President George Bush, son of former President George Bush; Teamsters leader Jimmy Hoffa, son of former Teamster's leader Jimmy Hoffa; Southern Christian Leadership Conference leader Martin Luther King III, son of former SCLC leader, Martin Luther King Jr. Former Tennessee senator Al Gore, son of former Tennessee senator Al Gore. Alaska Senator, Lisa Murkowski, daughter of former Alaska Senator Frank Murkowski. From Jesse Jackson Jr to former FCC chairman Michael Powell the list goes on.
America's political class looks more like royalty by another means than the product of a dynamic democratic system. From the Republican party to the civil rights movement all too often leadership appears to be a determined by genetics. If Hillary Clinton gets the nomination then we add marriage to the list too. But if the most crucial issue here is not nepotism (although that too is a problem) but class - the elephant in the room of American political discourse. For if classlessness is central to America's self-image of meritocracy and personal reinvention, class is increasingly central to American reality.

New studies reveal that parental income is a better predictor of whether you will be rich or poor in the US than it is in Canada or much of Europe. Meanwhile this week's Economist shows that only 3% of students at top colleges come from the poorest quarter of the population. Such class entrenchment was washed up for all to see following hurricane Katrina last year.
And yet the level of denial at all levels of American society to the existence of class is breathtaking. For all the various regional, racial and ethnic identities to which Americans sign up to the economic identity of class is rarely one of them. The overwhelming majority define themselves as middle class - expressing the admirable aspiration that they are en route to better things. But it begs the question, middle between what and what? Clearly, just because you don't talk about it doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

Gary Younge

This is pure garbage.

Would you gentlemen like to please comment on which aspects of the report Gary Younge is commenting on is pure "bullshit" and "garbage"? I'm not suggesting your comments are incorrect or correct, would just like a bit more information and reasons why it's "bullshit" and "garbage".



"AMERICANS do not go in for envy. The gap between rich and poor is bigger than in any other advanced country, but most people are unconcerned. Whereas Europeans fret about the way the economic pie is divided, Americans want to join the rich, not soak them. Eight out of ten, more than anywhere else, believe that though you may start poor, if you work hard, you can make pots of money. It is a central part of the American Dream.
The political consensus, therefore, has sought to pursue economic growth rather than the redistribution of income, in keeping with John Kennedy's adage that “a rising tide lifts all boats.� The tide has been rising fast recently. Thanks to a jump in productivity growth after 1995, America's economy has outpaced other rich countries' for a decade. Its workers now produce over 30% more each hour they work than ten years ago. In the late 1990s everybody shared in this boom. Though incomes were rising fastest at the top, all workers' wages far outpaced inflation.
But after 2000 something changed. The pace of productivity growth has been rising again, but now it seems to be lifting fewer boats. After you adjust for inflation, the wages of the typical American worker—the one at the very middle of the income distribution—have risen less than 1% since 2000. In the previous five years, they rose over 6%. If you take into account the value of employee benefits, such as health care, the contrast is a little less stark. But, whatever the measure, it seems clear that only the most skilled workers have seen their pay packets swell much in the current economic expansion. The fruits of productivity gains have been skewed towards the highest earners, and towards companies, whose profits have reached record levels as a share of GDP."

http://www.economist.com/printeditio...5911#footnote1

Washington, DC: In his new book, "The Conservative Nanny State: How the Wealthy Use the Government to Stay Rich and Get Richer," well-known economist Dean Baker debunks the myth that conservatives favor the market over government intervention. The book examines a variety of "nanny state" policies that make the rich richer while leaving most Americans worse off. Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research, candidly rejects current political truisms, proposes alternatives, and encourages readers to openly debate the way forward.

To download a free electronic copy of book, visit: www.conservativenannystate.org

By distributing the book online at no cost, Baker hopes to spark public debate about the most effective mechanism for supporting the writing and designing of books and other forms of intellectual work. Paperback copies are available for a fee that covers printing and shipping costs.

http://www.conservativenannystate.org/

Inheritiance is killing the so called principal of American meritocracy and its added racial dynamics to it.

So somewhat these analysis is touching upon it but not enough because it does not focus on why a racial group is always at the bottom of the class ladder even with recent our gains.

Some thoughts on this perspective.

There is a message out there by experts that say blacks are the way they are because we dont work hard enough.

That simply is not true. Based on history and based on current views.

Something else is there but experts dont want to say.

defyfear wrote: This is true, what's more irritating is when “black people are used to Chastise blacks people" as in this article:

http://www.blackchat.co.uk/theblackf...m32/21326.html

More of the SOS

The Twin Plagues Inequality and War By DAVID SWANSON

Ending the extreme inequality of wealth and well-being in the United States would end the war in Iraq.
Ending the war in Iraq and others like it would go a long way toward reducing the inequality.
Reverend Dr. Joseph Lowery honored Coretta Scott King at her funeral, speaking in front of four presidents, when he challenged injustice, saying: "We know now there were no weapons of mass destruction over there [standing ovation]... but Coretta knew and we know that there are weapons of misdirection right down here. Millions without health insurance. Poverty abounds. For war billions more but no more for the poor."
This wasn't just a challenge to the powerful. This should be taken as a challenge to peace activists to start fighting poverty and to the poor to become peace activists.
Were there not a population of Americans so much less well off than another, or did we simply have a fair and honest and universal military draft, we would not be fighting a war in Iraq. America's growing inequality is a growing danger to the world.
This war has already cost thousands of dollars per American family. If it ends up costing as much as Joseph Stiglitz and others predict, it will cost every single American family more than a full year's salary at the federal minimum wage.
But it won't cost the wealthiest among us that much, and it will cost the rest of us much more. Just look at the current budget proposals. Increases at the Pentagon, which already swallows half of all discretionary spending. Cuts everywhere else, including education.
On Monday, Congressman Dennis Kucinich said, "This budget is not just fiscally bankrupt, it is morally bankrupt. This budget chooses war over health care, tax cuts over education, special interests over need of the nation and rich over poor. This budget cuts vital domestic funding because of spending for the war in Iraq and the tax cuts to the wealthiest Americans, placing the burden squarely on the backs of poor and working class Americans. The President,s budget will increase defense spending by almost 7%, to $439 billion, while vital finding for Medicare, Medicaid, education, veterans health care, children,s health care, Welfare, transportation, NASA programs and the Department of Agriculture are slashed. All this, while requesting an additional $70 billion-or $120 billion for the year-to fund the misguided and ill-advised war and occupation of Iraq."
It has become harder and harder for many families to send their kids to college, but military recruiting stations are receiving more and more money. We're cutting federal student aid by $12 billion while doubling cash enlistment bonuses and raising the enlistment age to 40.
Meanwhile, war spending is still, dishonestly, left out of the budget and handled as a "supplemental."
Not only do the wealthiest among us that 1 percent of us who actually fund federal election campaigns tend to pay lower taxes. Not only do they depend less on the government for education, health care, recreation, or housing. But many of them are getting MORE stinking rich than they were before by profiting off this war. (Note: this is less the case among the 20 percent of Americans who THINK they are in the richest 1 percent.)
While an Army private is paid $24,000, a private military contractor $100,000, and a General with over 20 years experience $168,000, the average military contractor CEO is bringing in $11.5 million.
Military contractors are leading the way in inequality and unaccountability. Their average CEO to worker pay ratio is over 400 to 1, and their top earners have made their bucks by selling the US military defective equipment.
Military contractors are also leading funders of Congress Members and Senators. The spying industry is not, which may be part of the explanation for the higher level of noise in Congress about spying, as compared to the near silence over an illegal war based on lies.
There is total silence in Congress on the subject of inequality, and that is why a poor person in this country working three jobs and struggling with immediate crises needs to care about bogus reports on WMDs and lies told to the United Nations.
Peace activists need to care about inequality because the refusal of the Senate to oppose this war is closely tied to the fact that half of the people in the Senate are millionaires.
We peace activists need to care about the damage done to our society and our democracy, and therefore to the world, by inequality of the extreme sort described in this book: www.inequality.org
(A book which, however, says not one word about opposing war.)
If we are going to ask poor people to oppose war, the least we can do is find the time to oppose poverty.
Twenty percent of Americans own 84 percent of the wealth in this country. Our country is far more unequal than any other developed nation. And it has become far less frequent for anyone born poor in America to die rich. This is not a democracy. Look at the length of the lines at polling places in poor neighborhoods where people do not have time to vote anyway. This is not a democracy.
And without a democracy, you have war. Every time.
You also have domestic violence. Violence increases with inequality. Reducing inequality reduces crime, and for far less expense than that of housing prisoners. This is widely known and virtually undisputed, but not acted upon.
And it is by housing prisoners that we train guards to torture Iraqis.
Inequality and war are twin plagues, and we need to rid ourselves of both, or we will continue to be afflicted with both.
There are organizations, like Progressive Democrats of America and United for Peace and Justice, that work for both peace and equality. The march in March from Mobile to New Orleans will unite anti-war activists with victims of Bush-and-Katrina.
But, on the whole, anti-poverty activists and anti-war activists live in two separate worlds. That needs to end.
David Swanson can be reached at: david@davidswanson.org


http://www.counterpunch.org/swanson02082006.html

The Bourgeois Congress and Economic Violence If the greatness of a nation is measured by how it treats its poor rather than its military expenditure, America must rank near the bottom of the heap. The disparity between rich and poor has never been greater and it is widening at an accelerating pace.
Some pertinent statistics vividly tell the story:

• Of the world’s 100 largest economic entities, 51 are corporations and 49 are nations.
• The world’s top 200 corporations account for over a quarter of the economic activity on the globe while employing less than 1% of its workforce.
• The assets of the world’s 358 billionaires exceed the combined annual incomes of countries with 45% of the world’s people.
• The richest 1% of Americans own 40% of the nation’s household wealth.
• The average CEO in the U.S. made 42 times the average worker’s pay in 1980, 85 times in 1990 and 531 times in 2000.
• The corporate share of taxes paid has fallen from 33% in the 1940’s to 15% in the 1990’s. Individuals’ share of taxes has risen from 44 to 73%.
• The World Trade Organization (WTO) effectively gives veto power to corporations over our U.S. environmental and labor laws.

The first minimum wage was established in 1938. On September 1, 1996 the current $5.15/hr. minimum wage was signed into law. There has been no increase in the minimum wage in over nine years. During that same period of time Congress voted itself eight pay raises.
Even the paltry minimum wage of $5.15 does not possess its original purchasing power, as the cost of living has continued to rise. Thus, the minimum wage, a national disgrace, has its lowest purchasing power in 51 years.
The blatant exploitation of the working poor is occurring against the backdrop of a Congress that is doling out massive welfare to the world’s largest and wealthiest corporations and providing tax cuts for the richest Americans, even as worker pensions vanish after a lifetime of service. But it gets worse.
A worker who earns the minimum wage of $5.15/hr. during the course of a year earns just $10,700. That is $6,000 below the federal poverty level for a family of three at $16,600. Sixty-one percent of minimum wage earners are women, many of them single.
According to Rick Wilson, director of American Friends Service Committee’s West Virginia Economic Justice Department, the base pay for a congressperson is $168,500 per year. A single mother earning the minimum wage would have to work 15.7 years at 40 hours per week to earn the congressperson’s minimum.
Even that measure is misleading. The disparity is far greater than the dire statistics indicate. There are 435 members in the House of Representatives of which 123 had at least one million dollar incomes. In 2002, 43% of freshmen congresspersons had incomes of a million dollars or more and the number is growing with each election cycle. As Congress continues to resemble the nation’s economic elite rather than the demographics of their respective districts, the poor increasingly find themselves among the disenfranchised.
In the wealthiest nation on earth one in five children lives in deep poverty. It this is not class warfare, I do not know what is
As the working poor sink deeper into the oblivion of the swirling vortex of social and economic despair, ever more wealth is concentrated among society’s upper crust. What is Congress doing about it? They have wasted weeks discussing how to abolish the estate tax, a levy that benefits less than 0.3 percent of the population—the very wealthiest Americans.
It should be clear by now that the working people have no protection from Congress and the corporate Plutocracy. During the Clinton presidency, Bill Clinton and the Congress dismantled the welfare system while giving obscene subsidies to corporations such as Microsoft, Wal-Mart, General Motors and Daimler-Chrysler. The Republican record is even worse. Can there be any doubt about whose interest Congress serves?
The outlook is likely to worsen for American workers as the economic disparity gap widens. The minimum wage law is a cruel hoax against the working poor. The champions of capital, as evidenced in the statistics cited above, do not care about the poor. America’s vast economic divide is the deliberate result of pol