Wednesday, July 25, 2012

This is not "class warfare"

Asking that those who spend more on private jets and catering than they do on taxes to pay more in taxes is not "class warfare". Demanding a fair wage from a company that posts profits quarter after quarter, yet balks at giving their workers any kind of raise, that's not fucking "class warfare".

So, what is "class warfare"? I'll tell you what it is. The real class warfare is billionaires shoveling unlimited dollars into political campaigns without disclosure. It is media outlets taking in billions in advertising from companies like Boeing, Northrup Grumann, BP and other heavy hitters to continue their siphoning of tax dollars for military contracts and subsidies. It is the constant cacophony of talk radio bigots persuading long haul truck drivers, overnight security guards and retirees that labor unions, immigrants and liberals are to blame for all of their problems, not the 1% or the constant race to the bottom for cheaper goods and labor.

Listen sometime, if you can bear it, to rightwing talk radio from time to time. Step outside your comfortable Twitter and Facebook feeds from Moveon.org, thinkprogress.com, or the left's version of Glenn Beck, addictinginfo.org. Listen to the pompous windbag Limbaugh, Mark Levine, Michael Savage and really pay attention to what they're selling, figuratively and literally. The advertisements are for testosterone replacement drugs, survivalist gear, gold investments and hair loss therapies. Who is this target audience? Think about it. What are they selling? Fear, ego, and greed.

Convincing people to vote against their own interests, then getting them to believe that someone other than their corrupt representative is to blame, that is classwarfare. Getting people to give up their rights to a safe workplace and and an honest wage, that is class warfare. Tricking people into thinking that if they just vote for one more tax cut for folks who make more in a month than they will in a lifetime, that the manufacturing job they lost 10 years ago will come back, that is fucking class warfare.

Look, I will never, ever begrudge someone who made their millions honestly what they've lawfully earned. If you've worked all of your life to create a product that people want, without pulling strings to eliminate your competition, without getting a politician to earmark you some subsidies or a bailout when you tank, then good for you. You deserve to have your millions and there's very few people who think your lifetime's hard work should be taken away from you in the name of the fictional "wealth redistribution", despite what the pundits at Fox News will tell you repeatedly.

However, don't forget that every business uses our infrastructure, our roads, our highways and workers, all financed at some point or another by our tax dollars. You didn't get here solely on your own, especially if your money was handed to you by the work of your ancestors. So when it comes time to pay your taxes, which by the way, just happen to be the lowest since the institution of income taxes, stop bitching about "Taxed Enough Already" and pay your damn share already.

17 comments:

  1. Brilliant! Love that Mitt Romney is actually one of your Adsense ads. Irony at its finest!!!Great write and read. www.frompradatopayless.blogspot.com

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  2. Great post! Last week I emailed both my senators as well as my representative in the house telling them that the vote against the Disclose bill represented much of why I am disillusionment with Congress. One, they don't want sources of campaign contributions disclosed. They want the money to keep coming into elected officials' pockets with no accountability - a great recipe for corruption. Two, the constant use of the filibuster in the senate removes all possibility for a simple majority to get anything passed. AND, it removes any opportunity for honest discussion and debate. I also told all three of them that statesmanship seems to be a thing of the past.

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  3. Listen sometime, if you can bear it, to rightwing talk radio from time to time.

    I know it ain't cool to use the word "fascist" but I do listen to right-wing talk radio and what is said on those shows would make Hitler very happy. Lies and twist half-truths all for the purpose to make small minded people scared and ready to strike out at scapegoats.

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    1. Talk radio makes me think that Zombies would be easier to eradicate.

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    2. LOL!!!!

      Although, after talking with Limbaugh fans I believe zombies are smarter.

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    3. Beach Bum, I wish you were wrong, but you're right! Just two minutes of Fox's slavering drivel was enough to make me wonder whether the fabled Zombie Apocalypse might have actually happened...only the real walking dead have no use for brains--instead, they're into accessorizing with teabags and waving signs

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  4. Good Lord--how is it that I've only just found you!! Here now, and sharing.


    Thanks~

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  5. Great post. Wish I could fit it on a bumper sticker for those with short attention spans!

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  6. When it comes to telling it like it is.....you have done it, my friend! Keep up the good work and words. Putting the way a collective conscious feels is tough, you make it simple. Thank you!

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  7. If the people ever figure out that American style capitalism doesn't work the 1% will be fucked. Our system depends upon corporations having access to free resources and slave labor. When we got irate about our air and water being fouled the resources stopped being free and the corporations went global shopping for them. When the workers in the east and north unionized to demand humane conditions and wages the corporations went south. Then as southerners wised up a bit they began importing labor from third world countries. Eventually they just abandoned American labor and went global shopping again. Those that must find local labor make sure that the taxpayers are footing the difference in safety net costs, even as they scream "socialism" at every opportunity, causing the opposition to champion their labor savings. Does anyone really think the CEO of Wal Mart wants food stamps or HUD ended?

    The simple truth is that most of the world has been practicing "FEUDALISM" practically since the beginning of commerce and trade. There is no other apt description for a system that steals resources that rightfully belong to the people and then make them beg for the "opportunity" to add value to those resources (jobs). Then to add insult to injury, they sell back the value added resources at extreme profit, even charging interest on the purchases whenever possible. Look at the drive to source oil and gas from public land. Do you believe that all oil and gas is depleted under private property? Politicians are cheaper than royalties.

    The 1% is perfectly willing to give you whatever prosperity you are willing to finance with your grandchildren's future. They are claiming everything else. The system isn't broken. It was designed this way.

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  8. "Convincing people to vote against their own interests, then getting them to believe that someone other than their corrupt representative is to blame ..."

    Lewis Black rightfully calls this "leadership"

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  9. Beautiful post, you have a new fan.

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  10. EXAMPLE:
    One of the recent issues of American Rifleman (which I read at my father-in-law's house) featured a front-page scare story urging the purchase of $20 "NRA Challenge Coins" to help keep Obama from taking away your guns.
    The idea was that, you send them $20, they send you a coin with Wayne LaPierre's name on it that imitates the "Challenge Coins" popular among servicemembers & veterans, and then the NRA uses your money to elect Romney.
    This is silly on two levels.
    Romney is more anti-gun than Obama; he signed an assault weapons ban in Massachusetts, versus Obama whose only move on guns has been to allow them into federal parks.
    But more importantly: your $20 means nothing in the face of Sheldon Adelson's hundreds of millions. Your money will not swing a single vote; it will almsot certainly go to purchase another suit for LaPierre to wear as he calls for more money to protect you from the jackbooted thugs, except for a fraction that will be spent on more ads to solicit more money.

    P.T.Barnum could take lessons from these guys.

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  11. I have seen my own kind, Christians, attach sort of a only real Christians vote against ALL Liberal ideas/attitudes. To the point where it has been insinuated by some that I must not be a follower of Christ since I ache for Universal Healthcare coverage. I have seen the wool pulled over the eyes of the American people...to believe it's Christian and holy to corruptly let the 1% take huge honking tax breaks and bleed the middle-class dry. To let corporations use slave labor from 3rd world countries, to let our land get polluted and soiled from huge animal farms that REFUSE to follow the law. I feel like I've step outside my comfort zone and I just can't go back, no matter how much I try. Damn Morpheus and his red pill to me.

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  12. Excellent points. The other night over dinner, I felt the need to keep my trap shut when my sister-in-law stated she wouldn't be voting for Obama again. Everybody at the table (nine) besides me were conservatives. There's a lot of Obama bashing happening down here in Texas. I'm glad there are other people out there like me who still believe in the guy.

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  13. Well done, but you are never going to convince the masses who, frothing at the mouth, demand that Obama is a socialist hell-bent on destroying the liberties and freedoms of America. They bought into the delusion, swallowing it hook, line and sinker. The only recourse now is to put them out of our misery.

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