Romney scolds protester for asking about the 99 percent

By David Edwards/Raw Story

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney took a page out of the Chris Christie playbookon Thursday and berated an Occupy Wall Street activist for asking him how he would support less-wealthy Americans.

Romney was signing autographs outside his campaign headquarters in Charleston, South Carolina when a man asked, “What will you do to support the 99 percent, seeing as how you are part of the 1 percent?”

Romney quickly turned and pointed his finger towards the man’s face.

“Let me tell you something,” the candidate said angrily. “America is a great nation because we’re a united nation. And those who try to divide the nation, as you are trying to do here and as our president is doing, are hurting this country seriously.”

MSNBC host Martin Bashir suggested that the exchange could be a sign of things to come for the former Massachusetts governor.

“Is it possible that a candidate worth close to a quarter of a billion dollars, who refuses to release his tax returns and who reportedly has millions stashed away in the Cayman Islands, is having trouble connecting with the common man?” Bashir wondered.

Watch this video from MSNBC’s Martin Bashir, broadcast Jan. 19, 2012.

Sen. Thune Says There Is ‘No’ Merit To Idea That Multimillionaire Romney Is Of The 1 Percent

By Scott Keyes/Think Progress

Protesters interrupted a Mitt Romney campaign stop outside Des Moines, Iowa last night, chanting that the former Massachusetts governor is “of the corporate one percent” and admonishing him to “stop the war on the poor.” The protestors were quickly shouted down by Romney supporters.

ThinkProgress spoke with Sen. John Thune (R-SD), a prominent Romney endorser, after the event to get his take on the dust-up. Thune disagreed with the protesters, saying there is “no” merit to the idea that Romney, whose net worth is estimated at $250 million, is part of the corporate 1 percent.

KEYES: Do you think there is any merit, they’re charging that he’s of the corporate 1 percent?

THUNE: No. I think that this is somebody, if I’m somebody in this country who is worried about my job or is looking for a job, I want somebody out there who knows how to create jobs. [...] Obviously tonight these are people who are going to protest, that’s fine. That’s a democracy, we welcome that. I thought he handled it well.

KEYES: The charges are off-base though?

THUNE: They are. I think it’s all what you’d expect from a campaign like this. The other side’s got their people out there. I’m very happy with where his campaign is, with how he’s addressing the issues, and what I think he can do to get people back to work.

Listen to it:

The cut-off to be in the top 1 percent of the American income spectrum, according to the New York Times, is an income of $506,553 per year. If Romney were to put his entire $250 million fortune in a typical Nationwide Bank savings account, for instance, at a 0.95 percent rate, the interest alone would put him in the top 0.1 percentile with $2,375,000 per year. Meanwhile, his retirement package from Bain Capital is likely taxed at a far lower rate than what average Americans pay on their salaries, but Romney has thus far stonewalled on releasing his tax returns.

Romney’s wealth came in large part from Bain, a private equity firm he founded in the 1980s. Bain made enormous amounts of money by, as the Los Angeles Times noted, “firing workers, seeking government subsidies, and flipping companies quickly for large profits.”

Though his 1 percent credentials are beyond reproach, it is also worth noting that Romney has built his campaign relying on the support of Wall Street bankers and billionaires. In fact, 10 percent of all the billionaires in America have donated to Romney, and the candidate himself has called for allowing them to give unlimited amounts of money to political campaigns, including his own. Romney’s economic agenda, in turn, is tailor-made for the wealthiest 1 percent.

Still, despite his enormous personal wealth, billionaire-backing, and one-percent economic agenda, Romney has tried to reach out to average people by pointing out that, like many Americans, he’s “also unemployed.“

Robert Greenwald slams Fox News over ‘Occupy Wall Street’

By Eric W. Dolan/Raw Story

Filmmaker Robert Greenwald appeared Thursday night on MSNBC’s The Ed Show to discuss how the Fox News Channel has been covering the ongoing “Occupy Wall Street” protests.

Pundits on Fox News have routine blasted the protests, labeling them anti-capitalist and anti-American.

“It is pretty clear what is going on,” Greenwald said. “The right attacks in an organized fashion — if not a consistent fashion — when there is a real threat of some kind. I can tell you personality that I know I’ve done well when my Twitter account or my Facebook is lit up with all kinds of attacks from the right-wing. It means you are striking a cord.”

“And obviously the Occupy folks and 99 percenters have made a profound difference in the way the entire country is looking at economic inequities. The entire country is now having a discussion and debate about fairness, about the way capitalism works and about what’s going wrong with the system, which has so many people suffering incredibly.”

Greenwald explained the Occupy Wall Street movement was exactly the type of thing Fox News wanted to stop.

“Fox is the 1 percent,” he said.

Greenwald’s 2004 documentary OutFoxed highlighted the ways in which Fox News pandered to right-wing audiences.

Watch video, courtesy of MSNBC, below:

Finley Off the Mark on

From The Michigan Democratic Party:

I am proud to be a part of Wayne State University Law School’s Damon J. Keith Center for Civil Rights.  It is a good example of how successful people in the private sector and dedicated public servants in government can work together to achieve remarkable things.

As the Center’s associate director and a former clerk to Judge Keith, I’ve had the opportunity to see this Center and the building grow from an idea in the mind of Judge Keith’s network of supporters, mentees and former law clerks to one of the cornerstones of Wayne Law’s programming.

In the nearly 10 years that it took to open the Center, there were many individuals who oversaw and guided its development.  And as Detroit News editorial page editor Nolan Finley correctly pointed out in a recent column, private investors such as A. Alfred Taubman, along with Edsel and Cynthia Ford, provided the vast majority of the funding.  Without their devotion in shepherding this project through to its completion, there would be no Damon J. Keith Center for Civil Rights today.

But Finley is off base when he claims that some of the Center’s most sincere and dedicated supporters are part of the “1 percent being so harshly targeted by the Occupy Wall Street crowd.”

I disagree.

The “99 percenters” are not targeting philanthropy, which is a critical part of any thriving community. They are instead highlighting the very real, undue influence wielded by a small minority of individuals over those who enact and enforce our laws.

The “Occupiers” are challenging a system where most political decisions often favor that small 1 percent of individuals that wield undue influence.   Those decisions often come at the expense of the larger “99%” group of individuals.

The “protestors” are critiquing institutions that favor a select few over the many – and by “many,” I mean the people who paint America’s buildings, who build its houses, who drive its trucks, clean its offices, pick its fruit, patrol its streets, staff its offices, carry its bedpans, service its computers and, in so many other ways, do the nation’s work every day.

The idea is, simply, that government should be responsive and accountable to all people, instead of a select few. That ideal is the bedrock of our democracy.

But in a country where corporations can contribute millions, anonymously, to influence elections – and in a state where a wealthy financier can seemingly singlehandedly stymie the building of an international public bridge – we are not meeting that ideal.

Finley’s column implies that government can’t be expected to be competent, let alone accountable to all. He suggests “had the government built the center, you can bet the price tag would have been double or triple” the cost.

Actually, the “government” did build the Center.  Wayne State University is a public university.  And it was public employees – like President Allan Gilmour, Wayne Law Dean Bob Ackerman, and Wayne Law Professor Peter Hammer – overseen by a publicly elected Board of Governors, who spearheaded and organized the fundraising effort to ensure the building’s timely completion.

Finely is correct on one point, however.  The Keith Center will work to develop creative solutions that further Judge Keith’s dedication to a basic promise of our Constitution: Equal Justice for Under Law, for all.   We will advocate for a government, for a legal system, for policies, that are balanced and inclusive to everyone, regardless of class, race, gender, religion, sexual orientation or ability.

And that is a mission worthy of both the Center’s benefactors and beneficiaries.

CHICAGO TRADERS MOCK PROTESTERS: ‘WE ARE THE 1 PERCENT PAYING FOR THIS, YOU ARE PAYING FOR 1 PERCENT OF IT’

 From Think Progress

Today, demonstrators from Occupy Chicago continued to protest economic inequality, undeterred by the arrests of 175 of their members by the city for staying overnight in Grant Park. As demonstrators marched past the Chicago Board of Trade, financial traders above dropped flyers upon them that said, “We Are The 1 Percent Paying For This, You Are Paying For 1 Percent Of It.” Here are some snapshots of both sides of the flyers:

How Unequal We Are: The Top 5 Facts You Should Know About The Wealthiest One Percent Of Americans

By Zaid Jilani/Think Progress

As the ongoing occupation of Wall Street by hundreds of protesters enters its third week — and as protests spread to other cities such as Boston and Los Angeles — demonstrators have endorsed a new slogan: “We are the 99 percent.” This slogan refers an economic struggle between 99 percent of Americans and the richest one percent of Americans, who are increasingly accumulating a greater share of the national wealth to the detriment of the middle class.

It may shock you exactly how wealthy this top 1 percent of Americans is. ThinkProgress has assembled five facts about this class of super-rich Americans:

1. The Top 1 Percent Of Americans Owns 40 Percent Of The Nation’s Wealth: As Nobel Laureate Joseph Stiglitz points out, the richest 1 percent of Americans now own 40 percent of the nation’s wealth. Sociologist William Domhoff illustrates this wealth disparity using 2007 figures where the top 1 percent owned 42 percent of the country’s financial wealth (total net worth minus the value of one’s home). How much does the bottom 80 percent own? Only 7 percent:

As Stiglitz notes, this disparity is much worse than it was in the past, as just 25 years ago the top 1 percent owned 33 percent of national wealth.

2. The Top 1 Percent Of Americans Take Home 24 Percent Of National Income:While the richest 1 percent of Americans take home almost a quarter of national income today, in 1976 they took home just 9 percent — meaning their share of the national income pool has nearly tripled in roughly three decades.

3. The Top 1 Percent Of Americans Own Half Of The Country’s Stocks, Bonds, And Mutual Funds: The Institute for Policy Studies illustrates this massive disparity in financial investment ownership, noting that the bottom 50 percent of Americans own only .5 percent of these investments:

4. The Top 1 Percent Of Americans Have Only 5 Percent Of The Nation’s Personal Debt:

Using 2007 figures, sociologist William Domhoff points out that the top 1 percent have 5 percent of the nation’s personal debt while the bottom 90 percent have 73 percent of total debt:

5. The Top 1 Percent Are Taking In More Of The Nation’s Income Than At Any Other Time Since The 1920s: Not only are the wealthiest 1 percent of Americans taking home a tremendous portion of the national income, but their share of this income is greater than at any other time since the Great Depression, as the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities illustrates in this chart using 2007 data:

As Professor Elizabeth Warren has explained, “there is nobody in this country who got rich on his own. Nobody…Part of the underlying social contract is you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along.” More and more often, that is not occurring, giving the protesters ample reason to take to the streets.

UPDATE

For an excellent resource about how much income Americans at these different income levels have, see the Tax Policy Center. The top one percent of Americans have an average income of $1.5 million.