La Vida Loca

It is astounding how significantly one idea can shape a society and its policies. Consider this one.

If taxes on the rich go up, job creation will go down.

This idea is an article of faith for Republicans and seldom challenged by Democrats and has shaped much of today’s economic landscape.

But sometimes the ideas that we know to be true are dead wrong. For thousands of years people were sure that earth was at the center of the universe. It’s not, and an astronomer who still believed that it was, would do some lousy astronomy.

In the same way, a policy maker who believed that the rich and businesses are “job creators” and therefore should not be taxed, would make equally bad policy.

I have started or helped start, dozens of businesses and initially hired lots of people. But if no one could have afforded to buy what we had to sell, my businesses would all have failed and all those jobs would have evaporated.

That’s why I can say with confidence that rich people don’t create jobs, nor do businesses, large or small. What does lead to more employment is a “circle of life” like feedback loop between customers and businesses. And only consumers can set in motion this virtuous cycle of increasing demand and hiring. In this sense, an ordinary middle-class consumer is far more of a job creator than a capitalist like me.

—Nick Hanauer, a venture capitalist whose TED talk about inequality was deemed “too political controversial” to publish. (via theatlantic)

(via theatlantic)

We used to think that breast milk was just a food and that it was filled with fats and proteins and vitamins and that formula companies were successfully able to mimic this. But we now know that there are substances in breast milk that exist almost at the same levels that are not digestible by infants. So what are they doing there? It turns out, they’re digestible by beneficial bacteria. So over millions of years, the mother has been creating a substance that will recruit useful bacteria into her infant’s gut and this sets her infant up for life. So as much as breast milk is a food, we also now understand that it’s also a medicine.

—Florence Williams on the benefits of breast milk (via nprfreshair)

(via nprfreshair)

allimmaturityandallcaps:

jaybellavitta:

“I am TIRED OF burying little black boys” 

Congresswoman Wilson’s House floor speech on the shooting death of Trayvon Martin

God bless Florida Representative Frederica Wilson.

Transcript:

Thank you, Mr. Speaker, for the time.

Mr. Speaker? I am tired of burying young black boys.

I am tired of watching them suffer at the hands of those who fear them and despise them. I’m tired of comforting mothers, fathers, grandparents, sisters, and brothers after such unnecessary, heinous crimes of violence.

In Florida, almost 3 years ago, as I served in the Florida senate, a young black boy, Martin Lee Anderson, was beaten to death at a Florida bootcamp. It was all captured on a State of Florida Corrections video and shown all over the world. Martin Lee Anderson was beaten and tortured until his lifeless body couldn’t take anymore, and then Martin Lee Anderson was dead, at the hands of several bootcamp guards. A young boy, who wanted to be somebody! A young boy who was trying to turn his life around.

After they beat him to death on international TV as the world watched, over and over again—not one guard was sent to prison. Not one was even reprimanded. In fact, after we closed down every bootcamp in Florida, many of the accused received promotions.

Well, guess what? In Florida, we have another Martin—Trayvon Martin. Trayvon Martin was shot to death by a renegade wannabe policeman neighborhood watchman.

Trayvon Martin lived in Miami, Florida, in District 17—my congressional district. Trayvon, a 140-pound young black boy, 17 years old, was just trying to live and reach 18. In spite of that, the accused killer, George Zimmerman, has not been charged, and is using the term of “self-defense.”

The 911 audio tapes tell it all. They tell the story of the last moments of Trayvon Martin’s life, just as the videotapes told so visibly the story of Martin Lee Anderson’s last moments.

Trayvon was running for his life. He was screaming for help, fighting for his life, and then he was murdered—shot dead.

Today, I applaud the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the FBI, and the Federal Department of Justice for their intervention. I encourage the citizens of Florida and the citizens from around the world to continue to fight for justice for Trayvon Martin. Justice must be served. No more racial profiling.

I’m tired of fighting when the evidence is so clear, so transparent.

Twenty years ago, while serving as a school board member, I founded the Five Thousand Role Models of Excellence project: A million-dollar nationally recognized and honored foundation that specifically addresses the trials and tribulations of young black boys, and sends them to college. It impacts almost 20,000 young men throughout Florida.

In spite of that, we still have to march, and demonstrate, and write letters, and protest, and fight, and have prayer vigils, and sue, and sit in, just to be heard.

No more! No more, Florida. No more, America! No more hiding your criminal racial profiling by using self-defense to get away with murder. Stand up for Trayvon Martin! Stand up for justice! Stand up for our children!

I’m tired, tired, tired of burying young black boys.

Thank you, and I turn back the balance of my time.

(via mochafleur)

nprfreshair:

Every time I’ve gone through a major relationship upheaval in my life this archival episode of This American Life has made me cry and laugh. Enjoy!