Passing unnoticed at midnight, December 31, was another tax hike on the middle class. Given the silence from the Administration and Democrat-controlled congress, it is safe to say this is a bipartisan screwing.

From the Wall Street Journal:

The maximum amount of earnings subject the the Social Security tax rose to $102,000 from $97,500 last year. Of the estimated 164 million workers who will pay Social Security taxes in 2008, nearly 12 million will pay more because of this increase, the Social Security Administration says.

Bear in mind that this tax hike affects workers only – the employed and self-employed. Those who depend on interest, capital gains, dividends, rents and royalties are unaffected. Hence, the silence.

To be fair, the level of understanding in the media of our tax code, outside business publications like the Journal, is low. They don’t see it becuase they don’t get it.

DETROIT, MI – Democratic Presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich, the most outspoken advocate in the Presidential field and in Congress for election integrity, paper-ballot elections, and campaign finance reform, has sent a letter to the New Hampshire Secretary of State asking for a recount of Tuesday’s election because of “unexplained disparities between hand-counted ballots and machine-counted ballots.”
…
He added, “Ever since the 2000 election – and even before – the American people have been losing faith in the belief that their votes were actually counted. This recount isn’t about who won 39% of 36% or even 1%. It’s about establishing whether 100% of the voters had 100% of their votes counted exactly the way they cast them.”

Kucinich, who drew about 1.4% of the New Hampshire Democratic primary vote, wrote, “This is not about my candidacy or any other individual candidacy. It is about the integrity of the election process.” No other Democratic candidate, he noted, has stepped forward to question or pursue the claims being made.

“New Hampshire is in the unique position to address – and, if so determined, rectify – these issues before they escalate into a massive, nationwide suspicion of the process by which Americans elect their President. Based on the controversies surrounding the Presidential elections in 2004 and 2000, New Hampshire is in a prime position to investigate possible irregularities and to issue findings for the benefit of the entire nation,” Kucinich wrote in his letter.

“Without an official recount, the voters of New Hampshire and the rest of the nation will never know whether there are flaws in our electoral system that need to be identified and addressed at this relatively early point in the Presidential nominating process,” said Kucinich

Well, it appears to be happening again – an inexplicable swing to Clinton, the upstart stopped in his tracks. I learned in 2004 that we no longer knew how to do exit polls, which gave Kerry 57% of the New Hampshire vote (he officially ended up with 50.2%, barely squeaking it out). Now it appears as though the polling organizations have lost their craft – all eight of them above gave the New Hampshire primary to Obama by mostly huge margins. All eight uniformly got it wrong. (Oddly, they got it right for all the other candidates except Obama and Clinton.

Keep in mind that the above polls are pre-election samples, and not exit polls, which tend to be far more accurate. However, it appears as though there was a last minute inexplicable swing to Clinton, saving her ass. She will probably win the nomination. It appears she’s annointed.

Then there’s this small problem – New Hampshire uses Diebold optical scanning machines to count the paper ballots. This is the same machine that was so easily hacked in HBO’s movie, Hacking Democracy. The machines are under control of a private company, LHS Associates, which has exclusive control of the memory cards, start to finish. There is no interference in its control, no government oversight. And New Hampshire has done nothing, nothing, since the weaknesses of the Deibold machines were exposed, to remedy the problem. Nothing.

I doubt the Clinton campaign had anything to do with this travesty, if indeed we’ve been hacked again. She’s simply the establishment candidate, the easiest one to beat, the one who threatens conservatives least.

There’ll be more, I’m sure. Obama did what Democrats do best, gave up and went to bed. Everyone is scurrying around trying to explain the shift (*early results from exit polls show no swing to Clinton), no one is questioning the count.

I’m used to it. But can’t y’all be just a little bit suspicious? Just a little bit?

PS: For more, including updates throughout the night, check out The Brad Blog.

PPS: 25% of New Hampshire’s votes are hand counted, no machines used. It will be interesting to see the results in those precincts.

*PPPS: This official explanation, as I now hear it, is a swing of women voters to Clinton fueled by her crying spate. This would be plausible if supported by data. It’s not. It’s pulled out of the ether.

It’s been both fun and encouraging to watch the demise of the Hillary Clinton campaign. Never say never, but there does seem to be a trend.

What’s more encouraging is this: Democrats are turning out in far larger numbers than Republicans, and two-thirds of them are supporting the perceived “liberal” candidates, Edwards and Obama. Clintonist triangulation, whereby her husband once ambushed liberals into supporting Republican policies, no longer plays. It’s all good.

What remains to be seen: Is Obama indeed a liberal? The Democratic Leadership Council spotted him before he hit the national stage, and included him in its New Democrats Directory. (Citing differences on NAFTA, Iraq, and health care, he repudiated his listing.) The DLC are a cagey bunch, working constantly to prevent liberals from taking control of the party. Their name is an albatross at this point, so sympathizers are wise to disavow allegiance. Still, Obama’s past affiliation is suspicious.

John Edwards is a late-to-the-fold liberal, but I take him at face. David Brooks calling for him to step aside is a good sign. And he’s not backed down from liberal stances. (That usually happens after the nomination anyway.) But he must have learned something from running a weak-kneed centrist race with John Kerry. I much prefer him over Obama.

But the only true liberal left is Dennis Kucinich, struck from the list of candidates in New Hampshire by ABC News even as he qualifies for matching funds and is actively campaigning. (The same fate befell Ron Paul. The media does indeed meddle in our elections.) It’s a simple thing to understand – the media does not like true liberals. We live in a right wing country where even our left wingers are right wingers. Kucinich is an anomaly. No wonder ABC did what it did.

I certainly have mixed emotions seeing a nine year old girl sitting at her computer for hours – it’s not homework. It’s not to feed her natural curiosity. It’s Webkinz.

I suppose it’s always been this way, but the objective in children’s toys is to create a revenue stream that outlasts the original product. So it’s not enough to sell these kids little animals – they have a whole line of overpriced accessories too. And, the worst part, they come with codes that activate an online version. The object is to get the kid to the computer. That’s what that nine-year old was doing that day.

I just read about the business model for Webkinz in Business Week. Ganz Corporation, the maker of the product, is happy with sales, but there’s a discordant note too.

Ganz … must now strike a delicate balance: maximizing profit from the fad without alienating parents and kids. Visitors to Webkinz.com spent more than a million hours there in November, but the site is free.

Horrors! Neither Ganz nor its competitors have yet figured out a way to turn the kids’ time on the web into a revenue stream. Frankly, there’s only two ways: advertising, and getting hold of parents’ credit card numbers. They’re working on it.

The Campaign for a Commercial-free Childhood has noticed that Webkinz is using its web site for cross-marketing purposes, advertising other products for kids (in this case the movie Alvin and the Chipmunks). They have organized a protest campaign. Ganz is ambivalent, saying the have standards after all, but affirming their intention to advertise to kids on their web site.

In other countries, there are standards for marketing to kids. In this country, we let the advertisers into our schools. Kids are bombarded with ads on the first Saturday morning of their cognizant childhood. Parents are overmatched. Perhaps now is a good time to remind parents (and the corporations that market to our kids) that advertising is neither wholesome nor healthy, and that childhood should be a time when kids are exempted from our society’s shortcomings.

There’s three good food fights going on regarding Conrad Burns’ ‘exoneration’ – check them out here and here and here. Oh yeah – and here. There’s probably more.

The theme is common among Burns supporters – he’s been “exonerated” or “cleared of all charges”. Eric Coobs reminds us that he was right all along, just like he always is.

It’s kind of annoying. Burns may be many things, but innocent is not one of them. The man played politics like a pro – was there ever any question that he was handing out favors right and left to supporters and holding on to office by bribing us with our own money. Simply put, he was a disgrace.

Was he a crook? Well, that’s just it. There’s no smoking gun. He reminds me of Barry Bonds – we all know (except sports writers) that Bonds was juicing – is there any question? His stats took off in his late 30’s, when most ball players are in decline. His head expanded, he got angry and arrogant, he lost his hair. All circumstantial, but in the end, circumstantial evidence will convict. Some times that’s all you’ve got.

And we have that aplenty on Burns. We have Abramoff’s own words that he was using Burns and his staff to get things done. We have people treading back and forth between staffs, Burns changing his vote on legislation and supporting just about everything Abramoff wanted. It’s not as obvious as his hair falling out, but it’s enough for me.

Corruption is endemic in our culture. Our political system is designed to be corrupt, to favor people with money. The return on investment for ‘contributors’ is immense – billions of dollars in federal funds change hands for the passing of a few thousand dollars to a candidate’s coffers. Politicians have no choice but to sell out – if they don’t, they lose money at the rate of $2 for $1 – every dollar that they do not collect goes to their opponent. That scares them.

Burns was never shy about doing favors – I’ll never forget how he introduced a bill as his own that had been faxed to him by the Montana Wood Products Association – it still had the fax monikers on it. That kind of favor was routine for Burns, if you played ball with him. He was a corrupt politician, a crude jokester with racist tendencies, and a private joke to the 99 other senators who were not him.

The investigation of Burns is over – he’s not vindicated nor is he innocent. He’s just gone. No matter how good or bad Jon Tester turns out to be, I’m happy about that.

There’s a new drug on the horizon that could eliminate sleepiness, courtesy of DARPA. Like so much of what is around us, it’s a Pentagon application that may make its way into our daily lives.

In a trial with monkeys, some who were sleep deprived for 30-36 hours were administered orexin A, and performed on the same level as well-rested monkeys.

The subtleties are way too obvious.

We were in Wendy’s the other day – the place was almost empty, and as we approached the cash register, a man appeared on my left. He had that depraved look of a lost cause – sunken eyes, ragged clothing, stooped posture. He asked me for money. My initial reaction was to avert my eyes. We ordered my food, and I collected my change, and then I went over and gave him some money.

Whadda guy, eh? My initial reaction bothers me. But I suppose I’m like everyone else, secure in my little nest. And he did take me by surprise.

Some would say I was wrong to give him money. I know what he’s going to do with it – he’s either going to buy some food, or some liquor. Food first, but by midnight of that day I know he’ll be passed out in an alley. In the not-too-distant future, he’ll turn up dead.

There exists in conservatism a strain of social Darwinism. They deny it. If someone says to me one more time “teach a man to fish…”, I’m going to get physical. There are lost causes on this planet. They only need comfort – food, shelter, the warmth of human compassion. We can do no more for them. Maybe they’ll come out of it, but what if they don’t? Is it so wrong just to give them shelter for one night without pestering them about Jesus? Is that a bad use of public funds?

But the Darwinism operates on a higher level than the pitiful poor. In the conservatives’ mind eye view, all of us are working away on a ladder, all of us are upward bound. To reach down and help anyone below us is wrong, as it robs them of incentive. To reach up and take anything from up above is wrong, as it punishes success.

It’s ice cold, heartless. And it’s wrong. We’re not like that. We are connected, each to one another, by a firm hand grip. Some, like George W. Bush, are born high up, and very dependent on the hand up. He’s been bailed out of trouble more times than Paris Hilton. But he removes his own hand from those below. His dad was the same way, scarred by lavish inheritance, a sense of entitlement and mythical achievement. As Jim Hightower so famously said of W, he was born on third base and thinks he hit a triple.

It’s that sense of entitlement that bothers me, the idea that we should never involuntarily offer a hand down. Conservatives have a misshapen view of the privileged classes, that they will extend the necessary generosity to bring the lower classes along. And if they don’t, well, that’s how it works. If a man turns up dead in an alley, well, it’s probably best he never reproduced.

In the view of most of us, we’re all in it together. We can all use a break, whether it is help putting food on the table in hard times, or overcoming unaffordable illness. The best solution for most of us is education and job training. Private charity will never provide enough to help those who can use the help, because too many of the wealthy are like George W. Bush – “I’ve got mine. Screw you.”

Yes, there will be those who form a sense of entitlement to public resources. But they will be a minority. We should not all be punished for a few miscreants. Most people want to be self-sufficient, and only need help overcoming the early hurdles. So we eliminate some of them.

In other industrialized countries there is a much higher degree of public service to one another, and these countries have healthy economies, but more than that, happier people. In various measures of happiness, like this one, countries like Denmark, Canada and Sweden consistently outscore the U.S. Here we are tempered to hard-boiled competition, and can be wiped out by medical hardship. Our kids go deeply in debt to get an education and are chained to the wheel when they leave school by the need to service that debt. It’s a constant strain. We are hyper-busy, irritable, strained and insecure. We work harder, take fewer vacations, and have fewer public benefits. For all of those reasons, we Americans are very good employees.

How much better, how much more sensible, to use our resources for mutual aid. Conservatives say that no one should ever be forced to help another. But most of us recognize a duty, and see the tax system is the most efficient way to do it. Private charity, while important, is too small and selective to be as useful.

There are those among us who recognize no duty to one another, have no sense of fellowship, who want only to live in splendid isolation. They collect the bounty of all our labors and pretend that they created it. They are the strident voice of selfishness. They need to be dragged along, kicking and screaming, into humanity. Otherwise, they are safely ignored.

From Glenn Greenwald’s 12/26/07 column at Salon.com, listing some of his favorite quotes of 2007:

“When I talk to senior government officials on the phone, it’s my own policy — our conversations are confidential. If I want to use anything from that conversation, then I will ask permission” —Tim Russert, under oath at the Lewis Libby trial, citing the textbook function of a government propagandist to explain his role as a “journalist.”

“I suggested we put the vice president on ‘Meet the Press,’ which was a tactic we often used. It’s our best format,” as it allows us to “control the message” — Cheney media aide Cathie Martin, under oath at the Libby trial, making clear how well Russert fulfills his function.

I ran across these words again today – they are worth repeating. In another time, when the media was not so forgiving of (or intimidated by) power, these words would be on banners and book covers as a classic example of a woman so removed from reality that she cannot begin to feel the pain of ordinary people. Is it any wonder her son exhibits indifference to the lower classes (like those who fight and die in Iraq)?

Anyway, we need to be reminded of who raised our president. From an interview with Diane Sawyer, here is Barbara Bush on why she would not be watching television coverage of the attack on Iraq:

Why should be hear about body bags and deaths and how many, what day it’s gonna happen? It’s not relevant. So why should I waste my beautiful mind on something like that?

She must be of two minds. I’m yet to see the beautiful one.