Monday, February 10, 2025

Ignoring The Hard-Won Lessons Of History


 

Two Truisms Of Current Republican Economics


There are a couple of truisms that apply to today's Republican Party.

1. Republicans love rich people and don't care about other Americans.

2. Republicans love to whine about the national debt, but don't really care about it.

If you doubt that, congressional Republicans are preparing to prove it.

Other than giving Trump what he wants, the congressional Republicans have only one things they believe in enough to pass - reauthorizing the Trump tax cuts ((which are soon going to expire). 

These cuts primarily benefitted the rich when they were passed a few years ago, and it will be the same this time. At least half of the tax cuts will go to the richest 5% of Americans, while the other 95% will have to divide up the rest.

They don't seem to care that it is estimated that passing these tax cuts for the rich will balloon the national debt by $4 to $6 trillion dollars. That's the same national debt that they whined was too large when a Democrat was in the White House.

There are two ways to lower the national debt - raise taxes or cut benefits. We know they won't raise taxes because they are preparing to cut them again (especially for the rich). They claim they will cut government spending to offset the deficit cutting taxes will do.

Where will the cuts happen. It won't be the government giveaways to the rich and corporations. No! Instead, the cuts will be to the help the poor, the working class, and the lower middle class get. Unlike millionaires and billionaires, these people actually need the government help they get. Unfortunately, the Republicans don't care. They will cut help for people who need it so they can give more to the rich.

And those cuts will not be enough to offset the massive tax cut for the rich. The national debt will be ballooned.

To be blunt, today's Republicans love the rich (and no one else) and don't care about the national debt. Their own actions prove that to be true! 

Exceptions To GOP Belief In "Small Government"

 Political Cartoon is by Barry Duetsch at leftycartoons.com.

Arbitrary Power Depends On The Acquiescence Of Its Subjects


The following is part of a post by Robert Reich:

As of Friday, Trump has signed more than 50 executive orders, covering every aspect of American life and much foreign policy. 


It’s not just that this number of executive orders is unprecedented in modern American politics. Many are unlawful, unconstitutional, or both. 


In the age of monarchs, kings issued decrees. The tsars of imperial Russia proclaimed ukases. The dictators of the 20th century made diktats.

 

Trump issues executive orders.


Average people in the age of monarchs, tsars, and dictators were largely powerless. Resistance meant almost certain death. 


Many people were resigned to vulnerability. They practiced passivity. They knew no life other than repression. But their deference entrenched and ensured the power of monarchs, tsars, and dictators.


Arbitrary power depends on the acquiescence of everyone subjected to it.

 

Right now, after three weeks of Trump’s “flooding the zone” (as Trumpers like to say) some of you may be feeling powerless. 


Trump wants you to feel powerless. He depends on your passivity in the face of his takeover of American democracy. 


He wants to be a strongman who can act unilaterally and arbitrarily — who can issue orders about anything that pops into his head. Purging, firing, prosecuting, or deporting anyone he wants removed. Obliterating, freezing, and pummeling any institution he wants destroyed. Unleashing the richest man in the world to do whatever the hell he wants with the government of the United States. 


If you are dumbfounded into inaction, if you don’t even want to hear the news, if you feel as though you’re living through a nightmare over which you have no control, I get it. Every other day I feel the same.


But hear me out. 

You and I have no real choice but to stand up to Trump, Musk, and their lapdogs. To allow them to bully us into submission invites more bullying, more lawlessness, more gonzo executive orders. 

The Fifth Horseman Of The Apocalypse

Political Cartoon is by Paul Kinsella.

Opposing Trump's Populism Requires More Than "Everything Is Fine"

 

Sunday, February 09, 2025

The Bully And His Hatchet Man


 

Voters Want Funding Increased For Medicaid, Medicare, And Social Security


 



The charts above reflect the results of the Economist / YouGov Poll -- done between February 2nd and 4th of a nationwide sample of 1,423 registered voters, with a 3.3 point margin of error.

A Wanted Man

Political Cartoon is by Lalo Alcaraz at Pocho.com.
 

Americans Don't Want Musk Having A Lot Of Influence In The Trump Administration


The chart above reflects the results of the Economist / YouGov Poll -- done between February 2nd and 4th of a nationwide sample of 1,604 adults (including 1,423 registered voters). The margin of error is 3.2 points for adults and 3.3 points for registered voters.

Musk's Pluto-Brats

Political Cartoon is by Jen Sorensen at jensorensen.com.
 

A Win For Moscow And Beijing


 

Saturday, February 08, 2025

Trump Gave Right-Wing Israelis An Excuse To Seize Palestine

 

Unemployment Rate Drops To 4.0% In January

 

The Labor Department released it unemployment report for January on Friday. It showed the economy produced only 143,000 jobs in the month, but that was good enough to lower the unemployment rate to 4.0% (from 4.1% in December).

Here are the relevant statistics for January:

SIZE OF THE CIVILIAN WORK FORCE:

170,744,000

OFFICIAL NUMBER OF UNEMPLOYED WORKERS:

6,849,000

OFFICIAL UNEMPLOYMENT RATE:

4.0%

DEMOGRAPHIC BREAKDOWN OF OFFICIAL UNEMPLOYMENT:

Adult men...............3.7%

Adult women...............3.7%

Teens (16-19)...............11.8%

Whites...............3.5%

Blacks...............6.2%

Asians...............3.7%

Hispanics...............4.8%

Less than HS diploma...............5.7%

HS graduate...............4.5%

Some college...............3.5%

Bachelor's deg. or more...............2.3%

NUMBER OF MARGINALLY-ATTACHED WORKERS (unemployed but not counted):

1,590,000

MORE REALISTIC NUMBER OF UNEMPLOYED WORKERS (official + marginally-attached):

8,439,000

MORE REALISTIC UNEMPLOYMENT RATE:

4.9%

Hiring The Worst Among Us

Political Cartoon is by Clay Jones at claytoonz.com.
 

What's Happening In America Is An Attempted Autogolpe



 The following is from a post by Paul Krugman:

What’s happening in America right now is an attempted autogolpe.


Latin American readers are surely familiar with the term. An autogolpe is literally a “self-coup” — when a legitimately elected leader uses his position to seize total control, eliminating legal and constitutional restraints on his power. Are Musk and Trump trying to pull off an autogolpe here? Of course they are. And they are doing so with, as far as I can tell, the full support of every Republican in the House and the Senate.


You should look at everything they do through that lens. Yes, we can ask whether a policy move makes sense in terms of its announced goals. But you should also always ask, “How does doing this serve the autogolpe?”


Take, for example, DOGE’s obsession with finding ways to lay off federal workers. This makes no sense as a priority if you know anything about where the taxpayer dollar goes:



The federal work force is no larger now than it was under Dwight Eisenhower.


But making “headcount reduction” a policy goal is a way to purge civil servants who remain loyal to the law and the Constitution and replace them with Trump and Musk loyalists.


Fortunately, the Trump Administration’s push to induce federal workers to take buyouts appears to be a bust. Many of the relative handful of workers who took the sort-of-a-deal before a judge put it on hold were probably planning to leave anyway. But behind this “policy” is an attempt to drive out the most idealistic, most dedicated workers.


Musk-Trumpocracy’s illegal shutdown of USAID should be seen through this lens. Musk clearly hates the idea of helping people in need: just look at the rage he has expressed over the philanthropy of MacKenzie Scott, Jeff Bezos’s ex-wife. While he may believe that the agency is “a viper’s nest of radical-left marxists who hate America”, it also serves the purpose of purging civil servants while demagoguing to Trump’s base. The same can be said of the confected furor over DEI.


It hardly needs pointing out that the attempted purge at the FBI, targeting anyone who investigated Jan. 6 rioters or Trump himself, is an integral part of the autogolpe. And so, obviously, is the terrifying attempt of Musk and his acolytes to seize control of the Treasury payments system and give crucial power to rewrite the code to a 25-year-old who turns out (surprise!) to be a racist and eugenicist.


But don’t despair. We are in the middle of an attempted autogolpe. It hasn’t succeeded so far. In fact, I’d say tentatively that the autogolpistas are having a harder time than they expected. America’s oligarchs may mostly have preemptively surrendered to the new regime, but many of the rest of us have not.


The attempt to get large numbers of civil servants to self-deport appears to have been a bust. The courts, which haven’t been completely corrupted, are throwing up roadblocks to some of the ongoing power grabs. Workers at the FBI and elsewhere are circling the wagons, as are federal unions. Whistleblowers and at least some media organizations have been reporting on Musk’s attempts to seize the digital high ground, and the efforts of political appointees at Treasury to cover up what has actually been happening says that they still fear the consequences of public exposure.


And while we haven’t yet seen the mass demonstrations that faced Trump early in his first term, there are a growing number of protests against both Trump and Musk.


It is time more elected Democrats took a vocal stand.


Now, the enemies of democracy will keep trying to find new ways to undermine rule of law. I have to admit that I never even thought about the federal payments system as a target before the news of Musk’s antics was broken. Special credit goes to Nathan Tankus, an expert on “the technical details of monetary policy”, who has become the man of the moment.

But resistance to the autogolpe will throw sand into its gears.


These are scary times. But the bad guys haven’t won yet.

Foreign Flags

Political Cartoon is by Lalo Alcaraz at Pocho.com.
 

Is Government Just For Billionaires - Or For Everyone?


 

Friday, February 07, 2025

By Attacking DEI The Republicans Want To Get Rid Of Integration


 

A Clear Majority Of Texans Want Recreational Marijuana Legalized


The figures above are from the University of Houston Hobby School Poll -- done between January 13th and 21st of Texas adults, with a 2.83 point margin of error.

The Price Of Eggs

Political Cartoon is by Bob Englehart at Cagle.com.
 

About 219,000 Workers Filed For Unemployment Last Week


The Labor Department released its weekly unemployment report on Thursday. It showed about 219,000 workers filed for unemployment benefits in the week ending on February 1st. Here is the official Labor Department statement: 

In the week ending February 1, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 219,000, an increase of 11,000 from the previous week's revised level. The previous week's level was revised up by 1,000 from 207,000 to 208,000. The 4-week moving average was 216,750, an increase of 4,000 from the previous week's revised average. The previous week's average was revised up by 250 from 212,500 to 212,750.

Trump's Insane Dream

Political Cartoon is by Dave Granlund at davegranlund.com.
 

How The States Rank On Women's Health


 




Methodology

In order to determine the best states for women’s health, SmileHub compared the 50 states across three key dimensions: 1) Health & Living Standards, 2) Health Care Policies & Support Systems and 3) Safety Risk.

We evaluated those dimensions using 18 relevant metrics, which are listed below with their corresponding weights. Each metric was graded on a 100-point scale, with a score of 100 representing the highest level of women’s health. For metrics marked with an asterisk (*), the square root of the population was used to calculate the population size in order to avoid overcompensating for population differences across states.

We then determined each state’s weighted average across all metrics to calculate its overall score and used the resulting scores to rank-order the states.

Health & Living Standards - Total Points: 45

  • Women’s Life Expectancy at Birth: Full Weight (~4.50 Points)
  • Female Uninsured Rate: Full Weight (~4.50 Points)
    Note: This metric accounts for females ages 16 and older.
  • Share of Women with Good or Better Health: Double Weight (~9.00 Points)
  • Women’s Preventive Health Care: Full Weight (~4.50 Points)
    Note: This metric measures the share of women who were up-to-date on cervical and breast-cancer screenings.
  • Share of Physically Active Women: Full Weight (~4.50 Points)
  • Share of Women Who are Obese: Full Weight (~4.50 Points)
    Note: This metric measures the percent of females aged 18 years and older who have obesity. Obesity is defined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention as a body mass index greater than or equal to 30.0.
  • Maternal Mortality Rate: Full Weight (~4.50 Points)
  • Heart Disease Mortality Rate for Women: Full Weight (~4.50 Points)
  • Female Smoker Rate: Full Weight (~4.50 Points)

Health Care Policies & Support Systems - Total Points: 35

  • Health & Wellness Charities per Total Number of Women*: Full Weight (~4.38 Points)
  • Quality of Women’s Hospitals: Full Weight (~4.38 Points)
  • Share of Women Ages 18-44 Who Reported Having One or More People They Think of as Their Personal Doctor or Health Care Provider: Double Weight (~8.75 Points)
  • Note: Primary care providers are specialized in establishing a long-lasting relationship with their patients, and are their medical point of contact. They diagnose, treat and prevent a wide variety of conditions in a way that is tailored to each individual patient. Having a dedicated health care provider, or a provider considered to be one’s personal doctor, is associated with elements of successful health care, such as:Primary care providers are specialized in establishing a long-lasting relationship with their patients, and are their medical point of contact. They diagnose, treat and prevent a wide variety of conditions in a way that is tailored to each individual patient. Having a dedicated health care provider, or a provider considered to be one’s personal doctor, is associated with elements of successful health care, such as:

    • Lower health care costs;
    • Greater use of preventive services, such as flu shots or mammograms;
    • Fewer emergency department visits for non-urgent or avoidable problems;
    • Increased patient satisfaction;
    • Improvements in chronic care management for chronic conditions such as hypertension and high cholesterol.
  • Abortion Policies & Access: Full Weight (~4.38 Points)
  • Note: This binary metric is based on research conducted by the Guttmacher Institute and takes into account 20 types of abortion restrictions – including gestational age bans, waiting periods, insurance coverage bans and medication abortion restrictions – and approximately 10 protective policies – including state constitutional protections, abortion funding, insurance coverage for abortion, and protections for patients and clinic staff.

    • 2 - Most or very protective: the state has most or all of the protective policies;
    • 1.5 - Protective: the state has some protective policies;
    • 1 - Some restrictions/protections: the state either has few restrictions or protections, or has a combination of restrictive and protective policies;
    • 0.5 - Restrictive: the state has multiple restrictions and later gestational age ban;
    • 0 - Most or very restrictive: the state either bans abortion completely or has multiple restrictions and early gestational age ban.
  • Unaffordability of Doctor’s Visit: Double Weight (~8.75 Points)
    Note: This metric measures the percentage of women who could not afford to see a doctor in the past year due to costs.
  • Domestic Violence Support Services per Total Number of Women: Full Weight (~4.38 Points)

Safety - Total Points: 20

  • Suicide Rate for Women: Full Weight (~5.00 Points)
  • Depression Rate for Women: Full Weight (~5.00 Points)
  • Prevalence of Rape Victimization Among Females: Double Weight (~10.00 Points)
    Note: This metric measures instances of rape. According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics, 91 percent of rape victims are female, and 9 percent are male.

The Toddler-In-Chief

Political Cartoon is by Christopher Weyant in The Boston Globe.