Easy to pull in any direction to get what isn't normally possible.
The TPP and TiPP are Wall Street. Kudlow is Wall Street. They don't see labor, except, as a chronic cost to production, hence, robotics need to rule the day.
First, Mnuchin writes a tax policy to give incredible wealth to Wall Street while raising the income tax every year on the Middle Class. And now Kudlow comes in behind that and puts the Middle Class back in the chronic Working Poor Class. American labor will be at the disposal of Wall Street again, with low wages, no benefits and minimal retirement funding when the accumulation into Social Security amounts to next to nothing.
So, the people that voted for Trump thought they were actually getting something. Not. The new tax law attacks the small business people that are the backbone to the USA economy. The risk to collapse of the USA economy will return as of 2008, but, this time the small businesses that facilitated the recovery will be far weaker and less likely to survive another Great Recession.
Wall Street is a mess. It is losing ground from its hubris run after Trump was elected, Disney is trying to purchase Sky TV, Toys "R" Us is closing it's doors in May, Buffett is holding a shareholder revolt, Bed, Bath and Beyond is going down hill and will hit bottom soon, Volkswagen fired it's CEO, Sears is closing all its stores in Chicago and auctioning the stores online, Sinclair may be facing an investigation from some US Senators and the only thing that isn't in the news is another Norovirus on a Carnival Cruiseliner.
Wall Street fell in love with Trump the day after the election because the Trump Company needs help at least as much as most Wall Street companies.
Wall Street is going to fail. That is a fact. They had free money for far too long and pretended they actually needed it. The incentive to CEOs are all backwards and the methods they use to provide stock dividends are not what a good business model looks like. The companies are losing ground because they are over exposed and still trying to figure out what happened under "W."
When Wall Street fails this time, at least leave the American worker strong enough to restart the economy, rather than as impoverished as Wall Street, because Labor never gets a bailout.
April 12, 2018
By Ana Swanson
Washington — President Trump, (click here) in a sharp reversal, told a gathering of farm state lawmakers and governors on Thursday morning that the United States was looking into rejoining a multicountry trade agreement known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a deal he pulled out of days after assuming the presidency.
Mr. Trump’s reconsideration of an agreement he once denounced as a “rape of our country” caught even his closest advisers by surprise and came as his administration faces stiff pushback from Republican lawmakers, farmers and other businesses concerned that the president’s threat of tariffs and other trade barriers will hurt them economically....
I don't think Americans know what has happened to the old stalwarts of the USA economy.
6 March 2015
After first (click here) entering the Dow Jones industrial average in 1916, AT&T exits nearly a century later as Apple, the world's largest and most popular stock, takes its place.
Many will say this change, years in the making by the index committee at Dow Jones, marks a passing of the baton. Old Ma Bell's days are over, with its landline and cellular business quickly becoming a commodity....
So, what is the Dow in the year 2018? What is Trump backing when he builds a tax code for Wall Street? Where does Kudlow see a benefit for the USA consumer and it's economy?
So, Apple replaced ATT. Where is Apple's labor?
2013, Alcoa, Hewlett-Packard and Bank of America left the Dow.
2012, Kraft Foods left the Dow.
2009, Citigroup and General Motors left the Dow. (2008, GM had to jettison it's foreign assets and call itself a company rather than a corporation.)
2008, AIG left the Dow. No surprise there.
So, when the USA gives tax giveaways to Wall Street, where is the money going? Not into the US Treasury. When the new tax code puts increased taxes on the Middle Class, where is it coming from and when wages drop to please Wall Street the national debt and deficit goes up.
Wake up, America.
God bless those that still value landline phones, at least repair workers are still needed.
April 12, 2018
By Eli Watkins
...Steve Bannon, (click here) President Donald Trump's former chief strategist, is trying to pitch a Russia probe response strategy to White House aides and congressional allies despite Trump's dismissal of him, The Washington Post reported Wednesday.
The Post, citing four people, said Bannon's plan includes having Trump fire Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who named Robert Mueller to be special counsel, as well as having Trump stop cooperating with Mueller and invoke executive privilege in an attempt to render interviews by Mueller's team with White House officials "null and void."
"It was a strategic mistake to turn over everything without due process, and executive privilege should be exerted immediately and retroactively," Bannon told the paper....
President Trump has adorned everyone who displeases him with a new name. There is such frequent name calling I could write a book about, "How best to be a bully."
I wish former Director Comey success in his book tour. At the age of 57, the former director may have a distance to go before retirement and this book will help fill in the gaps. If it sells well, he might consider writing a squeal. I am sure the people would relish both.
April 12, 2018
By John Wagner
In advance of a publicity tour by James B. Comey (click here) to promote his new book, the Republican National Committee is preparing a widespread campaign to undercut his credibility, including a new website that dubs the former FBI director as “Lyin’ Comey.”
The website prominently features quotes from Democrats highly critical of Comey before his firing by Trump nearly a year ago as the president grew agitated by the Russia probe.
RNC officials say their effort will also include digital ads, a “war room” to monitor Comey’s television appearances, a rapid response team to rebut his claims in real time and coordination of Trump surrogates to fan out across other TV programs.
The broadside against Comey — a registered Republican for most of his adult life — comes as he set to begin a media tour to tout his memoir, “A Higher Loyalty,” which is expected to be brutally critical of Trump.
In advance of the book’s release on Tuesday, Comey is scheduled to appear in an interview airing Sunday night with ABC News’s George Stephanopoulos. A teaser for the interview says Comey compares Trump to a “mob boss.”...
April 12, 2018
by Gregory Viscusi, Donna Abu-Nasr and Henry Meyer
President Donald Trump (click here) said an attack on Syria could come “very soon, or not so soon at all,” as Russian leaders urged calm and reined in their own war rhetoric.
The U.S. president said Thursday on Twitter that he “never said when an attack on Syria would take place.” The comment came roughly 24 hours after warning Russia to “get ready” for a missile attack on its ally to punish a presumed chemical attack near Damascus....
Thanks to the excellent journalism of the New York Times, this is a perfect example of why chemical weapons were banned.
April 11, 2018
By Ben Hubbard
Beirut, Lebanon — For two days and a night, (click here) the computer science student had been huddling with his family in the basement of their apartment building as pro-government forces rained bombs down on their rebel-held Syrian town.
After night fell, they heard the whirring of helicopter blades followed by the whistling sounds of objects falling from the sky. Soon, a strange smell wafted down the stairs.
“People started shouting in the streets, ‘Chemicals! Chemicals!’” the student, Mohammed al-Hanash, 25, said by phone from Syria.
The attack in the Syrian town of Douma on Saturday, which witnesses and medical workers said used chemical weapons, has resonated far beyond the war-scarred community’s destroyed buildings, ratcheting up tensions among world powers and threatening to escalate Syria’s multi-sided civil war....
The people in the basement of their apartment building are innocent, unarmed people. They do not have weapons of any kind and are not terrorists or suicide bombers. They are citizens of Douma and they are suffering because of the lack of diplomatic efforts to bring a peace to Syria.
I strongly believe President Assad has to come to the reality that Syria will not be the same since the civil war. The war broke out because of the climate crisis and it has gone on far too long. The demographics across Syria has changed and that is legal.
No one should ever hold the belief that war, sincere war where cities are razed, will result in a return to the past. That will never happen. In looking across the spectrum of any change in government or change in demographics, there are some that are bloodless, but, when war is declared and carried out, the final disposition of the loss of blood and treasure results in different boundaries and different governance. I am not going to recite every war for proof.
Syria is not the same. It will never be the same and short of rooting out the existence of Daesh everywhere, the Syrians of ethnic and religious difference are living in different regions of Syria than before. Now, if that is displeasing to President Assad then he was never willing to accept the outcome of the civil war in an impoverished country.
Simply because he is displeased doesn't not give him the right to kill according to his preferences. That is a human rights abuse and quite frankly, genocide considering the population densities in the country. It is very easy to wipe out diverse cultures in Syria as some of the populations are small, but, that doesn't change the fact Assad would then be judged by the world in which he lives.
Stepping back from the ravages of the Daesh regime is to realize the success of the Arab nations that have joined together to end this terror. They are successful with only small remnants to arrest and put on trial. If Daesh members die in the process of being taken into custody by Syrian forces, at least President Assad attempted to end the conflict without bloodshed.
As to other rebel groups in the region that may be in Syria, there needs to be diplomacy with them to find a way forward that will return the people of Syria back to lives they understand. The children need to be returned to schools that will provide for the brain trust of Syria that will improve the quality of their lives. The tasks before the people and President Assad are enormous. There needs to be water sources secured and farmland has to be returned to farmers, where and if that is possible.
The world has wept for the people of Syria and it is time to end conflict and killing; remove remnants of Daesh from the cities and towns, establish priorities of jobs, water and food. Syria is a no man's land and needs to rebuild its' cities and places of worship. In carrying out all those tasks, the pilgrims will return and Syria's economy can be redefined.
But, the question now stands, what is Syria, who exactly lives within it's borders in peace and how does the government maintain a peace that includes diversity among people and religions. I look forward to answers to all those questions.
