I've noticed lately that on certain social media websites, particularly Reddit and Facebook, there has been an uptick in articles about fake hate crimes and false rape reports. The comments on these articles especially fan the flames on the subjects of homophobia, racism, and sexism. While the articles themselves are still noteworthy and deserving of attention, the amount of attention that they've been receiving has been disproportionately high (especially when considering how fairly unknown the individuals involved are) and the discourse on those articles particularly divisive.

On top of that, there are clear disinformation campaigns going on to attack current Democratic presidential candidates in the U.S. It seems pretty clear that we're having a repeat of the last presidential election, with outside parties stoking the flames of discrimination and disinformation on social media in order to further ideological divisions, and the consumers of that media readily falling for it.

I would caution readers to be mindful of the shifting representation of historically controversial or contentious topics moving forward. Even if the articles themselves are solidly factual, take note of how frequently you're seeing these articles, whether or not they're known to be contentious topics, and how they're affecting online discourse.

In short: make sure that you can still smell bullshit even when it's dressed up in pretty little facts.

In the US the tax rate on the bottom 78% of earners taxes was less than 7%

England has a tax rate for the same income of 11.5%

The top 6% (Avg Adjusted Gross income 514,000) paid $840 Billion of the income taxes

The Bottom 49.1% (Earning less than 45k AGI) paid $97 Billion of taxes, but 27.4 Million Households filled for $66.7 Billion in EIC tax credits

If the taxes on the bottom 78 percent were increased 6% to a level similar to England the USA could have universal health care

The US Spends 3.4 Trillion on Healthcare.

Just 5% of Americans Account for 50% of U.S. Health Care Spending. So taking away the top 5% means the US spends about 5,500 per person. More than UK, but with a long term approach we can tackle that.

1. Saying no to covering all issues. See above. Total cost down to 1.8T

2. Accepting a tax increase

• Doubling the Medicare withholding will provide 500B
• Down to 1.3T

1. Reallocate state spending In 2015, state governments across the country spent a combined $605 billion on health care

• Down to 700 Billion

1. Increase taxes 6% across the board, like those of countries that provide healthcare. 600B in Funding

• Down to 100 Billion

1. 1/3 of expenses in 2017 was payable for hospital room rentals and 21% was to doctor's office billable hours

• Increase utilization to make hospitals & Doctors more efficient so cost can be cut
• 1% reduction in billable hours and room rates Down 100B
• Adjust pricing based on cost savings
• Repeat

If the US had higher taxes for gas we could have a better Infastructure. Using rough math we in 2017 underfunded the highway dept about $21.5 billion

• 40 Cents per Gallon vs 18.4 cents currently
• 33 Cents vs 17.5 cents for Highway maintenance at fully funded for at least the next 5 years
  * 1 Cent vs 0.9 cents Gas Safety and storage. Round it up to a full penny better saftey funds for better clean up
  * 4 cents a new Green energy tax for Green projects
• 2 Cent New Metro Projects tax

$5.5 Billion annual funding for projects, plus using funding not going to covering the underfunded highway dept means who doesn't want to announce a 10 year $250 Billion Green Deal Project. Get States to match it 40/60 and its a $600 Billion Project

$96 a person more and With this Major Cities can tackle major projects and Rural cities can apply for the Metro Funding. $1.5 Billion each state gets on average can be applied however but that's encouraging moving to a Green plan.

The U.S. combined gas tax rate (State + Federal) is According to data from the OECD, is the second lowest (Mexico is the only country without a gas tax).

The average gas tax rate among the 34 advanced economies is $2.62 per gallon. In fact, the U.S.’s gas tax a rate less than half of that of the next highest country, Canada, which has a rate of $1.25 per gallon.

We want to have the European advanced economy of our peers but we arent wanting to pay for it

I think we can all (generally!) agree that the right-wing is too easy of a target here, and most of us seem to be left-ish. So, waves, what's leftism currently doing wrong, or on track to start doing wrong?