-- Connecting the dots between our economy, government and business --
Summary and audio linked here.
Chicago’s political leadership is floating a pension buyout program as evidence it is seriously addressing the city’s thirty-six-billion-dollar unfunded pension liability, but Mark Glennon, founder of the Illinois policy research organization Wirepoints, said that the proposal moves debt from one column to another rather than reducing it, and that the broader fiscal picture facing the city continues to deteriorate across every measurable dimension. Audio here.
Expect no retraction or apology. This what they do.
The state’s existing buyout program for its own pensions is the precedent for Chicago, which should be a warning: Look out for similar exaggerated claims and shoddy analysis.
Full interview and summary linked here.
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I read the Chicago Blueprint for Fair Housing’s Executive Summary. Amzing that the first, and only solution to Racially or Ethnically Concentrated Areas of Poverty (R/ECAPs) is:
COMMUNISM!
* Change zoning policies to encourage the construction of housing for all income
levels
* Strengthen guidelines around evictions and renewal regulations
*Develop a process to equitably distribute public resources based on need.
* Support home repairs and rehabilitation for qualifying owners through grants,
low-cost loans, or other cost assistance
*Develop standardized tools to assess racial and social equity impacts in capital
planning and budget processes
These groups spend more time on acronyms that the content within their proposals.
In the public comments:
I mean, sure, but good luck with that.
Can anyone here explain to me exactly what the differences are between “Socialism” and “Communism”?
…and for those of you that are willing to try, I would also appreciate it if you would explain the differences between the “Democratic Party” and those two degenerate political “philosophies” named above.
Come come!! Don’t be bashful, this is your opportunity to become a rich and famous author.
OK Bill, I will give it a shot because I too have been struggling with what the best label is for today’s far left that’s now in charge. I would say Communism is Socialist economic policy plus authoritarian, one-party dictatorial governmental control over everything. So, it is tempting to call today’s left Communism. But Communism incorporates an extreme form of socialism that includes government ownership of most everything. The far left hasn’t done much of that, at least not yet. Instead, it has sought to dominate and cozy up to private enterprise, especially big corporations. Many big corporations have been… Read more »
The promise to hurt the people you blame for your problems in exchange for power. In 2020, Democrats promised to hurt Republicans, and make them feel pain, in exchange for power. And they got power. And now they are using it. They’ve weaponized every institution in the government against Republicans. Democrats are not interested in governing. For one year now, they have been only interested in punishing. And the results have been disastrous. And now America is begging for someone, anyone, to return things back to normal. That man may end up being Donald Trump again. I hope not, 4… Read more »
@JesseKellyDC explains it best:
Communism is the promise made to some “oppressed” group of people to hurt the people who supposedly run things in order to make a society more equal. Soviets used wealth. We use race, gender, and sexual orientation. Same ideology. Different language; or put another way, The promise to hurt the people you blame for your problems in exchange for power.
Socialism is the redistribution of wealth as one way to ‘hurt’ a group of people.
The Democrat is communism.
There is socialism, communism and Russian. The problem is that they tend to morph into Russian
This doesn’t attempt to answer your question about difference between socialism & communism. But I throw this thought out anyway. Maybe a giant over simplification. Socialist/ progressives in Illinois site– Canada, Germany & Western Europe as examples of socialized democracies to emulate as ethically just societies with generous guaranteed benefits for EVERYONE. But its my understanding Canada, Germany & Western Europe report their debt to pay for all these guarantees, or at least make some attempt to report debt, on an accrual basis. Where as, in Illinois (and US)the outlandish constitutionally guaranteed benefits (and more or less guaranteed job security)… Read more »