This Law is a waste of Time and Money!

Rep. Kevin Tanner plans to carry a bill to the next legislative session which claims that it will protect pastors from being required to perform a marriage ceremony for a same sex couple in their church.  The problem with this bill is that all pastors and for that matter clergy in all religions are already afforded that right by the 1^st Amendment of the United States Constitution.  So why would we waste taxpayer money and the legislative sessions time in presenting this bill?  Tanner says it is because the Supreme Court decision making same sex marriage legal in all 50 states requires this bill.

My mother-in-laws’ priest at her church in North Carolina anticipated concerns from his congregation about the Supreme Court decision.  He called a meeting after services on Sunday to explain what the Supreme Court Decision meant. He explained that he was under no obligation to perform any service for anyone if he is not comfortable with it.  The congregation was satisfied.  A friend who is a retired minister said the same thing and added that most churches have as part of their ecclesiastical law, which are the laws governing the affairs of a Christian church, that clergy do not have to perform services which are against their conscience.  Pastor Beth LaRocca-Pitts in Atlanta stated that “You can’t be forced to do a wedding against your will, as a pastor of any faith or tradition, here in the United States.”

Tanner says the protections offered by the first amendment are not codified in Georgia.  But the US Constitution takes precedence over any other laws in any states so why does this need to be done!

Again, I ask why?  It seems to me the only reason for this law is that SOME Georgians want to make sure that the LGBT community knows they are not welcome or liked in their churches in this state.  If that is the message of “love” that they want to send, then so be it.

The Gap between the Rich and the Poor continues to grow!

This editorial was published in the Dawson News and Advertiser on January 9, 2012.  The numbers are scary, and no one seems to care except the Democrats!

We Need Jobs!

As we begin the New Year I can’t help but think of the millions of Americans who continue to suffer as a result of the “greatest recession” since the great depression.  I am trying to learn as much as I can about what happened to bring our country and the world to the brink of economic destruction.  So far I’ve gotten a great deal of information from two books I have read.  “The Price of Civilization” by Jeffrey Sachs and “The Big Short” by Michael Lewis have great explanations of the causes and results of what has happened over the past 30 to 35 years. Unfortunately, reading these books just makes me madder! 

I believe that the Democratic Party is the party of fairness and security for all Americans.  But things just aren’t fair anymore and Americans have lost the security of knowing that if they work hard, they will be fine.  Our Tea Party Columnist, who calls himself an Old American, keeps talking about how we liberals are conducting class warfare.  He also mentions what he calls the liberal media who forgives and or forgets, what in his mind, are the errors of President Obama.  Then he uses the term “Fair and Balanced”, right out of the headlines of Fox News.  Does he actually think that the news from Fox News is fair and balanced?  A recent study found that people who watch Fox News actually know less about what is going on in the world than people who watch no news at all!  Many of his quotes come directly from the Heritage Foundation web page.  I guess the Heritage Foundation, Americans for Prosperity, and Freedom Works are where he gets his “fair and balanced ideas!”

But as President Obama has said, “it is not class warfare, it is math”.  The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) recently completed a study on income inequality (The Washington Post, 10/26/11).  It shows that the after-tax incomes of the middle class have grown at about 1 percent per year from 1979 to 2007.  During that time the top 1% increased 281 percent and the top 20% has increased 105%.  It is the feeling of many economists that the Bush Tax cuts exacerbated these differences.  During this time period the top tax rate dropped from 70% to 35%.  Of course, the Heritage Foundation took this information and told the folks that read their website that this data is flawed and these huge discrepancies in income really don’t exist.  I haven’t read what they say about the recently released 2010 census data.  This data shows that nearly 50% of Americans have fallen into poverty or are scraping by on income that classifies them as low income.  What the Tea Party wants us to believe is that these folks are there because they are lazy—they just don’t know how to work hard.  I would imagine they probably agree with Newt Gingrich who says that 10 year old children of poor families should be put to work as janitors in our schools so they can learn what it means to work.  In fact Robert Rector, research fellow at the Heritage Foundation says these folks can’t really be poor because they live in nice houses.  Does he mean we need our low income citizens to be living in cardboard boxes in order to be classified as poor?  Maybe he should go and talk to some of the families who can’t buy food and clothing for their children and can’t afford medical care. To the 48% of Dawson County residents whose families are making less than $50,000 a year (low income to poverty), I don’t think you are lazy or don’t work hard.  I do think you have been treated unfairly and it is time we got back to treating all Americans with fairness and security! 

I watched 60 minutes on CBS a few weeks ago where they highlighted the plight of a group of Americans who were at one time considered middle class.  These folks have lost their jobs and are in process of losing their homes because of the financial dealings of some of our banks and Wall Street gurus over the past thirty years.  Those bankers and financiers are living wealthy lives now, while hard-working Americans are suffering because of the greed and unscrupulous business dealings of those individuals and their companies.

Hopefully the New Year will find our politicians recognizing that their job is not doing whatever it takes to get re-elected and amassing power for their political parties.  Their job is representing all of the people of this great country. They need to begin working like legislators; not politicians and solve the problems that are affecting so many Americans.

Governor Deal Visits Dawsonville

Governor Nathan Deal visited Dawsonville in December and talked about how great it was he cut 14,000 jobs.  Then in his State of the State Address he basically ignored the facts that I presented in this editorial in the Dawson News and Advertiser.  HE HAS NOT PLANS TO CREATE JOBS IN GEORGIA!!

Governor Deal, Where are the Jobs?

I read with great interest the two articles in our local papers about Nathan Deal’s visit to the Dawson County Republican/Tea Party meeting two weeks ago.  I wasn’t able to attend but sent in two questions.  From the articles I read it looks like the questions weren’t answered.  One question was why he appointed to the 7 member all male/white board which enforces HB87, Phil Kent, a known member and leader of anti-immigration hate groups (Southern Poverty Law Institute).  That wasn’t answered but this issue deserves a separate column.  The other question had to do with how he planned to create jobs in Georgia.  That wasn’t answered either.   In fact he bragged about the fact that he eliminated 14,000 jobs in our state!

First some facts about what has happened in Georgia since 2001 when Republicans took over the Gold Dome.  This data comes from the Georgia Budget and Policy Institute which gathers its information from places like the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

• Georgia lost 351,400 jobs - third most nationwide - since the financial crisis began, and ranks dead last in job growth since the official start of the recovery in June 2009
• Georgia has lost a greater number of jobs than all but two other states since the recession started in December 2007, and unlike the vast majority of states, has continued losing jobs at an alarming pace
• Georgia's unemployment rate since 2000 has nearly doubled from 5.2 percent to 10.3 percent; September 2011 marked the 50th consecutive month that Georgia's unemployment rate outpaced the national average

The jobs which Deal eliminated were government jobs.  Deal and his friends are proud that he was able to do that!  But what exactly do these lost jobs mean?  It means that teachers, firefighters, police, health care workers, librarians, DOT workers repairing our road and bridges, and social service workers, lost their jobs.  Real people had these jobs!  Sure there were probably some jobs that could have been eliminated, but what he and Governor Purdue did is a big part of why Georgia is near the top in unemployment in this country!  Hey, Gov. Deal and Lt. Gov. Cagle have government jobs!   Maybe we should just eliminate theirs, especially since instead of creating, they boast of eliminating jobs!

Then apparently Deal talked about two other problems our state is facing.  One is the high incarceration rate in Georgia.  He is right, that is expensive.  But if we fixed one of the largest problems we have in education, the high dropout rate, our rate of incarceration would go down also.  I agree with Deal that one way to do this would be to strengthen our dual enrollment and career classes.  But instead of strengthening education, Deal is talking about firing teachers and making the good teachers who remain deal with teaching larger size classes.  I am sure he is drawing his idea from headlines over the past few months that smaller class sizes are not necessarily better.  But he is ignoring the rest of the information from these studies that say for some students, especially average and at-risk students, smaller class sizes are better.  There are many factors to consider with this issue and just raising class sizes across the board is not the answer.  I am sure the teachers trying to teach our young people how to write are thrilled with the idea that instead of trying to teach 150 children they face the prospect of perhaps having 200 or 250 children.  Does Gov. Deal actually think that the best college students are looking at that prospect and choosing teaching over some other field?

So I ask Governor Deal again.  What are you doing to increase employment in Georgia?  It appears that all you have on your mind is cutting jobs.  I am sure when the Heritage Foundation starts working on our budget this winter, they will make the same suggestions—cut programs for the middle and lower income citizens, cut taxes for the wealthy, and give cash incentives to large corporations like the $200,000 he gave to Delta last year.  Same old, same old Republican tactics.  It hasn’t worked in 30 years and I doubt it will work now!  Georgia deserves better!

Support Small Business and American Made Goods

This article appeared in the November 23 Dawson News and Advertiser

Support “Small Business Saturday” on November 26

After we give thanks for our family and friends, our community, our men and women in uniform, and our nation on Thanksgiving Day, we begin one of the rituals of the holiday season, shopping.  Many of us will begin our Christmas shopping Thanksgiving Night or on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving.  Many will shop at stores such as Wal-Mart, Target, Belk’s, or Macy’s.  But Saturday, November 26 has been designated as “Small Business Saturday”.  This is the 2^nd year of the promotion and it is a day dedicated to supporting small businesses on one of the busiest shopping weekends of the year.  If millions of Americans all over the country would “shop small” the results could be huge!
Think about the small businesses in Dawson County, in Dahlonega, or in Gainesville.  It could be a gift shop, a clothing store, a decorating studio, a jewelry store, a bird store, a golf club, or a small restaurant. If everyone in North Georgia picked 3 or 4 of those small businesses at which to shop on Saturday, what an impact that would make!  It used to be that small business was the backbone of our country.  But unfortunately huge corporations such as Wal-Mart have pushed many small businesses out of business.  Small business cannot compete with the might of Wal-Mart which has become the largest retailer in the world.  Because of their might, they can dictate to manufacturers what to manufacture and what price to charge for the goods.  This has led to many companies sending their manufacturing to China or India where they can get cheap labor to produce their products and then sell them to Wal-Mart for distribution in the US.  The problem they have created, however, is that now middle class American has no manufacturing jobs available, jobs that used to pay $15 or $20 an hour.  Now all they have left is jobs at Wal-Mart making $8 to $10 an hour.  Even though retail sales are up at Wal-Mart, they are cutting employees hours and health benefits. If we don’t shop there quite as often, the Walton Family will be just fine!  Why?  Because the owners of the Wal-Mart Empire include 5 of the top 11 wealthiest individuals in America.  But the extra sales created by shopping small businesses this holiday season could make their year a success.
It would also be a boost to our economy if everyone would shop for American made goods.  Again these are hard to find, but if you buy from small businesses and get personal attention you may be able to find “Made in America” products.  When Sam Walton first began Wal-Mart in the 1960’s he promoted Wal-Mart as selling products “Made in America”.  But you would have to look very hard today to find anything in Wal-Mart today that is made in America.  So step out of the “Big Box” store for one day (or everyday!) and shop small—shop the small businesses in your area!  Look for local artists, seamstresses, bakers, and craftsman!  In fact, if we would all shop small and shop American made every day, we could probably turn this country and this economy around! 

Comparing Jobs Plans

This article will be published in the November 9 Dawson News and Advertiser.  As the Republicans continue to vote down every part of President Obama's jobs plan, our country continues to struggle, especially the middle and lower income people.  Yet the Republican jobs plan cuts taxes for the wealthy, does away with Wall Street and Bank regulations, and would practically eliminate the Environment Protection agency.  And the CBO says it wouldn't create any jobs in the short-term!

Comparing Plans to Create Jobs

President Obama has presented the American Jobs Act to the public and to Congress.  According to polls, the majority of the public is in favor of the provisions in it.  The Act includes things like giving grants to states to hire teachers, firefighters, and police, putting construction workers back to work and rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure.  It also includes support of green industry—an industry where we must get a foothold or the rest of the world will pass us by.  This all would be financed by a small increase in taxes on millionaires and billionaires.  But the Republicans don’t like it and even if they did and thought it would get our economy going again, they wouldn’t vote for it.  Remember Republican Sen. McConnell and Rep. Boehner both said their main goal was to make sure President Obama wasn’t re-elected, so they can’t let the economy get better even if it hurts the middle and lower income Americans!

The Republicans have come up with their own plan.  They claim that the Obama Administration has had enough time (2 ½ years) to straighten out the economy.  This economy was on the brink of total destruction when President Obama was inaugurated because of the policies of Republican Administrations since 1981.  But the Republican’s plan is to go back to the very policies that brought us to the current economic state such as:

1. Tax reform which would include a flat tax of 25% for those who make over $100,000 and 10% for those who make less than $100,000.  This would have higher income people paying more taxes if all deductions, exemptions and loopholes were eliminated.  However, it would leave almost all middle income and low income people paying more taxes also.  So the people who have already suffered the most during this recession would get hit with higher taxes. (In fact under Perry’s and Cain’s proposed tax plans, people like Warren Buffett would pay almost no tax.)  In a recent speech Eric Cantor said The Republican Party would help “a single working mom…a small business owner…and make sure the people at the top stay there”.  The problem is that taxing a single working Mom at 10% will not help her, especially since she is already paying 26% in payroll taxes, sales tax, state tax, and indirect property tax.  But the people at the top will be just fine!  "Republicans favor tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, but these had no stimulative effect during the George W. Bush administration, and there is no reason to believe that more of them will have any today," writes Bruce Bartlett, former Reagan Economic advisor.
2. Do away with regulations on banks and Wall Street.  By deregulating these two industries we will allow them to create money at will.  But wait a minute!  Isn’t that what got us into this recession?  Sub-prime mortgages, derivatives and hedge funds got us where we are today, but let’s do it again!  As for the idea that cutting regulations will lead to significant job growth, Bruce Bartlett said in an interview, "It's just nonsense. It's just made up."
3. Do away with the regulations imposed by the Environmental Protection Agency and open up all federal lands to drilling.  Rick Perry, Mitt Romney and Senate Republicans have put weakened environmental protection at the core of their plans based on a study done by the American Petroleum Institute claiming that doing away with regulations will be favorable for employment.  Republicans are claiming that if we create 1 job by drilling more, it will create 2.5 jobs elsewhere.  Of course when this claim was made with Obama’s jobs plan to put teachers, firefighters, police and construction workers back to work they said it wouldn’t create more jobs elsewhere.  Go Figure??  Damages to our world by doing away the environmental regulations would cost more than the sum of the wages and profits that would be made by cutting these regulations. Even global warming skeptic Robert Muller now agrees that there is global warming, probably caused by fossil fuels and that we should start cutting back on the use of fossil fuels to curb the over abundance of carbon dioxide.  This revelation came after a study, actually funded by the Koch Brothers Foundation (one of the biggest global warming naysayers) found the data on global warming to be correct!
4. Shrink government and cut the deficit.  More budget cuts will cost the economy around 700,000 jobs this year and next.  In addition to increasing unemployment, a tax decrease will further increase the deficit.  And their plans to decrease Medicare and Medicaid will shift the burden of this recession even further to the low and middle income American.

As Robert Reich (Economics Professor at Berkley and former Clinton Labor secretary) said, “Demagogues through history have known that big lies, repeated often enough, start being believed—unless they are refuted.”  These . . . economic whoppers are just plain wrong.  Make sure you know the truth—and spread it!”

Why Occupy Wall Street

This Article was published in the October 26 Dawson News and Advertiser.  Hopefully many of you have had an opportunity to participate in the Occupy Wall Street movement if not by attending a rally, by learning and supporting their cause through donations or conversations!

Why Occupy Wall Street?

A couple of weeks ago I worked at our Democratic Party Booth at the Dawsonville Moonshine Festival.  At our booth we had flyers to hand out and posters with pertinent information about our economy.   Reputable sources such as the Census Bureau, the Congressional Budget office, the Center for Tax Policy, and the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (all non-partisan organizations) were used.  Much of what was in this information concerned what the people, young and old, rich and poor, white and black, are protesting at the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations across the country.

1.        The top 1% of Americans own 42% of the financial wealth and 24 Percent of the National Income, which is more of the nation’s income since the 1920’s.  This great shift in wealth has taken place since the institution of “Trickle-Down Economics”, i.e., the wealthy pay less taxes in the hopes some of their money will “trickle-down” to the rest of us.

2.       Middle Class wages have not risen over the last 30 years, (the beginning of Reagan’s economic plan) and in fact over the last 10 years wages have gone down (since the Bush Tax cuts).

3.       Although the top 1% pay a large dollar amount in taxes, that is because they also have more money than 90% of the rest of the country.  But in percentage terms, they pay (after exemptions, deduction, loopholes) an average of 17% federal, state, sales, payroll, and property taxes while people in the low and middle income bracket pay an average of 37%( federal, state, sales, payroll, and property)

4.       Jobs!  The unemployment rate remains at 9.1% but is at 14.7% for high school graduates between 18 and 24 (23% for young black Americans).  Meanwhile corporate profits are at their highest level since WWII but corporations refuse to invest their more than $1.9 trillion in cash.  The so called job creators are not creating jobs!

5.       The corporate tax rate is 35% but no corporation pays this much because of loopholes and subsidies.  In 2011 corporate taxes equaled 1.2% of GDP, the lowest in the world (NY Times, 5/11). Big U.S. companies (among them GE, Exxon Mobile, Chevron, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs) have become experts at hiding profits in tax havens overseas.

6.       In 1959 the poverty rate among those 65 and older was 35.9%.  Since the broadening of social security benefits and the beginning of Medicare in the 60’s, the poverty rate among seniors has dropped to 9.2%.  But the Republicans want to do away with both programs!

These are just some of the disparities that have evolved over the last 30 years of cutting taxes for the wealthy (corporations and individuals) that the Occupy Wall Street movement is pointing out.  The conservative view of our economy is that everyone is individually responsible for themselves, but that they have no social responsibility to their country.  Liberals on the other hand also believe in individual responsibility, but also believe that citizens of America should also take responsibility for their community, country, people in general and the planet.  As Elizabeth Warren has said, “There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own.  Nobody!  You built a factory out there—good for you! But . . . you moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for.  You hired workers the rest of us paid to educate.  You were safe in your factory because of police forces and fire forces that the rest of us paid for. . . . It turned into something terrific. Keep a big hunk of it.  But part of the underlying social contract is that you take a hunk of that and pay it forward for the next kid that comes along.”
If you listen to the pundits on Fox News or CNBC, these folks that are part of Occupy Wall Street are just a bunch of “hippies”, socialists, lazy or worse.  To quote Paul Krugman in an Op Ed in the New York Times, he explains these reactions very succinctly…. “The way to understand all of this is to realize that it’s part of a broader syndrome, in which wealthy Americans who benefit hugely from a system rigged in their favor react with hysteria to anyone who points out just how rigged the system is.”
Occupy Wall Street is a patriotic movement based on a deep and abiding love of country.  This patriotism is not about the self-interests of individuals, but about what our country is to be.  Do Americans care about other citizens, or just about themselves?  99% of the people in this country are in the same boat!  That is why we need to stand up for the Occupy Wall Street.  Democracy is about citizens caring about one another as well as themselves.  Let’s get back to “we the people”!