Apathy

Many through the decades have warned of the impending doom of censorship by the authorities who script their rules and tokens to curtail the masses into false hope and hollow dialogue. By mass surveillance or the police state, it was feared that the voices would be silent for fear of the retribution of the elite. Though it was self-censorship that came to be.

Here now in this world facts are indistinguishable from opinions, and only some opinions matter. As quickly as they ignite, they are as fleeting as butterflies in the wind. Though truth needs no salesmen, the truth is that we don't value truth anymore. We cling to fragments of ideals and visions of Avengers as though if we clap in all the right places, we will somehow win those principals for ourselves.

Where did this construct of the masses-can-not-be-wrong evolve from? Where a singular point of view, tunneled into a vision so narrow that it is as imperceptible to the universe as the atom is to the fork. How can such a narrow point ever influence the universe to affect a change or growth?

How many social endeavors do we now avoid, because of drama, or fear, or not being worth the hassle. I remember when we would engage in conversations, discussions, debates, and expand our consciousness through different points of view. Where your personal life experience had value, and didn't need to be validated by persons with opinions. There was no mob, innuendo was a pleasure, and we didn't write posts for responses only to delete them so not to attract attention.

Speaking clearly is misunderstood at best or a microaggression most often. Not issuing trigger warnings is intellectual terrorism, although saying nothing well, is leadership. We pull back from our communities to prevent the compromise of our integrity, though we leave behind a vacuum that is then filled with chaos, and fear, and hate, and apathy. The voice of reason is torn down amongst the statues of the old gods, and yet we fight for equality for only a few.

I know many will read this and agree, and say nothing. Continuing the culture we've allowed to flourish until is smothers us all in apathy.

A new religion

Despite thousands of years of practice, evolution, and refinement the concept of a religion continues to be just as circumspect as the views that are contained within them. Searching for an exact definition of religion  is even more elusive despite the power of the interweb where the focus these days is less upon the service or worship to a god or the supernatural, but include the diversity of religious thoughts and personal experience.

Simply I find religion to be an organized system of beliefs, cultural, or sociological ideologies that people use to relate to the world or define their existence. Within this belief structure, across all religions there are common elements that make up it's core. Faith, propagation, and fanaticism.

A religion is propagated by the indoctrination of others by the salesmanship of its members by pressing these structures upon others. Children are the most susceptible of indoctrination as they do not have the facilities to defend against alternative beliefs or lack the wisdom to determine what is true or false. There are temples, schools, places of worship, that further the education of these systems to converts to expand the base and by doing so spread the faith.

Zealots and fanatics of a religions dogma will protect the integrity of their belief systems by suppressing intellectual discourse, judge and/or condemn those who do not subscribe, commit acts of emotional or physical violence, or enact ostracism to those who challenge or disagree with their held beliefs. Sure there is spectrum that people will fall under; from a passive believer who simply thinks what they hold is true, and everyone else is wrong who are often biased and prejudiced to non-believers. To the zealots who are willing to martyr themselves or murder for their beliefs.

Though faith I feel is the secret sauce of any religion. It's what makes an ideology defensible from rational deconstruction. It is the faith that is the emotional bond to the ideas where all of the power and conviction the members come from. Emotion by definition is not logical, it is instinctive and intuitive. It is not necessary to be supported by facts or science, it is tangible because it is felt.

A new religion has emerged in the last 40 years far more dangerous than Scientology with their cult following, blackmail, and practices of manipulation. Employing shout-down tactics, shaming, and intangible guilt as its primary weapons of choice. This new religion defies rational discussion while empowering the weak with promises of privilege and justice. An elementary position of good verses evil, members flock to the alter of freedom of oppression with frightening speed now that the devil has been revealed.  

Voltaire once said "to learn who rules over you, simply find out who you are not allowed to criticize" In this modern, educated, and free thinking age, the new institution above criticism are the Feminists.

I'm often bewildered at the conversations with feminists I read or come across these days. The first line of defense in questioning the validity of a feminism ideal is that you are demonized as a misogynist, victim- shamer, sexist, or suppressor of women's rights. Where the christian's faith is built on Jesus giving his life to forgive humanity for original sin. The feminist have their own Jesus, "patriarchy" where the original sin is now "Privilege".

Fortunately for the feminists, patriarchy like Jesus can not be seen or heard or touched, but it's always there ready to give justification support for whatever opinion you wish to manifest. Whether God hates fags or now watching porn is misogynistic. Never-mind that an omnipotent infallible being would be incapable of hate, or that female porn stars make 10x the money of their male counter parts do. Faith is an emotional construct that does not require logical consideration.

The IRS in their infinite wisdom have a collection of items that mandate if an entity is in fact a church, and by extension, a religion. 

• Recognized creed and form of worship
• Formal code of doctrine and discipline
• Distinct religious history
• Membership not associated with any other church or denomination
• Organization of ordained ministers
• Ordained ministers selected after completing prescribed courses of study
• Literature of its own
• Established places of worship
• Regular congregations
• Regular religious services
• Schools for the preparation of its members

Clearly, feminism can claim a number of these published requirements. If you include that "women's studies" at any college or university support the schools for preparation requirements, the educators of those schools with their degrees provide the ordained ministers requirement, literature of it's own, creed and form of worship, as well as distinct history are pretty self evident going back to the early 60's. That leaves only regular congregations as the final requirement to be met. In my opinion, the social formals, coffee shop debate, protest rallies as well as the simple internet presence makes this requirement easy to accomplish. 

The soft unpublished requirements to make a church are also present in the feminism is a religion claim. 

• Fervent body of followers
• Bigotry or fascist implementation of the belief edicts
• Exclusionary to progressive thoughts or ideas
• Discriminatory to non-practitioners
• A tool for social or political control, or change
• Binary acceptance of the religion, you're ether for us or against us
• Fundamental hypocrisy

Like all religions there is a spectrum of the followers on how volatile their personal belief system is expressed. And of course not all feminists win the aggressive "femin-nazi" label just as very few Muslims or Christians are actually extremists murdering abortion doctors or waking jihad. Though the facts remains the same. 

In our civilization, credence is given to this organization that under the guise of equality is politically forcing a doctrine of sexism on their fellow humans all the while showing it is sexism they are working to exterminate.  If we continue to give these organizations of so called equalists deference,  then the erosion of our society will continue unchecked until the pendulum swings back past "equality" and stops rigid at sexist, only at the other end of the spectrum.     

Privacy vs Entitlement

In the information age, there seems to be a sense of entitlement to what was always previously reserved as private information. An expectation to not only provide detailed information to questions asked, but to provide information hat the person "would want to know" without them ever actually asking for the information. The failure to do so of course would be not only offence at the information received, but added offence that the person was "lying by omission" or hiding something important.

Where discretion once was the better part of valor, it feels as though discretion is now the better part of trust. Taken to the extent where by not informing a partner that a surprise is coming, you trigger a series of emotions that often result in feelings of betrayal, abandonment, dishonesty, and lack of faith.

I take great exception to this trend of confession to enable trust. For me, my life is built on individual relationships. The having of one relationship does not entitle one to details of any other relationship, except where there my be an overt impact to the other.

The difference between something you would want to know, and something you need to know are very different. Though frequently meshed together into a foot stampy pouty insistence of entitlement. Even when the information you may receive would inform you to make a different decision, this is still not a need you have, as a decision has already been made without it. It may not be the best decision for you, but it was your decision all the same.

As we fall head first into mass surveillance, unfiltered data collection, and the ever present compulsion to share every detail of our personal lives. From snap chatting pictures of a hamburger to listing every relationship and context on our public profiles, we need to only look around the room in which we sit and remind yourself there are curtains on our windows.

We do not live our lives as exposed show pieces to be on display. We are private creatures that need privacy to attain peace of mind. The internet is the great vacuum of thoughts where each of us spew our conscious into the void. Where the window treatment protects from prying eyes to our bodies, we must strive to maintain a level of privacy for our minds.

Though cyberspace is not a void, but a pond filled with fish and filters and aqueducts pulling off its content to be re-purposed, mined, sifted, filtered, and measured. There are both predators and benign organisms in the pond, though once we cast our mind in to it we have little or no control as to what it attracts.

The concept of "if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear" is complete bullshit. Propaganda issued from an organization whose very existence was secret for its first 30 years, with secret budgets, secret operating procedures, and secret oversight... Hypocrisy in it's purest from. Clearly, we have everything to fear, as they hide everything about themselves.

The Opt Out is Not Choice.

A troubling trend I find among us and becoming more prevalent year by year is the cultural acceptance of “if you don’t like what is being offered, you do not have to participate” Now this on its own isn't a big deal, though when its presented in the context that you have a choice..and that choice is to take whats being offered or not participate is something I take great exception to.

Choice after all, is the presentation of two, different though equal entities upon which you consider the pros and cons of each and select one best suited to your interest or needs. A choice is not having a single entity to use or not to use. That is a zero sum gain. And therefore not a choice but a forfeit. As you don’t actually gain anything when the only other option is to get nothing. An illusion of choice at best, or simply tyranny. Point out this illusion and you'll most certainly be met with righteous indignation or outright anger for your awareness of the game and undermining the systems.

To offer a person on death row, the choice of lethal injection, or firing squad is not a choice. Its simply a preference to how they wish to be killed. If you offered them a real choice, I would wager in most cases it would always be “life”. Many if not most of the choices that we are presented each day I feel can use this analogy. Where if presented with a third option as with presidential elections, the choice would frequently be, “none of the above”

Though why do we subscribe to this belief system? The privacy argument is the most notorious for presenting the illusion of choice. If I don’t want my phone records data mined by the feds, then I should not use a cellular phone. If I do not want my shopping habits online or at target data mined, indexed stored and fed back to me in advertising, I should not shop. If I do not want private companies to restrict my access to healthcare, then I should not use health insurance. If you don’t like that the US Military bombs schools in the middle east full of children in the war on terror..then you should not be an American.

In a recent attempt to look at a facebook page I received the following pop up. AYI would like to access your, friend list, email address, birthday, hometown, interests, current city, photos, religious and political views, personal description and likes. Rather than share all of this personal information with a faceless company, I click no thanks and got re-directed to my homepage. The offense being I can not view YOUR public material on facebook without first giving you my religious and political views, email address of my friends etc etc. So much for having a choice.

Every month you receive bills from utility companies with lobbied rights to remove any choice you may have in the provision of your power, gas or cable providers. You pay what ever rates are forced upon you with no voice to challenge the validity of the numerous fees and taxes, delivery charges and other make believe profit padding line items on every bill. Of course you don’t have to pay these fees and charges, you have the right to opt out of electricity to your home... wait, whut?

The grandest of all illusions, is when all similar providers operate under the same terms and conditions. Legally this is called collusion, and its illegal. Though there is a fine line between collusion, and “providing goods and services to which the market will bear” Such as with credit cards or cellular service. There is no competition amongst providers, as they all base their fees or rates off of the same un regulated principal. “maximum allowable by law”.

As consumers of anything, we have an inalienable right (especially in the US) to voice our negative opinions when services are not rendered to our liking or expectations. For the retort to be that we have a choice to not use those services is not only frequently flawed, but undermines the fundamental principal that the customer not only has a voice, but is most often right.

In fact it is our duty to the religion of consumerism and capitalism to not only voice these concerns, but state them as loudly and as frequently as we are capable. For those who insist we have a choice and by doing so we go without, then I proclaim to offer them the choice to not look upon your middle finger up thrust in your own self righteousness. 

Rape Propaganda

A new discussion is required on the complex issue of rape culture. Not, is rape culture real and how do we solve it, but more importantly why are the discussions going the way they are? To put it simply, either through organics or by deliberate thought, the term “rape culture” is nothing more than a propaganda slogan.

As everyone inherently wants to be on the winning side of an argument, the easiest way to achieve this is to create / follow / promote a favorable and deliberately vague slogan like; “I'm loving it” “support our troops” “just do it” “god is great” “democracy” or in this case “rape culture” which doesn’t actually mean anything. That way, everyone can join a group or discussion that everyone can be for, despite nobody knowing what it actually means because it doesn’t mean anything to begin with. With this foundation you can literally sell any idea to anyone, and they will fight to the death to protect it no matter how horrible the reality actually is.

Since the slogan means something different for everyone designed to attract the greatest number of supporters, you can manifest simple answers to complex problems down concrete social or moral lines ie “you're either your with us or against us”. However In order to protect the vague slogan you must however control the message, this is done by silencing or eliminating any attempt to clarify or define what the slogan actually means. Ie censorship.

After all, as a clearer definition is formed, the attraction to the masses will wain as with any clarity comes understanding, and through that understanding comes the ability to make an informed choice. If people are making informed choices as to what “I'm loving it” actually means.. is..”I'm loving gonzo high calories, and saturated fats in over processed food so full of chemicals that it doesn’t even biodegrade” ….then the support base will dissipate and the propaganda has failed to maintain a support base. Its really unfortunate that the reality is that these tools that are in use have been used for decades by governments, corporations, and churches It is how we the people to influence, control, sell, and shape the world around us in the manner we see fit. We are so experienced responding to these tools, that we employ them in our own lives as second nature demonstrated on the countless threads and discussions we see in our our friends feeds.

If the people who actively drive for support and cultural reform of sexual assault, and really do want to manifest some change. Then they must break free from the use of propaganda and arguments of intimidation and actually define, discuss, and be prepared to respond to those ideas that may undermine their belief system. This will however require listening to what is important to all parties, and not just forcing your dogma onto others in some black and white separation of for and against.

A solution, a Plan, a Path

For the powers that be and maintain the status qoe, the Occupy protests have been long in the making. Through the divisions they have worked so hard to create and maintain through the years to keep us diversified and against one another remain in effect and all powerful. I see most prevalent the claim that the protesters are made of “privileged/affluent white guys” and I find this unbearably offensive.

Somehow the reality that these folk myself included, are educated, heavily in debt and unemployed somehow equates to a privileged lifestyle is beyond me. In my mind if I were actually privileged, I would not be so laden in debt, and I would most certainly be employed. The proponents assert that its because of the ability to become educated that it is somehow related to privilege is absurd when statistics show an unemployment rate of just over 40% for men and women under 30, with college degrees. I would argue, that the only privilege that we embrace was the wholesale purchase of the so called American dream.

There is no debate that per capita that there are more unemployed blacks, than there are whites, or there are more unemployed men than there are women. Or that some forms of systemic racism in the last 40 years has contributed to a lack of access to education for minorities which if was completely abolished, would have resulted in absolutely nothing. There would simply be more educated unemployed black men with the socioeconomic awareness to be pissed off enough to occupy a public park and protest.

At the end of the day, the ruling class have created this, and other wedge issues and keep them in the for front of our minds so that we challenge each other rather rather than looking for the wizard behind the curtain. We are all equally fucked over by the same system they have created, but rather than focusing on these petty symptoms the disease maintains we must instead focus on the cause. So they call the protesters radicals, and hippies, and other derogatory terms so that you believe what they want you to think rather than looking at your check book, phone bill, or debt and begin to wonder why it seems you're being screwed by everyone.

Though time and time again the media and the pundits are trying hard to make this about greed, or if we give them their 5 vague demands will they go away. And to them I insist that they just don't get it. The Occupy movement isn’t about “I want to take rich people money and give it to poor people” Its about:

“I cant find work, because certain wall street entities contributed to the collapse of the world economic market..and no one has been held accountable” its about “Big business has purchased my government, and uses their power to undermine my standard of living, environment and future physical and economic security for the purpose of profit” Its about a lack of fundamental justice and implementation of police state where your phones are bugged, your email sniffed and your house searched on the whim of an “official”.

Though most people don't seem to see the connection between the Occupy movement and their own lives. The truth of the matter is is that if you identify with any of the examples below.. they are protesting for you and you..are part of them.

• You pay $3.50+ a gallon for gas. The dirty secret is, that price was invented by whats referred to as speculation trading. Its currently completely legal and unregulated due primary to the fact the people who bought the government want it that way. The real price of gas by laws of inflation, supply and demand is closer to a $1.22 and the rest goes to profits for billionaires and mega corporations like Exxon.
• You pay over 9% of compounding interest on your credit cards. The bank that loaned you that money, borrowed it from the government at 0%. Which means you are personally funding a 9%+ profit for their bottom lines for the privilege of loaning you your own tax dollars. This is where citibank for example reported a 9 billion profits in the last 3 months. I dont know about you, but i think 2%-3% is a lot more reasonable profit margin than 15% to 29% since technically we the tax payer funded the loan they gave to us at a high interest rate to begin with.
• If you pay income taxes. Did you know if you make over $100k annually, its very easy to no longer pay income taxes...at all? They say the rich are taxed, but its a lie. Between write offs, deductions, dividends and strategic reinvestment into tax shelters, you can reduce your taxable income by millions a year and never have write Uncle Sam a check.

Take for example Senator Darrell Issa, (R California) link his tax return can be seen here, and as you'll note, despite being worth almost 400 million dollars..and taking a senators salary of some 150k+ annually, his declared taxable income...is 0 which means simply he pays no income taxes because he has no income. Accomplished through deductions and loop holes and creative tax shelters, he's managed to avoid paying those imaginary high taxes that the rich have to pay. Now multiply those tax losses by 30 million or so, and then make up those losses on the taxes that the other 120 million American actually pay.

If you have a cell phone, or internet service. Right now, neither are regulated as a commodity like your power water or gas. Isn’t it odd that despite technology getting cheaper and cheaper the price of these services are going up? Or that even though every cell phone uses the exact same technology, they don't work on other networks? This is simply because the corporations who own the congressmen who would normally say.. "you cant bill for the same service 3 times" or "your phone must work on any cellular network so you can cancel a bad contract and change carriers anytime” dont work for you. They work for verizon, and comcast, and tyson chicken for their campaign contributions and luxury vacations.

So maybe you make so much money, that paying triple for a gallon of gas, or 10 times for your cell phone or 100x for your credit card or 20% in taxes doesn’t mean anything to you. If that’s the case, you are the 1%. However for the rest of us, all of those little extras that are implemented by corporations who own our so called democracy add up through the year to a very significant amount of money. If you actually had that money you could what..? Buy a home..healthier food..pay of college..move out of your parents house...kick out that roomate... live the American dream?

Though you'll hear day and night ceo's of big corporations say they have a "responsibility to their stock holders" to make profits. Well, what you got to keep in mind sometimes that profit comes from innovation, cutting costs, or actualy producing a product the market wants like an iPod. But more often it comes from laying off 30 thousand workers at a time, closing a factories, cutting salaries and benefits or taking a huge shit on the environment. Which, never actually would have had to be done..if their first priority wasn't pumping up a stock price to get a bonus.

In most instances, corporations are profitable enough to do what they are doing on their own. Its when a ceo's salery includes 100k shares of the company stock, or if their contract states.."if you can get the stock to 4.00$ a share you'll get a $5mill cash bonus".. well.. like you..they are going to do everything they possibly can to get that stock price up..But, the down side is they will have to lay off 30 thousand workers, ship jobs over seas, make a slightly shittier product..or cut pensions to do it.

How does this effect you? You might not work for one of these corporations, but you've called their east inda call center..or you didnt notice that can of tuna that used to have 7oz of tuna in it only has 5oz now but its in the same can for the same price...Your car seems to break down more often because the parts it was made with are cheaper and therefore break down more.. because by holding their employees wages down or cutting them..it presses down the wages of everyone else. If a masters degree isnt worth what it used to be..then a bachelors isn't either..and if you dont have any degree..you're worth even less. Believe me, its rough when the job you've been doing for ten years, is suddenly worth 20k less and requires an additional 10 hours a week to do it.

So corporations buy the congressmen who pass laws or in these instances don't pass any laws protecting you John Q citizen to a fair shot in a free economy. They buy them because they dont want you to make the laws, because it would effect their ability to be responsible to their stock holder. It would hurt their profits to not pass fees on to you that they should pay. It would hurt their profits to dispose of chemicals properly rather than just dumping them in the river. It would hurt their profits to let you cancel your phone contract any time and take that 400$ phone you bought to someone else with a lower price.

So yes, they have a lot of demands, because the way things are done these days is seriously fucked up, and its been going on for 30+ years. So I ask you again, because i really dont understand myself. I dont get it..why arnt you pissed off?

Another common retort to the protestors, is demanding that they have a plan to fix the last 30 years of profiteering and corporatism as if their right to be upset is somehow invalidated by the lack of a solution to a systemic problem. Though fortunately, I...have a solution.

First Id continue this occupy movement cultivate it and grow it and then consolidate them into an effective political voting block. At current estimates 150+mill Americans support the movement. If that is actually true, that voting block is enough to elect anyone to anything as only 42% of America voted in the last election, and we'll be at 60% any week now.

I would then guide the following into action.

• Come 2012 election the Occupy voting block will vote out, every sitting elected official, in every level of government regardless of who they are what they have done and what they hope to achieve. Who we put in their place is irrelevant as Ill point out later. This will accomplish only two things...make the sitting "leaders" in the 2014 cycle just a little nervous about their jobs. and two.. eliminate 1/2 of the career electorate who have allowed us to get this far by selling their souls to corporatism for re-election.
• Come the 2014 election cycle..repeat.. Vote out every single sitting elected official in every level of governmental that didn't get the boot the last time around as it wasn't their turn. Again who they put in their place will also be irrelevant. This will accomplish a lot. To start:

1. The career elected officials with all of their long standing ties and debts to private companies has been dismantled in full.
2. Anyone who now has an elected position at this point, is scared how easily they will be outed in the next election..and therefore is more accommodating to the needs/demands of the people where as they probably ran on the standard platforms to get elected by chance, and now must realign their intentions to the people they actually serve.
3. The corrupt seniority and ranking system in the congress and statehouses has been completely dismantled. no longer is it the person with the best connections and influence has the high power placements.
4. Corporate doners see that just because they make an investment in the cronies, doesn't mean he's going to stay in office, making their donations worth less and less. 5). We can start to press for and pass legislation we want as the fear of getting fired will be a clear and present danger in the mind of every official. They will begin to obey us from self preservation alone.
5. The culture of “stall until election time” to avoid getting things done will wither and die..as everyone will be acutely aware they they probably dont have much time to accomplish anything so they better have a track record if they hope to stand a chance in 2018

• Come the 2016 election cycle.. vote out, every sitting elected official, in every level of government regardless of who they are what they have done and what they hope to achieve. By this point the new candidates will see the writing on the wall, and actually have solid platforms, be dissuaded from corporate sponsorship, and have a valid fear that just because they were elected doesn't mean they will keep their jobs so they better fucking work for the people who got them there.

This will put nails in the coffins of political corruption. No longer will corporations try to influence congress as a good investment, as their dollars will mean nothing, when we'll vote anyone out for simply taking a single corporate donation or lobbies PAC contribution. Perhaps they will begin to try and influence the movement but even that will fail if we stick together through these rough times. In the end they will have to fall in line with our agenda less our new powers of congress legislates them out of existence.

By this point, we the people can press for legislation favorable to our causes with full support of all levels of government. After all we've demonstrated its our government and they are there on our graces. piece by piece we can dismantle the tyranny and corruption that has been put in place for the last 40 years.. Addressing every issue on the Occupy agenda until we've rebuilt our nation under the intentions and freedoms that it was forged. A new breed of humanitarian public servant will rise out of the bullshit and chaos the likes of which hasn’t been seen since the birth of this nation. We will start to see real leaders, with real interest in executing the needs and demands of the people they represent.

We can call it the "none of the above" party because we have no faith in anyone..and everyone must go. Revolution would never work in this day and age, and we have all the tools we need to rebuild this nation from the ground up. The system..and the constitution works.. Its the corruption that must go.

But what can we do today about Jobs, the debt/deficit, and the housing market? Thanks for asking, Ive some ideas on that subject as well.

Job creation:

• Start with high cost products currently produced over seas where we still retain the infrastructure to support them, like steel mills, machinery, textiles, refineries, concrete. Pull subsidies for multi-billion dollar profiting earning corporations like in agriculture, and big oil, communications and re apply it to the manufacturing base to offset new labor costs.
• Supplement the remaining perceived value of manufacturing unions with laws like osha, so that it doesn't cost 74$ an hour to put bolts on a car which only reduces the quality of the products we buy, but reduces the scalability of these organizations.
• Make it market competitive for entities to bid jobs to both union or nonunion companies such as with new construction. In the age of building codes, you do not get a better building bridge or tunnel by spending 3x as much in labor.
• Start rebuilding the nations roads, highways, bridges with massive investments/subsidies in high speed rail.
• Add payroll taxes to business that outsource jobs that directly service the US, such as call centers and manufacturing. Reduce payroll taxes for business with employees only here.
• Create a federal lending institution focused on building factories so facilities can expand, or start up despite the non existent capital. Since banks arnt interested in making money on financing new business let the tax payer make the money and put it to the debt.
• Mandate anything built or purchased by the government must be 75% made in USA.
• Mandate standards for the recycling of products in the market, and create a "use tax" for anything not adhering to those standards.

The National debt, budget deficit, with tax reform: ie. close all tax loop holes for corporations that are not philanthropic in nature..as well as all taxable income deductions not philanthropic in nature for people..tax dividends and capitol gains. With this we'd have the money to not only balance the budget, but start a fresh new war with Iran.

Social Security and Medicare make it a felony to commit fraud punishable by a mandatory minimum of 10 yrs with the feds. Thats worth 100bil a year right there. Fund the dept with seized assets of the people they arrest. This shoundt be hard if they steal as much as they estimate. With proper taxation loophole closures, and making it illegal for congress to borrow from the funds.. this is a non issue.

The housing market do one more bail out, this time all the money goes directly to home owners to pay off mortgage's, and get out from under water and ahead of the game. The money of course would go right to the banks, but this would not only create liquidity, but reduce leveraged balance sheets on the books. With people free and clear from bad mortgage's not only would they stop loosing homes, but that would have money to spend elsewhere in the economy, thus boosting GDP, and stabilizing home values nation wide in one fell swoop.

Lending to start, they would gain liquidity through the above housing plan. second. regulate the shit out of them, starting with reinstating finegold glass or what ever its call banning deposit banks from playing in the investment markets. Put a national cap on compounded interest such as 2% for all lending preferably BELOW the 29% above prime its currently at. Direct the fed to lend to not for profit banks and credit unions at sub prime rates, where for profit institutions must borrow at prime. This will destroy most of the big banks by design, and intentionally allow smaller more competitive institutions to re establish themselves in the markets.

Wall St roll bank all regulation cuts all the way back to Regan. Draft new regulations on derivatives, ban market speculation on commodities outright, ban high frequency trading all together, and see what happens after that.

financial institutions Nobody is too big to fail, with everything else mentioned in place..let it work itself out and see what happens.

The fed Abolish the fed, its a private corrupt company owned by a secret group of share holders located in the virgin islands. Put the US economy back on the gold standard like most of the rest of the planet and take the power of our economy back to the people who actually live within it...the 99%.

Save and generate new revenue.

• end the corporate wars for profit overseas.
• legalize pot and release all incarcerations for offenses that involved in less than 10 pounds of possession. Tax the shit out of it like cigarettes/booze.
• Legalize online gambling, license the existing casinos to build it out..and tax the shit out of it.
• Institute a sugar tax on all foods/anything that contains sugar. you can make it a penny a gram. use sugar tax to fund a public option for health insurance.

Corporatism is not Capitalism nor is it Socialism!

If you're going to be involved with politics and the shaping of our nation, then LEARN THE DIFFERENCE.
Corporatism, is more appropriately referred to as "soft-fascism" and it's an insipid plague that's destroying nations around the world.

It's influence has been used to overthrow democratically elected presidents of sovereign nations whom wouldn't allow the exploitation of their land/people. Thus our CIA deemed it responsible to overthrow them in coups they organized (fine example: Jacobo Arbenz. Thank the American Government for that, because if they hadn't done it you wouldn't have your Chiquita bananas. Also, make sure to thank the people of Guatemala who's nation was put in peril for the aforementioned phallic fruit.)

Corporatism is the enemy of the Free Market, which makes it incompatible with Capitalism. Corporatism's sole purpose is to maximize the gain and power of corporate entities. Capitalism's purpose is to establish a market in which people can exchange goods and services for capital and capital for goods and services. Capitalism has no ulterior motive to enrich a certain type of people, it serves as a system of exchange of goods and services and nothing more. It does not intermingle with government to influence the profit/power/gains/etc. of special interest groups.

Corporatism is also the enemy of the laborers, workers, and anyone who isn't part of a corporation (the people). This makes it incompatible with socialism, because as we mentioned before - Corporatism's sole purpose is to maximize the gain and power of corporate entities. This hurts the little guy and the laborer. The government creates regulation that kills corporate competition, because corporations are the only ones that can use their power/money to muscle through these regulations. The corporations will probably lay off a few workers, cut overhead by reducing product quality, or cut some other expenditure and still make massive amounts of profit. The regulations will not destroy them, and can not destroy them. The small business owner however will be hit hard and with much consequence because of these
regulations. More importantly, in a corporatist world the laborer is more often than not..forced to work for a corporation.

The corporations manipulate the desperation of the worker and turn them into wage slaves. They continue to do this, because, well..who's going to stop them? Is said laborer going to quit their job that is sucking the life out of them for low pay or keep their job because they know it's keeping them alive? Besides, what will their families and people in the community say? They'll laugh at them and call them bums and "lazy" and "stupid" for quitting their job.
So as you can see, corporatism is incompatible with both Capitalism and Socialism.

I've heard people call Obama a socialist and treat people who support the free-market like they're corporatists who support corporations. These inaccuracies infuriate me, they are rooted in ignorance and need to be routed out. If you support Capitalism, then stop supporting corporatism. If you support Socialism then do not support Corporatism. If you're against Socialism, fine, but stop confusing it with corporatism.

Obamacare for example, is not truly socialist. It is more appropriately labeled corporatist because it serves the interest of the corporate insurance companies as well as big pharmaceutical and corporatized medicine. The only socialist part of Obamacare is the government mandate set up to give tax payer's money to the people who can't afford the insurance, in order for them to have the insurance that it's illegal not to have. However, even this is vaguely socialist because it's sole purpose is not based on the social welfare of the people, but rather on increasing money flow to said corporate entities in a way that they can justify. The legislation itself is not only corporatist but authoritarian. Something else people commonly confuse with socialism is authoritarianism. Socialism is not authoritarianism, but there is a such thing as authoritarian-socialism (as opposed to anarcho-socialism).

The Department of Agriculture is a fine example of authoritarianism and corporatism, as only 25% of it's program actually qualifies as socialism because the rest of it's funds and man hours goes to subsidies for corporate farmers and not the people.