Sunday, March 9, 2014
Republican, Right Wing goals don't work
What Republican, Right Wing, "small government" policies are resulting in clear and obvious results in the South:
First off, poverty rates are a lot higher in the South.
In fact, as many as one in four Southern kids lives in poverty, compared to the national average of one in five.
In the map above, red shading indicates a poverty rates between 17.9 and 22.8 percent. Orange indicates 15.9 to 17.8 percent; light orange, 12.2-15.8 percent; pale yellow, 9 to 12.1 percent. As you can see, there's a lot of high-poverty red in the South.
And minimum wages are much lower.
Virtually no Southern states, with the exception of Florida, have a minimum wage higher than the federal floor of $7.25 an hour. Many Southern states do have relatively low living costs. But they are not dramatically lower than costs of living in other states, such as Ohio and Missouri, that have set minimum wages at least slightly higher than the national limit. The Southern states are doing the absolute minimum for their poorest citizens by keeping the minimum wage at the lowest levels possible.
And people living in the South are a lot less likely to move up the economic ladder.
If you want to achieve the American Dream, don't move to the South. That's because states in the South have extremely low levels of economic mobility. In the map above, pale yellow represents places with higher mobility, while red indicates low mobility.
Many living in poverty in the South are being denied access to affordable health care.
States that didn't choose to expand Medicaid under Obamacare are highlighted in lighter gray.
...which is costing these states a ton of money.
This map shows how much money the 19 states that rejected Medicaid expansion will lose by 2022 as a result of doing so (assuming all other states participate).
This is particularly troubling because the South has several health crises on its hands. Like obesity.
Obesity rates are too high across the U.S. But they're particularly high in the South.
Southern states also have a higher percentage of cigarette smokers.
Most Southern states have a higher percentage of smokers than anywhere else in the country. Incidentally, most Southern states have relatively low taxes on cigarettes.
And a much higher rate of teen births.
The map plots birth rates among women ages 15 to 19. In states shaded dark blue, there are more than 50 births per 1,000 teenage women.
Perhaps all this is why some Southern states are among the least happy states in the country.
That's according to Gallup's recent "State of American Well-Being" report, which surveyed thousands of Americans and ranked states based on an average of six measures: "life evaluation," emotional health, physical health, healthy behaviors, work environment and basic access to things like food, water and shelter.
Sure seems like an indictment to me.
Link to original post: These 9 Maps Should Absolutely Outrage Southerners
Saturday, March 8, 2014
Pushing the positive today
So frequently people announce that the news is "too negative" or they feel the world is just that. As a brief solution today? Some good news. This from economist/author/professor/political commentator Robert Reich and his Facebook page today:
Too often we forget how much social progress has been made in recent years, mainly because determined people have organized and mobilized for change. Some examples:
(1) Despite its rocky start, the Affordable Care Act in January alone redistributed $34 billion in healthcare subsidies to low and middle-income families. Total healthcare spending (the main driver of the national debt) is now growing at the slowest rate since the creation of Medicare in 1965.
(2) More solar power was installed in the United States last year than the previous 30 years combined, and the per unit cost of solar power is falling so rapidly it’s soon likely to drop below that of coal.
(3) Smoking (the leading preventable cause of death) is now barred in most workplaces, restaurants, office, and public facilities in the United States -- and the percent of Americans who smoke continues to decline.
(4) Gay marriage is now legal in 17 states and the District of Columbia -- and federal judges have ruled against bans in Utah, Oklahoma, Kentucky, Virginia, and Texas.
(5) The rate of childhood obesity has dropped 43% over the last decade, and sales of sugary soft drinks and cereals have plummeted.
(6) Two states have legalized marijuana, and 20 others now allow it sale for medical purposes.
(7) America has its first black president, and seems very likely to have its first female president within a few years.
I can only add to this list that, God willing, the same political party that gave us our first black president in the White House is just about to give us the first female president of the nation, in our next big election.
Or, barring that, Senator Bernie Sanders as our next President. Either way, it's a huge win for America and middle- and lower-class Americans.
Think happy thought, campers.
Have a great weekend.
The really wealthy vs. you and me
The Koch Brothers Spent Twice as Much on the 2012 Election as the Top Ten Unions Combined
On yet another, incredibly do-nothing Congress
The nation's economy is lackluster, the people need jobs, our nation needs infrastructure work. It all begs the question:
At what point will we get a jobs/infrastructure bill from our Congress, legislators and government?
Friday, March 7, 2014
Americans and Canadians -- nearly couldn't be more different
Every time I visit Canada I'm reminded what Canadians -- who look and sound almost exactly like us Americans south of the border -- don't have what we do (guns, the National Rifle Association, huge piles of money corrupting their democracy, withering poverty, strident and vitriolic politics), and what they do have that we don't (single-payer health care, affordable public universities, civil discourse, conservatives that would be called moderate Democrats in the States).
--Robert Reich
Wednesday, March 5, 2014
Hypocrisy, American style
Today's quote of the day from The New York Times:
QUOTATION OF THE DAY
"It is not appropriate to invade a country and at the end of a barrel of a gun dictate what you are trying to achieve."
JOHN KERRY, secretary of state, on Russia's actions in Crimea, a region in Ukraine.
Oh, really?
All of a sudden.
Someone should have told George W. "I'm Gonna' Blow 'Em Up Real Good" Bush back in 2003, then.
Where was this US policy then?
America: Where we were, where we are (guest post)
How many of you recall a time in America when the income of a single school teacher or baker or salesman was enough to buy a home, have two cars, and raise a family? That used to be the norm. For three decades after World War II, we created the largest middle class the world had ever seen. During those years the wages of the typical American worker doubled, just as the size of the American economy doubled. More than a third of all workers belonged to a trade union -- giving average workers the bargaining power necessary to get a large and growing share of the large and growing economic pie (now, fewer than 7 percent of private-sector workers are unionized). CEO pay then averaged about 40 times the pay of the typical worker (now it's over 300 times).
In those years the richest 1 percent took home 9 to 10 percent of total income (today the top 1 percent gets more than 20 percent). The tax rate on highest-income Americans never fell below 70 percent; under Dwight Eisenhower, a Republican, it was 91 percent (today the top tax rate is 39.6 percent). Some of this money was used to build the largest infrastructure project in our history, the Interstate Highway system; some to build the world's largest and best system of free public education, and dramatically expand public higher education. We enacted the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act to extend prosperity and participation to African-Americans; Medicare and Medicaid to reduce poverty among America's seniors; and the Environmental Protection Act to help save our planet. And we made sure banking was boring.
Then came the great U-turn, and for the last thirty years we've been heading in the opposite direction. The collective erasure of the memory of that prior system of broad-based prosperity is the greatest propaganda victory conservatives and the privileged have ever achieved. But the fact we did it then means we can do so again -- not exactly the same way, of course, but in a new way fit for the twenty-first century and future generations of Americans. It is worth the fight.
--Robert Reich
Quote of the day -- on money in our politics and government
“People do not fully appreciate the degree to which big money, campaign contributions and lobbying and PACs and corporate media play in whether or not serious legislation is discussed and passed,” Sen. Bernie Sanders told Truthdigger.com. “Despite the fact that we have a collapsing middle class, more people living in poverty than at any time during our history, and the gap between the very, very rich and everyone else growing wider, it is very hard for me to imagine significant legislation being passed that Wall Street and the big money interests don’t want.”
--Sen. Bernie Sanders, Indep., Vermont
Tuesday, March 4, 2014
Monday, March 3, 2014
Let's be clear on this whole weather thing right now
Despite frigid temperatures in much of the US, January 2014 ranked as the fourth warmest since 1880, while many areas worldwide, including most of South America, Africa and Australia, had their warmest January in history. This NASA temperature rendering says it all.
Yes, Virginia, that's why it's called "global warming" and not "Eastern USA warming."
Sunday, March 2, 2014
The REAL government "moochers"?
I have 'em for you right here:
Twenty-six of the most powerful American corporations – such as Boeing, General Electric, and Verizon – paid no federal income tax from 2008 to 2012, according to a new report detailing how Fortune 500 companies exploit tax breaks and loopholes.
And then, of course, there's the entire NFL They pay no taxes whatever. Legally, too.
The report:
26 top American corporations paid no federal income tax from '08 to '12
And keep in mind, when we think "moochers"--you know, welfare moochers?--we aren't talking the ones getting oh, I don't know, $136 to live off of for two weeks or any "small potatoes" like that. We're talking billions of dollars here.
The 26?
Here they are:
They are, collectively, ladies and gentlemen, taking us for a ride.
A big, expensive, thieving, immoral ride.
And we're allowing it.
Saturday, March 1, 2014
Congratulations to Missouri Statehouse Republicans
Missouri was just listed, last week, as one of "The Most Miserable States" in a Gallup-Healthways study:
And the thing is, these are the most miserable states in the people's own opinions, the people of these very states.
And of the 10 "most miserable", we weren't even in last place, oh no. We ranked number 8. What they found:
8. Missouri
> Well-being index score: 64.5
> Life expectancy: 77.5 years (11th lowest)
> Percent obese: 29.0% (14th highest)
> Median household income: $45,321 (14th lowest)
> Percent with high school diploma: 88.0% (23rd lowest)
The economic confidence of Missouri residents improved considerably between between 2012 and 2013. Despite this, respondents had some of the worst outlooks about their lives in 2013. Just one half of residents surveyed said they were thriving last year, among the lowest rates in the nation. With a high number of residents experiencing stress, as well as a relatively low number reporting having smiled or laughed within the last day, Missouri ranked among the worst states for emotional health.
> Well-being index score: 64.5
> Life expectancy: 77.5 years (11th lowest)
> Percent obese: 29.0% (14th highest)
> Median household income: $45,321 (14th lowest)
> Percent with high school diploma: 88.0% (23rd lowest)
The economic confidence of Missouri residents improved considerably between between 2012 and 2013. Despite this, respondents had some of the worst outlooks about their lives in 2013. Just one half of residents surveyed said they were thriving last year, among the lowest rates in the nation. With a high number of residents experiencing stress, as well as a relatively low number reporting having smiled or laughed within the last day, Missouri ranked among the worst states for emotional health.
And so, to this I have to say, my hat is off, congratulations to the Republicans in the state, especially and specifically the Republican legislators in Jefferson City, in and at the capital, who are doing their legislative, governing handiwork. With their mean-spirited, ugly, vindictive, "we hate government" attitudes and legislation, against the people, even against the government but for the wealthy and corporations, you're making this state into just the ugly vessel you would have it.
This, then, is proof of you--the Republican legislators'--direct handiwork, lo these last seral years, if not one or two decades.
I hope y'all are happy because the citizens of the Show Me state certainly aren't.
Why we need a jobs/infrastructure bill from this Congress (guest post)
And we need a jobs/infrastructure bill badly. And as soon as possible.
From Robert Reich's Facebook page today:
Republicans call any measure that lifts wages or protects workers and the environment a “job killer.”
This is pure bunk.
(1) Even if such measures increase business costs, most companies can afford them without reducing payrolls. Corporate profits now account for the largest percentage of the economy on record.
(2) We need more jobs that pay decent wages, are safe, sustain the environment, and provide a modicum of security. If seeking to achieve this minimum level of decency ends up “killing” some jobs, maybe those aren’t the kind of jobs we ought to try to preserve in the first place.
(3) Businesses create jobs only when they have enough customers, and lay off workers when they don’t. The real job creators are consumers with enough money in their pockets to buy what businesses have to sell. The real job killers in America are lousy jobs at lousy wages.
(PS: "Inequality for All" is now on Netflix. Watch it and help build the movement).
Write your Congressman about jobs and a jobs bill from Congress, this Congress, today or as soon as possible, please. For all of us. For America, Americans, American jobs and for a better, healthier US and even world economy. You can find your representative here:
Contact Elected Officials | USA.gov
Thank you in advance.
Someone in this country has to lead on jobs
Republicans in Congress aren't leading and won't lead on jobs. They write, propose and pass zero jobs/infrastructure bills for the nation, this in spite of the worst downturn in the economy since the 1930's, since the Great Depression. So the president will lead, instead.
And yes, they and lots of others will hate him for even this.
Looney.
War, America: What is it good for?
Bill Kristol--and Senator McCain, for that matter, ironically--never met a war they didn't like. Or want to get involved in:
Friday, February 28, 2014
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