The War Against the People

DAILY KOS COMMUNITY SITE

Universal Human Redemption

The War Against the People

By Eternal Hope

Throughout the centuries governmental, religious, and corporate interests have engaged in a war against the people and have engaged in a systematic attack against our way of life. The Romans actively persecuted the Christians, irrespective of their own founding as a refuge of people against other peoples' tyranny. When the church became institutionalized and established, they turned around and did the same thing by persecuting pagans, fellow Christians who believed in the wrong doctrines, and other people they didn't like. After the Reformation Kings did the same thing, persecuting you if you were a Catholic living in a Protestant kingdom or being a Protestant in a Catholic kingdom. This country purported to be founded on equality, reason, freedom, and separation of church and state. But this country had its own underclass; specifically, the Blacks and the Indians; later, when the rise of the megacorporations came about, the working poor were another group of people who were attacked.

What is happening today is the same thing as what has been happening since the dawn of human civilization -- the concentration of power in the hands of a few. Our system of government was designed to be a system of checks and balances so that one group of people would not get too powerful. Our country was envisioned as a place which would engage in a systematic process of liberation and growing freedoms. Instead, we have a government and a system today that instead is designed to reward the powerful corporatist interests and barely keep the people alive just enough so that they can fuel the Oil Empire. Religion is hijacked to justify massive crimes against humanity and used as an excuse to justify the means.

Those of us who have opened our eyes see it for what it is -- a struggle by the people against the powerful. Back in the 1870's, 1880's, and 1890's, following the Civil War, the powerful interests established Jim Crow, corporate personhood, and xenophobic immigration laws. It was all part of the same mentality -- to create a society of winners and losers where one group of people would always be in the upper classes and one group of people would always be in the lower classes. Backed by lies, hate, and a total lack of regard for human life, these forces set up a system where the rich would get richer and the poor would get poorer and this country would transform itself into a Empire.

With the rise of the Bush I and Bush II eras, the Empire has turned itself into full form -- an oil empire whose goal and objective is domination of the world's oil resources and cheap labor to maximize profits. The monster is out of the bag, so to speak. The Neocon ideology of protecting a far-right Israeli government, preemptive warfare, and invasion and occupation is in full force with Libya being a pawn in the game. This ideology respects no laws, only making use of them when expedient. Libya is merely the latest example, seeing that it was an action which was done without the approval of Congress and seeing that we were aiding and abetting some of the very people who were fighting our troops in Iraq, Afghanistan, and supporting the very organization that attacked our soil on 9/11. And now, the Neocons are demanding that we expand our Oil Empire to include Syria.

We must do what people from Moses to Christ to Julian to the many "heretics" who were executed for their beliefs in the Middle Ages to the millions of Black slaves to the millions of Holocaust victims to the millions of Latinos to King, Gandhi, and others like them did -- struggle against the Empire. They believe in a society where there are winners and losers, where people are blamed for being poor. We believe in a society where everyone has a chance to succeed. They believe in a society where there are all these scary brown people such as immigrants, Palestinians, Arabs, Blacks, and other such people are to be feared and shunned. We believe in a society where all people should be treated equally regardless of race, religion, creed, gender, political belief, sexual orientation, or class. They believe in a society where if you believe in basic human decency for immigrants, you are somehow unpatriotic. We believe in returning to our roots as a country as a refuge for the poor and the persecuted. We have the policy of open borders to thank for our very existence as a nation.

They believe in a society which plays off one group of people against another. We believe in solidarity with immigrants here in the US to the Tibetans in China to the Native Americans trying to protect their way of life against powerful corporatist interests. They believe in a society of anarchy where might makes right. We believe in the rule of law, in institutions such as the UN and documents such as the Constitution. While it is not perfect and while it is stacked so that the five major powers of China, Russia, France, the UK, and the US have most of the power, it is still our best hope for applying the rule of law internationally.

We need to build a society in which basic human freedoms are respected, where we can create a process of constantly expanding peoples' basic freedoms, and live up to the basic principles of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness that our country was envisioned as. Everyone has got to choose which side they are on -- are we on the side of the powerful corporatist interests which care nothing for us besides the bottom line? Or are we on the side of the average people, small businesses, and families who are just trying to make ends meet? Which side are you on?

Many human freedoms that we take for granted here in the US are not to be found in the rest of the world. For instance, it is 15 minutes from here to our county seat. That 15 minutes would take hours to navigate through in Palestine given all the military checkpoints, soldiers, roadblocks, and war zones, assuming it is even legal for you to go. There are places in Mexico where you can't go to the store without running into various military checkpoints. There are places in Israel where Bedouins have been living for thousands of years where they live in fear every day that Israeli bulldozers will bulldoze their homes away. There are people all over the world who are being imprisoned simply for writing on a blog like this one. Here in the US, we take a place like Daily Kos for granted; in China, such a community would not be possible given the massive Internet censorship that is taking place over there.

The people who fight for better living conditions in Wisconsin, the people who fight for full equality for the GLBT community, the people who fight for the Palestinian people, the people who fight for immigrants' rights, the people who fight for stronger unions, the people who fight for a free Tibet and the right of all people to self-determination all are fighting the same enemy -- the same corporatist, jingoistic, and militaristic interests that we have fought since the beginning of civilization. Whose side are you on?

GOP-Style Democrats Moving to Sell Out Poor, Liberals: Lessons From the DC Budget Fight

GOP-Style Democrats Moving to Sell Out Poor, Liberals: Lessons From the DC Budget Fight

Monday 13 June 2011

by: Art Levine, Truthout | News Analysis

A homeless man in Washington, DC. (Photo: Daquella manera)

It's been less than two weeks since a guerilla campaign by local activists managed to restore about 20 percent of $131 million in budget cuts targeting Washington, DC's, neediest residents - with little help from the mainstream media, which essentially ignored a looming shutdown of the city's shelter, poor and disabled aid services that could have thrown thousands into the street. The city's reluctant Democratic leadership only bowed at the last minute to under-the-radar pressure to reverse some of the most obvious, draconian cuts with $27 million in restorations, especially services to the homeless.

Andy Silver, an attorney and organizer with the Washington Legal Clinic for the Homeless, has an optimistic perspective on the shelter crisis that was averted: "People need to be creative. You can still win without mainstream media attention."

Other sources familiar with the lobbying to restore homeless funding point out that some leaders in the local downtown business community were concerned about the impact on the city's image and tourism. There was a real prospect of a PR nightmare if 1,500 homeless single adults and 300 families wandered the streets after shelters closed down. So, they pressured city leaders to save the shelter system in the same week that liberal activists stepped up protests at the District's city hall, the Wilson building, with a "Reality Tour." One influential voice was developer Benjamin Miller, who wrote in The Washington Business Journal:

"It is unacceptable to cast 1,500 homeless people out on the streets of the District, but that is surely what will happen if the D.C. Council fails to restore year-round operation of shelters for single homeless adults. I am asking my colleagues in the business community to reach out this week to D.C. Council members and urge full funding for homeless services. This is one of those rare opportunities for the council to do right by business, by the taxpayers and by our most vulnerable residents."

Yet, a Democratic mayor and a Democratic city council were on the verge of shutting down the entire shelter system except during below-freezing weather and cutting a mere $250 a month in aid to the disabled waiting for their Social Security claims to be processed. But then, a small-scale grassroots revolt generating hundreds of emails and even fewer calls prompted them to reconsider. Yet, on top of all that, the council rejected any income tax increase on the city's wealthiest residents, including a mild proposal from the mayor, which would have added $35 million in revenues, even though 85 percent and more of the public in a poll - including those earning over $100,000 - wanted taxes on the wealthy raised to save city services.

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Keshini Ladduwahetty of DC for Democracy asks, "Who are they listening to? Who are we fighting? How can we fight forces we can't even see?"

But it's really only a partial win, because other vital programs and even affordable housing services are being jettisoned altogether or slashed to the bone, including children's mental health, in a city where three clinics serving the poor already closed in the last six months. "They made a bad budget worse," says Ladduwahetty, the activist with DC for Democracy, a DFA affiliate, that's organized a last-minute attempt to stave off yet another tax giveaway to mostly rich residents with the nation's only tax exemption for out-of-state bond funds.

The council voted by a slim majority two weeks ago to end that exemption, but powerful city figures, including the corruption-plagued Chairman of the City Council, Kwame "Fully Loaded " Brown, are moving to take away the revenue gains by extending the tax loophole to current bond holders.

And on Tuesday, as part of the budget's final vote, leading members of the DC City Council threatened to give away that $13 million in potential tax revenues to the city's wealthiest residents by grandfathering those who receive the exemption. That's why groups like Save our Safety Net and DC for Democracy are urging liberals to call their council members - especially those at-large members, who may reverse previous votes for ending the exemption, including Marion Barry, Harry Thomas and Vincent Orange - to ensure the revenues from ending that exemption remain.

A majority of the City Council voted to add funds to some of the most vital programs for the poor only if a hoped-for windfall of $33 million in tax revenue becomes available. It's the GOP-style Democrats' version of voodoo economics. But as DC for Democracy pointed out in an alert issued Sunday, blaming the "fiscal irresponsibility" of the council for rejecting any tax increases on the wealthy, this economics move:

... relied on $33.5M in hoped for funding contingent on updated revenue forecasts from the CFO [Chief Financial Officer] to fund critical human services, including homeless services, affordable housing, children's mental health, libraries, and childcare subsidies. Even assuming they materialize, these funds would most likely be available for one year only. CFO Natwar Gandhi has warned against using this kind of "contingent budgeting."

All told, though, the deep cuts and the apathy of most mainstream media organizations to the impact on the poor should be a wake-up call for progressives everywhere: "This can happen in a Democratic city," says Ladduwahetty, so, she contends, you can't count on the Democratic Party to stand up for a progressive agenda in upcoming state and local budget fights.

This work by Truthout is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License.

Art Levine

Art Levine, a contributing editor of The Washington Monthly, has written for Mother Jones, The American Prospect, The New Republic, The Atlantic, Slate.com, Salon.com, and numerous other publications. He wrote the October 2007 In These Times cover story, "Unionbusting Confidential." Levine is also the co-host of the "D'Antoni and Levine" show on BlogTalk Radio, every Thursday at 5:30 PM EST.

Manufacturing Poverty in America While Providing Trillions to Foreign Warlords

AlterNet.org

ACTIVISM & VISION

AlterNet / By Lauren Kelley

A National Living Wage Fight Finds a Battleground in NYC: 'We Aren't Here Just To Survive, We Want to Live'

The Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act has garnered strong support among the city's labor and religious communities, but has run up against big-moneyed, powerful interests.

June 10, 2011 |

Photo Credit: Living Wage NYC

"Mayor Bloomberg, enough is enough!" Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz, Jr. said at a lively May 12 rally organized by grassroots group Living Wage NYC. "If your friends don't want to pay us a living wage, then don't take our tax dollars!"

Diaz, a reliable supporter of New York City workers' rights, introduced the Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act in the spring of 2010. It was this legislation that brought hundreds of living wage supporters together on May 12, when the bill finally, after more than a year of delays and false starts, received its first City Council hearing.

Although the bill is far from sweeping (it would merely guarantee a $10-$11.50 hourly wage for the estimated 3 percent of New York City workers who are employed by companies in city-subsidized developments), it has garnered strong support among the city's labor activists, religious community and local leaders -- support that has been met, with equal measure, by propaganda-pushing from the Bloomberg administration and resistance from powerful businesses. All the while, living wage activists around the country are watching with great interest as the knock-down, drag-out fight plays out, as it could set the stage for the success or failure of living-wage battles elsewhere.

How did a relatively toothless piece of legislation become such a hotly debated, nationally watched issue? It happened in part because the outer boroughs of New York City have seen income disparities grow wildly in recent years -- something residents of many other urban areas can relate to. Ruben Diaz, Jr. wrote about the issue in an op-ed adapted from his May 12 City Council testimony:

[W]e have tremendous income inequality in this city, which is not just a local problem but a national cause of concern. The middle class, both locally and nationally, are working harder and earning less. As important, the working poor in our city are being forced to work multiple jobs for an ever-lower standard of living if not being forced to get food stamps, emergency housing and other government assistance. Our economic policies should facilitate upward mobility. Instead, they are accelerating a downward spiral, in which our middle- and working-class families have less and less and where our tax dollars and other city resources are instead being used to facilitate low-wage job creation.

Diaz goes on to note that "nowhere is this [economic inequality] clearer than in my home borough of the Bronx."

The Bronx suffers from the highest poverty rate among U.S. urban areas (a staggering 28.5 percent) and has the unfortunate distinction of being the county with the highest unemployment rate in the nation. According to a recent Fiscal Policy Institute study, between 1990 and 2007 hourly wages in the city fell by nearly 9 percent. Unsurprisingly, at the same time income inequality grew; the bottom 90 percent of city workers now earn only 34.5 percent of the money made in the city, while the top 1 percent earn a disproportionate 44 percent of the money.

This is maddening, frustrating stuff. Even worse is the fact that, as economic inequality went off the charts in New York City, the Bloomberg administration was green-lighting huge numbers of city-backed developments, with the promise that they would lead to job creation. However, those jobs did not materialize. Since 2002, the Bronx saw some $11 billion in new development, but, as Diaz notes, "the promised employment gains from the major developments...have been inconsequential."

The activists and citizens who support the Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act recognize city-subsidized developments as a first step to addressing the overwhelming problem of economic inequality in New York City. Their argument is straightforward: if a development is going to receive taxpayer dollars, the jobs created by that development should help taxpayers by paying at least a decent wage. Or as City Comptroller John C. Liu put it, "Taxpayers should not be subsidizing minimum wage jobs."

The term "decent" in the above paragraph is operative, since the $10 an hour that would be guaranteed by the Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act ($11.50 if employees aren't offered health insurance) is hardly a living wage in the most expensive city in the country. As Charles Barron, a councilmember representing District 42 in Brooklyn, said at the May 12 rally, "We can't even live off $10! And how dare you want to give us less?" He added, "We aren't here just to survive, we want to live."

Indeed, the city's billionaire mayor does want to give city workers less than a meager $10 an hour -- much less than they need to live. His campaign against the Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act has been anything but subtle, and has pitted business interests against grassroots activists, Goliath v. David-style. Bloomberg's "friends," as the Bronx borough president dubbed them, are of course the Goliaths in this battle -- the big companies that don't want to be required to pay their employees fairly.

The main business opposition to the bill has come from the 5 Boro Chamber Alliance, an group of chambers of congress from around the city that was formed in 2009 to put the kibosh on a paid sick leave bill. That effort was successful, in part because the group was able to convince Council Speaker and mayoral hopeful Christine Quinn not to support the bill. The 5 Boro Chamber Alliance has reportedly requested meetings with Quinn on the living wage legislation as well. Quinn, whose support of the legislation is considered critical to its passage, has declined to take a stand on the issue.

But that's not all. Friend-of-industry Mayor Bloomberg went so far as to spend $1 million in city funds to commission a study on the potential impact of the Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act. That would be a fine thing to do, if the researchers he chose for the job were impartial. As Crain's New York reported, that was not the case:

[T]he very administration commissioning the study has repeatedly argued that living and prevailing wage provisions would hinder development and kill jobs, creating the perception that the outcome is already determined.

And the selection of Charles River [Associates] added fuel to the fire because two of its leading consultants—David Neumark and David Macpherson—are outspoken critics of wage mandates, though Macpherson is not on the living wage study team.

As you might've guessed, the study was not favorable to the living wage legislation; it concluded that "the employment losses that could result from a decline in real estate in response to the living wage mandate are significant....These losses impact employees at all wage levels." These findings were disputed by a counter-report published by the National Employment Law Project and other groups, which found that "errors in methodology and analysis" in the city-funded report "render the study fundamentally flawed."

Why are New York businesses (and their ally, the mayor) putting up such a fight against the activists who want a mere $10 hourly wage requirement for a tiny percentage of New York workers? To put it plainly, businesses are concerned because they know living-wage laws are effective.

In San Francisco, for instance, city leaders signed a piece of living-wage legislation into law in 2000. The law turned out to be successful and popular enough that other, more far-reaching laws were passed. University of California Berkeley Labor Center Chair Ken Jacobs recently examined San Francisco's legislation, and found that both workers and businesses have benefited:

San Francisco's labor standards laws do not appear to be deterring retailers who want to locate in the city or developers looking for tenants or project financing. A new Lowe's just opened up in the city, just a short drive from their existing store in South San Francisco, which has no labor standards requirements beyond what is in state law.

The verdict is clear: labor standards policies of the kind San Francisco put in place improve workers' income, productivity and health, reduce turnover and decrease job vacancies; they have not reduced the number of jobs.

This is good news indeed for the workers and businesses in cities, such as New York, that are considering new living wage policies on economic development programs. San Francisco may be unique in the breadth of protections we provide our workers, but we are not special in our need to improve labor standards.

Living-wage laws have also been passed in Baltimore, Chicago, Pittsburgh, and some 40 other cities. Even though Jacobs and numerous other researchers have found that living-wage laws are a win-win-win for these cities, their workers and their businesses, many industry leaders still tremble at pro-labor legislation, for fear that it might impact their bottom line. And that is exactly what business groups are fighting against in New York City.

Mayor Bloomberg and his business friends may have the advantage of money and influence, but grassroots activists -- the Davids of the living-wage battle -- have managed to put up an impressive fight. Living Wage NYC has brought together a diversity of organizations and individuals to support the measure, including the African American Clergy and Elected Officials, the Drum Major Institute, City Harvest, the Stonewall Democratic Club, the Jewish Labor Committee, the National Lawyers Guild-NYC Chapter, and a number of local unions and elected officials. The campaign's rally's have been well attended and high-energy (you can watch a video of some rally highlights here), and its list of supporters is growing by the day.

One significant name who's thrown his support behind the campaign is Martin Luther King III, who wrote in a statement, "New York City offers a national roadmap for continuing my father’s unfinished work of economic justice….We need the living wage movement to succeed and spread to other parts of the country." He went on, "Countless stories of the working poor today are about people making impossible choices: food or rent, clothing or electricity. When we pause over those stories, and understand their painful significance, we grasp something fundamental about a country as wealthy as ours: no working person should have to settle for surviving over living. It’s that simple."

Lauren Kelley is an associate editor at AlterNet and a freelance writer and editor who has contributed to Change.org, The L Magazine and Time Out New York. She lives in Brooklyn. Follow her on Twitter here.

States Harming People Most in Need

June 2, 2011 at 03:55:22


States Harming People Most in Need

By Stephen Lendman (about the author)

In 1996, the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation ("welfare reform") Act (PRWORA) passed. Until then, needy households got welfare payments (since 1935) through Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), a program protecting states by sharing costs of increased caseloads during hard times.

Thereafter, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) set five year time limits, allocating fixed block grants to states to administer at their own discretion, putting needy people at risk during economic downturns when little or no additional federal funding is forthcoming.

TANF also requires recipients to work or be trained to qualify, even during hard times like now when skilled workers can't find jobs, let alone single mothers with young children needing them as caregivers in their most formative years.

During today's dire economic times, budget strapped states are implementing harsh cuts, harming vulnerable residents most, including families with children on TANF.

On May 19, a new Liz Schott/LaDonna Pavetti Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) study highlights the problem, titled "Many States Cutting TANF Benefits Harshly Despite High Unemployment and Unprecedented Need."

Deep cuts will affect 700,000 poor families, including 1.3 million children, about one-third of all households on TANF. Moreover, those numbers will rise, perhaps precipitously, as states keep slashing social benefits, hitting vulnerable residents hardest.

Already they're cutting cash payments or ending them entirely, including for "many families with physical or mental health issues or other challenges." As a result, poor ones are getting poorer. In addition, work-related aid, including child care, is being reduced, making it harder for working parents to retain jobs, needing someone home looking after their children.

TANF cuts so far made include:

-- monthly cash benefit cuts in California, Washington, South Carolina, New Mexico, and the District of Columbia; for example, South Carolina pays the equivalent of 14% of poverty wages for a family of three, severely impacting poor families;

-- time limits for receiving benefits have been reduced; for example, California and Arizona (among others) cut theirs, and some states may limit payments to 18 months, down from the federally enacted five year maximum; and

-- TANF-funded supplementary aid is being cut; for example, Michigan is slashing its (partly TANF funded) Earned Income Tax Credit by two-thirds; in addition, other states weakened "make-work-pay" policies by reducing or eliminating them altogether.

Overall, "(s)tates are terminating or reducing benefits for some of the most vulnerable families, most of whom have very poor labor market prospects."

At issue is less federal aid, leaving them no choice but to apportion lower amounts gotten, on the way perhaps to nothing as Capitol Hill debates ways to end social benefits entirely to provide more funds for bankers, war profiteers and other corporate favorites.

In fact, Democrats and Republicans are hammering vulnerable Americans, including those already at or below the poverty line, showing no concern for growing millions in need.

For example, in 1994-1995, AFDC served 75 out of 100 impoverished families with children. In 2008-2009, only 28 of every 100 got aid, the ratio varying by state. Seven, in fact, help 10 or less families out of 100 impoverished ones when all of them most need it.

In 1996, however, when TANF was established, assurances were given for a TANF Contingency Fund during hard times. That was then. This is now after resources were exhausted in December 2010, and 2011 allocations are too meager to matter. The 2009 Recovery Act included TANF Emergency Fund aid, not renewed after September 2010.

Moreover, Congress "level-funded" TANF from inception, providing no adjustments for inflation or other factors, including extra help during hard times.

As a result, budget-strapped states have cut back severely, reducing matching funds and using federal grants for other purposes.

Nationwide in July 2010, TANF benefits for a family of three averaged less than half the poverty line, and below 30% in over half the states. The median amount paid was $429, 28% of poverty wages. Compared to 1996, TANF benefits declined by over 20% in inflation adjusted dollars.

In 2011, they dropped more given skyrocketing food, energy and other costs, as well as several states implementing more cuts. Effective February 1, Washington reduced benefits by 15% a month, from $562 to $478. South Carolina cut them 20%, from $270 to $216. New Mexico slashed 15%, from $447 to $380.

Effective July 1, California dropped 8%, from $694 to $638 and will impose additional cuts up to 15% for "child-only" cases, those with "no adult in the assistance unit" that, up to now, got aid for 60 months or longer.

Effective April 1, The District of Columbia slashed 20% for families getting aid for 60 months or longer, from $428 to $342. In addition, Mayor Vincent Gray proposed more cuts, up to 40% (including the April one) by October as well as total elimination of benefits by 2013.

Watch for states across the country to propose similar measures as Washington heads for ending social benefits altogether, what Democrats and Republicans plan but won't explain.

A Final Comment

On May 28, New York Times writer Robert Pear headlined, "Administration Opposes Challenges to Medicaid Cuts," saying:

On May 26, "(i)n a friend-of-the court brief (to) the Supreme Court, the Justice Department said that no federal law allowed private individuals to sue states to enforce" mandated Medicaid rates, "sufficient to enlist enough providers" to assure recipients access care "to the same extent as the general population in an area."

Acting Solicitor General Neal Katyal's brief said suits "would not be compatible" with the ability of Health and Human Services officials to assure states comply, despite low payment rates in many areas preventing recipients from accessing care. Nonetheless, he said Medicaid equal access provisions are "broad and nonspecific." Moreover, federal health officials, he argued, are more qualified than judges to decide policy objectives, including cutting costs.

At issue before the Court is Douglas v. Independent Living Center of Southern California (January 2011). Legislators approved payment cuts to providers. They sued in federal court, winning in the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on grounds they conflict with Medicaid law, arguing if cutbacks are approved, mandated care can't be provided. The Supreme Court agreed to hear multiple appeals together on the same issue.

Although Medicaid law doesn't explicitly allow lawsuits, Ninth Circuit judges said beneficiaries and providers could sue under the Constitution's Supremacy Clause (Article VI, Clause 2), establishing all its provisions, US treaties, and federal statutes "the supreme law of the land."

As a result, payment reductions violate federal Medicaid law, threatening access to vital healthcare for poor recipients needing federal/state aid to provide it.

California appealed to the Supreme Court, Obama's Justice Department arguing for denial of what federal law mandates. As a result, consumer advocates are outraged. So is Washington and Lee Professor Timothy Jost saying:

"I find it appalling that the solicitor general in a Democratic administration would assert in a Supreme Court brief that businesses can challenge state regulations under the supremacy clause, but that poor recipients of Medicaid cannot challenge state violations of federal law."

In a separate friend-of-the court brief, Michigan and 30 other states argued that "(a)llowing 'supremacy clause lawsuits' to enforce federal Medicaid laws will be a financial catastrophe for" all of them.

Jointly funded, states manage Medicaid for qualified low-income families and children, pregnant women, the elderly, blind and disabled. In total, about 60 million Americans receive it, including one in three children, four in 10 pregnant women, and 70% of nursing home residents.

Since taking office, Obama waged war on working households and America's poor, proposing fiscal austerity for needy millions, including vital healthcare only government can provide them.

Now he's battling them in court to strip more than Congress already denied besides new legislation perhaps to end all social benefits, phased out incrementally by repeated cuts. Obama calls it "shared sacrifice." Working Americans call it cruel, heartless, unfair, and outrageous, especially from a Democrat promising change.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at Email address removed. Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour/ .

I was born in 1934, am a retired, progressive small businessman concerned about all the major national and world issues, committed to speak out and write about them.

The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author
and do not necessarily reflect those of this website or its editors.

In America, Being Poor is a Criminal Offense

Published on Saturday, May 14, 2011 by CommonDreams.org

In America, Being Poor is a Criminal Offense

by Rania Khalek

It takes a special kind of bully to target the most vulnerable and neediest families in society, which millionaire politicians like to argue are draining America’s treasury. I am referring to Rep. Charles Boustany (R-LA), who recently introduced a bill that would require states to implement drug testing of applicants for and recipients of the federal Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) program. This is reminiscent of Sen. Orrin Hatch’s (R-UT) failed legislation last summer to drug test the unemployed and those receiving other forms of government cash assistance, which ultimately died in the Senate. So far, Boustany’s proposal is following the same fate as Hatch’s, but around the country states are taking matters into their own hands.

In at least 30 state Legislatures across America, predominately wealthy politicians are quite impressed with themselves for considering bills that would limit the meager amount of state help given to needy families struggling to make ends meet. Many have proposed drug testing with some even extending it to recipients of other public benefits as well, such as unemployment insurance, medical assistance, and food assistance, in an attempt to add more obstacles to families’ access to desperately needed aid.

Florida’s Legislature has passed a bill that will require welfare applicants to take drug tests before they can receive state aid. Once signed into law by Republican Gov. Rick Scott, which is likely, all adult recipients of federal cash benefits will be required to pay for the drug tests, which are typically around $35. In Maine, Republican lawmakers introduced two proposals that would impose mandatory drug testing on Maine residents who are enrolled in MaineCare, the state’s Medicaid program for low-income and disabled residents. Under a similar bill that passed both the House and Senate in Missouri, recipients found to be on drugs will still be eligible for benefits only if they enter drug treatment programs, though the state wouldn’t pick up the tab for their recovery.

In Massachusetts — where about 450,000 households receive cash or food assistance — a bill introduced by state Rep. Daniel B. Winslow (R-Norfolk) would set up a program requiring those seeking benefits to disclose credit limits and assets such as homes and boats, as well as the kind of car they drive. His reasoning is “If you have two cars and a snowmobile, then you aren’t poor. If we do this, we will be able to preserve our limited resources for those who are truly in need and weed out fraud, because we know there’s fraud and we’re not looking for it.” State Rep. Daniel K. Webster (R-Pembroke) filed a budget amendment requiring the state to verify immigration status of those seeking public benefits. Webster made it clear that his proposal does not mean he dislikes poor people or immigrants, but “this is all unsustainable and the system is being abused.”

This is rather shocking because I can’t recall any Republicans or Democrats demanding that the CEO of Bank of America or JP Morgan disclose inventory of their vacation homes, private jets, and yachts before bailing them out in what amounts to corporate welfare. Nor did they insist that these CEOs submit to alcohol and drug screenings before receiving taxpayer money. No objections were made regarding the immigration status of the people running these companies or whether they happen to employ undocumented workers for cheap labor.

Some would argue that corporations are different, in that they create jobs. To that I will point out that corporations are making record profits, even as they layoff workers and pay next to nothing in Federal income taxes. And this doesn’t even begin to scratch at the surface of corporate abuse by the very entities that are soaked in taxpayer money. Just contrast these proposals with the way the rich are treated in this country with billions of dollars in subsidies and tax breaks.

This is simply an extension of a conversation that began in 1996, when President Bill Clinton and House Speaker Newt Gingrich passed bipartisan welfare reform, whose results have been tragic to say the least. The 1996 Welfare Reform Act authorized, but did not require, states to impose mandatory drug testing as a prerequisite to receiving state welfare assistance. Back then, unproven allegations of criminal behavior and drug abuse among welfare recipients were the rationales cited by those in support of the bill’s many punitive measures that were infused with race, class, and gender bias.

The majority of the proposals for drug testing require no suspicion of drug use whatsoever. Instead they rest on the assumption that the poor are inherently inclined to immoral and illegal behavior, and therefore unworthy of privacy rights as guaranteed under the Fourth Amendment. These proposals simply reaffirm the longstanding concept of the poor as intrinsically prone to and deserving of their predicament. Jordan C. Budd, in his superb analysis Pledge Your Body for Your Bread: Welfare, Drug Testing, and the Inferior Fourth Amendment, demonstrates how the drug testing of welfare recipients is part of what’s called a “poverty exception” to the Constitution, particularly the Fourth Amendment, a bias that renders much of the Constitution irrelevant at best, and hostile at worst, to the American poor.

Kaaryn Gustafson extensively documents the trend toward the criminalization of poverty. She demonstrates how, in her words “welfare applicants are treated as presumptive liars, cheaters, and thieves,” which is “rooted in the notion that the poor are latent criminals and that anyone who is not part of the paid labor force is looking for a free handout.” I would argue that given the disdain that has been shown for “entitlements” over the years, it won’t be long before this treatment extends to Social Security, Medicare, and even Financial Aid recipients.

The notion that the poor are more prone to drug use has no basis in reality. Research shows that substance use is no more prevalent among people on welfare than it is among the working population, and is not a reliable indicator of an individual’s ability to secure employment. Furthermore, imposing additional sanctions on welfare recipients will disproportionately harm children, since welfare sanctions and benefit decreases have been shown to increase the risk that children will be hospitalized and face food insecurity. In addition, analysis shows that drug testing would be immensely more expensive than the acquired savings in reduced benefits for addicts

With regard to welfare legislation, it’s beneficial to highlight where on the class ladder members of Congress stand. According to a study by the Center for Responsive Politics released late last year, nearly half of the members in congress — 261 — were millionaires, compared to about 1 percent of Americans. The study also pointed out that 55 of these congressional millionaires had an average calculated wealth in 2009 of $10 million dollars and up, with eight in the $100 million-plus range. A more recent study released in March, found that 60 percent of Senate freshman and more than 40 percent of House freshmen of the 112th congress are millionaires.

Why is this so important? Because very few of our lawmakers understand what it’s like to struggle financially. Millionaires can generally afford healthcare without grappling with unemployment, foreclosure, or an empty refrigerator. The majority of our representatives haven’t a clue what the daily lives of the people they represent are like, let alone the constant struggle of single mothers living below the poverty line. They are constantly arguing that we all must sacrifice with our pensions, our wages, our education, the security of our communities, and with the belly’s of our children, while they sit atop heavily guarded piles of money.

With the ranks of the underclass growing and the unemployment level at a staggering 9%, it’s more clear than ever that the wealth divide between “we the people” and our representatives has caused a dangerous disconnect. State and federal legislators claim to be acting fiscally responsible, but they support budgets that create unimaginably difficult circumstances for the lives of the most vulnerable people, especially children. There is no question that these newest proposals amount to class warfare, and the longer we ignore it, the more it will spread.

Rania Khalek is a young, progressive activist with a passionate dedication to social justice. Check out her blog Missing Pieces or follow her on twitter @Rania_ak. You can contact her at raniakhalek@gmail.com.

War on Poverty Has Become War on the Poor

Aaron Krager

What's the point?

War on Poverty and War on the Poor

Posted on | March 11, 2011 |

Evaluating history can do one of two things – help us learn and grow from mistakes or fill us with ruminations of “what if” questions. Looking back at President Lyndon B. Johnson’s War on Poverty could easily set the what if questions ablaze. What if the creation of Medicare actually included all citizens or only covered the elderly? What if the criteria to determine poverty levels had been updated and allowed to be adjusted with technological advances?

For the most part those questions only put us on a path towards writing a college paper or a book. Looking back should be a learning process. With LBJ’s Great Society and War on Poverty he propelled Congress and a nation to believe in a greater communal responsibility. The creation of Medicare provided key access to health care for seniors and the poor. In 1966, 28.5% of seniors were in poverty. Today that sits at 10.1%.

Johnson enlisted Sargent Shriver to head the newly formed Office of Economic Opportunity in 1965. During the office’s tenure programs such as Head Start, VISTA, and Legal Services were created to aid poor communities. Nixon ultimately dismantled the office in 1973 but the three key programs were dispersed into other governmental agencies. The backlash of Johnson’s War on Poverty became more a War on the Poor.

Many observers point out that the War on Poverty’s attention to Black America created the grounds for the backlash that began in the 1970s. The perception by the white middle class that it was footing the bill for ever-increasing services to the poor led to diminished support for welfare state programs, especially those that targeted specific groups and neighborhoods. Many whites viewed Great Society programs as supporting the economic and social needs of low-income urban minorities; they lost sympathy, especially as the economy declined during the 1970s.

The stereotypes continued to build up during the 80′s and 90′s with the idea of crack addicts and welfare queens. More subtle words like lazy or moochers became prevalent to cast a wary eye on the poor. So much so that the idea of a poor person can conjure up a fat, lazy, slob in front of the television for many people. The country has for the most part bought into it. Rush Limbaugh can even say this on his radio show: (via Andrew Sullivan)

We all know Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid, but unemployment compensation? The payment of unemployment benefits is almost as high as Social Security in this country. Folks, we are not going to survive as a nation, not the way we’ve been founded, with this kind of sloth and laziness and feeding at the public trough. It just cannot happen. And to even call this “wages” — I’m actually kinda glad they did because it points out how ludicrous this is and how dangerous it is. “Handouts,” handouts, the redistribution of wealth “makes up one-third of US wages.” Social welfare spending has increased three and a half times since 1960.

We declared war on poverty, and it’s given us this. We declared war on poverty, and what do we have? Thirty-five percent of our people living on the dole! Thirty-five percent of American citizens living on “handouts,” and where are the handouts coming from? Their fellow citizens… I know it’s depressing, folks. I mean some people are so lazy that they will only be unemployed if they’re paid to be unemployed.

After this diatribe, an anxious listener called to confess his sins:

I’m kind of caught between a rock and a hard place. I’ve been a conservative all my life. I don’t agree with the welfare state — of our country. I ran into a little bit of an issue a few years ago when I got some severe cancer and battled it for a couple years. I’m cancer free right now, but unfortunately I cannot work and I had to go on disability.

Here’s how Limbaugh responded:

Do you think I actually think you ought to be denied stuff? Okay. I don’t think that. I’m not talking about people like you, but there are people who fudge this disability business. I had a story not long ago about a bunch of drunks in jail getting disability payments because they were alcoholics. Well, we are a compassionate country. There is not a person in this country that does not want somebody who cannot provide for themselves to go empty. There’s not a person in the world who wants that. You don’t fall under the headline definition freeloader or what have you. And if you’re bothered by it, it’s life.

A lot of things affect a lot of people. But we’re not talking about you. And you are not the majority of that 35% on the dole anyway. You’re a small percentage of it. You’re not the problem we’re talking about.

Now here is a radio host lamenting the idea of providing for the basic well-being of his fellow citizens. He jumps on a story in which the premise is completely flawed to fit his own narrative. Social Security benefits are not just disability as well all know. It is a retirement system we all pay into and current retirees are receiving their benefits. He ignores the fact of the recent economic crisis and increased unemployment. All the while a caller feels guilty for something that is completely out of his control.

This man, a fellow conservative, bares a vulnerable part of himself that is covered in this guilt and seemingly dismisses his guilt as life. He somewhat reassures this man that he is not to blame but these drunks and freeloaders are dragging this country down. They are the one’s to blame and are the majority of the “35%.”

The 70 year old retired couple is to blame as they collect their social security benefits. The 32 year old man paralyzed from a car accident and receiving disability are to blame. The 44 year old mother getting an unemployment check for the last year because she was laid off as a paralegal at her law firm is to blame.

These are the freeloaders and go into the same category as a bunch of drunks sitting in jail. Forget the fact that alcoholism is a disease just as much as his drug addiction to oxycodone and his own arrest.

Regardless of his own history, the blame game is a strategic media campaign to distort the poor and cast them aside. Almost like untouchables. They are untouchables in our own American way. If noticed, they are to be avoided, shunned or to be a lesson in order to not be them.

AlterNet.org

After Pledging To Not Raise Taxes, Scott Walker Proposes Hiking Taxes And Fees On The Poor And Students

One of the most important ideological commitments of the modern conservative movement is an opposition to tax increases. It is with this ideology that then-Wisconsin gubernatorial candidate Scott Walker signed Americans For Tax Reforms’ “Taxpayer Protection Pledge,” a vow not to raise taxes on the people of his state.

Yet in his newly proposed budget, now-governor Walker appears to have already broken this pledge. While the budget would lower taxes overall — it includes $83.3 million in tax cuts “primarily for businesses and investors” — it would make up for lost revenue by eliminating tax credits and exemptions that primarily benefit the poor and even some in the middle class.

Wisconsin’s Legislative Fiscal Bureau — the state’s equivalent of the Congressional Budget Office — finds that this would amount to a $49.9 million tax increase on people who receive these credits over the next two years:

Low and middle income people would lose tax credits worth about $49.4 million over two years, the new Legislative Fiscal Bureau report said.

Those affected most by Walker’s proposal would include low-income families who qualify for the earned income tax credit program, and low-income homeowners who receive tax rebates under the homestead tax credit.

In addition to eliminating these tax credits, Walker also has proposed a spate of new fee increases. The “bulk of the fee increases are for tuition at University of Wisconsin campuses, totaling more than $105 million over two years.”

It appears that Walker is less committed to keeping taxes down on everyone than he is to cutting taxes for some of society’s most fortunate members, while raising them on some of its most vulnerable. He joins many other conservative state legislators across the country who are cutting taxes on the richest while slashing services and raising taxes for Main Street America.

By Zaid Jilani | Sourced from Think Progress

Posted at April 17, 2011, 9:32 am