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Posts Tagged ‘BARACK OBAMA’

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A CEO’S TEARS

In Business, Law, Politics, Social commentary on July 1, 2013 at 12:01 am

Break out the handkerchiefs.  A CEO is about to cry.

When the Affordable Care Act takes full effect, Papa John’s Pizza will change in two ways.

First, it will be forced to do something it hasn’t done since its founding in 1984: Offer healthcare coverage to its 16,5000 employees or pay a penalty to the government.

Second, according to the company’s CEO, John Schnatter, the prices of his pizzas will go up.

 John Schnatter

How far up?

By as much as eleven to fourteen cents price increase per pizza, or fifteen to twenty cents per order.

But Schnatter isn’t going to take this lying down.  He’s determined to pass along those costs to his customers.

“If Obamacare is in fact not repealed,” Schnatter told Politico, “we will find tactics to shallow out any Obamacare costs and core strategies to pass that cost onto consumers in order to protect our shareholders’ best interests.”

After all, why should a multi-million-dollar company show any concern for those who make its profits a reality?

Consider:

  • Papa John’s is the third-largest pizza takeout and delivery chain in the United States.
  • Its 2012 revenues were $318.6 million, an 8.5 percent increase from 2011 revenues of $293.5 million.
  • Its 2012 net income was $14.8 million, compared to its 2012 net income of $12.1 million.

Click here: Papa John’s turns in strong domestic and international Q2 | PizzaMarketPlace.com

Nor should anyone expect Schnatter to take a pay cut, just so his employees can obtain medical care when they need it.

Schnatter’s total calculated compensation for 2011 came to $2,745,219.

Click here: John Schnatter: Executive Profile & Biography – Businessweek

“We’re not supportive of Obamacare, like most businesses in our industry,” Schnatter–a supporter of Mitt Romney–admitted in an interview with Politico.

To demonstrate his opposition to providing medical insurance for all Americans, Schnatter hosted a fundraising event for Mitt Romney at his own Louisville, Kentucky mansion in May.

The luxurious setting for the fundraiser gave Romney a rush of pure, plutocratic ecstasy.

“What a home this is,” gushed Romney.  “What grounds these are, the pool, the golf course.

“You know, if a Democrat were here he’d look around and say no one should live like this. Republicans come here and say everyone should live like this.”

John Schnatter’s estate

Of course, Romney conveniently ignored a brutally ugly fact:

For the vast majority of Papa John’s minimum-wage-earning employees–many of them working only part-time–the odds of their owning a comparable estate are non-existent.

John Schnatter is not the first pizza magnate to attack proposed changes to federal health care.

In 1993, Godfather’s Pizza CEO Herman Cain charged that President Bill Clinton’s proposed health care reform law would cost his company Godfather’s Pizza money and jobs.

“For many many businesses like mine, the cost of your plan is simply a cost that will cause us to eliminate jobs,” Cain told Clinton in a famous exchange.

In a typical demonstration of corporate thinking, Judy Nichols, a Papa John’s franchise owner in Beaumont, Texas, said:

“I have two options, I can stop offering coverage and pay the $2,000 fine, or I could keep my number of staff under 50 so the mandate doesn’t apply,” she told Legal Newsline.

In short: Defy the law, and employee healthcare needs be damned.

Nichols added that the the law might cost her $20,000 to $30,000 in taxes: “Obamacare is making me think about cutting jobs instead,” she said.

Translation: If you force me to behave responsibly, I’ll just have to take it out on willing-to-work Americans.

So how can America cope with behavior that destroys not only lives but the economy as well?

By passing–and vigorously enforcing–a nationwide Employers Responsibility Act.

Among its provisions:

Employers would be required to provide full medical and pension benefits for all employees, regardless of their full-time or part-time status.

Increasingly, employers are replacing full-time workers with part-time ones—solely to avoid paying medical and pension benefits.  Requiring employers to act humanely and responsibly toward all their employees would encourage them to provide full-time positions—and hasten the death of this greed-based practice.

The seeking of “economic incentives” by companies in return for moving to or remaining in cities/states would be strictly forbidden.

Such “economic incentives” usually:

  1. allow employers to ignore existing laws protecting employees from unsafe working conditions;
  2. allow employers to ignore existing laws protecting the environment;
  3. allow employers to pay their employees the lowest acceptable wages, in return for the “privilege” of working at these companies; and/or
  4. allow employers to pay little or no business taxes, at the expense of communities who are required to make up for lost tax revenues.

Employers who continue to make such overtures would be prosecuted for attempted bribery or extortion:

  1. Bribery, if they offered to move to a city/state in return for “economic incentives,” or
  2. Extortion, if they threatened to move their companies from a city/state if they did not receive such “economic incentives.”

This would

  • protect employees against artificially-depressed wages and unsafe working conditions;
  • protect the environment in which these employees live; and
  • protect cities/states from being pitted against one another at the expense of their economic prosperity.

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CHENEY LIES DESCRIBE 9/11, NOT BENGHAZI: PART TWO (END)

In Bureaucracy, History, Politics on May 16, 2013 at 12:00 am

According to former Vice President Dick Cheney, President Barack Obama is trying to “cover up” the nature of a terrorist attack on the American embassy in Benghazi, Libya, on September 11, 2012.

He made this accusation while appearing on the right-wing Sean Hannity radio program on May 13.

Yet, perhaps unwittingly, Cheney’s accusations say at least as much about the failures of the Bush Administration to prevent 9/11–and its deliberate efforts to lie the United States into a needless war with Iraq.

CHENEY ON BENGHAZI:  There was never any doubt about what was happening here.  And the whole notion, they have gone through this process trying to get to the truth, they did exactly the opposite.

You say this, too, you start out with the truth as reported by the intelligence community, and then you turn it into a total distortion once the political types in the White House and some senior folks at the State Department get their hands on it.

THE RECORD ON 9/11/IRAQ:   Among the lies told by high-ranking Bush Administration officials to persuade Americans that Iraq posed an immediate threat to national security:

  • Iraq had sought uranium from Niger, in west Africa;
  • Thousands of aluminum tubes imported by Iraq could be used in centrifuges to create enriched uranium;
  • Iraq had up to 20 long-range Scud missiles, prohibited under UN sanctions;
  • Iraq had massive stockpiles of chemical and biological
  • Iraq had massive stockpiles of chemical and biological agents, including nerve gas, anthrax and botulinum toxin;
  • Saddam Hussein had issued chemical weapons to front-line troops who would use them when US forces crossed into Iraq.

Specifically:

August 26, 2002: Cheney told the Veterans of Foreign Wars, “There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies and against us.”

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Dick Cheney

September 8, 2002: National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice said on CNN: ”There is certainly evidence that al Qaeda people have been in Iraq. There is certainly evidence that Saddam Hussein cavorts with terrorists.”

September 18, 2002: Rumsfeld told the House Armed Services Committee, “We do know that the Iraqi regime has chemical and biological weapons. His regime has amassed large, clandestine stockpiles of chemical weapons—including VX, sarin, cyclosarin and mustard gas.”

October 7, 2002: Bush declared in a nationally televised speech in Cincinnati that Iraq “possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons.”

January 7, 2003: Rumsfeld told a Pentagon news briefing, “There’s no doubt in my mind but that they currently have chemical and biological weapons.” This certainty was based on contemporary intelligence, he said, not the fact that Iraq had used chemical weapons in the 1980s.

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Donald Rumsfeld

February 8, 2003: Bush said in his weekly radio address: “We have sources that tell us that Saddam Hussein recently authorized Iraqi field commanders to use chemical weapons—the very weapons the dictator tells us he does not have.”

March 16, 2003: Cheney declared on NBC’s “Meet the Press”: “We believe [Saddam Hussein] has, in fact, reconstituted nuclear weapons.”

March 30, 2003: On ABC’s “This Week” program, 10 days into the war, Rumsfeld said: “We know where they [weapons of mass destruction] are.”

CHENEY ON BENGHAZI:  Remember when they were doing the bin Laden raid, you got pictures all over the place of the President sitting in the Situation Room and monitoring the take-down of Osama Bin Laden.  This was exactly the opposite of that.

THE RECORD ON 9/11/IRAQ:  Remember when–on May 1, 2003–President Bush landed a Lockheed S-3 Viking aboard the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln?  How, to sailors’ cheers, he announced the end of major combat operations in the Iraq War?  How, above him, a huge banner read: “Mission Accomplished”?

George W. Bush claiming the Iraq war is over

And remember how guerrilla warfare increased in Iraq–and the majority of military and civilian casualties occurred after the speech?  Remember how administration officials grew increasingly testy and evasive in their interviews and press conferences? 

Remember how they suddenly quit talking about all those “weapons of mass destruction” that hadn’t been found in Iraq?

CHENEY ON BENGHAZI:  There were a lot of questions that need to be asked about the military chain of command….We have especially-trained units that practice this thing all the time.  They are very good at it and they are champing at the bit to go….Why weren’t they deployed ready to go to take action….?

THE RECORD ON 9/11:  When the first plane struck the World Trade Center, President Bush was reading My Pet Goat to a group of elementary schoolchildren in Sarasota County, Florida.  Even after being told that a second plane had hit the Center, Bush continued reading to the children for another seven minutes.

No armed Air Force planes were stationed between New York and Washington.  The CIA and the National Security Agency–the nation’s code-cracking center–stood totally vulnerable to aerial attack.  So did the Congress.

At the White House, Secret Service agents threw open the doors and told “ordinary” staffers to evacuate and fend for themselves.  Those officials considered worth protecting–such as Cheney and National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice–were hustled into a secure, bomb-proof chamber.

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CHENEY LIES DESCRIBE 9/11, NOT BENGHAZI: PART ONE (OF TWO)

In History, Politics on May 15, 2013 at 12:09 am

On May 13, 2013, former Vice President Dick Cheney appeared on the right-wing Sean Hannity radio show.

His mission: To assail President Barack Obama for a terrorist attack on the American embassy in Behghazi, Libya, on September 11, 2012.  Four Americans were killed, including Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens.  Ten others were injured.

Dick Cheney

Ironically, many of Cheney’s comments more accurately described the George W. Bush administration during the eight months before 9/11.  In that terrorist attack, 2,977 Americans died.

CHENEY ON BEHGHAZI:  I think it’s one of the worst incidences, frankly, that I can recall in my career….

That the State Department and White House ignored repeated warnings from the CIA about the threat. They ignored messages from their own people on the ground that they need more security.  They reduced what was already there. And the administration  either had no forces ready to respond to an attack, which should have been anticipated….

THE RECORD ON 9/11:   Among the most lethal offenses of the Bush Administration: The appointing of officials who refused to take seriously the threat posed by Al-Qaeda.

And this arrogance and indifference continued–-right up to September 11, 2001, when the World Trade Center and Pentagon became targets for destruction.

One of the few administration officials to take Al-Qaeda seriously was Richard Clarke, the chief counter-terrorism adviser on the National Security Council.

Clarke had been thus appointed in 1998 by President Bill Clinton. He continued to hold this role under President Bush, but with a major difference: The position was no longer given cabinet-level access.

This put him at a severe disadvantage when dealing with other, higher-ranking Bush officials–such as:

  • Vice President Dick Cheney
  • Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld
  • Rumsfeld’s deputy, Paul Wolfowitz and
  • National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice.

These turned out to be the very officials who refused to believe that Al-Qaeda posed a lethal threat to the United States.

During the entire first eight months of the Bush Presidency, Clarke was not permitted to brief President Bush a single time, despite mounting evidence of plans for a new al-Qaeda outrage.

And  during his first eight months in office before September 11, Bush was on vacation, according to the Washington Post, 42% of the time.

CHENEY ON BEHGHAZI:  …Well they tried to cover it up by constructing a false story, claiming there was confusion about what happened in the Benghazi compound. There was no confusion…..

The cover up included several officials up to and including President Obama and the cover up is still ongoing.

THE RECORD ON 9/11:  Eager to invade Iraq, President Bush searched for any excuse to convince America of the necessity of going to war. 

On the evening after the September 11 attacks, Bush took Clarke aside during a meeting in the White House Situation Room.

World Trade Center on September 11, 2001

“I want you, as soon as you can, to go back over everything, everything. See if Saddam [Hussein, the dictator of Iraq] did this. See if he’s linked in any way.”

Clarke was stunned: “But, Mr. President, Al Qaeda did this.”

“I know, I know,” said Bush. “But see if Saddam was involved. I want to know.”

On September 12, 2001, Bush attended a meeting of the National Security Council.

“Why shouldn’t we go against Iraq, not just Al Qaeda?” demanded Donald Rumsfeld, the Secretary of Defense.

Vice President Dick Cheney enthusiastically agreed.

Secretary of State Colin Powell then pointed out there was absolutely no evidence that Iraq had had anything to do with 9/11 or Al Qaeda. And he added: “The American people want us to do something about Al-Qaeda”–-not Iraq.

On November 21, 2001, only 10 weeks after 9/11, Bush told Rumsfeld: It’s time to turn to Iraq.

Bush and his war-hungry Cabinet officials knew that Americans demanded vengeance on Al Qaeda’s mastermind, Osama bin Laden, and not Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein,. So they repeatedly fabricated “links” between the two:

  • Saddam had worked hand-in-glove with Bin Laden to plan 9/11.
  • Saddam was harboring and supporting Al Qaeda throughout Iraq.
  • Saddam, with help from Al Qaeda, was scheming to build a nuclear bomb.

Yet as early as September 22, 2001, Bush had received a classified President’s Daily Brief intelligence report, which stated that there was no evidence linking Saddam Hussein to 9/11.

The report added that there was scant credible evidence that Iraq had any significant collaborative ties with Al Qaeda.

Bush administration officials repeatedly claimed that Iraq possessed huge quantities of chemical and biological weapons, in violation of UN resolutions. And they further claimed that US intelligence agencies had determined:

  • the precise locations where these weapons were stored;
  • the identities of those involved in their production; and
  • the military orders issued by Saddam Hussein for their use in the event of war.

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“BRANDING” AND BARBARISM: PART THREE (END)

In Business, Law, Politics, Social commentary on May 8, 2013 at 12:00 am

When an American employer can compel his employees to be permanently tattooed with the company’s logo, it’s time for a complete overhaul of the nation’s employment laws.

That’s what happened to about 40 employees of Rapid Reality, a New York-based residentia real estate brokerage firm, in return for a 15% raise in commission.

Behind such an outrage lies the justifiable fear of employees that their employers will throw them into the street and pocket their earnings.

Click here: Rapid Realty discusses company tattoos – YouTube

And the terms of such an overhaul can best be summed up in a nationwide Employers Responsibility Act (ERA)

Eleven of its ts povisions have already been outlined.  Here are the remaining ones:

(12) The U.S. Departments of Justice and Labor would regularly monitor the extent of employer compliance with the provisions of this Act.

Among these measures: Sending undercover agents, posing as highly-qualified job-seekers, to apply at companies—and then vigorously prosecuting those employers who blatantly refused to hire despite their proven economic ability to do so.

This would be comparable to the long-time and legally-validated practice of using undercover agents to determine compliance with fair-housing laws.

(13) The Justice Department and/or the Labor Department would be required to maintain a publicly-accessible database on those companies that had been cited, sued/ and/or convicted for such offenses as discrimination, harassment, health and/or safety violations or employing illegal aliens. Employers would be legally required to regularly provide such information to these agencies, so that it would remain accurate and up-to-date.

Such information would arm job applicants with vital information about the employers they were approaching. They could thus decide in advance if an employer is deserving of their skills and dedication. As matters now stand, employers can legally demand to learn even the most private details of an applicant’s life without having to disclose even the most basic information about themselves and their history of treating employees.

(14) CEOs whose companies employ illegal aliens would be held directly accountable for the actions of their subordinates. Upon conviction, the CEO would be sentenced to a mandatory prison term of at least ten years.

This would prove a more effective remedy for controlling illegal immigration than stationing tens of thousands of soldiers on the U.S./ Mexican border. With CEOs forced to account for their subordinates’ actions, they would take drastic steps to ensure their companies complied with Federal immigration laws. Without employers eager to hire illegal aliens at a fraction of the money paid to American workers, the invasions of illegal job-seekers would quickly come to an end.

(15) A portion of employers’ existing Federal taxes would be set aside to create a national clearinghouse for placing unemployed but qualified job-seekers.

* * * * *

For thousands of years, otherwise highly intelligent men and women believed that kings ruled by divine right. That kings held absolute power, levied extortionate taxes and sent countless millions of men off to war–all because God wanted it that way.

That lunacy was dealt a deadly blow in 1776 when American Revolutionaries threw off the despotic rule of King George III of England.

But today, millions of Americans remain imprisoned by an equally outrageous and dangerous theory: The Theory of the Divine Right of Employers.

Summing up this employer-as-God attitude, Calvin Coolidge still speaks for the overwhelming majority of employers and their paid shills in government: “The man who builds a factory builds a temple, and the man who works there worships there.”

America can no longer afford such a dangerous fallacy as the Theory of the Divine Right of Employers.

The solution lies in remembering that the powerful never voluntarily surrender their privileges.

Americans did not win their freedom from Great Britain–-and its enslaving doctrine of “the divine right of kings”-–by begging for their rights.

And Americans will not win their freedom from their corporate masters–-and the equally enslaving doctrine of “the divine right of employers”––by begging for the right to work and support themselves and their families.

And they will most certainly never win such freedom by supporting right-wing political candidates whose first and only allegiance is to the corporate interests who bankroll their campaigns.

Corporations can–and do–spend millions of dollars on TV ads, selling lies–lies such as the “skills gap,” and how if the wealthy are forced to pay their fair share of taxes, jobs will inevitably disappear.

But Americans can choose to reject those lies–and demand that employers behave like patriots instead of predators.

In 1970, Congress finally recognized the threat organized crime posed to the Nation’s security and passed the Organized Crime Control Act.  This gave law enforcement agents and prosecutors powerful weapons against the Mafia and similar criminal groups.

It’s long past time that Congress be forced–by fed-up voters–to recognize the threat posed to the financial and social security of the Nation by the unchecked power of greed-fueled corporations.

It’s time for Congress to apply to corporate slave-masters the wisdom of Robert F. Kennedy’s warning about the Mafia: “If we do not on a national scale attack organized criminals with weapons and techniques as effective as their own, they will destroy us.”

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“BRANDING” AND BARBARISM: PART TWO (OF THREE)

In Business, Law, Politics, Social commentary on May 7, 2013 at 12:05 am

When an American employer can compel his employees to be permanently tattooed with the company’s logo, it’s time for a complete overhaul of the nation’s employment laws.

That’s what happened to about 40 employees of Rapid Reality, a New York-based residentia real estate brokerage firm.  In return, they got a 15% raise in commission.

Although this story has received wide media attention, it has been treated as an oddity out of “Believe It or Not.”  No one has pointed out the sheer barbarity of such a proposal.  Or the sheer barbarity of a culture that bestows such unchecked power on corporate employers.

And the antidote to such employer barbarism: A nationwide Employers Responsibility Act (ERA).

Such legislation would legally require employers to demonstrate as much initiative for hiring as job-seekers are now expected to show in searching for work.

In Part One, I outlined its first two provisions.  Here are an additional nine:

(3) Employers would receive tax credits for creating professional, well-paying, full-time jobs.

This would encourage the creation of better than the menial, dead-end, low-paying and often part-time jobs which exist in the service industry. Employers found using such tax credits for any other purpose would be prosecuted for tax fraud.

(4) A company that acquired another—through a merger or buyout—would be forbidden to fire en masse the career employees of that acquired company.

This would be comparable to the protection existing for career civil service employees. Such a ban would prevent a return to the predatory “corporate raiding” practices of the 1980s, which left so much human and economic wreckage in their wake.

The wholesale firing of employees would trigger the prosecution of the company’s new owners. Employees could still be fired, but only for provable just cause, and only on a case-by-case basis.

(5) Employers would be required to provide full medical and pension benefits for all employees, regardless of their full-time or part-time status.

Increasingly, employers are replacing full-time workers with part-time ones—solely to avoid paying medical and pension benefits. Requiring employers to act humanely and responsibly toward all their employees would encourage them to provide full-time positions—and hasten the death of this greed-based practice.2-28-96

(6) Employers of part-time workers would be required to comply with all federal labor laws.

Under current law, part-time employees are not protected against such abuses as discrimination, sexual harassment and unsafe working conditions. Closing this loophole would immediately create two positive results:

  • Untold numbers of currently-exploited workers would be protected from the abuses of predatory employers; and
  • Even predatorily-inclined employers would be encouraged to offer permanent, fulltime jobs rather than only part-time ones—since a major incentive for offering part-time jobs would now be eliminated.

(7) Employers would be encouraged to hire to their widest possible limits, through a combination of financial incentives and legal sanctions. Among those incentives: Employers demonstrating a willingness to hire would receive substantial Federal tax credits, based on the number of new, permanent employees hired per year.

Employers claiming eligibility for such credits would be required to make their financial records available to Federal investigators. Employers found making false claims would be prosecuted for perjury and tax fraud, and face heavy fines and imprisonment if convicted.

(8) Among those sanctions: Employers refusing to hire could be required to prove, in court:

  • Their economic inability to hire further employees, and/or
  • The unfitness of the specific, rejected applicant.

Companies found guilty of unjustifiably refusing to hire would face the same penalties as now applying in cases of discrimination on the basis of age, race, sex and disability.

Employers would thus fund it easier to hire than to refuse to do so.  Job-seekers would no longer be prevented from even being considered for employment because of arbitrary and interminable “hiring freezes.”

(9) Employers refusing to hire would be required to pay an additional “crime tax.”

Sociologists and criminologists agree that “the best cure for crime is a job.” Thus, employers who refuse to hire contribute to a growing crime rate in this Nation. Such non-hiring employers would be required to pay an additional tax, which would be earmarked for agencies of the criminal justice system at State and Federal levels.

(10) The seeking of “economic incentives” by companies in return for moving to or remaining in cities/states would be strictly forbidden.

Such “economic incentives” usually:

  1. allow employers to ignore existing laws protecting employees from unsafe working conditions;
  2. allow employers to ignore existing laws protecting the environment;
  3. allow employers to pay their employees the lowest acceptable wages, in return for the “privilege” of working at these companies; and/or
  4. allow employers to pay little or no business taxes, at the expense of communities who are required to make up for lost tax revenues.

(11) Employers who continue to make such overtures would be prosecuted for attempted bribery or extortion:

  1. Bribery, if they offered to move to a city/state in return for “economic incentives,” or
  2. Extortion, if they threatened to move their companies from a city/state if they did not receive such “economic incentives.”

This would protect employees against artificially-depressed wages and unsafe working conditions; protect the environment in which these employees live; and protect cities/states from being pitted against one another at the expense of their economic prosperity.

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“BRANDING” AND BARBARISM: PART ONE (OF THREE)

In Bureaucracy, Business, Law, Politics, Social commentary on May 6, 2013 at 12:07 am

Would you agree to be permanently mutilated in return for a 15% commission raise by your employer?

Rapid Reality, a New York-based residential real estate brokerage firm, made that offer to its 800 employees, and nearly 40 of them agreed to permanently ink themselves with the company logo.

“I don’t see myself going anywhere, and if I have it on my arm, it’ll force me to keep going and working hard,” Brooklyn-based broker Adam Altman said in a Rapid Realty video  while getting the tattoo. “It’s there for life. Rapid for life, yo.”

Rapid Realty tattoos

And who came up with this new idea in employer barbarism?  Why, no less than Anthony Lolli, the founder of the comopany.

“They wear it like a badge of honor,” said Lolli. “They get a lot of respect from the other agents with the amount of commitment that they have.”

Lolli claimed that the new tatoos help brokers close deals because clients “love the fact there’s someone who’s 100% dedicated to the business.”

Bragging about his brainchild, Lolli tweeted:  “Talk about marketing–they’re walking billboards!”

Click here: Rapid Realty discusses company tattoos – YouTube

For thousands of years, slaves in the ancient world were branded with the mark of their master.  So were slaves in America before the Civil War finally ended 300 years of slaveocracy throughout the South.

During the 20th century, the Nazis tattooed each arriving inmate to their ever-expanding series of extermination camps such as Treblinka and Auschwitz.

Concentration camp inmate tattoo

Behind the practice of branding has always been the equation of “Who/Whom?”  As in: “Who can do What to Whom?”  The one who does the branding is the Conqueror; the one being branded is the Vanquished.

The same holds true for the work-slaves of American corporations as it did for those of the ancient Romans and 20th-century Nazis.

Behind this is the fear American employees justifiably have that, no matter how well or faithfully they work, their employer will cast them into the street.  And, if he does, it will most likely be to pocket their salaries for himself.

The Thirteenth Amendment was supposed to end slavery within the United States.  But the corrupting financial  power of corporate America has turned American workers into so many wage-slaves.

All of which serves as another reason why the United States needs an Enployers Responsibility Act (ERA).

If passed by Congress and vigorously enforced by the U.S. Department of Justice and Labor, an ERA would ensure full-time, permanent and productive employment for millions of capable, job-seeking Americans.

And it would achieve this without raising taxes or creating controversial government “make work” programs.

Such legislation would legally require employers to demonstrate as much initiative for hiring as job-seekers are now expected to show in searching for work.

An Employers Responsibility Act would simultaneously address the following evils for which employers are directly responsible:

  • The loss of jobs within the United States owing to companies’ moving their operations abroad—solely to pay substandard wages to their new employees.
  • The mass firings of employees which usually accompany corporate mergers or acquisitions.
  • The widespread victimization of part-time employees, who are not legally protected against such threats as racial discrimination, sexual harassment and unsafe working conditions.
  • The refusal of many employers to create better than menial, low-wage jobs.
  • The widespread employer practice of extorting “economic incentives” from cities or states in return for moving to or remaining in those areas.  Such “incentives” usually absolve employers from complying with laws protecting the environment and/or workers’ rights.
  • The refusal of many employers to provide medical and pension benefits—nearly always in the case of part-time employees, and, increasingly, for full-time, permanent ones as well.
  • Rising crime rates, due to rising unemployment.

Among its provisions:

(1) American companies that close plants in the United States and open others abroad would be forbidden to sell products made in those foreign plants within the United States.

This would protect both American and foreign workers from employers seeking to profit at their expense. American workers would be ensured of continued employment. And foreign laborers would be protected against substandard wages and working conditions.

Companies found violating this provision would be subject to Federal criminal prosecution. Guilty verdicts would result in heavy fines and lengthy imprisonment for their owners and top managers.

(2) Large companies (those employing more than 100 persons) would be required to create entry-level training programs for new, future employees.

These would be modeled on programs now existing for public employees, such as firefighters, police officers and members of the armed services. Such programs would remove the employer excuse, “I’m sorry, but we can’t hire you because you’ve never had any experience in this line of work.” After all, the Air Force has never rejected an applicant because, “I’m sorry, but you’ve never flown a plane before.”

This Nation has greatly benefited from the humane and professional efforts of the men and women who have graduated from public-sector training programs. There is no reason for the private sector to shun programs that have succeeded so brilliantly for the public sector.

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WHY REGULAR JOBS PROGRAMS DON’T WORK

In Bureaucracy, Business, Politics, Self-Help, Social commentary on May 2, 2013 at 12:18 am

Imagine this: A future President seeks to disband the FBI—and offer bribes to career criminals to not rob, rape and murder. And to sell his proposal, he chooses as his slogan: “Let criminals be criminals.”

If that sounds impossible, consider this: Politicians on both the Right and Left have adopted just that mindset toward holding corporate employers accountable for their criminal greed and irresponsibility.

Case in point: The Obama administration has signaled that it may adopt a Georgia program that allows businesses to train jobless workers for two months without having to pay them.

Its supporters claim the program—Georgia Works—lets workers get their foot in the door and reduces businesses’ hiring risks. Unions assert that it exploits workers and violates federal labor laws.

The drawbacks to this program:

  • It’s only open to workers receiving unemployment insurance benefits.
  • Businesses have no obligation to hire participating workers.

Mississippi, in turn, has launched the Subsidized Transition Employment Program and Services. Funded with left-over stimulus dollars, it initially covers 100 percent of an employee’s wages, gradually reducing the subsidy for every 160 hours worked.

Its drawbacks:

  • It lasts only four months—from August to December, 2011.
  • Businesses will be excluded from the program if funds are exhausted or the September 30 enrollment deadline has passed.
  • Only 80 companies had signed up for the program by early September.

Then there’s the Minnesota solution. Instead of adopting Senator Al Franken’s proposal to use public monies to subsidize wages, Congress enacted the Hiring Incentives to Restore Employment Act. This gave businesses $13 billion worth of tax credits for hiring unemployed workers.

The drawbacks to this effort:

  • The measure has not been evaluated.
  • It does not require employers to hire.

In Connecticut, another jobs program, Platform to Employment, puts workers through a four-week training period followed by an eight-week tryout at a participating business.

During the tryouts, the employees’ wages are paid by The Workplace, Inc., a private company which raised enough funds to support 100 jobs starting this fall.

The drawbacks to this are:

  • Employers get, in effect, free labor.
  • Only those who have already exhausted 99 weeks of unemployment benefits are eligible.
  • Employers have no obligation to hire participating workers.
  • The funds will create only 100 jobs.
  • Employers are not required to participate in the program.

Meanwhile, the unemployment rate keeps steadily rising. In 2007, 228,000 people were unemployed for 99 weeks or longer, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Today more than 2 million Americans have been unemployed for at least 99 weeks—the cutoff point for unemployment insurance in the hardest-hit states.

And the longer a person is out of work, the less likely s/he is to find an employer willing to hire.

What all these “job creating” programs have in common is this: They apply plenty of carrots–but absolutely no sticks.

Bribes–in the form of tax credits or tax breaks–are liberally applied to entice employers to behave like patriots instead of parasites. But for employers whose refusal to hire condemns their country to economic catastrophe–there are no penalties whatsoever.

A policy based only on carrots is a policy of bribery. A policy based only on sticks is one of coercion. Some people can’t be bribed, and some can’t be coerced. But nearly everyone is open to a policy of rewards and punishments.

Thus, corporations across the country are now sitting atop $2 trillion in profits. But their CEOs are using those monies for:

  • Enriching themselves, their bought-off politicians, their families—and occasionally their mistresses.
  • Buying up other corporate rivals.
  • Creating or enlarging companies outside the United States.

In short, the one expense they refuse to underwrite is hiring their fellow Americans.

This is because:

  • They want to pay their un-American employees far lower wages than would be tolerated by employees within the United States.
  • They want to escape American employee-protection laws–such as those mandating worker’s compensation or forbidding sexual harassment.
  • They want to escape American consumer-protection laws–such as those banning the sale of lead-contaminated products (a hallmark of Chinese imports).
  • They want to escape American laws protecting the environment–such as those requiring safe storage of dangerous chemicals.

They want, in short, to enrich themselves at the direct expense of their country.

In decades past, this used to be called treason.

Yet no major political figure–on the Left or Right–has so far dared to blame employers for selling out their country and destroying its economic prosperity.

No job-seeker, however well-qualified and -motivated, can hire himself onto an employer who refuses to hire.

But corporate CEOs–and their paid political stooges–continue to blame the unemployed for being unable to find employers willing to honor their integrity, qualifications and initiative.

Related image

Americans generally–and the unemployed and under-employed in particular–must hold corporate America accountable for its criminal greed and irresponsibility.

Until they do, the United States will continue to sink further into decline–economically, socially and politically.

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DOES TORTURE WORK?: PART THREE (END)

In Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on May 1, 2013 at 12:02 am

Throughout the Cold War, Republicans held themselves out as the ultimate practitioners of “real-politick,” at home and abroad. They convinced millions of Americans to believe that only their party could be trusted to not sell out America.

As a result, they held the White House–and often the Senate and/or House of Representatives–for most of the 20th Century.

According to Republicans and their Rightist supporters: A President–especially a Democratic one–could never be too aggressive or warlike.

  • President Harry S. Truman hemmed in the Soviet Union with a ring of military bases, making its further expansion into Europe impossible.
  • But the Right judged this as abject surrender. The reason: Truman refused to again turn Eastern Europe into a mass graveyard and ignite World War III by declaring war on the Soviet Union to “roll back” Communism.
  • President John F. Kennedy forced Nikita Khrushchev to withdraw Soviet nuclear missiles from Cuba.
  • But, according to Republicans, that was actually a defeat.  The reason: He didn’t risk thermonuclear war with the Soviet Union by launching an all-out invasion of that island.

After the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, Republicans lost their Great Red Bogeyman. Now they could only accuse Democrats of being “soft” on crime, not Communism.

Then, on September 11, 2001, the Republicans found their next great enemy to rally against–-and to accuse Democrats of actively supporting: Islamic terrorism.

This ensured the 2004 re-election of George W. Bush–-who had hid out from the Vietnam war in the Texas Air National Guard–over John Kerry, a genuine war hero who had seen heavy action in the same conflict.

In the last column, we saw that the FBI’s “kill them with kindness” approach to interrogation has yielded far better results than the “Jack Bauer/24” methods favored by the CIA and military.

But this has not prevented Republicans from attacking  even those FBI agents who have risked their lives at home and abroad to defend America from terrArabism.

According to the high priests of the Republican party, those agents are “naive” do-gooders who don’t have the guts to go “all the way” against America’s enemies.

But Niccolo Machiavelli, whose name is a byward for political ruthlessness, would disagree with those Republicans.

In his small and notorious book, The Prince, he writes about the methods a ruler must use to gain power. But in his larger and lesser-known work, The Discourses, he outlines the ways that liberty can be maintained in a republic.

Niccolo Machiavelli

For Machiavelli, only a well-protected state can hope for peace and prosperity.  Toward that end, he wrote at length about the best ways to succeed militarily.  And in war, humanity can prevail at least as often as severity.

Consider the following example from The Discourses:

Camillus [a Roman general] was besieging the city of the Faliscians, and had surrounded it….A teacher charged with the education of the children of some of the noblest families of that city [to ingratiate himself] with Camillus and the Romans, led these children…into the Roman camp. 

And presenting them to Camillus [the teacher] said to him, “By means of these children as hostages, you will be able to compel the city to surrender.”         

Camillus not only declined the offer but had the teacher stripped and his hands tied behind his back….[Then Camillus] had a rod put into the hands of each of the children…[and] directed them to whip [the teacher] all the way back to the city. 

Upon learning this fact, the citizens of Faliscia were so much touched by the humanity and integrity of Camillus, that they surrendered the place to him without any further defense.  

This example shows that an act of humanity and benevolence will at all times have more influence over the minds of men than violence and ferocity.

It also proves that provinces and cities which no armies…could conquer, have yielded to an act of humanity, benevolence, chastity or generosity.

This truth should be kept firmly in mind whenever Right-wingers start bragging about their own patriotism and willingness to get “down and dirty” with America’s enemies.

Many–like Newt Gingrich, Donald Trump, Rudolph Giuliani, Rick Santorum and Mitt Romney–did their heroic best to avoid military service. These “chickenhawks” talk tough and are always ready to send others into battle–but keep themselves well out of harm’s way.

Such men are not merely contemptible; they are dangerous.

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DOES TORTURE WORK?: PART TWO (OF THREE)

In History, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on April 30, 2013 at 12:24 am

In his gung-ho views on torture, New York State Senator Greg Ball has plenty of company.

At the November 12, 2011 Republican debate on foreign policy, all seven candidates endorsed the use of torture as an effective counter-terrorism tactic.

Former Godfather Pizza CEO Herman Cain called for the re-authorized use of waterboarding to “persuade” captured terrArabists to talk.

“I don’t see it as torture, I see it as an enhanced interrogation technique,” said Cain.

Representative Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) and Texas Governor Rick Perry agreed with Cain.

And Perry drew sustained applause when he declared, “This is war…I will defend them [waterboarding and other coercive techniques] until I die.”

The use of waterboarding was discontinued late in the administration of President George W. Bush.

Following much heated, internal debate, officials in the FBI and Justice Department admitted that it constituted torture and was therefore illegal.

But after the killing of Osama bin Laden, several Bush administration officials–notably former Vice President Dick Cheney–tried to reinstitute the technique, or at least its reputation.

They suggested that information acquired during the earlier waterboarding years may have provided an essential clue to locating bin Laden.

Unfortunately for Republicans, the truth about torture generally–and waterboarding in particular–is just the opposite.

Victims will say anything they think their captors want to hear to stop the agony.  And, in fact, subsequent investigations have shown that just that happened with Al Qaeda suspects.

Waterboarding a captive

Shortly after the invasion of Afghanistan in October, 2001, hundreds of Al Qaeda members started falling into American hands.  And so did a great many others who were simply accused by rival warlords of being Al Qaeda members.

The only way to learn if Al Qaeda was planning any more 9/11-style attacks on the United States was to interrogate those suspected captives.  The question was: How?

The CIA and the Pentagon quickly took the “gloves off” approach.  Their methods included such “stress techniques” as playing loud music and flashing strobe lights to keep detainees awake.

Some were “softened up” prior to interrogation by “third-degree” beatings.  And still others were waterboarded.

In 2003, an FBI agent observing a CIA “interrogation” at Guantanamo was stunned to see a detainee sitting on the floor, wrapped in an Israeli flag.  Nearby, music blared and strobe slights flashed.

In Osama bin Laden’s 1998 declaration of war against America, he had accused the country of being controlled by the Jews, saying the United States “served the Jews’ petty state.”

Draping an Islamic captive with an Israeli flag could only confirm such propaganda.

The FBI, on the other hand, followed its traditional “kill them with kindness” approach to interrogation.

Pat D’Amuro, a veteran FBI agent who had led the Bureau’s investigation into the 1998 bombing of the American embasy in Nairobi, Kenya, warned FBI Director Robert Mueller III:

The FBI should not be a party in the use of “enhanced intrrogation techniques.”  They wouldn’t work and wouldn’t produce the dramatic results the CIA hoped for.

But there was a bigger danger, D’Amuro warned: “We’ll be handing every future defense attorney Giglio material.”

The Supreme Court had ruled in Giglio vs. the United States (1972) that the personal credibility of a government official was admissible in court.

Any FBI agent who made use of extra-legal interrogation techniques could potentially have that issue raised every time he testified in court on any other matter.

It was a defense attorney’s dream-come-true recipe for impeaching an agent’s credibility–and thus ruin his investigative career.

But there was another solid reason for avoiding interrogations that smacked of torture: Most Al Qaeda members relished appearing before grand juries.

Unlike organized crime members, they were talkative–and even tried to proslytize to the jury members.  They were proud of what they had done–and wanted to talk.

“This is what the FBI does,” said Mike Rolince, an FBI experrt on counter-terrorism.  “Nearly 100% of the terrorists we’ve taken into custody have confessed.  The CIA wasn’t trained.  They don’t do interrogations.”

According to The Threat Matrix: The FBI at War in the Age of Global Terror (2011), jihadists had been taught to expect severe torture at tha hands of American interrogators.  Writes Author  Garrett M. Graff:

“Often, in the FBI’s experience, their best cooperation came when detainees realized they weren’t going to get tortured, that the United States wasn’t the Great Satan.  Interrogators were figuring out…that not playing into Al Qaeda’s propaganda could produce victories.”

And the FBI isn’t alone in believing that acts of simple humanity can turn even sworn entmies into allies.

No less an authority on “real-politick” than Niccolo Machiavelli reached the same conclusion more than 500 years ago.

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DOES TORTURE WORK?: PART ONE (OF THREE)

In History, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on April 29, 2013 at 12:02 am

On the night of April 19, 19-year-old Dzokhar Tsarnaev, the Boston Marathon bombing suspect, was arrested.

And almost immediately afterward, New York State Senator Greg Ball (R) offered his unsolicited advice on how to deal with him.  Ball took to his Twitter account and called for the Tsarnaev to be tortured:

“So, scum bag #2 in custody. Who wouldn’t use torture on this punk to save more lives?”

On April 22, Ball appeared on CNN’s Piers Morgan Show to elaborate on his approach to law-and-order.

Greg Ball

Morgan opened the interview by asking Ball if he still believed that Tsarnaev should be tortured.  The following exchange then occurred:

BALL: Absolutely.  At the end of the day–you know, I think you interview a lot of politicians.  A lot of politicians are full of crap. They’re  scared of their own shadow and scared to say what they feel.

I think that I share the feelings of a lot of red-blooded Americans who believe that if we can save even one innocent American life, including we’ve seen the killing of children, that they would use–and this is just for me–that they would use every tool at their disposal to do so.

MORGAN: But he’s an American citizen, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. He committed a domestic crime in Boston, and he’ll be tried in a U.S. civilian criminal court system.

BALL: Right.

MORGAN: How you going to torture him?

BALL: I mean, dude, you’re talking to a guy that supports death penalty for cop killers, terrorists.

MORGAN: Yes, but how would you torture him?

BALL: Piers, I would support–I’m talking about me. If you want to talk to the president of the United States about his policies next time you golf or go play basketball with him, you can ask him. I’m telling you as Greg Ball, I’m telling you as Greg Ball personally–

MORGAN: I understand you’re Greg Ball.

BALL: If you would put me in the room with anybody from the most current scumbags to Osama bin Laden, I’m telling you what I would do. As far as the policy of the United States, you got to take it up with Obama.

MORGAN: I understand. But if you start to torture an American citizen for committing a domestic crime in America, you are crossing a Rubicon.

BALL: Can I ask you a question? What would you do if you were given the opportunity?

BALL: Before Osama bin Laden was shot, if you had 30 minutes in the room, what would you do? Would you play cards with Osama bin Laden?

MORGAN: It’s really a question–

BALL: What would you do?

MORGAN: Let me put this to you.

BALL: No.  You answer this.  If you met this scumbag–

MORGAN: I’m actually doing the interview, though.

BALL: If you met this scumbag–

MORGAN: No, I really am.

BALL: –before he killed these people and turned people into amputees, what would you do, play cards?  Maybe I should have said it in a British accent.  This man killed innocent men, women and children.

MORGAN: Can you stop being such a jerk?

BALL: What would you do?  You get paid for it.  I figured I would give you a taste of your own medicine.

MORGAN: Seriously–

MORGAN: Because you tweeted this to the world.  I’m curious what you think.  Your behavior so far has been really offensive.

BALL: Because you don’t like it when you don’t have another bobblehead that you can beat up and treat like a coward?  The reality is is these men killed innocent men, women and children.  As a red-blooded American, I said who out there if it would save an innocent–

MORGAN: But you’re not answering my questions.

BALL: — would not use torture.  I would.

MORGAN: I understand all the gung-ho language you’re using.  Here’s the point I’m making to you.  Do you realize that if you torture this man, what you’re basically endorsing is the torture of American citizens for committing domestic crimes inside America?

Would you as a politician want to bring that in as a standard matter of practice in your country, yes or no?

BALL: What I am saying is that as an individual–

MORGAN: Yes or no?

BALL: If given the opportunity–

MORGAN: Yes or no.

BALL:  –to be in a room with somebody like Osama bin Laden, it would be me, Osama bin Laden and a baseball bat. And yes, I would use torture.

MORGAN: It’s very macho.

BALL: It’s not about being macho.  If I wanted to be macho, I would challenge you to an arm wrestling contest.  I’m telling you how I feel. That’s what I said on Twitter.

And that’s what I said today. You can ask it 100 times over.  I will give you the same answer.‏