I was regularly barefoot and in the kitchen while pregnant, but I was not regularly pregnant.

:)

What was that little meme your type use so often?

“Barefoot, pregnant, and in the kitchen?”

hehehehe

=)

mmMMMmMMMmmMmMMmMm…

Traitor to His Class: As they survey the ruins of the conservative movement, Republicans ponder what might have been, if only Bush hadn’t blundered so often and Congress plundered so much. A study in today’s New York Times provides shocking evidence of the latest conservative betrayal. According to the latest available IRS data, the richest Americans have fared worse under Bush than any other income group.

If the Republican revolution promised anything, it was that after years of oppression and neglect, rich people would finally have the chance to get ahead. But the Times reports that life is tough on Easy Street:

“Incomes after 2000 fell the most among those at the top of the income ladder. The top one-tenth of 1 percent, about 130,500 taxpayers, reported their average income fell almost 17 percent, to just under $4.9 million each in 2004.”

Even Bush’s harshest critics would have to concede that the president has done everything in his power to help the rich. He cut tax rates for the upper brackets. He cut the capital gains rate from 20 percent to 15 percent. He gutted the estate tax and virtually eliminated the tax on dividends.

From 2001 to 2004, Bush gave the rich a new tax cut every single year. Yet as the Times points out, even with all those trillion-dollar tax cuts, the richest Americans saw their after-tax incomes plunge by 12.1 percent.

In his 2004 campaign, John Edwards called Bush’s economic theory “the most radical and dangerous economic theory to hit our shores since socialism a century ago.” It’s now clear that for the very rich, even socialism might have been a better deal.

This is shattering news for Democrats and Republicans alike. What is the point of supply-side conservatism if it can’t even make the rich richer? For that matter, where is the joy in railing against it? Supply-side economics never made any sense to begin with, but now its logic isn’t worth the napkin it was written on. Trickle-down theory turned out to be no trickle, just down.

President Bush is famous for setting big goals and failing to meet them. Now we know he can’t meet the easiest of goals, either. The rich have been getting richer for centuries. Moreover, in contrast to its other pursuits, the Bush administration’s efforts to help the rich were a model of persistence and consistency. No pesky resistance tried to stop them; no clumsy Rumsfeld botched the execution. They did their best, yet still they failed.

In response, the rich are voting with their feet—or perhaps their footmen. In 2004, Bush carried voters with incomes above $200,000 by 63 percent to 35 percent. This year, the Republican margin shrunk 20 points, to 53 percent to 45 percent. That was the sharpest Democratic gain of any income category. More and more rich people are coming around to Bill Clinton’s view that “if you want to live like a Republican, you have to vote like a Democrat.”

While the very rich keep seeing their incomes go down, the cost of being rich keeps going up. The PNC Christmas Price Index, which tracks the price of everything from 12 drummers drumming to a partridge in a pear tree, reported this week that the cost of the 12 days of Christmas has jumped to an all-time high of $18,920. PNC says that a tight labor market means wages for piping pipers and other skilled workers are up, while the burst in the housing bubble “has dampened demand for luxury goods, such as gold rings.”

Ronald Reagan used to say that in the 1960s, Democrats fought a war on poverty, and poverty won. In this decade, Republicans fought a war on rich people’s poverty, and poverty won again.

Once upon a time, the United States was the world leader in making people rich. Not anymore. The annual World Wealth Report keeps track of High Net Worth Individuals (HNWIs), otherwise known as millionaires. According to the 2006 report, South Korea, India, and Russia are producing new millionaires three times faster than we are. Last year, the United States even fell behind Canada.

By examining “how much it costs HNWIs to live extremely well,” the World Wealth Report shows just how hard it can be to keep up with the Gateses:

“HNWIs around the world have two things in common: a deep concern about preserving their wealth and an abiding desire to ensure growth of their wealth for the benefit of future generations and benefactors. … The ‘admission and maintenance charges’ to a life of privilege cannot be overlooked when discussing impacts to HNWI wealth.”

While the gap has shrunk in the past two years, the report says that in 2003, the inflation rate for luxury goods was 5.5 percent higher than the Consumer Price Index. The report monitors an annual basket of luxury goods—including “5-star hotels, spa visits, and boarding school tuitions.” As a percentage of wealth, rich Americans pay 60 percent more to live like Paris Hilton than Asian-Pacific millionaires do.

As they look toward 2008, that gives Republicans a new mantra: Stop the class warfare! Let Democrats whine about the middle-class squeeze. The upper-class squeeze—now that’s an issue that Bill Frist and Mitt Romney can run on. … 4:33 P.M. (link)********************************************************************

http://www.slate.com/id/2156085/#GeorgeHasTwoFathers

toward the end of this long post…

And if you are Jewish, as I am, you can use that turkey bacon, if it’s really as issue for you. Honestly, friends, it’s not with me now & then. :)

Posted by: WSClark | December 25, 2006 at 09:34 PM

True dat.

FYI, Cox does NOT support Net Neutrality, neither does AT&T, Comcast, Verizon, and every other large telecommunications provider.

What is Network Neutrality?

Network Neutrality — or “Net Neutrality” for short — is the guiding principle that preserves the free and open Internet.

Net Neutrality ensures that all users can access the content or run the applications and devices of their choice. With Net Neutrality, the network’s only job is to move data — not choose which data to privilege with higher quality service. Net Neutrality prevents the companies that control the wires from discriminating against content based on its source or ownership.

Net Neutrality is the reason why the Internet has driven economic innovation, democratic participation, and free speech online. It’s why the Internet has become an unrivaled environment for open communications, civic involvement and free speech.

Learn more in Net Neutrality 101.

http://www.savetheinternet.com/

That would be great, Mr. KIA! Maybe if we have a blog meet next year, we can get together show off our chops!

The Left and the Right meet at the stomach!