Just a further thought from my earlier post today: If, in this idiotic "war on terror" we have been asked to sacrifice so many rights and freedoms, ... indeed, if so many Canadians believe that protesters willingly renounced their rights and freedoms by showing up the day after the vandalism at the G20, ... indeed, if people who chose to walk around downtown Toronto the day after the vandalism are thought by some dim-witted scum-bags to have renounced their rights to human rights and human dignity, ... then where the fuck do the wealthy get off believing that their money is off-limits? Why are their earnings so much more precious and sacred than the rights of their fellow human beings?
Tax unproductive wealth for the benefit of the country.
Sunday, November 21, 2010
Tax Corporations, Tax Wealth, Tax the Highest Income Earners, Tax Income From Investments
Here's something your beleaguered working-class blue n' white collar stiffs who voted for Rob Ford might understand. Some people have been making out like bandits for the past couple of decades, and they haven't exactly been doing anything productive for society to earn their keep.
Stephen Gordon, who i used to listen to on rabble-babble-dot-ca, and enmasse.ca, until the economic crisis which reared its head in summer 2008 totally discredited mainstream neoliberalism, continuously hawks the notion that taxing corporations is counterproductive, and that it makes more sense to tax consumption and let corporations invest their wealth in productivity-increasing avenues which create jobs. He refers to Sweden, which has low taxes on corporations, combined with consumption taxes, as well as highly progressive social service provision.
But Swedish firms are also under the obligation of negotiating with powerful unions which have significant oversight over corporate decision-making. In North America, a corporation is basically a cash-cow for overpaid managers and what's left goes to passive shareholders. Given that it's easier to legislate taxes than it is to command governance reform of private institutions, we should just tax the useless mother-fuckers and recover billions of dollars that went nowhere but into exotic, non-productive financial products and conspicuous consumption.
We should tax wealth because wealth inequality in this country is far more gigantic than income inequality and it is creating a class of plutocrats exceedingly dangerous to our feeble democracy. We should advertise loud-and-clear, and unapologetically, that we are going to break up the large family fortunes and make the heirs of billionaires have to work for themselves. All wealth over 1 million dollars will be taxed at increasingly steep rates.
We should tax the highest income earners because, as with everything else, they don't really do anything for the amount of money they get to take home. Overpriced corporate executives, corporate lawyers, entertainment figures, politicians, ... they're none of them so deserving of the vast amounts of money that gets shovelled their way. When we think of the productive corporate executives of the 1945-73 "golden age" of Western capitalism, and comparatively modest their incomes were and how much more socially productive they were, it beggars belief to imagine that these self-serving high-earners today believe they truly deserve such compensation as a result of the "talent" they bring to whatever it is they think they're doing.
Finally, tax investment income at the same level as income from work. Income from labour is far more dearly bought and is taxed, unfairly, at significantly higher levels. Taxing investment income should be fine-tuned to reward productive investments, but for the most part, "investing" in the Anglo-American countries has meant nothing more than the equivalent of buying and trading interest or dividend-earning trading cards. Instead of a bunch of nerds at a downtown convention centre, we have a bunch of expensively-suited pricks at brokerage firms of sitting in front of computer screens.
We should tax all this wasted wealth and obtain the billions of dollars needed for public investment in healthcare, education, green energy, infrastructure, public daycare, environmental reconstruction, First Nations compensation, etc., etc., .... because the private sector isn't in the business of creating jobs and social wealth anymore. They're in the business of down-sizing and profit-taking. The human world will slide into misery and crisis and the eco-system is spiralling into the abyss. We have no further time for neoliberal fantasies.
Stephen Gordon, who i used to listen to on rabble-babble-dot-ca, and enmasse.ca, until the economic crisis which reared its head in summer 2008 totally discredited mainstream neoliberalism, continuously hawks the notion that taxing corporations is counterproductive, and that it makes more sense to tax consumption and let corporations invest their wealth in productivity-increasing avenues which create jobs. He refers to Sweden, which has low taxes on corporations, combined with consumption taxes, as well as highly progressive social service provision.
But Swedish firms are also under the obligation of negotiating with powerful unions which have significant oversight over corporate decision-making. In North America, a corporation is basically a cash-cow for overpaid managers and what's left goes to passive shareholders. Given that it's easier to legislate taxes than it is to command governance reform of private institutions, we should just tax the useless mother-fuckers and recover billions of dollars that went nowhere but into exotic, non-productive financial products and conspicuous consumption.
We should tax wealth because wealth inequality in this country is far more gigantic than income inequality and it is creating a class of plutocrats exceedingly dangerous to our feeble democracy. We should advertise loud-and-clear, and unapologetically, that we are going to break up the large family fortunes and make the heirs of billionaires have to work for themselves. All wealth over 1 million dollars will be taxed at increasingly steep rates.
We should tax the highest income earners because, as with everything else, they don't really do anything for the amount of money they get to take home. Overpriced corporate executives, corporate lawyers, entertainment figures, politicians, ... they're none of them so deserving of the vast amounts of money that gets shovelled their way. When we think of the productive corporate executives of the 1945-73 "golden age" of Western capitalism, and comparatively modest their incomes were and how much more socially productive they were, it beggars belief to imagine that these self-serving high-earners today believe they truly deserve such compensation as a result of the "talent" they bring to whatever it is they think they're doing.
Finally, tax investment income at the same level as income from work. Income from labour is far more dearly bought and is taxed, unfairly, at significantly higher levels. Taxing investment income should be fine-tuned to reward productive investments, but for the most part, "investing" in the Anglo-American countries has meant nothing more than the equivalent of buying and trading interest or dividend-earning trading cards. Instead of a bunch of nerds at a downtown convention centre, we have a bunch of expensively-suited pricks at brokerage firms of sitting in front of computer screens.
We should tax all this wasted wealth and obtain the billions of dollars needed for public investment in healthcare, education, green energy, infrastructure, public daycare, environmental reconstruction, First Nations compensation, etc., etc., .... because the private sector isn't in the business of creating jobs and social wealth anymore. They're in the business of down-sizing and profit-taking. The human world will slide into misery and crisis and the eco-system is spiralling into the abyss. We have no further time for neoliberal fantasies.
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Friday, November 19, 2010
Catholics n' Canadians [Haiti and Afghanistan]
The thing about accountability is that you know who is responsible. When you know who is responsible, you have to hold them accountable. It's pretty circular thinking I'll admit, but I can't think of any other way to say it this morning.
The Pope is the big Roman Catholic cheese. He's da man. He's in charge. He's responsible. He has to be held accountable.
And over the past few years there's been an avalanche of evidence that the Catholic Church has become a refuge for pedophiles. Now, I don't dig pedophiles. I'm a pretty sympathetic guy in most respects, and even with child molesters, I'm prepared to grant some of them that they might have had no control over their impulses. It's not like we all wake up in the morning and make a "lifestyle choice" as to whether we're hetero, or gay, or into children or small animals, (or the Eiffel Tower, or the Berlin Wall, or cars, or other inanimate objects). Furthermore, I've read tragic stories about child molesters who had been raped repeatedly in their own childhoods and whose sexuality had been distorted outside of all their control.
But at the end of the day, destroying the mind of a helpless young child for whatever reason is wrong. And the Catholic Church appears to be rank with men who do this and it appears that the Pope himself actively covered-up for such abuses while an Archbishop in Germany, as a cardinal, and now as the Pope.
And here's the thing: While the Catholic Church is obviously an intellectual dictatorship, permitting no democratic challenge to its delusional pronouncements, it isn't a physical dictatorship. Ordinary Catholics, who might receive some comfort from remaining with the institution, have to reconcile the pleasure obtained from listening to the pedestrian spirituality, the vestiges of ancient ceremonies, and the traditions of exalted culture, of the Roman Catholic Church, with the fact that the whole senior management are quite clearly conspirators in a child-molesting ring, and they (ordinary Catholics) ought to do something about that.
Nobody is forcing Catholics to go to church every Sunday (aside from the Church's own threats of eternal damnation) or to contribute financially to it. If Catholics don't feel like going through a weekly ritual of extreme hypocrisy and stupidity, they have it within them to force accountability and justice on those who make their worship so meaningless.
But it appears that they don't. They keep quiet about it. They continue to go through the motions. They continue to pretend to take moral instruction from an top-down institution run by a man who advocates covering-up child sexual abuse.
Perhaps the Catholic Church's tradition of authoritarianism on the part of its hierarchy, and passivity on the part of its "flock" are just too strong for the right thing to be done. But that brings me to Canada and Canadians. Lots of Canadians like to take pride in their country. Witness the empty-headed spectacle of the Vancouver Winter Olympics. Witness the pride Canadians used to take in the fact that US-Americans sewed Canadian flag decals on their backpacks while travelling so as to avoid potential abuse for being "ugly Americans." We point with pride to the distant memory of Canada as a "peace-keeping nation" with no enemies. We pat ourselves on the back for our traditions of democracy and human rights.
But when Canadians are tortured in Syria and CSIS sends the torturers questions to ask the tortured, when the RCMP kills a man, lies about it, and gets away with it, when innocent protesters are intimidated and abused, when it becomes obvious that we're complicit in torture in Afghanistan, when our mining firms successfully resist any accountability for their criminal practices overseas, and when the unelected Senate crushes House of Commons legislation that contributes to attempts to save the planet itself, we, as people, do nothing. We continue to take pride in "Team Canada" hockey achievements, patronize people from other lands who do not enjoy the same rights we neglect, we continue to go through the motions and pretend that it'll all work out in the end (perhaps due to the uncertain efforts of unknown individuals, somewhere, sometime).
I put Haiti and Afghanistan in the title because these two examples serve as mega-indictments of Canadian evil. There's just no other way to describe it. As bad as they were, the Taliban somehow obtained enough acquiescence from the population of Afghanistan to rule the country, and contain violence in most of it, from 1996 to 2001. Canadian leaders (all NATO leaders in fact) pretend to scratch their heads in puzzlement, wondering why our puppet-government cannot do the same thing. Could it not be that the Karzai regime is vastly more corrupt than was the Taliban? Could it not be that the warlord governors often behave as conquerors of their subject peoples, rather than administrators of government services? Could it not be that the new order in Afghanistan has reintroduced child prostitution? Could it not be the case that underpaid Afghan security personnel rape and plunder their subject peoples?
Of course it's all those things. NATO leaders never gave, do not give, a single, solitary shit about the people of Afghanistan. The government of Afghanistan serves to allow the USA access to air-bases from which to project power in Central Asia. All the rest of the stuff about democracy and women's rights is just propaganda to dupe the gullible.
And Haiti? Cholera is sweeping the country as sanitary conditions deteriorate, as billions of foreign aid (billions less than was promised in any case) continues to be held up by foreign sloth and foreign and domestic corruption and incompetence. Haiti, I'll remind you, was doing so terribly before the 2010 earthquake which devastated that country, that the poorest among them were eating dirt to fill their bellies, unable to afford the cost of basic foods. And it was in this deplorable state SIX YEARS after Canada (under the detestable scum-bag Paul Martin) aided the USA and France in toppling the democratically-elected president (due to his "violence" and "mismanagement" of Haiti) in a coup. Haiti became Canada's second-largest overseas investment and our largest in the Western Hemisphere. And the results, as can be plainly seen, are atrocious. That's because Canada is not run by democratic politicians, but by cynical con-men who rely on Canadian ignorance, delusion, and apathy, to maintain the charade of an electoral process and who really exist to serve corporate-imperialist power both at home and abroad.
Haiti suffers as Afghanistan suffers, because our leaders are evil, twisted men, and because we, collectively, are so oblivious or indifferent (or so incapable of promoting alternatives) that we allow it all to happen.
The Pope is the big Roman Catholic cheese. He's da man. He's in charge. He's responsible. He has to be held accountable.
And over the past few years there's been an avalanche of evidence that the Catholic Church has become a refuge for pedophiles. Now, I don't dig pedophiles. I'm a pretty sympathetic guy in most respects, and even with child molesters, I'm prepared to grant some of them that they might have had no control over their impulses. It's not like we all wake up in the morning and make a "lifestyle choice" as to whether we're hetero, or gay, or into children or small animals, (or the Eiffel Tower, or the Berlin Wall, or cars, or other inanimate objects). Furthermore, I've read tragic stories about child molesters who had been raped repeatedly in their own childhoods and whose sexuality had been distorted outside of all their control.
But at the end of the day, destroying the mind of a helpless young child for whatever reason is wrong. And the Catholic Church appears to be rank with men who do this and it appears that the Pope himself actively covered-up for such abuses while an Archbishop in Germany, as a cardinal, and now as the Pope.
And here's the thing: While the Catholic Church is obviously an intellectual dictatorship, permitting no democratic challenge to its delusional pronouncements, it isn't a physical dictatorship. Ordinary Catholics, who might receive some comfort from remaining with the institution, have to reconcile the pleasure obtained from listening to the pedestrian spirituality, the vestiges of ancient ceremonies, and the traditions of exalted culture, of the Roman Catholic Church, with the fact that the whole senior management are quite clearly conspirators in a child-molesting ring, and they (ordinary Catholics) ought to do something about that.
Nobody is forcing Catholics to go to church every Sunday (aside from the Church's own threats of eternal damnation) or to contribute financially to it. If Catholics don't feel like going through a weekly ritual of extreme hypocrisy and stupidity, they have it within them to force accountability and justice on those who make their worship so meaningless.
But it appears that they don't. They keep quiet about it. They continue to go through the motions. They continue to pretend to take moral instruction from an top-down institution run by a man who advocates covering-up child sexual abuse.
Perhaps the Catholic Church's tradition of authoritarianism on the part of its hierarchy, and passivity on the part of its "flock" are just too strong for the right thing to be done. But that brings me to Canada and Canadians. Lots of Canadians like to take pride in their country. Witness the empty-headed spectacle of the Vancouver Winter Olympics. Witness the pride Canadians used to take in the fact that US-Americans sewed Canadian flag decals on their backpacks while travelling so as to avoid potential abuse for being "ugly Americans." We point with pride to the distant memory of Canada as a "peace-keeping nation" with no enemies. We pat ourselves on the back for our traditions of democracy and human rights.
But when Canadians are tortured in Syria and CSIS sends the torturers questions to ask the tortured, when the RCMP kills a man, lies about it, and gets away with it, when innocent protesters are intimidated and abused, when it becomes obvious that we're complicit in torture in Afghanistan, when our mining firms successfully resist any accountability for their criminal practices overseas, and when the unelected Senate crushes House of Commons legislation that contributes to attempts to save the planet itself, we, as people, do nothing. We continue to take pride in "Team Canada" hockey achievements, patronize people from other lands who do not enjoy the same rights we neglect, we continue to go through the motions and pretend that it'll all work out in the end (perhaps due to the uncertain efforts of unknown individuals, somewhere, sometime).
I put Haiti and Afghanistan in the title because these two examples serve as mega-indictments of Canadian evil. There's just no other way to describe it. As bad as they were, the Taliban somehow obtained enough acquiescence from the population of Afghanistan to rule the country, and contain violence in most of it, from 1996 to 2001. Canadian leaders (all NATO leaders in fact) pretend to scratch their heads in puzzlement, wondering why our puppet-government cannot do the same thing. Could it not be that the Karzai regime is vastly more corrupt than was the Taliban? Could it not be that the warlord governors often behave as conquerors of their subject peoples, rather than administrators of government services? Could it not be that the new order in Afghanistan has reintroduced child prostitution? Could it not be the case that underpaid Afghan security personnel rape and plunder their subject peoples?
Of course it's all those things. NATO leaders never gave, do not give, a single, solitary shit about the people of Afghanistan. The government of Afghanistan serves to allow the USA access to air-bases from which to project power in Central Asia. All the rest of the stuff about democracy and women's rights is just propaganda to dupe the gullible.
And Haiti? Cholera is sweeping the country as sanitary conditions deteriorate, as billions of foreign aid (billions less than was promised in any case) continues to be held up by foreign sloth and foreign and domestic corruption and incompetence. Haiti, I'll remind you, was doing so terribly before the 2010 earthquake which devastated that country, that the poorest among them were eating dirt to fill their bellies, unable to afford the cost of basic foods. And it was in this deplorable state SIX YEARS after Canada (under the detestable scum-bag Paul Martin) aided the USA and France in toppling the democratically-elected president (due to his "violence" and "mismanagement" of Haiti) in a coup. Haiti became Canada's second-largest overseas investment and our largest in the Western Hemisphere. And the results, as can be plainly seen, are atrocious. That's because Canada is not run by democratic politicians, but by cynical con-men who rely on Canadian ignorance, delusion, and apathy, to maintain the charade of an electoral process and who really exist to serve corporate-imperialist power both at home and abroad.
Haiti suffers as Afghanistan suffers, because our leaders are evil, twisted men, and because we, collectively, are so oblivious or indifferent (or so incapable of promoting alternatives) that we allow it all to happen.
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Three More Years! Three More Years!
So, after over 10 years, the Afghan government still can't fight its own battles against its own people? This is an insurgency with limited support from Pakistan and (MAYBE) Iran, versus a government with billions of dollars and the backing of NATO.
One wonders how the Taliban was able to stabilize the country completely on its own. Perhaps the degree of corruption and brutality of the Karzai regime is far, far worse than the grim fanaticism of the Taliban in the eyes of the Pashtun?
And after all this training, we still don't know how many insurgents are showing up to get a new rifle and tips on how to fire it, and how many are thugs sent by the warlords to learn how to more efficiently plunder and rape.
It boggles the mind. A majority of Canadians has consistently opposed the mission in Afghanistan, but the harpercons will have us believe that their attacks on Statistics Canada were motivated by a few e-mail complaints?
One wonders how the Taliban was able to stabilize the country completely on its own. Perhaps the degree of corruption and brutality of the Karzai regime is far, far worse than the grim fanaticism of the Taliban in the eyes of the Pashtun?
And after all this training, we still don't know how many insurgents are showing up to get a new rifle and tips on how to fire it, and how many are thugs sent by the warlords to learn how to more efficiently plunder and rape.
It boggles the mind. A majority of Canadians has consistently opposed the mission in Afghanistan, but the harpercons will have us believe that their attacks on Statistics Canada were motivated by a few e-mail complaints?
Friday, November 12, 2010
What would make harper and Ignatieff change their minds?
So,the detestable, anti-Canadian sociopath and the elitist prick both think that its a good idea to waste our resources training insurgents and rapists for another three years in Afghanistan. This as the current supreme leader behind this whole travesty, Barack Obama, has decided that the whole thing is a quagmire that he's going to allow to drag-on for a couple more years while he dithers trying to find some marketable excuse to justify leaving.
Canadians are unenthusiastic about this, and I imagine that a majority, when pressed, would find the cavalier way that harper commits the Canadian Forces for a multi-year exercise in futility a tad disturbing as well. Obviously, some of us are absolutely disgusted with the idea of this abomination being dragged out for still more years of wasted treasure and blood.
But our elites don't give a shit about us. The flimsiest pretexts can be used to abuse any of us and they're aware that so long as the majority of Canadians are left alone, they'll acquiesce to anything. So marching in the thousands in the streets isn't going to convince harper and Ignatieff not to do this. Letters to the editor aren't going to stop them. What will? What is justified?
Canadians are unenthusiastic about this, and I imagine that a majority, when pressed, would find the cavalier way that harper commits the Canadian Forces for a multi-year exercise in futility a tad disturbing as well. Obviously, some of us are absolutely disgusted with the idea of this abomination being dragged out for still more years of wasted treasure and blood.
But our elites don't give a shit about us. The flimsiest pretexts can be used to abuse any of us and they're aware that so long as the majority of Canadians are left alone, they'll acquiesce to anything. So marching in the thousands in the streets isn't going to convince harper and Ignatieff not to do this. Letters to the editor aren't going to stop them. What will? What is justified?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
