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MORE ABOUT THE MOVIE

The movie was written and directed by Charlie Steak and produced by Synthetic Human Pictures. Everyone worked on the film for free. Contributions from individuals paid for most of the expenses.

You can learn more about Synthetic Human Pictures by clicking on their logo in the top navigation.

For a full list of the cast and crew, as well as news and events, click here.

You can contact the filmmakers directly by clicking here.

A FEW WORDS ABOUT THE SEGMENTS OF THE MOVIE:

"We just love cheap plastic crap from China"

Walmart is the largest retailer in the United States. It is the largest retailer in the world. Ranked by revenue, it is the world’s third largest corporation.

Its revenue in 2011 was $422 billion dollars. That exceeds the GDP (gross domestic product) of at least 154 of the world’s countries. 70% of Walmart’s sales are of items manufactured in China.

While studies show that families save money shopping at Walmart, the Economic Policies Institute estimates that from 2001 to 2006, Walmart alone caused a trade deficit with China which eliminated 200,000 U.S. jobs. Some studies show that while new Walmart stores create jobs, within five years of opening they put 50% of the existing competition out of business—destroying jobs.

Walmart has resisted providing adequate and meaningful health care coverage for its workers and has prevented its U.S. employees from forming unions. Walmart pays most of its workers less than the amount needed to live on. Full-time workers earn an average of $10.78 an hour, although starting pay can be far lower. Yearly income for workers with children can often be below the federal poverty level.

From the 2012 DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL PLATFORM:

The President knew from the start that to rebuild true middle class security we can't just cut our way to prosperity. We must out-educate, out-innovate, and out-build the world. We need an economy that creates the jobs of the future and makes things the rest of the world buys—not one built on outsourcing, loopholes, or risky financial deals that jeopardize everyone, especially the middle class.

We continue to fight for measures that strengthen recovery and create jobs now, including keeping teachers and first responders on the job, putting construction workers back to work by investing in our roads, bridges, schools, and water supply, helping families refinance their mortgages and save hundreds of dollars a month, cutting taxes for small businesses that invest and hire, and putting veterans back to work. That's why we continue to fight for relief for the long-term unemployed, including a ban on hiring discrimination against the unemployed and a reformed and expanded universal worker training proposal to provide more training and job search assistance to all displaced workers regardless of how they lost their job.

Democrats believe that the most effective way to increase opportunity for our families is a high quality, well paying job. The Democratic Party supports fair trade agreements that raise standards for all workers here and abroad while making American businesses more competitive, and we don’t believe in tax giveaways that reward companies for moving American jobs overseas.


"I don't want a cure for AIDS or breast cancer"

There is no known reliable cure for breast cancer or AIDS, although promising breakthroughs in AIDS treatment have extended the life expectancy of those infected—if they have access to drug regimens.

While the Bush administration was more interested in promoting AIDS treatment in Africa (for the benefit of American pharmaceutical companies) than in assisting American citizens who have AIDS, and Republicans have withheld money from organizations in Africa that distribute condoms in attempts to control the spread of HIV/AIDS, President Barack Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton have pledged the support of the United States in the global fight against AIDS. Clinton said the United States believes access to HIV/AIDS prevention, treatment and care should be a universal and shared responsibility and said health is a human right.

Affordability and accessibility of drug regimens continue to be issues both in the U.S. and abroad.

While breast cancer continues to fight for attention and funding (far more than prostate cancer and erectile dysfunction), the Republicans have waged a savage war against Planned Parenthood, often the only potential provider of women’s health care for low-income women. If the Affordable Care Act remains in effect, checkups should be available for many women who would otherwise go without. Early detection remains crucial to surviving breast cancer; affordable available screenings and checkups are essential to women’s health.

From the 2012 DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL PLATFORM:

Democrats have increased overall funding to combat HIV/AIDS to record levels and will continue our nation's fight against HIV/AIDS. President Obama established the first-ever comprehensive National HIV/AIDS Strategy for responding to the domestic epidemic, which calls for reducing HIV incidence, increasing access to care, optimizing health outcomes, and reducing HIV-related health disparities. This is an evidence-based plan that is guided by science and seeks to direct resources to the communities at greatest risk, including gay men, black and Latino Americans, substance users, and others at high risk of infection. We will continue to support America's groundbreaking biomedical researchers in their lifesaving work.

Our efforts to combat HIV/AIDS are part of a broader commitment to address the challenges posed by infectious disease. Over the past four years, the administration has leveraged billions of dollars in commitments from donors to meet the demand for new vaccines, making it possible to immunize millions of children and prevent premature deaths.


"...A classroom with thirty other children"

The average size of an elementary school class is more than 24.3 students. Speaking from experience, there is no way anyone can do an adequate job of teaching that many students at the same time. Insanity rules. The ideal ratio for the best results is eight students per instructor. Teachers are not well-paid. 25% of elementary school teachers make less than $35,000 a year. Teachers with 15 years experience average a salary of only $43,000 a year. In some states, California for one, teachers often cannot afford to live in the district where they teach. The federal government could do a lot more to help.

From the 2012 DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL PLATFORM:

Democrats believe that getting an education is the surest path to the middle class, giving all students the opportunity to fulfill their dreams and contribute to our economy and democracy. Public education is one of our critical democratic institutions. We are committed to ensuring that every child in America has access to a world-class public education so we can out-educate the world and make sure America has the world's highest proportion of college graduates by 2020.

We have helped states and territories develop comprehensive plans to raise standards and improve instruction in their early learning programs and invested in expanding and reforming the Head Start Program.

President Obama and the Democrats are committed to working with states and communities so they have the flexibility and resources they need to improve elementary and secondary education in a way that works best for students. To that end, the President challenged and encouraged states to raise their standards so students graduate ready for college or careers and can succeed in a dynamic global economy. Forty-six states responded, leading groundbreaking reforms that will deliver better education to millions of American students.


"Women just can't be trusted to make decisions about their own bodies..."

A woman’s right to choose whether to terminate her pregnancy is controlled by state law as limited by the Supreme Court’s decision in Roe v. Wade. If and when Roe v. Wade is overturned by the current Republican-appointed majority of Supreme Court Justices, abortion will be outlawed in some states. The pregnant daughters of the well-to-do lawmakers in those states will be flown by their mothers to states where abortion is still legal; some poor women in those states will return to using coat hangers—risking infection, injury, and death.

During the past four years, Republican state legislatures have tried to prohibit abortion by finding new ways to limit a woman’s right to choose. Collectively, they have enacted 83 statutes requiring waiting periods, mandating opportunities to view ultrasound pictures, shortening time periods, and attempting to defund Planned Parenthood—Planned Parenthood never received money for performing abortions, but states tried to take away the money it received for women’s health care in an effort to drive it away. Republicans have passed statutes targeting clinics that provide abortions by adding requirements that have no bearing on the safety of the woman or the procedure, such as room size or hallway width, or whether the doctor performing the abortion has admission “privileges” at the nearest local hospital. (The latter requirement has no bearing on whether a woman needing admission to a hospital would be admitted; its only effect might be to bar the Planned Parenthood doctor from initially being the doctor to treat her at the hospital.)

It remains a mystery why the Republicans, in their out-and-out fight against abortion, fail to embrace contraception, which, if universally practiced, would prevent the issue of abortion from occurring. My most logical guess is that they really want you to not have sex for enjoyment, and they believe they can deter you from having sex if they can maintain the existence of serious consequences for having sex. This is vicious and puritan in the worst possible way.

From the 2012 DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL PLATFORM:

The Democratic Party strongly and unequivocally supports Roe v. Wade and a woman's right to make decisions regarding her pregnancy, including a safe and legal abortion, regardless of ability to pay. We oppose any and all efforts to weaken or undermine that right. Abortion is an intensely personal decision between a woman, her family, her doctor, and her clergy; there is no place for politicians or government to get in the way. We also recognize that health care and education help reduce the number of unintended pregnancies and thereby also reduce the need for abortions. We strongly and unequivocally support a woman's decision to have a child by providing affordable health care and ensuring the availability of and access to programs that help women during pregnancy and after the birth of a child, including caring adoption programs.


"Even if we're separate we'll still be called equal"

Despite advances in social equality in the last 50 years, including the election of Barack Obama, different races are all too often separated in this country. Some people’s deep-seated hatred of Obama for being in a position of authority is a chilling reminder of the feelings of race-based superiority that are still with us. In some communities, these feelings extend toward Hispanics and other minorities.

In many ways, America is a segregated nation. Many whites and blacks live in separate neighborhoods, go to separate schools, and seldom bridge the divide. The Supreme Court, rarely a leader and never courageous, has eviscerated any ongoing attempts to achieve diversity in institutions of higher education and has undone efforts to desegregate public schools following the 1954 decision in Brown v. The Board of Education that held that “separate but equal” schools were inherently unequal.

The recent spate of efforts by Republican state legislatures to restrict voting rights have been race-neutral on their face, but with an overwhelming negative effect on minorities. Students at schools which serve a predominantly or exclusively minority population generally receive an inferior education. This must change; the best tool a government can give its citizens to change their lives is a good education.

From the 2012 DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL PLATFORM:

We believe in an America where everybody gets a fair shot and everybody plays by the same set of rules. At the core of the Democratic Party is the principle that no one should face discrimination on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, language, religion, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity, or disability status. Democrats support our civil rights statutes and we have stepped up enforcement of laws that prohibit discrimination in the workplace and other settings. We are committed to protecting all communities from violence. We are committed to ending racial, ethnic, and religious profiling and requiring federal, state, and local enforcement agencies to take steps to eliminate the practice, and we continue to support enforcement of Title VI. We are committed to equal opportunity for all Americans and to making sure that every American is treated equally under the law.


"I need the government to tell me (who I can love)"

It just kills some straight people that two men or two women might love each other enough to want to join themselves together as one, and ask that the world recognize that union. As Republicans in Arizona (which already has a law excluding same-sex unions from marriage) try to put a similar provision in their constitution, the message reverberates: “We don’t just hate you—we really, really, really hate you.” Denial of equal recognition and status by the government encourages hatred and persecution. An Oklahoma State Representative, Sally Kern, said homosexuality is the biggest threat our nation has, more so than terrorism. Gay teenagers continue to commit suicide because they are made to feel so unwelcome in the world—just for being who they are.

In what way do two women living together in a committed relationship really threaten Mitt and Ann Romney’s marriage? Answer: It doesn’t. The suggestion that it would is ridiculous. Committed relationships are valuable building blocks of stable communities.

From the 2012 DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL PLATFORM:

We support the right of all families to have equal respect, responsibilities, and protections under the law. We support marriage equality and support the movement to secure equal treatment under law for same-sex couples. We also support the freedom of churches and religious entities to decide how to administer marriage as a religious sacrament without government interference.

We oppose discriminatory federal and state constitutional amendments and other attempts to deny equal protection of the laws to committed same-sex couples who seek the same respect and responsibilities as other married couples. We support the full repeal of the so-called Defense of Marriage Act and the passage of the Respect for Marriage Act.

President Obama and the Democratic Party are committed to ensuring all Americans are treated fairly. This administration hosted the first-ever White House Conference on Bullying Prevention and we must continue our work to prevent vicious bullying of young people and support LGBT youth. The President's record, from ending "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" in full cooperation with our military leadership, to passing the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act, to ensuring same-sex couples can visit each other in the hospital, reflects Democrats’ beliefs that all Americans deserve the same chance to pursue happiness, earn a living, be safe in their communities, serve their country, and take care of the ones they love. The Administration has said that the word ‘family' in immigration includes LGBT relationships in order to protect bi-national families threatened with deportation.


"The EPA is an outmoded idea..."

The Environmental Protection Agency is supposed to help investigate and enforce regulations keeping America’s environment clean and healthy. Republicans have seen to it that the EPA doesn’t. It was too expensive for corporations. Under the Republicans, the federal law that deals with investigating and cleaning up toxic waste sites (The Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act, known as Superfund) has been gutted and efforts have been made to shift costs from the responsible parties (corporations) to consumers. Our groundwater supplies are in danger of contamination from toxic waste sites. Now pharmaceutical waste is everywhere in our surface water. Why does our government fail to protect us? Because we’ve let the government come under the control of corporations. Even now, many of the corporations pouring vast amounts of money into the Republican’s coffers are seeking one thing: the rollback of regulations that prevent them from polluting America without consequences or liability. We need clean water and clean air. We do not deserve cancer or respiratory diseases so corporations can make more money.

From the 2012 DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL PLATFORM:

Democrats are committed to balancing environmental protection with development…

Under Obama, the EPA helped draft a historic rise in fuel economy standards for new cars and trucks, issued the first-ever rules to curb mercury from the nation's coal-fired power plants and started regulating the heat-trapping gases blamed for global warming.

"When I hear folks grumbling about environmental policy, you almost want to do a `Back to the Future' reminder of folks of what happened when we didn't have a strong EPA," Obama said to about 800 EPA employees gathered at headquarters in Washington, reminding them that before Republican President Richard Nixon created the agency in 1970, rivers caught fire and were devoid of life.

“We don't have to choose between dirty air and dirty water or a growing economy. We can make sure that we are doing right by our environment and in fact putting people back to work all across America."

Obama Addresses EPA Staff
The Huffington Post, 1/10/12


"So long as the label says it's food..."

Corporations aren’t interested in letting you know exactly what goes into your food. If they did, you wouldn’t eat it. A Republican Congress isn’t interested in keeping you safe—that would be bad for business. So you eat meat and dairy products that are full of hormones, grain products that have been genetically-modified, and produce covered with pesticide residue. The Food and Drug Administration fails to regularly inspect the food industry, and when it finds violations, does little or nothing to enforce regulations. Many facilities get inspected less than once a year. Truth in labeling is constantly resisted.

About 70 percent of grocery store food in the U.S. and Canada contain genetically engineered ingredients, and there is no mention of this on the labels. In the meantime, all you can do is read the nutrition label. If it contains ingredients that you don’t recognize, that don’t sound real, then don’t buy it and don’t eat it.

President Obama proposed a simpler, smarter, and more cost-effective approach to regulation, rather than one riddled with special rules written by lobbyists. Efficient and effective regulations enforce common sense safeguards to protect the American people.


"Getting screwed by the utility company..."

The Republicans have worked hard to deregulate many industries, claiming that it would result in more competition and said competition would be good for the consumer. The opposite has been true. Deregulation has led to less competition and consumers having to pay rates that the government allows to rise and rise and rise.

Nine years ago, the average American family spent $3,300 on gasoline, home heating, and electricity. This year, the average American family will spend over $6,000 on gasoline, home heating, and electricity. This is an increase of nearly $3,000 per family. The indirect costs of higher energy prices in the form of higher prices for consumer goods and services are likely to cost families another $1,400 per year.

 

From the 2012 DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL PLATFORM:

We are saving consumers money on their energy bills—both at home and at the pump—but Republican energy policy is full of empty rhetoric and bad ideas that would make their Big Oil donors even richer at the expense of the middle class. Republicans would keep giving billions of taxpayer dollars a year to profitable oil companies and increase costs on consumers. Democrats will fight to cut tax subsidies for Big Oil while promoting job growth in the clean energy sector, so we can cut the deficit and increase jobs and growth in America.


"We need more minorities in prison"

While black men make up less than 12% of the general population, they account for almost 50% of the prison population. One third of all black males are on some sort of criminal justice supervision. One third of all black males are not dangerous and evil. Something is wrong with this picture.

Until recently, possession of crack cocaine and powder cocaine were punished differently. Crack cocaine (commonly possessed by black defendants) was punished 100 times more severely than powder cocaine (the preferred form used by whites). Improved education, housing, and meaningful job opportunities would do more to stop crime than increasing incarceration. It would also be much less expensive in the long run.


"Hybrid cars really suck"

Not really. Actually, they suck less of our natural resources from us. Also, with increased innovation, they will allow people not just to get around but to transport their stuff, and express their persona.

We don’t have cars that are as fuel efficient as they could be because past Republican administrations and legislators have prevented the government from encouraging car manufacturers to make such cars. Our continuing disproportionate use of oil benefits oil companies and those they support. As America’s corporations continue to have the ear of Republican congressmen, protection of America’s national wildlands has decreased. Arches National Park and Canyonlands National Park have been under attack. Whether it’s oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge or uranium at the edge of the Grand Canyon, if there’s money to be made for a corporation, no loss is too great.

From the 2012 DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL PLATFORM:

In the last four years, President Obama and the Democratic Party have taken concrete steps to make us more energy independent. We've supported nearly 225,000 clean energy jobs and Americans are importing less oil, breathing cleaner air, and saving money on energy costs. Historic investments in clean energy technologies have helped double the electricity we get from wind and solar sources. New emissions and fuel efficiency standards for American cars are reducing our oil use, saving consumers at the pump, and putting Americans back to work. Our dependence on foreign oil is now at a 16-year low, and a new era of cheap, abundant natural gas is helping to bring jobs and industry back to the United States.

We can move toward a sustainable energy-independent future if we harness all of America's great natural resources. That means an all-of-the-above approach to developing America's many energy resources, including wind, solar, biofuels, geothermal, hydropower, nuclear, oil, clean coal, and natural gas. President Obama has encouraged innovation to reach his goal of generating 80 percent of our electricity from clean energy sources by 2035. Democrats support making America the world's leader in building a clean energy economy by extending clean energy incentives that support American businesses and American jobs in communities across the country. It's not enough to invent clean energy technologies here—we want to make them here and sell them around the world. We can further cut our reliance on oil with increased energy efficiency in buildings, industry, and homes, and through the promotion of advanced vehicles, fuel economy standards, and the greater use of natural gas in transportation. Harnessing our natural gas resources needs to be done in a safe and responsible manner, which is why the Obama administration has proposed a number of safeguards to protect against water contamination and air pollution. We will continue to advocate for the use of clean fossil fuel while ensuring that public and environmental health and workers' safety are protected. We support more infrastructure investment to speed the transition to cleaner fuels in the transportation sector, and we are expediting the approval process to build critical oil and gas lines essential to transporting our energy for consumers. Building a clean energy future means that new exploration and production needs to be approached safely and responsibly. Democrats are committed to balancing environmental protection with development, and that means preserving sensitive public lands from exploration, like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Pacific West Coast, Gulf of Maine, and other irreplaceable national landscapes.


"I don't feel that I deserve health insurance"

Most health insurance used to be provided by employers as a benefit for the employee and the employer (healthy workers are more productive). Now health insurance is provided by private insurance companies with employees covering some or all of the cost. Health insurance companies also increase their profits by denying claims. In 2011, health insurance companies made profits measured in hundreds of millions of dollars. People who can’t afford health insurance live in fear of getting sick or losing their job. A national health insurance program would allow part of the money currently counted as profit to help cover everyone else. In the wealthiest, most powerful nation on earth, no one should have to choose between taking their child to a doctor and paying the rent. Democrats are committed to making sure every single American has access to affordable, effective health care coverage. The Affordable Care Act, often referred to as “Obamacare,” has been the subject of much argument and resistance, with few of the American people completely aware of its benefits.

From the 2012 DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL PLATFORM:

We believe accessible, affordable, high quality health care is part of the American promise, that Americans should have the security that comes with good health care, and that no one should go broke because they get sick. Over the determined opposition of Republicans, we enacted landmark reforms that are already helping millions of Americans, and more benefits will come soon.

Today, as a result of our efforts, young Americans entering the workforce can stay on their parents' plans. Insurers can no longer refuse to cover kids with pre-existing medical conditions. Insurance companies will no longer be able to arbitrarily cap and cancel coverage, or charge women more simply because of their gender. People with private insurance are getting preventive services like cancer screenings, annual well-woman visits, and FDA-approved contraception with no out-of-pocket costs. We've established new Offices of Minority Health, and are helping state Medicaid programs fund home and community-based services. Small businesses are receiving tax credits to help them cover their workers, and businesses and families are receiving rebates from insurers who overcharged them.

Soon, working families will finally have the security of knowing they won't lose health care or be forced into bankruptcy if a family member gets sick or loses their job. Also, insurance companies will no longer be able to deny coverage based on pre-existing conditions. Medicaid will cover more working families. Those who don't get insurance at work will be able to shop in new exchanges and will be eligible for new tax credits. As a result, all Americans will have access to health care. We heard powerful testimony before the platform drafting committee about the difference it will make in Americans' lives when, for the first time, 30 million of our fellow citizens finally gain health insurance.

Mitt Romney and the Republican Party would repeal health reform. They are more concerned with playing politics than supporting families in this country. No law is perfect and Democrats stand willing to work with anyone to improve the law where necessary, but we are committed to moving forward. We will continue to stand up to Republicans working to take away the benefits and protections that are already helping millions of Americans every day. We refuse to go back to the days when health insurance companies had unchecked power to cancel your health policy, deny you coverage, or charge women more than men.

At the same time, the Affordable Care Act is not the end of efforts to improve health care for all Americans. Democrats will continue to fight for a strong health care workforce with an emphasis on primary care. We remain committed to eliminating disparities in health and will continue to make sure families have access to mental health and substance abuse services. We will strengthen Medicaid and oppose efforts to block grant the program, slash its funding, and leave millions more without health insurance. We will continue to invest in our public health infrastructure—ensuring that we are able to respond to emergencies and support community-based efforts to prevent disease. The Recovery Act and the health reform law made historic investments in Community Health Centers, and Democrats will continue to support these valuable institutions.


"Sometimes the Constitution is one big inconvenient headache"

Our Constitution is, in the end, what America is. It is through adherence to and respect for our unique governing document, with its wise checks and balances, that we maintain liberty and the rule of law. America is not a certain race, or religion, or even a geographical area (the America that was comprised of the original 13 states in 1789, or of 48 states in 1940, was no less America than the 50 United States of today). America is, rather, a system of governance that vouchsafes, through the constitution, our individual and collective freedoms. If we stray from it, America ceases to have meaning.

The Constitution encourages color-blindness and equality. But judges (and Supreme Court justices) don’t really “interpret” the constitution. Judges decide the result of the case, based on their political beliefs, and then write their opinion, claiming to have “found” the answer in the Constitution. As long as we have judges who aren’t black, Hispanic, gay, female, or poor, we’re going to go on getting law that is unfriendly to blacks, Hispanics, gays, women, and the poor.

The current 5 – 4 split of the Supreme Court (5 justices consistently vote for “conservative” results benefitting corporations, established wealth and, with the exception of gun control, against individual liberties, and generally against the causes of minorities, women, the poor, and others seeking redress against larger, more powerful entities) is creating a country where the individual is at the mercy of powerful business interests. The next president may have the opportunity to replace one of the justices. This alone may be the single most important reason we must make sure that the new justice believes individual rights are more valuable and deserve more protection than the privileges granted corporations and the government.


"Texas needs more billionaires"

Not! Many of them have profited from “good old boy” deals with the Republicans—from exploiting oil and mineral rights to non-competitive subcontracting for the Iraq war. While the stated goal of the Republicans is to cut taxes for the richest Americans and balance the budget, this can only be accomplished by increasing taxes on the middle class and slashing [read: eliminating] the safety net and Medicare. Despite all the efforts by the rich to make you believe that what’s good for them is good for you, economic studies have proved over and over again that while “trickle-down economics” may marginally assist those working in luxury goods and services, it does not, on the whole, benefit the middle class.

The wealthy are desperate to maintain the status quo, so much so that individual millionaires have donated inordinate amounts to efforts to defeat Obama. They aren’t donating this money to help the middle class. They are afraid of tax loopholes closing, and they are afraid of having to pay the same rate on their income as you and me.

The undisputed master of Super PAC money is Mitt Romney. In the primary season alone, Romney's rich friends invested $52 million in his Super PAC, Restore Our Future—a number that's expected to more than double in the coming months. This unprecedented infusion of money from America's monied elites underscores the radical transformation of the Republican Party, which has made defending the interests of 0.0001 percent the basis of its entire platform. "Money buys power," the Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman observed recently, "and the increasing wealth of a tiny minority has effectively bought the allegiance of one of our two major political parties." In short, the political polarization and gridlock in Washington are a direct result of the GOP's capitulation to Big Money.

That capitulation is evident in Romney's campaign. Most of the megadonors backing his candidacy are elderly billionaires: Their median age is 66, and their median wealth is $1 billion. Each is looking for a payoff that will benefit his business interests, and they will all profit from Romney's pledge to eliminate inheritance taxes, extend the Bush tax cuts for the superwealthy—and then slash the top tax rate by another 20 percent. Romney has firmly joined the ranks of the economic nutcases who spout the lie of trickle-down economics. "Support from billionaires has always been the main thing keeping those charlatans and cranks in business," Krugman noted. "And now the same people effectively own a whole political party."

Right-Wing Billionaires Behind Mitt Romney
Tim Dickinson, Rolling Stone


In addition to the billionaires mentioned in the Rolling Stone article are the Koch brothers, Charles and David, whose political activities are described on their own Wikipedia entry, and at length in a New Yorker article, COVERT OPERATIONS, billionaire brothers who are waging a war against Obama.

From the 2012 DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL PLATFORM:

The Republicans in Congress and Mitt Romney have a very different idea about where they want to take this country. To pay for their trillions in additional tax cuts weighted towards millionaires and billionaires, they'll raise taxes on the middle class and gut our investments in education, research and technology, and new roads, bridges, and airports. They'll end Medicare as we know it. They want to let Wall Street write its own rules again and allow insurance companies to once again deny health care to working families. Their troubling and familiar economic scheme doubles down on the same bad ideas of the last decade while arguing that, somehow, this time, they'll lead to a different result. We can't afford to go back or abandon the change we've fought so hard for. We have to move forward.


"The world should be run by one big corporation"

When that happens, we will all be slaves. America’s strength comes from the ability of its citizens to engage in free enterprise, to compete, to innovate, and to create jobs for themselves and other Americans. Corporations are not people. Corporations evaluate whether the injury they cause (including the death of humans) is a worthwhile course to pursue, if the profits from their activity exceeds the risk of punishment or the penalty. Why is this not criminal? Why are there no effective deterrents?

While executives and major shareholders continue to live in the United States in order to take advantage of the infrastructure and benefits of a stable society, they have no interest in maintaining democracy or the middle class. They will do anything to boost their bottom line. Corporations want to pay their workers as little as possible and provide as few benefits as possible. They do not want to provide a living wage, they do not want to provide benefits such as health insurance, and they have successfully shifted the burden of retirement onto the workers and the government. Corporations have successfully destroyed pension plans (often called “defined benefit”) replacing them with insufficient and inferior 401K plans funded primarily by the worker. Corporations have worked to destroy the bargaining power of workers by destroying or fighting labor unions, or preventing the formation of collective bargaining groups.


"We should start as many wars as we need...Iraq...Iran"

The United States has a history of interfering in other countries when politics in those countries are adverse to American corporations’ business interests. We also like to sell weapons, so wars are good for business, and therefore are encouraged by weapons manufacturers. We went into Iraq because President Bush and his advisors decided to go to war based on information they knew was faulty. 4,400 Americans and countless Iraqis have lost their lives. Estimates vary regarding the total monetary cost of the war (depending on final interest payments as much was financed with money the US borrowed) range between 1.9 and 3 trillion dollars. 1,900,000,000,000.00. The conflict in Afghanistan has added another $500,000,000,000.00 and the deaths of another 2,114 American soldiers and 1,057 coalition forces.

Death is final, mysterious, and a terrible unknown. I can see nothing about the present war efforts that justifies the ongoing loss of life and waste of resources. As mentioned earlier, we are also spending billions of dollars a month on the war. Each month. If we must spend this money, why are we not spending it to improve our infrastructure, better educate our children, and to develop sustainable clean energy leading to independence from the middle east?

From the 2012 DEMOCRATIC NATIONAL PLATFORM:

Charting a responsible path out of the war in Iraq has been a crucial element of President Obama's foreign policy and has enabled important shifts in our broader strategy.

Then-Senator Obama pledged during the 2008 campaign to responsibly end the war in Iraq, saying it was imperative to "be as careful getting out as we were careless getting in"—and that is precisely what he has done. For over half a decade, our focus on Iraq meant we had taken our eye off of al-Qaeda, and it had cost us thousands of lives, a trillion dollars, and severely strained our key alliances. When President Obama took office, there were over 140,000 American troops in harm's way in Iraq. Today, all of those forces are out of Iraq, and there are no American bases there either. The Iraqi people, in continued partnership with the United States, now have the opportunity to build a better future.

After taking office, President Obama removed our combat brigades and ended our combat mission on a 19-month timetable. And after an interim period in which we continued to advise Iraqis and conduct counterterrorism operations, we completed the drawdown of all U.S. troops last December. This decision was reached after extensive discussions and with the full agreement of the Iraqi government, and it was determined to be in the best interest of both nations. Many Republicans, including Mitt Romney, would have preferred to leave tens of thousands of U.S. troops in Iraq in an open-ended commitment, against the will of the Iraqi government and people.

Moving forward, President Obama and the Democratic Party are committed to building a robust, long-term strategic partnership with a sovereign, united, and democratic Iraq in all fields—diplomatic, economic, and security—based on mutual interests and mutual respect.

The United States went into Afghanistan after 9/11 to bring justice to those who had attacked us and to take away al-Qaeda's safe haven. But by the time President Obama took office, we had lost sight of those goals. So the President refocused our efforts there in 2009, setting the clear goal of defeating al-Qaeda and denying it an ability to reestablish a safe haven in Afghanistan. Because of the deteriorating security situation, he sent additional resources to reverse the Taliban's momentum and to give the Afghans the time and space to build the capacity of their security forces. We have accomplished that, and now we have begun the process of bringing our troops home from Afghanistan, including removing 33,000 by September 2012. And, with the support of our allies, the President has outlined a plan to end the war in Afghanistan in 2014.

Already, the United States and our North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies have begun to transition responsibility to Afghan security forces. At the same time, we are keeping up the pressure on the Taliban, pursuing the possibility of a political resolution to parts of the conflict, and continuing our capacity-building efforts. Beyond 2014, we will continue to provide counterterrorism and training assistance and to build an enduring relationship with Afghanistan, as outlined by the U.S.-Afghanistan Strategic Partnership Agreement concluded in May. We will not build permanent bases in Afghanistan. More broadly, we will also continue to support peace and stability in South Asia. Pakistan can be a partner in that process. The United States will make clear that we respect Pakistan's sovereignty and democratic institutions, and that our interest is in putting an end to al-Qaeda's safe havens and respecting Afghan sovereignty.

Mitt Romney has been both for and against our timeline to end the war in Afghanistan, but he has failed to outline any policy ideas for how he would bring our troops home and, at times, has suggested he would leave them there indefinitely.

 

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