One area of disappointment I've had with Presidents Biden, Obama, and Clinton has been and still is the abandonment of the United States Postal Service which represents a huge cohort of unionized workers. The only President who openly expressed contempt and destruction for American institutions appointed people whose entire corrupt objectives were to implement destruction of those institutions (Betsy DeVos, et al) with Louis DeJoy being the prime example of that. Biden made some campaign statements about DeJoy and the USPS and he has appointed two members of the USPS board but DeJoy is still there and still undermining the USPS - and in this election season, no less, with mail-in voting being a target from his and Trump's beginnings.
The USPS is a body of union workers, many women and Black workers, many veterans, and it is a beloved, valued institution. This would be a good place to start to stand up and speak out for American labor and a large American union - the USPS. The undermining of the USPS began 2 or 3 decades ago and while it has been largely a Republican plan to dismantle and hamstring it, the undermining got plenty of aiding and abetting from Democrats. What happened is shameful; that it continues to this day is despicable.
Biden and the USPS oversight board has a very short time to fire DeJoy and take a strong stand to reform, save, protect, defend the USPS and the myriad American workers it employs.
I am 65 years old I came to California from New Mexico as a 27 year old on my own. I earned two masters degrees and a PhD in Psychology. Due to illness my husband could not help and I had two children to raise by myself. Thus my student loan is balloon more than $400,000. I've tried those phony income repayment opportunities which were lies and I had to sign a paper saying I would not Sue the federal government for having lied. Remember the federal government doesn't owe the $400,000 Plus, I do. Despite the fact that my two children and I have neurological illnesses we have gone on to work very hard. My 34-year-old daughter is now almost $200,000 in debt because of getting an MSW. She was a citizen of Arizona the second year but they wouldn't count it because they decided she wasn't going to stay. I guess they were right. My daughter my son and myself all work way under what we could be making. Our neurological illnesses are only one small part. I have left many jobs in Psychology that pay a lot more because they are just as corrupt as the governmental figures you have mentioned and I'm not going to play that game. I had to sell my house at some point but I bought another house 5 years ago and my house payment is less than $1,400. My son and his fiance and their niece are renting an apartment and not the best area of town for over $1,700 a month. My daughter is renting a room in Washington for $700 a month. Neither child can make enough money to ever buy a house at this point. I am hoping to pay off this house so they could have something. This is absolutely ridiculous all of it and playing out in our lives. The mental health crises I deal with are overwhelming everyday as I am in private practice. In my 30 plus years as a therapist I have never seen such suicidal, anxious, and depressed teenagers young people and people in their 30s and 40s. They're all having similar lives to mine and to what you've discussed no hope for any kind of security and just hoping that we don't get sick and screw over our children some more. Not that we've done it but this government sure has. I'm so glad you call out Obama and Clinton and I hope you keep doing it. They're worse than the Republicans cuz they should have known better. I'm sick of Obama always so concerned about his legacy get a clue look at what you did to us. So my biggest hope is that you will run for president or somebody who carries your exact values. And of course I'm very glad that you continue to speak out and include us all. One of my biggest causes is bringing back bankruptcy protection for student loans. Myself and my daughter should not have our lives ruined because we went to school and worked hard. My son was just slightly younger and like most second children around here in the Fresno Clovis area had to give up the UCS and go to City College because the economy had fallen apart in 2008. Thus he doesn't have a degree so at least he doesn't have hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt to stop him he just has a completely underpaying job. So keep up the good work Dr Reich. Know that you're speaking out has given me a lot of Hope and all of us here on the thread. Have a great day, Alexia
This is a helpful overview, but I think that it misses some crucial points.
1. Manchin was not removed from his positions of power within the Democratic caucus because he could have chosen to change parties. In so doing, he would have flipped the Senate. Democrats had to bargain with a corporate colleague who was already too powerful.
2. I wish this weren't true, but I fear that Trumpism has already won and we are looking at a colossal car wreck in slow motion. Democrats have failed to protect voting rights at the federal level, with Manchin and Sinema refusing to eliminate the filibuster. Republicans are electing Trump loyalists to positions like Secretary of State in battleground states. There are election deniers running in many safe Congressional districts. The Supreme Court is stacked with reactionary loyalists who will uphold legal challenges to MAGA shenanigans.
3. "Executive underreach," (Pozen and Scheppele*) in government is an established means of oppression that leaves people so busy trying to survive and creates such agitation that they are more vulnerable to propaganda -- something that I believe happened with Trump's mishandling of the pandemic. * "Executive Underreach, in Pandemics and Otherwise." American Journal of International Law, Vol. 114, pp. 608-17, 2020. Pozen, D. and Scheppele, K.L. (Available for free download here): https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3649816
4. Trump went even further when he sent troops to the Portland demonstrations to stir up conflict that was settling down, a strategy also pursued by Assad in Syria. (Friedman**) That strategy turns people against each other and decimates resistance against tyrants. ** "Trump's Wag-the-Dog War." Friedman, T. The New York Times. July 21, 2020. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/21/opinion/trump-portland-syria.html
5. The inability to manage chaos and catastrophe of the pandemic saw escalating homelessness and crime in Portland and may flip Oregon from Democrat to Republican. (Goldberg) This is one example of a narrative MAGA Republicans are pushing nationwide. "If Oregon Turns Red, Whose Fault Will That Be?" (Goldberg, M.) The New York Times. Oct. 31, 2022. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/31/opinion/oregon-governor-race.html
We have to build a stronger movement, but we're in for rough times, especially with climate change taking hold while we're caught up in culture wars and held down by oligarchic rule.
It is clear that we are further away from Economic Justice in America. Citizens United has permitted politicians to be bought. They increasingly represent their buyers & not we the people.
I have watched Bernie Sanders work hard to even out the playing field in his support of the unions & pray that he has planted enough seeds to make Unions grow. We have seen the harm of Big Oil, Big Banks & Big Corporations on the quality of life, health, education & welfare. There has been an increasing drive in the press, & social media to double down on propaganda wars to support their agendas.
The pandemic made these elite institutions nervous because without the masses of people keeping their financial wheels turning they would loose.
Only by the masses uniting, rising& working together can they be empowered to better their lives. Only with reinforcing the power of we the people- with Democracy can we protect ourselves, our planet & achieve the Economic Justice all people deserve.
In some ways, this piece understates the risks that society faces and what is needed.
The statistics and the analysis are, understandably, entangled with economic data representing the financialization of most Western economies. Wall Street's trading alone is somewhere above 4x of the real U.S. economy. Split the "financialized economy" from the real value economy and the picture will look even worse.
The house of cards will, at some point, collapse--and collapse hard. From a societal and civic education process that collapse will provoke a choice represented by the choices made in Germany and the U.S. in the 1930s. If the grievance mentality is allowed to continue dominating civic dialogue then Autocracy, Inc. will be able to step in easily and take over. We should rather focus on real economic value, not financial games, and build the message for Democracy, Inc. with a good economy for all of us.
Where attention goes so we go.
We have a national press focused on easy-to-get information. This creates a focus on central points of information, e.g. performance politics in D.C., Twitter and similar platforms, and the mechanically harvested data from the New York financial hub, but not explaining real economic value.
Our leaders need to focus on real value and hammer that home every day, all the time. Biden's calling out of share buybacks in by the oil companies was refreshing. Let's have more!
Saturday morning, the doorbell rings. It’s a man passing out campaign brochures. I look at the brochure, then the man and grin, you’re him? He nods. I introduce myself. We shake hands. If you have time, I have questions, want to come inside and talk? He nods and takes a seat in the living room.
After 50 years in civic life, I know a qualified candidate when I meet one. And this man is qualified. Turns out, he was born and raised in Kentucky, and knows this state inside out. Don has been here an hour when I ask the question that weighs on me.
Don, they say Kentucky is a red state, is that true? He looks down, like he’s thinking, then looks back at me and says “we’ve never been Republicans” and doubts it will ever happen. That tracks with me, and so I ask… Okay, then, how do you explain Mitch McConnell, how does that man stay in office?
I wish I could convey the pained expression on his face, and the sorrow in his voice when he replies, “poor people don’t vote” anymore.
I’ve worked with activists, organizers and political campaigns in almost every state in the union, and every single one has told me the same damned thing: “poor people don’t vote” anymore.
We traded info on our networks (connections, resources and name names). Suffice to say, after the mid-terms are over, Don, the candidate, and I plan to meet again. I’ve already laid the groundwork out west. All we need are connections and those resources will start flowing into Kentucky. The Democratic Party is too stupid to do it, let alone help. Judging by the last 30 years, the Democratic Party will fight us tooth and nail. I’m ready for that fight. It’s time to start welcoming rural Americans back home, to America.
Admittedly, not a direct reply to the Professor’s analysis, a week out from the midterm election, I’ve noted that the closing argument for Democrats, aside from punctuating democracy, abortion care, and a record of accomplishments, increasingly has focused on Republican threats to default on the U.S. national debt as pretext for extracting concessions on protections, including Social Security, Medicare, Veterans benefits, funding for Ukraine, and more. While a befitting closing argument, the case, as I posted on Oct. 24th, is insufficient unless Democrats also call out record corporate profits (a 54% increase) as the biggest driver of inflation.
Considering, as previously posted, the American people in poll after poll report the economy and inflation as their two major issues, barring an occasional word from President Biden calling out corporate gouging or the occasional Congressional hearing unearthing data confirming that the biggest driver of inflation is corporate pricing, I am troubled that Democrats, overall, have declined to enact a united, laser-focused effort to expose how corporate profits account for over half of the increased prices people are paying.
While some might defend a party’s reluctance to bite the hand that feeds it, I believe the benefits of pinning corporate pricing as the biggest driver of inflation would outweigh the costs. I further contend, with 60% of the people in this country living paycheck to paycheck and millions working for starvation wages, not only should Democrats not ignore this biggest driver of inflation; they should make it clear to working families throughout this country, many of whom are prepared to vote Republican, that if they vote Republican, the Party that has been silent on this issue, their vote will run counter to their interests and concerns. In a word, we need Democratic leadership to be focused and disciplined and not to allow Republican deceptions and distortions related to the state of the economy to go unanswered.
Very well put. And the solution, as you say, is political. In election year 2016 I followed 538 closely (still do). I was blown away by the hypothetical matchups between Sanders and Trump, as well as those between Hillary Clinton and Trump. In poll after poll, Sanders beat Trump 2:1, with about 5% of potential voters undecided. Hillary, on the other hand was level-pegging Trump throughout 2016, with about 30% undecided. Then the DNC sandbagged Sanders. and in November the horror show began.
The point is, left wing populism is POPULAR, and the DNC has let us all down. See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9vncWKPngE for the beginning of all this nonsense about government being the problem, hurting corporations through taxation.
It is also instructive to hear the weasel-words of Milton Friedman, maligning Keynes while at the same time saying that the post-WWII system that Keynes helped set up - a system which made possible the great economic and societal achievements of America between 1948 and 1980 - was inherently flawed to the point that Keynes would have changed his mind
Or look up Friedman's interview with Phil Donahue in 1980, where Friedman singled out the Department of Energy as being a loathsome part of government. "There are 20,000 people who work for the DOE, " he said. "Do you know what the cost of this is? 10 cents for every American. Every time you buy a gallon of gas, add on 10 cents for the DOE." And Donahue just sat there, not even questioning this verbal shell game, his mouth agape at Friedman's magnificent intellect.
Here were the beginnings of the assault on government, TV interviews supported by corporate America, which would have Adam Smith - who believed in strong government and progressive taxation - spinning in his grave. That is, the misrepresentation of the free market as something to which government is inherently opposed. On the contrary, free markets depend upon strong government.
I fully agree, this 40 year descent into madness will only be stopped by a strong Democratic platform from the left. Believe 538.
Looking at the graph, things might have been better if Al Gore had become president in 2001. The Bush administration inherited a budget surplus and promptly blew it on the trademark Republican tax cuts for the wealthy. And Bush appointed the virulently pro-plutocrat John Roberts and Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court, where they gave us the democracy-destroying Citizens United decision.
Biden is working to correct some of the problems, but I agree that his advocacy often seems less than energetic. In his public statements, he'll mention something every so often, but doesn't keep pounding on it.
I think the news media must take some responsibility as well. They persistently equate Bernie Sanders, who works hard to improve people's lives and to solve the problems mentioned, with the likes of Marjorie Taylor Green and her ilk, who are just show horses who don't want to govern. Shame on the media!
I wrote a short version of this analysis months ago & received no support. Humans, even the so called educated, are SHEEP. All levers of US power have been redirected to the current Oligarchy of corporations & the richy rich. We are so far beyond just vote!. Trumpty, the cherry on the Sundae! All effective leaders are SHOT. I keep wondering why no one shoots these republicans, but I guess the Oligarchal democrats don’t operate that way. They marginalize , minimize, destroy in other ways. Corporations & Government = Facism, it is in place. US institutions are ‘hollowed out’ of all regulatory function & effectiveness. Watch Robert Kennedys film, very well done, to see how Corporations & Billionaires, including Gates, Facebook investors have sidelined US public health with their ‘initiatives’, read investments , after decades of infiltration. The only way forward, after the tepid work of vote, is boycott, unionize, stop buying, patronizing, travel to make these Oligarchs listen. We can not take to the streets as we will be shot now. That would come later in non violent demonstrations, if US citizens can begin to Think for themselves. There is also a path forward where Blue states use Secession, (which I favor) to move the dials. But, democrats are as enchanted with $$$$$ & power as anyone. Read the Nation article on line by Nathan Newman on blue state secession. We could become like Europe, with humane values lived in Blue states & as the Red states cannot dip into our economic engines, see how fast their ‘tunes’ change. McConnell is one of the most dangerous men ( like Gingrich) here with his sheer love of POWER, & skill at it. Wake Up!!
We have a week to push forward and try to get more voters to the polls. We see what we are up against, Professor Reich.
Perhaps you might print a piece that the average American can read to convince them of what is at stake here… and I mean for someone who isn’t quite as smart as you, like me for example. Not all of us “get” statistics and not all of us know of whom you are referring to in each paragraph of this piece. I had to read it three times before most of it sunk in. I don’t mind admitting I don’t understand some of it which is why it might help if you wrote something once in a while that the average high school graduate who didn’t have the opportunity to go to college will understand.
Please write a piece telling us what you would do if you were President someday, and then send it to yourself…
"I didn't leave the democratic party, the democratic party left me" is a very common phrase I hear when door, knocking, campaigning and talking to voters in central KY area. An organized truthful heartfelt dedicated long term consistent effort around what Dr. Reich is saying would help us here. Thanks.
I say "Hear, hear" to your "Democrats cannot defeat authoritarianism without an agenda of radical democratic reform — an anti-establishment movement. Democrats must stand squarely on the side of democracy against oligarchy. They must form a unified coalition of people of all races, genders, and classes to unrig the system."
How do "we" move the Democratic party to do this? I can't prove this, but it felt as if the corporate globalist pro-deregulation powers were pulling strings to see that Sanders could not become the candidate. They seem to have a strangle-hold on the Democratic party and certainly on the media.
Do you have specifics about how "we" move the Democratic party to rediscover its true interest?
I think RR's voice is prophetic. Has the polarization, the division gotten so ingrained in today's politics that we are faced with Republican authoritarianism on the one hand or Democratic "populism" on the other? Our representative democracy is neither pure capitalism nor pure socialism. Whittling sticks into spears and crafting stones into weapons will break the backbone of "We the People". We are made up of captialist incentives and public safety nets, "infrastructure". BOTH/AND, not Either/Or. Thank you, RR, for calling us back to our roots. Not our shoots.
Again, I totally agree with all of that. It paints a picture of why Democrats always seem to be on the defensive -- because they haven't done enough to help the public, and because they, too, are beholden to corporate donors.
I was thinking again yesterday that, more and more, young people will find no financial reason to pursue higher education because, along with corporate tycoons, another population segment has vastly increased their wealth: small trades businesses. Three years ago, I paid $1000 for two people to cut down a few dead trees on my property. This year, the utility company informed me they refuse to fix the 14,000 volt electric line running down our privately owned, shared road, despite the fact that every expert has told us they've never seen private homeowners be required to manage such high-voltage lines because it's too dangerous. I called the Dept of PUBLIC Utilities. They sided against us, the public, and with the big corporation. So I now have to pay to trim trees around our power lines. The same company that charged me $1000/day 3 years ago to cut trees now wants $600/hr, for 2 people, no matter what the job. After much searching, I found someone to do the job for $3000. Then we paid a private lineman $3000 to fix a downed line. In a big storm, it will be impossible to hire a lineman. We'll be left without power, freezing, for longer than our propane will last. (I get no electric bill rebate, and in fact, I supply electricity TO the electric company from my solar panels.) The next day, I paid $1100 for a 15 minute plumbing job requiring a $2 part. Painters want absurd amounts for a simple job. The young boy who cuts my lawn has gone from $30 to $60 for the 20-minute job. He can do 2 jobs per hour, for $120/hr with no overhead beyond a ride-on lawnmower and old truck. So, tradespeople with no education beyond high school are making between $120 and about $400 per hour or more, with no cap on increases. Even if as much as half goes (to big corporations) for insurance and equipment, they're still making more profit than many highly educated "professionals." That and (big-corporation) materials prices are key reasons for sky-rocketing housing prices. Auto-repeair is the same, as are all other trades that I encounter. Why bother to incur education debt or even waste those earning years? And, with no schooling in logic or humanities, every one of those budding mini-corporation tycoons that I've met in our "blue" state blindly sports Trump stickers on their trucks or otherwise makes their GOP affiliation clear. More trend toward demise of democracy.
Brilliant! A simple way to think of this is Mr Smith’s bank that used deposits by local residents to help other residents. We put our money into savings and loan banks, collected interest, and helped each other and our community. Now, we put money into investments, save for retirement in 401ks, lose our savings when greed crashes the market, and give power to international corporations and Wall Street. When Obama and Hillary both gave speeches to Wall Street, I knew the Democrats were on the dark side. No one, I repeat, no one is worth $250,000 as a speaker to Wall Street. No one.
One area of disappointment I've had with Presidents Biden, Obama, and Clinton has been and still is the abandonment of the United States Postal Service which represents a huge cohort of unionized workers. The only President who openly expressed contempt and destruction for American institutions appointed people whose entire corrupt objectives were to implement destruction of those institutions (Betsy DeVos, et al) with Louis DeJoy being the prime example of that. Biden made some campaign statements about DeJoy and the USPS and he has appointed two members of the USPS board but DeJoy is still there and still undermining the USPS - and in this election season, no less, with mail-in voting being a target from his and Trump's beginnings.
The USPS is a body of union workers, many women and Black workers, many veterans, and it is a beloved, valued institution. This would be a good place to start to stand up and speak out for American labor and a large American union - the USPS. The undermining of the USPS began 2 or 3 decades ago and while it has been largely a Republican plan to dismantle and hamstring it, the undermining got plenty of aiding and abetting from Democrats. What happened is shameful; that it continues to this day is despicable.
Biden and the USPS oversight board has a very short time to fire DeJoy and take a strong stand to reform, save, protect, defend the USPS and the myriad American workers it employs.
I am 65 years old I came to California from New Mexico as a 27 year old on my own. I earned two masters degrees and a PhD in Psychology. Due to illness my husband could not help and I had two children to raise by myself. Thus my student loan is balloon more than $400,000. I've tried those phony income repayment opportunities which were lies and I had to sign a paper saying I would not Sue the federal government for having lied. Remember the federal government doesn't owe the $400,000 Plus, I do. Despite the fact that my two children and I have neurological illnesses we have gone on to work very hard. My 34-year-old daughter is now almost $200,000 in debt because of getting an MSW. She was a citizen of Arizona the second year but they wouldn't count it because they decided she wasn't going to stay. I guess they were right. My daughter my son and myself all work way under what we could be making. Our neurological illnesses are only one small part. I have left many jobs in Psychology that pay a lot more because they are just as corrupt as the governmental figures you have mentioned and I'm not going to play that game. I had to sell my house at some point but I bought another house 5 years ago and my house payment is less than $1,400. My son and his fiance and their niece are renting an apartment and not the best area of town for over $1,700 a month. My daughter is renting a room in Washington for $700 a month. Neither child can make enough money to ever buy a house at this point. I am hoping to pay off this house so they could have something. This is absolutely ridiculous all of it and playing out in our lives. The mental health crises I deal with are overwhelming everyday as I am in private practice. In my 30 plus years as a therapist I have never seen such suicidal, anxious, and depressed teenagers young people and people in their 30s and 40s. They're all having similar lives to mine and to what you've discussed no hope for any kind of security and just hoping that we don't get sick and screw over our children some more. Not that we've done it but this government sure has. I'm so glad you call out Obama and Clinton and I hope you keep doing it. They're worse than the Republicans cuz they should have known better. I'm sick of Obama always so concerned about his legacy get a clue look at what you did to us. So my biggest hope is that you will run for president or somebody who carries your exact values. And of course I'm very glad that you continue to speak out and include us all. One of my biggest causes is bringing back bankruptcy protection for student loans. Myself and my daughter should not have our lives ruined because we went to school and worked hard. My son was just slightly younger and like most second children around here in the Fresno Clovis area had to give up the UCS and go to City College because the economy had fallen apart in 2008. Thus he doesn't have a degree so at least he doesn't have hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt to stop him he just has a completely underpaying job. So keep up the good work Dr Reich. Know that you're speaking out has given me a lot of Hope and all of us here on the thread. Have a great day, Alexia
This is a helpful overview, but I think that it misses some crucial points.
1. Manchin was not removed from his positions of power within the Democratic caucus because he could have chosen to change parties. In so doing, he would have flipped the Senate. Democrats had to bargain with a corporate colleague who was already too powerful.
2. I wish this weren't true, but I fear that Trumpism has already won and we are looking at a colossal car wreck in slow motion. Democrats have failed to protect voting rights at the federal level, with Manchin and Sinema refusing to eliminate the filibuster. Republicans are electing Trump loyalists to positions like Secretary of State in battleground states. There are election deniers running in many safe Congressional districts. The Supreme Court is stacked with reactionary loyalists who will uphold legal challenges to MAGA shenanigans.
3. "Executive underreach," (Pozen and Scheppele*) in government is an established means of oppression that leaves people so busy trying to survive and creates such agitation that they are more vulnerable to propaganda -- something that I believe happened with Trump's mishandling of the pandemic. * "Executive Underreach, in Pandemics and Otherwise." American Journal of International Law, Vol. 114, pp. 608-17, 2020. Pozen, D. and Scheppele, K.L. (Available for free download here): https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3649816
4. Trump went even further when he sent troops to the Portland demonstrations to stir up conflict that was settling down, a strategy also pursued by Assad in Syria. (Friedman**) That strategy turns people against each other and decimates resistance against tyrants. ** "Trump's Wag-the-Dog War." Friedman, T. The New York Times. July 21, 2020. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/21/opinion/trump-portland-syria.html
5. The inability to manage chaos and catastrophe of the pandemic saw escalating homelessness and crime in Portland and may flip Oregon from Democrat to Republican. (Goldberg) This is one example of a narrative MAGA Republicans are pushing nationwide. "If Oregon Turns Red, Whose Fault Will That Be?" (Goldberg, M.) The New York Times. Oct. 31, 2022. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/31/opinion/oregon-governor-race.html
We have to build a stronger movement, but we're in for rough times, especially with climate change taking hold while we're caught up in culture wars and held down by oligarchic rule.
It is clear that we are further away from Economic Justice in America. Citizens United has permitted politicians to be bought. They increasingly represent their buyers & not we the people.
I have watched Bernie Sanders work hard to even out the playing field in his support of the unions & pray that he has planted enough seeds to make Unions grow. We have seen the harm of Big Oil, Big Banks & Big Corporations on the quality of life, health, education & welfare. There has been an increasing drive in the press, & social media to double down on propaganda wars to support their agendas.
The pandemic made these elite institutions nervous because without the masses of people keeping their financial wheels turning they would loose.
Only by the masses uniting, rising& working together can they be empowered to better their lives. Only with reinforcing the power of we the people- with Democracy can we protect ourselves, our planet & achieve the Economic Justice all people deserve.
In some ways, this piece understates the risks that society faces and what is needed.
The statistics and the analysis are, understandably, entangled with economic data representing the financialization of most Western economies. Wall Street's trading alone is somewhere above 4x of the real U.S. economy. Split the "financialized economy" from the real value economy and the picture will look even worse.
The house of cards will, at some point, collapse--and collapse hard. From a societal and civic education process that collapse will provoke a choice represented by the choices made in Germany and the U.S. in the 1930s. If the grievance mentality is allowed to continue dominating civic dialogue then Autocracy, Inc. will be able to step in easily and take over. We should rather focus on real economic value, not financial games, and build the message for Democracy, Inc. with a good economy for all of us.
Where attention goes so we go.
We have a national press focused on easy-to-get information. This creates a focus on central points of information, e.g. performance politics in D.C., Twitter and similar platforms, and the mechanically harvested data from the New York financial hub, but not explaining real economic value.
Our leaders need to focus on real value and hammer that home every day, all the time. Biden's calling out of share buybacks in by the oil companies was refreshing. Let's have more!
Saturday morning, the doorbell rings. It’s a man passing out campaign brochures. I look at the brochure, then the man and grin, you’re him? He nods. I introduce myself. We shake hands. If you have time, I have questions, want to come inside and talk? He nods and takes a seat in the living room.
After 50 years in civic life, I know a qualified candidate when I meet one. And this man is qualified. Turns out, he was born and raised in Kentucky, and knows this state inside out. Don has been here an hour when I ask the question that weighs on me.
Don, they say Kentucky is a red state, is that true? He looks down, like he’s thinking, then looks back at me and says “we’ve never been Republicans” and doubts it will ever happen. That tracks with me, and so I ask… Okay, then, how do you explain Mitch McConnell, how does that man stay in office?
I wish I could convey the pained expression on his face, and the sorrow in his voice when he replies, “poor people don’t vote” anymore.
I’ve worked with activists, organizers and political campaigns in almost every state in the union, and every single one has told me the same damned thing: “poor people don’t vote” anymore.
We traded info on our networks (connections, resources and name names). Suffice to say, after the mid-terms are over, Don, the candidate, and I plan to meet again. I’ve already laid the groundwork out west. All we need are connections and those resources will start flowing into Kentucky. The Democratic Party is too stupid to do it, let alone help. Judging by the last 30 years, the Democratic Party will fight us tooth and nail. I’m ready for that fight. It’s time to start welcoming rural Americans back home, to America.
Admittedly, not a direct reply to the Professor’s analysis, a week out from the midterm election, I’ve noted that the closing argument for Democrats, aside from punctuating democracy, abortion care, and a record of accomplishments, increasingly has focused on Republican threats to default on the U.S. national debt as pretext for extracting concessions on protections, including Social Security, Medicare, Veterans benefits, funding for Ukraine, and more. While a befitting closing argument, the case, as I posted on Oct. 24th, is insufficient unless Democrats also call out record corporate profits (a 54% increase) as the biggest driver of inflation.
Considering, as previously posted, the American people in poll after poll report the economy and inflation as their two major issues, barring an occasional word from President Biden calling out corporate gouging or the occasional Congressional hearing unearthing data confirming that the biggest driver of inflation is corporate pricing, I am troubled that Democrats, overall, have declined to enact a united, laser-focused effort to expose how corporate profits account for over half of the increased prices people are paying.
While some might defend a party’s reluctance to bite the hand that feeds it, I believe the benefits of pinning corporate pricing as the biggest driver of inflation would outweigh the costs. I further contend, with 60% of the people in this country living paycheck to paycheck and millions working for starvation wages, not only should Democrats not ignore this biggest driver of inflation; they should make it clear to working families throughout this country, many of whom are prepared to vote Republican, that if they vote Republican, the Party that has been silent on this issue, their vote will run counter to their interests and concerns. In a word, we need Democratic leadership to be focused and disciplined and not to allow Republican deceptions and distortions related to the state of the economy to go unanswered.
Very well put. And the solution, as you say, is political. In election year 2016 I followed 538 closely (still do). I was blown away by the hypothetical matchups between Sanders and Trump, as well as those between Hillary Clinton and Trump. In poll after poll, Sanders beat Trump 2:1, with about 5% of potential voters undecided. Hillary, on the other hand was level-pegging Trump throughout 2016, with about 30% undecided. Then the DNC sandbagged Sanders. and in November the horror show began.
The point is, left wing populism is POPULAR, and the DNC has let us all down. See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9vncWKPngE for the beginning of all this nonsense about government being the problem, hurting corporations through taxation.
It is also instructive to hear the weasel-words of Milton Friedman, maligning Keynes while at the same time saying that the post-WWII system that Keynes helped set up - a system which made possible the great economic and societal achievements of America between 1948 and 1980 - was inherently flawed to the point that Keynes would have changed his mind
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FXLWd_avNT8
Or look up Friedman's interview with Phil Donahue in 1980, where Friedman singled out the Department of Energy as being a loathsome part of government. "There are 20,000 people who work for the DOE, " he said. "Do you know what the cost of this is? 10 cents for every American. Every time you buy a gallon of gas, add on 10 cents for the DOE." And Donahue just sat there, not even questioning this verbal shell game, his mouth agape at Friedman's magnificent intellect.
Here were the beginnings of the assault on government, TV interviews supported by corporate America, which would have Adam Smith - who believed in strong government and progressive taxation - spinning in his grave. That is, the misrepresentation of the free market as something to which government is inherently opposed. On the contrary, free markets depend upon strong government.
I fully agree, this 40 year descent into madness will only be stopped by a strong Democratic platform from the left. Believe 538.
Looking at the graph, things might have been better if Al Gore had become president in 2001. The Bush administration inherited a budget surplus and promptly blew it on the trademark Republican tax cuts for the wealthy. And Bush appointed the virulently pro-plutocrat John Roberts and Samuel Alito to the Supreme Court, where they gave us the democracy-destroying Citizens United decision.
Biden is working to correct some of the problems, but I agree that his advocacy often seems less than energetic. In his public statements, he'll mention something every so often, but doesn't keep pounding on it.
I think the news media must take some responsibility as well. They persistently equate Bernie Sanders, who works hard to improve people's lives and to solve the problems mentioned, with the likes of Marjorie Taylor Green and her ilk, who are just show horses who don't want to govern. Shame on the media!
I wrote a short version of this analysis months ago & received no support. Humans, even the so called educated, are SHEEP. All levers of US power have been redirected to the current Oligarchy of corporations & the richy rich. We are so far beyond just vote!. Trumpty, the cherry on the Sundae! All effective leaders are SHOT. I keep wondering why no one shoots these republicans, but I guess the Oligarchal democrats don’t operate that way. They marginalize , minimize, destroy in other ways. Corporations & Government = Facism, it is in place. US institutions are ‘hollowed out’ of all regulatory function & effectiveness. Watch Robert Kennedys film, very well done, to see how Corporations & Billionaires, including Gates, Facebook investors have sidelined US public health with their ‘initiatives’, read investments , after decades of infiltration. The only way forward, after the tepid work of vote, is boycott, unionize, stop buying, patronizing, travel to make these Oligarchs listen. We can not take to the streets as we will be shot now. That would come later in non violent demonstrations, if US citizens can begin to Think for themselves. There is also a path forward where Blue states use Secession, (which I favor) to move the dials. But, democrats are as enchanted with $$$$$ & power as anyone. Read the Nation article on line by Nathan Newman on blue state secession. We could become like Europe, with humane values lived in Blue states & as the Red states cannot dip into our economic engines, see how fast their ‘tunes’ change. McConnell is one of the most dangerous men ( like Gingrich) here with his sheer love of POWER, & skill at it. Wake Up!!
We have a week to push forward and try to get more voters to the polls. We see what we are up against, Professor Reich.
Perhaps you might print a piece that the average American can read to convince them of what is at stake here… and I mean for someone who isn’t quite as smart as you, like me for example. Not all of us “get” statistics and not all of us know of whom you are referring to in each paragraph of this piece. I had to read it three times before most of it sunk in. I don’t mind admitting I don’t understand some of it which is why it might help if you wrote something once in a while that the average high school graduate who didn’t have the opportunity to go to college will understand.
Please write a piece telling us what you would do if you were President someday, and then send it to yourself…
Respectfully yours, Anne M. 🌻
"I didn't leave the democratic party, the democratic party left me" is a very common phrase I hear when door, knocking, campaigning and talking to voters in central KY area. An organized truthful heartfelt dedicated long term consistent effort around what Dr. Reich is saying would help us here. Thanks.
I say "Hear, hear" to your "Democrats cannot defeat authoritarianism without an agenda of radical democratic reform — an anti-establishment movement. Democrats must stand squarely on the side of democracy against oligarchy. They must form a unified coalition of people of all races, genders, and classes to unrig the system."
How do "we" move the Democratic party to do this? I can't prove this, but it felt as if the corporate globalist pro-deregulation powers were pulling strings to see that Sanders could not become the candidate. They seem to have a strangle-hold on the Democratic party and certainly on the media.
Do you have specifics about how "we" move the Democratic party to rediscover its true interest?
I think RR's voice is prophetic. Has the polarization, the division gotten so ingrained in today's politics that we are faced with Republican authoritarianism on the one hand or Democratic "populism" on the other? Our representative democracy is neither pure capitalism nor pure socialism. Whittling sticks into spears and crafting stones into weapons will break the backbone of "We the People". We are made up of captialist incentives and public safety nets, "infrastructure". BOTH/AND, not Either/Or. Thank you, RR, for calling us back to our roots. Not our shoots.
Again, I totally agree with all of that. It paints a picture of why Democrats always seem to be on the defensive -- because they haven't done enough to help the public, and because they, too, are beholden to corporate donors.
I was thinking again yesterday that, more and more, young people will find no financial reason to pursue higher education because, along with corporate tycoons, another population segment has vastly increased their wealth: small trades businesses. Three years ago, I paid $1000 for two people to cut down a few dead trees on my property. This year, the utility company informed me they refuse to fix the 14,000 volt electric line running down our privately owned, shared road, despite the fact that every expert has told us they've never seen private homeowners be required to manage such high-voltage lines because it's too dangerous. I called the Dept of PUBLIC Utilities. They sided against us, the public, and with the big corporation. So I now have to pay to trim trees around our power lines. The same company that charged me $1000/day 3 years ago to cut trees now wants $600/hr, for 2 people, no matter what the job. After much searching, I found someone to do the job for $3000. Then we paid a private lineman $3000 to fix a downed line. In a big storm, it will be impossible to hire a lineman. We'll be left without power, freezing, for longer than our propane will last. (I get no electric bill rebate, and in fact, I supply electricity TO the electric company from my solar panels.) The next day, I paid $1100 for a 15 minute plumbing job requiring a $2 part. Painters want absurd amounts for a simple job. The young boy who cuts my lawn has gone from $30 to $60 for the 20-minute job. He can do 2 jobs per hour, for $120/hr with no overhead beyond a ride-on lawnmower and old truck. So, tradespeople with no education beyond high school are making between $120 and about $400 per hour or more, with no cap on increases. Even if as much as half goes (to big corporations) for insurance and equipment, they're still making more profit than many highly educated "professionals." That and (big-corporation) materials prices are key reasons for sky-rocketing housing prices. Auto-repeair is the same, as are all other trades that I encounter. Why bother to incur education debt or even waste those earning years? And, with no schooling in logic or humanities, every one of those budding mini-corporation tycoons that I've met in our "blue" state blindly sports Trump stickers on their trucks or otherwise makes their GOP affiliation clear. More trend toward demise of democracy.
Brilliant! A simple way to think of this is Mr Smith’s bank that used deposits by local residents to help other residents. We put our money into savings and loan banks, collected interest, and helped each other and our community. Now, we put money into investments, save for retirement in 401ks, lose our savings when greed crashes the market, and give power to international corporations and Wall Street. When Obama and Hillary both gave speeches to Wall Street, I knew the Democrats were on the dark side. No one, I repeat, no one is worth $250,000 as a speaker to Wall Street. No one.