"A quarter or less of Americans think the country is moving in the right direction, and they think Mr. Biden’s Presidency has done more harm than good. They think Mr. Biden is too old to be President, and they view Mr. Trump’s Presidency far more favorably than they do Mr. Biden’s.
Most important, Mr. Biden is viewed even more unfavorably than Mr. Trump in the polls (59% to 57% unfavorable in the Fox survey, which is Mr. Biden’s best showing). Even worse for Biden, 68 percent say Trump was better on the economy." -WSJ, Panic Time for Democrats, 3/4
" More than half (55%) of Americans believe the economy is shrinking and we’re in a recession (when it’s growing faster than under any president since FDR and has been for three-plus years),
— When President Biden came into office in 2021, almost two-thirds of Americans approved of his handling the economy and foreign affairs; today that number is fewer than a third,
— Almost half (49%) think the stock market is down for the year when in fact the S&P 500 was up 24% last year and is up more than 12% this year,
— About three-quarters (72%) are sure that inflation is up right now, when the rate has fallen from 9.1% to a current low of 3.4%, better than the lowest inflation number Reagan had at 4.1% in his entire 8 years,
— While unemployment is lower than it’s been in over 50 years, half of Americans (49%) say “unemployment is at a 50-year high,”- Thomas Hartmann, 'What Has Happened To Our Democracy?'
A persistent glitch in the brains of too many 2024 voters is that Trump and the Republicans would be better at the economy than Biden and the Dems. Of course, this is arrant poppycock. One need not be a Mensa member to see that House members (mainly Freedom Caucus) have been poised for months now to push the nation off a fiscal cliff with a government shutdown. Only by some small saving grace has the shutdown been delayed as it was last week. Congress approved a temporary spending bill to prevent a partial government shutdown this weekend, with Speaker Mike Johnson (R., La.) forced once again to turn to a coalition made up mostly of Democrats to clear it in the House, followed by passage in the Senate.
Now, ask yourselves: Why mostly Democrats? Well, because Dems have the nation's welfare at heart and unlike House Reeps are not into brinksmanship with our whole economy put at risk. Not just with repeated threats of shutdowns but refusals to raise the debt ceiling (credit defaults) as well. Both often for the same deranged reasons: abominable and savage spending cuts that would leave millions adrift and federal workers and pensioners especially. Financial Times columnist Edward Luce already explained (last October) how an ill-timed game of financial 'chicken' could wreck what was still then a recovering economy, e.g.
To refresh readers' memories, in 2011, Standard &
Poor’s stripped the U.S. of its triple-A credit rating for the
first time after the Treasury came within days of being unable to pay certain
benefits. In other words, a credit downgrade merely for coming close to
default. Now imagine what an actual default at the hands of Republican
terrorists would do.
A U.S. default could trigger a worldwide financial crisis,
possibly a depression. That’s because financial markets currently treat U.S.
debt as the safest of assets, with all other assets around the world
benchmarked against us. Our default would send waves of financial panic
cascading through lots of other markets, too. If. the
government can’t borrow to pay bills that come due, it would have to suspend
certain pension payments, withhold or cut the pay of soldiers and federal workers,
or delay interest payments, which would constitute default. Unless Congress
raises the debt ceiling, the Treasury could be forced to cut payments by more
than 40%, including Social Security, VA benefits. Think this wouldn't crater the economy? Think again!
"Oh it won't happen!" You say?
Then you are not paying attention.
As for shutdowns, the House wasn’t even back from its Presidents Day recess and Speaker Mike Johnson clearly didn’t have a handle on the situation. Johnson whined about it to members of the GOP conference in a call complaining that they are undermining his bargaining position with their constant infighting and chaos. But do these imps care? Hell NO! All they care about is following orders from Traitor Trump to wreck any chance for Biden's re-re-election. Which is why these accessory traitors torpedoed the bipartisan border bill, e.g.
Yet now they have the chutzpah to demand border security funding or no fiscal agreement! Members of the Freedom Caucus, meanwhile, are refusing to back down from their demands that a slew of poison-pill policy riders be included in the funding package and "for more border security funding".
This despite the fact these Reep Turds killed the Senate’s bipartisan border security bill. So I advise Biden to tell them to go suck shit. They had their chance and blew it. In the words of one WaPo commenter:
"As far as I'm concerned the Republicans can now shut their mouths about any issues at the border. They had their opportunity to pass something more far reaching than anything ever proposed before and instead they chose to bow down to their corrupt narcissistic psychopath cult leader."
Back to the recent calamity dodge. House Republicans had emerged from a closed-door meeting Thursday ahead of the vote saying they were frustrated that Johnson was asking them to support another deadline extension without more spending cuts or other conservative victories. Thursday’s stopgap measure was the third passed with Democrats during Johnson’s speakership, and will buy negotiators more time to then pass full-year spending bills next month, under a framework agreed to with Democrats. But don't discount more brinksmanship to come as the House ideologues are still salivating at the prospect of using their "leverage" to try to make the Ds cut, cut, cut - everything from food stamps, to Medicaid, to meals on wheels for seniors, to VA medical spending and Medicare.
Now let's deal with all the political lamebrains who want to see Trump back in the White House again because they believe he will be "better on inflation". Dream on, bumpkins. Trump is proposing to implement a "universal tariff" of 10% on every country in the world. Contrary to Dotard's "economics" or fringe beliefs, tariffs aren't paid by foreign governments. So he isn't hurting them.
They are paid initially by U.S. companies that import whatever goods - whether baby formula or HDTVs - and then these are passed on to American consumers. Result? Higher cost, more inflation. Thus, Trump's tariffs would push costs up on just about everything and increase inflation dramatically.
These increased costs will hit the low income people the hardest, most of whom are rural Trump supporters. This is because they spend a larger share of their income on goods. Thus, if baby formula goes up 25% low income people - laborers, family farmers, etc. will feel it much more than Wall Street mavens.
What has the fungal maggot Trump accomplished? Virtually nothing positive in his first four years:
- Trump ran up the largest
national debt since the Revolutionary War era (He added $9 trillion to the
national debt in four years, as Nikki Haley pointed out in one GOP debate.)
- He also ran four consecutive years of deficits.
-He instituted tariffs on the goods from a number of nations that in effect exacted a blowback tax on Americans purchasing power.
-He was prepared to invoke the
insurrection act to shut down protesters in June, 2020,
- He tried several times to eliminate Obamacare and will succeed if he gets in again.
- Stock market crashed under Trump on Mar. 17, 2020 wiping out all gains up to then.
- Trump had worst jobs creation record in U.S. history, e.g.
- He conspired to take down a duly elected government on January 6, 2021 by trying to first get Mike Pence not to certify electoral votes for Joe Biden, then to instigate mob violence at the Capitol to try to find an excuse to mobilize the military to quell an insurrection he himself incited. This cock roach is thereby unfit by any sane standard to ever assume power again - no matter what the corrupt Supreme Court decrees.
Joe Biden, meanwhile can claim:
- Over 15 million jobs created since taking office.
- Lowest unemployment since 1969.
- U.S. has had the highest GDP growth in the world
- Passed an infrastructure bill, Trump couldn't or wouldn't. Trump talked incessantly about investing in infrastructure (his “infrastructure weeks” became a late-night TV joke), but he never did.
- Canceling some student loan debt , even after the Supremes blocked his major effort to cancel much more.
- Protected the environment with a sweeping climate measure.
- Capping the cost of insulin and other drugs.
-To address consumer prices, Biden signed the American Rescue Plan (ARP) and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA)
- Biden’s investments in infrastructure, semiconductors, and green technologies are rebuilding the middle class. Spending on new factories has almost tripled over the past three years, as companies rush to locate in the U.S. market.
- Biden expanded and extended the refundable tax credit that help Americans purchase health insurance.
- The actual prices of goods and services is lower today than it was four years ago under Trump, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
- Defending abortion rights.
- Putting the first Black woman on the Supreme Court.
Yet, despite these facts too many voters continue to see Trump and the Reeps as their economic salvation. Also, if you can believe this - offering more stability. In a new poll from Echelon Insights, only 29 percent responded that Biden's reelection would mean more stability. By contrast, fifty percent said it means less stability. Meanwhile, 45% said Trump's election would mean more stability. Begging the question of whether they are even remotely aware of his 'universal tariff' plans and their consequences.
It appears more and more, with each poll showing "the nation on the wrong track" or the Goopers and Trump ahead on the economy that Janice's assessment of too many American voters is true: They are a "pack of idiots".
See Also:
by Carl Gibson | June 10, 2024 - 5:13am | permalink
One plank of former President Donald Trump's 2024 campaign is lowering prices for gas and groceries, which remains a top concern of most American voters. But at least one economic expert is doubtful that Trump's policies would do anything to make goods more affordable — in fact, he says prices will likely jump even higher under a second Trump administration.
Trump has argued that he plans to "knock the hell out of the inflation" if sent back to the White House, mainly through a combination of extending his tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy, gutting regulations and slashing government spending. Most of the regulations he has run on eliminating are ones President Joe Biden put in place on extractive industries. Trump has also campaigned on repealing subsidies for the renewable energy industry like those in the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act.
But according to the New York Times, Michael Strain — who is the director of economic policy studies at the conservative American Enterprise Institute — said all signs point to higher prices if the policies Trump is running on become reality.
And:
Republicans 'Trump ' Dems and Biden On Economy & Inflation? Says WHO?
And:
by Lawrence Wittner | May 22, 2024 - 6:03am | permalink
Although Donald Trump, as president, proclaimed in his 2020 State of the Union address that he had produced a “blue-collar boom” in workers’ wages, the reality was quite different. Using his control of the executive branch of the U.S. government, Trump repeatedly undermined the wages of American workers by blocking raises and imposing wage reductions.
Only the preceding year, Trump derailed vital wage legislation. In July 2019―with the pathetically low federal minimum wage stuck at $7.25 per hour for a decade and some 13 million workers holding two or more jobs to support their families―the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives passed the Raise the Wage Act. If enacted, the legislation would have gradually increased the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour over a six-year period. But, instead of supporting the legislation or proposing an alternative, the Trump White House announced that, if the Senate passed the House bill, Trump would veto it. Consequently, the measure died in the Republican-controlled Senate. According to the AFL-CIO, the legislation would have raised the pay of 40 million American workers.
And:
by Robert Reich | May 29, 2024 - 5:54am | permalink
And:
The economy is roaring. Immigration is a key reason.
And:
Donald Trump routinely claims he “built the greatest economy in the history of the world.” It is a claim rarely challenged in the mainstream media. If true, it would be at least part of a possible claim for re-election. But is it true?
There are five things we need to know to evaluate Trump’s claim to economic wizardry.
The first is that rather than “building” a strong economy, Trump hitched a ride on the one that was handed to him by Barak Obama and Joe Biden. When Trump took office, the economy had already been growing for 90 straight months. It would go on to grow for another 38 months before Trump drove it into the ditch. It was the longest U.S. economic expansion since data was first collected, in 1854. But Trump didn’t “build” it. He inherited it.
The second thing to know is that Trump’s stewardship of the economy has been far less effective than that of many other presidents over the past 60 years. In 2018, Trump’s best year for growth, the economy expanded 3.18%. That is the 29th best year for growth since JFK took office in 1961. For 2017, growth clocked in at 2.22%, 44th best in the last 59 years.
Best ever? It’s not even close to being close.
What about median income? That is a reliable measure of economic well-being. According to the House Joint Economic Committee, “During the last two years of the Obama administration, annual median household income increased $4,800. This is three times more than the $1,400 increase during the first two years of the Trump administration.” Best ever? Hardly.
Job growth? That, too, is a reliable indicator of a strong economy. The same Joint Economic Committee reported, “During the last 33 months of the Obama administration, nonfarm job growth averaged 224,000 per month. During the first 33 months of the Trump administration, the average was 34,000 jobs per month less.” Best ever? Please.
And:
And:
As shutdown deadline nears, Biden convenes congressional leaders, urges funding for Ukraine
And:
by Joan McCarter | January 6, 2024 - 6:34am | permalink
Congress has a few immediate jobs when it returns to work next week: meeting two funding deadlines in less than a month and averting government shutdowns; coming up with a budget for both 2024 and 2025; and passing a supplemental funding package with aid to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. All of these are intertwined, and all of them are endangered by a Republican House that seems to be hell-bent on forcing a government shutdown over the completely unrelated issue of immigration.
The government is a third of the way into the 2024 fiscal year, and none of the 12 appropriations bills that fund all the various agencies and departments have been passed and signed into law. Since the beginning of the fiscal year on Oct. 1, the government has been running on two successive continuing resolutions, the second of which has set the Jan. 19 and Feb. 2 funding deadlines. Funding for military construction and veterans programs, Agriculture and food agencies, and the departments of Transportation and Housing and Urban Development expires first, then the State, Defense, Commerce, Labor, and Health and Human Services departments, among others, last until Feb. 2.
And:
by Henry Giroux | March 5, 2024 - 7:10am | permalink
Memory currently occupies a large media presence, less as a tool of historical remembrance than as a source of political repression and regressive ignorance and thoughtlessness. In an act of elimination and erasure, far right GOP legislators such as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis are attempting to whitewash, censor and ban Black history. Memory is now administered, cleansed of its democratic revelations, relieved of the practice of moral witnessing and devoid of lessons learned from the past. The history of Indigenous genocide, slavery, Jim Crow, and a wave of resistance movements extending from the fight for civil rights to struggles for labor rights — which reside in the domain of the unpleasant and repressed — are being systemically removed from schools, libraries, books, curricula and classroom pedagogy. This attack on historical memory brings to mind Marxist philosopher Ernst Bloch’s trenchant reflection: “The most tragic form of loss isn’t the loss of security; it’s the loss of the capacity to imagine that things could be different.”
Remembrance is under siege as far right politicians work to disintegrate, misrepresent and eliminate its emancipatory possibilities. The absence of critical memory work poses both a crisis of witnessing, the cancelling of moral vision, the destruction of public education and the depoliticization of agency itself. What is particularly disturbing is that this notion of historical erasure is barely acknowledged in the mainstream media as a serious threat to democracy. This is in spite of the fact that when history is erased as a repository of dangerous memories, it becomes complicit with the emerging threat of fascism. Amid this widespread and underreported attack on public memory, the mainstream media has instead chosen to focus relentlessly on another story of memory: President Joe Biden’s alleged loss of memory and his assumed decline in cognitive abilities.
And:
12 Days To Avert Another Federal Shutdown - Can It Be Done Or Will GOOPs Punk Out At Last Minute?
And:
Voters’ Memories Crater: A Majority Now Believe Trump Was A Better President Than Biden
And:
