The picture above is from the 1930's courtesy of the Library of Congress. Then, as now, it is no freak of nature that the people in line are of color while the icon of the American family is white. Unemployment among minorities has always been more prevalent and persistent. Initial unemployment claims increased by 12,000 from last week reversing an improvement in the number of jobless:
The claim of the world's highest standard of living on the propaganda billboard no longer has a grain of truth in it. A recent
national magazine rated America eleventh in quality of life among nations. Finland was rated first, Switzerland second, Sweden third, and Australia surprisingly fourth. One of the reasons for the declining living standard is the post-world war rate of inflation increase:
The chart shows the most rapid increase in the CPI occurred after the dollar was decoupled from the gold standard, effectively devaluing the currency. Caught between declining real income and a shift of living wage jobs overseas to cheaper labor markets, the white American middle class may end up in line too. If that happens, heaven help the Current Occupant.
The ignoramuses on the other side of America's political divide will tell you the fuel needed to power the nation out of economic stagnation is "cut taxes". Allow the great intergalactic ship of private enterprise to go to warp speed thereby creating more jobs and more wealth is their Hollywoodesque rationale. But these scenario pitchmen will not tell you corporate America and it's wealthy bosses already pay less in taxes than ordinary individuals, as this pie chart shows:
US corporations paid only 6.5% of taxes (red) collected by Uncle Samuel while individual income taxes accounted for 47% of revenue (blue)! The plutocrats are spending as never before to keep the pie sliced the way they like it. Thanks to the conservative activists on the Supreme Court who gave us
Citizens United v. FEC, the US Chamber of Commerce has increased its spending for the upcoming congressional election from $38m in 2008 to a projected $75m or more. This huge amount of money will be focused on 10 Senate races and about 40 races in the House. One report circulating among Democratic legislators says 15 conservative groups have budgeted $300m to spend on the campaigns. Rather than talking about
allowing the Charlatan's tax cuts for the rich to lapse, we should be talking about taking the annual income cap of $160,000 off Social Security contributions (green), thus eliminating the problem of the program's fiscal soundness for the foreseeable future. Now that is class war
US Person can endorse!
