California Free Press

5 Reasons Why Trump’s Corporate Tax Cut is Appallingly Dumb

by Robert Reich

Tuesday, April 25, 2017

Trump wants to cut the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 15 percent, in order to “make the United States more competitive.”

This is truly dumb, for 5 reasons:

1. The White House says the United States has one of the highest corporate tax rates in the world. Baloney. After corporate deductions and tax credits, the typical corporation pays an effective tax rate of 27.9 percent, only a tad higher than the average of 27.7 percent among advanced nations.

2. Trump’s corporate tax cut will bust the federal budget. According to the Congress’s own Joint Committee on Taxation, it will reduce federal revenue by $2 trillion over 10 years. This will either require huge cuts in programs for the poor, or additional tax revenues from the rest of us.

3. The White House says the tax cuts will create a jump in economic growth that will generate enough new revenue to wipe out any increase in the budget deficit. This is supply-side nonsense. The Congressional Research Service reviewed tax cuts since 1945 and found no evidence they generate economic growth. Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush both cut taxes, and both ended their presidencies with huge budget deficits. Bill Clinton raised taxes, and the economy created more jobs than it did under Bush or Reagan.

4. American corporations don’t need a tax cut. They’re already hugely competitive as measured by their profits – which are at near record highs.

5. The White House says corporations will use the extra profits they get from the tax cut to invest in more capacity and jobs. Rubbish. They’re now using a large portion of their profits to buy back their shares of stock and to buy other companies, in order to raise their stock prices. There’s no reason to suppose they’ll do any different with even more profits.

Don’t fall for Trump’s corporate tax giveaway. It will be a huge windfall for corporations and a huge burden on ordinary Americans.

Tiny Houses for Homeless Built in Seattle and Portland

Growing Homelessness Problems Spur Interest in Tiny Houses - WSJ

Growing Homelessness Problems Spur Interest in Tiny Houses

Seattle, Portland and Denver are among the cities looking to small dwellings as part of a solution

from the Wall Street Journal

 

What a State-Owned Bank Can Do for New Jersey

by Ellen Brown

Posted on April 11, 2017

Phil Murphy, the leading Democratic candidate for governor of New Jersey, has made a state-owned bank a centerpiece of his campaign. He says the New Jersey bank would “take money out of Wall Street and put it to work for New Jersey – creating jobs and growing the economy [by] using state deposits to finance local investments … and … support billions of dollars of critical investments in infrastructure, small businesses, and student loans – saving our residents money and returning all profits to the taxpayers.”

A former Wall Street banker himself, Murphy knows how banking works. But in an April 7 op-ed in The New Jersey Spotlight, former New Jersey state treasurer Andrew Sidamon-Eristoff questioned the need for a state-owned bank and raised the issue of risk. This post is in response to those arguments, including a short refresher on the stellar model of the Bank of North Dakota (BND), currently the nation’s only state-owned depository bank.

Which Is Safer, a Public Bank or a Private Bank?

Sidamon-Eristoff warns, “[W]e need to remember that a public bank would be lending the state’s operating cash balances – we’re not talking about an enormous pool of unused, unencumbered cash – and that any repayment shortfalls or liquidity restrictions could potentially impact the availability of funds for employee salaries and other regular operating expenses.”

As the Bank of England recently confirmed, however, banks do not actually lend their deposits. The deposits at all times remain in the bank, available for withdrawal. They are no less available to the state when deposited in its own bank than in Bank of America. In fact, they are more at risk in Bank of America and other Wall Street banks, which with the repeal of Glass-Steagall are allowed to commingle their funds. That means they can gamble with their deposits in derivatives and other risky ventures, something a transparent and accountable state-owned bank would not be allowed to do.

Today, government deposits are at risk in private banks for another reason. Banks across the country are telling governments of all sizes that they can no longer provide the collateral required to fully protect these deposits while paying a competitive interest rate on them, due to heightened regulatory requirements. FDIC insurance covers only the first $250,000 of these deposits, a sum government revenues far exceed. The bulk of these deposits are thus left insufficiently protected against a banking collapse like that seen in 2008-09—something that is widely predicted to happen again.

In North Dakota, by contrast, state revenues are deposited by law in the state-owned Bank of North Dakota and are guaranteed by the state. The BND pays a competitive interest rate on these deposits that is generally at about the midpoint of rates paid by other banks in the state. The BND, in turn, guarantees municipal government deposits, which are generally reserved for local banks. Unlike in other states, where local banks must back public deposits with collateral to an extent that makes the funds largely unavailable for lending, North Dakota’s community banks are able to use their municipal government deposits to back loans because the BND provides letters of credit guaranteeing them.

The concern that a New Jersey state-owned bank might make risky loans can be obviated by limiting lending, at least initially, to the same sorts of loans the state makes now, using the same underwriting standards. Sidamon-Eristoff observes that “the state already maintains a comprehensive range of economic development, infrastructure finance, housing finance, and student assistance programs.” What financing through the state’s own bank would add is leverage. State and local governments routinely make loans through revolving funds, in which the money has to be there before it can be lent out and must come back before it is lent again. Chartered depository banks are allowed to leverage their capital into 10 times that sum (or more) in loans, acquiring the liquidity for withdrawals as needed from the wholesale markets (Fed funds, the repo market or the Federal Home Loan Banks). A bank with adequate capital will lend to any creditworthy borrower, without first checking its deposits or its reserves.  If the bank has insufficient reserves, it can borrow from a variety of cheap sources that are normally the exclusive province of the banking club, but that local governments and communities can tap into by owning their own banks.

That is one of the major benefits to the state of having its own bank: it can borrow very cheaply in the money markets. It can get the sort of Wall Street perks not otherwise available to governments, businesses, or individuals; and it is backstopped by the Federal Reserve system if it runs short of funds.  This is the magic that allows banks to be so profitable, and it is what makes a publicly-owned bank exceptionally useful at state and local levels of government.

Cutting the Cost of Infrastructure in Half

Consider the possibilities, for example, for funding infrastructure. Like most states today, New Jersey suffers from serious budget problems, limiting its ability to make needed improvements. By funding infrastructure through its own bank, the state can cut infrastructure costs roughly in half, since 50 percent of the cost of infrastructure, on average, is financing. Again, a state-owned bank can do this by leveraging its capital, with any shortfall covered very cheaply in the wholesale markets. In effect, the state can borrow at bankers’ rates of 1 percent or less, rather than at market rates of 4 to 6 percent for taxable infrastructure bonds (not to mention the roughly 12 percent return expected by private equity investors).  The state can borrow at 1 percent and turn a profit even if it lends for local development at only 2 percent—one-half to two-thirds below bond market rates.

That is the rate at which North Dakota lends for infrastructure. In 2015, the state legislature established a BND Infrastructure Loan Fund program that made $150 million available to local communities for a wide variety of infrastructure needs. These loans have a 2 percent fixed interest rate and a term of up to 30 years; and the 2 percent goes back to the State of North Dakota, so it’s a win-win-win for local residents.

The BND is able to make these cheap loans while still turning a tidy profit because its costs are very low: no exorbitantly-paid executives; no bonuses, fees, or commissions; very low borrowing costs; no need for multiple branch offices; no FDIC insurance premiums; no private shareholders. Profits are recycled back into the bank, the state and the community.

In November 2014, The Wall Street Journal reported that the BND was actually more profitable than the largest Wall Street banks, with a return on equity that was 70 percent greater than for JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs. This remarkable performance was attributed to the state’s oil boom; but the boom has now become an oil bust, yet the BND’s profits continue to climb. In its latest annual report, published in April 2016, the bank boasted its most profitable year ever. The BND has had record profits for the last 12 years, each year outperforming the last. In 2015 it reported $130.7 million in earnings, total assets of $7.4 billion, capital of $749 million, and a return on equity of a whopping 18.1 percent.

The BND Partners, Not Competes, with Local Banks

Sidamon-Eristoff argues that “a new public bank would inevitably compete against New Jersey’s private banks for routine business.” But the BND does not compete with private banks either for municipal deposits or for loans. Rather, it partners with local banks, participating in their loans. The local bank acts as the front office dealing directly with customers. The BND acts more like a “bankers’ bank,” helping with liquidity and capital requirements. By partnering with the BND, local banks can take on projects in which Wall Street has no interest, projects that might otherwise go unfunded, including loans for local infrastructure.

The BND helps local private banks in other ways. It acts as a mini-Fed for the state, providing correspondent banking services to virtually every financial institution in North Dakota. It offers secured and unsecured federal funds lines to over 100 financial institutions, along with check-clearing, cash management and automated clearing house services.  Because it assists local banks with mortgages and guarantees their loans, local banks have been able to keep loans on their books rather than selling them to investors to meet capital requirements, allowing them to avoid the subprime and securitization debacles.

Due to this amicable relationship, the North Dakota Bankers’ Association endorses the BND as a partner rather than a competitor of the state’s private banks.  Indeed, it may be the BND that ultimately saves local North Dakota banks from extinction as the number of banks in the US steadily shrinks. North Dakota has more banks per capita than any other state.

Bolstering the State’s Budget

The BND also helps directly with state government funding as needed. Between 2009 and 2016, the BND retained its profits because the state did not need them and the bank needed the additional capital for its rapidly expanding loan portfolio. But in December 2016, Governor Jack Dalrymple proposed returning $200 million from the bank’s profits to the state’s general fund, to help make up for a budget shortfall caused by collapsing oil and soybean proceeds. Dalrymple commented, “Our economic advisers have told us there is no similar state in the nation that could have weathered such a collapse in commodity prices without serious impacts on their financial condition.”

The BND also served as a rainy day fund when the state went over-budget in 2001-02 due to the dot-com bust. The bank simply declared an extra dividend for the state, and the next year the budget was back on track: no massive debt accumulation, no Wall Street bid-rigging, no fraudulent interest-rate swaps, no capital appreciation bonds at 300% interest.

Having a cheap and ready credit line with the state’s own bank can have similar benefits for New Jersey and other states. It can reduce the need for wasteful rainy-day funds invested at minimal interest in out-of-state banks; allow the state to leverage its funds, expanding its current credit facilities without adding to the state’s debt burden; cut infrastructure costs nearly in half; and jumpstart the economy with new development,  new employment, and an expanded tax base.

_____________________

Ellen Brown is an attorney, founder of the Public Banking Institute, a Senior Fellow of the Democracy Collaborative., and author of twelve books including Web of Debt and The Public Bank Solution. She also co-hosts a radio program on PRN.FM called “It’s Our Money.” Her 300+ blog articles are posted at EllenBrown.com.

The Savings and Stability of Public Banking

Posted April 11, 2017

By Ralph Nader

April 11, 2017

As a society obsessed by money, we pay a gigantic price for not educating high school and college students about money and banking. The ways of the giant global banks – both commercial and investment operations – are as mysterious as they are damaging to the people. Big banks use the Federal Reserve to maximize their influence and profits. The federal Freedom of Information Act provides an exemption for matters that are “contained in or related to examination, operating, or condition reports prepared by, on behalf of, or for the use of an agency responsible for the regulation or supervision of financial institutions.” This exemption allows financial institutions to wallow in secrecy. Financial institutions are so influential in Congress that Senator Durbin (D, IL) says “[The banks] frankly own this place.”

Although anti-union, giant financial institutions have significant influence over the investments of worker pension funds. Their certainty of being bailed out because they are seen as “too big to fail” harms the competitiveness of smaller, community banks and allows the big bankers to take bigger risks with “other people’s money,” as Justice Brandeis put it.

These big banks are so pervasive in their reach that even unions and progressive media, such as The Nation magazine and Democracy Now have their accounts with JP Morgan Chase.

The government allows banks to have concentrated power. Taxpayers and Consumers are charged excessive fees and paid paltry interest rates on savings. The bonds of municipalities are are also hit with staggering fees and public assets like highways and public drinking water systems are corporatized by Goldman Sachs and other privatizers with sweetheart multi-decade leases.

Then there are the immense taxpayer bailouts of Wall Street, such as those in2008-2009 after the financial industry’s recklessness and crimes brought down the economy, cost workers 8 million jobs, and shredded the pension and mutual fund savings of the American people.

Standing like a beacon of stability, responsiveness and profitability is the 98 year-old, state-owned Bank of North Dakota (BND). As reported by Ellen Brown, prolific author and founder of the Public Banking Institute (Santa Clarita, California), “The BND has had record profits for the last 12 years” (avoiding the Wall Street crash) “each year outperforming the last. In 2015 it reported $130.7 million in earnings, total assets of $7.4 billion, capital of $749 million, and a return on investment of a whopping 18.1 percent. Its lending portfolio grew by $486 million, a 12.7 percent increase, with growth in all four of its areas of concentration: agriculture, business, residential and student loans…”

North Dakota’s economy is depressed because of the sharp drop in oil prices. So the BND moved to help. Again, Ellen Brown:

“In 2015, it introduced new infrastructure programs to improve access to medical facilities, remodel or construct new schools, and build new road and water infrastructure. The Farm Financial Stability Loan was introduced to assist farmers affected by low commodity prices or below-average crop production. The BND also helped fund 300 new businesses.”

All this is in a state with half the population of Phoenix or Philadelphia.

A California coalition is forming to establish a state-owned bank for California. Coalition organizers say a California State Bank will cut the state’s long-term financing costs in half, compared to what avaricious Wall Street is charging. The nation’s largest state (equivalent to the world’s sixth largest economy) can free itself from massive debt accumulation, bid-rigging, deceptive interest-rate swaps and capital appreciation bonds at 300% interest over time.

What assets does the state have to make this bank fully operational? California has surplus funds which total about $600 billion, including those in a Pooled Money Investment account managed by the State Treasurer that contains $54 billion earning less than 1 percent interest.

Money in these funds is earmarked for specific expenditure purposes, but they can be invested – in a new state bank. To escape from a Wall Street that is, in Brown’s words “sucking massive sums in interest, fees and interest rate swap payments out of California and into offshore tax havens,” a state bank can use its impressive credit power to develop infrastructure in California.

Huge state pension funds and other state funds can provide the deposits. Each one billion dollar capital investment can lend $10 billion for projects less expensively and under open stable banking control by California. Presently, California and other states routinely deposit hundreds of billions of dollars in Wall Street banks at minimal interest, turn around and borrow for infrastructure construction and repair from the Wall Street bond market at much higher interest and fees.

This is a ridiculous form of debt peonage, a lesson Governor Jerry Brown has yet to learn. He and other officials similarly uninformed about how the state of California can be its own banker should visit publicbankinginstitute.org and read Ellen Brown’s book, The Public Bank Solution.

Legislation for public banks is being pursued in the states of Washington, Michigan, Arizona and New Jersey, as well as the cities of Philadelphia and Santa Fe. Look for county commissioners and state treasurers to come on board when they see the enormous safeguards and savings that can be secured through “public banks” in contrast to the convoluted casino run by unaccountable Wall Street gamblers and speculators.

A longtime backer of public banking, retired entrepreneur Richard Mazess, hopes that national civic groups like Public Citizen, Common Cause, People for the American Way and Consumer Watchdog can get behind the proposal. “Public, not private, infrastructure is essential for an equitable economy,” he says.

California already has a public infrastructure bank called the IBank. Mr. Mazess and others believe that expanding the existing IBank into a depository institution would be more likely to pass through the California legislature. The deposits would come from public institutions, and NGOs (not from private persons). These pension funds and other public deposits would become reserves and serve as the basis for safely leveraged loans to public projects at a conservative tenfold multiplier. No derivatives or other shenanigans allowed.

Before that proposal can be enacted, however, there needs to be much more education of state legislators and the public at large.

Such enlightenment would illuminate the enormous savings, along with the restoration of state sovereignty from the absentee, exploitative grip of an unrepentant, speculating, profiteering Wall Street that believes it can always go to Washington, DC for its taxpayer bailouts.

Blaming Russia Helps Democratic Party’s Anti-Bernie Elites Maintain Power

by Norman Solomon from truthdig April 20, 2017

  Democratic National Committee chairman Tom Perez, left, and Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in a joint interview on MSNBC. (MSNBC)

After Hillary Clinton’s devastating loss nearly six months ago, her most powerful Democratic allies feared losing control of the party. Efforts to lip-sync economic populism while remaining closely tied to Wall Street had led to a catastrophic defeat. In the aftermath, the party’s progressive base—personified by Bernie Sanders—was in position to start flipping over the corporate game board.

Aligned with Clinton, the elites of the Democratic Party needed to change the subject. Clear assessments of the national ticket’s failures were hazardous to the status quo within the party. So were the groundswells of opposition to unfair economic privilege. So were the grass-roots pressures for the party to become a genuine force for challenging big banks, Wall Street and overall corporate power.

In short, the Democratic Party’s anti-Bernie establishment needed to reframe the discourse in a hurry. And—in tandem with mass media—it did.

The reframing could be summed up in two words: Blame Russia.

By early winter, the public discourse was going sideways—much to the benefit of party elites. The meme of blaming Russia and Vladimir Putin for the election of Donald Trump effectively functioned to let the Wall Street-friendly leadership of the national Democratic Party off the hook. Meanwhile, serious attempts to focus on the ways that wounds to democracy in the United States have been self-inflicted—whether via the campaign finance system or the purging of minorities from voter rolls or any number of other systemic injustices—were largely set aside.

LISTEN: The Russians Aren’t Coming—the Deep State Is

Fading from scrutiny was the establishment that continued to dominate the Democratic Party’s superstructure. At the same time, its devotion to economic elites was undiminished. As Bernie told a reporter on the last day of February: “Certainly there are some people in the Democratic Party who want to maintain the status quo. They would rather go down with the Titanic so long as they have first-class seats.”

Amid great luxury and looming catastrophe, the party’s current hierarchy has invested enormous political capital in depicting Vladimir Putin as an unmitigated archvillain. Relevant history was irrelevant, to be ignored or denied.

With dutiful conformity from most Democrats in Congress, the party elites doubled, tripled and quadrupled down on the emphatic claim that Moscow is the capital of, by any other name, an evil empire. Rather than just calling for what’s needed—a truly independent investigation into allegations that the Russian government interfered with the U.S. election—the party line became hyperbolic and unmoored from the available evidence.

Given their vehement political investment in demonizing the Russian president, Democratic leaders are oriented to seeing the potential of detente with Russia as counterproductive in terms of their electoral strategy for 2018 and 2020. It’s a calculus that boosts the risks of nuclear annihilation, given the very real dangers of escalating tensions between Washington and Moscow.

Along the way, top party officials seem bent on returning to a kind of pre-Bernie-campaign doldrums. The new chair of the Democratic National Committee, Tom Perez, can’t bring himself to say that the power of Wall Street is antithetical to the interests of working people. That reality came to painful light this week during a live appearance on national television.

During a 10-minute joint interview along with Bernie Sanders on Tuesday night, Perez was a font of exactly the kind of trite empty slogans and worn-out platitudes that oiled the engines of the dismal Clinton campaign.

While Sanders was forthright, Perez was evasive. While Sanders talked about systemic injustice, Perez fixated on Trump. While Sanders pointed to a way forward for realistic and far-reaching progressive change, Perez hung onto a rhetorical formula that expressed support for victims of the economic order without acknowledging the existence of victimizers.

In an incisive article published by The Nation magazine, Robert Borosage wrote last week: “For all the urgent pleas for unity in the face of Trump, the party establishment has always made it clear that they mean unity under their banner. That’s why they mobilized to keep the leader of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, Representative Keith Ellison, from becoming head of the DNC. It’s why the knives are still out for Sanders and those who supported him.”

While Bernie is hardly a reliable opponent of U.S. war policies, he is significantly more critical of military intervention than the Democratic Party leaders who often champion it. Borosage noted that the party establishment is locked into militaristic orthodoxies that favor continuing to inflict the kind of disasters that the United States has brought to Iraq, Libya and other countries: “Democrats are in the midst of a major struggle to decide what they stand for and who they represent. Part of that is the debate over a bipartisan interventionist foreign policy that has so abjectly failed.”

For the Democratic Party’s most hawkish wing—dominant from the top down and allied with Clinton’s de facto neocon approach to foreign policy—the U.S. government’s April 6 cruise missile attack on a Syrian airfield was an indication of real leverage for more war. That attack on a close ally of Russia showed that incessant Russia-baiting of Trump can get gratifying military results for the Democratic elites who are undaunted in their advocacy of regime change in Syria and elsewhere.

The politically motivated missile attack on Syria showed just how dangerous it is to keep Russia-baiting Trump, giving him political incentive to prove how tough he is on Russia after all. What’s at stake includes the imperative of preventing a military clash between the world’s two nuclear superpowers. But the corporate hawks at the top of the national Democratic Party have other priorities.

Norman Solomon is coordinator of the online activist group RootsAction.org and executive director of the Institute for Public Accuracy. He is the author of a dozen books, including “War Made Easy: How Presidents and Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death.”

 

The Only Real “Centrist” Agenda

by Robert Reich

Monday, April 17, 2017

With Steve Bannon on way out, official Washington is jumping for joy that Gary Cohn – the former president of Goldman Sachs who’s now running Trump’s National Economic Council, along with Dina Powell, another influential Goldman Sachs alumnus, – seems to be taking over Trump’s brain.

As CNBC puts it, Cohn will push “more moderate, business-friendly economic policies.” The Washington Post says Cohn is advocating “a centrist vision.” The Post goes on to describe “The growing strength of Cohn and like-minded moderates" as revealed in Trump’s endorsement of government subsidies for exports, and of corporate tax cuts. Says the Post: “The president’s new positions move him much closer to the views of … mainstream Republicans and Democrats.”

In reality, Cohn, Powell, and other Wall Streeters in the Trump White House are pushing Trump closer to the views of Wall Street and big business – views that are reflected in the views of “mainstream” Republicans and Democrats only to the extent the “mainstream” is dependent on the Street and big corporations for campaign money.

These views aren’t “centrist,” and they’re not sustainable. More tax breaks for the rich and more subsidies for big corporations aren’t much better for America than xenophobia.

Wall Street and corporate America seem not to have learned a thing from what’s happened over the past year. Do they really believe the anger, rage, hate, racism, and nationalism that welled up during the 2016 election was a random, passing phenomenon, like a particularly bad hurricane?

If so, they’re wrong. These sentiments came from a shrinking and ever more anxious working class. From millions of people so convinced the game is rigged against them they were prepared to overthrow the established order in order to get fundamental change. From voters whipped up into a fury over tax breaks and subsidies and bailouts for those at the top – socialism for the rich – but who for years have been getting the harsh losing end of the capitalist stick: declining wages, mass firings, less job security, emptying towns and cities, and their children with even lower and fewer prospects.

They came from people who during the Great Recession lost their jobs, homes, and savings, as Wall Street got bailed out for its wanton greed, and not a single top Wall Street executive went to jail.

The so-called “centrist” policies that Wall Street and big corporations are now happily promoting via Gary Cohn and Dina Powell won’t reverse these sentiments. They’ll add to them, because these were same sort of the policies that got us to this point.

There’s a better alternative. It’s to make it easy for people who lose their jobs to get new ones that pay at least as well, through wage insurance; expand the Earned Income Tax Credit and raise the minimum wage so every job pays a living wage; invest in great teachers and great schools, along with a system of lifelong learning, and high-quality early childhood education; and provide Medicare for all.

And pay for all of this with a 2 percent tax on wealth over $1 million and a carbon tax. While we’re at it, get big money out of politics.

Here’s a “centrist” agenda that big business, Wall Street, and the rest of America should agree on because it (or something very much like it) is the only way to move forward without inviting even more inequalities of income, wealth, and political power – and ever more vicious backlashes against such inequities.
If Wall Street and big business used the 2016 election as a teachable moment, they would realize this.

Politicians Don't Need Fake News to Manage Reality

by John Lawrence

They Have Other Techniques at Their Disposal

We have seen two recent examples of politicians getting themselves out of a bind. Manipulation of the news need not include producing fake news. Since reality seems to be composed of media images and talk show brou ha ha, all that is necessary is to change the subject. Case in point: the US as personified by President Trump was on the hook for dropping bombs in Mosul that killed 200 civilians. The New York Times reported on March 24:

The American-led military coalition in Iraq said Friday that it was investigating reports that scores of civilians — perhaps as many as 200, residents said — had been killed in recent American airstrikes in Mosul, the northern Iraqi city at the center of an offensive to drive out the Islamic State.

If confirmed, the series of airstrikes would rank among the highest civilian death tolls in an American air mission since the United States went to war in Iraq in 2003. And the reports of civilian deaths in Mosul came immediately after two recent incidents in Syria, where the coalition is also battling the Islamic State from the air, in which activists and local residents said dozens of civilians had been killed.

The management of this news can be discerned from the very first sentence, and in particular the word "investigating." Until the incident is thoroughly investigated, we can't be sure, evidently, that the reports are really true. And by the time the investigation is complete, the media reality will have been taken over by some more current event - it usually doesn't take more than a day or two - and that is exactly what happened in this situation.

Sure enough on April 6, a little more than a week after the purported US attack that killed 200 civilians, another event occurred which made the earlier event all but forgotten. This was a chemical bomb attack on the town of Khan Sheikhoun in Idlib Province, which left scores dead and hundreds sickened in one of the worst atrocities so far in the six-year-old Syria war. Immediately there was a hue and cry that this was the doing of Syrian President Bashar Assad. There was outrage in the American media by pundits and politicians that this called for President Trump to do something which he promptly did by bombing an airfield in Syria from which the attack supposedly originated. The massacre of civilians by US bombs in Mosul was totally forgotten and Trump looked Presidential at last because he took action where supposedly Obama had dithered.

But wait a minute. Since all we know about the gas attack are the images of pathetic children, do we really know it was perpetrated by Assad? Immediately Assad denied responsibility. President Putin of Russia even suggested it was a "false flag," a set-up to bring the US into the war. We won't know the truth, evidently, until an "investigation" has taken place, Putin suggested. Well fair is fair. If Trump and the US military can get off the hook by denying responsibility until an investigation has taken place, why can't Assad and Putin? Again, they are suggesting, we can't nail them until an investigation has conclusively concluded that Assad is responsible. Until then we have to withhold judgment just as we have to withhold judgment about the Mosul attack which, by the way, killed more than the Idib gas attack - 200 in Mosul vs 87 in Idib.

The UK Daily Mail reported:

The OPCW [Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons] said Thursday that a fact-finding mission was analysing samples gathered from 'various sources' and that allegations a chemical attack took place in the Syrian rebel-held town of Khan Sheikhun were 'credible'.

Lavrov said Russia, Iran and Syria have demanded a 'thorough, objective and unbiased investigation' under the auspices of the OPCW, insisting it must use 'independent experts', including from Moscow.

So if Assad was responsible, by the time an investigation is concluded, the furor will have died down. So Putin and Assad are using the same techniques to get off the hot seat that Trump and others have used.

Hey News Media, You've Been Trumped!

Trump even managed to divert media attention from his alleged involvement with Putin regarding the Trump political campaign by suggesting Obama had "tapped wires" at Trump Tower. Immediately there was a media furor which took attention away from Trump's alleged nefarious activities and put it squarely on his predecessor even though Trump's allegation was patently false. I don't even know if an "investigation" was necessary in that case, but, in any event, Trump has proven himself to be a past master in managing media attention. Will there be any consequences to Trump for telling what seems to be a blatant lie implicating Obama in a nefarious deed? No, there will never be any consequences so he can lie away, and distract the pundits, politicians and American people any time he feels like it, particularly if his claims are more sensationalistic than whatever he's being charged with or implicated in. Trump knows that sensationalism Trumps more boring news especially if it's more than a day old, and he can use this to manipulate the media and public opinion. Trump stands ready to Trump your Ace reporter!

Why should we take anything the Trump administration claims to be the truth after all the lies of the Bush administration? And have we forgotten the lie that intensified the Viet Nam war - the Gulf of Tonkin incident? Vox has reported in an article, No, really, George W. Bush lied about WMDs:

Mother Jones’s David Corn has been excellent about chronicling specific examples over the years. Here are just a few:

In October 2002, Bush said that Saddam Hussein had a "massive stockpile" of biological weapons. But as CIA Director George Tenet noted in early 2004, the CIA had informed policymakers it had "no specific information on the types or quantities of weapons agent or stockpiles at Baghdad's disposal." The "massive stockpile" was just literally made up.

In December 2002, Bush declared, "We do not know whether or not [Iraq] has a nuclear weapon." That was not what the National Intelligence Estimate said. As Tenet would later testify, "We said that Saddam did not have a nuclear weapon and probably would have been unable to make one until 2007 to 2009." Bush did know whether or not Iraq had a nuclear weapon — and lied and said he didn’t know to hype the threat.

On CNN in September 2002, Condoleezza Rice claimed that aluminum tubes purchased by Iraq were "only really suited for nuclear weapons programs." This was precisely the opposite of what nuclear experts at the Energy Department were saying; they argue that not only was it very possible the tubes were for nonnuclear purposes but that it was very likely they were too. Even more dire assessments about the tubes from other agencies were exaggerated by administration officials — and in any case, the claim that they’re "only really suited" for nuclear weapons is just false.

On numerous occasions, Dick Cheney cited a report that 9/11 conspirator Mohammed Atta had met in Prague with an Iraqi intelligence officer. He said this after the CIA and FBI concluded that this meeting never took place.

More generally on the question of Iraq and al-Qaeda, on September 18, 2001, Rice received a memo summarizing intelligence on the relationship, which concluded there was little evidence of links. Nonetheless Bush continued to claim that Hussein was "a threat because he’s dealing with al-Qaeda" more than a year later.

In August 2002, Dick Cheney declared, "Simply stated, there's no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction." But as Corn notes, at that time there was "no confirmed intelligence at this point establishing that Saddam had revived a major WMD operation." Gen. Anthony Zinni, who had heard the same intelligence and attended Cheney’s speech, would later say in a documentary, "It was a total shock. I couldn't believe the vice president was saying this, you know? In doing work with the CIA on Iraq WMD, through all the briefings I heard at Langley, I never saw one piece of credible evidence that there was an ongoing program."

The Bush administration on numerous occasions exaggerated or outright fabricated conclusions from intelligence in its public statements. Bush really did lie, and people really did die as a result of the war those lies were meant to build a case for. Those are the facts.

Aside from the fact that Assad and Putin are actually winning the Syrian civil war, why would Assad be so reckless as to drop chemical weapons which might have the effect of bringing the US, which had been sitting on the sidelines, back into the war? What would be his incentive? They were just sitting around and he did not want them to go to waste? He was running out of conventional bombs and didn't want to pay for new ones?

The news coming out of Idlib is completely controlled by al Nusra and the "white helmets" which are working for the ouster of Assad. They want regime change and they want the US to stay involved in the war because that's the only way they're going to get it. As Alternet reporters Ben Norton and Max Blumenthal have pointed out, Idlib is controlled by an affiliate of ISIS, al-Nusra. They control not only the population which was given a choice of becoming their radicalized brand of Islam or clearing out, but also they control all the news coming out of Idlib, and that includes the news regarding the chemical attack. This means that an objective observer can't take the blame for the attack at face value.

According to an Alternet article:

But there has been one issue major media outlets have refused to touch, and that is the nature of the rebels who would gain from any U.S. military offensive. Who holds power in Idlib, why are they there and what do they want? This is perhaps the most inconvenient set of questions for proponents of "humanitarian" military intervention in Syria.

The reality is that Idlib is substantially controlled by al-Qaeda's Syrian affiliate, which has gone through a series of rebranding schemes but remains the same jihadist group it always was: Jabhat al-Nusra. In the province it rules, al-Nusra has imposed what a leading scholar has described as a Taliban-like regime that has ethnically cleansed religious and ethnic minorities, banned music and established a brutal theocracy in which it publicly executes women accused of adultery.

Even analysts who have repeatedly called for U.S.-led regime change in Syria have described Idlib as the "heartland of al-Nusra."

Beneficiaries of Idlib Chemical Attack: ISIS and al-Nusra

On the Chris Hedges show On Contact recently, Blumenthal and Norton claimed that the only beneficiaries of the chemical attack on Idlib were the ISIS affiliates who want regime change in Syria, and their only way of getting it is to bring the US back into the war. Trump seems to have changed his position from non-involvement in Syria to regime change. Making a 180 degree policy change on Syria or anything else is nothing new for Trump. He also made several others of the same type in a week recently.

Modern atrocity propaganda most notably was also undertaken to cause President George H. W. Bush to get involved in the war in Kuwait. An incident related by a 15 year old girl by the name of Nayirah detailed how Saddam's army had taken babies out of incubators in Kuwait and left the babies to die. This incensed numerous United States senators and President George H.W. Bush himself in their rationale to back Kuwait in the Gulf War. Later it was revealed that Nayirah was the Kuwaiti ambassador's daughter and the whole thing had been a set-up, a propaganda ploy to bring the US into the war. Her testimony was organized as part of the Citizens for a Free Kuwait public relations campaign which was run by American public relations firm, Hill & Knowlton, for the Kuwaiti government.

So before we get too excited about Assad's purported chemical attack we must ask the hard questions

1) what could be Assad's motive?

2) who benefits from the blame for the attack being placed on Assad?

3) who gains if the US comes back in the war as the champion of regime change?

and 4) should we wait for an investigation before we start shooting?

Even if Assad is finally to blame, it could be said that he and Putin have mastered one aspect of media manipulation which is to call for an investigation. Both investigations - the one of Trump's campaign's involvement with Russia, and the other being Assad's blame for the chemical attack - will likely take weeks if not months and both will be relegated to a small column on the last page of the New York Times. By that time those events will have been overtaken by the media's constant pursuit of the latest tidbit of sensationalism and will have been for all intents and purposes completely forgotten.

What a State-Owned Bank Can Do for New Jersey

by Ellen Brown from Counterpunch, April 12, 2017

Phil Murphy, the leading Democratic candidate for governor of New Jersey, has made a state-owned bank a centerpiece of his campaign. He says the New Jersey bank would “take money out of Wall Street and put it to work for New Jersey – creating jobs and growing the economy [by] using state deposits to finance local investments … and … support billions of dollars of critical investments in infrastructure, small businesses, and student loans – saving our residents money and returning all profits to the taxpayers.”

A former Wall Street banker himself, Murphy knows how banking works. But in an April 7 op-ed in The New Jersey Spotlight, former New Jersey state treasurer Andrew Sidamon-Eristoff questioned the need for a state-owned bank and raised the issue of risk. This post is in response to those arguments, including a short refresher on the stellar model of the Bank of North Dakota (BND), currently the nation’s only state-owned depository bank.

Which Is Safer, a Public Bank or a Private Bank?

Sidamon-Eristoff warns, “[W]e need to remember that a public bank would be lending the state’s operating cash balances – we’re not talking about an enormous pool of unused, unencumbered cash – and that any repayment shortfalls or liquidity restrictions could potentially impact the availability of funds for employee salaries and other regular operating expenses.”

As the Bank of England recently confirmed, however, banks do not actually lend their deposits. The deposits at all times remain in the bank, available for withdrawal. They are no less available to the state when deposited in its own bank than in Bank of America. In fact, they are more at risk in Bank of America and other Wall Street banks, which with the repeal of Glass-Steagall are allowed to commingle their funds. That means they can gamble with their deposits in derivatives and other risky ventures, something a transparent and accountable state-owned bank would not be allowed to do.

Today, government deposits are at risk in private banks for another reason. Banks across the country are telling governments of all sizes that they can no longer provide the collateral required to fully protect these deposits while paying a competitive interest rate on them, due to heightened regulatory requirements. FDIC insurance covers only the first $250,000 of these deposits, a sum government revenues far exceed. The bulk of these deposits are thus left insufficiently protected against a banking collapse like that seen in 2008-09—something that is widely predicted to happen again.

In North Dakota, by contrast, state revenues are deposited by law in the state-owned Bank of North Dakota and are guaranteed by the state. The BND pays a competitive interest rate on these deposits that is generally at about the midpoint of rates paid by other banks in the state. The BND, in turn, guarantees municipal government deposits, which are generally reserved for local banks. Unlike in other states, where local banks must back public deposits with collateral to an extent that makes the funds largely unavailable for lending, North Dakota’s community banks are able to use their municipal government deposits to back loans because the BND provides letters of credit guaranteeing them.

The concern that a New Jersey state-owned bank might make risky loans can be obviated by limiting lending, at least initially, to the same sorts of loans the state makes now, using the same underwriting standards. Sidamon-Eristoff observes that “the state already maintains a comprehensive range of economic development, infrastructure finance, housing finance, and student assistance programs.” What financing through the state’s own bank would add is leverage. State and local governments routinely make loans through revolving funds, in which the money has to be there before it can be lent out and must come back before it is lent again. Chartered depository banks are allowed to leverage their capital into 10 times that sum (or more) in loans, acquiring the liquidity for withdrawals as needed from the wholesale markets (Fed funds, the repo market or the Federal Home Loan Banks). A bank with adequate capital will lend to any creditworthy borrower, without first checking its deposits or its reserves.  If the bank has insufficient reserves, it can borrow from a variety of cheap sources that are normally the exclusive province of the banking club, but that local governments and communities can tap into by owning their own banks.

That is one of the major benefits to the state of having its own bank: it can borrow very cheaply in the money markets. It can get the sort of Wall Street perks not otherwise available to governments, businesses, or individuals; and it is backstopped by the Federal Reserve system if it runs short of funds.  This is the magic that allows banks to be so profitable, and it is what makes a publicly-owned bank exceptionally useful at state and local levels of government.

Cutting the Cost of Infrastructure in Half

Consider the possibilities, for example, for funding infrastructure. Like most states today, New Jersey suffers from serious budget problems, limiting its ability to make needed improvements. By funding infrastructure through its own bank, the state can cut infrastructure costs roughly in half, since 50 percent of the cost of infrastructure, on average, is financing. Again, a state-owned bank can do this by leveraging its capital, with any shortfall covered very cheaply in the wholesale markets. In effect, the state can borrow at bankers’ rates of 1 percent or less, rather than at market rates of 4 to 6 percent for taxable infrastructure bonds (not to mention the roughly 12 percent return expected by private equity investors).  The state can borrow at 1 percent and turn a profit even if it lends for local development at only 2 percent—one-half to two-thirds below bond market rates.

That is the rate at which North Dakota lends for infrastructure. In 2015, the state legislature established a BND Infrastructure Loan Fund program that made $150 million available to local communities for a wide variety of infrastructure needs. These loans have a 2 percent fixed interest rate and a term of up to 30 years; and the 2 percent goes back to the State of North Dakota, so it’s a win-win-win for local residents.

The BND is able to make these cheap loans while still turning a tidy profit because its costs are very low: no exorbitantly-paid executives; no bonuses, fees, or commissions; very low borrowing costs; no need for multiple branch offices; no FDIC insurance premiums; no private shareholders. Profits are recycled back into the bank, the state and the community.

In November 2014, The Wall Street Journal reported that the BND was actually more profitable than the largest Wall Street banks, with a return on equity that was 70 percent greater than for JPMorgan Chase and Goldman Sachs. This remarkable performance was attributed to the state’s oil boom; but the boom has now become an oil bust, yet the BND’s profits continue to climb. In its latest annual report, published in April 2016, the bank boasted its most profitable year ever. The BND has had record profits for the last 12 years, each year outperforming the last. In 2015 it reported $130.7 million in earnings, total assets of $7.4 billion, capital of $749 million, and a return on equity of a whopping 18.1 percent.

The BND Partners, Not Competes, with Local Banks

Sidamon-Eristoff argues that “a new public bank would inevitably compete against New Jersey’s private banks for routine business.” But the BND does not compete with private banks either for municipal deposits or for loans. Rather, it partners with local banks, participating in their loans. The local bank acts as the front office dealing directly with customers. The BND acts more like a “bankers’ bank,” helping with liquidity and capital requirements. By partnering with the BND, local banks can take on projects in which Wall Street has no interest, projects that might otherwise go unfunded, including loans for local infrastructure.

The BND helps local private banks in other ways. It acts as a mini-Fed for the state, providing correspondent banking services to virtually every financial institution in North Dakota. It offers secured and unsecured federal funds lines to over 100 financial institutions, along with check-clearing, cash management and automated clearing house services.  Because it assists local banks with mortgages and guarantees their loans, local banks have been able to keep loans on their books rather than selling them to investors to meet capital requirements, allowing them to avoid the subprime and securitization debacles.

Due to this amicable relationship, the North Dakota Bankers’ Association endorses the BND as a partner rather than a competitor of the state’s private banks.  Indeed, it may be the BND that ultimately saves local North Dakota banks from extinction as the number of banks in the US steadily shrinks. North Dakota has more banks per capita than any other state.

Bolstering the State’s Budget

The BND also helps directly with state government funding as needed. Between 2009 and 2016, the BND retained its profits because the state did not need them and the bank needed the additional capital for its rapidly expanding loan portfolio. But in December 2016, Governor Jack Dalrymple proposed returning $200 million from the bank’s profits to the state’s general fund, to help make up for a budget shortfall caused by collapsing oil and soybean proceeds. Dalrymple commented, “Our economic advisers have told us there is no similar state in the nation that could have weathered such a collapse in commodity prices without serious impacts on their financial condition.”

The BND also served as a rainy day fund when the state went over-budget in 2001-02 due to the dot-com bust. The bank simply declared an extra dividend for the state, and the next year the budget was back on track: no massive debt accumulation, no Wall Street bid-rigging, no fraudulent interest-rate swaps, no capital appreciation bonds at 300% interest.

Having a cheap and ready credit line with the state’s own bank can have similar benefits for New Jersey and other states. It can reduce the need for wasteful rainy-day funds invested at minimal interest in out-of-state banks; allow the state to leverage its funds, expanding its current credit facilities without adding to the state’s debt burden; cut infrastructure costs nearly in half; and jumpstart the economy with new development,  new employment, and an expanded tax base.

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Ellen Brown is an attorney, founder of the Public Banking Institute, and author of twelve books including the best-selling Web of Debt. Her latest book, The Public Bank Solution, explores successful public banking models historically and globally. Her 300+ blog articles are at EllenBrown.com.

More articles by:Ellen Brown

Container Ships Burn Dirtiest Fuel

by John Lawrence

Globalization's Dirty Little Secret

One giant container ship can emit almost the same amount of cancer and asthma-causing chemicals as 50 million cars. Globalization and the offshoring of American jobs is directly responsible not only for good paying jobs leaving the US, but also for massive amounts of pollution put into the environment leading to increased global warming. These mammoth machines guzzle through fuel at a rate of 16 tons per hour — equivalent to nearly 400 tons a day. They consume 86 percent of the oil exported from Saudi Arabia. So not only would bringing these jobs back home bolster the middle class and decrease the economic divide between the 99% and the 1%, but it would also forestall climate change.

Confidential data from the maritime industry shows that just 15 of the world's biggest ships may now emit as much pollution as all the world's 760 million cars. In addition to getting fossil fuel burning cars off the road, we need to be concerned about getting container ships off the seas. US academic research which shows that pollution from the world's 90,000 cargo ships leads to 60,000 deaths a year and costs up to $330 billion per year in health costs from lung and heart diseases.

In light of the pollution produced by container ships, the US has proposed buffer zones along the US coast in which dirty container ships would not be allowed to operate. These rules proposed in 2009 were supposed to go into effect in 2016. Whether or not they have gone into effect is not clear. If they have, you can bet that the Trump administration will rescind them. There is new technology which, if installed on container ships, would lower the amount of pollution they put out. However, this technology is expensive. That would add to the price of transport and finally to the price of consumer products. Much of government is in effect supported by lobbyists that want to kill any and all regulations that increase costs for any industry. And of course the pro-business Trump administration wants to get rid of all government regulations.

As usual all attempts at regulation of this or any other industry are put off until a later date because of the need for further study. When that date is reached there is only further obfuscation until a new later date is set. The Wall Street Journal reported that in October 2016 the International Maritime Organization (IMO) and its 170 member nations have agreed to reduce sulfur pollution from container ships by the year 2020. The IMO said the sulfur content in fuel will be limited to 0.5%, far below the 2.5% average today. But in order to assuage business interests, the reduction of sulfur will occur in a "setback". That means that the full effect will be phased in gradually in order not to disrupt business. Critics have warned the deal will significantly raise fuel costs at a time the shipping industry can least afford it. Some estimates said that this accord could cost the shipping industry about $40 billion.

Container Ships Use Cheapest and Dirtiest Fuel

The Guardian reports:

In international waters ship emissions remains one of the least regulated parts of our global transportation system. The fuel used in ships is waste oil, basically what is left over after the crude oil refining process. It is the same as asphalt and is so thick that when cold it can be walked upon. It's the cheapest and most polluting fuel available and the world's 90,000 ships chew through an astonishing 7.29 million barrels of it each day, or more than 84% of all exported oil production from Saudi Arabia, the worlds largest oil exporter.

South Korea is planning to build ships which can carry 22,000 containers that would be 450 meters long. The amount of pollution produced just by these ships alone is equivalent to having another 29 billion cars on the roads. In place of these fossil fuel burning ships which produce great amounts of pollution, there is the possibility of using nuclear engines to propel them. There are already 150 ships in operation that use nuclear propulsion. Most of these are submarines, but this technology could be adapted for container ships. Why isn't it? Again it's a consideration of cost. The shipping industry would rather go with relatively lower cost ships even though it means that they are exporting into the environment large amounts of pollution for which there is no cost to them. The cost is to the health of average people in addition to the long term threat due to global warming.

Airborne pollution from these giant diesel engines has been linked to sickness in coastal residents near busy shipping lanes. Up to 60,000 premature deaths a year worldwide are said to be as a result of particulate matter emissions from ocean-going ship engines. The IMO, which regulates shipping for 168 member nations, has mandated cleaner fuels by 2020, but that doesn't mean very much unless there is enforcement by the US and other governments which is unlikely to happen since lobbyists for the industry will get Congress to reduce regulations rather than increase them. That way the container ship industry can continue to run at a lower cost level and can continue to pollute.

Is the Pollution Worth Cheap Goods?

Several countries have already instituted buffer zones within which container ships must use a cleaner and more expensive fuel. That fuel is more expensive, but it also cuts pollutants dramatically. Sulfur, for instance, is reduced by 98%, and particulate matter is reduced by 85%. The question is is there any enforcement mechanism or are these buffer zones so much hooey? Is the 230 mile US buffer zone really in effect and really working? Are scofflaws being fined and brought to account? Or is the risk of using dirty fuels just the cost of doing business with or without fines?

90% of consumer products travel around the world in these dirty, polluting container chips because producing them overseas with cheap labor offsets the transportation costs and maximizes profits as long as the externalities of health damaging pollution and global warming are not figured in. Regulating this industry would make it cheaper to manufacture these products here at home and return jobs to American shores.

As usual the driving force of international commerce is the production of cheap consumer goods produced by cheap overseas labor. The dirty little secret is that the true cost of this cheap stuff is borne by environmental degradation causing sickness and disease. The true long term cost is a planet too hot to live on.

Brer Donald and the Tar Baby

by John Lawrence

One of the Uncle Remus stories written in 1880 was about Brer Rabbit and the tar baby. It aptly applies to Brer Trump who's mired in a trap and being closed in on by both the Right and the Left. Patriotic Americans of whatever stripe are incensed that Brer Fox in the form of Putin has performed the equivalent of rape by interfering in the American election. How dare he? Trump took the bait and professed admiration for Brer Fox because he just wants to make Russia great again. So they have a lot in common. Now Trump can't extricate himself from the Tar Baby.

While not necessarily wanting to impugn Donald Trump, the US military-industrial complex is fanning the flames of Russia's purported interference in the US election because they want to justify the immense military expenditures by creating another Cold War with Russia. They need Russia for an enemy and to have Russia as a friend defeats their purpose of justifying more and more money for themselves. After all if Peace broke out, the military budget might be reduced and so many Americans would be unemployed.

I experienced this first hand when I worked in the military-industrial complex. Whenever a Presidential election came up, we were encouraged to vote Republican because a Democrat in the White House might decrease the military budget leading to a RIF (Reduction in Force). That meant that people would lose their jobs. Quelle horreur! But no worries. Trump increased the Offense budget by $54 billion. Trump's increase is more than the entire Russian military budget, some of which, I suppose, is spent on hackers. But for all the money spent on the military-industrial-intelligence complex, the American public should demand better hackers. We've been outhacked by the Russians!

The Left has sensed an opportunity to keep Brer Trump mired in the Tar Baby the way the Right mired Brer Hillary with Benghazi and her emails. When the smoke settled, there was nothing to these allegations, but they sure got people riled up about Hillary's supposedly nefarious, underhanded activities. Well now it's Brer Trump's turn with the Tar Baby. Let's see if he can extricate himself from this one. Any contact with any Russian by any member of his administration will be looked on with suspicion. There is no such thing as just passing the time of day by having a conversation with some person if he or she happens to be Russian. They're all spies, of course, and they report directly to Putin who usually laughs outrageously as he elicits all the confidential and Top Secret information from his army of spies.

What we do know at this point is that Brer Trump can't ask to be thrown in the briar patch as Brer Rabbit convinced Brer Fox so to do. Of course, the briar patch is just where Brer Rabbit wanted to be, but he convinced Brer Fox that this would be a scenario worse than death. The plot thickens as the Left tightens the noose around Brer Trump's neck. He will be so mired in tar that he'll never get anything done much less get his pick, Gorsuch, confirmed on the Supreme Court. But Mitch McConnell intends to use the "nuclear option" if he doesn't have Democrats voting with the Republicans. And right now he doesn't have enough Democratic votes to reach the totally arbitrary magic number of 60. You see majority rule simply does not apply when it comes to the US Senate.

So what will McConnell do? He'll just change the rules so that only 51 are needed. Just think if Obama had been bold enough to do the same thing, Obamacare could have been Medicare-For-All instead of the abortion of health care that Obamacare represents. But the Dems thought they had to play nice and the Repubs convinced them that, if they used the nuclear option, all hell would break loose. It would have been the end of the world as we know it. Now the Repubs just casually say they'll go ahead and do it just to get Gorsuch on the Supreme Court. The Repubs don't hesitate to use any means at their disposal to get what they want. But they convince the Dems that they have to play nice and get the Repubs on board. So Obamacare was watered down with the result that there is no cost containment and pharmaceutical corporations can charge whatever they want for life saving drugs. Martin Shkreli raised the price of Daraprim 5000% thereby becoming the poster boy for corporate greed.

It seems that Brer Putin with his meager military budget one twentieth the size of the US military-industrial complex budget has managed to outsmart the FBI, the CIA and the NSA. He even convinced FBI Director Comey to come out and support Trump by getting him to make an announcement about Hillary's emails a few days before the election, thereby reminding us of what a scoundrel she is. Of course anyone who mentions the fact that maybe, instead of a renewed Cold War, the US and Russia should become friends and gang up on a common enemy - terrorism - is already suspected of being a Russian dupe, one who has become converted to the Russian line by Russian propaganda. If only they weren't so good at that!

Brer Donald got himself stuck to the Tar Baby when he started talking about being friends with Putin.

"Ahem!" said Brer Rabbit loudly, wondering if the Tar Baby were deaf. "I said 'HOW ARE YOU THIS MORNING?"

The Tar Baby said nothing. Brer Fox curled up into a ball to hide his laugher. His plan was working perfectly!

"Are you deaf or just rude?" demanded Brer Rabbit, losing his temper. "I can't stand folks that are stuck up! You take off that hat and say 'Howdy-do' or I'm going to give you such a lickin'!"

The Tar Baby just sat in the middle of the road looking as cute as a button and saying nothing at all. Brer Fox rolled over and over under the bushes, fit to bust because he didn't dare laugh out loud.

"I'll learn ya!" Brer Rabbit yelled. He took a swing at the cute little Tar Baby and his paw got stuck in the tar.

"Lemme go or I'll hit you again," shouted Brer Rabbit. The Tar Baby, she said nothing.

"Fine! Be that way," said Brer Rabbit, swinging at the Tar Baby with his free paw. Now both his paws were stuck in the tar, and Brer Fox danced with glee behind the bushes.

"I'm gonna kick the stuffin' out of you," Brer Rabbit said and pounced on the Tar Baby with both feet. They sank deep into the Tar Baby. Brer Rabbit was so furious he head-butted the cute little creature until he was completely covered with tar and unable to move.

Well along came Brer Michael Flynn and Brer Trump say to him, "Hey there, Brer Flynn, can you get me unstuck from this Tar Baby?" Michael Flynn say, "I'll try, Brer Trump." So he start pullin' and haulin' and before you know it, Brer Flynn hisself was stuck to the Tar Baby too. "How come you stuck, Brer Flynn?" say Brer Trump. "I talked to a Russian," reply Brer Flynn, "and now you have to give me immunity." "I can't give you immunity, Brer Flynn. You stuck to the tar baby too!"

So all these guys had conversations with the Russian Ambassador, Sergey Kislyak. He seems grandfatherly enough, but he really is a notorious Russian spy hell bent on destroying America. You shake hands with him and some Russian dirt will rub off on you. Ooooh. Yuck.

So what is Brer Donald's "briar patch"? Brer Donald did his best to distract the American public by tweeting about his wires being tapped. This consumed the news media which was off in a different direction now searching for something more sensational than Rex Tillerson being honored by Vladimir Putin. This distraction about the tapped wires took the spotlight off Trump's Russian connection. But some Congressmen and women still wanted to investigate. That's what Congress does best: investigations. Instead of fiddling like Nero while Rome burned, Congress investigates while America falls apart.

The moral of the story: Brer Donald can't find a safe briar patch to hide in and will be mired in the Tar Baby for the duration. Some day hopefully long after Brer Donald is safely out of office and his hand is off the nuclear trigger, the dust will clear and it will come out that there was nothing nefarious about him and Brer Flynn and Brer Tillerson and all the other members of his campaign, transition team and administration talking to the Russians and Brer Kislyak can get on with the business of trying to prevent another Cold War.

The Human C02 Contribution to Planet Earth: Good or Bad?

by Frank Thomas

A Synopsis of Climate Change in Plain English

The planet is warming and human agency is causing it. The sun is not causing recent decadal climate changes as research reported in this article shows. We are in an unprecedented, human-made climate warming powered by an ongoing striking growth in population, industrialization, and fossil fuel use which started in the 19th century and continues today. Resultant heat-trapping greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and C0₂ atmospheric concentrations have risen RAPIDLY to levels unseen in almost a million years. Atmospheric C0₂ and temperatures have gone up and down within a stable range of 170-280 ppm for over 800,000 years – in contrast to an unnaturally high 405 ppm today reached over only a few decades. The last time atmospheric C0₂ was at this level, humans didn’t exist! What’s now happening is setting the climate our grandchildren and their children will inherit.

Most scientists agree the earth is warming and has warmed nearly 1 degree Celsius in the last 100 years (most of which occurred in last 65 years), temporarily reaching shocking records of 1.4°C to 1.6°C recently. The planet's historical warming and cooling shows an average rate of change of about 1°C per thousand years. So current global warming is more than ten times faster than ever before.

James Hansen notes with deep concern the global 12-month running mean average temperature is now 1.3°C above 1880 - 1920 average – comparable to the last warm Eemian interglacial period 130,000 - 115,000 years ago when sea levels rose 6-9 meters higher than today. Hansen warns there’s added warming in the pipeline now – ^e.g., ultimate outgassing of ocean-stored C0₂ – from climate’s delayed response and inability to speedily scale down on fossil fuels, contributing to the inevitability of continued global temperature rises. Oceans store heat but take many decades to fully respond to atmospheric GHG concentrations, and this will continue to affect the climate during the next millennium. (“Global Temperature in 2016,” James Hansen, Makiko Sato et al. , 18 Jan. 2017; and “Young People’s Burden: Requirement of Negative C0₂ Emissions,” by Earth System Dynamics, 4 Oct. 2016).

It is well known that there are galatial periods or Ice Ages during which the Earth gets much colder and Arctic ice covers much lower latitudes. Then there are interglacial periods when the Earth is much warmer which is the kind of period we're in now. The current period is called the Holocene. Scientists have analyzed in depth the Eemian interglacial, looking for analogies to today’s Holocene intergalacial period. Eemian temperatures rose 5°C higher in high latitudes of Northern Hemisphere versus Arctic’s 3°C rise today. Global mean average temperature was 1°C higher, similar to today. Eemian’s high temperature in the Northern Hemisphere came with lower C0₂ concentrations of 250-300 ppm but a very high summer insolation (solar radiation energy reaching earth’s surface) that melted ice sheets fast, creating the 6-9 meter sea level rise.

The scientific insight gained from the last Eemian interglacial revolves around the central question: how was the Eemian so much warmer with lower C0₂ concentration levels and yet a large sea-ice and ice-sheet meltdown that produced a much higher sea level increase (and 40 meter ocean waves) than the current Holocene interglacial has shown to date?

For the Eemian there were a number of natural forcings occurring at the same time. Earth orbital forcings, related peak seasonal insolation and global warming with rising GHGs led to the big increase in Northern Hemisphere summer temperature.

Eemian’s peak seasonal insolation and earth warming in Northern Hemisphere were further strengthened by a perihelion occurring also in summer rather than the winter. A perihelion is when earth is closest to the sun. This now occurs in the winter when earth is farthest from the sun. Other feedbacks expanding the insolation effect were a huge loss of sun reflectivity from reduced snow and ice cover and from reforestation at high northern latitudes where trees absorb more sunlight than C0₂, causing a net earth warming effect. If Eemian’s many thousands of years of strong insolation and feedbacks had taken place in the last century with the far higher atmospheric C0₂ levels of recent decades, our current Earth temperatures, ice-sheet melt and sea levels would be trending even HIGHER now than what occurred during Eemian.

Today’s observed annual rate of increase in C0₂ concentrations (2.3 ppm in 2016) and related global warming is occurring shockingly FASTER than during Eemian. Luckily, insolation from orbital forcings is expected to be much LOWER than insolation earth received in the rather warm Eemian period. (Skeptical Science: “The Last Interglacial Part Two: Why Was It So Warm?” by Steve Brown, 6 July 2011; “The Last Interglacial Part Five: A Crystal Ball?” by Steve Brown, 17 Nov. 2011)

Upsetting Earth's Energy Balance and Natural Carbon Cycle

Direct observations and actual measurements show a warming-up of the lowest part of the atmosphere, the troposphere. At the same time, levels above the troposphere from the stratosphere up are cooling because less radiation is escaping into space. This reflects a distinct human fingerprint. Sun cycles don’t explain this troposphere-warming and stratosphere-cooling because sun radiation warms the atmosphere uniformly at all levels. There’s no evidence of broad long-term changes in sun’s output over the past century. So, global temperatures are rising while solar output remains the same.There must be something else going on.

Natural variability has always existed. But the earth doesn’t warm up (or cool) because it feels like it; the warming-up happens because something forces it to. Well-documented scientific evidence confirms that natural variable climate forcings fall short in explaining current earth warming. Earth’s energy imbalance from added heat being trapped in the troposphere can only be explained by including man-made radiative forces, namely GHG increases produced largely by fossil fuel burning and deforestation in tropical zones.

FIGURE 1 : Natural vs. Human-Induced Changes in Global Temperature

Source: Skeptical Science – “Human Fingerprints on Climate Change Rule Out Natural Cycles.”

In FIGURE 1, the black curve represents observed temperatures; the blue curve is a computer simulation that accounts for natural variations like changes in the sun’s brightness and volcanic eruptions; the red curve includes all the natural variations in the blue curve, but adds C0₂ human emissions and reflective sulfate aerosols. Note that after 1970 observed temperatures aren’t consistent with natural variations. The gap is the human-made warming effect.

Over geologic time, natural cycles of global cooling and warming are considered to be governed by Milankovitch cycles – caused by earth orbital and axial variations that alter the sun’s radiation to earth, especially a ‘perihelion’ solar radiation when sun and earth are at their closest point of contact. Thus, solar insolation increases, causing larger ice sheet melt downs.

These natural cycles and ‘feedbacks’ initiate climate changes into 100,000 year cold periods known as ‘glacials’ and 10,000 to 30,000 year warm periods known as ‘interglacials.’ The natural cycle is the time between cold periods and warm periods … like the stable Holocene interglacial we’ve been in for ±15,000 years and normally expected to last another ±5,000 before next glacial occurs. BUT, a new report out dramatically increases that number!

Given the HUGE C0₂ emissions and atmospheric concentration occurring in a record geological timescale, the Holocene is NOT a normal natural cycle. The threshold for a glacial depends not only on insolation (amount of solar radiation received by earth’s surface) but also on atmospheric C0₂ content. A consensus of scientists in an exhaustive report (“Interglacials of the Last 800,000 Years,” by Past Interglacials Working Group,” 5 March, 2016) predict the Holocene will NOT revert to a glacial period for another 50,000 years – when the next strong drop in northern hemisphere insolation occurs.

This stunning news assumes current high C0₂ concentration of 405 ppm and rising is TIMELY reduced and stabilized, ideally at 300 ppm, but no more than 350 ppm. All living species could hardly adjust to 1,000 more years at current GHG concentration level, let alone 50,000 more years! We need C0₂, but not so much of it coming so lightning FAST from a geological timescale perspective and for so many thousands of years!

How lucky we are today that the sun’s radiation is much dimmer than in Eemian and, according to scientists, will remain so for a very long time. BUT, even a modest Holocene solar insolation process combined with continuation of current high C0₂ concentrations is a planet-heating-up recipe for an unfathomable climate disaster in this century.

While the sun had a negligible impact the last century, Arctic ice sheets are still melting down quickly. We are seeing a marked reduction in record time in sea ice and ice sheet volume. Greenland and Antarctic waters are showing far warmer surface temperatures. As oceans rapidly accumulate heat and melting increases also intensifying the positive feedback process, not only are large C0₂ outgassings and Arctic deep water methane releases possible, but a potential collapse of polar ice sheets and a sea level rise of several meters similar to the Eemian (NOT, as James Hansen warns, the IPCC’s conservative one meter sea rise prediction) is possible by end of this century.

Something else is happening. Beginning in the industrial age and especially since 1950, humankind has become the central driving force behind a departure from the natural cycle toward an era of human-induced global warming. Simply stated, man-made forcing of HUGE amounts of GHGs into the atmosphere at a geologically phenomenal rate has taken the lead away from earth’s natural cycle forcing and balancing process that occurs over thousands of years.

The energy change that a climate forcing, like GHGs, introduces into the climate system is measured in Watts/m2. The consequence of such a forcing is then expressed in terms of the change in the average global mean temperature. Scientists have found that a doubling of global atmospheric C0₂ from pre-industrial levels of 280 ppm to 560 ppm would cause an added energy (heat) forcing of 4 W/m2 by 2050. While a SMALL number, such a forcing translates into a HUGE global average Earth temperature increase of 3°C to 4.5°C by 2050.

TABLE 1 shows that the atmosphere had already reached an ‘extra’ heat balance trapped forcing of 2.6W/m2 in 2007. As human-made atmospheric GHGs increase, more of sun’s energy absorbed by the Earth and reflected back as infrared (heat) radiation into the atmosphere is trapped in the atmosphere – increasing earth warming.

_________________________________________________________________

TABLE 1: 2007 Energy In and Energy Out of Climate System - Averaged Over the Whole Earth (Expressed in Watts Per Square Meter, W/m2)

• All Human Energy Usage .025 W/m2

• Extra Heat Trapped in Atmosphere by GHGs 2.60 W/m2

• Energy Received From Sunlight 341 W/m2

• Energy Reflected into Space 101 W/m2

• Energy Absorbed by Earth from Sunlight 240 W/m2

Source: Video: “Climate Change: A Scientist’s Perspective,” by Ralph Cicerone, July 28, 2016) (NOTE: Energy absorbed by earth from sunlight is 10,000 times all human energy usage. This illustrates three realities: raw sun energy is Free, Infinite, Clean; of 240 W/m2 energy absorbed by earth, about 70 W/m2 is absorbed by the atmosphere and 170 W/m2 is absorbed by earth’s surface. _________________________________________________________________

To be in natural equilibrium, the net inflow of sun energy must equal the outflow. As noted, over last 800,000 years before arrival of large scale human, industrial and agricultural activity, the carbon system and C0₂ concentration have been in remarkable equilibrium. However, over last 120 years, something different has been fundamentally resetting our climate on a dangerous path.

The natural balance of the carbon cycle has been upset by accelerated burning of fossil fuels leading to a 45% increase in atmospheric C0₂ since pre-industrial era. This has drastically disturbed the natural balance of the carbon cycle. A titanic store of carbon unavailable to the carbon cycle for millions of years is being put back into the system in an awesomely short time frame that’s simply scary – bringing C0₂ concentrations out of equilibrium, creating an unnatural forcing of global temperatures, further warming the planet.

As noted, most of sun’s energy entering Earth’s atmosphere must ultimately be sent back into space in order to have a constant global average temperature. About 30% of the 340 W/m2 of solar radiation received by earth, or 100 W/m2, is reflected back into space, leaving a net energy ‘budget’ of 240 W/m2 of sunlight absorbed by earth that warms the atmosphere and surface. About 50% of this incoming energy, or 170 W/m2, is absorbed by earth’s surface (oceans and land) and the balance of 20% or 70 W/m2 is emitted as infrared radiation back into the atmosphere. Much of this infrared radiation cannot freely escape into space because of absorption in the atmosphere by C0₂ and water vapor. This process traps the infrared radiation between the ground and lower atmosphere. The net reduction in earth’s efficiency to lose heat causes an earth energy imbalance that in turn causes increased earth warming.

Anything perturbing the Energy In and Energy Out balance eventually leads to a higher or lower Earth temperature. Internal natural variability like volcanoes, El Nino and La Nina events move energy between the atmosphere and ocean causing short-term warming and cooling, not long-term climate change. Long-term climate changes come from changes in Earth’s energy balance. They require external forces like the heating effect of atmospheric GHGs, changes in sun’s heat output, albedo feedbacks or amount of sun energy reflected back into space. Ice-albedo feedback (or snow-albedo feedback) is a positive feedback climate process where a change in the area of snow-covered land, ice caps, glaciers or sea ice alters the albedo which is the proportion of light or heat that is reflected back into space. Snow and ice, for example, reflect a lot of sun’s energy into space.

Scientists find that all measures of what’s happening now – land temperatures, atmospheric temperatures, ocean heat, ice sheet melt, sea level – point to a Holocene interglacial warming-up for several thousands of years. The challenge is how to contain, survive, adjust to the next 100 years of high warming, let alone another 50,000 years of high warming induced by human activities. We are producing over 39 billion tons of C0₂ yearly, 80% of which remains in the atmosphere for a century and 20% for even longer plus highly toxic CH₄ and N₂O emissions that remain for centuries. So, even if C0₂ emissions are stopped, multi-century climate change has been created by the immense accumulated past, current and future greenhouse gas emissions.

Trends in C0₂ Emissions and Temperatures

Extensive analysis of air bubbles trapped in ancient ice sheets show that C0₂ atmospheric concentrations have remained within a 170 – 280 ppm range for the past 800,000 years. During this time, a number of ±100,000 year glacial cycles occurred with ±20,000 year warming interglacials coming in between. Often, coincidences of solar maximums and variations in earth’s orbit have first triggered temperature changes later amplified by C0₂, CH₄, N₂O emissions.

Scientists believe rising temperatures at the end of ancient glacials probably created positive feedbacks of outgassings of ocean-stored C0₂ built up over thousands of years. So too today, one might think – given the exceptionally fast warming up of oceans from huge C0₂ emissions absorbed and expected to continue for another 50,000 years – that substantial ocean C0₂ outgassings may well occur in this 21st century and onward. Sudden bursts of ocean C0₂ into the atmosphere much larger than human-made sources could be a future feedback that profoundly amplifies global greenhouse warming.

The consistently constant, stable atmospheric C0₂ concentrations of 170 – 280 ppm for glacials and interglacials over past 800,000 years compares to the extraordinarily FAST 45% increase in atmospheric C0₂ over a TINY 266 years from 280 ppm in 1750 to 405 ppm in 2016; 75% of that increase occurred even FASTER over a TINIER 56 years from 310 ppm in 1960 to 405 ppm in 2016. And these figures exclude highly toxic methane and nitrous oxide emissions. Welcome to the world of anthropogenic climate change!

Comparison of Ancient Climates to Where We Are Now

FIGURE 2: Global Temperature and Atmospheric C02 – Ancient Geologic Time

Source: Skeptical Science – “Do High Levels of C02 in the Past Contradict the Warming Effect of C02?”

In the late Ordovician, C0₂ levels peaked at 4000 ppm in a glaciation that lasted one million years with no runaway greenhouse induced warming. Does the rise and fall of C02 concentrations before temperature changes over thousands of years – like occurred in the Ordovician-Silurian period 500 million years ago as shown in FIGURE 2 – prove that C0₂ does not drive warming?

The answer is: NO. The late Ordovician C0₂ levels peaked at 4000 ppm with a glaciation that lasted one million years. BUT, sun activity was extremely low. With a much dimmer sun over a very long period, a much higher C0₂ level is necessary to stop the earth from freezing over. The Ordovician very low sun output created the natural necessity for the C0₂ ice meltdown threshold to be in the 3000 ppm range. This compares to an estimated 500 ppm C0₂ ice meltdown threshold for the far higher solar output today. When the sun is much less active for repetitive periods, the C0₂ ice-threshold is much higher. In ancient times, there were large planet ecological, geological and ocean differences. These differences also helped draw down the spectacular Ordovician 4000 ppm C0₂ level naturally over thousands of years.

The Pilocene 3 million years ago was the last time C0₂ concentration levels matched today’s level. They remained within a 365-410 ppm range for thousands of years. Arctic temperatures rose 11 to 16°C global temperatures 3 to 4°C. Sea levels were around 25 meters higher than current level.

The late Cretaceous period 100 million years ago was very warm and atmospheric C0₂ concentration was around 1000 ppm. New research shows that NO continental ice sheets were formed in this period . This has led one scientist to conclude that a doubling of pre-industrial C0₂ concentrations to over 580 ppm this century could increase earth surface temperatures 6°C, as opposed to 3.0-4.5°C conservatively predicted by the IPPC. BUT, the Cretaceous C0₂ and temperature buildups occurred over many thousands, if not millions, of years. So life, ocean chemistry, and atmosphere had many millennia to adjust to the high CO2 concentrations and temperatures of that period.

Very high C0₂ levels coming before temperature rises 100 to 500 million years ago doesn’t say much of anything about global warming today. Insufficient data makes comparisons difficult and a little pointless as the earth was essentially a different planet back then. What is more relevant is that, before the industrial revolution (1750) and up to 1900, C0₂ content in the atmosphere remained fairly steady at 280 ppm for 800,000 years. In 1960, it began to soar from 310 ppm to 405 ppm today in a mind-numbing, short geological time frame.

Never before have atmospheric C0₂ concentrations increased so much and at such a fast rate - leaving not enough time for many organisms to get adjusted or survive. Scientists have determined that a 'natural' C0₂ concentration change of 100 ppm takes 5000 to 20,000 years. This compares to the ‘split time-second’ of 56 years for our 'human-made' C0₂ concentration to increase 95 ppm.

Disturbance of Natural Balance of the Carbon Cycle

FIGURE 3: Evidence We’ve Already Exceeded Limits of Natural Variability

Source: Skeptical Science – “Human Fingerprints on Climate Change Rule Out Natural Cycles”

The natural balance of the carbon cycle has been fundamentally disturbed in record geological time. The rate at which human activities are adding C0₂ to the atmosphere is overwhelming much slower natural processes. The natural cycle adds and removes C0₂ to maintain an energy balance while humans add 'extra' C0₂ without removing enough. The translates into a sharp turn to higher earth temperatures from 2000 to 2100, as shown in FIGURE 3.

Concerning the last century, scientists have concluded that detailed patterns in temperature change CORRELATE with increased C0₂ emissions but correlate little with increased solar radiation. Changes in Earth’s orbit on sun radiation reaching Earth’s surface have been negligible. The overwhelming natural forcings by human-made increases in atmospheric C0₂ levels, especially since 1950, have been creating a greater capacity for earth warming through the 'greenhouse effect'. GHGs act as a blanket that holds heat onto the earth. Much of the sunlight radiation coming in gets trapped and doesn’t go out.

Up to a point, this is a very GOOD thing! Thanks to the ‘natural’ greenhouse effect, Earth is a comfortable place in which to live. Absent the right balance of C0₂ and water vapor gases, life would be unendurable on this planet. Without some warming to evaporate water from oceans and lakes, land wouldn’t get water. Warming produces fewer droughts and deserts and expands agricultural possibilities.

BUT, too much of a good thing can be bad. C0₂ entering the atmosphere over such an incredible short time and causing severe global warming, weather volatility and more damaging storminess is a BAD thing. As one scientist said, “That’s like piling on a bunch of blankets in the summer time.” That’s exactly what’s happened in past decades. There’s now 45% more C0₂ and 250% more methane in the atmosphere than in 1750 – built-up mostly since 1950. Result? Costly, severely destructive recurring droughts, floods, heat waves and fires have been erupting at a scale and frequency natural factors can’t explain.

We are now ±15,000 years into the Holocene interglacial that scientists are now saying likely has another 50,000 years to go. That’s even more reason why limiting life-menacing climate change over such an extensive period will require substantial, sustained reduction of (a) human-made annual C0₂ emissions to 20 billion tons by 2035, and to below 10 billion tons by 2050; (b) reduction in atmospheric C0₂ concentrations to 375 ppm by 2035 and to a maximum of 350 ppm by 2050 – the FASTER, the BETTER. This is to avoid a lock-in threshold and consequent horrendous loss of living species and devastation to sectors of civilization from insufferably enduring high global surface temperature increases of 3°C to 5°C.

Climate Impact From Near Exponential Population Growth

During past 800,000 years, there was little increase in C0₂, CH₄ and N₂O emissions. Since 1950, these gases have risen dramatically – forced by vast industrialization processes (^e.g. China) in concert with a near exponential 5 billion population growth since 1950 to 7.5 billion today … rising to 9.5 billion in 2050. Since Year 1 AD, it took 1,800 years of human history to reach a world population of 1 billion by 1800; but a SHORT 150 years to reach 2.4 billion in 1950; a SHORTER 66 years to reach 7.5 billion today; and a MERE 36 years to reach 9.5 billion in 2050.

These titanic increases, especially after 1950, have impelled the burning of ever larger amounts of fossil fuels, turning long-buried carbon into human-made, heat-trapping greenhouse gases in an earth shattering record time. This dual-dynamic gets to the core of what’s tearing earth's climate away from a natural balance of energy entering and leaving earth. Our human magnification of climate warming and weather crises presents a survival menace to 21st century living species – on a scale, one could say, potentially matching the rare massive asteroid striking Earth or the not so rare bursting of a series of giant volcanoes that occurred in past planet extinctions.

Lag Effect Between C0₂ Emissions and Temperatures

Geological history shows that C0₂ increases LAG temperature increases almost 2/3 of the time in past ice ages and interglacial warmings. BUT, contrary to what climate skeptics claim, this does NOT mean there's NO correlation between C0₂ concentrations and rising earth temperatures. This does NOT mean that C0₂ could NOT have caused (or cannot be causing) warming in between an interglacial warming and a cooling period.

This is because today we know we are adding C0₂ into the atmosphere way beyond previous peak levels of 280 ppm over past 800,000 years … and at an incredible speed in terms of geological time frames. We know what the GHG radiative forcing effects are from laboratory spectroscopy. We know the changes to earth’s energy balance. We know GHGs are the dominant heat-trapping contributors to the Holocene interglacial warming cycle we are in at a time of weak orbital forcing.

Yes, C0₂ does not always start the warming after an ice age or a glacial, but it does act as an amplifier of a warming triggered by orbital cycles. This was confirmed in a 2012 paper by Shakun et al, "Clarify The C0₂-Temperature Lag,” Skeptical Science; and in a 1990 paper by Claude Lorius and co-authored by James Hansen “The Ice-Core Record - Climate Sensitivity and Future Greenhouse Warming” That is why scientists say GHGs can be seen as a biogeochemical feedback triggered first by natural forcings – ^e.g. slow but recurring earth orbital variations around the sun that alter distribution of solar energy to earth over thousands of years. In this regard, GHGs are now amplifying a warming that started at an early phase of our 20,000 year Holocene interglacial. GHGs have become the leading ‘direct forcing’ of warming in Holocene – a 20,000 year interglacial normally expected to last another 5,000 years or so. BUT, as noted earlier, scientists now say it’s a warm, pleasant interglacial that will very likely last another 50,000 years if global surface temperatures don’t soar and get fixed 3°C - 5°C higher this century.

The IPCC conservatively projects a future global warming increase of 3°C ± 1.5°C if atmospheric C0₂ doubles from its historical 1750 preindustrial level of 280 ppm to 560 ppm by 2050. Recent yearly atmospheric C0₂ rates of increase have risen to 2.3 ppm. If that rate remains constant next 36 years, there will indeed be a doubling of C0₂ concentration to 560 ppm in 2050. The planet will by then be facing a massive Arctic and Antarctic sea ice meltdown exceeding the Eemian. (San Diego Free Press – Part 2: “Conversion to Renewable Energy Is Going Too Slowly to Avoid Catastrophe,” December 9, 2014)

Earth GHG Warming and Amplifying Feedbacks

The Eemian warm climate led to a significant melting of Greenland and Antarctic sea and ice sheets, thereby significantly lowering the reflectivity of sunlight into space. Eemian’s very high Arctic temperatures cannot be explained entirely by increased summer insolation in Northern Hemisphere. Multiple feedbacks played a major role in amplifying already very high Eemian insolation warming. And they are also playing a major role in the Arctic now. For example, loss of ice at the poles makes the ocean surfaces less reflecting and a greater absorber of sun energy which in turn increases the rate of ice melt, which in turn creates more earth warming. Making matters worse is the fact that Arctic ice is thinner since it’s being formed mainly in a shorter winter rather than a longer season. Thinner ice means Arctic ice is now melting more quickly.

The Eemian climate change was driven mainly by orbital cycles that spurred increased solar insolation in combination with lower GHGs than today. The Holocene climate change has been and is being driven primarily by a RAPID expansion to much higher C0₂ concentrations combined, thank God, with a much weaker insolation warming scientists expect will endure for a long time.

Our earth today, like Eemian period, is being struck by a growing intensity and frequency of costly heavier rains and floods from added air moisture. This turbulent weather can change to long heat waves and costly droughts as California has had. Key feedbacks that amplify original climate temperatures, weather changes and ocean warming and get stronger as they continue are:

• Ice-albedo feedback: when loss of sea ice and permafrost reduce surface reflectivity of sunlight because it sees more dark leading to more solar absorption, more warming, more melting.

• Water vapor feedback: when rising temperatures increase water vapor into the atmosphere expanding the heat trapping greenhouse gas Earth warming effect; the much high water vapor produced from the open ocean than from sea ice ocean adds to the earth warming.

• Warm tropical waters feedback: when warm tropical waters flow north, significantly adding to melting of Arctic sea ice and stirring up ever more turbulent storms and weather changes.

These feedbacks explain in part why the Arctic has had the greatest amount of warming and ice melt in recent decades – enhanced by warmer Antarctic water surfaces circulating north and amplifying substantial melting of Arctic ice.

Summary

In ancient times atmospheric gases, ocean chemistry and life had millions of years to adjust to big variations in temperature and atmospheric C0₂ levels that took thousands of years to build up – versus today’s extremely high C0₂ level built up in a phenomenally short 120 year time frame. The huge difference now, and an essential theme of this paper, is that we are emitting prodigious quantities of C0₂ at a rate, some scientists say, FASTER than even the most destructive climate changes in our planet’s geological past. And we have another 5,000, more likely 50,000,  years to go to enjoy the Holocene, if we don’t humanly overheat it, destroying possibilities for living species to adjust.

The human-influenced rapidly steep rise in C0₂ concentrations has caused an Earth energy imbalance that is forcing higher Earth temperatures. We are approaching Eemian’s global mean temperature rise and are moving closer to its very high temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere, leading to a vast sea ice loss and 6-9 meter sea level increase over today’s level.

That’s the Holocene end-reality being imposed on planet Earth now by human warming activities from an immense growing population, industrial and agricultural base. We are overstocking the atmosphere with extra radiative warming energy by rapidly expanding the atmospheric greenhouse gas buildup from massive fossil fuel usage – converting humankind’s next 100-year planet stay into an environmental struggle to survive. And so far, C0₂ capture & storage technology (or technology to remove C0₂ from the atmosphere & store it) is a long way off from ever being of any help in time. The policy focus must be on sharply reducing fossil fuel usage as expeditiously as possible.

The science is crystal clear. Over the next 34 years, annual C0₂ emissions must be reduced from a huge 39 billion tons to below 10 billion tons by 2050; current atmospheric C0₂ of 405 ppm must fall back to the 300-350 ppm range by 2050. Failure here will lock in an earth energy imbalance, rising earth temperatures, ocean warming, ice sheet and permafrost melting, and a high sea level rise for many millennia. How soon could such a point of no return be reached? Nobody knows for certain.

Lacking 100% scientific certainty, it’s time to behave cautiously and pro-actively on something ALL humans have a vested interest in. We must come together on strong policy measures and incentives to stabilize global GHG concentrations by drawing fossil fuels, especially coal, down to no more than 30% of total energy usage in 2050. The GAP between where we are heading now and where we must go is GIGANTIC. (See an energy demand and sustainable energy supply projection: San Diego Free Press – Part 4: “Conversion to Renewable Energy Is Going Too Slowly to Avoid a Catastrophe”).

America is world’s highest per capita C0₂ emitter, producing 16% of global C0₂ emissions vs. EU’s 9.5%. China’s with 1.3 billion people is now producing 28% of global C0₂ emissions, getting a stunning 68% of its energy from dirty coal. Not far behind is India’s 1.3 billion people and huge 58% dependency on coal. In 2015, China burned 66 quadrillion Btu of coal, the rest of the world 56 quadrillion. In 2035, China is forecast to burn 108 quadrillion Btu of coal, the rest of the world 61 quadrillion. (source: U.S. Energy Information Administration). These are startling reasons – ignoring the fact fossil fuels will be exhausted and economically impractical by 2075 – why nations like the U.S., China and India must transition swiftly to 70% renewable energy and energy efficiency by 2050.

The global human-induced climate change situation we are in is serious. It’s planetary environmental suicide to allow atmospheric C0₂ concentrations to double to 560 ppm by 2050 – in a warm Holocene that normally will last another 5,000 years or so … a number that has shot up ten-fold to 50,000 years based on a recent scientific study.

If global C0₂ concentrations are timely reduced and stabilized to low 300 ppm levels by 2050, humankind and Earth ecosystems will have remarkably better chances to mitigate, delay, even avoid the worst effects of global warming – enabling future generations to continue to enjoy a livable Holocene interglacial this century and far beyond.

Frank Thomas
The Netherlands
March 22, 2017

Frank's Bio:

I’m a Maine native and graduate of Bowdoin and Dartmouth colleges. For many years, I was an independent management consultant and interim-manager for international Dutch firms manufacturing dredgers, engaged in offshore oil/gas exploration and contracting. Later I worked as a language/writing/presentation trainer for Dutch firms like ING, DSM, Siemens, Royal Dutch Shell, and Dutch Ministries of Foreign and Economic Affairs and Justice in the Hague, and also as lecturer at the Hague University and NTI University in Leiden.

Recent years, my time has been devoted to research and writings on grave global environmental, economic, and social problems. A primary focus has been exposing the scientific facts of climate change. The evidence is clear we are in a long-term trend towards increasing human-caused earth warming and extreme global weather events of severe, costly floods, droughts, heat waves that go beyond the bounds of natural cyclical variability. We are in an unstable climate system where drastic changes in human-made greenhouse gases and mild solar radiation are forcing Earth’s climate away from a natural balance of energy entering and leaving Earth. The SPEED of this change is unheard of! Ever more energy is entering entire global system. Unbridled rising concentrations of heat-trapping greenhouse gases accumulating in the atmosphere are certain to intensify future global warming and turbulent weather volatility. Average earth temperatures are likely to rise 2 degrees Celsius by 2036 and 3.5-5 degrees Celsius by 2050 – UNLESS C0₂ atmospheric concentrations are swiftly reduced to 300 ppm-350 ppm levels to reverse Earth’s dangerous energy imbalance. The battle is to avoid an irreversible C0₂ concentration well above current 405 ppm level, greatly risking the lives of our children’s children and their children.

References

Dr. Ralph J. Ciceroni: Former President, National Academy of Sciences:

1. “Climate Change” – Evidence and Causes,” by R. J. Ciceroni, National Academy of Sciences, The Royal Society

2. You Tube–PEI: “Climate Change: A Scientist’s Perspective,” Dr. Ralph J. Ciceroni, 28 July 2016

3. “Science, Climate Change, and Conversations with Ralph Ciceroni – Conversations with History,” 18 March 2016, by UC Climate Solutions

James Hansen:

4. “Young People’s Burden: Requirement of Negative CO2 Emissions,” James Hansen et al., by Earth System Dynamics, 4 Oct. 2016 (http://csas.ei.columbia.edu/2016/10/04/young-peoples-burden/)

5. “Global Temperature in 2016,” James Hansen, Makiko Sato et al., 18 Jan. 2017 (http://csas.ei.columbia.edu/2017/01/18/global-temperature-in-2016)

6. “Ice Melt, Sea Rise and Superstorms: Evidence from Paleoclimate Data, Climate Modeling and Modern Observations That 2C Global Warming Could be Dangerous,” by James Hansen, Makiko Sato et al., by Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. 22 March 2016 (www.atmos-chem-phys.net/16/3761/2016/acp-16-3761-2016-pdf)

7. “Abbreviation of Ice Melt Paper,” by Web Team, 22 March 2016 (http://csas.ei.columbia.edu/2016/03/22/abbreviation-of-ice-melt-paper/)

Shakun et al:

8. “Global Warming Preceded by Increasing Carbon Dioxide Concentrations During the Last Glaciation,” by Jeremy D. Shakun, Peter U. Clark, Feng He et al., 5 April 2012, Macmillan Publishers Limited - Vol. 484 - Nature

9. “Shakun et al. Clarify the CO2 Temperature Lag,” 10 April 2012 (https://skepticalscience.com/shakun-co2-temperature.lag.html)

Skeptical Science:

10. “Human Fingerprints on Climate Change Rule Out Natural Cycles as Primary Causal Factors,” Skeptical Science, updated July 2015 (https://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-natural-cycle.htm)

11. “Do High Levels of CO2 in the Past Contradict the Warming Effect of CO2,” Skeptical Science, updated July 2015 (http://skepticalscience.com/co2-higher-in-past-htm)

12. “What Does Climate Change Tell Us About Global Warming?”, Skeptical Science, updated July 2015 (http://skepticalscience.com/climate-change-little-ice-age-medieval-warm-period.htm)

13. “The Last Interglacial-Part2: “Why Was It So Warm?”, by Steve Brown, Skeptical Science, 6 July 2011 (https://skepticalscience.com/LIG2-1906.html) ; “The Last Interglacial-Part 5: A Crystal Ball?”, by Steve Brown, Skeptical Science, 17 Nov.2011 (https://skepticalscience.com/LIG5-1110.html)

Other References:

14. “Interglacials of the Last 800,000 Years, by Past Interglacials Working Group,” 5 March 2016 (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2015RG000482/full); “Characterizing Interglacial Periods Over The Past 800,000 Years,” Cody Sullivan, 2 March 2016 (https://eos.org/research-spotlights/characterizing-interglacial-periods-over-the-past-800,000-years)

15.“Earth Will Cross the Climate Danger Threshold by 2036,” Michael E. Mann, 11 April 2014 (http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/earth-will-cross-the-danger-threshold-by-2036)

16.“The Human Contribution,” Dr. Stephen H. Schneider, Prof. of Biological Sciences, Stanford University (http://www.scienceclarified.com/scitech/Global-Warming/The-Human-Contribution.htm)

17.“Why Does CO2 Get Most Attention When There Are So Many Other Heat-Trapping Gases?”, Union of Concerned Scientists (http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/science_and_impacts/scienceCO2-and-global-warming-faq.html#.WJRsx9ThA0M)

18.“How Do CO2 Levels Relate To Ice Ages and Sea Level,” Rob Monroe, 20 June 2014 (https://scripps.ucsd.edu/programs/keelingcurve/2014/06/20/how-do-co2-levels-relate-to-ice-ages-and-sea-level/)

19. “The Real Truth About Greenhouse Gases and Climate Change,” by Dr. George MacCracken, 21 Sept. 2011, Climate Science Watch. MacCracken presents an illuminating rebuttal of well-known ‘skeptic Princeton physicist Dr. Willian Happer’s views expressed in his paper, “The Truth About Greenhouse Gases: The Dubious Science of Climate Crusaders ,” (http://www.climatesciencewatch.org/2011/09/21/maccracken-v-happer-the-real-truth-about-greenhouse-gases-and-climate-change/

20. “Study: The Late Cretaceous Period Was Likely Ice-Free,” by University of Missouri-Columbia. (https://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/09/26/study-the-late-cretaceous-period-was-likely-ice-free/)

US Infrastructure Gets D+ Grade: Trump to the Rescue?

by John Lawrence

Trump Promises a Trillion Dollar Investment in Infrastructure

It will be an investment by private equity and hedge funds which grants them huge tax breaks. Those will have to be made up for by the middle class American taxpayer. In addition freeways will be replaced by toll roads so that not only will Americans pay more taxes while Wall Street benefits, they will pay tolls as well. So while $1 trillion may or may not be invested (over 10 years), most of the investment will be made by corporations that will then have the right to impose tolls on the American public. There will be tolls for everything from roads and bridges to water and electrical. Americans will probably even pay tolls for toilet flushes eventually. Got to pay for those rebuilt sewage systems somehow! Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) will boil down to private ownership of US infrastructure.

Meanwhile, private investment in infrastructure in poorer areas (think Flint, Michigan) will not take place at all because it's not profitable. Infrastructure investment in rural areas will also languish for the same reasons. Workers who build the new infrastructure will work for lower wages since they won't benefit from the same wage levels as Federal workers. Profits will come from reduced wages and benefits for construction workers and the workers who operate and maintain the assets after construction is finished. If the Federal government funded the projects, Davis-Bacon or prevailing wage requirements would be in effect, but the Trump-Ryan-McConnell legislative package could include a repeal of that 1931 law. The permanent workers could become private-sector workers with lower wages and reduced health and pension benefits.

The American Society of Civil Engineers gave the US a D+ rating recently in its infrastructure report which comes out every four years. They say poor infrastructure is costing the economy $3.9 trillion in GDP. They grade infrastructure in 16 different categories. The only category that passes muster is the freight rail system. Everything else - roads, bridges, ports, airports, drinking water, waste water, energy, dams, levees etc - is sub-par. Infrastructure-wise, the US is a third rate nation.

Four in ten of the country's 614,387 bridges are more than 50 years old and near the end of their designed life span. Nearly 59,000 are structurally deficient. There are 240,000 water main breaks each year which waste 2 trillion gallons of water. Traffic backups cost $160 billion in wasted time and fuel in 2014 and 20% of highway pavements are in poor condition.

Trump's plan to privatize infrastructure would also, Republicans might claim, help the environment. As tolls on highways and bridges rise, more people won't be able to afford them and so there will be fewer cars on the road - fewer poor people's cars, that is. The poor and carless will be forced onto public transportation to get where they're going. Or they may take Uber or Lyft which are cheaper than taxis and provide an alternative which many people are using today. Only the rich will be able to afford private automobiles. That's one way to forestall climate change. However, public transportation, having been sold off to private investors might become exorbitantly expensive as well.

The Federal gas tax hasn't been raised since 1993. 19 states have increased the gas tax though to pay for infrastructure. GA governor Nathan Deal wanted to do something about gridlock in Atlanta. In 2015 the gas tax was raised 6 cents a gal. This gave rise to a $10 billion transportation bill over 10 years. Some governors are doing it right. A gas tax may be the best way not to sell off public assets. Now Governor Jerry Brown is proposing raising the gas tax in California.

So how will we fund the necessary improvements in infrastructure? It comes down to a gas tax or a toll road. It's as simple as that.

Are Toll Roads a Bad Idea?

From StreetsblogUSA:

From the beginning, there were plenty of reasons to suspect that Texas 130 — a private toll road between San Antonio and Austin — was a bad idea.

For one thing, the state of Texas looked into extending the highway in 2006 and concluded it wouldn’t generate nearly enough toll revenue to pay for construction.

Nevertheless, when two private firms, Cintra and Zachry Corp., decided to take the project on in 2008, the state of Texas and federal officials were happy to help. Cintra and Zachry put together a deal to build the $1.35 billion freeway. They lined up $430 million in federally-backed TIFIA (Transportation Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act) loans, and promised to share toll revenues with the state of Texas and pay $25 million upfront.

After shoddy construction the companies involved went bankrupt. Texas 130 is the third private toll road that received TIFIA funding to have declared bankruptcy or been restructured. It remains to be seen how much of the $430 million in TIFIA loans can be recovered.

In another case, Virginia received a $150 million TIFIA loan for the “Pocahontas Parkway”. The full balance of the federal loan was transferred to the new owner, DBi Services, in May 2014, after original owner Transurban surrendered the road in a “defacto bankruptcy” in 2013.

In San Diego, the South Bay Expressway borrowed $172 million backed by TIFIA. The balance of that loan was written down in bankruptcy to $93 million. In return, the federal government was given a 32 ownership stake.

Cities and states are strapped for cash. They are selling off city assets to make ends meet. In southern Virginia a tunnel was privatized. The tolls started low but have risen to $11. The state of Virginia now subsidizes some low income drivers. A toll road in Denver didn't used to cost taxpayers a dime but now costs drivers as much as $18 one way. Americans don't want an increased gas tax, but the alternative is to pay tolls through the nose to private corporations.

Chicago's Privatized Parking Meter Fiasco

Privatization has its bleak underside. Consider Chicago which privatized its parking meters back in 2008. The cost of parking has more than doubled since then and the lease is for 75 years. Former Mayor Richard M. Daley quietly negotiated the meter selloff behind closed doors for $1.15 billion. It was either that, he said, or lay off hundreds of employees. The City Council rubber stamped the Mayor's deal. And then there are the hidden clauses. For instance, if the city blocks off the streets for a street fair or a parade the contract calls for the City to make up what the private company lost in parking revenues.

Chicago Parking Meters' (CPM) income stream last year included $6.5 million in direct payments from the City as penalties for taking meters out of commission. That means taxpayers still have to compensate CPM every time the city needs to shut down a meter for street repairs, festivals, summits, traffic flow, or any other reason. Better hope President Trump doesn't make any appearances there. That will shut down a lot of streets and cost the citizens of Chicago a lot of money.

CPM is a consortium led by Wall Street behemoth Morgan Stanley. Since the deal went through, rates have skyrocketed (downtown areas more than doubled in cost to $6.50 an hour by 2013) and the company has netted $778.6 million in revenue. By 2020, the company will have made back its initial $1.15 billion investment and will continue to profit for 60 years. They have also added new parking meters in outlying areas subject to the same exorbitant rates. The deal also includes revenue from underground parking garages. Morgan Stanley soon offloaded ownership of Chicago's parking meters to Alliance Capital Partners and the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority. Chicago’s parking-meter system took in $121.7 million last year, while four underground city-owned garages reaped another $34.7 million — with not a penny of that money going to the cash-strapped city government.

The public is outraged. Not only do they pay through the nose to a foreign corporation for parking, but their taxes go up to make up the shortfall to the City government caused by lost parking meter and garage revenue. Within two months of selling its parking meters to a coalition of U.S. and Western investors led by Morgan Stanley, Chicago's parking meters came under new, foreign ownership.

Mat Taibbi reported:

[The investment] process involved [Morgan Stanley]'s Infrastructure group going on a road tour to ask people with lots of cash to pony up. It was these guys from Morgan's Infrastructure desk who took their presentation to the Middle East and pitched Chicago's parking meters to a room full of bankers and analysts in Abu Dhabi, the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, who ultimately agreed to purchase a large stake.

Trump said he wants to finance it with both public and private capital creating millions of new jobs. Billions in tax credits will go to private investors willing to finance public infrastructure projects. The project has to generate revenue for the private investors regardless of what the public has to pay in tolls.

Trump's Infrastructure Plan a Huge Giveaway to Wall Street

Trump's plan to privatize infrastructure development would cede control over public assets to private interests who would have to borrow the money from Wall Street. They would then recoup that money with tax credits. So basically Trump's infrastructure plan is a huge giveaway to Wall Street. Wall Street can borrow money from the Fed at zero interest. Then it would lend it out to private developers at say 5%. Essentially government would be lowering its tax revenues by a huge amount because it doesn't control the Fed which is under private bank ownership. So the US does not own its own central bank. If it did, it could borrow money from the Fed at zero interest instead of having to have the money funneled through Wall Street, which controls the Fed. What it comes down to is that the American public has to pay taxes to support Wall Street.

Paul Krugman says:

First, why involve private investors at all? It’s not as if the federal government is having any trouble raising money — in fact, a large part of the justification for infrastructure investment is precisely that the government can borrow so cheaply. Why do we need private equity at all?

One answer might be that this way you avoid incurring additional public debt. But that’s just accounting confusion. Imagine that you’re building a toll road. If the government builds it, it ends up paying interest but gets the future revenue from the tolls. If it turns the project over to private investors, it avoids the interest cost — but also loses the future toll revenue. The government’s future cash flow is no better than it would have been if it borrowed directly, and worse if it strikes a bad deal, say because the investors have political connections.

But Paul doesn't get it. There is no need for the government to pay interest at all as Paul claims if it owned its central bank instead of it being owned by Wall Street. Governments built toll free highways for years. They're called freeways. If government didn't have to pay interest, it could do so again. Trump's plan would not only make automobile travel a thing of the past for poor people, it would privatize public assets and turn over control to private interests whose sole consideration is the profit motive. That's why it's necessary to create public banks at the Federal, state and municipality level so the nation does not proceed down the road of turning the American public into debtors beholden to Wall Street. They are already in enough debt to Wall Street from student loans, credit cards, car loans and mortgages.

So everything the private equity or hedge fund investors would invest in would have a toll associated with it. Roads and bridges, of course, but also you would be paying higher rates for the water coming into your home if private equity fixed your water mains. You would pay higher rates for your electricity if private hedge funds improved the electrical grid. You could even pay higher rates for sewage disposal. Perhaps a modern toilet would have a meter that exacted a toll every time you flushed.

None of this would apply to rural areas where there is not enough traffic to extract tolls from roads and bridges. Water and sewage disposal are private anyway with wells and septic systems. So rural areas would be left to languish under the Trump infrastructure plan. Instead there would be a lot of Trump tunnels and Trump toll roads, not to mention Trump airports, in urban and suburban parts of the country. You thought he was egotistical when he put his name on all his privately owned properties. You ain't seen nothing yet!

Chicago learned the hard way in the midst of the recession, leasing its parking meters to Wall Street for $1 billion under value. Texas did too when the private investors in a toll road between Austin and San Antonio went bankrupt, leaving taxpayers to clean up the mess.

From The American Prospect:

The need for capital is real and in some cases urgent. It is possible that private capital could meet the need although at lower than their usual rates of return and without shifting operational control for multiple decades. We call this option “P3 without privatization” since the public maintains full control (not just ownership) of the asset.

Unfortunately, investors and infrastructure companies are pushing for the full privatization that relies on private finance, operations, and maintenance to be able to capture decades of stable revenues that come with long-term operation and maintenance of the asset. The promise they offer to policymakers is alluring, at worst false and at best not entirely true—lower costs, faster construction, and new ideas and innovations.

So get prepared to see red light cameras at every intersection with the fines going to a foreign (perhaps) profit making corporation, not to city government. Revenues will skyrocket as the corporation strictly enforces every traffic violation perhaps with its own private police force which will not deal with criminal issues but will deal with any finable infractions. This will increase profits immensely while cities will be cash strapped to deal with hard core criminality. Go a mile over the speed limit and your car will be recorded as such with GPS technology and you will be sent a bill payable to the XXX Corporation.

Privatization of Water System Led to Doubling of Prices

It's already been tried in South America - at least twice! The World Bank foisted water privatization on the people of Bolivia. Poor people ended up with no access to water at all. In 2002 the citizens of El Alto took to the streets to demand that their water system, privatized in 1997, be returned to public hands. Three days later Bolivia's president issued a decree canceling the water concession, led by the French water giant, Suez, and an arm of the World Bank itself. The El Alto water revolt followed, by five years exactly, the now famous revolt against water privatization in Cochabamba, in which a company controlled by the Bechtel Corporation was ousted from the country.

The Nation reported:

Bolivia's experience with bank-forced water privatization is a striking example of the yawning gap between World Bank theory and how things actually work in the real world for the poor families who have to live with the results.

In Cochabamba five years ago, the water contract with Bechtel and the Abengoa Corporation of Spain paved the way for rate increases of double and more for poor water users.Those steep and sudden price hikes, needed in part to finance the 16 percent annual profit demanded by the companies, led to citywide protests and eventually to Bechtel's and Abengoa's ouster.

So now Trump wants to do to Americans what the World Bank, which is controlled by the US and represents US economic orthodoxy, did to Bolivians! The results will likely turn out the same way they did in Bolivia - a revolt against rising prices and shoddy delivery systems. Again only the rich will get a good supply of fresh water. The poor will get the dregs delivered in pipes 100 years old. You think it can't happen here? You didn't think Trump would win either, I bet.

Why Not Start a Public Bank to Pay for Infrastructure

A public bank devoted to infrastructure would solve the problem that governments have of having to borrow money and give Wall Street its cut of everything. The creation of a National Infrastructure Reinvestment Bank was first proposed by Senator Christopher J. Dodd and Senator Chuck Hagel in 2007. Public banks have an excellent track record for helping cities and states finance infrastructure.

This is from the Public Banking Institute:

In the case of nearly every state and town government, it is standard practice to send millions upon millions of dollars a year to banks and investors to pay the interest on bonds that have been issued for state infrastructure. If you add up the money the towns collectively send to banks and investors for the same purposes, it is a lot of money. In the case of California, its long awaited new Bay Bridge span was recently completed at a cost of $6.4 billion - over 400% over its initial projection.  What most Californians don't realize is that the total cost of the bridge will eclipse $13 billion when interest payments are considered over their life.  50% savings is not an aberration - it is pretty much a standard calculation for what municipalities can save by issuing their own loans for critical infrastructure from their own bank.

Meanwhile it is also standard practice to cut programs that benefit low income citizens and students to close “budget gaps” that appear on a regular basis.  There are also many unmet needs for roads, bridges, public transit, energy, housing, education, water, and telecommunications. If the interest payments on infrastructure, housing, economic development, and student loans were going to the public sector instead, we would have lower taxes and more funds available for needed improvements.

Amen to that, brother. There is no reason why governments at any level should have to pay Wall Street an amount equal to the cost of the infrastructure simply to get financing. Start a publicly owned bank instead like the state of North Dakota did.