[Home]  [Headlines]  [Latest Articles]  [Latest Comments]  [Post]  [Sign-in]  [Mail]  [Setup]  [Help] 

Status: Not Logged In; Sign In

FBI recovers funds for victims of scammed banker

Mark Felton: Can Russia Attack Britain?

Notre Dame Apologizes After Telling Hockey Fans Not To Wear Green, Shamrocks, 'Fighting Irish'

Dear Horse, which one of your posts has the Deep State so spun up that's causing 4um to run slow?

Bomb Cyclone Pacific Northwest

Death Certificates Reveal FBI 'Revised' Murder Stats Still Bogus

A $110B bubble on $500M earnings. History warns: Bubbles always burst.

Joy Behar says people like their show because they tell the truth, unlike "dragon believer" Joe Rogan.

Male Passenger Disappointed After Another Flight Ends Without A Stewardess Frantically Asking If Anyone Can Land The Plane

Could the Rapid Growth of AI Boost Gold Demand?

LOOK AT MY ASS!

Elon Musk Responds As British Government "Summons" Him To 'Disinformation' Hearing

MSNBC Contributor Panics Over Trump Nominating Bondi For AG: Dangerous Because Shes Competent

House passes dangerous bill that targets nonprofits, pro-Palestine groups

Navy Will Sideline 17 Support Vessels to Ease Strain on Civilian Mariners

Israel carries out field executions, massacres in north Gaza

AOC votes to back Israel Lobby's bogus anti-Semitism definition

Biden to launch ICE mobile app, further disrupting Trump's mass deportation plan: Report

Panic at Mar-a-Lago: How the Fake Press Pool Fueled Global Fear Until X Set the Record Straight

Donald Trumps Nominee for the FCC Will Remove DEI as a Priority of the Agency

Stealing JFK's Body

Trump plans to revive Keystone XL pipeline to solidify U.S. energy independence

ASHEVILLE UPDATE: Bodies Being Stacked in Warehouses & Children Being Taken Away

American news is mostly written by Israeli lobbyists pushing Zionist agenda

Biden's Missile Crisis

British Operation Kiss kill Instantly Skripals Has Failed to Kill But Succeeded at Covering Up, Almost

NASA chooses SpaceX and Blue Origin to deliver rover, astronaut base to the moon

The Female Fantasy Exposed: Why Women Love Toxic Love Stories

United States will NOT comply with the ICC arrest warrant for Prime Minister Netanyahu:

Mississippi’s GDP Beats France: A Shocking Look at Economic Policy Failures (Per Capita)


Editorial
See other Editorial Articles

Title: The Meagerness of the GOP Debates, the Smallness of the President's Solutions, and the Need for a Progressive Alternative
Source: [None]
URL Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rober ... py-wall-street-_b_1017228.html
Published: Oct 18, 2011
Author: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-rei
Post Date: 2011-10-18 12:24:52 by tom007
Keywords: None
Views: 119
Comments: 8

Robert Reich Robert Reich

The Meagerness of the GOP Debates, the Smallness of the President's Solutions, and the Need for a Progressive Alternative Posted: 10/18/11 08:32 AM ET React ry

Republicans are debating again Tuesday night. And once again, Americans will hear the standard regressive litany: government is bad, Medicare and Medicaid should be cut, "Obamacare" is killing the economy, undocumented immigrants are taking our jobs, the military should get more money, taxes should be lowered on corporations and the rich, and regulations should be gutted.

Four years ago the most widely-watched TV debate among Republican aspirants attracted 3.2 million viewers. This year it's almost twice that number. And for every viewer assume a multiplier effect as he or she shares what's heard with friends and family.

Americans are listening more intently this time around because they're hurting and they want answers. But the answers they're getting from Republican candidates -- tripping over themselves trying to appeal to hard-core regressives -- are the wrong ones.

The correct ones aren't being aired.

That's partly because there's no primary contest in the Democratic party. So Republicans automatically get loads of free broadcast time to air their regressive nonsense while the Democrats get none.

But even if the president had equal time, the debate about what to do about the crisis would still be frighteningly narrow.

That's because the president's answers don't nearly match up to the magnitude of the crisis.

Without bold alternatives, Americans desperate for big solutions are attracted to bold crackpot ideas like Herman Cain's "9-9-9" proposal, which would raise taxes on the poor and cut them for the rich.

This is where the inchoate Occupy Wall Street movement could come in. What's needed isn't just big ideas. It's people fulminating for them -- making enough of a ruckus that the ideas can't be ignored. They become part of the debate because the public demands it.

The biggest thing the president has proposed is a plan to create 2 million jobs. But that's not nearly big enough. Today, 14 million Americans are out of work, and 11 million more are working part-time who'd rather be working full time.

The nation needs a real jobs plan, one of sufficient size and scope to do the job -- including a WPA and a Civilian Conservation Corps, to put the millions of long-term unemployed and young unemployed to work rebuilding America.

I'm not criticizing the president. Without energized, mobilized, and organized progressives, even the best people in Washington can't overcome the monied interests.

For example, America's long-term debt needs to be addressed, but not the way the president is doing it. He wants to lop $4 trillion off the budget over the next ten years. This almost certainly means sacrificing education, job training, food stamps, and everything else now listed in the so-called "non-defense discretionary" budget, as well as cuts in Medicare and Medicaid.

What about halving the military budget instead? It doubled after 9/11, and military contractors are intent on keeping it in the stratosphere. So is Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta. Result: Defense cuts this size won't be on the table unless progressives vociferously demand it.

And what about really raising taxes on the rich to finance what the nation should be doing to create a world-class workforce with world-class wages?

Here again, the president's proposal is paltry compared to what should be done. He wants to raise taxes on the rich by ending the Bush tax cut for incomes over $250,000 and limiting certain deductions.

Yet income and wealth are now more concentrated than they've been in 70 years. The top 1 percent gets over 20 percent of total income and holds over 35 percent of national wealth; the richest 400 Americans have more wealth than the bottom 150 million Americans put together.

Meanwhile, effective tax rates on the rich are lower than they've been in three decades.

We need to push for higher marginal taxes on the top, and more brackets. Incomes of more than $5 million should be subject to a 70 percent rate. (The top marginal rate was never below 70 percent between 1940 and 1980.) And these rates should apply to all income regardless of source, including capital gains.

This would allow for a bigger Earned Income Tax Credit (that is, a wage subsidy) for lower-income workers. And lower taxes on middle-income workers.

There should be a 2 percent annual surtax on all fortunes over $7 million. This would only hit the richest half a percent of Americans at the very top of the heap. And would yield $70 billion a year -- enough to improve our schools and make college affordable to everyone.

And a tax on financial transactions. Even a tiny one of one-half of one percent would generate $200 billion a year. That's enough to make a major contribution toward early childhood education for every American toddler.

The president's healthcare law is a good start but it's not the solution, either. We need Medicare for all. Medicare has lower administrative costs than private insurers. And it has the bargaining heft to reduce drug and hospital costs as well as shift the system from fee-for-services to payments for healthy outcomes.

The president's financial reforms are also a beginning but they're way too weak to stop Wall Street depredations. (At this moment, for example, no one even knows the exposure of Wall Street banks to European banks and, through them, Europe's debt crisis.)

We need to resurrect the Glass-Steagall Act and break up the biggest banks.

The president has talked about fixing Social Security by raising the retirement age. But the best way to ensure the program's long-term solvency is to lift the ceiling on income subject to Social Security payroll taxes (now $106,800.) Yet this, too, is off the table.

Workers also need more bargaining power. The ratio of corporate profits to wages is now higher than it's been since before the Great Depression. Workers should be able to form unions through a simple up-or-down vote, without delay.

None of this is possible without strong and consistent pressure from the progressive side. Regressives are setting the agenda.

The president isn't even talking about the environment any more. Yet climate change is a reality, and our survival depends on reducing carbon emissions.

We should tax carbon-based fuels, and divide the revenues equally among all Americans. It's the best way to get us to switch to non-carbon fuels, and stimulate research and development of them. And by dividing the revenues, the typical American would come out ahead even though some prices would increase.

Finally, we need public financing of elections and strict limits on so-called "independent" expenditures. Corporations should have to get the approval of every shareholder before spending corporate funds - the shareholders' money - on politics.

I have no idea whether the Occupiers will morph into the kind of progressive force necessary to put these ideas into play. But if Americans stand together and demand real reform, we can have a real national debate in 2012.

Tonight's Republican debate may attract lots of viewers. It need not capture their minds.

Robert Reich is the author of Aftershock: The Next Economy and America's Future, now in bookstores. This post originally appeared at RobertReich.org.

Post Comment   Private Reply   Ignore Thread  


TopPage UpFull ThreadPage DownBottom/Latest

Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 6.

#6. To: tom007 (#0)

Americans will hear the standard regressive litany: government is bad, Medicare and Medicaid should be cut, "Obamacare" is killing the economy, undocumented immigrants are taking our jobs, the military should get more money, taxes should be lowered on corporations and the rich, and regulations should be gutted.

You stupid liberal, Clintonista, apologist for the Bush Crime Family, and the Welfare/Warfare Murder Machine, Ron Paul, is actually talking about issues that matter, The FED, the dishonest and murderous force behind the endless wars and economic bubbles that put us in the mess we are in.

But NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoo, you stupid, fucking filthy lying whore for the regime, and the Empire of Lies, you prescribe the same old liberal non-sense......Go F*ck yourself, suicide yourself, you stupid piece of lying human sh*tbag.

Are you starting to feel may anger !?

Lysander_Spooner  posted on  2011-10-18   14:44:51 ET  Reply   Untrace   Trace   Private Reply  


Replies to Comment # 6.

        There are no replies to Comment # 6.


End Trace Mode for Comment # 6.

TopPage UpFull ThreadPage DownBottom/Latest


[Home]  [Headlines]  [Latest Articles]  [Latest Comments]  [Post]  [Sign-in]  [Mail]  [Setup]  [Help]