Associated Press
Protesters outside Romney's fundraisers at the Hamptons.
Imagine if Thurston Howell III and C. Montgomery Burns were real people. Then imagine they were attending a fundraiser for Mitt Romney in the Hamptons. Then imagine they spoke to reporters about why, exactly, they want to see President Obama defeated.
It turns out, you don't actually have to imagine any of this, because yesterday, it actually happened. The multi-millionaire Republican -- dodging questions about his controversial shell corporation in Bermuda, hidden cash in the Caymans, and inexplicable Swiss bank account -- thought it'd be a good idea to spend the day in the Hamptons, attending several posh fundraisers with the hyper-elite, including an event at David Koch's home.
I couldn't make up stuff like this if I tried.
A New York City donor a few cars back, who also would not give her name, said Romney needed to do a better job connecting. "I don't think the common person is getting it," she said from the passenger seat of a Range Rover stamped with East Hampton beach permits. "Nobody understands why Obama is hurting them.
"We've got the message," she added. "But my college kid, the baby sitters, the nails ladies -- everybody who's got the right to vote -- they don't understand what's going on. I just think if you're lower income -- one, you're not as educated, two, they don't understand how it works, they don't understand how the systems work, they don't understand the impact."
I'm not sure which of those sentences is the most ridiculous. Let's call it a tie.
The L.A. Times report quoted another wealthy Romney donor saying, "It's not helping the economy to pit the people who are the engine of the economy against the people who rely on that engine." Apparently, asking the rich to pay the same tax rate they paid in the Clinton era is making wealthy people feel put upon. (Matt Yglesias also highlighted "the absurd level of self-regard among the winners in the modern American meritocracy.")
The New York Times report quoted Ted Conklin, the owner of the American Hotel in Sag Habor, speaking from inside his gold-colored Mercedes, whined that the president "is a socialist." At his wife's urging, Conklin then boasted that a Hollywood executive was staying on his 75-foot yacht because his hotel was fully booked.
I don't generally get nauseous reading the news. There are exceptions.
It's one thing to know Romney, worth a quarter of a billion dollars, is a hopelessly out-of-touch elitist, who enjoys the support of other hopelessly out-of-touch elitists. But the larger political context almost reads like a Dickens novel on acid -- the "nails ladies" are uneducated, so they're inclined to vote for the president, despite his tendencies to hurt rich people's feelings.
Keep in mind, under Obama, these hyper-wealthy Romney donors are doing great. Their stock portfolios are strong; they still have plenty of servants and "nails ladies"; and their tax burdens haven't increased at all. Despite the brutal recession that began in late 2007, the folks who showed up to shower riches onto Romney have fared extremely well in recent years.
But they're not happy. There's a Democratic president who's too busy championing the interests of the middle class to think about their feelings, so it's time to elect Mr. Car Elevator, who may not appeal to the riff raff, but who "understands how it works."
What does "it" refer to? I haven't the foggiest idea, but I'm sure if I was allowed into one of these donor's country clubs, someone would try to explain it to me.
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"It" is how power really works.
"Let them eat cake"
"We don't pay taxes. Only the little people pay taxes..."
Ah! slappy when I read that womans comment I thought - they've reincarnated Leona Helmsley! She's alive and well and slithering her way through the hamptons.
The Leonas you will always have with you.
I hear that the hair-dresser the woman quoted above goes to is getting a new-fangled, high-tech razor for the shop.
Yea? How about "OFF WITH THEIR HEADS". Really...
Are their 'nail ladies' legal or are they ok because they are not Hispanic? The attitudes posted are reminiscent of the old French aristocracy. They are so out of touch with daily life for many Americans. Few of the ultra-wealthy will take the time to know let alone to care before it is too late. Madam DeFarge will again begin to knit.
I am completely convinced that the political situation in the US has reached the point where it is inevitable that people will die because of it...many people. The only question is who.
They've decided that they don't have any use for FDR, so 1933 is right out. That leaves 1793.
You people should respect your betters. I mean after all if not for the wealthy who would hie all those illegals as gardeners and maids? Imagine how bad things would be in China and Viet Nam if the rich corporations did not hire all those communists at slave wages.
Now get to work and pay your taxes because we need to re-nourish those private beaches.
We do -- or at least the ones who win the big lotteries.
This would make an excellent A or B block segment. The ridiculous disparities between rich and poor were never more obvious in this country and need to be addressed. Hammered, actually. So many middle-class and economically "inferior"
servantspeople actually intend to vote for this man. Against their own interests. And gladly.Progressives stand to lose not only the election, but democracy if we do not speak out against Mitt Romney.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/26/opinion/the-rich-get-even-richer.html?_r=1
It's outrageous! That seven percent of income growth that went to the bottom 99% is rightfully ours and that awful Obama person is keeping if from us! To the barricades! (No, no darling, not the Mercedes. At a barricade? That's just tacky. One drives one's Land Rover to a barricade.)
Oh deary me the neighbors are driving an armored Hummer.
Mr. Car Elevator says he's lowering taxes by 20%. Does that include the middle class? I thought that was just for the rich & corporations.
The bit I liked on This Week was the little riff by Steve Rattner on how Romney can't talk about his plan because people won't like it! He can't say how the tax cut will be paid for, he's privatizing medicare with the voucher program, he's cutting programs like food stamps by 30%.
What does "it" refer to? I haven't the foggiest idea,
I know exactly what they mean by "it." They genuinely believe in trickle-down economics. As far as Romney supporters are concerned, simply continue to enrich the rich, and the country will be better off for it.
Well, the part that counts will be anyway.
There you go, we are uneducated, too stupid to understand that we have to cut the taxes of upper levels so they will grace us with a low paying job, Oh, we can beg the doctor to get their child's medicine.
Don't they see the burden on "us" if "we" have to get them heath insurance? We cannot have our nails done and cars washed or have them serve us crab cakes at Buffy's catered debutant party.
Biff has the polo match where we rub elbows and discuss high capital gains tax rates are forcing us to open numbered accounts.
The bigger problem is this:The Private Sector fallacy has penetrated our collective conscience.The myth that businesses create jobs.
Example: Comcast has 10million customers and one hundred thousand workers.
If say directv comes along and offers a better deal with a comparable or superior quality and 4million of Comcast customers decided to move to directv.
Question:Would Comcast keep its one hundred thousand workers?absolutely not.
Businesses are profit making entities period.It's because day in day out we hear job creators job creators that these people would have the braggadocio to be expounding rubbish like these.
Consumers are the REAL JOB CREATORS.i wish the mass would understand this.
Speaking of the Hamptons, there is an interesting piece over at http://www.motherjones.com/
It seems that the NEW nouveau riche are annoying the OLD nouveau riche with their helicopter commuting from Wall Street. Some people do NOT know their place!
Always nice to be reminded that there is no connection whatsoever between the brain and the billfold. I'm reminded of that every day I drive over Coldwater Canyon from the Valley to Beverly Hills.
As an historian, I never thought I'd see my country go from the equivalent of the Rome of the Punic Wars (us in WW2) to the Rome of the Caesars in one still-incomplete lifetime.
Amazing,the disdain that rich bitch has for the middle class.I hope her college age son gives her a swift kick in the ass and her nail girl files through to her diinty little finger.BITCH!
Class Warfare at it's finest. Apparently all the education their money bought, must have been enough for them to at leat comprehend what Mitt talks about at his level.
We see bull@!$%# for what it is, they see gilt fecal frisbees and call us, uneducated?
The revolution will be televised.
"all the education their money bought"
And there lies one of the many problems.
Being an educated person is about understanding and learning, things that are earned.
If wealthy conservatives can afford to pony up millions into Mitt’s election coffers, then they certainly shouldn’t have any qualms about a relatively (historically) small increase in their taxes. "It" or "Mitt", no difference.
Every working class American should be offended by those comments and the sentiments behind them - they epitomize romney and his campaign. It should be a clear wake up call for working class republicans, but my bet is they don't have the self-respect to be insulted.
If the Democrats don't seize on this woman's horrifying quote, they are missing a major opportunity. The candor of this 1%er is amazing not only for what it reveals about the attitudes of the rich toward the rest, but also because it shows how insulated the rich are, since she obviously would never dream that such an statement could ever harm her candidate.
The assumption that money will buy the election for Romney may not be true, no amount of spending can really sell a defective product. Ask Ford about the Edsel. (with thanks to Harvey Weinstein).
" I just think if you're lower income -- one, you're not as educated, two, they don't understand how it works, they don't understand how the systems work, they don't understand the impact." Somehow I think Seattle and Portland (as the cities with the highest percentage of college degrees) would disagree with her. MY question is how did she get HER money? Did she marry it or make it on her own? OK bitchy I know but some of these people...
She made her money the old fashioned way! She inherited it.
As opposed to those making their billions the new fashioned way, by stealing it.
Isn't she also saying "poor people should have no vote" by saying those things about understanding how the system works?
It's fair to say that businesses are the engine of the economy but to say we are dependent on the engine is nonsense. What this arrogant gas bag fails to grasp is that we are the fuel for that engine. Without us, it ain't going nowhere.
They might be the engine, but we're the body and frame... and give me a pulley and some tools, and I can replace an engine.
As I see it, there are three or four elements. Consumers, employees and employers. They only see their own element, but without the others (even i you are self employed someone needs employees to accomplish things) there is no ecnomomy. Also, the regulating and taxpayer funded services and roads people so easily forget. Education, roads, utilities, police, fire department, deed recorders, court personnel, etc.
Oh, and of course the military. Look at all that, plus government contracts. But the rich and business people got everything all on their own. Who doesn't "get it"?
They are mixing up cause and effect.
The engine of the economy is always people.
Companies, big and small, rely on the work of people to produce wealth to the owners.
Wealth is created by mining materials, refining them, transforming and using them and the people at the top think wealth is created by investing in stocks and getting dividends and selling them at a profit.
When they think of workers they think of costs, not of assets for the production process, on the knowledge the different people bring to the company. That is why it is so easy to fire. That is how Romney comes up with things like "I like to be able to fire people".
They also assume competition is the solution for everything because they have no concept of quality evaluation and control - if those were applied to them they would all be fired from their jobs for gross incompetence, while instead they get to change the rules to get bonuses for failure.
when you first read the article, you think it's from The Onion.
Abso-freaking-lutely.
Saturday Night Live writers are probably busy just writing down everything and thinking of how harder it will be this year compared to 4 years ago when they had less to choose from.
Here's all you have to know: they watch Fox.
They're as clueless as to their own good fortune and luck as they are on fundamental economics, public policy, and history. In essence, they're as dumb as the Useful Idiots that keep them puffed up there on their economic high perches.
Nauseating is not a strong enough word.
"I ain't got a hell of a lot of respec' for 'em now," said Muley. "On'y kind a gover'ment we got that leans on us fellas is the 'safe margin a profit.' There's one thing that got me stumped, an' that's Willy Feeley--drivin' that cat' an gonna be a straw boss on lan' his own floks used to farm. That worries me. I can see how a fella might come from some other place an' not know no better, but Willy belongs. Worried me so I went went up to 'im and ast 'im. Right off he got mad........."What happens to other folks is their look-out,' he says. Seems like he's 'shamed, so he gets mad." Steinbeck, Grapes of Wrath
It's the Willy Feeley's who depend on the pompous rich and drive down wage standards. This rural voting block could sway the election when they are paid to vote.
How Republicans Collapsed the Economy
Click here for references.
Republican Immigration Policy caused The Great Recession.
Real estate value represents over half of accumulated US wealth, and real estate value depends upon population.
Wealth is destroyed when real estate abandonment becomes common, and real estate is abandoned only when population declines.
The most important changes are periods of unusually high unemployment and poverty. California personal value dropped from 2007 for the first time since 1938 (Legislative Analysis Office, California, 2009).
Every period of economic decline corresponds with population decline.
These are as follows.
Illegal immigrants contribute about $200 billion in GSP across the entire US right now. That consumer demand employs about 10 million US residents.
Three important events occur from 2000 to 2006 during the Bush presidency.
These regulatory changes cause real estate prices and stock prices to skyrocket as investors borrow as much money as is possible. The Bush legislation in 2003 legalizes predatory lending, which is intended to restore economic losses that followed the attack of September 11, 2001 (usury decriminalized).
This deregulation creates rapid economic growth. Illegal immigrants flood into the country at the highest rate since the Mexican Revolution. A construction boom begins in the American south and west as hundreds of thousands of excess dwellings are constructed.
The following begins in 2006.
The Mexican economy improves in 2007, and the US population begins to decline. Population decline creates over a million extra dwelling vacancies by 2009.
Real estate prices plummet in 2007 and a foreclosure boom begins in 2008 as foreclosure rates increase by 400%.
Pres. Bush finally realizes the magnitude of the coming disaster caused by eliminating depression era financial regulations. Bush signs the Emergency Mortgage Loan Modification Act of 2007 in an attempt to prevent the coming banking system collapse, but it is too late.
Real estate value depends upon people to demand dwellings in which to live (US Census Bureau).
Immigration departing the US accounts for a drop of about 1.6% in the population in less than 2 years.
Each US resident creates consumer demand for real estate, vehicles, food, and consumer goods, and that consumer demand includes illegal immigrants.
The illegal immigrant population of Arizona produced $42 billion in GSP during 2008, and immigrant population decline is one of the underlying causes for economic collapse in the American south and west (Immigration Policy Center, 2011).
Birth nearly equals mortality during this period, so this population change is entirely due to migration that contributes the following to the US economy.
The following shows how migration contributed to part of the decline in US real estate values, which collapses real estate value in the American south and west.
The resulting foreclosure boom and real estate collapse in 2007 leaves inadequate asset recovery from foreclosure sales, which reduces bank assets to dangerously low levels.
There is no recession in Texas which encourages immigration.
Banks issue margin calls for stock market investments to cover lending losses in an attempt to avoid bankruptcy.
Margin calls result in rapid trading that collapses the stock market. Over 60% of value is lost from 2007 to 2009 as the population declines.
Investment firms, banks, and businesses lose sufficient capitol that they cannot cover the losses, and the US government is forced to issues loans in order to prevent total economic collapse and double digit unemployment.
This chain of events halts the startup of new businesses, at the same time that millions of jobs are lost in manufacturing, real estate, construction, finance, and investment.
Departure of 5 million immigrants raised unemployment by about 4 million from 2007 to 2009.
A return of 2.6 million immigrants reduced unemployment by about 2 million from 2009 to 2011.
http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/Aliens.aspx
This also relates to chicken or the egg question.
We need demand first, then someone recognizes demand and creates jobs. When there are more people, more demand. Less people, less demand.
People need to know baby boomers created a whole lot of demand, just look at how the ads pander to us. Music, cars, medical, long term care, there is more ED medication than I ever care to see. People, the Boomers brought demand, the immigrants bring demand, especially in housing. No truer words, more people, more demand, but without income and economy, there are more needy people.
It's true that people want to buy stuff and they will if they have jobs, but these rich folks would rather hoard than spend because spending or investing might make it look good for Democratic President and they have pay a fairer tax or contribute something after getting theirs.
All those donations... each plate/ticket could employ one or even two persons for a year, as the sign says. The economy would spike, but they would rather win an election or hoard money.
These people (J.P. Morgan Chase/Carlyle Group, etc.) created the problem and they need to bite down on something, because it should hurt them.
I wonder if those folks in the picture protesting the fundraiser in the Hamptons were also protesting in Chicago and Hollywood (and Switzerland) during the 5 figure a plate fundraisers for President Obama? That photo along with the post, shows how divided we are getting AND how both sides only see things that favor their stance/status. The whole truth is not really discussed by either side on almost any topic.
I wish we could get somewhere doing that, skip. But when you try to get the poor to carry the rich, it just rings hollow when the rich want to say they are paying too much and they have made out like bandits on this scheme.
The country IS divided and the rhetoric of blaming working people just seems so distorted. We will do better if we try to help with jobs, but there is one side saying they need their Mitt blankies with Ryan cutting Medicare and jobs.
I admit Obama does big fundraisers, but he is trying to do what helps working people, not just the top tier and let it trickle on our heads. People need health care, government needs to spend less on health care. So, Mitt and chorus sings to repeal this law that is constitutionally upheld.
Unfortunately, the election spending is where we are. I hope to see the wasteful nature of all this and people do not reward most spending with most votes. I dream of that being true. I wish all that money would be able to go to poor and needy because I surely cannot help them all.
Sandy, you're asking Skip to do nuance. The right wing doesn't have the neural capacity to do nuance. If your short term memory can't hold more than half a thought at a time, then it certainly isn't going to be able to put together two different thoughts at once. Hence the reason the right wing thinks in bumper stickers. But keep on trying to educate them.
However, I'm reminded of the observation that trying to teach a pig to sing is an exercise in futility and it just irritates the pig.
Yeah, I know. The attempt to converse and have someone listen is lost, when they already made up their mind.
I try and try and there is only resistance and talking over someone. The idea that voting for your own interests by listening to Republicans talk about how bad Democrats are? Well, if you are working in a government job with a pension, you might be worried about your pension. But my Republican friend in a union county law enforcement job says "I'm a Republican"… me: "why?": her: "because my Grandma said I should be".
The times I try to get to facts is met with "I go with my feelings, you go with facts".
Am I successful in pointing out repealing the health care law could mean people we both know losing health insurance? I don't think it gets through the bubble.
So, yeah… but I gotta try.
Woody Allen said something like "religion was created to keep the poor people from killing the rich"' I would never advocate killing them but have no problem encouraging their damnation.
Actually, the quote is paraphrased from a longer one attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte.
“I do not see in religion the mystery of the incarnation so much as the mystery of the social order. It introduces into the thought of heaven an idea of equalization, which saves the rich from being massacred by the poor.”
(Napoleon : In His Own Words (1916) edited by Jules Bertaut, as translated by Herbert Edward Law and Charles Lincoln Rhodes.)
Thanks for that. I've never seen this more complete version of the quote.