What should the U.S. do about the so-called "fiscal cliff"? Who better to ask than Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein, "one of the world's most influential bankers"?
Lloyd Blankfein (photo: Stuart Isett)
That's what CBS Evening News must have been thinking, anyway, when they did a segment last night (11/19/12) all about Blankfein's opinions. CBS's Scott Pelley began: "When we asked Blankfein how to reduce the federal budget deficit, he went straight for the subject that politicians don't want to talk about."
BLANKFEIN: You're going to have to undoubtedly do something to lower people's expectations. The entitlements, and what people think that they're going to get, because it's not going to–they're not going to get it.
PELLEY: Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid?
BLANKFEIN: Some things.
It's maddening, isn't it, when someone who obviously knows exactly what needs to be done insists on being so coy about it? Luckily, Blankfein did offer some specifics on one of those things that we think we're going to get, and aren't:
And you can go back and you can look at the history of these things, and Social Security wasn't devised to be a system that supported you for a 30-year retirement after a 25-year career. So there will be certain things that the retirement age has to be changed, maybe some of the benefits have to be affected, maybe some of the inflation adjustments have to be revised.
Huh. So Blankfein–who was paid $16 million last year, and owns $210 million worth of his company's stock–thinks that people can retire on Social Security after working for 25 years? As Gene Lyons pointed out, that would mean that people are getting their first paychecks when they're 42–or, assuming they're willing to take the severe benefit cuts that come with early retirement, at 37. Or possibly he mistakenly believes Social Security allows you to retire at 41.
He also thinks people typically live to be 92 or 97, depending. In real life, of course, most people start working as early as 16, so they reach retirement age after 51 years of labor, when they have a life expectancy of 17 years–or 14 years if they're an African-American man.
On the basis of this peculiar understanding of U.S. society–which, strangely, doesn't seem to trouble Pelley at all–Blankfein has some news for us:
BLANKFEIN: But in general, entitlements have to be slowed down and contained.
PELLEY: Because we can't afford them going forward?
BLANKFEIN: Because we can't afford them.
You often hear this "we can't afford them" line, sometimes from people who aren't multimillionaires. For the record, in 1937, when Social Security Act was first implemented, the per capita GDP of the U.S. was than $7,971. In 1965, when Medicare was created, it was $18,575. Today it's $42,671. (All figures in 2005 dollars.)
It's hard to figure out how we could afford to take care of our old people in 1937 and 1965, when our country was one–quarter or one–half as wealthy as it is today, but can't afford to do so today. Unless it has something to do with the fact that in 1937 and 1965–people like Lloyd Blankfein didn't make $16 million a year.
Correction: This post originally mixed up the year when the Social Security Act was passed, 1935, with the year it was implemented.
About Jim Naureckas
It just proves that everything has been dumbed down SOO MUCH that we think these idiots are brilliant and deservedly the captains of industry when all they really are are corporate politicians, PR guys blowing smoke up everyones asses and hoping they don't fart financial bubbles.
And Lloyd Blankfein is actually one of the most down to earth CEOs on Wall Street, with a tendency to say what he thinks rather than what his company wants him to. Speaks volumes about the overall state of affairs, eh?
Every one of these guys lives in a world far removed from the one most of us have to face. A world so separate from reality that the vast amount of resources they spend on incredible luxuries doesn't actually seem – to them – to impact what we can and can't do as a society.
Re the last sentence
Or pay less of their income in taxes than someone making $42,671.
But SS and Medicare don't really "take care of our old people", do they? They help, certainly, but fall well short of the benefits in many European nations.
Blankfein and friends are at work on that discrepancy, however, aren't they?
But unlike here, large numbers of folks are fighting back.
Of course, that's something else the corpress tries to obfuscate, isn't it?
Whatever gives the pundits (and hence the media & general public) the perception that 'captains of industry' have some special insights into the economy & things like job creation, Social-Security/Medicare/Medicaid policy, etc, etc?? This people are 'gamers' who have — often through luck, amorality, indifference to human suffering, opportunism, and gaming the system — made their own PERSONAL fortunes. Sometimes they'll be in a company that has an uptick so they claim success and draw huge bonuses/stock options. Other times it ticks downwards and they blame it on external factors, or (at worst) they get golden parachute severance packages. And all the time they're drawing 7 figure salaries. They've MADE their fortunes about NOT caring about things like the unemployment rate, living wages, SSI/Medicare/Medicaid, etc, etc – - – WHY would anyone want to listen to them bloviate about these topics when it's only going to be more self-serving 'hustle' posturing??
It seems I am always writing about this issue. Those on the right just want to destroy Social Security; they don't like it. And the "left" go along, as usual trying to thread the needle, even though the other side is supposed to be theirs. Thus we get this nonsense about partially destroying Social Security. Hey! Why don't we raise the retirement age to 90?! That will make Social Security funded for at least 100 years!
Here's more or less what I write over and over and over:
Social Security Paradox
I wondered if I was totally off base about what is the most logical approach to making Social Security (and Medicare) stronger: raise the payroll tax cap. So I asked Dean Baker why the MSM never talk about it. He was blunt, "They don't want to tax rich people." It is frustrating: the "liberal" media won't even TALK about it.
[...] Evening News anchor Scott Pelley gave this summary on November 19: We wanted to remind you tonight of what Gaza is and how it came [...]
[...] Evening News anchor Scott Pelley gave this summary on November 19: We wanted to remind you tonight of what Gaza is and how it came [...]
Blankfein (Goldman Sach's CEO) and Cote (Honeywell's CEO) are on the same page as are many other rich guys.
It's impossible: The richest men in the country want to cut the benefits to the poorest. They have no cards on the table since they do not need or use Medicare, Medicaid or Social Security They pay only the minimum amounts to social security as the multi -millions they earn are not subject to the tax. It's the "let them eat cake philosophy" so they can increase their personal wealth. It's the ultra rich and famous in action.Let then make an equitable contribution.They build nothing!
the elite powerbrokers are getting ready to dicie up your retirement pie into a smaller slice. A guy making 16 million a year is gonna tell the average Joe making 43,000 a year to work longer before retirement. What do you think is gonna happen to the Fed. budget in 2013?
http://www.fair.org/blog/2012/11/20/you-think-youre-getting-social-security-but-youre-not-says-multimillionaire-banker/
It's the cap on Social Security taxes at just over $100,000 of income that keeps it from long term solvency. If the cap was raised to $5 million or removed entirely, S.S. would be solvent for more than 75 years and possibly up to 100 years.
Why didn't the interviewer take this opportunity to ask GS how soon they can implement the Robin Hood Tax and would he like 5% now and 1% in ten years – there's the tax revenue.
I doubt he's interested in Social Security – he has his, you get yours (maybe).
These asshats just can't understand why the people of this country can not realize that they MUST, without a doubt, give up SS and Medicare so that THEY, the job creators don't have to pay one cent, not one cent more in taxes.
with math skills like that, its NO WONDER a scum bag such as blankfein is allowed to be one of the Magical CEO's, whos useless opinions and socipathic comments carry such immense weight in the propaganda apparatus known as broadcast news
I'm always grateful to millionaires that clarify things for me like what it is that I have and don't have. Or what I should want or need vs what I don't. I thank the FSM for them every day.
Blankfein made a couple idiotic remarks. However, toward the end of the interview, he sounds reasonably sensible. Yes, rich people must be taxed more. OTOH, he (along with most rich folks) continues the imbecilic notion that somehow or other people must expect less. Actually, Lloyd, Social Security recipients over the long term shall continue to expect MORE and MORE because they live longer and longer. Thus, given that we need to exercise ZPG, the workers will need to get used to the idea that they must support a larger group. That's how things are, not was you wish them to be.
I am astonished by the callousness and the selfishness of the banker, small wander that a lot of people call them the ‘banksters.’ The poor did not get poor because they were/are lazy, when the difference in wages/income between the top, and the bottom is 400 times, when we consider that it is the top 1-2% who accumulated astronomical wealth on the backs of the working class, and the poor, and see this leach smile speaking nonchalantly how it should be the little people who will get to tighten the belts, calls for his resignation for being a maladjusted psychopath. Revolutions happen because of the arrogance of the people like this bankster, and the rest of his cronies. Marry Antoinette was blamed for the French Revolution, if we have a revolution here, it will be blamed on the banksters, as it should.
This incredible level of ignorance (and of basic arithmetic) is worth 16 million bucks, and gets to form our economic policy? We're in big trouble.
This "class" brought about these problems – purposefully.
I think it's pretty hard to argue that when we were in record 6 trillion dollar debt and President Bush cut taxes that he had no idea what would happen – of course he did -he was executing on the "drown government in the bathtub" plan, and year by year as the debt excalated and people desperately grabbed everything they could we discovered "too big to fail".
Now this is what is put forth as the compassionate side, but the time this has been a PR campaign to mold people's opinions and reality.
I disagree with everything this guy says, our leaders have not been leading they have been cutting people out and collected the resources they otherwise would have needed, and getting richer and richer while using their control of the media to force this mindset on everyone.
Americans are in their rights to say no to this, and they should.
The alternatives to social programs that they do not think work is to use their supposed entrepreneurial expertise to fix the problem, not a virutal concentration camp mentality.
He's a doubletalking idiot, if he thinks his moron math can fly past anyone.
He's just like the rest of the 1%: they just want to get their grubby hands on what we've paid into for decades, because they're too lazy to actually EARN their money.
Basically, just like the "bank bailout": they want to steal our money.
And you can go back and you can look at the history of these things, and Social Security wasn't devised to be a system that supported you for a 30-year retirement after a 25-year career. – Lloyd Blankfien CEO of Goldman Saks
This Fhead is so clueless about SS, Medicare and reality for people who actually work for a living or he is one lying bastard with one hell of a lot of gall!
http://www.fair.org/blog/2012/11/20/you-think-youre-getting-social-security-but-youre-not-says-multimillionaire-banker/
this is reminding me of mark mcgowan, the artist taxi driver, and his youtube videos (over a hundred of them. i think they're all brilliant. they are angry, they are heartfelt, they are poignant. )
he does some outstanding reports about the barclay bank head who "had to answer" for the libor fraud. i'd like to see what mcgowan would say to mr. bank-fein, but i guess it would be the same as he says about the barclay boys, the deutschbank boys, etc–and it ain't pretty–and it's all justified.
and people should please go to webster tarpley's tarpley.net and to his pdf'd
report for the united front against austerity. it's this time, before january! that we must say something, do something, call the whitehouse, call our "representatives", stop them from cutting our social net, and stand out NOW, strike now, for the ways and demands that will save our futures.
the taxiartist, mark mcgowan, shows how the same plundering is happening in the u.k.. they are now privatizing the nhs! and taking away benefits for disabled, elderly, and unemployed. it's a scandal and it's everywhere. mr. blankfein and the transnational banks are destroying our lives, and he thinks we better realize it has to be this way!? it's because he has NO idea what lives WE know need protecting.
Why do we let the upper 1% undermine Social Security and Medicare by calling them entitlements? They are insurance programs which people have worked toward and purchased. The media contribute to the degradation of these programs everytime it fails to correct that untrue label.
Those poor bastards (lazy news writers) don't know who else to ask. We need to send them reading lists. Pacifica radio has had several very savvy "economists" lately. It's time to stop asking the wolf about the chicken house security.
Pelley comes across as a not particularly bright third-grader, asking a Great Man why there's so much trouble in the World. The child-like obeisance is startling, but not unexpected. Pelley really thinks Blankfein has something to offer, when any fool understands that Blankfein belongs in a Federal Penitentiary, where he can't harm anyone
Lloyd Blanketyblankfein should be ashamed to open his mouth on this subject, and it's up to the media to see that he is. How could the "reporter" let him get away with those absurd figures?
I watched the video of M. Pelley and the rich banker and i couldn't help but laugh. Do these guys think that because i'm poor and have no power that i'm stupid? Do they really believe that I'm just going to keep on taking their oppression without rising up in revolution?
I have taken this guy off my "human= do not hurt" list….
http://www.fair.org/blog/2012/11/20/you-think-youre-getting-social-security-but-youre-not-says-multimillionaire-banker/
What the US can't afford is the Multimillionaire Banker Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein… there are a lot of people who know this: 99% of Americans know it!
re. Social Security wasn't devised to be a system that supported you for a 30-year retirement after a 25-year career.
No, the reality is that it's a system devised to support a worker putting in 40 to 45 years of labor [20 to 60ish] for at best 20 years of retirement until they die. Problem is the Feds since Reagan era have been stealing trillions of dollars from money put into social security by US Workers. This guy is just another 1% twit trying to brainwash workers with utter BS….
We do have the right to change the system of injustice, here is the foundation of our government:
The Unanimous Declaration of the Thirteen United States of America.
When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers form the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. –Such has been the patient sufferance of these colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former systems of government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states. To prove this, let facts be submitted to a candid world.
A complete snake. This scoundrel, to speak in complimentary terms, is a case for Matt Taibbi. When entitlements are made to people who need them, they're indeed entitlements. When they're made to the filthy, in the profoundest sense of the term, like Blankfein, their laissez faire free market enterprise system. It's to the point there's nothing left but rebellion, revolution and insurrection. And the likes of Blankfein ought be first to the gallows.
MONEY
THE PERNICIOUS POWER OF MONEY
“We all need some money most of the time, and when we need it, it can become the succor of life. I do not renounce the possession of money. I reject instead the noxious bargain that is usually made for it. I pity the greed that poisons the person who seeks it as his life’s principal goal. I abhor the sickness it brings on, causing the possessors of it to see themselves as having been kissed by God. I detest how we long for it, often coveting it over even the divine virtues. I loath the changes it renders in ordinary people, often less than ordinary people, how it converts them in our eyes into celebrities or gurus or, when they publicly parade their gifts of a few piddling percentage points to charity, into saints. I detest the cruelty, the slavery imposed on the weak in order that the greedy might obtain more of it. Most of all, I despise the hypocrisy, the false arguments, the sickly rationalizations, the socially imposed dogma, that make the quest for money, at a sacrifice of human life, acceptable in society that pretends to be humane. Money is like salt. A little bit of it lends a flavor to the food of life. Too much of it destroys the pudding and a ton of it turns the kitchen into a salt mine.” GIVE ME LIBERTY, P.88
Gerry Spence
I have – 0 sympathy for Lord Bankfine.. He does not fail to understand how Social Security works, and he certainly knows who it works for directly – not him. Coming from him, these kind of comments are not a misunderstaniding or a "wish", they are, in his estimation, a command. He is commanding his bought and paid for servants in congress to do as he says. He, and the rest of the dead weight petty nobility known as "the CEO's " and thier sub-worthless rackets known as "finance" are parasitic. They have mostly killed the real economy and now they are attemting to kill off the rest of us.
A BIG PART OF THE PROBLEM IS THAT MOST PEOPLE CANT SEE BEYOND NEXT YEAR. NOBODY WONDERS WHAT WILL BE IN 2050
OR 2075, THEY JUST WANT TO BE SURE OF 2015. THEY BETTER WAKE UP WHILE THERE IS STILL TIME TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT WHERE WE'RE GOING. 1/2d
The OTHER thing that's wrong about Lloyd Blankfein's know-nothing comment about Social Security is that the much-discussed increase in our longevity is a class-mediated phenomenon. Investment bankers and private equity gurus like Blankfein and Romney may be living to age 90 or 95, but construction workers and waitresses and cab drivers and retail clerks are lucky if they live to age 80. So raising the Social Security full eligibility age would simply shift billions of dollars of benefits from the poor and working and middle class to the superrich. That's hardly what anyone would call sensible public policy!
Re: my previoius comment, it made me think, and I did a little checking. Retirement age has always been 65, and life expectancy reached that level 1952, and has continued to climb, with no increase in SS withdrawal, in stead of keeping up with longer life. In '52 you were only expected to last a few more years, now it's well past 80 and still collecting. The age of eligibility should have risen with the increase in expectancy. The # of 65 year olds has gone up by a factor of 20 since
1952, but not the # of contributors. As I said, can't think beyond next month. It may be too late to correct it before it's gone. I'm glad I'm past 80, as it won't be my problem much longer. 1/2d
@radical pragmatists
there are not more 65 year olds becasue "life expectancy is increasing"..life expectancy is only increasin from the other end..infant mortality has dropped since the 1930's..please dont buy into that drivel and if you do, have the common sense not to repeat it to others…if there are more 65 year olds it because of cyclical. population swells, like the baby boom…..if there are less contributors its becasue loyd and his class have deliberately decimated the real economy and job market, offshoring jobs and anihilating an entire industry, the one, by the way that made the US wealthy and strong – MANUFACTURING…all the "discipline" labor and drive wages below the poverty line..they want to destro the safety net to further impoverish the labor force and to remove any possible option to being forced into slavery..they must not be rewarder for this behavior…anyone who aids them in this crime is equally (if not more) culpable…
Congress would do us all na favor if everyone was pon social security, which is supported by both the employer and emplyee. Congress has borrowed the money to pay for wars, tax breaks etc. for years. They haven't got the good sense to admit it. Blaming it on the retirees that have worked until they were 65 or beyond, is incorrect.
Think about the vast number of Government employees that retire after 20 of service, at half their salary, having not paid into it at all, in most cases.
About the financial cliff. Think back to WWI when the allies demanded Germany pay for the cost of the war. They just ran their printing press, Inflated their currency to pay it off, and ruined theri economy in the process. The U.S. inflaterd their currency after WWII, to pay for that war too. It has continued ever since. Now that we have a debt of 16 or 17 trillion dollars, What shall we do? I wouldn't reccomend printing more paper money unless they increase the denomination. (talk about wasting paper) We would have to cut down all the trees to print that much! Perhaps creating a million dollar note would do the trick, I get dizzy counting the zeros.
hat shall we do? Don't print
Congress would do us all na favor if everyone was on social security, which is supported by both the employer and emplyee. Congress has borrowed the money to pay for wars, tax breaks etc. for years. They haven't got the good sense to admit it. Blaming it on the retirees that have worked until they were 65 or beyond, is incorrect. There aren't that many that live beyond 65
Think about the vast number of Government employees that retire after 20 of service, at half their salary, having not paid into it at all, in most cases.
About the financial cliff. Think back to WWI when the allies demanded Germany pay for the cost of the war. They just ran their printing press, Inflated their currency to pay it off, and ruined their economy in the process. The U.S. inflated their currency after WWII, to pay for that war too. It has continued ever since. Now that we have a debt of 16 or 17 trillion dollars, What shall we do? I wouldn't reccomend printing more paper money unless they increase the denomination. (talk about wasting paper) We would have to cut down all the trees to print that much! Perhaps creating a million dollar note would do the trick, I get dizzy counting the zeros.
hat shall we do? Don't print
@elmer stenger
elmer im not sure what your trying to say overall, but theres a lot of factual untruth in what you did mangage to say…ill point out the biggest to whoppers and leave it to experts to refine the details..
1.. germany "running the printing presses after ww1" has NOTHING to do with and NO RELATION OR LIKENESS AT ALL. to the US in 2013. Germany was a blasted, burned, bombed and gassed out country in 1918-29, and was on the losing end of the mother of all European imperialist wars..the treaty of Versaille created conditions THAT A NATION ON THE GOLD STANDARD could never meet. We are no longer on the Gold Standard, and we are also not occupied by foreign enemies.
2…"Government employees" do not "retire" after 20 years. PERIOD. unless you are talking about active duty millitary…and, even they cannot collect social security at a 20 year retirement, they must wait until age 65 like everyone else…and EVERYONE IN THE MILLITARY PAYS SOCIAL SECURITY TAXES…where DO you find this nonsense. please try hardrer.
Marc,
I agree with you on all points posited here (so far). Your analysis of the situation, and the conclusions that the strength of America was in its manufacturing is absolutely correct, Marx would give three stars for those conclusions. When a country becomes more service than manufacturing, it starts borrowing, not having surplus values. China is rightfully subsidizing their manufacturing to keep the masses working, while we are exporting the dollars back to China where we borrowed it. We can print for a while more worthless paper dollars, as long as the other countries are willing to accept it, but every ride has a final station, and then starts a hyper inflation, and just as in Germany (1920’s), we shall carry buckets full of dollars to buy a loaf of bread.
Bozidar Thanks. In the US and increasingly in Western Europe the analysis that would be most useful to us right now would be classical Marxist analysis, and thats just what we arent going to get from politicians or corporate media. The very mention of Marx in mainstream venues in the US disqualifies the speaker from being listened to….thats because neoliberal-"freemarket" capitalism is as much a religion and a massive cultural bias as it is a (bad) way of apportioning capital and labor. I have identifed 3 major deities of the freemarket faith.."The invisible Hand",
"The animal spirits" and (if you listen to the ilk of pete peterson, erskine bowles, alan simpson and others ill leave unnamed at this point) "The Confidence Fairy"…
Marc,
My final project in the grad school for pol.sci. was: The AMERICAN DREAM. Break it down; it measured the people’s belief that with hard work, one can get to become rich. I spent some two years collecting data, writing survey questionnaire, doing statistics, and alike. In the process, I had to read DAS KAPITAL, and a number of other economy books (theories of economics). Lot of work, almost all a waste of time, except for a few pearls I dug from the ‘intellectual excrement.’ One of them was my conclusion that the best laws of economics about the creation of the ‘surplus value,’ (profit) came from Marx. We can be amused by his naïveté about the human nature that it will change as we eliminate the capitalist mode of production, and few other postulates, but in essence, Marx was correct about this process, the relative, and absolute values of commodities, the fact that once the capitalist mode of production is started, without the strict regulations, it becomes a self destruct mode of production. Another pearl I picked up was that the American Revolution was caused by the English corporation (tea) that managed to control the King George III. Even Thomas Hobbs defined the corporations in his time 1650’s already evil. I encountered the power of greed, and finally; the cognitive dissonance, human ability to accept two diametrically opposite facts to be both true, but on a CONSCIOUS LEVEL. That black is black, and white at the same time. This cognitive dissonance explains why a chicken will vote for colonel Sanders, why a poor person will see himself being a ‘middle class,’ and why a super rich person will be able to rationalize that he is doing a favor to the poor workers by giving then jobs at a minimum wage, or below. Krishnamurti has a say that ‘it is not a sign of mental health to adjust to an irrational society.’ If he right, than we are not mentally healthy. Myself included.
Bozidar, i dont think Marx was at all naive about human nature. He didnt have any faith in it at all. Perhaps he was even too cynical. Try bringing up the Labor Theory of Value to any "serious" economist and they will give you a look as if you just said you like to rape hamsters – because its not only perfectly true, its completely antithetical to the capitalist state. Only labour creates value. You can go as complex or primitive as you like to nut gather pre-tool making man – nuts and berrys are nice but until they are gathered they are of no use.
You Think You're Getting Social Security But You're Not, Says Multimillionaire Banker
http://www.fair.org/blog/2012/11/20/you-think-youre-getting-social-security-but-youre-not-says-multimillionaire-banker/
Sounds like you are trying to say if only the rich payed more we would be ok.Bullshit.If the rich paid 100% it would effect little.He is trying to say that people who look toward retirement in the old standard(pensions,later ss and medicare)might have to rethink that.And he is right.We will all be working till we die.And the safety net will be far less.We just voted to create less jobs and tax what is left in the cookie jar more.Unsustainable.Sorry folks but you wont be proved right on this one.If you think all will be well you are nuts.Oh …and yes the rich will always have more to fall back on.Why does that confuse you?
Bozidar…..I learned a lot from Marx too.I learned he was the dumbest pelican that ever walked on the face of Gods green earth.You need a big slice of apple pie,flags waving, and a few verses of God bless America.You need to realize the happiness created here since our revolution.Freedom.Here the people rule.And that means having faith in your fellow man.You sound like your studies taught you to look at askance at all man creates.I wonder about your feelings on God.I wonder what school is turning out this stream of consciousness.I could recommend better I think.Nothing personal.I understand the way education can color your views on life.In Med school you go through phases i think.There is that point where you become a germaphobe.Then you realize there is no way to avoid a lot of things.Resignation.Then you enjoy getting kissed again(ha ha).At some point you pull it together and get back to enjoying your daily blessings.Each one a gift.You sound like your still in the "germaphobe" state.This is an amazing country.And we are both blessed to be here.
Michael e,
My education is in several areas; physical, social, and behavioral sciences. The sciences opened my eyes; I learned what the world is like, not what the Bible claims it to be. The social sciences educated me what societies are made of, how they function, and what would make them better (for majority, not just for the rich parasite takers), and finally; the behavioral sciences (psychology) made me realize what are the causes of our basic behavior. I do not wear blinders, or dark glasses for the blind, nor any filters as you are implying. As for believing in the so called HIGHER POWER, I do, and that is gravity. I do believe in gravity because I can confirm it, test it, and in every test, it will prove that it really exists, unlike the imaginary, man-made various Gods. It may come as a shocker to you that George Washington too, was not very religious, if any at all. Read the books LIES MY TEACHER TOLD ME, and LIES ACROSS AMERICA by the same author, James W. Loewen. You will find it there. My beginnings were in learning trades like tool-die making, designing, following by engineering, and the sciences came as a result of my desire to be much higher educated, and knowledgeable. So you can spare me your patronizing, and trying to be my therapist how to enjoy my life, and worse yet; teaching me how to think.
@michael e
sounds like you havent actually "learned" anything, really that you dont already know. You are obviously a troll trying to get a rise out of someone…whether you "know" anything that couldnt be learned from watching a beer commercial is not obvious from your 'flag wave god bless america blah blah blah"..if you "know" anything lets have the details, not just your asshole-like opinions..i ive heard all the sheep bleating before
@michael E.
actually, i didnt say anything like that at all..my comment is there for everyone to read, go over it again…what i said is the Loyd "god dick" Blankfein is a biased liar, and an unreliable "expert" opinion, and he and his ilk should not be give the platform they have to continue the super -exploitation of workers..if I were going to say what should be done, taxing the rich would be unnecessary because Labour would own the whole store. Finance capitalists (such as lord bank-fine) are parasites anyway and would have no place in any solution I suggest . I look forward to your demented reply in defense of murserous psychopathic parasites ( and all in the name of Jesus?)