Between 2008 And 2010, 30 Big Corporations Spent More Lobbying Washington Than They Paid In Income Taxes

A report released this month by Public Campaign demonstrates just how important it is for Americans to battle corporate special interests and reclaim our democracy.

The group’s research finds that thirty big corporations actually spent more money lobbying the federal government between 2008 and 2010 than they spent in taxes. For example, General Electric — one of the top 10 most profitable companies in the world — got a net tax rebate of $4.7 billion during this period.

Meanwhile, it spent $84 million lobbying the federal government.

Think Progress: Between 2008 And 2010, 30 Big Corporations Spent More Lobbying Washington Than They Paid In Income Taxes

Postal Service Cuts Could !nterfere With Elections, Delay Vote By Mail Ballots

With Con­gress debat­ing plans to shut down post offices and pos­si­bly elim­i­nate Sat­ur­day mail deliv­ery, some elec­tion offi­cials are wor­ried that bring­ing the U.S. Postal Ser­vice out of the red could harm elec­tion pro­ce­dures — per­haps even in time for the Novem­ber 2012 pres­i­den­tial election.

In Novem­ber the Postal Ser­vice announced it lost $5.1 bil­lion in fis­cal 2011, not includ­ing the man­dated $5.5 bil­lion owed to the fed­eral gov­ern­ment to pre­fund retiree health ben­e­fit payments. For the ser­vice to return to prof­itabil­ity, it must cut $20 bil­lion by 2015.

Sen­ate leg­is­la­tion would pro­tect Sat­ur­day ser­vice for the next two years, but a House bill would per­mit a reduc­tion to five-day-per-week mail deliv­ery six months after enact­ment. The Postal Ser­vice has said it intends to cut Sat­ur­day ser­vice unless Con­gress requires it to continue.

Steve Mon­teith, the Postal Service’s man­ager of trans­ac­tion cor­re­spon­dence, said tak­ing away Sat­ur­day deliv­ery or shut­ting post office doors could force elec­tion offi­cials to send bal­lots out a day ear­lier to make sure they arrive on time.

Cal­i­for­nia Repub­li­can Rep. Dar­rell Issa, who chairs the House Over­sight and Gov­ern­ment Reform Com­mit­tee, co-sponsored the House bill. The service’s finan­cial losses, he said, put elec­tions at risk.

“Fun­da­men­tal reforms are needed to pro­tect the finan­cial via­bil­ity of the United States Postal Ser­vice, includ­ing its ser­vices that are inte­gral to vot­ing,” Issa said.

Full Arti­cle: The Daily Caller.

Who Killed the Postal Service?

The Postal Service just announced roughly $3 billion in service cuts that will slow down the delivery of first-class mail for the first time in 40 years. Starting in April, it plans to shutter more than half of its 461 mail processing centers, stretching out the time it will take to ship everything from Netflix DVDs to magazines. One-day delivery of stamped envelopes will all but certainly become a thing of the past.

The announcement is just the latest sign of a sad and increasingly dire fact: the Postal Service is in shambles. This past fiscal year, it lost a mere $5.1 billion. In 2012, it's facing a record $14.1 billion shortfall and possible bankruptcy. In order to turn a profit, Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe says the agency needs to cut $20 billion from its annual budget by 2015. That's almost a third of its yearly costs.

How did it come to this?

The culprits include the Internet, labor expenses, and, as with pretty much every problem our country faces now, Congress.

Obama's Kansas Speech a Game-Changer

The Democratic Strategist

WaPo columnist Greg Sargent takes a look at President Obama's speech in Osawatomie Kansas, and finds it to be a critical point of departure, "a moral and philosophical framework within which literally all of the political and policy battles of the next year will unfold, including the biggest one of all: The presidential campaign itself." Citing Obama's emphasis on "inequality itself as a moral scourge and as a threat to the country's future," Sargent continues:

Obama's speech in Kansas, which just concluded, was the most direct condemnation of wealth and income inequality, and the most expansive moral defense of the need for government activism to combat it, that Obama has delivered in his career...

The clash of visions Obama tried to set the stage for today -- a philosophical and moral argument over government's proper role in regulating the economy and restoring our future -- is seen by Dems as more favorable to them than the GOP's preferred frame for Campaign 2012, i.e., a referendum on the current state of the economy and on Obama's efforts to fix it. Hence his constant references to the morality of "fairness."

"We simply cannot return to this brand of you're-on-your-own economics if we're serious about rebuilding the middle class in this country," Obama said, in what will probably be the most enduring line of the speech. A number of people on Twitter immediately suggested a new shorthand: "YoYo Economics."

That line is key in another way. Dems believe inequality will be central in 2012 because they think there's been a fundamental shift in how Americans view the economy, one rooted in the plight of the middle class and in the trauma created by the financial crisis.

A New York Times editorial affirms Sargent's evaluation of the President's speech:

Report: Corporate America Is Sitting On The Solution To The Jobs Crisis

Last September this news blog posted an article saying:

American corporations are holding more cash on their balance sheets than at any time in nearly a half century, as they continue to save instead of investing or hiring workers, according to a Federal Reserve report released last Friday. At the same time, Republican presidential candidates and corporate leaders continue to lobby for lower corporate tax rates and huge corporate tax giveaways under the guise that they will lead to higher rates of job creation.

According to the report, non-financial corporations held more than $2 trillion in cash at the end of June, a $88 billion jump since the end of March. Cash holdings made up 7.1 percent of all company assets, the highest level since 1963.

According to a new report from a group of University of Massachusetts economists America's largest banks and non-financial companies are now sitting on $3.6 trillion in cash. If banks and non-financial companies would stop hoarding the $3.6 trillion in cash they have accumulated and move it into productive investments, the report estimates that about 19 million jobs would be created in the next three years, lowering the unemployment rate to under 5 percent.

"There is no reason that the U.S. needs to remain stuck in a long-term unemployment crisis," Robert Pollin, lead author of the report and co-director of the Political Economy Research Institute, said in a statement accompanying the report's release Tuesday.

"Getting the banks and corporations to move their hoards into productive investments and job creation requires carrots and sticks -- policies such as a new round of government spending stimulus as well as taxes on the banks' excess reserves -- that can both strengthen overall market demand and unlock credit markets for small businesses," Pollin said.

Obama Addresses Issues In Terms Of Basic Fairness

The "Occupy" movement has changed our country’s political conversation. One only needs to listen to the speech Pres. Barack Obama gave in Osawatomie, Kansas, today, to understand how the conversation has changed since the GOP controlled House twice threatened to shut down government earlier this year in the Republican bid to make draconian cuts to Social Security and Medicare.

For much of 2011, Obama’s speeches followed the Tea Party controlled Republican Party's lead on draconian cuts to federal safety-net programs for seniors and veterans. Today the central theme of Obama’s speech was income inequality—and how this mounting problem weakens our economy and our democracy. At long last, the president sounded like he was channeling his inner Elizabeth Warren.

Robert Reich: "The President’s speech today in Osawatomie, Kansas — where Teddy Roosevelt gave his “New Nationalism” speech in 1910 — is the most important economic speech of his presidency in terms of connecting the dots, laying out the reasons behind our economic and political crises, and asserting a willingness to take on the powerful and the privileged that have gamed the system to their advantage."

President Barack Obama promotes an economy and a government that works for the 99 percent in a speech on Tuesday, Dec. 6, 2011, at Osawatomie High School in Osawatomie, Kan. To read the prepared text click here.

Obama’s pivot away from the GOP's austerity orthodoxy and toward public investment began with his jobs speech in September.

Since his September "jobs speech" Obama has continued to sharpened his populist focus in response to pressure from Occupy Wall Street.

Obama is again sounding like a progressive tackling issues in terms of basic fairness and attacking the GOP’s brand of conservative “your-on-your-own economics” in a much more direct way.

Obama called for a new approach to addressing America’s current economic challenges. In calling for a new approach Obama fires a shot across the bow of 30 years of conservative economic theory; Trickle down economics, the conservative theory embraced by Ronald Reagan and virtually every conservative since, “doesn’t work,” Obama declared. And even as conservatives have clung to the idea in the face of overwhelming evidence against it, “it has never worked,” Obama added:

'Obamacare' To The Rescue

A woman who believed the GOP Obamacare negative propaganda was so upset with President Obama for having "let down the struggling middle class" that she switched her registration from Democrat to Independent and altered her Obama bumpers sticker to read "Got Nope" is apologizing to the President. She says that while she was angered by Obama's plan, she's suddenly come to appreciate it, now that she's benefitting from it personally.

Two years ago, Spike Dolomite Ward and her husband had to choose between paying their mortgage or keeping their health insurance. They kept the house, and now at 49 Ward has been diagnosed with breast cancer. She didn't know how she'd afford months of expensive treatment, until he discovered the Pre-existing Condition Insurance Plan, which is part of Obama's healthcare plan. Now she's publicly "outed" herself in the hopes that she can teach ObamaCare opponents that the uninsured aren't just lazy freeloaders. She writes:

LA Times

I want to apologize to President Obama. But first, some background.

I found out three weeks ago I have cancer. I'm 49 years old, have been married for almost 20 years and have two kids. My husband has his own small computer business, and I run a small nonprofit in the San Fernando Valley. I am also an artist. Money is tight, and we don't spend it frivolously. We're just ordinary, middle-class people, making an honest living, raising great kids and participating in our community, the kids' schools and church.

We're good people, and we work hard. But we haven't been able to afford health insurance for more than two years. And now I have third-stage breast cancer and am facing months of expensive treatment.

ObamaCare’s Hidden Time Bomb That Benefits Every Insured American

PoliticusUSA

There are times that the title of legislation does not adequately describe the nature and purpose of a law that leads to confusion and uncertainty in the population. In March 2010, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was signed into law and over this past weekend, one specific provision of the law went into effect and it epitomizes the meaning of the law irrespective of all the other benefits to Americans. All at once, the law’s detractors on the professional left and wary Americans will see immediate benefits that will change the nature of health care insurance for the better and it has the potential to push health care in America toward a single-payer, universal care system.

The provision that seemed to be buried in the extensive law, the medical loss ratio, requires health insurance companies to spend 80-85% of consumer’s premiums on real medical care and not overhead, profits, or marketing expenses. If insurers fail to meet the requirement, they are bound by the law to send rebate checks to consumers “representing the amount in which they underspend on actual medical care.” Now, before any conservative or naysayer claims the provision is not workable or true, California school teachers began receiving their rebate checks on Friday for premiums they paid that were not used for medical care. According to a report in Forbes, “This is the true ‘bomb’ contained in Obamacare and the one item that will have more impact on the future of how medical care is paid for in this country than anything we’ve seen in quite some time.”

Nomination Race Hurting GOP, But Not Helping Obama

Pew Research Center: As the fight for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination unfolds, more Americans say their impression of the GOP field is worsening than improving. Those views, however, have not resulted in a better view of President Barack Obama at this point.

By a margin of two-to-one, more say that their impression of the GOP field is getting worse (31%) than getting better (14%). Half (50%) say their impression remains the same as they learn more about the Republican candidates.

About one-in-five (19%) say their impression of Obama has improved as they learn more about the Republicans. About as many (21%) say that the GOP campaign is worsening their impression of the president. Most (58%) say the Republicans have had no effect on their feelings about Obama.

The negative margin in evaluations of the GOP field rises to three-to-one (29% worse vs. 10% better) among independents, according to the latest national survey by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press and The Washington Post, conducted Dec. 1-4 among 1,008 adults. Still, more than half (55%) say their impression is unchanged.

Only Republicans are more likely to say their impression of the field is improving (30%) rather than getting worse (8%).

Nearly six-in-ten (58%) say their take hasn’t changed. Last month, about half of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents (48%) said they saw the field as excellent or good; about as many (46%) said they saw the candidates as a group as only fair or poor. (See “Obama Job Approval Improves, GOP Contest Remains Fluid.”)

Among independents, 14% say the GOP campaign has improved their impression of Obama while 20% say it has made them more critical of the president. Nearly two-thirds (64%) say their opinion remains the same.

More than a third of Democrats (36%) say the GOP campaign has made them feel better about Obama, while 6% say it has made them feel worse. Most (56%) say their impression of the president has not been changed as they learn more about the Republican candidates.

From the Pew Research Center.

Tammy Baldwin Delivers Passionate Defense Of Progressivism

The typical political Democratic consultant today has simple advice for almost candidate these: Run to the middle, and whatever you do, don't let your opponent smear you as a liberal.

Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.), running for Wisconsin's open U.S. Senate seat, suggested Democrats should ignore that "centrist" conventional wisdom.

In a speech at the Nation Institute's annual dinner -- which helps support one of the most liberal publications in the country -- Baldwin delivered an unapologetic defense of progressivism and its contribution to America.

"It's not that we've forgotten how to create wealth in this country. It's that we have allowed that wealth to be concentrated in fewer and fewer hands. And as the distance between top and bottom has widened, the bonds between us have stretched -- and broken," she said.

During her speech, Baldwin pointed to the "proud progressive tradition" in her own state as a model of what the movement can accomplish.

"Wisconsin was one of the first states to guarantee access to a free public education," she said. "We were the first state to ratify the 19th amendment allowing women the right to vote. We were the first to protect gays and lesbians from workplace discrimination. Wisconsin was the first state to grant collective bargaining rights to public employees. We invited workers' compensation. We invited unemployment insurance. But recently, that progressive tradition has come under attack by extremists."

Democrats Planning Major Voter Education Effort To Counter Voter ID Laws

Huffington Post

Democrats said last Thursday they are planning a major effort to protect voting rights in the 2012 election after several states passed voter photo identification laws and restrictions on early voting and same day registration.

Concerned over what they call voter suppression efforts in states, party officials said they were organizing on a number of fronts to, educate voters on the types of documents necessary to vote and pursue lawsuits if necessary.

A new website, ProtectingtheVote.org, makes the case that actual instances of voter fraud are rare, despite Republicans’ success in passing stricter laws to combat fraud in dozens of states. Democrats accuse the GOP of trying to stifle minority votes as a way to win elections. The site and an accompanying report, “A Reversal in Progress,” are the first step in an “unprecedented voter protection effort,” DNC Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz (picture above right) said during a conference call.

"We have a history of challenging these matters in court if need be. We'll be more than prepared to continue that into the future," said Will Crossley, the Democratic National Committee's counsel and director of voter protection.

Kansas, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Wisconsin have passed laws this year requiring photo ID to vote.

NBC | As 2012 Turnout Battle Brews, Justice Department Eyes Voter ID Laws

If it’s pres­i­den­tial cam­paign sea­son, it must be time for another furor over voter fraud and voter suppression. As the Democ­rats did in 2008, they are again charg­ing that Repub­li­cans are try­ing to use photo iden­ti­fi­ca­tion laws and other changes in elec­tion laws to win­now out would-be Demo­c­ra­tic voters.

The dif­fer­ence this time: six more states have enacted laws, or strength­ened their exist­ing laws, requir­ing vot­ers to show a form of photo iden­ti­fi­ca­tion such as a driver’s license in order to cast a ballot. The stand­out among the new voter ID states: Wis­con­sin, which may have a recall elec­tion next year for Repub­li­can Gov. Scott Walker. It also has a mar­quee Sen­ate race and will likely be a bat­tle­ground in the pres­i­den­tial race.

Last week Demo­c­ra­tic National Com­mit­tee chair­woman Rep. Deb­bie Wasser­man Schultz launched a new mobi­liza­tion effort, say­ing, “Repub­li­cans across the coun­try have engaged in a full-scale attack on the right to vote, seek­ing ways to restrict or limit vot­ers’ abil­ity to cast their bal­lots for their own par­ti­san advantage.”

The strat­egy, she con­tended, dis­pro­por­tion­ally affects African-Americans, Lati­nos, and young peo­ple and could “skew the 2012 pres­i­den­tial elec­tion in the Repub­li­cans’ favor.”

Assis­tant Attor­ney for Civil Rights Thomas Perez said last week that Jus­tice Depart­ment lawyers are review­ing some of the recently-enacted state laws to ensure that they com­ply with the Vot­ing Rights Act and do not have “a racially dis­crim­i­na­tory pur­pose or dis­crim­i­na­tory effect.”

Advocates of broader voting rights are looking forward to a speech on voting next week by Attorney General Eric Holder. “We’ve been pushing him hard to do that because we think it is a national crisis,” said Laura Murphy, the director of the Washington Legislative Office of the American Civil Liberties Union. “The big question is what will the Justice Department do – and that’s why we’re so excited about the attorney general’s upcoming speech.”

Democrats confront one big obstacle: the Supreme Court, in a 6-3 decision handed down in 2008 and written by Justice John Paul Stevens, upheld Indiana’s photo identification law. “There is no question about the legitimacy or importance of the State’s interest in counting only the votes of eligible voters,” Stevens said. The decision left open the possibility that future plaintiffs could try to show that, as applied in specific cases, a voter ID law is unconstitutional.

Full Arti­cle: NBC Pol­i­tics — As 2012 turnout bat­tle brews, Jus­tice Dept. eyes voter ID laws.