Category Archives: Taxes

The New F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. My, How Time And Money Fly!

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It seems that the United States military-industrial complex has always been good at squandering taxpayer money. But, as the most costly weapons program in our nation’s history, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter has taken wasteful spending to a new level.

The F-35 was supposed to replace the F-16 as the nation’s premier fighter jet. But it’s more than seven years behind schedule and more than $163 billion (yes, that’s billion with a B) over budget. It has also been grounded more than a school kid who refuses to study or listen to his parents, leading the Pentagon’s chief weapons buyer, Frank Kendall, to call the F-35 program “acquisition malpractice” during an interview on CBS’s 60 Minutes.

In order to fully appreciate the problems with the F-35, it should be noted that a contract for the fighter was awarded to Lockheed-Martin in 2001 with expectations that our combined forces would acquire 2,852 of the planes at a cost of $233 billion. But, following a series of blunders and redesigns, only 114 had been built as of November 2014, and the fighter is not expected to be fully deployed until 2018. Ultimately, the fighters are expected to cost from $98 million to $114 million each with the total cost of the program likely to exceed $400 billion. To make matters worse, the GAO found that operating costs for the F-35 would be 79 percent higher than for the aircraft it replaces. And the F-35A’s cost per flying hour is $7,000 per hour higher than the F-16C/D.

Yet costs aren’t the only concern. There are also concerns with the plane’s performance and safety.

For example, some defense experts have questioned relying solely upon “short range” aircraft like the F-35 in future conflicts and have suggested reducing the number of F-35s ordered in favor of a longer range platform. Others have raised safety issues over the F-35’s reliance on a single engine versus the twin-engine F-16. The plane has been accused of being “heavy and sluggish” and possessing a “pitifully small payload for the money.” These problems showed themselves when, in 2008, two former RAND Corporation employees conducted simulated war games between the F-35 and the Russian Sukhoi Su-35 fighter. The Russian fighter won!

There are also questions about the F-35’s capability of engaging modern air defenses. In an apparent acknowledgement of the problem, the Pentagon awarded Lockheed Martin $450 million in 2012 to improve the F-35 electronic warfare systems and incorporate Israeli systems.

During evaluation flights, USAF test pilots have noted a lack of visibility from the F-35 cockpit, stating that the problem would lead to them being shot down in combat and leading one defense analyst to conclude that the F-35A “is flawed beyond redemption.” It was also noted that the plane’s current software is inadequate for even basic pilot training, that its ejection seat may fail causing pilot fatality, that its radar performs poorly, or not at all, and that its engine replacement takes an average of 52 hours, instead of the two hours specified.

A 2015 Pentagon report also found issues with the plane’s reliability and maintainability, significant fire risk due to vulnerability of its fuel tanks, concerns with wing drop that have yet to be resolved after 6 years, engine problems, problems with its software and problems with the F-35’s high-tech helmet. And even before the F-35 could be deployed, China unveiled a portable long-range surveillance radar system specifically designed to defeat stealth aircraft like the F-35.

As if all of these problems aren’t bad enough, the fighter’s technology has already been compromised. After sharing the F-35’s plans with our ally, Australia, last year it was determined that someone – likely China – had hacked Australia’s computers and downloaded the plans. Though the plane offered to Australia is not exactly like those intended for the US military, it’s close enough for concern.

Given the delays and cost overruns, would anyone really be surprised if China ended up deploying the fighter before we do?

To read even more about the F-35, visit Wikipedia.

The Balanced Budget Fraud.

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It may sound like a good idea to require the federal government to balance the budget, but it’s nothing more than a thinly-disguised way for Teapublicans to shrink government and give corporations free reign to exploit people and resources.

Make no mistake, as soon as a balanced budget amendment is passed, if it ever is, Teapublicans will cut taxes at the first opportunity. That will result in less revenue, which, in turn, will result in large budget cuts. Of course, those cuts will not affect corporate welfare or the military-industrial complex. Instead, there will be cuts to regulatory agencies and safety nets. Already we’ve seen the GOP propose the repeal of the Affordable Care Act which will deny affordable health insurance to more than 16 million Americans. We’ve seen GOP-sponsored budgets that propose cuts to Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security and Supplemental Nutrition programs. We’ve seen Teapublican initiatives to defund the Department of Education, the Environmental Protection Agency, the IRS, and the Department of Labor.

All of this will be made much easier if Teapublicans can muster enough votes to pass a balanced budget amendment.

The truth is, our federal government has often operated at a deficit. Not because of bad management or negligence. But out of necessity. Indeed, the Constitution was created to replace the failed Articles of Confederation over federal deficits. The fledgling government had run up substantial debts during the Revolutionary War and, without a central government, it had no way of collecting the funds to repay those debts. And that’s but one example: Had FDR not expanded government programs to put people back to work, we likely would have never emerged from the Great Depression. Had the US not operated at a deficit, we would not have been able to conduct military operations for WWII and most of our other all-too-frequent wars.

The Reagan administration operated at massive deficits in an attempt to outspend the Soviet Union. The Bush administration operated at enormous deficits in order to create the Homeland Security Department and to prosecute the Afghan and Iraq Wars. And the Obama administration has operated at deficits (albeit steadily decreasing deficits) in order to wind down operations in Iraq and Afghanistan and to dig our economy out of the trench created by Bush.

Since 1975, only two administrations have produced surpluses, and both of them were Democrats! Taking it a step further, in the past 100 years, there have been eight Democratic presidents and nine Republicans. Five of the eight Democrats oversaw deficits smaller than they inherited, while seven of the nine Republicans oversaw deficits larger than they inherited.

Given their history, do you really think Teapublicans are pushing a balanced budget amendment out of a sense of fiscal responsibility?

Moreover, balanced budget requirements are no guarantee of fiscal responsibility. In Arizona, for example, once the legislature passed a balanced budget requirement, Teapublicans set about starving the state with tax cuts. Of course, those tax cuts have not been shared equally. The state not only cut taxes for the wealthy. It has cut corporate taxes for 24 of the past 25 years. Meanwhile, it has raised sales taxes to push the costs of government onto those who can least afford it. The resulting lack of revenue has, in turn, led to catastrophic cuts to education and other services.

Since no Teapublican will ever again agree to raise taxes, the state is caught in a downward spiral fueled by ideologues, greedy corporations, self-serving politicians, dark money donations to lapdog candidates, and a series of “studies” and propaganda from conservative “think tanks.” It’s a death spiral from which the state may never recover.

Democracy Lost.

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In recent years, much has been written about growing inequality. It is, indeed, one of the most important issues of our time. And the effects of big money on our democracy have been devastating.

Sure, you may still be able to vote to elect those who are supposed to represent you. But that, alone, does not constitute democracy. Not only are the choices of candidates limited to two individuals – the only two who were able to climb their way up the political ladder in order to receive their parties’ blessings and, more important, their campaign funds. All too often, those who are elected are promised large campaign donations by corporations and industries in exchange for political favors. It is not necessarily quid pro quo, but the expectation for a return on the investment is there. So, too is the pressure.

In reality, such high stakes lobbying has long been a part of politics. But, over the past 35 years, things have gotten even worse.

In the late seventies, large US corporations began to see their hold on the world economy slip. New, lower-priced, high-quality imports – many of them made with robotics – from Japan and Germany began to push aside American-made products. US corporations responded by relocating manufacturing – first to the South, then off-shore – in search of lower-priced labor.

Perhaps, the most destructive response was the move to tie CEO compensation to the value of the companies’ share prices. This ushered in an era of ever-increasing CEO salaries and even more lucrative stock options for CEOs – a legalized form of insider trading. The result was for US corporations to seek ever lower-priced labor in countries where there is no regulation and no employee benefits. At the same time corporate profits have soared, employee salaries and corporate investments in the future have diminished – almost guaranteeing that the future will belong to foreign-based corporations. But why would our CEOs care? They and their money will be long gone before it matters.

Our corporations have used the threat of off-shoring jobs to extort our state and city governments. In exchange for their extortion, those governments have assumed many of the risks of corporate relocation or expansion by paying for needed infrastructure, cutting regulations, and delaying or eliminating corporate taxes.

Now these corporations are attempting to extort the federal government.

Unwilling to pay US income taxes on profits made off-shore, these corporations are stashing cash in foreign banks until the federal government agrees to “repatriate” the money at a greatly reduced tax rate. Of course, they’re justifying the extortion by saying that “repatriation” will lead to greater investments and more jobs in the US – the great “trickle down” fraud.

In reality, the money is more likely to be doled out to CEOs and other executives in the form of bonuses (as a reward for robbing ordinary taxpayers) and stock options.

In the meantime, corporations and billionaires have been working to rig the system. Realizing that buying Congress and our state legislatures is cheaper than paying lobbyists, people like the Koch brothers have stuffed the pockets of candidates willing to do their bidding. To pave the way, they pushed conservatives to stack the Supreme Court with ideologues such as Alito, Roberts, Scalia and Thomas. That inevitably led to favorable court rulings giving corporations the rights of people and all but eliminating limitations on political donations. They got the IRS to change its rules allowing “non-profits” to fund political campaigns. When they won control of legislatures, they gerrymandered congressional districts making it all but impossible for anyone but “their people” to win office. And they introduced Voter ID laws to suppress the votes of minorities and the poor.

In 2014, their efforts finally came to fruition. Having already bought the House in 2010, they now own the Senate. It’s no coincidence that the first bills to reach the House and Senate floors were to repeal “Obamacare” and to build the Koch…er…Keystone XL Pipeline. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has also made it clear that issues such as raising the minimum wage, equal pay for equal work, unemployment insurance and student loan costs will be pushed aside in favor of gutting regulations on health care and financial services and eviscerating the EPA.

If you’re still worried about the effects of so-called “dark money” on our democracy, don’t. Last year, our democracy officially became an oligarchy.

Is Another Civil War Inevitable?

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Some on the right believe so. To examine that dire possibility, it’s necessary to look at history – the issues that led to the Civil War and the issues created by the defeat of the Confederacy. As any school child knows, the cause of the Civil War was slavery. The primary reason the Union won was its manufacturing power. And, following the war, the South was left in poverty, even resenting the attempts of the North to help restore its institutions and economy.

While the South suffered and chafed at what it considered northern meddling, following the Civil War, the North went back to business as usual, happy that its boys were no longer dying. It never believed that its culture was all that different from the South. Sure, there were the stereotypes that anyone with a southern drawl was slow; that they didn’t believe in education and hard work. There were jokes that, in the South, a family reunion was a great place to pick up chicks. But few people in the North held a grudge.

Attitudes in the South were entirely different. Rather than admitting the war was initiated by slavery, it called the Civil War the “War of Northern Aggression.” And though the Confederacy surrendered, the South has never really admitted defeat. It kept its own identity; its distinct culture; and, of course, its racism.

You’ve heard the phrase, “The South Will Rise Again?” Well, it has – at least politically. The states of the old Confederacy are now almost completely red, with Republican governors, Republican-controlled legislatures, Republican US senators and mostly Republican congressional representatives. Like the Confederacy, today’s elected officials from the South believe in states’ rights and they have an almost universal contempt for the federal government.

In fact, the second Civil War has already begun. But, so far, it has been confined to a culture war. Rather than build their own business, southern states seem intent on taking corporations and jobs away from the North. And, to some extent, they’ve succeeded. In search of low-paid labor and lower taxes, many corporations have abandoned their places of origin and moved south, leaving the cities and former employees to wallow in poverty. Southern states have even succeeded in swaying the nomenclature to their benefit. While northern states are now known as the “Rust Belt,” southern states are known as the “Sun Belt.”

Yet the biggest differences can be measured in terms of faith, poverty, education and tax contributions to the federal government. Most of the northern states contribute far more in federal taxes than their southern counterparts. Indeed, most of the southern states receive far more in expenditures than they contribute. The southern states routinely rank among the most underfunded public schools and at the bottom with regard to the level of education. And most of the people in the southern states are devout followers, believing that their impoverished circumstances are an act of God; that they will succeed if they only pray harder.

While the South has a relatively uniform identity, the North is much more diverse. States like California, New York, Minnesota and Washington have little in common with Montana, Idaho, North Dakota, South Dakota and New Hampshire. About the only thing they share is the climate.

And though the Civil War represented a clash over slavery, it was also urban versus rural; manufacturing versus farming; the educated versus the uneducated. For the most part, those differences haven’t changed. Certainly, there are large cities, large manufacturing plants and large universities in the modern South. But the culture divide remains and, following the last 4 national elections, the divide seems to be widening.

For example, Arizona (now part of the South) has already passed a nullification bill that would challenge any federal law or regulation its legislature deems “unconstitutional.” Can the rest of the South be far behind? Even though the bill is likely to be vacated by federal courts, the attitude will remain. The southern states would rather spend the millions of dollars required to challenge the federal government than to spend the money improving their schools, nurturing business start-ups, maintaining the environment and creating jobs.

Where all of this conflict will end is uncertain.

The Sad State Of Arizona (2015 Edition)

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Before the GOP-created Great Recession, Arizona’s state economy was based on the fantasy that construction could continue until the entire Sonora Desert was covered by homes, shopping malls and golf courses. So since the housing market crashed, Arizona’s economy has languished.

While other states were trying to mend their losses by diversifying, stimulating their economies and raising taxes, Jan Brewer and the GOP-dominated legislature chose, instead, to make cuts. Deep, desperate budget cuts. Yet, despite facing a large deficit, they chose to further reduce revenue by cutting taxes for corporations. At the same time, they put teachers out of work by cutting the funding of public schools. Indeed, since 2009, only Oklahoma has cut more from student funding than Arizona. As a result, the state’s per student funding is now just 69 percent of the national average and its student performance stands at 47th out of 50 states and the District of Columbia. Only 1 in 18 students who enter an Arizona high school will receive a degree from a college or technical school, and those who do earn a degree will likely be buried in student loan debt.

Not content with destroying schools and jobs, the GOP also did what it could to destroy tourism, the state’s 2nd-largest industry, by closing state parks and highway rest stops. And to make the state even less appealing to tourists, they passed the anti-Latino law, SB1070, which made tourists and conventions spurn the state costing us tens of millions of dollars in lost revenue.

It was as if the GOP was intent on pushing our citizens into its ideological clown car and driving us off a fiscal cliff.

Now along comes the new GOP governor, Doug Ducey, who must have frozen his brain while peddling questionable franchises for Cold Stone Creamery. During the campaign, he and his supporters ran millions of dollars in misleading attack ads accusing his Democratic opponent of raising tuition to the state’s universities. But, now that Ducey has been sworn into office, he has presented a budget that would cut $75 million in funding for post-secondary education. And, though he pledged to increase K-12 education funding during the campaign, he is attempting a shell game in which he proposes to take as much from the already stressed school administration and operations budgets as he would add for classrooms. Moreover, his budget completely ignores the hundreds of millions of dollars a court awarded public schools as the result of previous cuts to education in violation of the state constitution.

Of course, one budget item that will increase is the money allocated to corrections. True to the GOP’s commitment to line the pockets of private prison corporations, Ducey proposes building yet another privately-operated prison at a cost of $5.3 million. But there is no money for the education and rehabilitation of prisoners, so after they serve their time, they are all too likely to commit more crimes. And since the privately-operated health care system for prisons doesn’t track or treat infectious diseases, they are also likely to spread infectious diseases into our communities.

In their obviously delusional minds, Ducey and the Teapublicans still seem to believe that, by further cutting the state’s already low corporate taxes, they will be able to attract corporations to relocate to Arizona bringing with them thousands of high-paying jobs. Anyone who has ever consulted with corporations seeking a place to expand or relocate knows that’s a fantasy.

Corporations, at least good corporations, look for places to expand that offer quality transportation, abundant resources, an abundant high-skilled and well-educated workforce, abundant and low-cost energy, a high quality of living, and affordable taxes…usually in that order. Arizona’s approach will only result in the relocation of corporations that offer low-skill, low-paying jobs or gun manufacturers who are drawn to the state by our heavily-armed population and our virtually non-existent gun laws. Even then, they will only come to Arizona if the state is willing to pay for changes in needed infrastructure, provide further tax cuts and pay for other incentives. All of which explains why, when high tax states like California and Minnesota are thriving with low unemployment and budget surpluses, Arizona has failed to emerge from recession and faces annual budget deficits of $1 billion or more.

In the competition to build a sustainable, thriving economy, it would seem that Arizona can only compete in a contest of Biggest Loser against other red states like Kansas and Mississippi. And the biggest losers of all will be our students.

State Of The World.

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On the day following President Obama’s inspiring State of the Union address, I think it appropriate to wonder, if a world leader were to make a State of the World address, what would it be? What would be the calls to action? What accomplishments would it tout? What dire warnings would it contain?

If I was that world leader, my address would include the following:

Accomplishments? There are very few. Charities and non-governmental organizations have nibbled at the edges of some problems, such as access to clean water, housing and food. But most of these are mere symptoms of larger issues. For example, many nations have contributed to refugee camps while ignoring, or even exacerbating the conflicts that created the refugees in the first place. We have killed terrorists while creating others as a result of those very same killings, all the while ignoring the causes that led to much of that terrorism in the first place. And though we have discussed environmental problems, we have solved few. Sometimes, these two larger issues overlap. For example, at the current rate of killings (an elephant is killed every 15 minutes), African elephants could disappear from the wild in just 11 years. The reason for the slaughter? Ivory is expensive and highly sought after for jewelry, so terrorists are killing the elephants to claim the ivory in order to fund their terrorist activities.

According to a new scientific study, the world’s oceans are on the precipice of mass extinctions. The oceans are being overfished and horribly polluted. Coral reefs are being destroyed by cruise ships and, most especially, container ships in order for large corporations to increase manufacturing profits by exploiting low labor costs in underdeveloped countries. There are large “islands” of trash and plastics floating in our oceans. BP and other oil companies have polluted our waters with oil spills consisting of millions of barrels of crude oil. Fracking is pumping benzenes and other toxic chemicals into our aquifers and polluting our drinking water, even causing earthquakes. Chemical companies and large corporate farms are responsible for toxic runoff from farmlands that have created “dead zones” in our oceans at the mouths of rivers. Those same chemical companies have contributed to the near catastrophic collapse of bee colonies needed to pollinate our food plants. As a result of the tsunami at Fukishima, radioactive water is pouring into the ocean unabated. And the effects of that mess are, as yet, unknown.

Back on land, white rhinos are now extinct in the wild and virtually non-existent in zoos. Black rhinos are greatly endangered. Amur Tigers are virtually extinct and all large cats are endangered. Pandas, which have long been on the edge of extinction, are now even more threatened by climate change. Mountain and Lowland Gorillas are endangered, in addition to Orangutans – both as the result of wars and habitat loss. Rain forests are being denuded in order to exploit them for exotic hardwoods and palm oil. Some forests are being cleared under the mistaken belief that the land can be used for agriculture.

Polar ice sheets and glaciers are melting at phenomenal rates inevitably leading to rising seas that will displace millions and millions of people. And the cost of relocating many of the world’s largest cities will run into the hundreds of billions, likely trillions, of dollars. The loss of ice pack in the Arctic is also threatening the existence of Polar Bears and other species. Of course, it has been well-established that ice melt is the result of our love affair with fossil fuels, but only a few nations are taking the problem seriously. As a result, 2014 was the warmest year on record. Global warming is leading to larger, more violent and more numerous storms. To make matters worse, the Koch-bought US Congress is intent on passing laws that will defund the Environmental Protection Agency, cut environmental regulations for large corporations and maintain tax breaks for the world’s largest polluters, all the while denying their impact on climate change.

Economic inequality and religious extremism have led to an explosion of wars and terrorism worldwide, resulting in the deaths of millions and the displacement of millions more. The immigration of those fleeing violence and economic oppression has led to the rise of hate, racism and right wing extremism in the refugees’ host nations. Meanwhile, economic inequality continues to get worse. It is estimated that, by 2016, 1 percent of the world’s population will own more than 50 percent of the world’s wealth! Yet conservative politicians in the US, Europe and elsewhere continue to vote to cut taxes for large corporations and the wealthy. The beneficiaries then contribute to political campaigns to help elect those who will do their bidding, and the cycle repeats. (Actually, it’s less of a cycle than a death spiral.)

Such is the sad state of the world today. And, thanks to conservative politics, things are only getting worse.

How Our Media Are Failing Us.

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The US news media were once the envy of the world. TV news gave us legendary journalists such as Edward R. Murrow, Walter Cronkite, David Brinkley and Chet Huntley to name just a few. These were people who proudly informed Americans, exposed corruption and provided context for politics. So what happened? How did we go from Walter Cronkite to Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Bill O’Reilly. There is no single answer. Instead, a number of factors have led to the demise of journalism in the US. Here are the most prominent:

1- Media Have Chosen Sides: Newspapers have long leaned to one side or another. The Wall Street Journal was always conservative as The New York Times was always liberal. But despite their leanings, they at least tried to present both sides. That no longer is the case. Fox News Channel gets its daily talking points from the Republican National Committee and, since the end of the Fairness Doctrine, talk radio has become more than 90 percent right wing with almost no liberal counterparts.

2 – Infotainment And Ratings: Far too many so-called “news” shows have become infotainment – more devoted to creating high ratings than presenting actual news and information. They focus on the most bizarre, sensational and macabre stories rather than news that matters. As a result, we know more about the murder trial of the day than what Congress is doing.

3 – Equating Equal Time With Accuracy And Fairness: Fearful of backlash from the party faithful, the media tend to report both sides of a political story rather than dig for the truth. I call this the “We report, you decide” syndrome. This is no substitute for actual journalism. With no reporter focused on getting to the truth, the falsehoods from one side become accepted as fact.

4 – The Horse Race Syndrome: During the run-up to elections, the news media have refused to report the truth. They are more interested in reporting the results of polls with the idea of finding a winner. As a result, we hear two disparate views of issues with no context available to help us choose a candidate.

5 – Accepting Politically-Biased Nomenclature: Republican strategists are constantly trying to win a literal war of words. For example, Estate Taxes were once widely accepted as a way of preventing dynasties in the US – so that the extremely wealthy could not pass unimaginable wealth onto their heirs. But once the GOP labeled them Death Taxes, the media picked up the term and, as a result, public opinion began to change. The same thing happened when the abortion foes changed the description from anti-abortion to Pro-Life.

6 – Newsroom Cutbacks: In the late 1970’s, the owners of news organizations began seeking greater profits. They found them by eliminating foreign news bureaus and eliminating many reporters and staff photographers. As a result, they now rely on stock photos and wire services. Reporters no longer have the time to investigate corruption or to check facts.

7 – Laziness: Too many reporters are willing to accept what they are told by one source. It requires too much effort and too much time to seek other sources or to research the issue in order to provide context. It’s more convenient to go with the story half-finished. For example, business reporters often report that US corporate income taxes are the highest in the world. What they neglect to say is that is only the stated tax rate, not the effective tax rate which is often just one or two percent. And they never report the amount of subsidies and other forms of corporate welfare received by the very corporations that complain of high income taxes.

7 – Expediency: In the rush to be first, news media no longer take the time to verify the story through multiple sources. False stories are often repeated over and over before the mistake is uncovered and, if it is, the retraction (if there is one) is scarcely noticed. This was never more apparent than with Lara Logan’s false and misleading 60 Minutes report on Benghazi. The original story was nearly an hour. The retraction was only a minute or two.

8 – Economic Self-Interest: The vast majority of our media are now owned by just 6 conglomerates. (And if the Time-Warner/Comcast merger is completed, that number will drop to 5.) These corporations are less concerned with news than they are with profits. There are no longer firewalls between news departments and corporate operations. So if a story will harm the corporation, it is too often buried.

9 – Fear Of Retribution: Chuck Todd’s recent admission about treatment of Teapublicans on Meet the Press is exhibit A. When he said that he didn’t dare challenge a Republican lie or they would not appear on the show, he was, in effect, being a whistle-blower for the profession of journalism.

10 – Overwhelming Number Of Lies: As Politifact.com found, Teapublicans tell nearly 3 times as many lies as Democrats. They tell bigger whoppers, too. It’s hard for journalists to keep up. And with fewer journalists willing to challenge the lies, the politicians keep on telling them. Eventually the lies become accepted as fact. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of examples. One of the most popular lies is that the Keystone XL Pipeline will create thousands of jobs. Yet independent studies show that the number of jobs is grossly inflated and that they don’t justify the environmental risks.

Despite the media’s many failings, all is not lost. There are still numerous, credible news outlets. But the best way to be informed is to actually work at it. After all, that’s what our Founding Fathers expected of us. It’s not even all that daunting. The Web can be a very convenient and useful tool. The basic rule is to never accept anything from a biased source, or even a single source, as fact. Seek out information from independent sources, as well as conservative-leaning and liberal-leaning sources. Then check the information through Websites such as FactCheck.org, Politifact.com and Snopes.com.

The very future of our nation depends on it.

The Difference Between The Facts And The Truth.

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Since President Obama’s Executive Order on immigration, various news organizations have been crawling all over each other to “fact-check” the president’s statements. Predictably, they found a number of things that were at odds with the “facts.”

What those news organizations fail to recognize is that the facts don’t necessarily represent the truth. So I’ll do their job for them. The truth is that illegal immigration, and the resulting influx of undocumented workers, has been a large problem for many years. As a result, President Obama has overseen the greatest expansion of border security in history in addition to an unprecedented growth in deportations. In addition to the “fence,” we now have 21,000 border patrol agents. We have at least one agent for every half mile of the border. Combined with slow job growth (as opposed to a slow economy), that has resulted in a net loss of illegal immigrants.

The fact is that many immigrants have crossed our southern border. The truth is that 40 percent of undocumented immigrants entered the US legally through our airports, bus stations, and seaports and they have overstayed their visas. Building a bigger fence and stationing more agents at the border will do nothing to stop these immigrants.

The fact is that an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants work in the US. The truth is that these workers do not take American jobs. They do the work that very few Americans will. For example, despite advertising for American workers to pick his fruit, a fruit grower in Georgia could not find a single American to do what undocumented workers will.

The fact is drugs are still being smuggled into our country illegally. The truth is that most of them are being smuggled into the US on airplanes, in freight cars, in boats. Few are being brought in by human mules.

The fact is that some criminals cross our borders illegally…drug smugglers, human smugglers and gang members. The truth is that these people represent a very small percentage of illegal immigrants.

The fact is that we pay to educate the children of illegal immigrants. The truth is that these children grow up to contribute far more to our society than their education costs. It is also true that illegal immigrants cannot receive food stamps and welfare benefits. Neither can they vote.

The fact is that many immigrants came across the southern border in search of a better life. The truth is that these immigrants had little choice. Many came to the US as refugees in the 1980’s when the Reagan administration was supporting dictators and death squads in El Salvador and Nicaragua. (Remember Iran-Contra?) Many were small farmers who were put out of business by our large corporate farms that dumped low-priced corn into Mexico and Central America as a consequence of NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement) and CAFTA (Central American Free Trade Agreement).

The fact is that thousands of children recently crossed our southern border. The truth is that few tried to sneak across the border. Most simply turned themselves into Border Patrol officers seeking asylum from the violence in Honduras and El Salvador.

The fact is that our border security has greatly limited the number of illegal crossings. The truth is that is has also greatly limited the billions of dollars in trade between Mexico and the US. 6 million US jobs depend on exports to Mexico and the US receives nearly $9 billion per year in tourism from Mexico. Yet despite being on the border, thanks to SB1070, Arizona ranks 21st in exports to Mexico behind Wisconsin and Minnesota!

The fact is that millions of undocumented workers are employed in the US. The truth is that most of these workers pay federal and state income taxes, sales taxes and licensing fees. They also contribute approximately $7 billion per year in payroll deductions to Social Security and Medicare even though they will never benefit from these programs.

The fact is that we need comprehensive immigration reform. The truth is that Republican politicians have used the issue of immigration to promote racism and fear in order to be elected.

The fact is that President Obama acted alone in an attempt to solve the immigration crisis. The truth is that the US House of Representatives had more than 500 days to vote on the Senate’s bi-partisan comprehensive immigration bill, but Speaker Boehner refused to bring it to a vote. Republicans also refused to negotiate the issue with Democrats. The president was left with no other option than to act by Executive Order.

Greed Versus Poverty.

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“For the first time in history it is now possible to take care of everybody at a higher standard of living than any have ever known. Only ten years ago the ‘more with less’ technology reached the point where this could be done. All humanity now has the option of becoming enduringly successful.” – Buckminster Fuller, 1980.

I recently spotted this quote on Facebook and it made me think: What is the true state of the world in 2014? How far have we come since 1980?

Well, here are the sobering statistics:

– According to the human rights group, Walk Free, 36 million people live in slavery worldwide.
– In the US, approximately 250,000 women and children are held as sex slaves.
– In the US, nearly 2.5 million children were homeless at some point in 2013.
– In the US, 48 million people live in poverty.
– Worldwide, more than 3 billion people – nearly half the world population – live on less than $2.50 per day.
– In the US, 1 in 6 children don’t have enough to eat.
– Worldwide, 1 in 8 people suffer from chronic malnourishment and approximately 5,000,000 children die of malnutrition each year.
– Worldwide, many millions of people don’t have access to clean water.
– Worldwide, billions of people don’t have access to modern medical care.
– In the US, approximately 12 million people don’t have access to affordable health care even after implementation of the Affordable Care Act.
– Worldwide, climate change causes 350,000 deaths each year and that number is certain to grow.

As Fuller stated, it is now possible to solve these problems. Yet too many voters still believe in the fraud that is called “trickle-down economics”…a trickle that never comes. Too many politicians would rather give the wealthy and large corporations another tax cut than help these “freeloaders.” Others are too busy campaigning for office to be troubled with real problems. And the political problems aren’t just in the US. The rest of the industrialized world is not much better. Much of Europe has fallen back into recession as the result of economic austerity programs. In response, their populations have taken a nasty turn toward fascism.

We should all strive to avoid blaming others for our lack of progress and, instead, look for solutions.

Imagine what could be done to improve lives if the US corporations that have $2.1 trillion stashed in offshore tax havens paid just 10 percent in taxes on that money. Imagine if corporate CEOs devoted just a portion of their multi-million dollar annual salaries to pay their employees a living wage. Imagine if all of the world governments agreed to cut in half the $1.75 trillion in annual military spending and dedicated it to giving people access to health care, food and clean water. Imagine if our politicians weren’t bought and paid for by corporate lobbyists who are rewarded with billions in government contracts…more than $4 trillion between 2007 and 2012. Imagine if the billions dedicated to lobbying was used, instead, to help end human suffering.

We certainly have the means to achieve Fuller’s vision. All we need is the will (and the heart) to demand it.

The Not-So-United States.

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It’s the day after Veteran’s Day. After flying the Stars and Stripes one last time to honor those who served our nation, Arizona citizens and businesses should be folding up their American flags and storing them away. Or, for the few who still pledge allegiance to the flag, they should remove the star representing Arizona. At the very least, they should cut the star in half.

Why?

Because, in our most recent election, Arizona voters passed Proposition 122. This new law, which will go into effect on January 1, 2015, makes it illegal for any Arizona state employee to enforce a federal law or regulation which our nincompoop-dominated legislature deems unconstitutional. Why trust the already far-right-dominated Supreme Court to make such decisions? Why pay attention to the Constitution’s federal supremacy clause?

Arizona’s legislators know best.

This brilliant piece of legislation, which legal experts have pronounced blatantly unconstitutional, was written by the late Tea Party Senator Chester Crandell and co-sponsored by other Tea Party legislators in response to the armed standoff by Cliven Bundy and his militia buddies against the Bureau of Land Management’s attempts to make Bundy pay more than $1 million in back fees for grazing his cattle on federal lands. Despite the fact that other ranchers pay the fees without complaint, the militant Tea Party seems to view the government’s attempt to collect the fees as blatant government over-reach. Arizonans certainly wouldn’t want the evil BLM to try to collect bills here.

In reality, Prop 122 is secession-lite.

The Arizona Tea Party “Patriots” would really like to secede from the United States (apparently nothing says patriotism like lifting a middle finger to your nation’s government and all those who have fought and died for it), but the state simply can’t afford to secede. After all, Arizona is a “taker” state. According to the most recent data, it receives approximately $1.50 in federal subsidies for every dollar the state’s citizens contribute to the federal government in taxes.

So we have Prop 122, instead, created by our legislature, passed by our voters and supported by Arizona’s governor-elect and attorney general-elect. That means Arizona’s citizens should be prepared to, once again, be the laughing stock of late night TV and the Comedy Channel. Moreover, Arizona taxpayers should be prepared to spend tens of millions in legal fees in a futile attempt to defend the state’s actions against the federal government. But, hey, enough of those taxpayers voted for the bill to allow it to pass by the slimmest of margins…slightly more than one half of the 44 percent of registered voters who actually made the minimal effort to vote.

It’s difficult to have much sympathy for Arizonans. The state that brought you the racist SB 1070 and the legalized discrimination SB 1062 has now fired the first salvo in secession. It’s as if the state has denounced its status of statehood and set the way-back clock to 1911 when Arizona was still a territory.