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FARM subsidies were much more sensible when they began eight decades ago, in 1933, at a time when more than 40 percent of Americans lived in rural areas. Farm incomes had fallen by about a half in the first three years of the Great Depression. In that context, the subsidies were an anti-poverty program. Now, though, the farm subsidies serve a quite different purpose.
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The proposed House Republicans’ farm bill takes real money, money that is necessary for bare survival, from the poorest Americans, and gives it to a small group of the undeserving rich, in return for their campaign contributions and political support.American food policy has long been rife with head-scratching illogic. We spend billions every year on farm subsidies, many of which help wealthy commercial operations to plant more crops than we need. The glut depresses world crop prices, harming farmers in developing countries. Meanwhile, millions of Americans live tenuously close to hunger, which is barely kept at bay by a food stamp program that gives most beneficiaries just a little more than $4 a day. So it’s almost too absurd to believe that House Republicans are asking for a farm bill that would make all of these problems worse. For the putative purpose of balancing the country’s books, the measures that the House Republican caucus is pushing for in negotiations with the Senate, as Congress attempts to pass a long-stalled extension of the farm bill, would cut back the meager aid to our country’s most vulnerable and use the proceeds to continue fattening up a small number of wealthy American farmers. The House has proposed cutting food stamp benefits by $40 billion over 10 years — that’s on top of $5 billion in cuts that already came into effect this month with the expiration of increases to the food stamp program that were included in the 2009 stimulus law. Meanwhile, House Republicans appear satisfied to allow farm subsidies, which totaled some $14.9 billion last year, to continue apace. Republican proposals would shift government assistance from direct payments — paid at a set rate to farmers every year to encourage them to keep growing particular crops, regardless of market fluctuations — to crop insurance premium subsidies. But this is unlikely to be any cheaper. Worse, unlike direct payments, the insurance premium subsidies carry no income limit for the farmers who would receive this form of largess. The proposal is a perfect example of how growing inequality has been fed by what economists call rent-seeking. As small numbers of Americans have grown extremely wealthy, their political power has also ballooned to a disproportionate size. Small, powerful interests — in this case, wealthy commercial farmers — help create market-skewing public policies that benefit only themselves, appropriating a larger slice of the nation’s economic pie. Their larger slice means everyone else gets a smaller one — the pie doesn’t get any bigger — though the rent-seekers are usually adept at taking little enough from individual Americans that they are hardly aware of the loss. While the money that they’ve picked from each individual American’s pocket is small, the aggregate is huge for the rent-seeker. And this in turn deepens inequality. |
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All posts by randyshannon
PA Governor Candidate Calls for Single Payer Healthcare
Enroll in Obamacare at Local Drugstores
Tue Nov 05, 2013 at 07:09 AM PST
I bet you didn’t know this : Most Americans will get Obamacare at their drugstore.
by Pluto
Months ago, the major drugstore chains of the US announced that they were joining with the Federal Government to help their customers around the nation to get signed up for “ObamaScare.” Computer shopping isn’t ubiquitous — and it is merely ONE approach to retail sales. That’s why the Federal Government set up bricks-and-mortar PPACA stores in every neighborhood in America.
I hopped into Walgreens last night and noticed a sign outside offering to get me ACA health insurance. And why wouldn’t they? After all, they receive a commission for doing so, which costs the customer nothing whatsoever. Sounds like a a win-win to me.
Walgreens offers customers a chance to speak to licensed insurance advisors to discuss health insurance plans sold through the state HIXs. They also have their own private online health insurance portal contracted by GoHealth. According their website, tax credits and subsidies are issued there, as well.
Rite Aid announced that it will initially station independent, licensed insurance agents in nearly 2,000 of its 4,600 stores to help uninsured customers sign up for a health insurance plan for the entire six-month enrollment period. The agents will work one-on-one with customers to help them make insurance choices.
Like Rite Aid and Walgreens, CVS Pharmacy is offering Affordable Care Act information in its 7,500 stores and 650 MinuteClinics; it has launched an informational web site, as well. CVS also plans to have health insurance experts answer customer questions in various stores nationwide during the enrollment period. In a recent press release, CVS notes:
Our survey results, based on a sample of over 1,000 respondents, found general awareness of the ACA has increased to 74 percent, up from 57 percent as seen in a similar 2011 CVS Caremark survey. But the new survey found that 36 percent of respondents who are likely to enroll in health exchanges need more information and help in evaluating the insurance exchange process. What’s more, perceptions about cost remain the biggest barrier to the likelihood of enrolling and lack of knowledge could prove costly: Only 48 percent of those who are eligible for a subsidy believe that they are.
“We have a tremendous opportunity to help Americans understand the new health care law and how it affects them so consumers receive the coverage that best fits their families,” said Helena Foulkes, Executive Vice President and Chief Health Care Strategy and Marketing Officer of CVS Caremark.
PA Environmental Defense Fund Sues Gov. Corbett
PA Environmental Defense Fund (PEDF) Sues Governor Corbett in Commonwealth Court of PA
Read TEXT of Lawsuit
by Randy Shannon
The PEDF has sued the Governor to reverse numerous acts that have gutted the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. These acts have turned the DCNR into an agency that sells our natural resources to fund other government programs and has practically eliminated the DCNR’s role to protect our natural resources. These acts of the Governor violate the Pennsylvania Constitution. The lawsuit contains eight counts of violation of the constitution and other laws designed to protect the state’s natural resources and seeks relief through a declaratory judgement of the court.
The Commonwealth Court has accepted the suit. On August 20, 2013 the Court denied a request from the Republican Caucuses to intervene in the suit. The Republican Caucuses contended that when gas resources are present all the laws protecting the Commonwealth’s air, water, and land are inoperable. The lawsuit is now in the discovery process.
The gas industry projects that by 2030 there will be 60,000 wells in PA. Presently there are around 3,000 permits. If these projections are accurate, 200,000 acres of land will be cleared for well pads. More land will be cleared for roads, pipelines, and communication systems.
Pennsylvania water resources will lose 240 billion gallons of fresh water forever, as this water will be chemically poisoned and injected over one mile into the Marcellus shale stratum. Approximately 10 billion gallons of radioactive water will be produced at the surface for disposal.
The PEDF is asking for donations from the public to help fund the lawsuit. Go here to make a tax deductible contribution.
In July three newspapers in eastern PA carried news items discussing the case. Below is the item from the Philadelphia Inquirer. No news organization in western PA has covered this story.
Continue reading PA Environmental Defense Fund Sues Gov. Corbett
$61,142 Reward for Text of Secret Trade Agreement
Wanted
Negotiating Text of the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement
$61142 Reward
WikiLeaks: We’ve got a job for you
At this very moment, the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement (TPP)–a trade agreement that could affect the health and welfare of billions of people worldwide–is being negotiated behind closed doors. While 600 corporate lobbyists have access to the text, the press, the public, and even members of the US Congress are being kept in the dark.
But we don’t have to stand meekly by as corporate cronies decide our futures. Concerned citizens from around the world are pooling together their resources as a reward to WikiLeaks if it makes the negotiating text of the TPP public. Our pledge, as individuals, is to donate this money to WikiLeaks should it leak the document we seek.
As WikiLeaks likes to say, information wants to be free. The negotiating text for the TPP wants to be free. Someone just needs to release it.
FAQ
1. What is the TPP?
The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) is a multilateral “free trade” agreement for the Asia-Pacific region which some have taken to referring to as “NAFTA on steroids.” The agreement was originally between just three nations–Chile, New Zealand, and Singapore–with a fourth, Brunei, joining shortly after. Today, seven additional countries are in negotiations to join the agreement: Australia, Peru, Vietnam, Malaysia, Mexico, Canada, and the United States. Eventually, every Pacific-rim nation could be included, making it possible for this trade agreement to affect the lives of billions of people.
2. What’s so bad about the TPP?
The TPP negotiations have taken place under an unprecedented shrowd of secrecy, denying all but a very few any input into the terms of the agreement. The chapters that have been leaked are quite disturbing, revealing plans that would threaten public health, the environment, internet freedom, and the general well-being of perhaps billions of people. Here’s a little taste of what the agreement would include: foreign investor protections that would help corporations offshore jobs, powers that allow multinational corporations to challenge domestic regulations before international tribunals, a strengthening of patent and intellectual property rules which would, among other things, raise the price of life-saving medicines in third world countries, and the ability for Wall Street to roll back safeguards meant to restore financial stability worldwide.
Continue reading $61,142 Reward for Text of Secret Trade Agreement
TPP/Fast Track Trade Fight Is On
TPP/Fast Track Trade Fight Is On
October 30, 2013
You’ve probably been hearing warnings about the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) “trade” agreement that is being negotiated. And you might have heard that the big corporations are going to push to use something called “fast track” trade promotion authority (TPA) to push it through.It’s time to learn about TPP and fast track, and then call your member of Congress to let them know if you want them to hand the giant multinationals an end-run around democracy and national sovereignty.
The Fast Track Push Is Coming
“Fast track” trade promotion authority, if passed, means Congress yields its constitutional authority and obligation to review and amend trade agreements. A “fast track” treaty has to be voted on quickly, cannot be amended, and Congress has to give it an up-or-down vote.
The U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) Michael Froman is pushing Congress to pass “fast track,” in hope of pushing through the TPP agreement by the end of the year. Politico lays it out, in “Froman pushing Congress to finalize trade deals,”
President Barack Obama was often criticized in his first term for moving too slowly on trade, but now his chief negotiator is pressing Congress to pick up the pace as the White House pushes to conclude a landmark trade deal in the Asia-Pacific by the end of the year.
[. . .] Froman and his team at USTR are pushing to finish the TPP talks by the end of the year, putting pressure on Congress to move a TPA bill to set the stage for the final phase of talks.
Fast Track To Push TPP
The next “trade” treaty will be the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). This is a huge treaty with only a small part covering trade. Most of the agreement (according to leaks) sets down a new kind of regulatory structure for the giant corporations that would supersede the ability of any country to rein them in. The treaty is being negotiated in secret with only business interests “at the table.” Representatives of others with a stake in the outcome are not part of the process. Groups representing the interests of consumers, labor, human rights, the environment, democracy or even smaller and innovative companies that might want to compete with the giant multinationals are not part of the negotiations.
Economist Dean Baker explains that TPP is not about “free trade” and growth, writing,
Of course the TPP is not about free trade, in most cases the formal trade barriers between the countries negotiating the pact are relatively low. The main thrust of the negotiations is to impose a regulator structure in a wide range of areas — health, safety, environmental — which will override national and sub-national rules. This has little to do with trade and in some cases, such as the increased patent protection for prescription drugs being pushed as part of the deal (which is noted in the article), will actually involve increased barriers to trade.
In The Trans-Pacific Partnership: A Trade Agreement for Protectionists, Baker writes, “The
TPP is about crafting rules that will favor big business at the expense of the rest of the population in both the United States and in other countries.
… The world has benefited from the opening of trade over the last four decades. But this opening has been selective so that, at least in the United States, most of the gains have gone to those at the top. It is possible to design trade deals that benefit the population as a whole, but not when corporate interests are literally the negotiators at the table.
Senators Oppose Obama Cuts
Warren, Sanders Ready to Face Down Obama over Social Security, Medicare Cuts
As budget negotiations restart, Obama, GOP still pushing austerity
– Jacob Chamberlain, staff writer
Both images: Reuters
Though the ‘deficit scold dream‘ of a so-called ‘Grand Bargain’ may be diminished on Capitol Hill, a mini-version—circulating among some as the ‘Small Deal’ version of a 2014 austerity budget—is still on the table as congressional budget negotiations are set to resume Wednesday.
With austerity proposals again taking the lead in the latest budget battle, however, at least two progressive senators, Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, are ready to fight such a deal.
“Instead of talking about cuts in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, we must end the absurdity of corporations not paying a nickel in federal income taxes.” –Sen. Bernie Sanders
“Instead of talking about cuts in Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, we must end the absurdity of corporations not paying a nickel in federal income taxes,” Senator Sanders, who is on the Senate and House budget conference committee, wrote in an op-ed in the LA Times Monday.
Pushing for progressive tax reform as opposed to further cuts to key social programs and earned benefits, Sanders added, “We cannot impose more austerity on people who are already suffering. When 95% of all new income between 2009 and 2012 went to the top 1%, and while tens of millions of working Americans saw a decline in their income, we cannot cut programs that working families depend on.”
Among the austerity proposals put forth in Obama’s 2014 budget and still considered a bargaining chip in the new round of talks, significant worry among progressives centers around a plan that would reduce the annual cost of living calculations for Social Security payments, known as the ‘Chained CPI’, which would effectively reduce benefits for seniors.
“Chained CPI is just a fancy way to say ‘Cut benefits for seniors, permanently disabled, and orphans,’” warned Sen. Warren in a recent interview. “Our Social Security system is critical to protecting middle-class families, and we cannot allow it to be dismantled, inch by inch.”
According to the Boston Globe’s analysis, “Warren’s voice on the issue is key to liberals, and could put pressure on other Democrats to avoid compromising on the issue.”
“Our Social Security system is critical to protecting middle-class families, and we cannot allow it to be dismantled, inch by inch.” – Sen. Elizabeth Warren
“Her six-minute floor speech on the role of government during the shutdown,” the paper notes, “drew about 1 million views on YouTube, even though she had no official role in leading the Democrats’ case.”
Lawsuit to Stop Frack Dumping in Allegheny River
Federal lawsuit: Plant in Warren discharging drilling waste into Allegheny River
October 28, 2013 11:41 PM
By Don Hopey / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Clean Water Action has filed a federal lawsuit against Waste Treatment Corp., alleging the commercial water treatment facility in Warren is illegally discharging gas drilling wastewater containing high levels of salts, heavy metals and radioactive compounds into the Allegheny River.
The statewide environmental organization, which filed the lawsuit Monday in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania in Erie, said the company has violated its discharge permit limits more than 400 times since 2010.
Despite those violations, and the ongoing 200,000-gallon-a-day discharge of drilling wastewater containing 125,000 pounds of salt, the state Department of Environmental Protection has not taken any effective action to stop the pollution, said Myron Arnowitt, Clean Water Action state director.
“You hear all the time that gas drilling wastewater doesn’t end up in our rivers anymore. However, this is one case in which it clearly is,” Mr. Arnowitt said.
A 2012 DEP study, cited in the lawsuit filing, found levels of chloride, bromide, lithium, strontium, radium-226 and radium-228 downriver from the plant that were more than 100 times higher than those found upriver from the plant.
The Allegheny River is the drinking water source for several public water suppliers, including the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority, which has 400,000 customers.
The Waste Treatment Corp. treatment plant was one of 16 water treatment plants that were asked by then DEP Secretary Michael Krancer and Gov. Tom Corbett in April 2011 to “voluntarily” stop disposing of drilling wastewater. The DEP had said that all complied, including the eight of those discharging upriver from Pittsburgh’s drinking water intake pipe in Aspinwall.
Continue reading Lawsuit to Stop Frack Dumping in Allegheny River
Rothfus Tea Party Demand: Cut Social Security & Medicare
Republicans Demand Social Security And Medicare Cuts, Is It Reported?
October 24, 2013
Republicans are demanding cuts in Social Security and Medicare if Democrats want to change the terms of the “sequester.” I’m sure their Tea Party “base” would be shocked if they understood this. So would most Americans. So is the media giving Americans the information they need in order to make informed decisions?
Yesterday The Hill reported, in “House GOP says sequester is leverage in next budget battle,” that House Budget Committee chairman Rep. Paul Ryan is pushing for cuts in Social Security and Medicare:
In a meeting with House conservatives, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), told rank-and-file lawmakers that, as the party’s chief budget negotiator, he would push instead [of killing Obamacare] for long-term reforms to entitlement programs in exchange for changes to sequestration spending cuts that Democrats are expected to demand.
[. . .] Rep. Matt Salmon (R-Ariz.) said that during the GOP meeting, Ryan pointed to sequestration as the party’s leverage with Democrats and said the Republican negotiators would not accept revenue increases in exchange.
“We’re going to try to push for some substantial reforms on entitlement spending and our backstop is sequestration,” Salmon said in describing Ryan’s remarks.
Most American’s don’t read The Hill. And most Americans don’t know that “long-term reforms” to “entitlement spending” specifically means cuts to Social Security and Medicare.
Continue reading Rothfus Tea Party Demand: Cut Social Security & Medicare
Keith Rothfus Shutdown: Miners Die
Another coal miner dies on the job
October 13, 2013 by Ken Ward Jr.
This is the 4th fatal coal-mining accident since the federal government shutdown began on Oct. 1 forcing MSHA to furlough 1,400 of its 2,355 staffers nationwide and end its regular inspections in favor of “targeted” inspections of high-hazard mines.
Keep in mind that the government shutdown also has stopped MSHA’s work on a long-delayed set of rules aimed at requiring mine operators to install proximity devices, equipment aimed at helping to prevent crushing and pinning deaths in underground mines.
The bad news from Indiana has been confirmed: Another coal miner died on the job, this time at the Five Star Mining Co.’s Prosperity Mine in Pike County, Ind. It happened at about 2:20 p.m. on Friday. Here’s the preliminary information from the federal Mine Safety and Health Administration:
At approximately 2:20 pm (EST), a shuttle car driver on Unit No. 5 was tramming in a crosscut from entry 6 to entry 7. The car driver saw the victim and stopped. They talked a few seconds. The victim proceeded by the car and walked straight into the next crosscut between entries 7 and 8 thinking that the car driver would turn down entry 7 to go around the pillar. The victim told the car driver that he was in the clear. The car driver did not turn down entry No. 7 as the victim thought but continued forward through the crosscut between entries 7 and 8. The shuttle car pinned the victim between the car and the coal rib on the blind side of the shuttle car.
The miner killed was identified in the MSHA preliminary report as 59-year-old Larry Schwartz.
http://blogs.wvgazette.com/coaltattoo/2013/10/13/another-coal-miner-dies-on-the-job-6/
Beaver County Blue: Voice of the 17th CD of Progressive Democrats of America 