It's the third anniversary of the Occupy and 99% Movements. Happy anniversary!

We Are the 99%: The Focus of Our Rage (part one)

by Rev. Paul J. Bern

On this third anniversary of the Occupy and 99% Movements, I have given a lot of thought and engaged in plenty of research regarding the plight of middle America, and what should and should not be done to bring the top 1% in line with the rest of us. Having written two books about this topic, I will now attempt to spell out the basics of what we want, and why working Americans of all kinds have continued the “Occupy” protests that are springing up all over the world (such as in Ferguson Mo. recently). We all want basically the same things. We want all the legalized bribery out of politics. This can be accomplished by strict regulation of the lobbyist profession at the very least, but most likely we should consider outlawing the lobbyist profession as it currently operates. If Washington won't do it then “we the people” will have to do it for them. We can accomplish this by, among other things, “occupying” K Street in downtown Washington where most of the lobbyist's offices are located, or by laying siege to their offices through human barricades (nobody comes and nobody goes), or other forms of nonviolent protest. Either take the rampant corruption out of our nation's politics and fully prosecute those responsible for the 2008 financial meltdown on Wall Street and for creating the housing bubble just before they intentionally popped it, or else we may well be destroyed by Wall Street and their armies of lobbyists, shady co-conspirators and other henchmen, starting with the Federal Reserve on down.

From my vantage point, and based on my own experiences, the least common denominator to everything that we are protesting, marching and occupying for can be boiled down to 2 things: the rights of workers and the right to economic equality, including the peaceful restoration of the American middle class to its former economic and social position in American society. Allow me to use the next few pages to explain exactly how we can go about accomplishing these goals in a manner that is legal, peaceful and orderly so we can set a good example for our nation's kids and grand-kids. For example, one very good way that we could go about accomplishing this is to emulate the peaceful and nonviolent tactics of Rev. Dr. King, Jr. that were utilized during the civil rights marches and protests of the 1950's and 1960's. In so doing, history will be on our side and victory against the top 1% will ultimately be ours.

Let me add one more thing before I get into this. You will notice as you read the rest of this essay/op-ed that there are a lot of ideas in here about how to restore America and its middle class, and how to re-balance the distribution of wealth in a peaceful and orderly manner for the mutual betterment of everyone. These ideas I am about to share are simple and practical solutions to some huge problems that America faces. You will also notice that these ideas can be easily implemented using our existing governmental framework and technology. It won't be necessary to reinvent the wheel in order for America's people to accomplish their goals for the perfection of our society, starting with a rescue of the poor and middle class.

The first and foremost issue of what we the people want should be the rights of all workers and independent contractors. We want a $15.00 per hour minimum wage combined with the abolition of the federal income tax and an end to the withholding of US income tax from our paychecks. This would give everyone who makes less than $108.000.00 per year a pay raise amounting to an average of 20% immediately, pumping billions of fresh dollars into the US economy that generates many millions in new tax revenue without raising any existing taxes. Full employment should become the new standard of the world, and that standard should be set by the USA.

The second issue I wish to mention is the right to higher education and/or vocational retraining at will and at nominal cost. This is what we should do for all the long-term unemployed, all the homeless who are healthy enough to work, all unemployed veterans, and for all newly released prisoners who are re-entering society. This is how we can end homelessness for good and cut back on crime; simply give these people a trade. It is an established fact that the root cause of the majority of crime is economic desperation (excluding crimes of passion). Every human being on the face of the earth has the unconditional right to a livelihood and to a living wage. Those unable to find work, and those needing to learn new job skills in order to be self-sufficient have the basic human right to professional retraining without cost. Let the private colleges and universities remain as they are, but let our public institutions of higher education become nonprofits so that higher education is unconditionally accessible to everyone. The days of exclusively for-profit educational institutions must come to an end, because I am convinced that it is immoral and mean-spirited to prevent another human being from being able to sustain themselves because some CEO or policy wonk somewhere thinks that retraining America's workers would be “too expensive”, as if they are not worth the trouble. The best part about this as far as I am concerned is that America can easily afford this, and I will use the 2 wars in Iraq and the occupation of Afghanistan as an illustration.

If the US government took all the money spent in one single day on the illegal occupation of Afghanistan or Iraq and put it into an interest-bearing account, there would be enough money to put every school kid in America through 4 years of college fully paid for, including tuition, books, dorms, food, transportation and Internet access, plus a new desktop or laptop computer. Let me give you another example. If the US government took all the money spent in one single day on the war in Afghanistan and put it into an interest-bearing account, there would be enough money to put every homeless person or family in America – all 2.2 million of them as of 2013 – into a new 3,000 square foot home fully paid for, fully furnished, with the utilities turned on including Internet access (which the UN declared to be a basic human right as of 2011), and stocked with a years worth of groceries. This is what converting to a peacetime economy can do for America. And all on one day's military expenditures. Then, send them all back to school to teach them new trades so they can keep those houses and leave them to their children upon their departure from this earth.

There is one more important thing that I have yet to mention. The world is changing and developing so rapidly as scientific and technological advances are made that the job market has become very dynamic. As you know, the pace of this advancement is accelerating, resulting in different types of jobs coming and going rapidly in order to meet an ever-changing demand. Higher education, the US public school system and for-profit vocational schools will most definitely have to adjust their curriculum accordingly. You have probably noticed that some very traditional jobs are disappearing. Just ask anybody who used to be in the travel industry, or direct sales, or a factory worker, or a former computer and network technician like I was for 22 years. When I went back and tried to get retraining I was told that my credit rating was not good enough to qualify for a student loan. Many of the courses taught in various vocational schools cost tens of thousands of dollars, and I was broke at the time (come to think about it, I still am, but I digress). So, I found myself shut out from any chance at changing careers. As I began to research this I found that this is actually quite commonplace in today's dreary job market. Instead of going back to work like I wanted, I was forced into early retirement, and forced to depend on a federal government that I despise for my monthly sustenance. I would much rather be self-sufficient, but never mind that. My government has already decided to throw me away because I'm allegedly too old (I'm in my 50's as I write this), and therefore too expensive to keep around. Therefore I insist that this practice must come to an end, that higher education should be free for everybody, and that higher education is a basic human right. The days of a college education or vocational retraining being only for those who can afford the tuition (or who “qualify” for predatory and highly unethical student loans) must come to an end. Do you want to have a better educated country? Fine, so do I! Let everybody who wants to get educated – or reeducated – go back to school, and let the government, the Wall St mega-rich and corporate America foot the bill. The funds are definitely available, as I wrote above.

Of course, I can hear my critics laughing already. Where, they will say, do we get the money to fund re-educating the whole country? We're running a $16 trillion deficit as it is! You know what? You're absolutely right, we do have a seemingly insurmountable federal deficit. How do we tackle both problems together? By creating new taxpayers who have found new careers and gotten their incomes restarted thanks to low cost retraining, and there is ample precedent for this very thing. At the end of World War 2, there were about 600,000 former GI's who had just returned from the European and Pacific theaters in the wars against Germany and Japan. Many of them didn't have any marketable job skills, so Congress passed the GI Bill and put all those soldiers through 4 years of college. It paid off handsomely, paving the way for the record economic expansion of the 1950's and 1960's. Well, if they could do that in the 1940's, why can't they do it in 2014? The answer is that the system most certainly can, and we of the Occupy and 99% Movements must count reeducation as one of the things that we occupy and protest for. Either employ us or retrain us, and we're not leaving until we get what we want.

One final thing about the basic right to higher education. According to data I obtained from the US Department of Labor, and some additional information I obtained from CareerBuilder.com, the average student graduate from college today will have to change careers from 5 to 8 times during the course of their lifetime of employment. So, by today's standards, and assuming career changes involve getting 2-year degrees, somebody going back to school a total of 8 times multiplied by the average cost of obtaining each of those degrees – roughly $30,000.00 times as much as eight – could be as much as a quarter of a million dollars, plus interest. Do our colleges and universities seriously believe that people will be willing to go into that much debt from student loans in their lifetimes, just so they can remain employable? How ridiculous! The cost of tuition for higher education in the early 21^st century has reached a level that is so unreasonable that getting a degree has become financially out of reach for all but the top few percent. Excluding the overwhelming majority of all others for purely financial reasons is a social injustice and a human rights violation if there ever was one. We must start demanding our right to free or low-cost higher education as part of our goals. And so we will continue to “occupy” and protest peacefully until we get what we want. We are the 99%!

The third fundamental human right that I want to write about is to be free from poverty and hunger, with an equal chance at prosperity, in a clean and peaceful environment. How do we do all that? We clean up the environment that we already have, and for that we will need lots of people. That brings me to the topic of a huge public works program that this country urgently needs, and this is part of the solution that I see. Therefore, this is indeed another basic human right. This is something that should already have been done at the Presidential level, but unfortunately it has not since president Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal of the 1930's. We need massive protests and demonstrations, and a major effort through the social media to get this passed into law. My proposed solution is that all the long-term unemployed people plus all the others I mentioned above be put to work in this new series of public works projects. Some will be doing environmental cleanup, others will assist with bridge and highway repairs, and still others will be repairing sewers and sidewalks. The homeless will be put to work revitalizing abandoned homes left over from the “great foreclosure robbery” (as I called it in my first book). When they are finished with the first home, they can go live in it as they begin repairs on others. We do have the capacity to have full employment at a living wage, and to end homelessness while ending the foreclosure crisis. This is one way to accomplish just that. I encourage anyone having additional ideas to publish them as I have, and the more input the better. And what about all the households where both parents work, or single-parent households? Who is going to watch all those kids? I think we should have on-site daycare available for everybody free of charge. It would be yet another way to create jobs with a starting wage of $15.00 an hour.

The fourth fundamental human right, and another way to articulate what we want, is to address the problem of health insurance and its ridiculous cost, pricing 54 million Americans out of the health insurance market and forcing many of us to rely on the local emergency room for medical treatment. It is an indisputable fact that every developed country in the world has national health insurance for its citizens except for the United States. From Europe to Canada to Japan, getting sick is never a problem unless the illness is terminal. Not so in the USA, where health care is on a for-profit basis, and we are the only country in the developed world where this is so. We have the highest cost for health care and the most expensive prescription drugs of any country in the world by far. In other words, good health care in this country is only for those who can afford it. The rest of us are left stranded on the side of the road to health and wellness and without remedy, eventually to die, and well before our time. Speaking as an Internet pastor, I find the idea of denying health care to nearly a fourth of the US population (about half of whom are children) just because they can't pay for it to be immoral, unjustifiable, and utterly barbaric.

So what is the solution to this pressing problem? One thing is for sure, every human being on the face of the earth has the unconditional right to good health care. It's as basic as access to clean water (another area where mankind has some work to do). I strongly maintain that it should be a crime for any patient to die because they lacked access to treatment due to having no money or health insurance. There is simply no excuse for that to be happening in the richest country in the world, and I for one am ashamed that it is occurring, and I doubt that I am the only one who has this opinion. Also, people with preexisting conditions or who are beset with a catastrophic illness should always have unconditional access to health care. One possible way to do this would be to change the health care industry in the US from for-profit entities to nonprofits. Anyone seeking treatment for substance abuse or mental illness, or who are in need of any organ transplants, or kidney dialysis, cancer treatment, or any other serious illness requiring constant monitoring or ongoing therapy, must be able to get treatment without financial qualification. This is not a privilege of the well off, it is a basic human right. For example, it is pointless and prohibitively expensive to prosecute and incarcerate nonviolent drug users. They don't need jail, they need treatment.

See you next week for part two! Until then, shalom.

Our capitalist economic and tax systems are breaking down. Maybe that's not so bad.

America's Tax and Monetary Systems Are Broken

Excerpts from the book, "Occupying America: We Shall Overcome"

by Rev. Paul J. Bern

Wall Street has gotten completely out of control when it comes to the salaries, and especially the outrageous bonuses, being paid to top management, sales and other executives. This problem has been ongoing for a long time, and it continues to get worse. The scenario usually works out something like this: A global financial catastrophe occurs a la 2008. An outraged public shakes pitchforks at the corporate culprits. Lawmakers respond by proposing some new BS laws that appear to require corporations to more fully disclose what they’re doing. Corporate America, sensing encroachment on their hunting territory, goes ballistic. Sound familiar? We’ve seen this story play out before. In fact, we’ve seen this story play out after almost every grand corporate catastrophe over the last 80 years.

For example, back in 1933, with the nation still reeling from the 1929 stock market crash, newly-elected President Franklin Roosevelt pushed for legislation that required firms to register securities trades and provide basic financial information. That act eventually passed despite fanatical Wall Street opposition. A more modern example? In 1984, a Union Carbide chemical leak killed thousands in Bhopal, India. U.S. lawmakers had to battle relentless industry opposition before they could pass a right-to-know law on toxic emissions.

Runaway executive pay played a key driving role in the run-up to the Great Recession. Executive pay excesses, as President Obama once put it, “have contributed to a reckless culture.” By attempting to avoid the issue, it seems clear that corporations simply want to avoid embarrassment and public outrage, not to mention the attention of investigators outside the scope of Wall St. such as the Office of Management and Budget and the US Attorney General's office, among others. If we are going to be successful in reversing this trend for the purpose of redirecting America's cash flow from the top 1% back in favor of the rest of us, the remaining 99% of Americans – that's us – will have to forcibly take back what has been shamelessly stolen from us. Political and economic power is never surrendered voluntarily, so forcibly retaking it is the 99%'s only option as of now. Is this too much to ask of ourselves? I think not! In fact, I made up my mind a long time ago that this would be a cause that I would always believe in, the cause of social and economic justice for all.

Outrageous pay packages, research indicates, encourage outrageous executive behaviors that range from high-risk investing gambles to outsourcing jobs while firing long-time workers without cause, to cooking the corporate books for the aggrandizement of upper management. The wider the pay gap between the guy in the top floor corner suite and everybody else, the lower the workforce morale and the higher the employee turnover. In other words, the more cash we let corporations stuff in executive pockets at their employee's expense, the less competitive our corporations become. Is this any way to run the richest country in the world? Whose lame-brain idea was this to begin with?

Is it any wonder that the US economy has been run into the ground when we find such egregious examples of inexcusable mismanagement, criminal malfeasance and offensive buffoonery? It is abundantly clear to me that the system has been abused so badly that it is no longer functional. Allow me to present a couple of examples taken straight from the Web on what happens when abusive people who also happen to be exceptionally greedy take control of our country's entire governmental system. Vast sums of money are being quietly diverted from the wallets, pensions, banking and investment accounts of the American public just by changing the tax laws to favor the ultra-rich.

In my example #1, tax cuts for the wealthiest five percent of Americans cost the U.S. Treasury $11.6 million every hour, according to the National Priorities Project. America’s top earners got an average tax cut of $66,384 in 2011, while the bottom 20 percent will get an average cut of $107. These enormous tax cuts are weighing on the national debt. The non-partisan Center for Budget and Priorities found that the Bush tax cuts costs about the same as the shortfall from Social Security in the ten years after they were signed into law. If the U.S. reverted to Clinton-era marginal tax rates, the U.S. Treasury would net an additional $72 billion annually, according to Citizens for Tax Justice. In addition, increasing taxes on the wealthy could also help to narrow the widening wealth gap. In 2012 when this book was first written, the net worth of the bottom 60 percent of U.S. Households – about 100 million households – was lower than that of Forbes 400 richest Americans. Tax cuts for the wealthy provided Americans making more than $1 million with a $128,832 benefit, while Americans earning from $40,000 to $50,000 got an $860 benefit on average. This disparity has since gotten still worse. As of this summer 2014 update, the entire Walton family of Bentonville, Arkansas, the six sons and daughters of Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton, now have roughly the same wealth as America's “bottom” 100 million people, as if one's net worth correlated somehow with the measure of a man, or of a woman. This is how twisted and distorted capitalism has become, and economic inequality doesn't happen by accident.

Besides the broken tax system, as if this set of problems were not enough, I offer our broken monetary system as my second example. The US Federal Reserve was created on December 21^st, 1913 and given a 99 year lease to print America's money. This lease was given to an organized group of nameless, faceless investors who formed a private holding company that is the de facto sole proprietorship of the Federal Reserve. (The Federal Reserve Bank is not a public entity, and never was). That 99-year lease expired on December 21^st, 2012, but the Fed is still there occupying that real estate and those reserve banks. Legally, that makes the Federal Reserve and all its employees nothing more than mere squatters on US Government property, and I think they should be treated as such.

What many people don't realize is that the US Constitution gives the right to mint money to the Department of the Treasury, which makes the Federal Reserve Bank in its current form completely unconstitutional, as it has been right from the start. To make matters worse, in all the time the Federal Reserve has been in existence it has never – ever – been audited until fairly recently. Nobody in Washington, not even the president, knows the exact true state of the Federal Reserve as I write this, although I have no doubt that many in DC will claim they do and a few will even believe it. For that reason senator Bernie Sanders, an independent US senator from Vermont with (thankfully) no party affiliation, sponsored a bill calling for an audit of the Federal Reserve system that was made public in the summer of 2011. He published a blog post regarding this first-ever Fed audit that was widely cross-posted on the Web, and I offer a short excerpt of what the senator wrote.

“The first top-to-bottom audit of the Federal Reserve uncovered eye-popping new details about how the U.S. provided a whopping $16 trillion in secret loans to bail out American and foreign banks and businesses during the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. 'As a result of this audit, we now know that the Federal Reserve provided more than $16 trillion in total financial assistance to some of the largest financial institutions and corporations in the United States and throughout the world,' said Sanders. 'This is a clear case of socialism for the rich and rugged, you're-on-your-own individualism for everyone else. Among the investigation's key findings is that the Fed unilaterally provided trillions of dollars in financial assistance to foreign banks and corporations from South Korea to Scotland, according to the GAO report. No agency of the United States government should be allowed to bailout a foreign bank or corporation without the direct approval of Congress and the President. One thing already is abundantly clear. The Federal Reserve must be reformed to serve the needs of working families, not just C.E.O.'s on Wall Street'...”

The so-called “national debt” is nothing more than the indebtedness of the US Government to the Federal Reserve for the money it prints for our government. For example, when former Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke initiated what he called “QE3” (for quantitative easing), what actually occurred was the need for Washington to borrow more money. This necessity was met by having the Fed print what we now know was $16 trillion dollars in order to flood American markets with liquidity. Unfortunately for the American people, there was a price tag to be paid in the form of interest on the money that the Fed printed. And so it turns out that the United States has to borrow to print its own money, an arrangement whose legality is highly questionable and whose very existence is contrary to the best interests of the United States.

I'm not a politician and have no plans to become one, but if I were President I could solve America's national debt problem in one afternoon. On my first day in office, I would send certain platoons of US Army soldiers to seize control of the Federal Reserve Banks in Washington DC and all other locations throughout the country, along with federal agents and local SWAT teams, to arrest all the directors and managers along with anyone else who opposes us. They will all be charged with treason for ruining the financial health and general welfare of the US, or with being accessories to the same, and they will be prosecuted. The Federal Reserve will be immediately nationalized, with the authority to manage and oversee returned to the Department of the Treasury where it belongs, pursuant to Article 1, section 8 of the US Constitution, which says this: “Congress shall have the power... to coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and to fix the standards of weights and measures”.... One thing would happen for sure: it would be 'bye bye national debt'! In fact, maybe the Federal Reserve banks across the US should be “occupied” until they are returned to the rightful owners, the American people. Now THAT would be something to see! Who is with me today?

Anonymous Million Mask March worldwide - Nov 5 2014

Anonymous Million Mask March worldwide - Nov 5 2014  Freedom isn't free, and neither is apathy. Join us on November 5th all over the world!!

Those who try to marry politics and religion are setting themselves up for failure

Christian Hypocrisy In Washington DC

by Rev. Paul J. Bern

Remember when we were kids in school? We used to recite the pledge of allegiance to the flag every day. Among other things, the pledge calls us “one nation under God”. Judging from how things are going in Washington these days we have become anything but that. We are faced with endless wars overseas with no end in sight, and these wars on multiple fronts threaten to bankrupt the country. Meanwhile here at home, it is the American people who are already faced with bankruptcy and even homelessness due to long-term unemployment, while citizens everywhere continue to lose their houses to foreclosure under circumstances that are questionable at best. The rapidly growing population of homeless people is already in the process of turning into a human tidal wave of misery and hopelessness. Here in Atlanta where I live, the homeless population on any given day averages around 7,000 or so, of which half are children. This is a gross social injustice considering that it is happening in the richest country in the world. Even the cave men lived in caves tens of thousands of years ago. So it is accurate to say that they had it better than the homeless folks do today. It is a basic human right to have a roof over your head. Shelter is not a privilege, and throwing children out into the elements is nothing short of barbaric. And yet some have the nerve to call America a Christian nation!

In the meantime, we have our nation's leaders in Washington invoking the name of God as a justification for waging immoral and illegal wars all over the globe, with many being of the clandestine variety. Here at home, our nation's lawmakers debate whether gay persons should serve openly in the military or not, and various individuals in our country's leadership take a stand on whether they are pro-life or pro-choice. These side-issues are being debated while our country grapples with record deficits that threaten to swallow up what is left of the US economy, just as Nero fiddled while Rome burned. They pontificate about “family values” while the value of American real estate continues to stagnate, depriving millions of formerly middle class people of their chief source of wealth – their homes. They threaten to do away with the American social safety net at a time of record unemployment and rampant homelessness, just when it is needed the most. If these neo-conservatives succeed in taking away, or even reducing, the social safety net that millions are currently depending upon because they can't find work (and often because they can't even feed their kids), you can be sure there will be rioting in the streets similar to Ferguson, Mo., and let's not forget the civil wars in Syria, Ukraine and elsewhere. These current events line up with much of what I have been saying on this web site since day one about what is wrong with the world in which we live, and what we should change to make it better. Anyone can be religious, but I choose to take it to the next level. I'm going to spend the rest of my life trying to make a real difference.

Being a blend of liberal Christian, Teddy-Roosevelt-style Populist and political progressive (hence the name Progressive Christian), I particularly enjoy going after big government and main-stream denominations at all levels, taking them all to task not just for the way in which they are running things, but challenging their thinking and their values. For example, many Republicans in Washington keep talking about God and politics as if they are interchangeable. They like to make it look like they are on the side of God, as if God were a political conservative. And they like to make it seem like the Democrats and “liberals” are a party of loose morality, favoring abortion, gay marriage, and hanging around with terrorists. They are experts at crafting and delivering their message – good enough to inspire many middle-class folks to vote against their own financial interests in the 2010 mid-term elections. Their message works because it appeals to people's base emotions, not their intellects. And reacting is so much easier than critical thinking, especially when we're so emotionally drained from these years of unemployment, or working multiple part time jobs, or home foreclosures. They are so effective with their message that they don't think twice before selling the idea that God wanted George W. Bush to attack Iraq, God favors the Tea Party, and God wants Sarah Palin to be President. Or maybe Mike Huckabee.

They completely ignore the First Amendment's separation of Church and State. The first amendment to the US Constitution begins by saying, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.......” To me, this means anyone who wishes to engineer a merger of government and organized religion either knows nothing about the Constitution or they openly wish to break it. Either way, that means they would be committing treason if the neo-cons were to actually pull off such a thing as that.

They publicly thump the bibles on which they were sworn into office. They brag about giving 10% of their incomes to the church, even though many don't. And they make sure they're seen praying, whether it be in church, in public, or on TV. Jesus had something to say about that, and those words of wisdom are just as relevant today as they were 2,000 years ago when they were first spoken. “And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go to your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.” (Matthew chapter 6, verses 5-6, NIV)

But if you set aside the hysteria and look at the facts, Jesus was part liberal and part socialist by today's standards, and much of the New Testament condemns the attitude of the so-called religious right (which is neither as far as I am concerned). For example, Jesus condemned the greedy rich, saying, "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God." [Matthew 19:24] He denounced the moneychangers in the temple at Jerusalem as He threw them out, saying, “My house will be called a house of prayer, but you have made it a den of robbers.” [Matthew 21:13] And Jesus stood up for the poor and underprivileged, saying, "Inasmuch as you have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, you have done it unto me." [Matthew 25:40] So then, how can the nation's leadership, especially the conservative right-wingers, call themselves Christian – followers of Jesus Christ and He alone – as they hold the unemployed and retired pensioners hostage while fighting for tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires? They don't care about us, and they don't care if we know that or not. We the people, America's middle and working classes, need not tolerate what amounts to being openly insulted. We can and should fight back! Who is with me today?

Jesus acknowledged the need for both government and tax-supported government services, saying, "Render unto Caesar the things which are Caesar's, and unto God that which is God's." [Matthew 22:21] So then how can the conservatives call themselves Christian as they rail against taxes and their definition of "big government"? Never mind the fact that it is the same bunch of people railing against big government who are voting in favor of the continued funding of the largest and most formidable military in world history. Last year the US government spent more money on military expenditures than all the rest of the world combined. Then again, there is the fact that the United States has more people in prison than all the rest of the world's countries – again, combined. There is something very wrong with this picture, that's for sure. When faced with these facts, I am forced to come to the conclusion that America isn't the world's greatest country anymore. It's up to us, the American people, to turn this around.

Jesus healed the sick – even lepers – for free. He didn't ask them for an insurance card first, he just healed them because it was the right thing to do, but more importantly because that's what he was called to do. Jesus was the original "socialized medicine" machine. So then, how can the Republicans call themselves Christian (that is, followers of Jesus Christ in Spirit and in truth) as they condemn the much less socialistic (and woefully insufficient) "Obamacare"? The truth of the matter is that much of the effectiveness of any government is directly proportional to how well it cares for its people. (By the way, it was Thomas Jefferson who first said that.) The United States is the last developed country in the world that does not have national health insurance for its citizens. Every other developed country – and many developing ones – has national health insurance except for us. As I said above about shelter being a basic human right, so it is with health care. Proper medical care is not a privilege available only to those who can afford to pay. Good quality health care is a basic human right that must be available to everyone without qualification, including preexisting conditions. The money to implement such a plan as this is already available with plenty to spare. All the government has to do is call off all the wars and occupations overseas and bring the troops home. Whatever money is left over can be used for a giant public works project to put all the long-term unemployed back to work, or to send them back to school to learn a trade. Is there sufficient money to accomplish and finance this worthy goal? Absolutely, and all without adding to the federal deficit. Here's an example: If the US military set aside one day's expenses for the twin occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq (Again! Wasn't twice enough?) and put those funds in an interest-bearing account, there would be enough money to send every single American school kid to four years of college education – fully paid for. We'd get all that from just one days military expenditures! So don't tell me we can't afford quality education without qualification! Oh yes we can!!

As he stood there on the Mount, Jesus said, "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of the living God." [Matthew 5:9] Still, the conservatives call themselves Christian as they continue to call for endless war, be it legally and morally justified or not. At the same time, they expound on how pro-life or anti-abortion they are. So, let me get this straight. In order to be a good Christian, one must be pro-war and pro-life simultaneously? Sorry, Reverend, but you're going have to explain that one to me. And then they try to justify torture. So I ask them, in the words of the popular button and bumper sticker: Who would Jesus torture?

In the end, I see many conservatives paying much homage to the Bible while ignoring what is inside it. As for myself, I could not stand to live like that, being a Washington hypocrite. Let's vote these right wing-nuts out of office this November and start all over again on a clean sheet of paper. It's the only way we can peacefully force things in Washington to change. But if things don't start changing, and soon, the unrest of Egypt, Syria and Greece will be arriving on American shores with a vengeance. If governing power cannot be returned to the American people peacefully, then things will deteriorate to the point where we will simply have to retake it by force.

Labor Day isn't being celebrated by far too many US workers this year

America's Damaged Workforce

excerpt from , "Occupying America: We Shall Overcome"

by Rev. Paul J. Bern

For my Labor Day message today, I would like to make some observations about the plight of America's work force and the strongly negative effect that long-term unemployment is having on our fellow citizens. If we could find a least common denominator for the complaints of the Occupy and 99% Movements, one of the things America is most furious about would be the lack of jobs and the damage this has done to America's workforce. While real unemployment (not the government's version) is at historically high levels considering the economy is supposed to be in recovery mode, the tragedy of long-term unemployment is especially troublesome. The longer a person remains jobless the more difficult it is to find new work. Many prospective employers often disparage the long-term unemployed for being lazy, having out-of-date skills and not having the confidence to step into a new position. And on top of that some companies including PMG Indiana, Sony Ericsson and retailers nationwide have explicitly barred the unemployed or long-term unemployed from certain job openings, outright telling them in job ads that they need not apply.

With the numbers of long-term unemployed increasing, it may be reasonable to think a great deal of effort is being expended to address the issue. Unfortunately, that is not the case. More time and effort is being spent cutting unemployment benefits than devising job or retraining programs. Why is so little being done for the 6.3 million long-term unemployed? Why have “99-'ers” (those out of work for 99 weeks or more) been abandoned by Congress and the White House? They seem more inclined to cut social safety net programs in order to continue tax cuts for the wealthy. There were 3.3 million US households earning more than $250,000 a year as of the end of 2013. These 2.5 million households are given an inordinate amount of congressional and executive branch attention compared to the 6.3 million households experiencing long-term unemployment. Are the families of the wealthy more deserving of taxpayer benefits than the families of the long-term unemployed? The actions of Congress and the executive seem to indicate that they think this is the case.

The Great Recession has cost US workers millions of jobs and those jobs have not come back as quickly as they disappeared, and in many cases those jobs will never return. According to the Economic Policy Institute, “In total, there are 6.9 million fewer jobs today than there were in December 2007.” Seven million jobs vanishing in just four years, the media has failed to present the unemployment problem, with all its associated economically devastating consequences, for what it truly is. There is passing mention of discouraged workers and the underemployed, but the true scale of the jobs crisis isn't given anywhere near enough attention considering the magnitude of the problem. What follows are some unemployment details that mass media under reports or ignores completely.

[1] The jobs deficit: That is the total number of jobs lost plus jobs that should have been created since the great recession began in December 2007. There are 6.9 million fewer jobs in 2013, the latest year for which these records are available, than at the start of the Great Recession, but that tells only half the tale of the jobs deficit. There is also the matter of creating jobs to keep up with the increase in workforce population. Those new workers include high school and college graduates, plus immigrants. The number of jobs that need to be created each month to accommodate new entrants into the workforce ranges from 150,000 - 200,000. Adding together the jobs lost since the recession and the new jobs needed for population growth, the total jobs deficit is estimated to be 11.3 million. A massive effort such as a public works program is required to fill that absolutely enormous jobs hole.

[2] Filling the jobs deficit: According to the Economic Policy Institute in Washington, DC: “To fill that gap in three years – by mid-2017—while still keeping up with the growth in the working-age population—would require adding around 400,000 jobs every single month. To fill the gap in five years—by mid-2019—would mean adding 280,000 jobs each month.

[3] There is a monthly Bureau Labor Statistics report giving an indication of the number of unemployed per job opening, which stands currently at 4.9. But those aren’t the only unemployed wanting a full-time job. There are the 2.6 million marginally attached workers and 8.8 million underemployed (those who want full-time work, but are working part-time). I’m not going to include the 3.9 million non-unemployed unemployed. When those 11.4 million workers are included, there are 25.4 million workers and 3.2 million jobs, or 8 unemployed or underemployed workers per job opening. In addition, part-time jobs are included in job openings counts; however, there is no difference between full and part-time positions. It is only determined if the position exists, not which type of position it is. However, it’s important to know how many job openings are part-time, since part-time jobs usually pay less and offer fewer, if any, benefits. Currently there are 139,627,000 employed workers, of which 27,034,000 are part-timers. More than 19 percent of all workers work part-time. If nearly 20 percent of all available job openings are part-time, there are only 2.56 million full-time jobs for 25.4 million unemployed and underemployed who want full-time work, or 10 workers for each available full-time position; more than double the 4.9 workers per job opening touted by most media outlets.

[4] Marginally attached workers: From the Bureau of Labor Statistics, “These individuals were not in the labor force, wanted and were available for work, and had looked for a job sometime in the prior 12 months. They were not counted as unemployed because they had not searched for work in the 4 weeks preceding the survey.” Currently 2.6 million workers are considered marginally attached. If they are included in the unemployment rate, that rate increases from 9.1 percent to 10.6 percent.

[5] The underemployed: These are the number of persons employed part time for economic reasons (sometimes referred to as involuntary part-time workers). These individuals were working part time because their hours had been cut back or because they were unable to find a full-time job. The “real” unemployment rate increases to 16.2 percent when the underemployed and marginally attached workers are considered. There is a point at which the BLS stops considering an unemployed person unemployed. That point is reached when an unemployed person has not looked for a job in the previous 12 months. When asked, the BLS replied, “The 3.9 million individuals not in the labor force that you are referring to responded that they wanted a job, but had not looked for a job in the last 12 months. They are not considered unemployed because they had not actively searched for work in the four weeks preceding the survey.” I recall no mention of these 3.9 million from any mass media outlet. This 3.9 million are the most discouraged of discouraged workers, but if the jobs market was improving, these millions would start to become part of the unemployed once more. If these 3.9 million were added to the “real” unemployment rate the rate would increase from 16.2 percent to 19 percent. Nearly one in five American workers is either unemployed or underemployed.

[6] The long-term unemployed: These are the 6 million-plus jobless who have been looking for work for 6 months or more (not including the not-unemployed unemployed). Long-term unemployment receives occasional mass media recognition, but it scratches only the surface. There are subsets of the long-term unemployed that show the depth of the problem more clearly. The 6 million long-term unemployed represent 43.1 percent of all unemployed. Of that 6 million, 4.458 million have been jobless for 52 or more weeks and within that group 2.04 million, a record high, have been unemployed for 99 weeks or more.

How many unemployed collect unemployment benefits? It may seem reasonable to assume that all 14 million unemployed collect unemployment insurance benefits, but that is not the case. In September 2013 7.3 million unemployed collected benefits, which was only 51 percent of all unemployed. What message can be taken from this list of realistic and discomforting unemployment figures? The bottom line is that unemployment is much, much worse than the roughly 7 percent unemployment figure pushed currently by the media and many lawmakers. Unemployment and jobs creation throughout America are national emergencies demanding focused attention with a wide-ranging and rapid response. This American jobs disaster will not vanish if neglected, but what will vanish are the hopes, dreams and financial well-being of millions of hard-working Americans. And that is why we Occupy! That's why we're part of 'the 99%', and that's also why people have been buying guns like crazy!

Where are our jobs? That's what everyone wants to know, and our current batch of “leaders” in Washington are either unwilling or incapable of coming up with an intelligent answer. They are trying to articulate what middle America already knows, which is that the jobs that couldn't be outsourced overseas to the third world were rightsized and downsized out of existence. Middle America is unemployed because that is exactly what the top 1% want. They planned on it to turn out this way all the long! And so there is nothing wrong with the system as far as the top 1% are concerned. To them, it is working just fine. The salaries formerly paid to all of us from 'the 99%' have been redirected back to the overseas bank accounts of corporate America, while all the former workers have been kicked to the curb. But the top 1% forgot about something in the course of their financial and military conquests. When they put millions of American workers out of work they forgot that consumer spending comprises over two thirds of the US economy. Since few, if any of us, have any extra money to spend these days, when US worker's incomes dry up so will much of the US economy, and the hard times that many are currently experiencing will seem like child's play in another year or two, three at the most. That means that by the latter part of this decade (if not sooner, but I hope not) we may be looking at the end of capitalism, or at least as we have known it. The warning signs are already all around us. The probable changeover of the world reserve currency from the US dollar to the Chinese Yen, or the Euro if the Europeans can get their act together, is set to occur by about 2016 or 2018 at the latest. When the US dollar ceases to be the world's reserve currency, the consequences here at home and abroad will be catastrophic. The plight of US workers will be much worse when America ceases to be a super-power. Until then, I advise you all to make preparations for hard times ahead. And I would counsel the unemployed to not get tired out and give up, but to press onward in your quest for employment. Jesus said, “Seek, and you shall find. Knock, and the door will be opened. Ask, and it will be given to you”. If you apply these methods to your job search, you'll be searching for employment Jesus' way, meaning you will succeed if you work continuously and not give up. Happy Labor Day, everyone!

Future Transportation Technology Will Blow Your Mind

What if Jesus came to Ferguson Mo.? What would he say and do?

What Would Jesus Protest?

By Rev. Paul J. Bern

It started in the fall of 2011 as most age-defining movements do, with some unrest and some recognition of what is right and wrong. It started with some people willing to take a stand against rampant injustice. And then some more people join. And then some more. Next time we look it is in another city, then another country. Sweeping across the globe, the civil unrest known as Occupy Wall Street or as “we are the 99%” continues to capture the attention of everyone, despite the attempts of the military-industrial complex and their media conglomeration to slander it, discredit it, and lie about it. It is in that same revolutionary spirit that those who are protesting in Ferguson Mo. and simultaneously around the world are on the evening news every night.

By now everyone realizes that there is a “la cosa nostra” of ultra-powerful people (sometimes called the Illuminati) that control the vast majority of wealth in this world, beginning with the US. They have spoon-fed us American Idol, pro wrestling and other sports, reality TV and Dancing With the Stars while sneaking around behind our backs tampering with our voting rights, stealing elections, repealing sensible regulations designed to protect us, and enacting laws totally in favor of the rich – and all this occurred as the 1% shipped all our jobs overseas for pennies on the dollar. There can be no question that their goal is the redistribution of wealth and consolidation of power to the 1% elite while squeezing the once proud middle class into the new working poor caste. You can already hear the screams of "class warfare!" The problem is we didn't start the war, they did. The same ones screaming “class warfare” the loudest are the ones who are waging the war.

Apparently when the Occupy and 99% Movements first started it didn't register with the power elite. They couldn't possibly fathom America's outrage. In their arrogance, they simply didn't comprehend that people had caught on to the illegal Ponzi schemes, crooked midnight deals and winner-take-all financial piracy of the money-worshiping top 1%. But since OWS, “the 99%” and Ferguson have gone viral in the social and political fabric of America, the 1% have begun frantically looking for ways to neutralize this latest movement, but they are already too late. So the next thing they did was to criminalize it, orchestrating mass arrests for the entire world to see. They tried to intimidate the protesters and occupiers by sending in their police squads in full military gear but that backfired on them too as it only served to garner more sympathy for the people's cause. Next up was an attempt to mock the group and pretend they were somehow uneducated and clueless about why they were protesting at all. That has backfired as well, as all these grassroots movements has generated considerable interest from some very smart people and astute observers.

Turns out that OWS, “the 99%” and the folks in Ferguson know exactly why they are protesting. People everywhere are arriving at the same conclusion – correctly, by the way – that it is financial suicide to go into hock for $100,000 to get a Bachelors Degree only to be offered jobs that require a paper hat or a $19.95 shirt and tie when they graduate. They become furious when they see billionaires with golden parachutes getting bailed out while their parents are getting evicted. They are vehemently opposed to an economic and educational system that is only available to those who have enough money to pay. They have already read the 2011 United Nations Resolution stating that Internet access is a basic human right, and that denying Web access to anyone due to their inability to pay is a human rights violation at best, and a criminal act at worst. They already see capitalism for what it is – an economy based on plunder and conquest at home and abroad. They see all the homeless people on the street while entire neighborhoods are littered with abandoned, boarded up houses that represent the shattered dreams of countless families, some of whom are now living in shelters or with relatives because there is no where else for them to go. They see all the school teachers, fire fighters and police officers who continue to get laid off so the country can have more for the top 1%, and so they can have more money for pointless foreign wars. They do not think that 1% of the population should control 99% of the wealth in this country -- and they are absolutely right.

So what would Jesus protest? Would Jesus protest merciless treatment of the neediest people? He already has: “Then, with the crowds listening, he turned to his disciples and said, 'Beware of these teachers of religious law! For they like to parade around in flowing robes and love to receive respectful greetings as they walk in the marketplaces. And how they love the seats of honor in the synagogues and the head table at banquets. Yet they shamelessly cheat widows out of their property and then pretend to be pious by making long prayers in public. Because of this, they will be severely punished." (Luke 20: 45-47, NLT)

The Occupy and 99% Movements, and what happened in Ferguson and again the very next night in St. Louis are all about the least fortunate of us, and it is these very people who want their lives back. They have lost jobs, careers, homes (some of which had been paid on monthly for years or even decades), savings, pensions and even their health. Economic and racial inequality reigns supreme across our land, and the misery that it has spawned threatens to grow into revolution in American streets (cue “Revolution” by the Beatles).

Throughout the Bible the number one theme after Christ's salvation is taking care of the least in society. Jesus said that if we want to be considered religious, then we are to look after the welfare of widows and orphans. “Whatsoever you do for the very least of my brethren, that you do for me”, and this nugget of wisdom holds as much meaning today as when those words were uttered by Jesus 2,000 years ago. The divine truth of human equality that He illustrated with that verse is something that has yet to be fulfilled, and it's our fault. Human equality was a radical notion in the time of Christ, and many churches continue to leave out of the teaching of this revolutionary aspect of His ministry. So long as racial and ethnic hatred persist, equality cannot flourish. It's up to ministers like myself to address this issue, and I encourage all who read this to join me in my efforts.

I am painfully aware that some conservative Christian writers, and a whole lot of 1%'ers, are apparently in love with the Old Testament verse that says, “If a man will not work, then neither shall he eat”, presumably in reference to strikers, protesters and “occupiers”, but they are forgetting the original context of that verse:

“Even while we were with you, we gave you this command: "Those unwilling to work will not get to eat." Yet we hear that some of you are living idle lives, refusing to work and meddling in other people's business. We command such people and urge them in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and work to earn their own living. As for the rest of you, dear brothers and sisters, never get tired of doing good. Take note of those who refuse to obey what we say in this letter. Stay away from them so they will be ashamed. Don't think of them as enemies, but warn them as you would a brother or sister.” (2Thessalonians 3: 10-15, NLT)

The context reveals that these verses do not apply to the OWS/99% or Ferguson people. These verses deal with lazy people who simply don't want to work. The people protesting want to work and can't find jobs, that is why they are protesting! You may be of the opinion that the protesters are "lazy" or somehow not trying hard enough but I have actually been through what these protesters are experiencing. I know what it's like to see a 23-year career evaporate, and to not be able to find enough work to sustain oneself. I know what it's like to wind up homeless through no fault of my own, and I have personally experienced how homelessness, even for relatively short periods of time as was in my case, can and will literally ruin one's health. Like these multitudes of others, I too can attest to how brutal it is out there. The true unemployment rate is very likely double or triple what the government is telling us. The jobs being offered have absurdly low wages that are simply not enough to live on, come with no health insurance, and are often temporary or part time.

The other truth revealed from the context of these verses, however, is how we should be acting. The apostle Paul does not say that we should treat these people with contempt, lie about them, or sneer at them. He does not say they should only help those who can afford to pay. Instead, we should be doing for others what we would have them do for us. We must treat others the way we want to be treated. We must love our neighbor as ourselves. He says we should treat them not as enemies but to warn them as if they were a brother or sister.

“Though you offer many prayers, I will not listen, for your hands are covered with the blood of innocent victims. Wash yourselves and be clean! Get your sins out of my sight. Give up your evil ways. Learn to do good. Seek justice. Help the oppressed. Defend the cause of orphans. Fight for the rights of widows. -- Isaiah 1: 15-17 (NLT)

What God is saying here is to check your hands before raising them in praise to Him to see whose blood you have on them. Give up your sins. Learn to do good. And then what does the Lord say is doing good? Seeking justice. Helping the oppressed. Defending the cause and fighting for the rights of the needy. If you really and truly think that there is no injustice in our current system then you have no heart, never mind your soul. If you honestly do not believe that there is oppression for the lowest in our society today then I advise you to stop watching Fox News. There is a real world out there and it is really hurting.

The people at Ferguson, Mo. want social and economic justice. They want the same thing God speaks about throughout the entire Bible. They want the same thing Jesus taught about. Once Christ told a parable about the Good Samaritan. Most of us know the story. A man is mugged and essentially left for dead on the street. He is passed over by a Temple assistant and a priest. But a Samaritan stopped and helped him, bandaged him, and paid for him to recover at a nearby inn. But the context of this parable is the point. Jesus told it because He was asked the question -- "who is my neighbor?" The Samaritan was chosen as the hero of this story by Jesus because there was much hatred towards them by the Jewish people then. Who is my neighbor? I think this is the question we need to ask ourselves every day. We need to ask it when we hear the hate merchants on TV and radio trying to stir up our darker side. We need to ask it when we think that we know the motives of people we never even met. We need to ask it when we start to use God to defend things He obviously would never defend. Jesus finishes the Parable of the Good Samaritan with these words:

"Now which of these three would you say was a neighbor to the man who was attacked by bandits?" Jesus asked. The man replied, "The one who showed him mercy." Then Jesus said, "Yes, now go and do the same." (Luke 10: 36-37, NLT)

As far as the teacher of law that asked the initial question here was concerned, only fellow Jews were his neighbor. Anyone else was not looked upon the same way. We have that same spirit infecting this country too. The other side is presented only for the purpose of blame and hatred. Those who find themselves on the right look upon the OWS crowd negatively because they are not their neighbors to them. They also looked down on the protesters in Ferguson as being just a mob of rioters and looters, when in fact only a small percentage of all those engaged in the street protests engaged in such illicit activities, as if they are all somehow unworthy of mercy. They are somehow to blame not only for their own plight, but supposedly for the plight of the country as a whole. God requires something from us and He spelled it out very plainly in the Old Testament: “No, O people, the Lord has told you what is good, and this is what he requires of you: to do what is right, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God. (Micah 6: 8, NLT)

The world sells various shades of gray to hide the truth, spinning it and disguising it as it goes. The truth is that if somehow anyone thinks Jesus would support a system where over 40 million people are homeless while the ultra rich clothe their dogs, then I suggest that maybe they do not understand what "doing what is right" truly means. If anyone thinks that Jesus would support a system where 16,000 children die every day from hunger while the world's top 1% gets richer and fatter, then I am not so sure that they understand the concepts of loving and being merciful. Not just being merciful – really loving mercy and walking humbly with your God. I want you to think the next time someone is trying to sell you on the notion that the Ferguson, OWS and “the 99%” people are this or that. It makes me wonder what their motivation is for saying such things. If you have the snooty opinion that the Ferguson, OWS and 99% folks are lazy, then that is not my problem. If you have the political opinion that they should go home and find a job, fine, but have any of you tried to find a job lately? Brothers and sisters, those are nowhere near being Christian arguments. They are most definitely not Biblical arguments – and they are devoid of any compassion, any mercy, or any humility. What will we do to help all these people? What would happen if you lost your job tomorrow, or if a family member were to be killed by the police? What have we done lately to help each other? Because in the end, that's all that really counts.