Government of the rich, by the rich but especially for the rich. Maybe olgold will explain to us why this is such a shrewd or canny move by Man o’ the people Barack Obama….

Don’t you understand the importance of re-electing the man who extended the Bush tax cuts?

We’re at the mercy of the oligarchy here. Is this really the campaign message the White House wants to send to the working people in the state?

Yes.

Next question?

Not to mention throwing the unemployed under the bus, starting a couple of more wars, adopting the Republican “Health Care” plan in toto and continuing programs like rendition, assassination and for all we know, torture.

Three days remaining on the “Obama needs a primary challenger” bus ad campaign in D.C. We’re 85% funded and only need another $300 to close the deal and send this bus ad driving around D.C.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/61669596@N07/5613417029/

Please help if you can.

This is one of the reasons incumbent Presidents are almost always re-elected. They have a staggering ability to raise money. Not only for themselves, but for the party as well.

How many people were willing to hand over $50k to Senator Obama in 2007? I’m guessing not many.

It’s too bad we don’t have 100% public financing for elections, but we don’t. This guy will be raising $1 billion this cycle. Some of that will be $25 per click on the net, but those folks don’t get access. The 50k Club aren’t paying that much just for the chicken dinner.

Oops! Forgot the link to the campaign.

http://www.epicstep.com/campaign/199/obama-needs-a-primary-challenger/

Obama has gave up on the USA economy

Obama and his political team are trying to make OBAMA a war time president like BUSH done in 2004!

Killing Osama Bin Ladin was just the beginning!

Listed below is the reality most americans now face!

Fact1
This cruel economy is causing “ghost towns” to appear all across the United States. There are quite a few counties across the nation that now have home vacancy rates of over 50%.

Fact 2
There are now about 7.25 million less jobs in America than when the recession began back in 2007.

Fact 3
The average American family is having a really tough time right now. Only 45.4% of Americans had a job during 2010. The last time the employment level was that low was back in 1983.

Fact 4
Only 66.8% of American men had a job last year. That was the lowest level that has ever been recorded in all of U.S. history.

Change we can believe in? Not

Obama new slogan

“Have US MILITARY will kill Dictators to keep Dumb Americans happy and poor.”

We’re at the mercy of the oligarchy here.

This is true only to the extent that we’re at the mercy of the federal government.

If one is a serious progressive – and frankly I’m beginning to question the seriousness of many self-proclaimed “progressives” – then it should be abundantly clear that there is an urgent need to develop alternative vehicles besides the federal government to effect progressive policies.

Gee, I can’t think of a better way to spend $50K than on the reelection campaign of Barack Obama. (Do I *really* need a snark tag for that?)

Blue Texan,

Thanks for this post. It effectively illustrates Obama’s true colors. In 2007 and 2008, Obama was running as a Tribune of the Plebians. Now, Obama is governing like a Patrician, so why shouldn’t he run as one? It sickens me.

We might forgive the money angle if only Obama had kept some promises regarding the people’s access to government, among other things.

Open government
Oct 30, 2008

The Obama platform is something of a “Top Ten” list when it comes to proposals for federal leadership in revitalizing democracy through technology. He would “make government data available online in universally accessible formats to allow citizens to make use of that data to comment, derive value, and take action in their own communities.” He would establish pilot programs to open up government decision-making to meaningful public input. He would require heads executive departments and agencies to conduct significant public business in public and in venues that can be watched online.

Obama promises to employ current information technology to permit citizens to participate in public meetings from a distance. He promises “a web site, a search engine, and other web tools that enable citizens easily to track online federal grants, contracts, earmarks, and lobbyist contacts with government officials.” He would solicit public comment on the final drafts of all non-emergency legislation before he signs it into law.

Srsly…who is willing to hand over $50K to O today? Unless you are the top 1% of income earners, no one would do it ever.

Look, I know it costs a lot of money to mount a national presidential campaign…

Why? He doesn’t need to campaign. He’s going to waltz back into the White House. He’s trying to raise $1 billion. For what?!? More than half of the voters in this country are going to vote for him regardless of what he does in the next 18 months. Hell, the best thing he could do is sit down, shut up, and let the Republicans eat eachother.

Extend your points to the nation, BT. It’s relevant for all of us. None of the average folks can afford a fundraising event or special private dinner. Yet this fucking punk wants $1 billion for his re-election. Fuck my life.

This is even more difficult to read, honestly whether O or Nwet or anyone one announcing they are running and attending a $$$ event when we are looking at the worst flooding of the Miss since the 1927. Interesting what happened two years after that flood.

A smart move would be to donate the $$$ to aid to those who have lost everything and have to relocate.

When Senator Obama visited Austin in 2007, he spoke at Auditorium Shores to a crowd of 20,000.

Tickets were free.

Yeah, but if he let the riff raff in this time, he’d probably have to dodge rotten tomatoes.

Fair point. I remember going to the St. Paul speech in August 08 when he officially declared victory over Clinton. I don’t think he’d want most of the people that were there that day in the same room with himself again. We might hurt his delicate fee fees.

No, Robert Earl! Say it ain’t so, man. :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6Ze3HehkBs

curious how the unemployed were thrown under a bus?

Seems like they have been coddled to the point to where it wasn’t worth their time to look. Certainly not the case for everyone but still at some point you need to make some sacrifices on location, pay etc. Nobody owes anyone a job.

and 50k, no thanks

Dadgummit that’s a desecration of Austin City Limits if I’ve ever seen one. Looks like the next stop is Rollingwood.

Only $5000 to meet the O’man. Do I get to call him a corporate tool to his face? Sounds like a bargain if i can, oh yeah, that’s right, I don’t have $5K lying around, like everybody else in the United Banks of America.

Guess I’ll just have to hope that the motorcade passes me on the sidewalk so I can give him the finger…

1 in 7 14 (video, May 10, 2011) on SNAP (“food stamps”).

he’d probably have to dodge rotten tomatoes shoes. Security for these events prolly screens for rotten tomatoes.

Why? He doesn’t need to campaign. He’s going to waltz back into the White House. He’s trying to raise $1 billion.

Good question, Kris. Does anyone know what happens to all that money in a Presidential Election Campaign Fund if it’s not used during the campaign? Does it go back to the officeholder after office?

Does your self-righteousness ever bother you? No, I suppose not.

Not $5,000. Fifty. 5-0.

Seems like they have been coddled to the point to where it wasn’t worth their time to look.

Yeah, the problem with this country is that the poor have it too goddamn easy.

You act like someone is being forced to do this. If you don’t want to go don’t go but whatever you do keep banging the drum.

I guess having been unemployed for an extended period and choosing to move myself 2000 miles across the country to take a lower paying job I have very little patience for those who believe a certain pay grade is owed to them.

You adapt to the new world or you don’t.

this blog does not work

Not $5,000. Fifty. 5-0.

thanks BT, my dyslexia got the better of me…

That’s not an amount I’m gonna find by going through the loose change in my couch.

That is not the problem no. But go ahead and put the words in my mouth.

$50k, eh? Well, little people like me are dealing with the fact that our insurance premiums have gone up, along with the number of medications prescribed by doctors that insurance companies are refusing to cover.

I guess Obama doesn’t give a shit about us. He certainly doesn’t want to hear from us or help us.

When Senator Obama visited Austin in 2007, he spoke at Auditorium Shores to a crowd of 20,000.

Tickets were free.

It’s amazing how much difference an election can make. And those 20,000 people were among the ones who worked hard and contributed to make that one election go his way. F*ck ‘em if they thought the election was about them and not about him, right?

he just doesn’t care… (what you think).

seriously.

cjc

I guess you have to pay money to comment on a blog bitching about having to pay money to see the prez!

Must be nice to have the resources to pick up and move 2000 miles away.

And what’s up with the homeless? Sheesh. Everywhere they go they’re “home.” /s

$50,000 just to see Obama?
You could probably buy most congressmen for that much.

Do you have any actual data to back up your assertion that there are all these jobs lying around but people are too lazy or unwilling to take them, or are you just making it up?

So let me get this straight, if one is unemployed, it’s because they’re unwilling to work for lower wages? There’s no other factor(s)? Even McDonalds and WalMart can’t hire that many people. And if you’ll notice headlines lately, when employers open up for job apps, they’re overwhelmed with folks applying. Me thinks you’re too full of yourself…

Most of the campaign money will go to the media as advertising, a large subsidy which will be repaid in favorable press. You won’t read Noam Chomsky in the Times or see him on Fox.

That’s what the money will do, that’s why it’s needed and that’s why you won’t read or hear anything from third party candidates or anybody else that bucks the system, which the media is an integral part of because it’s fed millions of dollars by the powers that be.

Well, to be fair, I have to say that atleast the prices are tiered. College kids can feel like they count as much as the $50,000 power couple. Also, he wouldnt charge that high of a price if people were not willing to pay it.

That being said he will not get a dollar of mine or my vote this time around.

Start with the 20 million illegal immigrants doing the jobs that “Americans refuse to do”

Then there are these:
http://blog.aimnet.org/AIM-IssueConnect/bid/57673/Massachusetts-Officials-Report-People-who-Choose-Unemployment-over-Work

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2010/08/13/cavuto_choosing_unemployment_checks_over_a_job.html

http://video.foxnews.com/v/4276350/job-recruits-choosing-unemployment

http://www.businessinsider.com/us-companies-cant-find-enough-skilled-workers-right-now-2010-8#ixzz0w8WqHoXN

Yeah, that’s what I thought — you’re just making it up.

Until you provide some links to back up the claims, we’ll have to assume you’re a troll.

Personally, I don’t care to demonize or criminalize labor. And as a gringo, I’m not sure who’s the illegal alien.

Another one for you

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704895004575395491314812452.html?mod=WSJ_business_LeftSecondHighlights

McDonald’s had over 1M applicants for jobs at their big hiring day in April (where they initially intended to hire 50k but increased the hires to 62k)

Ever picked tomatoes or oranges for a living? I know a couple of American white men who tried it. Neither lasted more than 2 weeks. Would you, could you do it?

It must be nice to have the resources after being unemployed for an “extended period” to pack up and move 2000 miles.

Scroll past the troll.

It must be nice to have the resources after being unemployed for an “extended period” to pack up and move 2000 miles.

I’m thinking that trip is occurring via Conestoga wagon

Cavuto? Fox News?

Job creation lags population growth, and real income has fallen. It helps set conditions (by design?) for a kind of class warfare: people in the bottom half fighting one another over the crumbs of a corrupt empire.

President Obama…$50K…I don’t think so.

Took the words right out of my mouth….

yes, with an interview with a CEO of a CA recruiting firm? Is his experience any less valid because he is giving an interview to fox?

You got your links. Not everyone that disagrees with you is a “troll’

Jeez, read your own link.

Longer-term trends are at play. For one, the U.S. education system hasn’t been producing enough people with the highly specialized skills that many companies, particularly in manufacturing, require to keep driving productivity gains. “There are a lot of people who are unemployed, but those aren’t necessarily the people employers are looking for,” says David Autor, an economist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

There are numerous other grafs in the WSJ piece that directly and rather thunderously undermine you contention.
Get a clue. You must to be able to do better than that bastion of clear, unbiased thinking about economics, the freaking Wall Street Journal.

I’ve applied for five jobs today. Three of them for minimum wage. Stay sanctimonious though, by all means.

sigh…..Its an article that looks at a lot of examples. If you want to pull out one example out fine so can I. Regardless of the examples the piece indicates that there are more openings than their are people willing or able to take those jobs.
“Some workers agree that unemployment benefits make them less likely to take whatever job comes along, particularly when those jobs don’t pay much. Michael Hatchell, a 52-year-old mechanic in Lumberton, N.C., says he turned down more than a dozen offers during the 59 weeks he was unemployed, because they didn’t pay more than the $450 a week he was collecting in benefits. One auto-parts store, he says, offered him $7.75 an hour, which amounts to only $310 a week for 40 hours.

“I was not going to put myself in a situation where I was making that small of a wage,” says Mr. Hatchell. He has since found a better-paying job at a different auto-parts dealer.”

Some workers…

Resign. You’re not very good at this. Read your own link. All of it.

Some workers… Faux News would be so proud.

HI, Raven.

Michael Hatchell, a 52-year-old mechanic in Lumberton, N.C., says he turned down more than a dozen offers during the 59 weeks he was unemployed, because they didn’t pay more than the $450 a week he was collecting in benefits

I call bullshit. Nobody makes 450 dollars a week in unemployment compensation and that sure as hell isn’t happening in North Carolina.

Just fyi, I was prematurely retired from a skilled trades position for an auto manufacturer. Since then I have applied for several local IT jobs paying a third of my regular salary with no results. A friend’s daughter has a journalism degree, couldn’t get hired anywhere till she left out the info that she was degreed. She now works for Dollar General part time… This are real life stories not some journalistic hack’s propaganda. We should be looking at why employers can’t pay a decent living wage…

Go read where this conversation started. I never suggested that every unemployed person wasn’t trying to find work. So yes, some people.

Recruiting for $60K engineering jobs. And I’m supposed to believe what this guy is telling me about people who turn him down? Plus, I wouldn’t exactly consider those folks “working class,” normally making $30K or less.

Actually, a few states do pay that much, even including NC.

To me that obvious lie about making 450 dollars a week in unemployment benefits discredits everything else in that piece. Not buying it.

http://fileunemployment.org/unemployment-benefits-comparison-by-state

Crap. I guess I’m in the wrong state.

With so many unemployed they can get away with paying minimum wage and people will line up around the block for the job. The Regressives in the House want to do away with the minimum wage, by the way. Slavery in the US of A in the 21st century.

Certainly not the case for everyone…

Do you have numbers, or anything constituting a fact, besides the piece you linked to, which by the way blows your blanket contention

Seems like they have been coddled to the point to where it wasn’t worth their time to look.

all to Hell?

No. I thought not.

Pardon the blog whoring, but as one of the long term underemployed, I do try to cover the issue here (usually cross posted to MyFDL)

More Republican douchebaggery regarding the unemployed:

Reps. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) and Bobby Scott (D-Va.) want to give the long-term unemployed another 14 weeks of unemployment insurance. In a remarkable April meeting, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) encouraged them to work with Rep. Dave Camp (R-Mich.), chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, which oversees unemployment insurance.

Instead, Camp is pursuing a bill that would give states the option to spend federal unemployment dollars on paying down debt instead of paying for extended unemployment benefits.

I’ll bet that’s both hunky and dory with HeadedWest though….

Though you will notice that NC is the exception among the southern states. And all those figures are the maximums per week and a lot of folks don’t come near the maximums

I love it how the troll quotes someone saying he turned down a job because the wages were less than UI and then thinks that UI is the problem. Hysterical.

Could you live on $310 a week? I sure as shit couldn’t. And yes, people are actually owed more money for the same work. They are entitled to it, and that is not a dirty word. Some people are getting obscenely wealthy off stealing labor while the workers are on food stamps. The rich and the wages their enterprises pay are the problem, not UI.

But if he were smart enough to understand that nobody would have to tell him.

I was two dollars below the maximum allowable and grossed about 390 per week, roughly half what I had been making.

But, the unemployed, they’re being coddled… lol. I know I shouldn’t bite, but some things just get my goat. I’m in my fifties and have at least my early retirement though I needed to work another 5 years to pay off my mortgage, etc. So I’m coming up short each month and have tried to find a menial job locally to bridge the gap. Nobody’s hiring 50+ year olds. Even if I would apply for physically taxing jobs, no one will hire me due to my age. But, believe me, for every unemployed worker interviewed saying he won’t take a lower paying job, there’s thousands who will. (No link to that, just my personal experience.)

Yeah, I was going to say I got $400 a week for UI last year, so I can see someone who made more than I did when I lost my job ($32,000ish) could get $450.

You’re definitely in the wrong state. Move to Minnesota. The air is cleaner here and we’d love to have you.

Hi! Let’s see if my greeting gets moderated!

At this point, I’d love to move but there would have to be guaranteed job waiting. Unlike HeadedWest, I don’t have the resources to move 2,000 miles.

That is the threshold – at least as explained to me way back when I had my first layoff. UC paid 50% of your average weekly salary up to the maximum but as many can attest, that maximum in a lot of states is far less than 50% of their former wages.

That’s why the BS merchants who call it “a paid vacation” are really full of shit

This is Obama not giving a fuck what a DFH thinks.

Yeah, when I say “roughly” I mean less than half and that of course didn’t include medical, vacation, etc.

Shit I only got 1 5th of my pay when I was unemployed here in CA… Sure as hell sucked but it did help us get by…

How goes it Peg? Hope things are looking up for you..

Yeah, I’ve seen you discuss this before. My heart really goes out to you.

I was unemployed all of last year except January and February, found temp work two weeks into this year that I’m still doing. It’s ok, but it’s still temp work with no benefits. And the only reason I can find stuff like this is that I’m 28, so I’m young enough that I’ve never been in a good economy with my college degree and I’m cheaper than the 40 something laid off folks. I’m extremely cognizant of this and I know that if I stay here staying employed well enough to get by will get harder as I get older.

So I’m going to work on leaving. Only I have nowhere to go because we exported this model all over the world before it boomeranged back home.

Fuck our lives, friend.

You’re definitely in the wrong state. Move to Minnesota. The air is cleaner here and we’d love to have you.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way. If the work had been done in Texas and you then move to another state, all you can do is file against the Texas wages and you get paid the Texas amounts.

Although that did work out for me as the last time, I moved to Florida after the layoff but was given an option of filing against Colorado and NY because of the earnings. NY paid more so I was able to file against the NY earnings so it worked out for me.

Unfortunately no, things are looking pretty grim right now. I was going to comment on this upthread but I decided not to. Don’t want to sound like a drama queen.

We’re at the mercy of the oligarchy here. Is this really the campaign message the White House wants to send to the working people in the state?

I assume, BT, that this question is rhetorical??? Because, clearly, the answer is a resounding Yes!!! And one can then add the traditional Cheney response: SO??!!??

Why are we bothering with elections? what a farce and waste of time. Yes, I know elections are big dollars for corporate media that carry water for politicians and the two party system.

i think we need to get rid of elections and have computer generated results. Oh wait we already do that?

I may disagree with many of the policies he never lived up to, but I do not disagree that he has to raise $$$$ because of the Citizen’s United case.

You know what they are going to throw at his re-election. I just wished somehow we can get back to McCain-Feingold legislation someday (or better).

I also hopes that since he will not run again, that he uses his second term to tighten up the reigns of Corporate run Feudalism in America.

I may disagree with many of the policies he never lived up to, but I do not disagree that he has to raise $$$$ because of the Citizen’s United case.

Which I conceded in the first sentence. Raise lots of money, sure. But a $50K benefit…in Austin? New York, maybe. But *Austin*?

I don’t think that’s very smart.

Good luck with that. Listening to the radio this afternoon (on my way home), it sounds like Obama is shutting down, downtown Austin. I left work early to avoid it all together. Pathetic. Hey, come to our city so you can make everyone irritated at your presence. Absolutely fantastic.

Heh, yeah. I’m doing that with my family right now. It’s going to cost around $8,000, all told.

I’m sure most long-term unemployed folks have $8,000 laying around.

Heh.

Had forgotten about the Cheney quote — thanks.

Are you referring to migrant apple picking? I guess this would qualify as the new economy.

Hey, Jodo, if you are one of the chronically unemployed, then YES, that could be your new economy for now. You can drive a school bus, work at one of the large retailers, be a crossing guard, pick fruit, work on a farm..oh yea, aren’t you people (the holdover hippies) the ones who raved about living off of the land? Sounds like a good job for all of you.
But getting the working taxpayer to pay 99 weeks of unemployment is just too easy.

I very much doubt I’ll be able to put my plan into action, but it would be sooo satisfying if i could (never got the opportunity to flip off either Bush), but who knows, I may end up in Guantanamo…

Obama certainly has the reverse Midas touch. Nothing like making the worst rush hour traffic in the state even more miserable.

Uh, I saw this late but I wanted to be on record on the thread as saying I didn’t mean that Margaret could actually move to Minnesota and just start collecting unemployment. Like, at all.

I think she could probably find a job here after a while, too.

I’m just a homer. I want smart people to move here.

I read somewhere, maybe here at FDL, something to the effect that a wingnut would rather live in a cardboard box and roast sparrows over a scrapwood fire than pay *anything* that might be used someday by some “unworthy” person.

I am reminded of that here. What horrible, narrow, mean-spirited lives these folks live, constantly fearing that something, somewhere, might be done for someone they dislike.

I feel sorry for all our little trolls, because they are so miserable. Mind you, I think they’re terribly wrong and destructive.