Working Life

Republicans are embracing the full Dick Cheney doctrine. I don’t mean simply the “let’s break international law and bomb the fuck out of people in service to Halliburton.” I mean the doctrine that, for all the tough talk, when it came time to serve, the vast majority of these guys who are ready to go to war with Iran, decided, like Cheney, that when it came to serve in the military and put their lives on the line, they all had other priorities.

This is a group of “chicken hawks” who are ready to have more people die–Americans and others–but would never put their own lives on the line.

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I had heard, now leaking out to the media, that the AFL-CIO will not rush to endorse anyone in the Democratic primary. This is good news for Bernie Sanders, and not so good for those on the Chipotle-eating circuit. It gives Bernie more time to show a hard-edged practical reason–as opposed to the obvious “I’d actually take on Wall Street and be good for unions”–for the AFL-CIO to support him, and it also gives more time for the Chipotle-eating crowd to show that, hey, we’re actually like regular, working people (though probably not “dead broke” like real people).

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This is a good one from Rich Trumka.

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So true. The country where politicians run around talking about “family values” and never miss a chance to be photographed with a child–while too many of them cut health care for kids and vote for illegal, immoral wars that bankrupt the country and send kids to war (though their own kids never serve–they just give speeches for five-figures in which they say nothing).

Bernie pegs it. And wants to at least create 1 million jobs for young people over the next two years.

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WTF? Ok, I guess I should actually say: this is not shocking but because Chuck Schumer just made me yell “WTF?” and ruin my schedule for the rest of the day…

The loud yelling and clapping you just heard came cascading down from executive suites of all the tax-dodging big corporations who must be dancing in the halls. “Bi-partisanship” is about to fleece the American people–yet again. And it’s being led by the presumed Democratic majority leader come 2016, Chuck Schumer.

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Banks on the brink. Financial system close to collapse–or so said the experts. To the rescue rode the Federal Reserve Board, which authorized trillions of dollars for all sorts of financial institutions, domestic and foreign…even if said institutions didn’t need the money but were happy to take essentially free money.

That was back during the financial crisis.

Now, it’s Greece and its banks running short on cash, squeezed by the money lenders and, in particular, the European Central Bank. So, why not: the Federal Reserve Board should be directed by Congress to commit to providing liquidity to Greek banks so the people in Greece–millions of human beings–can pay their bills, get their pension payments and continue to have money to buy food–or cut off the ECB from its Fed-backed line of credit.

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This is a short post. But, an important one that says a lot.

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I’m skeptical of putting too much into polls so early out, largely because you can never predict events that actually happen in campaigns much closer to the election and shape the results. But, in an insurgent, grassroots campaign, this is worth paying attention to.

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I’ve kind of laughed at the analysis percolating around that, oh, surprise, the Supreme Court is a liberal bastion…or not so conservative. Well, it was a great day when marriage equality became the law of the land. But, while everyone can now marry, the Supreme Court has a very clear five vote conservative bloc when it comes to empowering business, enhancing class warfare and making it impossible to make a decent living…married or not.

And it is now gearing up to potentially destroy public sector union.

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The underlying issue in Greece is simple: the oligarchs wants the people of Greece to bleed, pure and simple. There are easy ways to resolve the crisis without exacting more pounds of flesh from already desperate people. But, that’s the way of the Troika.

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