My Radio Debut

Top O' The Day To You All,

Saturday, July 23rd marked my radio debut. I have to say it was quite an honor to be on Ring Of Fire Radio and interviewed by Mike Pappantonio, one of my favorite Progressive champions and a man that I admire greatly. His appearances on the Ed Schultz Show during the BP oil spill were magnificent. He fills in admirably on Ed Schultz's radio show and he always takes it to the misinformation mongers on the right. By all rights, Mike could have taken the heartless, soul-less route that many attorneys have and just practiced law for the money but he didn’t. No, Mike has championed many wonderful causes and made a career out of standing up for the little guy. A true fighter for the middle and working class of this country, my hat’s off to you Pap!

We didn’t get much of a chance to discuss citizen’s media and the role that it plays in politics, but Pap did extend an open invitation to come back on the show anytime. Stay tuned for our next appearance - we’ll get to talk at length about Shred Of Truth, how it came to be and what we’re trying to accomplish with it.

I would also like to expound on some of the things we discussed during the interview as well as other thoughts bouncing around my thick skull, dying to get out!

Orrin Hatch’s La-la land pontification that poor people need to pay their fair share of taxes is a shortcut to thinking. Hatch has a history of discrimination and dumping on the less fortunate so this latest outburst is no big surprise to me. The stakes are never high enough for Republicans to put aside politics. Just when you think they can’t sink any lower, another one of these gems pops up.

Whenever I hear “tax cuts create jobs” or “We can’t raise taxes on the job creators” I want to scream! It’s the biggest myth and the cruelest joke ever played on the American people. Bill Clinton proved that. The Clinton administration was a beacon of light in the economic policy darkness of the last 30 years and should be used “liberally” pun intended, to combat the arguments of the myth tellers. We've had 10 years of these ridiculous tax cuts and we should be rolling in jobs. Uh, what happened? How many more decades will the middle and working class people of this country keep falling for this pyramid scheme while they lose their homes, jobs, cars, quality of life and on and on?

Another myth floating around that’s quite a popular sound bite is that there are 51% of households who don’t pay taxes. Teabaggers paint the picture of a bunch of poor people sitting home on their butts living off the government tip. EVERYONE wants a job right now so that’s nonsense! CBO data suggests that about 10 percent of all households pay no net federal taxes. If we start including other payroll and state taxes it’s almost zero! We know how selectively they listen to CBO data though, don’t we?

Income levels have soared for the top 2% while tax rates are now the lowest since the Eisenhower administration, which was in the 1950’s! When they were a little higher during the Clinton Administration we did stunningly well! The top 2% are the ones making all the money! They have the resources to put their money into offshore accounts and tax shelters that reduce or eliminate their tax burden. Their tax to income ratio is so low because they don’t have to pay other payroll taxes like FICA (Social Security and Medicare) on most of their income because it’s capped at around 106k. Investment and dividend income are also exempt from those taxes. Why don’t we double the cap on those taxes? We’d have a solvent social security and medicare for decades to come!

What about all the corporations that paid no taxes or received a rebate? Making billions and not paying any taxes is NOT shared sacrifice. What about that Orrin Hatch? To understand exactly what I’m talking about, read Bernie Sanders’ “A Guide To Corporate Freeloaders”. It’s very interesting indeed.

Seriously, how can anyone even engage in this debate? We have to raise revenue to solve these debt and deficit problems and it’s really basic math. Who can afford a tax increase more, someone making a million dollars a year or someone making 30/40/50k a year? Oh no, Dick Cheney might only make 32 million this year instead of 32.5 but a middle class family could lose their home. How in the hell do you justify that to ANYONE?

The corporate media is complicit in this too. They allow the same old people to spew the same old ideas decade after decade without any accountability for the results. It’s the definition of insanity and it makes me angry that it’s still treated as a credible side to the debate. It reminds me of the “two sides” of the debate on evolution and global warming. There aren’t two sides to any of those debates. This country has been under the curse of “Reaganomics” for 22 of the last 30 years and NEWS FLASH - it’s a miserable failure. The job creation, deficit, and economic results are absolutely retched. We’ve got the quantifying data and it sucks! If it was a science experiment the grant would be revoked!

Harry Truman is one of my favorite Presidents and there is a quote of his that might explain why: “I wonder how many times you have to be hit on the head before you find out who's hitting you?  It's about time that the people of America realized what the Republicans have been doing to them.” How timeless is this quote?

I think our President needs to look to his inner Harry Truman / FDR and start taking it to these guys. I’m tired of the President being the timid kid on the playground who lets the bullies run off with his lunch money.

For me anyways, there is something about Obama in these big showdowns with Republicans that always leaves me wanting more. Maybe he’s just a consummate chess player toying with bad checkers players.

If it were me in one of those closed door meetings, I’d tell the petulant brats on the right: “If you guys want to continue with the no-compromise my-way-or-the-highway doctrine, then the remainder of my time in office will be spent using the bully pulpit of the US Presidency to go on a weekly prime time media blitz making it crystal clear exactly who is responsible for the depression that your petty political games will plunge us into!” Tie them to this issue as the Progressives did in the NY-26 special election with Medicare and the Paul Ryan budget.

This whole debt ceiling argument is such a farce. It’s a crisis that has been completely fabricated by the Republicants because the teabaggers have taken the party’s collective head and stuck it up it’s ass. These guys have NO clue what they’re doing. NOT raising the debt ceiling has never been discussed or entertained before because everyone has always known what the consequences are - an economic catastrophe!

Pap Attack!It’s always been a non-event because it’s a foregone conclusion until it wasn’t anymore. Leave it to the teabaggers to make a matter-of-fact function of government into a crisis. They’re even more masterful than their predecessors at making government look so incompetent that it supports their argument that government is bad. It’s bad when THEY’RE running it.

Well, now that my rant on taxes and teabaggers is over, I’ll touch on one last thing…

How about that Rupert Murdoch dust up? Couldn’t happen to a nicer asshole! I never thought I’d live to see the day that Fox Misinforpinion Channel and Rupert Murdoch would be going down in flames but life is full of surprises, huh Rupert? Karma is a beotch!

In fitting conclusion, I’ll quote Mike Pappantonio from this week, referring to Rupert Murdoch: “When you live in a glass house and you throw rocks at your enemies for decades, you can expect a damn rock shower to come back at you!”

Classic Pap attack and...My Thoughts Exactly!

-Truthteller