Part 2, American Politicians Are "Just Not Into You"

Today is the second in a three part series of posts where we prove what most of America already senses: American politicians do not care what our needs, sufferings, and requirements are, they are too busy catering to the needs of wealthy political contributors and their own selfish gains. Or as we summarized it yesterday, using an old movie cliché, they are “just not into you.”

Yesterday, we discussed an extensive statistical research effort from two political science professors who proved this point quantitatively. We also showed how the Obama administration is infected with high powered and wealthy lobbyist-types and how Nancy Pelosi has probably spent more time enriching her family with taxpayer wealth than enriching taxpayers with government programs that encourage economic growth.

This discussion continues below to show that politicians are more concerned about money and wealth, and how to keep it by sucking up to wealthy entities, than they are in resolving the problems facing the vast majority of Americans.

1) A recent article by the Independent Journal review had a fascinating graph, from the Business Insider website, that showed how much more money residents of the greater Washington D.C. area make over citizens in the rest of the country:



If you look at the vertical axis on the left side you see a scale that runs from 1.2 to 1.8. If a plot point is at 1.2, then the residents in D.C. earned, on average, 20% more than the rest of the country. A plot point of 1.5 means that for that year, D.C. residents on average earned about 50% more than the rest of the country. Other conclusions from the historical data in the graph include:

• From the 1950s through the late 1990s, the ratio stayed pretty constant between 1.25 and just under 1.40.
• However, as a new century dawned, the ratio broke through the 1.4 ceiling and started to accelerate quickly, with the rate of accelerating getting worse under the Obama administration. 
• In fact, all time highs were attained by the ratio during the entire Obama administration with the latest data still way above historical norms.
• The shaded areas in the graph indicate recessions and it appears that the ratio actually grew during recessionary periods, indicating that Washington took much better care of itself in tough economic times than it took of the rest of the country.
• The points of closest parity between D.C. and the rest of the country came under Republicans Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan while the largest disparities came under Democratic Presidents Harry S. Truman and Barack Obama. So much for the President’s false focus on “income equality.” 

So much for caring about the middle class. Washington takes care of itself first and foremost, they are “just not into you.”

2) Mary Barker, recently writing for the Deseret News on August 14, 2014, did a comprehensive review of how corporate cronyism uses its influence and dollars to get favorable deals for themselves at the expense of the American taxpayer. Disgraces from her research writing include the following:

• The bailout of General Motors cost American taxpayer over $11 billion that will never be paid back even though GM profits since the bailout have totaled $22.6 billion.
• The author quotes a research study which that between the years 2008 and 2010, 30 of the largest American companies paid more to lobby Congress (about $400,000 per day) than they did in Federal taxes. 
• During that time, only one of the 30 largest companies actually paid Federal taxes, despite these companies’ total profits of $164 billion. 
• Not surprisingly, most of them contributed to the financing of incumbents' reelection campaigns.
• Even though hundreds of bankers went to jail after the 1980s for their illegal actions and shenanigans during the savings and loan crisis, after the Great Recession, no bankers were prosecuted even though the major banks and investment companies were at the root cause of many of the factors which triggered the Great Recession.
• In this banking fiasco, they got bailouts and hefty bonuses rather than jail time, all courtesy of a needy American political class.
• The Government Accountability Office has estimated that the Great Recession cost the U.S. economy $22 trillion and much more in lost careers, foreclosed homes, stress, lost pensions, etc.
• However, a major perpetrator and player in the cause of the Great Recession, JPMorgan Chase, received a $25 billion taxpayer bailout while its CEO, Jamie Dimon, received a 74% pay raise, getting his annual compensation to around $20 million, according to the article.
• Another major bank, HBSC, freely admitted to laundering billions of dollars for the biggest, dirtiest Mexican drug cartels but once again no one was prosecuted. The bank paid a fine and its chief executive, however, said that the bank was “profoundly sorry.”

By the way, if you follow the money that is used to influence politicians via the Open Secrets website, you would find that:

• In the latest election cycle, JP Morgan's political contributions put them in the top .5% of all contributors to election campaigns and their $5.5 million spent on lobbying put them in the top 2% of all companies who had lobbying expense.
• In the latest election cycle, HSBC's political contributions put them in the top 10% of all contributors to election campaigns and their $3.4 million spent on lobbying put them in the top 4% of all companies who had lobbying expense.
• In the latest election cycle, General Motors' political contributions put them in the top 1.5% of all contributors to election campaigns and their whopping $8.8 million spent on lobbying put them in the top 1% of all companies who had lobbyin expense.

Still think that American polticians care about you in the face of these millions and millions spent by the banks and large companies to buy influence in Washington?

You break a law, you go to jail. Wealthy corporate types and bankers break a law, they get taxpayer bailouts and get to say they’re sorry rather than go to jail. Obviously, the political class is “just not into you” when it comes to bailouts and law breaking excuses.

3) But it is just not bankers that get to stay out of jail for illegal behavior. Recent news reports show that Regina Dugan, the former director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), has been implicated in a U.S. Inspector General’s report for improperly directing agency contracts that were awarded to a company she had previously founded and in which she still had a financial stake in.

She founded and still holds a financial interest in RedXDefense, a company which designs detection devices for drugs and explosives. She was the company’s CEO until 2009, when she left to take the head job at DARPA. According to the Inspector General, while at DARPA, Dugan refrained from involving herself directly in any contract-awarding process for which RedXDefense was a bidder. But the company nevertheless received major contracts which drew the scrutiny of the Inspector General’s office in 2011.

While Dugan has since left that post and government work to go work at Google, the Inspector General found that: “We determined that Dr. Dugan violated the prohibition against using her government position for the stated or implied endorsement of a product, service, or enterprise.” 

Certainly at least the appearance of conflict of interest, if not outright conflict of interest. Better to take care of her own personal financial gain than do the best thing to protect the taxpayers’ dollars.

4)According to a most recent Reuters poll, 70% of Americans believe illegal immigrants "threaten traditional U.S. beliefs and customs," and 63% believe "immigrants place a burden on the economy." However, both Democrats and Republican politicians in Washington are pushing for favorable treatment of illegal immigrants. 

Why? Democrats see them as future voters. Republicans and their business cronies see illegal immigrants as sources of cheap labor, current citizens’ employment needs be damned. On the one issue where both Washington Democrats and Republicans agree, it is because of their own selfish interests, votes and financial election contributions, not because of the will of the people that they are supposed to represent the vast majority of Americans who do not want more and more illegal immigrants coming into this country.

Why would our politicians have more interest in foreigners illegally coming here than existing U.S. citizens? Obviously, they are “just not into you.”

Our politicians make sure that they get paid first and more handsomely vs. the rest of the country, they make sure that their corporate and banking financial bankers serve no jail time and are rewarded for bad and illegal behavior via bailouts, they take no action when government employees enrich themselves and foreign illegal immigrants take precedence over existing citizens. 

So if we learned anything over the past two days is that when the November elections start to get closer and a politicians promises you that they are looking out for your well being and welfare, keep in mind that they are “just not into you,” you are nothing more than a vote and a subsequent ATM machine once they are in office.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

www.loathemygovernment.com

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:

Term Limits Now: http://www.howmuchworsecoulditget.com
http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.robertringer.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w