Unlike us, insects detect ultraviolet light rays. Hawks’ eyesight far exceeds ours. Bears can smell us from afar. We create reality. Some people delude themselves by choosing their illusions.
The concerted Republican effort to demonize minorities and the “big government” necessary to protect us from the brutal greed of the moneyed elite has split what should be a unified bloc of the working classes.
Too many hard-working people embrace a contrived culture war while not seeing that they are losing an economic war waged against them by alleged allies.
In 2014, former Oklahoma Sen. Fred Harris lamented the divisiveness that persists in the U.S., citing “a few rich people and big corporations” for holding “most of the money and power in this country.”
The effective counter to these robber barons should be “the rest of us,” Harris said, who “ought to be in our coalition.” He even acknowledged the roadblock of bigotry. “(We) don’t have to love each other. I wish we would, but we don’t have to. All we have to do is recognize that we have common interests which overlap.”
This unrealized coalition suits the suits just fine. (They did orchestrate and fund it.) Getting richer daily at our expense, they aim to consolidate their winnings and power with an enshrined oligarchy.
Mid-month federal election filings revealed that Elon Musk, Miriam Adelson and Richard Uihlein – three billionaires – had donated $220 million to the Trump election campaign over a three month period. They are not doing this to benefit middle class Americans.
Other Federal Election Commission filings showed the fossil fuel industry donating more than $54 million to Republican House and Senate bundlers, according to Sludge.
Trump had earlier promised these lying polluters windfall profits – not to be confused with windmills, which scare him – if they would donate to his campaign. Straight up quid pro quo: selling government regulations for his personal benefit – sort of like reaping profits from the hotel stays of those wanting to do business at his White House.
Trump’s promise to give billionaires and Big Business more tax cuts and obliterate governmental regulations – and fire the regulators – excites their greed. (How much money does anyone really need?)
The Congressional Budget Office in May estimated that extending the Trump tax cuts would add $4.6 TRILLION to the deficit.
An analysis last May by economist Gabriel Zucman reported that in 2018 the effective tax rate for working class Americans was higher than for our billionaires, who amass currently nontaxable fortunes.
On Oct. 23, Accountable.US, a watchdog organization, reported that, “The 15 largest corporate beneficiaries of former President Donald Trump’s 2017 tax law have dumped a combined $839 billion into executive-enriching stock buybacks and dividends since the measure’s passage,” according to Common Dreams.
Accountable.US president Caroline Ciccone said, “There’s nothing to be gained for everyday Americans by doubling down on the Trump corporate tax breaks—a historic mistake that added trillions to the deficit while threatening critical priorities like Social Security and Medicare.”
“It’s time billionaires, wealthy tax cheats, and price-gouging corporations stop avoiding their fair share of taxes at the expense of everyone else,” Ciccone added.
Ten years ago, Fred Harris denounced this situation:
” Strange but true, in a country that professes to believe in the value of work, we tax money earned from work a lot harder than we tax money earned from money.”
Referencing the infusion of billionaire bucks into Trump’s campaign, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders stated the obvious: “Democracy is not billionaires buying elections. That’s oligarchy.”
But, embracing Trump’s blatant racism and xenophobia, many working class Americans plan to support the GOP plan to impoverish them.
Trump has referred to Social Security, which supports many of his supporters, as a “Ponzi scheme,” elaborating: “There’s a lot you can do…in terms of cutting.” And, rugged individualist Republicans drool over the possibility of funneling public funds into private coffers.
On Oct. 15, People’s Action reported that UnitedHealthcare’s Medicare Advantage plan would double its revenue from $137 billion to $274 billion under the GOP’s Project 2025.
The report observed, “UnitedHealth would be empowered by Trump’s Project 2025 to harm more Americans than virtually any other private corporation, other than fossil fuel companies, that benefits from his plan.”
Trump and crew also have their knives out for Medicare, again looking for ways to enrich the rich. Trump would also repeal the drug negotiation legislation that curbed the price gouging of Big Pharma.
Yet, many people whose lives would be at risk as life-saving medication is priced out of reach think Trump and company are looking out for them. Talk about a distorted view of reality!
But, as Trumpian anti-vax, anti-common sense measures at the start of the COVID pandemic revealed, Greed’s Own Party sees sheepishly obedient supporters as sacrificial lambs on the Altar of Avarice.
(Gary Edmondson is chair of the Stephens County Democratic Party.)