Noblesse Oblige

Listening to politicians talk about the state of the economy often sounds like a rock musician or Igor Stravinsky talk about expressionist German opera. They either sound painfully out of their depth or unable to discuss the matter without disdain and great trembling. What even the coherent pols have so failed to address is what exactly would be an optimal "recovery".

We know for the Republicans in Congress it would be more 30% returns for the top 1% and sackcloth and ashes for the rest of us. Never mind that those very policies have brought us to our current precipice. Eastern Europeans fresh from their forty lean years "in the communist wilderness" fear any government hand in the financial markets. Thus it was that the current president of the European Union, Czech prime minister, Mirek Topolanek, labeled Obama’s emergency stimulus package “a way to hell” that will “undermine the stability of the global economy.”

But most economists, even those like Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a former McCain adviser, understand that to get the folks back investing and markets lending requires a much larger stimulus than our timid President Obama has so far put forward. For once and no doubt the very last time I agree with Darth Vader himself, Dick Cheney who said: "Deficits don't matter" -- it depends on what you're buying and what you'll be getting. What we certainly do NOT need is greater consumption leading to even MORE inflation. Here I agree with Brad de Long that there "are legitimate fears when a government undertakes a deficit-spending plan. We can all recall historical episodes when they turned out to be not just fears but realities. We remember bottleneck-driven and wage-push inflation from the late 1960s and from the oil shock-ridden 1970s – those episodes were the first fear coming home to roost. Nobody today is happy with American fiscal policy in the late 1960s or American demand management policy in the 1970s."

Instead what we need is a complete change in thinking. Here again, we have history to serve as a guide. To drag us out of the Depression (something quite different than bulking up our powers of purchase) FDR's government hired the unemployed. They planted over a billion trees, saved endangered species, modernized backwoods America, and built New York’s Lincoln Tunnel and Triborough Bridge. They also put up 2,500 hospitals, 45,000 schools, 13,000 parks and playgrounds, 7,800 bridges, 700,000 miles of roads, and a thousand airfields while employing 50,000 teachers and 3,000 writers, musicians, sculptors and painters, among them de Kooning and Jackson Pollock.

For the world to experience a truly sustainable recovery there is but a single viable solution-- we must reeducate the filthy rich and indoctrinate them with the virtues of public sacrifice and noblesse oblige.

Republican Hypocrites Feed at the Gov't Teat

Sen. Richard Shelby, Republican of Alabama claims that President Barack Obama's stimulus plan is nothing but "socialism".

"We're going down a road where it's unchartered. We're going down a road to disaster. We've never seen this kind of spending - ever. There's got to be some other way better than what we're doing. Not the socialist way, but to try and get our free market working again."

Shelby proceeded to vote against the stimulus package. He was not, however opposed to procuring a big hunk of that socialist "pork" for Alabama.

Federal funds the senator has procured for his state since January 2009

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01/29/09
Shelby: Applications Available for Delta Regional Authority Grants
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01/28/09
Shelby Announces $317,188 for the University of Alabama at Birmingham
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01/23/09
Shelby Announces $ 54,600 for Town of Midway
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01/23/09
Shelby Announces $2.7 Million for the University of Alabama at Birmingham
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01/23/09
Shelby Announces $286,962 for Center Point Fire Department
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01/23/09
Shelby Announces $44,650 for Pittsview Volunteer Fire Department
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01/23/09
Shelby Announces $967,082 for Daphne Fire Department
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01/23/09
Shelby Announces $202,089 for Skinnerton Volunteer Fire Department
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01/23/09
Shelby Announces $25,120 for Fairview Volunteer Fire Department
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01/23/09
Shelby Announces $10,175 for Sprott Volunteer Fire Department
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01/22/09
Shelby Announces $1.2 Million for Geneva Municipal Airport
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01/22/09
Shelby Announces $2.1 Million for Dothan Regional Airport
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01/22/09
Shelby Announces $235,460 for Camden Municipal Airport
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01/22/09
Shelby Announces $1.4 Million for Mobile Regional Airport
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01/22/09
SCHUMER, SHELBY ANNOUNCE NEW LEGISLATION TO CRACK DOWN ON WALL STREET FRAUDSTERS
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01/16/09
Shelby Announces $60,000 for Magnolia Springs Volunteer Fire Department
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01/16/09
Shelby Announces Over $1.5 Million for Birmingham-Shuttlesworth International Airport
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01/16/09
Shelby Announces $153,060 for City of Arab Fire Department
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01/16/09
Shelby Announces $67,029 for Collirene Volunteer Fire Department
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01/16/09
Shelby Announces $85,629 for Cottonwood Fire Department
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01/16/09
Shelby Announces $273,639 for Brewton Municipal Airpor
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01/16/09
Shelby Announces $324,622 to Baldwin County Airports
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01/16/09
Shelby Announces $355,870 to Coffee County Airports
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01/16/09
Shelby Announces $380,278 for Mobile County Airports
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01/16/09
Shelby Announces $352,926 to Henry County Airports
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01/16/09
Shelby Announces $28,000 for Alabama Historical Commission

The total funds for Alabama comes to well over $13 million and that is just for January, 2009. In November, 2008, Shelby appropriated over $14 million for programs in Alabama including more than $6 million for Alabama Head Start Programs.

Kit Bond: "Against" the Stimulus bill until he's "All for It"


They talk a good game but even the so called "free-market" Republicans no better than to risk a second Depression. From "Bits of News"

The First Hunger March

Empty is the cupboard,
no pillow for the head,
we are the hunger children
who cry for milk and bread.
We are the hunger children
who cry for milk and bread.
We are the worker's children
who must, who must be fed.

- song that was sang by children
at the gates of the White House, Thanksgiving Day, 1932, shortly before they were arrested

I'm spending my nights at the flophouse
I'm spending my days on the street
I'm looking for work and I find none
I wish I had something to eat

- the popular 'Soup Song' sung to the tune of 'My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean'

Local hunger marches started on April 1, 1931, when a large group of unemployed forced their way into the Maryland state legislature to demand relief. Later that month 3,000 turned out in Columbus, Ohio. In May 15,000 unemployed marched on Lansing, Michigan. By the end of summer there had been 40 hunger marches in states all over the country.

Despite this growing movement, it was business as usual in Washington. A few of the more bold Democrats proposed modest relief packages which Hoover immediately vetoed. It required someone outside of the two parties to take this movement to the next level, and that someone was Herbert Benjamin.

Herbert Benjamin was an unapologetic communist until his dying day. A few months before he had returned from Moscow where he had received training on organizing the unemployed.

Unlike Coxey's Army in 1894, this hunger strike would have 1,670 "delegates" rather than being a ragtag group. Columns of unemployed represented by all races would leave from Boston, Buffalo, Chicago, and St. Louis, and all arrive on December 6. Marches from the west coast would leave earlier and meet up in either Chicago or St. Louis.

Each delegate wore an armband that said "National Hunger March, December 7, 1931", which was the day that Congress would open for a new session. There were ten marchers to a truck as well as a smaller car that would run ahead looking for hostile crowds and/or police. While the media and local governments were extremely hostile to the marchers (Mayor Mackey of Philadelphia advised them to "pass by" his city. Hartford closed its streets to them), the public often turned out in large numbers to cheer them on and protect them from the local police. The marches were given $40 for all expenses, but frequently local communities would furnish them food and medical care free of charge, or at cost.

All of the columns reached Washington D.C. on December 6, as scheduled. Both the Hoover Administration and the media was in an uproar.

Three days later, however, 14 persons appeared outside the White House as "hunger marchers." In a cold drizzle they unfurled their banners ("Mr. Hoover, We Demand Food & Lodging," "Mr. Hoover You Have Money for the Entertainment of the Fascist Assassin Grandi."). Promptly the police pounced on them, arrested all 14 for parading without a permit.
[...]
Next day the U. S. Secret Service paid Leader Benjamin the compliment of taking his "hunger march" seriously and thus helping to publicize it throughout the land. Chief Moran declared that his sleuths had learned the march was really a Communist demonstration on a large scale. "Marchers" from all parts of the country would be brought to Washington in 1,144 trucks, 92 automobiles. They would be lodged and fed along the way. They would have medical attention. They would defend themselves with stones. They would be organized in military fashion. They would petition the President and Congress for relief for the jobless. They would make trouble. Only one thing in their plans did Chief Moran fail to ascertain and that was where the money was coming from to finance such a large undertaking. As usual, Moscow was publicly suspected.

"The marchers were of several races, mostly whites and negroes, but among them were several scores of yellow men from various climes. Many women appeared in the column."

- Daily Mirror

1,000 police showed up for the march, as well as 1,000 Marines, and an unknown number of secret service. Another 500 police were in the Capitol. Police were armed with shotguns and machine guns.

Vice-President Curtis sent out word that no marchers could enter the Capitol grounds carrying placards that were critical of the president. [Hmmm. Doesn't that sound a little familiar?] Congress refused to let them speak in the Capitol. Neither Democrat nor Republican heard their demands. In response the demonstrators sang the "Internationale". President Hoover also refused to see them. According to the Washington Herald, the marches who were arrested were beaten. The march then went to the AFL Headquarters to meet with President William Green, who promptly berated the marchers.

The first hunger march was over and the marchers left Washington. However, it had forced the media to actually report on the hunger problem in America, something it was loath to do. It also pushed Congress to propose relief legislation, which the Hoover Administration promptly defeated.