Why Is the Left Protecting the 1%?
by Seton MotleyOf wireless Internet bandwidth hogs, that is.
We have for months been odiferously awash in word of the Occupy Wall Street (#OWS) “movement.”
Intellectually and ideologically sloven, these gathered gaggles have been commandeering sporadic public spaces (and some private ones) all across the fruited plain.
When asked why they are so doing, you get an inanity cornucopia – think Jay (Leno) Walking or (Jesse) Watters’ World on ignorance steroids.
The only semi-comprehensible – but still factually vacuous – thing to emanate from the whole mess is the 1% – 99% nonsense.
That being the #OWS-ers saying that the upper 1% of Americans control most of the money and power and thusly must be…destroyed? Certainly taxed and regulated into utter oblivion.
In an always-and-forever failed effort to “spread the wealth around” – misery being the only thing that ever ends up equally distributed.
Work, work ethic and talent never enter the #OWS equation – but then again, why should they?
Nearly everyone on the Left has at one time or another expressed solidarity with the #OWS-ers. That includes many amongst the uber-pro-government-Internet-regulation Media Marxists.
Free Press and Public Knowledge are the lead Media Marxist joints. And they have both expressed ideological sympathy for and/or are simpatico with #OWS.
Which brings us to what the doubtable New York Times recently gave us:
Top 1% of Mobile Users Consume Half of World’s Bandwidth, and Gap Is Growing
Hmmm.
The gap between extreme users and the rest of the population is widening, according to Arieso. In 2009, the top 3 percent of heavy users generated 40 percent of network traffic. Now, Arieso said, these users pump out 70 percent of the traffic.
But wait – that’s the exact argument the #OWS-ers make against the 1% – and capitalism.
This makes the Media Marxist Leftist life-work of unlawfully shoving the Huge Government, all-encompassing regulatory Internet assault that is Network Neutrality down our throats – more than a little schizophrenic.
Net Neutrality – amongst other terrible things – allows bandwidth hogs like Google, Netflix and Amazon to shift the costs of their gi-normous bandwidth use to the likes of grandmothers who do little more than email their grandchildren.
That’s “fair,” right? That’s #OWS-compliant, right?
Net Neutrality allows The Internet Rich to get richer, while giving everyone else the shaft. Why then are the Media Marxists and the broader Left ram-rodding it – and myriad other policies – through that do nothing but further widen the 1% – 99% gap?
I’m confused.
Could it be that these aren’t “public interest” or “consumer interest” groups – but government interest groups instead?
—–
In Reality, this Leftist policy disconnect happens with cringe-inducing regularity. They push proposals that will have the exact opposite effect of their desired intent – and yet onward they press.
Oft it is unintentional – sometimes it is not. Then soon-to-be President Barack Obama admitted that the inheritance (death) tax costs more to implement than it collects – but that he favored it anyway, in the interest of “fairness.”
Spread the misery around.
In Reality, bigger government and more regulations – which the Left (say they) implement to reduce the gap between rich and poor – actually widen it.
It goes like this:
Say we increase all regulations by a cumulative 50%. The Rich, Big Companies have the money to absorb the abusive costs and keep going. The up-and-comers do not. The Rich, Big Companies hold on – the little ones go under.
So you end up with a few wealthy joints, and everyone else starving – the gap between widens.
Say we raise taxes to 50% of income. The likes of Warren Buffett can afford it – they’re already rich. But it dramatically damages the chances of people like us – the up-and-comers – from becoming rich.
So you end up with a few wealthy individuals, and everyone else starving – the gap between widens.
In short: The bigger the government – the bigger the taxes, the more the regs – the bigger the gap between rich and poor.
The outcome the Left with their policies seek to ameliorate – they instead exacerbate.
—–
We have long had an incessantly growing Leviathan in Washington – meteorically so in the Age of Obama. The government impediments to individual and business advancement have grown ever larger and ever more numerous.
And the wealth divide between the 1% and the rest of us – which the Left decries – has grown right along with it.
The lesson lost on the Media Marxists and all Leftists is:
The solution to government isn’t – more government.
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40 Comments
This 1% 99% crap is just that, crap.
It's clear the conservatives are the majority
http://www.gallup.com/poll/152021/Conservatives-R...
"Say we raise taxes to 50% of income." Only if EVERYBODY PAYS and we SLASH SPENDING. No work, NO EAT. The Nations debt will vaporize in short order!
"The outcome the Left with their policies seek to ameliorate – they instead exacerbate."
While this has always been the case, you're just never gonna get that point across to the lefties if you're using those big words.
Well said, and as is usually the case, facts and reason will reduce the lefties to sputtering incomprehensibility. People like they, stuck in perpetual adolescence will never get beyond their feelings that something is just not fair. They never recognize that the only "fairness" that should be and can be rightly imposed is the removal of obstacles to personal success. Anything else is simply thievery, and right now we have far too many thieves in the country.
Monosyllabic words or guttural grunting is more their speed.
"In Reality, this Leftist policy disconnect happens with cringe-inducing regularity. They push proposals that will have the exact opposite effect of their desired intent – and yet onward they press. "
Textbook Example – California
Everything you said except the 50% part – if EVERYONE paid 18-20% and we coupled that with real spending cuts that would be all that is needed.
Punish those who can to benefit and reward those who can't or won't – Obama's socialism. It's the old ant and grasshopper thingy all over again.
Leftists are totally clueless about how an economy functions. I laugh at the OWS types that have branded clothing, i pads and i phones and are against capitalism and corporations. SO who makes this stuff? Companies that want to make profitable goods. Duh.
This is all the result of Obama's campaign against American exceptionalism and productivity. There is a name for that political stance….Anti-Americanism or traitor.
"facts and reason will reduce the lefties to sputtering incomprehensibility"
With most lefties, "sputtering incomprehensibility" would actually be an improvement.
If there was a way to hijack this movement with the message of pro-capitalism, anti-crony-capitalism that would be something I would get behind. Crony-Capitalsim (or Corporatism to some) really chaps my bottom, and is a legitimate complaint.
Nice article, I like the comparisons to bandwidth usage; this needs to be done more often.
More regulations that only certain companies can comply with = more power in the hands of those who can comply
More power in the hands of those who can comply = more influence in politics
More influence in politics = more regulations that only certain companies can comply with
Repeat
Millions of people stream video and pay for that usage
Millions of people don't and pay far less
Net Neutrality makes it illegal to charge different rates
Millions of people that don't stream pay more, driving them away from the market
Fiddle with the tax code, only the fabulously rich can comply
The fabulously rich drive away the pesky competition of the regular wealthy
The fabulously rich influence those who can amend the tax code: Congress
Congress fiddles with the tax code
Repeat
The occuppy movement tries to take advantage of something that the founders tried to take care of. A majority of 51% because they can get 51% wasn't suppose to harm the 49% let alone just 1%. The occupy movement doesn't care about that.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
The 50% was a quote from the article and certainly not my thought! I would say 20% for 5 years and then a cut to 15% and 5 more years a cut to 10%.
Now we are in total agreement – not that I thought otherwise before. I knew you weren't really advocating for 50%.
Better yet, why does the left always go after the people MAKING money and CREATING value with income taxes?
Given the left's "inequality of opportunity" beliefs, it would make much more sense to raise capital gains taxes and eliminate inherited wealth.
The Democrats can't do this, though, because too many of their supporters and top brass are the people who have family money, but couldn't actually make money on their own.
or just look at the State of New York cigarette tax.
State Raises tobacco tax to increase revenue
(and punish those evil tobacco companies)
Wonder of wonders – cigarette sales, and revenues go down,
(while evil tobacco stays in business)
State raises tobacco taxes to increase revenue
The left IS the "1%", the vast majority of the wealthiest investors, actors, massive corporations and global banks donate heavily to the DNC in every election cycle.
The billionaire left controls nearly 60% of annual GDP and makes up nearly 80% of all annual DNC campaign donations through bundling front groups such as the AARP, SEIU, Open Society Institute, ACORN and Progressive Policy Institute.
They use their massive donations to buy MASSIVE amounts of TV time to convince people they will be better off with larger scraps, bought by the indenture of others, from their keeper's table rather than learning how to farm or cook for themselves.
This 99% vs. 1% BS is a George Soros front operation designed to convince the violent elements of society to do his violent dirty work and simply "eliminate" the competition for him.
The funny thing about dictators is that none of them ever actually get their own hands dirty when they make their final bloody push for unlimited power…
Soros and his puppet President Downgrade are exactly those kinds of despots.
But the drug addled dread locked dregs of #OWS can't even understand that the people behind this "alleged movement" are the ultimate in venture capitalists…
The monied interest funding them are simply manipulating the useful idiots as cannon fodder to eliminate their competition for them…
Remember in a socialist society there is no competition, only happy smiling pictures and stories of it.
The natural prey of the democratic elitist sharks are the minorities, the poor and the ignorant. Though claiming to be an advocate of Abraham Lincoln, the father of the GOP. The president and all his anti-American party tend to dismiss the principles that Lincoln believed in. "You cannot help the weak, by weakening the strong. You cannot help the wage earners by bringing down the wage payers. You cannot strengthen the brotherhood of man by encouraging class warfare. You cannot permantly help the down-troddened by doing for them what they could and should be doing for themselves."
A nation of dependants is a nation sure to fall under emperial rule of the elitists. That is the true goal of all democrats. AKA: Plantation Liberals
"The time is near at hand which must determine whether Americans are to be free men or slaves."
George Washington
Because the dead uniformly vote democrat.
That and Republicans are equally stuck on stupid when it comes to self inflicted gunshots to the head.
Who are the 1 %, great article by Charles Cooke National Review .http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/281793/iwhoi-are-1-percent-charles-c-w-cooke
….because they ARE the 1% that Occupy hates….
Another interesting article contrasting "the Left," with more "classical liberals." His point is to really defeat the "progressives," it will take both conservatives and liberals seeing that the radicals have taken over.
http://pjmedia.com/barryrubin/2012/01/15/can-libe...
Right on John!
Anyone trying to speak on behalf of 99% of the population is an ignoramus whose opinions, thoughts, and ideas are irrelevant by default. They should try speaking for themselves for one….or, even better, move to an oppressive country like North Korea where one man speaks on behalf and represents everybody. SURELY they'd love that, right?
Off topic update: EPIC – FOIA Documents Reveal Homeland Security is Monitoring Political Dissent http://epic.org/privacy/socialnet/EPIC-v-DHS-Soc-...
"The time is near at hand which must determine whether Americans are to be free men or slaves."
George Washington
Naturally, they are only protecting the LEFTISTS in the "1%" – the typical dirty ,Leftist, secret.
Anytime I see the 99% mentioned, I can't help but think of one of the T-shirts I saw that said "99% of all Democrats are giving the rest a bad name." Think of this next time they start yelling about how their the 99.
I don't get that either. Right now I live in the Omaha area. It's a very red city (not commie red) and yet it votes in corrupt, liberal Democrat mayors one after the other.
Well it is a good question isn't it.
As more than one commenter has brought it up why don't one of you take a shot at explaining it?
Excellet work as usual Mr. Motley, there are an awful lot of contradictions to be found with the 1%…such as why all the communist art at the Rockefeller Center, a monument to capitalism if there ever was one?
The left and the 1% have a very cozy arraingement…..
Since just before the turn of the last century…the twentieth century, the word has developed a cancer…it is the cancer of socialism….
In spite of the fact that well over one hundred million souls have perished under the boot of this menace…it still plagues us…
Now the question is why? There are many theories, but I'll tell you this………..the .0001 percent at the very top of the food chain simply love it and nurture it……
Why?
Don't know. The unions own the mayor and the past Democrat mayors have caved in to most union demands and now the city is near bankrupt also. Which makes me wonder how the same constituents can continue to vote in elected officials who are obviously working against the will of the people. Nebraskan's are notoriously frugal people, but it remains a mystery. Hmmmmmm.
Raising capital gains taxes will hurt the middle class. Eliminating inherited wealth makes no sense. Some middle class couples routinely save money to ensure a reasonably comfortable retirement. The government has no right to confiscate that money when they die. It doesn't belong to the government.
Their motto should be, "Destroy those that are successful".
I completely agree with you.
The government has no right to confiscate any money. And it has even less moral justification for income tax than it has for capital gains taxes OR inherited wealth taxes (estate taxes). I'm not advocating ANY tax on the money people earn or hold for their posterity.
Both CG taxes and wealth taxes make more sense than income tax at addressing the problems the left seems to have with capitalism. Yet, the left always seems to push for higher income taxes instead of capital gains taxes or inherited wealth taxes. Why is that?
The statist is well organized, well funded, smart and patient. From gerrymandering to voter fraud to indoctrination and manipulation of public opinion they have gained power.
They have the media on their side, the untold numbers of apparatchiks wielding power from the halls of the various agencies and departments of the state, the "intelligentsia", the elites of industry, unions, you name it.
The conservative has none of these advantages.
Due to this we must fight all the harder.
I've always said that liberals/statists are political animals from birth. Everything they do seems to be based on advocacy of some sort.
I am not sure if this is hate speech or not, or if this is a clown author, you decide. This person compares Obama's election to OJ Simpson getting away with murder.
What do you think?
Does he make a good point? Was Obama, like OJ's murdering his wife, a purely racial thing?
http://freedomaintfunny.com/?p=1276
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