Weekend Update 10-29-2011

Our government is basically an insurance company with an army. That’s actually a pretty good way of putting it. I’m reminded of something the head of the CBO told a Republican member of the “super committee” in one of the committee’s few meetings. The member asked if the CBO could cost some part of the government or some program that irritated him and the savings from eliminating it. The head of the CBO said his office worked for Congress and would provide a cost/savings analysis on anything requested, but went on to tell him that on the scale of the committee’s task it would be essentially meaningless — a fraction of a percent.

Pope Benedict XVI speaks on economic justice issues.

For those who are unfamiliar with it, the White House tax receipt tool provides a pretty good tool for understanding federal government expenditures by relating it to a breakdown of the taxes you actually paid.

From 1979 to 2007, the top 1% of Americans tripled their inflation-adjusted income. I agree that class warfare is at work. The top 1% (or enough of it to implement policy) has been engaged in sustain class warfare against everyone else in our country for the past three decades. And make no mistake, they have been winning.

The Bible is not God’s revelation to man: Jesus Christ is God’s revelation to man. I’ve never suffered from the anxiety of the particular sort of modern fundamentalist literalism Fr. Stephen describes, but I’ve certainly seen and heard it at work in my SBC context.

Bailing out the banks while punishing workers is not, in fact, a recipe for prosperity. Well, duh.

Who’s decided to quit governing? Technically, you have to have governed at some point in time before you can quit. Boehner and the GOP house have refused to govern from day one.

So unless Obama agrees to sharp spending cuts, we’ll be forced into austerity? What? Why does anyone take these buffoons seriously?

So Ryan is outraged, outraged, that Obama is offering a wholly accurate description of his party’s platform. I’m shocked, I say, shocked!

Occupy Wall Street: Outing the Ringers. Well worth watching.

Richard Wilkinson: How economic inequality harms societies. Not that evidence indicates that facts have any impact on ideology.

Liespotting. All my life I’ve had something almost like a sixth sense in this regard. Most of the time, when it mattered most, I ignored it. Despite all evidence to the contrary, I’ve wanted to believe people are better than they often are. Me? I’m a pretty bad liar. Always have been.

RSA Animate – The Divided Brain. A better look into the complexity than most.

And Republicans go ballistic at Obama’s announcement that our troops are coming home from Iraq as required by the agreement Bush signed with the Iraqi government. Another great Jon Stewart segment. Shoe!