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Thursday, March 28, 2024

Faltering Thursday – Reality Rears it’s Ugly Head

The truth.

We don't get a lot of that in America these days.  Remember when we used to pity the poor Russians, who were being fed misinformation by their Government from the state-run media?  While it certainly can't make Fox news any more of a GOP propoganda network than it already is, now they featuring Trump weekly, violating the Equal-Time Rule that says "U.S. radio and television broadcast stations must provide an equivalent opportunity to any opposing political candidates".  This means, for example, that if a station gives a given amount of time to a candidate in prime time, it must do the same for another candidate who requests it, at the same price if applicable.

We know this is going on with our Political News but you also need to be aware this goes on with our Financial News as well.  Fox News (Murdoch) is sponsored by GOP supporters, Climate Deniers, Covid Deniers and, of course, the keep America White crowd while CNBC, Fox Financial (Murdoch) and the Wall Street Journal (Murdoch) are so embedded with the Government that Larry Kudlow, of CNBC's Kudlow and Cramer is the White House Economic Adviser.  While that, of course, makes sense when you have a Reality TV President – it doesn't make a lot of sense if you were, for example, trying to run a $20Tn economy. As noted by American Progress:

One would think that news organizations ostensibly devoted to understanding and explaining Wall Street would know better. Either way, the dishonest propaganda push undertaken by CNBC and the Wall Street Journal is politically disconcerting from the standpoint of a functioning, well-informed democracy. From the standpoint of moral and intellectual honesty, it is downright criminal.

Matt Wuerker's Editorial Cartoons - Roger Ailes Editorial Cartoons | The  Editorial CartoonsAnd that moral and intellectual dishonesty is affecting your health, your safety and your portfolio.  As much as you KNOW that these networks are lying when they are denying climate change, promoting miracle vaccines or propping up despicable bastards for public office – you have to realize they are ALSO lying to you when they tell you how great the economy is and what to invest in.  

Why would they not have an economic agenda as well as a political one?  And it's not just CNBC and Murdoch Media that are doing this.  ALL the TV networks are run by people in the Top 0.1% – the same people who benefit from ignoring climate change and propping up political parties that refuse to address or even admit the growing inequality in our society.  

Here's a good example:  Did you even know that there was a massive study released this week that showed that the MEDIAN worker should be making $102,000 per year in America, $42,000 more than they do make, if not for some $2.5 TRILLION being "reverse distributed" away from the working class to the entitled class?  

We were shocked by the numbers,” says Nick Hanauer, a venture capitalist who came up with the idea for the research along with David Rolf, founder of Local 775 of the Service Employees International Union and president of the Fair Work Center in Seattle. “It explains almost everything. It explains why people are so pissed off. It explains why they are so economically precarious.”  It's a very interesting, very NEWS-worthy study, isn't it?  Did you hear a word about it?

And there it is in black and white – the Top 1% are making $200,000 more than they should be if they were taxed THE SAME as everyone else yet their refusal to live on $560,000 causes 1/2 of the country to make 1/2 as much money as they would be makign under a fair system – the same system we USED TO HAVE in the 50s and 60s, when America was, ostemsibly, "great."

So how do we make America Great Again?  Get rid of the lying bastards who use that for a slogan, for one thing!  Even workers in the 90th percentile, making $133,000 a year are getting screwed over by Trump/GOP policies. “From the standpoint of people who have worked hard and played by the rules and yet are participating far less in economic growth than Americans did a generation ago,” said David Rolf, “whether you call it ‘reverse distribution’ or ‘theft,’ it demands to be called something.” 

“There is no way of slicing the numbers where people come out ahead,” says Carter Price, a senior mathematician at RAND, who co-authored the study with his colleague Kathryn Edwards, an economist. “I was surprised by the magnitude of this.”  For the vast majority of Americans, what they earn at work through hourly wages or a salary represents practically all of their income. And that is fully captured in the study.

Six Clever Cartoons on Income InequalityThey say the blame lies, in large measure, with decades of failed federal policy decisions—allowing the minimum wage to deteriorate, overtime coverage to dwindle, and the effectiveness of labor law to decline, undermining union power. They also cite a shift in corporate culture that has elevated the interests of shareholders over those of workers, an ethos that took root 50 years ago this week with the publication of an essay by University of Chicago economist Milton Friedman.

Who is talking about this, why have you not heard of it?  Go ahead, Google "Rand Study Income Inequality" and YOU decide if you think this study and it's implications were generally buried by the media.  Why is that?  The advertisers don't like that, the OWNERS don't like that, even the well-paid anchor people don't like that.  And why should Americans have to talk about things we don't like or that make us uncomfortable – that's just not the way we were raised – by the media…

 

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