We keep hearing the Economy is Strong, but Economic Conditions for many are Dire…For now & into the future on the economy, this article inside the link below expresses not just a problem, it is the problem. It even goes so far as to say the problem is so profound that it will only be solved by essentially throwing out the long-standing economic policies of both parties. And this difficult issue is not just unique to America, as we’re also witnessing the anger break out among allied nations like France & Britain. Too many workers just can’t find footing in this modern economy, as lots of jobs are dead-end & couldn’t pay the bills. The fundamental economic conditions we’re facing with work & careers can never be solved until we find a way to figure out this daunting challenge: problem-with-work-ai-robots-automation-oren-cass.
A Dysfunctional Government Largely Responsible for Our Uncertain Economic Conditions
And irresponsible & thoughtless fiscal policies aren’t helping things. Workers still aren’t making up lost ground with their paychecks despite there being lots of jobs out there available, while our skyrocketing deficits don’t position us well for the future or the next crisis, as seen in excerpts from broken-washington-called-threat-to-us-economy:
A decade after the financial crisis wiped out the home values and retirement savings of millions of Americans, the U.S. faces a new risk to the economy — Washington dysfunction — and has too few tools to withstand a future financial collapse, according to a trio of policymakers who steered the country through the 2008 crisis. Timothy Geithner, a former Treasury Secretary under Barack Obama and one of the architects of the federal government’s controversial bailout of major banks, called the current political system “broken” in an interview with CBS News correspondent Alex Wagner. “No economy can be stronger than its political system. And the political system of the United States today has lost the capacity to govern and lost the core requirements not just to make people confident in the fairness of the system, but to buy into compromise on the tough challenges we face,” Geithner said.
Political gridlock ultimately could harm the American economy, Geithner added. “It’s not something we can survive indefinitely. We can’t withstand the effects of a prolonged period of a system this broken, this dysfunctional,” he said. Former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, a co-architect of the bank bailout in 2008, told CBS News the kind of political dysfunction Geithner described also allows empowers a budding superpower, China, to rise at America’s expense. While Paulson said he is optimistic the U.S. and China will “come to an agreement and end the tariff war,” he expects the two countries’ relationship to remain tense for years. “We need to find common ground with China for a global economic system to work, for us to have peace, prosperity,” he said. A decade after the 2008 banking crisis, the U.S remains unprepared for another financial collapse, former Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke told CBS News.
Health Care plays favorites depending on One’s Means
More signs of uncertain economic conditions are found in health care. There’s lots of things young adults have a hard time affording, including what’s seen inside poll-young-people-most-likely-to-defer-health-care-because-of-cost. The wealthy have many advantages not available to common folks, including access to better health care: reddit-cofounder-alexis-ohanian-healthcare-inequality-rich-people. See this cartel for keeping drug prices artificially high: quote-of-the-day-this-is-most-likely-the-largest-cartel-in-the-history-of-the-united-states. And we should have this larger debate: universal-healthcare-could-save-america-trillions-whats-holding-us-back.
Rural Economy
Cities having so much more economic vitality than out in the country are helping fuel the inequalities: america-cities-inequality-wealth-jobs-economy. Then we see a huge divide between rural & urban in how they view Trump: trump-is-really-popular-in-rural-areas-other-places-not-so-much. Rural residents should be mad since the modern economy is passing them by, where they’re stuck in very adverse economic conditions. But we need real solutions for the future, not Trumpian solutions dredging up the distant past. These are the types of initiatives rural America could really use, modern-day careers bringing high tech to the country as seen in silicon-valley-microsoft-linkedin-rural-america-iowa-tech-workers-jobs-workforce-careers-investment.
Here’s an interesting map showing incomes across the U.S.: map-shows-americans-earnings-in-every-part-of-the-us. Back in my neck of the woods, where support for Trump is still inexplicably strong, a local House rep tore into the president’s policies as seen here from ohio-dem-shreds-trumps-manufacturing-plans-he-wants-to-get-back-to-the-horse-and-buggy:
Appearing on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH) ripped into Donald Trump’s economic policies saying that they are devastating his constituents who work in the manufacturing sector in northeast Ohio. Addressing the recently announced auto plant closures, Ryan complained to MSNBC hosts Joe Scarborough and Mika Brezinski that Trump’s tariffs and erratic intrusions while trying to figure out how to handle the U.S. economy are “insane.” “Let me just say it’s brutal for a community like ours,” the Ohio Democrat explained. “We lost, you know, tens of thousands of steel jobs and now we’re losing General Motors. We used to be able to say, at least we have General Motors — now we’re losing that.” “You’ve got to keep northeast Ohio in mind, they play by the rules, go to their little league and churches, they do everything right,” the exasperated Ryan continued. Saying the Trump’s economic advisers are trying to take America back to the “horse and buggy” era, Ryan slammed them for turning their backs on workers. “Where’s the social contract between the workers and the government?” he asked. “There’s always the hammer, they’re going to lose their pensions and jobs. I mean how much longer are we going to do this to where the worker don’t matter? I hope this is a real wakeup call for us to say workers — white, brown, black, gay, straight — working-class people have got to come together because it’s becoming impossible for them to keep their noses above water.”
Other Issues that Need Improvements
It’s about time to talk this over!: republicans-minimum-wage-hearing. It’s been too long since an increase in the federal minimum wage. And retirement plans certainly aren’t what they used to be: retirement-planning-improving-401-k-plans-workers-who-invest.
The Leadership of Trump
Is this MAGA? Really? A compromised Trump sometimes seems more interested in MRGA (Make Russia Great Again): america-are-we-great-again-yet. In the president’s thoughts, the buck stops somewhere else: trump-ready-to-blame-others-for-potential-recession. Trump keeps touting this great economy, but the large percentage of the nation still bogged down by difficult economic conditions should be offended…& mad! And he’s also lying about all this too: trumps-arguments-necessity-border-wall-have-already-been-broadly-debunked (see song below). Maybe populism would in fact be a good thing if led by a prez with sincere intent: trump-populism-democracy-threat-minority-rule.
Usurping Power through Corrupt Means
This is a legitimate question: are-republicans-abandoning-democracy. The GOP has been bold & blatant lately in their shameless attacks on democracy, from which Trump’s dictatorial intent is just one component of their illicit strategies. The next article details undemocratic actions like Citizens United, gerrymandering, gutting labor unions, restricting voting rights & committing lame-duck power grabs: wisconsin-michigan-north-carolina-lame-duc. The frustration & disgust all fair-minded Americans should feel is reflected in the opening posted here to republicans-michigan-wisconsin-strip-power-democrats-undermine-democracy:
What Republican legislators just did in Wisconsin – passing bills to strip key powers from the governor-elect, Tony Evers, and other newly elected Democratic officials – is a total betrayal of the people of Wisconsin and our nation’s democratic ideals. Michigan is passing a similar set of bills and North Carolina Republicans are accused of paying someone to steal absentee ballots and commit election fraud for a US House candidate. In Ohio, other undemocratic efforts are under way. It seems that Republicans officials nationwide from Donald Trump to Mitch McConnell and right down the line don’t have a problem assaulting our democracy if it means holding onto their power. This is not how democracy works, and these maneuvers in Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio and North Carolina are not just power grabs. They are deliberate efforts to undermine democracy and our faith in it. And these efforts are getting more brazen and desperate every year. I am enraged and, frankly, sick of the shenanigans.
Everything from gerrymandering to attempts at voter suppression have been long-term projects of the monied interests. But, like the white supremacists’ public actions and the attacks on the media in the age of Trump, Republicans making their power grabs around the country are particularly emboldened right now. The lame-duck session concept isn’t new either – it has just being taken to new extremes. Congress has used lame-duck sessions repeatedly for work that should have been conducted during the regular session. North Carolina Republicans showed Wisconsin Republicans how to mess with democracy back in December of 2016 when they successfully diminished the powers of the incoming Democratic governor North Carolina Republicans showed Wisconsin Republicans how to mess with democracy back in December of 2016 when they successfully diminished the powers of the incoming Democratic governor Roy Cooper. A lame-duck session should only be for emergency measures. Too many people voting is not an emergency. Ultimately we need legislative solutions. Gains that were made in the midterm elections have given congressional Democrats a chance to push back and show the country it’s not just business as usual.
The Choice Is Either Fix the GOP or Watch Its Demise
This Rubin op-ed is right, the Dems are the go-to party until the GOP becomes sane again: centrists-are-alive-kicking. The GOP has lost its reasoning, its bearings & its principles in this era of Trump & the echo. Instead of only being about themselves & their tribe, they’ve got to get back to representing the American people. They’re destined to self-destruct with the path they are on. See the opening to this article from flake-republican-party-is-a-frog-slowly-boiling-in-water:
Retiring Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) said in a new interview that the Republican Party has been inured to the danger of President Trump‘s continued criticism of special counsel Robert Mueller. “It’s like the party is a frog slowly boiling in water, being conditioned to not be worried, to not think too hard about what’s happening around them,” Flake told The Washington Post. “They feel at a loss about what to do because it’s the president’s party, without any doubt,” he said. “So, there’s a lot of whistling by the graveyard these days.”
A Tremendous Collateral Effect of having Trump go down
It could also destroy the GOP & their echo so we can start all over with a clean slate. We now have a major political party & popular TV network both corrupted by Trump, plus it’s been proven Trump surrounds himself with staff members who are criminals. Being implicated in a crime himself, the walls are caving in as we anticipate the prez will be exposed in 2019 for committing numerous crimes over Russian connections & financial dealings. On that note, here are excerpts from the middle & ending to donald-trump-mueller-investigation-cohen-manafort:
The president is in legal peril. In court filings on Friday, prosecutors connected him to a crime involving hush-money payments to women who claim to have had affairs with him; revealed that contacts with Russia began earlier in his campaign than previously thought; and unravelled webs of lies spun by former lawyer Michael Cohen and former campaign chair Paul Manafort. Matthew Miller, a former justice department spokesman, summed it up on Twitter: “The president and his lawyer violated campaign finance laws to influence the outcome of the election while his campaign chair was meeting with an intelligence asset of a foreign government that was trying to influence the outcome of the election. Not very legal and very cool.”
“Look, nobody runs for the House of Representatives or the US Senate because they want to impeach a president. But when the evidence becomes so clear that you very likely have a criminal sitting in the Oval Office, what is the Congress left to do at that point?” John Garamendi, another House Democrat, told CNN these may be “the opening days of an impeachment”. Trump “clearly has surrounded himself with criminals”, he said, adding: “During the campaign, laws were broken … And now we have the president implicated in that.” Democrats take control of the House next month, although the Republican-held Senate is certain to reject any such motion. Trump’s efforts to undermine Mueller are backed by Fox News and other conservative media. John Dean, White House counsel to Richard Nixon, told CNN: “I don’t know that this will forever disappear into some dark hole of un-prosecutable presidents. I think it will resurface in the Congress. I think what this totality of today’s filings show that the House is going to have little choice the way this is going other than to start impeachment proceedings.”
Economist Sounds a Dire Warning
A respected economist points out Trump may be permanently changing capitalism & not for the better. His remake of the system only validates more of a crony capitalist good ole boy network, where insider connections & blatant corruption rule the day, from which America may never be able to recover. The economist’s comments are seen inside trump-crony-capitalism-luigi-zingales & also posted below from the article economist-warns-trump-has-set-american-politics-back-over-100-years-damage-may-be-permanent:
Luigi Zingales, a widely respected economist and professor at the Chicago Booth Business School who predicted the rise of Donald Trump to the Presidency as far back as 2011, warns that Trump’s “crony capitalism” has the potential to entirely shift American politics back to a bygone era. Zingales claims that President Trump’s willingness to appoint friends and allies into government positions of power despite their lack of qualification, particularly in the judiciary, could permanently shift American politics toward something that looks more like Zingales’s native Italy, according to Business Insider. Zingales frequently compares Trump to on-again, off-again Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, and says that this practice will create an environment similar to that in Italy, where politicians frequently exert their influence on positions that should be free from political interference such as the judiciary and the governors of the central bank. Zingales says that in today’s Italian government, the likelihood of judges being pressured by politicians prior to important decisions is 100 percent. While that type of behavior has been unusual so far in American politics, Trump’s persistent attacks on the Mueller investigation and the Federal Reserve are threatening to become the new normal. “If I expect that the other side is going to try to get to the judge [and influence his decision], I will also try to get to the judge,” Zingales said. Should that behavior continue to be normalized without the proper checks, it would be impossible to reverse.
(As Zingales argued, demagogues such as Trump come to power because people are alienated and angry – often justifiably so. The demagogues behave repugnantly, but when the opposition focuses on that awful behavior – as Hillary Clinton did in the election campaign – it is playing a losing hand. The more the elite go after Trump, Zingales suggests, the more people think, “He’s one of us.”)
“It’s like when everyone waits in line to get the bus, or the ski lift, or to go to the office. As long as everybody is in line, you don’t like it, but you join the line as well,” Zingales said. “If one person deviates, you yell at him. If two deviate, you yell at them. If three deviate, you join them. At some point, if everybody goes, you can’t be the only idiot still waiting in line.” Zingales believes that the risk of America descending into crony capitalism will increase the longer that President Trump remains in office. “What remains to be seen is to what extent this can be seen as an aberration, and then the world returns to a normal situation moving forward, or to what extent this is a permanent shift in the way politics is run in the United States, and the way people perceive it,” Zingales said. “The negative impact is very dependent on this. My suspicion is that once people develop a reputation, it’s very hard to go back. Once you shift the game, changing back ain’t easy.”
The United States has seen such times in the past, and some lessons can be learned from history. During what is known as the Gilded Age, a period between the Civil War and American imperialism at the height of the Industrial Revolution, the American economy was dominated by monopolistic business tycoons and American politics was ruled by patronage, and often appointments were made by personal or political affiliation and not by merit. During this time, seven of the ten richest Americans were alive, orphan children hustled for a living in the streets of New York, snake-oil salesmen proffered their wares, meat-packing plants allowed filth to spoil their product, and the economy went through a boom-and-bust cycle of wild growth and depression. The work of U.S. Presidents Chester A. Arthur, who fought patronage to create a merit-based system, and Theodore Roosevelt, who took on corporate politics like perhaps nobody else ever could, transformed our nation into something more like the one we have today. Biographer Scott Greenberger, in an interview on C-SPAN, talked about the positive impact of Arthur and Roosevelt on American life. “[C]ivil service reform was important in retrospect and in the sweep of history, it’s important because as in later years… the progressives and Teddy Roosevelt [and] later presidents wanted to imbue the federal government with more powers and… take a more active role in everything from… safeguarding the safety of food and drugs to… the national parks,” Greenberger said. “All of this stuff needed to be done and it needed to be overseen by people actually knew what they were doing.” The transcript has been edited for written clarity.
The Presidency of Donald Trump so far has most often been compared to that of Warren G. Harding. According to the Los Angeles Times, there are some distinct comparisons between the two. Harding made fiery but vague speeches during his 1920 campaign, the centerpiece a promise of “returning America to normalcy” in the postwar period. He championed tax cuts, immigration restrictions, tariffs, and a rolling back of the progressive reforms of his predecessors. He was a champion of “America First” and opposed U.S. entry into the League of Nations. Harding littered his administration with friends, relatives, and cronies, and had one of the most scandal- and corruption-laden presidencies in American history. Harding faced the threat of impeachment, and perhaps would have been had he not died in office. The Harding presidency also established the core group — Vice President Calvin Coolidge, Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover, and Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon — that would establish irresponsible short-term economic policy that eventually led the nation into the Great Depression. Recently, Business Insider reported that over 1,100 economists sent a letter to President Trump claiming that his administration was making the exact same mistakes that those did. Luigi Zingales’s warnings perhaps should be considered, as he seems to know what he is talking about. In an unpublished chapter of Zingales’s 2011 book Capitalism For The People, Zingales predicted the rise of Trump or someone like him to the American presidency. Sadly, Zingales elected to withhold the chapter from final publication, as his colleagues who read the book beforehand felt that the idea was so far-fetched that it would hurt Zinagles’s reputation. “One of my colleagues who was kind of enough to read the first version told me that I was crazy, that I would lose credibility to the book if I were to keep that in,” Zingales said.
2 Songs Today & a very Contentious Meeting
Trump staged a shoutfest with Schumer & Pelosi in the White House for the optics of showing his base how tough he is. But he made several misrepresentations during that tense encounter, which his silly banter over the wall might bring us a government shutdown just in time for Christmas: senators-dumbfounded-by-trump-vow-to-shut-down-government. The video can be found in here: trump-pelosi-schumer-government-shutdown. For that, Trump should get a lump of coal in his stocking from Santa. Better yet, Mueller might deliver a present far worse than a lump of coal!:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzoMipZkg38
Yes, it could be a Blue Christmas for Trump as he engineers a useless shutdown, along with the spectre of the Mueller probe & soon-to-be Dem House hanging over his head:
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