Dishonest Greg Walden

Rep. Greg Walden has shown his core dishonesty so flagrantly that even Republican leaders in the U.S. House of Representatives (Walden represents AT&T, drug companies and the insurance industry) are backing away from his smell.

The news is everywhere, but we offer this story from Oregonlive, the online version of The Oregonian. Essentially, Walden attacked a part of President Obama's budget that was to reduce the deficit. It has to do with how cost of living increases are calculated and was initially proposed by Republicans.

So Walden trying to use it to get seniors angry at Obama backfired and caused Republican leaders to call Walden immediately on the carpet.

Walden is chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, in charge of raising funds for Republicans to get elected, so he is in campaign mode and did this for cheap political points. Walden is the type of political hack that gives politics its stink: the destructive, tear-opponents-down-any-way-you-can kind of nonsense that voters across America rejected last November.

That's aside from being in the pocket of corporations which profit from monopolizing services essential for Americans (look at his record and draw the lines right back to market-destroying activism).

But there is much to enjoy here. For the act of attacking President Obama, Walden not only faces the wrath of House conservatives and leadership, but at the same time was labeled a "Rino" by conservative action committees for opposing something that would reduce the budget deficit.

Central Oregon should be part of an effort to refuse Walden another term in Congress so he can go to work lobbying for AT&T and make the income he deserves from work that he loves.

Buy guns. Tax bullets.

We may not ever stop the carnage. The left desires state “control,” which won't work, the right believes the problem isn’t too many guns but not enough guns in the right hands—a belief pure crazy.

But given the dysfunction of America on this issue, what can we do? I suggest a market-based approach. Let’s put a value on guns that means something, buy them and melt them down. 

I suggest $20 per round-capacity. So a six shot revolver would bring $120 to the seller, a 9-round semi auto would bring $180, an assault rifle with a potential 50-round magazine a cool $1,000.

At the same time, we should tax bullets. I don’t know—$1 apiece? We can figure that out. The revenue from bullet sales will be used to buy the guns. 

I was thinking about making an exception for hunting rifles and shotguns but was told that such discrimination was not fair. So okay, no exceptions.

All guns collected go into a blast furnace.

To those who wrap themselves in the second amendment: keep your guns. No question. But… since we already have gun registration laws, we need to extend those laws and all your guns need to be registered. And identified with ballistic evidence. With some pretty severe penalties, including confiscation, for non-compliance with the registration law.

Then we add real liability. If you are negligent in gun ownership, proven simply by the fact that a gun registered to you was used in a crime, you are economically liable for the consequences and maybe criminally liable if the negligence was gross.

I don’t know if we will ever change the culture of gun ownership. But I think market place economics can be used to reduce the number of times guns fall into the wrong hands and are used to kill classrooms full of children. It’s about damn time.

Longer term consequences

Because the economy is going to recover without Republicans in charge, the right now loses the myth that only they can solve economic woes. This wound will last a couple generations. With it to the trash goes the right’s bigotry that theirs is the only morality, the only religion, the only good worthy of the word, that the rest of us are vile and immoral. So to goes the falsehood that getting sloshed on beer is less harmful than getting baked on brownies. Freedom to choose is not free if the choices are already chosen.

But the left loses something, too, with their victory. They lose the real messsage of the Right, poorly wrapped in fear and hypocrisy, about the power of the individual, the validity of making choices in our lives. There need be consequences for bad choices and individuals need to suffer those consequences. If society takes up too much of the burden we disable instead of empower. Freedom to choose means freedom to fail. We cannot eliminate risk nor should we. We make better choices knowing life is not easy. 

Careful, Mr. President

Mr. President:

Two things in the news over the last couple of days concern me. First, your proposal to Republicans on avoiding the fiscal cliff includes $1.6 trillion in tax increases and $50 Billion in stimulus spending. This seems like a bit of a “cram down,” as in something you cram down your opponents throat.

Given the stonewalling and muck Republicans drug you through with the avowed goal of making you in their words "a one-term president," I don’t blame you. Not one bit. Giving them a knuckle rub probably feels pretty good.

But is it right for the country? We are coming out of the recession. To avoid becoming guilty of everything the Republicans said you already were guilty of in terms of potential damage to the economy from fiscal imprudence, now is the time to think about going after the deficit in a year or two, not adding to the debt.

You rescued the ship, now steady as she goes. The deficit is not a single-generation problem, it is a problem for our children's grandchildren. Saving the country for them would be a legacy worthy of Lincoln, and only you can do it.

My second concern is you opposing the bill that would grant work visas for 50,000 educated foreigners who could greatly benefit the United States. Whoa… really? These are the very people who will build the very economy of the future that you have supported, another move that could cement your legacy. 

Please reconsider. Yes, different people make different contributions. A PhD from India will contribute more than a maid from Guatemala. That does not mean the PhD is worth more as a human being, only that their contribution will produce greater returns. If you have to give up one for the other, just do it, as we say out here in Oregon.

Finally, I am going to tell you to be wary of the advice of friends in your second term. Many will be looking for payback, others will be looking a political windfall. Success for you doesn't work like that. Yes, they stood by you and were often right. Smart people, they helped redirect the pendulum and were invaluable. But you are in danger now of being pushed too fast in a direction where we are already gaining speed.

Slowly, sir.

Taxes

Here comes Fox News, the propaganda wing of the Republican Party, trying to stymie any compromise on the deficit.

Fox wants us to drive off the fiscal cliff, so they are attempting to yank the wheel. They are doing so by saying that closing loopholes will mean cuts to:
"-- Medicare benefits for senior
-- Capital gains rates
-- Earned income tax credit
-- Charitable contributions"

Of course this is not the only approach to tax reform. This is just the most difficult way which is why Fox News, Mitch McConnel, John Boehner, and Oregon's own Republican flack Rep. Greg Walden are so focused on it. If they put "charitable contributions" in the mix, they get churches to bring pressure on the Democrats. Medicare gets seniors riled, mortgage deductions gets every Realtor in the country on the phone.

Walden, recently elevated in the House for lockstep advocacy of the rights of corporations over the rights of consumers said on Nov. 20:  "Part of the way to (avoid the fiscal cliff) is by reforming our tax code to close loopholes, lower rates, and spur economic growth." Lower rates and close loopholes. Yeah, okay, Mr. Walden, that should only take about what, 4 years or so if you had your way? It's time you took that plush job ATT has waiting for you.

But wait a minute. What about the ideas of Warren Buffet, one of the country's most savvy investors and one of the wealthiest men in America. What does he have to say?

On November 25 in the New York Times, Buffet wrote that there is another way. Read it here. After explaining how the rich—like himself—have accumulated more wealth and paid less taxes than at any time in generations, Buffet advocates a minimum tax for the wealthy.

He said it so well that I quote him here:

"Additionally, we need Congress, right now, to enact a minimum tax on high incomes. I would suggest 30 percent of taxable income between $1 million and $10 million, and 35 percent on amounts above that. A plain and simple rule like that will block the efforts of lobbyists, lawyers and contribution-hungry legislators to keep the ultrarich paying rates well below those incurred by people with income just a tiny fraction of ours. Only a minimum tax on very high incomes will prevent the stated tax rate from being eviscerated by these warriors for the wealthy."

Othere things need to be done, Buffet says, but "We can’t let those who want to protect the privileged get away with insisting that we do nothing until we can do everything."

So, before we let Republicans like Oregon's Rep. Greg Walden attempt to make tax reform too difficult, or drive us off the fiscal cliff so they can then blame Obama, or take away contributions to churches (after all, they just help the poor, so who cares?), we need to look at other alternatives.

Warren Buffet is one of the smartest investors the world has ever seen. And he invests in America instead of putting his money in banks in the Cayman Islands, like some in the Republican Party. I think we need to listen to what he says.

Economic recovery is a time to do less

Let’s have a discussion about the 47%. Students who got bought off by college loans, women bought off with birth control,  poor bought off with medical care, Hispanics bought off with immigration reform. Let’s assume, for a moment, that Romney’s White Man’s Nightmare is true.

Let’s even ignore his secret tax returns and off-shore bank accounts.

We need to ask about the actual cost of these programs and whether this is truly the harbinger of an “entitlement society” as bemoaned by the right.

And at the same time, we need to look ahead about six months or a year, assuming the recovery that seems to be picking up steam (without Republican participation) continues to build.

The more affordable college becomes, the more engineers we produce (and fewer Golden Sach bankers) the better off we are. It is probably an investment, as opposed to a cost. I will make the same argument for much of Obamacare.  We do not have the best health care system in the world, just the most expensive. We can do better.

Immigration reform? How much does that cost us really? Should we send back the Irish, the Swedes, the Italians, the Chinese? C’mon.

Birth control? Let’s get government out of the religion business. And the morality business. Let’s make it as easy as possible to avoid unwanted pregnancies. If abortion offends you, then advocate for birth control.

No surprise, I have a contrarian argument to my friends on the left: We need already to be thinking about doing less with government. The left will say that they won and now is the time to push forward with an agenda they feel they earned. I respond that there was no mandate and a political victory does not change the laws of economics.

First and foremost of those laws is the problem of deficits. Of productivity. And yes, let’s give Republicans their due on this one, it is a fact that if something is free it will be consumed without limits, and the law of unintended consequences assures that if we remove consequences behavior will be altered and individuals will depend more and take responsibility for less.

It was never a good idea to cut budgets during a recession. But now that we see the end of the downturn and the beginning of prosperity, it is time to determine how we will slow the growth of government. Because we can’t live that far beyond our means as a society and we cannot tax our way into higher productivity, the only way that we truly create wealth.

Oh, Mr. Ro-money

On Tuesday night I stayed up for the final election results and saw Gov. Romney's concession speech. I was impressed, actually, and for an entire day felt that America may have actually had a choice between two qualified candidates. And I was done with this election.

Then came Wednesday. Then Romney proved he was just as out of touch as has been written here, as he was portrayed by the Obama campaign, as voters finally decided. We got his unvarnished opinion, given with nothing to lose, nothing to cover. On Wednesday, Mr. Romney proved he was not right for America. Read it here.

According to him, Romney's loss was due to gifts of education to students, gifts of medical care worth $10,000 a year for them poor Mexicans, gifts of free abortions to women. Obama gave those gifts and that is why he won, according to Romney. Why, the responsible Romney couldn't compete! He had the interest of ALL Americans in mind when he guaranteed free money to the top 1%. My god, what a putz.

Romney lied when he apologized for the remark that 47% of Americans were freeloaders. That is exactly the fiction he believes and that is how he would have governed. He just repeated it to the nation through his disappointed campaign contributors. Romney planned to make life harder for the poor and decimate the middle class in the foolish belief that the top 1% are the only social class worth coddling.

Other Republicans are trying to put as much distance between themselves and Governor Gaffe as they can, but Ro-money has already given Democrats heavy artillery for the next election. That may be too bad, because by then we may need the austerity and good ideas from the right.

Good ideas, not the posturing, lies, half-truths, and misinformation spread by the Romney campaign and rejected by more than half the country in 2012.

America, we have much to be proud of this week.

Four reasons why Romney lost

Pundits across the political spectrum are analyzing, dissecting, and opinionating why Mitt Romney lost the election to be President of these United States.

They are making it far too complex:

1) No tax returns. C'mon, what's with the off-shore bank accounts?

2) No plan. Magical thinking is not a plan.

3) No honesty. Etch-A-Sketch was the only truth spoken by the Romney camp.

4) Obama won. The Dem's brought game and Karl Rove brought… nothin'.


It's time to move on.

What now?

Victory is sweet. No denying it. We won. And for all the right reasons.

But so quickly is that overwhelmed by the realization that we are still standing in deep shit and we are in it together. It does not matter, today, where that shit came from. It does not matter, today, who kept it from being cleaned up over the last four years.

What matters, today, is cleaning it up.

Conservatives cannot do it today. Any proposal for action makes stepping forward too risky for them, like a capitulation, an invitation to be abused. Their whole argument was that the shit will take care of itself, eventually it will drain away or get covered up or maybe we'll just get used to the smell. That's why the victory was for all the right reasons. America knew better.

That leaves it to the Left. The first task is to extend a hand to the conservatives and thank them for presenting their ideas. Because as our President said, we are lucky to be Americans and other nations fight with GUNS when they disagree.

Tax reform: Let's take Governor Romney's pledge and make it real. No loss of revenue. But at the same time, no increased revenue. The only way to do both and meet our obligations is to become more efficient and the first step along that path is reform of the tax code.

Please. Reform. The. Tax. Code. Flat tax, progressive tax, sales tax… I don't care. But simplify, please. 

Liberals, money comes from somewhere. Every dollar spent on consumption in lieu of investment is a dollar that does not multiply. Yes, the gamblers on Wall Street have to give up their "carried interest" dodges, capital gains should be taxed as ordinary income, mortgage interest capped so the middle class can still buy a home but the loophole limited for mansions. But let's fix the tax code. We can do this.

Medicare and Social Security need to cost each one of us more money. We need a serious co-pay program that does not discourage primary care but makes each of us is cost conscious. It will mean some hardship, but hip replacements in the last 30 days of life only happen because nobody is footing the bill. 

We need to have a serious spiritual discussion about the difference between saving lives and prolonging death. A. Serious. Spiritual. Discussion. Shut up, Sarah.

Education? C'mon, teachers. You're right, children are our future, but THEIR future is in your hands. You are NOT proud of the product.

Industry and jobs: Government employs a lot of people, but it is not government's job to employ people except in certain circumstances. We need roads and bridges, we need teachers and soldiers and battleships, the auto industry bailout was a very good thing.

But mostly, government needs to be a referee: markets need protection from oligopolies, our financial system must not be a casino for Goldman Sachs to play with other people's money, the military/industrial complex must not be allowed to poison our water and foul the air to compete with the Chinese. That's a cost shift, a market distortion.

But Liberals, profit is not a dirty word, income inequality is a great force of inspiration and there are many unintended consequences to the best of intentions. Maybe we can talk about taking the burden off industry for health insurance and pensions so when somebody loses a job, they don't lose access to basic  services? Maybe we can cut a deal, here, that might fit everybody's ideology?

Gays and lesbians, did you HEAR our President acknowledge you in that speech on Tuesday? It was wonderful. "Gay or straight!" he boomed out there at the end. Equal. But look: Marriages are contracts between two consenting adults. It is a contract for living, of mutual responsibility for obligations, rights etc. If we just get rid of the word "marriage," a lot of the animosity goes away. Man-woman, man-man, woman-woman, it's a contract. Why is this a government issue?

Abortion? Gentlemen, please turn this debate over to the women. They will figure it out without your help. Just ask them.

Marijuana? Do Americans 200 miles north of the Rio Grand KNOW what our drug war is doing to Mexico? The cartels control STATES down there now. Allow the market to work. It's a REPUBLICAN idea! Legalize pot, cocaine too, crack, whatever. Addiction is a naturally regulating behavior. Toughen up, let junkies clean up or die, get some taxes out of it and call it a day.

Liberals, we do NOT have a mandate. We have a job to do. And the first task is to turn to our conservative neighbors for help in solving some of these terribly difficult problems. We can't clean up all this shit by ourselves, and certainly not if they are standing on the shovel.

Salt Lake City Tribune endorses… Obama

For all the right reasons, The Salt Lake Tribune, of all newspapers, turned away from Mitt Romney and endorsed President Obama. Read it here. Every moderate, every undecided voter, hell, everyone should read this. It is one of the best descriptions that has been published about the choice that faces America.