"Quintile" means divide the population up into 5 equal sized groups using a variable -- in this case income. The same number of Americans are in each of those 5 groups, roughly 64 million people each.
This chart makes the decline of America extremely easy to understand. Want to place any bets on how "sustainable" this is?
On average, if you make much over $100K, you pay something just below $50K into the FEDERAL government. What the chart doesn't show is that you ALSO pay something close to 10% of your income into the STATE if you live in a blue or purple state. If you don't feel like a tax slave, you need to look at the chart a while longer.
Any one having trouble understanding why our workforce participation rate is the lowest since the '70s? People pull that train for a few years and they figure out that the cars behind are a lot more comfortable than the providing pedal power for engine.
Other small fact -- notice that "The Party" (TP-D) doesn't throw the most money to the bottom -- the votes are in the 2nd and 3rd quintiles! The folks at the very bottom are often too old or too unmotivated to even do the handed to them mail in vote, so the money goes to those that make from $20-$62K ... the fact that more per capita goes to the $38K-$62K group than to the 0-$20K group would be especially galling to anyone that cared about "the poor" more than votes!
I case you are reading this and saying "but I pay income taxes", remember that this is NET -- if you get FICA, housing assistance, BOcare, Earned Income Credit, etc, that is deducted from what you "pay".
The linked article has one more fact worth repeating ---40% of US households now get more than HALF of their income from transfer payments!
The level of bias in the US media still finds a way to shock me!
Chelsea's FiL is an ex congressman, convicted felon -- pretty much the flower of TP so I'd expect that the in-laws ought to get along superbly. Two sets of feckless felons! The sordid linkages and the character of Mezvinsky are worth reading the Snopes link -- we already know the Clinton's character, and that it is officially "not an issue" according to the TP controlled media.
I'm sure they would treat it just the same if one of W's daughters got married to an ex-congressman Felon! (every day needs some humor)
The problem here is that the MSM would cover this if a Republican offspring was being similarly wed -- because Republicans would react with shock and horror and it would be a big smudge on even the girls parents. The DIFFERENCE is that the very business of TP is criminally defrauding the american people! They just typically have enough power to prevent prosecution -- but even when they are found out, it is considered to just be "an occupational hazard".
Since TP controls the media, the facts are usually to be found only with the difficulty of following the ball on a 3 card monte game. The TP story on congress for 4 years now has been "the Republicans are obstructionist", when the fact was that hundreds of bills were stopped in the TP controlled Senate with no reporting.
But in a shameless case of naked political opportunism, TP wanted to give Mary Landrieu's run-off bid a boost by putting her name in front of getting the Keystone XL through the Senate. Keystone is hugely popular in Louisiana as well as 65% approval across the US.
They did get it to a vote, but they could not pass it! In what is one of the landmark cases of political incompetence, they attempted to put a feather in their candidates cap, but even with Republican help were unable to get the job done!
Corrupt and Incompetent -- the cornerstones of TP and government in general.
So HHS is paying Gruber $400K, yet it and the Democrats persist in quoting him ad nauseum as an "independent source". It gives criminal corruption a bad name -- mob bosses were far far more honorable than this.
There really are no words. "I just learned about this a few minutes ago" ... Arrogance, narcissism, complete lack of even a hint of truth, and utter disdain for America and it's people.
The nation voted itself into the abyss and there is clearly no bottom.
Just try to imagine the kind of coverage this would be getting if it was a heat event of similar proportions. It boggles the mind -- there would be nothing else on.
Most of the MSM suppresses any contrary evidence -- they are done with it, they want to control carbon and that is that. Anyone that doesn't see it their way is "fool, denier, oil company stooge, etc" -- pay no attention to record cold winters, Novembers, springs, late ice outs on Lake Superior, 18 year pause in warming, etc, etc ... the list goes on, just follow the link and read up on the basics.
One more topic where any hint of sanity has completely left the building.
I see that 40+ year old rape charges against Bill Cosby have been in the news lately. I scanned one of the articles in amazement and could not help think of the Juanita Broaddrick charges against Bill Clinton that I linked to above, that were barely covered at the time they came out.
Bill Cosby has run afoul of TP ("The Party", Democrat) and it's media arm as a black man that believes that blacks need to live and act responsibly if they want to move forward. TP is of the opinion that blacks need to remain as wards on the happy TP voter plantation, rioting, doing drugs, and feeling outraged.
If one wastes the time to scan the kinds of charges, the similarities are rather striking -- dates and details are often smudged and what you most pick up are women telling you in some way that their trust was broken, they were outraged, they were afraid and they were under some "spell" in that they didn't report it at the time.
One can only feel sorry for these women no matter what actually happened in either case, but why oh why would such accusations be national news against Bill Cosby? Clinton OTOH was in the presidency with CURRENT accusations at the level that made one wonder if any women would be able to come forward and say " I was NOT sexually molested by the president"! Certainly any woman that had been attacked by him in the past, OR was just the kind of suggestable woman that might have trouble with reality was likely to come forward. The media of course did all it could to tamp down accusations in that case, and Juanita Broaddrick barely saw the light of day.
I can't see any reason that the Cosby accusations are national news beyond yet another example being made of a black man that has had the courage to step off the TP thought plantation just a TINY bit. He is even on record not very long ago with a solid rant against "racist Republicans", but apparently that isn't enough to keep him in good standing!
ANY suggestion of blacks being able to take responsibility for themselves and break their chains of fealty to TP must be met with attacks. Here is an article where Cosby's call for blacks to break the violence in their community is mentioned. Ironically, the article is written by Juan Williams, himself banished from NPR for "insufficient blackness".
Thou shalt not question the authority of TP or you will be punished! Cleave on to TP and thy sins will be covered. Thus saith TP.
This book was first published in 1948 and it is scary to see how far we have tumbled down the predicted cliff toward the ultimate demise of Western Civilization since then.
Weaver points out that without first principles, there is no way to know where we went astray or why, and he is very clear and simple on the causes.
"This was a change that overtook the dominant philosophical thinking of the West in the fourteenth century, when the reality of transcendentals was first seriously challenged."
Since man moved away from the idea of transcendentals to the idea that "man is the measure of all things", the Whig theory of history quickly developed -- "the belief that the most advanced point in time represents the point of highest development". Today this banner is carried by "progressives" -- the firm belief that the last drop of hootch to be excreted from the still today is better than 40 year old Scotch.
"For four centuries every man has been not only his own priest, but his own professor of ethics, and the consequence is an anarchy which threatens even that minimum consensus of value necessary to the political state."
At least he isn't always his own bartender! Weaver links transcendentals primarily back to Plato, although the connection with religion obviously seeps through. For the common man, the doctrine of Christianity is what would be infinitely more beneficial to both the eternal soul and temporal existence here on earth than the worship of the relativist pagan state.
"The issue ultimately involved is whether there is a source of truth higher than, and independent of man; and the answer to the question is decisive for one's view of nature and the destiny of humankind. The practical result of nominalist philosophy is to banish the reality which is perceived by the intellect and and to posit as reality that which is perceived by the senses."
"The denial of everything transcending experience means inevitably -- though ways are found to hedge on this -- the denial of truth. With the denial of objective truth there is no escape from the relativism of man is the measure of all things .... The witches spoke with the habitual equivocation of oracles when they told man that by this easy choice he might realize himself more fully, for they were actually initiating a course which cuts one off from reality. Thus began the "abomination of desolation" appearing today as a feeling of alienation from all fixed truth".
"Nominalist" meaning denying that things that transcend the physical universe exist. ("matter" is all there is) Not simply however "god" -- since our own abstract thoughts and to some degree language stretch the old meaning of "physical".
It is a book I could go on and on quoting from, but that breaks my promise to explain what the book means to me and encourage others to read it.
Ideas set humans apart and make us what we are. When we are focused at the highest levels of our brain --- reason, abstraction, ultimates, patterns, relations, connections, etc, we are most human in the sense of unique from animals -- with an eternal soul, a soul that wants those transcendentals. It drives us to look for ultimate and eternal causes, the explanation for WHY things are as they are.
When I was in college, a favorite professor described the difference between the university and the vocational school up the hill as basically "Down here we learn WHY the computer works as it does, up the hill they learn only HOW to operate or program following a specific path, not the reason why that path may be optimal, easy, efficient or what alternatives there are to the specifics being taught".
The reference is at about 7:30 in if you don't like the lead up ...
When there are no transcendentals (ultimate reasons "why"), then one way is hard to defend one view from another and we arrive at "my truth and your truth". It is all relative -- it is todays sense data that counts, because it is assumed that is all there is. The physical shared reality (although that is less certain than it once was). We may be able to do a lot of "technology", but as is also covered in the book, much of it will only do more to distract us from that which is of ultimate value.
"Ideas" is a critical book about first principles to understand the universe, our place in it, and how to reach for "the good life", as in the spiritual life that has eternal meaning (although it is not a "religious" book).
"Ideas" is a cornerstone of what I'm re-reading and attempting to weave together as my personal "Canon of Christian Conservatism" at this point in my life -- the basis of what I have come to believe about life, the universe and everything! It was previously discussed here, as well as here.
At its base "Ideas" is "God" (transcendence), Yes or No, and what is likely to happen to both you and your civilization depending on how you choose!
I'm re-reading one of my favorite books on how to think about meaning / the universe, "Ideas Have Consequences". I'll do a review on it here in a few days, but the basic element is that how we live personally and even more importantly, as a society/culture, is defined by how we answer the question: "Is man the measure of all things, or are there "universals", "transcendentals" that provide the ultimate forms of our existence?".
The layman version of that is "God, yes or no"?
One of the questions that I have is if all people actually feel a shiver of extra awareness when they see the light hit the dog in the linked video, or if it is only some of us? Christians? Other? My belief is that it is universal and that some either deny or have managed to suppress / alter the natural "shiver of awareness" over the course of life to suppress that feeling or convert it to anger, hurt, derision, etc as they declare "it is just some trick", "it is an accident", etc.. They have "killed the shiver" and now it is a negative that makes them want to strike back and what they are convinced is "fake".
In song, my prayer for myself and those I love on this subject is well embodied in this song -- which I think hints at accepting and believing in the shiver -- if even some of them turned out to be "fake".
Naturally, it COULD all a be a big accident, and we no longer have to feel small beside the ocean -- the transcendent does not force belief, yet ignoring it can be exceedingly hard I think. Hard enough to turn hopeful loving people into insolent haters -- because maybe there was something about Gods purity that made them feel smaller than they wanted to.
Our days on this rock have a number of "light on the dog" or "stand beside the ocean" kinds of moments -- all clearly explainable by coincidence, random chance, good wine or a momentary chill maybe. Phenomena like humor, music, love, consciousness, etc are all "explainable" by "random selection" -- or just "accidental artifacts, side-effects" ... nothing to see here, move along. Don't give faith a chance -- but really, it is just THAT faith that links us to the eternal that "the other" is going to work hard to get you to deny.
Our very existence remains a matter of faith. That the universe that we live in is teleological (goal directed/has a purpose), is rational, predictable and can be understood by reason/experience are ALWAYS matters of faith! Those matters are not provable by experience -- induction can falsify, but it can never prove. We can ALWAYS deny -- 3 times, hundreds of times maybe, but no matter how angry that shiver may make some, does it ever really really go away?
Accepting the existence of God is called a "leap of faith". I personally find atheism, the ultimate faith in the non-existence of God to be a MUCH greater "LEAP of faith" since as Nietzsche explained when he lamented "God is dead", it is known by thinkers to be a lamentable decision. A leap and a tumble into the the abyss. No God, no center, no meaning, no purpose, no direction ... the faith of nullification. Indeed the HOPE of instant annihilation. But can even rejection really kill the shiver? I don't know, I certainly don't want to walk that dark path, but my sense tells me no -- the shiver will keep calling, keep trying to bring you home. At least I pray it does!
No doubt I will have to read the book discussed here, but the link is worth following for the "8 explanations of the universe" which I'll cover another time. The book is prompted by the fact that there are numerous features of our universe that must be "just so" (like the porridge in Goldilocks) ... some of those values are:
N (ratio of strength of gravity to electromagnetism),
Epsilon (force binding nucleons into nuclei),
Omega (ratio of universe mass density to critical mass density),
Cosmological Constant (starts being significant at 10 to -122),
D (number of spatial dimensions in spacetime) ... etc
Our scientists believe many of these were "set" during the Big Bang, and were they set to tiny different values we would not exist. But ALL of them were set "just right". Again ... as the 8 ways to deal with that indicate, it COULD all be an accident ... in fact, the discovery of the precision of anthropic "setting" is one of the larger reasons that the "Multiverse Theory", where there are gigantic number of UNIVERSES -- like 10 to the 400 or so has gained consideration primarily because many scientists and atheists realized that something like that HAD to be true if their position of no God was to remain tenable.
Murdering the shiver can take a lot of ammo!
Do we all feel the "shiver of awareness"? I believe we do -- for Christ came for ALL. I believe we all have both the "shiver" and free will -- thus the opportunity to make THE choice of eternal significance in all things, those as mundane as a dog in a picture or as immense as the cosmos itself.
Still just a small thing next to the power of God.
A Republican President that had a single attempted program that benefited say business, or families, or energy, or hard work, or thrift -- any of the horrors of existence that the left rails against, and was somehow exposed as having knowingly used subterfuge to accomplish it would have been removed from office within a year of the discovery.
We know this. We witnessed the level of media outrage over W's supposed shortcomings as a fighter pilot 30 years prior to taking office, the absolute meta-falsehood of "Bush lied, people died" where at worst he merely took action on information at the time, and has since been proved correct, and even the complete farce of Valerie Plame -- the "secret agent" who drove to work each day at CIA HQ ("Deep Cover")!
As I've said, none of this is new -- it's been exposed since before the bill was passed. It is absolutely clear that Americans were lied to big time by BO, the MSM and Democrats in general, but what is new? I can only assume that most Americans are OK with that -- although they may not like actually having their elite "experts" call them stupid to their face. Anyone that doesn't realize that the lefty elites think of them that way is either willfully not paying attention, simply doesn't care, or is actually stupid. "Bitter Clingers" anyone?
“this bill was written in a tortured way to make sure CBO did not score the mandate as taxes. If CBO scored the mandate as taxes, the bill dies.”
Yes, BOcare was always and still is a massive tax increase largely on the middle class and young to transfer dollars to those that failed to insure in the past and are now stuck with no insurance and existing conditions.
So it is all old news, but is there actually a limit to how much voters will put up with? The first mistake that folks like myself and likely readers of this blog make is that something like a "majority" of voters are actually aware of this -- I doubt it is covered on Jon Stewart, I've not heard it on MPR (I don't listen 24x7, but a casual listener certainly could have missed their coverage), and I'm certain it is sparse to non-existent on MSNBC, Huffpo, etc. I suppose some of their folks take the Pelosi dodge of "he didn't write it, I never knew him" ... followed by, OOOPS, big praise for him!
Such admissions aren’t revelations, since the truth has long been obvious to anyone curious enough to look. We and other critics wrote about ObamaCare’s budget gimmicks during the debate, and Rep. Paul Ryan exposed them at the 2010 “health summit.” President Obama changed the subject.
But rarely are liberal intellectuals as full frontal as Mr. Gruber about the accounting fraud ingrained in ObamaCare. Also notable are his do-what-you-gotta-do apologetics: “I’d rather have this law than not,” he says.
Yes, BOcare is nothing but a gigantic wealth transfer fraud perpetrated on the American people, but will a DIRECT ADMISSION made by one of their own have any effect on the discussion?
So they used a decade of taxes to fund merely six years of insurance subsidies. They made-believe that Medicare payments to hospitals will some day fall below Medicaid rates. A since-repealed program for long-term care front-loaded taxes but back-loaded spending, meant to gradually go broke by design. Remember the spectacle of Democrats waiting for the white smoke to come up from CBO and deliver the holy scripture verdict.
The "savings"? A lie! The cost control? Also a lie!
Then again, Mr. Gruber told a Holy Cross audience in 2010 that although ObamaCare “is 90% health insurance coverage and 10% about cost control, all you ever hear people talk about is cost control. How it’s going to lower the cost of health care, that’s all they talk about. Why? Because that’s what people want to hear about because a majority of Americans care about health-care costs.”
It's 90% wealth transfer, but people want to hear "lower costs", so they faked the numbers and lied about the particulars of the bill so that the MSM would make claims that BOcare "controlled costs".
The only way it "controls costs" is by putting middle class people like myself that formerly had good coverage into high deductible Vegas Style HSA plans so we use less healthcare!
We certainly made a horrible choice to allow BOcare to pass -- was it because of not paying attention, being lied to, or being stupid? I suspect there are plenty of each in the mix.
But don't expect to hear it in the media! Good column that covers the fact that Carter really isn't a successful ex-president either, even if you give him HUGE credit for some Habitat for Humanity work.
W OTOH ... well documented in the linked article if you care. I've heard the AIDs stuff quite a bit and I like this Bono / Jon Stewart interaction:
Bono discussed Bush’s President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. He said, “We’re hoping very much that President Obama is going to follow through on what President Bush did.” Stewart cringed and Bono patted his hand and said, “I know that’s hard for you to accept.” He added, “It is amazing. People like John Kerry worked for this. Hillary Clinton, and eventually President Clinton did some extraordinary stuff renegotiating the prices of these very expensive drugs down. But George Bush kind of knocked it out of the park.”
Bono is at the very least a strong Christian Sympathiser if not actually a Christian himself, WAY more talented than Jon Stewart, and wise enough to be very worthy to pat Jon's hand or head. Wisdom and class vs the spoiled adolescent.
Carter and Stewart have a lot in common (as they do with BO), as it seems that Bono and Bush do was well.
W was and is a good, decent, competent man. The country was lucky to have him as President 9-11-2001 and one really doesn't need to look at BO hard at all to see what a horrible mistake followed W in office.
Canada is pumping oil from their oil sands, and the only question is where that oil goes to be refined. Overseas to China where the refining process is not under the watchful eye of the EPA, or to the US where American workers will be involved in the process and it will have at least SOME positive impact on jobs and energy prices. The president says very little, Canada, the oil industry and most voters say quite a lot.
Obviously the media finds Mr "Red Line" in Syria, "I did and didn't end the war in Iraq", and "You can keep your healthcare if you like it" to be a very trustworthy and thus believable source. Based on the election, it would seem that voters are generally not in agreement -- however BO and his true fans have decided that the appropriate electorate to "listen to" are those that stayed home on the couch.
Suddenly, Mary Landrieu is a force for passing Keystone in the Senate. Imagine that!
For the first time in the six-year fight over the controversial Keystone XL pipeline, both houses of Congress will hold a vote on the proposed project, giving each side in a Louisiana Senate election a chance to boost its candidate.
So for 4 long years the Senate has been a firewall, (2 years prior it was a partisan rubber stamp) along with the media, allowing BO to pontificate on issues without having to actually take the action of getting out a veto pen! The executive requirement to lead, follow, stand aside, or take some other specific action has been unscrupulously sidestepped! Harry Reid unilaterally controlled what bills passed by the house got a change to be seen in the Senate and surreptitiously passed enough "naming a new bridge" bills so that a pure comparison of numbers of bills passed by House and Senate would cover the tracks of his disingenuous ploy.
Naturally, in what is truly a monument to at least the inattention of the American People, the TP controlled media has run the nifty magic trick by which all problems with CONGRESS are converted to problems with THE HOUSE! The Senate, the supposed "greatest deliberative body", the "upper chamber" was nearly invisible save for occasional Harry diatribes on how bad things were in the House, the Koch brothers, or what life was like in Searchlight in medieval times.
The faint hope for the next two years is that BO will be given the opportunity to be an executive -- getting signed bills on his desk for things like Keystone, and we assume telling the shivering American public that the world has warmed significantly and is in the process of warming still more, so they ought to forgo heat to prevent that warming. Put on a sweater.
Perhaps, as he says this, a few Americans may take a couple minutes to consider that the ISSUE is ONLY about WHERE the oil gets refined -- and how it gets transported. The fact summary is:
Not having Keystone is a windfall for Warren Buffett who owns the railroads -- since he is a BO supporter, TP regularly assures us his motives for opposing Keystone has nothing to do with owning railroads. if you believe that wealth inequality is an issue, then you ought to support the Keystone!
The oil is being pumped and it WILL be burned. The only issue is if it is refined / burned in the US or refined / burned in China. If you believe in AGW, then it is BETTER to have the Keystone since the US is a more carbon friendly refiner and fuel user!
The ONLY people to which Keystone is bad is for are DEMOCRATS losing a wedge / funding issue! It has become a totem for low information voters to be against a pipeline that will HELP both the environment and wealth inequality -- supposed issues they care about, but apparently much less than fund raising!
Congress needs to quit doing stunts -- the Landrieu bill is just a stunt to supposedly help her in her election, the bill won't actually make it out of the Senate, conference, or something. Stunts are part of Congress -- the difference is that when Republicans do it, the STORY is the fact that it is a STUNT!
There needs to be a signed bill on BO's desk so we can listen to whatever his lie dejour is once it gets there. Something new, or the same old spurious prevarication we have been listening to for 6 years now!
In terms of risk rated subsidies, if you had a law which said that healthy people are going to pay in – you made explicit healthy people pay in and sick people get money, it would not have passed… Lack of transparency is a huge political advantage. And basically, call it the stupidity of the American voter or whatever, but basically that was really, really critical for the thing to pass.
Transparency? Do you REALLY need to see all this to see the obvious that has been obvious from time immemorial? When you let government get too big and the folks that lust for POWER, not "service" take over, then "We the People" become "the proletariat", or "the masses", or "fly over country", or something derogatory, that basically means "stupid" -- unimportant, unaware, lacking power, basically scum.
Certainly not the people in charge! "The American voter" ... to be lied to, to be denigrated, to be treated like the serfs we have generally have become!
What part of "we have to pass it to find out what is in it"? (Pelosi) or the myriad of BO "modifications", "exemptions", "delays", etc -- none of which are legal under the Constitution. CONGRESS makes the laws -- the executive executes the laws AS WRITTEN!
I suppose our attention span is now so short that many actually have to watch the video.
Oh, wait ... there is THIS! What happens when the after massive media pressure and a lot of assurances about "how loved" they will be if they ONLY play nice with the Democrats THIS TIME!
Naturally the Democrats in in the role of Lucy and the Republicans in the role of Charlie Brown the blockhead!!
If you want to review a tiny bit of the sordid history of this, here is a start!
This specific case involves uninvestigated sex crimes against children in NO, but it could be any of TP's totally controlled centers of urban blight. Detroit is attempting to rise from bankruptcy, Chicago is murder central, and DC is the "Disaster of Columbia".
The detective in the case wrote in his report that the 2-year-old "did not disclose any information that would warrant a criminal investigation and closed the case," the inspector general's report said.
Gee, "the 2-year-old didn't disclose information". Imagine that -- 1,111 cases with no sign of investigation over a 3 year period. Hello single party government control!
It's worth a quick scan through this sorry report if you harbor any thoughts of government being some sort of solution to ANYTHING. This is local, major US city, no "new programs", advanced technology, partisan politics, or any other of typical left wing excuse for why government doesn't work.
The fact is, it just doesn't, and people are hurt injured and die because of it.
Government CAN be IMPROVED (not fixed) via an ADVERSARIAL press and an ACTIVE two party system that keeps cronyism, featherbedding and just general corruption in check. BUT, when TP controls an area in total plus the media, the result is predictably NO, DC, Chicago, Detroit, etc.
Whis is it that this is hard for the left to understand????
