I will protect your pensions. Nothing about your pension is going to change when I am governor. - Chris Christie, "An Open Letter to the Teachers of NJ" October, 2009

Sunday, September 19, 2010

Paul Krugman: National Treasure

He's the best:
You see, the rich are different from you and me: they have more influence. It’s partly a matter of campaign contributions, but it’s also a matter of social pressure, since politicians spend a lot of time hanging out with the wealthy. So when the rich face the prospect of paying an extra 3 or 4 percent of their income in taxes, politicians feel their pain — feel it much more acutely, it’s clear, than they feel the pain of families who are losing their jobs, their houses, and their hopes.
Read the whole thing. But expect a spate of articles about the lavish lifestyle of Prof. Krugman, thus proving him a hypocrite.

It's how they roll...

1 comment:

thinker said...

The other thing to remember is that we, as communities and as a nation, have created/allowed a system where you don't have a chance of getting elected unless you are wealthy. So not only do our politicans feel the plight of the rich more because they are hanging out with them, and they then react to that pressure, but these policies that serve primarily the wealthy also serve the politican him or herself as they are part of this upper income class. Moreover, most of these people have no idea what it's like to try to live on $40K, or less, a year so they cannot even comprehend the concerns of this segment of society. I sometimes wonder if they even believe that such families exist, or do they just view them much the way some view the homeless: they know they are there, but that lifestyle is so completely foreign to them, and solving the problem is so daunting, that they simply prefer not to think about it.

I don't believe there is a political party left that will give me a candidate I feel good about voting for and it is sad that our nation has come to this. Everything seems to have changed in the span of my lifetime. I don't remember such great wealth disparity when I was younger, was I just completely unaware of it?