Madam President Will Need a New Deal

FDR put through the New Deal because he knew the country was about to go into revolution. Doug McArthur had fired on the Bonus Army marchers and there were people who said capitalism didn't work for the many and the Russians had the right idea. Communism was more equitable. Even manufacturing understood this and one of their motivations for giving the Chicago Worlds Fair of 1933 millions of dollars and showcasing their goods was to get the country buying again and to keep it from going "Bolshevik".

The Brits just took a turn to the hard right. Not unlike what the Germans did when a paper hanger failed art student giving speeches in beer halls told them the Jews were to blame for their economic woes and he would give them back their pride and their country. And we have the Donald aping that paper hanger and promising to restore America back to her place. Close the borders and batten down the hatches and the jobs will return.

It doesnt matter if he is wrong Madam President has to recognize the  boat is top heavy and go bold with  New Deal type of programs to get people to not go down Britain's path. There is too much money at the top and it has drained the middle class. The great irony is a man worth ten billion dollars is claiming he can right the ship. A thousand families could live on his fortune for years. If he really wants to make America great, he could give back all that money. Short of that, Madam President should take a page from FDR and take note of a Britain that is no longer Great.

Madam President The Secret Presidency of Edith Wilson

Priming the Pump

We had a Briggs and Straton lawn mower when I was a kid that refused to start. I would have to pop off the spark plug and pour gas into the cylinder, blow out the gap in the plug, put it back and start pulling again. The mower would start with a quick burst and then sputter. I had to do this three times before the mower heated up and ran again. Dad called it priming the pump and when I got minibikes and motorcycles then snow blowers it became my go to method to get an internal combustion engine running again.

This is what we need now. We need to prime the pump with some raw gas and get things going. If an economy is a motor then ours just wont start. Middle class people are the gas of an economy. Sorry but they are. Without buying power it doesn't matter how many times the spark plug fires there can be no combustion. People have no buying power anymore, no gas. We have to pull off the plug and pour rag gas into the cylinder and see if can get the motor to catch now. It is a last resort but that is where we are.

Do not insult me with trickle down nonsense. Nothing trickles down. Let me say it again. Nothing trickles down. The rich stay rich and companies say fat. They will not suddenly release all their millions and employ people. They will find things to do with their money no doubt, but we now need to put the gasoline directly into the cylinder. We do need New Deal style muscle.We need to give people jobs. Any kind of jobs. Call it Grow Up. But the gas must be poured into the engine and not sit in the tank.

People need money to spend. This is how the economy gets rolling. Oh but it will sputter. The stimulus didn't work. Bull and so what. Something is better than nothing. Forget about rich people bailing us out.  That Republican mantra is just bull. We will bail ourselves out by giving to the people who will spend the money to buy the goods and get the economy rolling.

A lot of times I had to put the gas in several times before the mower would start. We will probably have to do this several times also. But priming the pump does work, and eventually, the motor  starts again.

The VigorousVirtures or Starve the Beast (people)

Our vigorous virtues will save us. That is the thrust of  the new mantra. That our VV's were squelched by being on the government dole. That we really just need to be unleashed by the nanny state and we will start creating companies fending for ourselves and taking care of the sick and elderly. No need for Big Three entitlements anymore. David Brooks piece in the New York Times explores this idea and he does say there has to be more than this. I would argue that the vigorous virtues were born out of necessity when there was a wide open country to be built up. People had to have VV's or they died. And a lot of them did.

But we industrialized and people were used like fodder. So on Labor Day we stand at nine percent unemployment with our vigorous virtues standing idle because we are all on the government tit. Knock everyone off and we will kick it in. This discounts personal responsibility in Titanic fashion. So nobody has any personal drive unless we are driven to hunger? Strip it down. It is Starve the Beast for the People. The Starve the Beast strategy was the driving force behind the debt ceiling kamikaze run. Just cut off the money flow and government will shrink.

Cut off the food and money and people will shrink. The weak will be weeded out and we will be left with the Vigorous Virtues cream of the crop. Can anyone say Social Darwinism? Survival of the fittest. This was the law of the land when bears and wolves ruled the North woods and people died like flies from starvation. But FDR decided enough was enough and we were better than that. Starve the people was replaced by a SAFETY NET. Vigorous Virtues took a back seat to compassion.

But that is all over now. So our new brethren say. It is time to Man Up and either start a company or die off and decrease the surplus population as Ebenezer Scrooge put it. So stock up and get ready. The Vigorous Virtues of those in power and who want power are coming to get us all off our duffs and back into action. Hell, they may even do away with Labor Day. No Vigorous Virtues man or woman needs a day off to celebrate...what? Labor? Slackers.

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