Closing out her Iowa campaign, Hillary Clinton on Friday declared that the Medicare-for-all proposal pushed by her Democratic primary opponent and many liberal groups will “never, ever come to pass.” The statement came weeks after a new poll showed most Americans support the idea. Her declaration was a reversal of her position two decades ago — which came before she received millions of dollars of campaign cash from …
Paul Buchheit – The Real Terrorists: The .01%
They consist of 16,000 individuals, about the size of a crowd at a professional basketball game. The inequality horror they’ve fomented is reaching far beyond the half of America that is in or near poverty, for it now impacts those of us well above the median, those of us in the second highest of four wealth quartiles. 1. The .01% …
Paul Craig Roberts – Update to BLS December Payroll Jobs Report: It is even worse than I reported
In my column on Friday I reported the unreported facts in the payroll jobs report. http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2016/01/08/another-fabricated-jobs-report-paul-craig-roberts-2/ If we choose to believe the report, it is really very bad news. Good middle class jobs are continuing to decline. The new jobs are jobs that pay considerably less and often are part-time jobs devoid of benefits. Moreover, the new jobs are going …
Dean Baker – The Federal Reserve Board and the Presidential Candidates
Some of the folks watching the Republican presidential debates were struck by the fact that Donald Trump was apparently unfamiliar with the concept of the nuclear triad: that the United States maintains a nuclear force composed of land based missiles, submarine based missiles, and strategic bombers that can deliver nuclear weapons. This is the sort of basic knowledge of the …
Dean Baker – The Federal Reserve Board and the Presidential Candidates
Some of the folks watching the Republican presidential debates were struck by the fact that Donald Trump was apparently unfamiliar with the concept of the nuclear triad: that the United States maintains a nuclear force composed of land based missiles, submarine based missiles, and strategic bombers that can deliver nuclear weapons. This is the sort of basic knowledge of the …
ROBERT REICH – The Revolt of the Anxious Class
The great American middle class has become an anxious class – and it’s in revolt. Before I explain how that revolt is playing out, you need to understand the sources of the anxiety. Start with the fact that the middle class is shrinking, according to a new Pew survey. The odds of falling into poverty are frighteningly high, especially for the majority without …
Melissa Dykes – Why Are College Students Willing to Barely Make More Money Than People Did in 1979?
A recent Pew Research report shows that the American middle class is disappearing. Most Americans are no longer considered middle class anymore. The wealth gap in this country, a gap that continues to grow, has already broken all records. In short, the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer. Data also shows that, despite the fact that …
Steven W Thrasher – Disaster capitalism is a permanent state of life for too many Americans
In the United States, disaster has become our most common mode of life. Proof that our daily existence was something other than a simmering, smoldering disaster has been historically held somewhat at bay by the myth that hard work equals some kind of subsistence living. For the more deluded amongst us, this ‘American dream’ even got us to believe we …
The Gary Null Show – 09.02.15
Russ Baker is an award-winning investigative reporter and journalist in the alternative media and founder of the independent progressive news and analysis site, WhoWhatWhy.com.
Over the past two decades, he has produced over a thousand stories on a broad range of topics, from political revolutions to revolutionary humor. Among Russ’s breaking investigations were the Hutu-Tutsi massacres in Central Africa, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the overthrow of Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceausescu.
He has received Society of Professional Journalists, the Mencken and the Common Cause awards, and has served on the adjunct faculty at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism. His research into the rise and election of George W Bush led to his bestseller, “Family of Secrets: The Bush Dynasty, America’s Invisible Government and the Hidden History of the Last 50 Years.” His website is www.WhoWhatWhy.com
Alan Nasser – The Myth of the Middle Class: Have Most Americans Always Been Poor?
One of the most firmly entrenched myths of the American Ideology is that the U.S. is a “middle class society,” a “land of opportunity” where anyone who works hard has the opportunity to achieve the standard of living which has made America “the envy of the world.” A common, and spot on, rejoinder has been to remind us that America …