mntleo2
mntleo2's JournalBernie Gets it; The War on Those in Poverty Never Ended
...Welfare Deformed only put low income (mostly) women in lifelong poverty. This was cheered along by established Democrats who purposefully misunderstood (IMO) that poverty is an institute. Institutions are kept in place because they benefit someone. Here is the definition of an Institution from the Marriam Dictionary:
a significant practice, relationship, or organization in a society or culture the institution of marriage
also : something or someone firmly associated with a place or thing
Who does the poverty institute benefit? Unlike the haters of those in poverty, they refuse to acknowledge the truth. The Poverty Institute certainly does not the benefit the poor. The institution of poverty is kept in order to employ and include those in the upper classes. such as the legal system, medical, social services, housing, food, all of these are part of the Poverty Institute
In the 1980s a man in Venezuela stood on the top of the garbage mountains and told those people, that not only were they far more numerous, they were also losing all the resources of their country, which gave them away to the richest and other companies from foreign entities. He said if they all voted they would win and be able to benefit from those resources. So they did vote and won, stunning the country and the world who never even counted him as a real candidate.
He did turn out to be a kook, but he did inspire the least among his country to vote as a block and win. His name was Ugo Chavez. The point I am making here is that, if the Dems stopped hating and blaming the poor from whom they benefit, they would win in a landslide. And this is why they are so afraid of that part of the country and try to shut them up. They just won't admit to their own benefit from those in poverty and embrace this population.
Say or do whatever you like but the truth is this is the way Dems could win if they took off their blinders.
My 2 cents, Cat from Seattle
Poverty 101
I am a Poverty Scholar out of the Theology Union. I have studied and been participating around issues of poverty for decades. I am a member of The Poor Peoples Campaign. I have news for this horrible tax. I have some news for you and believe me I have been hit blow by blow as an activist grieving for decades that even our own allies have turned against those in poverty. . Here are a few things i have observed:
* Poor people already pay more than any other class and have paid larger blows to their incomes forever. My go-to for taxes and who pays, where you can check it out is at: https://itep.org/whopays-7th-edition/ . There you can find your state and see this tax analysis. They have been around for over thirty years. Including what taxes you pay in your state too. Also, they calculate corporate taxes who who paid those ~ and who do not pay them in this website. It is well worth anyone's time to explore as they are full of so much information.
*With American poverty, the tax and the hatred burden on the poor has been gutted since Reagan's fake Welfare Queen garbage. I hate to tell you, many "progressive" people bought his crap and began to hate the poor right here on this forum. I am holding my breath and hope so much more understanding about the conditions of poverty are now better understood. .
* I have a "secret" about Welfare Reform that has ruined many families ~ and hate to say it, even though I may get reported, Hillary Clinton, a former Walmart board member who celebrated this trash ~ and helped promote it. She went around the country with that other turncoat Joe Lieberman crowing about how wonderful Welfare DEfroemd, has been. In NYC alone, where Hillary lives, There they implemented a program undermining union workers and hire "Welfare to Work" hire for $.50 cents an hour. did not hear a thing about that from her, only applause. sorry I am still angry about her, the so-called "women's issue" girl.
* Welfare DEformed has been terrible for these low income folks. First of all these (mostly women and some men),were told their care for their families was "doing nothing" They were forced into McJobs that did not pay enough to even pay the rent, much less their medical, childcare, food, or costs of living,. Subsequently they ended up homeless, children taken by the DSHS where they are placed in foster care that pays 3 X the cost than if the parent were caring for their kids themselves. Goddess forbid that low income people can actually do things good for their community by raising the next generations who will take care of us!
* Poverty is considered now to be "child abuse" and this gives authority for the State to take kids.
* $billions as been given for foster care, adoption, for taking kids and placing them in foster homes with designer curtains and a new SUV in the driveway, who cares what goes on behind them?
* From my own eye witness out of my own experiences, and while working on the street with homeless kids, the largest part of this unhoused population were adoptees and foster kids.
* Kids who are adopted have no sense of belonging, they have been ripped out by the roots from their families and do not know who they are. Their grandparents have no rights either, but foster care do get those rights. Oh and written in the policies for these case managers and departments get a $10,000 bonus for each kid taken.
* Maybe these foster and adopted kids have a fantastic home where they are loved and well cared for, but they still just so not feel they belong. This is not due to bad care or lack of love, they can have very loving care …but they just do not feel they have the roots they need for their self identity. .
*Family reunion would save more lives in the long run. The Rebecca Project helps parents to find support like whole family substance abuse treatment, including spouses and kids. I know there are kids who do not feel this way as well. I am not saying ALL of them feel these things, but I am saying that there is a good chance they will.
*I cannot tell you the heartbreak I have felt with parents working hard to get their kids back, but nope, the money is too good for the myriads of people, lawyers, case managers, CASAs, who are working hard to take away their rights so they get their pay. Like abortion should be legal but rare, I have seen more than one suicide because the options should be available but rare They are paid for and taken by a government of recipients determined to get the money they want.
There is more information that I have ~ tons. But trust me, defining what work is and what it is all about the lack of respect or support for those toiling at this work. It should not just be about making rich people richer. It needs to make unpaid labor more than "zero years" or "doing nothing." . Instead like so many poor who whose loved ones enter the military, we assume that the poor do not pay taxes when they make the greatest sacrifice than any other class.
Cat in Seattle
https://m.mamapower.org/
Motherwork (unpaid care giving) IS work!
Cat in Seattle
My Jazzie Just Passed ...
...over the Rainbow Bridge.. I am still sorely missing her.
I got her as a kitten, and was "baby sitting" her while my son and his wife located a home. But I oddly told them she was mine, I just could not give her up. She was a free soul, but she adored me, watching me and sending me hearts with meows. She had this endearing way of wrapping her tail around my leg. Her tail had a peculiar little kink at the end of her tail, that she inherited from her mother. But Jazzie HAD to go outside and patrol her areas, and patrolled it up to the night before she died, so thin she would never have had a chance if a coyote, owl, or other animals in the area had wanted her for their lunch.
I am also a long time a follower of Edgar Cayce, and have found him fascinating My studies about him has helped me in so many ways. As a Christian I struggled with a memory I had as a kid where we visited a mansion and I "knew" I was black and I was familiar of the area. I knew furniture was "misplaced", missing buildings, and as a small child who had no idea about reincarnation and I did not know what it meant. I grew up to be an empath, but I never knew what to do with it as my culture denies there is any such thing. Not so empathic now, but at least I understand things because of Edgar Cayce about who I am.
Lastly my name is Cat, I am a Leo. I have had cats with me all of my life. My kitties are all with me wherever I am. They are not at all like Jazzie, but they have their own personalities, and I know they chose me.
Thank you for posting this. The surprise I am seeing here is that for once, those of us who are "woo-woo" do not get the "scientific" disgust with us. As a long time DU member, since the late '90s where early in their existence, they created forums for us where we could be let alone and with each other, no trolls tolerated there.
Love, Cat in Seattle
Not only S Korea does this, we do too
...In the States it is big business to take kids and give them to anyone with designer curtains and a nice car in the driveway. In fact for each child taken and adopted there is a $10,000 award for doing it. The adoption business is very well financed by lucrative government and grants awarded "nonprofits." I have my own family damage they made with me and the child. They took the child from, the grandparents and lied about them, accusing them of abuse. There was no real investigation, no speaking to the people who were involved with the family, no real looking into the things that they should have been investigating and ignoring the facts ~ especially when it came to their anticipated $10,000 + bonuses. None, and the child was in a therapeutic childcare for the first 4 years who never saw a damn thing and recommended the child be adopted by them.. This childcare center was quite aware of kids who were abused, they kept watch and they found none. These people then adopted this kid to a couple who had just lost their own 2 year old child months earlier who drowned in their back yard pool! They had 4 little kids running around in the house with no supervision and they were still asleep in bed at 10am. What parent who is a decent parent raises up early, before the kids are up? Oh I know
Believe me until it happened so close to me I was shocked. I thought up to then that this part of child protection was a good thing. After all they were saving kids getting cigarette burn and beatings, right? But when I researched it thoroughly, I found some horrifying things. One sector of this population I was already working with; low income families and teens. Many of these teens on the street are lost to their own families, they are not heard when they try to report abuse and neglect even rape of a child. these kids are told lies about their parents and foster and adopted kids do not even know their parents, as well as their grandparents. See, these departments and non-profits do not get as much money if they actually see the fraud and abuse right in front of them. After alol they "vetted" these place ~ but to hell with the families who may want their children.
So it is not just Korea giving away kids. Whether taken as babies or older not having blood related family around them ~ and especially if they do not even share the race of these kids, We do it here too. In my state taken kids were subjected to physical abuse, denying of food and other needs. I heard all the time from kids that they try to talk to authorities about what they experience and unless "sex" was in the report well, they just go to hell ~ literally. I have even known parents whose kids that were taken and in foster care or adopted whose children are murdered and found buried in the homes' back yards. I am *not* making this up!
I've discovered so much more I have seen and believe me it is not pretty about our own country. I pity the immigration kids put in these foster homes, I worry about the "disappeared ones, who I suspect have been trafficked. But hey, these kids were placed in new homes with designer curtains by golly! I am not saying there aren't good homes out there, indeed I know of those too. the alarm is about who is vetting these people? Certainly not the CASA, who also gets massive government grants in exchange for their "work," many who have never had kids of their own. Not the CPS worker who already decides the birth family is bad, even the grandparents, while it is fine to place them with strangers they've "vetted"
Just sayin' ... Cat in Seattle
Unfortunately
...these taxes are only going to the poorest in this state. Oh no question that cigarettes make a lot of money ~ for the rich. Already the poor pays the highest proportion of their income in taxes, almost 20% of their meager income. So an average Social Security is about $9000 a year. Do the math. What in taxes are they already paying out of that? Almost $2000. that is beyond sinful, that is outright cruelty.
Yes the poor smoke. A lot. They work their butts off making ends meet, they pay and pay those regressive taxes and the price of staying barely above water is the fear, exhaustion, tears, smoking is one way they cope. . If you think piling more taxes on is somehow a will stop it? Addiction is a bitch, Love. It just makes it harder, puts more taxes on people who have already more than enough to pay. so IMO people should not get so hopped up with this.
Smokers have already been paying enough for the medical issues smoking brings. To a pack that costs almost $11.00, the pack itself costs less than $2.00. Once a day pack every day pays about $9.00 a pack X 30 days in a month = $270 a month. .that is almost a health insurance payment already..
So yay, they want to add more taxes, whoopie do! Meanwhile the rich pay zero for their yachts and jets, and if they paid what I paid, just, ONE of those tax deadbeats would balance our budget, just ONE! Boeing has not paid a red cent in my state in decades and they keep whining and threatening to leave our state if they do not get them. All of them if they paid what the poor pay would leave this state swimming in money that would pay those taxes you want to be paid. Me too, II am no tax deadbeat. I make a greater sacrifice than any other class.
Check out who pays taxes It is already frightening, but the reliance all the other classes rely on the poor to pay everybody else's way, well it makes me sick!
https://itep.org/whopays-7th-edition
Cat in Seattle ,
Oh and PeeEss: I do not smoke, but I did for 40 years. I got so sick I had to quit. But to tell you the truth that was the only way I was able to do it.
.
Barabbas was a Revolutionary
...He was resisting Roman rule, he was standing up and violently resisting the Roman government, a rebel against this occupying, corrupt government. Any common Jewish folk, while they know being disobedient was basically hopeless against this powerful tyranny, they also may have had admiration for any ballsy defiance. Our modern resistance believes using anything violent as being wrong. But in Jesus' day violence was perhaps a necessity as an organized war would have been the main way to stop the occupation. However it was also considered an impossible way, even if the entire country stood against them. It was the way to massive slaughter with little conscience by the Romans as it might be considered violently standing up to the Romans was like using sticks and stones against a powerful and brutal well armed army. .IMO this is why the crowd chose Barabbas as he would have been admired for his courage and outrageous resistance.
While I am for non-violence almost in any instance, I have heard the Nobel Prize winning Archbishop Tutu for his take on how effective was the use of non-violent resistance. He was criticized for supporting the Tutsi as they had used violent resistance. His response was that Apartheid was basically like trying to use nonviolent resistance against the Nazis. He said if that method had been used by the non-resisters they would have just been mowed down with no conscience by the Germans. He said why it worked in India was because the British had at least a little conscience about how being brutal would look to the world.
These common people had no idea who Jesus was, even his followers were not sure about who he was. They lived in a brutal world where lives could be lost with the flick of a ruler's hand. They had a lot of kooks who claimed to be chosen by God, their very Sanhedrin was in bed with the Romans, they were corrupt as well, they profited well from being being "the voice of Yahweh" in attempts to save their people from the slaughter that could have happened.
This president's rule and utter corrupt ways that he is part of, has pardoned people who were *not* like Barabbas. They are like the Roman thugs who raped, stole, and murdered these people and anyone they ruled. These Magat thugs have little or no love for us like the Romans and their own leader.
Just sayin;'
Cat in Seattle
Oh thank-you, thank-you, thank-you!!!!!
I have been mulling over this whole thing and considering writing something about it. AOC is no fool and she knows what she is doing. That proposal can sit on the shelf for all that matter, but it is still sitting there to be taken down and acted upon at any time. Furthermore, she will be supported by two powerful senators, Whitehouse and Durbin, along with others in both the House and the Senate.
And look People, maybe we should look at this in a positive light with these SCOTUS goons Right now President Biden also enjoys immunity,, Just think about how he could use it. I'm pretty sure he would not do anything about it, he is an honorable man. But the very threat to tRump and his goons means they are also vulnerable now, they are sitting ducks with Biden. I wonder how much sleep they are losing to consider this possibility. At this time they are prancing around thinking they have "won" something, but they are blind as bats.
Speaking of old bats, MTG, and her nimrods are hanging on a wall pooping mounds of putrid crap, again, thinking they "won" when in fact this ruling is not just about tRump, it is about ALL of them also.
So you go girl, Ms AOC. You rule!
My 2 cents,
Cat in Seattle
Funny Story Meeting Robert Heinlein and Wife
OK So the first Star Trek convention was in Seattle, November 8th 1975. My brother-in-law had bought tickets for my sister and I to go to the banquet. Sulu was there, and i am not sure whatever other characters were there. I was just dazzled to occupy the same space. The convention at that time was small and mainly Trekkies like me who, as a teenager, had loved them since the beginning of Star Trek.
ANYWAYS ... my sister and I were placed at the same table where the Heinleins sat, I was seated next to Mrs Heinlein. Everybody was chatting and enjoying the banquet. Then Mrs Heinlein turned to me and asked me if I had read his books. That is where the troubles began.
The truth was I had stopped reading Heinlein, although in many ways I knew he was an amazing author. But I had become an feminist and just thought he was too sexist for my sister and me. Do you know that throughout Heinlein's work,100s of his books and short stories, he made sure they all connected with one another in some way? I am sure he was invited because Star trek had re-created The Trouble with Tribbles, one of his very funny short stories about a cute pet tribble that someone had brought onto the ship. It began to multiply and multiply, until they were everywhere on the ship, etc.
So when she asked me if I read him, I opened my mouth to politely say I had, which was true. But my sister jumped in and said, "Oh we don't read him anymore. Mr Heinlein was sitting next to my sister, talking to someone else, but he stopped talking turning to me, intensely focusing his attention on me. He asked, "Why don't you read my books anymore?"
(sigh) Now I had to tell him the truth. So I told him the reason was that his female characters had no depths, they just had big boobs. I said, that having this rather useless crew member who did not do anything was a waste of space on a ship where every crew member should have important lifesaving work to do. I explained that the way I saw it, space ships were small, everybody on one of those ships had to have more of an important purpose than having big boobs.
Heinlein stared hard at me as i was wishing the seat I was in would just swallow me whole. Then he said, "Promise me you will read my next book, OK?" I told him I would.
A year or more went by and his next book was called, "The Cat Who Walked Through Walls." I obediently bought the book and began to read it as i promised. But the first chapter sent me into gales of laughter, I could not believe what I was reading. One of the main characters was a woman and yeah she still had those big boobs. But she was an engineer, dammit!
My 2 cents, Cat in Seattle
Monthly Payment
I am a long time member of your news site, almost since your beginning (I believe I was also on your all text forum in the middle nineties). I left you for awhile because to be honest, your speech rules were too much for me as you will not allow anything you deem "attacks" whenever someone disagrees with an elected or a Democratic candidate. I could not see how there would be any way to hear any critical questions, it is only (hate to say it) a very Republican rule about never ever speaking in opposition of any Democratic people. I have been a Democratic voter for all my adult life (over 52 years, I turned 18 when the voting age was changed from 21 to 18). In that time I have seen some things that need to be addressed that are not.
I am a member of The Poor People's Campaign, Repairers Of The Breech, and while most of us are Democrats, we have some major issues that need to be addressed by the Democratic Party. This is for the over 40 million poor, seniors, immigrants, indigenous, people of color, low wage workers, and low income kids that are just not addressed.
But they need to be addressed. Because if you could get even half of this group to vote for every Democratic candidate, they would ALL win by a landslide. We already know that less than 20% of actual voters vote even in the 4 year cycle, so the addition of this huge block of low income Americans would push everything over to the Democratic people. But you need to be there for us, or we are going to vote for the worst candidates, or worse not vote at all because we feel disenfranchised by the so-called "People's Party. "
If you want those of us who are on fixed incomes to give out of our meager incomes, then perhaps you need to allow POLITE and accurate debates, not just speak to the choir.
Just sayin' ...
Cat in Seattle, long time social justice advocate
Institution on Taxation and Economic Policy
If you REALLY want to know where your tax dollars are going this website, which has been around for at least a couple decades, this is the place you may want to check out. https://itep.org//
It goes state by state and breaks down who is paying taxes, who is not paying taxes and take in account corporate as well as groups of individual taxes by economic class.
Incidentally, according to the ITEP, in every single state the poorest of the poor make the greatest sacrifice in paying their taxes. So NOBODY should be upset that they "pay too much" because all other classes are living off the poor and their families in order not to pay as much themselves so they do not pay as much unless they are from the least among us. In my state (Washington), the poor pay about 14% of their incomes in taxes, but the poorest among us pay upwards of 15-19% of their income in taxes. Meanwhile one of our residents, one of the richest men in the world, Bill Gates, pays less than 4% of his $biilions. If he were to pay the percentage a welfare mom pays in our state, his fairly paid taxes alone would raise our state completely out of debt ~ and he is but one of three of the richest men in the world in my state.
Check your state out here: https://itep.org/whopays-7th-edition/. To show I am not making any of this up check out my state here, which is the most regressive taxed population in the nation; https://itep.org/whopays/washington-who-pays-7th-edition/ . Boeing pays ZERO taxes here, as they have not paid a single dime in decades, the same with the Nordstroms.
So if you are from the upper classes, stop feeling sorry for yourselves. Your local poorest always makes a greater sacrifice for your state than you ever thought.
Just my 2 cents. Cat in Seattle
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