Here We Go Again

 

Republican Math

 

Sliding Back Into Superstition And Darkness

“I have a foreboding of America in my children’s or grandchildren’s time–when the United States is a service and information economy; when nearly all of the manufacturing industries have slipped away to other countries; when awesome technological powers are in the hands of a very few, and no one representing the public interest can even grasp the issues; when the people have lost the ability to set their own agendas or knowledgeably question those in authority; with our critical faculties in decline, unable to distinguish between what feels good and what’s true, we slide almost without noticing, back into superstition and darkness.

And when the dumbing down of America is most evident in the slow decay of substantive content in the enormously influential media, the 30-second sound bites now down to 10 seconds or less, lowest-common-denominator programming, credulous presentations on pseudoscience and superstition, but especially a kind of celebration of ignorance.”

“One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we’ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. It’s simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we’ve been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back.”

“For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.”

    Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark

“It pays to keep an open mind, but not so open your brains fall out.”

    Carl Sagan

Largest National Debt Increase In U.S. History Occurred During Donald Trump's First Term

'I Did The Math, Sean': James Carville Hits Hannity With Searing Fact Check On Live TV

The national debt — under Trump’s first term in office — grew by $7.8 trillion, the largest four-year increase in history, The Washington Post found last year.

Trump's Inheritance

 

Economists To Trump: Don’t Screw It Up

Tariffs

Endarkenment

So the supposedly Jesus-loving, flag-waving crowd feels a convicted felon, convicted rapist, bankrupt, tax cheat, philandering, con man is the best leader for our country and the example they'd like to set for the children. What a disgrace!

Republicans, don't preach another second about law-and-order, God, morality, right-and-wrong, or any of your other meaningless talking points. The Republicans are the party of stupid. They are the party of ignorance. They are the party of immaturity. They are the party of hypocrisy. They are the party of petulance. They are the party of greed. They are the party of misogyny. They are the party of racism. They are the party of homophobia. They are the party of transphobia. They are the party of cognitive dissonance. Republicans are non-thinking, spineless, windbags. 

But now let's talk about the apathetic American voter. In 2020, 66% of eligible voters went to the polls. Pathetic in it's own right. But, in 2024, what was deemed the most consequential election ever, even fewer voters turned out. Twenty million less people (as of this writing) voted for president in 2024 than in 2020. Embarrassing! 

Let's not forget about the media. Normalizing this insanity every step of the way. I'm not just talking about Fox News, Newsmax, and OAN. We all know they are full-of-shit shills. But all media outlets reporting on the Trump candidacy as if it were just any other. If anyone should have been continually sounding the alarm and raising questions about a cheating, traitorous, felon, it was our media. Instead, Trump got a pass. His incoherence and ramblings were largely ignored. The media overlooked the actual economic record of Biden/Harris and failed to correct the narrative that the economy was doing poorly. Everyone was focused on questioning Kamala and having her discuss specific policies. Meanwhile, Trump was allowed to ramble and dance at his rallies.   

I can't end this without mentioning the fact that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris entered office and ushered us out of the pandemic without pulling us down into a recession. In case you forget, Donald Trump had lost jobs, lowered the American standard of living, ignored the pandemic and told people to drink bleach. [Plus this, this, and this.] And, not only did the U.S. not enter a recession under Biden/Harris, our economy is leading the world - the stock market it up, GDP is up, wages are up, jobs are up, and inflation is down. As The Economist noted, The U.S. Economy is the Envy of The World. This is what the geniuses on the right have voted against and the apathetic slouches on the left decided not to vote for. Sad.

For Further Reading:
U.S. economic growth remains impressive. It’s the envy of the world, except at home
The American economy has left other rich countries in the dust
The U.S. Economy Reaches Superstar Status
The robust U.S. economy is leaving ‘other rich countries in the dust’
The envy of the world

Getting Down To Business

We Are Not In A Recession

 I don't think people know what the definition of a recession is.

Definition of recession: two consecutive quarters of decline in a country's real (inflation-adjusted) gross domestic product (GDP) - the value of all goods and services a country produces.

The last decline in GDP occurred from 2019 to 2020 - during Donald Trump's term. 

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/GDP

GDP has been steadily been increasing since.

https://www.bea.gov/data/gdp/gross-domestic-product

How Low Can Republicans Go? Always Lower.

Ah, our annual State of the Union, where Republicans can remind all of America how vile, nasty, petty, childish, and uncivil they are. They are not an adult party. They are not a serious party. Nothing but greedy, imbecilic, attention-whores.

5 Takeaways From the State of the Union

Rep. Derrick Van Orden shouts 'lies!' at Joe Biden during State of the Union

As House Republicans heckle, Biden serves it back

Biden's State of the Union hecklers face internal GOP groans

Fiery Joe Biden Unleashes Forceful Rebuke Of Trump, GOP In State Of The Union Address

Yes. You are better off under Biden than Trump.

Screenshots of Wisdom

 

Turn That Frown Upside Down

An overarching theme for Republicans, regarding the next election cycle, is this idea that things are an economic mess. Times are tough, everyone is struggling. 

Yet, in many metrics, a reasonable, non-partisan observer would most likely conclude that times are, generally, good. 

Unemployment

The current unemployment rate is under 4% (3.7% as of today for the U.S.; 3% for Wisconsin). And, despite an historically low unemployment rate, wages are rising.

Interest Rates

Historically speaking, interest rates are low. In the 1970s, rates were mid-7 percent. The 1980s saw rates rise to mid-9 percent. The 1990s started around 10 percent, and finished around 8 percent. From 2000 through the 2010s, rates fell from 8 percent to 3 percent. The 2020s have seen rates rise from high-3 percent to the current mid-5 percent.

Inflation Rate

The majority of noise in the inflation rate hangs on the energy sector. A better descriptor for this phenomenon is price-gouging. The energy sector doubled gasoline prices and laughed all the way to the bank as Republicans and their accomplices manufactured the price-gouging into a Joe Biden spending (inflation) problem. It's no coincidence that as the energy sector has gouged less (gas prices have come down), inflation has fallen.

No Brain Necessary: Trumpers in Waukesha, Wisconsin

Sunday Reading

How one institution keeps claiming math’s highest award

Wisconsin Supreme Court Backs GOP Scheme To Rob Dem Governor Of Appointment

Reiki: still stupid after all these years

Blame the Fed For Everything!

Inflation, Unemployment, Mortgage Rates: Here's What History Tells Us About the Economy

The Inefficient Market Hypothesis

How the Fed Bailed Out the Investor Class Without Spending a Cent

No evidence that violent video games are causing mass shootings, despite politicians’ claims

Video Games Aren’t Why Shootings Happen. Politicians Still Blame Them.

How will we know if we’re in a recession?

The Most Pathetic Men in America

The Supreme Court’s Gone Rogue — And This is a Judicial Coup

The Supreme Court's Partisan Divide Hasn't Been This Sharp In Generations

The Supreme Court has pushed America to the brink.

Companies Keep Hiring

Nonfarm payrolls increased by 390,000 in May, above the 328,000 Dow Jones estimate.

The unemployment rate held at 3.6%, while a more encompassing jobless rate edged higher to 7.1%.

Average hourly earnings rose slightly less than expected but were still up 5.2% from a year ago.

Leisure and hospitality led gains, followed by professional and business services then warehousing and transportation. [source]

Fox News thinks all of this is bad. The delusion continues. Being contrarian for the sake of being contrarian continues. 

Holiday Reading

Monarch butterflies bounce back in Mexico wintering grounds

The Media Needs to Stop Pretending that Elon Musk is a Wise Sage rather than a Grifter

When I First Saw Elon Musk for Who He Really Is

No Atheist Has Done This Much Damage to the Christian Faith

'Big Short' investor Michael Burry compares the market slump to a plane crash — and hints tumbling stocks and home sales remind him of the housing bubble bursting

The massive gap between rich and poor Americans costs the US economy more than $300 billion every year, study says

The Southern Baptist Horror

How America Sold Out Little League Baseball

Bad Economics

Weekend Reading

How did Wisconsin get the largest telescope in the world?

Ron Johnson is a virus that infects the Wisconsin GOP

Mount Pleasant Pays For Foxconn Water Shortfall

Eating meat may not have been as crucial to human evolution as we thought

Bari Weiss and Bill Maher said it’s time to live with COVID. A local doctor fact-checked them.

Economist Paul Krugman explains why so many Americans are 'very down on' a booming economy

What to know about the battle over Wisconsin health care workers now playing out in court

The Dark History of Medicare Privatization

The Anti-Vaccine Right Brought Human Sacrifice To America

The Fed's War on Inflation Is Really an Attack on Workers

Why the COVID death rate in the U.S. is so much higher than other wealthy nations

Buzzwords Are Not Public Policy or We've Heard Enough From So-Called Business Experts

More cliched economic jargon from error-prone businessmen. 

Biden Needs Some Business Experts

The article moans, "The new administration does not have a lot of chops when it comes to job creation. That’s largely in the domain of the private sector. Biden and his crew are loaded with experience in managing the government, but are extremely shallow in knowing what to do to help the private sector become vibrant again. Remember, all tax revenues come directly or indirectly from dynamism in the private sector. Most companies deserve to be revered for providing jobs and tax revenues, but that is not the mindset of the progressives in the Democratic Party. Their proclivity is regulation. Common sense regulation is a necessity in any economy, but more important is turning entrepreneurs loose to reinvent the economy. They are the job creators, not the government."

There is so much wrong here, it's hard to know where to begin. There are so many regurgitated conservative falsehoods in this right-wing word salad, it really does make the mind spin. For someone who can occasionally make reasonable sounding arguments, John Torinus, more often, just parrots typical Republican talking-points. 

Biden has been working for the citizens his entire adult life. He's plenty familiar with job creation. Republicans are the party that has left this country in recession after recession over the past few decades. And, it has been the Democrats who enacted targeted policies to help pull the country out. Biden was Vice President during the Obama Administration, in case Mr. Torinus has forgotten that fact. 

What did Obama and Biden do? There has not been a consistent job market expansion on record, dating back to 1939, that lasted longer than the expansion during their administration. Job growth was faster than population growth—a key measure of a healthy job market expansion. The typical weekly pay of U.S. workers has been increasing since early 2013 and re The ACA made it possible for more than 20 million individuals to afford health insurance and decreased the share of Americans without health insurance to an all-time low.ached its highest level on record, dating back to 1979, at the end of 2016. They inherited a deficit that claimed 9.8 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) in fiscal year 2009. By FY 2016, the deficit had fallen to less than one-third of that, at 3.2 percent of GDP.

Seems like they know something about job creation, reinventing the economy and helping the private sector be vibrant.

And this "dynamism in the private sector" and "turning entrepreneurs loose" are, as Joe Biden would say, a bunch of malarkey. This country has been cutting taxes and deregulating the past 40 years. If the private sector entrepreneurs are so damn dynamic, why does the economy keep falling back into recession when we allow Republicans control of the government?

It's long overdue for the private sector knows it all, government needs to get out of the way-gang to go away. The public sector employs over 20 millions people. The public sector accounts for nearly half of the entire economy. This idea, pushed by Republicans for decades, that government is inept and wasteful is wrong. If anything, the private sector is the wasteful and inefficient actor. Not to mention the fact that the private sector is also selfish and greedy.

Private retirement account fees are drastically higher than public pension fees or Social Security fees. Much of the medical advancements we see are due to university research and the National Institutes of Health. Study after study has shown that public infrastrucutre projects are cheaper when done by unionized public workers, rather than being bid out to private corporations.

 

So, please, Republicans, conservatives, dynamic private sector know-it-alls, please step aside and let the adults in the Democratic party save the country from your destructive and misguided ramblings once again.

Midweek Reading

Changes that Would Make a Difference in the Biden Administration

AOC’S NEXT FOUR YEARS

The stock market is overvalued, according to almost every measure dating to 1950

What Foxconn Will Cost Taxpayers

The stock market’s strength tells us less about the true state of the economy than at almost any other time over the last five decades

By one key measure, household income, metro Milwaukee is worse off than it was in 1980

If Wisconsin's Legislature were a business, Republicans would've already been fired

How the Satanic Panic Led Straight to QAnon

TRUMP IS TERRIFIED ABOUT GOING TO PRISON AFTER LOSING THE ELECTION, AS HE SHOULD BE

Trump Supporters Spend Weekend Clogging America’s Highways

Disappearing Data

Data show these US industries have the most recession proof jobs

The Other Tool Democrats Have to Rein in the Supreme Court

The NFL rewards men who put their hands on women

The current state of the pandemic in five graphs

Republican senator ‘personally benefited from tax change he sought’ (Ron Johnson is a piece of shit)

To Hell With Florida

Science Denial and COVID Conspiracy Theories

Vos, GOP Use Faked Photos Against Opponents