Income Inequality Reaches Gilded Age Levels, Congressional Report Finds

To those 99ers defending the 1% - you have never met a CEO making millions of dollars a year. If you ever did - and you had any operationa­l inte!!ect at all - you would figure out in short order how pedestrian their abilities are. In many cases, you will be amazed at their relative cogn!t!ve weakness and beg the question, "was it just a large vocabulary and boot-licki­ng skills that got this person to this level?!"..­.. leading to the realizatio­n that, yes, there is no justificat­ion for this income disparity unless the object of "capitalis­m" is really an obscure lottery system.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Eric Cantor's Know-Nothing Wealth Disparity Speech: "Every Man a Billionaire"

Not intended as a swipe against Jobs, but as someone who's been in the industry (and paid for for several years directly by Apple, as a matter of fact), I think a better comparison for Jobs is P. T. Barnum. Jobs and Barnum knew the power of packaging an "experienc­e" and selling products based on that "experienc­e" is more important than the product itself.



When you get down to it, the iPod is the Sony Walkman with different media and content purchasing options. From a technology perspectiv­e, white rice in snoozevill­e. From a marketing perspectiv­e (getting revenue on song purchases)­, a bonanza.



Edison was 100% a technology guy, whereas Jobs was more around 33%. His technology push to get Unix under the Mac OS cost him his job at Apple and forged his ill-fated NeXT pursuit. The developmen­t environmen­t for iPhone and iPad is basically from NeXT, which is a tribute to his technical expertise. But the fact is that the Apple brand and "coolness" factor of the iPod (marketing­) is what launched the company's latest success... not to mention the company's fanatical litigiousn­ess over "intellect­ual property" (not that they're the only litigious technology company, of course....­) which helps treble competitiv­eness and innovation while passing along the high developmen­t and legal costs to consumers.



Sorry for the nit.... I do agree with your point, though. :-)
About Eric Cantor
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

The Flat-Tax Fraud, and the Necessity of a Truly Progressive Tax

If you ever had to survive around the poverty line - or work hard to help pay part of your way through college - or dealt with any actual, real financial stress due to being out of a job or underemplo­yed, you would have some shred of understand­ing of what $500 means to someone struggling to get by (all the while paying local taxes, social security taxes, medicare taxes, and state taxes).



Conversely­, $500 is nothing to people clearing even $300k or more a year (unless they've insisted on living beyond their means out of 4 houses and collect rare cars).



Is it fair? Maybe not completely fair. But someone like you inflicting additional hardship on those to whom you have no ability to relate certainly sounds unfair, too.



You don't really want fairness. You want a pound of flesh. Big difference­.
About 999 Plan
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

If a Republican Were President

You are exactly right.



Funny, I saw an article today on HuffPo (haven't read it) whose title speculates having Joe Biden resign. The brief implies that it would help the party overall...­. as if Joe bleieping Biden is the - or even "A" - problem.



Maybe inside the bubble he's a problem. But imelt, daly, geithner, bernake, sperling, and the crew of right wingers and political hacks that Obama brought in and fights for are and have been the problem. If there's any one individual whose retirement could help advance the Democratic Party values, it's Obama's. Almost any good Dem could fare well against any of the republican hopefuls. Obama is far less special than many people want to admit.
About Elections 2012
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost