Bill Ayers, Bernardine Dohrn, and Obamas Entry into Politics In the mid-1990s, Obama entered electoral politics, setting his sights initially on a state senate seat in Illinois. He launched his political career in the home of two well-connected Chicagoans, longtime activists who would help him make important contacts and enlarge his public profile. These two allies were Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, lifelong Marxists who in the 1960s and 70s had been revolutionary leaders of the Weather Underground Organization, a domestic terror group that aspired to transform the U.S. into a Communist country. Obama Views the Poor As a Potential “Voting Bloc” At an October 19, 1998 conference at Loyola University, Barack Obama stated that the “working poor” on welfare constituted a political voting bloc that could be harnessed to the advantage of Democrats. Specifically, he said that: “To the extent that we are doing research figuring out what kinds of government action would successfully make their [the working poors] lives better, we are then putting together a potential majority coalition to move those agendas forward.” The “one good thing that comes out of [the welfare-reform bill of 1996] is that it essentially desegregates the welfare population,” merging urban blacks with “the working poor, which are the other people.” Such a coalition becomes “one batch of folks ... that is increasingly a majority population” whose policy needs would grow to encompass health care, job training, education, and a system where government would “provide effective child care.” “Rich People Are All for Nonviolence.... They Want to Make Sure Folks Dont Take Their Stuff” On January 21, 2002—Martin Luther King Day—then-Illinois state senator Obama appeared at a Chicago church and delivered an emotionally charged speech drenched in the rhetoric of class warfare. He said: “The philosophy of nonviolence only makes sense if the powerful can be made to recognize themselves in the powerless. It only makes sense if the powerless can be made to recognize themselves in the powerful.... I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but rich people are all for nonviolence. Why wouldn’t they be? They’ve got what they want. They want to make sure folks don’t take their stuff.” Obama Equates Conservatism with Greed, and Free Markets with “Social Darwinism” In a 2005 commencement address, Obama described conservatism as a philosophy that promises “to give everyone one big refund on their government, divvy it up by individual portions, in the form of tax breaks, hand it out, and encourage everyone to use their share to go buy their own health care, their own retirement plan, their own child care, their own education, and so on.” “In Washington,” said Obama, “they call this the Ownership Society. But in our past there has been another term for it, Social Darwinism, every man or woman for him or her self. Its a tempting idea, because it doesnt require much thought or ingenuity.” “Tax Breaks to Paris Hilton Instead of Providing Child Care and Education” Blacks in the areas devastated by Hurricane Katrina were poor, Obama charged, because of the Bush administration’s “decision to give tax breaks to Paris Hilton instead of providing child care and education.” The “Rich” Should Pay More Taxes During a June 28, 2007 primary debate at Howard University, candidate Obama was asked, “Do you agree that the rich arent paying their fair share of taxes?” He replied, “There’s no doubt that the tax system has been skewed. And the Bush tax cuts—people didn’t need them, and they werent even asking for them, and that’s why they need to be less, so that we can pay for universal health care and other initiatives.” Calling for a Capital Gains Tax Hike In an April 2008 Democratic primary debate, Obama was asked, by journalist Charlie Gibson, about his proposal to nearly double the capital gains tax (from 15 percent to 28 percent). Said Gibson: “In each instance when the rate dropped [in the 1990s], revenues from the tax increased. The government took in more money. And in the 1980s, when the [capital gains] tax was increased to 28 percent, the revenues went down. So why raise it at all, especially given the fact that 100 million people in this country own stock and would be affected?” Obama replied that he wished to raise the tax “for purposes of fairness.... [T]hose who are able to work the stock market and amass huge fortunes on capital gains are paying a lower tax rate than their secretaries. That’s not fair.” Higher Taxes for the Wealthy In a September 2008 Fox News Channel interview, Obama pledged to cut taxes for 95 percent of Americans, while raising taxes on those who earn more than $250,000: “Teddy Roosevelt supported a progressive income tax…. If I am sitting pretty and youve got a waitress who is making minimum wage plus tips, and I can afford it and she cant, whats the big deal for me to say, Im going to pay a little bit more? That is neighborliness.” Telling “Joe the Plumber” about “Spreading the Wealth Around” At an October 2008 campaign appearance in Ohio, Obama was approached by a man named Joe Wurzelbacher (“Joe the Plumber”). Obama said that a tax increase on businesses like Wurzelbachers was justified because it would enable the government to give tax breaks to people earning considerably less than $250,000. “I think when you spread the wealth around, it’s good for everybody,” said Obama. “Fat-Cat Bankers” During a December 2009 interview broadcast on CBS 60 Minutes, Obama said: “I did not run for office to be helping out a bunch of, you know, fat-cat bankers on Wall Street.” “At Some Point, Youve Made Enough Money” On April 28, 2010, President Obama was in Illinois making a speech about a proposed Wall Street reform bill. He criticized Wall Street lobbyists for trying to dilute the bills most stringent provisions, saying: “Were not trying to push financial reform because we begrudge success thats fairly earned. I mean, I do think at a certain point youve made enough money, but you know, part of the American way is, you can just keep on making it if youre providing a good product or youre providing a good service.” Obama Opposes Tax Cuts for Top Earners In September 2010, Obama strongly reiterated his opposition to extending Bush-era tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans, depicting such a measure as an outgrowth of “the same philosophy that led to this [fiscal] mess in the first place.” The “Rich” Should Pay More Taxes In an April 13, 2011 speech on the topic of debt reduction, President Obama said: “In the last decade, the average income of the bottom 90 percent of all working Americans actually declined. Meanwhile, the top 1 percent saw their income rise by an average of more than a quarter of a million dollars each. Thats who needs to pay less taxes?... Theres nothing serious about a plan that claims to reduce the deficit by spending a trillion dollars on tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires.” Obamas contention that tax hikes on the wealthy would have any meaningful effect on the U.S. budget is unfounded. As of 2012, even if the IRS were to take, from every high earner, fully 100% of whatever income they earned in excess of $1 million, the governments take would be just $616 billion—not even half of the countrys annual deficit. In other words, the total national debt would continue to spiral out of control. Further, the proposal itself is absurd, since the wealthy would no longer continue to work or invest their money if their income were to be taxed at a 100% rate. Despite His Rhetoric against “Greed,” Obama Rewards Big Donors with Jobs, Stimulus Money, and Government Contracts On June 15, 2011, the Center for Public Integrity reported: “More than two years after President Obama took office vowing to banish special interests from his administration, nearly 200 of his biggest donors have landed plum government jobs and advisory posts, won federal contracts worth millions of dollars for their business interests or attended numerous elite White House meetings and social events.... These bundlers raised at least $50,000 and sometimes more than $500,000 in campaign donations for Obama’s campaign.... As a candidate, Obama spoke passionately about diminishing the clout of moneyed interests and making the White House more accessible to everyday Americans. In kicking off his presidential run on Feb. 10, 2007, he blasted the cynics, the lobbyists, the special interests, who he said had turned our government into a game only they can afford to play.” All told, as of June 2011, some 184 of 556 (33%) Obama bundlers or their spouses had joined the administration in some role. But the percentages are much higher for the big-dollar bundlers. Of those bundlers who collected more than $500,000 for Obama, fully 80% had taken “key administration posts,” as defined by the White House. Of the 24 ambassador nominees who were bundlers, 14 had raised more than $500,000 for Obama. Campaign bundlers and their family members accounted for more than 3,000 White House meetings and visits. Half of them had raised at least $200,000 for Obama. At least 19 bundlers had ties to businesses poised to profit from government spending to promote the Presidents agendas in such fields as “clean energy” and telecommunications. One of these was the Oklahoma billionaire investor George Kaiser, who was a big financial backer of Solyndra, the now-defunct Silicon Valley solar plant that in March 2009 won a $535 million loan guarantee from the Department of Energy. Obama Says the “Occupy Wall Street” Movement Reflects Americans Frustrations At an October 6, 2011 press conference, President Obama congratulated the anti-capitalist Occupy Wall Street activists for “express[ing] the frustrations that the American people feel … about how our financial system works”; for reminding him “what we are still fighting for”; for “inspir[ing]” him; and for being “the reason why I ran for this office in the first place.” Obama Calls for Tax Hikes on “Millionaires,” “Billionaires,” and “Corporate Jet Owners” On June 29, 2011, President Obama called on Republicans to drop their opposition to tax increases for those earning $250,000 or more, saying that because “everybody else” was sacrificing their “sacred cows” for deficit reduction, GOP lawmakers should be willing to follow suit. He made six mentions of eliminating a tax loophole for corporate jets, suggesting that insufficient taxes on such jets had the effect of depriving student-loan funds or food-safety funds of their needed revenues. For example: “Ask Republican constituents if theyre willing to compromise their kids safety so some corporate jet owner continues to get a tax break.” “The tax cuts Im proposing we get rid of are tax breaks for millionaires and billionaires, tax breaks for oil companies and hedge fund managers and corporate jet owner.” “I think its only fair to ask an oil company or a corporate jet owner that has done so well to give up that tax break that no other business enjoys.” (In fact, Obamas plan proposed an end to tax breaks for anyone earning $250,000 or more.) As The Daily Caller subsequently pointed out, eliminating tax breaks for corporate jet owners would result in a mere $3 billion in new tax revenues over a ten-year period. The U.S. budget deficit for 2011 alone was $1.3 trillion. Projected over a decade, that annual figure would result, cumulatively, in $13 trillion of new debt. Thus the $3 billion in revenues would decrease the budget deficit for that period by just one-fortieth of 1%. In other words, Obamas proposal was not a serious attempt to address the deficit. It was intended solely to stir class resentments against wealthy people who were presumably exploiting everyone else. Obama Again Calls for Tax Hikes on High Earners At a July 11, 2011 press conference, President Obama said: “And I do not want, and I will not accept, a deal in which I am asked to do nothing, in fact, I’m able to keep hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional income that I don’t need, while a parent out there who is struggling to figure out how to send their kid to college suddenly finds that they’ve got a couple thousand dollars less in grants or student loans.” Obama Denounces the Wealthy, the “Greed” of Bankers, “Inequality,” and Free Markets On December 6, 2011, President Obama delivered a speech in Osawatomie, Kansas, where he said: “Fewer and fewer of the folks who contributed to the success of our economy actually benefited from that success.” “Those at the very top grew wealthier from their incomes and their investments—wealthier than ever before, [but] everybody else struggled with costs that were growing and paychecks that werent.” The financial crisis of 2008 was caused by “the breathtaking greed” of “banks and investors” as well as “irresponsibility all across the system.” “Youre on your own economics … results in a prosperity thats enjoyed by fewer and fewer of our citizens.” “The typical CEO who used to earn about 30 times more than his or her worker now earns 110 times more,” and “this kind of inequality—a level that we havent seen since the Great Depression—hurts us all.” There will be insufficient money to fund “the investments we need in things like education” if we “keep in place the tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans in our country.” “Today, thanks to loopholes and shelters, a quarter of all millionaires now pay lower tax rates than millions of you, millions of middle-class families.” “Some billionaires have a tax rate as low as 1% ... the height of unfairness.” Obama Again Denounces Inequality, the Wealthy, and Tax Breaks In an April 3, 2012 speech at an Associated Press luncheon, President Obama said: “Can we succeed as a country where a shrinking number of people do exceedingly well, while a growing number struggle to get by?” “What drags down our entire economy is when there’s an ever-widening chasm between the ultra-rich and everybody else...” “Research has shown that countries with less inequality tend to have stronger and steadier economic growth over the long run.” “Meanwhile, these [Republicans] proposed tax breaks would come on top of more than a trillion dollars in tax giveaways for people making more than $250,000 a year.” “Were told that when the wealthy become even wealthier, and corporations are allowed to maximize their profits by whatever means necessary, its good for America, and that their success will automatically translate into more jobs and prosperity for everybody else.” “At the beginning of the last decade, the wealthiest Americans received a huge tax cut in 2001 and another huge tax cut in 2003. We were promised that these tax cuts would lead to faster job growth. They did not. The wealthy got wealthier—we would expect that. The income of the top 1 percent has grown by more than 275 percent over the last few decades, to an average of $1.3 million a year. But prosperity sure didnt trickle down.” “Youd think theyd [Republicans] say, you know what, maybe … just maybe, at a time of growing debt and widening inequality, we should hold off on giving the wealthiest Americans another round of big tax cuts.” “If were serious about paying down our debt, we cant afford to spend trillions more on tax cuts for folks like me, for wealthy Americans who dont need them and werent even asking for them, and that the country cannot afford.” “At a time when the share of national income flowing to the top 1 percent of people in this country has climbed to levels last seen in the 1920s, those same folks are paying taxes at one of the lowest rates in 50 years.... That is not fair. It is not right.” “You Didnt Build That”: Obama Disparages Entrepreneurs and Praises Government On July 13, 2012, Obama minimized the achievements of entrepreneurs, and emphasized the notion that government was the key to a thriving economy: “Look, if you’ve been successful, you didn’t get there on your own. You didn’t get there on your own. I’m always struck by people who think, well, it must be because I was just so smart. There are a lot of smart people out there. It must be because I worked harder than everybody else. Let me tell you something—there are a whole bunch of hardworking people out there. If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help.... Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business—you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen. The Internet didn’t get invented on its own. Government research created the Internet so that all the companies could make money off the Internet.” Obama Calls for “An America in Which Prosperity Is Shared” On August 12, 2012, Obama asked: “Do we go forward toward a new vision of an America in which prosperity is shared, or do we go backward to the same policies that got us into this mess in the first place? I believe we have to go forward.” “Everybodys Getting a Fair Share” During the closing statement of his October 3, 2012 presidential debate with Mitt Romney, Obama said that he sought to create an America where “everybodys getting a fair shot, and everybodys getting a fair share.” He then quickly corrected himself: “everybodys doing a fair share, and everybodys playing by the same rules.” Obama Gives an Indication That Taxes Will Ultimately Be Raised on most Americans, Not Just the Wealthy (though the latter will be targeted first) On December 6, 2012, Obama, calling for a tax hike on the top 2% of earners, said: We’re going to have to strengthen our entitlement programs so that they’re there for future generations. Everybody is going to have to share in some sacrifice, but it starts with folks who are in the best position to sacrifice, who are in the best position to do a little bit more to step up. “A Shrinking Few Do Very Well and a Growing Many Barely Make It” During his second inaugural address as president on January 21, 2013, the newly re-elected Obama emphasized his belief that capitalist America had become a place of widespread inequity and injustice: “[O]ur country cannot succeed when a shrinking few do very well and a growing many barely make it”; “We do not believe that in this country freedom is reserved for the lucky, or happiness for the few.” Obama Says Republicans Only Care About Cutting Taxes for the Rich In February 2013, President Obama told an audience of black broadcasters: My sense is that their [Republicans] basic view is that nothing is important enough to raise taxes on wealthy individuals or corporations ... Thats the thing that binds their party together at this point. Obamas Weekly Address Emphasizes Class Warfare During his weekly address to the American people on February 23, 2013, Obama addressed the looming sequestration budget cuts that were scheduled to take effect in a few days: He said it was important to close wasteful tax loopholes for the well-off and well-connected. ... Republicans in Congress have decided that instead of compromising—instead of asking anything of the wealthiest Americans—they would rather let these [budget] cuts fall squarely on the middle class. Are Republicans in Congress really willing to let these cuts fall on our kids’ schools and mental health care just to protect tax loopholes for corporate jet owners? Are they really willing to slash military health care and the border patrol just because they refuse to eliminate tax breaks for big oil companies? Are they seriously prepared to inflict more pain on the middle class because they refuse to ask anything more of those at the very top? [M]y plan [has] got tough cuts, tough reforms, and asks more of the wealthiest Americans. Obama Say The Wealthiest and Most Powerful Are Not Paying Enough in Taxes On February 28, 2013, Obama stated that America cannot just cut our way to prosperity while asking nothing more from the wealthiest and most powerful. Obama Seeks to Cap Americans Tax-Sheltered Retirement Savings In April 2013, President Obama unveiled his budget for fiscal 2014. This budget proposed, for the first time ever, to cap the amount of money Americans could save in tax-sheltered 401K retirement plans -- because some people were accumulating substantially more than is needed to fund reasonable levels of retirement saving. Specifically, the president sought to limit an individuals total balance across tax-preferred accounts to an amount sufficient to finance an annuity of not more than $205,000 per year in retirement, or about $3 million for someone retiring in 2013. Obama Tells College Grads that the Traditional U.S. Economic System Is Rigged Against Them In his speech at Ohio State Universitys 2013 Commencement, Obama urged the graduates to reject a country in which only a lucky few prosper, and where the well-connected get special treatment that you dont get. Winner-Take-All Economy and Growing Inequality On July 24, 2013, President Obama made the following remarks on the economy at Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois: Used to be that as companies did better, as profits went higher, workers also got a better deal.... [T]he income of the top 1 percent nearly quadrupled from 1979 to 2007, but the typical familys incomes barely budged. Even though our businesses are creating new jobs and have broken record profits, nearly all the income gains of the past 10 years have continued to flow to the top 1 percent. The average CEO has gotten a raise of nearly 40 percent since 2009. [T]he trend of a winner-take-all economy where a few are doing better and better and better while everybody else just treads water -- those trends have been made worse by the recession. And thats a problem. This growing inequality not just of result, inequality of opportunity, this growing inequality -- its not just morally wrong; its bad economics ... Its time for the minimum wage to go up. Were not a people who allow chance of birth to decide lifes biggest winners or losers. Obama Speaks about Americas Economic Injustice On August 28, 2013—the 50th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.s “I Have a Dream” speech—Obama spoke about Americas economic inequity and the role that government could play in curbing it via wealth redistribution: “Even as corporate profits soar, even as the pay of a fortunate few explodes, inequality has steadily risen over the decades. Upward mobility has become harder. In too many communities across this country in cities and suburbs and rural hamlets, the shadow of poverty casts a pall over our youth, their lives a fortress of substandard schools and diminished prospects, inadequate health care and perennial violence.... “The test was not and never has been whether the doors of opportunity are cracked a bit wider for a few. It was whether our economic system provides a fair shot for the many … “Entrenched interests—those who benefit from an unjust status quo resisted any government efforts to give working families a fair deal, marshaling an army of lobbyists and opinion makers to argue that minimum wage increases or stronger labor laws or taxes on the wealthy who could afford it just to fund crumbling schools—that all these things violated sound economic principles. “Wed be told that growing inequality was the price for a growing economy, a measure of the free market—that greed was good and compassion ineffective, and those without jobs or health care had only themselves to blame. “And then there were those elected officials who found it useful to practice the old politics of division, doing their best to convince middle-class Americans of a great untruth, that government was somehow itself to blame for their growing economic insecurity—that distant bureaucrats were taking their hard-earned dollars to benefit the welfare cheat or the illegal immigrant.... “We can continue down our current path in which the gears of this great democracy grind to a halt and our children accept a life of lower expectations, where politics is a zero-sum game, where a few do very well while struggling families of every race fight over a shrinking economic pie.... “And with that courage, we can stand together for good jobs and just wages. With that courage, we can stand together for the right to health care in the richest nation on earth for every person. With that courage, we can stand together for the right of every child, from the corners of Anacostia to the hills of Appalachia, to get an education that stirs the mind and captures the spirit and prepares them for the world that awaits them. With that courage, we can feed the hungry and house the homeless and transform bleak wastelands of poverty into fields of commerce and promise.” Obama Calls for More Economic Equality and More Government Control of the Economy In a December 4, 2013 speech on the U.S. economy, President Obama made the following remarks to his Center for American Progress audience: [I]n their own daily battles, to make ends meet, to pay for college, buy a home, save for retirement, [people have] the nagging sense that no matter how hard they work, the deck is stacked against them. [There] is a dangerous and growing inequality and lack of upward mobility that has jeopardized middle-class America’s basic bargain that if you work hard, you have a chance to get ahead. I believe this is the defining challenge of our time: making sure our economy works for every working American. That’s why I ran for president. It was the center of last year’s campaign. It drives everything I do in this office. When millions lived in poverty, FDR fought for Social Security and insurance for the unemployment and a minimum wage. When millions died without health insurance, LBJ fought for Medicare and Medicaid. Together we forged a new deal, declared a war on poverty and a great society, we built a ladder of opportunity to climb and stretched out a safety net beneath so that if we fell, it wouldn’t be too far and we could bounce back. And as a result, America built the largest middle class the world has ever known. [S]tarting in the late 70s ... [t]echnology made it easier for companies to do more with less, eliminating certain job occupations. A more competitive world led companies [to] ship jobs [overseas]. And as good manufacturing jobs automated or headed offshore, workers lost their leverage; jobs paid less and offered fewer benefits.... [B]usinesses lobbied Washington to weaken unions and the value of the minimum wage. As the trickle-down ideology became more prominent, taxes were slashed for the wealthiest while investments in things that make us all richer, like schools and infrastructure, were allowed to wither. And the result is an economy that’s become profoundly unequal and families that are more insecure.... Since 1979 our economy has more than doubled in size, but most of the growth has flowed to a fortunate few. The top 10 percent no longer takes in one-third of our income; it now takes half. Whereas in the past, the average CEO made about 20 to 30 times the income of the average worker, today’s CEO now makes 273 times more. And meanwhile, a family in the top 1 percent has a net worth 288 times higher than the typical family, which is a record for this country. So the basic bargain at the heart of our economy has frayed. In fact, this trend towards growing inequality is not unique to America’s market economy; across the developed world, inequality has increased.... But this increasing inequality is most pronounced in our country, and it challenges the very essence of who we are as a people. The problem is that alongside increased inequality, we’ve seen diminished levels of upward mobility in recent years. A child born in the top 20 percent has about a 2-in-3 chance of staying at or near the top. A child born into the bottom 20 percent has a less than 1-in-20 shot at making it to the top. He’s 10 times likelier to stay where he is. In fact, statistics show not only that our levels of income inequality rank near countries like Jamaica and Argentina, but that it is harder today for a child born here in America to improve her station in life than it is for children in most of our wealthy allies, countries like Canada or Germany or France. They have greater mobility than we do, not less. [T]he idea that a child may never be able to escape that poverty because she lacks a decent education or health care or a community that views her future as their own -- that should offend all of us. And it should compel us to action. And greater inequality is associated with less mobility between generations. That means it’s not just temporary. The effects last. It creates a vicious cycle. For example, by the time she turns three years old, a child born into a low-income home hears 30 million fewer words than a child from a well-off family, which means by the time she starts school, she’s already behind. And that deficit can compound itself over time. The opportunity gap in America is now as much about class as it is about race. And that gap is growing. So if we’re going to take on growing inequality and try to improve upward mobility for all people, we’ve got to move beyond the false notion that this is an issue exclusively of minority concern. And we have to reject a politics that suggests any effort to address it in a meaningful way somehow pits the interests of a deserving middle class against those of an undeserving poor in search of handouts. [W]e need to set aside the belief that government cannot do anything about reducing inequality.... Investments in education, laws establishing collective bargaining and a minimum wage -- these all contributed to rising standards of living for massive numbers of Americans. And [we should make] high-quality pre-school available to every child in America. We know that kids in these programs grow up are likelier to get more education, earn higher wages, form more stable families of their own. It starts a virtuous cycle, not a vicious one. And we should invest in that. We should give all of our children that chance. Now, we all know the arguments that have been used against the higher minimum wage. Some say it actually hurts low- wage workers; business will be less likely to hire them. There’s no solid evidence that a higher minimum wage costs jobs, and research shows it raises incomes for low-wage workers and boosts short-term economic growth. Others argue that if we raise the minimum wage, companies will just pass those costs on to consumers, but a growing chorus of businesses small and large argue differently ... A broad majority of Americans agree we should raise the minimum wage.... I agree with those voters. I agree with those voters and I’m going to keep pushing until we get a higher minimum wage for hardworking Americans across the entire country. [W]e still need targeted programs for the communities and workers that have been hit hardest by economic change in the Great Recession.... There are communities that just aren’t generating enough jobs anymore. So we’ve put new forward new plans to help these communities and their residents ... not [with] handouts, but a hand up.
Posted on: Tue, 02 Sep 2014 02:18:17 +0000
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