From Kareem Abdul Jabbar's substack today. He is more than a legendary basketball player, he is an intelligent and brilliant writer:
Trump is President
America fooled me. Just when I was optimistic that we had turned a corner against irrationality, hate, and greed, and were marching forward toward a new age of enlightenment. We hurtle backward in time to a dark place where we dance around a pagan fire like the deranged children in Lord of the Flies.
I don’t want this to turn into a bitter diatribe about my disappointment in the American people who selected a rapist, racist, and cognitively challenged buffoon as their leader. Who put all marginalized people’s lives and rights at risk. Who put the security of the country at risk. Who put our children’s futures at risk.
The next four years will be challenging as we are led by a man in serious mental decline who has surrounded himself with political dimwits and moralless thugs. Most of the prominent people he hired last time turned against him during this election to warn us of his ineptitude, pettiness, and greed. His closest advisors said he was incompetent. But his supporters thought they knew him better. So, here we are.
The next four years will be about survival. If his economic plans are instituted, economists warn that we face dire times. If his health insurance plans are carried out, many will be without insurance. If his plans to protect women against their will (leave it to a sexual predator to phrase it that way) are realized, women will slip further into second-class citizenry. Christianity will be shoved down our throats by the most unChristian man in the country.
How do we live with our friends, families, and neighbors who voted for a rapist, racist, and fraudster? We give them grace. We assume that, though their minds were clouded by their lack of critical thinking, in their hearts they still want a compassionate America that embraces all of its people and protects their rights. They made a mistake, like a child sticking its finger in an electrical socket. Let it go as that and be the person that maybe influences them to think better next time.
Take a day or week to mourn, those of you who still believe in our Constitution and the country we could be. Then roll up your sleeves and prepare for four years of battle to save our country from becoming the tyrannic state that Trump and his supporters envision. They expect us to be humbled and docile. We won’t be. We are better than this election. Let’s prove it.
You identify this dissatisfaction well and resulting class struggle and looks like a worthwhile book.
It's true what others have said here as to how the policies proposed and put in place after many years do unquestionably weigh heavy to the Dems.
But you may be right - it may be just tokenism in light of the 50T dollar transfer you (and I and some others) referenced to the oligarchs.
Seems the excesses of Capitalism is winning.
Do you think the vote for Trump was a "fuck the elites" vote or Do you really think the voting public thinks Trump will lower their collective cost of living?. How would that work?, wouldn't Trump need to make a deal with the grocery, housing, health, dry goods and fuel monopolies to lower the prices?. Some say, big deal that inflation is under control NOW. I don't see any prices coming down.. EVER.
Anyhow, I did get caught up in a related convo here and read bout SNAP,.. took some select passages from wiki that underlined for me it's long enjoyed success..
In December 2019, the Trump Administration proposed to limit states' ability to issue eligibility waivers to single able-bodied adults between 18 and 49, which would result in ineligibility of SNAP benefits to an estimated 688,000 people in April 2020.[41][needs update] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supplemental_Nutrition_Assistance_Program
States and counties with highest use of SNAP per capita
[.. couldn't provide the charts so go look - they cool!]
.. the individual counties with the highest levels of SNAP usage were:
According to the United States Department of Agriculture (based on a study of data gathered in Fiscal Year 2010), statistics for the food stamp program are as follows:[71]
49% of all participant households have children (17 or younger), and 55% of those are single-parent households. 15% of all participant households have elderly (age 60 or over) members. 20% of all participant households have non-elderly disabled members. The average gross monthly income per food stamp household is $731; The average net income is $336. 37% of participants are White, 22% are African-American, 10% are Hispanic, 2% are Asian, 4% are Native American, and 19% are of unknown race or ethnicity.[71]
Based on income and family structure, SNAP does not target specific racial and ethnic groups. As a result, SNAP benefits reach a broad range of disadvantaged households; yet, minority households report food insecurity at a rate more than twice that of White households.[72]
Macroeconomic effect
The USDA's Economic Research Service explains: "SNAP is a counter-cyclical government assistance program—it provides assistance to more low-income households during an economic downturn or recession and to fewer households during an economic expansion. The rise in SNAP participation during an economic downturn results in greater SNAP expenditures which, in turn, stimulate the economy."[95]
In 2011, Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack gave a statement regarding SNAP benefits: "Every dollar of SNAP benefits generates $1.84 in the economy in terms of economic activity."[96] Vilsack's estimate was based on a 2002 USDA study which found that "ultimately, the additional $5 billion of FSP (Food Stamp Program) expenditures triggered an increase in total economic activity (production, sales, and value of shipments) of $9.2 billion and an increase in jobs of 82,100", or $1.84 stimulus for every dollar spent.[97]
A January 2008 report by Moody's Analytics chief economist Mark Zandi analyzed measures of the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008 and found that in a weak economy, every $1 in SNAP expenditures generates $1.73 in real GDP increase, making it the most effective stimulus among all the provisions of the act, including both tax cuts and spending increases.[98][99]
A 2010 report by Kenneth Hanson published by the USDA's Economic Research Service estimated that a $1 billion increase in SNAP expenditures increases economic activity (GDP) by $1.79 billion (i.e., the GDP multiplier is 1.79).[100] The same report also estimated that the "preferred jobs impact ... are the 8,900 full-time equivalent jobs plus self-employed or the 9,800 full-time and part-time jobs plus self-employed from $1 billion of SNAP benefits."[100]
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