Bernie and Federal Income Taxes: Why He Suggested Restoring the Top Bracket...
Progressive income taxes at the federal level have all but disappeared. Billionaire investor Warren Buffet famously declared that his $60,000.00/year secretary pays a higher effective federal tax rate...
View ArticleIs the Ownership Society a Fraud?
Bernie Sanders' recently made a comment in an interview about the possible wisdom of a 90% top bracket on the very wealthiest income earners in America (probably millionaires and billionaires who...
View ArticleDoes Opposition to Free Trade Agreements Necessarily Mean Support for Tariffs?
Since the House Passed "fast track" for the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP), with significant Democratic Party support, it only seems appropriate to have another look at the whole...
View ArticleHow Influential Is AIPAC On US Foreign Policy?
It is often assumed that US policy in the Middle East would be far more "even handed" and less tied to Israeli interests if a lobby in Washington called the American Israeli Political Action Committee...
View ArticleThe US and Israel: A Rejoinder to My Critics.
There's so much of importance in the news these days; far too much to continue to beat a dead horse. Still I feel not only the need for some closure on this issue, which to me is highly important,...
View ArticleGreece, Debt and Austerity: A Better Way Forward is Possible.
The current crisis in Greece is due to the fact that the country is plagued by a structurally weak economy. That simply means that the Greek economy is highly volatile and unstable, lacks a viable...
View ArticleWas the Maastrict Treaty a Big Mistake?
When very staid, rational and sober economists like Paul Krugman declare Greece's solemn right to bolt from the EU and go off the Euro, one sits up and takes notice. Here is his argument;The truth is...
View ArticleWhy Bernie Sanders is African-Americans Best Hope in 2016.
Bernie Sanders was asked by a prominent activist in the Black Lives Matter movement, what he would do about America's problem with what she called "structural racism" which I take to mean the...
View ArticleBernie Sanders Finally Makes Racist Police Brutality Against African...
“It is unacceptable that police officers beat up people or kill people...If they do that, they have got to be held accountable.” Senator Bernie Sanders in Houston, TX 7/19/15It does appear that Sanders...
View ArticleWhat's Really Behind Illinois Budget Deficits: Rauner Won't Tax the Rich.
The State of Illinois, like most states, has had long term structural deficits especially since the 2008 financial crisis/recession dramatically reduced economic growth and therefore, tax base from...
View ArticleObamacare: Myth and Fact. Are Employers Really Dumping Their Health Insurance...
Conservatives are now all over the place claiming that employers are dumping their existing more expensive health benefit plans because Obamacare is so much cheaper to provide. Employers with fifty or...
View ArticleWill Immigration Reform Vex the Sanders Campaign Even More Than Police...
Sanders is beginning to epitomize the traditional white left who, like him, have tended to be highly educated, middle and upper middle class people who have always had the very sanguine belief that by...
View ArticleWhat is a Nation-State?
Sometimes it is good to place purely topical political issues on hold to pursue the deeper realm of political theory. I recently wrote a diary in which I reproach Bernie Sanders for using the term...
View ArticleNo Good Deed...
I'm disgusted! Disgusted with the treatment of the most progressive candidate to run for high office in this country since Eugene Debs polled nearly 920,000 votes from his Atlanta prison cell in 1920....
View ArticleFear, Hope and Change in 2016.
No one jumped for joy like I did on the recent news that Bernie is ahead of Hillary 44% to 37% in New Hampshire. No one expected a seven point lead this early. But stop and think. The problem is that...
View ArticleBehind the Numbers: The Anatomy of a Low Wage Recovery
For the first time since the week ending on April 15th 2000, the four year moving average for new unemployment claims has reached a new low. On April 15, 2000, according to MarketWatch the moving...
View ArticleMandatory Detention is Unconstitutional. Let's Dump It Now!
Mandatory detention in the US began in 1988 as part of the War on Drugs. The Anti-Drug Abuse Act created new grounds to deport non-citizens convicted of an "aggravated felony" including murder, drug...
View ArticleBernie's Political Momentum is a Shock to Skeptics
According to a recent Washington Post report, over 100,000 people have so far turned out to see Bernie Sanders publicly deliver his populist political message. He's addressed overflow crowds repeatedly...
View ArticleWe Were Right All Along: The Voters Want REAL Democrats not Republican Lite!!
An interesting bit of news from Politico about Democratic Party strategy in Red States. According to Politico, "...the suddenly ascendant left — its populist overtones becoming part of the mainstream...
View ArticleThe TPP is Even Less About Trade than all the Rest.
Wheaton College economics professor, John Miller writing in Dollars & Sense, a self described journal of "real world economics" puts the issue quite bluntly; "TPP is less about trade than about...
View Article