It’s Time for Some Truth Telling

As we move toward the 2012 Presidential election the battle lines are being drawn and hard facts of continued economic setbacks and possible double-dip recession accompanied by serious inflation in direct cost of living expenses are upon us. The federal government may leave food and fuel out of its cost-of-living index as it measures inflation, but we don’t. Those costs have escalated faster in the last few months in any time in over 60 years, and there has been no real improvement in the unemployment situation.

 

Cities and states are facing insolvency, budget cuts are causing more layoffs, pensions are not being funded and the future of the federal social safety network is a priority issue. None of this is new to those who have followed national, state and city politics in recent years, and some of those recently elected had been sending warning signs for years.  Now they are in a position to do something about it, but there is push-back.

 

You can forget the time-tested partisan labels and supposed party philosophies this time around for we have a Democrat president who raised more money than any one in history, and recent a Republican congress that spent recklessly for years.  Both were buying votes with your money.   And that brings us to the point - - it’s your money and it always has been your money that they play with.

 

The questions is what do they do with it, where is it spent and what good does it do for us - - the American citizen.  Well, it built the only majority middle class in history post World War II, and from about 1950 to the late 1990s it stabilized a country racked by depression and war for 20 years and was a model for the world.

 

What happened?  Well, we let those who govern lie to us about what was important and who was going to control how our savings and our tax dollars were spent.  Unrestrained and unregulated international spending quickly replaced careful domestic fiscal stabilizing and a reckless philosophy of job exportation in exchange for cheap commodities became the sell - - and it was our very own federal government that did the selling.  A recent Frontline Expose reminded us of the bi-partisan wheeling and dealing of Treasury Secretary Rubin, Alan Greenspan, all with the imprimatur of President Clinton, as they demolished (with congressional approval) almost all of the stabilizing elements for our currency and markets and sold them to a group of charlatans and global wheeler-dealers who are still in control.  These folks have no allegiance to the United States, and no primary interest here.  That international “rising tide that was to lift all boats” became a Tsunami  that swamped all ports and left only those who could afford the highest ground in charge.

 

Now they are about to levy taxes to stop the borrowing and bleeding that has already mortgaged too much of our future, and the story is that tax rates are too low and that in years past everyone paid more.  Well, let’s take a closer look at how those high rates of the past fueled the economy.  Sure, rates on paper were higher, but there were may legal ways to minimize what was paid, and when one did so, all that diverted capital went to invest in this country - - there was no way you could avoid taxes and send capital and jobs oversees in the process.  You could not legally move money from this country without oversight and taxation, but your Washington leadership did away with all that with their new-found partnership with Wall Street. 

 

Since the internal government revolution of the late 1990s everything has changed. Your savings, your pension dollars, all of it spent in keeping foreign banks afloat and foreign economies stabilized. A large portion of the federal rescue dollars spent by the current administration went to save major world-wide insurance companies and banks that prioritized speculation over sound investment. The reason the Federal Reserve resists being audited is because you will learn just how much of your money went there rather than fund the domestic economic recovery we so desperately need.  Bottom line, we borrow heavily from China and then give it to Europe and third world economies while our manufacturing and energy base remains stagnant at best.

 

Forget the Democrat vs. Republican battles of the past; they no longer apply. If any group recognizes what is wrong, it is the Tea Party folks. They have become a force to be reckoned with; and rightly so.  While they may not have all the answers, they have many of the questions that need answering. They will not be sidestepped before the next election.

 

It is time to reprioritize and redirect. Despite all the propaganda from the Wall Street/Washington Cabal, we really have not created any new jobs in this country for at least 10 years and the growth figures for domestic productivity are bogus.

 

Its time for some truth-telling.

 

Jim Foster

Publisher