REAL JOB CREATORS

I think if I hear one more economically illiterate teabagger refer to the wealthy as job creators I may puke!

Someone should explain to the conservatives that real job creators are people who buy things. You know...like when you have a job, or unemployment compensation if you don't have a job. Taxing the super wealthy won't spoil the purchasing power of the extremely wealthy at all...they won't be spending what we tax them anyway...they'll be saving it. Take care of the unemployed and stimulate the economy. Job growth initiatives and debt will start to make deficits become manageable. At 4% unemployment the deficit will shrink almost, if not, to nothing.

The economy is stalled because there is a lack of demand, not because the wealthy are taxed too much. Let's look at what has occurred historically. In the 1930's to spur demand Keynesian Economics encouraged the government to increase government spending to put people to work. They created jobs doing public works. They built schools, libraries, stadiums, roads...they worked on conservation projects in forests and on building damns. As a result there was work which paid a wage to previously unemployed individuals who in turn spent those wages buying the products that the wealthy ended up making. The wealthy didn't create those jobs, the lower and middle class did when they bought products with those wages. But, the wealthy made more money when the lower classes began buying their products.

As of this writing, private enterprise has created precious few jobs in the ongoing recovery. But, due to our shortsighted economic illiteracy we have cut the government payrolls by 500,000 employees since Barack Obama became President. That's 500,000 fewer customers in the workplace.

The notion that government doesn't create jobs is foolishness. NASA by driving technology to produce products that take mankind into space has produced jobs, and created demand for those products that all of our economy craves now. Creation of the interstate highway system in the 1950's and 1960's created business opportunities all across our great country. It provided the transportation system to move products and convenient real estate locations to build and sell those products.

In 1993 we raised taxes, not just on the wealthy but everyone, and the result was the longest period of expansion in the country's history. Interest rates were driven to the lowest level in my generation's history. The low cost to produce products and the availability of low interest rates on credit to buy them ignited the creation of 23,000,000. Then in 2001 we departed on a different course, we cut taxes, and we cut them massively for the wealthy. The result was not the wealthy creating jobs, quite the opposite. The wealthy hoarded the savings, engaged in speculative stock schemes, and the country exacerbated the problem by indulging in two wars and an excessive give away to the pharmaceutical industry. The result was the deepest economic contraction since the depression of the 1930's.

Now our economically challenged teabagging buddies want to offer the simple solution that all we need to do is control spending. I believe it was Albert Einstein who said "there is a simple solution to everything, and it's usually wrong!"

It's time we stop asking "Joe the Plumber," "Sarah the Half Governor of Alaska," and "Rush the Blowhard Disc Jockey" about economics and start listening to those who have experience in solving international economic problems. The solution starts with creating jobs...any kind of job, private or public, and not encouraging further economic contraction.

BLESS HER HEART

As a young boy growing up in Oklahoma my fellow Southern Baptist church members used to identify absurd behavior, intellectually challenged conversation, or actions for which they might normally characterize as ‘just plain crazy” in a way they thought might be less confrontational. They would simply say “bless their heart.” Well, we here in the good ole U.S. probably should adopt that saying for all of the crazy talk from one of our own, Sister Sarah Palin…”bless her heart, she just doesn’t know any better.” That’s just the way the brothers and sisters at the local Fundamentalist Southern Baptist Church would phrase it.

This week at the Long Island Association in Woodbury, N. Y., she gave a backhanded slap to the First Lady for advocating breast feeding. Breastfeeding. Really! Forget that as governor she had signed a proclamation that was almost word for word what Mrs. Obama’s advocacy stated…”bless her heart.”

But, I won’t stop there…there’s more…much more.

"As Putin rears his head and comes into the air space of the United States of America, where– where do they go? It's Alaska. It's just right over the border." This was Sarah explaining why Alaska's proximity to Russia gives her foreign policy experience. It comes from an interview with CBS's Katie Couric, Sept. 24, 2008. Say it with me now…”BLESS HER HEART.”

"The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama's 'death panel' so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their 'level of productivity in society,' whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil." Sarah in a message posted on Facebook about Obama's health care plan, Aug. 7, 2009. (By the way…the death panel apparently sounded so good that some of Sarah’s Republican colleagues in the Republican dominated Arizona Legislature actually passed legislation which effectively created a “death panel” for patients awaiting Medicaid assistance for transplant operations.) With enthusiasm this time…BLESS HER HEART!”

This is my personal favorite. "All of 'em, any of 'em that have been in front of me over all these years." This was Sarah unable to name a single newspaper or magazine she reads The interview once again was with Katie Couric, CBS News, Oct. 1, 2008. Sarah also referred to this as a “gotcha” question…that’s right asking her what she reads was a trick question in Sarah’s mind. Just the ladies this time…BLESS HER HEART.”

"Well, let's see. There's ― of course in the great history of America there have been rulings that there's never going to be absolute consensus by every American, and there are those issues, again, like Roe v. Wade, where I believe are best held on a state level and addressed there. So, you know, going through the history of America, there would be others but ―" Sarah unable to name a Supreme Court decision she disagreed with other than Roe vs. Wade, interview with Katie Couric, CBS News, Oct. 1, 2008. Once again…”Bless her heart.”

"'Refudiate,' 'misunderestimate,' 'wee-wee'd up.' English is a living language. Shakespeare liked to coin new words too. Got to celebrate it!'" This in a Tweet sent by Sarah in response to being ridiculed for inventing the word "refudiate," proudly mistaking her illiteracy for literary genius, July 18, 2010. Prayerfully this time…”Bless her heart.”

"But obviously, we've got to stand with our North Korean allies." This was Sarah’s response after being asked how she would handle the current hostilities between the two Koreas, being interviewed on Glenn Beck's radio show, Nov. 24, 2010. Of course, North Korea isn’t an ally of the United States…that would be South Korea. Those on the front row…”Bless her heart!”

"Especially within hours of a tragedy unfolding, journalists and pundits should not manufacture a blood libel that serves only to incite the very hatred and violence they purport to condemn. That is reprehensible." Sarah defending her fiery campaign rhetoric in the wake of the Arizona shooting massacre by invoking a phrase ("blood libel") that typically refers historically to the alleged murder of Christian babies by Jews, Jan. 12, 2011. Regarding this statement don’t let the fact that the most famous of the victims of this event was Congresswoman Gabrelle Giffords, who is Jewish. Now let’s let our Jewish friends join us…”Bless her heart.”

"We used to hustle over the border for health care we received in Canada. And I think now, isn't that ironic?" This was Sarah admitting that her family used to get treatment in Canada's single-payer health care system, despite having demonized such government-run programs as socialized medicine that will lead to death-panel-like rationing, March 6, 2010. I’m running out of groups…but, how about everyone without health care insurance this time…”BLESS HER HEART!”

I have family that believes this woman could actually function as President of the United States. I on the other hand have to agree with Keith Olbermann…”that woman is an idiot!”

(Softly this time.) Bless her heart.

AN ARAB MODEL FOR RELIGIOUS TOLERANCE

Tahrir Square and the citizens of Egypt provided a model for those of us who proclaim we live in the United States, “a Christian nation,” would be well to observe and follow.

As the counter protest of the government police instigated by the party of Egypt's President, Hosni Mubarak, sought to create violence amongst a peaceful protest Muslim’s and Christian formed a most unique and inspiration model that I would hope fundamentalist Christian in the our country, the United States, could and will follow. As Muslims gathered to offer prayers in the middle of the Square, the Christians formed a ring around the Muslims to protect them from outsiders as they prayed. Later on when Christians gathered to offer prayers of their own the Muslims responded in kind by forming a ring around the Christians so their prayers could go on uninterrupted. It was a moving and inspirational scene.

It’s time for us to respect all points of view, Muslim, Christian…even atheist. We all have sooner or later got to admit, at least from a religious point of view, that we just don’t have all the answers. Any, or all, of us could be wrong about our faith. Because we don’t have all the answers we have to give persons of other points of view respect to express their faiths with the same hope that fundamental Christians express their own.