Krugman writes: "Rising inequality has obvious economic costs: stagnant wages despite rising productivity, rising debt that makes us more vulnerable to financial crisis. It also has big social and human costs."
New York Times columnist Paul Krugman. (photo: AP)
Paranoia of the Plutocrats
28 January 14
ising inequality has obvious economic costs: stagnant wages despite rising productivity, rising debt that makes us more vulnerable to financial crisis. It also has big social and human costs. There is, for example, strong evidence that high inequality leads to worse health and higher mortality.
But there's more. Extreme inequality, it turns out, creates a class of people who are alarmingly detached from reality - and simultaneously gives these people great power.
The example many are buzzing about right now is the billionaire investor Tom Perkins, a founding member of the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. In a letter to the editor of The Wall Street Journal, Mr. Perkins lamented public criticism of the "one percent" - and compared such criticism to Nazi attacks on the Jews, suggesting that we are on the road to another Kristallnacht.
FOCUS: Charles Pierce | The Republican Clown Car
Charles Pierce, Esquire
Pierce writes: "I'm going to miss Barack Obama's presidency, if only for the fact that his State of the Union address has become an occasion for Republicans to proudly let their freak flags fly."
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Steve Weissman | Fascist Beast Back in the
Streets of Paris
Steve Weissman, Reader Supported News
Weissman writes: "Yes, many Israelis make use of the Holocaust, just as many in America traded on the undeniable horror of 9/11. That's Shoah business, as Israel's silver-tongued Abba Eban once called it."
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Steve Weissman, Reader Supported News
Weissman writes: "Yes, many Israelis make use of the Holocaust, just as many in America traded on the undeniable horror of 9/11. That's Shoah business, as Israel's silver-tongued Abba Eban once called it."
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James Clapper Calls for Snowden and
'Accomplices' to Return NSA Documents
Spencer Ackerman, Guardian UK
Ackerman reports: "James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, has issued a blistering condemnation of Edward Snowden, calling the surveillance disclosures published by the Guardian and other news outlets a 'perfect storm' that would endanger American lives."
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Spencer Ackerman, Guardian UK
Ackerman reports: "James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, has issued a blistering condemnation of Edward Snowden, calling the surveillance disclosures published by the Guardian and other news outlets a 'perfect storm' that would endanger American lives."
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Ray McGovern |
No Tears for the Real Robert Gates
Ray McGovern, Consortium News
McGovern writes: "In Official Washington, the gap between image and reality can be wide, but there is a virtual canyon separating the mainstream's awestruck regard for Robert Gates as a 'wise man' and his record as a deceitful opportunist known to his former colleagues."
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Ray McGovern, Consortium News
McGovern writes: "In Official Washington, the gap between image and reality can be wide, but there is a virtual canyon separating the mainstream's awestruck regard for Robert Gates as a 'wise man' and his record as a deceitful opportunist known to his former colleagues."
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Rand Paul
Wants to Punish Poor Women Who Have Children
Bryce Covert, ThinkProgress
Covert reports: "At a luncheon for the Chamber of Commerce in Lexington, KY, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) floated the idea of capping government benefits for women who have children out of wedlock."
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Bryce Covert, ThinkProgress
Covert reports: "At a luncheon for the Chamber of Commerce in Lexington, KY, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) floated the idea of capping government benefits for women who have children out of wedlock."
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US Says Russia
Tested Missile, Despite Treaty
Michael R. Gordon, The New York Times
Gordon reports: "The United States informed its NATO allies this month that Russia had tested a new ground-launched cruise missile, raising concerns about Moscow's compliance with a landmark arms control accord."
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Michael R. Gordon, The New York Times
Gordon reports: "The United States informed its NATO allies this month that Russia had tested a new ground-launched cruise missile, raising concerns about Moscow's compliance with a landmark arms control accord."
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Pete Seeger's Greatest Legacy? Saving New York's Hudson
River
Suzanne Goldenberg, Guardian UK
Goldenberg reports: "Pete Seeger's greatest legacy after a long life filled with music and activism may have been saving the Hudson river, according to those who worked with him to save the waterway."
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Suzanne Goldenberg, Guardian UK
Goldenberg reports: "Pete Seeger's greatest legacy after a long life filled with music and activism may have been saving the Hudson river, according to those who worked with him to save the waterway."
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