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"Two things only the people anxiously desire; bread and circuses." Dr. Reich, I saw two of your articles in the media yesterday. I have been waiting for the tipping point, where enough people understand why our government will never work for the majority that we can change it with amendments. But it doesn't seem near. It is discouraging to see my children and grandchildren struggle to survive the same way I did. Not much changes. What's the answer? Until the electoral college, gerrymandering, and Citizens United are in the review mirror, I don't see hope going forward.

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Gloria, remember this?

"Hope" is the thing with feathers

That perches in the soul

And sings the tune without the words

And never stops at all.

--Emily Dickinson

Hopefulness is the mindset of activism. Together with faith in the possibility of success, and charity towards our fellow human beings, hope motivates and inspires. Please, Gloria. You can't give up hope or your children and grandchildren will lose your example.

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That is a beautiful thought and a good reasons not to give up hope.

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Thank you ❤️

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Gloria, I write in response to your remarks regarding the Electoral College, gerrymandering, and Citizens United. As for abolishing the Electoral College, which is written into the Constitution, a two-thirds majority in both U.S. chambers, in turn, ratified by three-fourths of the states is a mighty heavy lift. Accordingly, I suggest, as an alternative, we start by focusing our efforts on D.C. and Puerto Rican statehood, which would increase the number of Democratic leaning electors, add more Democratic representatives to the U.S. House, and add 4 Democratic seats to the Senate. Additionally, we need to revisit the 1929 Permanent Apportionment Act, passed by Congress, which capped the number of representatives in the U.S. House at 435. Considering a century ago, there was one member for about 200,000, a number today that stands at approximately 700,000, Congress should be pressed to vote to add, say, 100 seats to the House, the federal body closest to the people. A simple majority in both chambers is all that’s required, a doable outcome presuming, in 24, we win back the House, hold 50 Senators receptive to a modicum of filibuster reform, and hold the White House. I also should note that increasing the size of the House would add more electors to the Electoral College, resulting in a more representative body of electors.

As for Citizens United, to repeal it, we would have to expand the Court, for which there are sound arguments. For example, when the number was set at nine, there were nine U.S. Circuit Courts, with one justice assigned to each. Today there are thirteen. In the interim, I would advise focusing on passing the Freedom to Vote Act, admittedly a significantly edited down version of H.R.1 For the People, which passed in the House in 2021. Nonetheless, it is federal legislation that would ensure all eligible votes were cast, counted correctly, and certified without interference and without their being diluted through partisan gerrymandering. While Freedom to Vote would get some dark money out of politics, admittedly it would not approximate the provisions called for in For the People.

I hope my comment has been helpful and simply would add I always carry on my person a remark from the late, great U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, who once wrote, “Most of the things worth doing in the world had been declared impossible before they were done.”

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Thank you for the information and some hope. I have copied your response and need to do more reading about what you suggest. When FDR threatened to expand the SC, he got his New Deal passed.

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Gloria, While I’m not certain what prompted Justice Owen Roberts, in 1937, to start voting with the more liberal justices nor what prompted conservative Justice Willis Van Devanter to retire that same year, I so very much appreciate your reply to my comment.

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Wow. Thank you.

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Martha, My pleasure, and also my thanks for your affirming reply.

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Baby steps garner actionable change! Now I hope the legislators are reading your response. Thank you!

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Mimi, I am particularly grateful for your reply, given I write regularly not only to my own Democratic representatives, but also to House and Senate Democratic leadership.

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Isn't it nice to think our names might become known to these folks because we communicate with them consistently ❤️❤️

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Mimi, Because I presume staffers receive my correspondences, whether sent independently or through an organization’s portal, I always conclude with a request that my missive promptly be passed to whomever it was addressed. While I hope for all our sakes our letters are passed to the designated recipients, admittedly, at least half the time, I receive scripted replies only partially related to my letter’s content.

Still, I hope, as you intimated, that we are getting a hearing.

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I do too!

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I still have faith that either the 2024 or 2028 election will put a PROGRESSive in power who will do these things and more! Remember: BOTH MeatballRon DeathSantis AND Bunkerboy are UNELECTABLE.

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...which is why they're trying to come up with a way to gain control without being elected (fairly, anyway).

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Here’s a big idea to make this tax proposal even sweeter: raise the corporate rate to 28% BUT KEEP IT AT 21% FOR ANY CORPORATION or private entity that makes less than $20 million in gross revenue. That means most of the big dollar, medium sized business owners will actually come out BETTER than their bigger rivals in the marketplace. Biden could call it the Anti-Monopoly Tax Tier, and promote it as giving the “little guy” a better shake.

Biden wants to brand himself as a pragmatic capitalist, and this is a fine way to usher in that reputation.

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All these "rates" mean little, when wealthy individuals and corporations can "hide" revenue, with exclusions to income. The tax code needs complete overhaul, and the exclusions and deductions need to be eliminated, so the rate of taxation is easily calculated on EVERY PENNY, whether for individual or corporation. It will have ZERO impact on investment, because rich folks are always going to try to make more by investing, no matter what. They don't need incentives.

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You are correct. Eliminating tax loopholes and strong enforcement against tax cheats will produce much more revenue than an increase in the tax rate. If every penny of income was taxed, we might even be able to reduce the tax rates.

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Might reduce rates? They would PLUMMET! If every dollar was taxed, we would KNOW what real rate we were playing. The vast majority would probably pay less than 3%, while the wealthy could be paying 10-12%, IF they were taxed on every dollar.

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I meant PAYING, not playing..........jeez, I'm so OLD!

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Years ago I got a pastime job with someone who paid me under the table because he felt taxation was corrupt. He figured that if everyone across the board paid 5% or less everyone would have medical, social security, etc. No loopholes, no deductions. Course the his little business took off, the wife got nervous so he paid all his six years back taxes with every loophole there was. Paid about $600 which was about what I ended up having to pay for working part-time in three years! The wealthy and not-so-wealthy will always have ways to cheat.

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Jonathan, I agree that there needs to be an overhaul of the tax code. Right now, it is so complicated that it's nearly impossible for anyone to figure it out without a lot of help, and that help may not even be accurate and it is very expensive. I do like incentives, though for smaller businesses to help them to keep going in the face of the huge corporations that try to gobble up everything they can get their greedy hands on.

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I agree with all that you mentioned. Additionally, I'm always telling the IRS that I will be glad to use their e-file returns when they do away with the for-profit online tax return companies. (i'm still using their paper forms and snail mail.) That would be a good first step in reforming our tax codes and system, I strongly believe.

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Penny, I agree that the IRS needs to make its online forms and filing easier. There is no reason a person's information from the previous year couldn't come up on the form and just have to be edited for this year. People would only have to change addresses and other personal information and put in the new money numbers from their W2 or 1099 and other forms. The necessary forms for extra income or special needs would automatically come up because the program would know the person needed them. If needed for the first time, there could be an easy catalog of those forms to choose from and what each form is for in normal people language, even with translation to languages other than English. We have the technology to do all of that. The IRS just needs the funds and the will.

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Good idea, but you'd get a large dissension from working Americans who would lose their property and child deductions. unless, at the same time the tax rates on working Americans was reduced to at least the same REAL rate as enjoyed by the billionaire class.

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Exactly! Everyone's "rate" would be reduced, but at least the rich would be paying SOMETHING. And the rate you pay would be the REAL RATE. No exclusions. I figure most Americans would have their tax rate plummet to about 1-2%, while rich folks could count on about 10-12% of ALL revenue.

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Wealth can still be hidden away, no matter what .

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ProgTodd, I like your idea. That would be a workable incentive. I suspect the big guys would figure out how to cash in on that lower rate by "breaking off" some parts of its corporation and claiming it is a small business. I still would go with it because it could make a real difference. I think Biden could sell it to the people too.

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I agree

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Curious. What "private entity" are you referring to?

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Well said, I agree with you.

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Great idea ProgToddNorCal, It would have net benefits too.

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The only thing that ever trickled down was the dye on Rudy Giuliani’s head.

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HAHA!

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Thank God you never had to deal with Trump's pants. /s

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🤣🤣🤣. What an unforgettable sight that was 🤮.

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Hi, Janet! Nice to see you! Hadn't seen you in what seemed like a month, and was worried about you.

Giuliani was even the favorite early on in 1 of the Republican primaries. I think it was 2008, the one eventually won by McCain. Never was the hero he pretended to be, but he has declined so much since then that he appears to be a demented joker, a cartoon character like you said, maybe 1 of the evil foes of Batman.

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Apparently all of us in the West have had more than our share of snow these last couple of weeks. I like it! I do hope it translates in much reduced drought & wildfires this summer.

You have a great weekend, too, Janet!

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Political theater with the Fed too. Jerome Powell is wrecking Biden’s economy with now pointless rate hikes. The same way the Fed juices it for Republicans by keeping it low. It’s all theater - but it’s me paying for their tickets to the show.

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It's windfall profit tax time !

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“A giant tax increase on the super-rich would be a miracle, given their political clout.“ This is indeed the root problem of our time! The massive and unjust power of the super-rich and their corporations is exactly why Pramila Jayapal has introduced HJR48, the We the People Amendment! But SCOTUS will not overrule itself. Please help out at movetoamend.org

We can, and must restore the power of the people, and good governance!

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In that case, a 90% wealth tax on the 1% would be a good restoration, like when Ike was President. "I like Ike" was the first political slogan I ever heard. There was a reason for that!

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Ike looks like a Saint compared to today's Republicans. No Republican comes close.

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Lawrence. I would love to see an amendment, but alas, it would have to go through corporate owned state legislatures and most would never do it, at least not in my life time. I don't know the answer as to how to get people in office who are not bought and paid for by corporations since it is so expensive to run a campaign and campaigns go on 24/7 now. Cutting campaign length to say 2 months would help a lot and would decrease the amount of money candidates would need and hopefully the amount corporate purchasers could "donate." Johnn Roberts and his conservative SC crew are the villains of this play as they ruled on the unconstitutional Citizens United. They knew they were undermining our democracy and just didn't care since they have lifetime appointments and the ability to rake in all kinds of money (as we have seen lately as long as it is through their wives). Maybe a better SC could help us correct this insanity, but alas, Republicans just seem to like things as they are. How sad for all of us!

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In California, there is an “end run” around Citizens United and it’s called AB83. It will get most corporate money out of our elections because most corporations are now partially foreign owned, and this bill will make it illegal!!! Please check it out and help us pass it at moneyoutvotersin.org It’s a stepping stone to passing HJR54 : )

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Lawrence, Yay California! I hope you all can pass such an important measure. We need that all over the country, particularly since Citizens United when the Supreme Court gave our elections to corporations with no or next to no restrictions. Outrageous! People claim Roberts really isn't as corrupt as the other conservative justices, but, I say he is. He masterminded that Citizens United corruption and their claim that money is speech which is and will continue to be, a disgrace and judicial malfeasance.

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SCOTUS did reverse Roe v. Wade.

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Mar 9, 2023·edited Mar 9, 2023

Their goal in that decision was to treat women as second class citizens. If

Pramila's bill came to fruition, once the bill were promoted to the level of SCOTUS attention, those Federalist Society henchmen would of course declare it unconstitutional-can't let the dark money donors of the Society have to pay taxes.

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Thank you for everything you do, Robert! 🙏

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"The tax cuts were real, but the idea they were based on was always a fantasy. "

Or better described as a 'ruse'?

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Edward: “Scam” would also be an appropriate term.

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" ... always a Grift."

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McCarthy long ago committed to oppose raising the debt ceiling as part of his bargain with the MAGA faction that allowed him to become Speaker. But no one else was part of that bargain. The majority of House Members never agreed to hold the national economy hostage in exchange for unattainable concessions from the Executive branch. And whatever drama may precede it, a cross-party alliance will inevitably be the means by which this “crisis” ends.

Or it could be ended before it begins. A cross-party alliance can remove the Speaker with a “motion to vacate the chair” at any time, and elect a moderate Republican Speaker who owes nothing to the MAGA radicals. It’s the only way to end the dominance of the extremist MAGA minority in the House, and the only way to restore a normal functioning legislature.

(I represent a network of ordinary citizens who have been working to help achieve the removal and replacement of Kevin McCarthy as Speaker. To learn more, please visit "Feathers of Hope" at jerryweiss.substack.com. )

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Agree!

On the “motion to vacate” they don’t even need cross-party alliances, do they? Since McCarthy bargained his way into speakership by allowing a single person to bring a vote of no confidence.

Or am I remembering incorrectly?

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You remember correctly, sammijo. One person can make the motion, but it takes a majority to pass. Without an alliance of 218 Members, there's no point to making the motion.

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Of course! I thought they changed it all up. So they do need cross-party alliances to get that majority.

Thanks for the info!!

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Let’s hope the Republicans Debt ceiling absurdity doesn’t tip into a tragedy where the negotiators run out of time. And each repeat performance in this theatre of the absurd costs the US credibility : the fear that the actors, this time, have over played their hand.

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I just read President Biden made a deal with big oil in Alaska. Progressive rhetoric to the public counters what is said by democratic elite profiting in closed session deals. Humanity is incapable of ending the hegemony pursuit that drives our extinction.

We are led with lies

to fight over scraps as our flooded poisoned planet is set ablaze.

Please

Can you watch Jeffery Sachs’ lecture answering an audience member’s question?

He goes in to a scary history on Ukraine finishing with a horrifying present day conclusion. I click this note into my phone

heartbroken. I am frightened.

https://youtu.be/O7KcutogvsA

Click the link or search for his channel, He uploaded this an hour ago, March 8th a little after 8:00pm here in Michigan

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BUT - that does not make putin the 'nice guy' - we know the US is up to all kinds of trickery to get as much power & cooperation as possible, but which side would you rather be on - putin's ? Nothing in the world could convince me that living under a regime like his would be a better life for me or anybody else, so that alone is enough for me to know who I want to prevail in the push for supremacy ! Give an inch & he will take a mile ! All those falling out of windows lately would agree with me !

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I would rather be on the Gorbachev side. Sanity says a lot for keeping us out of these “power play wars” your children fight these wars!

Have the power mongers ever gotten down and dirty in the sandbox of their constant maneuvering for More , more more. What’s left. Empty planet!

Just the sandbox. Either we can get our heads out of the sandbox or we can use it as our toilet!

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Please

Watch the lecture - 23 minutes

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Full of himself. Half truths only tell part of the story. Ukraine split from USSR. Russia is NOT the USSR. We got the Gorbachev benefit... it fell of it's own weight. Russia did not inherit Soviet rights to Warsaw backed countries.

We had Trump 4 years. Came in attempting to undermine NATO. 4 years of undermining Ukrainian sovereignty. Putin helped him get elected. Trump tried to bribe Zelensky.

Biden does NOT speak for NATO. The only transgressor in the Ukraine is Russia.

We aren't the only player in the UN, NATO. At present, NATO is expanding into Finland and Sweden. They are sovereign nations that can do what is best for themselves.

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Sachs needs to be tested for sure. His use of “I know this” almost makes him sound conspiratorial. In general I do believe he hits the nail on the head as to the Neocon America first position as brought to light by Andrew Bacevich in his books. I’d also listen closely to Timothy Snyder as a true expert on Ukraine. Here’s an excerpt from Bacevich’s book Washington Rules:

Andrew Bacevich argues convincingly that the outmoded notions underlying U.S. national security policy are propelling us into bankruptcy at home and perpetual war abroad. These notions are the “Washington rules” of his book’s title, which evolved after World War II in response to the cold war with the Soviet Union.

“This postwar tradition combines two components, each one so deeply embedded in the American collective consciousness as to have all but disappeared from view,” Bacevich writes.

The first component—what Bacevich calls the “American credo”—exhorts the United States both to set norms for the world order and to enforce them. “In the simplest terms, the credo summons the United States—and the United States alone—to lead, save, liberate, and ultimately transform the world.”

One of the first to proclaim this credo was magazine publisher Henry Luce writing in Life in 1941 envisioning what he called the American century. He urged Americans to “accept wholeheartedly our duty to exert upon the world the full impact of our influence for such purposes as we see fit and by such means as we see fit.”

The means Luce speaks of comprise the second component of U.S. statecraft after World War II. These are what Bacevich, a professor of history and international relations at Boston University and a Vietnam veteran, calls the “sacred trinity.” These consist of “an abiding conviction that the minimum essentials of international peace and order require the United States to maintain a global military presence, to configure its forces for global power projection, and to counter existing or anticipated threats by relying on a policy of global interventionism.”

Exercising global leadership on these terms, notes Bacevich, “obliges the United States to maintain military capabilities staggeringly in excess of those required for self-defense.” The size and extent of our national security state includes $700 billion per year in military spending, as much or more than the rest of the world combined. The United States also has 300,000 troops stationed abroad, also more than the rest of the world combined.

How did we get here? The first secretary of defense, James Forrestal, anticipating a long struggle with the Soviet Union, coined the term “semi-war,” a condition in which great dangers threaten the United States into the indefinite future. Semi-warriors created the Washington rules, uphold them and benefit from their continued existence.

Two early semi-warriors stand out. Allen Dulles, C.I.A. director from 1953 to 1961, extended the agency’s reach around the world, overthrowing democratically elected governments in Iran and Guatemala. Air Force Gen. Curtis LeMay, who led the Strategic Air Command from 1948 to 1957, built SAC into a highly efficient weapon—nuclear-armed planes always airborne—that kept the peace by threatening “destruction on a scale never before seen.”

By the end of his presidency in 1961, Dwight Eisenhower apparently had some second thoughts about what he had helped create, as he warned the nation in his farewell address of the dangers of “the military-industrial complex.” From threatened massive nuclear retaliation keeping the peace during the Eisenhower years, the “action intellectuals” of the Kennedy years preferred a “flexible response,” which included the willingness to use the Army to fight limited proxy wars against the Soviets.

During the Kennedy administration, the Bay of Pigs was followed by an ever-deepening involvement in Vietnam. About the latter debacle, Bacevich marvels at how little was learned: “In retrospect, what distinguishes the legacy of Vietnam is not how much things changed, but how little.” And so for the presidents Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton “the war had no truly important lessons to teach, none at least that should call into question the larger record of U.S. policy or alter its future course. Reflecting on the past took a backseat to looking ahead.”

The original impetus for the Washington rules was the struggle with Communist totalitarianism that began after World War II. Yet when that struggle ended with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the end of the Soviet Union in 1991, the Washington semi-warriors kept their aggressive focus. “The Red Menace had disappeared,” Bacevich writes, “but humankind more than ever needed the United States to show the way.”

Bacevich describes in detail but does not stop with the disastrous militarism of the George W. Bush administration. Indeed, as has every U.S. president since the start of the cold war, President Barack Obama too seems to be keeping faith with the vision of an interventionist America.

Lyndon Johnson failed to challenge the Washington rules when in 1965 he escalated the Vietnam War he inherited. Similarly, after a policy review during his first year as president, Obama chose to escalate the war in Afghanistan. Withdrawal was apparently “off the table.” “Like Johnson, the president whose bold agenda for domestic reform presaged his own, Obama too was choosing to conform,” Bacevich writes.

Against the Washington rules, the author argues for reordering the hierarchy of national priorities, in the words of Martin Luther King Jr., for America “to come back home.” Bacevich offers an alternative credo: “America’s purpose is to be America, striving to fulfill the aspirations expressed in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution as reinterpreted with the passage of time and in light of hard-earned experience.”

The alternative “trinity” he proposes includes a U.S. military meant not to combat evil or remake the world but to defend the United States and its most vital interests. Second, “the primary duty station of the American soldier is in America.” Third, “consistent with the Just War tradition, the United States should employ force only as a last resort and only in self-defense.”

Bacevich may not be heeded, but he is right. U.S. efforts to transform nations and shape global events through military force and covert action are not succeeding, arguably creating more problems than they solve. We do not have the means or the wisdom to save the world, and our foundation at home is crumbling.

This article also appeared in print, under the headline “New World Order,” in the December 6, 2010, issue.

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An addendum: Luce's concept of the American Century was revived when Cheney, Wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, et. al., came up with the PNAC idea: Project for the New Anerican Century. That strategy brought us the WMD scam and the 2003 invasion of Iraq. That event had nothing to do with 9/11. Cheney and his cronies merely used 9/11 as a pretext to implement their overarching plan.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_Century

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Absolutely agree.

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Don’t underestimate the corruption and back channel dealing of Eisenhower’s VP - Richard Nixon. Many of Eisenhower’s National Security Regrets ™️ were Nixon capers. Nixon was grifting for money, a racist, and a militaristic war addict.

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Look for U.N. Alliances, to find those neutral and less aligned with U.S. hegemony. Countries voting at the UN are shown either neutral or against U.S. agenda in far different percentages than what corporate media may offer. We are seen as an evil empire by a growing number, as CIA and military documents are released. Centuries of coercion, assignation, covert aid in regime change and genocide all to place unelected, undemocratic administrations in countries around the globe. So, trillions in exploited resources flow. Not the spread of freedom and democracy we are led to believe.

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So nothing wrong with Vladi attacking a sovereign nation because it's 'supposed' to be Russian? Committing war crimes with the attacking and killing innocent civilians? Causing his own youth to flee their own country by the tens of thousands to avoid fighting a 'military conflict?'

How about expanding your sources? I suggest reading 'Between Two Fires' by Joshua Yaffa as a starter. Provides a better idea of the sinister character that is Putin.

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Thank you

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The aggressor is PUTIN. Biden is not GWB, Cheney etc. So far, NATO hasn't declared war against Russia, although Putin makes all of these unfounded charges. Russia is surrounded by countries that are threatened and live in fear of a Russian invasion.

Dig into Putin's philosophy to find a nationalist white supremacist who denies the mere existence of Ukrainian sovereignty.

BTW the UN is not dispositive and does not necessarily defend democracy.

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The Maidan Revolution overthrew Victor Yanukovich, a despot now living in Russia and supported by Trump shill Paul Manafort. He wasn’t the pro west guy Sachs tries to portray him as.

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Sachs, unfortunately, has essentially become a propagandist for Russia. I haven't watched this lecture, but I've read two recent opinion pieces he wrote on the same topic. Both were full of distortions and highly dubious claims. Some examples: Contrary to what Sachs claims, the US never made any kind of formal promise to the Russians that NATO wouldn't expand eastward (James Baker once said something to that effect to Gorbachev, but he hadn't been authorized to do so). The Maidan revolution was a genuine popular revolt by the Ukrainian people, not something the US somehow conjured into existence (as Sachs implies), the bulk of the evidence indicates the violence was mostly committed by the police (contrary to what Sachs asserts), and the pro-Russian government that was overthrown was corrupt and undemocratic (Sachs acts if it was moderate and widely supported). Sachs also treats Seymour Hersh's recent outlandish claims about the Nord Stream pipeline as if they are fact, when they are based entirely on an anonymous source who claimed highly improbable knowledge of secret discussions and many of the details have been proved false. Given all this, no one should take what Sachs has to say about Ukraine seriously.

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I definitely caught the pro-Russia feeling coming from him !

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He has a similar attitude toward China. When asked if he condemned China's treatment of the Uyghurs, he repeatedly evaded the question and started talking about human rights problems in the US. He's also dabbled in Covid conspiracy theories, appearing on anti-vaxxer Robert Kennedy Jr.'s podcast.

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Hard to believe so many usually rational, decent people could support such an evil tyrant as Putin. This has substantially lowered my opinion of Sachs, who once was my favorite economist, along with Reich.

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What Jeffry Sachs has become is an advocate for humanity sir. Listen very carefully. He is not advocating Russia in any way. He is advocating the United States to stop sticking her finger in every pie around the world. Please look very carefully at what has actually gone on around the globe. Thank you for looking at Dulles and friends . Thank you for learning about every democratically elected leader who was bounced by coups started by America.

This is what I mean about putting our heads in the sandbox.

And while we are on the subject of willfully misrepresenting the strange happenings around the world what happened to the hysteria called”Santos”?

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The problem is not that Sachs is critical of US foreign policy. There are many things that the US has done and continues to do that can and should be criticized. But the criticism has to be based in reality, not false or misleading claims about supposed US covert actions, and never should it involve defending the actions of autocratic governments like Russia and China. When Sachs falsely claims that the US was the prime mover behind the overthrow of the Yanukovych government (completely ignoring the popular support behind the Maidan revolution) or that the US "provoked" Russia into attacking Ukraine (when in fact Russia's excuses for attacking were totally baseless and absurd), he is advocating on behalf of Russia. Sure, in one of his recent pieces on the topic, he says "both sides have lied, cheated and committed violence", but this is just the mirror image of the Mar-a-lago clown's "good people on both sides" comment. Russia's attack on Ukraine was totally unjustified and it has committed numerous war crimes in its prosecution of the war. Nothing that Ukraine has done is remotely comparable.

It is certainly possible to be critical of US foreign policy without taking the side of bloody autocrats like Putin, Xi or Assad. If that was what Sachs was doing, I'd say more power to him. But when he "both sides" and "what abouts" the egregious human rights violations of regimes like Russia's and China's and bases many of his criticisms of the US on outright misinformation, he's doing far more harm than good.

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Excellent comments, Eric!

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Dear Eric,

My delay in responding is not to ignore your very well written and articulated piece. My delay is because I am trying to read as much as I can of responsible journalism to feel that I am absorbing truths and not more propaganda.

In my career as an international( Pan Am only had international routes in most of my career with them) Purser I spent much time working flights to Russia: Moscow and Ukraine. And to Iran (Tehran). My time included the stages of Communism in Russia and in the demise of same. I am a student of observation. I wasn’t a journalist or a government agent. I had been a teacher.I was, in a special way , much freer to observe the human theatre. No one paid attention to me as a threat. I can tell stories into the night about life and human nature . We carried Diplomats, and high officials of many places. We talked to them and shared thoughts.

We watched while Russians (regular citizens after Communism) filled up First Class and enjoyed their largess( literally handfuls of cash being carried into the United States. )They also loved their liquor.

When Communism ended the society was not unlike American society when we got the birth control pill. Suddenly there was all that freedom and many of us (humans) in both situations didn’t know how to handle it...

So now, so you don’t yawn, I am trying to read everything I can to enlarge my picture of each situation. I am just watching the documentary on” MH370, The Plane that Disappeared”

There are many stories and I say that with “truth” in mind.

But the “story” that keeps coming back for me is because I have watched “ Our Universe”, narrated by Morgan Freeman( a God’s voice if I believed)! That hits the soul like no spy movie.

Well, I could go on and on. Flight is landing! Lol

But thank you for making me want to know more, trust more, accept frailty more, and to keep sharing with the wonderful people who follow Robert Reich and Heather Cox Richardson.

With truth as my guide,

Jean(Muriel)🌎🎶🌎

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Thanks for your response. I absolutely agree that it is best to expand our understanding as much as possible. In fact, the more we know, the less we are prone to fall for misinformation. But since we can't know everything about every topic, it's still hard to avoid the occasional pitfalls. Still, I generally find it's possible to learn the basic facts on any issue, if we use a variety of reliable sources (while keeping in mind no source is 100% reliable) and examine all claims carefully (most misinformation has logical flaws if you look closely).

I haven't watched the MH370 documentary, though I may if I can find the time (I have a fairly long list of things I want to watch). I certainly remember the incident, which took place in the same general part of the world I live in now (Asia). I've flown on Malaysian Airlines quite a few times myself. I remember there were a lot of bizarre conspiracy theories about the plane's disappearance, though the truth is, the part of the Indian Ocean where it disappeared is easily vast enough to make trying to find the wreckage of even a large plane quite difficult, no weird explanations required.

I've only watched the first episode of Our Universe, but I intend to watch the rest. Morgan Freeman is great, and the things they cover in the series are fascinating, though I'm pretty well versed in some of them (particularly the astronomy related parts). There are a number of good documentaries about our environmental problems on Netflix as well.

Enjoy your explorations of the world and everything about it!

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I agree that we should stop getting involved in so many conflicts around the world, but if there is 1 conflict since WWII that the US should get involved in, this is it. There hasn't been a clearer case of right vs. wrong, of good vs. evil, with as much riding on the outcome for future world peace, democracy & sovereignty of nations. If he can't see that, there's something wrong with his perception, judgment or moral compass.

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The more aggression and the more players involved the scarier it gets. Anyone who is not scared here is not up to what is going down.

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Sachs has been 1 of my favorite economists because he realizes how critical the environment is, but I think he is wrong about the Russian invasion of Ukraine. If there was only 1 conflict since WWII that we should've gotten involved in, this is it, & the beauty is (for us, anyway), we don't have to provide troops.

Russia must be stopped here, otherwise it will continue to attack & grab the territory of its other neighbors, one by one, in its endless, insatiable obsession to expand empire.

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Just watched the Sachs video. Gobsmacked. Thanks Dan for lifting it up for us. Now I want to see his whole speech.

Dear esteemed Robert, could you possibly expand, confirm, or rebut the history that Sachs unfolded?

I also am heartbroken over this.

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How/why the heck did Russia get into thread about debt ceilings and taxing the rich?

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Maybe the same way war distracts us from our internal political and economic problems.

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Daniel Martin Eckhart. They are involved in our domestic policy and have been corrupting our politicians.

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How true! They're everywhere!

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Sachs certainly makes interesting arguments. Below are 2 statements by Andrew Bacevich, Boston University historian and retired Army colonel that support Sachs from his book Washington Rules. There are also a series of Yale lectures by Timothy Snyder that are available on his Substack blog dealing with Ukraine. I’ve yet to listen to them, but there is no doubt that Snyder is probably the foremost expert on Ukraine. Here are the Bachvich statements:

Andrew Bacevich argues convincingly that the outmoded notions underlying U.S. national security policy are propelling us into bankruptcy at home and perpetual war abroad. These notions are the “Washington rules” of his book’s title, which evolved after World War II in response to the cold war with the Soviet Union.

“This postwar tradition combines two components, each one so deeply embedded in the American collective consciousness as to have all but disappeared from view,” Bacevich writes.

The first component—what Bacevich calls the “American credo”—exhorts the United States both to set norms for the world order and to enforce them. “In the simplest terms, the credo summons the United States—and the United States alone—to lead, save, liberate, and ultimately transform the world.”

One of the first to proclaim this credo was magazine publisher Henry Luce writing in Life in 1941 envisioning what he called the American century. He urged Americans to “accept wholeheartedly our duty to exert upon the world the full impact of our influence for such purposes as we see fit and by such means as we see fit.”

The means Luce speaks of comprise the second component of U.S. statecraft after World War II. These are what Bacevich, a professor of history and international relations at Boston University and a Vietnam veteran, calls the “sacred trinity.” These consist of “an abiding conviction that the minimum essentials of international peace and order require the United States to maintain a global military presence, to configure its forces for global power projection, and to counter existing or anticipated threats by relying on a policy of global interventionism.”

Exercising global leadership on these terms, notes Bacevich, “obliges the United States to maintain military capabilities staggeringly in excess of those required for self-defense.” The size and extent of our national security state includes $700 billion per year in military spending, as much or more than the rest of the world combined. The United States also has 300,000 troops stationed abroad, also more than the rest of the world combined.

How did we get here? The first secretary of defense, James Forrestal, anticipating a long struggle with the Soviet Union, coined the term “semi-war,” a condition in which great dangers threaten the United States into the indefinite future. Semi-warriors created the Washington rules, uphold them and benefit from their continued existence.

Two early semi-warriors stand out. Allen Dulles, C.I.A. director from 1953 to 1961, extended the agency’s reach around the world, overthrowing democratically elected governments in Iran and Guatemala. Air Force Gen. Curtis LeMay, who led the Strategic Air Command from 1948 to 1957, built SAC into a highly efficient weapon—nuclear-armed planes always airborne—that kept the peace by threatening “destruction on a scale never before seen.”

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By the end of his presidency in 1961, Dwight Eisenhower apparently had some second thoughts about what he had helped create, as he warned the nation in his farewell address of the dangers of “the military-industrial complex.” From threatened massive nuclear retaliation keeping the peace during the Eisenhower years, the “action intellectuals” of the Kennedy years preferred a “flexible response,” which included the willingness to use the Army to fight limited proxy wars against the Soviets.

During the Kennedy administration, the Bay of Pigs was followed by an ever-deepening involvement in Vietnam. About the latter debacle, Bacevich marvels at how little was learned: “In retrospect, what distinguishes the legacy of Vietnam is not how much things changed, but how little.” And so for the presidents Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush and Bill Clinton “the war had no truly important lessons to teach, none at least that should call into question the larger record of U.S. policy or alter its future course. Reflecting on the past took a backseat to looking ahead.”

The original impetus for the Washington rules was the struggle with Communist totalitarianism that began after World War II. Yet when that struggle ended with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the end of the Soviet Union in 1991, the Washington semi-warriors kept their aggressive focus. “The Red Menace had disappeared,” Bacevich writes, “but humankind more than ever needed the United States to show the way.”

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Bacevich describes in detail but does not stop with the disastrous militarism of the George W. Bush administration. Indeed, as has every U.S. president since the start of the cold war, President Barack Obama too seems to be keeping faith with the vision of an interventionist America.

Lyndon Johnson failed to challenge the Washington rules when in 1965 he escalated the Vietnam War he inherited. Similarly, after a policy review during his first year as president, Obama chose to escalate the war in Afghanistan. Withdrawal was apparently “off the table.” “Like Johnson, the president whose bold agenda for domestic reform presaged his own, Obama too was choosing to conform,” Bacevich writes.

Against the Washington rules, the author argues for reordering the hierarchy of national priorities, in the words of Martin Luther King Jr., for America “to come back home.” Bacevich offers an alternative credo: “America’s purpose is to be America, striving to fulfill the aspirations expressed in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution as reinterpreted with the passage of time and in light of hard-earned experience.”

The alternative “trinity” he proposes includes a U.S. military meant not to combat evil or remake the world but to defend the United States and its most vital interests. Second, “the primary duty station of the American soldier is in America.” Third, “consistent with the Just War tradition, the United States should employ force only as a last resort and only in self-defense.”

Bacevich may not be heeded, but he is right. U.S. efforts to transform nations and shape global events through military force and covert action are not succeeding, arguably creating more problems than they solve. We do not have the means or the wisdom to save the world, and our foundation at home is crumbling.

This article also appeared in print, under the headline “New World Order,” in the December 6, 2010, issue.

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But why did the US insist on expanding NATO? Who benefits? It must be financial in some way. Is it oil companies? Thanks for posting.

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The simplest answer is FEAR. Russia will never stop unless they are stopped. Just like Trump.

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Mr. Franzman, with all due respect, has #45 really been stopped? He is still running for President again with the many investigations going on about him in the Georgia find the votes case, the Justice Dept., the January 6th committee, I don't feel he has been stopped at all. And with everyone in power seemingly afraid to put the former president in jail, I'll believe he has been stopped when I see him the orange jumpsuit to match his orange head.

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No, Trump has not been stopped. That's still on our to-do list.

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The US didn't insist on expanding NATO. Nations afraid of Russia begged to join (& not all who have requested admittance have been accepted).

Also the US is by no means the most vigorous advocate for supporting Ukraine & opposing Russia. Nations that have previously been subjugated by Russia, like Poland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania & Czechia, are the most enthusiastic supporters of Ukraine. Europe & North America haven't been this united against a common foe in many decades, & with good reason, since Russian success in this totally unprovoked war is a potentially existential threat to many nations (if not all, in the long run).

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Exactly. Any nation, once having been independent and then subdued by Russia, only has fear and loathing at the thought of ever going back and will do most anything to avoid. When Putin equates himself and today's Russia with the Russia of Catherine the Great, he's telling whoever can listen and understand that he's not content with just Ukraine.

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Consider Russia's neighbors. Members of ECU. Need protection from Russia.

We don't, as falsely assumed, dictate NATO policy.

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If we did, Sweden and Finland would already be members. Instead we're waiting on the results of the Turkish election

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I learned a new word: Hegemony

he·gem·o·ny

/həˈjemənē,ˈhejəˌmōnē/

noun

leadership or dominance, especially by one country or social group over others.

"Germany was united under Prussian hegemony after 1871"

The United States administrations over the last three decades continues on a bent to take over the world, doing what ever is necessary to realize this complete control. The lecture offers dates detailing

several administrations ordering horrifying agendas. I am utterly shocked.

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I prefer the 'idea' of the West to the alternatives, however that does not mean I am so in love with Capitalism that I cannot see what happens when given full control of the world's affairs. Our problem is always human nature - give it an inch it will try to take over - that is true of putin, and also true of Capitalism's worst instincts ! SO - controls must be in place to rein in the tendency of the Big Bully Capitalists to control everything - hence I am a slightly Leftie Centrist, who knows the frailty of any human endeavor must be carefully controlled else it collapses at the hands of the extremists in either direction !.

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Actually, it is Russia that has this insatiable obsession to build empire, something it has been doing practically nonstop for centuries, which is why it has far more territory than any other country. When was the last time the US gained territory?

I'm surprised you weren't familiar with the word "hegemony" before now. I've known it since my early teens, even before I became very interested in international affairs.

The US has indeed gotten involved in far too many conflicts, & has erroneously felt it had to be the police of the world, & like many real police, has sometimes gotten on the wrong side of conflicts & committed plenty of wrongdoing (although not on the scale nor as prolifically as Russia has been doing in Ukraine or did in Chechnya & Syria). This is the 1 conflict that the US should be involved in, to keep Russia from overrunning Ukraine. Appeasement won't work any better with Putin than it did with his model Hitler. He'll always demand more.

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There is an old agenda in play - strangle - Russian sovereignty. The goal is to surround the country with NATO forces. The plan is also occurring in the South Pacific and strategic points of the Southern Hemisphere. I am frightened

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It's been frightening for decades, but being fearful doesn't change anything. Sure it could all collapse into an inferno any minute, but since putin is playing nasty little games, the US also has to play nasty little games to try to contain him. "Who started it?" is an argument you can have, but the result is the same. Anybody who thinks they can have a reasonable conversation with somebody who kills those who argue with him, is wasting their time ! I love peace & quiet above all things, but when another human will not leave you alone, you have to fight back. & guard yourself against their plotting.

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You are describing the United States foreign policy.

We have paid our taxes to support administration after administration to enact horrors not reported. Corporate News has the American population listing to designed rhetoric manufacturing consent, as covert and open military genocide is performed daily by our money spent on a budget of evil.

Please watch the video detailing the dates and details of this story

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With certain people, you can hear the steamroller engine start running when you are nice to them. If you are listening. On the macro level, Russias neighbors are listening.

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If Biden's tax proposal is theatrics, for the near term, then hopefully it will at least bring the idea into the forefront and get more attention as the 2024 election season gets going. If the idea is wildly popular with the American people, it should be leveraged in '24 to bring in enough Democrats and independents to be able to make real change. If (as I've read several times already) a Trump nomination for the GOP is a benefit to the Dems, then let's use this combination of forces to lay the groundwork for this billionaires tax. I'd prefer a millionaire tax (as Sen. Warren has pushed), but any kind of tax on the super-rich is a move in the right direction.

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“The tax cuts were real, but the idea they were based on was always a fantasy.”

A fantasy? That implies a forgivable delusion. But supply side has never been anything but a cynical lie, of the kind always at the heart of every swindle. And a swindle it always is, because it steals the future from those with the unhappiest of pasts.

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Excellent analysis of the reality of what will in all likelihood probably happen 👍 😀 just don't give away all of Gpa Joe's secrets as our country dearly needs him to steer us all thru these waves of seditious insurrectionists hell bent on imposing their dysfunctional control over all of America 🇺🇸 God bless the President and these United States of America 🇺🇸 👍 😀 💙

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founding

Prof. Reich! Now you've given us a cliff-hanger! How did your debate go? How did your audience respond? Do continue your story .... please!

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Thank you for this reassurance. Now you need to reassure us that in the next election the present GOP will not turn the US into a Nazi crazed white-Christian filled-with-hate nation-state

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Why can't the 'fantasy' tax increase at the top be over the 30% that is paid by the middle class? If we're going to have a fantasy it might as well be a good one!

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