News flash.
The Man in Black—is that really who you are?
I was wearing black clothes almost from the beginning. I feel comfortable in black. I felt like black looked good onstage, that it was attractive, so I started wearing it all the time. And then in 1969 I wrote a song called Man in Black, in which I pointed out that there are a lot of things wrong in my country, a lot of hypocrisies, the Vietnam War, all that, you know, that all these things could be corrected if we turned it over to the people, and one of those people is me. And I point my finger at myself: when you see me, I'll be the man in black, one of those responsible. And that kind of became my flag bearer, that song. And I've worn that mantle ever since.
Do you feel that same way about this country?
Yeah. Uh-huh.
Do you watch the news?
Yeah, quite a bit.
Do you feel pessimistic about the way things are going?
I just wish we would ... I wish we would ... mmm. Not going to get into that, Lev."
From Lev Grossman's http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101030922/tcashqa.htmlof Johnny Cash, conducted on July 25.
This should help morale: A GI suffers a grenade attack, ends up having his foot amputated, spends four weeks in a military hospital, then gets billed for his food?
While they're paying for their food, corporate boards and the politicians who love them aren't paying for anything:
Grasso...$139.5 million in accrued benefits
Koslowki...$71 million last year at Tyco, "while allegedly using the coporate treasury as a personal piggybank -- and cutting jobs and losing shareholders' value."
Eisner..."nearly a billion dollars of compensation over the past decade."
Barad...$431 million when she was fired from Mattel.
According to Albert Hunt in yesterday's WSJ (sorry, subscription required), "Mr. Grasso's confusion occurred when he looked at other CEOs who have made out like bandits -- and a few who are. In 1980 the average CEO of a major American company was paid 40 times more than the average worker; today it's about 400 times as much. If the average worker's pay had gone up as much over the past two decades, it would be more than $160,000 a year. Median pay for the CEOs of Fortune's 100 largest companies rose 14% to $13.2 million last year, while everything else -- jobs, stock value, profits -- was dropping."
And Bush wants to widen that divide, pushing tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans that will increase after-tax income for millionaires by more then 5%. That's double what middle-income taxpayers will get. And it gets better when you realize that even the toys of the rich are getting cheaper, care of the U.S. gov't, as congress, following the administration's lead, has "quadrupled write-offs for owners of luxury SUVs to $100,000. Thus, over the next decade American taxpayers will lose $1.3 billion to subsideize more gas-guzzline Lincoln Navigators and Cadillac Escalades."
And that's money that we'll need in Iraq where we are trying to make sure we have enough oil to feed the maws of those ridiculous behemoths.
"Defenders of the current system arrogantly assume Americans have little problem with rewarding success, figuring someday they'll be on the right side of the widening income and wealth gap. This view is shared by George W. Bush, who dropped talk of corporate malfeasance and accountability since it disappeared from the headlines a year ago."
The Man in Black—is that really who you are?
I was wearing black clothes almost from the beginning. I feel comfortable in black. I felt like black looked good onstage, that it was attractive, so I started wearing it all the time. And then in 1969 I wrote a song called Man in Black, in which I pointed out that there are a lot of things wrong in my country, a lot of hypocrisies, the Vietnam War, all that, you know, that all these things could be corrected if we turned it over to the people, and one of those people is me. And I point my finger at myself: when you see me, I'll be the man in black, one of those responsible. And that kind of became my flag bearer, that song. And I've worn that mantle ever since.
Do you feel that same way about this country?
Yeah. Uh-huh.
Do you watch the news?
Yeah, quite a bit.
Do you feel pessimistic about the way things are going?
I just wish we would ... I wish we would ... mmm. Not going to get into that, Lev."
From Lev Grossman's http://www.time.com/time/covers/1101030922/tcashqa.htmlof Johnny Cash, conducted on July 25.
This should help morale: A GI suffers a grenade attack, ends up having his foot amputated, spends four weeks in a military hospital, then gets billed for his food?
While they're paying for their food, corporate boards and the politicians who love them aren't paying for anything:
Grasso...$139.5 million in accrued benefits
Koslowki...$71 million last year at Tyco, "while allegedly using the coporate treasury as a personal piggybank -- and cutting jobs and losing shareholders' value."
Eisner..."nearly a billion dollars of compensation over the past decade."
Barad...$431 million when she was fired from Mattel.
According to Albert Hunt in yesterday's WSJ (sorry, subscription required), "Mr. Grasso's confusion occurred when he looked at other CEOs who have made out like bandits -- and a few who are. In 1980 the average CEO of a major American company was paid 40 times more than the average worker; today it's about 400 times as much. If the average worker's pay had gone up as much over the past two decades, it would be more than $160,000 a year. Median pay for the CEOs of Fortune's 100 largest companies rose 14% to $13.2 million last year, while everything else -- jobs, stock value, profits -- was dropping."
And Bush wants to widen that divide, pushing tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans that will increase after-tax income for millionaires by more then 5%. That's double what middle-income taxpayers will get. And it gets better when you realize that even the toys of the rich are getting cheaper, care of the U.S. gov't, as congress, following the administration's lead, has "quadrupled write-offs for owners of luxury SUVs to $100,000. Thus, over the next decade American taxpayers will lose $1.3 billion to subsideize more gas-guzzline Lincoln Navigators and Cadillac Escalades."
And that's money that we'll need in Iraq where we are trying to make sure we have enough oil to feed the maws of those ridiculous behemoths.
"Defenders of the current system arrogantly assume Americans have little problem with rewarding success, figuring someday they'll be on the right side of the widening income and wealth gap. This view is shared by George W. Bush, who dropped talk of corporate malfeasance and accountability since it disappeared from the headlines a year ago."
posted by John at 4:53 PM
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