the strategy that uses covert and overt racism to stir up fear and anger among white voters to get them to vote Republican and to turn them out in larger numbers. The chairman of the Republican National Committee, Michael Steele, not only admitted that this strategy was used with success, he specifically apologized to the country on behalf of the Republican Party for using the Southern Strategy because it was wrong.

In this midterm election, the Southern Strategy was applied on a national level and it worked in both northern and southern states. The result of this covert and overt race baiting was that the Republicans have the majority seats in the House of Representatives in Congress.

So the question now is: Will the racist campaign strategy turn into a governing strategy?

Midterm Election 2010: The Unreported Headlines

Democrats won the Senate.

There were enough seats up for grabs in this midterm election in both houses of Congress so that either party could gain control of the Senate or the House. The Republicans won control of the House, and the Democrats won control of the Senate. So why does the "mainstream media" frame it as a "win" only for the Republicans?

This is a perfect example of how the "mainstream media" weaves its Conservative bias into the news.

The headline we see is "America Has Spoken: Republicans Win The House"

The Republicans won enough seats in this election to be in the majority in the House. Therefore, Republicans won the House. The Democrats won enough seats in this election to be in the majority in the Senate. Therefore, Democrats won the Senate.

But you won't see it reported that way. Not on CBS, NBC, CNN, not anywhere. Why isn't there a headline that says "America Has Spoken: Democrats Win The Senate"? It's because it doesn't fit with the "mainstream" media's Conservative narrative.

What did America say, and what did the media hear?

Because the Republicans are now in control of the House, everyone is saying "America has spoken". Didn't America speak just as loudly when we voted the Democrats to be in control of the Senate? Or when Obama was elected President? These Democrats were also elected by a majority of American voters.

Democrats were elected to control half of the Legislative Branch in the Senate, and there is a Democratic President presiding over the Executive Branch of our government. Republicans control only one half of the Legislative Branch. For those of you keeping score, that's one and one half branches for the Democrats, and only one-half of a branch for Republicans. That equals a 3 to 1 'branch ratio' favoring the Democrats.

The "mainstream" media narrative is detached from the reality of mainstream America. On the whole, America is still telling Democrats "Keep going!"

Anti-Washington Vs. Anti-America

This election has literally become very negative. The winners will be determined by which "anti-" sentiment gets the most people out to vote. Voters fall into one of the two Anti movement groups: the Anti-Washington group and the Anti-American group.

The anti-Washington movement is fueled by anti-government sentiment.

The Anti-Washington group is essentially against the Democrats. They are the party in power, so they are the party that is blamed for the problems that we are facing as a nation right now, as well as some problems that are entirely made up by or for the media's consumption. The Democrats are in charge, so therefore they are the "Washington insiders" who have either succeeded or failed, depending on which media narrative you are following.

The Anti-America group manifests itself as the Republican Tea Party. They are so determined to have Obama fail that they are willing to have America fail to do it. They want to take Obama down by taking America down.

The Republican Tea Partiers often claim to be defending the Constitution. But they hypocritically proclaim they want to change the Constitution. As the self-proclaimed defenders of the Constitution, they really mean they want to defend only selected parts of it. They skip over the First Amendment, which creates the separation of church and state, because they believe the founding fathers would have wanted the commingling of religion and government. They conveniently ignore decades of legal precedent. They also ignore the fact that the founding fathers really did oppose the commingling of church and state, and that's precisely why they wrote the 1st Amendment! Teabaggers instead focus mostly on defending the Second Amendment and the right to bear arms because that one is supposedly under attack.

Republicans have said they don't like the 17th Amendment. They are against the election of U.S. Senators by the voters. That is a pretty Anti-American idea. They also want to change the 14th Amendment; specifically, they want to change the part that makes everyone who is born here a U.S. citizen. I think it is important to point out that this is the way that ALL natural born Americans became U.S. citizens. In other words, the vast majority of Republican Tea Partiers became citizens through the 14th Amendment - but they want to change it. How much more Anti-American can you get than to be against the Constitution? Read on.

Republicans in the Senate rail against the lack of job creation by the government, but have voted against every measure to create jobs. They voted against safeguards that would prevent our economy from crashing again. And they voted against making oil drilling off our coast safer. They vote against everything that is good for America. On every issue, Republicans have taken a hard-line Anti-American stance. They are willing to scuttle America for the sake of giving the wealthiest people in the world (not just Americans) an even greater portion of America's wealth. They block every effort by Democrats to build America up. Then they fill the media with their convoluted spin that somehow they are "doing America good."

The prevailing Republican attitude is "Either you give us all of the money and power, or we'll take America down!" Taking America hostage is as Anti-American you can get.

There are two kinds of people in America: those who want to take Obama down by taking America down, and those who want to build America up.

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Conservative Political Activism On Supreme Court Threatens Democracy

The Citizens United decision by the Supreme Court is naked Conservative political activism which opens the floodgates for unlimited campaign funding by multi-national corporations. The judicial activism of the high court breaks down the last barrier which has held back for decades the disproportionate influence by the richest few over our democracy.

It turns American democracy into the same system that is used for shareholders who own stock in a company. In that system, you are able to "vote your shares", which means those who have the most dollars invested in the company get the most votes.

With unlimited amounts of money flowing into the political election process, elections and seats in government can be bought and sold like commodities. This is far different than what the founders created, a system that was "one man, one vote", not "one dollar, one vote".

The Conservative activism of the court created something that is simply not found anywhere in the Constitution. The hyper-reactionary court majority dominated by Roberts and Scalia have created a "self-destruct" button for our Democratic system. It changes America from a democracy to an aristocracy made up of the rich and the largest multinational corporations that drowns out the voices of 99% of Americans with unlimited political cash.

The court itself is dominated by the same political payback system that the rich and the Republican party have been cultivating for decades in both the executive and legislative branches.

Acting alone, the activism of the conservatives on the court would not succeed. Eventually the voters would check the radical power grab by the court. However, the conservative bias of the mainstream media, and the outright conservative propaganda of media such as FOX, ensures that American voters are left unaware of this threat to our democratic system of governance.

The Supreme Court's radical decisions also open American democracy to threats from other countries. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has been actively soliciting donations from foreign corporations and governments to fund attack ads against Democratic political candidates. These attack ads smear those candidates who fight the outsourcing of American jobs to those same countries that benefit from receiving the jobs. And the circle of money is completed.

The media is mute despite the polls that show over 80% of Americans are against outsourcing of jobs overseas. The mainstream media is adept at displaying it's strong conservative bias by poorly reporting, or not reporting at all, important populist issues - even issues that threaten to end our great American experiment in democracy.

The Citizens United decision makes the American voter the low bidder in the auctioning off of American democracy.

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