The hypocrisy of Fiscal Conservatism....

"The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness." - John Kenneth Galbraith

The quote above is almost dead right about every Conservative I have ever met or listened to. Frankly the vast majority of them use their "fiscal conservatism" as a way to fatten their own wallets. They preach corporate welfare while crying foul about how social programs take taxpayer money. They can put us into endless wars that are basically fronts to fund their corporate war profiteering friends who get contracts from Washington and then deposit paybacks to these politicians with campaign funding but they whine without end about the need to privatize (another corporate giveaway) Social Security or Medicare. Or worse they take aim and cut Welfare, WIC and Energy Assistance Programs for the poor.

There is a deep irony involved when you look at what they say to get elected. They talk about tax cuts and then pander to evangelicals by claiming the Christian mantle as if they own religion.

The truth is the tax cuts they want are only for the rich and they could care less about poor and middle class voters.

Those who have similar interest in keeping the rich filthy rich and keeping the poor down continue to work with "fiscal conservatives" to get whatever they want and use as many fear tactics in their field as you would hear from Bush and the Neo-Cons when it comes to War.

Here's a fun example. Moody's who rated those subprime loans highly (and we know how that worked out), tried to scare people this week saying that America's triple A credit rating was in jeopardy.

I can believe that, after all we're racking up huge debt to China, spending like crazy on endless war and gutting the middle class and poor for tax cuts for the rich which obviously hurts consumer spending.

But what did Moody's blame? Healthcare and Social Security spending. Even though we have the least government-financed health care available for our citizens (to disasterous results I might add), we need to cut there... yeah... right.

It's funny how all these like-minded people stretch the truth as far as they can to corrupt the system to work in their favor.

What's worse though is how these people can whine incessantly about the burdens on our tax money that the poor cause with the social programs in place to help them but never once whine about the pork that gets into every spending bill to pay off their political donors.

And this tends to go back to the second staple of the Conservative Politician: Christianity.

They scream up and down about how Christian they are. They use ads and pundits as weapons to push this farce onto potential voters.

Ignoring the poor and enriching yourself at the expense of the hard working taxpayers is exactly what Christ worked against and ignores every principle in his teachings.

With so many 'do as I say, not as I do' Republicans out there, it's rare that I am surprised in a positive way from these people.

In fact "Christian Politicians" are hardly the only hypocrites when it comes to using innocent people for their religious beliefs while scamming them out of their hard earned money. Many of the evangelical preachers from these "Mega Churches" are picking their people clean (I think there should be a major investigation into Pat Robertson also but that's a different story).

Republican Fiscal Conservative, Senator Chuck Grassley from Iowa actually found out about such a case and unlike other conservatives that learn of this corruption and turn a blind eye as long as they are ideologically aligned, he decided to do something about it:


From Alternet:

The New Testament reports that Jesus rarely used fancy modes of transportation to get around. He walked most of the time, although Matthew and other gospels mention that he once rode a borrowed donkey into Jerusalem, where he burst into the Temple and tossed out the money changers.

Nearly 2,000 years later, some who claim to speak in Jesus' name are taking a different view. Consider Bishop Eddie Long, who pastors a megachurch in Lithonia, Ga. With a salary approaching $1 million a year and a nine-bathroom mansion situated on 20 acres, Long's choice of vehicles reflects his opulent lifestyle: He drives a $350,000 Bentley.

-snip-

Long's lack of humility has probably done him no favors. At the time, U.S. Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa), expressed dismay.

"When I hear about leaders of charities being provided a $300,000 Bentley to drive around in, my fear is that it's the taxpayers who subsidize this charity who are really being taken for a ride," he quipped.

In November, Grassley, who serves as ranking minority member on the Senate Finance Committee, ramped things up a bit. He announced that he is seeking detailed financial information from six mega-ministries, Long's among them.

Bravo to Grassley (at least for now). It's a rare day you'll hear me say that but even a broken clock can be right twice a day I suppose.

However the rest of fiscal conservatism is a scam. As long as their corporate campaign donors are protected then it's perfectly fine to attack the poor and kill their programs.

With all of this protection of Corporations and the rich it's no wonder why they all seem to fear John Edwards the most.

Proof of FOX Propaganda

Is there any question anymore that Fox is nothing more than Right Wing Pravda?

Why John Edwards is the best choice for America

Well it's been quite some time since I last posted. It's not for lack of wanting to post but as someone who has had to work myself into a better job I have been a bit busy since my flurry of September activity (well minus one book plug post in November). Luckily I was told that all the hard work had paid off and that my new company was going to hire me on in a much better position. To get the position though I spent a whole heck of a lot of free time working at home and off the clock to prove I was willing to do what it took to earn this position.

Obviously that leaves little time for blog posts. Oh don't think I didn't have opinions on Bush's S-CHIP veto and the William Kristol comments about it (a sick must see video). I certainly had something to go with there and on other issues but I decided to concentrate on working hard to advance my career.

Since I turned 18 in 1995 I have always seen the American "dream" as just that. I did not finish college and have had to work in different temp jobs proving my worth and learning new skills in hopes that it would eventually pay off down the road. The problem with working temp jobs is they are by definition, temporary. Then when you apply and interview with future employers they question your commitment to a job or worse question why you would have what they deemed an "unstable job history".

For me it was the best way to move up the corporate ladder and be a viable candidate down the road for a serious job. It took a while since I just turned 30 years old, but it finally happened.

But all the struggling I went through on this path was a learning experience for sure. My mother struggled in similar but possibly much worse ways when we were young, working full time and needing Welfare benefits to help us make ends meet.

I know she hated even being on public assistance but she knew it was the only way for her and her three children to survive. I also have had to struggle, accepting assistance before and racking up mountains of debt in which I am going to be paying off for the next few years in trying to take care of my son and myself to the best of my abilities.

The reason this is relevant isn't just because I haven't been able to keep up with a stupid blog in trying to advance my career to financial stability. It's relevant because I have just described an experience more and more Americans are suffering through.

The economy has been a deceptive smoke and mirrors campaign from the get-go with the Bush Administration. Always touting decent (if not mostly disappointing) unemployment numbers as well as economic growth they were able to parlay much out of little and have most of the media cover them on this issue.

The truth is much murkier than that. Bush and the Republican Congress spent us into huge deficits and increased the national debt by record numbers. Unemployment numbers are skewed to only include those laid off by a job but not those who haven't had one in some time and can't find work. Not to mention most of that economic growth was based on the mortgage lending market which was irresponsibly being set up to fail with the push to low credit consumers of risky ARM loans.

With the mortgage lending collapse crushing home owners and putting them into foreclosure and the incredible lengths of which the Bush Labor Department has pushed to eliminate jobs or pay from the American worker (sending memos on how to not pay overtime or pushing outsourcing as a solution). From an August 13, 2004 David Sirota article:

Now, the executive agencies are taking over. According to The Associated Press, the Bush Labor Department began “suggesting ways employers can avoid paying overtime” to their workers. Similarly, The New York Times reports that the Bush Commerce Department is participating in “conferences and workshops that encourage American companies to put operations and jobs in China.” And the Bush Treasury Department has tried to defy federal-court rulings by attempting to legalize “cash balance” pension schemes that reduce retirement incomes that companies promised to their older workers.

The economy is in free fall.

Think about how the vast majority of the economy works. The Middle Class is the backbone of the economy. They are made up by many different types of workers but factory workers make a large portion of this group. Another large portion of this group is made up of college graduates.

Thanks to outsourcing, when College Grads get out of school, the middle class wage jobs are no longer there to employ them. Many of these students, now possibly as much as $100,000 or more in debt to student loans, need to find work and are finding the vocation in which they trained to be filled. They still have student loans to pay off as they are not granted an out by taxpayer-paid college tuition or even an option of bankruptcy on the loans.

Also thanks to outsourcing, many of these factory workers who see their entire companies in which they have spent decades putting in loyal hard work, move operations overseas. Sometimes they even lose their entire pension, the nest-egg which they depended on for their retirement years. These jobs usually paid pretty well, $20 an hour or more (much more depending on experience and position).

Where do these two large groups of middle class-skilled workers end up? The service industries such as retail or fast food.

To make ends meet these workers have to take lower level jobs to stay afloat, sometimes two or more if they have mortgage payments.

That does two things. First it takes jobs away from lesser skilled or lesser educated workers who already have a hard time finding work with their education or skill set. They usually depend on the McDonalds or Wal-Marts hiring them. However with no work available at higher levels those companies can take their pick of a college grad or a high school drop out to work at the same pay rate.

This has been (along with other Bush economic decisions) one of the key reasons why the gap between the poorest and the rich has expanded further than any time since the great depression during Bush's Administration.

The second thing it does is takes a lot of middle class purchasers off the market. Previously American businesses could depend on this group of people to be bigger spenders. Usually these workers provide many of the new car or home mortgage loans that help build the economy. Without that sort of income at their disposal, home sales have been dramatically down and this year was one of the worst in terms of new car sales.

These people, the middle class and the poor, are generally forgotten entities in politics. We just spent the past 8 years, hell the past 38 years of pro-corporate welfare while at the same time watching welfare and government supplied social programs to help the poor be cut and slashed more and more daily.

It's been way too long since a major candidate had the backbone to stand up for these people.

I have to admit I didn't come to John Edwards immediately. In early 2003 I was still wavering between Edwards and John Kerry when I heard Edwards seem hawkish and unapologetic about the Iraq War. Something inside me decided to choose John Kerry and I do not regret that decision nor any of the work I did for Mr. Kerry whom I consider to be a great American and someone whom people should look up to in terms of his personal and political bravery. I still strongly believe that Kerry won in 2004 and believe Ohio, much like Florida before it, was set up to steal votes for Bush.

This cycle I kept on hoping Al Gore would get back into the race and didn't really have a horse in the race. I knew Hillary was not whom I wanted or anyone I could ever truly support. I see her as being all too comfortable with the Washington atmosphere and being too cozy with lobbyists.

Barack Obama intrigued me but something about how he continued to use Republican talking points to attack other Democrats, his voting "present" all too often on major Senate votes to not take a position and the incredible corporate support he has (see below) turned me off. Not to mention his approach to health care is not much different than Hillary's in that they mirror each other with a "sit down and negotiate with HMOs and drug companies" approach.

For a time I started to think I was going to be forced to vote for Dennis Kucinich just to make a political point.

Then about a month or so ago things changed. John Edwards, who always had a great "Two Americas" speech dating back to the 2004 campaign started speaking in ways that I hadn't heard before. First he admitted what a huge mistake his IWR vote was. Hillary STILL hasn't done this.

Then he went out talking about taking corporations on, taking HMOs and Drug Companies on and pushing universal health care so strongly that he would go to the districts of members of Congress that opposed this for regular Americans but approved of it for themselves and campaign for their defeat personally.

He spoke of poverty, of a shrinking middle class, of getting out of Iraq... it was everything I wanted a candidate to say.

Now I know the man is personally rich but that does not mean rich people can't help the poor. Bill Gates is one of the richest men in the world but he is quite a philanthropist.

Another thing I think makes Edwards strong on is that he is so much stronger on not taking lobbying money.

Actually, there's this wonderful chart I found on DU that shows the money trail for each candidate (click to enlarge):



To me that sort of dispels the myth of Obama being able to negotiate with these companies because he and Hillary seem most in their pocket.

So great I found a candidate that finally talks about progressive ideals and has the courage to take on corporations.... except that this means the corporate media is going to bury the guy.

And the day after the Iowa Caucuses, where he placed 2nd place and defeated Hillary Clinton, that's EXACTLY what happened.

The corporate media doesn't want you to know who John Edwards is. They want to kill him worse than they did Howard Dean. After all, Dean was just a liberal. Edwards, however, is a liberal who would hurt every one of their political interests.

After watching how the media has operated since basically when FOX NEWS became a force in the late 1990s and seeing real journalists be railroaded off the air because of right wing pressure (see: Rather, Dan; Banfield, Ashleigh) one has to think that any candidate that is such an enemy of the media HAS to be good for America.



I encourage you all to go to http://www.johnedwards.com, sign up and join the fight. Not only can we take back our Presidency but we can actually take back our country from the corporate powers who work for their pocketbooks at the peril of the good of our country.

We can only win if we band together. Corporations have used off shore tax havens, outsourcing, massive tax benefits to avoid paying their fair share and every cent of that was a political gift for a campaign donation or contribution their lobbyists made to Congressmen and Senators. We can never expect the system to change if we do not elect a fighter willing to do what's needed to change it.

Our future is in your hands.

-Rp