New Deal
« Previous EntriesPublic Service vs. Private Profit
Thursday, September 15th, 2022Conservatives have been pretty clear about one aspect of their governing philosophy. They say that they will run government like a business. Liberals, however, see government as public services. The results are dramatically different. Liberal policies shaped American politics after the Great Depression. Franklin Delano Roosevelt provided a role model for creating government services. The […]
Break Big Oil’s Monopoly
Thursday, March 17th, 2022Insanity is doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result. The first oil shock happened in 1973. Energy prices are set by “the market. The global energy market keeps failing us. We have known the market is failing us for 49 years. We know what can fix it: conservation and competition. Conservatives […]
Natural Monopolies
Friday, March 11th, 2022In 1776, Adam Smith published a ground breaking book, The Wealth of Nations. Smith introduced the French phrase laissez-faire to the English speaking world. The phrase best translates as “free market.” Smith criticized European monarchs for subsidizing domestic production and granting monopolies for foreign trade. He argued that monarch redistributed income from small farmers and […]
Earth Race
Thursday, October 21st, 2021You don’t have to listen long to hear what workers are saying about their lives. Their hours are long. Their pay is stagnant. They want more time with their children. They live one healthcare emergency away from bankruptcy. Millionaires and billionaires, however, have never had it better. They have the lowest tax rate since the […]
I’m Not Scared of Words
Tuesday, October 12th, 2021Every time we turn around Fox News and the rest of the professional conservatives cry like babies about scary socialism. It doesn’t take much education to know they haven’t a clue what socialism is. They simply want to scare and paralyze American. In the early 1900’s apartment and factory fires killed thousands. As a society […]
Progressive America
Thursday, March 4th, 2021I am proud to live in Modern America. America is a progressive country. Our democracy allows us to create laws to improve our lives. Over the past 230 years much has changed for the better. The progress has been slow but steady. In the 1820s white laborers won the right to vote. In the 1870s […]
Socialist Ghosts
Saturday, October 10th, 2020Clever politicians have turned socialism into a frightening ghost. It has replaced terrorism as the catchall phrase. Should we get our pitch forks and kill this really scary monster? Maybe, but be careful what you kill. You might just kill a friend. Socialism simply means public ownership of property. No more. No less. Governments turned […]
1933, 1954, 2020 SCOTUS
Thursday, September 24th, 20201954 was a pivotal year in the history of the United States. Since 1933, a coalition of representatives from Northern cities and rural Southern states had worked to improve the lives of average Americans. Franklin Delano Roosevelt built that coalition. The fruits of the coalition were collectively known as the New Deal, or the welfare […]
Heal the Pain
Thursday, July 30th, 2020How do we react to pain? Do we treat it or ignore it? The answer to this question is at the heart of the argument between liberals and conservatives. In October of 1929 Wall Street crashed. The financial markets froze as speculators could not pay their loans. Banks lost income and failed. Bank failures wiped […]
Moments of Clarity.
Friday, March 13th, 2020Moments of crisis are also moments of clarity. The very same politicians who scream prolife to get elected are now telling us to focus on profits, not saving lives. The very same politicians who scream get the government away from businesses are now throwing money at banksters faster than they can light it on fire. […]
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