Comments on: PA-13 Rep. Allyson Schwartz – Balanced Budgets are “Extreme” http://blog.tenthamendmentcenter.com/2011/07/pa-13-rep-allyson-schwartz-%e2%80%93-balanced-budgets-are-extreme/ The Tenther Grapevine Wed, 19 Jun 2013 11:40:38 +0000 hourly 1 By: Jeff Matthews http://blog.tenthamendmentcenter.com/2011/07/pa-13-rep-allyson-schwartz-%e2%80%93-balanced-budgets-are-extreme/#comment-4929 Jeff Matthews Fri, 22 Jul 2011 15:48:55 +0000 http://blog.tenthamendmentcenter.com/?p=8459#comment-4929 She has valid points. The ideological divide is this: For decades, we've been cutting taxes on the very rich. Capital gains, a form of income almost exclusively enjoyed by the rich, had its rate chopped in half. You didn't see them chop the ordinary income tax rate in half.

As a result, the rich became fabulously richer (fact shown in US wealth statistics) and the debt grew faster (undeniable). The middle class did not share in the productivity gains (profits) of the technological boom, except for the ability to buy cheap gadgets built from poor foreign workers. The ideologues on the right are sending a clear message. Somebody other than their rich patrons must be forced to pay for these wars, etc

If anyone thinks these wars are designed to protect the ordinary Joe from al Qaeda, all he has to do is step away from the play on fear and see that the goal is control of a geography. History repeats. Did our predecessors slaughter the native Americans to protect us from savagery, or to expand the land grab? It can be rationally argued on both sides, but in my mind, it couldn't be clearer. The land grab was the goal, and they peddled fear of Indians to promote it.

I feel for all the servicemen and women who think they are serving the people, but are really instruments of corporatist America. They are enlisting to Exxon, Halliburton and friends, who collectively run a joint venture which operates under the assumed name of "the United States."

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