Midnight Meme Of The Day!

by Noah

The Trump/Ryan Tax Scam 2017 was an early step in the continuing plan to destroy America being implemented by Trump and his masters, his corporate and oligarchic backers, both here and abroad, and, of course, his cult of accomplices in Congress and the voting booths. There's always been debt, accrued under the leadership of both political parties; and then there's the ultra greed-bred debt that strangles. Most of the borrowed trillion dollars will end up coming from China and that trillion gives China an extremely unhealthy amount of control over the U.S economy. We need the borrowed money to make up for revenue that isn't coming in due to corporations, billionaires and soon to be trillionaires* getting more and more exponentially bigger tax breaks, not to mention the "free stuff" socialistic handouts that corporations, many of whom pay little or zero taxes at all, receive.

Meanwhile things cost what they cost and those costs aren't going down. The money has to come from somewhere, so why not borrow the money, let the interest pile the debt figure up even higher and let China hold the note until, one day, they decide to pull the rug out from under us or just take over America without even firing a shot? Bankruptcy or blackmail? Take your pick. Why not go for both? This is the Trump way of business acumen after all. Didn't his voters vote for him because "He's a businessman?"

None of the trillions will go for things like healthcare, education, helping veterans who risked their lives, or solving climate change problems. In fact republicans have repeatedly stated that they want to do away with such "burdensome entitlements" such as Social Security and Medicare. Pennies might go to last possible second infrastructure fixes or sustainable energy projects, maybe even before Americans die in the next preventable bridge collapse or as the result of a power grid failure. Soon, our idiot leaders will probably just be asking the Chinese and the Russians to repair our bridges while America workers sit at home watching FOX "News" cheer that on. We'll even borrow more money at even higher interest rates just to pay them, or maybe we'll just offer them some cages full of kidnapped children. For decades, I've said that a main goal of conservatives is to create a medieval world of lords and serfs. Today's Republicans have put the means to do that on steroids.



*As I wrote this, the spell check on my MAC flagged the word 'trillionaires'. It seems that to a company even as big as Apple Inc., the need for the word doesn't exist. Apple needs to update, very soon.

Midnight Meme Of The Day!

by Noah

Happy TAX DAY everybody! Or, if you like, how about Happy Oligarch Creation Day!

Today is a religious holiday for supporters of the Greed Over People Trump/Ryan Tax Scam of 2017. It's a day where the stinking rich celebrate the biggest wealth redistribution of all time, a very efficient upward wealth redistribution right of of your pockets to theirs. Paul Ryan felt so comfy, smug, and happy about the cash his Tax Scam would bring him that he knew he could quit his job. This soak the poor greed fest didn't start with Trump and Ryan, though. They just put their feet down on the accelerator and floored it. That red line in the graph below that indicates what Ronnie Raygun wrought is going straight up by now; completely vertical. Reagan is smiling up from his hovel in Hell, saying "That's my boys!" Even before the Tax Scam, the richest 1% at the top had more wealth than the 99% at the bottom but that wasn't enough. They wanted it to be 99.9%. When they get it all, they'll start tearing at each other like a pack of rabid hyenas. Still waitin' for the trickle down? It ain't comin'. Be careful though. If you point that out, republican politicians and their media goons at FOX will accuse you of "class warfare" or worse. I've said for decades now that it's all about creating a pre-Magna Carta society of nothing but Lords and Serfs.

As you file your taxes, always remember, as tonight's meme illustrates: Socialism for you is bad, but for those who rammed the Trump/Ryan Tax Scam down our throats, socialism is fine and dandy. Handouts for the rich aren't socialism but handouts for the rest of us are. The more welfare for the rich the merrier and Trump is the biggest, fattest Welfare Queen of all. Oh, and fuck you, too, Jamie Dimon.

Midnight Meme Of The Day!

by Noah

So... Trump, his capos like Betsy DeVos, and the rest of his Republican Party, just had to ram through their Tax Scam to enrich themselves and their biggest donors. But, obviously that wasn't the only reason. People like Trump, Ryan, DeVos, McConnell and the rest of them worship their own god; a god of sociopathy and cruelty, a god that goes way beyond any old testament gods.

It's long been clear that Trump has dedicated his life to hurting others as much as he possibly can. Either his parents ruined him or he came out of his mother's womb that way. It's not just that the Trump crew want to take away all federal funding for the Special Olympics. It's not just the relatively small amount of cash ($18 million) that they want to take away from the Special Olympics: It's The Cruelty Stupid!" And you can see all of Trump's supporters cheer that cruelty whether at his rallies or on his GOP TV station. Yes, Trump's new budget aims to also cut Medicare and Social Security. Trump and his Consigliere/AG William Barr are now looking to deal a total death blow to Obamacare and those whose lives could be saved by Obamacare. But, $18 million? To Republicans, no amount is too small if it can spread some human misery throughout our country. Trump and his followers are the brats in schoolyards who relished recess just for the opportunity to beat up a disabled kid. $18 million? Most of Trump's inner circle and crime family got much more than that in Tax Scam tax breaks and they are laughing all the way to their banks.

Americans Are Asked What The Biggest Threats Are To The U.S. And Trump Tops The List

Along with a poll released yesterday, Gallup noted that 35% of Americans "name the government, poor leadership or politicians as the greatest problem facing the U.S. This is the highest percentage Gallup has recorded for this concern... 11% specifically citing Trump as the most important problem (5% name the Democrats or liberals and 1% Congress). When asked to name the #1 biggest problem for the country, this is how it came out in the wash:

• The government/Poor leadership- 35%
• Immigration- 19%
• Healthcare- 6%
• Race relations/Racism- 5%
• Unifying the country- 4%
• Poverty/Hunger/Homelessness- 4%
• Environment/Pollution- 3%
• Ethics/Moral/Religious/Family decline-3%
• Federal budget deficit/Federal debt- 3%
• Economy in general- 3%
• Unemployment/Jobs- 3%
• Lack of respect for each other- 2%
• Education- 2%

As we approach the heart of tax season, the mood of the country is getting surly and more surly. It's not what the Trump regime and their lickspittles in Congress were expecting. Reporting for HuffPo, Arthur Delaney wrote that "Republicans boasted all last year that their new tax law boosted paychecks and showered bonuses on several million workers. But now that tax season is upon us, several million Americans are getting a nasty surprise: a bill from the Internal Revenue Service that they never expected."

Many people who had less in federal taxes withheld from the paychecks last year are having to pay for it-- and then some-- in surprise demands from the IRS, demands as much as 5 times more than what they thought they had saved because of the Republican Tax Scam! Two reasons: the Republicans purposely limited deductions that would hurt tax payers in blue states like New York, California, New Jersey and Massachusetts, Hawaii, Minnesota, Connecticut, Vermont, Illinois, Oregon-- and is also hitting Iowa and Wisconsin hard. Voters responded last year by defeating 7 of the 14 California members of Congress from California. All but one of New Jersey's red congressional districts flipped. Iowa went from 1 Democrat and 3 Republicans in their delegation to 1 Republican and 3 Democrats. 2 Red seats flipped in Minnesota and in Illinois and 3 flipped in New York. Connecticut, Massachusetts, Vermont and Hawaii went into the election already Republican-frei.

The average refund is down 8.7% so far this year. "By capping deductions for state and local taxes," explained Delaney, "Republicans knew the tax hikes in their law would be concentrated on states with high taxes-- which tend to be led by Democrats, who use the taxes to provide more social services." Republican voters in Wisconsin and Iowa are "collateral damage." And although Wisconsin is gerrymandered enough to protect Republican legislators, every single Republican running statewide in the Badger state was defeated in 2018.

How To Watch The 2020 Elections Unfold

Maybe you like Pelosi and her leadership team or maybe you hate them. Or maybe you like it when they do something decent and hate them when they do something awful. Yesterday Pelosi sent out a statement condemning Ilhan Omar for trying to break the iron grip of the Likud (and its tail, AIPAC) over U.S. Middle East policy. It was signed by Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, Majority Whip Jim Clyburn, Assistant Speaker Ben Ray Luján, Caucus Chair Hakeem Jeffries and Caucus Vice Chair Katherine Clark. I was surprised that the only committed progressive among the House leadership at that level, Katherine Clark, signed too. Maybe they forced her. Maybe not. Sad.

Bernie said this many times during the 2016 primary: "This is what I believe and I've always believed-- that real change never ever takes place from the top on down; it is always from the bottom on up." Pelosi and her crew are going to pass the Green New Deal and Medicare-For-All and will bring back free public colleges when we force them to-- and not one day sooner. The people lead; the politicians follow. Unless the people abrogate their responsibilities, a very dangerous thing if you want to keep a democracy a democracy.

The meme up top is from an MSNBC promo for Chris Hayes' show. BINGO! BINGO! BINGO! Who will they fight for? What will they fight for? And who can be trusted to do what they say? The rest is noise. That's the 2020 Democratic primary to pick a candidate to oppose Trump. Who can be trusted? Who, meaning which politician?

You know who comes out really badly when you use that lens? Trump, of course. He fights for the rich and the corrupt and for his own delusions of grandeur. And on the Democratic side... there are a lot of candidates running around-- with varying degrees of sincerity-- saying "I'm sorry" for past behavior, none worse than Kirsten Gillibrand, Mike Bloomfield (who somehow thinks he's going to persuade South Carolina black voters that it was OK to order cops to shoot blacks in NYC) and Joe Biden. And speaking of law and order... what do we make about Kamala Harris' criminal justice record while she was San Francisco D.A. and then California Attorney General?

A lot of this tends to be kind of abstract for voters though. But you know what's not abstract? Taxes. And who to believe on taxes is the beginning and the end for many voters. Reuters took a little look at how the Trump #TaxScam is working out for people this year. Short version: not well. "Republicans," Reuters reported, "passed a $1.5 trillion tax overhaul in the final weeks of 2017 that cut rates for both individuals and corporations, giving fellow Republican Trump a major policy victory. Democrats had warned that the cuts and other changes in the overhaul would primarily benefit the country's wealthiest, and many are eager to see how it will affect average Americans." So far "the average refund of $1,865 this year was 8.4% smaller than the average refund in the period last year."

It's less abstract when it hits you in the pocketbook that way. And... everything else is noise. Watch-- and think about Chris is saying here:



And one more thing: Who's financing them?

Señor Trumpanzee: "We Must Maintain Efforts To Put Our Nation On A Fiscally Sustainable Course (So Let's Give Billionaires Tax Cuts And Make Workers Pay For It)"

A brand new Harvard CAPS/Harris poll indicates that just 22% of voters say they will "definitely" vote for Trump in 2020. Another 11% say that will "probably" vote for him. 33% said they would definitely vote for whomever the Democrats run against him and another 11% said they'd probably vote for the Democrat. Of course it's early and things can change. It's likely that Trump will continue behaving like a baboon and that his approval ratings will continue to sink. That 11% who said they will probably vote for him could dissipate. There is little doubt he will drag his whole party down with him, especially if they keep enabling his behavior.

Example: Trump and his pliant congressional enablers have shut down the government over the Christmas holiday for no reason at all other than Trump's power-play to get billions of tax dollars for his childish wall. Most voters are angry and getting angrier about it. Now he's telling laid off workers to barter with their landlords soothed don't get evicted for now-payment of December or January rent. This is part of a letter the Trump regime has suggested laid off workers send to their landlords after speaking with them on the phone:

I will keep in touch with you to keep you informed about my income status and I would like to discuss with you the possibility of trading my services to perform maintenance (e.g. painting, carpentry work) in exchange for partial rent payments.

Here's one for mortgage holders, at least the ones who don't see this as an opportunity to seize your home:

Trump himself, though, decided this would be a good time to rub some salt on the wounds of federal workers. On Friday, just as the financial consequences of the layoffs were really kicking in, Trump issued an executive order freezing federal workers' pay for 2019, reneging on a 2.1% pay raise that was set to take effect next week, basically to allow workers too keep up with the cost of living increase. Trump claims the federal budget can't afford it, something do with the Republican tax scam, allowing billionaires and multimillionaires to cease paying billions in taxes.

About 380,000 federal employees are on furlough and 420,000 are working without pay as the new year approaches.

In a letter to House and Senate leaders in August, Trump described the pay increase as "inappropriate."

"We must maintain efforts to put our Nation on a fiscally sustainable course, and Federal agency budgets cannot sustain such increases," the President wrote.

Trump also stressed that a pay freeze would not affect the federal government's ability to attract qualified workers. He cited his statutory authority to adjust pay out of "national emergency or serious economic conditions affecting the general welfare."

2018 In Review: Donald J. Trump, The (Con) Jobs President! The Whole World Is Watching, Part 11/The End.

by Noah

We're going to win so much you're going to be sick and tired of winning.
- Donald Jackass Trump
Billings, Montana, May 2016

Yup. So much winning! 62,000,000 voters bought the con from America's #1 Con Artist. Perhaps, they didn't realize that, in republican lingo, winning means you lose, emphasis you. So, yeah, in that sense, I guess a lot of people are getting sick and tired of "winning" republican style.

First it was his lies at the Carrier plant in Indiana, more recently, it was Ford Motors, now it's GM.

At the same time, he's telling his gullible cult that steel plants are opening all over the country. He might as well tell them that distant towns are paving their streets with Trump-provided gold or that, due to an agreement he's made with planet Zontar of the 9th dimension, aliens are providing new technology that will provide "millions and millions" of new jobs. Of course, his audiences would lap such idiocy right up. Believe me. As long as none of those jobs go to black or brown people.

In both the FORD and GM cases, the main reason for plant closings centers around the rising costs of parts from China caused by Señor Trumpanzees imposing of tariffs on the parts. The effects of the Trump-imposed tariffs are textbook. They can be no accident. Saying Trump was just stupid is highly implausible and almost offers him an out or an excuse.

In the case of the GM plant closings, a 12,000 figure mentioned for people earmarked for unemployment by Trumpanzee's tariff policies and his Republican Tax Scam rose, in just a few days, to 15,000, and, that doesn't include all of the ancillary metal, plastics, and electrical jobs that will be lost in other factories. Why that's enough for the whole White House staff to get out their "I Don't Really Care, Do You?" jackets and parade en masse down Pennsylvania Avenue all the way to their Republican friends in the Capitol Building in celebration. The Trump presidency truly is the bizarro presidency, one in which that which is bad is viewed as success. Kinda like his promise to drain the swamp. That’s where the obvious fact of Trump being a total sadist comes in. It also means that anyone who still supports him is a masochist. Those in power who continue to enable him are accomplices, at best.

Remember when Trump and his army of psychotics led by McConnell and Ryan claimed that Tax Scam 2018 would lead to corporations adding jobs? Even after the corporations themselves famously publicly admitted that it wouldn’t?



For years, Republicans talked about the need to lower the corporate tax rate in order to stimulate job creation. However, thanks to the Trump/Ryan Tax Scam, GM and other large corporations had their tax rates cut by 40% and instead, predictably to everyone but republican voters, the corporations like GM have just bought back stock, moved even more jobs overseas or across the border, given raises to top executives, pocketed the windfall and done nothing to stimulate job growth. As an example, so far this year, GM has received $157 million in tax cuts and used $100 million of that to buy back the corporation’s stock in order to benefit its top executives and biggest shareholders while screwing their workers.

You're going to see General Motors, they're coming back. A lot of companies are coming back. It's a good feeling. That's a really good feeling.
- Trumpanzee, February 13, 2018 at the White House.

Let me tell you folks in Ohio and in this area. Don't sell your house. Don't sell your house. We're gonna fill up those factories or rip them down and build brand new ones. That's what's gonna happen.
- The biggest asshole in the world. July 2017 in Youngstown, Ohio

Trump promised that factories would be filled up or torn down and replaced by new ones. And those 62,000,000 actually believed him. (Oh? Ok, that's an exaggeration. So many of them voted in support of the typical Republican racism and misogyny instead.) But again, the opposite was the truth. When Trump speaks, does he have a third little tiny hand behind his back with the fingers crossed?

When Donald Trump, Mitch McConnell, Paul Ryan and the entire rest of their party passed their tax scam for the 1% and their corporate benefactors, they knowingly lied and said the benefits of the tax cuts would “trickle down” to average Americans, even thought the “trickle down voodoo economics” of the Reagan years never bore fruit for average Americans. Republicans even went as far in their psychotic lying to say that every working family would receive a $4,000 pay raise in their checks. To top that lie off, Trump promised a new, instant middle class tax cut just as soon as the midterm elections were over. Again, Trump supporters bought the con. And let’s not forget Trump, after reluctantly actually going to visit some of our troops, lied to them that he had given them a 10% raise.

To date, only 4.4% of American workers have received any kind of raise or bonus related to the tax cuts that corporations received in the tax scam.

Republicans love to talk about things like recovery aid for disasters, natural or man-made, being “paid for” by offsets of cuts to be made elsewhere. In this case, the man-made disaster of the tax scam is an exploding deficit soaring into the trillions; enough to end the United States of America. But, that’s OK with Trump, Ryan, McConnell and their army of perps and dirtbags. Trump and his army went into this with their own ideas of off-sets in mind. They want to pay for the corporate welfare money they handed out to their benefactors by stealing from us by cutting our Social Security and Medicare. It’s all the equivalent of a nasty cat sadistically playing with its prey before it finally kills it.

Sadism is everything with Trump. Anyone who ever thought, even for an instant, that Trump was going to pursue policies that would result in jobs or help Americans or America is a fool of astronomical proportions. Such people are the ultimate example of people voting against themselves. In his whole life Trump has never done anything for anyone else but Trump. Sure, you can point to the CEOs and the 1% and say he’s helping them but all he’s doing with that is building an army of rich protectors. That is The Wall that Trump is actually building.

In less than two years, my administration has accomplished more than almost any administration in the history of our country... America's economy is booming like never before.

So said President Donald J. Trump in front of the United Nations General Assembly back in September of this year. His claim was greeted by laughter. I was reminded of the time a man threw his shoes at Dubya. I wished that the entire General Assembly had pelted him with their shoes, and rotten tomatoes. The paramedics would have had to quickly sedate him and carry him off with his legs bound and his arms in a straitjacket the way he belongs. We would have never seen him again, although putting an Internet Trump-Cam in his padded cell for 24 hour viewing would be appropriate, especially if the public could buy chances to address him from home through a speaker system in his cell.

Trump has truly "accomplished more than almost any administration." To be fair to Trump, you can take out the almost. The problem is whom has he accomplished it for. Himself and his psychotic hate for mankind? His army of CEOs, bankers and the worst of the 1%? His friends in China? Putin? By the time you read this, the number of Trump days listed on the list of the Top 20 worst single-day stock market drops in history will have grown to a dozen or more. Yes, "the American economy is booming..." It's booming like a 200 megaton A-bomb. Are you tired of all this winning? Well, keep in mind that if a president says something that triggers a market drop once, it might be an accident. Twice may be cause for suspicion, but Trump tweets, says or does something to sabotage the United States economy every day now. Also, keep in mind that he once said a low market isn't the worst thing because it's a great time to buy things below their true value and make a profit later. Now there’s a man with a plan, a sadistic plan that not only makes him rich but hurts as many Americans as possible.

At some point, even the most naive among us should realize (not that they will) that Trump's sinking of the economy can only be deliberate. No one, even a complete idiot, gets it wrong every damn time. If Trump is innocent of deliberately tanking the economy that would require breaking new ground in human behavior. Trump is an extreme sadist. For whatever reasons that goe back to the day he was born, he is out to get all mankind and he has been emboldened by the results of his mayhem so far in life. Media people, bank vermin, his voters, his CEOs, and the rest of the Trump-supporting community may try to tell us that he's just stupid or a buffoon, but he's gotten as far as he has on the strength of being a marketing savant. People who are good at marketing a person's name and brand (including themselves), to the top are just as good at tearing something, anything, down and ripping it to shreds when their insecurities and dellusions rule them. It's still marketing moves. In Trump’s case, it’s the moves of a despot, a perfect storm of betrayal if not outright treason. And, yet, no one in a position of power or authority wants to point it out and call it what it is. They love that status quo.

Trump's shutdown rhetoric, appointment of a FOX "News" bimbo as U.N. ambassador, the removal of Gen. Mattis, the appointment of Betsy DeVos, the Tax Scam, his KKK approach to voting rights, his removal of environmental protections and regulations, his attacking the FED, his raising the stature of Kim Jong-un in the world, his catering to every whim of Putin and attacks on NATO, the mishandling Syria, his war on women, his war on healthcare for veterans and all Americans, his personal use of his charity’s funds even when they are meant to aid children with cancer, his xenophobia, his general virulent racism, shutting down research for a cure for AIDS, Children dying in cages, withdrawing from the Paris agreement on Climate Change... all of these things can only be done with one end result in mind, the tarnishing of America's image so badly that confidence in America and its economy crashes to the ground. Doing one or two of these things can be chalked up to a difference in political thought. All of them? That is being an American-hating, even humanity-hating mental case, and a Manchurian President. Regardless of which it is, and regardless of the fact that he appears to be all three, the result is the same and that result is getting worse by the day as those who could do something about it emulate Nero and fiddle away the country.

Midnight Meme Of The Day!

by Noah

Tonight's meme has been around for awhile but I thought that, in light of Congress recently coming back into session and vowing to help our adversaries Russia and China by pushing Tax Scam 2018-Part 2 thus sending our increasing national debt into unchartered waters, and Paul Ryan's vows to cut Social Security and Medicare, using the Trump/Ryan Tax Scams as an excuse... well, it's as timely as ever. The list in the meme is only a partial indicator of the Republican agenda in its war against all but the very richest Americans. Meanwhile, they fervently believe in socialistic billion dollar subsidy handouts of our money to fossil run fossil energy companies. All of this after decades of both parties being willing puppets of the military industrial complex.

When Will The Hollow Trump Economy Crash?

Yesterday, Rachel Feintzeig reported for the Wall Street Journal that the Republican tax scam has specifically helped executives afford even fancier airplanes. "The recent changes to the tax code," she wrote, "are giving business executives a new perk: the opportunity to deduct the entirety of a corporate-jet purchase. A 100% tax write off was one of the GOP changes to the tax code. Maybe something will trickle down.

The write-off does allow some buyers to splurge on bigger, faster jets that cost between $7 million and $10 million that they otherwise might not afford, Ms. Meiners-Levy said.

Jessica Mah, head of San Francisco accounting-software firm inDinero Inc., has been testing out potential planes in anticipation of buying next year. She has a budget of as much as $10 million, assuming she can get the 100% deduction.

“It goes from being completely unaffordable to being like, ‘Oh my God, not only is this not unaffordable but it’s kind of a no-brainer,’ ” she said.

The Center for American Progress weighed in to point out that GOP tax scam 2.0, which Republicans are trying to ram through Congress now, would hand a tax break to the wealthiest 1 percent big enough to buy more than 13,000 yachts every year. Vern Buchanan (R-FL) sits on the House committee that was charged with drafting the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act-- a bill that gave him millions of dollars in special tax breaks. On the same day that he voted to pass the bill, Rep. Buchanan purchased a brand new 73-foot yacht with a base price of nearly $3 million.

Nancy PAY-GO Pelosi chimed in that "the deficit-exploding GOP tax scam for the rich continues to enrich big corporations and the wealthiest few, while threatening the future of Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.  That’s why Democrats are fighting for real, bipartisan tax reform that creates jobs, reduces the deficit and is For The People."

Going Down by Nancy Ohanian

Last week, in his newsletter, Popular Information, Judd Legum did a piece called "Trump's Imaginary economy." He wrote that "Kevin Hassett, the chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers [paint] a fantastical picture of an idyllic American economy. The only thing that was missing was a chocolate river: wages are booming, business investment is spiking, and a trillion dollars in corporate tax cuts is paying for itself. And we have one person to thank: Donald Trump. None of this, however, is true. Hassett's apocryphal economy has little in common with the real thing." And yet... the Republicans want to keep digging.

The Trump administration is eager to make the case that the tax cuts have delivered. Why? Because they want more.

The administration and Republican leaders in Congress are currently working on a new wave of tax cuts that will be unveiled sometime this month.

The centerpiece of the proposal is to make the individual tax cuts enacted in December 2017 permanent. That legislation created massive permanent tax cuts for corporations but its individual tax cuts, which are heavily tilted toward the wealthy, expire around 2025.

The cost of the extension would be about $600 billion.

The effort is expected to struggle to get the necessary votes in the House and has no chance of passing the Senate.

One reason: Support for the original tax legislation is languishing below 40%.

A few days ago Bloomberg News ran a piece by Cormac Mullen, Goldman Bear-Market Risk Indicator at Highest Since 1969: Chart. "Goldman Sachs' Bull/Bear Index, which is based on measures of equity valuation, growth momentum, unemployment, inflation and the yield curve, is now at levels last seen in 1969. While the gauge is at levels that have historically preceded a bear market, Goldman strategists including Peter Oppenheimer wrote in a note last week that a long period of relatively low returns from stocks is a more likely alternative."

I asked my financial advisor and she agreed that it was coming but said "not yet." That wasn't comforting so I asked her when. She e-mailed me "Year end to April data dependent... I am watching. Hold for now."

These are the guidelines by which the leader of our county runs his life-- always has and always will-- which is why I'm nervous about investments:

Real Democrats Don't Compromise Away Social Security And Medicare

That Fox News poll that came out yesterday had some interesting findings beyond just Trump's skyrocketing disapproval ratings (53%). One was that, even after all that poison the GOP spread about Obamacare-- and all that cash they spent trying to persuade voters that the GOP tax cuts for the rich would trickle down to the rest of us-- Obamacare is still more popular than the only GOP legislative "accomplishment" since Trump took over the White House.

• Obamacare approval- 51%
• Republican tax cuts approval- 40%

One of the reasons the GOP Tax Scam is so unpopular is because voters are savvy enough to understand that it will have to be paid for by cutting essential progress-- the social safety net. Steve Stivers (R-OH), a former bank lobbyists who heads the NRCC, told John Harwood in a CNBC interview yesterday spent the whole interview defending failed Voodoo Economics. He admitted the conservative masterplan has always been cutting Social Security, Medicare and other programs that help working families.

Stivers: "What I think we need to do is get some people who are now on government programs jobs, we have more open jobs than we have people on unemployment. So if we could get people to go from unemployment, or a government program, to become a taxpayer, it's a twofer because not only are they getting less government assistance, they probably have a better life economically and they're actually paying taxes... I'm talking about a lot of programs. A lot of those people, there's a skills gap. You have to give them the skills they need for the jobs that are available today. I don't want to be, you know, mean and kick people off of programs, but the way I'd like to see us do it is in the benefit cliffs and create ramps where the more people earn. It might cost them a little more for their social subsidy, but they actually can keep their Medicaid expansion, or they can keep their housing, but they actually have an incentive to take that pay raise and do better and pay more taxes."

Harwood: Your speaker, Paul Ryan, has said the biggest spending issues are in those big entitlement programs, Medicare and Social Security, as opposed to food stamps or welfare or that sort of thing.

Stivers: They are. And we have 10 million people on Social Security disability now-- actually, 11 million-- more than any time in history. And some of those people can't work at all, but many of those people can't work in the job they used to be in. And if we gave them some training, let them keep making a portion of the Social Security disability, but put them back to work, it would be a net win for the individual.

Harwood: But also Social Security and Medicare, right?

Stivers: The only way we're going to be able to fix Social Security and Medicare is for the two parties to come together-- the way that Ronald Reagan did with Tip O'Neill-- and figure out how to fix them together. I hope we can do that, I believe it's the right thing to do.

Harwood: Retirement age?

Stivers: We need to come together. I think we need to say, "You give a little, we give a little," and figure out how to sustain Medicare and Social Security into the future. The other thing on Medicare is we have to bend the cost curve on health care.

Harwood: Do you like the Ryan proposal on premium support for Medicare?

Stivers: I voted for it. I think it's a way forward. It's not the only way forward. Instead of dictating the ideas that are acceptable, I'd rather work with Democrats and Republicans and say, "What can we all come together to find acceptable?"

"Coming together" in Stivers' world means getting conservative Democrats-- the Blue Dogs, New Dems and No Labels characters that make up the Republican wing of the Democratic Party-- to join the GOP in cutting Social Security and Medicare. That's why I worry so much when Schumer recruits right-wing Democrats like Kyrsten Sinema and Jackie Rosen and when the DCCC backs corrupt conservatives disguised as Democrats and willing to talk about cuts. The worst of those are Jeff Van Drew (NJ), Darren Soto (FL), Kathy Manning (NC), Ben McAdams (UT) and Anthony Brindisi (NY). Real Democrats are campaigning on protecting and expanding Social Security and Medicare, not protecting and expanding tax cuts for the rich by cutting Social Security and Medicare.

Yesterday, Ro Khanna tweeted "Fresh off the heels of a tax plan that helped investors and corporations, Republicans want to index capital gains to inflation to give another tax cut to the 1%. Really? How many voters do you know that are crying out for a capital gains tax cut?" If the Democrat in your district can't agree with Ro-- 100%, without any verbal acrobatics-- he or she is a Democrat, not a Democrat.

Randy Bryce has built a winning political brand by straight-talking on behalf of working men and women-- like himself. Early this morning he told us that he "completely agrees with Congressman Khanna. The Republicans have taken off their masks and shown us what they are. Less than a full week after passing their tax scam to reward wealthy donors with 1.5 trillion dollars we were told we can’t afford Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid. They were also bold enough to admit that the tax scam needed to be passed or their donors would cut them off. Priorities."

Iowa progressive J.D. Scholten is on team Khanna when it comes to this. There's nothing that's going to get him to cut Social Security or Medicare. Period. "Rep. Khanna," he told us earlier today, "is right. We would be cheating folks from an aging working class district like IA-04 to pay for these tax cuts. Not only did my opponent, Rep. Steve King, vote for these horrible tax cuts he also boasted that it was his 'best vote.' Another example of an out of touch career politician.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who the conservative establishment is busy/busy trying to destroy... the way they destroy all left-of-center heroes (don't be a sucka), tweeted yesterday that "At this point, any candidate or official who doesn’t support Medicare for All could be seen as holding a “fringe” stance in the Democratic Party. Americans overwhelmingly want single payer. We know it has the power to transform life for working people. Let’s make it happen."

Oklahoma progressive Tom Guild has his primary runoff is this coming Tuesday. Today he told us that "After squandering $2.2 trillion on a tax cut for the wealthy and big corporations and screamingly running up the national deficit and debt, Trump Republicans like Rep. Steve Russell (R-OK) claim that we need to tighten our belts and cut vital programs. The wealthy elitists need to loosen their vice grip on the lives and fortunes of working people and the middle class. We need to expand Social Security benefits along the lines of legislation proposed by Senator Bernie Sanders and Senator Elizabeth Warren and adopt Bernie’s Medicare for All plan. Trump and the Republicans are like fiscal junkies looking for another fiscal fix. Ro Khanna is right that indexing capital gains to give yet another irresponsible tax cut to the political ruling class is going in the wrong direction. We need to throw the big donors and huge corporations out of the American political temple and give control back to hard working and long suffering American workers. Enough is enough. We may be getting close to a breaking point where non violent political revolution may soon be afoot. It reminds me of a book I used in teaching my Contemporary Workplace Issues Seminar, 'The Rich Get Richer and the Poor Get Prison,' by Jeffrey Reiman. We need to get this runaway train back on the tracks and going in the right direction to effectuate desperately needed and genuine change in America."

"And speaking of "real Democrats," there are an awful lot of Democratic candidates who do not support Medicare-For-All-- the DCCC tells them not to. Among 41 House battleground districts polled, DCCC recruitment-and-support policies has made sure only a miniscule dozen candidates support Medicare-For-All. This is a disgrace and it is 100% the fault of the DCCC leadership and the very conservative staffers who run that hellhole. And yet... the new poll from Reuters by Ipsos shows that 84.5% of Democrats support Medicare-For-All. The DCCC might say, "we have those voters anyway." They might but "those voters" might stay away from the polls if the candidates aren't offering them what they want. And besides, Medicare-For-All is very popular with independents as well and even a MAJORITY (51.9%) of Republican voters support it! Overall, 70.1% of voters want Medicare-For-All. What is the DCCC's problem? Are they trying to throw the election again? The Democratic electorate is far more progressive than the Democratic leadership and the scumbags in Congress are busy talking about replacing Pelosi with someone far to the right of her. What a shit party! And it's either them or Trump's damned kleptocracy!

The Trump Economy Exposed

Americans have been noticing-- in increasing numbers-- that the Republican tax cuts have done exactly what they were designed to do: make the rich richer. And nothing more. Trump's economic miracle is an economic mirage, with the GOP's chief marketer "pulling numbers out of thin air when it comes to the economy, jobs and the deficit."

Last month Jay Willis, writing for GQ, warned that the "tax cuts for the rich aren't helping anyone but the rich. When the Democrats label the Ryan/Trump tax cuts a "scam," they were exactly right. "The tax reform bill is, as expected, a giant reverse Robin Hood scam that delivers on none of the Republican Party's loftiest promises. Six months after the bill's enactment, real wages are down slightly and appear to be getting worse, says economist Noah Smith at Bloomberg, whose charts on the subject feature titles like 'Not Very Convincing,' 'That's Not Very Pretty,' and 'Very Meh.' While business investment is up slightly, the increase isn't notable compared to those observed in previous years. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, Smith concludes, is not going to pay for itself, as Ryan and company asserted that it would-- a failure, he adds, which suggests that the decades-old practice of slashing taxes to jump-start economic growth has reached the outer limits of its alleged efficacy, and should be retired for good."

But the Trump Regime did what it's been promising to do: unilaterally redefine the tax code to give the very wealthiest Americans another huge tax break. "Last year's massive tax cut bill," wrote Erik Sherman, "was supposed to increase economic activity to such a degree that everyone would be better off and more resulting taxes would fill the treasury. Instead, the deficit is increasing because increases in spending continue to outpace revenues. Republicans knew there was a problem-- just like everyone else did, no matter who claimed what. With the way budget rules work in the Senate, Congress technically had to restrict growth of deficits past a ten-year window. A large break for pass-through income affected the self-employment and many small businesses. There were exclusions. But new rules from the IRS, otherwise known as part of the Trump administration's Treasury Department, have provided loopholes for some of the largest businesses and wealthiest people in the country, first noticed by investigative reporter David Sirota in the areas of banking, but apparently extending to other industries as well."

Many small businesses and self-employed individuals use pass-through structures so that profits pass through directly to the owners rather than being taxed once at the corporate level and again for the individual. The rationale was that the businesses were essentially personal.

These pass-through structures also worked for many wealthy people who used the strategies to reduce their taxation as well.

The new tax law enabled pass-through businesses to deduct 20% of their gross income. As part of limiting deficit growth, at least on paper, Congress exempted certain "specified service trade or business" entities (SSTBs), subject to certain threshold amounts of income. Businesses that appeared on the unqualified list included the following:

(A) any trade or business involving the performance of services in the fields of health, law, engineering, architecture, accounting, actuarial science, performing arts, consulting, athletics, financial services, brokerage services, or any trade or business where the principal asset of such trade or business is the reputation or skill of 1 or more of its employees,
(B) any banking, insurance, financing, leasing, investing, or similar business,
(C) any farming business (including the business of raising or harvesting trees),
(D) any business involving the production or extraction of products of a character with respect to which a deduction is allowable under section 613 or 613A, and
(E) any business of operating a hotel, motel, restaurant, or similar business.

That left out some lucrative opportunities where companies and wealthier people would not get breaks. The IRS has fixed that "oversight."

...Here is the new rule definition that rationalizes the change:

Commenters requested guidance as to whether financial services includes banking. These commenters noted that section 1202(e)(3)(A) includes the term financial services, but that banking in separately listed in section 1202(e)(3)(B) which suggests that banking is not included as part of financial services in section 1202(e)(3)(A). The Treasury Department and the IRS agree with such commenters that this suggests that financial services should be more narrowly interpreted here. Therefore, proposed §1.199A-5(b)(2)(ix) limits the definition of financial services to services typically performed by financial advisors and investment bankers and provides that the field of financial services includes the provision of financial services to clients including managing wealth, advising clients with respect to finances, developing, retirement plans, developing wealth transition plans, the provision of advisory and other similar services regarding valuations, mergers, acquisitions, dispositions, restructurings (including in title 11 or similar cases), and raising financial capital by underwriting, or acting as the client’s agent in the issuance of securities, and similar services. This includes services provided by financial advisors, investment bankers, wealth planners, and retirement advisors and other similar professionals, but does not include taking deposits or making loans.

It was the banking industry that pushed for this and nearly 2,000 banks are organized as pass-through entities, according to the American Bankers Association.

Although not covered in that story, you might wonder how other industries were affected. Here are some of the other decisions:

• In the field of health, the Treasury has excused "the provision of services not directly related to a medical field, even though the services may purportedly relate to the health of the service recipient." That apparently includes companies that do payment processing for health-- in other words, massive insurance and benefits organizations-- and companies that make or sell pharmaceuticals or medical devices.
• In the performing arts, it is the artists who, again depending on income limits, are restricted for the additional deduction. Not so the those who operate the facilities in which performances happen or who broadcast or disseminate video or audio to the public. That means many production companies pulled together for particular projects or ongoing ones could get a big break.
• The IRS does say that the field of consulting "includes providing advice and counsel regarding advocacy with the intention of influencing decisions made by a government or governmental agency and all attempts to influence legislators and other government officials on behalf of a client by lobbyists and other similar professionals performing services in their capacity as such." Other services are not restricted. But that would seem to include many activities aimed at influencing the public, whether fake grassroots organizations (also known as astroturfing), deploying public media campaigns, or doing PR aimed at media organizations. Inducing pressure on the public will have an effect on government officials, but probably couldn't be called "advice and counsel" in this definition.
• Similar to the performing arts, athletes, coaches, team managers, and other individuals are part of the restricted groups. Not so people who own and operate stadiums or those who broadcast or disseminate video or audio to the public, leaving out media companies.
• Investing and investment management, which would normally be considered part of financial services and, no, ineligible for the additional tax break, doesn't include directly managing real property. Like real estate, the major business of Donald Trump, who operates through a large series of pass-through entities.

That growing deficit just got a good helping of fertilizer.

A New York Times editorial on Monday drove the point home: You Know Who The Tax Cuts Helped? Rich People. "When Republicans were pitching a massive tax cut for corporations and wealthy families last year, they promised voters many benefits: increased investment, higher wages and a tax cut that pays for itself. The tax plan, congressional leaders said, would turbocharge the American economy and provide a much-needed helping hand to working-class families. 'Most people, half the people in this country, live paycheck to paycheck, so there’s a lot of economic anxiety,' the House speaker, Paul Ryan, told The Times in November. 'And I think just one of the key solutions is faster economic growth, more jobs. And I think the best thing we could do to deliver that is tax reform.' So, more than six months since President Trump signed the tax cut into law, is it delivering on the promises Mr. Ryan and other leaders made?"

The most notable outcome of the tax law is one that few Republicans talked about: Companies are buying back their own stock-- a lot of it. Stock buybacks are expected to reach a record $1 trillion this year. After Congress reduced the top federal corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent, businesses are flush with cash. Lawmakers also let companies repatriate foreign earnings that they have been amassing at a rate of 15.5 percent for cash and 8 percent for other assets.

By spending a big chunk of their tax windfall on buying back shares, businesses are boosting demand for and, thus, the price of their stock. It is no wonder then that the S&P 500 stock index is trading near its high.

...Share buybacks have an understandable appeal to executives, many of whom are compensated with stock themselves, and to investors. But buybacks do little for workers, most of whom own little or no stock. It is not even clear that it is in the best long-term interest of companies when they could be using that money to expand or invest in technology that would make them more productive and profitable in the future.

And what happened to that promise of a big raise for workers? No sign of it yet.

The typical family would earn $3,000 to $7,000 more a year, the White House Council of Economic Advisers said. In fact, real wages are down, largely thanks to the rising price of oil, which has more than offset any modest increase in income.

Even ignoring inflation, wages are up only 2.7 percent over the last 12 months. Even with the unemployment rate at a low 3.9 percent, businesses are not offering higher pay yet.

The idea that the tax cuts were going to line workers’ pockets was always a mirage. Most people will enjoy only a modest and temporary tax cut-- families earning $25,00 or less will save on average just $60 on their federal tax this year, and those making between $48,600 and $86,100 will save $930, according to the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center. Families in the top 1 percent, on the other hand, will save an average of $51,140.

...Today, many Republicans seem to realize that the tax cut has become a political liability, which is why they aren’t talking about it ahead of the November election. Even they realize that it doesn’t do any of what they promised.

Maybe that has a little something to do with why, for the first time, Gallup found that Democrats have a more positive image of socialism than they do of capitalism. 57% have a positive attitude towards socialism and only 47% have a positive attitude towards capitalism. Among young Americans-- age 18-29-- 51% have a positive attitude towards socialism and 45% have a positive attitude towards capitalism, "12-point decline in young adults' positive views of capitalism in just the past two years and a marked shift since 2010, when 68% viewed it positively."

In his popular newsletter, Judd Legum, made a point about Trump's dysfunction economy that goes a long way towards tying this all together. "Unemployment is low. GDP growth is strong. But official government data released on Friday show that real wages for American workers have gone down over the last year. Nominal wages, the dollar amount workers see in their paychecks, have slowly crept up, increasing 2.7% between July 2017 and July 2018. But that has not kept up with inflation, which rose 2.9% over the same period. The economy is growing. Workers, however, are falling further behind. What," he asks, "gives?"

Declining wages have not prompted Trump or his advisers to rethink their economic policies. Instead, Trump has ignored the actual economic data and pretended that workers’ paychecks are increasing.

On Sunday, Trump tweeted that “[y]our paycheck is bigger,” adding that “our country is booming like never before.”

Trump’s tax cuts have not created wage increases for American workers. His promises were empty.

...Why do so many Americans think the deck is stacked against them? Because it is. America is getting richer. Profits are rising. But the benefits are flowing to fewer and fewer people.

...One culprit for stagnant and declining wages: employer-provided health care.

Health care costs have skyrocketed over the last few decades, and most American workers get their health insurance through their employers. Dramatically increasing health costs in an employer-based insurance system create a couple of dynamics that depress wages.

First, employers may be hesitant to increase wages, knowing that they made need to absorb unknown increases in health costs in the future. Second, employees may be more reluctant to move jobs, fearing that it will impact their health coverage and costs. Less mobile employees have less bargaining power because employers know that low wages are unlikely to result in their departure.

Health care costs are also driving income inequality because they don’t impact all workers in the same way. This is because “[h]ealth costs are a bigger share of total compensation for lower-wage workers, and so rising health costs hit their salaries the most.”

Since the late 1970s, labor unions in America have been decimated. In the 1950s, 1 in 3 workers belonged to a union. Today, it’s 1 in 20. This decreases bargaining power for workers and wages for non-union workers.

A 2016 study by the Economic Policy Institute found the decline in unionization “has contributed to substantial wage losses among workers who do not belong to a union.” If, for example, unionization in 2013 had been the same as in 1979, men who are not union members would have earned an average of $2703 more in annual salary.

Unions “set pay and benefits standards that nonunion employers follow.” When union membership is robust, “nonunion firms lift wages to prevent their employees from leaving for higher, union wages.”

...These are hard problems, but there are potential solutions.

If health care costs and the employer-based system are keeping wages low, the government could help rein in costs and make insurance less dependent on an individual’s current job. Obamacare began this process, but the Trump administration has been weakening it. We could go further-- everything from a public option to Medicare-for-all.

As worker power declines, the government could make it easier to create new unions by passing laws to allow card check or increase worker power through sectoral bargaining.

If businesses don’t invest to make their workers more productive, the government could make major investments in better infrastructure-- roads, bridges, basic research and development-- that could make all workers more productive.

Most of the policies of the current administration are heading in the opposite direction. Trump’s policies are increasing health costs and weakening unions. He claimed to be interested in infrastructure investment but hasn’t followed through.

GOP Tax Scam-- Just More Failed Trickle Down

The GOP thought that at least they'd have one "achievement" to run on in the midterms-- the massive taxcut. But the tax cut-- which many call "the tax scam"-- has turned out to not be that popular, not popular enough to run on. Over the weekend, the NY Times reported that Republicans aren't barging about and aren't even bragging about the continuation of the Obama economic expansion Trump takes credit for. "Republicans have reason to doubt the efficacy of an economic message in hotly contested midterm campaigns, which have historically been referendums on the sitting president. The last time the economy grew 4 percent in a quarter was in the middle of 2014, under President Barack Obama, just before Senate Democrats lost nine seats-- and their majority-- that fall... For their part, Democrats are weaponizing the tax law-- which is mired in only middling popularity-- against Republican opponents in some key races. Their critiques have been fed by government statistics showing that wages for typical American workers have not risen over the past year, after adjusting for inflation, even though Republicans promised the tax cuts would unleash rapid wage growth."

Polling has shown that voters are skeptical of the tax cut. Six months after its passage only 34% of voters approved-- a 6 point decline from the previous month. Patrick Murray, director of the independent Monmouth University Polling Institute said that "Public opinion on the Republican lawmakers’ signature accomplishment has never been positive, but potentially growing uncertainty about how American taxpayers will be affected does not seem to be helping the GOP’s prospects for November."

So where's the beef dough? Early yesterday morning Politico reported that it's been gobbled up the kinds of stock buy backs that make CEOs and corporate executives very rich.

Yesterday, I spent a couple of hours being interviewed for a book. It brought me back to thinking about long-forgotten incidents in my life in corporate America. I had to recall an incident when I was arguing about freedom of expression with 4 of Time-Warners highest ranking executives-- the kinds of guys who got millions of dollars in stock options annually. These are people whose net worth went up and down based on rises and drops in the company stock. And a record I had been executive producer on, "Cop Killer" by Ice-T's Body Count was causing the stock to go down-- a lot. I was arguing about freedom of expression. They were arguing about their personal wealth. At one point they rose from the table as one and walked out of the room snarling, sure they would never see me again. (At the time I was an obscure employee at Sire Records, someone whose name they didn't know and would never have to know. When they saw me next I had just been named president of Reprise and they walked into a party and saw me, thought about it in their hive brain and nearly fainted.)



Anyway, the gist of the Politico feature was that the biggest winners from Señor Trumpanzee’s new tax law "are corporate executives who have reaped gains as their companies buy back a record amount of stock, a practice that rewards shareholders by boosting the value of existing shares." These executives "have been profiting handsomely by selling shares since Trump signed the law on Dec. 22 and slashed corporate tax rates to 21 percent. That trend is likely to increase as Wall Street analysts expect buyback activity to accelerate in the coming weeks."

“It is going to be a parade of eye-popping numbers,” said Pat McGurn, the head of strategic research and analysis at Institutional Shareholder Services, a shareholder advisory firm.

That could undercut the political messaging value of the tax cuts in the Republican campaign to maintain control of Congress in the midterm elections.

Since the tax cuts were enacted, Oracle Corp. CEO Safra Catz sold $250 million worth of shares in her company-- the largest executive payday this year. Product development head Thomas Kurian sold $85 million. The sales came after the company announced a $12 billion share repurchase.

Mastercard CEO Ajay Banga sold $44.4 million of stock in May, the largest single cash-out by an executive of the company in at least 10 years, months after the company announced a $4 billion buyback of its own stock.

Two days after Eastman Chemical announced it would purchase $2 billion of its own stock, CEO Mark Costa sold 55,000 shares for $5.4 million.

The SEC requires company executives to disclose share purchases or sales within two business days. Companies emphasize that their executives’ share sales are often scheduled at regular intervals well in advance. In Banga’s case, he has routinely sold shares once a year, and always in May, since 2013.

Yet the insider sales feed the narrative that corporate tax cuts enrich executives in the short term while yielding less clear long-term benefits for workers and the broader economy. Critics of insider sales argue that they diminish the value of paying C-suite employees in shares-- a practice that’s intended to give them a greater stake in the long-term health of the company-- and can even raise questions about the motivation for the buybacks themselves.

Following the tax cuts, roughly 28 percent of companies in the S&P 500 mentioned plans to return some of their tax savings to shareholders, according to Morgan Stanley. Public companies announced more than $600 billion in buybacks in the first half of this year-- already toppling the previous annual record.

Year to date, buybacks have doubled from the same period a year ago, Merrill Lynch said in a July 24 report, citing its clients’ trading activity. “Last week we noted that buyback activity [was] poised to accelerate over the next six weeks, and indeed, corporate clients’ buybacks picked up to a two-month high and the 6th-highest level in our data history,” the company said.

The correlation between corporate buybacks and insider sales is clear, according to SEC Commissioner Robert Jackson, a Democrat. He studied 385 buybacks since the beginning of 2017 and found that after half of them, at least one executive sold shares within the next month.

The link between the tax cuts and big executive payouts, fueled by buybacks, is also plain, according to one institutional research firm.

“Stock buyback announcements in the U.S. have swelled to the highest levels on record in the wake of last year’s corporate tax cut,” said TrimTabs Investment Research in a July 10 report. “Corporate America’s actions suggest that most of the benefits of the corporate tax cut will flow to investors in general and top corporate executives in particular.”

And as the Washington Post pointed out yesterday, "since Paul Ryan joined Congress in 1999, the budget will have gone from a $125 billion surplus to a $1.1 trillion deficit." But... maybe some of these rich executives getting much richer are hiring butlers or buying more private planes and yachts and a little of that money is trickling down to working folks. Maybe. But a blue collar friend of mine who just moved to L.A. can't find a job. And he's been looking really hard and is pretty much willing to do anything. Trickle down has never worked and it's not working now.

Ellen Lipton, is running for an open seat in a suburban Michigan district north of Detroit. Today she pointed out that "For decades, Republicans have been running on the same message-- that massive tax cuts to billionaires and huge corporations will spur economic growth and make everyone better off. One reason I'm running for Congress in Michigan's 9th district is because voters here know that's not true, and that we can't afford to keep giving massive tax breaks to the top 1% while working people in this country continue to suffer. If Republicans in Congress could find over a trillion dollars to give tax breaks to their rich donors, we can absolutely make universal health care a reality in this country. Americans are sick and tired of hearing that there's no money for free college, no money for infrastructure, no money for a living wage. We know trickle-down doesn't work, and that it's time to stop putting the needs of political donors ahead of everyone else."

Progressive Democrat Lisa Brown was the chancellor of Washington State University in Spokane and an economist herself. She pointed out that despite the terrible numbers, her opponent, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers "continues to deliver the DC talking points in eastern Washington to avoid talking about what’s really coming down-- which is the fallout of the ill-conceived tariffs and trade war on farms, ranches, businesses, and consumers. Tariffs are taxes. Worth repeating-- tariffs are taxes, ultimately paid in lost markets and revenue for farms and businesses  and higher prices for everyone. The administration has imposed billions of dollars of tariffs on imports and friends and foes alike are in retaliation imposing billions on U.S. exports. Republicans in the House are 'expressing disappointment' and then pivoting to their talking points while this disaster continues to unfold."

J.D. Scholten is giving Iowa racist Steve King a real race for his money, Yesterday he told me that "Trump and Speaker Ryan said the average American worker would see an extra $4,000-9,000 a year from this bill. So far, the average American worker has seen an additional $323, according to an Employment Situation report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In IA-04, we haven't seen any job growth. Our district is shrinking. As much as we produce corn, hogs and wind energy, the best thing we produce is our children. This Tax Bill doesn't do a damn thing for this district long term and it doesn't help us create a modern economy that allows us to keep our high school and college graduates in our district."

Matt Haggman is running for the open Miami-Dade seat that Ileana Ros-Lehtinen is retiring from, the bluest Republican-held district in the country. Trump only took 38.9% of the vote in 2016. Matt told us that "we know America is the strongest when its middle class is in good shape and we also know that trickle-down economics only benefits the wealthiest in this country. Trickle-down economics has never worked in this country and it never will. It’s time that as a country we get smarter about changing the economic landscape and start preparing our workforce for a 21st century economy. Too many families today are working twice as hard for less and we don’t tackle this issue now it will likely get much worse soon. The GOP tax reform passed in late 2017 was not only a scam that lied and manipulated lower and middle-class Americans, but it gave the wealthiest 1% breaks that they don’t need. The tax cuts that should have been made should’ve gone towards middle class families. It should have also made sure corporations and the wealthiest 1% are paying their fair share of taxes-- which as of today is not the case. I believe that everyone who is willing to work hard and play by the rules deserves a fair shot at the American Dream. It is clear though, after their horrendous Tax plan, we see the GOPs mentality is more towards the ‘kick them while they’re down’ approach."