Saturday, March 22, 2008
Corporate welfare is one of our biggest problems...
Here's a clip from an excellent interview of David Cay Johnston by Bill Moyer on the current state of "corporate welfare" in the United States:
Johnston is a reporter for the New York Times (though he won't be there much longer) and Pullitzer Prize winner "for his penetrating and enterprising reporting that exposed loopholes and inequities in the U.S. tax code, which was instrumental in bringing about reforms."
In the interview above, you get a glimpse at how professional sports as a whole make their profits entirely off of government subsidies, how George W. Bush (a man who gloats about his tax cuts) actually made his money off of the people by raising taxes, how corporations like Wal-Mart and Cabellas get major tax breaks and subsidies from the government, and finally, how in the midst of all of this, the rich are getting richer and the poor poorer. Plus, this isn't just a problem with Republicans either -- sadly, most Democrats have gone corporate as well.
See the full interview and transcript here.
Many of Johnston's points are more fully documented in his two popular books, Perfectly Legal: The Covert Campaign to Rig Our Tax System to Benefit the Super-Rich--and Cheat Everybody Else (2003) and Free Lunch: How the Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves at Government Expense and Stick You With The Bill (2007).
Much of the information is available online as well, if you know where to look, and I'll do my best to post on some of the resources backing up Johnston's claims in the weeks to come. For now though, if you remain unconvinced, feel free to just express your outrage at the possibility that what he says is indeed true.
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9 comments:
did you see this ? ouch!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8BfNqhV5hg4
Yep, I've seen it.
So she made an "honest mistake", just like Barrack Obama has made mistakes about his own past from time to time. ;-)
As Barack puts it in the new intro to his book, there is always "the temptation to color events in ways favorable to the writer ... [and] selective lapses of memory." And he adds, "I can't say that I've avoided all, or any, of these hazards successfully."
Here's another good relevant post, surprisingly from the Obama central site, Daily Kos. And for what it's worth, while there certainly wasn't sniper fire, her trip still wasn't some cushy photo-op tour.
The bottom line, however, is that while this embellishment is bad, I don't see how it destroys her claims of experience. She's already vindicated herself against the attacks from the Obama campaign concerning her past experience.
And ultimately, where does all of this leave us? Still having to acknowledge that Clinton has far more experience at an international level than Obama does. All Barack has to go on are his early childhood and his (in)experience as chair of the Subcommittee on European Affairs.
In my opinion, it'd be wise for the Obama campaign to push questions on experience as little as possible. They will only hurt them in the long run.
Oh' c'mon, honest mistake?!
You've already jumped to saying, "Well, Obama does it too" as a defense. I'm not defending Obama, nor voting for him.
Just objectively, as an independent person, I think it's pretty bad. It's not an honest mistake. It's like saying, "I remember going to lunch in high school and a shooter barged in the door and open fired" instead of perhaps more accurately saying, "I remember eating french fries and sleeping in study hall."
But, for a Clinton, its all too typical.
Yes, I pointed out Obama has done the same thing, but I didn't strongly criticize him for it either, just as I'm not going to strongly criticize Clinton.
And by "strongly criticize", I mean taking this new information as a serious reason to question Hillary's credibility. There are other far more serious issues that can be raised about her than this, just as there are far more serious issues that can be raised about Obama than pointing out the numerous factual errors in his memoirs.
And I did say this embellishment was bad, but I also think it could very well have been a honest conflation of different events. That being said, I'm glad the lie/error was caught and that the Clinton campaign has admitted she was wrong.
But did you look at the links to old newspaper reports that say there were risks in the trip and that "Clinton became the first presidential spouse since Eleanor Roosevelt to make such an extensive trip into what can be considered a hostile area"?
Additionally, the Washington Post blogger that was the first to break this story big (after getting it from a Republican blogger), has already received these two interesting responses:
(1) Lissa Muscatine, who served as Hilary Clinton's chief speechwriter in 1996 and accompanied her on the Bosnia trip, feels that I have failed to provide a full picture of what took place. She gave me her "vivid recollections" of the arrival in Tuzla, which I quote below:
"I was on the plane with then First Lady Hillary Clinton for the trip from Germany into Bosnia in 1996. We were put on a C17 -- a plane capable of steep ascents and descents -- precisely because we were flying into what was considered a combat zone. We were issued flak jackets for the final leg because of possible sniper fire near Tuzla. As an additional precaution, the First Lady and Chelsea were moved to the armored cockpit for the descent into Tuzla. We were told that a welcoming ceremony on the tarmac might be canceled because of sniper fire in the hills surrounding the air strip. From Tuzla, Hillary flew to two outposts in Bosnia with gunships escorting her helicopter."
(2) Gen. Nash says that I misquoted him in saying he was unaware of any "security threat" to the First Lady. While he was unaware of any "sniper threat," he now tells me there were a couple of "security concerns" that day, which he found out about after returning to his headquarters after greeting Clinton at the airport. There was a "non-specific report" of a possible truck bomb in the area. The military also had information that "some of the communications associated with the First Lady's visit were being monitored."
"In both cases, we took appropriate security action," said Nash, adding that Clinton's visit was not disrupted.
Why is it not possible to think she conflated things? I don't know about you, but to me, intentionally lying about "sniper fire" seems a bit of an extreme move for a politician like Hillary Clinton to make (though I certainly won't throw it out as a possibility). On the other hand, for her to have mistakenly thrown that detail in (a rumor she may have heard while waiting on the plane), as well as mixed the primary filmed landing in Tuzla with later landings in military zones, seems much more plausible in my opinion.
But I'll be the first to admit I've been supporting Hillary in the primaries, so perhaps I'm not seeing something bigger.
Yes, all good points. And I guess I wouldn't necessarily say it was malicious, like she was lying--just typical, a little ego-driven, as if that's probably how she really does remember it.
But...regardless of what we say, it IS really bad for her, and she will have a hard time explaining it away.
No, not overtly relevant in the big picture, but it does stick out as a "what the f!@#" moment, wouldn't you say?
I'm totally with you now on your most recent comments.
And I'd just add, slightly modifying something you said earlier, that "for a politician, it is all too typical."
(And I don't mean this as a way of excusing the Clintons for their actions.)
Actually, I should clarify: I think this is definitely bad for her campaign, but probably more so in the eyes of the MSM than anybody else. I'll honestly be surprised if it has much of an effect on the actual voters (that is turning supporters or even undecideds away from her). And I certainly don't think it will be as damaging as the Wright controversy has been for Obama.
I should also say that I am enjoying your blog. Though you have an endless amount of resources, just keep putting out the most interesting ones...
Thanks!
Sometimes I feel bad just putting up videos and links all of the time, and I really do want to start writing more on here again, but I just don't have the time or energy for it right now.
So it's good to hear that what little I have to offer right now is appreciated.
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