SusanThur's Open Salon Blog

Bin Laden documents at a glance

Fri, 4 May 2012 14:05:39 -0400

ON THE U.S. MEDIA: Like any public figures, bin Laden and his advisers were mindful of the media. Adam Gadahn, one of bin Laden’s spokesmen, provided a summary of his view of U.S. TV cable news.

“From the professional point of view, they are all on one level except (Fox News) channel which falls into the abyss as you know, and lacks neutrality too,” he wrote.

CNN seemed to be closely collaborating with the U.S. government, but its Arabic version was better, Gadahn wrote.

“I used to think that MSNBC channel may be good and neutral a bit, but it has lately fired two of the most famous journalists — Keith Olbermann and Octavia Nasser the Lebanese — because they released some statements that were open for argument,” wrote Gadahn, an American citizen.

“ABC channel is all right; actually it could be one of the best channels, as far as we are concerned. It is interested in al-Qa’ida issues, particularly the journalist Brian Ross, who is specialized in terrorism,” Gadahn wrote.

Bin Laden himself mentioned CBS as a possible, unbiased network. Gadahn didn’t know enough about it but wrote that the show “60 Minutes” has a good reputation.

“In conclusion, we can say that there is no single channel that we could rely on for our messages,” Gadahn wrote.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/bin-laden-documents-at-a-glance/2012/05/04/gIQAPV1i0T_story.html

Social Security and the Federal Deficit

Sat, 21 Apr 2012 14:04:59 -0400

But didn’t Congress spend the money in the trust fund?

Yes, but it would have spent it anyway. Congress spent way more than what it borrowed from the trust fund, which holds roughly one-fifth of federal debt outstanding. There’s a global market for U.S. Treasury securities, which are especially popular during times of economic turmoil. So even if Social Security had no money in the trust fund or the trust fund were invested in other securities, this would have had little impact on the federal government’s borrowing costs or access to funds. In any case, Social Security has always invested the trust fund in U.S. Treasuries and is required by law to do so. So to make this seem like news, as Montgomery does (“the government has borrowed every cent”), is strange to say the least.

Does this mean there’s no connection between the federal deficit and Social Security?

Unfortunately, no. While Social Security has had little influence on Washington’s spendthrift ways, the converse isn’t true. Social Security benefits are on the chopping block as Congress suddenly finds deficit-cutting religion. In this sense, the retiree at an Occupy Palm Beach protest who waved a sign saying “my Social Security paid for these yachts” is on to something, though his verb tense may be off. But it’s probably better to avoid saying politicians looted Social Security because this implies there’s nothing in the piggy bank. The trust fund may be full of “IOUs,” but that’s just a pejorative way to describe government bonds. If they’re worthless, the real chumps are the hedge funds, investment banks, rich individuals and sovereign governments around the world that have ploughed money into Treasuries – and increased their demand in recent years.

http://www.epi.org/blog/social-security-federal-deficit-part-1/

http://www.epi.org/blog/social-security-federal-deficit-part-2/

Contrary to "Entitlement Society" Rhetoric,

Sat, 14 Apr 2012 16:04:13 -0400

Some conservative critics of federal social programs, including leading presidential candidates, are sounding an alarm that the United States is rapidly becoming an “entitlement society” in which social programs are undermining the work ethic and creating a large class of Americans who prefer to depend on government benefits rather than work. A new CBPP analysis of budget and Census data, however, shows that more than 90 percent of the benefit dollars that entitlement and other mandatory programs[1] spend go to assist people who are elderly, seriously disabled, or members of working households — not to able-bodied, working-age Americans who choose not to work. (See Figure 1.) This figure has changed little in the past few years.

http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3677

Chart Book: The Legacy of the Great Recession

Sat, 14 Apr 2012 16:04:42 -0400

The United States went through its longest, and by most measures worst economic recession since the Great Depression between December 2007 and June 2009. This chartbook will document the course of the economy following that recession against the background of how deep a hole the recession created – and how much deeper that hole would have been without the financial stabilization and fiscal stimulus policies enacted in late 2008 and early 2009.

http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3252

Understanding Taxes http://www.cbpp.org/

Close to half of U.S. households currently do not owe federal income tax. The Urban Institute-Brookings Tax Policy Center estimates that 46 percent of households will owe no federal income tax for 2011. A widely cited figure is a Joint Committee on Taxation estimate that 51 percent of households paid no federal income tax in 2009.

“These figures are sometimes cited as evidence that low- and moderate-income families do not pay sufficient taxes. Yet these figures, their significance, and their policy implications are widely misunderstood." Read more

http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=3505

Taibbi Talks Bank of America on Current TV

Sat, 24 Mar 2012 14:03:27 -0400

Check out Matt Taibbi on Current TV's The Young Turks last night. The topic: Matt's recent Rolling Stone article about too-crooked-to-fail Bank of America. "It’s no different than here on the streets of New York where you see people selling fake Prada bags or phony blue jeans. What they were doing is selling phony mortgages… It was a giant fraud scheme. The fraud on Wall Street — they think it’s some kind of abstraction, it’s bankers ripping off other bankers, it’s some kind of insider-trading scheme where it’s a victimless crime. That’s not true — it’s bankers ripping off old people and retirees." Watch the clip:

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/national-affairs/taibbi-talks-bank-of-america-on-current-tv-20120323