Donald Trump wants to make us great again. So far, my best guesses of when exactly that was are shaky, at best:
When The Dukes of Hazzard was on TV
When farm work was seriously discounted
When I had hair
But I think I found it!
Here it is:
It’s when we were moving closer together, towards common purpose & mutual interests.
…somebody, get me a cookie.
Even if we weren’t GREAT, we were on our way.
Somehow, we drifted wildly towards extremes. Now, every micro-group is a downtrodden victim looking to guilt or bully their way to special privileges – or silence their endless list of oppressors. Others are on the hunt for the Mexican, Muslim or Chinese who’s been crushing their hopes and dreams.
The question is how did we get here?
Here are some possibilities:
1) Economics and rising inequality
2) Obscene growth in Private political contributions and lobbying
…creating a stockpile of crony policies where citizens don’t matter. (Read: Fire. Them. All.)
DAMN! Elections GOT expensive
Luckily, private donors came to the rescue!
Here are some of the Generous givers:
But why would so many companies and organizations give so much??
They must be very nice people…
Actually, companies that lobby outperformed the S&P 500 by a smidgen: 400%
Yes, spend billions, get TRILLIONS in return
Some examples:
But surely, money doesn’t guarantee their candidate$ win, right?
Yeah, it does…
3) Polarized, Privately-Sponsored media pushing A Divisive agenda?
Or, is media merely a reflection of our drift?
Nope, they are direct beneficiaries.
4) Just a bunch of Unexpected consequences from Many bad ideas, coming home to roost?
Everything from deregulating banks…
To Clinton-era free trade agreements, like NAFTA
To government backing OF unlimited loans to students and homeowners
Free government money means schools are free to raise tuition.
More money? More tuition.
And make sure they can’t ever get rid of it. (Read my related post on fixing this: Unshackle The Debtors)
Same for home loans. No one’s really buying anything. They’re indentured to banks and their jobs to pay for it.
Bush tax cuts, wars, and economic downturn
When Clinton ACCIDENTALLY MADE CEO pay explode…
You can’t plot The McFuture, unless you know what got you into The McPresent. It’s a mess of things.
The question is: where’s the DeLorean? I’ll be on the lookout for it here, so subscribe below.
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