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From: Gregory Brown  
To: undisclosed-recipients:; 
Bcc: jeevac,[email protected] 
Subject: Greg Brown's Weekend Reading and Other Things.... 02/02/2014 
Date: Sun, 02 Feb 2014 08:35:11 +0000 
Attachments: Why_There's_No_Outcry_Robert_Reich_Huff Post_01_25_2014.docx; 
Working_on_Empty,America's_Workers_Are_Spending_Down_Savings_to_Survive_Huff 
Post_01_25_2014_Farai_Chideya_Huff Post_01_27_2014.docx; 
Hydrogen_cars_arrive_in_Washingtonr
but are_we_ready_for them_JD_Harrison_TWP_02_27_2014.docx; 
the:Case_for Snooping_Fareed_Zakaria January_22,2014.docx; 
PETE_SEEGER_bio.docx; 
Absurd CEO_Arguments_Against_Laws_We_Take_For Granted_Huff Post+01_29_2014. 
docx; Tie_Opportunity_Coalition_David_Brooks_NYTJanuary_30„2014.docx; 
Advice_to_Plutocrat Perkins, Time to Shut Up Bill Moyers 01 31 2014.docx; 
Bill_Moyers_Essay, 
30„2014.docx 
Inline-Images: image.png; image( I ).png; image(2).png; image(3).png; image(4).png; image(5).png; 
image(6).png; image(7).png; image(8).png 
DEAR FRIEND 
Peter "Pete" Seeger (May 3, 1919 - January 27, 2014) was an American folk singer. A fixture on 
nationwide radio in the 19405, he also had a string of hit records during the early 195os as a member of 
the Weavers, most notably their recording of Lead Belly's "Goodnight, Irene", which topped the charts 
for 13 weeks in 1950. Members of the Weavers were blacklisted during the McCarthy Era. In the 
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1960s, he re-emerged on the public scene as a prominent singer of protest music in support of 
international disarmament, civil rights, counterculture and environmental causes. 
As a songwriter, he was the author or co-author of "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?" (with Joe 
Hickerson), "III Had a Hammer (The Hammer Song)" (composed with Lee Hays of the Weavers), and 
"Turn, Turn, Turn!", which have been recorded by many artists both in and outside the folk revival 
movement and are still sung throughout the world. "Flowers" was a hit recording for the Kingston Trio 
(1962); Marlene Dietrich, who recorded it in English, German and French (1962); and Johnny Rivers 
(1965). "If I Had a Hammer" was a hit for Peter, Paul & Mary (1962) and Trini Lopez (1963), while the 
Byrds popularized "Turn, Turn, Turn!" in the mid-1960s, as did Judy Collins in 1964 and the Seekers 
in 1966. 
Seeger was one of the folksingers most responsible for popularizing the spiritual "We Shall Overcome" 
(also recorded by Joan Baez and many other singer-activists) that became the acknowledged anthem of 
the 196os American Civil Rights Movement, soon after folk singer and activist Guy Carawan 
introduced it at the founding meeting of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCO in 
1960. In the PBS American Masters episode "Pete Seeger: The Power of Song", Seeger stated it was 
he who changed the lyric from the traditional "We will overcome" to the more singable "We shall 
overcome". 
Pete Seeger, the man considered to be one of the pioneers of contemporary folk music who inspired 
legions of activist singer-songwriters, died Monday. He was 94. Seeger's best known songs include 
"Where Have All the Flowers Gone," "Turn! Turn! Turn! (To Everything There Is a Season)" and "If I 
Had a Hammer (The Hammer Song)." But his influence extended far beyond individual hits. His 
grandson Kitama Cahill Jackson told CNN that the singer died of natural causes at New York 
Presbyterian Hospital on Monday evening. 
Familiar with controversy: In a career spanning more than 70 years, Seeger frequently courted 
controversy. "He lived at a time when so many things hadn't been done yet, the idea of making music 
about something hadn't really been done,"Jackson (Seeger's grandson) said. "And now people do it 
all the time." Seeger's opinions didn't always sit well with authorities. "From the start, he aspired to 
use folk music to promote his left-wing political views, and in times of national turmoil that brought 
him into direct confrontation with the U.S. government, corporate interests, and people who did not 
share his beliefs," William Ruhlmann wrote in a biography on allmusic.com. "These conflicts shaped 
his career." 
In 2009, Seeger talked to CNN about the beginnings of his music career in the late 1930s. "I come 
from a family of teachers, and I was looking for a job on a newspaper and not getting one," he said 
in the interview. "I had an aunt who said, 'Peter, I can get five dollars for you if you come and sing 
some of your songs in my class.' Five dollars? In 1939, you would have to work all day or two days to 
make five dollars. It seemed like stealing." But Seeger said he took his aunt up on the offer. "Pretty 
soon I was playing school after school, and I never did work on a newspaper," he said "You don't 
have to play at nightclubs, you don't have to play on TV, just go from college to college to college, and 
the kids will sing along with you." 
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Last days: Jackson, said the singer-songwriter had heart surgery in December to replace a valve, 
which had gone well and had nothing to do with his death. He said Seeger was in the hospital for six 
days before his death. He couldn't speak for the last three days, Jackson said, but his mind never went 
away and he continued to recognize people. "He was a second father to me, he was a friend, he was a 
best friend," Jackson said. "He was just this wonderful, genuine person." 
As someone who was touch by Pete Seeger's passion on behalf of needs, tolerance and acceptance of 
the common man when I first saw him perform at Thompson Square Park in East Greenwich 
Village in New York City when I was twelve years old, he left an indelible impression. Having 
finally met him in the late 196os, I remember going with friends to his home in Beacon, New York to 
find he was exactly what I could have ever hope for 
A real American original with no airs or 
pretentions with the heart of a lion who loved everyone and life itself. For this reason, in addition to 
being the musical guest in this week's offerings, I have also included a comprehensive biography which 
I urge everyone to both enjoy. 
One of the big uglies in America that it appears that we haven't learned from our mistakes and one of 
the latest examples was illuminated this week in The Huffington Post by journalist Farai Chideya in 
the article - Working on Empty: America's Workers Are Spending Down Savings to 
Survive — as a majority of people in the country are almost certainly be worse off financially than they 
were a decade ago. That's not allocating blame, just stating a fact. According to the Pew Research 
Center, in the first two years following the Great Recession, 93 percent of Americans lost net worth. 
Only 7 percent got wealthier. Forty-three percent of those sampled in a nationally-weighted survey 
recently commissioned believe this is a permanent trend. 
Using the online platform Survey Monkey, the author ran the 2500-respondent query as part of an 
ongoing book project charting how America's workers are faring, and what qualities allow people to 
succeed despite the daunting state of the job market. Among the sobering findings were that nearly 
35% of respondents said they had spent retirement or personal savings to supplement their wages. 
Twenty percent relied only on personal savings; four percent on retirement savings, like an early 
withdrawal from an IRA or 401k, and eleven percent spent both. According to an analysis of data from 
the Federal Reserve and the U.S. Census Bureau by the firm Hello Wallet, in 2010, one in four 
Americans withdrew money from their retirement accounts. And the Transamerica Center For 
Retirement Studies found a third of un- or under-employed workers made early withdrawals. 
Even more arresting: 21 percent of those I surveyed agreed with the statement "In 2013, I borrowed 
money from friends or family specifically in order to pay household, medical or credit card bills." All 
of this adds up to some painful math: Americans, faced with stagnant wages despite pronounced gains 
in productivity, are spending against their future in order to live today. Here are some of the scenarios 
we'll see play out in the coming years: 
1) Consumers Who Can't Buy (Much) 
America is a consumer economy, with up to 70 percent of GDP generated by spending and purchases. 
In 1955, the ratio of household debt to disposable income was 49 percent. By 2010, it had grown to 112 
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percent. In pushing to re-up the lapsed Emergency Unemployment Compensation program, affecting 
long-term unemployed, President Obama made two arguments -- a moral "there for the grace of God 
go I" plea, and a statement that money to the unemployed was immediately spent, not saved, thus 
aiding local businesses. Those politicians and analysts who disagree say that Americans must be 
willing to take lower paying jobs or relocate in order to find opportunity. That approach may work in 
some cases (though people who have already spent down their savings have little funds to relocate), 
but the case remains that jobless Americans and workers in transition cannot bolster a consumer 
economy. 
2) Finance-Draining Retraining 
Job retraining is essential for many people seeking new employment. For those who return to college 
to reboot their career and incur educational debt, that debt (unlike credit cards) cannot be dissolved by 
bankruptcy. That means that some senior citizens are already finding their Social Security checks 
garnished to pay back educational institutions. If Social Security garnishing becomes widespread, you 
can bet the government may find itself having to negotiate a solution -- perhaps taking on the student 
loan defaults (and incurring more government debt) in order to protect seniors. In addition, as I have 
found during my reporting, many people are too proud to declare bankruptcy even in dire 
circumstances. Many spend down their retirement savings while looking for work, leaving themselves 
in a possible bind for their latter years. 
3) Cobbled-Together Careers 
Twelve percent of the respondents agreed "I work multiple part-time jobs, but would prefer to work 
one full-time job." With the advent of the (still contentious) Affordable Care Act, people who don't 
have employer-provided insurance, Medicare or Medicaid can generally find healthcare. The cost and 
quality vary based on location. Part-time jobs generally offer far fewer benefits than full-time work, not 
only health insurance but retirement plans and greater job security. Working multiple part-time jobs 
also often requires additional outlays for costs like transportation, and financial savvy to account for 
fluctuations in income. 
Only 34 percent of people surveyed agree with the statement: "I believe I will have enough income 
(from savings, pension, or other sources) to live on comfortably during retirement." Yet Americans 
are still a resilient bunch. Half of Americans believe their peak earning years lie ahead of them. Half 
also say that they work not just for money, but for enjoyment or creativity. One question that lies 
ahead for America -- for the president, the Congress, business leaders and citizens -- is how to harness 
the creativity of the American workforce, and provide the tools eager citizens need to succeed in a 
volatile labor market. 
There is something wrong here and it urgently has to be addressed. One of the best way to address this 
would be an intense comprehensive country-wide jobs program. We have saved the Big Banks, Wall 
Street and the Big Three Automakers, then why aren't our politicians not aggressively pushing 
programs that would stimulate immediate jobs, and I don't mean tickle-down economics, because 
after more than three decades of trickle-down policies -- They Don't Work 
American workers 
need jobs and one of the easiest ways to creating these jobs would be investing in repairing the 
country's badly decaying infrastructure, which by the way can't be outsourced to India, China and 
Brazil. Because if we allow the current trend of Americans using the savings and retirement money to 
survive today, the problem will only become greater in the future. 
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A friend came across this over the week end and thought that I (thus you) might enjoy it. Mark 
Twain is one of the country's favorite author/philosophers. Here are some of his comments on his 
seventieth birthday in 1905. 
Web sate: 1"StfAvvew.pbs.orgintarldwainAeammore/writings seventieth.html 
Well, if I made that joke, it is the best one I ever made, and it is in the prettiest language, too. I never 
can get quite to that height. But I appreciate that joke, and I shall remember it-and I shall use it when 
occasion requires. 
I have had a great many birthdays in my time. I remember the first one very well, and I always think of 
it with indignation; everything was so crude, unaesthetic, primeval. Nothing like this at all. No proper 
appreciative preparation made; nothing really ready. Now, for a person born with high and delicate 
instincts-why, even the cradle wasn't whitewashed-nothing ready at all. I hadn't any hair, I hadn't any 
teeth, I hadn't any clothes, I had to go to my first banquet just like that. Well, everybody came 
swarming in. It was the merest little bit of a village-hardly that, just a little hamlet, in the backwoods of 
Missouri, where nothing ever happened, and the people were all interested, and they all came; they 
looked me over to see if there was anything fresh in my line. Why, nothing ever happened in that 
village-I-why, I was the only thing that had really happened there for months and months and months; 
And although I say it myself that shouldn't, I came the nearest to being a real event that had happened 
in that village in more than two years. Well, those people came, they came with that curiosity which is 
so provincial, with that frankness which also is so provincial, and they examined me all around and 
gave their opinion. Nobody asked them, and I shouldn't have minded if anybody had paid me a 
compliment, but nobody did. Their opinions were all just green with prejudice, and I feel those 
opinions to this day. Well, I stood that as long as- well, you know I was born courteous and I stood it to 
the limit. I stood it an hour, and then the worm turned. I was the worm; it was my turn to turn, and I 
turned. I knew very well the strength of my position; I knew that I was the only spotlessly pure and 
innocent person in that whole town, and I came out and said so. And they could not say a word. It was 
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so true, They blushed; they were embarrassed. Well that was the first after-dinner speech I ever made. 
I think it was after dinner. 
It's a long stretch between that first birthday speech and this one. That was my cradle-song, and this is 
my swan-song, I suppose. I am used to swan-songs; I have sung them several times. 
This is my seventieth birthday, and I wonder if you all rise to the size of that proposition, realizing all 
the significance of that phrase, seventieth birthday. 
The seventieth birthday! It is the time of life when you arrive at a new and awful dignity; when you 
may throw aside the decent reserves which have oppressed you for a generation and stand unafraid 
and unabashed upon your seven-terraced summit and look down and teach- unrebuked. You can tell 
the world how you got there. It is what they all do. You shall never get tired of telling by what delicate 
arts and deep moralities you climbed up to that great place. You will explain the process and dwell on 
the particulars with senile rapture. I have been anxious to explain my own system this long time, and 
now at last I have the right. 
I have achieved my seventy years in the usual way: by sticking strictly to a scheme of life which would 
kill anybody else. It sounds like an eraggeration, but that is really the common rule for attaining to old 
age. When we examine the programme of any of these garrulous old people we always find that the 
habits which have preserved them would have decayed us; that the way of life which enabled them to 
live upon the property of their heirs so long, as Mr. Choate says, would have put us out of commission 
ahead of time. I will offer here, as a sound maxim, this: That we can't reach old age by another man's 
road. 
I will now teach, offering my way of life to whomsoever desires to commit suicide by the scheme which 
has enabled me to beat the doctor and the hangman for seventy years. Some of the details may sound 
untrue, but they are not. I am not here to deceive; I am here to teach. 
We have no permanent habits until we are forty. Then they begin to harden, presently they petrify, 
then business begins. Since forty I have been regular about going to bed and getting up-and that is one 
of the main things. I have made it a rule to go to bed when there wasn't anybody left to sit up with; and 
I have made it a rule to get up when I had to. This has resulted in an unswerving regularity of 
irregularity. It has saved me sound, but it would injure another person. 
In the matter of diet-which is another main thing-I have been persistently strict in sticking to the 
things which didn't agree with me until one or the other of us got the best of it. Until lately I got the 
best of it myself. But last spring I stopped frolicking with mince-pie after midnight; up to then I had 
always believed it wasn't loaded. For thirty years I have taken coffee and bread at eight in the morning, 
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and no bite nor sup until seven-thirty in the evening. Eleven hours. That is all right for me, and is 
wholesome, because I have never had a headache in my life, but headachy people would not reach 
seventy comfortably by that road, and they would be foolish to try it. And I wish to urge upon you this-
which I think is wisdom-that if you find you can't make seventy by any but an uncomfortable road, 
don't you go. When they take off the Pullman and retire you to the rancid smoker, put on your things, 
count your checks, and get out at the first way station where there's a cemetery. 
I have made it a rule never to smoke more than one cigar at a time. I have no other restriction as 
regards smoking. I do not know just when I began to smoke, I only know that it was in my father's 
lifetime, and that I was discreet. He passed from this life early in 1847, when I was a shade past eleven; 
ever since then I have smoked publicly. As an example to others, and not that I care for moderation 
myself, it has always been my rule never to smoke when asleep, and never to refrain when awake. It is 
a good rule. I mean, for me; but some of you know quite well that it wouldn't answer for everybody 
that's trying to get to be seventy. 
I smoke in bed until I have to go to sleep; I wake up in the night, sometimes once, sometimes twice, 
sometimes three times, and I never waste any of these opportunities to smoke. This habit is so old and 
dear and precious to me that I would feel as you, sir, would feel if you should lose the only moral 
you've got-meaning the chairman-if you've got one: I am making no charges. I will grant, here, that I 
have stopped smoking now and then, for a few months at a time, but it was not on principle, it was 
only to show off; it was to pulverize those critics who said I was a slave to my habits and couldn't break 
my bonds. 
To-day it is all of sixty years since I began to smoke the limit. I have never bought cigars with life-belts 
around them. I early found that those were too expensive for me. I have always bought cheap cigars-
reasonably cheap, at any rate. Sixty years ago they cost me four dollars a barrel, but my taste has 
improved, latterly, and I pay seven now. Six or seven. Seven, I think. Yes, it's seven. But that includes 
the barrel. I often have smoking-parties at my house; but the people that come have always just taken 
the pledge. I wonder why that is? 
As for drinking, I have no rule about that. When the others drink I like to help; otherwise I remain dry, 
by habit and preference. This dryness does not hurt me, but it could easily hurt you, because you are 
different. You let it alone. 
Since I was seven years old I have seldom taken a dose of medicine, and have still seldomer needed 
one. But up to seven I lived exclusively on allopathic medicines. Not that I needed them, for I don't 
think I did; it was for economy; my father took a drug-store for a debt, and it made cod-liver oil 
cheaper than the other breakfast foods. We had nine barrels of it, and it lasted me seven years. Then. I 
was weaned. The rest of the family had to get along with rhubarb and ipecac and such things, because I 
was the pet. I was the first Standard Oil Trust. I had it all. By the time the drug store was exhausted my 
health was established, and there has never been much the matter with, me since. But you know very 
well it would be foolish for the average child to start for seventy on that basis. It happened to be just 
the thing for me, but that was merely an accident; it couldn't happen again in a century. 
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I have never taken any exercise, except sleeping and resting, and I never intend to take any. Exercise is 
loathsome. And it cannot be any benefit when you are tired; and I was always tired. But let another 
person try my way, and see where he will come out. 
I desire now to repeat and emphasize that maxim: We can't reach old age by another man's road. My 
habits protect my life, but they would assassinate you. 
I have lived a severely moral life. But it would be a mistake for other people to try that, or for me to 
recommend it. Very few would succeed: you have to have a perfectly colossal stock of morals; and you 
can't get them on a margin; you have to have the whole thing, and put them in your box. Morals are an 
acquirement-like music, like a foreign language, like piety, poker, paralysis-no man is born with them. 
I wasn't myself, I started poor. I hadn't a single moral. There is hardly a man in this house that is 
poorer than I was then. Yes, I started like that-the world before me, not a moral in the slot. Not even an 
insurance moral. I can remember the first one I ever got. I can remember the landscape, the weather, 
the-I can remember how everything looked. It was an old moral, an old second-hand moral, all out of 
repair, and didn't fit, anyway. But if you are careful with a thing like that, and keep it in a dry place, 
and save it for processions, and Chautauquas, and World's Fairs, and so on, and disinfect it now and 
then, and give it a fresh coat of whitewash once in a while, you will be surprised to see how well she 
will last and how long she will keep sweet, or at least inoffensive. When I got that mouldy old moral, 
she had stopped growing, because she hadn't any exercise; but I worked her hard, I worked her 
Sundays and all. Under this cultivation she waxed in might and stature beyond belief, and served me 
well and was my pride and joy for sixty-three years; then she got to associating with insurance 
presidents, and lost flesh and character, and was a sorrow to look at and no longer competent for 
business. She was a great loss to me. Yet not all loss. I sold her-ah, pathetic skeleton, as she was-I sold 
her to Leopold, the pirate King of Belgium; he sold her to our Metropolitan Museum, and it was very 
glad to get her, for without a rag on, she stands 57 feet long and i6 feet high, and they think she's a 
brontosaur. Well, she looks it. They believe it will take nineteen geological periods to breed her match. 
Morals are of inestimable value, for every man is born crammed with sin microbes, and the only thing 
that can extirpate these sin microbes is morals. Now you take a sterilized Christian-I mean, you take 
the sterilized Christian, for there's only one. Dear sir, I wish you wouldn't look at me like that. 
Threescore years and ten! 
It is the Scriptural statute of limitations. After that, you owe no active duties; for you the strenuous life 
is over. You are a time-expired man, to use Kipling's military phrase: You have served your term, well 
or less well, and you are mustered out. You are become an honorary member of the republic, you are 
emancipated, compulsions are not for you, not any bugle-call but "lights out." You pay the time-worn 
duty bills if you choose, or decline if you prefer-and without prejudice-for they are not legally 
collectable. 
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The previous-engagement plea, which in forty years has cost you so many twinges, you can lay aside 
forever; on this side of the grave you will never need it again. If you shrink at the thought of night and 
winter, and the late home-coming from the banquet and the lights and the laughter through the 
deserted streets-a desolation which would not remind you now, as for a generation it did, that your 
friends are sleeping, and you must creep in a-tiptoe and not disturb them, but would only remind you 
that you need not tiptoe, you can never disturb them more-if you shrink at thought of these things, you 
need only reply, "Your invitation honors me, and pleases me because you still keep me in your 
remembrance", but I am seventy; seventy, and would nestle in the chimney-corner, and smoke my 
pipe, and read my book, and take my rest, wishing you well in all affection, and that when you in your 
return shall arrive at pier No. 70 you may step aboard your waiting ship with a reconciled spirit, and 
lay your course toward the sinking sun with a contented heart. 
There is a new manufactured Conservative controversy, centered on the fact that the Obama 
Administration recently ordered the US Vatican Embassy to move to a more secure building and the 
outcry has been so intense you would think that President Obama had ordered the recreation of the 
Sack of Rome. "A slap on the face on 78 million Catholics in the United States" one Congressman said. 
"Why would our President close our Embassy to the Vatican," tweeted Jeb Bush. "Hopefully, it is not 
retribution for Catholic organizations opposing Obamacare." 
This week in the New York Times Gail Collins wrote — The Luck of the Potato* — as the above 
political tweets go, this is a keeper on two counts. First, we can once again marvel a Republican 
politician's ability to insert the Affordable Care Act into everything. Secondly, we can mark the official 
end of the former governor of Florida is career as the safe, sane fallback option in 2016. But American 
Embassy: the State Department has been trying to move it into a compound that includes the 
American Embassy to Italy. This will save money and improve security. Instantly, certain parties 
detected a plot. 
Two former ambassadors to the Vatican, Ray Flynn (Clinton) and Jim Nicholson (Bush), pens a 
blistering iPad for The Wall Street Journal in which they call the move "a colossal mistake" that 
would squash the Holy See's separate identity. Diplomatically, they attributed more intense feelings to 
others, ("... many have seen the move as a deliberate slap at the Catholic Church and the Pope; some 
even detect veiled anti-Catholicism.') 
Fast-forward too many variations of the headline "Obama Insults Catholics." The State 
Department pointed out that the new quarters would be in an entirely different building, with an 
entirely different entrance then the Italian Embassy. And that was the new Embassy will not be in the 
Vatican, no there is the current one. Or that of any other country. The Vatican is only two-tenths of a 
square mile and more than half of that is gardens. "In fact, our new location is a tenth among closer," 
said Undersecretary of State Patrick Kennedy. "It's a clear the management of the importance of the 
Holy See post," said Nicholson. 
Cynics must wonder why we have an embassy for the second in the first place. The total population of 
800 people, which is approximately one-eighth the seating capacity of Radio City Music Hall in New 
York. It has virtually none of the attributes you would find in an actual country. It doesn't even have a 
cuisine. But, obviously nobody is going to disrespect the Vatican Walpole Frances is around. He won 
the world's heart but quickly doing a few things that was so obvious, it's amazing no previous poniff 
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figured them out. Such as: if you are going to talk about the poor all the time, you should try to avoid 
gold furniture. 
Without changing any of the church is reactionary rules on contraception, homosexuality or abortion, 
Francis change the tone just by saying that Catholics should stop obsessing about sex. Imagine what 
the nuns who ran the Catholic schools in the 19505/19605 would have thought about that theory. And 
instead of just pleading for great a charity to what the poor, Francis who created the world needed to 
drop the idea that when the rich got richer everybody eventually benefited. Trickle-down economics 
amounted to a "crude and naive trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power." 
Ken Langone, the billionaire co-founder of Home Depot, call Cardinal Timothy Dolan that's a rich 
benefactors to be rebuilding project of St Patrick's Cathedral in New York might hesitate to cough up 
his promise multi-million dollar donation because of the Popes attitude. Cardinal Dolan said he 
assured Langone the wall of Pope love the poor, "he also loves rich people." 
Republican budget guru Representative Paul Ryan said the Pope's apparent lack of enthusiasm for the 
capitalistic system was due to an unfortunate upbringing. "The guy is from Argentina. They haven't 
had real capitalism in Argentina," he told The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. Even if Francis was 
down on capitalism, no capitalists wanted to sound down on Francis. Meanwhile, President Obama 
has spent the last 5 years dodging calls for new taxes I'm protecting the insurance industry from 
healthcare reform. Stocks have been at an all-time high, and Wall Street hates him. As Collins wrote, 
"The moral is: its way easier to be pope."As this latest manufactured controversy is just another 
cheap-shot to discredit the President. 
****** 
Absurd CEO Arguments Against Laws We Take For 
Granted 
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Child Labor Prohibitions Will Ruin Us 
'The new child labor law making the willful employment of children under the age of fourteen years a 
misdemeanor.. will be fought both in and out of the courts by the glass manufacturers.. who claim the 
glass industry will be ruined by the measure." 
To Fight Child Labor Law: New Jersey's Statute Will Be Opposed Bitterly by Glass Manufacturers, August 10, 1903 
Without Slavery We'd Have No Cotton 
'The first and most obvious effect, would be to put an end to the cultivation of our great Southern 
staple... Imagine an extensive rice or cotton plantation cultivated by free laborers, who might perhaps 
strike for an increase of wages, at a season when the neglect of a few days would insure the destruction 
of the whole crop. Even if it were possible to procure laborers at all, what planter would venture to 
carry on his operations under such circumstances?" 
"Slavery in the Light of Social Ethics" by Chancelor Harper 
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8 Hour Work Days Doom The Railroads 
'The railroads have estimated that it would cost them $50,000,000 a year to give the members of the 
four brotherhoods the eight-hour day, and they are by no means assured that other workers, such as 
telegraphers and switchmen will not try to come in under its benefits, thus increasing the cost still 
further." 
Railroads United In General Attack On the 8-Hour Act, The New York Times, November 16. 1916 
Social Security Will Kill American Prosperity 
"One employer tells me this law will increase his costs between to and 15 percent. If this is added to 
selling prices, what will it do to sales, and hence employment? If it is taken out of the labor fund, what 
will it do to the purchasing power of all who work for a living, and hence to national prosperity?" 
Social Security: Effect of Tax on Payrolls Viewed With Alarm, by 
Ellis, The New York Times, November 17, 1935 
Ban On Cigarette Ads Is Silly! 
'The Tobacco Advisory Committee, representing the manufacturers, called the ban unjustified and 
said it would not solve the question of smoking and health. A spokesman said that all cigarette 
advertising was brand advertising and that there was little or not evidence that this had increased the 
consumption of individual smokers." 
The Cigarette Companies Would Rather Fight Than Switch by Elizabeth 13. Drew, The New York Times, May 4, 1969 
Cigarette Taxes Will Kill Small Business Owners 
"Re-enactment of the city's 1-cent-a-package tax on cigarettes will defeat its own purpose by driving 
thousands of small retailers out of business, the finance committee of the City Council was told 
yesterday at a public hearing." 
City Urged To Drop Its Cigarette Tax, The New York Times, June 16, 1939 
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Minimum Wage Laws Will Hurt Old People 
'The first ill effect of raising the minimum wage to the standard of the average wage would be to cause 
the weak, slow, and the aged--and especially unskilled young women and girls--to fall by the wayside. 
These classes of workers are always a drain upon the employer, for the overhead charges of a factory 
are just as great whether the places be occupied by good, quick workers or poor, slow ones, therefore a 
smaller output of the latter causes a loss by raising the percentage of these overhead charges. An 
advance in wages... adds to this loss and forces the employer to discharge the sub-average, giving 
preference to strong workers who already earn the minimum." 
The Minimum Wage: Should Worthy Laborers Be Sacrificed to Establish It? by Marcus M. Marks, The New York Times, March 25, 
1913 
Seatbelts Laws Shouldn't Be Legislated 
'The auto industry's Big Three told congress today that the public should be educated to use auto 
safety seat belts and not forced into it by legislation." 
Car Makers Oppose Law On Seat Belts, The New York Times, August 8, 1957 
Bill Moyers and Michael Winship posted this week — Advice to Plutocrat Perkins: Time to 
Shut Up! — There's a rule of thumb in cyberspace etiquette known as Godwin's Law, named after 
Mike Godwin, the Internet lawyer and activist who first came up with it. A variation of that law boils 
down to this: He who first compares the other side to Nazis loses, and the conversation is at an end. 
Unless you're billionaire Tom Perkins, who seems dedicated to digging a deeper and deeper hole for 
himself. By now you're probably heard about Perkins' infamous letter to The Wall Street Journal 
(whose editorial page is the rich man's Pravda of class warfare) in which he wrote: 
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"I would call attention to the parallels of fascist Nazi Germany to its war on its 'one percent,' namely 
its Jews, to the progressive war on the American one percent, namely the 'rich...' This is a very 
dangerous drift in our American thinking. Kristallnacht was unthinkable in 193o; is its descendant 
progressive' radicalism unthinkable now?" 
It's astonishing how ignorant (not to mention crude and cruel) the very rich can be. Surely, one of his 
well-paid retainers could have reminded Mr. Perkins that Kristallnacht was the opening salvo in 
Hitler's extermination of the Jews, the "night of broken glass" in 1938 Germany and Austria when 
nearly a hundred Jews were murdered, 30,000 were sent to concentration camps, and synagogues and 
Jewish-owned business were looted and destroyed, many of them burned to the ground. If Perkins 
thought his puny point survived the outrageous exaggeration, he was sadly mistaken. 
Web site: http://youtu.be/VuxoS6tHEag
Nonetheless, after a stunned world responded, venture capitalist Perkins went on Bloomberg TV to 
apologize for using the word "Kristallnacht" but not for the sentiment of his letter. "I don't regret the 
message at all," he said. "Any time the majority starts to demonize the minority, no matter what it is, 
it's wrong and dangerous and no good comes from it." 
Perkins also said that he has family "living in trailer parks," but bragged like some cackling James 
Bond villain that he owns "an (Li:plane that flies underwater" and a wristwatch that "could buy a six-
pack of Rolexes." That watch, on prominent display during the Bloomberg interview, seems to be a 
Richard Mille, a charming little timepiece that can retail for more than $300,000. At that price, a 
watch shouldn't just tell you the time, it should allow you to travel through it, perhaps back to the 
Gilded Age or Versailles in 1789, just as the tumbrils rolled in. Here in the office, our $85 Timex and 
Seiko watches have crossed their hands over their faces in shame. 
The fact that this isn't a bigger outrage, is an outrage in itself. If Jessie Jackson, Reverend Wright, 
Hillary Clinton or President Obama had made similar statements they would be so demonized that 
Bora Bora or Antarctica wouldn't have been far enough way. And for this insensitive idiot who is a 
billionaire that flouts his "street creds" as having family living in trailer parks, he is an obvious 
example why trickle-down economics doesn't work. Especially when every homeboy's first dream after 
signing his first NBA contract or receiving his first residual check from his record company or corner 
drug dealer making his first major drug sale, the first thing that they do is buy their Mothers a new 
home and employ their family members and posse so that they too can make it out of the "trailer 
park." Hopefully Mr. Perkins will become the social and business piranha he deserves and exiled to 
the gulag of irrelevance. This is my Rant of The Week 
WEEK's READINGS 
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With three years left on his second term in Tuesday's State of the Union speech president Obama 
signaled what he plans to focus on with the remaining his remaining time in office. In a strong State of 
the Union address the President delivered a center-left message without alienating the center-right of 
the country. He called on Congress to pass an extension of the long-term unemployment benefits, to 
raise the country's minimum wage, to do something about climate change when to stop endlessly 
ridiculous votes to kill the Affordable Care Act. He touted the need for equal-pay for women, saying 
it's time to do away with the workplace policies that he said belongs in a madman episode. While the 
cornerstone of the speech was strengthening the middle class and building ladders of opportunity for 
all Americans. He warned Congress that if they don't act he will take executive action in areas that he 
could. And when it comes to national security, he warned Congress and both parties to not obstruct 
diplomacy with Iran and that the country move off of "this permanent war footing" around the 
world 
I saw it as a strong message deliver by the President who is willing to do whatever he can, with or 
without Congress, to help the American people. It was a very American speech what a populist tone. 
I'm sure that they are people in the president's own party who will be disappointed with the modesty in 
the speech as it didn't include any grand bargains or major programs that the opposition could rally 
against, as 'overreaching' or 'expansion of Big Government'. 
No better example of Republican intense hatred of the President, is that prior to the address Rep. 
Randy Weber, R-Texas tweeted, "On floor of house waitin on 'Kommandant-In-Chef ... the Socialistic 
dictator who's been feeding US a line or is it A-Lying?" — from Republicans who immediately 
dismissed the speech as fluff, with one Congress person asking, "Where was the beef" While 
representatives of the Tea Party Movement characterized the President as the biggest disaster that has 
ever happened to the country. Utah Republican Sen. Mike Lee, the face of the national tea party 
Tuesday night, delivered the movement's response to President Barack Obama's State of the Union 
speech, pinning the widening wealth gap on the president's policies and touting the ideas of a new 
generation of leaders, including himself and Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas. 
There is gridlock in Washington, DC and it isn't because the President hasn't tried to reach across the 
aisle to Republicans in Congress and elsewhere. Conservatives conveniently forget/ignore that that, 
"when Obama first came into office, the head of the Senate Republicans said, my number one 
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priority is making sure president Obama's a one-term president." There was never a sense of working 
together with the President among Conservative Republicans, as a horde of Republican leaders 
demanded a copy of the long-form of Obama's birth certificate as a way to delegitimize him as a 
credible candidate and then President. There is a universal belief in the Republican Party that they can 
run against Obamacare. But you have to ask why? Because where I come from if something is broken 
you try to fix it, not cheer for its failure. 
2,Photo 
I understand that during his first term the President had to play his cards close to the vest to make 
sure that he wasn't marginalized like one-term Presidents, Jimmy Carter and Bush 41. But having 
achieved a number of major accomplishments from enacting the first new healthcare legislation in fifty 
years, reversing a 800,000 monthly job loss to 46 straight months of job growth and 8.2 million new 
private sector jobs, got the country out of the senseless Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, enacted policies 
that saved the American banking sector, Big Three Automakers, stopped the free-fall of the financial 
market with stocks doubling in the last four years, killed bin Laden, decimated Al Qaeda, turned 
around the housing crash, got rid of Qadaffi without puffing American boots on the ground, kept the 
country out of potential armed conflicts in the Middle East and elsewhere to mention a few 
 I 
understand that after five years of NO from Republicans in Congress, the President has decided to go-
it-alone. 
Still this doesn't mean that he won't be able to achieve more, because there is a real possibility that a 
Comprehensive Immigration Bill can be signed, the minimum wage will be raised and the Affordable 
Healthcare Act become cemented, much like Medicare and Medicaid. And God forbid, with several 
more mass shootings, even the most starched supporters of the NRA might embrace some sort of gun-
control reform. For me, President Obama knocked the ball out of the park with Tuesday's State of the 
Union speech. Not because it was one of his best, but because he artfully tacked to the middle (instead 
of presenting new tantalizing targets) for Republicans who believe that by denying him any victory 
they can marginalize him. President Obama Tuesday's State of the Union speech has put Republicans 
on noticed that if they continue to the Party of No, they will find that they themselves are marginalized. 
As Conservative columnist, David Brooks pointed out this week in an opt-ed in The New York 
Times -- The Opportunity Coalition -- instead of being the lame-duck that pundits 
are prophesizing, the President should use the next three years as a period of liberation uninhibited by 
the need to please donors, to cater to various Congressional constituencies and to play by Washington 
rules over the next few years he is free to think beyond legislation, beyond fund-raising, beyond the 
necessities of the day-to-day partisanship. He will have the platform and power of the presidency, but, 
especially after the midterms, fewer short-term political obligations. This means he will have the 
opportunity to build what he could have used over the past few years: An Opportunity Coalition. He'll 
have the chance to organize bipartisan groups of mayors, business leaders, legislators, activists and 
donors into permanent alliances and institutions that will formulate, lobby for, fund and promote 
opportunity and social mobility agendas for decades to come. President Obama began his career as an 
organizer. His mobility agenda floundered because the governing majority he needed to push it 
forward does not exist. He now has the chance to remedy that, to organize, to convene, to build, and to 
make life a lot easier for the next swimming in the race. 
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One of the current biggest scandals plaguing the Obama Administration are the ongoing news reports 
in the international media revealing operational details about the U.S. National Security Agency 
(NSA) and its international partners' global surveillance of foreign nationals and U.S. citizens. The 
reports emanate from a cache of top secret documents leaked by ex-NSA contractor Edward 
Snowden. In June 2013, the first of Snowden's documents were published simultaneously by The 
Washington Post and The Guardian, attracting considerable public attention. The disclosure 
continued throughout the entire year of 2013, and a significant portion of the full cache of the 
estimated 1.7 million documents was later obtained and published by many other media outlets 
worldwide, most notably The New York Times (USA), Der Spiegel (Germany), Australian 
Broadcasting Corporation (Australia), 0 Globo (Brazil), the Canadian Broadcasting 
Corporation (Canada), Le Monde (France), L'espresso (Italy), NRC Handelsblad (the 
Netherlands), Dagbladet (Norway), El Pais (Spain), and Sveriges Television (Sweden). 
In summary, these media reports have shed light on the implications of several secret treaties signed 
by members of the UKUSA Agreement in their efforts to implement global surveillance. For example, 
Der Spiegel revealed how the German Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) transfers "massive 
amounts of intercepted data to the NSA", while Sveriges Television revealed that the Forsvarets 
radioanstalt (FRA) of Sweden is continuously providing the NSA with intercepted data gathered 
from telecom cables, under a secret treaty signed in 1954 for bilateral cooperation on surveillance. 
Other security and intelligence agencies involved in the practice of global surveillance include those in 
Australia (ASD), Britain (GCHQ), Canada (CSEC), Denmark (PET), France (DGSE), Germany 
(BND), Italy (RISE), the Netherlands (AIVD), Norway (N/S), Spain (CNI), Switzerland (VDB), as 
well as Israel (ISNU), which receives raw, unfiltered data of U.S. citizens that is shared by the NSA. 
The disclosure provided impetus for the creation of social movements against mass surveillance, such 
as Restore the Fourth, and actions like Stop Watching Us and The Day We Fight Back. Domestic 
spying programs in countries such as France, the UK, and India have also been exposed. On the legal 
front, the Electronic Frontier Foundation joined a coalition of diverse groups filing suit against 
the NSA. Several human rights organizations have urged the Obama administration not to prosecute, 
but protect, "whistleblower Snowden": Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, 
Transparency International, and the Index on Censorship, inter alia. 
On June 14, 2013, United States prosecutors charged Edward Snowden with espionage and theft of 
government property. In late July 2013, he was granted asylum by the Russian government, 
contributing to a deterioration of Russia—United States relations. On August 6, 2013, President 
Obama made a public appearance on national television where he reassured Americans that "We don't 
have a domestic spying program" and "There is no spying on Americans". Towards the end of 
October 2013, the British Prime Minister David Cameron warned The Guardian not to publish any 
more leaks, or it will receive a DA-Notice. Currently, a criminal investigation of the disclosure is being 
undertaken by Britain's Metropolitan Police Service. In December 2013, The Guardian editor 
Alan Rusbridger said: "We have published I think 26 documents so far out of the 58,000 we've seen." 
The extent to which the media reports have responsibly informed the public is disputed. In January 
2014 U.S. President Barack Obama said that "the sensational way in which these disclosures have 
come out has often shed more heat than light" and critics such as Sean Wilentz have noted that many 
of the Snowden documents released do not concern domestic surveillance. 
From 2001 to 2011, the NSA collected vast amounts of metadata records detailing the email and 
intemet usage of Americans via Stellar Wind, which was later terminated due to operational and 
resource constraints. It was subsequently replaced by newer surveillance programs such as 
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ShellTrumpet, which "processed its one trillionth metadata record" by the end of December 2012. 
According to the Boundless Informant, over 97 billion pieces of intelligence were collected over a 
3o-day period ending in March 2013. Out of all 97 billion sets of information, about 3 billion data sets 
originated from U.S. computer networks and around goo million metadata records were collected 
from German networks. Several weeks later, it was revealed that the Bundesnachrichtendienst 
(BND) of Germany transfers massive amounts of metadata records to the NSA. On June 11, 2013, 
The Guardian published a snapshot of the NSA's global map of electronic data collection for the 
month of March 2013. Known as the Boundless Informant, the program is used by the NSA to 
track the amount of data being analyzed over a specific period of time. The color scheme ranges from 
green (least subjected to surveillance) through yellow and orange to red (most surveillance). Outside 
the Middle East, only China, Germany, India, Kenya, and the United States are colored orange or 
yellow. 
Snowden has been variously called a hero, a whistleblower, a dissident, a traitor, and a patriot. 
Snowden's "sole motive" for leaking the documents was, in his words, "to inform the public as to that 
which is done in their name and that which is done against them." The disclosures have fueled 
debates over mass surveillance, government secrecy, and the balance between national security and 
information privacy. Seven months after the NSA revelations began, Snowden declared his mission 
accomplished, citing the international debate sparked by his leaks. A federal judge in December 2013 
ruled that the government had "almost certainly" violated the US Constitution by collecting metadata 
on nearly every phone call within or to the United States. Ten days later, a different federal judge ruled 
the surveillance program was legal, raising the likelihood that the constitutionality of the program 
would ultimately be decided by the Supreme Court. In early 2014, numerous media outlets and 
politicians issued calls for leniency in the form of clemency, amnesty or pardon, while others called for 
him to be imprisoned. 
He is considered a fugitive by American authorities who have charged him with espionage and theft of 
government property. He lives in an undisclosed location in Russia and continues to seek permanent 
asylum. As recently as this week Snowden and his operatives (because I don't believe that he is acting 
alone) are still releasing sensitive documents to justify their claims that the NSA and its fellow cohorts 
around the world have abused the rights of citizens and leaders home and abroad, and calling attention 
to this abuse is their patriotic duty. I would almost believe it if he hadn't fled to Putin's Russia where 
government overreach is normal. Whatever your belief journalist Fareed Zakaria wrote an 
interesting article this week — The Case for Snooping — saying that although many liberal critics 
say that President Obama's speech on the NSA didn't go far enough, they are wrong. 
Obama's liberal critics say his speech on NSA didn't go far enough on intelligence reform. Why they're 
wrong. In his speech, Obama defended the essential structure of U.S. surveillance activities. He 
argued that the National Security Agency is not a rogue outfit that it plays by the rules and is 
staffed by patriotic men and women. But in an important admission, he also made clear that after 9/11, 
the NSA and American intelligence efforts in general went too far. Talting advantage of its unique 
technological capabilities, the U.S. government did whatever it could, rarely asking whether it should. 
The President proposed some new checks on decisions to collect data and new constraints on how it is 
stored and when it can be accessed. 
The speech annoyed liberals and conservatives suspicious of government overreach, but reaction from 
the left has been more anguished. Many voices have begun arguing that Edward Snowden's 
revelations show that U.S. intelligence operations have run amok and are illegal and unconstitutional 
and that Snowden deserves to be pardoned and treated like a hero. The factual basis for every one of 
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these claims is weak. A large number of Snowden's revelations involve not domestic surveillance but 
foreign intelligence operations, a standard role for U.S. spy agencies. They show, for example, that the 
U.S. government is spying on the Taliban and Pakistan. They show that the NSA is spying on foreign 
leaders like Germany's Angela Merkel and top aides to Brazil's Dilma Rousseff. Now, you might regard 
some of these choices as wise and others as mistaken, but there is nothing unprecedented about 
countries spying on foreign leaders. Obama conceded too much when he promised not to eavesdrop 
on a host of them. Foreign governments will certainly not return the favor and stop what is often a 
relentless effort to spy on America's top officials and CEOs. 
There is a gaping hole in the left's understanding of U.S. intelligence work. The U.S.—its government, 
businesses and people — is under massive, sustained surveillance from and infiltration by criminals, 
terrorists and foreign governments. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff pointed out recently that 
since 2011, cyberattacks on America's critical infrastructure — chemical, electrical, water and transport 
systems — have risen seventeenfold. The National Nuclear Security Administration, which is 
responsible for the country's nuclear power plants, reported in 2012 that it faces to million 
cyberattacks every day — that's 3.65 billion in one year. Every major bank and corporation, from 
Bank of America to Goldman Sachs to the New York Times, faces almost continuous efforts 
from abroad to penetrate its networks, mine its data, disrupt its procedures and steal its secrets. The 
effects can range from disruption of transactions to systemic damage that feels more like a military 
invasion. 
It would be impossible to defend against these attacks without allowing intelligence agencies to spy on 
foreign governments and groups abroad. But it is also crucial that the NSA and others have some 
ability to enter into telecommunications systems at home to track cyberattacks, figure out where they 
come from and render them ineffective. Former Justice Department official Jack Goldsmith notes that 
the New York Times objects to foreign cyberattacks yet wants the NSA to shut down its surveillance 
at home. In fact, he writes in the New Republic, "To keep our computer and telecommunication 
networks secure, the government will eventually need to monitor and collect intelligence on those 
networks using techniques similar to ones the Times and many others find reprehensible when done 
for counterterrorism ends." 
We all live, bank, work and play in a new parallel world of computer identities, data and transactions. 
But we do not seem to realize that this enormous freedom of activity in the cyberworld, as in the real 
world, has to be defended. Just as the police need basic information about your life and activities, the 
government will need information about the cyberworld. As General Keith Alexander, the NSA's 
director, has pointed out, there is no way to defend these systems without getting into them in the first 
place. In "Federalist No. 51," father of the American Constitution James Madison wrote (along with 
Alexander Hamilton) that in setting up a government, "the great difficulty lies in this: you must first 
enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself." That 
is the balance we have to strike, in cyberspace as anywhere else. 
In a world where Google monitors your every search and then enables advertisers to target associated 
ads and aggregators from Peoplemart to zillow.com are compiling your information to either 
upsell you or sell to others -- to credit bureaus that aggregate and sell your information to anyone. --
to Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites trying to monetize your information. -- to store 
camera that follow shoppers throughout a mall. -- to advertising on digital signage that is directed to 
your specific profile we are being monitored every day by corporations that would make Big Brother's 
snooping look passive in comparison. We should know that every keystroke, posting, call, email or 
tweet is being monitored by some organization, private or public and to single out the NSA, misses the 
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point that we are living in an age where technology has taken away privacy in ways that we never 
notice and we are just in the infancy of this paradigm. My father had a saying, "everything has a 
price" and the price for national safety is the intrusion on our privacy, and for the NSA to be affective it 
has to be ahead of the curve, which means aggressive. So for you who think that the 
President didn't go far enough, like Zakaria, I think that you are wrong especially when you are not the 
one who has to defend the charge that something should and could have been done to stop a terrorist 
attack. And if you don't think so 
 Remember gin, The Arab Spring and Benghazi. Because 
dots can't be connected until information is accumulated, sometimes the shotgun approach is 
necessary. 
One of the greatest challenges in America is the ever growing inequality and one of country's greatest 
champions of the Middle Class trying to address this injustice is Robert Reich, American political 
economist, professor, author, and political commentator who served in the administrations of 
Presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter and was Secretary of Labor under President Bill Clinton 
from 1993 to 1997. This week in The Huffington Post under the title - Why There's No Outcry 
- asking why don't we have a revolution in America, or at least a major wave of reform similar to that 
of the Progressive Era or the New Deal or the Great Society. Middle incomes are sinking, the ranks of 
the poor are swelling, almost all the economic gains are going to the top, and big money is corrupting 
our democracy. So why isn't there more of a ruckus? 
Web Link: http://www.youtube.com/watchN=9REdocfie3M 
The answer is complex, but three reasons stand out. 
First, the working class is paralyzed with fear it will lose the jobs and wages it already 
has. In earlier decades, the working class fomented reform. The labor movement led the charge for a 
minimum wage, 4o-hour workweek, unemployment insurance, and Social Security. No longer. 
Working people don't dare. The share of working-age Americans holding jobs is now lower than at any 
time in the last three decades and 76 percent of them are living paycheck to paycheck. No one has any 
job security. The last thing they want to do is make a fuss and risk losing the little they have. Besides, 
their major means of organizing themselves -- labor unions -- have been decimated. Four decades ago 
more than a third of private-sector workers were unionized. Now, fewer than 7 percent belong to a 
union. 
Second, students don't dare rock the boat. In prior decades students were a major force for 
social change. They played an active role in the Civil Rights movement, the Free Speech movement, 
and against the Vietnam War. But today's students don't want to make a ruckus. They're laden with 
debt. Since 1999, student debt has increased more than goo percent, yet the average starting salary for 
graduates has dropped to percent, adjusted for inflation. Student debts can't be cancelled in 
bankruptcy. A default brings penalties and ruins a credit rating. To make matters worse, the job 
market for new graduates remains lousy. Which is why record numbers are still living at home. 
Reformers and revolutionaries don't look forward to living with mom and dad or worrying about credit 
ratings and job recommendations. 
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