The Economist: Richard Davies Interviewing Zanny Minton-Beddoes: Time to Rethink Retirement

Source:The New Democrat

This emphasizes the great need for improving the skills of workers, especially in America which ranks  39th in the world in education.  That 1 in 5 Americans lives in poverty is already  unacceptable.

Our aging population means current and future workers are going to have to work longer and be more productive.  They need to put more money away for their own retirements and be less dependent on the public safety net to provide them needed income when they retire.

Private retirement accounts are an attractive policy option that encourages people to put money,  matched by their employers, away for savings and retirement.  This allows people to finance their own retirements bringing down government costs. 

The New Republic: Jeffrey Rosen: Schuette Decision: Supreme Court Supported Precedent

Source:The New Democrat

Jeff Rosen, as almost always, hit it on the mark today in his column in The New Republic.  He said that whether you agree with the Supreme Court decision on affirmative action at the University of Michigan  or not, you should at least agree with how they decided it.  Showing judicial restraint, they said that whether you have affirmative action in your state or not, should be decided by democratic processes, through the legislature and the voters.  It should be not be left to some unelected board or institution.

Today's Progressives are always talking about the need for more democracy in America, that too many important decisions are being left to a handful of people who represent powerful interests.  Yet they take the undemocratic position that an institution, in this case the University of Michigan, knows better than the voters themselves whether or not there should be affirmative action at this public university.  They believe in affirmative action and will seek to preserve it by any means necessary.

Slate Magazine: Jay Porter: A Small Business Owner's Case For Raising the Minimum Wage

Source:The New Democrat 

There are several reasons why I'm in favor of raising the Federal minimum wage.  Minimum wage workers are under paid for the work that they do and the services that they perform for their employers. Cashier handle most, if not all, of the money that their employer receives. They provide a necessary and essential service to their company.  The company can't stay in business without it.

Underpaying service workers reduces their ability to live a decent life.  Taxpayers then have to assist these workers in meeting their costs of living.  There is also a cost to the economy in decreased economic growth because of the purchasing power that these workers don't have.  Henry Ford realized this at the beginning of the 20th century.

Do I believe everyone is entitled to earn at least a middle class living simply for being alive?  Of course not, I'm not a Socialist but I do believe that everyone is entitled to be paid the money that their work and services bring to the table.  $7.25 an hour for workers who are critical to the success of a business  is underpayment.  The cost of that underpayment is passed to taxpayers as public assistance and lost  economic growth. 

Robert Shiller: 'Better Insurance Against Income Inequality'

Source:The New Democrat  

I could blog about indexing taxation of income for the wealthy in a couple of ways.  One would discuss the fact that it would never pass this Congress, especially with a Republican House.  Also, vulnerable Senate Democrats up for reelection in red states don't want to talk about tax increases in an election year. They want to get reelected and keep the Senate in Democratic control.

This proposal will never become law but, just for the hell of it, we can talk about why its not good policy, which is yet another reason why it won't become law.  The idea that taxes on certain people could  go up automatically without specific congressional or executive branch action is undemocratic.  Money is power and the government should not rule that some people should have less of it without due process and complete transparency.

Minister Malcolm X: 'We're Going to Have to Go to War Against The Racists'

Source:Minister Malcolm X- Minister Malcolm X, talking about racism in 1963-64.

Source:The New Democrat 

Minister Malcolm X: 'We're going to have to win the fight against the racists." The video has since been deleted or blocked on YouTube.

This could easily be interpreted as saying that the supporters of equal rights and freedom for all Americans: "Are going to have to win the war against the racists in the courtroom and on the political battlefield." Which is what they have done for sixty or so years now. The bigots, both racists and homophobes, have been losing ground, since the Eisenhower Administration and Brown V. Board of Education.

The opponents of Malcolm X, especially on the Right and Far-Right, whether they are racists or not, will take his statement to say that he was calling for a violent revolution and for the African-American community to start attacking law enforcement, especially Caucasians and others who are in their way.  This is not what he was saying.  He was saying that if you are physically or verbally attacked, you have a right to defend yourself.

The Washington Post: George Will: Progressives Are Wrong About the Essence of the Constitution

Source:The New Democrat  

The more I hear from today's, so-called, Progressives, the more I believe that they are from a different country or, at least, have lived a long time in another country. They don't seem to see the U.S. Constitution for what it is.  They say, "Look, this is how other countries do it and it works there so we should do the same thing here."  They seem to be ignorant of the Constitution's constraints on the Federal Government.

These people are really Social Democrats.  They believe that the United States should be ruled by majority rule.  If we ever let the will of the majority decide everything without that annoying document that keeps interposing the Federal court system,  we could build the socialist utopia that they've always wanted and take care of everyone.

The Social Democrats, in the absence of the Constitution, would move to a parliamentary social democracy where Congress, actually just the House of Representatives, would pick our President for us.

The Constitution protects our individuals rights, our ability to live our private lives with minimal interference from government.  Today's Neo-Right Republican Party doesn't like that.  They claim to favor democracy but support the banning of homosexuality and same-sex-marriage.  They complain that the courts are thwarting the will of the people and being undemocratic when one of their big government behavioral control proposals is rejected.  They are either ignorant of the Constitution or hypocrites.

As George Will said in his column today, the U.S. Constitution is not about protecting American democracy but  protecting the constitutional rights of individual Americans.  Government at all levels is prohibited from infringing these rights even if certain of them become unpopular and a popular will emerges to limit these.  The U.S. Constitution protects Americans from big government even if an overweening big government becomes popular. 

The Washington Post: Alyssa Rosenberg: If Conservatives Lost the Culture War, That Doesn't Mean Liberals Won it

Source:The Washington Post- 

Source:The New Democrat

When people use the term "Culture War," it's not immediately clear what they're talking about.  It could be some pop culture war between Hollywood and Nashville, the capitol of country music, or, perhaps, the broader Bible Belt. Well, that sort of conflict is really not of much significance.  A more significant  Culture War is in the arena of politics and the way Americans look at life and how they believe they should be living it.

All the evidence you need to know that Liberals won that Culture War is that it's no longer 1955.  We no longer watch black and white TV or get together in the living room to listen to the radio. The man of the house is no longer likely to say, "Honey I'm home," when he comes home from work, with honey responding "How was your day dear?  Your favorite drink is by your chair in the living room."  Honey may not be there.  She may still be at work.

This may sound simplistic but we are in a completely different era where both men and women believe that they can do anything they want to if they work hard and get a good education and the skills they need to be successful. Gone are the days of stereotypical masculine and feminine roles.  African-Americans no longer live, for the most part, to serve Caucasian-Americans by working in their homes.  Gays are no longer trapped in the closet. Men and women no longer feel that they have to be married in order to have sex or live with their romantic partner and have and rear children.

The 1960s was obviously not a perfect decade but it was a liberating (great liberal word) decade for millions of Americans, thanks to the Baby Boom generation.  Today, 40-50 years later, we as a country, at least outside of the Bible Belt, feel that we have the freedom to live our own lives and do as we please without the threat of government or the religious and social establishment interfering.  Now, legalized gambling, legalized marijuana, same-sex-marriage, homosexuality, and  adult pornography are all mainstream.  Bye bye, Billy Graham, Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, and Phyllis Schaffly.  You lost the Culture War.

As much as the Christian Right may want to put the whole country in a time machine and take us back to Leave it to Beaver Land (1955), those days are long gone.  America, today, is much more free than it was then and it seeks ever more personal and economic freedom.  It is never going back. 
Source:Secular Talk