In this clip, George Carlin pretty well sums up what was happening to Americans at the time (2006). Unfortunately, America stepped into a much worse situation in November (about 4 minutes):
With the election of the vulture known as Donald Trump there is no longer any pretense that Republicans run the government at the behest of the rich. The Republican congress is in the process of taking away most everything that labor and progressives have fought for since the Roosevelt Administration – the Teddy Roosevelt Administration!
And they have to work fast because at sometime, despite the cover from the corporate media, Americans will wake up and realize they are being robbed blind.
Right now they are working on killing Dodd-Franks – the lone firewall between a sane financial system and the rampant casino that spun out of control under George W. Bush just a decade back.
But that isn’t all. Mining regulations are going or gone. Workplace safety rules are being relaxed. Public education is on the chopping block to be replaced by a system of corporate or church schools with little public oversight.
Of course there are the threats of making access to health care prohibitive to the sick and poor. To do this the rich through their representatives the Republicans will repeal the ACA including most of Medicaid. This will be a major kick in the crotch to the poor and middle aged. Then after some sanctimonious utterances, they will go after Medicare with a vengeance. Tough, old folks!
After taking money for health care for the old and poor to fund huge tax cuts for the wealthy, look for them to go after the BIG prize – Social Security! Boy won’t their buddies on Wall Street have fun gambling with your retirement money! PARTEEE!
But all is not doom and gloom. Cracks are appearing in the downward plunge of the American lifestyle. As reported here last week, California is taking early steps in establishing a state single payer health care system.
There is also good news from states not as progressive as California. The Nevada legislature last week approved a bill that would allow those without health insurance to buy into the Medicaid system. This is approach is sort of a twist on the Medicare buy in that some have offered as an alternative. Vox.com has a discussion of some of the pros and cons of the idea. Right now the decision rests on the pen of Nevada’s Republican governor Brian Sandoval.
Another really surprising crack in the wall of Republican solidarity showed up this week in Kansas. As many of you may recall Kansas has been hard hit by a disaster named Gov. Sam Brownback. Brownback’s extreme right wing trickle down, cut all taxes policies have left the state government a financial shambles. Iowa appears to be poised to follow Kansas down this rabbit hole.
At long last the heavily Republican state legislature in Kansas has had enough of the closed schools and other services not performed. Earlier this week they overrode a Brownback veto in order to raise taxes. Brownback had made Kansas into the nation’s “tax cuts bring prosperity” laboratory and it failed miserably. Iowa’s version seems to be off to a quite bumpy start.
We have a friend who always wonders how much Americans will have to lose before they finally rise up. Based on the cracks showing up around the country plus the amount of pressure that the public is putting on Congress concerning health care it looks like the sleeping giant is waking up and is mad as hell.
