On the State of the Union

by Nicholas Ruiz III

http://downwithtyranny.blogspot.com/2011/01/different-approach-to-state-of-union.html

Investment is a thoughtful word. Going back in time, we first see it in French and then Latin, where it originates with a simple concept: to clothe, or to envelop, and then to cover, or to adorn, and then ultimately for us, to endow, inaugurate or behold in esteem and high hopes of some future and greater return. In short, we invest in something, so that something else may be returned to us from it.

‘Investment’ is a fashionable word today, no? Sort of like ‘spending’ which the Republicans are all the time howling about with their insatiable need for cuts.

But let’s not forget - spending is basically a form of investment. So when we cut spending - we essentially cut investment in a particular idea. If we cut our spending on bubble gum – we have essentially decided that investing in a chewable food product is no longer a nice idea. If we raise the Social Security retirement eligibility age, or lower the benefit payment in order to cut spending, we are then saying that investing in a particular concept – that of a guaranteed public retirement system – is a bad idea. Democrats don’t believe that investing in a guaranteed public retirement system is a bad idea. If they do – they’re not Democrats.

My point: the national conversation about ‘spending’ really amounts to a simple question: “What are we going to invest in?”

There’s a bandwagon rolling through town. The Republicans are driving it, and it seems, Obama the Democrat wants to jump on it, too. But Democrats need not let him.

The increased radicalization of the American right is undermining any reasonable political balance available to our democratic republic. Under the disguise of spending cuts and cost-cutting, the nation is plainly being asked to accept a non-democratic investment plan for America. A reallocation program if you will, where we invest in something different than what makes America compelling as an egalitarian nation.

In a basic State of the Union preview op-ed in the Wall Street Journal on 1/18/11, Obama declares a new vanguard of national deconstructive investment: regulatory cuts. Citing the carcinogen, saccharin, Obama asserts: “The FDA has long considered saccharin, the artificial sweetener, safe for people to consume. Yet for years, the EPA made companies treat saccharin like other dangerous chemicals. Well, if it goes in your coffee, it is not hazardous waste. The EPA wisely eliminated this rule last month.”

The FDA’s idea, actually is that saccharin is ‘safe’ to consume in small quantities, and that theory is a speculative judgment call. Research shows that saccharin causes cancer in mice and rats in a variety ways, and by general scientific extrapolation – it causes cancer in some human beings. Deregulating the carcinogen saccharin is a mistake that will allow greater exposure of the chemical to greater numbers of people and will almost certainly increase cancer incidence among the affected populations, as deregulation will also certainly increase corporate profits by lessening corporate accountability for use of the chemical. How’s that for rebalancing the nation’s investments?

Paul Ryan (WI-1), the Republican investment slasher has to like Obama’s Deregulatory New Deal. I doubt Democrats do. Paul Ryan already, last year, lavished his investment advice for the nation via his published ‘Roadmap’ for public destruction: an indecent proposal to slash billions in investment from the public sector. And why in the world would Paul Ryan want to bring public investment down to 2008 levels? Katrina vanden Hueval explains in the Washington Post on 1/25/11:

“Understanding the purpose of the "roadmap" is key to understanding Ryan. When he speaks of ‘fiscal responsibility,’ what he really means is that middle class and working Americans will shoulder the responsibility of tackling debts and deficits, while multinational corporations and financial institutions will reap the benefits of favorable government policies and taxpayer-funded bailouts… The respected Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, drawing on estimates of the non-partisan Tax Policy Center, concluded that the average tax cut for the top one percent of the population (with incomes over $633,000) would be $280,000. The richest one tenth of one percent, who had incomes over $2.9 million in 2009, would pocket a handsome $1.7 million a year in tax breaks.”

Refining Katrina vanden Hueval’s logic further, the ‘investment’ idea being peddled by Paul Ryan et al. essentially achieves very dark returns: the further decimation and demoralization of the working class. With record unemployment, record commodity and equity prices and the lowest working wages, worker benefits and citizen confidence in decades – wouldn’t it be a better idea to increase our public investment? I’m sure. We need to remind our democratic President that there’s a reason Democrats don’t vote for Republicans, so he need not act like one by floating Republican investment ideas like the New Deal of Deregulation.

But if Obama is in need of some regulations to reasonably review, Democrats can help. For example, let’s review the stifling minimum wage regulation. The minimum wage, unreasonably and unrealistically, remains untethered to the consumer price index. Therefore, it almost never goes up. But market prices sure do. And that’s why the buying power of the average American today pales in comparison to the buying power senior citizens had when they were young. Deregulate the minimum wage by tethering it to the market via the consumer price index. Republicans, whose charms and favor Obama seems too eager to court, will be happy, too: it has the word ‘market’ in it.

On the state of the union: today, the most important need we have as a nation is the need to invest in all our people. Government policies that favor a fractional minority of people, and legal entities called corporations are simply not right. And most everybody knows it.

Put a progressive Democrat in Congress.

Thank you for your support in the 2010 campaign.

After much consideration regarding the elections of 2010, I'd like to let you know that in 2012, I will run as a Democratic candidate for Congress in Florida District 24. 

In this way, I feel that my efforts to cultivate a progressive agenda for Florida and America will best be served, and have the greatest chance of success. I remain supportive of third parties and their independent contributions to our democracy. But I can no longer wait for them to become competitive under the American political duopoly. 

Our progressive agenda cannot afford to wait.

The Republican sweep of the U.S. House of Representatives in 2010 is confirmation that the Democratic Party is at a crossroads. The Democratic electorate, uninspired by non-progressive Democratic candidates and officials, did not show up at the polls in sufficient numbers to support them, and retain a Democratic majority in the U.S. House. Citizens that believe in a democratic progressive agenda, are losing their enthusiasm for Democratic leaders, because too many of these leaders think and act more like the other side each day.

Progressives have to look forward. Almost everyone I met on the campaign trail that supported my platform and views - identified themselves as a "Democrat". There is a huge independently progressive and Democratic constituency that is not being adequately represented by the Democratic Party as it stands today. Constituents on the Left are hungry for the real thing. 

Real progressive politics. Real democracy. Real progress.

In 2012, I aim to offer a progressive, democratic agenda for all citizens - regardless of their party affiliation. But I will offer my candidacy, on the ballot, as a Democrat. There is a historically rich tradition and legacy in Democratic politics, if we have the courage to reclaim it.

Let's do it. Or as someone famous once said, not so long ago: "It'll be - just like starting over."

-- 
Nicholas Ruiz III, Ph.D

NRIII for Congress 2012
http://intertheory.org/nriiiforcongress2010.html
____________________________________
Editor, Kritikos
http://intertheory.org

The forum is free and one hour long. The debate will be shown live and re-broadcast on WBCC-TV:

* Wednesday, October 13, 7 p.m. United States Representative District 24
* Candidates – Dr. Nicholas Ruiz III –  Green Party Write-In, Ms. Suzanne Kosmas – Democrat, Ms. Sandra “Sandy” Adams – Republican

http://intertheory.org/nriiiforcongress2010.html

And power is but a metaphor for Capital.

So in order for us to discuss independence, let us ask, “Independence from what and from whom?”

Anyone who has in mind the fate of a people, a country, a nation – will more likely than not, spend very little of their time in relentless pursuit of capital, and its analog, power.

Yet, the people are fooled by this every time.

For independence to have meaning, it must become untethered to brokers of capital and power. Or else, the people fall prey to them.

If Main Street is to remain alive, it cannot be abused by Wall Street. Main Street can work with Wall Street, but as partners, not servants.

There is an independence of freedom, if the people will simply vote for it – and not something else.

In the Book of Samuel, written about 2600 years ago, the people ask for a king, which in a very real sense, may be construed as the desire for representation, a desire that would later lead to the creation of a Parliament or a Congress. God tells the people what such a body, unchecked, is apt to do:

"This is what the king who will reign over you will do: He will take your sons and make them serve with his chariots and horses, and they will run in front of his chariots. Some he will assign to be commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and others to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and still others to make weapons of war and equipment for his chariots. He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive groves and give them to his attendants. He will take a tenth of your grain and of your vintage and give it to his officials and attendants. Your menservants and maidservants and the best of your cattle and donkeys he will take for his own use. He will take a tenth of your flocks, and you yourselves will become his slaves."

In The Tragedy of Coriolanus, written approximately 2200 years later, in the early 17^th century - Shakespeare’s citizen has this to say of the political oppressors of his time:

"Care for us! True, indeed! They ne'er cared for us
yet: suffer us to famish, and their store-houses
crammed with grain; make edicts for usury, to
support usurers; repeal daily any wholesome act
established against the rich, and provide more
piercing statutes daily, to chain up and restrain
the poor. If the wars eat us not up, they will; and
there's all the love they bear us."

In the two hundred years that followed, there were revolutions in England, France and America. No one denies that these revolutions were wrought by mismanagement and abuse of the land and livelihood of the people, by a self-appointed nobility and their heirs.

Looking upon America today, we must acknowledge that many gains have been made. We also cannot ignore that many gains have been lost. Indeed, many gains have been squandered by an apathetic independence on the part of citizens, and again, by a largely self-appointed nobility, due to the fact that the political and media communication machinery, and electoral processes remain largely held hostage by them.

Does our present status harken back to an earlier time when America was beholden to an unresponsive Mother England?  Where citizens speak – but the government does not listen? Have we accomplished enough since then? Have we merely imported some variation on a feudal theme, an elected, yet pre-selected nobility and heirs all the same? That body politic of Congress, talking tough about fiscal strength and responsibility, all the while showering trillions of dollars upon banks, industry and defense – at the expense  a demoralized, degenerating middle class?

ABC News recently reported on July 2, 2010 that at a recent city council meeting regarding the potential construction of a Wal-Mart store in Chicago, a concerned citizen pointed out that:

"…Wal-Mart CEO Michael Duke's $35 million salary, when converted to an hourly wage, worked out to $16,826.92. By comparison, at a Wal-Mart store planned for the Windy City's Pullman neighborhood, new employees to be paid $8.75 an hour would gross $13,650 a year."

The debate over the disparity of compensation among corporate nobility and the officials they help elect continues nationwide, Chicago being only a recent example, because American citizens are increasingly concerned about “the pay gap between top executives and their rank-and-file employees”:

"A study last fall by the Institute for Policy Studies, a liberal Washington D.C. research group, found that CEOs in the country's S&P 500 companies make, on average, 319 times more than the average American worker.

IPS associate fellow Sam Pizzigati said that in the 1970s, that ratio was 30 to 1. 'We've seen, over the past three decades, a tenfold-plus increase in the gap between top executives and average American workers,' Pizzigati said…The top marginal tax rate, he said, dropped from 91 percent in the 1960s to 28 percent in 1980s. It stands at 35 percent today.

'If you look at the historical record, executive pay really started exploding in the early 1980s,' he said. 'That's when the top rate started precipitously falling.'

On the worker side, Pizzigati said, wages have been hurt by the declining power of U.S. organized labor. When it represented more than one-third of the American workforce, unions could influence wages -- and force them higher -- throughout the labor market. With just seven percent of Americans represented by unions today, Pizzigati said, that's no longer the case."

Relationships? According to the Federal Elections Commission filings to date, collated by the Center for Responsive Politics of OpenSecrets.org – Wal-Mart, through its PAC, or political action committee (Wal-Mart Stores Inc. for Responsible Government) – contributed $781,550 to federal candidates (53% to Democrats, 47% to Republicans). How’s that for fair and balanced? And don’t be misled; the Wal-Mart PAC contributed yet more money to other PACS, the Republican and Democratic political parties, etc., who in turn contribute to federal candidates and so on.

Under such an integral reality, independence, becomes something else.

It’s easy to tighten belts and lift boot straps, says the noble Congress – when they are not their own. Tough love is needed says the Congress – but for the people, not themselves.

Can we do better than this? Is that all there is?

America can’t feel her legs anymore – but she’s still running. They say she’s getting better – but she doesn’t feel any better. Americans don’t feel any better.

Independence is somewhat more serious than a speech and a barbecue, and something less radical than a revolution. It’s a process of deliberative negotiation which we enact and embody every day. This Fourth of July, ask yourself: What does independence mean to me? To my family? America?

Take not, America for granted; nothing is more uncertain.

Nicholas Ruiz III, Ph.D
NRIII for Congress 2010
http://intertheory.org/nriiiforcongress2010.html
____________________________________
Editor, Kritikos
http://intertheory.org

by Brian Stefans

Press Release

Bank of America Online Banking: A Critical Evaluation provides a detailed, easy-to-read critical evaluation of Bank of America Online Banking. It argues that the great portion of the bank’s revenue accrued through overdraft fees is often the result of the deceptive and confusing nature of the online banking site.

The average citizen has no choice but to rely on debit and credit cards for many transactions, which are impossible to track on paper due to the ubiquity of virtual transactions. The BoA online banking center, despite its fluffy tutorials and FAQs, does not make this task easier, but rather conceals the increasingly complex nature of virtual transactions.

This analysis, while informal, integrates the new fields of software studies and data visualization with perennial complaints about the abuses of the banking industry. It argues for a complete transformation in how online (and other forms of virtual) banking is conducted rather than the cosmetic policy changes of recent years.

Nicholas Ruiz III, Ph.D
NRIII for Congress 2010
http://intertheory.org/nriiiforcongress2010.html
____________________________________
Editor, Kritikos
http://intertheory.org

The dispute began back in August, when Adair Turner, Britain’s top
financial regulator, called for a tax on financial transactions as a way
to discourage “socially useless” activities. Gordon Brown, the British
prime minister, picked up on his proposal, which he presented at the Group
of 20 meeting of leading economies this month...