State Governments

The Recklessness And Irresponsibility Of Many State Governments In The Midst Of Economic Hard Times!

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At a time when the nation is facing the worst economic conditions since the Great Depression, many state governments, particularly those governed by Republicans, are wasting their time, instead of creating job opportunities!

In reality, many states, by their policies, or lack of them, are creating MORE unemployment, and promoting division among their citizens!

Instead of dealing with real issues, many states are appealing to the emotions and prejudices of their citizens, promoting hysteria and disarray in the process!

States are busy doing the following:

1. Passing legislation to make abortion more difficult to obtain.
2. Working against gay marriage rights or civil unions.
3. Enacting legislation against “Sharia” or Muslim law, a total “red herring” exploiting fear, where there is no chance of such law becoming part of the American legal system.
4. Making English an “official” language, a strike against immigrants, both legal and illegal.
5. Cracking down on illegal immigration in ways that will have to come to the Supreme Court, as to whether they are constitutional.
6. Setting out to destroy labor union rights of public employees, who have served their states and communities loyally, but now are being made “scapegoats” for economic hard times.

So, these are hard times in the states, being made worse by the narrow mindedness and prejudices of the population, being stoked by irresponsible politicians!

The Intercollegiate Studies Institute And Civic Literacy Testing

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The Intercollegiate Studies Institute is an organization which promotes civic literacy among the American people.

In a survey done in 2008, it was discovered that the average American taking a 33 question test scored 49 percent, and more shockingly, college educators only scored 55 percent! But those in public office scored lower than the average citizen, only 44 percent!

The test deals with American history, government, and economics, and it demonstrates how poorly our citizenry is knowledgeable about its own institutions and traditions.

79 percent of those in public office did not know that an official establishment of religion is banned in the Bill of Rights! 43 percent do not know the purpose of the Electoral College! 54 percent do not know that the power to declare war resides in the Congress! 27 percent cannot name one right or freedom guaranteed in the First Amendment! And 49 percent cannot name the three branches of government!

The author of this blog is proud to announce that he got a 90.91 percent result, 30 out of 33, matching his son David, on the exam, with both of us somewhat stumped by economics questions, but fortunately, only three of them!

By the way, IF such an exam was given to Rick Santorum, who this week condemned liberals for the poor knowledge of American history in America, it seems certain he might not even score the average of 49 percent of the typical American citizen who participated in the exam in 2008 or the average of 44 percent of officeholders. And it is clear that Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin would also fail miserably. Instead of them all blaming liberals, who have promoted an expansion of the American history curriculum to cover the history of minorities, women, and labor, from just the usual white male leaders of government and great business capitalists constantly idealized by conservatives, they might finally learn the truth and complete story of American history!

An Absolute Outrage: Top 400 Families In America Own As Much as Bottom 60 Percent Of Entire American Population!

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In the midst of outrageous budget cuts in many state legislatures for education and health care and other essential needs of the American people, and with the suggestion of Congressman Paul Ryan of the House of Representatives Budget Committee that future taxes on the top incomes be lowered from 35 to 25 percent, while privatizing Medicare and Medicaid, we see the further acquisition of America’s wealth by the very super rich of our population!

The top 400 Families in America, including all relatives, owns as much total income as the bottom 60 percent of all Americans, about 200 million citizens!

America is more stratified in the past 30 years since the administration of Ronald Reagan changed tax policy to favor the wealthy, and surpasses the most stratified society before 1980, Great Britain!

Great Britain has always had an aristocracy based on heritage over a thousand years and more, but we have now managed to create a greater aristocracy based simply on greed, selfishness, and materialism than our former colonial masters!

Is this something to be proud of, that we claim to be a democracy with equal opportunity for all, and yet the truth is that such statements are a total fabrication, and that we have become a plutocracy controlled by a class that loves to perpetuate the myth that anyone can strike it rich, just to keep the masses happy in their dreaming of a reality that is not possible?

America is on the way to future civil war based on the masses eventually realizing that they have been lied to, and income levels will cause a reaction that the super wealthy will fear to see, if we do not have those most fortunate among us to start realizing their social, moral, and religious responsibility to pay a fair share of their income to better the lives of the rest of us, and make us what we claim to be but are not, a democracy of, by, and for the people!

Republican State Governments Trying To Destroy Voting Rights Of Those Likely To Vote For Democratic Party In 2012

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In thirty two states, where the legislature is majority Republican, legislation is being sponsored to destroy the voting rights of those likely to vote for the Democratic Party and its candidates in 2012.

College students have always had the right to vote where they attend college, but many states are now working to require residency of the student or their parents, or else no chance to vote in the college town.

New ID card requirements are being imposed, which African Americans, Latinos and Hispanics, and poor people in general, are less likely to possess, with their suspicion of government as great as it is already.

The move to end same day registration is another method being used to cut down the voting population.

Florida is now requiring a five year wait before former felons, who have met all requirements of their sentence, can even ask for the return of the right to vote.

The concept of the right to vote has been fought over the past two centuries, and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 was supposed to guarantee that no one would be denied that right, but conservatives are working very hard to fix the elections of the future by interfering with that basic human right!

It is not enough that corporations have no limit anymore on contributions to Republicans!

It is not enough that Republican Governors are destroying the rights of public workers by destroying collective bargaining!

It is not enough that Republicans are striking out against the interests of the poor, the sick, the elderly, the young, women, ethnic minorities, and on the issues of the environment, health care and education!

Nothing is enough, as the Republican Party works to make this nation a country dominated by the rich and the corporations FOR the rich and the corporations, and to hell with the interests of the rest of us!

The Largest Percentage Of Homeless Children Since The Great Depression And The Republican Response Nationwide: Cut Programs Which Benefit Children!

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As Sixty Minutes on CBS reports, the growing number of homeless children who are living in weekly motels or in cars is reaching an alarming level, soon to be an estimated 25 percent of children of all races and ethnicities, the greatest since the Great Depression, and in actual number an all time high!

And what is the response of Republican Governors and the Republicans in control of the House of Representatives? Cut spending on education, health care, housing, nutrition, and all other programs, while making major concessions to corporations and rich people by cutting taxes and regulations!

We are seeing the true nature of the GOP! They DO NOT CARE about the effect on children of their policies, and they DO NOT CARE about anything but gaining the financial backing of the elite upper class!

If anyone with a rational mind had doubts, the GOP takeover in many states and the House of Representatives is proving just how nasty and vicious they really are! They do not care what happens to the poor or middle class, and are presiding over the greatest increase in poverty ever, and nonchalantly go about their business of being heartless and insensitive!

Speaker of the House John Boehner may cry when interviewed, but he fails to cry for what is most important: damage to the future generation that will grow up to hate their government for doing nothing to make their childhood a positive experience!

Children cannot be blamed for the misfortunes of their parents, and should NEVER be victims of a political party which only cares they be born, and then says in basic terms, to hell with you as you are now on your own, and don’t expect government to intervene in your behalf!

The Destruction Of Public Employees Labor Unions: An Assault On The Middle Class And 80 Years Of American History! :(

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As the nation faces the toughest economic times since the Great Depression, we are witnessing an assault on public employees and their labor unions, wiping out eighty years of hard gained rights since the New Deal of Franklin D. Roosevelt, and in so doing, further eroding the middle class!

It was labor unions, which came to full development and success beginning in the 1930s, which helped to create decent working conditions for millions of Americans, both in the public and private sector.

Now Republican Governors, and backed by the Republican leadership in Congress, are salivating over the loss of pension and medical benefits, the end of collective bargaining, and the return of employers, including state governments, dictating conditions of work to employees, as if this was the Gilded Age or the 1920s revived! 🙁

In the process, the middle class is being wiped out, being added to the growing number of Americans who are falling into poverty, and yet the suggestion that raising taxes on the wealthy and business might lessen the assault on hard won labor rights is automatically dismissed.

If the states and the national government continue the Republican assault on the middle class, there is the real danger that people will not just sit by and take punch after punch, and allow their dignity and rights gained long ago to be taken away without a counter reaction.

We are entering very dangerous territory and conditions, and yet the Republican Party seems to be tone deaf and immune to the reality of human suffering, only concerning themselves with the comfort of the elite wealthy and corporations.

It may remind many of the arrogance of the elite in other societies, and how their short sightedness led to unfortunate tragedy!

Democrats and progressives must continue to speak up and oppose with all of their energy this great tragedy of the middle class being destroyed, without any concern as to the long range effect!

The Danger Of City And State Budget Cuts: Future Lawsuits!

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The city of Camden, New Jersey has just cut its police and firefighter contingents by 45 percent, in a city infamous for the second highest crime rate and a large number of suspicious fires.

At the same time, in New York City, a 75 year old woman had cardiac arrest, and with the failure to clean up the snowstorm that hit the city, it took three hours for help to reach her, and she passed away, and now her daughter is suing the city because of the lack of response.

It is easy to say–cut, cut, cut–rather than to tax to keep services. But these developments mentioned above are happening all over the nation, and it means crime rates will skyrocket, fires will destroy much property and kill large numbers of people, education will become truly a mockery, health care in hospitals will deteriorate, sanitation will not be able to keep up with vermin that will overrun where garbage gathers uncollected, libraries will shut down that offer people a chance for an escape and to do job seeking on their computers, etc, etc, etc.

There are no winners in this situation, including hundreds of thousands or even millions of dedicated public servants who will be unemployed as a result.

Instead of everyone facing up to the reality that we do not get necessary services by praying to God, but must pay the appropriate level of taxes to keep our service, even in a difficult time, the nation will deteriorate to a level that will destroy the body fabric long term.

It also is reality that more lawsuits will ensue, which will use up city and state budgets for attorney fees, and the likelihood of payouts in the millions of dollars for reckless endangerment of all citizens because of the budget cuts!

It is due time for all citizens to face reality: we are all in this together, and must stop seeing taxes as the great evil, as lack of services is a far greater sin! 🙁

46 States Face Bankruptcy: Do The Republicans Have The Answer? :(

Ronald 1 Comment

In an unprecedented situation, 46 states now face bankruptcy, and are being forced to cut government workers and services, raise taxes and fees, and cut government pensions that were guaranteed to workers when they began to work for the state and local governments! 🙁

The states were prevented from such dire straits up to now because of the economic stimulus provided by the federal government, as the result of the initiatives of the Obama Administration!

The Republicans in the House now propose to do no more spending, as they emphasize the federal deficit, something that they caused by their reckless budgets under the Bush Administration, when they were in control of Congress for the first six years! But they also propose to cause more deficit by cutting taxes endlessly, and giving a great gift of most of the tax cut to those who do not need it, will not spend it, and are in many respects, very greedy and selfish! 🙁

So with more deficit being created, while unemployment compensation is not being extended, and hundreds of thousands of workers in state and local government are to be laid off, meaning they have no purchasing power and add to the already burgeoning unemployment rolls, the GOP prescription to do nothing will cause the Great Recession to turn into the Great Depression Number Two! 🙁

The American people are going to suffer mightily under this scenario, whether government workers or the general public! There will be increased crime, more fires not being able to be extinguished, more students per classroom making learning harder than ever, more libraries and parks shut down or cut down in hours, more prisoners released for lack of prison guards and adequate prison facilities! 🙁

All of this creates social dynamite, and the Republicans, who show clearly they only support the needs of the corporations and the wealthy elite, will have created a dangerous situation that might make the troubles of 2008-2010 look like a dream that people would wish for! 🙁

The only states that seem not to have a budget crisis are small states with small population–Alaska, North Dakota and Wyoming–each with only one Congressman state wide–and Arkansas–the so called “Giant” of the group with a grand total of four Congressmen! So only four states with a total of seven House members represent states not having financial difficulties! 🙁

This situation is, obviously, an unmitigated disaster that is bound to get worse, if that is possible to imagine! 🙁

State Budgets And The Link To Federal Stimulus Funds

Ronald 1 Comment

It is truly ironic that in a time of tremendous stress for all state budgets, it is the federal stimulus money passed a year ago by Congress, with the urging of President Barack Obama, that is “saving” many states on cutting teachers, firefighters, police officers, prison guards, and state government agency workers!

For instance, the state of Florida, seemingly hellbent on becoming as reactionary in government policies as South Carolina and Texas and Mississippi, seems unwilling to attribute their final state budget to the help of the federal government, but if it was not for $3 billion in federal money, there would have been no way to deal with state problems in a fairly reasonable way!

Not that what Florida and other states are receiving this year is adequate enough, as already there are hints in various counties in Florida, and other counties in other states, that there will be an education crisis, law enforcement emergency, and public safety shortcomings!

Despite all the attacks on the federal government, it seems clear that another economic stimulus is essential to keep the states afloat in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression!

What it comes down to, again, is that the states “hate” federal intervention, but in the modern world since the Great Depression and World War II, it has been unavoidable that the national government must play a major role in the lives of all Americans!