Tax Political Advertising

by muon

If we learned anything from this election, it's that obscene amounts of money that could have been better spent elsewhere went to put ads on TV, radio and the Internet, to put mounds of junk ads into our mailboxes, place billboards and signs all over our towns and highways, and of course, shower us with lovely, unceasing robocalls. Shedon Adelson alone spent $57.7 million on super-PACs.

Everyone says we ought to curb campaign spending, but it's not going to happen, not as long as the politicians on the receiving end of the funds, or who benefit from super-PAC support, are the ones who need to figure out how to reform the way they campaign.

So, while they're spinning their wheels, let's try a stop-gap measure. Impose a federal tax on all political advertising that supports federal candidates, pans their opponents, or where money changes hands so that a political view can be expressed to, say, more than 500 people at once. This would include advertising by lobbying groups trying to influence legislation.  State taxes could be imposed on advertising for state office candidates or lobbyists trying to influence state legislation, like all the pro-fracking ads on TV. I'd even be make an exception for bumper stickers and campaign buttons, so regular citizens could express their views without being taxed. (But not lawn signs, which are as ugly as billboards. You want a lawn sign, fine, but you ought to at least pay something to your town for ruining the scenery.)

I think I'd mind the ads and billboards and robocalls a smidge less if I knew a percentage of the megabucks spent would be used to, say, fund election reforms, or help pay off the deficit.

They Call it 'Flexibility'

by Ruth A. Sheets

Just when you think you have experienced every manifestation of Romnesia, one more bit of craziness raises its head.  On Elliott Spitzer’s show on Current TV “Viewpoint,”  Romney’s frequent change of position and casual lying was referred to as “flexibility.”  Then, viewers were informed that this is just the quality needed for negotiating.

Since George Orwell’s classic “1984,” we have been aware of the power of language.  Give something a clever name and it won’t matter what that thing actually is.   Advertisers have taken advantage of this for years.  We call flavored sugar water things like Coke, Pepsi, Dr. Pepper.  None of it is good for us in any way even the one named “Dr.”  The names are great, though. 

We expect politicians to manipulate language to catch the attention of particular constituencies.  That is just part of political life.  The current cycle has carried this idea to heights previously unimagined by most Americans.  

Mitt Romney’s handlers are masters at language manipulation.  They craft his message so carefully that the lies are often tucked in the fast flow of words that Romney pours out for his audiences.  The lies are carefully mixed in with truths and half-truths and when called on them, he will “double down,” strongly defending the lies. 

Mitt Romney lies so often he can’t possibly remember what is the truth.  But, he is a good Mormon, so we can’t call what he is saying lies.  We say he is flexible.  Candidate Romney is sooooo flexible he has no obvious set of core principles.  It doesn’t matter, though because the majority of folks who support him like his one main feature: White.  This means that whatever he actually believes doesn’t matter to them.  And, the lies are irrelevant too.. 

For the people on the fence, calling lies “flexibility” makes their choice of Romney acceptable.  Remember, these are good Christians who love the 10 Commandments.  If their candidate is a liar, they will have a personal conflict.  Renaming Romney’s lies clears up the problem for them.  Isn’t language manipulation great?!

One-Issue Decision? Not This Year

by muon

I made a list last night of all the issues, off the top of my head, that seem to hinge on this election. I'm sure I forgot something. Here's my list, in no particular order:

Unemployment
Education
Energy independence
Climate change
Renewable energy
Equal pay for women
Middle East, terrorism, war, national security
Healthcare
Women's healthcare, including contraceptives, abortion, and Planned Parenthood
Medicare and Social Security
Immigration
FEMA and crisis management
Infrastructure
Welfare, food stamps, other poverty issues
Science, Arts, PBS
Deficit
Gun control
Citizens United
Supreme Court appointees
Banking/mortgage industry problems
Foreign and Domestic Trade
Wealth imbalance

For all of you still undecided folks out there (if any), really, all you have to do is go down this list and decide who you trust to make policy for you on these issues, at the Presidential, Congressional, State and Local levels. For instance, if you're hit by a natural disaster in the next 4 years, do you want someone who acted the way President Obama, Governor Christie and Mayor Bloomberg acted this week, or say, the way President Bush acted during Hurricane Katrina? Do you want a president who'd shut down FEMA and tell the states to handle disasters themselves, even when their infrastructure is completely compromised?  You might say, oh, but I don't live in a natural disaster prone area. I thought so, too, until Hurricane Sandy.

These issues are the main reasons I'm voting, not only for Obama, but for all the Democrats on my ballot.  I say main reasons because there are others.

I refuse to vote for a party that condones and spreads the blatant lies of its presidential candidate. This week Mitch McConnell and other GOP leaders pressured the independent Congressional Research group to suppress a report showing that tax cuts for the wealthy do nothing to help the economy. I won't vote for anyone who has such a contempt for truth.

GOP leaders have gone out of their way to make voting more difficult this year. Voter ID laws, voter roll purging, laws restricting registration drives, reduced early voting in many states, and intimidation measures aimed at African-American and Latino voters are all forms of voter suppression. For the first time, the UN has sent monitors to the US to observe our elections. I'm not voting for the party that made all this happen.

Legislation in this country shouldn't be influenced by anyone but the voters. Many Democrats are in the pockets of lobbyists as much as Republicans, but the worst offenders right now--the Koch Brothers, Grover Norquist, the NRA, far-right religious fanatics, and Big Oil--are GOP cronies.

So that's the election in a nutshell for me. You're on your own.

Turn the Poor over to the Churches and Charities?

Line at a food bank

by Ruth A. Sheets

Back in the 1930’s during the Great Depression, my grandparents depended on several churches for their survival.  I say several because the amount any one church could give to a family was so small that my out-of-work grandfather could not feed his family on it.

With the advent of the food stamps and general welfare programs of the Federal and State Governments, poor people no longer had to go from church to church to seek help through their hard times.  They did not always have to beg at the church door.  They no longer had to sit through worship services that did not necessarily meet their needs in order to receive the pittance churches could afford to hand out.  Some of the stigma was removed from being poor.

Unfortunately, the removal of the stigma rubbed a lot of people the wrong way.  Being poor should be at least a little humiliating so people won’t want to remain in that condition.  The “haves” liked being able to reach down and give a little in order to receive the gratitude of the have-nots. 

It doesn’t matter that in order to receive welfare of any kind, individuals must be nearly in abject poverty.  Married couples have a hard time getting such help because it is assumed that if a man is in the household, he is working and earning enough to support his family or he’s a moocher. 

Many Republicans and Libertarians have chosen ending or severely (even more severely) limiting welfare and food stamps as one of their causes, saying that our nation can’t afford it anymore.  This is at a time when large companies are making record profits but bearly hiring.  This is at a time when many, if not most of the jobs companies are creating are mimimum wage jobs, which as anyone who has ever earned minimum wage knows, is not enough to live on.

I recently heard a report on NPR which included an interview with a truck driver for a food bank.  He told the interviewer and all of America that he thinks helping the poor is the job of the churches and charities and not the Government. 

I know that food banks, thrift stores, and other charitable organizations do a great good in our society.  They can sometimes take the edge off the pain of poverty.  What they cannot do is offer dignity to those who need their services.  They cannot provide a shared experience of conducting one’s life as one chooses:  going to the supermarket, buying new clothing for the kids, using things that are not other people’s discards.  They cannot provide these services on the scale needed in America at this time.

It is ironic that the folks who have the most, resent the commonwealth for trying to level the field for those who have not been as lucky.  I wonder how many of the lucky do their best to avoid paying taxes, but also give as little as they can to the charities that serve the poorest among us.  If they do give anything, it has to make a big splash in the media, “wonderful me giving to those less fortunate than I.”   

It is fascinating that those who earn the least pay the largest percentage of their income for charities, but it is the wealthiest who are celebrated for their largess.

Even if there are a few moochers  around, I’d rather take the chance to provide my fellow citizens with welfare, if needed, and food stamps, if needed, than know they have to go from church to charity to receive enough to survive, as my mother’s family did 75 years ago.