Bill Maher Gets It Wrong Again - Joking on Seniors, Sex and "Entitlements"

Bill Maher, again, has it in for seniors. According to his end segment  ('New Rules') last night on REAL TIME, and quoting a HARPER's piece, the Federal yearly spending per child in this country is $3,822 while the federal yearly spending per senior is $25, 455. He continues by posing the ludicrous question:

  "What kind of world are we leaving for our grandkids, well one where Headstart, nutrition assistance and child welfare are being cut"

Then adds his little hee-haw zinger:

"These days when grandpa finds a quarter behind your ear, he keeps it!"

Really, Bill? You believe this bollocks? He then leads into the reason circulated by the Neoliberal media for why "Uncle Sam's  always giving first dollar to grandma"- because she votes.  He then veers off into "CDC reports" on how "fucking in nursing homes is at an all time high" and "syphilis and chlamydia in seniors has nearly tripled in the past decade".  Both citations are intended to make the gullible believe 99% of seniors are on a real sex binge joy ride in their elder years, and on under 60 y/o citizens' taxpayer dime- while the kiddies starve. Never mind that the senior percentage applicable to Bill's narrative is perhaps 1/2 of one percent, if that. Talk about taking an  exceptional incidence and turning it into a commonplace for the sake of fallacious argument!

But hey- it provides Bill with material for his last segment. Also his ending tirade about "why are so many seniors among the angriest people in the U.S.,  opposing Obamacare, etc. ....despite the fact they have government care that will pay for their ED, penis pumps etc."

Nice jokes, but again, misplaced. If Maher had taken the time to actually read and understand why so many seniors are miffed at Obamacare, he'd have learned that its financial inputs are predicated on $500b in cuts to Medicare - most of which were relatively well concealed until recently. One is cuts to Medicare providers which are causing many seniors to lose their primary care physicians. Tens of thousands of seniors with cancer who need chemotherapy have been turned away from Cancer centers (that deliver the treatments) thanks to just 2% cuts to Medicare providers.

Another is the new hidden bomb in hospital admissions, where the option is left to the hospital - according to the law- to enable the sickly senior to be admitted "under observation only".  In this case, the costs are 3 to 5 times higher than they'd have been if it had been full admission.  The senior then, after having perhaps recovered from one heart attack, almost has another when s/he sees the bill.

Leaving out Bill's exaggerations concerning the sexual exploits of seniors, let's look at some stark realities. First and foremost is that it isn't seniors "taking" from the kids - but our vastly expanded (since 9/11)military -industrial complex. This is the ‘elephant’ in the room,  laying waste to the domestic landscape:  the gross, even malignant expansion of the war and national security state. This nexus has benefited from a political establishment invested in the insane policy of perpetual war. It is this policy that has drained us dry and made the country even more vulnerable to terrorism than it would have been had we not stuck our nose in where it never belonged.

It has also left our kids hungry, and our long term unemployed without benefits, and seniors waiting for the next shoe to drop in terms of cuts (e.g. Chained CPI).  The much ballyhooed "bipartisan budget deal" in December was a perfect example, in which the military-industrial state was granted an extra $23 b while domestic needs were sacrificed. See e.g.

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/12/latest-budget-deal-seeks-to-preserve.html

This Military malignancy has already drained us of over $4 trillion and it may well be much more, when all the medical needs of the returned Iraq and Afghanistan vets are tended to, as well as their future disability benefits finally paid for.

Yet despite naming the ‘elephant’, Maher ignores it and wanders off the beaten path and points to seniors receiving Social Security or on Medicare STEALING "from our children"!  And he makes this oh so much more credible because he couches it in yucks about senior sex.

What the elder "sacrifice" mongers like Maher and others forget is that if those "entitlements" weren't there to provide that support, 8 out of 10 elderly would have to move in with those adult "kids". But somehow, the image of rich, greedy old farts persists ....now, thanks to Maher, having endless sex romps.....despite the fact that the AARP's own statistics show that only the uppermost quintile of seniors receive more than $50,000 a year in their retirement. The unlucky ones who don't hit that threshold are eaten alive by medical costs, and let's bear in mind Medicare only pays a fraction of those.

If even $50,000/ yr.  sounds like a lot, just think about this: One major accident, say a fall, could land a senior in a nursing home at a cost of $4,000 a month. If the senior is unlucky enough to have the gene that leads to Alzheimers, he could end up in the same position - emptying his or her bank account - to be warehoused in some home. Likely ending up bankrupt. One wonders how this never got onto Maher's joke tableaux, but perhaps it was too serious to blend in. Far easier to hack for cheap laughs.

Are seniors really "cavalier" and "coasting nice and easy" like Bill claims? Hardly! According to the latest Newsletter from the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare the "grand bargain" bollocks is still on hold, and with it the yen to implement the chained CPI. As the NL puts it:

"This cost of living adjustment is not a 'technical tweak' but a benefit cut for the oldest and most vulnerable Americans."

Indeed. It reduces the cost of living adjustment down by 0.3 percentage points annually. That translates into a cut in benefits of 3 percent for those who have been retired ten years, 6 percent after 20 years, and 9 percent after 30 years. The people who have been retired the longest and are, therefore, the poorest, will see the largest cuts. After ten years, the senior will lose the equivalent of one whole monthly S.S. payment - and given inflation isn't going away (especially for prescription drugs, fuel, food) this could be disastrous.

And now, based on Bill's jokes, many ponder taking food out of poor seniors' mouths???

Just so we are clear on this, let me also provide a quote from the American Prospect article: 'Stealing From Poor, Making Rich Richer':

"Social Security isn't broke, but millions of retirees who depend on it are, and many more would be broke without it. The average retired worker's Social Security benefit is just $922 a month--about $11,000 a year. Disabled workers average just $862.

One out of three seniors depends on Social Security for 90 to 100 percent of their income. Two out of three seniors depend on it for more than half their income. Even with Social Security, many seniors must choose between eating and heating, paying the mortgage or paying for medicine."

The next time Bill Maher, David Brooks, Robert Samuelson, Tom Brokaw, Richard Haas or anyone else thinks of playing the "generational war" meme they need to be reminded of the following:

- Seven million children currently live with grandparents - who depend on Social Security to care for them

- 8.5 million other children (including college kids that find themselves jobless and live at home) who live with elder parents that depend on Social Security to make do.

- The tens of millions of 50-plus Americans who, through their tax dollars and Social Security monies, pensions, provide voluntary contributions to support public schools, child health programs, grandparent guardianship programs as well as other charities that care for homeless kids (e.g. Covenant House).

 Concocting war between the generations, pitting young against old, therefore serves no useful or moral purpose. It is merely a cheap, malicious tactic to take attention from the REAL problem: the malignant growth of the Military Industrial Complex to the detriment of all of us outside it!

Austerity Economics Is Triggering Unsustainable Economic Weakness

The news in today’s Washington Post that the middle class is barely keeping it’s head above water should come as no surprise to anyone paying attention. As the Post lead story (Middle Class Still Left Behind in U.S. Economic Recovery – Data Shows) notes:


“The economic recovery of summer 2013 is playing out in an all-too-familiar way for poor and middle-class Americans: Gas prices are up, growth is slowing, and there still aren’t nearly enough new jobs to employ the almost 12 million people seeking work.

An improving housing market and rising stock prices appear to have done little to increase the take-home pay of the typical U.S. worker. And while the economy continues to heal faster than that of almost any other Western nation, evidence remains strong that the recovery has done little to boost the fortunes of people in the vast economic middle.  The Labor Department reported this month that average earnings have barely grown faster than inflation over the past year. Data from spring show that median earnings — those of the worker smack in the middle of the middle class — have fallen 4 percent since the recession ended, after adjusting for inflation.”

Why is this? Basically, it’s because we have - or at least our political and media class have – accepted economic myths while allowing the government to become hamstrung by the GOP opposition via absurd filibuster rules. At the core of these myths is the mainline economists’ acceptance of the Pareto distribution,e .g.
http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2011/06/modern-economics-its-evil-basis-pareto.html


Let's bear in mind also, that the same (Neoliberal) political class has "bet the farm" that Pareto optimality delivers more if spent on "wars" (actually overlong occupations that inflame overseas passions) and massive surveillance than domestic needs. So no wonder that our domestic infrastructure is cratering at a rate while too many remain mesmerized by the numbers (on assorted tube  'crawlers') for the DOW. Can we use this to define national insanity? Yes, I believe we can!

Another sign is the yen to cut Social Security and Medicare! But as a recent Bulletin of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare has pointed out ('Debunking Media Myths'):

"Contrary to what you might read in the headlines or hear on the evening news, Social Security and Medicare are not to blame for our nation's fiscal woes or our deficit."

Indeed! It is the unending wars and domestic spy state amassing of precious tax dollars to spy on all of us that is contributing most to deficits and woes!  Another important point for the pointy-headed Pareto-ists:

""Without these vital programs our economy would be in even worse shape and millions more American families would face economic security".

How so? Because we are in a low aggregate demand environment - since the recession (which many, including  economist Thea Lee believe is still going on). In this environment cuts to social insurance programs mean lower spending by recipients and FOR them (e.g. via insurance to cover procedures from Medicare) hence demand is lowered, adding to the woes. What we need then is MORE spending, not less! Less austerity (and an end to the absurd sequester) not more! 

But the political class and its favorite economic tools (fools?) don't want to hear it. As one former Fed economist put it two years ago ('Economists Win Nobel for Focus on Real World', WSJ, Oct. 11, p. A3) in regard to making substantial cuts to “entitlements”:


"If you made a credible committment to do this now and the markets saw that, this theory would predict that you have a much more positive impact on the economy today".

But that is bollocks, and those are the words of a delusional guy who tacitly accepts the Pareto. In other words, as standard for Pareto optimality BS, we must sacrifice citizens' security for a generic market benefit, available only to the elites, mainly the 1%. Incredibly, these economic shysters actually believed a ramping up stock market (pumped by Bernanke’s cheap money crack) would also feed the middle class – unaware that most of them are(wisely) not exposed to the equity markets, especially after the disastrous 2008 collapse.


But they still echo the refrain: “Let them eat stocks!” (Or mutual funds) as opposed to actually paying real livable wages that trump phantom money that expands or diminishes on any given day. Meanwhile, if Medicare and Social Security benefits are cut this would be "Pareto efficient", reinforcing the old Pareto Parable that if a sheep and a wolf form a collective, it is always preferable for the wolf to eat the sheep for the "collective" to be maximally optimal. In like manner, it is always preferable that the economy give preference to the dollars of the wealthy because they are worth more than dollars simply given to the elderly out of “entitlements”. After all, the latter are merely getting economic largesse for breathing every day!


Epitomizing this sort of deranged thinking is Thomas Sargent, an Econ Nobel winner from two years ago- who along with Christopher Sims, poured bollocks on Keynesian stimulus from governments, which - let's face it - has seen a rash of attacks in the wake of the onset of the austerity virus. Sargent's "rational expectations" model posited negative "rational" reactions of people to events like the Fed loosening the money supply, "a conclusion at odds with the Keynesian model". For example, he claimed that people woould adjust their "wage demands" higher if the Fed increased the money supply (as it has recently been doing by buying back hundreds of billions of treasury securities, under 'quantitative easing'). Then, by increasing the wage demands unemployment will increase, rather than decrease.

But in truth, as the WaPo released stats show, this is nonsense. The true fact is even though the Fed has poured hundreds of billions into quantitative easing it hasn’t made a dent in wages, or unemployment. But it has increased inflation (never mind the Federal Reserve’s bogus index) and merely enriched the speculators. But that is what it intended to do. All this crap about helping the vast Middle to regain its footing via stock returns is just that, crap.


Sargent also argued that people will "make decisions now" based on how they rationally believe the government will deal with Social Security and Medicare. Thus, according to the Pareto Distribution basis, if government were to act for cuts now (including Obama’s proposed Chained CPI) then people might invest more in the stock market (for higher returns) instead of depending on government. But again, this is nonsense as the WaPo piece shows. Since “rising stock prices appear to have done little to increase the take-home pay of the typical U.S. worker.”


The reason is a dirty little secret amongst the political –economic elites: corporations are still sitting on over $1.7 trillion stash and not using it to enhance wages or increase jobs. Instead they are mostly practicing economic equity incest and buying back their own shares at odd intervals. Meanwhile, unemployed college grads waste away in their parents’ basements with no future economic prospects and unable to repay their monumental student loans. Thus, stock values aren't increasing because more people are purchasing the goods companies have in their inventory (they can't afford to with their meager wages) but because the stock prices are being artificially inflated, via Bernanke's 'crack' and corporate buy backs.  Those few middle classers into stocks and especially equities are in for a very rude awakening when the rubber meets the road. Likely next year after the Fed pulles the QE plug.

Sargent's own bias in his development of his mathematical models to support his rational expectations "theory" confirms his pro-Pareto bona fides. For example, in one of his theoretical models Sargent arrives at a set of "competitive equilibria": C = {(x,y)! x = h(y)}, such as shown on the accompanying graph where "welfare" is plotted vs. "tax rate". Entering into the basis for generation of such equilibria is what is called a "utility function" framed for example as: U(L, c,g) where L denotes "leisure", c is the rate of consumption, and g is the per capita government expenditure. From this, Sargent purports to obtain some parameter 'alpha' spanning a range in a limited set from 0 to 1/2.


At some point later then, one also will find the tax rate τ, enter. Thus, he claims a government will in general balance its budget if: g = τ (1 - L). Meanwhile, he poses "welfare" within the constraints of competitive equilibria as defined by:


W(τ) = L(τ) + log {alpha + (1 - τ) [1 = L(τ)]} + log (alpha + τ[1 - L(τ)}


He argues that a "benevolent government" chooses L = 0, c = g = ½

while a "dictatorial" outcome yields: W = 2 log (alpha + ½)

This is nonsense, given that any true benevolent government would never ever require a leisure L = 0! However, a dictatorial "slave camp" government, such as under Chairman Mao in the 1960s, would! So what the hell is he getting at? The graph shown sets it in perspective assuming an alpha = 0.3 or just past midway in the set {0, ½}. Thus, he argues that the "government problem in a "Nash equilibrium" is defined by a limiting maximum tax rate, max(τ) such that: L = log [alpha + (1 - τ)(1 - L)] + log (alpha + τ(1 - L)]


Then, if L < 1, the option is τ = 0.5  However, as the tax rate moves beyond this limit, the welfare crashes! Well, by that I mean it reaches a Nash equilibrium lowest value of around -1.2.

Stripping away all the math and balderdash, what do we have? Well, a curve that fits perfectly within Pareto Distribution parameters of Pareto optimality or efficiency! (Notice the line marked "unconstrained optimum, which is really an optimum for maximal Pareto effciency). What we are being warned against here, is the use of too many government expenditures or resources for the common good, whether in Medicare, Social Security or even unemployment insurance. Any time one seeks to maximize a putative welfare within these limits, one ends up in a crash pile. The welfare drops and so does everything else.

Beware then of all those who wish to stimulate the economy by too high a tax rate?

 Hmmmm....wonder then why our unemployment was lowest during the 1950s when the marginal tax rate was 91%.?  Oh, these latter day anti-Keynesians will argue it was the aftermath of the war production, the lack of global competitors or some such rot, anything to deny any consistent Keynesian approach. But they ignore how solid the economy was with relatively low unemployment as JFK regularly used deficit spending! (See e.g. http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2012/07/thats-right-now-blame-60s-jfk-for.html  )

The conclusion the truly rational person must draw is both cynical and realistic: our political elites and their corporate media are using the Pareto narrative to protect massive military and surveillance spending as they wreck domestic security and infrastructure. In other words, these rats don't care about us little guys. They only care about propping up an "empire" and using that to justify minimal domestic security - REAL security!

To get a further handle on our misbegotten, military industrial complex fueled austerity economics check out Jeff Cohen's blog piece: "The Elephant in the Room: Militarism":

https://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/04/09-1

Guest Article: 'The Soul Of America': Sen. Bernie Sanders

Despite such terminology as "fiscal cliff" and "debt ceiling," the great debate taking place in Washington now has relatively little to do with financial issues. It is all about ideology. It is all about economic winners and losers in American society. It is all about the power of Big Money. It is all about the soul of America.


In America today, we have the most unequal distribution of wealth and income of any major country on earth, and more inequality than at any time period since 1928. The top 1 percent owns 42 percent of the financial wealth of the nation, while, incredibly, the bottom 60 percent own only 2.3 percent. One family, the Walton family of Wal-Mart, owns more wealth than the bottom 40 percent of Americans. In terms of income distribution in 2010, the last study done on this issue, the top 1 percent earned 93 percent of all new income while the bottom 99 percent shared the remaining 7 percent.


Despite the reality that the rich are becoming much richer while the middle class collapses and the number of Americans living in poverty is at an all-time high, the Republicans and their billionaire backers want more, more, and more. The class warfare continues.

My Republican colleagues say that the deficits are a spending problem, not a revenue problem. What these deficit-hawk hypocrites won't talk about is their spending. They won't discuss what they did to dig the country into this $1 trillion deep deficit hole. They waged wars in Afghanistan and Iraq without paying for them. They gave away huge tax breaks for the rich. They squandered taxpayer dollars on the pharmaceutical industry by making it illegal to let Medicare bargain for lower drug prices. They also rescinded financial regulations that enabled Wall Street to operate like a gambling casino, leading to a severe recession that eroded tax revenue and left more than 14 percent of American workers unemployed or underemployed.


Now, despite the deficits their policies helped to create and despite the enormous suffering which exists in our society, the Republicans want to cut Social Security, veterans' programs, Medicare, Medicaid, education, nutrition programs, and virtually every program which benefits low- and moderate-income Americans. They choose to turn their backs on the economic reality facing a significant part of our population: high unemployment, reduced wages, 50 million without health insurance, college graduates saddled with enormous student debt and elderly people living in desperation. And they have tried to slam the door on any further discussion about how to raise revenue by ending tax loopholes and unfair tax breaks.


Republicans like Senator Minority Leader Mitch McConnell who say the revenue debate is over don't want you to consider these facts:

• Federal revenue today, at 15.8 percent of GDP, is lower today than it was 60 years ago. During the last year of the Clinton administration, when we had a significant federal surplus, federal revenue was 20.6 percent of GDP.

• Today corporate profits are at an all-time high, while corporate income tax revenue as a percentage of GDP is near a record low.

• In 2011, corporate revenue as a percentage of GDP was just 1.2 percent -- lower than any other major country in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, including Britain, Germany, France, Japan, Canada, Norway, Australia, South Korea, Switzerland, Norway, Italy, Ireland, Poland, and Iceland.

• In 2011, corporations paid just 12 percent of their profits in taxes, the lowest since 1972.

• In 2005, one out of four large corporations paid no income taxes at all while they collected $1.1 trillion in revenue over that one-year period.

We know where the Republicans are coming from. What about the Democrats? Will President Obama fulfill his campaign pledge to "protect the middle class" or will he surrender to right-wing blackmail? Will Democrats in the House and Senate stand with the vast majority of our citizens and such organizations as AARP, the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, the AFL-CIO, the American Legion, the Veterans of Foreign Wars and every other veterans' organization in the fight against cuts to Social Security and veterans' programs, or will they agree to a disastrous corporate-backed "chained CPI" concept which makes major benefit cuts to those programs and raises taxes on low-income workers?

The simple truth is there are relatively easy ways to deal with the deficit crisis -- without attacking the elderly, the children, the sick and the poor.

For example, we have got to eliminate loopholes in the tax code that allow large corporations and the wealthy to avoid more than $100 billion in taxes every year by setting up offshore tax shelters in places like the Cayman Islands, Bermuda and the Bahamas. This situation has become so absurd that one five-story office building in the Cayman Islands is now the "home" to more than 18,000 corporations.

Further, we must also end tax breaks for companies shipping American jobs overseas. Today, the United State government continues to reward companies that move American manufacturing jobs abroad, despite the fact that millions of American jobs have been outsourced to China, Mexico, and other low wage countries over the past decade. The Joint Committee on Taxation (the official revenue scorekeeper in Congress) has estimated that we could raise more than $582 billion in revenue over the next decade by eliminating these offshore tax loopholes.

We must also recognize that Wall Street recklessness caused the economic crisis, and it has a responsibility to reduce the deficit. Establishing a 0.03 percent Wall Street speculation fee, similar to what we had from 1914-1966, would dampen the dangerous level of speculation and gambling on Wall Street, encourage the financial sector to invest in the productive economy and reduce the deficit by more than $350 billion over 10 years.

We are entering a pivotal moment in the modern history of our country. Do the elected officials in Washington stand with ordinary Americans -- working families, children, the elderly, the poor -- or will the extraordinary power of billionaire campaign contributors and Big Money prevail? The American people, by the millions, must send Congress the answer to that question.