My Type of Patriotism

For this 4th of July, this picture describes my patriotism:

#politics

Happy Veteran's Day

 
Here are some patriotic photos you may find moving this Veteran's Day... or any other patriotic holiday. They were all taken in the fall in Northern Arizona. 

Military Guest Lodging
Near Flagstaff, AZ

Old Ft. Tuthill Parade Grounds
Now part of the County Fair Grounds

Korean War Era Jeep
Military Musem, Ft. Tuthill

Commemorative Marker
Aircraft Training Accident, WW2
San Franciso Mountains

More Political Choices

    

     The 20th Century was, in many ways, a tug of war between far right (often fascist) and far left (communist/extreme socialist) movements in many parts of the world.  Each of these movements would justify what they did, saying "At least, I'm not those guys..."  "We just do what we do to keep those guys at bay..."

      Guess what?  They're both bad; they're both really bad. They both lead to autocracy.  Once autocracy is in place, it all becomes about propping up the autocrat's ego and/or greed.  Whatever the people who put the autocrat in place wanted, that fades in light of the autocrat keeping his position, no matter what.  Beware-- what you thought you'd get by supporting an autocrat will fail.              

 

The old adage that right & left bend around and meet in some weird spot.  Here it's backwards, in the past.  The center goes forward.

       As we move into the 21st century, this tug-of-war seems very active in the U.S.  If you listen closely to the loudest of the voices, they seem perfectly willing to cave in to autocracy to get what they want.  

      There are other combinations than hard right and hard left.   

      Besides the absolute Center, there are really 4 dimensions that combine differently in different voters:  liberal on social matters, liberal on economic matters, conservative on social matters, and conservative on economic matters.  

     One of these voices that truly exists but is almost completely unrepresented is the voice that is conservative on social matters (or at least wants to ensure that religious conservatives have an on-going place in society), yet economically liberal (not necessarily fully socialist; just more progressive taxes).   Some people who don't understand this position assume that it would be an autocratic one.  Not necessarily.  The positions defined as "Christian Democratic Parties" in much of Europe fall into this perspective.  These parties do not seek to exclude people who are socially liberal from the society nor to deny their rights. They just want to ensure that people who practice traditional or conservative religions (in ways where they are not discriminating again others in society) are not ostracized from society for their beliefs.  In addition, many European countries that are otherwise socially liberal do not have free and unrestricted abortion through all 40 weeks of pregnancy.  Some Americans who believe in this combination feel that better support for workers is a family matter (supporting something that's socially conservative); it might also reduce abortions. 

     The economically conservative yet socially liberal position is not officially represented by either major political party but is hugely represented in influence across society.  They are loosely defined as the "Libertarians."  This is the position a lot of businesses and business leaders like.  If you listen closely to what a lot of the media says about "moderates" they favor, they hold this position.  A fair amount of the Hollywood crowd is in this camp.  "Be nice to everyone on the surface.  But don't let everyone know that it's still much easier for the rich to get richer than people on lower rungs to climb any higher."

     The right & left are getting very polarized socially.  The economic area has many centrist thinkers.  Some of the center has shifted into liberal economic territory during the 45th presidential administration.  But the economic center is still larger than the economic left.  This 'territory', especially slightly left of center, is similar to the propositions discussed in the paragraph on European Christian Democrats.  This would be more of a repeal of Reaganomics, improving educational & training opportunities, improving a safety net for workers or the truly disabled, improving public works projects (some of which would also improve the environment). Price controls would not be a factor (except possibly in the area of medicine, such as prescription medicines and insurance costs); neither would be taking over industries, etc.  Private enterprise would continue.

     Though the Right & Left are becoming more polarized on social issues, this does not mean that the numbers are equal.  It does appear the Religious Right is shrinking and is maintaining its political clout is somewhat artificial ways. This is not helpful for anyone in the long term.

     If we had better representation, it would take the force of one vs. the other away.  It would be less likely that an eventual "victor" would pull everyone off the cliff with a huge tug.  We could get some of this through things like rank-choice voting and fully open primaries.

Route 66 Tour

Route 66, where it splits off from I-40 in northwest Arizona

Wild Burros in Oatman

Colorado River, Grand Canyon

Different than in National Park

Permit to drive down (!)

Favorites

It always amazed me when our 45th president spoke of how much the press maligns "your favorite president."  I really didn't hear the press speak much on Theodore Roosevelt in our day & age!  😉😅  ---Marie Byars            

Ted, Jr., Yet Again

     Brigadier General Theodore (Ted) Roosevelt, Jr., was President Theodore Roosevelt's oldest son.  It is especially good to remember him on D-Day,06 JUN.  He was the first General Officer on the beach on D-day.  Not only this, but he was leaning on a cane.... from injuries sustained in World War I!!!!
     As World War I had been drawing to a close, young Major Ted Roosevelt was asked to help form the American Legion.  The picture below is from the preamble to the Legion's constitution.  It mentions freedom from the "autocracy of the classes and the masses."  Neither mob rule nor oligarchy should define our country. These words are clearly those of Ted, Jr., and his father before him.  It's a shame we can't get that balance now!  (Of note, the "classes" are mentioned first... definitely a risk in our time... has been growing since the 80s.)

     For the record, the "100% Americanism" is of note.  Both Ted and his father wanted Americans to define themselves as "Americans without hyphens."  (I don't always do this because I do sometimes define myself as German-American.  I want to keep my ancestors' culture alive, particularly as I see little actual culture afloat in White America.)  But I take the point... and it cuts both ways.  It means we also have to let people of other races and other immigration statuses fully integrate as Americans. A lot of White Americans have griped over the years that minorities don't seem to fully integrate but have blocked them when they tried.  Not cool.

Article II, Section 8 U.S. Constitution

"The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare [emphasis mine] of the United States... "

The conservative, "narrow" constitutionalists of our day do not have a "lock" on the Constitution.  It was meant to be a living, growing document.  The provision for "general welfare" encompasses many things.   In other words, sometimes the government helps those less off to promote everyone's "general welfare."  Societal unrest destroys the general welfare.

It *IS* Fair to Tax the Rich More

First of all, is "fair" exactly the right lens to look through when discussing broad political policies?  It seems the right measure would be "what does the most good while doing the least harm for most people?"

Overall, the best coupling of economic-political systems seems to be democracy and capitalism with appropriate "safety valves" in place.

The "fairness" question has a lot to do with "safety valves" among other things.  Without some checks on rampant greed, government officials can just be "bought out", and you end up with an oligarchy,  rule by the wealthy, over time.

Another safety valve involves the stock market.  As I've said elsewhere in this blog, too low of taxes on the rich leaves too much money for stock market speculation at the top. The market crashes, and we ALL end up saddled with the increases to national debt that come with this.  This debt saddles our descendents, too.  Debt pay-off is a far higher percentage of middle class resources than upper class resources. 

After the first shock waves of the 2008 crash passed, the wealthy regained their wealth quickly. The middle class, which had already been struggling to maintain its place, keeps falling further behind. We really did bail out the rich more than the poor did.

Returning to the national debt:  if we don't pay it down, our country's ability to borrow money will be impacted negatively.  We will have to pay more interest to borrow money.  One prong in paying down the national debt involves raising taxes on the wealthy.  We could someday leave our children or grandchildren with the harsh austerity measures of Greece.  This would hit the middle harder than the wealthy at first, of course.  Over time, though, as the middle was squeezed more and could not be extended personal credit in the way it has been, they will not be able to support the wealthy through buying from the companies and corporations of the wealthy as much.  (I have also made this point elsewhere.)

The wealthy either outright own or own more stock in corporations that damage or negatively affect the environment.  Frequently, these companies/corporations would rather pay fines than fix the problems that hurt the environment or workers.  So we all get saddled with the eventual costs of clean-up or medical bills.  (The corporation may pay some costs in lost productivity.) While corporations pay part of the clean-up costs, we need an active Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to make this happen. This costs money.  As the wealthy are profiting more from corporations, it seems "fair" to make them pay a larger share in ensuring the negative impact is limited or addressed.

When poorer people don't have insurance, they use emergency rooms later into their illnesses.  Emergency rooms cannot turn people away.  The hospitals recoup their costs via charging everyone more.  That drives everyone's health insurance up more.  The costs for insurance are a far lower percentage of the wealthy's compensation packages than it is for the middle class.  (The poor figure in differently, due to subsidies.)

There are other ways that the health industry benefits the wealthy out of all of this.  Hospitals keep being allowed to merge, although it is not necessarily good for the public.  Hospitals frequently operate, technically, by non-profit rules that benefit their ability to rake in the money.  But being non-profits doesn't stop them from paying their boards and their managing staff (roughly the equivalents of "CEOs") enormous salaries.  Additionally, health insurance companies and their CEOs, which are for profit, rake in big $$$.

(As an aside, the German system does not allow insurance companies to make a profit from basic policies.  The companies make their profits from the high-end "designer" policies.  Maybe a thought for here?)

The argument comes up that the wealthy are "job creators."  Not so fast. When greed became fashionable in the 80s (a fashion that has not died), a lot of corporate muckety-mucks accelerated the pace of moving jobs overseas to cheaper labor.  There is nothing written into current federal tax-lowering schemes that makes the wealthy produce more high-paying jobs in exchange for lowered taxes.  Besides which, some of the wealthy inherited their wealth.  Others are CEOs, who managed to get themselves into a "sweet deal." And they don't always lead their companies to better earnings. Even when they don't, they get obnoxiously high salaries, or at least the "golden parachute" to just leave and let another CEO give it a try.  And they have no obligation to create more high-paying jobs here. Their only obligations are to helping the shareholders get higher returns on their stocks.

There are those entrepreneurs who have created companies and wealth in their own generation. But, generally, they relied on strength, talents and resources of others. And a lot of the people in this category are very generous and give away a lot of their earnings.

Another reason raising federal taxes on the wealthy is fairer than you think is that state and local taxes tend to even out the percentages everyone pays in taxes.  State taxes are less graduated (everyone pays "closer" to the same percentage) and sales taxes take a far higher percentage of your money, the less you earn (or take home in disability or retirement pay).

Wars and the costs of caring for Veterans are another reason to tax the rich more. We're given all sorts of "noble reasons" why we've gone to war. And sometimes those noble reasons are true, though sometimes there are reasons to be skeptical.  Either way, the wealthy benefit off of wars. They disproportionately own stocks in companies that make military supplies and equipment.  VP Cheney's Halliburton connections appear to have benefitted from the Iraq war. Yet, servicemembers come disproportionately out of lower classes.  And we all have to pay the high financial and social costs of injured Veterans.

Some states have tried ridiculous tax-lowering, as I've also mentioned elsewhere.  There have been some states that kept cutting to the point of ridiculous.  Kansans went out to warn other states trying these policies that Kansas has tried that the policies didn't work.  Some of these states did couple corporate tax cuts with the requirement to provide jobs with certain salary levels.  Others did not. Still, Kansas and Louisiana, as mentioned elsewhere, ran into serious problems.  It looks like Wisconsin is going that way; the programs are beginning to be very unpopular there.  It seems only a matter of time until Arizona learns the hard way. 

Another reason I don't like this is how much this line of thinking is bought out directly by the Koch Brothers.  When you trace all the ways they funnel money to candidates to promote this, it's scary.  I won't list them all here right  now.  But there are a couple points worth making.

As an aside, I will mention a couple of the glaring improprieties of how the Kochs are setting too much of the national agenda.  First of all, their constant interference makes democracy a farce.  Secondly, the Kochs aren't terribly honest.  They're very willing to "use" conservatives who are pro-life, while the Kochs are decidedly pro-choice.  At some point, when they've gotten their way on economic matters, will they buy out the public thinking on abortion?  (There are other social conservative preferences that are the opposite of what the Kochs want.  I will not discuss all that here.  Suffice it to say, it looks like they're using people.)

As mentioned in my post on libertarianism, the Kochs literally want -0- taxes. That's not realistic at all in a modern society.  (see that post for more details) 

The Kochs bring out a great deal of cynicism in me.  There are so many things deserving another post at another time on the Kochs' operations.  But that's not the main point of this post.  The reason they came up in this post is their constant pushing of the opposite of what would be helpful for the U.S. to move forward. And I wanted to point out that they buy politicians' intentions.  

I agree that there's a point at which taxes are too high on the wealthy.  I'm no "Bernie, Jr.", either.  (I think his use of "socialism" was misapplied.  And it risks letting people like me get labelled as "socialist", which I'm not.  The correct definition of socialism is, according to Merriam-Webster: "1) any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods. 2) a system of society or group living in which there is no private property."  Even Bernie doesn't believe this.)  The "sweet spot" seems to be setting federal taxes on the wealthy somewhere between 40 to 45% and more fully graduating state taxes, to have more brackets.  (I realize I mentioned how having them less graduated equalizes things more, but they would still not likely end up fully graduated in most states.)

Think for yourself.  Don't follow straight ideologies.

Reason 1000 (on "Why We Need a New TR")

And, yes, this is a real quote.  I found it and made the meme.

In Business We Trust....

"Business ethics":  an oxymoron.

A Very Grand Canyon

There may be larger canyons around the world, but ours is very grand.  The kids & I recently went to the less-travelled North Rim, which is higher in elevation.

We also saw Roosevelt Point on the North Rim:

Here's a picture from October, 2010, when I took them to the South Rim:

(Both times, my husband had either work or study obligations.  But he & I went to the South Rim a few years ago for our wedding anniversary.)

Mad Hatter

D-Day

Gotta post this link again on President Theodore Roosevelt's eldest son, a real D-Day hero!

(Not actually from D-Day)

Brigadier General Ted Roosevelt, Jr.

More Presidential Wisdom

Historically, taxing the rich has been supported by both parties across the ideological spectrum. Even Thomas Jefferson, whom many Tea Party members worship, supported higher taxes on the wealthy. In an 1811 letter to Thaddeus Kościuszko, he defended the tariff because it would force the rich to pay more:

“The rich alone use imported articles, and on these alone the whole taxes of the General Government are levied. The poor man, who uses nothing but what is made in his own farm or family, or within his own country, pays not a farthing of tax to the General Government.”  --Thomas Jefferson

Believe Me Now?

"42"..... as in raise the tax rate on the top 1-1/2% to 42%.

As I've said repeatedly, I think that ending Supply Side Economics is one of the most important things we could do for our times.  In the 35+ years that it has mostly dominated, things have not "trickled down"... the wealth has concentrated further up.  Take a look at how much good could be done if we change this: 

What Could Raising Taxes on the 1% Do? Surprising Amounts

People further up the economic ladder complain that about 47% of our populace pays no taxes at all.  Well, maybe if things were shaken up somewhat, more of them would move further up the ladder and pay taxes! 

Keep On...

"Believe you can, and you are halfway there."  ---Theodore Roosevelt; at Harvard, on 28 June, 1905.  (Harvard University was his alma mater)

Service with Dignity

There's a lot of talk right now about whether rescinding trade deals really helps or hurts workers.

There's actually another discussion we should be having:  how can we realistically make a service-based industry a better thing for workers?  For one thing, there's no guarantee how many substantial manufacturing jobs we can bring back home.  Secondly, though outsourcing was a big part of the problem, many jobs were replaced by automation/computerization.         

It's helpful to look at other examples.  While we cannot be exactly like other countries, we can learn from them.  In Germany, about 71% of the workforce is in service jobs.  Yet, having a job like this is not taken as a mark of "shame."  In fact, if you see German wait-servers at work, you can see they treat it as a real profession.  (Unfortunately, Germany has resorted to a trickle-down economics type plan. They now have more workers needing food pantries to get by.)

Although politicians can't change our behavior directly, they do seem to exercise outsized influence on people.  Maybe if they came out and talked about our "nameless, faceless" service industry workers, if they reminded everyone of the respect that McDonald's and Wal-Mart workers should have, maybe that would make a difference.

And, once again, dumping supply-side economics would be a good thing.  There are many articles coming out where a few radical, open thinkers in the "1%" are saying the same thing.  They value a stable society and argue that better wages are part of this.  They admit that huge windfalls for the wealthy don't "trickle down."  They remind their audiences that the wealthy need middle-class customers to buy their stuff.  They remind others that, if the middle class isn't stretched so thin time-wise, they can volunteer in ways to make the world a better place.

Some of these thinkers admit where the windfall to the rich goes:  it goes to buying up stock in their own companies.  This artificially raises the price of stock, which gives the CEOs, who get part of their income off their stocks, more money.  One of these enlightened one-percenters pointed out that every Wal-Mart employee could have gotten a raise of over $4000 with the money Wal-Mart spent to buy up  and inflate its own stock.  Finally, Wal-Mart listened, and there have been some pay raises there. Wal-Mart must hustle more to compete with other corporations.  But some consumers are rewarding Wal-Mart by using their services more since they've given raises.

President's Day

     We've had 44 [as of this posting] men who've led this country under the Constitution (plus eight more who led it under the Articles of Confederation).  This month let's take more than just a day to remember them; however much we might criticize them, it's a tough job.

D-Day

 "We’ll start the war from right here."   --General Ted Roosevelt*, Jr., D-Day**

*President Theodore Roosevelt's oldest son.
**June 6, 1944:  storming the beaches at Normandy, the Allies got off-course, and Roosevelt knew he had to take action. There was no turning back.

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