Posted on 05/18/2014 7:24:54 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Many Americans really have no comprehension of the importance of basic physical and organizational structures and facilities such as buildings, roads, and power supplies needed for the operation of an advanced society or enterprise. A great number of Americans mesmerized by Republicans’ anti-tax agenda may get exercised and complain when their power goes out or their teeth are shaken loose driving over pothole-ridden roads, but they are most likely the first to vehemently oppose any tax increase to repair America’s crumbling infrastructure. Apparently, Republicans and their supporters are proud that America’s infrastructure compares unfavorably with most advanced and even some developing nations because in their minds spreading the South’s third world status to the entire nation is a worthy goal.
Last year, the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Report for 2012-2013 exposed America’s quality and availability of roads, railroads, ports, air transport, electricity, and telephones ranks 25th, behind nations such as Oman and Barbados, and only one spot ahead of Qatar. On Tuesday, the Obama Administration warned that failure to head off bankruptcy of the federal Highway Trust Fund (HTF) before summer will mean delaying over 112,000 roadway and 5,600 transit projects and cost the economy over 700,000 construction jobs within a year. No doubt bankrupting the highway fund, keeping over a hundred-thousand roads in disrepair, and killing nearly three-quarters-of-a-million jobs is appealing to Republicans who have no intent in funding infrastructure improvements.
The highway trust fund is the main funding source for state road and highway projects, and most of them will cease if it runs out of money that is looking likely because the federal gas tax which funds the HTF has not been raised in twenty years (1994). Currently, federal gas tax is 18.4 cents per gallon, but if it kept pace with inflation it would be about 26 cents per gallon and if it were indexed to increasing gas prices, it would be about 35.4 cents. The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) warned that to keep Highway Trust Fund solvent, Congress will either have to raise the gas tax by 10 to 15 cents per gallon or find between $13 billion and $18 billion a year from other sources and knowing Republicans it will come out of social safety nets. President Obama has proposed infrastructure spending in the past, and once again proposed a $150 billion four-year plan to replenish the Highway Trust Fund, but Republicans refuse to fund anything the President requests.
One solution from the President is allowing states to charge a toll on Interstate highways as a last resort, but Republicans are as likely to go along with that idea as they are raising the gas tax or approving the President’s infrastructure spending plan. On Thursday, a bipartisan group of Senators approved a bill to keep funding at current levels, but as was revealed this past week, Senate Republicans are enamored with obstructing bipartisan plans they support unless they can add an amendment or two forcing the President to approve the KeystoneXL pipeline or eliminating some clean energy standards for the Koch brothers; there is little to no chance the funding bill will pass the Senate. Even if Senate Republicans go along with the bipartisan funding proposal, House Republicans will not support anything the President proposes.
America’s infrastructure already rates a grade of “D” according to the Society of Civil Engineers, and the nation would need to spend $3.6 trillion within 6 years just to upgrade the nation’s bridges, roads, and waterways to keep pace, and be competitive, with the rest of the developed world. According to Standard & Poors, there are long term as well as immediate benefits to the economy by investing as little as $1.3 billion over the next year including adding at least 29,000 jobs, boosting economic growth by $2 billion, reduce the deficit by at least $200 million, and many more benefits over the long term. However, Republicans are not going to invest in infrastructure because they already cut federal spending on infrastructure by $60 billion that is at World War II levels.
To get an idea of the typical Republican opposition to spending even a penny on improving infrastructure when they can give the money to the rich and corporations, a good example is the proposed California High Speed Rail project. The project will be the greatest Earth-moving project in California history, create millions of construction and related jobs immediately and long into the future, improve air quality, and save California motorists fuel costs. The California Republican who is chairman of the House subcommittee on Railroads, Pipelines and Hazardous Materials said he has no intention of expediting federal funding for the project that will benefit his constituents or the state’s economy. He told supporters last fall he will continue blocking federal funding for the project because he claims the money is better spent on the rich because they “know how to create jobs.” The congressman, Jeff Denham, is firmly ensconced in the pocket of the Koch brothers and the oil industry and they will not allow any project to even start that creates millions of jobs, improves air quality, or reduces fuel usage.
Keeping the Highway Trust Fund out of money, and America’s infrastructure at levels below every developed country on Earth, really serves a variety of Republican goals. Whether it is killing 700,000 jobs, keeping America from competing with the rest of the world, retarding economic growth, or just letting the nation fall farther into disrepair, they have no incentive to fund infrastructure improvements. About four months ago a conservative economist Republicans revere argued that President Obama should propose, and Congress should immediately approve at least $1.3 trillion in infrastructure improvements to strengthen the economy, create millions of jobs, and bring the nation closer to some developing countries’infrastructure. Needless to say, the conservative economist is no longer held in any esteem by Republicans.
President Obama warned that not adequately funding the Highway Trust Fund will bankrupt it, and it was probably succor to Republicans who have tried desperately to bankrupt the federal government and sell it off to the highest bidders. There is no telling how far Republicans will deliberately let this country slide into third world status to prove their racial hatred for this President, but if the Republican former Confederacy is any indication, they will not stop until America ranks below Yemen and Afghanistan’s infrastructure where bridges are non-existent and dirt roads are the norm.
Stupid. But if my taxes actually went only to those things, I would be OK with that. Fix my roads, fund an army, and that’s about all.
Thee is so much wrong with this venom filled hate piece. He obviously - and conveniently - omits the trillion dollars spent on “infrastructure” by his idol. He neglects to tell us that Elmer Fudd hasn’t submitted a budget that Congress won’t laugh at in six years. And how does a Republican become chairman of a committee in a RAT controlled CA government?
The strangest thing about PA is that they are really good at putting up orange barrels. I80 and I70 will often be cut down to single lane traffic for 20 miles or so, with no sign of any road work occurring. The barrels will stay there for weeks or months for reasons unknown.
More like the rest of the country’s going Third World as smart business people move their firms to the South. Oh, and the high-speed rail projects I’ve heard about here in California (Central Valley and Las Vegas are both chunks of poo, and frightfully expensive ones at that.
Why post the rantings of the criminally insane?
Liberal points of view can be determined in the first sentence or two, if not the first few words. In this case, he had to get into the second sentence: "...Many Americans really have no comprehension of the importance of basic physical and organizational structures and facilities such as buildings, roads, and power supplies needed for the operation of an advanced society or enterprise. A great number of Americans mesmerized by Republicans’ anti-tax agenda...
Because many people are against taxes being spent on health care and education for illegals, taxes to fund abortion, taxes to help middle easterners build mosques, taxes to fund the EPA and DOE, taxes spent to prop up unions, taxes on grants for idiotic purposes such as determining the sexual habits of the spotted morgwort and hundreds, if not thousands of equally offensive examples of spending money we don't have, that makes us "mesmerized" by a bunch of charlatans practicing ideological sleight of hand.
Most conservatives are not against ALL taxes. They simply believe that taxation has wildly spiraled out of control and is destroying our industry, our economies and our lifestyle. Many of us believe in taxes to pay for our water and sewage treatment, fixing roads, etc.
But many of us also believe the federal highway funds are a source of tax money that are used to force states to buckle to the federal will.
Don't want to pass (insert an unpalatable liberal piece of law here) legislation in your state? The Federal government says "That's fine if you don't want to pass it. You are a state, and we in the Federal government cannot force you to. However, we hold the purse strings to the Highway Funds that are disbursed to each state by the federal government. If you don't pass this legislation that we want you to, we will withhold 10% of your highway funds. We therefore do not impinge on your right as a state to pass legislation as you see fit (NOTE: THIS PROCESS OFTEN INVOLVES LEGISLATION THAT HAS ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH HIGHWAYS OR TRANSPORTATION, BUT MAY DEAL WITH EDUCATION, WELFARE, ETC) and so, you maintain free choice in your state legislation."
So, there is state independence, and then there is state independence. And you get liberals like this POS who wrote the article talking about how it is the evil republicans responsible for our drop in the worldwide condition of our infrastructure. Kind of the equivalent of "Do it for the children".
PING!
(This is a description of a small foray into what exactly some of those trillions of dollars were used for...)
And it illustrates why so many people are against uninhibited taxation. *********************************************************************************************************
I can't tell you how angry I was when I tried to find out how many dollars from the "American Recovery and Reinvestment Act" were used to build a state of the art visitor center on the grounds of a national park near me.
Sudbury, Massachusetts is near where I live, it is one of the wealthiest communities in the state, and is located some twenty miles due west of Boston. In Sudbury, there was an old, abandoned Army base that had been closed up for years, and sometime in the last ten years or so, it was opened to the public to be able to walk through. It was great.
Not many people knew about it or knew it was open, and one could walk on dilapidated old crumbling roads through the woods, punctuated by an occasional boarded up decaying building. Most interestingly, there are a series of huge concrete munitions bunkers with evidence of railroad (possibly small gage) that serviced the bunkers, and on a few of them, you could get inside to find old, empty metal desks, light fixtures in the overhead with old fashioned incandescent bulbs in them.
To anyone who has ever lived on military installations, it has that general air of decay you know you could sniff out in the remote accesses even on some large active bases. As someone who grew up as a military brat and spent many hours exploring such ignored areas, that type of thing has always had a kind of charm for me. Anyway, it was great, and always deserted. Just about two years ago, I began to see evidence of activity...backhoes, roads being paved and such. It was a real disappointment, and I stopped going there for a while. Then, last winter, my wife and I went for a wintertime snow walk there, and came across this facility:
Now, just seeing that sign makes my blood pressure go up, but as I looked over the facility, I got angrier and angrier.
There was apparently no expense spared to build this facility, everything built of the highest quality materials, I do believe there were solar electricity panels on the roof (not sure though) but it didn't look like they skimped on anything. As I looked through the windows of the closed facility, I think I even saw Herman Miller chairs in what looked like an office. Bottom line, I see this, and figure they probably spent at LEAST a million or two on this facility, probably more, and now have it staffed with a park ranger or two. All this money WE DON'T HAVE for one or two government employee FTE's. Don't get me wrong, I like parks and such. BUT YOU DON'T SPEND MONEY YOU HAVE TO BORROW TO BUILD THEM! If times are prosperous, just maybe you can do it, but when we have a debt burden of $500,000 per household in this country, it is INSANITY to spend money on this type of thing.
So I decided to try to find out just how much of the "stimulus" was spent on this boondoggle. There is a website in Massachusetts to monitor the distribution of the stimulus funds at Massachusetts Recovery Website as an an attempt to live up to the Obama administration's promise of "transparency".
On the site, you can dig around in a variety of ways to see data, one way to slice it is by project, another shows funds by zip code. Unfortunately, they make it so you cannot download all the funds for all Massachusetts zip codes, but at least you can download data for a given zip code for a given fiscal quarter. Now, I never did find out how much was spent on that facility. But what I did find out was interesting.
I downloaded the data for 01776 (oh, the IRONY at that zip code) in successive passes for each fiscal quarter and got them all into an Excel spreadsheet. Once there, I used a pivot table to slice the data in a variety of ways. The column on the left is a general category, and the categories from left to right are subcategories of that. I specified that I only wanted to see the top four, and specifically excluded the Police and Firefighter components, but since the total money awarded was $25.2 million and this table shows an expenditure of $23.13 million, that means all other expenditures for this community that I didn't show totaled just over two million dollars. So my table below shows the lion's share.
(I only showed money awarded, not money used, but gee whiz, is anyone concerned they would get awarded the money and not use it? I'm not...)
As I went through the data, I kept seeing an entry for Minuteman Nashoba Heath, and it was a large chunk twice a year. Doing a search on the Internet showed this website: Minuteman Nashoba Health Group. They describe themselves as such:
"The Minuteman Nashoba Health Group (MNHG) is a coalition of Massachusetts towns and school districts that have joined together to purchase health benefits for their employees, retirees, and their eligible dependents. Joint purchasing of health benefits gives the participating governmental employers purchasing clout to help keep costs under control. The MNHG has been operational since 1990 and has added several towns to its membership in the last several years." I don't know what the cost for healthcare is for teachers in that town, but it looks from a couple of things I have seen that teachers might contribute between 20-30% of their own money towards their premium. Bottom line, you folks down in Texas, all you Freepers in California, even you Sooners out in Oklahoma, your tax dollars are all paying for the health care of unionized Massachusetts teachers.
I am not choosing Sudbury, MA for analysis because of some perceived corruption. I don't believe it is any more or less corrupt than any other community in this country. It just happened to be the community I was looking at to find out about something else, and this fell out of it. I fully expect that if I were to do this analysis on my town (which I will do) or any other locality in this state or throughout the country, we might find similar activity. What is unspeakable in my opinion is the fact that we took hundreds of billions of dollars we didn't have, and opened the coffers for every community around the nation to dip their hands into. To me, this is the equivalent of a family that cannot meet their mortgage (or their second and third concurrent and outstanding Home Equity Loan) pay their car insurance or keep up with any of the other bills they have incurred, taking out a fourth home equity loan, withdrawing it in cash and distributing it throughout the family. "Hey everyone, I'm going to buy a new boat, Mom is going to get a sports car, you kids can take the rest of this and spend it on whatever you wish! Computers, video games, clothes, whatever you want! You don't have to tell me precisely what you are doing with it (and even if you do tell me, I'll just wink and approve!) and you won't have to pay any of it back! This is FREE MONEY, and we are going to have a great time with it!" We have heard people say the whole stimulus bill is a scam. From day one, I have believed it. We have heard many say that this stimulus was supposed to provide "shovel ready jobs" that would stimulate the economy, but from looking at the expenditures, it is clear that, in one of the single, wealthiest communities in Massachusetts, 25 million dollars of stimulus money was spent, and the vast majority of it appears to be spent not on "shovel ready jobs" (whatever the HELL that means) but instead for paying for unemployment benefits, benefits for teachers and other "unspecified" educational costs (that detail could not be teased out of the spreadsheet, since it is not broken down that way). Spending the money on unemployment benefits may or may not be the best use for that money, but I think there should have at least been a dialogue about the wisdom of using it. It might indeed be the best use of our taxpayer money, but nobody got to even discuss it. It was just used to pay for these things...AND THOSE USES WERE NOT WHAT THE "STIMULUS" WAS SOLD AS. Brain dead liberals think that pumping borrowed/printed money back into the hands of the unemployed so it can be used to pay bills actually STIMULATES an economy. (Ask Nancy Pelosi...SHE thinks it does, and has said so.) It doesn't, but people who believe in socialism think it does. And socialists are running the show now.
Many of us recognize that the stimulus was a bill of goods, being used primarily by many communities to cover shortfalls, and who could blame those communities for doing so. But the unimpeachable idiocy of declaring that this money was going to stimulate anything is apparent, and it is yet another instance of the dishonesty of the liberals (and so-called "conservatives") who not only supported this expenditure the first time around, but are now pushing for more money WE DON'T HAVE to be thrown down the rat-hole.
And I do mean "Rat-Hole".
And it is a UNION Rathole. Using MY money to pay for it.
Just look at how much money Bush and the GOP spent on infrastructure in Iraq and Afghanistan!
Haven’t you figured out that the purpose of those barrels is to advertise that Panndot is working? Somewhere. And they will eventually get to it. Someday.
The unspoken words about “road repairs”:
Unions.
‘Family’ control of materials, and their substandard requirements.
Control.
Well, hey — we’re still six slots above Slovenia!
This is a very common argument amongst the sheeperal leftists.
When you express opposition to big government and distribution, they always bring up “roads, buildings, police, and fire departments” as examples of why we should have to pay confiscatory tax rates.
It’s so easy to counter, if you’re in a venue where you can speak back -
OK, let’s keep the roads, buildings, bridges, police and fire departments and stop giving money to people who don’t work, how about that?
I didn't excerpt it, the whole thing is here at FR. And for your viewing pleasure, here are all the comments so far:
frances
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 2:58 pm
How dare the American people put our great country in 25 place in ;this world. we who have been the front runner in every war, catastrophe, crisis, given of our money, our young mens lives, SHAME,SHAME,SHAME. Either stand up for your country or get the hell out and go to a country where you have no freedoms. Any politician who does not want to better our country for our people, and insists on bucking our gov. every step of the way, needs to be brought down as seditious. VOTE now and lets quit fiddling around with these people.i am an American- what are you?
I Agree(30)No Way(1).
Luke
Mon, May 19th, 2014 at 3:41 am
Why would anyone try to say that the Kochs (oil business people) want to oppose road construction? That would increase driving (which uses gasoline, diesel, and oil lubricants), not to mention asphalt used to build and repair roads comes from petroleum.
Anyway, if we just used half the money that went to bail out the banks, plus Social Security, SNAP, food stamps, affirmative action, foreign aid, environmental/logging lawsuits, etc., there'd be plenty of money to fix roads, bridges, sewer lines, etc.
I Agree(1)No Way(5).
Astorix
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 3:41 pm
Thank Ronald Reagan for the start of this decline. The shining city on a hill is now brown with rust.
I Agree(33)No Way(3).
nordangb
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 4:44 pm
When will we, as the American people start working together to get this country into todays' world. The jackasses that are bringing us down apparently do not give a sh#t what it will cost to repair the infrastructure they are letting decline now. Every thing will collapse at one time which will cost more in the long run to refurbish. And all for the sake of keeping a few people happy, and because they do not like the man in the white house. I was under the impression that these people were elected to do as the majority of people wanted them to do. I would venture to guess that many, many campaign promises have gone by the wayside to appease their wealthy greedy masters instead of those who put them in office. I trust that they will not repeat their mistakes by voting them into office in November.
I Agree(14)No Way(1).
buckeyewill
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 5:22 pm
I live in Cleveland, OH and I see this issue come up when VP Biden came to town talking about a rapid transit stop which is expanded near one of the local universities and two of the major hospitals. Local reaction on the news site was disgusting and reactionary. The transit stop would benefit area that has a mix of working people and students.
Guess people forget Ike built the highway system.
I Agree(6)No Way(0).
knight4444
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 5:40 pm
Anyone who has read @joeb, INSANE rants knows full well what's destroying this country! it's corporate america who buys politicians on BOTH sides! what do you call BLUE DOG democrats? The koch brothers aren't anything new! this country has been corrupt long before 1776! get real. the corruption really started getting bad when the railway barons started lining the pockets of politicians. One of the goals of corporate america is to reduce the USA into third world status! where you have the top 3 or 4 % and the rest are fighting for low wage jobs! BOTH political parties know this! HELL, I assume most of you know it too! I don't think it can be fixed SORRY, YES voting is important, but thats NO guarantee either, it's just another illusion, if democracy tries to come back to america, the power brokers will rig the system! HELL, didn't we see it in 2000? didn't it almost happen in 2012? the big MONEY controls the politicians and the media and the supreme court.
I Agree(5)No Way(1).
knight4444
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 6:02 pm
BTW, try going to a article bye Cliven Thompson at the N.Y. Times and peep out the story about Diebold voting machines and how in 2000 at 10pm the voting machines servers suddenly FROZE up and after the problem was FIXED the machines turned off AGAIN a hour later,votes in OHIO were so close they to recount them! that was 2000, karl rove and the big wheels have destroyed democracy in america! just ask Al Gore what he thinks.
I Agree(10)No Way(3).
Sugapea
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 6:12 pm
Hillary should focus her campaign on Re-Building America, Let's make US strong again!
Look at the historical Tax Rate Chart, note the years the wealthy were paying higher rates. Years when we could afford highways, bridges and schools.
http://s158.photobucket.com/user/OnlyObvious/media/Tax_Rates/TopTaxBracket_TaxRate.jpg.html
I Agree(6)No Way(2).
bobloblaw
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 10:37 pm
You chart shows tax rates, not how much was paid.
I Agree(1)No Way(1).
Shiva
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 6:26 pm
Start screaming We are #1.
The gop has no intentions of fixing this stuff. It doesnt benefit the 1%
I Agree(5)No Way(2).
Peter J. Kraus
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 7:50 pm
Nothing will be done as long as politicians can be bribed by industry and banking. Call out "political funding" for what it is -- bribery. Let the government fund elections, make the broadcast media, who don´t pay a penny to use the people´s airwaves, run a set amount of free political ads, put people who give or take any kind of bribe in jail and see what happens.
We have lost any semblance of democracy we had. Democracy American style is simply a matter of the richest winning.
I Agree(7)No Way(0).
bobloblaw
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 10:36 pm
Third world?? Must be talking about Detroit, Cleveland, Newark, Los Angeles, Chicago.
The left is terrified of the south. Terrified of it growing population, growing jobs base and growing electoral strength.
I Agree(2)No Way(4).
Shiva
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 10:51 pm
No, many more of the left live in the south. Many of the people are done with the actions of the gop governors and state congresses.
The job rush is over. The people are finding out all they get is low paid jobs
I Agree(3)No Way(1).
Shiva
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 10:53 pm
BTW, almost all major cities have problems. The jobs that have left them are crucial to survival. Kansas and Wisconsin are in bad shape. Almost all "left" state out perform the red states.
I Agree(4)No Way(1).
Harry Lime
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 10:57 pm
Many of those (Korea, Switzerland, Singapore, Hong Kong) are tiny or city-states. Easy to have great infrastructure in such a small area. We are a huge country. And why are the PRC and Taiwan lumped together?
I Agree(1)No Way(0).
Mark C. Finley
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 11:09 pm
What happened to all those hundreds of Billions of dollars from the 2009 stimulus plan the was suppose to go to "shovel ready" infrastructure works? How can we be in 25th place now after that? Were did that money go?
I Agree(0)No Way(0).
Shiva
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 11:18 pm
Ask the states. The money was sent to them. However the 2009 stimulus was far too small to fix all these problems. The money went to a lot of different issues.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Recovery_and_Reinvestment_Act_of_2009
I Agree(1)No Way(2).
Chris Nelson
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 11:27 pm
What the hell is No. 27 "Taiwan, China", and why is a PRC flag being used?? Way to insult the good folk of Taiwan...
I Agree(0)No Way(0).
john
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 11:42 pm
I'm 62 I came to the states in 1957 when I was 5. Every 3=4 years I have gone back and visited my family in Sweden and I've traveled around Europe 3-4 times also. It used to be when I went over there, they all envied me and the USA. Now when I go there I envy them. They are a head of us in most things now. Its a shame.
I Agree(3)No Way(0).
hinckleybuzzard
Sun, May 18th, 2014 at 11:44 pm
Infrastructure. Republicans and democrats alike voted 850 billion dollars to fix "infrastructure" in 2009. Nothing happened. Where did the money go? Why did the president laugh later about his lying about "shovel ready" jobs?
Why is it that the infrastructure is suffering more in democrat ruled cities than anywhere else? Why doesn't the democrat mayor fix your potholes instead of the democrat einsteins wanting to build 40 mph "high speed rails" to nowhere?
Blaming republicans is cheap and easy, when the major decisions were made by a democrat Congress and a democrat president. But then, they don't call liberalism "the politics of denial" for nothing.
I Agree(1)No Way(4).
Shiva
Mon, May 19th, 2014 at 12:02 am
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Recovery_and_Reinvestment_Act_of_2009
But then again you jump to silly assumptions. That money went to the states. And the money was for far more then infrastructure. Obviously thread reading is beyond you. Ask the governors
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Recovery_and_Reinvestment_Act_of_2009
I Agree(1)No Way(0).
Bostonbob
Mon, May 19th, 2014 at 9:41 am
It certainly looks like the federal government spent all it took in and then some. It is not a tax issue, it is a spending issue and the D's and R's are both complicit.
Bob.
2013 - $901 billion budget deficit (projected)
2012 - $1.1 trillion budget deficit
2011 - $1.3 trillion budget deficit
2010 - $1.3 trillion budget deficit
2009 - $1.4 trillion budget deficit
2008 - $455 billion budget deficit
I Agree(0)No Way(0).
novenator
Mon, May 19th, 2014 at 9:53 am
You can really look at almost any standard to find that conservative Republican economic and social policy in the American South is guilty for the mass creation of poverty, suffering, and death. Now they want to impose that misery on the rest of America for corporate profits.
Economic Opportunity Is Lowest In the Republican Bible Belt, Major Study Finds
Class-rigidity is most extreme in the South, according to leading Harvard and Berkeley economists.
http://www.alternet.org/economy/economic-opportunity-lowest-former-slave-states
"Economic royalists complain that we seek to overthrow the institutions of America. What they really complain of is that we seek to take away their power. Our allegiance to American institutions requires the overthrow of this kind of power. In vain they seek to hide behind the flag and the Constitution." -FDR
I gathered you included it all, and thank you for doing that. I read what you had posted, and got the measure of it.
And thank you for the comments...not that I couldn’t have predicted most of them. But it was nice to see a rational comment mixed in here and there.
Good job with posting the thread.
True, but not really the point of this article. (but you probably knew that!)
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