President Obama, When It Comes to Human Rights, We Need More Action, Not Words
By Jamil Dakwar | ACLU | March 2, 2016
The Obama administration this week made new pledges and commitments to protect “human rights and fundamental freedoms” to the United Nations in advance of the U.S. re-election to the U.N. Human Rights Council. Yet while the U.S. has used its first six years of HRC membership to advance human rights overseas, its participation has had little direct bearing on human rights at home. Lack of accountability for torture and cooperation with U.N. human rights experts are just two examples of such double standards.
When he took office, President Obama promised to disavow many of the disastrous Bush administration policies, including by closing Guantánamo and ending the use of torture. Obama also promised to reassert U.S. global leadership on human rights by joining the HRC later that year.
While the president issued an executive order on his second day in office ending the CIA’s secret detention and torture program, he declined to support any meaningful measures of accountability for crimes that had taken place. His policy of “looking forward rather than backward,” as well as his administration’s continuing fight against transparency and any attempts to reveal the whole truth about Bush administration torture policies, will undoubtedly stain his human rights legacy.
That’s why it was surprising when the U.S. government released the following statement earlier this week:
“The United States is committed to upholding our international obligations to prevent torture and cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment. The United States supports the work of the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture and the Committee Against Torture, and in 2015, the United States was proud to become a participant in the Group of Friends of the Convention Against Torture Initiative.”
This kind of rhetoric is emblematic of the Obama administration’s hypocrisy and cherry-picking when it comes to U.S. international legal obligations. The U.S. is obligated under the Convention Against Torture not only to prevent torture and cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment. It is also obligated to hold accountable those who ordered or perpetrated acts of torture and to provide legal redress to victims. On these fronts, our government’s record has been abysmal. Yesterday Human Rights Watch and the ACLU submitted a response to the U.S. one year follow-up report to the U.N. Committee Against Torture, which details the United States’ failure to meet its legal obligations to fully investigate acts of torture during the Bush administration.
When it comes to torture, the gap between rhetoric and action isn’t limited to the Bush administration’s record. While it is encouraging to see the U.S. expressing support for the U.N. Special Rapporteur on Torture, consider the ways the U.S. has directly prevented this critically important institution from effectively doing its job.
The current special rapporteur on torture, Juan Mendez, is about to end his six-year term. Since the early days of his mandate, he has repeatedly asked to visit U.S. prisons and detention facilities in order to examine the widespread use of solitary confinement, which often causes mental and physical suffering and can amount to cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment — even torture. However, the U.S. has consistently stonewalled his requests and has so far failed to provide him with the minimum standards of access required by U.N. protocol for such visits. It is very likely that Mr. Mendez won’t be able to carry out his visit before the end of his term, which is exactly what the U.S. likely intended in delaying and dragging out the process. It’s simply outrageous that the United States won’t provide basic access to its domestic detention facilities, especially given that the U.S. is perhaps the only Western democracy that doesn’t have a permanent and independent monitoring system of all detention facilities.
American leadership on the world stage suffers when the country presents such a stark double standard on human rights and denies independent human rights monitors access to U.S. facilities abroad, like Guantánamo, and here in the United States.
This coming November, the U.S. will be on the ballot for a new three-year-term membership in the U.N. Human Rights Council. The Obama administration has another opportunity to demonstrate to the world that U.S. commitment to the universal prohibition against torture is serious and long-lasting. By upholding U.S. human rights obligations through action in addition to rhetoric, the Obama administration can send a strong message to future presidents that there will be consequences for breaking the law and more effectively press other governments to end torture abroad.
Russia working on ways to protect its internet due to US online dominance – Com. Minister to RT
RT | March 2, 2016
The US government and a handful of corporations working under US jurisdiction have a disproportionately strong influence on the internet. So other countries are mulling ways to protect their web sectors, the Russian communications minister told RT.
“Today, if you have a look at the whole IT global system, you will see that the whole world… is actually totally dominated by a single country and literally by several companies, which have practically monopolized the entire IT system,” Nikolay Nikiforov said.
The issue is not only about market shares of tech giants such as Google and Facebook, but also about the US government’s control of critical elements of the internet’s infrastructure, he said.
One small example is the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), which assigns internet domain names. In 2014, the US pledged to hand over control over it from the US Department of Communications to a multi-stakeholder collective, which would include governments, companies, international organizations and individual users. The transition was scheduled to happen in September last year, but was postponed for at least a year.
“This didn’t happen for some reason, and many reasons were voiced. I believe them to be pretty far-fetched,” Nikiforov said.
“With this prolonged monopolization, many countries in the world are working on technical solutions that would protect national segments of the internet from a possible external destructive action. They are creating backup infrastructures, which respond to a disruption – intentional or accidental – and prevent national segments from being blocked,” he added.
The minister said Russia is among the countries heavily investing in the internet and naturally wants to protect this investment.
The issue is not theoretical for Russia. As part of the US-imposed sanctions, several American companies suspended their services in Crimea, which seceded from Ukraine in response to an armed coup in Kiev and rejoined with Russia. Washington called the move illegal and targeted individuals and some sectors of the Russian economy with sanctions.
Google, Apple, PayPal and others cut Crimea from their services. This affected tens of thousands of people, who could no longer properly update the software for their phones, buy apps, use electronic payments for online products and do other basic things.
The minister was speaking in Egypt, which he is visiting to foster business ties. He said Russia and Egypt have agreed to have mobile operators to cut down roaming tariffs, which would benefit Russian tourists visiting the North-African country.
“It’s no secret that overpriced roaming is the reason why many travelers simply don’t use their phones abroad. We are trying to make this problem go away for Egypt and Russia,” he said.
The agreement indicates that Russia may soon lift restrictions on flights to Egypt, which were imposed after a terrorist bomb last October destroyed a plane carrying Russian tourists home from Egyptian resorts.
Mental health professionals protest decision to hold conference in Jerusalem
MEMO | March 2, 2016
Over 140 psychotherapists, researchers and other mental health professionals have written an open letter to the Society for Psychotherapy Research (SPR) to express dismay at its decision to hold its next international conference in Jerusalem.
In the letter, the group of professionals called for the conference to move locations, explaining that Israel’s policies in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, including house demolitions, movement restrictions and imprisonment without trial, result in “insecurity, despair, helplessness and humiliation”.
“The calamitous impact of Israel’s occupation on the psychological health of the Palestinians is well documented,” read the letter.
The group expressed shock over the organiser’s response to their concerns, which included a promise to assist Palestinian psychotherapy researchers to attend the conference.
“This may ease SPR consciences but it is as nothing weighed against the political message they will be sending by meeting in this beleaguered city,” it added.
Former Colombia President Alvaro Uribe’s Brother Arrested for Links to Death Squads
teleSUR | February 29, 2016
The brother of former Colombian President Alvro Uribe was arrested Monday accused of having ties with paramilitaries — also known as death squads — in the country as well as other crimes.
Santiago Uribe Velez was arrested in the coastal city of Medellin by officials from the attorney general’s office, who have long been monitoring the former president’s brother.
Velez is accused of forming and developing the paramilitary group known as “Los Doce Apostoles” (The Twelve Apostles) in the 1990s.
According to testimony by officials in the municipality of Yarumal in Velez’ home state of Antioquia, Velez was among a group of farmers who had the idea of forming an armed group to protect traders who were victims of extortion in the region.
The group then created an armed paramilitary unit in the 1990’s that committed various crimes, with the complicity of the Antioquia police department.
Juan Carlos Meneses, chief of police for Yarumal, said that when he arrived to the region in 1993, there was “a group of people doing cleaning, or social cleansing, or disappeared people who identify themselves as guerrillas, as thieves, as kidnappers, extortionists or even if they only had a vice, or vices. The only thing you have to do is, when that group goes to do a job, you have to collaborate with them.”
Meneses added that he would “collaborate” by giving Velez a sum of money every month and pointed out that Velez’ group had the full support of the state and national authorities, reported Colombian daily El Espectador.
While Uribe was president (2002-2010), his administration was tarnished by scandals. This included accusations of housing death squad members at his ranch in the 1980s — some of the most violent times in the country — when he was governor of Antioquia. He was accused of maintaining those ties while leading the country.
Paramilitary groups targeted not only guerrilla fighters, but also political opponents, left-wing activists, as well as academics and have been found guilty of committing numerous human rights abuses.
Even though these groups were technically demobilized between 2003-2006 under an agreement with the government, they continue to be a strong force across the country.
Human rights groups have long demanded that Uribe clarify his role, if any, in the formation of paramilitary groups. However, he has denied all allegations and continues to be active in politics, serving as a senator for the Center Democratic party.
Mayor: Israeli forces assault entire family during al-Issawiya raid
Ma’an – February 29, 2016
JERUSALEM – Israeli forces physically assaulted an entire family in the occupied East Jerusalem village of al-Issawiya overnight Sunday after the family resisted during an arrest raid, the head of the village said.
Darwish Darwish said Israeli forces stormed the home of Tareq and Tahreer Darwish with the intention of detaining the couple’s sons Yousef, 18, and Laith, 17.
The two teens, along with their father, resisted the detention, and Israeli forces attacked the three, beating them.
Darwish said the family told him that when Israeli forces began beating the father and two brothers, other members of the family stepped in and tried to stop Israeli forces, who then turned on the rest of the family.
According to the mayor, the mother, Tahreer, 37, her daughter, Batoul, 14, and 2-year-old son Darwish all suffered from bruises and lacerations all over their bodies.
Israeli forces detained the entire family, including the toddler, after the assault. The family was detained while still barefoot and in pajamas, the mayor said.
Darwish added that Israeli forces ransacked the family home, destroying valuables, before taking the family to a police station in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood of occupied East Jerusalem, and then transferring them to the Salah al-Din police station near Damascus Gate.
After four hours of detention, Israeli forces released the mother and her young son, but kept the rest of the family, including the 14-year-old daughter, under detention.
The 17-year-old son Laith is set to appear in Israeli court for a trial on Monday. The charges levied against him are unknown.
While the mayor shares a last name with the family, Darwish is one of the most popular surnames in al-Issawiya village, and the family is not necessarily directly related to the mayor.
The right to own property — for Jews alone
A central problem of the implementation of the Levy Report by the government is the effective abolishment of Palestinians’ property rights
Jewish settlers run towards the West Bank village of Asira al-Qibilya near Nablus during clashes with Palestinian villagers July 3, 2011. According to witnesses, the clashes erupted after the settlers cut down olive trees belonging to the village. An Israeli army spokesperson said one Israeli was injured by a rock before security forces dispersed the crowd. REUTERS/Abed Omar Qusini – WEST BANK
By Yossi Gurvitz | Yesh Din | February 28, 2016
Our previous post on Yesh Din’s new position paper, “From Occupation to Annexation,” explored the various ways the Israeli government implements the Levy Report. This post will focus on another critical point: the erasure of the Palestinians’ right to property.
Prior to the Levy Report, the Israeli government was careful to avoid legalizing the seizure of private Palestinian property, except when it could argue it was done due to pressing military needs (“military seizure”) or by declaring it state land and claiming that it was never, in fact, private property at all. This took place, in part, because the laws of occupation demand that the occupier protect the private property of protected persons in occupied territory. The legal appeals against the illegal outposts, about 80% of which are at least partially built on private Palestinian land, challenged this way of thinking.
And then came the Levy Report, which claimed the government has the right to build settlements and outposts in the West Bank. On paper this claim may have been harmless, had its implementation not directly threatened the property of private persons.
Let’s look at some examples. The future of the Adei Ad outpost – which was at the heart of another one of our reports, “The Road to Dispossession” – is being debated by the High Court of Justice. The report detailed how Israeli civilians took over private Palestinian land while using violence against Palestinian residents who tried to hold on to their land, all while the Israeli authorities stood aside. Although the report was published in 2013, the reality it describes continues even today.
As our position paper shows, the Israeli government relies on Levy’s exceedingly broad legal interpretation to legalize a series of illegal outposts, under the pretense they are in fact neighborhoods of already existing settlements – even when they are outside the jurisdiction of their “mother settlement.” Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked even boasted that “anyone who knows the Adei Ad [appeal], knows that the state responds differently these days.”
Therefore the state informed the High Court that although the outpost was illegal, it does not intend to remove it. On the contrary, it announced that it would try and legalize it. In practice, then, what Shaked meant to say was that “we decided to give criminals a prize.”
If the state told the court in 2008 that it – some day — intends to enforce the law and evacuate the outposts, its position had radically changed by 2011. Now, said the state, it will enforce the law only vis-a-vis structures built on private land, while legalizing structures built on state land. The Levy Report came out in 2012; by 2013, the state was telling the courts that in some cases “state reasons” may supersede the need to enforce the law. By 2015, the state spoke expressly about retroactive legalization.
Another case that represents the erasure of Palestinian property rights is that of Amona. Amona is the largest illegal settlement outpost in the West Bank – a significant part of the land on which it stands belongs to Palestinian residents, whose theft was followed by violence against the Palestinians. In court, the state opposed the evacuation of Amona time after time. At the end of 2014, the High Court of Justice ruled that Amona was to be evacuated by the end of 2016. So what did the government do? Did it accept the ruling and follow the instructions of the court? Of course not. It tried to bypass the court through a new bill titled the “re-ordering bill.”
This law follows one of the comments made in the Levy Report, according to which compensation for Palestinians whose land has been taken from them is preferable to evacuating the invaders. Once it can be proven that an outpost was illegally built on Palestinian land, the Palestinian owners would be forced to accept compensation and give up their rights to their own property.
According to the Levy Report, therefore, all people are equal before the law, but some are more equal. You own land? Jewish invaders took it with government aid? We won’t evacuate them, we simply legalize the invasion. Here are your 30 pieces of silver. Oh, you don’t want to take them because you’re afraid of living next to Israelis who have already proven their affinity for violence? You won’t take the silver because you don’t want to take part in Jewish expansion over parts of Palestine? Tough. Your property rights are secondary to our historical rights. Do yourself and us a favor and take the money, because, you see, this outpost won’t be removed. It will remain here whether you like it or not. The court ruled otherwise? We’ll try and change the law. What about your rights? What rights?
The bill currently names three outposts and a part of a settlement – three outposts that the court had already ordered be removed, and one whose case is still debated. Amona is mentioned specifically as an outpost covered by the bill. Politicians are not even trying to conceal the fact the point of the bill is to prevent the High Court from slowing down the violation of Palestinian rights. Just in case, the bill – which has been frozen for the time being – allows other outposts to be added to it even after it passes.
The state’s responses to the court and the “re-ordering bill” deal outposts whose fate were either ruled on by the High Court or are still being debated. But the government ministers, being people of vision, take care not only of the past and present but also of the future. The “re-ordering committee,” created by Prime Minister Netanyahu, is supposed to provide other solutions, as it has a mandate to “examine the current process of evidence needed for proof of land ownership.” To put it more bluntly: its purpose is to make it even more difficult for them to prove they are landowners. The purpose of the committee is to create “an outline for the legalizing of structures and neighborhoods in Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria that were built with the support of the authorities.”
The Israeli government never authorized the Levy Report’s recommendations while effectively endorsing and carrying them out in secret. The government implements an unofficial policy of annexation – one that does not grant equal rights to those being annexed, while at the same time depriving them of the legal defenses they are entitled to as protected persons, since, allegedly, there is no occupation.
As for the people who live there? It’s their own problem. They should have lived someplace else. Didn’t they get the hint already?
Five reasons why the TTIP talks are looking a bit wobbly
By Guy Taylor | TruePublica | February 26, 2016
The twelfth round of negotiations for TTIP, the biggest trade deal of them all, started this week in Brussels. The impacts of TTIP are disturbing and well documented elsewhere on this site, but we are seeing signs of panic setting in on the pro-TTIP side of the fence. They’re right to panic.
1) TTIP is hugely behind schedule. It should have been signed off by now, and well into the ‘legal scrubbing’ stage where the lawyers tie up the legal loose ends and smooth of the rough edges. These negotiations are not open ended. Every delay, every extra month taken up at this stage is a threat to the entire project. We have the US elections looming, two of the frontrunners are against the new generation trade deals like TTIP and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). There is no secret about the desperation of the Obama machine as they try to get the deal done and signed off before he vacates the White House at the end of the year. Obama is due to visit Germany in April to plead with all concerned to get a move on with the project. It is not impossible for the ratification vote in the European parliament to be held in 2019, after the next elections. That would make ratification in Europe very uncertain indeed.
2) There is a huge crisis over the proposals of corporate courts or ‘ISDS’ as it is often known. As the most contentious part of TTIP, it has attracted huge criticism and upset amongst members of the European parliament and in the public domain as well. In 2014, 150,000 responded to a European consultation on the issue and 97% of those responses were very negative. Since then, the trade commissioner in Brussels has dreamt up the Investor Court System as a proposed alternative. It has been made very clear that ICS is not alternative, more a repackaging of the dangerously flawed ISDS. Earlier this month,the largest association of German Judges completely slammed the ICS idea as undemocratic and undermining the sovereignty of domestic courts. Slowly, our representatives in Brussels are beginning to realise this. We need to keep shouting about this
3) You might have noticed, but there is going to be a referendum on membership of the EU in the UK in June. Everything is up for grabs. If the UK votes to leave the EU, TTIP will probably still apply to us. In the horse-trading and arguments that will rage between now and the day of the vote, there will be concessions and deals struck – maybe, just maybe, TTIP could become a casualty. And in the run up to the referendum, the very idea of Brussels politicians signing off on such a far-reaching corporate power grab is adding a whole lot of fuel to the Brexit fire.
4) Procurement at all levels of government, both sides of the Atlantic is proving to be a sticking point. The EU wants access to state level procurement in the US – that’s a huge market to access. And at country level in the EU there’s an almost equally lucrative market to exploit for US corporations. The trouble is, this isn’t a deal being negotiated at state or nation state level. The US Trade Representative and the DG Trade in Europe are doing their utmost to keep scrutiny and influence at that level to a minimum, but agreeing stuff that is essential to their underlings at local level is part and parcel of TTIP and is inflaming opposition. Local authorities across the EU and in the UK are declaring their opposition to TTIP and CETA. In the States, there’s a similar move afoot. It was recently announced that the EU and USA were going to swap procurement market access offers at the end of this month and then hold a special intercessional meeting to discuss them.
5) And finally, one thing that cannot be ignored, is the growing movement of ordinary people across the EU & the US gaining knowledge and understanding about the deals (despite the best efforts of our governments and media). From the 3.2 million people who signed their opposition in the European Citizens’ Initiative last year, to the trade unions and community organisations saying ‘no’ to the deals, we are building a force that will be hard to resist. We can win this fight if we continue to step up the pressure.
More atglobaljustice.org.uk
Israeli settlers escorted by army raid village in Salfit district
Ma’an – February 27, 2016
SALFIT – A group of Israeli settlers escorted by Israeli military forces raided the village of Yasuf in the northern West Bank district of Salfit on Saturday.
The head of the Yasuf village council, Hafith Ebayya, said that a group of Israeli settlers raided the village and attempted to enter the al-Basatin area in central Yasuf.
Ebayya said that the settlers were escorted by military vehicles and soldiers, and that a military checkpoint was set up at the entrance of the village.
Clashes erupted between dozens of Palestinian youths and Israeli forces.
Israeli forces fired live bullets, rubber-coated steel bullets and tear gas at youths and several farmers who were in their fields nearby.
Several youths and farmers suffered from tear gas inhalation.
An Israeli army spokesperson told Ma’an they were looking into the report.
Three quarters of Yasuf’s lands are located in Area C — under full Israeli military and administrative control. According to a report by the Applied Research Institute-Jerusalem (ARIJ), over the years, some 602 dunams (148.7 acres) of Yasuf land have been seized to establish settlement housing.
Several Israeli settlements are located near Yasuf, including Ariel, the fourth largest settlement in the West Bank. These settlements in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem are illegal under international law.
Palestinian activist Rasmea Odeh Has Conviction Thrown Out
Palestinian activist Rasmea Odeh | Photo: Justice 4 Rasmea
teleSUR – February 26, 2016
A U.S. appellate court on Thursday vacated the conviction of Palestinian activist Rasmea Odeh for allegedly lying on U.S. immigration papers 20 years earlier.
Odeh, 67, was put on trial in November 2014 for allegedly falsifying immigration documents when she first entered the U.S.. Odeh had denied ever having been “charged, convicted or imprisoned for a crime,” but the government maintained that she lied as she had been convicted in an Israeli military court for allegedly bombing a supermarket.
Odeh said she was subjected to torture and rape by Israeli interrogators and forced to sign a false confession.
The U.S. federal appeals court panel ruled that Odeh’s sentencing judge had improperly excluded testimony about the psychological trauma Odeh suffered while in Israeli military custody.
“The court’s decision presents a great victory to anti-torture advocates and survivors of torture,” said the Center for Constitutional Rights in a press release.
Odeh’s case will now return to the district judge for a possible retrial.
During Obama’s Presidency Wealth Inequality has Increased and Poverty Levels are Higher
By Rick Baum | CounterPunch | February 26, 2016
Troubling and significant statistics produced by the government indicate important facts about our political system and its priorities. Unfortunately, these statistics often get little coverage in the media. What coverage is provided usually only focuses on the current year and might include comparison with the previous year.
Two such sets of government statistics cover wealth distribution and poverty. These statistics have a margin of error and do not account for the up and down fluctuations in the economy nor changing historical conditions or limitations of what any president can do.
What is perhaps most critical are the trends. These trends show that wealth has become more concentrated and more people are deemed by the government to be poor.
Wealth Inequality
Below are government figures that show the trend of growing wealth inequality.1
Share of Total Net Worth by Percentile of Wealth Owners, 1989-2013
These figures show that during the presidencies of Bush Sr., Clinton, G. W. Bush, and Obama so far, a greater portion of the nation’s wealth has become more concentrated in the hands of the rich as indicated by the share of wealth held by the top 1%. From 1989 to 2010, it increased from 30.1% to 34.5% and, under another methodology, to 36.6% in 2013.
From 1989 to 2013, the share of the top 10% went from 67.2% to 75.2% or from slightly over 2/3 to more than 3/4 of the nations’ total wealth. This means that from 1989 to 2013, the drop in the share of wealth held by the bottom 90% went from 32.9%, almost a third, to 24.8%, less than one-fourth.
Even more striking is that from 1995 to 2013, the poorest half of the population, after experiencing its share of the nation’s wealth peaking in 1995 at 3.6%, underwent a more than 2/3 decline in their portion. It fell in 2013 to a paltry 1.05% of all wealth.
Despite the last few years of “recovery,” the share of wealth held by the bottom 50% of the U.S. population declined from 1.15% in 2010 to 1.05% in 2013. This is less than half of where it stood in 2007, before the great recession, when the share of the country’s wealth held by the poorest 50% of the population was at 2.5%.
In 2008, Obama spoke of hope for a better future. If the wealthy hoped for a greater share of the nation’s wealth, their hope was fulfilled while the wealth conditions of most everyone else have declined.
These changes in wealth holdings were clearly described by Federal Reserve Board head Janet Yellen who began a speech on October 17, 2014 noting:
“The distribution of income and wealth in the United States has been widening more or less steadily for several decades… This trend paused during the Great Recession because of larger wealth losses for those at the top of the distribution and because increased safety-net spending helped offset some income losses for those below the top. But widening inequality resumed in the recovery…” (emphasis added). 2
This widening inequality and greater concentration at the top was presumably more pronounced after 2013 when the value of the stock market rose with the Dow Jones Industrial Average reaching its peak at over $18,300 in May of 2015. Today, wealth inequality is probably back to where it was in 2013 since the stock market has recently gone down to 2013 levels.
Poverty
While wealth inequality has increased, the number of people living in poverty has also generally increased. Below are figures from 1981 to 2014 for the number of people deemed to be poor and their percentage of the population.3 This percentage has been 15% or higher for three years of Obama’s presidency, from 2010-2012. It had reached that level only three other times since 1981.
These numbers show that the rate of poverty since 1981 was lowest in 2000 at 11.3%. During the time George W. Bush was president, with exceptions, it steadily increased from 11.7% in 2001 to 13.2% in 2008. 5 As might be expected, the rate increased during the great recession peaking at 15.1% in 2010.
As of 2014, some six years after the beginning of the recession and during a period of “recovery,” the rate of poverty remains high at 14.8%. In fact, according to these government statistics, the rate of poverty for every year Obama has been president is higher than it was for every year during George W. Bush’s presidency.
The percent of people below 125% of the official poverty rate has also been higher every year under Obama than during Bush’s presidency, and has been over 19% every year from 2010 through 2014. The highest level it reached under Bush was during the start of the recession in 2008 when it was at 17.9%.
What is most disturbing is the percent of the population living in extreme poverty, or having an income at 50% or lower than the poverty level.5 Every year that Obama has been president, the percent of the population at that level of income has been over 6% and, as of 2014, consisted of over 20 million people. When George W. Bush was president, the percent was always under 6%. The last time it was over 6% was during the first year of the Clinton presidency. 6
Even the record during Reagan’s presidency may be viewed as more favorable than Obama’s. During the time Reagan was president, the official rate of poverty peaked at 15.2% in 1983. Thereafter, it gradually declined to 13.0% in 1988.7 By contrast, the rate of poverty during Obama’s time in office has always been more than 14.3% and was 14.8% in 2014, or almost 2% higher than it was at the end of Reagan’s presidency.
A quip that was made about Reagan is that he liked poor people so much that he acted to increase their numbers. During his first three years, the poverty rate and the number of people deemed to be impoverished increased, reaching its peak in 1983. Thereafter, from 1983 to the end of Reagan’s presidency in 1988, the number of people deemed to be poor declined by over 3.5 million ending at slightly below the total during the first year of his presidency.
In contrast to the record of Reagan’s presidency, during the time Obama has been president and statistics are available, 2009-2014, the population has grown by 11.98 million. This is close to its growth for the last six years of Reagan’s presidency. Yet, the number of people deemed to be living in poverty has not declined, but has increased by more than 3 million. For comparison, see this table extrapolated from previous figures:
If, in 2008, one hoped for the presence of more poor people and for a greater concentration of wealth in the hands of the rich, so far, during Obama’s presidency, these hopes have been fulfilled. They will presumably continue were a Republican elected president. Should one also expect more of the same from Hillary Clinton who wants to build “on the progress the president has made,” or Bernie Sanders who thinks Obama “has done an excellent job?”8
Footnotes
1. Wealth is the value of what one possesses minus what is owed. Unlike income, it is not subject to a yearly tax. It is also distributed more unequally than income. See the last tables in the links at the end of this footnote.
see page 4 in An Analysis of the Distribution of Wealth Across Households at https://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/RL33433.pdf and
For 2013, a figure for the top 1% is not provided. See the next two sites.
http://www.federalreserve.gov/pubs/bulletin/2014/articles/scf/accessible.htm#box3figA
another table with historical trends: see Figure 3 at: It is source for bottom 50% figure of 1.15% in 2010 and 1.05% in 2013. http://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/speech/95BF8144CFB24C649FAEF51B056738B9.htm
The source for the 2013 figures for the top 1% and the 90-98.9% whose figures from 1989-2010 are slightly different are in Table A1C on page 34 at: http://www.federalreserve.gov/econresdata/feds/2015/files/2015058pap.pdf
According to one study, as of 2012, the top .01% of the population or about 16,070 families whose average wealth is about $371 million, possess 11.2% of all wealth and the top .1% possess about 22% of all of the country’s wealth. See table 1 at the end of the paper after references at: http://gabriel-zucman.eu/files/SaezZucman2016QJE.pdf
Figure 1 in the same location shows the share of wealth holdings of the top .1% from 1913-2012. It was below 10% in 1989 which means it more than doubled during the subsequent years.
For income inequality see https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2015/demo/p60-252.html tables:
Income Distribution Measures Using Money Income and Equivalence Adjusted Income: 2013 and 2014 [PDF – 46k] and
Selected Measures of Household Income Dispersion: 1967 to 2014 [PDF – 402k]
2. http://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/speech/yellen20141017a.htm
3. https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2015/demo/p60-252.html see table under Poverty title
Impact on Poverty of Alternative Resource Measure by Age: 1981 to 2014
Those with income at 125% of poverty rate see https://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/data/historical/people.html
Table 6. People Below 125 Percent of Poverty Level and the Near Poor
Those with income at 50% of poverty rate see
Table 22. Number of People Below 50 Percent of Poverty Level
Noteworthy about poverty in the U.S. is that in 2014, 21.1% or 15.5 million children under 18 years of age were deemed impoverished by the government, and some 6.8 million of them lived at one-half the official poverty rate. The rate of poverty among Blacks (26.2%) and those who are “Hispanic any race” (23.6%) is much higher than that of the general population. See https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2015/demo/p60-252.html see tables under Poverty title
People and Families in Poverty by Selected Characteristics: 2013 and 2014 and People With Income Below Specified Ratios of Their Poverty Thresholds by Selected Characteristics
4. see https://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/data/historical/people.html
Table 1. Weighted Average Poverty Thresholds for Families of Specified Sizes
5. During the Clinton administration, the rate of poverty and the number of people deemed to be poor remained high as both steadily declined.
During the Clinton years and continuing thereafter, wealth became more concentrated at the top in part due to the dot-com boom and from policies enacted including NAFTA, the repeal of
Glass Steagell and reduced taxes on some forms of investment income.
6. A single person with a level of income at 50% of the poverty threshold lives on less than $17/day. A couple would be having to get by on less than $22/day.
7. The rate and number of people living in poverty increased during all four years of the presidency of Bush Sr.
8. Clinton quote: see http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/hillary-clinton-i-want-build-obama-era-progress
Sanders quote at: http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/05/us/politics/democratic-debate.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news
Rick Baum teaches Political Science at City College of San Francisco.
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New Book
The silver that medicine dropped — four thousand years of clinical use, four decades to erase.
Colloidal Silver — First Edition, 2026, Paperback
Lies are Unbekoming | October 16, 2026
Silver was medicine. Not alternative medicine. Not folk medicine. Medicine. In surgery. In obstetrics. In the burn ward. In water treatment. In the household medicine chest. Every physician before 1938 knew this.
By the 1870s, silver nitrate was standard in surgical wound care across the leading hospitals of Britain, Germany, and the United States. Colloidal silver preparations — Collargol, Argyrol, Protargol — entered European and American practice through the 1890s and early 1900s and became standard antiseptics in military field medicine. By the time Fleming grew his first penicillin mould in 1928, silver was the first-line antimicrobial of the Western pharmacopoeia. The Lancet and the British Medical Journal carried the clinical reports in volume. The practice ran continuously through the Victorian era, the Edwardian era, the First World War, the interwar period. By 1980, almost all of it was gone.
What has not been treated at book length, until now, is how a four-thousand-year clinical record disappeared from mainstream medicine within four decades of the Flexner Report — and what the honest account of silver looks like once that record is reassembled.
Colloidal Silver reconstructs the pre-1938 record from The Lancet, the British Medical Journal, and the primary literature of the era; recovers Robert Becker’s bioelectric framework from the regeneration research the pharmaceutical model buried; and places silver inside a practical terrain-paradigm guide to its current place — in water, on the body, inside the body, and in the chronic conditions where antibiotics have failed. … continue
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