Today we got word that congenitally corrupt Republican Congressman, Wall Street pawn and Republican Senate candidate Mark Kirk (IL) was by forced by his opponent to disgorge the thinly veiled, legalistic bribes-- or at least a small portion of the most recent ones-- he's taken from the Goldman Sachs empire. Like Mike Castle (R-DE), Roy Blunt (R-MO), Paul Ryan (R-WI), Rahm Emanuel (D) and Harold Ford (D), Wall Street made huge investments in Kirk over the years in the hopes that he would climb the ladder of political power-- with their help-- and be in a position to further their corporate agenda. (It's no coincidence that the big Wall Street firms invest carefully in up-and-comers with plenty of a certain kind of smarts and no ethical boundaries that anyone has ever seen displayed. These are, after all, long term investments, not simple pay-offs for a vote on a specific bill or two.
And as that word was coming in, we also got word that Forbes has classified ten major American cities as being in "free fall," including, from bad to worst Providence, Tampa, Orlando, Miami, Jacksonville, Phoenix, Sacramento, Riverside, Los Angeles, Las Vegas. What do the two things have to do with each other?
I'm sure you're aware that the sketchy Peterson Foundation is convening a forum to discuss how to cut Social Security and Medicare without anyone knowing featuring crooked political hacks like Paul Ryan, Judd Gregg, Robert Rubin, Alan Greenspan and other criminal types who, in a more just world, would all be serving time in prison cells rather than sitting on top of the world or running around their homes in Masters of the Universe costumes. That so-called Fiscal Summit is scheduled to take place Wednesday, April 28 under the guise of a discussion of the "nation's rising deficits and debt." It will be bipartisan, the name way that NAFTA was bipartisan-- conservatives and corrupt politicians on both sides of the aisle conspiring to make the rich richer and the poor poorer, while squeezing the middle class.
This morning my friend Selise posted about a counter conference on the same day, the Fiscal Sustainability Teach-In Counter Conference and Blue America offered to help raise the funds for the event. They need $8,500 for expenses, this the thermometer. James Galbraith from the University of Texas in Austin drew a contrast between this meeting and the Peterson Foundation cabal:
"The Fiscal Sustainability Teach-In Counter Conference will be the important event in Washington on April 28. Unlike the other meeting, this one will feature important work by honest scholars. It deserves at least equal attention, and very much more respect."
Selise:
The deficit hawks at the Peterson Foundation are at it again: attacking Social Security and Medicare with their false economic notions, this time with a "Fiscal Summit" to "Discuss Nation's Rising Deficits and Debt."
We have a massive need for a counter-narrative to the false but conventional notion that Federal deficit spending is bad, that it is a burden to the next generation, that deficit spending risks insolvency -- basically that the Federal Government Budget is some how analogous to a household budget when, in fact, it is no such thing.
The Teach-In Counter-Conference on Fiscal Sustainability on April 28th, 2010 in Washington, DC aims to do just that with some real world, honest economics. The date was chosen as an alternative and counter to the deficit hawks at Peterson Foundation's "Fiscal Summit."
We can move beyond the false economic orthodoxy that got us into the current economic mess and that are now being promoted to attack Social Security and Medicare -- and harming our Nation and it's People in so many ways. You can help.
The tentative program schedule, topics and presenters as of 04/16/10:
- Contribute to the cost of the Conference -- Here
- Attend the Teach-In -- watch these pages for location and other logistical information
- Spread the word -- write a blog post, talk with your friends.
- Educate yourself -- some great introductory resources are:
- Teaching the Fallacy of Composition: The Federal Budget Deficit, by L. Randall Wray
- Fiscal sustainability 101, by William Mitchell
- 7 Deadly Innocent Frauds, by Warren Mosler
- In Defense of Deficits, by James K. Galbraith