Does corporate welfare qualify as wealth redistribution

From where I sit, there is clearly something wrong with this picture. I will be voting for the candidate who shares this view and plans to restore a more balanced, equitable and FAIR distribution of wealth. This is not about shifting bucks from one person to another. This is about corporations whose butts are being bailed out right and left by us Joe Shmoes shouldering more fiscal responsibility toward their shareholders AND toward John Q. Public.

http://michellemalkin.com/2008/10/26/obama-in-2001-how-to-bring-about-redistributive-change/

Before discounting this because it is on a conservative site....the You Tube tape is there...you can hear "O" in his own words.

You're right on the money there!!! I applied 10 months ago due to chronic pancreatitis from cystic fibrosis. (In fact, I was just discharged from my 10th hospitalization yesterday, after spending the night in the hospital for what they deemed to be a small stroke.)

I'm at the point now where I'm awaiting a hearing. My lawyer said it can take up to 14 months for one to be scheduled.

I was doing great with the medicines I had been prescribed because three of them are free from the manufacturer based on my income. One of these medications is the Duragesic patch, which would cost almost $700 a month if I wasn't enrolled in this program. (With this new diagnosis, however, I need to check to see who manufactures some of the other medicines I've now been prescribed.)

I would encourage anyone who has difficulty paying for their medicines to find out who manufactures them. I think many of them have a patient assistance program. It can really help a LOT.

Commentary: Larger-Than-Life Corporate Salaries are Unfair to Average American Workers

Despite slower-than-anticipated growth and lower-than-expected profits, many corporations have generously rewarded their leaders, while simultaneously reducing lower-level staff salaries and benefits in an attempt to control costs. This disturbing practice only serves to further widen the gap between America�s wealthy few and its working class and clearly demonstrates just how little this country values its workforce.

At a time when most American workers are struggling to make basic ends meet and worrying how they�ll manage to save enough for retirement, many of this country�s corporate chief executives are stuffing their pockets with larger-than-life compensation packages that include high base salaries, stock options and ample pension plans. In 2004, the average chief executive�s salary at a large company was more than 170 times that of the average worker�s pay. Last year, executive salaries grew 25 percent, while that of the average American worker grew only 3.1 percent.

Even when a company struggles, their CEOs are still rewarded. For example, the current CEO of a global manufacturing firm received over $11 million in compensation last year, despite the company�s $3.4 billion revenue loss, an 11-percent drop in stock value and a staff reduction of 17,000 workers. There are similar stories at corporations across the country. While worker pensions are frozen and many are asked to do without raises, CEOs manage to earn their multi-million dollar bonuses.

It�s no surprise that CEOs are cleaning up. Consider this: Corporations often use compensation committees to set their executive salaries. Many of these committees use outside consultants to help guide the process. These consultants are often already contracted to do other work for the company. The conflict of interest here is obvious: The consultant won�t upset the CEO -- and risk losing other contracts -- by setting a more realistic, performance based pay model.

Many corporate CEOs are, in short, getting over, and it is a slap in the face of every American worker. While it is understood that executive salaries would greatly exceed that of the average worker�s, there is no logical argument to explain why the growth rate between the two is so dramatically different. To protect its workforce, corporate America must ensure worker�s salaries grow at rates that keep pace with the cost of living, while slowing the rate of growth of CEO salaries. Corporate boards must stop rewarding CEOs with multi-million dollar bonuses. It is unacceptable for a company to lay off thousands of workers and then turn around and pay an executive for a job well done.

As a country, we often ask our government to think about the needs of the average American, and rightly so. However, if America is to truly prosper, the corporations that feed our local economy must also consider and respect the well-being of average worker.

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Judge Greg Mathis is national vice president of Rainbow PUSH and a national board member of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference.

I am happy that FINALLY someone is standing up for the middle class. I am happy that finally we will be given some tax breaks. The wealth does NOT trickle down when the tax breaks are given to the upper class/business that fall in that tax bracket. They do not create more jobs, therefore strengthening the middle class/economy. What they do is line their pockets and get rich and then save even more money and get even more tax breaks by sending work overseas and hiring people that will gladly work for way less an hour, therefore driving the value of American jobs down so that the rest of us, who are stuck trying to make it, find a decent paying job, are screwed. I am voting for Obama and I think he is going to win.

isn't taken away someone's rights even though it penalizes hardworkers by taking their money and giving it to people who don't? I do believe that is taking away someone rights....the rights to keep the hard earned money that they earned and make their life better because that is what they worked for and we voted for that when we voted in Obama.

They still have the right to be together as a couple. No one is telling them that they can't go out in public and declare they are a couple, etc. However, to allow their union and call it marriage is something that many people cannot agree with and they have that right to their opinion and their vote has made that decision. Marriage is between a man and a woman. If homosexuals want to be legally bound to each other......call it something else but keep the definition of marriage as a man and woman.

I took my first MT job in 1974 when we were still respected hospital employees with benefits. In 1976 I had my first child and in 1980 I became a singe parent. Between 1974 and 1992, I worked between 40 and 50 hours every single week of my life, worked all holidays because I needed the extra pay and had an interval between 1986 and 1993 where I did not take one single vacation day because I bought a home to get my son away from the gang problems that became concentrated in apartment complexes. During those years, I developed hypertension at age 34 and progressive, unrelenting back pain in 1987. With the help of ibuprofen and regular exercise, I worked through it and never skipped a beat. For those who may not remember, 1986 was when outsourcing happened and in the years to follow, not one single start-up MTSO offered medical benefits.

In 1992 I began to develop significant insomnia due to the chronic pain. One morning, after tossing and turning through the night, I got out of bed and found myself unable to stand erect because of the pain. For the next week or so, I had to crawl around on my hands and knees and was unable to work. I got behind in my bills, depressed and was utterly exhausted. I had a physical and "nervous" breakdown that landed me in a psychiatric facility where I received much needed rest and treatment. I couldn't afford to pay that bill.

I lost my car, my job and my house. My son had to go to live with his father since I could not feed him and at age 40 I had to move back in with my aging mother. I tried to apply for social security disability just long enough to get job retraining and get back on my feet again. I was denied those benefits. I applied for unemployment and food stamps and entered the county medical health care system. I was not able to achieve rehabilitation and recovery sufficient to enable me to return to transcription. I ended up out of work for 7 years while I figured out my own rehabilitation and lived with my elderly mother who could not really afford to support the extra expense of feeding me on a fixed social security/retirement income. My unemployment benefits ran out, but I stayed on food stamps for 3 of those years for her sake until I returned to school on a student loan and later on scholarship. When mhy mother's health deteriorated, I became her terminal care attendant and had to leave school.

I am no slacker. It took me 7 years to recover from the disability I sustained from medical transcription and single parenthood. When I was able to return to work, I did. I still transcribe and at age 59, have developed the same back problems I had that disabled me in 1993. I am simply trying to scratch my way to retirement, which probable will commence for me one I drop dead in front of the computer. I would not wish this fate on anyone, but if any of you, your family or your friends ever do encounter such circumstances for whatever reason, (i.e., death of a spouse, for example) and need assistance, you will come to understand the importance of welfare and will never view it with the cold-blooded, icy, self-righteous indignation that some on this board have expressed.