Catie Edmondson and Carl Hulse in the New York Times yesterday noted that House speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) cannot bring his conference together behind a budget plan. He wanted to pass a bill demanding major concessions from President Biden before the Republicans would agree to raise the debt ceiling, both to prove that he could get his colleagues behind a bill and to put pressure on the Biden administration to restore the old Republican idea that the only way to make the economy work is to slash taxes, business regulation, and government spending.
Wow! Vision of what we can be. Strategies flexible enough to work for many and not just the few. A real plan and partners willing to join from all over the world. The will to see it through. A roller coaster ride for sure. Full of scary highs and lows. And hope.
Your writing makes it very clear what a sloppy mess the Republicant party is. McCarthy got his picture all over the news for proposing the same old nasty crap— the rich get richer while the workers stay in their place.
What a beautiful statement. Sullivan's confirmation of Biden's work to be the foundation of not just the US's but the planet's better future is the most optimistic view heard in a long time.
Thank you for your ability to assemble these items every day and keep us inspired. Our own son will be graduating from your school, BC in less than a month. He and his classmates have been concerned as have we all of the country and world they are entering. You and your work is assuring to them and all of us and I thank you for that. I hope to seek/find and thank you in person at graduation in a few weeks.
Dr Richardson, words cannot express my joy at reading this letter. This is the world as it should be. Thanks to President Biden for the foresight to see this clearly and get us back on the track. This train wreck has been a constant and painful problem since 1981. Now if we can just reclaim both the House and Senate by electing sensible, civic minded, persons to fill those 535 seats we may finally pull ourselves out of the abyss into which we have fallen. These new civic and honorable people don't need to be all Democrats. Sane, intelligent, and freedom loving Independents and Republicans can round out the Legislative branch too. We just need to cut out the cancerous rot of the trumpster maggots, bring back the REAL Constitution, do away FOREVER with gerrymandering, voter suppression, and rampant greed.
What Jake Sullivan had to say gives me, and should give US all hope. What a lovely and exciting path forward for US and for our world - if we can make it happen.
I have always been a big fan of Jake Sullivan but this piece about his economic vision is just I have been advocating for years. The Laffer economic message of "Tax Cuts" and "Trickle Down Economics" that still resonates with Republicans is dead or should be dead. The Sullivan message of investing in supply chain building and infrastucture development is the way government can help
Professor, you capture the essence of how a healthy world economy is as necessary as a productive domestic economy. And America must pay attention.
“But today at the Brookings Institution, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan outlined a very different vision of the global economy and American economic leadership.” Calling for a bipartisan approach to restore middle class, a clean energy transition....this is not new, but it definitely counters the repubs’ approach to cut services and programs that strengthen all citizens. “We’re all in this together” quoting President Kennedy. At home and abroad. Can we make this happen in today’s political climate? Hoping step by step we get beyond partisan politics and move forward. A healthy economy helps everyone.
For me to make sense of Heather's Letter, I drew this analogy. It comes from an article written by Tom Silva's This Old House:
"Building a good foundation requires a lot more than digging a hole and pouring some concrete into forms. It must be tailored to its site like a custom suit, taking into account soil conditions, water tables, even the quality of the backfill.
"And as with a custom suit, every detail must be perfect: the base properly compacted, the formwork set up right, the concrete free of voids. Neglect even one of these, and the most carefully poured foundation can fail."
I would argue that our Declaration of Independence and Constitution with its accompanying amendments provide us with that good foundation. I would also argue that the Biden Administration is tending to perfecting the details that are necessary to protect our foundation for ourselves and the generations to come.
Synopsis; Every person, every nation on Earth is connected. Like it or not. We rise or fall together. All or none.
Conclusion; Giving the wealthy more money doesn't help workers or expand the middle class. It doesn't even help the wealthy. When you already have more money than you could spend in ten lifetimes, the reciepts from another 5% tax cut aren't even noticeable. One can purchase political power; buy yourself a congressman or Senator or two, maybe even a Supreme Court justice, but, as we have seen of late, the return on investment peaks and then declines rapidly.
Jake Sullivan; sounds like the name of a prizefighter or tough union organizer. Before you even meet him, you know "No nonsense here! Take your BS down the road!"
I've been a "hired gun" with my cameras since 1973 when I freelanced on my first corporate gig at Pangborn in Hagerstown. We all worked at the local Board of Education TV studios and put together the first independent video production company in our region. Our first corporate gig was making training videos for the Soviets...with a Russian soundtrack. We were told the parts were being used in Russian farm tractors. We found out years later the parts were used in Soviet Tanks. At that time Hagerstown and the area was full of manufacturing plants. Mack Trucks, Fairchild planes, Grove Cranes, Jamison, Moller, Brandt and more. I had a lot of clients. Over the years as I produced more corporate videos and we kept moving more plants to China and outsourcing more jobs, I said "don't they understand what they are doing?". Guess what? They did not care. It became about quarterly profits. Most of these companies had been owned and operated by the families that started them. They took care of their workers. Eventually they sold off, or had new boards who didn't care about the local workers. Bit by bit many of these plants closed or downsized. Hagerstown is now full of warehouses and trucking and only a few manufactures like Mack...which is now Volvo still exist. In my business when I started at the Board of Ed in 1972, virtually all of the equipment was American made. RCA, GE, AMPEX, Century lights, Bell & Howell, Kodak film. And then we got our first Sony port-a-pak video camera & recorder. My first camera was a Minolta 35mm SLR from Japan. Pretty quickly most of the gear was Sony, JVC or Panasonic. By the time I started my first video business in in 1980, all of the camera & recording gear I bought was JVC from Japan. There was nothing made by the US that could compete. At that time Kodak was developing digital photography. Their R&D had made the first all digital camera. Their management said we are a film company...and they let the Japanese take their invention and run with it. Every camera all of us has now is digital...and made overseas...yet Kodak invented it. We've been idiots. Our greedy boards of directors sent our manufacturing plants and jobs out of country to make them a bigger profit...our "leaders" did not understand their own ingenuity...when VW and then Japan first brought in low priced, gas economical cars, we countered with the unsafe at any speed Corvair. When GM developed a good electric vehicle in the 90's the EV1 which people loved, they killed it...to sell more gasoline. Our corporate "leadership" has screwed up in so many ways. I now work mostly for non-profits, on history related projects...or am trying trying to fund and create documentaries on social & climate issues...because the manufacturing is not here any more...it's starting to come back. But we the people need to have a say in this...we cannot trust the business people to do whats best for us. The last good corporate gig I had was with Rukert Terminals in Baltimore. They just celebrated their 100th Anniversary as a terminal that handles imports and exports at the docks. They transfer goods from ships to the warehouses. Most of it is imports. Products or raw materials from Brazil, Germany, Asia, Africa, Saudi...Russian aluminum for your Ford 150 pickup trucks, until Ukraine broke out. They are a family owned and operated business that started with one truck and a rented stable for a warehouse. Now they are the largest Independent Terminal (non government) on the East Coast. Even they had to buy their biggest crane from Europe, because no one here makes one that will do the job they need.
If we stop electing Repubs...keep Joe & Company...maybe my son & daughter can take over my company...maybe there will be manufacturers who need our services again. It's just starting to happen here in the offshore wind sector....for now I'll try and make documentaries that matter....and keep folks like Trump and DeSantis out of office. Now if we could just beat Andy Harris for Congress on the Eastern Shore....Peace
I like this vision! I've been thinking we need younger blood at the top in 2024, but maybe with such competent people in place supporting Biden we don't just yet.
Politicians and the people are finally waking up in the Western world to the negative reality of the globalization of the world's economy. While the growth achieve might be said to have produced a "win-win" situation in macro-economic terms for many of the countries, when measured by GDP etc, this is not necessarily true when you get down to the micro-economic level. You and I, as individual consumers suffer more frequently rather through a "win-lose game" as the "winners" in any country are not the same as the "losers" and the former tend to take all of the gain in wealth while leaving little in the form of wages or small business earnings to be shared with those whom TFG qualified as "losers" . Size gives might perhaps but it doesn't make it right. It's time to make the individual vote count for more than the money sloshing around the democratic process.
Wow! Vision of what we can be. Strategies flexible enough to work for many and not just the few. A real plan and partners willing to join from all over the world. The will to see it through. A roller coaster ride for sure. Full of scary highs and lows. And hope.
Your writing makes it very clear what a sloppy mess the Republicant party is. McCarthy got his picture all over the news for proposing the same old nasty crap— the rich get richer while the workers stay in their place.
What a beautiful statement. Sullivan's confirmation of Biden's work to be the foundation of not just the US's but the planet's better future is the most optimistic view heard in a long time.
Thank you for your ability to assemble these items every day and keep us inspired. Our own son will be graduating from your school, BC in less than a month. He and his classmates have been concerned as have we all of the country and world they are entering. You and your work is assuring to them and all of us and I thank you for that. I hope to seek/find and thank you in person at graduation in a few weeks.
Dr Richardson, words cannot express my joy at reading this letter. This is the world as it should be. Thanks to President Biden for the foresight to see this clearly and get us back on the track. This train wreck has been a constant and painful problem since 1981. Now if we can just reclaim both the House and Senate by electing sensible, civic minded, persons to fill those 535 seats we may finally pull ourselves out of the abyss into which we have fallen. These new civic and honorable people don't need to be all Democrats. Sane, intelligent, and freedom loving Independents and Republicans can round out the Legislative branch too. We just need to cut out the cancerous rot of the trumpster maggots, bring back the REAL Constitution, do away FOREVER with gerrymandering, voter suppression, and rampant greed.
Thank you Heather.
What Jake Sullivan had to say gives me, and should give US all hope. What a lovely and exciting path forward for US and for our world - if we can make it happen.
Yes, Biden has vision. I think that comes of years in government. I will vote for him again.
I have always been a big fan of Jake Sullivan but this piece about his economic vision is just I have been advocating for years. The Laffer economic message of "Tax Cuts" and "Trickle Down Economics" that still resonates with Republicans is dead or should be dead. The Sullivan message of investing in supply chain building and infrastucture development is the way government can help
Professor, you capture the essence of how a healthy world economy is as necessary as a productive domestic economy. And America must pay attention.
“But today at the Brookings Institution, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan outlined a very different vision of the global economy and American economic leadership.” Calling for a bipartisan approach to restore middle class, a clean energy transition....this is not new, but it definitely counters the repubs’ approach to cut services and programs that strengthen all citizens. “We’re all in this together” quoting President Kennedy. At home and abroad. Can we make this happen in today’s political climate? Hoping step by step we get beyond partisan politics and move forward. A healthy economy helps everyone.
For me to make sense of Heather's Letter, I drew this analogy. It comes from an article written by Tom Silva's This Old House:
"Building a good foundation requires a lot more than digging a hole and pouring some concrete into forms. It must be tailored to its site like a custom suit, taking into account soil conditions, water tables, even the quality of the backfill.
"And as with a custom suit, every detail must be perfect: the base properly compacted, the formwork set up right, the concrete free of voids. Neglect even one of these, and the most carefully poured foundation can fail."
I would argue that our Declaration of Independence and Constitution with its accompanying amendments provide us with that good foundation. I would also argue that the Biden Administration is tending to perfecting the details that are necessary to protect our foundation for ourselves and the generations to come.
Great synopsis, Dr. Richardson. Thank you.
Jake Sullivan is a very impressive young man. Look for him to go far.
Synopsis; Every person, every nation on Earth is connected. Like it or not. We rise or fall together. All or none.
Conclusion; Giving the wealthy more money doesn't help workers or expand the middle class. It doesn't even help the wealthy. When you already have more money than you could spend in ten lifetimes, the reciepts from another 5% tax cut aren't even noticeable. One can purchase political power; buy yourself a congressman or Senator or two, maybe even a Supreme Court justice, but, as we have seen of late, the return on investment peaks and then declines rapidly.
Jake Sullivan; sounds like the name of a prizefighter or tough union organizer. Before you even meet him, you know "No nonsense here! Take your BS down the road!"
I've been a "hired gun" with my cameras since 1973 when I freelanced on my first corporate gig at Pangborn in Hagerstown. We all worked at the local Board of Education TV studios and put together the first independent video production company in our region. Our first corporate gig was making training videos for the Soviets...with a Russian soundtrack. We were told the parts were being used in Russian farm tractors. We found out years later the parts were used in Soviet Tanks. At that time Hagerstown and the area was full of manufacturing plants. Mack Trucks, Fairchild planes, Grove Cranes, Jamison, Moller, Brandt and more. I had a lot of clients. Over the years as I produced more corporate videos and we kept moving more plants to China and outsourcing more jobs, I said "don't they understand what they are doing?". Guess what? They did not care. It became about quarterly profits. Most of these companies had been owned and operated by the families that started them. They took care of their workers. Eventually they sold off, or had new boards who didn't care about the local workers. Bit by bit many of these plants closed or downsized. Hagerstown is now full of warehouses and trucking and only a few manufactures like Mack...which is now Volvo still exist. In my business when I started at the Board of Ed in 1972, virtually all of the equipment was American made. RCA, GE, AMPEX, Century lights, Bell & Howell, Kodak film. And then we got our first Sony port-a-pak video camera & recorder. My first camera was a Minolta 35mm SLR from Japan. Pretty quickly most of the gear was Sony, JVC or Panasonic. By the time I started my first video business in in 1980, all of the camera & recording gear I bought was JVC from Japan. There was nothing made by the US that could compete. At that time Kodak was developing digital photography. Their R&D had made the first all digital camera. Their management said we are a film company...and they let the Japanese take their invention and run with it. Every camera all of us has now is digital...and made overseas...yet Kodak invented it. We've been idiots. Our greedy boards of directors sent our manufacturing plants and jobs out of country to make them a bigger profit...our "leaders" did not understand their own ingenuity...when VW and then Japan first brought in low priced, gas economical cars, we countered with the unsafe at any speed Corvair. When GM developed a good electric vehicle in the 90's the EV1 which people loved, they killed it...to sell more gasoline. Our corporate "leadership" has screwed up in so many ways. I now work mostly for non-profits, on history related projects...or am trying trying to fund and create documentaries on social & climate issues...because the manufacturing is not here any more...it's starting to come back. But we the people need to have a say in this...we cannot trust the business people to do whats best for us. The last good corporate gig I had was with Rukert Terminals in Baltimore. They just celebrated their 100th Anniversary as a terminal that handles imports and exports at the docks. They transfer goods from ships to the warehouses. Most of it is imports. Products or raw materials from Brazil, Germany, Asia, Africa, Saudi...Russian aluminum for your Ford 150 pickup trucks, until Ukraine broke out. They are a family owned and operated business that started with one truck and a rented stable for a warehouse. Now they are the largest Independent Terminal (non government) on the East Coast. Even they had to buy their biggest crane from Europe, because no one here makes one that will do the job they need.
If we stop electing Repubs...keep Joe & Company...maybe my son & daughter can take over my company...maybe there will be manufacturers who need our services again. It's just starting to happen here in the offshore wind sector....for now I'll try and make documentaries that matter....and keep folks like Trump and DeSantis out of office. Now if we could just beat Andy Harris for Congress on the Eastern Shore....Peace
I like this vision! I've been thinking we need younger blood at the top in 2024, but maybe with such competent people in place supporting Biden we don't just yet.
Politicians and the people are finally waking up in the Western world to the negative reality of the globalization of the world's economy. While the growth achieve might be said to have produced a "win-win" situation in macro-economic terms for many of the countries, when measured by GDP etc, this is not necessarily true when you get down to the micro-economic level. You and I, as individual consumers suffer more frequently rather through a "win-lose game" as the "winners" in any country are not the same as the "losers" and the former tend to take all of the gain in wealth while leaving little in the form of wages or small business earnings to be shared with those whom TFG qualified as "losers" . Size gives might perhaps but it doesn't make it right. It's time to make the individual vote count for more than the money sloshing around the democratic process.
Great letter, sorely needed dose of encouragement.
Oh, the things we could accomplish. The possibilities for a better world. If only...we had a better congress.