I see this attitude at play in authoritarian societies I've lived in. People stop believing in a fair outcomes (often their biggest concern are courts) and so cheating, lying, and stealing to get ahead become a social virtue. From the outside it looks immoral, but when you have a system ruled by men and not a system ruled by law, it seems inevitable.
A woman in my book club was saying how terrible it is that the United Healthcare CEO was murdered. Yes, it is terrible, and evidently a lot of people are not sorry for his loss. I told her that the income inequality that we have is how civil wars get started. FDR and France’s Perkins saved America. Our society at present is rigged economically, politically, and legally toward the morbidly rich, who think they can do and buy anything. Their brains have somehow been transformed by immense wealth. It will take millions of people standing on the arc of history to bend it down toward justice. My mother told me a long time ago that when people become wealthy, it’s because they stepped on other people along the way and took unfair advantage. That’s still true today.
It is really worrying but if the MAGA authoritarians succeed in substantially implementing Project 2025, revolution may be our last recourse against White Christian nationalist fascist dictatorship.
I hope the fact that trump is sticking his cabinet with billionaires will awaken more Americans to his intentions to yield to the 1%and further widen the wealth and wage gap that fuels the despair
The only thing she doesn't have is the collapse of public education. Humanities zapped. Standardized testing treating all the working classes as if they only wish they, too, could be like all the dehumanized majors in finance at all the Ivy League.
Great essay and a timely warning that the elites should heed, but will likely ignore at their peril. I would like to offer a few comments from a Modern Monetary Theory perspective. MMT tells us that Federal taxes pay for nothing but are necessary to give the fiat currency value and to manage the money supply. They can be a valuable policy tool. I am a strong proponent of progressive taxes to counter wealth inequality and promote social justice. Federal taxes essentially destroy money by removing it from circulation and effectively disappear when they hit the infinite pool of the US Treasury. Taxes are necessary to give value to a currency because they must be paid in that currency, and as a tool to regulate the money supply.
The national debt is a red herring. The treasury can and does create money to fund priorities as determined by our elected representatives. Sovereign currency nations do not have the same financial constraints as do individuals, businesses, or US states and localities. All “pay-for” arguments are moot for nations issuing their own fiat currencies.
A sovereign currency nation literally cannot go bankrupt. The only real problem is inflation and that can be managed by fiscal and monetary policy including taxation, interest rates, and a job guarantee to achieve full employment.
A Federal Job Guarantee (JG) of Public Sector Employment (PSE) as recommended by MMT, would provide an automatic mechanism for controlling inflation that would increase GDP and reduce poverty. A JG would also effectively create a living minimum wage including benefits, and would be federally funded but locally administered to benefit communities. We can afford our priorities and manage inflation in more humane ways than the current approach. We need a progressive tax system for fairness, not to fund federal programs.
Thank you. Did you listen to Ezra Klein’s episode with Gary Gerstle? I appreciate the attention you gave to unheard voices and alignment with King’s ideas.
We are at a dangerous point in the struggle. This is one of the best descriptions I have seen and I will be sharing. But first, my comments. I have said this elsewhere. We are well past the time for peaceful protests. This does not mean that I am advocating for violence, though it may come to that. The powers that be have planned for every eventuality. Think back to tRump’s disgusting pose, bible in hand, in front of the church when he was in office. What did he do to protesters then? The thugs will be ready with guns if we protest, and they will use them. I do not recommend. We should urge all our elected officials who are sympathetic to resist, as it has some effect. And we need to find any way we can to oppose and resist. Their attacks are well planned and any safety nets that exist will be gone as soon as they are free to act. Our taxes are meant for us, not to enrich them. There never was any such thing as a welfare queen. It was the beginning of turning people against the disadvantaged in order to begin the looting of our future.
Could you not then ask, what's the point of fighting it? Whether we end up in a socialist quagmire, or under fascist oligarchs, doesn't matter. Because the end game with both is, we're no longer the victims of untethered capitalism. Either way, us peons are still in the same boat.
I don’t know your work but you just earned a new subscriber. This piece is perfection. So smart and so, so true.
Same here, just subscribed. Great essay and warning that the elites should heed, but will likely ignore at their peril.
Me, too!
Same. Excellent. Spot on.
Yup …make that two
Indeed it does seem like a flashing red light.
I see this attitude at play in authoritarian societies I've lived in. People stop believing in a fair outcomes (often their biggest concern are courts) and so cheating, lying, and stealing to get ahead become a social virtue. From the outside it looks immoral, but when you have a system ruled by men and not a system ruled by law, it seems inevitable.
A woman in my book club was saying how terrible it is that the United Healthcare CEO was murdered. Yes, it is terrible, and evidently a lot of people are not sorry for his loss. I told her that the income inequality that we have is how civil wars get started. FDR and France’s Perkins saved America. Our society at present is rigged economically, politically, and legally toward the morbidly rich, who think they can do and buy anything. Their brains have somehow been transformed by immense wealth. It will take millions of people standing on the arc of history to bend it down toward justice. My mother told me a long time ago that when people become wealthy, it’s because they stepped on other people along the way and took unfair advantage. That’s still true today.
And then what happens if the new administration starts cutting safety net programs? Not good.
yeah, it's really worrying
It is really worrying but if the MAGA authoritarians succeed in substantially implementing Project 2025, revolution may be our last recourse against White Christian nationalist fascist dictatorship.
I hope the fact that trump is sticking his cabinet with billionaires will awaken more Americans to his intentions to yield to the 1%and further widen the wealth and wage gap that fuels the despair
Ari Drennen is good, very good, super good.
She's got the stats. She's got our debts to FDR.
The only thing she doesn't have is the collapse of public education. Humanities zapped. Standardized testing treating all the working classes as if they only wish they, too, could be like all the dehumanized majors in finance at all the Ivy League.
Another new subscriber here. This is 100% tracking with my viewpoint as of late. Thank you for summing it up so nicely.
Great essay and a timely warning that the elites should heed, but will likely ignore at their peril. I would like to offer a few comments from a Modern Monetary Theory perspective. MMT tells us that Federal taxes pay for nothing but are necessary to give the fiat currency value and to manage the money supply. They can be a valuable policy tool. I am a strong proponent of progressive taxes to counter wealth inequality and promote social justice. Federal taxes essentially destroy money by removing it from circulation and effectively disappear when they hit the infinite pool of the US Treasury. Taxes are necessary to give value to a currency because they must be paid in that currency, and as a tool to regulate the money supply.
The national debt is a red herring. The treasury can and does create money to fund priorities as determined by our elected representatives. Sovereign currency nations do not have the same financial constraints as do individuals, businesses, or US states and localities. All “pay-for” arguments are moot for nations issuing their own fiat currencies.
A sovereign currency nation literally cannot go bankrupt. The only real problem is inflation and that can be managed by fiscal and monetary policy including taxation, interest rates, and a job guarantee to achieve full employment.
A Federal Job Guarantee (JG) of Public Sector Employment (PSE) as recommended by MMT, would provide an automatic mechanism for controlling inflation that would increase GDP and reduce poverty. A JG would also effectively create a living minimum wage including benefits, and would be federally funded but locally administered to benefit communities. We can afford our priorities and manage inflation in more humane ways than the current approach. We need a progressive tax system for fairness, not to fund federal programs.
http://pavlina-tcherneva.net/job-guarantee-faq/
Well written.
thank you!
Thank you. Did you listen to Ezra Klein’s episode with Gary Gerstle? I appreciate the attention you gave to unheard voices and alignment with King’s ideas.
We are at a dangerous point in the struggle. This is one of the best descriptions I have seen and I will be sharing. But first, my comments. I have said this elsewhere. We are well past the time for peaceful protests. This does not mean that I am advocating for violence, though it may come to that. The powers that be have planned for every eventuality. Think back to tRump’s disgusting pose, bible in hand, in front of the church when he was in office. What did he do to protesters then? The thugs will be ready with guns if we protest, and they will use them. I do not recommend. We should urge all our elected officials who are sympathetic to resist, as it has some effect. And we need to find any way we can to oppose and resist. Their attacks are well planned and any safety nets that exist will be gone as soon as they are free to act. Our taxes are meant for us, not to enrich them. There never was any such thing as a welfare queen. It was the beginning of turning people against the disadvantaged in order to begin the looting of our future.
Could you not then ask, what's the point of fighting it? Whether we end up in a socialist quagmire, or under fascist oligarchs, doesn't matter. Because the end game with both is, we're no longer the victims of untethered capitalism. Either way, us peons are still in the same boat.
Follow and subscribe
All very true but FDR is a different sort of class of politician than Trump and the electorate seems to have had different interests back then