Oh it's going to be repeated over and over, but how can you avoid it when it's the truth. Mitt Romney lies. And I know there are those who will say, "all politicians lie", but not like this.
Romney filed government documents that show he remained CEO of Bain Capital three years after he says he did. Why does this matter? Well these are SEC documents showing he was the firm's "sole stockholder, chairman of the board, chief executive officer, and president." Meanwhile in a Massachusetts financial disclosure he filed in 2003 showed he was executive in control in 2001 and 2002.
That contradicts what the Romney campaign and Bain have been feeding to the press. Like this one:
"Mitt Romney retired from Bain Capital in February 1999. He has had no
involvement in the management or investment activities of Bain Capital,
or with any of its portfolio companies, since that time."
Except according to legal documents filed with the SEC it isn't true. A lie!
Why does this matter? Well if someone saw the SEC filings and invested in Bain because they believed Romney was CEO then it is deliberate misrepresentation by the company and Romney and that is not legal.
The intricacies of the lie are myriad, but the substance is simple. Romney stayed around at Bain while it bankrupted companies and outsourced thousands of jobs. He either maintained control of Bain Capital or he lied about it. He lied to the SEC or to the Massachusetts Ballot Law Commission and either way it's serious.
Friday, July 13, 2012
Tuesday, July 10, 2012
Fixing Beliefs - Texas GOP Promotes Ignorance in Their Platform
I was raised to be intellectually curious. My family encouraged me to investigate, explore and learn both with their guidance and on my own. As some of you know, my father was a research scientist, microbiologist and hematologist, so I spent a lot of time hanging around laboratories growing up. Asking “why” was a natural to me as breathing.
Most of my friends when I was a child also shared some of that intellectual curiosity; it was taught to us in school and at home. Critical thinking skills were as important as learning facts and figures. It is what an education is all about, teaching children not just to recite their ABC’s but to actually reason and think on their own.
That is why this clause in the GOP platform struck me as uniquely bone headed and inconceivable.
The idea that challenging students “fixed beliefs” is something bad really floors me. I believe it was Socrates who taught his students by asking questions. Questioning their “fixed beliefs”. That is a technique that worked very well over 2000 years ago and seems to have been the foundation for science, philosophy and even theology for lo these many years. That’s why when the great State of Texas GOP want to toss out the entire purpose of scholarship I get a little testy.
If we abandon critical thinking, we might as well stop innovating and doing any research and development at all. Why question the “fixed beliefs” of anyone? Some people believe the Earth is flat, I suppose the school system under the GOP platform would stop teaching the fact that the Earth is round, to avoid the behavior modification of having a student understand that they will not fall off the edge of the earth if they travel too far east or west.
What is this plank in the otherwise wacko platform really about? Well it is a concession to the folks who are convinced that schools are trying to teach kids all manner of un-biblical facts like the Earth was not created in just 6 “literal” days. Or that all humankind did not descend from Adam and Eve!
What’s worse is that the folks who wrote this tripe most likely have kids that will never attend a public school. Their kids will go to private academies where they are protected from minorities and other undesirable rabble. And that brings me to the real reason for this plank.
For years the GOP has been actively trying to gut the public education system in our state. Their continued call for “vouchers” points to this. They believe in a two tiered education system, though they will never come out and say it that clearly. One tier is private education for the privileged kids who will become the leaders and the other is the public system for the kids who will most likely grow up to be serviceable workers in society. Now before you go calling me a socialist or worse, hear me out.
In South Africa during apartheid, they had a very well organized two tier education system. For whites, a good public education will all the bells and whistles and for blacks and “coloreds” they had the “Bantu Education System”. This appalling system was designed to give its students only enough education to make them useful as low paid workers and underlings. It was one of the most reprehensible components of the apartheid system yet was very effective for its evil purpose.
Transpose that to today, and you see the same mentality being woven into the GOP platform for public education. It is insidious and potentially devastating for our education system which used to be one of the best in the world. Now it is but a shell of that and a large part of it is due to changes imposed by politicians in the guise of “improving accountability” and the latest ploy, preventing the education system from challenging “fixed beliefs”.
You will be hard pressed to find any politician who will admit to this systematic dismantling of public education, but if you look at the facts it is undeniable. Of course that is unless you are already a product of a system that doesn’t challenge your “fixed beliefs”, in which case you most likely never finished this blog.
Most of my friends when I was a child also shared some of that intellectual curiosity; it was taught to us in school and at home. Critical thinking skills were as important as learning facts and figures. It is what an education is all about, teaching children not just to recite their ABC’s but to actually reason and think on their own.
That is why this clause in the GOP platform struck me as uniquely bone headed and inconceivable.
Knowledge-Based Education – We oppose the teaching of Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) (values clarification), critical thinking skills and similar programs that are simply a relabeling of Outcome-Based Education (OBE) (mastery learning) which focus on behavior modification and have the purpose of challenging the student’s fixed beliefs and undermining parental authority.Read that gobbledygook again and let the meaning really sink in.
The idea that challenging students “fixed beliefs” is something bad really floors me. I believe it was Socrates who taught his students by asking questions. Questioning their “fixed beliefs”. That is a technique that worked very well over 2000 years ago and seems to have been the foundation for science, philosophy and even theology for lo these many years. That’s why when the great State of Texas GOP want to toss out the entire purpose of scholarship I get a little testy.
If we abandon critical thinking, we might as well stop innovating and doing any research and development at all. Why question the “fixed beliefs” of anyone? Some people believe the Earth is flat, I suppose the school system under the GOP platform would stop teaching the fact that the Earth is round, to avoid the behavior modification of having a student understand that they will not fall off the edge of the earth if they travel too far east or west.
What is this plank in the otherwise wacko platform really about? Well it is a concession to the folks who are convinced that schools are trying to teach kids all manner of un-biblical facts like the Earth was not created in just 6 “literal” days. Or that all humankind did not descend from Adam and Eve!
What’s worse is that the folks who wrote this tripe most likely have kids that will never attend a public school. Their kids will go to private academies where they are protected from minorities and other undesirable rabble. And that brings me to the real reason for this plank.
For years the GOP has been actively trying to gut the public education system in our state. Their continued call for “vouchers” points to this. They believe in a two tiered education system, though they will never come out and say it that clearly. One tier is private education for the privileged kids who will become the leaders and the other is the public system for the kids who will most likely grow up to be serviceable workers in society. Now before you go calling me a socialist or worse, hear me out.
In South Africa during apartheid, they had a very well organized two tier education system. For whites, a good public education will all the bells and whistles and for blacks and “coloreds” they had the “Bantu Education System”. This appalling system was designed to give its students only enough education to make them useful as low paid workers and underlings. It was one of the most reprehensible components of the apartheid system yet was very effective for its evil purpose.
Transpose that to today, and you see the same mentality being woven into the GOP platform for public education. It is insidious and potentially devastating for our education system which used to be one of the best in the world. Now it is but a shell of that and a large part of it is due to changes imposed by politicians in the guise of “improving accountability” and the latest ploy, preventing the education system from challenging “fixed beliefs”.
You will be hard pressed to find any politician who will admit to this systematic dismantling of public education, but if you look at the facts it is undeniable. Of course that is unless you are already a product of a system that doesn’t challenge your “fixed beliefs”, in which case you most likely never finished this blog.
Monday, July 09, 2012
Another Multimillionaire Denounces Citizenship to Horde Money
It's becoming a trend, the ultra rich denouncing their US Citizenship in order to horde more cash. They escape taxes when they leave the country, even though they continue to make money from US investments and from US sources. Some like billionaire Facebook part-owner Eduardo Saverin. He denounced his US citizenship in favor of one from Singapore where he can stash his profits from the sale of Facebook's stock and pay no US taxes.
Second case is Denise Rich, yes the songwriter Denise Rich, whose husband Mark Rich fled the US in 1983 for tax evasion, has decided to take the legal way out. In November, she renounced her citizenship and stashed much of her wealth in the Cook Islands. That tiny South Pacific country has become the new Switzerland for hiding massive amounts of wealth.
The trend has seen 1800 ultra-rich US citizens bail the country to avoid paying their fair share of taxes to the country where they made their billions. Add to this the many companies who shifted their "headquarters" to off shore locations like the Cayman Islands. Because of a nice tax loophole companies having "headquarters" offshore get big tax breaks. There is a building on Grand Cayman housing what some estimate as 12,000 corporations including Coca-Cola and Halliburton. Though not illegal, the practice is a sham and needs to be stopped.
The idea that the super-wealthy are above our laws and are "Citizens of the World" is not new, but when their businesses and investments make their fortunes here, they need to pay their taxes here. Just because they are obscenely rich does not give them any more rights than any other US citizen....oh wait, they are no longer US citizens! See how it works?
Second case is Denise Rich, yes the songwriter Denise Rich, whose husband Mark Rich fled the US in 1983 for tax evasion, has decided to take the legal way out. In November, she renounced her citizenship and stashed much of her wealth in the Cook Islands. That tiny South Pacific country has become the new Switzerland for hiding massive amounts of wealth.
The trend has seen 1800 ultra-rich US citizens bail the country to avoid paying their fair share of taxes to the country where they made their billions. Add to this the many companies who shifted their "headquarters" to off shore locations like the Cayman Islands. Because of a nice tax loophole companies having "headquarters" offshore get big tax breaks. There is a building on Grand Cayman housing what some estimate as 12,000 corporations including Coca-Cola and Halliburton. Though not illegal, the practice is a sham and needs to be stopped.
The idea that the super-wealthy are above our laws and are "Citizens of the World" is not new, but when their businesses and investments make their fortunes here, they need to pay their taxes here. Just because they are obscenely rich does not give them any more rights than any other US citizen....oh wait, they are no longer US citizens! See how it works?
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