-- fiscal austerity produces enormous winners, not just losers, and that this fact helps explain why the economic malpractice of austerity is so common. Austerity is a policy that aids the wealthy and harms the non-wealthy. One of the greatest triumphs of the wealthy is to get vast numbers of the non-wealthy to fail to understand this point. The New Democrats' passionate support for austerity reflects the interests of its primary donors -- Wall Street elites. Austerity produces higher unemployment rates. It can cause deflation. It leads to cuts in public employment and funding for social programs. High unemployment allows CEOs to force lower wages and creates a political climate in which CEOs are able to get legislation and rule changes embracing "labor flexibility." That phrase is a euphemism for making it easier for firms to fire workers""
Embracing populism.
The Republican party opened up its primary to a huge array of candidates and taking a Bottom Up, democratic approach let the chips fall where they may. The Democrats took an ugly, anti-democratic, Top Down approach, doing all they could to prevent the will of the people, collaborating with media insiders. They shunned, insulted, offended and turned off a new generation of voters and made workers feel unwelcome. Trump is a duplicitous leader, with reality diverging far from his words. As Robert Reich says, " in Trump's private-public partnerships, private investors get rich and the public gets shafted." Same thing is mostly true of the New Democrats-- the ones currently leading the Democratic Party-- the people who used to be part of the DLC-- Democratic Leadership Council, which the Clintons played major leadership roles in.
The Voice of the People
As I write, Mitch McConnell describes his party and president as being "the voice of the people." It is hard to believe that the party of corporations, imperialism and plutocrats has taken on this mantle, taken it from the Democrats. But the Democrats ceded it to them by becoming the neoliberal party of corporations.
Trump says, at the Republican retreat, "The people are in charge of their own destiny." Looking at Trump's appointees, that's hard to believe. But the fact is, Trump has tens of millions of workers, particularly non-college-educated ones believing it.
Trump says, "We have to transfer power from Washington D.C. and give it back to the people" to return power to everyday Americans. Even though it's only a few days we've done it in record numbers." Then he cites the Keystone and Dakota pipelines as an example. WTF? But he does argue that the pipes used will be manufactured in the US. Compare that to the Democrats who backed Obama in supporting the TPP and every other trade deal that screws workers.
Paul Craig Roberts, in his article, The Demise of the Left, says,
""the European and American left, which traditionally stood for the working class and peace (bread and peace) no longer exists. The cause championed by those who pretend to be the "left" of today is identity politics."
Hear or view more on his take on the demise of the left and its failure to support workers in my Video/Audio Interview Paul Craig Roberts.
Working closely with congress and the grassroots
Obama never made a strong effort to work with Democrats in Congress. And he actively spurned progressives, with his first Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel referring to liberals as "f*cking retarded." Hillary mocked the progressives supporting Bernie Sanders as unrealistic, out of touch dreamers.
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