Here is a look inside the "holding" facility here in denver during the Dem ConventionWatch the video after you go to the link   Read More »

The term lib-con does, of course, result from combining the words liberal and conservative.

Lib-Con is in fact a far more accurate way of describing people who have traditionally been described as liberals.

The reason that the term lib-con is more appropriate is - "liberalism" is a product of the Industrial Revolution and a basic tenent of liberalism is an economy based upon "freedom from restraint".

If something is unrestrained then it is permitted to develop as it wishes.

Liberalism, therefore, endorses the exploitation of people.

Though a liberal may not be conservative regarding social issues they are, in fact, a lib-con.

Our political philosophy must move beyond the paradigm of the Industrial Revolution just as the leaders of the business world have moved beyond it.

Economic forces must be "restrained" because their natural tendency is to eliminate competition and if left unrestrained they will crush everything.

We need a "PROGRESSIVE" approach to economic issues, not a lib-con approach.

                           

           

 

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Generally speaking, the profits you draw out of a trust fund are taxable.

The profits you roll back over into the trust fund are not taxable.

This is because taxes are paid on the assets when the trust fund is established - I'm sure you can translate that to mean you get a "sweet heart" deal on the taxes.

You can place ownership of stock or corporations in the trust fund and those assets remain untaxable for the life of the trust - which can be up to 100 years.

Considering that the lawyers have 100 years to figure out how to do it - you can basically take that to mean forever.

Any assets which the corporations in the trust fund acquire - other corporations for instance - become part of the trust and therefore
nontaxable - except what portion of their profits that are withdrawn from the trust.

But remember the lawyers are the best that money can buy and so that probably isn't even true in most cases.

How often do we hear that corporations do not pay taxes - guess why!!!!!!!!!!!

The following is a White House press release from April of this year.

"President and Mrs. George W. Bush reported taxable income of $719, 274 for the tax year 2007. This resulted in a total of $221,635 in federal income taxes paid by President and Mrs. Bush.

The President's 2007 income included salary earned as President and investment income from the trusts in which the President and Mrs. Bush's assets are held. The tax return also reports a $150,000 advance received by Mrs. Bush for the children's book she co-authored with Jenna Bush. Mrs. Bush donated all net proceeds from the advance to Teach for America and the New Teacher's Project

President and Mrs. Bush contributed a total of $165,660 to churches and charitable organizations, including the Crawford Volunteer Fire Department, Susan G. Komen For the Cure, Malaria No More Fund, Martha's Table, and St. John's Church."

This statement lists sources of income as:

1. Presidential salary..........$400K

2. Book deal.....................150K

3. Trust Funds....................?

Total income is stated as approximately $719K.

Of course none of this includes the $50,000 presidential expense account, the $100,000 nontaxable travel account, or the $19,000 entertainment account.

Anyway, $400K plus $150K equals $550K.

This means that trust fund income is - at a minimum - $169K.

Think about your interest bearing accounts for a moment and ask yourself:

HOW MUCH WEALTH WOULD YOU HAVE TO ACTUALLY CONTROL TO MAKE $169K??????

And that $169K is just the money that was drawn out of the trust fund. The money that was "rolled over" was not taxable.

This is why trust funds must be made taxable. If they are not they will continue to accumulate greater amounts of wealth which is then wealth that other people CANNOT acquire and therefore the average citizen must have LESS AND LESS all of the time.

Isn't that what we are currently experiencing

In his article Buchanan wrote:

"From Harry Truman to Ronald Reagan, as Defense Secretary Robert Gates said, U.S. presidents have sought to avoid shooting wars with Russia, even when the Bear was at its most beastly."

Of course they did. As I have written before, there is more money to be made in stalemate than in victory.

But as I recall President Kennedy stood up to them in Berlin AND in Cuba.

Buchanan also wrote:

"The American people should be eternally grateful to Old Europe for having spiked the Bush-McCain plan to bring Georgia into NATO."

If Georgia had been admitted to NATO they might not have been silly enough to have done some of the things that they have done.

Another quote:

"And can we not understand how a Russian patriot like Vladimir Putin would be incensed by this U.S. encirclement after Russia shed its empire and sought our friendship?"

Patriot??????? Nationalist maybe. Patriot - I don't think so. He fed the Russian people to the economic dogs. That's not a patriot in my book.
But then, I don't see anything patriotic in
The (Un)Patriot(ic) Act either.

Then he finally wrote something I can agree with:

"Joe Biden ought to be conducting public hearings on who caused this U.S. humiliation."

Yes - and the guilty should be publically humiliated, then placed on trial for related criminal actions by them.

David Lester Young wrote:

"The Patriot Act is nothing but about making the Executive Branch this autocrat unchecked and unbalanced Totalitarian Creative Government using there Creative Intelligence of prefabricated "Truth" (not) built on preplanned "Lies"....."

David is exactly right and The (Un)Patriot(ic) Act should be repealed during the next session of congress.

Anyone in favor????????????????

In a previous post Liz wrote:

"In my opinion, and I'm sure others may disagree as well as agree since this is after all a democracy, I think that the bottom line for this election is really about wrestling our government out of the hands of conservatives and into the hands of progressives--and that includes conservative Democrats as well as conservative Republicans"

I agree with Liz' statement.

A basic tenent of "liberalism" is an economy based upon "freedom from restraint". In other words, liberalism is in agreement with the so called "free market" economic policies of the republican party.

This is because liberalism is a product of the Industrial Revolution. Our political philosophy must move beyond the paradigm of the Industrial Revolution just as the leaders of the business world have moved beyond it.

In terms of his response to the economic conditions of his time the last "progressive" democratic president was Franklin Roosevelt. As I recall he was elected to four terms.

Truman was a conservative, Kennedy was a moderate, and all of the others have, in fact, been
"liberals" in terms of their allegiance to free market forces.

Globalization has snuffed out the free market forces unleashed by the Industrial Revolution.

Globalization is also snuffing out whatever effectiveness liberal political philosophy was capable of exhibiting.

As for gridlock - there is no gridlock.

Congress enacts legislation all of the time.

Politics is the art of compromise.

The simple truth is - the economic differences of the "liberals" and the "conservatives" in Washington are not great enough to result in meaningful legislation.

Democrat in Clifton Park, NY wrote:

As a Republican I am sure my comments will fall into the 'who asked you' category, but let's start a discussion. I think if Democrat delegates want to make real 'change' they should do so by changing their minds in Denver. Why ? Because a lot has 'changed' since the primaries ended in early June; including Senator Obama 'changing' his positions on important issues.

Dear democrat nee republican in Clifton Park, NY,

As a republican this may be difficult for you to understand but the reason that shouldn't happen is because such an action would not reflect the will of the people.

Drugs - all drugs - are a device used by the wealthy to help them control the masses.

The group calling itself "safer" and any other group advocating the use of drugs should be banned from this site.

The following is an excerpt from a New York Times article which was recently posted by Hollywood.

"Mr. McCain let the scope of his ambitions slip out again in fall 1970, when he was in Vietnam and four of the prisoners of war were put together in a cell
....We asked John what he wanted to be....recalled Richard A. Stratton, one of those present. "He said....that what he really wanted to be was president."

Then rjsnj commented that this story showed, "Just a little bit of ambition on McCain's part ..."

It reminded me of a conversation I was involved back in 1973. I had had only been living in Arkansas a few months.

One day I was talking politics with some new acquaintances and one of them suddenly became very agitated and began to just rail against a man whose name I didn't even recognise.

Finally he concluded by saying something as if it was absolutely the worst thing that could happen. He said, "and Bill Clinton wants to be president."

People with the ambition - the real desire - to be president don't suddenly get up one morning at age 40 and decide that it might be nice to be president.

I'm sure the same is true for Senator Obama.

What is the goal which is attained by winning an election?

Cerca Trova wrote:

"HHH once said, (paraphrase) "It was once said that the moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; and those who are in the shadows of life, the sick, the needy and the handicapped."

I say:

Hubert Horatio Humphrey - there was a fighter!

There was an orator!

There was a Democrat!

Excerpt from www.dailyreckoning.com

According to data from the Pew Charitable Trust’s Economic Mobility project, a generation ago, American men in their 30s had median annual incomes of about US$40,000. Today, men of the same age, make about US$35,000 a year, adjusted for inflation. That’s a 12.5% drop over the last 30 years.

Here are the cold hard facts.

If you borrow $100K to purchase a home and and finance the loan for 30 years at 10% Interest
you monthly payment will be:

$877.58

If you make those payments for 30 years that is 360 payments.

You will have paid:

$315,720

for that 100K home.

Those who loaned you the money will have made a 215% profit during that time.

That does not include the money you may have paid for "points" or any of the other 101 additional costs that may be associated with a mortgage.

That money will have also been put to work and will have made the people you gave it to additional money.

The 215% profit also does not include the profit that was made by the lender with your monthly payments.

At the end of the 30 years the lender will have made a tremendous profit with "your money" and you will have a house which you may or may not even be able to sell.

Some deal!!!!!!!!!!!

In a previous post entitled "Four Point Program" I advocated the outlawing of all interest charges.

In a subsequent comment to that post I stated that we must distinguish between interest and other capital gains. Just because you can't charge interest doesn't mean you can't become a business partner and share in the profits which are made.
With interest there is no risk and therefore no competition

Arius then questioned my statement by saying, "No risk with interest? Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would beg to differ."

I am therefore posting the following in response to Arius:

Who has the deeds to the properties???

The American tax payer will pay off any part of the loans that the victim of the forclosure doesn't have to pay.

And who will still have the deeds to the properties???????

I would like to again say that the charging of interest is a vile, evil practice which is offensive to the LORD - the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and Jesus Christ.

Prior to the Council of Nicea in 325 AD the church acrually forbade Christians to charge interest.

This change at Nicea was made at the insistence of the Emperor Constantine.

Permitting the charging of interest was part of the deal which the church made to become the state religion of the Roman Empire.

It was an immoral and sinful decision by the church.

This is very alarming. Reguardless of who you support or what you want. Anyone who has ever been involved in a civil rights demonstration sometimes you do not have to do anything wrong to be one of those who get hauled in with a group who was acting up. Correct me if I am wrong.... this has never happened before.
Here is the story those who are intrested in others thoughts please follow the link and read the comments below.   Read More »

I wrote the following as part of a comment on another post, "A Soviet "fishing trawler" always followed along with the (aircraft) carriers (off North Vietnam). We never launched an air strike that the Vietnamese didn't know was coming. You can thank Nixon, Kissenger, and the Pentagon for that."

To be fair I really should add that you can also probably thank Johnson, Rusk, and many others in both parties.

There is more money to be made in stalemate than in victory.

I would like to propose the following four point economic program:

1. The elimination of taxation on incomes of less
than $75,000 per year.

2. A federal minimum wage of at least $15 per hour.

3. The taxation of all trust funds - which, by the
way, can currently remain untaxed for 100 years
or more.

Their current tax free status fosters an accumulation of wealth which then remains under the control of the few virtually forever.

4. The outlawing of all interest charges.

The charging of interest is a vile, evil practice which is offensive to the LORD - the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and Jesus Christ.

Prior to the Council of Nicea in 325 AD the church acrually forbade Christians to charge interest.

This change at Nicea was made at the insistence of the Emperor Constantine.

Permitting the charging of interest was part of the deal which the church made to become the state religion of the Roman Empire.

It was an immoral and sinful decision by the church.