In the world.
We spent $672,879,000,000 on war-making in 2012 (we call it "Defense," and don't think about it). That may be why the Department of War became the Department of Defense--although there were bureaucratic reasons, as well. Anyway, we may be the most powerful militarily, but part of the reason for that is that we're somehow persuaded, year after year, to spend on "Defense" as much at least as the five next "most powerful" nations combined. But the most powerful nation cannot control the world.
It shouldn't try. We may be "the richest" nation, but we have a lot of poor people. Nevertheless, we'd rather spend money on military toys and warriors, than on helping to maintain people through unemployment insurance, who still cannot find jobs: there are far fewer jobs than job seekers.
Further, austerity's stupidity is causing disasters all over the world.
Tepid growth in the US compares to what austerity has done to nations like Greece and Spain--despite, in Spain's case, conservative fiscal policy--the result: Depression-level unemployment.
In the US, Republicans boast they forced Democrats to cut off the long-term unemployed. Dismissive phrases they use: "a way of life," "rip off artists," and unemployment is an "easy Street" where "fraud" is "rampant." Democrats are faced with a dilemma that doesn't trouble Republicans. Republicans don't believe in government, anyway, so there's no felt obligation to make it work for people--at least people who aren't CEO's or hedge fund artistes.
Democrats seek the money represented by wealthy and corporate interests, too, but they're torn: they tend to believe that government can be a force for good: FDR was their hero. If in order for government to work at all, the long-term unemployed have to be sacrificed, well, the greater good, some reason….
The bottom line is: the most uncompromising, well-funded side, appealing to a minority of ill-informed white people, gets to call the shots, setting the agenda.
Even the New York Times apparently assumes that Social Security and Medicare are going to have to be cut, despite a growing appeal among progressives for expansion, not contraction of Social Security, in response to the disappearance of private pensions, or fully funded public ones. The media attempt to eliminate any dialog about whether Social Security needs to be expanded, instead of contracted, despite the fact that it's self-funding and the payroll tax, is easily modified. It could be raised on the people paying too little, to make the tax no longer regressive; it subtracts a larger share from earnings below $115,000, than for those above that.
The GOP wages class warfare: progressives must fight back, like Senator Warren, not "go along" with elite greed. Americans should reject the elite's takeover, so reminiscent of the Roman Senators' monopoly of wealth in the Fifth Century.
Showing posts with label Austerity. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Austerity. Show all posts
Wednesday, December 18, 2013
Tuesday, April 30, 2013
A Discarded World
Sunday at sunrise I saw a car parked in our parking lot along the dirt road, not far from houses and an equestrian center. A guy got out, did something with his leg, and then, as I approached, he got back in the car and drove off. There was someone in the passenger seat.
The driver had discarded something and its foil wrapper. He was probably proud of himself: it was an oversized used condom. On his way to church?
That pretty much epitomizes relations with our social, natural and international world. We trash the natural world, we trash each other; we also trash other nations: cancer has skyrocketed in Iraq because our depleted DU munitions litter the landscape. Our military is proud of them; they're more effective than lead or steel in penetrating tank armor. Who cares about the Iraqis?
Margaret Thatcher was known for popularizing a politics epitomized by: "Screw you, Jack! I've got mine." Our "conservatives" are less eloquent.
Sequestration was meant to force Democrats and Republicans to agree to something sensible, but the first adjustment insures that flights aren't delayed, so Congressmen and Senators can get home during their break. Meanwhile, cuts to Head Start, schools, health research, medical care, extended unemployment insurance and to so many other government programs cause far more damaging consequences: lives lost, children untaught, research not done, people driven homeless: long-term costs to everyone--except the wealthy.
And for what? Both the Alesina/Ardagna article on "expansionary austerity," and the Reinhart/Rogoff article positing the economic danger of a 90+% budget deficit--Economists' arguments promoting austerity--have been proven false, while real experiments with it in Greece, Spain, Ireland, the UK and Portugal have demonstrated its destructive effects.
I sent two of Krugman's anti-austerity articles to a fundamentalist friend; he refused to read them: said they were "all false," and "ideologies will never replace the wisdom and power of the Word of God." Facts didn't matter. To him, and apparently to a large contingent of Republicans in Congress, "debt is debt," an evil--except for Defense, or corporations, or mortgages, or….
My friend made money in California real estate, The austerian agenda makes sense to him: why should he pay for losers, driven homeless, and/or jobless by the burst housing bubble; he made money, so what's wrong with them?
People like him, and those much wealthier drive the political agenda. We don't live in a democracy; the powerful listen to the one-percent, not to the rest of us--except, maybe, the 5%. Our contemporary Roman Senatorial class has conquered. High unemployment benefits them: it makes workers compliant; bosses can cut wages and raise their own salaries: life is good.
It will last until either revolution or collapse, the latter from the instability inherent in extreme inequality; it contributed to Rome's fall in 476.
The driver had discarded something and its foil wrapper. He was probably proud of himself: it was an oversized used condom. On his way to church?
That pretty much epitomizes relations with our social, natural and international world. We trash the natural world, we trash each other; we also trash other nations: cancer has skyrocketed in Iraq because our depleted DU munitions litter the landscape. Our military is proud of them; they're more effective than lead or steel in penetrating tank armor. Who cares about the Iraqis?
Margaret Thatcher was known for popularizing a politics epitomized by: "Screw you, Jack! I've got mine." Our "conservatives" are less eloquent.
Sequestration was meant to force Democrats and Republicans to agree to something sensible, but the first adjustment insures that flights aren't delayed, so Congressmen and Senators can get home during their break. Meanwhile, cuts to Head Start, schools, health research, medical care, extended unemployment insurance and to so many other government programs cause far more damaging consequences: lives lost, children untaught, research not done, people driven homeless: long-term costs to everyone--except the wealthy.
And for what? Both the Alesina/Ardagna article on "expansionary austerity," and the Reinhart/Rogoff article positing the economic danger of a 90+% budget deficit--Economists' arguments promoting austerity--have been proven false, while real experiments with it in Greece, Spain, Ireland, the UK and Portugal have demonstrated its destructive effects.
I sent two of Krugman's anti-austerity articles to a fundamentalist friend; he refused to read them: said they were "all false," and "ideologies will never replace the wisdom and power of the Word of God." Facts didn't matter. To him, and apparently to a large contingent of Republicans in Congress, "debt is debt," an evil--except for Defense, or corporations, or mortgages, or….
My friend made money in California real estate, The austerian agenda makes sense to him: why should he pay for losers, driven homeless, and/or jobless by the burst housing bubble; he made money, so what's wrong with them?
People like him, and those much wealthier drive the political agenda. We don't live in a democracy; the powerful listen to the one-percent, not to the rest of us--except, maybe, the 5%. Our contemporary Roman Senatorial class has conquered. High unemployment benefits them: it makes workers compliant; bosses can cut wages and raise their own salaries: life is good.
It will last until either revolution or collapse, the latter from the instability inherent in extreme inequality; it contributed to Rome's fall in 476.
Sunday, April 21, 2013
Extreme Wealth Corrodes Democracy
The United States was, for a short time, a democracy, if only of white male property owners--much like early Athens. Counterrevolution began with the Constitutional Convention.
Democratic forces were predominant in other eras in the US, but they didn't last. There was the Democracy of Andrew Jackson and brash new western men. There was the early radical Republicanism of the Civil War. There was the Progressive era: the overweening power of the trusts was busted, at least temporarily. There was the New Deal, extending through the Great Society, in which government made it its business to extend equality and its benefits.
But each democratic era has been followed by a period of reaction and hardening elite rule. However, up until now, America has always had an upwardly mobile society: the son of the worker, farmer, or clerk becoming the new rich. And always before, the elite made way for them, even if they hated "upstarts" and "new money."
Today, class mobility in America is lower than in class-bound Britain; American society is becoming rigid and stratified--though no one will admit they are anything but "middle class." The difference between the new financial wealthy and everyone else has never been greater; CEO's are paid 100's or 1000+ times more than their workers, a greater margin of difference than other developed nations. Inequality increased even more rapidly after the so-called Great Recession and subsequent "recovery" under Obama's leadership. More than 90% of the gains since 2009 have gone into the pockets of the extremely wealthy, while unemployment hovers around an official 7.8% and is nearly twice that when counting workers who have given up looking for work.
The intransigence of conservative Republicans is not surprising, nor the timidity of Democrats: they both reflect the changing balance of power in the US. Unions have declined to single digits of the private sector workforce, and Republicans have sharpened their knives to eliminate the power of public sector unions, as well.
Meanwhile, state legislatures and Congress promote austerity, and cut programs benefiting the less affluent, while attempting to lower taxes and eliminate regulations that irritate the resurgent wealthy.
Why not? Politicians easily accumulate wealth from their connections. Anyone in government, even idealistic Obama staff, can legally line his/her nest by cooperating with the moneyed, our Roman Senators. None live in ghettos, or working-class neighborhoods. None see or hear the people who are hurt by the wealthy bias in media and politics.
And the media, largely owned by our Roman Senators, naturally reflects their bias; so even the poor tend to accept the agenda of the wealthy, insisting that austerity is necessary and even Social Security benefits must be cut.
This isn't just the swing of the pendulum; this smells like "takeover" by the very wealthy, like the Roman Senators' monopoly of power in Fifth Century Rome--before its fall.
Democratic forces were predominant in other eras in the US, but they didn't last. There was the Democracy of Andrew Jackson and brash new western men. There was the early radical Republicanism of the Civil War. There was the Progressive era: the overweening power of the trusts was busted, at least temporarily. There was the New Deal, extending through the Great Society, in which government made it its business to extend equality and its benefits.
But each democratic era has been followed by a period of reaction and hardening elite rule. However, up until now, America has always had an upwardly mobile society: the son of the worker, farmer, or clerk becoming the new rich. And always before, the elite made way for them, even if they hated "upstarts" and "new money."
Today, class mobility in America is lower than in class-bound Britain; American society is becoming rigid and stratified--though no one will admit they are anything but "middle class." The difference between the new financial wealthy and everyone else has never been greater; CEO's are paid 100's or 1000+ times more than their workers, a greater margin of difference than other developed nations. Inequality increased even more rapidly after the so-called Great Recession and subsequent "recovery" under Obama's leadership. More than 90% of the gains since 2009 have gone into the pockets of the extremely wealthy, while unemployment hovers around an official 7.8% and is nearly twice that when counting workers who have given up looking for work.
The intransigence of conservative Republicans is not surprising, nor the timidity of Democrats: they both reflect the changing balance of power in the US. Unions have declined to single digits of the private sector workforce, and Republicans have sharpened their knives to eliminate the power of public sector unions, as well.
Meanwhile, state legislatures and Congress promote austerity, and cut programs benefiting the less affluent, while attempting to lower taxes and eliminate regulations that irritate the resurgent wealthy.
Why not? Politicians easily accumulate wealth from their connections. Anyone in government, even idealistic Obama staff, can legally line his/her nest by cooperating with the moneyed, our Roman Senators. None live in ghettos, or working-class neighborhoods. None see or hear the people who are hurt by the wealthy bias in media and politics.
And the media, largely owned by our Roman Senators, naturally reflects their bias; so even the poor tend to accept the agenda of the wealthy, insisting that austerity is necessary and even Social Security benefits must be cut.
This isn't just the swing of the pendulum; this smells like "takeover" by the very wealthy, like the Roman Senators' monopoly of power in Fifth Century Rome--before its fall.
Friday, February 15, 2013
Sequestration
Is a fancy word: it means, in the memorable phrase of Congressman, Sean Maloney, "Congress screwing up the economy for no reason."
It's true that the projected government deficit is over $1.1 trillion, a mind-boggling number, but cutting spending would make that number worse. Why? As the miniscule retreat in GDP last quarter demonstrated, when we cut government spending, the whole economy is negatively affected. We teeter between recovery and renewed recession. Further, the experience of European countries, demonstrates that austerity does not create prosperity; it created renewed recession in the UK (triple dip) and depression in Greece.
The "sequester" has the Republicans worrying about cuts to Defense, complaining that this will cost jobs (it will), but they're not worrying about, and want to increase cuts to domestic programs. The cuts already mandated would not only cost even more jobs (civilian programs create more jobs per dollar than defense), but they would hurt our most vulnerable, and our future prosperity.
Cuts to domestic programs will: cut 70,000 children from Headstart, deny treatment to 373,000 mentally ill (adults and children) and reduce small business loan guarantees by $540 million. In addition, the $85 billion in cuts on Mar 1, could include, according to Congresswoman Nita Lowey, "furloughs of air traffic controllers, food inspectors, border patrol, reduced investment in safe drinking water and medical research, diminished military readiness and embassy security."
Think about this logically: if you reduce expenditures March 1st by $85 billion, how is that going to help us recover from the Great Recession? It will cut that amount of money (US multiplier estimated at 1.29 to 1.73) from flowing into the economy, cutting jobs, cutting purchases--as well as needed services. It won't "grow" the economy; it will shrink it by at least $109 billion--in one month.
Greece, subjected to radical austerity, has seen tax receipts plummet with government cuts: its ability to pay back debts is reduced, not enhanced by austerity.
Austerity proponents speak as if "business confidence" will be restored by cuts, and prosperity and jobs will magically return. Why? If everyone, except for banksters and one-percenters, have less money, who's going to buy what businesses sell? The wealthy are too few to create enough demand, so there's no reason for businesses to hire more workers, or produce more goods, if austerity means everyone--except the wealthy--will buy less than they did before. So where are more jobs to come from?
The Roman Empire was in a centuries long depression before it collapsed; its gold standard prevented expansion of the money supply; further, when Senators hoarded gold, money contracted, deepening the depression. Today, the Federal Reserve can expand the money supply, as can the Federal government. When demand is lacking, Government should build demand, not cut it. Only during a full recovery, should long-term budget deficits be cut, by tax and health care reform and withdrawal from an empire the US can no longer afford.
It's true that the projected government deficit is over $1.1 trillion, a mind-boggling number, but cutting spending would make that number worse. Why? As the miniscule retreat in GDP last quarter demonstrated, when we cut government spending, the whole economy is negatively affected. We teeter between recovery and renewed recession. Further, the experience of European countries, demonstrates that austerity does not create prosperity; it created renewed recession in the UK (triple dip) and depression in Greece.
The "sequester" has the Republicans worrying about cuts to Defense, complaining that this will cost jobs (it will), but they're not worrying about, and want to increase cuts to domestic programs. The cuts already mandated would not only cost even more jobs (civilian programs create more jobs per dollar than defense), but they would hurt our most vulnerable, and our future prosperity.
Cuts to domestic programs will: cut 70,000 children from Headstart, deny treatment to 373,000 mentally ill (adults and children) and reduce small business loan guarantees by $540 million. In addition, the $85 billion in cuts on Mar 1, could include, according to Congresswoman Nita Lowey, "furloughs of air traffic controllers, food inspectors, border patrol, reduced investment in safe drinking water and medical research, diminished military readiness and embassy security."
Think about this logically: if you reduce expenditures March 1st by $85 billion, how is that going to help us recover from the Great Recession? It will cut that amount of money (US multiplier estimated at 1.29 to 1.73) from flowing into the economy, cutting jobs, cutting purchases--as well as needed services. It won't "grow" the economy; it will shrink it by at least $109 billion--in one month.
Greece, subjected to radical austerity, has seen tax receipts plummet with government cuts: its ability to pay back debts is reduced, not enhanced by austerity.
Austerity proponents speak as if "business confidence" will be restored by cuts, and prosperity and jobs will magically return. Why? If everyone, except for banksters and one-percenters, have less money, who's going to buy what businesses sell? The wealthy are too few to create enough demand, so there's no reason for businesses to hire more workers, or produce more goods, if austerity means everyone--except the wealthy--will buy less than they did before. So where are more jobs to come from?
The Roman Empire was in a centuries long depression before it collapsed; its gold standard prevented expansion of the money supply; further, when Senators hoarded gold, money contracted, deepening the depression. Today, the Federal Reserve can expand the money supply, as can the Federal government. When demand is lacking, Government should build demand, not cut it. Only during a full recovery, should long-term budget deficits be cut, by tax and health care reform and withdrawal from an empire the US can no longer afford.
Monday, February 4, 2013
Icelandic Style Revolution
Iceland's revolution should be old news--if our media actually covered important international stories not involving violence and war. Iceland, in 2008-2009 went through the most dramatic financial collapse of the sub-prime induced banking crisis. Its bankers had speculated many times the value of Iceland's GDP, and their ventures crashed, bankrupting the nation.
Maybe, we didn't hear much because of the smallness and remoteness of Iceland, although Mali is as remote and in population almost as small (Iceland's population: 319,000; Mali's 14.5 million).
Furthermore, Iceland is a positive story compared to Mali, where the former colonial power was welcomed enthusiastically because the Malian state is near collapse and vulnerable to Muslim extremists.
Iceland's banks collapsed in 2008-2009 and Icelanders threw out the conservative government through popular outrage and clanging kitchen pots, not gales of machine gun bullets.
Not only did a new, leftist government take office but a popularly elected body of non-politician citizen members, randomly selected, is helping to write a new constitution.
Further, the collapsed banks were nationalized, and although the left-wing government intended to pay back the banks' private, international debts through taxation--as per IMF instructions--the people again rebelled, and defeated the proposal by 93%.
Yet, Iceland is not an international pariah, despite refusing to pay international speculator debts, and despite bringing criminal charges against a whole raft of bankers and speculators.
The IMF noted that Iceland is experiencing positive growth (ca 2.5%), better than the US, much better than the recession-bound EC, yet it chose not to follow IMF policy. It inflated its currency, launched an aggressive home mortgage relief program, and, instead of austerity, has embarked on development-led growth.
Granted, Iceland is small, homogenous and the first democracy (founded 930), but it offers a model for recovery from the debt crisis that is completely the opposite of Europe's failed austerity policies, or Republican/Tea Party proposals. Furthermore, it appears to be successful. The Icelandic model demonstrates just how far the Obama administration has departed from what the US really needs: real homeowner relief, real control (or nationalization?) of the financial sector, criminal indictments, not just slaps on the wrists of banker-speculators and demand-led growth promoted by government.
The instigator of the popular (kitchenware) rebellion in Iceland has authored a Youtube piece with Greek subtitles: his message? Greece would be better off renouncing its debts and going on its own, like Iceland.
Why haven't we heard more of this? The story is complicated (I've oversimplified hugely), and it's counter to the narrative the powers-that-be, our contemporary Roman Senators, want us to hear. They are afraid they won't be paid, or might actually go to jail. Instead, they can flood the airwaves with the Super-bowl, stories of stars, international disasters like Mali and Greece and their own demands for austerity. Why? They'd rather avoid taxes just like their Roman forebears--which is why Rome "fell."
Maybe, we didn't hear much because of the smallness and remoteness of Iceland, although Mali is as remote and in population almost as small (Iceland's population: 319,000; Mali's 14.5 million).
Furthermore, Iceland is a positive story compared to Mali, where the former colonial power was welcomed enthusiastically because the Malian state is near collapse and vulnerable to Muslim extremists.
Iceland's banks collapsed in 2008-2009 and Icelanders threw out the conservative government through popular outrage and clanging kitchen pots, not gales of machine gun bullets.
Not only did a new, leftist government take office but a popularly elected body of non-politician citizen members, randomly selected, is helping to write a new constitution.
Further, the collapsed banks were nationalized, and although the left-wing government intended to pay back the banks' private, international debts through taxation--as per IMF instructions--the people again rebelled, and defeated the proposal by 93%.
Yet, Iceland is not an international pariah, despite refusing to pay international speculator debts, and despite bringing criminal charges against a whole raft of bankers and speculators.
The IMF noted that Iceland is experiencing positive growth (ca 2.5%), better than the US, much better than the recession-bound EC, yet it chose not to follow IMF policy. It inflated its currency, launched an aggressive home mortgage relief program, and, instead of austerity, has embarked on development-led growth.
Granted, Iceland is small, homogenous and the first democracy (founded 930), but it offers a model for recovery from the debt crisis that is completely the opposite of Europe's failed austerity policies, or Republican/Tea Party proposals. Furthermore, it appears to be successful. The Icelandic model demonstrates just how far the Obama administration has departed from what the US really needs: real homeowner relief, real control (or nationalization?) of the financial sector, criminal indictments, not just slaps on the wrists of banker-speculators and demand-led growth promoted by government.
The instigator of the popular (kitchenware) rebellion in Iceland has authored a Youtube piece with Greek subtitles: his message? Greece would be better off renouncing its debts and going on its own, like Iceland.
Why haven't we heard more of this? The story is complicated (I've oversimplified hugely), and it's counter to the narrative the powers-that-be, our contemporary Roman Senators, want us to hear. They are afraid they won't be paid, or might actually go to jail. Instead, they can flood the airwaves with the Super-bowl, stories of stars, international disasters like Mali and Greece and their own demands for austerity. Why? They'd rather avoid taxes just like their Roman forebears--which is why Rome "fell."
Thursday, June 14, 2012
Stimulus or Austerity
What do we hear from the movers and shakers? Still, austerity.
Greece is imploding, and even if moderates win this Sunday, it's unlikely that they'll be able to force Germany's Angela Merkel to abandon her stance: austerity as the solution to all their economic ills. Spain is now the problem de jour: another bank/bonds crisis, but again, European bonds, the only interim solution, are nixed by Merkel.
Merkel has her reasons. Germans have their history as justification: the Weimar Republic collapsed under inflation that saw the mark tumble to over 1 trillion to the dollar, wiping out the middle class. After that, the Nazis took over.
Ironically, but also logically, some of the beneficiaries of the austerity-driven depression that's overtaking Europe's periphery are politicians of the extreme right, like Greece's neo-Nazi Golden Dawn.
If Germans could realize that their resistance to meaningful bailouts and stimulus to create growth is creating little Weimar's all over Europe, perhaps they'd re-think their reluctance.
Angela's conservatives are in the driver's seat in Europe. In the US, conservatives are in a similar position, even though they don't control the federal government. The tea party dominated Republicans control the House, and effectively stymie any stimulatory policy in the Senate: 41 votes out of 100 = a blocking minority. Plus, by controlling a majority of states, Republicans are able to lay off public employees wholesale--partly to balance budgets, but partly because unionized public employees are the only organized group left that can counter their lock-step promotion of corporate and wealthy/selfish class interests. Conservatives see public employees as "the greatest threat" to the US economy. However, the net effect of state (and local) layoffs has been to offset any growth in employment in the private sector, one of the prime reasons why unemployment went up a notch last month.
Given their antagonism to public employees, it's not surprising that Republicans refuse to allow the major Federal grants (stimulus expenditures) necessary to prevent the layoffs or hire back the teachers and police needed.
The US doesn't have the equivalent of Greece's Golden Dawn or its left-wing Syriza, but Republican intransigence and Democratic waffling surely justify them.
Instead, we have the Koch brothers, Karl Rove and the millionaire/billionaire funded super-pacs on one side, and only the weakened Occupy movement on the other. So, our equivalent of the Nazi takeover of Weimar would put corporations and their owners in control.
Why "only" the Occupy movement? Tom Barrett, the defeated old-line Democrat in Wisconsin is your answer. Centrist resistance may win barely enough votes in the General Election against Koch-Rove billions, but what people really yearn for is the kind of policy (only more so) that Obama campaigned on but only half-delivered. Incremental measures aren't solutions.
Even with Obama, the 1%, or the Selfish Class, face little resistance to their takeover. Long-term depression could result, paralleling the history of the late Roman Empire.
Greece is imploding, and even if moderates win this Sunday, it's unlikely that they'll be able to force Germany's Angela Merkel to abandon her stance: austerity as the solution to all their economic ills. Spain is now the problem de jour: another bank/bonds crisis, but again, European bonds, the only interim solution, are nixed by Merkel.
Merkel has her reasons. Germans have their history as justification: the Weimar Republic collapsed under inflation that saw the mark tumble to over 1 trillion to the dollar, wiping out the middle class. After that, the Nazis took over.
Ironically, but also logically, some of the beneficiaries of the austerity-driven depression that's overtaking Europe's periphery are politicians of the extreme right, like Greece's neo-Nazi Golden Dawn.
If Germans could realize that their resistance to meaningful bailouts and stimulus to create growth is creating little Weimar's all over Europe, perhaps they'd re-think their reluctance.
Angela's conservatives are in the driver's seat in Europe. In the US, conservatives are in a similar position, even though they don't control the federal government. The tea party dominated Republicans control the House, and effectively stymie any stimulatory policy in the Senate: 41 votes out of 100 = a blocking minority. Plus, by controlling a majority of states, Republicans are able to lay off public employees wholesale--partly to balance budgets, but partly because unionized public employees are the only organized group left that can counter their lock-step promotion of corporate and wealthy/selfish class interests. Conservatives see public employees as "the greatest threat" to the US economy. However, the net effect of state (and local) layoffs has been to offset any growth in employment in the private sector, one of the prime reasons why unemployment went up a notch last month.
Given their antagonism to public employees, it's not surprising that Republicans refuse to allow the major Federal grants (stimulus expenditures) necessary to prevent the layoffs or hire back the teachers and police needed.
The US doesn't have the equivalent of Greece's Golden Dawn or its left-wing Syriza, but Republican intransigence and Democratic waffling surely justify them.
Instead, we have the Koch brothers, Karl Rove and the millionaire/billionaire funded super-pacs on one side, and only the weakened Occupy movement on the other. So, our equivalent of the Nazi takeover of Weimar would put corporations and their owners in control.
Why "only" the Occupy movement? Tom Barrett, the defeated old-line Democrat in Wisconsin is your answer. Centrist resistance may win barely enough votes in the General Election against Koch-Rove billions, but what people really yearn for is the kind of policy (only more so) that Obama campaigned on but only half-delivered. Incremental measures aren't solutions.
Even with Obama, the 1%, or the Selfish Class, face little resistance to their takeover. Long-term depression could result, paralleling the history of the late Roman Empire.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)