Anti-Vaxxers

Political Cartoon is by Bob Engelhard in The Hartford Courant.

Florida Voters Say No To Rubio Running For President

Marco Rubio, the Republican senator from Florida, has made it pretty obvious that he wants to run for the GOP nomination for president in 2016 (even though he has not officially announced his candidacy). Some political pundits give him a pretty fair chance of winning that nomination, and others don't -- but it's still very early.

Personally, I don't think he could win it. And one of the reasons I think that is that the voters in his home state don't want him to run. Note in the chart above that only 15% of registered voters in Florida think he should run. Even worse, only 19% of Republicans and 30% of Hispanics think he should run -- and those are groups he would have to have to carry the state in a GOP primary.

This doesn't necessarily mean that Florida voters don't like Rubio -- just that they don't want him running for president. In fact, 57% of those voters (and 68% of Republicans) think he should run for re-election to the U.S. Senate. And I do believe he would be very hard to beat if he ran again for the Senate. He's not a very good senator (in my opinion), but he's still popular in Florida.

Support for another Floridian is a little stronger. About 42% of Florida voters think Jeb Bush should run for president (while 43% think he should not -- and 59% of Florida Republicans think he should run (while 31% say no to a Bush presidency). That strikes me as some very lukewarm support (even among Republicans) for a "home-state" candidate.

If he runs, I think Bush would probably win the Republican primary in Florida. But I'm not at all sure he could take his home state in a general election (and if he can't, then he has little chance of getting the required 270 electoral votes).

Both of these charts were made from information in a new Mason-Dixon Poll. That survey was done between January 27th and 29th of a random sample of 625 registered voters in Florida, and has a margin of error of 4 points.

An American Classic

Political Cartoon is by Pat Bagley in the Salt Lake Tribune.

It's Good Business

Rolling Drunk

U.S. Citizens Are Pessimistic About The Country's Future

Wall Street may be setting records, and the rich and corporations making huge profits -- but most Americans are still trying to shake off the effects of the Bush recession. And that seems to have given a lot of them a pessimistic view of this nation's future.

Only 32% believe the best days are ahead for this country, while a plurality of 46% say the country's best days are in the past (and 22% don't know what to think). I would like to be in the optimistic group, but if the voters keep electing Republicans who still believe in the failed "trickle-down" economic policies of that party, then that plurality may be right. That economic policy is hurting the country and destroying our economy, and if we don't change it soon we'll become a third-world nation (composed only of "haves" and "have-nots").

These numbers are from a recent Rasmussen Poll -- done on January 13th and 14th of a random national sample of 800 likely voters, with a 3.5 point margin of error.

Deflating Democracy

Political Cartoon is by Rob Rogers in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

States With The Most & Least 2014 Presidential Job Approval

Poll after poll has shown that President Obama's job approval rating has rebounded recently (while that of Congress is still extremely low). These charts don't reflect the president's recent ratings, but his job approval rating in each state for the entire year of 2014. The chart above shows the 15 states with the highest ratings, and the chart at the bottom shows the 15 states with the lowest ratings. If you state is not on either list, you can go to the Gallup Poll site to see its rating.

The highest presidential job rating was in the District of Columbia (84%), but I didn't include it in the charts because it isn't a state. I thought it was interesting that even in the states with the lowest approval of the job President Obama is doing, the rating is still significantly higher than the most recent Gallup Poll rating of congressional job approval (16%).

These charts were made from surveys taken by the Gallup Poll from January through December of 2014 of a random national sample of 177,034 adults. The margin of error for each individual state ranged between 3% and 6%, depending on the size of that state's sample.

Dumb

Political Cartoon is by Nick Anderson in the Houston Chronicle.

Corporate Tax-Dodging Is Hurting The U. S. Economy

Republicans would like for us to believe that corporations have to pay too much in taxes in the United States -- and they would like to significantly reduce the corporate tax rate. They are lying. The truth is United States corporations pay an actual tax rate that is the lowest of nearly all developed nations. And as you can see from the chart above, the share of U.S. government revenue that comes from corporations is lower than ever. Note that the corporate share in the early 1950's was slightly over 30%. Now it is well below 10%.

The corporations are not really paying their fair share of taxes in this country -- and that is due to the Republican's "Trickle-Down" economic policy -- a policy that gives corporations huge subsidies to offset taxes, gives them tax breaks for exporting U.S. jobs, and allows them to avoid taxes by keeping profits in overseas bank accounts. It has gotten so bad that about one-quarter of all corporations pay no taxes at all, even though they make huge profits -- and most others pay a far smaller rate than they should be paying.

Here are some of the most egregious examples of corporate tax-dodgers:

	Bank of America runs its business through more than 300 offshore tax-haven subsidiaries. It reported $17.2 billion in accumulated offshore profits in 2012. It would owe $4.3 billion in US taxes if these funds were brought back to the US.
	Citigroup had $42.6 billion in foreign profits parked offshore in 2012 on which it paid no US taxes. It reported that it would owe $11.5 billion if it brings these funds back to the US. A significant chunk is being held in tax-haven countries.
	ExxonMobil had a three-year federal income tax rate of just 15 percent. This gave the company a tax subsidy worth $6.2 billion from 2010-2012. It had $43 billion in offshore profits at the end of 2012, on which it paid no US taxes.
	FedEx made $6 billion over the last three years and didn’t pay a dime in federal income taxes, in part because the tax code subsidized its purchase of new planes. This gave FedEx a huge tax subsidy worth $2.1 billion.
	General Electric received a tax subsidy of nearly $29 billion over the last 11 years. While dodging paying its fair share of federal income taxes, GE pocketed $21.8 billion in taxpayer-funded contracts from Uncle Sam between 2006 and 2012.
	Honeywell had profits of $5 billion from 2009 to 2012. Yet it paid only $50 million in federal income taxes for the period. Its tax rate was just 1 percent over the last four years. This gave it a huge tax subsidy worth $1.7 billion.
	Merck had profits of $13.6 billion and paid $2.5 billion in federal income taxes from 2009 to 2012. While dodging its fair share of federal income taxes, it pocketed $8.7 billion in taxpayer-funded contracts from Uncle Sam between 2006 and 2012.
	Microsoft saved $4.5 billion in federal income taxes from 2009 to 2011 by transferring profits to a subsidiary in the tax haven of Puerto Rico. It had $60.8 billion in profits stashed offshore in 2012 on which it paid no US taxes.
	Pfizer paid no US income taxes from 2010 to 2012 while earning $43 billion worldwide. It did this in part by performing accounting acrobatics to shift its US profits offshore. It received $2.2 billion in federal tax refunds.
	Verizon made $19.3 billion in US pretax profits from 2008 to 2012, yet didn’t pay any federal income taxes during the period. Instead, it got $535 million in tax rebates. Verizon’s effective federal income tax rate was negative 2.8 percent from 2008 to 2012.

This is inexcusable. Any corporation or other business that makes billions in profit (or even just millions) should be paying their fair share of taxes. It is just not right that they should get the benefits of the tax-payer funded government without paying any of the taxes (or without paying the full share of taxes the law says they owe). Why should corporations get a free ride when workers must pay their taxes?

The Republicans say our economic woes come from too much government spending, and they want to deeply cut government programs (especially those programs that help hurting Americans. They are wrong. Our economic problems don't come from too much spending -- but from too little revenues, especially from the corporate sector.

Ignoring The Important For The Trivial

Political Cartoon is by Stuart Carlson at carlsontoons.com.

We Need Jobs -- Not Jails

Trickle-Down Is A Fraud

Vaccinations Are A Public Health Issue (Not A Choice)

Those of us who are older remember a time when disease took far too many human lives. But we also remember that vaccinations began to control many of those diseases. Smallpox and polio have almost been completely eliminated by required vaccinations, and others (like measles, mumps, & rubella) were significantly reduced -- and on their way to being eliminated. This was a good thing, because many lives were saved.

But recently a new movement has developed -- the anti-vaxxers. These people don't think vaccinations should be a requirement, but a parental choice (and some would do away with vaccinations altogether). Sadly, a few celebrities jumped on the anti-vaxxer bandwagon, giving it a kind of weird credibility (even though these people were not scientists or doctors).

The anti-vaxxers latched on to a study done by a British scientist that said early childhood vaccinations were the cause of autism. That study has discredited by many scientists and doctors, who pointed out the many flaws in the study. But the anti-vaxxers cling to the discredited study, because without it there is simply no way to justify their position. And they seem to have been partially successful in spreading their flawed and dangerous message (as is evidenced by the chart above).

But there now seems to be another aspect to the anti-vaxxer movement. Look at the chart below, and compare it to the one above.

If the only reason to oppose required vaccinations was the mistaken belief that it caused autism, then the two charts should be very close to identical -- but they aren't. Note that a much higher percentage of Americans think vaccinations should be a parental choice (instead of a requirement) than believe it causes autism.

Why do they believe this? All I can figure is that they look at the issue as one of free choice or rights -- that it is a parent's right to refuse to vaccinate their children. I find this idea to be an absurd one. Vaccinations have nothing to do with freedom or rights -- they are a public health issue.

One of the obligations of government is to protect the public. It is why we use tax dollars to fund a standing military, and it is why we fund police agencies in all cities and localities -- and it is why we pass laws. We don't recognize the "right" of anyone to murder a fellow human being, or to hurt them. Why then would we allow people to hurt others by refusing to vaccinate their children?

These people are not just endangering their own children (which would be bad enough), but they are also endangering other people. They are allowing disease to continue to exist, and continue to take human lives -- and that is inexcusable. The government doesn't just have the right to protect the public by requiring vaccinations -- they have a solemn duty to do so.