Patriot News e-letter December 2011
The Patriots
Dr. Robert M. Bowman, Lt. Col., USAF, ret., National Commander
1494 Patriot Dr, Melbourne, FL 32940
home: (321) 752-5955
OCCUPY THIS!
By Dr. Robert M. Bowman, Lt. Col., USAF, ret.
National Commander, “The Patriots”
Occupy Wall Street (OWS) is a recent grass-roots movement which has caught the attention of millions of people across the country (and indeed around the world). It has garnered the support of people of all ages, all walks of life, and all parts of the political spectrum. It is one of the most promising phenomena of recent times. It represents a true populist uprising of the 99% who have been locked out of the political process, ignored, marginalized, and impoverished against the 1% who have used their immense wealth to manipulate the political system so as to further expand their already obscene wealth. Indeed, another name for the OWS movement is “The 99%.”
If we (the 99%) are to continue to be successful, there are several things we must do: (1) We must remain nonviolent. (2) We must avoid being co-opted. (3) We must be clear who we are and who it is we are against. We must be inclusive, rejecting divisiveness.
Nonviolence
Many of us believe that nonviolence is the morally superior path. Others may not. But we must ALL understand that in a grass-roots movement like this, nonviolence is absolutely essential because it WORKS and because it is the only way that can. (All those guns did not help the Branch-Davidians.) The forces we are up against have not only great wealth, but also access to enormous firepower … but only so long as the police and armed forces will obey their orders. Once our nonviolent resistance and our reaching out in love reminds the young folks in the police and armed forces that they too are part of the 99%, they will not take action against us. Once our nonviolence wins the hearts and minds of the mayors and generals, they will use their power to PROTECT US! Most importantly, once our nonviolence wins the support of the people of this country, we cannot lose!
If we are infiltrated by rock-throwers or car-burners, we must physically restrain them and turn them over to the authorities. (Usually, they are police officers ordered to infiltrate us.) Most importantly, we must never carry weapons. The 1% are scared silly by nonviolent resistance. That’s why they will try to infiltrate us with violent “anarchists.” We must not let that happen!
Co-Option
We must vigilantly avoid being co-opted by agents of the very forces we are protesting against. We must not go the way of the Tea Party. I was keynote speaker at four Tea Party conferences, beginning in 2000. The first three were in Boston. By the time I spoke in Tampa, most of the Tea Party had already been infiltrated by Glenn Beck, the Republican National Committee, the Koch Brothers, and Sarah Palin. Instead of a grass-roots movement protesting the evils of a government controlled by big money, it became the protector of big money. Instead of protesting the phony “war on terror” and calling for an end to corporate wars of aggression in Afghanistan and Iraq, it turned to promoting tax cuts for the wealthy and an end to any government program benefitting the poor and middle class. In other words, it became a tool of the 1%. The Koch brothers were able to buy up the Tea Party because it had never stated who they were and what they were against. We can’t make that mistake.
Identity
We who engage in protests must be clear who we are and who it is we are against.
First, who is it we are against? Are we against everyone in the 1% wealthiest people in the country? Of course not. There are some very fine rich people who have not used their wealth to manipulate government to the detriment of the rest of us. There are also some greedy folks not in the 1% who have done nasty things in an attempt to get there. We must also remember that among those we are against are Wall Street banks, financial companies, and insurance giants who have devastated the economy, taken government bailouts, and used the money to buy up other banks and give their executives obscene bonuses. Whatever the Supreme Court says, these institutions are not “persons” and are technically not part of the 1%. Yet we are against them, just as we are against the Enrons and Exxons who write energy policy and the giants of big pharma who write laws like Medicare Part D to enrich themselves at our expense. We also oppose the corporate media giants who control what we see, hear, and read, and who ignore or marginalize any candidate (like Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich) whom they do not control. In sum, we are against the persons and companies whose greed causes them to use their power and wealth to buy up politicians and elections, and to write laws enriching themselves and impoverishing the rest of us.
And who are we? We are the 99%. That means we are Democrats, Republicans, Independents. Libertarians, and Greens. We are conservatives and liberals. Supporters of Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich should feel equally welcome. We are also police and military officers and their troops. Most of us oppose the corporate wars of aggression. We understand that they are major ways of transferring trillions of dollars from us to the 1%. But there are others who haven’t come to that conclusion yet. They believe the wars are necessary. They too are part of the 99%. As important as the wars are, they should not be a litmus test. Neither should health care, nor abortion, nor gay rights, nor school prayer, nor gun control, nor tax reform, nor monetary policy. People on both sides of such issues make up the 99%. Once we succeed in taking back our government, we can argue these issues and resolve them. But right now, all of us in the 99% must stick together and be united in pursuing only ONE objective – to separate big money and political power. We must have a president beholden only to the people, not to Wall Street money. We must have members of Congress who are responsible and responsive to us, not to giant corporations and their K Street lobbyists. Unless there’s a big change in the Supreme Court, the only way we’ll get money out of politics is through a series of measures. The first is a Constitutional amendment declaring that corporations and other fictitious entities are not “persons” under the Constitution, and shall have none of the rights and privileges thereof. Once that is done, we can pass legislation prohibiting corporate money (or any private money) from being used for electoral purposes. At the same time, we must re-regulate the media, going back to pre-Reagan rules prohibiting ownership of multiple media outlets. The present big-money control of the electoral process would not be possible without the corporate monopoly media, in which almost all newspapers and radio and TV stations are owned by one of five multinational corporations (the same corporations who profit from war, poverty, and pollution, and the government policies which impose them)
In sum, we are the 99%, all Americans who want a government that meets our needs, not the greeds of the 1%. Because we are diverse, our core demands must be few. We all agree that it is necessary to no longer allow the 1% to manipulate government policy to enrich themselves at our expense. We recognize that to sever the connection between big money and political power it will be necessary (probably through a Constitutional amendment) to reverse the horrible “Citizens United” decision which gives unlimited political power to corporations and billionaires. It will also be necessary to restrict the power of the 1% to brainwash and deceive us through their corporate monopoly media. Once we have successfully disempowered the 1%, everything else becomes possible. The wishes of the people about wars, health care, taxes, jobs – you name it – can be carried out. Till then, we must set such issues aside in the name of the unity of the 99%. The Occupy Movement is the greatest opportunity we have had in decades. We dare not waste it. With nonviolence and inclusiveness on our side, we the 99% will succeed.
YOU are the 99%. Support Occupy Wall Street. Can’t get to New York City? Then occupy your town. Occupy a Federal Reserve office. Occupy a big bank. Occupy something. You are the one. This is the time! This is the place! OCCUPY THIS!
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Capitalism 101: How the System Works
First, the super-rich are not job creators. Consumers are job creators. You can make taxes on the wealthy and corporations Zero and no jobs will be created until there are consumers willing and able to purchase their goods or services. Demand always comes first.
In our capitalist society, there are two sources of income for consumers – private sector wages and government spending. Almost all government spending winds up in the pockets of consumers, whether it’s military or civil service pay, Social Security checks, or contracts with weapons manufacturers or road builders.
The cost of the goods and services offered in the private sector is:
Costs$ = Wages$ + Profits$
We ignore overhead, since most of it winds up as wages to somebody. Of course, Profits are income to the investors, but this money generally gets saved or re-invested. Most of it is not available to purchase the goods produced. So Costs are always larger than Wages. How then are the workers to pay for the goods or services? They can’t. So with unsold goods piling up, the investors lay off workers, which only makes matters worse. Voila – depression.
For the last few centuries, the industrialized capitalist countries have overcome this problem through imperialism. Colonies in the developing world have given us sources of cheap raw materials and a market for excess production. The total income to the mother country was increased by the amount by which exports exceeded imports, the Trade Balance.
Total $$ = Private Wages + Trade Balance
But then more recently, the investors saw these colonies as sources of cheaper labor so that their profits could be raised. They moved manufacturing plants overseas and sure enough costs went down. People could buy more stuff with less money – if they had any. But of course there were fewer workers making less money, and before long people had to stop buying. The Trade Balance had turned negative, so the Total $$ available to people to buy the products made here was less than the total wages (a lot less). The investors began loaning more money to the people through mortgages, credit cards, pay-day loans, whatever. So investors sold more of their stuff and made interest on the loans to boot … until the credit bubble burst. In such an unsustainable economy, there’s no way people can buy goods and services and pay even the interest on the debt. There’s simply not enough money to go around.
Fortunately, that’s not the end of the story. The above assumes that all government spending is paid for by taxes, so there’s no net input to the economy. That’s not always the case. If spending exceeds taxes (Deficit), then the equation becomes:
Total $$ = Private Wages + Trade Balance + Deficit Spending
This solution goes back to before this nation was born. The colonies printed Colonial Scrip and distributed it freely to the people to augment their wages (which can never be enough to match the cost of goods and services). This worked well until about 1760 when the British banned Colonial Scrip (a major cause of the Revolution). Then in 1913 the Federal Reserve was created (which is about as “federal” as Federal Express). This private central bank, part of the Rothschild global banking empire, was given the right to print money (a right given to Congress by the Constitution). Ever since then, the government has had to borrow money at interest from the Fed, whose owners make billions a year in interest on money that was never theirs. And we taxpayers are stuck paying the debt and the interest. The whole thing is a giant money pump, pumping money from workers to the investors.
Note that until the Trade Balance is reversed, Deficit Spending is absolutely essential! If the Koch Brothers and the Tea Party had their way and passed a Balanced Budget amendment to the Constitution, it would be the death warrant for our economy. It would make the Great Depression look like a picnic. Capitalism would die.
The solution, rather, is to abolish the Federal Reserve, cancel the debt to it, and issue debt-free money (Greenbacks) for government purposes ( such as public works programs, health care, pay for our troops, and subsistence income for Dependents, including Social Security).
To bring revenue into the government, there should be (1) a sharply graduated income tax, with a top rate for those making millions of dollars a year of something like 70%, (2) higher corporate income taxes with no loopholes for off-shore headquarters, (3) tariffs to level the playing field, making it just as expensive to build widgets in China as in Chicago, and (4) a Tobin tax on financial transactions. This would allow us to eliminate income taxes on those making $50,000 a year or less and do away with payroll taxes completely, including Social Security (FICA) taxes, unemployment insurance taxes, workers comp taxes, etc. Think how this would simplify things for small businesses! The end result will be to allow government to augment wages without deficit spending because more taxes are taken from the investors, and less from the workers. If capitalism is to survive, we must move in this direction.
AGRICULTURE AND NATIONAL SECURITY
An old friend, James Roberson, is in the final stages of completing a documentary on agriculture and national security. Dr. Bowman appears in it arguing against how agriculture has been hijacked by Monsanto, Archer, Daniels, Midland, and other giant agribusiness concerns, and how this threatens our security. To take a look at the trailer, go towww.intheinterestofnationalsecurity.com . While you’re there, make a contribution to the making of this film. It’s been several years in the making, and they’re doing it on a shoestring. Nevertheless, the end result should be an outstanding and unique documentary.
OCCUPY CONGRESS ??
Many folks in this part of Florida (both Democrats and Republicans) are pushing me to run again for Congress. There’s no doubt we need to get rid of Bill Posey, a Republican who protects the status quo by doing what he’s told. I’ve been looking for younger candidates who are true populists, and I’ve found a few. So far, the best are Alan Grayson and Nick Ruiz, but neither of them live in my Congressional district. That may change with redistricting, but the odds are slim. I’ll be supporting them in any event, but still must figure what to do about our own district. I don’t have the money to run, and would have to take a leave of absence from The Patriots, which I’ve been subsidizing financially for years. What would make it much easier is if a few angels would make large donations to The Patriots. Of course, lots of small donations would work too, but it’s never happened before. One thing I’m asking all of you to consider is leaving a bequest to The Patriots in your will. 5% or 10% of your estate would go a long ways toward helping us build a better future. Don’t your kids and grandkids need that more than your money? I’ll let you all know if I decide to tackle a Congressional race again. Right now it doesn’t look likely.
Bob
Dr. Robert M. Bowman, Lt. Col., USAF, ret.
National Commander, "The Patriots"
1494 Patriot Drive, Melbourne, FL 32940
home : (321) 752-5955
cell: (321) 258-0582
