Category: Monday Wake Up Call

Monday Wake Up Call – April 29, 2019

The Daily Escape: (In recognition of Poway, CA)

There’s no escape, we’re staying on the hamster wheel

And this:

All these killers used the same weapon, the AR-15 (or a knock-off of the AR-15). And just how many “lone wolf” killers will it take before America realizes they’re a pack? Do you have any hope that the Congress will rein in assault-type weapons?

Time to wake up, America. This weekend we saw two more acts of domestic terrorism against non-Christians. One by an Islamophobic Christian who mistakenly thought Sikhs are Muslim, and another by an anti-Semitic white supremacist who targeted Jews.

In the first case, a white man drove into a family of Sikhs in Sunnyvale, California, believing they were Muslims. He was allegedly on his way to a Bible study group, and was praising Jesus when authorities caught him.

In the second, another white man, gunned down several people in a synagogue in Poway CA, killing one and injuring three. He apparently wrote an anti-Semitic manifesto. The letter talks about planning for the attack. The letter writer also claims responsibility for an arson fire that blackened the walls of the Islamic Center in Escondido on March 24th, but no one was injured.

The Poway suspect also championed Robert Bowers, who killed 11 people and wounded six others in the Tree of Life synagogue shootings in Pittsburgh six months ago.

None of this is to downplay the ISIS killings of Christians in Sri Lanka. But today, we’re focusing on America, and two converging trends: The ubiquity of guns in America, and the growing and unbridled domestic racism that has returned to daylight.

We can blame Republicans for some of the escalating number of US white terrorist acts against non-Christians and non-whites. We all know that Trump has in many cases, encouraged hate to come out of the closet. This from David Atkins:

“White supremacist, anti-Semitic, Islamophobic and misogynist rhetoric runs rampant across the entirety of the conservative movement. The transformation of the Republican Party into a vehicle of violent white male grievance has rapidly accelerated its longtime trend under Trump.”

Atkins notes that the weekend attacks came one day after Trump congratulated the white player picked second in the NFL draft while ignoring the black player picked first. In 2016, Trump won both states that the two players played for, so it wasn’t politics. That’s who he is, and he doesn’t care who knows it.

We on the liberal side of the ledger continue to debate whether the “reachable” Trump voters are as racist as the rest of the MAGAs. Some Democratic pols wonder how many of them could be persuaded to vote for a Democrat in 2020. It’s unlikely that the “reachable” Trump voters are more than 4% of the electorate, but that could well swing what shapes up as a very close presidential election.

Can Democrats appeal to their base and to the persuadable Republicans by hammering on the moral repugnance of these white terrorists, while downplaying any program to weaken the Second Amendment?

At the same time, what will Republicans do? We can be sure that Trump will double down, but will the rest of the Party follow him? More, from Atkins:

“…violent acts of terrorism by their own base are much harder to sweep under the rug. Vague statements of general condemnation against violence won’t cut it as these despicable acts continue to increase, and as the Republican Party becomes increasingly associated with them.”

The thing is, the fires of hatred are not a tool you can use only to fire up your voters to do what you want. Once ignited, it’s not your kitchen stove, where you can turn the heat up, down, or off at your choosing. These are wildfires. You can ignite them, and use them to heat things up, but they can take on a life of their own, burning whatever they reach.

We’re told over and over that we have a civility crisis in this country. That the Democrats aren’t being polite enough to the right.

We do have a civility crisis in this country. We are far too civil to bigots. We are far too tolerant of those who would oppress, or kill others.

The right wing needs to pay a price for its toleration and cultivation of bigotry. It has no right to demand civility when it allows some of its base to treat people with contempt just for being who they are.

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Monday Wake Up Call – April 22, 2019

The Daily Escape:

Hout Bay, South Africa – 2012 photo by Wrongo. Hout Bay is a suburb of Cape Town.

Let’s talk a little about ageism and sexism in politics. Are Biden and Sanders too old to be president? Why are the top-polling four 2020 Democratic presidential contenders men?

Over America’s 230 years of presidents, 220 of those years have featured a man who was less than 70 years old. The ten other years consist of most of Reagan’s two terms, along with all of Trump’s time in office, and the last three months of Eisenhower’s second term.

Reagan was 75+ in the last half of his second term. That’s when many in the White House speculated about whether Reagan’s deteriorating mental condition might justify invoking the 25th amendment:

“He was lazy; he wasn’t interested in the job. They said he wouldn’t read the papers they gave him—even short position papers and documents. They said he wouldn’t come over to work—all he wanted to do was to watch movies and television at the residence.”

Does any of that sound familiar?

Biden and Sanders are leading the early polling for the 2020 Democratic nomination, so the possibility of an 80 year-old president is very real (Sanders would be 79 upon taking office, while Biden would be a year younger). If Trump gets re-elected, he would spend the second half of his second term as the oldest president in US history.

People in this age group can perform very well, but their odds of dying or getting dementia are reasonably high. So, why not elect younger people? The idea of electing a white man about to turn 80 to the presidency seems crazy. Maybe not as crazy as re-electing Donald Trump, but we aren’t grading on a curve. There are plenty of perfectly acceptable alternatives that don’t carry anything like these particular risks.

And what explains the fact that in the most diverse primary in Democratic Party history, the top four candidates are all white men? We unfairly hold women who hold, or seek jobs in high places to different standards than men, possibly thinking that in politics, “electability” means “white dude”. This is wrong.

We need to let the policy ideas of this group play out, and let meritocracy prevail. At this point, we have no idea who is “electable”. But Wrongo hopes that we pick from among the younger prospects, someone with energy, ideas and a message that unites rather than divides the country.

Before accusing Wrongo of being ageist, or of playing identity politics, let it be said that his top three presidential prospects at this point are Elizabeth Warren, Pete Buttigieg, and Kamala Harris. All three seem to have the personality that will relish the fight on the campaign trail. Warren offers more policy positions that Wrongo supports. Mayor Pete and Kamala Harris have that elusive “electability” that Warren may lack.

Speaking of identity politics, we shouldn’t forget that Bernie Sanders is Jewish. So his election would be no less historical than electing a woman, a gay or a person of color.

Time to wake up Democrats! We need to support the candidate who can turn current policies in a new direction. Let’s support the candidate who has the courage, stamina, and experience to be successful.

To help you wake up, here is “I Don’t Understand The Poor” from the 2014 Tony Award-winning best musical, “A Gentleman’s Guide to Love & Murder”. This could be sung at every Republican Convention:

Sample Lyric:

I don’t understand the poor

And they’re constantly turning out more

Every festering slum In Christendom

Is disgorging its young by the score

I suppose there are some with ambition

Say, the pickpocket, beggar, or whore

From what I can tell

They do quite well

They’re rising above

And its work they love

But I don’t understand the poor.

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

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Monday Wake Up Call – April 15, 2019

The Daily Escape:

Tax day! Wrongo got the Wrong family taxes finished, and submitted with a few days to spare. Last week was one of the many that will make you scratch your head. Here are three amazing things from last week:

  • Scientists unveiled an image of a black hole
  • That image is 50 million years old
  • Millions of Americans still believe the Earth is 6,000 years old

And just when you thought America’s cities couldn’t be any more corrupt, check out NYC’s Hudson Yards, Manhattan’s mega-project that is the largest private real estate development in the US by area. Private? City Lab reports that Hudson Yards was partially bankrolled by a federal investor visa program called EB-5, which was meant to help poverty-stricken areas:

“Specifically, the project raised at least $1.2 billion of its financing through a controversial investor visa program known as EB-5. This program enables immigrants to secure visas in exchange for real estate investments. Foreigners who pump between $500,000 and $1 million into U.S. real estate projects can purchase visas for their families, making it a favorite for wealthy families abroad, namely in China. EB-5 is supposed to be a way to jumpstart investment in remote rural areas, or distressed urban ones.”

The threshold for these EB-5 visas can be reduced to $500,000 if investors place their capital in a “targeted employment area” (TEA). The TEA can be either a rural community or distressed urban area with a high unemployment rate (at least 150% of the national average).

Investors typically obtain visas for two additional family members, so Business Insider thinks the development likely created about 10,000 EB-5 visas, the maximum permitted in any year.

These are the kind of immigrants both parties can agree should be let in!

But is Hudson Yards a distressed neighborhood? It is bordered by expensive neighborhoods such as Chelsea and Hell’s Kitchen. It sits at the start of the High Line, and is too wealthy to qualify for the EB-5 program. To solve the problem, the state included a few census tracts from Harlem as part of the Hudson Yards TEA. Here’s a map of the TEA:

This looks just like a gerrymandered Congressional district in North Carolina. And it tells you all you need to know about how our local, state, and federal politicians are in the pocket of private industry. Money is always the driving factor, and it engulfs our politicians of both parties in a stew of questionable ethics.

America can’t be bothered investing in our own people, so we sell visas to bribe foreigners to do the investing for us.

Time to wake up America! This is the tip of the iceberg for the rot in our political process. To help you wake up, listen to “Why We Build the Wall” from the 2010 album “Hadestown” by AnaĂŻs Mitchell. This “folk opera” opens on Broadway on Wednesday. The play is inspired by the story of Orpheus and Eurydice. Here is “Why We Build the Wall”, featuring Greg Brown. Wrongo is seeing the play in the middle of May:

Note that this song was written in 2010, long before Trump, or any politician had any interest in building a wall.

Sample Lyric:

Who do we call the enemy?

The enemy is poverty,

And the wall keeps out the enemy,

And we build the wall to keep us free.

That’s why we build the wall;

We build the wall to keep us free.

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

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Monday Wake Up Call – April 8, 2019

The Daily Escape:

Three Brothers, Yosemite NP – February, 2019 photo by mattfloresfoto

Last week, the House of Representatives voted to reauthorize the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA). The reauthorization was opposed by 157 Republicans including four of the thirteen Republican women in the House. The debate turned on provisions in the bill that restrict those convicted of domestic abuse, assault, or stalking from buying or owning a firearm.

You would think that supporting the bill would be a no-brainer, but only 33 House Republicans voted for the bill. The NRA was opposed, warning that a vote in favor of the bill would be reflected in individual Congressperson’s NRA ratings.

The current law has been on the books for 25 years. The original law already prohibits spouses or former spouses convicted of abuse from purchasing a firearm, but an amendment to the bill closed the so-called “boyfriend loophole,” adding unmarried partners to the language. It would also prohibit people convicted of misdemeanor stalking offenses from owning or buying firearms, as well as abusers subject to temporary protective orders.

That all was a bridge too far for the NRA. NRA spokesperson Jennifer Baker:

“The gun control lobby and anti-gun politicians are intentionally politicizing the Violence Against Women Act as a smoke screen to push their gun control agenda…”

The NRA’s objection was that too many violent people would be prevented from owning a gun.

Nancy Pelosi said in a speech on the House floor:

“There should be nothing partisan or political about ending the scourge of domestic violence and sexual assault, which one in three women faces today…”

Is this a good look for Republican lawmakers? We think of the GOP as excellent in controlling the political narrative, but a headline that says “157 House Republicans support violence against women” will leave a mark. It doesn’t help the NRA either. The group can be said to favor gun rights more than they care about protecting women from domestic violence. Another bad look.

It gets worse for both the GOP and the NRA: Think back to the Texas church mass shooting, and remember that the shooter got a gun because the US Air Force never reported his domestic violence court martial conviction — 26 people died.

Common sense is not common. The VAWA has been in place for 25 years, and there has been very little serious opposition until now. The amendment seems reasonable. This may be a case where the NRA lost its ability to think objectively. But, the bill faces an uncertain future. With these new gun control provisions, it is likely to be dead on arrival in the GOP-held Senate.

It’s clear now that the NRA doesn’t care about the problem of domestic violence. All they want is more gun sales.

And the Republicans are right there with them. Their motto should be: Greed, Guns and God.

Time to wake up, America! The GOP’s position against the VAWA demonstrates their bias against women and in favor of the NRA. To help you wake up, Wrongo brings back the Monday rock song feature. Today we hear from Chrissy Hyde of the Pretenders. We present her song “My City is Gone” from her third album, “Learning to Crawl”. It was released 35 years ago in 1984.

The song’s title was chosen because there had already been a song called “Ohio” by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young:

Some might realize that the bass line in this song is used by the execrable Rush Limbaugh as the music bumper on his radio show. Hyde agreed to let him use it as long as the proceeds were donated to animal rescue.

Sample Lyrics:

I went back to Ohio
But my city was gone
There was no train station
There was no downtown
South Howard had disappeared
All my favorite places
My city had been pulled down
Reduced to parking spaces
A, o, way to go Ohio

Her lyrics could have been a letter sent 35 years ago to the Democrats as a warning about what was happening in the heartland. It was unread, and marked “return to sender”.

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

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Monday Wake Up Call – April 1, 2019

The Daily Escape:

Racka Sheep, Hungary, April 2017 – photo by Laszlo Balogh.

The Trump legacy keeps on giving. Forbes reports that when Trump’s tax bill passed in late 2017, it included:

“A new tax on litigation settlements: no deduction for legal fees…..That means many plaintiffs must pay taxes even on monies their attorneys collect. Of course, the attorneys must also pay tax on the same money.”

Robert W. Wood, a Forbes contributing writer who follows taxes, cites the case of Edwin Hardeman who won $80.5 million in a suit against Monsanto’s Roundup. From Forbes:

“Hardeman was awarded a bit over $5 million in compensatory damages, and $75M in punitive damages. The combined contingent fees and costs Mr. Hardeman pays his attorneys might total as much as 50%. If so, the plaintiff would get to keep half, or $2.5 million of the $5 million compensatory award. Since it is for his…non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, that part for physical injuries should not be taxed. Then, of the $75 million punitive award, $37.5 million goes to legal fees and costs, and $37.5 million to Hardeman. So before taxes, the plaintiff’s take home is $40 million.”

But because of Trump’s new math, Hardeman’s $75 million punitive damages award is fully taxable, with no deduction for the fees he pays to his lawyer. Between federal taxes of 37% and California taxes of about 13.3%, Hardeman could lose about 50% to the IRS and California Franchise Tax Board. He would still owe another $37.5 million to his lawyers, so his after-tax take from an $80 million verdict only $2.5 million.

A $2.5 million award isn’t chump change, but this is another effort by corporations and Republicans to discourage law suits seeking punitive damages by plaintiffs. Notably, compensatory damages for physical injuries or physical sickness are still tax-free, but not punitive damages.

Doesn’t paying taxes on money you don’t receive seem un-American? The reach of corporate interests into our laws cannot be overstated. It will take a generation to reverse all of the inroads corporate lobbyists have made into our tax laws alone.

So, wake up America! It’s time to change capitalism so that it works for the people, not just for the owners and managers of corporate America. Bill Maher had a great discussion on his show “Real Time“. He echoed FDR’s “Four Freedoms” while commenting on how countries with a higher socialism-to-capitalism mix rank as happier than the US in the recent World Happiness Report. Maher says;

“Happiness isn’t only about what you have. It’s also about what you don’t have to worry about,”

Maher recommends rebranding Capitalism Reform as “Capitalism Plus.” Because, “It’s a plus when you get sick and you can focus on getting better instead of not going broke“. Or, ending up sleeping under an overpass.

Maher ends with:

“Does pure unbridled capitalism work? I guess that depends whether you’re on the board of Boeing, or onboard a Boeing.”

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

 

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Monday Wake Up Call – March 18, 2019

The Daily Escape:

View from Angel’s Landing, Zion NP – 2019 photo by ducc517

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) says that she favors “capitalism with serious rules.” David Leonhardt wrote in Sunday’s NYT:

Her platform aims to reform American capitalism so that it once again works well for most American families. The recent tradition in Democratic politics has been different. It has been largely to accept that big companies are going to get bigger and do everything they can to hold down workers’ pay. The government will then try to improve things through income taxes and benefit programs.

Warren is trying to treat not just the symptoms of inequality, but the underlying disease. Warren also called for an annual wealth tax, for people with assets greater than $50 million. She has proposed a universal child-care and pre-K program. She favors tougher guidelines on future mergers, and also a breakup of the giant tech companies (Google, Facebook) that resemble monopolies.

Of the current crop of Democrats, she’s the reform capitalism candidate. But one idea that Warren hasn’t espoused is the Financial Transactions Tax, (FTT). Wrongo first wrote about a FTT in March 2013.

Sen. Brian Schatz, (D-HI) and Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-OR) introduced a tax of one-tenth-of-one-percent, or 10 basis points (100 basis points equals 1 percentage point), on securities trades, including stocks, bonds, and derivatives. The CBO estimates that the FTT would raise $777 billion over 10 years. Sens. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Jeff Merkley (D-OR), and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) are co-sponsors of the bill.

For the math-challenged, 10 basis points on a $1,000 trade equals one dollar. Jared Bernstein says:

FTTs exist in various countries, including the UK and France, with Germany considering the tax (also, Brazil, India, South Korea, and Argentina). The UK is a particularly germane example, where an FTT has long co-existed with London’s vibrant, global financial market.

More from Bernstein: (brackets by Wrongo)

Because the value of the stock holdings is highly skewed toward the wealthy, the FTT is highly progressive: The TPC [Tax Policy Center] estimates that 40% of the cost of the tax falls on the top 1% (which makes sense as they hold about 40% of the value of the stock market and 40% of national wealth).

Vox also reports that an FTT would mostly affect wealthy Americans, because an estimated 84% of the value of stocks is owned by the wealthiest 10% of households. Schatz isn’t the first Democrat to suggest an FTT, Bernie Sanders ran on a similar idea in the 2016 Democratic primary. He pitched it as a way to pay for free college.

Globally, there is plenty of experience with FTTs. In the UK, a 0.5% “stamp tax” is charged when someone buys shares on the stock market, and the UK market is fine. France in 2012 introduced a tax on financial transactions, and a study from the European Commission found that trading volumes declined slightly, but share prices and volatility weren’t meaningfully changed. France and Germany have pushed for a European Union-wide FTT.

Opponents include the high-frequency traders, who note that even a small FTT could upend their extremely low margin business model. Although a dollar on a $1,000 trade doesn’t sound like much, if the industry is making 4 billion trades a day, it can add up.

Time to wake up and support an FTT, America. Sens Warren and Sanders support this idea, and you should too. Those who think that the government should use the tax code to ensure that everyone has an equal opportunity to get ahead, and that we should do more to ensure the well-being of our citizens aren’t socialists.

If that makes us socialists, then Eisenhower, who presided over a 90% top tax bracket, was also a socialist.

To help you wake up, here’s Steely Dan with “Any World That I’m Welcome To” from their 1975 album “Kay Lied”. This tune gives you the benefit of hearing the late, great, Hal Blaine on drums. Blaine may have been the most recorded drummer in pop music history. From the late 50s through the mid-70s, Blaine did sessions with Sam Cooke, Ray Charles, The Righteous Brothers, Henry Mancini, Ike & Tina Turner, The Monkees, Nancy Sinatra, The Fifth Dimension, The Byrds, Sonny & Cher, Mamas and the Papas, and The Grass Roots.

The famously picky Steely Dan only used Blaine for this one tune:

Those who read the Wrongologist in email can view the video here.

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Monday Wake Up Call – February 25, 2019

The Daily Escape:

Hooded Merganser with fish, Housatonic River, CT – February, 2019 photo by JH Clery

Disenchantment with the government has become an important part of America’s current mindset. A recent Gallup survey that found that 35% of Americans surveyed named the government as the “top problem” facing the US:

“Gallup has asked Americans what they felt was the most important problem facing the country since 1939 and has regularly compiled mentions of the government since 1964. Prior to 2001, the highest percentage mentioning government was 26% during the Watergate scandal. Thus, the current measure is the highest in at least 55 years.”

(Gallup’s poll was a telephone survey of 1,016 adults in all 50 US states and the District of Columbia. The survey has a margin of error of ± 4%. It was conducted between Feb 1st – 10th, 2019)

This is more significant because this time, Gallup’s question was open-ended, unlike the usual form of the question that Gallup has been asking for decades. In the previous version, Gallup asks “which of the following will be the biggest threat to the country in the future—big business, big labor, or big government?”

What’s driving the current historic discontent with government isn’t that government does too much, but that government does too little. Gallup speculates that the increase reflects public frustration with the government shutdown that occurred from late December through most of January. They observed a similar double-digit spike after the 2013 government shutdown, when it climbed from 16% in September 2013, to 33% in October 2013.

Gallup reports that 11% of respondents cited “Donald Trump” as the most important problem, while 5% name “the Democrats” or “liberals” and just 1% named “Congress.” Since January 2017, about the time Trump took office, the government has been the top problem each month, except in Gallup’s November poll, and in July 2018. In both of those months, immigration edged out the government at the top of the list. After the government, the most important problems according to Gallup’s latest poll were immigration, at 19%, and health care, at 6%.

Gallup began asking about the “most important problem” on a monthly basis in 2001; since then, only a few times and a few issues have matched or exceeded the 35% currently mentioning the government:

  • After the 9/11 attacks, mentions of “terrorism” topped the list as the most important problem, peaking at 46% in October 2001.
  • Mentions of the situation in Iraq escalated in early 2007 after G.W. Bush’s announcement of the “surge”. “Iraq” was cited as the biggest problem by 38% in February of that year.
  • In November, 2008, the percentage of Americans naming “the economy” reached 58%.
  • In 2011, as Obama was laying out an ambitious job creation plan, 39% saw unemployment as our major problem.

This time, by frequency of mention, government is our biggest problem among a list of 47 national problems, not terrorism, or the economy or unemployment. Those were individual crises that our government responded to. Now, we’re saying that government itself is dysfunctional.

And Gallup revealed:

“While Democrats were more likely than Republicans to name government and leadership as the top problem facing the nation in the year leading up to the latest poll, both party groups are now about as likely to name government as the top US problem.”

As we might expect, Republicans disproportionately mention Democrats or liberals as the problem, while Democrats (as well as independents) disproportionately mention Trump.

Gallup concludes that while Democrats and Republicans are currently aligned in their negative view, it is for different reasons. For Democrats, the shutdown was caused by a stalemate over a border wall they overwhelmingly rejected, promoted by a president they dislike. Gallup speculates that for Republicans, it is the ramifications of losing control of the House of Representatives and their party’s inability to pass more legislation while it was in power.

This bears watching as the presidential primary season takes form. The poll may offer some fodder for one or more candidates to harness the frustrations of voters who are saying that they are fed up with the gridlock and hyper-partisanship in Washington that has only grown with time.

There’s a window here, the question is who can seize the opportunity. Already, some right-wing pundits are linking the growing disapproval of government by Republicans with the Democrats’ embrace of Medicare for All and other “socialist” programs.

It’s time to wake up, America! People are starting to understand that dysfunctional government isn’t in their interest. The time is right for a messenger who can harness the frustration and move the country back to a functioning democracy.

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Monday Wake Up Call – Green New Deal Edition

The Daily Escape:

Double Rainbow, Kauai, Hawaii – 2018 photo by Charlene Renslow

There has been plenty of talk about the introduction of a Green New Deal (GND) as an answer for what ails America. Here is the text of HR 109. Everyone should take a few minutes and read it.

The power of the GND is that it addresses the power imbalance between established political and business interests in the US and the rest of us. The GND injects compassion into our democracy. Justice for workers is compassion. Care of the environment for future generations is compassion. A more equitable distribution of wealth is compassion.

From Ed Walker:

“The Green New Deal is an overarching statement of political goals for the Democratic Party, something the party has not had for decades. It lays out a vision of a future inspired by the best the party has to offer, Franklin Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms, which he laid out in January 1941 as the US stared at the unfolding crisis in Europe…..It is a combination of Roosevelt’s unfinished goals and the massive work done by liberals to expand the reach of the Constitution to previously disfavored groups. It offers hope and possibility as we confront the crisis of environmental disaster.”

Most people think the GND is about fixing the environment. That’s true, but there is a larger theme running through it, the reform of capitalism.

Capitalism is at the core of our country’s growth and place in the world. It has created wealth for all. In accordance with its tenets, a few of us are fabulously rich, while the majority of us are not. It also imposes economic costs on the 99% while sucking up most benefits for those at the very top. As Ed Walker says:

“You don’t see the rich living next door to petroleum processing plants or airports or gravel pits or trash dumps. You don’t see their kids suffering from asthma caused by factory pollution or heavy truck traffic or worse. You don’t see them unable to pay medical bills or take their kids for needed medical attention. That’s for the little people.”

The GND’s most important virtue is that it doesn’t assume that the entire burden of the disruption caused by economic growth (if the GND becomes law), should be borne only by the 99%. It insures corporations will not grab vast profits, or control adaptation to the new economy for their sole benefit.

For example, when the price of natural gas dropped, capitalists stopped using coal, and coal miners lost their jobs, their insurance, their homes and their futures. Under the GND, when natural gas is phased out in favor of alternative sources, displaced workers will have a job and health care, because the GND offers a job guarantee and universal access to health care.

The knee-jerk reaction from Republicans (and many Democrats) is that the GND is socialism, and it’s impossible to implement in a free society. It is true that HR 109 is designed to rebalance the power about who decides the future of the nation. It explicitly favors the interests of the vast majority. It explicitly limits the power of corporations to dictate what response will be made to the threat of climate change.

This isn’t socialism, it’s an overdue reform of capitalism. Our companies, in particular the large global firms, can no longer be trusted to do the right thing when it comes to the welfare of Americans. For the past 70 years, people accepted that they would do well if American companies did well.

Globalism has made a lie of that ideology. Corporations must pay taxes. Corporations must be responsible for bearing the economic costs for all of us that come from their decisions.

Capitalism reform is a serious challenge not just to corporations and the rich. It is a serious challenge to our current political parties. Democrats claim to be the party of the people. The GND will force them to prove it.

The GOP represents the interests of corporations and the rich against the interests of working people. The GND makes this clear. It offers voters a contrast with the Republican/MAGA vision for this nation.

Both parties claim to want the best for the country’s future. Thinking about the GND forces them to come up with positive programs, or to do nothing in the face of mounting inequality, and a zero-sum political economy. Some have compared a GND transition to the abolition of slavery. Slavery was immensely profitable, and the benefits went to relatively few. And those few held all the political power in the South. It led to war.

Meanwhile, the media focuses on the horse race of ideas, and the cost. Can the Green New Deal pass? How could we ever pay for it?

Democrats and Republicans opposed to the GND must explain why even more neoliberal capitalism will accomplish what voters say they want. Republicans will continue to argue that the GND will turn us into Venezuela or worse.

But the rest of us now have a vision for a better future.

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Monday Wake Up Call – February 11, 2019

The Daily Escape:

The Piedmont Kilns, Wyoming. They were built in 1869 to supply charcoal for the iron smelting industry in Utah. Part of a ghost town, three remain.

A wave of bankruptcies is sweeping the US Farm Belt, and Trump’s trade disputes are adding to the pain. The primary cause is low commodity prices that American farmers have experienced for the past few years. Throughout much of the Midwest, US farmers are filing for Chapter 12 bankruptcy protection at levels not seen for at least a decade.

From the WSJ:

“Bankruptcies in three regions covering major farm states last year rose to the highest level in at least 10 years. The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals, which includes Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin, had double the bankruptcies in 2018 compared with 2008. In the Eighth Circuit, which includes states from North Dakota to Arkansas, bankruptcies swelled 96%. The 10th Circuit, which covers Kansas and other states, last year had 59% more bankruptcies than a decade earlier.”

Those states accounted for nearly half of all sales of US farm products in 2017, according to USDA data. Since 2000, China’s share of our agricultural exports has increased from two percent to about 19% in 2017. China has become our largest agricultural trading partner.

The rise in farm bankruptcies tracks a multi-year slump in prices for corn, soybeans and other farm commodities caused by a world-wide glut. Prices for soybeans and hogs further declined after Mexico, along with China, retaliated against US steel and aluminum tariffs by imposing duties on our AG products, and then slashing purchases.

Farmers generally supported Trump’s tariffs when he started the trade war in 2018. China’s retaliation was to virtually cease purchasing American agricultural products. As an example, China moved the sourcing of soybeans from the US to Brazil. When a low margin business like farming loses 20% of sales, only those who aren’t in debt can survive. And most US farmers owe quite a bit to their bankers.

The Trump administration recognized the potential problem, and approved funding to bridge farmers across the decline in Chinese purchases, but the trade war has gone on for longer than anticipated.

Now, bankruptcies are way up, and exports to China are way down:

Source: Econbrowser

Unfortunately, we keep importing from China. But in the past year, the Chinese have stopping buying as much of our goods. Clearly, the bull our farmers got isn’t in their barn, but in the White House.

Republicans are saying that the surge in farm bankruptcies isn’t Trump’s fault, that the problem with the farm product glut started years ago. But, if Republicans want to give Trump credit for the good employment numbers, and a still-robust stock market, they have to blame him for the bad as well.

Time to wake up America! Disruption without a strategy brings chaos. And think back to the SOTU, when Trump said how he stood between us and socialism. But Trump’s picking winners and losers with his trade wars. He’s using tax-payer money to subsidize farmers damaged by his self-imposed trade wars. That sounds eerily like socialism to Wrongo.

Wake up to the fact that farmers are pawns in Trump’s capricious tantrums against China. Those who have played chess know that most of your pawns are gone by the end of the game.

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Monday Wake Up Call – Wreck It Ralph Edition, February 4, 2019

The Daily Escape:

The Expectation — 1936 painting by Richard Oelze

(Patriots won a tough Super Bowl, and the chili was terrific!)

Ralph Northam is the Democratic governor of Virginia. Ralph is on pace to wreck his political life. Here’s the story so far:

On Friday, Northam’s personal page from his 1984 medical school yearbook surfaced. It includes a picture of two unidentified people, one wearing blackface, the other in a Klan robe and hood.

Within a few hours, Northam says he’s one of the people in the picture, although he doesn’t say which of the two people he is.

A few hours later, he says he’s definitely NOT in the picture, but he confesses to a different racist escapade. Around the time that he graduated from medical school, he participated in a Michael Jackson impersonation contest, and used shoe polish to darken his skin.

Eugene Robinson had a great take, using Jackson’s tunes:

But Northam must have done enough in his youth to mistakenly assume that the picture in the yearbook was of him, even though he had never even seen that picture before Friday.

Is anything about his story even plausible, much less true? So the question becomes, what follows IF the story as he’s telling it now is true? Wrongo condemns his actions, and he’s certainly handled this as poorly as possible.

As a practical matter, his political career is over.

Wrongo was born into a racist family system. Both sides of his family were without doubt, white supremacists. But as a child of the silent generation, living in a white suburban NY culture, by 17 years of age, Wrongo and all of his friends had figured out that white supremacy was unacceptable.

If Northam had said, “I grew up in a place and time when racism was tolerated, and even at 25, I hadn’t quite left it behind. But my record shows I’m not that guy now, and haven’t been for 30 years. I am deeply embarrassed and sorry I was such a dope back then“, we could be more forgiving.

But instead, he says he doesn’t recall, and offers up a different racist experience while invalidating the first racist experience.

Northam is undergoing political death by a thousand cuts. He’s done, he just hasn’t come to terms with it. Sadly, it didn’t necessarily have to be that way. He just wasn’t willing to do the difficult work of first, being honest with himself, and then, being honest with the rest of us.

Northam’s whole story is especially upsetting in light of studies that show that medical students believe black people feel less pain than whites. While Northam was training to be a doctor, apparently, he was dressing up blackface, and possibly in Klan costumes.

Did his racism have a negative effect on any black patients he may have treated?

Even if you take at face value his claim that he isn’t in that yearbook photo, he clearly remembered wearing blackface while dressing up like Michael Jackson that same year. If wearing blackface is disqualifying, then his Michael Jackson imitation is reason enough to step down. Remember that he said:

“I only blackened my face a little bit because everybody knows shoe polish is hard to get off your face”

Sorry, but most people have no idea how hard it is to get shoe polish off your face. Or, that shoe polish is the accepted method of blackening your face. Sadly, Northam clearly doesn’t think his blackface admission is disqualifying. He isn’t sorry for doing it–he’s sorry he got caught.

When this type of thing happens, someone always says we shouldn’t punish him for something that happened 35 years ago, that we should forgive and forget. Some will say that Democrats are showing an inappropriately heightened sense of political correctness. That they are exaggerating the offense in this case.

We ought to forgive, but there can be no forgetting.

Time to wake up America! Racism is our original sin, and it is still practiced by both political parties, and by plenty of average citizens. We can’t call for Rep. Steve King (R-IA) to resign for saying that White Supremacy is A-OK, and not also insist that Governor Ralph Northam step down.

 

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