I'm chuckling at Mika and Joe this morning and their daily outrage at the

[Skidmore]

bailout, Obama's tax plan, and what is happening to "our money" (Mika's wording). Joe has been raving not "raising taxes" at this time and went on about a friend of his who thought he'd buy gold now and then in the next breath started name dropping about a party he attended where he saw Mark Penn who "threw some lobster" on him. The Rs and the media talking heads clearly make more than $250K per year.

A couple of days ago, I caught a brief portion of an item on one of the channels in which the subject appeared to be that the wealthy had fallen on hard times and Neiman Marcus and Sacs sales numbers were down.

The angst about taxes and "our money" (as if the middle class and poor class have no iron in this fire)are not about doing what is good for this nation, and these goobers need to be called on it. If you or I can do without the only house we own because a loan was foreclosed, then someone with 8 houses can learn to live with 7. If it is a-okay for the peasants to have a single car for the family or none at all, I'm certain some of these guys could take reducing the fleet of cars they own. Perhaps a few less rich meals and expensive wine could make the fat cats a little leaner and more fit and allow our nation to regain its economic health.

I don't begrudge people success. I do take issue with the idea that all success was gained honestly in this time. There have been some rotters out there--among the wealthy and in our halls of government--who have gotten us to where we are. Professional confidence men using whole industries to scam the nation and the world.

Do you hear the fiddler demanding to be paid? The lower classes have been tossed their pennnies in long ago and two generations after will be tapped for the bill. Time for Joey and Mika and their chums to help foot the bill for the ball.

Now the bailout--that's a whole other story. No more bailouts for dinosaur industries who refuse regulation and innovation. Republican capitalists want free markets? Let the market work. I'm calling them on their hypocrisy and lack of faith in their prize economic model.

Let's get to work restoring our nation and demand that those at the top do their part too.

[4lbs]

1. Someone should ask them about companies that layoff or cut thousands of jobs

while their executives rack up annual compensations of the tens of millions each.

Then, after these laid off peoples' severences are spent, they go on unemployment for 13 to 26 weeks, burdening the various state and federal governments who then see their cash supplies dwindle at a rapid rate, versus that of the company.

Maybe if the corporate executives didn't flaunt their concentration of wealth and stopped taking such huge compensations when laying people off, they actually wouldn't have to lay as many people off.

For example, a company as a cost-cutting move lays off 2,000 workers each earning an average of $50,000 annually. That trims $100 million from the annual budget.

However, the various corporate executives get extra compensation to about $50 million combined. Hey, maybe if they forego that extra compensation, the company would only have to lay off 1,000 workers, not 2,000. The annual budget is trimmed by the same overall amount, but 1,000 more people still have jobs and the corporate executives can still subsist on their million dollar salaries.

[Ganja Ninja]

2. You couldn't be more right about the wealthy paying higher taxes.

If they want to continue buying a new Mercedes every time the ashtrays get full then maybe they need to work a little harder rather then expect a tax break to cover the bill.

[BeyondGeography]

3. Mika drives a Ford F-150 into Manhattan every day

Once we've restored Bill Clinton's tax structure we need to pass a law against that.

[DemRob]

4. Joe & Mike

irrelevant