Financial experts advised that Greece has balance sheet liabilities over 800%. Other European countries are at about 500%. The United States is at 500% plus and rising.
What does this mean to us?
We will soon be history too unless we do something drastic.
Many people during the Great Depression went without shoes for the simple fact that if they could not afford shoes and could not borrow enough money to buy shoes, they went shoeless. That's where America is today broke and on the way to becoming shoeless.
When Jefferson's feared "monied interests" practice their top-down Class Warfare, using their corporate-owned, corporate-controlled, liberal-in-myth-only media and prostitutes in public office to push their agenda on the unwilling or unaware, they always seem to point to the evils of programs or government spending that benefits our nation or its people, while never casting a dark shadow on their own obscene greed, blatant hypocrisy, obvious disdain for our nation and its people, or open theft of our Treasury.
Make no mistake, however, because these are desperate times. To add to that the American public has been so completely neutered in every aspect of independent critical thinking and participatory democracy, that legions of indoctrinated Stepford tea-partiers will continue to nod their heads and agree with everything the members of America's Kleptocratic Plutocratic Oligarchy, or what I call the KPO, say will "fix" our nation.
That they will fix anything is complete fiction, however. It's already "fixed" in the same way that Vegas casino owners have no need to change the way they operate.
The reality is more likely that the KPO's wealth, power, manipulation and control will either continue to increase or at least remain constant, while the rest of us everyone not in the club of the top 1% of the top 1% - will continue to decline in our standard of living as we cling to hope for some type of security in our old age as a just reward for all the hard work we spent our lives doing.
When those in the "liberal" media talk of "fixing" our broken economy and government, they never mention corporate welfare, corporate "entitlements", corporate bailouts, privatized profits and socialized losses or the fact that corporations and the KPO that owns them all virtually pay zero taxes, while the rest of us get fleeced and if need be bullied by a tyrannical IRS to make sure we are too intimidated to step out of line.
When they talk of ending programs or cutting costs it's always Social Security or Medicare or other such benefits for Citizens administered through a government that is supposed to be of, by and for the People. Those things that are hypocritically labeled "entitlements" in its fully negative connotation when it applies to us, but called stimulus, subsidy or my personal favorite initiative when it applies to the KPO. (KPO even sounds evil, like some Soviet-era throwback, and that wasn't intentional.)
However, if these are, in fact, desperate times and they are then it is time we all did our patriotic part to make our nation strong once again.
As a retired military officer I believe that good leaders lead by example. Prominent politicians and those who have successfully accumulated wealth in our culture are constantly viewed as leaders. So with that in mind, here are some simple fixes to get America back on the right track. It might not be much in the big picture, but remember, every little bit counts.
All current and retired members of our three branches of government Congress, the Supreme Court and Presidents & Vice-Presidents should immediately reduce their salaries or retirement benefits to one-quarter of what they are now, with a total freeze on all raises or cost-of-living increases until our nation is solvent or the War on Terror ends, whichever comes first. (If this alone were to happen we'd declare victory next week and immediately bring all our troops home to ticker tape parades in every major city.)
I'm sure any legitimate poll -- meaning none -- but if it were possible, the vast majority of American Citizens would probably agree that salaries of $1 million or more each year are considered at least adequate if not superb. And in a legitimate vote -- meaning none -- but if it were possible, the vast majority of American Citizens would be open to a 40% tax on incomes of $1 million to $2 million a year. People in this bracket would still be able to file and take all types of deductions currently allowed within our tax laws.
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