The Plot to Destroy the Middle Class

There's a growing body of evidence that the American middle class has been declining for decades. It used to be true that Americans had the best standard of living and that American blue collar workers lived better than the white collar workers in the rest of the world. Now that's no longer true, with persistent unemployment and rising costs of just about everything from housing to healthcare. The prevailing economic theory which is just to let the rich get richer at everybody's expense will only make matters worse.

In other advanced countries it is the middle class that has always supported the welfare state. In those countries people realize that government has a role in maintaining social equality. In the US on the other hand, the "Age of Affluence" during the fifties and sixties convinced most middle class americans that they didn't need a welfare state. The made it possible for right wing propagandists to spread lies and distortions about the welfare state and even to turn the word "welfare" into a pejorative term.

In reality the age of affluence came to an end during the recession of 1974-75. It's been downhill ever since for most Americans with economic and social stagnation making it harder for people to get ahead or even maintain their standards of living. Yet people continue to hold to a mentality of "affluence" even though fewer and fewer people enjoy it. We no longer have a system of class but of caste; social mobility is only possible for a few members of the upper middle class who manage to move into the upper class (like Mark Zuckerberg).

Why the American middle class allowed this to happen to them? Partly because it's difficult for people to change their way of thinking.

The Final Nail in the Coffin

The final proof that the Bush administration's rationale for invading Iraq was a pack of lies appears in an article by Knut Royce in the Huffington Post titled "Remembering the Hoax That Helped Launch the U.S. Invasion, and Later Disintegration, of Iraq". As Royce puts it

The forged reports alleged that Saddam Hussein had been secretly buying the raw material to build an atomic bomb, uranium ore, and became George W. Bush's most compelling selling point for the invasion some eleven years ago. Many intelligence officials and members of his administration at the time suspected that, at the very least, the intelligence was questionable.

And as we all remember Condi Rice was running around scaring everybody with visions of mushroom clouds. The thing is that the documents, known as the "Italian letter," were bogus. As Royce puts it

The documents were crafted by rogue Italian intelligence officers who wanted to peddle them to unsuspecting countries, including Britain and the U.S. -- or anyone else with cash. The centerpiece, or The Italian Letter, was a July 27, 2000, letter purportedly written to Saddam by the president of Niger, an impoverished African country. It allegedly formalized an agreement reached by representatives of both countries three weeks earlier for the supply of 500 tons of uranium ore, also known as yellow cake. The Italian intelligence service, SISMI, first alerted the CIA to the alleged transaction on Oct. 15, 2001, when America was still reeling from al Qaeda's attacks. But it gave no details, such as the tonnage being purchased, and provided no documentation.

Ultimately, the Bush admin. wasn't relying on facts but on fear and hysteria. And the rest is history.

Another FUBAR Courtesy of the GOP

What is so grotesque about our political culture is how the GOP causes problems and then gets to escape the blame by a lot of macho wipe posturing. The recent "surge" of Central American immigrants is a case in point. GOPer politicians are demagoguing the issue which they themselves caused by (1 blocking immigration reform (2 underfunding
the immigration service (3 pushing "free trade" agreements like NAFTA and CAFTA. Anybody who talks about "sealing the borders" is pandering the boneheads who comprise the political "base" of the GOP. Who do they get away with it? It helps that the right wing corporate media acts as nothing more than a GOPER propaganda machine.

Democrat Ineptitude Syndrome

The general concensus is that the GOP is going to win big in this year's elections. How's that possible given their dysfunctional and negligent conduct? Because the Dems are even worse. They're like the Iraqi army that doesn't put up a fight. Case in point the Highway Trust Fund is about to go insolvent. The Gopers act like there's no problem, the Dems are proposing an increase in the sales tax on gasoline. This while gas prices are soaring to the highest levels in years. The Obama admin. blew its chance years ago when it should have made repeal of the Bush tax cuts in the rich its top priority. Now they Dems are proposing a tax which will fall hardest on ordinary people. Which will allow the Gopers to paint the Dems as "tax and spenders." No wonder the Dems lose even when they should win.

You Want A War? Pay for It!

As Iraq continues to disintegrate into violence and chaos, mainly due to the ineptitude of its government, the same neo-conservative mafia that sold the disaster of Iraq--Woflowitz, Bremer, Feith-- are all over the media, urging a new American invasion of Iraq. The fact that these liars are getting a platform by the media shows what the real agenda of the corporate interests who own the media. It turns out that Lara Logan is back at CBS. You'd think that with her track record she'd be relegated to appearing on infomercials. That CBS would take her back shows how low the standards of the mainstream have sunk.

Let's get one thing clear: Iraq was never ours to lose or win. This campaign is being waged by the GOP in order to rally its base by turning the Iraq war into some kind of "lost cause." Those people who are so anxious to go to war should answer this question: how are you going to pay for the war? Bring back the draft, impose credit controls, bring back the draft?

Think about that!

Another Faith Based Horror

If someone wrote a history of all the crimes and atrocities of the Roman Catholic Church, how many volumes would it be? Recently, in the Irish town of Tuam there has been discovered a mass grave containing the remains of hundreds of children. This was on the grounds of a "Mother Baby Homes" that the Catholic Church used to run. The matter is still under investigation, but these children apparently died at the home.

The Catholic church created a culture of hypocrisy and denial, in which young women grew up in ignorance of human reproduction. When some of these young women ended up getting pregnant, they faced social ostracism produced by the same culture. The so called "Mother Baby Homes" were really a part of a child trafficking scheme run by the Church itself. And the church was also receiving subsidies from the Irish government. So much for "faith based" social services.

300 Farting Gopers

The GOP and the right-wing media are actually attacking the Obama administration for sending 5 detainees to Qatar in order to secure the release of Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl. These are the same people who actually defend Ronald Reagan for sending missiles to Iran to secure the release of American hostages, but that was back in the '80s so they hope that nobody will remember. Congressional Gopers are feeling on the upswing after they forced out Erik Shinseki out of the VA. Entirely lost in the matter is that funding for the VA is set by the House of Representatives which is controlled--by Gopers! It seems reminiscent of the farting cows who caused a barn in Germany to blow up back in January by emitting methane gas. GOPers do the same thing--except that they pass gas through the mouth instead of the rectum.