A headline in the New York Times today read: “Factory Jobs Are Booming Like It’s the 1970s.” The story explained that more money in the hands of consumers thanks to federal stimulus spending, along with a new skepticism of stretched supply lines, has created a rebound in American manufacturing.
“in fact it never showed signs of increasing economic growth. What it did was to move wealth dramatically upward. It also made the measure of the economy the health of Wall Street rather than Main Street.”
It is also a fact that more Chinese businessman have become millionaires and billionaires than in the US since 1980 by a huge margin. It also lifted a billion Chinese out of poverty. Thank Nixon for ‘opening’ China. For his business donors. At the expense of the ever shrinking US middle class. “These jobs are going boys, and they ain’t coming back.”-Bruce Springsteen. “Capital is like water, it seeks its own level”- AOL Time Warner CEO said something like that mid 2000’s.
Now, after 42 years of concentrating so much wealth upward and Citizen’s United to keep it that way, and no Fairness Doctrine thus keeping masses ignorant of these facts. Do we have a chance of a more perfect Union based on equality of opportunity, of access to quality education, clean air and water, and the pursuit of happiness? Our only chance is to vote BLUE!
I’m so glad we finally had the chance to prove “bottom up and out” is the best way to grow the economy and benefit the middle class. President Biden is going a great job and can do even more if we can get him a better majority.
The most startling and heartening statistics aren't the number of new manufacturing jobs, which is indeed impressive, but these: "the real net worth of the bottom 50% of U.S. households has climbed 60% since Biden took office, now reaching $67,524."
But how many Americans in this group realize what they've reaped under Biden? Unfortunately, Inflation skews so many perceptions. Then again, I don't recall Republicans proposing anything that would help keep the economy rolling on. Meanwhile, Biden and the Democrats keep proving that good things happen when government is focused on improving lives rather than fomenting hate and division.
I've been watching TV tonight and seeing many Republican ads for local races. They seem to come from a planet very different from ours, usually citing outdated conditions and lying about the participation of Democrats.
In the name of democracy, sounding an alarm from The States Project for Arizona!
* Rep. Diego Espinoza won his primary election for the District 22 Senate seat, then withdrew from the race without notifying the party to take a lobbying job. He was running unopposed in the general election, meaning he would have easily won in November. So this safe seat is now in danger of a flip.
* Rep. Espinoza will be the only candidate on the ballot but any votes cast for him won't count. We must mount a write-in campaign.
* Voters need to understand not to vote for Espinoza and to write in Dr. Evangeline Diaz instead.
* Dr. Diaz is a former school principal and former chair of her town’s planning and zoning commission. Our partners on the ground in Arizona have aligned behind her for this seat.
* Republicans didn't get anyone on the ballot in this district, so they will also run a write-in candidate.
* Early voting starts in AZ on October 12, so this campaign needs support to start reaching voters immediately.
* Bottom line: What we thought was a safe Democratic seat is now at risk in a chamber where flipping just one seat would shift enough power to end rightwing control and protect Arizona’s electoral votes from being stolen in 2024.
What we can do: Raise an additional $50K for Arizona in the next week.
Here are 2 States Project Giving Circles focused on raising funds specifically for Arizona. Our small donations add up to a powerful force!
Will Rogers understood trickle down economics in 1932: "The money was all appropriated for the top in the hopes that it would trickle down to the needy. Mr. Hoover didn't know that money trickled up.
Give it to the people at the bottom and the people at the top will have it before night, anyhow. But it will at least have passed through the poor fellow's hands."
I cannot believe that Republicans feel comfortable drawing attention to any sort of child abuse when there has been so much child sexual assault in the Republican voting church populations. We should be pointing this out and what predators the Republicans have been. It is no wonder with policies that turn women into property, which makes little girls into just toys for sick men's pleasure. I do not believe that Warren Jeffs, or the Mormon faith voted Democrat a day in his life, and now he sits in jail after having provided young wives for many of the law enforcement around him. Nor, did the Evangelicals in the Southern Baptist church who have been exposed as being sexual assaulters, groomers, child predators and much more vote Democratic.
So, I am surprised that they get away with this. Our press is shamefully lax in not putting this together for people. It is why most articles leave me disgusted with their lack of honesty or clarity.
I am glad about the news of the job increases. I hope the Feds do not destroy this. I am not clear why a specific interest rate is more important than people having jobs when it is the poorest who get hit by job loss, a low interest rate won't do them any good, and everyone who is well off can manage to pay for things regardless of what the interest rate is. I agree with this Guardian analysis on that. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/sep/23/federal-reserve-interest-rate-hikes-are-going-to-hit-the-most-vulnerable
Trickle down has never worked, and is a flawed theory because it does not understand human behavior. Getting the common person money does. It is also healthier to be keeping everything local and better for the environment. The less one has to ship the better. As people produce what they need locally they are using less fuel to transport goods around. That will be better for the environment.
TFG had a portrait of Andrew Jackson in the Oval Office. When President Biden arrived, he replaced that image with FDR's. A simple action, which set the tone for the incoming administration.
A note from an American traveling to Ireland (3 years in the planning due to pandemic induced delays). Ireland is, for anyone who has visited the country, home to many of the kindest people in the world (based on my travels to 80 countries). It is not a rich country by most standards.
So perhaps it should not have been a surprise to see a list at the front desk of my hotel displaying 4 pages of names - nearly all women and children with their Ukrainian nationality identified. The Irish government (=Irish people) are paying to host these displaced people as they fled the Russian invasion.
Such kindness shown by the Irish. Once upon a time, this would have been America - a country of immigrants (allowed in by native Americans of course). So to all Americans, a lesson perhaps in kindness from a place with far less in the way of wealth and power. Kindness!!
I haven’t felt so incredibly eager and utterly anxious about a November election since 2015. Prayers to the Universe that the results this year help to continue unraveling the results and aftershocks of that one.
And now, with all the positive economic news coming in, the Republicans want to impeach Biden. Who knows for what baseless transgression. The GOP has disappeared down the rabbit hole.
And yet focus group after focus group says that voters trust the GOP on the economy more than they do Democrats. I don’t know if this is just forty years of brainwashing or if the message isn’t getting out or what. Do the facts on the ground no longer speak for themselves?
The Regressives keep f*cking that same old supply-side chicken. It makes no sense: if you move most of the wealth upward, depriving of money those most likely to spend it and create demand, the wealthy won’t invest their excess wealth in anything that will create jobs. What would be the point? Biden’s plan has increased wealth for working people, which will increase demand, which in turn will spur job-creating investments. If the jobs are sufficiently productive it will reduce inflationary pressures, since there will be ample goods and services to meet the increased demand.
Steve Moore? Jeez, haven't we sent that empty-headed faux-economist wack job to the moon (or farther) yet? He has yet to be anywhere near correct on any economic question and is so unqualified I wouldn't seriously take his suggestion for where to go for lunch.
And Truss + tax cuts... <sigh> ... More supply-side voodoo on top of Brexit. The Brits are going to be digging out from under that for decades.
Here in the UK, we are still reeling from what was billed as a "mini-budget" or "interim statement" which was to be so modest as to not require the analysis of the Office of Budget Responsibility, which always scrutinises a formal Budget. Our two -week old new Government under the ideologically driven Liz Truss, has adopted the attitude of "growth at all costs" without any strategy of how to fund it.
The pound has hit historic lows, interest rates are rising, all at the same time as we are in the middle of a cost of living crisis, an energy crisis and the other ills that are sweeping the globe.
Who is hit most? Those who are most vulnerable. Who profits? You won't be surprised to know that it is those at the top of the financial tree, who are toasting their new found wealth - which won't of course "trickle down"!
Every section of our society is being hit. Even food banks, with unprecedented numbers of clients, are getting fewer contributions, as those who would normally give are looking to their own finances, as well as the energy costs involved in running the food banks being prohibitive.
This is a result of a new government who want to radically change what they themselves created over 12 years of mis-management, 12 years in which Ms Truss was part of every decision...
“in fact it never showed signs of increasing economic growth. What it did was to move wealth dramatically upward. It also made the measure of the economy the health of Wall Street rather than Main Street.”
It is also a fact that more Chinese businessman have become millionaires and billionaires than in the US since 1980 by a huge margin. It also lifted a billion Chinese out of poverty. Thank Nixon for ‘opening’ China. For his business donors. At the expense of the ever shrinking US middle class. “These jobs are going boys, and they ain’t coming back.”-Bruce Springsteen. “Capital is like water, it seeks its own level”- AOL Time Warner CEO said something like that mid 2000’s.
Now, after 42 years of concentrating so much wealth upward and Citizen’s United to keep it that way, and no Fairness Doctrine thus keeping masses ignorant of these facts. Do we have a chance of a more perfect Union based on equality of opportunity, of access to quality education, clean air and water, and the pursuit of happiness? Our only chance is to vote BLUE!
I’m so glad we finally had the chance to prove “bottom up and out” is the best way to grow the economy and benefit the middle class. President Biden is going a great job and can do even more if we can get him a better majority.
The most startling and heartening statistics aren't the number of new manufacturing jobs, which is indeed impressive, but these: "the real net worth of the bottom 50% of U.S. households has climbed 60% since Biden took office, now reaching $67,524."
But how many Americans in this group realize what they've reaped under Biden? Unfortunately, Inflation skews so many perceptions. Then again, I don't recall Republicans proposing anything that would help keep the economy rolling on. Meanwhile, Biden and the Democrats keep proving that good things happen when government is focused on improving lives rather than fomenting hate and division.
I've been watching TV tonight and seeing many Republican ads for local races. They seem to come from a planet very different from ours, usually citing outdated conditions and lying about the participation of Democrats.
In the name of democracy, sounding an alarm from The States Project for Arizona!
* Rep. Diego Espinoza won his primary election for the District 22 Senate seat, then withdrew from the race without notifying the party to take a lobbying job. He was running unopposed in the general election, meaning he would have easily won in November. So this safe seat is now in danger of a flip.
* Rep. Espinoza will be the only candidate on the ballot but any votes cast for him won't count. We must mount a write-in campaign.
* Voters need to understand not to vote for Espinoza and to write in Dr. Evangeline Diaz instead.
* Dr. Diaz is a former school principal and former chair of her town’s planning and zoning commission. Our partners on the ground in Arizona have aligned behind her for this seat.
* Republicans didn't get anyone on the ballot in this district, so they will also run a write-in candidate.
* Early voting starts in AZ on October 12, so this campaign needs support to start reaching voters immediately.
* Bottom line: What we thought was a safe Democratic seat is now at risk in a chamber where flipping just one seat would shift enough power to end rightwing control and protect Arizona’s electoral votes from being stolen in 2024.
What we can do: Raise an additional $50K for Arizona in the next week.
Here are 2 States Project Giving Circles focused on raising funds specifically for Arizona. Our small donations add up to a powerful force!
https://www.grapevine.org/giving-circle/WXWhrLm/Arizona-Pathfinders
https://www.grapevine.org/giving-circle/adWhPkp/Coast-to-Coast-Giving-Circle
(Remember that Alaskans learned how to spell "Lisa Murkowski" when she was a write-in candidate.)
Please spread this message widely. Thank you for helping!
h/t Adele G.
That black and white post of Trump and the “dark of night” quote is disgusting. And he is emphatically not the president. What a fraud.
Will Rogers understood trickle down economics in 1932: "The money was all appropriated for the top in the hopes that it would trickle down to the needy. Mr. Hoover didn't know that money trickled up.
Give it to the people at the bottom and the people at the top will have it before night, anyhow. But it will at least have passed through the poor fellow's hands."
~Will Rogers
Nov. 26, 1932
I cannot believe that Republicans feel comfortable drawing attention to any sort of child abuse when there has been so much child sexual assault in the Republican voting church populations. We should be pointing this out and what predators the Republicans have been. It is no wonder with policies that turn women into property, which makes little girls into just toys for sick men's pleasure. I do not believe that Warren Jeffs, or the Mormon faith voted Democrat a day in his life, and now he sits in jail after having provided young wives for many of the law enforcement around him. Nor, did the Evangelicals in the Southern Baptist church who have been exposed as being sexual assaulters, groomers, child predators and much more vote Democratic.
https://www.vox.com/culture/23131530/southern-baptist-convention-sexual-abuse-scandal-guidepost
So, I am surprised that they get away with this. Our press is shamefully lax in not putting this together for people. It is why most articles leave me disgusted with their lack of honesty or clarity.
I am glad about the news of the job increases. I hope the Feds do not destroy this. I am not clear why a specific interest rate is more important than people having jobs when it is the poorest who get hit by job loss, a low interest rate won't do them any good, and everyone who is well off can manage to pay for things regardless of what the interest rate is. I agree with this Guardian analysis on that. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/sep/23/federal-reserve-interest-rate-hikes-are-going-to-hit-the-most-vulnerable
Trickle down has never worked, and is a flawed theory because it does not understand human behavior. Getting the common person money does. It is also healthier to be keeping everything local and better for the environment. The less one has to ship the better. As people produce what they need locally they are using less fuel to transport goods around. That will be better for the environment.
TFG had a portrait of Andrew Jackson in the Oval Office. When President Biden arrived, he replaced that image with FDR's. A simple action, which set the tone for the incoming administration.
A note from an American traveling to Ireland (3 years in the planning due to pandemic induced delays). Ireland is, for anyone who has visited the country, home to many of the kindest people in the world (based on my travels to 80 countries). It is not a rich country by most standards.
So perhaps it should not have been a surprise to see a list at the front desk of my hotel displaying 4 pages of names - nearly all women and children with their Ukrainian nationality identified. The Irish government (=Irish people) are paying to host these displaced people as they fled the Russian invasion.
Such kindness shown by the Irish. Once upon a time, this would have been America - a country of immigrants (allowed in by native Americans of course). So to all Americans, a lesson perhaps in kindness from a place with far less in the way of wealth and power. Kindness!!
I haven’t felt so incredibly eager and utterly anxious about a November election since 2015. Prayers to the Universe that the results this year help to continue unraveling the results and aftershocks of that one.
And now, with all the positive economic news coming in, the Republicans want to impeach Biden. Who knows for what baseless transgression. The GOP has disappeared down the rabbit hole.
And yet focus group after focus group says that voters trust the GOP on the economy more than they do Democrats. I don’t know if this is just forty years of brainwashing or if the message isn’t getting out or what. Do the facts on the ground no longer speak for themselves?
The Regressives keep f*cking that same old supply-side chicken. It makes no sense: if you move most of the wealth upward, depriving of money those most likely to spend it and create demand, the wealthy won’t invest their excess wealth in anything that will create jobs. What would be the point? Biden’s plan has increased wealth for working people, which will increase demand, which in turn will spur job-creating investments. If the jobs are sufficiently productive it will reduce inflationary pressures, since there will be ample goods and services to meet the increased demand.
<sigh>
Steve Moore? Jeez, haven't we sent that empty-headed faux-economist wack job to the moon (or farther) yet? He has yet to be anywhere near correct on any economic question and is so unqualified I wouldn't seriously take his suggestion for where to go for lunch.
And Truss + tax cuts... <sigh> ... More supply-side voodoo on top of Brexit. The Brits are going to be digging out from under that for decades.
Here in the UK, we are still reeling from what was billed as a "mini-budget" or "interim statement" which was to be so modest as to not require the analysis of the Office of Budget Responsibility, which always scrutinises a formal Budget. Our two -week old new Government under the ideologically driven Liz Truss, has adopted the attitude of "growth at all costs" without any strategy of how to fund it.
The pound has hit historic lows, interest rates are rising, all at the same time as we are in the middle of a cost of living crisis, an energy crisis and the other ills that are sweeping the globe.
Who is hit most? Those who are most vulnerable. Who profits? You won't be surprised to know that it is those at the top of the financial tree, who are toasting their new found wealth - which won't of course "trickle down"!
Every section of our society is being hit. Even food banks, with unprecedented numbers of clients, are getting fewer contributions, as those who would normally give are looking to their own finances, as well as the energy costs involved in running the food banks being prohibitive.
This is a result of a new government who want to radically change what they themselves created over 12 years of mis-management, 12 years in which Ms Truss was part of every decision...
I'm rambling now. Despair is speaking.