"Move Your Money" is a bad solution

The group urging folks to "move your money" from big banks to small ones says that such moves will show the banks you mean business. Nonsense.

That may have been true many years ago when the government realized that allowing monopolies to exist was bad for the economy. It was also before people like Mayor Bloomberg fought to do away with regulation of the banks , Wall Street, the real estate industry,credit card issuers and the utility companies.

It was also before the Supreme Court decided that corporations were people.

Let us assume you take your money out and put it in a small bank. There is nothing to stop a big bank from buying out the small
bank, and you're back where you started - but worse. Now there are fewer small banks and more people unemployed.

This business of "A" bank becoming "B" bank getting bought out by "C" bank is ridiculous. Each bank changes its rules and you have to play the game of "Do you know where your money is?" Someone like Elizabeth Warren might have brought some common sense to banking regulation but she was never given a chance - forced out by bank lobbyists.

The tale of the campaign button

While looking for something the other day, I came upon a button. It said 2008, had a profile of Obama with the following words. "HOPE. ACTION. Change We can Believe In."

After eight years of being Bushwacked it was refreshing to get a change. Obama promised to change health care. Make it simpler, fairer, and more encompassing. He promised to get us out of Iraq and Afghanistan. He promised more transparency. He promised the usual campaign battle cry to fight against "Special Interests."

So far the only change I see, is the change in Obama. From a Sir Galahad we got a Don Quixote. From a fighter we got a dreamer.

Now the apologists have gone to bat for him. Even James Carville, who was slightly critical of the President has now started to say "Think of the Alternative."

While it is true that the alternative would be devastating, why do we have to have such choices. It is like asking someone would they rather be shot or poisoned. Why can't we insist on the Obama we voted for?

While I am disappointed I have not given up hope for him. Even Rip van Winkle came out of a deep sleep after 20
years. But we have to stop excusing his failures and demand he shape up. Do not use the "Think of the Alternative" argument as an excuse.

Maybe if we insist on a better Democrat we might even get some better Republicans.

The skinny on the GOP field

My thumbnail sketches of theGOP presidential field:

Bachmann: How can we get inoculated against whatever she's carrying?

Huntsman: Another Mormon? Too nice a guy for the Republicans to show him big love.

Santorum: Preaches a form of Christianity with which Jesus would be unfamiliar.

Gingrich: Too smart to actually believe the nonsense he spews.

Paul: If they can't pay for insurance let them die.

Cain: Former CEO of Godfather's Pizza has an offer I can refuse.

Perry: Makes the previous governor of Texas look like a Mensa member.

Romney: His claim to fame as a governor is the successful Obamacare style program he instituted in Massachusetts which he has now decided would be bad for America.

The GOP and Jobs

Forty-two years ago a group of record dealers were sitting around and listening to President Nixon give the usual speech as to how the small business community created more jobs than the large corporations - that the small business community deserved the government's help in order to expand.

A few of the dealers got angry and said they could not get help from the Small Business Administration to expand. I was president of the Association of Record Dealers at the time and the group told me to find out why. I wrote President Nixon about the issue and the reply I received said that if I really wanted to help small business I should join the newly formed SCORE and ACTION.

I did just that. At the beginning I had the feeling I was helping small business, in conjunction with the SBA, which gave out loans. Then Congress decided it was too expensive and lessened the money given to the SBA and forced it out of the loan business. They turned the matter over to the banks and guaranteed a large portion of the loans. Unfortunately, the banks were more interested in making bad loans, bad mortgages and foreclosures than than they were in loaning money to small businesses.

I heard the same nonsense in the last GOP debate. How can you be concerned about small business and not want to fund the Small Business Administration?

If the Democrats also give lip service to small business, where do these job creators have to turn for help?

Entitlers, entitlees and the entitled

Congress is both an entitler and an entitlee. It makes the laws about entitlements and at the same time votes itself a raise in salary and perks whenever it feels like it. While many Americans are losing their pensions, members of Congress are pensioned at the taxpayers' expense.

Other entitlees are the wealthy who make their money by the work of the entitled. They are rewarded by big breaks on taxes, because they are the large contributors to campaign money for Congress. They have also been given help with the "Estate Tax" decline. They make their heirs entitlees by use of the trickle down theory.

The entitled are the working stiffs, who paid taxes into the Social Security and Medicare funds. This gave members of Congress more money for earmarks and pork so they could keep getting elected. Then Congress decides it does not have enough money for even COLAs and some members of Congress want to emasculate both successful programs. These programs are advertised as only benefiting seniors but they are actually good for young people also because they give them some security for when they can no longer work (and the pension they were hoping for is gone and their 401K money has tanked in the stock market). Medicare also gives them health care in spite of outrageous health costs.

Since the wealthy have largely made their fortunes off the investments and purchases of those who will be dependent on SociaI security when they retire, it is only fair that the wealthy pay higher taxes so that the money taken from the Social Security fund can be returned to it.

The myth of bipartisanship

A few days ago I watched C-SPAN again and was treated to a fictional account of what bipartisanship is all about.

Here is the scenario: The President starts from a weak position as he did in the health care issue. He makes speeches that say that he will not sign any law that does not include taxing billionaires.

The Tea Partiers believe that in the interest of compromise and bipartisanship, he will cave in.

I listened to the House Republicans and some Democrats thanking the president and the other Democrats for their bipartisanship approach to a deal.

The president was like the parent of a kidnapped child forced to pay ransom. "Give us what we want or we're going to let the government default," the Tea Partiers wrote in their ransom note, and the president and moderate Democrats gave them the satchel full of unmarked bills and the getaway car.

It may be that in acquiescing the president in acquiescing is playing politics. He may believe that the Republicans have again over-reached and have hurt their chances in the next election with their tactics.

While I do not believe the deal was a good deal. I do not think there was much choice. 2012 will tell us if the poor, middle class and seniors are going to be willing to take another stand for their interests or of they've given up the fight and will allow the Tea Party to take greater control and begin the dismantling of Medicare and Social Security and continue the widening of the gap between the rich and everyone else.

TV Shows

I was watching one of my favorite, but most annoying, TV shows the other day. It was on C-SPAN. For the first time I realized I was watching a new concept to go with our sports shows, sitcoms, shopping shows and reality shows.

This was a non-reality show.

The segment was called, "Cut, Cap and Balance." It had a large cast and under normal circumstances might be called a spectacular, but this one was more of a spectacle.

Or a debacle.

It was seemingly scripted by people called whips and majority leaders and all the performers had pretty much the same lines.

Although listening is a key to a believable performance, these performers read their words without listening. Here were well-spoken adults speaking as if what they were saying meant something. I have seen High school debates that made more sense.

It was all a tease though, because the outcome was a vote with everyone knowing what the outcome would be. It was not even well acted. In other words, a total waste of time and money.