Okay, time for a little ranting over the current state of affairs in this country we love and call home. It is being completely relabeled day by day, issue by issue, job by job and state by state.
We continue to call ourselves the "Land of The Free....and the Home of The Brave" yet we are no longer entitled to use either term. Over the past couple of decades there has been a force at work in the U.S. to imprison every person possible - for an increasing number of criminal acts that have only become "criminal" over the same period of time.
Home of the brave? Yes, we have brave young men and women fighting on behalf of our country in several hot spots around the globe...but on the whole, we are a frightened and scared society. We are made that way by those who have worked hard to take control of the U.S.A. and accuse us of being unpatriotic or un-American if we don't swallow their Kool-Aid without thought or protest. As many now know, it should be called Koch-Aid and can be found everywhere we turn today.
For years conservative groups, organizations, foundations and associations have realized that most working Americans have little time to pay strict attention to what's going on within our communities or larger areas that include the states where we live. This is because now both husbands and wives have to work. It's no longer a women's right thing to be able to join the workforce and contribute to the family income. No, now it is required that every member of our families have to work in order to pay the bills and keep our heads above the water pushed at us by the economy.
These individuals that own the largest and most lucrative companies and realize tremendous incomes have become addicted to having lavish lifestyles and unlimited access to wealth. In order to maintain their way of life in an economy that required higher wages to workers - and thus presenting a threat to their wealth - these corporate elite have been made to invest some of their wealth to create an unrealistic concept of our world today. They have spent millions acquiring or merging media and news outlets for their purposes. In this way they can limit our access to truthful and informative facts about our world and present their views to a working America that is having to work harder, for less money and has less time to spend studying on important facts and issues. In this way many of us and our neighbors gather insight on the health and wealth of the nation - along with other important issues - through the media controlled by a handful of individuals in our country.
This scheme has been used now since the early1980's and has been so successful for this select few among the populace that most Americans now have a skewed and tilted view of our country, our lives, our needs and the responsibilities and duties of our state and national governments. It has become "the norm" for us over the past 30 years and as the time passed and we believed the propaganda being fed us, those using this means have expanded their efforts. They learned through trial and error that Americans could be made to believe and do most anything if they are made to fear that which is most beneficial to them and the rest of society.
For instance, it has been standard procedure for years to espouse rhetoric that we should fear: crime, size of government, government control, government regulations, release of convicted offenders, immigrants, Jewish control of media and financial institutions, socialism and of late; all Muslims, immigrants entering from Mexico, fair wages, Unions and collective bargaining. This list does not include all of the things we've been told to fear, just a few of the more obvious. Of course we do need to have an awareness about crime, but it is not at our doorstep 24/7 as we are led to believe.
These issues and topics are spoon fed to us without the benefit of the complete view - given from both sides of an issue - as used to be the case. No, we hear what they want us to hear, that it is bad for us and we should do as they suggest in order to be "safe" in our homes, workplace and daily lives.
Sadly these efforts on behalf of large companies, corporations and their owners, CEO's and investors have turned all of us into fearful slaves of one form or another for their use and exploitation. Today just look around at what the corporate owned media - especially Fox News outlets - tells us we must be afraid of; proper diet for our children, exercise for those children to reduce obesity and early onset of diabetes, government spending, healthcare for the entire population, equal taxation for all - corporate and individuals alike, freeing prisoners, paying public workers too much in wages, Unions and of course, collective bargaining among other warnings.
So, though we have brave citizens fighting and giving their lives in pursuit of "freedom" in the Middle East right now, we have far less bravery here being demonstrated by us. As to Land of the Free? Not. Today we have the world's largest number our citizens imprisoned. Figures are now approaching 2.5 million in prison with another 5 million or more on some form of probation or parole. For every 32 Americans there is now 1 caught up in either prison, jail or on supervision. The worst rate in the world is now one of our claims to fame. With these kind of statistics, how on earth can we look people in the face and continue to proudly proclaim that we are a land of the free?
Let's take a moment and examine the actual facts that have/are being withheld from us on all of the above topics. Crime. The Bureau of Justice Statistics and the National Institute of Justice and the federal census inform that crime rates - violent, non-violent and property crime - has been in decline for more than two decades now. Even as crime has dropped, the number of those imprisoned has increased steadily. Laws were enacted that made more acts criminal and punishable, lengthened sentences, called for abolishing parole, mandatory minimum sentences, truth in sentencing (every prisoner must do 85% of his/her sentence. Because we were made to "fear" anyone that had been in prison, we didn't want them released anytime soon, and supported this legislation - based on the one sided argument.
Size of government - There were fewer government employees in 2009 than in 1990. Every President in recent history, with the exception of LBJ and Reagan, reduced the number of government employees.
Source: http://www.whitehouse.gov/...
Government regulations? Well no need for us to go into a long or detailed discussion about that after the collapse of our financial markets, institutions and the likes of Enron. Yet even after the financial collapses and turmoil beginning in 2008, it is claimed that over-regulation contributed to it. After bailing them out, we have no more regulatory control over those that caused the problems - again, led by those opposing government "interference." Recovery is in the hands of those who caused the mess and that's just how the conservatives want it.
Socialism - another bugaboo scare term to keep us from wanting anything to do with our society assisting others through social programs and safety nets. This is how they went after the healthcare initiative, calling it socialism, and Obamacare and claims that our President is a socialist that wants to redistribute wealth in the U.S. Okay, who has all the friggin wealth? It isn't you and it certainly isn't me, so this explains who is in possession of that wealth and dead-set against you and I getting one penny of it - in tax dollars, fair and comparable wages or social programs. The stories and articles fail to remind us that Medicare, Medicaid, VA health benefits are all "social" programs. They work well so far and benefit soldier and retired worker alike. See any conservative politician or corporate owner publicly volunteering to surrender any of those programs that benefit them personally? No and yet they want to deny the working middle class the same healthcare benefits they and lawmakers enjoy.
Once the election of 2010 was over and many gains made by predominantly conservative Republican and Tea Party candidates at both the state and federal levels were realized...they immediately went after healthcare repeal, laws to increase the number of hours worked by U.S. prisoners, keeping tax breaks for the richest (owners of the corporations, media outlets and similar companies). Again this was facilitated by the use of fear tactics to make us believe that the Republicans and Teabaggers were our only salvation to stop the unchecked wild spending by Democrats. They railed and pointed fingers, wrote articles and gave speeches informing all of us that unless they were put in office, our country would be bankrupted by President Obama and his socialist policies and agenda.
The entire Muslim population of the world hate and are coming after us. They're recruiting insurgents and American Muslim terrorists to attack us from within...they despise our "freedoms" and want to finish what a handful of Saudi Arabians began on 9/11/01! Fear them...fear a new world caliphate! Don't let them build a cultural center close to ground zero...Muslim or Islamic extremists who perished in the terrible attack on that date were really "terrorists" all along who willingly gave their lives to take a few thousand of Americans with them to Paradise. This is so false, so discriminatory, so un-American and so against our constitution and citizen's rights that there really should be no realistic pursuit of this or discussion about doing something so vile.
Yet, we've been brought to the same precipice by the same sources on the issue of immigration. We open our national arms to embrace those oppressed elsewhere, offering them sanctuary and a place among us...unless those oppressed people are of the Muslim religion or Latino. No, Americans must fear them. They're a threat to our safety, our jobs and too great a demand put upon us for caring for them and their families; education, healthcare, and general well being.
Now the same sources tell us to fear public sector worker's wages! They make way too much, do far too little and this is what is driving the nation to bankruptcy! It isn't two unnecessary and unwarranted wars that have gone on for nearly a decade, or the collapse of the economy due to the acts of unregulated financial institutions or investment firms that have brought us to this place in history...nope, it's the high wages that private sector and public/government workers are paid for their labor. It's the terrible advantage they have by being able to collectively join and demand fair wages, inflation and cost of living increases, vacations, healthcare, a 40 hour work week and maternity leaves, that is causing our state of near national depression. Unions are the devil's spawn that allow such collective efforts - on behalf of middle class workers. Ahem...uh...these Unions, public and private sector workers are US! None of "them" are struggling to work for a living wage that is disappearing. They want us to support their efforts to toss out fifty years of hard fought for labor laws in this country. Why do they want us to support this - eliminate Unions and the ability for workers to petition for fair wages? Because corporate and company owners are the ones who have to pay those wages!! The argument isn't about we're paying workers too much - it's about they having become addicted to the low wages they pay overseas and to prisoners and wanting to apply the same concept to the every American worker. Why should they have to take their manufacturing overseas and pay transportation costs to bring their products back to the U.S. for sale? Much more attractive and profitable to bring the wages to the American workplace and convince us to accept such low wages as a way of rewarding them for giving us a job - at half of what they should be paying. At the same time, they have made us accept poor quality in exchange for instant gratification.
Back in 1970 we could buy a new television for a few hundred dollars and guarantee it for 5 years. It would sit in our living rooms and work month after month, year after year. It worked so well that at some point ten or fifteen years later, we got tired of it collecting dust and sold it in a yard sale or donated it - still working. Today, the new "advanced technology" brings us Plasma, HD, LCD and all sorts of television products. that are flashy and make us all smile...until they fail within a year and if we didn't buy "extended protection" coverage for it, it was only warranted for one year. The added protection costs you half again what the price of the TV is/was and the friggin' set is always in need of costly repair. Somewhere along the line we, as consumers, have forgotten the value of our money and have come to expect our electronics and other products to become outdated from the day we purchase them and don't expect them to work as advertised.
No this is more of the same rhetoric we've been hearing for two decades now and that is disinformation at best and propaganda at worst...perpetuated by the same cabal, over and over again. We really can't blame them...they found a game plan back in 1980 that worked then and they've used the same formula year after year to keep the rest of us in place, earning merely that which they are willing to pay...while they have fought continuously to reduce all benefits to workers and quality of products they sell to the public. As an example look at the technological advances that have been made over the past thirty or so years. Wow have we come a long way or what?
All of the issues and facts provided in this post are related, interwoven and done at the hands of a central core of individuals in the U.S. The criminal laws enacted, the pursuit of tax breaks for corporations, the disinformation, fear and other tactics used all originate within one small segment of our society and we know who they are. We know now that Charles and David Koch and similar billionaires have been the ones funding all of the conservative efforts I've written about above. They push for tax codes that make us pay their way, reduced wages, outsourcing of jobs, using prison labor to manufacture their products, laws to keep the most in prison for the longest time possible, available as a work force. They work in conjunction with the financial conglomerates to keep loans unavailable to normal folks, wanting instead to only loan money to the richest and most stable companies in their particular markets. They push for foreclosure of our homes, repossession of our vehicles and if/when we can't pay their exorbitant interest rates because they've taken our jobs...they push for new laws allowing for reimplementing debtor's prisons.
Simplistic explanations of how this all works in conjunction, can best be shown this way:
Koch Industries + Conservatives + ALEC + 2400 conservative state lawmakers = legislation favorable to Koch and Conservatives = pursuit of cutting entitlements (social security, Medicare, Medicaid, etc.) - less taxes for Koch and other corporations = more contributions from the middle class.
Koch Industries = membership and funding of ALEC = proposed legislation beneficial to corporations and Koch = handed to 2,400 conservative state lawmakers and taken back to their respective assemblies as proposed laws = campaign contributions from Koch and similar members to other non-conservative, non-ALEC member lawmakers to ensure passage.
Koch and Alec interests + American Heritage Foundation, Reason Foundation, American's for Prosperity (and dozens more, too numerous to mention) = advertising campaigns nationwide to promote those interests = fees paid to lobbyists to sway lawmakers to pass legislation benefiting that legislation.
Koch, ALEC, CCA and Geo Group + harsher criminal penalties = longer sentences + larger prison workforce = more manufacturing in prison industries - less private sector jobs + depressed wages = higher corporate profits.
Koch, Alec, CCA and Geo Group + prison privatization to profit from imprisonment = increased prison industry acquisitions and inmate control = immigration efforts such as SB 1070 = profits to CCA and Geo from contracts to house those detainees = profits to all concerned from our tax dollars.
Koch, Rupert Murdoch, ALEC + large media market share = mergers and acquisitions of broadcasting and media outlets = limitation of facts relating to opposition to the positions of Koch, Murdoch and ALEC = less availability of opposing views to the public = more control of information to the public and ability to keep their views before the largest possible segments of our society.
Koch, ALEC, Reason Foundation, Heritage Foundation + funding of Tea Party and Conservative campaigns = advance the issues beneficial to them + legislation to reduce wages and eliminate collective bargaining = more profits to Koch, ALEC and other corporations belonging to ALEC = more profits = more influence over political candidates and elections.
All of this represents a return to the elite corporations and individuals such as Charles and David Koch. I'm sure they would have you believe that it simply does not work this way, but after years of research and an analysis that eliminates every other conclusion possible, I assert this is exactly what has been going on and why we're today faced with the financial and political mess we're in. It is profit and influence driven by a corporate desire to replace democracy with a form of corporatocracy - corporatism, whatever term you use.
In conclusion let me provide this from Sinclair Lewis:
"When facism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.”
and:
"The concept of corporatocracy is that corporations, to a significant extent "own" or have massive power over governments, including those governments nominally elected by the people, and that they exercise such power not by back-room conspiracies but by their enormous, concentrated economic power, and by legal in-the-open mechanisms (lobbyists, campaign contributions to office holders and candidates, threats to leave the state or country for another with less oversight and more subsidies etc).
If nothing else, the Conservatives always use patriotic slogans, words and images in every piece of advertising, the names of their "Foundations", groups or PAC's. They all carry our American flag to their rallies, claiming they have a right to the flag and those who oppose them do not. We're told over and over that if we object to their ideas and programs, we are Un-American, lack patriotism.
You know what I say? Its all corporate and conservative bullshit. More of the same from the same for the same goal - control and money from that control
I say a partial solution - though again, rather simplistic - is this: all of us need to take our retirement, savings, 401(k)'s out of the big banks, investment firms and the like. We need to put that money in local, community owned credit unions, community banks and community financial investing companies. Take it all out of the hands of the rank and file that bankrupted us and took our children's money for their bailout. Put it in places where small local banks and credit unions can put that money to work in the communities, small business loans, home loans, secured loans, etc. to grow our economy at the community level. Lets deny our hard earned nest eggs to the speculators who are driving our food and gas prices over the top and put it where it will do the most good in our neighborhoods. Doing this we can change the way business is done on wall street, deny billions in investment dollars to the likes of Fidelity, Vanguard and other firms making huge income off of investing our money with their buddies. Hit these corporate bastards in the wallets and let them know if they want our purchases as consumers, or our trust of their handling of our money, they must earn that trust. Lastly, I suggest a push to support and fund Public Broadcasting. We all are aware they have gone after PBS and NPR funding due to both exposing the manipulations of the larger media by the likes of the Kochdealers passing as responsible company owners. Let's reward the truth rather than allow the untruthful to profit for telling us lies.
'Course that's just my opinion - but I'm no longer easily swayed by Koch's conservative propaganda.