Shame Shame SHAME on the Susan G. Komen foundation for pulling support to Planned Parenthood:

"According to Planned Parenthood, its centers performed more than 4 million breast exams over the past five years, including nearly 170,000 as a result of Komen grants."

Cutting funding for breast cancer exams is a despicable political move as a result of extreme Right Wing pressure on the foundation. All men and women who are interested in eradicating breast cancer should exert pressure on them to reverse this decision. Until they do, we are urging all of our friends to withhold support for the Susan G. Komen Race for a Cure Foundation.

Send SKG a message on any of their Facebook pages, like this one.

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Tags: breast cancer, Planned Parenthood, Susan G. Komen

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It's January, but the OWS movement certainly isn't cold:

Twelve protesters were arrested Sunday night on a march through Lower Manhattan to show support for Occupy protesters in Oakland, where a violent confrontation erupted on Saturday night between the police and demonstrators who tried to take over an empty convention center.

The crowd in New York, about 300 strong, occasionally surged into streets, and on at least two occasions someone in the crowd threw a bottle, apparently aimed at police officers who accompanied the march on foot and in vehicles. The police plunged into the crowd several times.

Three men were charged with assault and one with criminal weapons possession, the police said. Most of the rest of those arrested were charged with disorderly conduct. Three of the 12 people arrested were women. One officer sustained an injured finger.

About 400 people were arrested and three police officers were injured after a weekend protest by members of the Occupy movement in Oakland, Calif., turned into a violent confrontation with law enforcement officers that led to an assault on City Hall.

The clashes began about 3 p.m. on Saturday when protesters marched toward the vacant Henry J. Kaiser Convention Center and began to tear down construction barricades, and the violence extended into early Sunday. The Oakland Police Department said in a statement that the crowd was ordered to disperse after protesters "began destroying construction equipment and fencing."

'Officers were pelted with bottles, metal pipe, rocks, spray cans, improvised explosive devices and burning flares," the police statement said. Officers responded by firing smoke and tear gas canisters and beanbags, and they initially arrested 20 people.

Several hours later, some protesters broke into City Hall, the police said, although some of the demonstrators said they found the building's door ajar. Mayor Jean Quan surveyed the damage there on Sunday, and the city administrator, Deanna J. Santana, said at a news conference that the protesters had broken a window and damaged a historic model of the building. Flags were stolen, she said, and one of them was burned in front of City Hall.

Omar Yassin, 42, a member of the group's media committee, said the vandalism was "not something I would have done."

"But I do understand that people were enraged by the brutality that they had already seen," he said. "There were children in that crowd; there were families in that crowd."

And finally, OccupyWashingtonDC is getting ready to be evicted:

In the wake of a recent Congressional hearing on Occupy DC, misleading threats from Mayor Vince Gray about nonexistent "health" concerns in the park, and yesterday's taser attack that hospitalized a resident of the park, the National Park Service has given Occupiers in McPherson Square and Freedom Plaza until 12:00 noon today until they will begin enforcing a no-camping ban. Occupy DC has begun preparing nonviolent resistance and is calling for all supporters to join them.

More here from the NY Times.

This is JANUARY! Imagine what the Spring will bring...

The movement continues...

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Tags: Oakland OWS, OWS, Zucotti Park

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This number - 15% - is the presumptive Republican nominee's tax rate. FIFTEEN percent. Mitt Romney pays such a low rate because most of his income comes from the "carried interest" rule that allows those running hedge funds or private equity firms (like Romney's Bain Capital) to pay taxes at the long-term capital gains rate, which is 15%.

The big question going into this election in November is why we allow these hedge fund and private equity owners to be taxed at the long-term capital gains rate. Capital gains are taxed at a lower rate to supposedly encourage long-term investment (defined as longer than one year) by individuals. The stated goal is to encourage long-term investing of our own money into investments like stocks and real estate. But these hedge-fund owners aren't investing their own money. They're investing other people's money (same with Bain Capital). So why are they receiving this lower rate?

Romney's tax returns will shine a light on this form of class warfare, where those making far less than Romney (like his secretary) pay a much higher tax rate. Billionaire Warren Buffett has repeatedly spoken about this inequity.

He said this today in South Carolina, when asked about his tax rate:

"It's probably closer to the 15 percent rate than anything," Mr. Romney said. "Because my last 10 years, I've -- my income comes overwhelmingly from some investments made in the past, whether ordinary income or earned annually. I got a little bit of income from my book, but I gave that all away."

Mr. Romney added: "And then I get speaker's fees from time to time, but not very much."

Americans don't mind their candidates being rich (see Mike Bloomberg as mayor of New York City). What they hate are rich folks who pretend to not be rich (or to show how completely out of touch they are with ordinary folk). Is Mitt Romney so clueless as to think that a few hundred-thousand dollars made from speaking engagements is "not very much" money?

In fact, in the most recent year, Mr. Romney made $374,327.62 in speaker's fees, at an average of $41,592 per speech, according to his public financial disclosure reports.

At least he gave the money away (so he says).

Romney's real Achilles heel, though, is the 15% tax rate that he pays. This income inequality will play right into the Occupy Wall Street movement, the main goal of which is to reveal the huge income disparities that exist in this country.

The Republicans just might be committing harakiri by nominating such a rich, tone deaf man as Mitt Romney.

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Tags: carried interest, long term capital gains, Mitt Romney

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Recent Entries

Susan G. Komen Foundation Pulls Support For Planned Parenthood.
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September 11th, 2001-2011