Pentagon clears General McChrystal of misconduct

Department of Defense officials found no corroborative evidence that General Stanley McChrystal did any of the things a "Rolling Stone" profile depicted him doing on a junket to Paris.

President Barack Obama relieved the four-star general in August following publication of the article in which he was quoted saying he and other soldiers fight for each other and not for politicians, nations, flags or abstract ideas.

Subsequently, Pentagon officials denied Michael Hastings, the author of the article, the opportunity to be "embedded" with troops fighting in Afghanistan.

In the article, a June profile of McChrystal in Rolling Stone magazine, he was reported as making comments seen as disrespectful toward Obama administration officials. But on Monday, Acting Deputy Inspector General Michael S. Child said the inquiry concluded that "not all of the events at issue occurred as reported."

Don't stop the carnival - Sonny Rollins

WSJ offers sobering figures on how to close budget deficit

Prosecutor - “Why do you rob banks, Mr. Sutton?”
Willie Sutton - “Because that's where the money is.”

The astronomical numbers dance across the computer and television screens with ghostly precision, trip off the tongues of the commentators and politicians in glib and pear-shaped tones.

They speak in terms of trillions. How much is a trillion? Well, for starters, bear in mind that a billion is actually one thousand million, and you start to get the picture.

Trillion sounds like a word from a "Start Trek" episode or a Buck Rogers movie.

How to close the budget deficit gap and thereby save the nation's credit rating?

Soak the rich?

Hose down the middle class?

Borrow your way out of debt by directing the U.S. Federal Reserve to buy your own U.S. Treasury bonds?

Those benchmark instruments were downgraded on Monday, just yesterday, from “stable” to “negative” by the credit reporting company, Standard & Poor. There is a one in three chance that the United States' excellent credit rating could slip off its pedestal in the next three years if the government does not cut its spending.

None of that will work, according to the leading financial news service in the U.S., Dow-Jones, publisher of “The Wall Street Journal.”

The nation could tax the wealthiest of the wealthy at a rate of 100% and still not tax itself out of debt.

In the nation's revenue stream of $5.65 trillion in total taxable income, the lion's share comes from middle income earners, according to figures obtained by the Journal's editorial writer.

“The nearby chart shows the distribution, and the big hump in the center is where Democrats are inevitably headed for the same reason that Willie Sutton robbed banks,” the ultra-conservative financial publication of News Corporation hooted.

This came in the wake of President Barack Obama's pronouncement that if only the top earners – the top 2% - would pay just a little more, the nation could tax itself out of the troubles with a $14.3 trillion debt ceiling and a $1.65 trillion budget deficit, a number that seems almost as high as the mileage between Times Square and the corner of space and time, located somewhere in an obscure village on the Planet Uranus.

It wouldn't work if you taxed all who earn more than $114,000 per year – five times the President's targeted 2% - or the top 10%, at the maximum rate. It would only raise $3.4 trillion, the numbers show.

The top 10% already pay 69% of all total income taxes, the top 5% more than all of the other 95%.

In fact, if the government taxed the income of all who earned more than $200,000 at the rate of 100%, the yield would only be $1.89 trillion.

The newspaper concluded that President Obama has set the nation on the path of an entitlement state on autopilot.

That leaves the prospect of either cutting entitlements for elderly citizens such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, according to House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan, or, according to Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, raising the debt ceiling off its current $14.3 trillion peg.

Herein lies the murky truth – somewhere – because Mr. Ryan cannot remember any such commitment extracted from the “Republican leadership” in talks at the White House with President Obama.

Said Mr. Geithner in an appearance on ABC's Sunday “This Week” news talk show. “There's no alternative, and they recognize that. I sat there with them, and they said, we recognize we have to do this. And we're not going to play around with it. Because we know – we know that the risk would be catastrophic.”

Au contraire, said Mr. Ryan in an appearance on CBS's “Face The Nation.”

Any such move would come only in conjunction with huge spending cuts in entitlement programs for the elderly's health care and retirement annuities.

“We won't raise, just simply raise, the debt limit. We will vote to have spending cuts and control in conjunction with the debt limit increase.”

Rep. Bill Flores, R-Dist. 17, had no comment. His press secretary did not respond to an inquiry from The Legendary. The freshman Congressman is a member of the House Budget Committee.

Are there any alternatives?

In the wake of what pundits on the street are calling "the next great short," stocks are tanking all over the lot.

According to the “rationale” section of the Standard and Poor decision to lower the credit rating of the U.S. Treasury, “The Obama Administration's proposed spending cuts include reducing non-security discretionary spending to levels similar to those proposed by the Fiscal Commission in December 2010, holding growth in base security (excluding war expenditure) spending below inflation, and further cost-control measures related to health care programs...”

So, there it is, the elephant in the living room no one talks about.

Defense spending - “war expenditure,” as termed by the Standard & Poor credit rating accountants – is sacrosanct in all talks political, fiscal and conversational on both sides of the aisle, or inside the Beltway.

What is the share of the $4 trillion budget that goes to such spending? It's about 20 percent, or 4.7% of the gross domestic product, up from 3% only a few years ago.

Neoconservatives will not even talk about cutting the share of defense spending, according to pundits. Why?

According to the Congressional Research Service, defense spending authorized by the 2010 Supplemental Appropriations Act is set at $1.121 trillion for military operations, base security, reconstruction, foreign aid, embassy costs and veterans' health care for the three operations initiated since 9/11 – Operation Enduring Freedom Afghanistan and other coutner terror operations; Operation Noble Eagle, providing enhanced security at military bases; and Operation Iraqi Freedom.

The share of each segment is set at 94% for defense department budget, 5% for foreign aid programs and embassy operations, and 1% for medical care for veterans.

Spending in Iraq is down 25% from 2009 – from $7.2 billion to $5.4 billion. Spending in Afghanistan is up – from $3.5 billion to $5.7 billion.

Troop strength in Iraq fell by 50,000, down by 46%; troop strength in Afghanistan is up by 70% at 98,000.

Whatever happens in the House of Representatives, the actions won't gain easy concurrence from conservative Senators.

The senior Senator from New York, Republican Mike Pence, has vowed to filibuster any measure that will raise the debt ceiling until he sees cuts in entitlements for senior citizens.

Senator John Warner, a member of the “gang of six” – three Democrats and three Republicans – who are working to find a way out of the financial maze, said that he and his colleagues feel there should be spending cuts of $3 for every $1 in new tax revenue.

While the nation is spending 25% of gross domestic product, “Our revenues are at an all-time low at about 15%,” he said on CBS.

Tell It Like It Is - Little Willie John

Nearly half of U.S. households pay no income tax

Washington – Because of all the tax credits and exemptions, deductions and other breaks built into tax laws, only 45% of U.S. households pay any income tax at all.

According to the IRS, the average income tax rate for all taxpayers fell from 9.9% to 9.3% in recent years.

Of the 400 highest adjusted gross incomes in the nation, the highest rate was 17%, down from 26% in 1992.

The tax code is filled with $1.1 trillion in credits, deductions and exemptions, according to the IRS – an average of $8,000 per taxpayer.

GE will pay $0 in taxes on $14.2 billion worldwide profits

With its far-flung operations pumping in billions in profits - $14.2 billion in 2010 – General Electric faces a tax burden of nothing.

Zip. Goose egg. Zilch. Nada.

In terms of its American tax bill, the corporation benefits from a $3.2 billion break, at which it arrived through the sophisticated services of its corporate tax department – acknowledged as the best in the business.

According to filings on its Japanese operations, made just prior to the earthquake disaster, its American tax burden is 7.4 percent of its profits – but only if it brings the funds back into the American economy. Leave the dough in foreign banks or in offshore securities and the result is the same as nothing.

Though GE is the biggest and the best at what it does to avoid taxes, it's not alone.

According to a report published in “The New York Times,” corporate share of the nation's tax receipts have fallen from 30 percent of all federal revenue in the mid-1950's to 6.6 percent in 2009.

President Barack Obama believes in the myth that American taxes are so high, multinationals have to seek their profits overseas that he has appointed G.E.'s chief executive, Jeffrey R. Immelt, to head a commission studying ways to make the nation more competitive by lowering corporate taxes even more.

General Electric is the contractor at the Japanese nuclear power plant which exploded and burned following an earthquake there last month. Radiation levels in seawater that cools the plant are millions of times higher than normal as a result.

Conflict Between 2 Tea Parties Continues On Tax Day

Belton – The parking lot wasn't big enough to suit Central Texas Conservatives Chairman Elwood Smith.

He ordered Belton police to confront Central Texas Tea Party activist R.S. Gates to take his clipboard and get outside the building to collect names and e-mail addresses of people who think they've been taxed enough already (T.E.A.).

Mr. Gates, an ex-police officer who still holds a state certification as such, promptly went outside, where Mr. Smith confronted him again.

He said it was illegal to organize voters and potential supporters outside the Bell County Expo Center – anywhere on the property.

When Mr. Gates told Mr. Smith he didn't think that is illegal, Mr. Smith reportedly said he would call the local gens d-armes to explain it to him.

They arrived and said he could not solicit information on the massive sidewalks that surround the expo center's dome and exhibition hall.

He would have to stand in the parking lot. He did so.

Mr. Gates did much better in his operation than did the purveyors of red T-shirts and balloons for the Central Texas Tea Party.

They were forced to set up shop across the road from the Expo Center.

The two factions are part of the same April 15 Tax Day movement now three years old and responsible for sweeping liberal Democrats from the U.S. House of Representatives in the 2010 mid-term elections.

The difference is in their allegiance to the traditional values of the Republican Party.

The Central Texas Tea Party, led by former U.S. Army Colonel Wes Riddle, a West Point grad and Oxford University-trained historian, is up for change from the grass roots up, adherence to conservative concepts of fiscal responsibility, constitutionally limited government, and free markets.

The Central Texas Conservatives have formed in reaction to what is perceived and has been stated by no less a luminary than Dick Armey, former Republican Congressman from Irving, as a hostile takeover of the GOP.

Their backing comes from traditional vertically integrated petroleum and energy industrial forces. As do other member organizations of the Tea Party Patriots, they favor a top-down management style.

Local officials estimated the attendance at the April 15 Tax Day rally in the hundreds.

The Expo Center has a capacity of nearly 7,000 seats.

The floggings will continue until morale improves!

- The Legendary