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Monday, August 23, 2010, 02:19 PM.:

Only 21% Say U.S. Government Has Consent of the Governed - by Rasmussen Reports

Category:United States | Posted by: babagrr | Add comment 523 words

"http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/february_2010/only_21_say_u_s_government_has_consent_of_the_governed"
>Rasmussen Reports " ---- The founding document of the United States,
the Declaration of Independence, states that governments derive “their just powers from the consent of the governed.” Today, however, just
21% of voters nationwide believe that the federal government enjoys the consent of the governed.


A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 61% disagree and say the government
does not have the necessary consent. Eighteen percent (18%) of voters are not sure.


However, 63% of the http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/january_2010/65_now_hold_populist_or_mainstream_views"
>Political Class think the government has the consent of the governed, but only six percent (6%) of those with Mainstream views agree.


Seventy-one percent (71%) of all voters now view the federal government as a special interest
group, and 70% believe that the government and big business typically work together in ways that hurt consumers and investors.


That helps explain why 75% of voters are http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/february_2010/75_are_angry_at_government_s_current_policies"
>angry at the policies of the federal government, and 63% say it would be http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/february_2010/63_say_better_for_country_if_most_of_congress_not_reelected"
>better for the country if most members of Congress are defeated this November. Just 27% believe their own representative in Congress is the
best person for the job.


(Want a http://www.rasmussenreports.com/daily_updates
blocked::http://www.rasmussenreports.com/daily_updates
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/daily_updates" target="_self" href="
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/daily_updates"
>free daily e-mail update? If it's in the news, it's in our polls). Rasmussen Reports...

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Tuesday, July 27, 2010, 08:33 AM.:

1,500 layoffs at Pittsburgh health system - By Alexander Demir and Samuel Davidson

Category:United States | Posted by: babagrr | Add comment 1,241 words

West Penn Allegheny Health Systems (WPAHS) announced in June the layoff of 1,500 doctors, nurses, aides and other staff at its 98-year-old flagship West Penn Hospital in Pittsburgh’s Bloomfield neighborhood.


West Penn Hospital, where 1500 workers will lose their jobs by JanuaryThe layoffs are expected to take place by January 1, as most of the inpatient and emergency room services are closed. According to hospital officials, critical care, oncology, neurosciences, orthopedics and cardiovascular care will also close by January.

The women’s and infants’ center, the burn unit, bariatric surgery and inpatient rehabilitation will remain at the hospital. The hospital will lose over 303 of its 505 beds. Currently some 2,400 people work at the facility.

WPAHS said that the layoffs and closure of services were necessary to offset $80 million in losses sustained by the health system in the past two years, although the hospital’s finances improved in the last quarter. The job cuts were announced a few days after both Moody’s Investors Services and Standard & Poor’s announced a downgrading of the health system’s bond ratings.

“This is terrible, this is bad for the people who work here, this is bad for the community,” a secretary at the hospital, who asked that her...

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Tuesday, July 27, 2010, 08:20 AM.:

On Wall Street, crime pays very well - by Patrick Martin

Category:United States | Posted by: babagrr | Add comment 772 words

Published by the International Committee of the Fourth International (ICFI)
In a report issued Friday, a federal “special master” found that 17 big financial firms awarded nearly $2 billion in bonuses and retention payments to top executives during the period when they were receiving bailout funds from the US Treasury under the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP).

Kenneth Feinberg, the special master for TARP executive compensation, declared in a perfunctory four-page statement that he “did not determine that payments were contrary to the ‘public interest’ requiring monetary reimbursement.” He also claimed that he had no legal authority to rescind the bonuses or penalize the banks that awarded them.

A total of 419 banks participated in the TARP program between October 2008, when it was established in the midst of the Wall Street crash, and February 19, 2009, when new rules went into effect to regulate executive pay. But the bulk of the payments were made by 17 firms. The 600 executives at these banks received payouts, combining salary and bonuses, totaling $2.03 billion. This represents an average of $3.38 million per executive.

In press interviews after he delivered the report to the Treasury Department, Feinberg said that many of the payments came to more...

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Wednesday, February 24, 2010, 02:25 PM.:

Dropping Like Flies - By Danny Schechter

Category:United States | Posted by: babagrr | Add comment 1,160 words

Danny Schechter is the Author of The Crime Of Our Time


>Information Clearing House" --They seem to be dropping like flies, as the old saying goes. Now, New Jersey Senator Lautenberg has been diagnosed with Cancer. Earlier in the week, Senator Bayh said Sayonara to the Senate and, a week ago, Jack Murtha of Pennslvania died somewhat
mysteriously on the operating table with the Navy now investigating.



In a sense, this growing body count is a metaphor for a larger die-off—a death of democracy itself with the Supreme Court giving corporations the status of persons while the political system has been paralyzed by self-serving partisanship in a poisonous cloud of ideological extremism calling itself conservatism (while conserving nothing!)



The follow–up to the sad spectacle of that wannabe software entrepreneur who flew a plane into an IRA office based on a legitimate grievance with a tax code provision inserted initially to benefit IBM and other big companies that was legitimate.



Sadder still was the disclosures that, despite attempts over decades to eliminate the rule by Presidents and members of both parties, nothing was done.



Nothing ever seems to get done.



So this angry Texan went beserk, borrowing a tactic from the al Qaeda playbook.



Perhaps that’s a symptom...

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Tuesday, February 23, 2010, 10:55 AM.:

America: Land of Unlimited Anger - by Christoph von Marschall

Category:United States | Posted by: babagrr | Add comment 561 words

America remains the land of unlimited opportunities. For the time being, however, it’s a land of unlimited rage and disarray
about the balance of political power.



Translated By Ron Argentati - href="
http://www.tagesspiegel.de/meinung/kommentare/Barack-Obama;art141,3031796"
>Germany - Der Tagesspiegel - Original Article (German)



America is becoming impossible to govern. Voters want neither Obama nor the Republicans.



February 17, 2010  -- "http://watchingamerica.com/News/46423/america-land-of-unlimited-anger/"
>Watching America" --  America remains
the land of unlimited opportunities. For the time being, however, it’s a land of unlimited rage and disarray about the balance of political power.
Conflicting theories may be formulated from the more reputable surveys.



Theory one: President Barack Obama has completed one year since his triumphal election victory. Only one-third of American voters
think the country is on the right track — nearly as bad as George W. Bush’s numbers near the end of his administration. Obama’s approval
ratings have slipped below the 50 percent mark. He lost the ability of his party to shape the future with the Senate election in Massachusetts. If congressional
elections were held today, the Republicans would win by 48 percent to 45 percent for Democrats (according to The Washington Post). The newspaper describes
the Republicans as “on the rise.”



Theory two: The Republicans are the big losers. People are angrier with their obstructionist tactics than...

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Saturday, February 20, 2010, 10:49 AM.:

The Richest 1% Have Captured America's Wealth - By David DeGraw - part two

Category:United States | Posted by: babagrr | Add comment 2,224 words

 






The war against working people should be understood to be a real war.... Specifically in the
U.S., which happens to have a highly class-conscious business class.... And they have long seen themselves as fighting a bitter class war, except they
don't want anybody else to know about it." -- Noam Chomsky

 


February 17, 2010 "http://www.alternet.org/economy/145705/the_richest_1%25_have_captured_america's_wealth_--_what's_it_going_to_take_to_get_it_back?page=entire"
>Alternet" -- As a record amount of U.S. citizens are struggling to get by, many of the largest corporations are experiencing
record-breaking profits, and CEOs are receiving http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/banking_and_finance/article7010492.ece"
>record-breaking bonuses. How could this be happening, how did we get to this point?



The Economic Elite have escalated their attack on U.S. workers over the past few years; however, this attack began to build intensity
in the 1970s. In 1970, CEOs made http://www.jstor.org/pss/3592881"
>$25 for every $1 the average worker made. Due to technological advancements, production and profit levels exploded from 1970 - 2000. With the lion's
share of increased profits going to the CEO's, this pay ratio dramatically rose to http://www.jstor.org/pss/3592881"
>$90 for CEOs to $1 for the average worker.



As ridiculous as that seems, an http://www.jstor.org/pss/3592881"
>in-depth study in 2004 on the explosion of CEO pay revealed that, including stock options and other benefits, CEO pay is more accurately http://www.jstor.org/pss/3592881"
>$500 to $1.



Paul Buchheit, from DePaul University, revealed,...

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Friday, February 19, 2010, 10:55 AM.:

The Economic Elite Have Engineered an Extraordinary Coup, Threatening the Very Existence of the Middle Class - by David DeGraw

Category:United States | Posted by: babagrr | Add comment 1,912 words

"The American oligarchy spares no pains in promoting the belief that it does not
exist, but the success of its disappearing act depends on equally strenuous efforts on the part of an American public anxious to believe in egalitarian
fictions and unwilling to see what is hidden in plain sight." -- Michael Lind, http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/45/006.html"
>To Have and to Have Not

 

February 15, 2010 http://www.alternet.org/story/145667/the_economic_elite_have_engineered_an_extraordinary_coup,_threatening_the_very_existence_of_the_middle_class"
>Alternet" -- We all
have very strong differences of opinion on many issues. However, like our founding fathers before us, we must put aside our differences and unite to fight
a common enemy.



It has now become evident to a critical mass that the Republican and Democratic parties, along with all three branches of our government,
have been bought off by a well-organized Economic Elite who are tactically destroying our way of life. The harsh truth is that 99 percent of the U.S. population
no longer has political representation. The U.S. economy, government and tax system is now blatantly rigged against us.



Current statistical societal indicators clearly demonstrate that a strategic attack has been launched and an analysis of current
governmental policies prove that conditions for 99 percent of Americans will continue to deteriorate. The Economic Elite have engineered a financial coup
and have brought war to our doorstep...and...

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Friday, February 19, 2010, 10:47 AM.:

Real, Uglier American Unemployment - By Joel S. Hirschhorn

Category:United States | Posted by: babagrr | Add comment 904 words

"http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/"
>Information Clearing House" --- Can you trust national averages?  As bad as the jobless data
you hear are, you have not been told the whole truth.  If you think the terrible impact of America ’s Great Recession is shown by an official
unemployment rate of about 10 percent, think again.


 


Economic inequality and the myth of Reagan trickle down logic are shown by new data from the Center for Labor Market Studies
at Northeastern University in Boston .  http://www.clms.neu.edu/publication/documents/Labor_Underutilization_Problems_of_U.pdf"
>The report noted: “What has been missing from the public debate over the labor market crisis is an honest and detailed analysis of which
American workers have been most adversely affected by the deep deterioration in labor markets.”  The researchers found a correlation
between household income and unemployment rate in the last quarter of 2009:  Look carefully at these numbers and see how unemployment rises as
income drops:


 


$150,000 or more, 3.2 percent


$100,000 to 149,999, 8 percent


$75,000 to $99,999, 5 percent


$60,000 to $75,000, 6.4 percent


$50,000 to $59,000, 7.8 percent


$40,000 to $49,000, 9 percent


$30,000 to $39,999, 12.2 percent


$20,000 to $29,999, 19.7 percent


$12,500 to $20,000, 19.1 percent


$12,499 or less, 30.8 percent


 


Ten times worse unemployment in the lowest class than in the highest class!  Truly amazing and...

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Friday, February 19, 2010, 10:26 AM.:

America’s Global Weapons Monopoly - Frida Berrigan

Category:United States | Posted by: babagrr | Add comment 2,029 words

February 17, 2010 "http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175207/tomgram:_frida_berrigan,_pimping_weapons_to_the_world/"
>TomDispatch" Feb. 16, 2010 - -On the relatively rare occasions
when the media turns its attention to U.S. weapons sales abroad and shines its not-so-bright spotlight on the latest set of facts and figures, it invariably
speaks of “the global arms trade.”


Let’s consider that label for a moment, word by word:


*It is global, since there are few places on the planet that lie beyond the reach
of the weapons industry.


*Arms sounds so old-fashioned and anodyne when what we’re talking about is advanced
technology designed to kill and maim.


*And trade suggests a give and take among many parties when, if we’re looking at
the figures for that “trade” in a clear-eyed way, there is really just one seller and so many buyers.


How about updating it this way:  “the global weapons monopoly.”




In 2008, according to an authoritative report from the Congressional Research Service (CRS), $55.2
billion in weapons deals were concluded worldwide. Of that total, the United States was responsible for $37.8 billion in weapons sales agreements, or 68.4%
of the total “trade.” Some of these agreements were long-term ones and did not result in 2008 deliveries of weapons systems, but these latest
figures are a good gauge of the global appetite for weapons. It doesn’t take...

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Thursday, February 18, 2010, 10:45 AM.:

Grounds for Hope and Despair - by Paul Craig Roberts

Category:United States | Posted by: babagrr | Add comment 1,202 words

"http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/"
>Information Clearing House" -- My February 16 column, “http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article24704.htm"
>A Country of Serfs Ruled By Oligarchs,” received confirmation
from high places on the very day it appeared. Popular Indiana Democratic U.S. Senator Evan Bayh announced that he was quitting the Senate. Yahoo News gave
this account:



“In an interview on MSNBC this morning, newly retiring Sen. Evan Bayh declared the American political system "dysfunctional,"
riddled with "brain-dead partisanship" and permanent campaigning. Flatly denying any possibility that he'd seek the presidency or any other higher
office, Bayh argued that the American people needed to deliver a "shock" to Congress by voting incumbents out in mass and replacing them with
people interested in reforming the process and governing for the good of the people, rather than deep-pocketed special-interest groups.”



In short, Senator Bayh got tired of being a whore for the corporate lobbyists who rule the U.S.



As Shamus Cooke noted the same day, in the last election voters gave the Democrats a super majority in the mistaken belief that Democrats
would remove U.S. policy from the corporate/neocon grip only to find that the result was a surge in America’s wars of aggression.



There are grounds for hope in the fact that some of the Tea Party people understand that Americans have...

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