Who benefits from the War on Terror?

Johnny Barber writes from Kabul: On September 11th, 2001, George W. Bush announced, “We are at war. Somebody is going to pay.” Eleven years later, we are still paying. Bullets, mortars and drones are still extracting payment. Thousands, tens of thousands, millions have paid in full. Children and even those yet to be born in […]

Paul Ryan on Social Security MediCare and Pell Grants

Paul Ryan was chosen by Mitt Romney as his Vice Presidential pick. Here’s 6 things to know about Paul Ryan, as researched by MoveOn: 1. His economic plan would cost America 1 million jobs in the first year. Ryan’s proposed budget would cripple the economy. He’d slash spending deeply, which would not only slow job […]

What your Social Security contribution should be worth

The government is now referring to our Social Security checks as a “Federal Benefit Payment.” –This isn’t a benefit – its earned income! Not only did we all contribute to Social Security but our employers did too. It totaled 15% of our income before taxes. If you averaged $30K per year over your working life, […]

Myths of War and Combat

[America] conditions the poor and the working class to go to war. We promise them honor, status, glory, and adventure. We promise boys they will become men. We hold these promises up against the dead-end jobs of small-town life, the financial dislocations, credit card debt, bad marriages, lack of health insurance, and dread of unemployment. […]

Why the worst recession since the Great Depression

Facts shared in a speech by US Senator Bernie Sanders, the longest serving independent member of Congress in American history: The American people are angry because they are living through the worst recession since the Great Depression. Unemployment is not 8.2%, real unemployment is closer to 15%. Today the wealthiest 400 individuals in America own […]

America writing off Social Security for the elderly

When neoconservatives, politicians, and high ranking military officers speak of a 30-year war against terrorism, there is no discussion about its affordability or whether the one significant attack (September 11, 2001) that is attributed, perhaps incorrectly, to Muslim terrorists justifies an open-ended war against a dozen countries. There is no discussion of the burden on […]

Why do they hate us

Americans ask, “Why do they hate us?” Stephen M. Walt, Harvard professor of international relations, suggests: Remember the Golden Rule? “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” I’ve been thinking that Americans ought to reflect a bit more on the long-term costs of our willingness to do unto others in ways […]

Memorial Day What Ifs

What if Memorial Day reminds us of times when we had more freedom? What if the memory of the past is more fulfilling than the reality of the present? What if the federal government could write any law, regulate any behavior and tax any event, no matter what the Constitution authorized? What if the House […]

New Record for Military Spending

On April 17, 2012, as millions of Americans were filing their income tax returns, the highly-respected Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) released its latest study of world military spending. In case Americans were wondering where most of their tax money — and the tax money of other nations — went in the previous year, […]

Find out how your tax dollars are spent

Would you like to know where the federal government spend all the money you paid in income taxes during fiscal 2011? Click here for a breakdown. Following the above link, enter in the box the amount of federal income taxes you paid. And then click “Show My Taxes”, and you will find out where every […]