The New Hampshire Union Leader’s John DiStato today reports that in 1999 the business in question, Gilchrist Metal, “received $800,000 in tax-exempt revenue bonds issued by the New Hampshire Business Finance Authority ‘to set up a second manufacturing plant and purchase equipment to produce high definition television broadcasting equipment’…” In addition, in 2011, Gilchrist Metal “received two U.S. Navy sub-contracts totaling about $83,000 and a smaller, $5,600 Coast Guard contract in 2008…”
The businessman, Jack Gilchrist, also acknowledged that in the 1980s the company received a U.S. Small Business Administration loan totaling “somewhere south of” $500,000, and matching funds from the federally-funded New England Trade Adjustment Assistance Center.
“I’m not going to turn a blind eye because the money came from the government,” Gilchrest said. “As far as I’m concerned, I’m getting some of my tax money back. I’m not stupid, I’m not going to say ‘no.’ Shame on me if I didn’t use what’s available.”
Right. Some of his personal tax dollars paid for all of that, including the roads he’s been using for decades and the education of his workforce and the police and fire protection and reliable energy and water and everything else that contributes to the environment that makes it possible for his business to exist. He’s quite the macho pioneer.
You know, if none of that matters to him, why doesn’t he move his plant to Somalia? They don’t have all these taxes and you really can do it all on your own — including building your own roads and bridges. If what you want, however, is to make a business in first world country where all these services are so taken for granted you aren’t even aware that you are getting them, maybe you ought to STFU and say “thank you” to all your neighbors who helped make it possible for you to be successful.
Oh, and offer them a helping hand as well. It’s the decent thing to do.
The Tax Justice Network, an organization I frankly had never heard of until this weekend, came out with a study over the weekend alleging that between $21 and $32 trillion in global wealth is being hidden away in tax havens. This represents the total sum of the US and Japanese economies combined. Former McKinsey and Co. chief economist James Henry oversaw the TJN study.
These are assets and not earnings, but the study estimates that if the assets generated even a modest 3% rate of return, the tax revenue off of it would equal between $190-$280 billion worldwide. Instead of going toward productive purposes, that annual take remains in the hands of high net-worth individuals using tax shelters.
A good deal of this wealth, between $7.3 and $9.3 trillion, comes from rich individuals in the developing world. They have sheltered their wealth and denied their largely impoverished countries the ability to raise themselves out of debt and provide for their citizens, through simple tax evasion. Well over $1 trillion of that sheltered wealth comes from China…
If you’re wondering how global inequality can continue to rise despite advances in productivity and the promotion of democracy worldwide, it’s due to the ability for the richest people in the world to stash away their money with relative ease. And the global financial system, the executives of which have the net wealth and lifestyle of the richest of the rich, enable this behavior.
This sort of behavior doesn’t just damage the economies of the affected countries: it damages the labor market as a whole. When the rich is developing countries keep their wealth in offshore havens, economic justice and equitable growth in those nations is impacted. When that happens wages stay lower, which in turn make it more profitable for companies to cheaply outsource their labor costs to less industrialized countries. The middle class suffers worldwide.
The question is what to do about it. It’s highly unlikely each nation is going to pass national laws to address the issue. The solution would have to entail some sort of international ban on this type of financial activity, focused on the financial institutions receiving the deposits.
Making a humiliating attempt at reconstructing this piece by Dylan Matthews explaining the philosophy underlying Obama’s claim that businessmen didn’t do it all on their own (a real treat if you’ve got the stomach for it) Rush proves he’s not very bright and, in the process, fumbles one of the fundamental explanations as to why conservatives hate liberals:
Intellectuals hate capitalism because intellectuals are egomaniacs; they think they’re smarter than everybody else. And if capitalism were just, they would be the ones who are rich, because they’re the ones who smarter. And because they’re the ones who are smarter than everybody else, they’re the ones that deserve it! But capitalism hasn’t seen fit to reward college professors and academics with billionaire status.
And so, there’s something wrong with capitalism.
It’s pure ego, folks. Nothing more than that. It’s not hard to understand. Intellectuals don’t like capitalism, and they don’t like America, because they resent it. They’re the smartest people in the world, and yet capitalism doesn’t take care of them — and that’s why it’s gotta be changed. That’s Obama; that’s his professors; that’s the people who’ve mentored him. That’s who they are. Hard work doesn’t count for squat. It’s how smart you are. In fact, in their world the smarter you are, the less hard you have to work. And that ought to be rewarded. It’s a neat perversion of so many American traditions and ethics.
It’s a perversion, that much is true.
Oddly, Rush seems to be claiming that smart people aren’t rich and rich people aren’t smart, but I don’t think that’s what he means. (After all, if that’s the formula, at 40 million a year he would be proclaiming himself one of the stupidest men on earth.)
What he’s trying to articulate is what a fair number of conservatives believe: “if you’re so smart how come you’re not a billionaire?” That’s what any really smart person would do, right? So, you must not really be that smart. In fact, you can’t possibly be any smarter than I am! You’re just a lazy egomaniac speaking gibberish and trying to give all my hard earned money to the wrong people. Who wouldn’t want to be rich more than anything?
Hating on the intellectuals has a long pedigree, of course. (It’s one of the motivating factors in a number of revolutions, both left and right.) But the idea that the billionaire is a just a workin’ guy like you and me is an idea that only exists among conservatives. Especially American conservatives.
I can understand being skeptical of elites. Especially now. What I don’t get is why these John Galts and Masters of the Universe continue to get a pass despite the fact that they caused our depression and are still strutting around as if they created the world with their own two hands. Lots of elites failed in recent years, but none so obviously and catastrophically as the keepers of our capitalistic system. It’s a testament to the heroic place they hold in the American popular imagination (and our fetish for individualism) that anyone has the chutzpah to argue that they literally did it all on their own.
Lest you think this gentleman is making a joke, think again. He’s got hundreds of videos on Youtube, including many songs like this. He’s mostly concerned with the Rapture which is confusing since he seems to be averse to Barack Obama’s plan for WWIII. You’d think he’d be all for it.
Anyway, all the songs are just great. But when it comes to campaign songs, I’m still partial to this one.
Four people told Jackson that police offered to buy their cell phone video.
Of course they did. And that’s because something went very wrong here and they know it. If the cops can’t keep their cool enough to figure out how to calm a situation like this without shooting rubber bullets into crowds of kids and sending in attack dogs to bit mothers with babies in their arms then they need to get into another line of work.
This is yet another example of the militarization of the police. Many of them don’t see themselves as public servants anymore. They see themselves as soldiers in a war — against the citizens. Just looking at that footage of police in uniform with those weapons aimed at that crowd makes my blood run cold.
Anyone watching the Washington budget debate over the past decade must have wondered why there didn’t seem to be any grown-ups in the room — someone who could cut through what Honeywell’s Dave Cote calls the “hysteria, histrionics and hyperbole” and force the bickering children to agree on a reasonable compromise.
That’s what the voters want, what the economy demands and what country must now have to regain its confidence and its global influence.
Some grown-ups who have been noticeably absent from this conversation have been the heads of the country’s major corporations, who talk a good game about deficit reduction but haven’t invested the time, money and political capital necessary to jolt the political system from its dysfunctional equilibrium.
That’s about to change. Last week, the first battalion of CEOs showed up in Washington, reporting for duty. […] During the past year, there have been quiet meetings put together by chief executives such as Cote, Aetna’s Mark Bertolini and JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon, and Senators Mark Warner (D) and Saxby Chambliss (R), the ringleaders of the bipartisan Gang of Six. Nudging it along and pulling it all together has been Maya MacGuineas, who for a decade has been sounding the deficit alarm from the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
In addition to Cote, Dimon and Bertolini, the charter business members include Sandy Cutler of Eaton, Gregg Sherrill of Tenneco, Marty Flanagan of Invesco, Gary Loveman of Caesars, Thomas Quinlan of R.R. Donnelley & Sons and financiers Steven Rattner and Pete Peterson.
This is the “Fix the debt” group I wrote about last week. I didn’t realize John Galt was going to be the front man, but the whole project is just perverse enough that it makes sense.
What’s most infuriating about this piece is the blithe assumption that a) this is the biggest problem in the universe and b) Wall Street sharks like Jamie Dimond are coming to the rescue. Talk about putting the foxes in charge of the henhouse.
Steven Pearlstein, the Washington Post business columnist, often writes insightful pieces on the economy, not today. The thrust of his piece is that we all should be hopeful that a group of incredibly rich CEOs can engineer a coup.
While the rest of us are wasting our time worrying about whether Barack Obama or Mitt Romney are sitting in the White House the next four years, Pearlstein tells us (approvingly) that these honchos are scurrying through back rooms in Washington trying to carve out a deficit deal.
The plan is that we will get the rich folks’ deal regardless of who wins the election. It is difficult to imagine a more contemptuous attitude toward democracy.
The deal that this gang (led by Morgan Stanley director Erskine Bowles) is hatching will inevitably include some amount of tax increases and also large budget cuts. At the top of the list, as Pearlstein proudly tells us, are cuts to Social Security and Medicare. At a time when we have seen an unprecedented transfer of income to the top one percent, these deficit warriors are placing a top priority on snatching away a portion of Social Security checks that average $1,200 a month. Yes, the country needs this.
He repeats what we all know: they want to change the cost of living formula that will result in cutting social security by nearly 10% over time. If I’m lucky enough to live into my 80s, I’ll be feeling it. But hey, I guess I can always get a job to make up for it, right?
Oh, and they want to raise the Medicare eligibility age. Because buying insurance in your 60s is so inexpensive. (Even under Obamacare it’s expensive as hell.)
But not to worry. These “grown-ups” will reluctantly agree to close a few loopholes (yeah, right) in exchange for lowering their rates which every Very Serious Person agrees is not only a great way to raise revenue but also a tremendous sacrifice for the millionaires.
David M. Cote J.D. Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Honeywell International Inc. $37,842,723 annual compensation
Alexander M.(Sandy) Cutler Executive Chairman, Chief Executive Officer, President and Chairman of Executive Committee, Eaton Corporation $13,586,010 annual compensation
Gregg M. Sherrill Executive Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Tenneco Inc. $5,750,640 annual compensation
Martin L. Flanagan Chief Executive Officer, President and Executive Director, Invesco Ltd. $13,420,458 annual compensation
Mark T. Bertolini Chairman, Chief Executive Officer, President, Chairman of Executive Committee and Member of Investment & Finance Committee, Aetna Inc. $10,556,335 annual compensation
Thomas J. Quinlan III Chief Executive Officer, President and Director, R.R. Donnelley & Sons Company $6,059,714 annual compensation
James Dimon Chairman, Chief Executive Officer, President and Member of Operating Committee, JPMorgan Chase & Co. $23,105,415 annual compensation
Those are all figures for 2011. There’s no annual compensation info available for the rest of them.
I’m sure they’re really going to feel the pinch in this deal. The 90 year old women who will have 10% less of their already meager social security probably won’t suffer half as much.
ROMNEY: You Olympians, however, know you didn’t get here solely on your own power. For most of you, loving parents, sisters or brothers, encouraged your hopes, coaches guided, communities built venues in order to organize competitions. All Olympians stand on the shoulders of those who lifted them. We’ve already cheered the Olympians, let’s also cheer the parents, coaches, and communities.
Unhindered by federal background checks or government oversight, the 24-year-old man accused of killing a dozen people inside a Colorado movie theater was able to build what the police called a 6,000-round arsenal legally and easily over the Internet, exploiting what critics call a virtual absence of any laws regulating ammunition sales.
With a few keystrokes, the suspect, James E. Holmes, ordered 3,000 rounds of handgun ammunition, 3,000 rounds for an assault rifle and 350 shells for a 12-gauge shotgun — an amount of firepower that costs roughly $3,000 at the online sites — in the four months before the shooting, according to the police. It was pretty much as easy as ordering a book from Amazon.
He also bought bulletproof vests and other tactical gear, and a high-capacity “drum magazine” large enough to hold 100 rounds and capable of firing 50 or 60 rounds per minute — a purchase that would have been restricted under proposed legislation that has been stalled in Washington for more than a year.
Mr. Holmes, a graduate student in neuroscience with a clean criminal record, was able to buy the ammunition without arousing the slightest notice from law enforcement, because the sellers are not required in most cases to report sales to law enforcement officials, even unusually large purchases. And neither Colorado nor federal law required him to submit to a background check or register his growing purchases, gun policy experts said.
Of course, it’s a totally unpreventable tragedy, the work of a madman over which we have no control.
Clearly, nothing could possibly have been done to throw up any roadblocks that might have stopped this massacre. Freedom, after all, isn’t free. Sometimes it has to be paid for with the blood of random moviegoers.
A New York police officer killed his son after thinking he was an intruder and shooting him.
Michael Leach, of Rochester, was staying at the Clark Beach Motel in Old Forge, Wyoming County.
The 59-year-old and his son were part of a group of police officers who had driven to the area on motorcycles for a long-weekend getaway.
‘It was just a group of guys coming to have a good time,’ motel owner Dan Rivet Jr told uticaod.com.’We have very little violence in Old Forge.’
Leach was disturbed by someone coming into his room shortly after midnight. Believing the disturbance to be an intruder Leach grabbed his police department-issued .45-caliber Glock handgun and opened fire.
After realising his error the 59-year-old called 911 and reported the shooting. 37-year-old Matthew Leach was pronounced dead at St Elizabeth’s Hospital and his father was taken to St Luke’s Hospital for mental support.
He stood his ground.
Why he felt he needed to have a loaded gun near his bed is a question someone would ask in a sane country. But here, it’s evidently become routine to be armed to the teeth and ready to shoot to kill at a moment’s notice.
Here’s an interesting little bit of context on this:
In November 1975, Michael Leach, then a 22-year-old officer in the Rochester Police Department, shot and killed Denise Hawkins, an 18-year-old who was coming toward him with a knife in the basement of an apartment building.
The incident led to extensive protests from black community leaders and a grand jury investigation. The shooting was ruled to be justified.
Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) is floating legislation that would name most U.S. coastal waters after former President Ronald Reagan.
Issa reintroduced his bill Wednesday to rename the country’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), which generally extends from three miles to 200 miles offshore, as the Ronald Wilson Reagan Exclusive Economic Zone.
I haven’t written about this recently, but it’s time to revisit it. Most people associate Grover Norquist with the anti-tax pledge. But his other “accomplishment” is the “Reagan Legacy project” which I wrote about some time back:
It may be apocryphal, but the bin Laden family’s good friend and everybody’s favorite Leninist right wingnut, Grover Norquist, is reported to have said back in the 1980’s:
“We must establish a Brezhnev Doctrine for conservative gains. The Brezhnev Doctrine states that once a country becomes communist it can never change. Conservatives must establish their own doctrine and declare their victories permanent…A revolution is not successful unless it succeeds in preserving itself…(W)e want to remove liberal personnel from the political process. Then we want to capture those positions of power and influence for conservatives. Stalin taught the importance of this principle.”
I think he’s been damned successful so far. You can’t fault the guy for thinking small.
Inspired as he is by all things totalitarian, Norquist went on to do a number of things that Uncle Joe would be proud of, one of which was The Legacy Project.
Here’s what Mother Jones had to say about it:
Win one for the Gipper? Hell, try winning 3,067 for the Gipper. That’s the goal of a group of a powerful group of Ronald Reagan fans who aim to see their hero’s name displayed on at least one public landmark in every county in the United States.
A conservative pipe dream? The intrepid members of the Ronald Reagan Legacy Project don’t think so. Launched in 1997 as a unit of hard-line antitax lobby Americans for Tax Reform, the project’s board of advisers reads like a who’s who of conservatives; it includes, among others, staunch GOP activist Grover Norquist, supply-sider Jack Kemp, and Eagle Forum chief Phyllis Schlafly. To this crew, the Great Communicator is the man who almost singlehandedly saved us from the Evil Soviet Empire, made Americans proud again, and put the nation on the road to prosperity through tax cuts that helped the poor by helping the rich help themselves.
Buoyed by an early success in having Washington National Airport renamed in Reagan’s honor in 1998, the project started thinking big. In short order, they convinced Florida legislators to rename a state turnpike. From there, it was a logical step to the push for a Reagan memorial just about everywhere. “We want to create a tangible legacy so that 30 or 40 years from now, someone who may never have heard of Reagan will be forced to ask himself, ‘Who was this man to have so many things named after him?'” explains 29-year-old lobbyist Michael Kamburowski, who recently stepped down as the Reagan Legacy Project’s executive director. […] …it was the Gipper’s ho-hum performance in a 1996 survey of historians that apparently triggered the right’s recent zeal to enthrone him in the public eye. It was in that year that presidential historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr., in The New York Times Magazine, asked 30 academic colleagues and a pair of politicians to rank all US presidents, and when conservatives saw their undisputed hero languishing in the “average” column, they were aghast. Appearing on the heels of Clinton’s landslide victory over Bob Dole, the Schlesinger article seemed a slap in the face, a challenge to the GOP to stake its claim on recent history.
The charge was led by the Heritage Foundation — a conservative think tank that helped devise the Republican Contract with America. In the March 1997 issue of the foundation’s magazine Policy Review, the editors charged that Schlesinger’s survey was stacked with liberals and New Deal sympathizers, and presented opinions from authors more appreciative of the Gipper. (The 40th president has always fared better with the general public than with the pointyheads: In a recent Gallup poll, respondents rated Ronald Reagan as the greatest American president, beating out second-place John F. Kennedy and third-place Abraham Lincoln.)
Two issues later, for its 20th anniversary, Policy Review ran a followup cover story: “Reagan Betrayed: Are Conservatives Fumbling His Legacy?” For its centerpiece, the magazine invited soul-searching by prominent Reagan acolytes including senators Phil Gramm and Trent Lott, representatives Christopher Cox, and Dick Armey, then-Christian Coalition head Ralph Reed, Gary Bauer, and Grover Norquist. Soon after the cover story appeared, Norquist launched the Reagan Legacy Project as an offshoot of Americans for Tax Reform, which he had founded a decade earlier to further Reagan’s fiscal policies.
And tonight, Grover won the very first Ronald Reagan Award from the Frontiers of Freedom Foundation. Check out the sponsors, a veritable who’s who of GOP luminaries. How sweet it must have been for these lovers of freedom to be able to celebrate successfully repressing a “docu-drama” about their Dear Leader without even having seen it. After all, “a revolution is not successful unless it succeeds in preserving itself.”
I have no doubt that they all stood up at the gala tonight and proudly proclaimed “Thank You Comrade, Norquist!”
By now, of course, they just do this stuff out of habit. Naming the oceans after Reagan is pro-forma.