Excellent article from Robert Reich, economist, and former Clinton labour secretary:
“A funny thing happened to the First Amendment on its way to the public forum. According to the Supreme Court, money is now speech and corporations are now people. But when real people without money assemble to express their dissatisfaction with the political consequences of this, they’re treated as public nuisances and evicted.
First things first. The Supreme Court’s rulings that money is speech and corporations are people has now opened the floodgates to unlimited (and often secret) political contributions from millionaires and billionaires. Consider the Koch brothers (worth $25 billion each), who are bankrolling the Tea Party and already running millions of dollars worth of ads against Democrats.
Such millionaires and billionaires aren’t contributing their money out of sheer love of country. They have a more self-interested motive. Their political spending is analogous to their other investments. Mostly they want low tax rates and friendly regulations…”
He also makes some great observations about how the Occupy movement is now under attack by the status quo. Read the whole article here.
Only those who are blindly part of the problem cannot see the massive conflicts inherent in the present status quo and the legitimate complaints being voiced about its assault on our democracy.
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Read the article again. It’s about Democrats, mentioned by name twice. Reich would like to defund any opposition to Democrats. That is why he and others repeat the Democratic talking points about the Koch brothers. This is an anti first amendment article.
No? Then show me where Reich has ever mentioned George Soros and MoveOn or Code Pink or ACORN in the way he uses the Koch/ Tea Party Democratic talking points.
But……”it’s the economy stupid”….remember that one from Bill Clinton. Civil rights have been hijacked and will continue to be as long as the Fascist cabal can keep the masses living in fear and still dangle that carrot in front of their donkey. The economy will always trump civil rights. Always.
Very soon now and as the market reaches a bit lower we can all rest assured that the Bernank has his speech all ready to go for QE 3. The Big O will be right behind him with some candy for the beleagured middleclass homeowners(voters).
The fear trade will temporarily propel the $U a bit higher but the Bernank knows he has to put a lid on it.
Until the masses finally once and for all figure out how badly they have been had nothing will change and they are far from relaizing the obvious.
This IS our future. Of course “it depends on what your definition of IS, is”.
Close to a near term bottom?….reverse head shoulders formations everywhere…..shrug the news?
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/entire-system-has-been-utterly-destroyed-mf-global-collapse-presenting-first-mf-global-casualty
The Barnhardt piece resonates, but not sure why—never understanding the Options/Futures “Market”.
Can John Corzine have done what is alleged, and get away scott free?!
“In order to rally people, governments need enemies. They want us to be afraid, to hate, so we will rally behind them. And if they do not have a real enemy, they will invent one in order to mobilize us.”…..Thich Nhat Hanh
It sure worked for W didn’t it.
With the fear of the masses now turning to anger how long can it be before they go looking for another “evil empire” to vanquish. Only one left now ….. Iran which can be easily justified in defense of Israel….. but they have to wait until the first punch is thrown. Even a slap with a gloved hand would do it.
Then the world will turn it’s attention to the crisis of the war and away from the financial fraud.
They just might get away with it because in the end even the most outraged of us would rather have corrupt stability than Anarchy. “Better The Devil You Know”??
As the 60 minutes piece showed, it is not really the bad Republicans or the bad Democrats anymore (although that is how it is presented), or it is not the bad Conservatives or the bad Liberals or the bad Democrats (here in Canada), it is all about self-interest and self-interest groups trying to get as much as they can. I agree with the above statements. Enemies have to be created to divert the attention from the real issue: a systematic erosion of democratic rights coupled with a systematic shift of money from the middle class to the corporate and political elite, both group conspiring, manipulating, and partaking in the heist. Bye bye democracy! Hello oligarchy!