Straight outta Trotsky

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The economy is, by all metrics, doing great. Last month 300,000 new jobs were added and the unemployment rate remained at 4%. Not enough, say democrats. We don’t want merely simple jobs, we need moral jobs. We need a moral economy:



Democrats running for president in 2020 say the rapid job growth and low unemploymentunder President Trump is not enough and insist America needs to strive for a “moral” economy.

Their calls reflect a growing consensus among Democrats over how to deal with a healthy economy that is creating jobs and the rising influence of socialist candidates and lawmakers in the Democratic Party.

The U.S. economy added 304,000 new jobs in January, and the unemployment rate held steady at 4.0 percent, according to the Department of Labor. The country’s gross domestic product increased last quarter by 3.4 percent.

When liberals talk about social and economic justice, this is the economic justice part.

“What happened to a moral responsibility, to a moral capitalism?” former Vice President Joe Biden asked an audience of students Tuesday during an event at the University of Pennsylvania.

This is the prelude to government run and controlled businesses.

“I’m not looking for charity. Business is not in business to be in charity, it’s to make money. But the last dime does not dictate what corporate responsibility should be,” the former 36-year longtime senator from Delaware said.

“And look, I don’t begrudge anybody making a million or hundreds of millions of dollars, I really don’t. But I do think there’s some shared responsibility, and it’s not being shared fairly for hard-working, middle-class, working-class people.”

This makes no sense and it is disingenuous. Talking out of all four sides of his mouth, Biden is preparing to make rules here for how business divvies up its profits.

Sen. Kamala Harris of California, also running for president, made a similar pitch in New Hampshire. The former California attorney told the business-oriented attendees their success shouldn’t be “vilified” because it was created in the “pursuit of the American Dream.”

But she also accused those praising the Trump economy of valuing job quantity over the quality of those jobs.

Except that is vilifying success. One wonders where her concern for the “quality of jobs” was back when obama was replacing high paying jobs with low paying jobs.

WASHINGTON — The deep recession wiped out primarily high-wage and middle-wage jobs. Yet the strongest employment growth during the sluggish recovery has been in low-wage work, at places like strip malls and fast-food restaurants.

In essence, the poor economy has replaced good jobs with bad ones. That is the conclusion of a new report from the National Employment Law Project, a research and advocacy group, analyzing employment trends four years into the recovery.

“Fast food is driving the bulk of the job growth at the low end — the job gains there are absolutely phenomenal,” said Michael Evangelist, the report’s author. “If this is the reality — if these jobs are here to stay and are going to be making up a considerable part of the economy — the question is, how do we make them better?”

The report shows that total employment has finally surpassed its pre-recession level. “The good news is we’re back to zero,” Mr. Evangelist said.

But job losses and gains have been skewed. Higher-wage industries — like accounting and legal work — shed 3.6 million positions during the recession and have added only 2.6 million positions during the recovery. But lower-wage industries lost two million jobs, then added 3.8 million.

Which in essence tells you that she is full of crap. Of course, Cory Booker puts in his two cents:

Pressed on Trump’s economic record last weekend, Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey, a declared 2020 candidate, said: “Well, working Americans would tell you that the dignity of work is being stripped from them.

“Working Americans would tell you they’re working harder than their parents and falling further behind. Working Americans will tell you that while their salaries may moderately have gone up, what’s gone up more is the cost of prescription drugs, cost of child care, the cost of college.”

I’ll be the first one to agree that secondary education has largely become a scam. Instead of educating young adults, colleges are filling their heads with the left wing indulgences of the demented faculty:

America’s top colleges and universities have bulked up politically correct courses that “malign conservatives,” and Ivy League schools have put a focus anti-Trump offerings, according to a new report from Young America’s Foundation.

Harvard University, Cornell University, Columbia University, and Dartmouth College have created courses that question the Trump presidency, scrutinize his “fake news” charges and call his election a sign of “of an imminent apocalypse.”

The leading conservative youth organization looked at some 50 top colleges and found 250 examples of courses that question conservatism and Trump.

Majoring in “I hate Trump” isn’t just useless in the real world, it’s beyond stupid.

All this claptrap about “moral economies” harks us back to the morals espoused by the father of societal morality- Leon Trotsky.

In his famous polemic on the nature of morality and its place in human society, Trotsky argues that morality is relative to each society, to each epoch, and is above all, relative to the interests of the different social classes. True morality should defend the interests of humanity itself, represented by the working class, and cannot be an absolute idea. Each situation must be analysed on its own merit. For example, if violence is used by a group as a way to defend the interests of the masses as a whole and wave the flag for the greater good then it is justifiable.

In bourgeois democratic countries the interests of the ruling class are masked under an ideal morality, often stemming from religious teachings, in conformity with the well understood interests of the bourgeoisie. They claim that morality is an eternal and absolute ideal, whereas Trotsky argues that the only true morality comes in the form of the representation of the ‘true proletariat’. Trotsky frames his argument under four sub-headings: Historical materialist conception of morality; Leninism versus Stalinism; the ‘Ends and Means’ argument; and Revolutionary morality.

If sounds like a more floral version of the verbiage spilling from the mouths of democrat candidates, it’s no mistake.

The task for revolutionaries is to figure out the guide posts for making these decisions. Revolutionaries must firmly reject ‘official morality’ and fuse a dynamic understanding of the ends and means theory with the concrete situations that they confront. In other words, the central core of Marxism – the working class and its self-emancipation – is the starting point for Marxist morality. Trotsky encourages revolutionaries to construct their own definitions of morality using dialectics, independent of the thoughts and teachings of the ruling classes.

Dailectics- like “moral economy.” Trotsky also believed killing the Tsar’s children was moral.

Now you can understand how Trotsky’s morality brought Stalin to Russia. All this morality nonsense comes down to the “morality” of the dictator, as we see in Venezuela. Speaking of Venezuela, Bernie Sanders, who is bent on bringing Communism to this country, gives us all a clue as to how he would rule if left as dictator. Oh sure, he calls it “progressivism” but that is merely a waypoint to socialism and the goal of socialism is Communism.  Bernie, who not long ago bought his third house, refused to call for Maduro to step aide and would not even condemn him.

The degree to which democrats have run to the left is frightening. They are saying things that would make JFK and even Jimmy Carter shudder. The farther we get from the Greatest Generation the more vulnerable we are to this darkness. democrats are pandering to the absolute worst in people- selfishness. They have all become the anti-JFK- “Ask not what you can do for your country, ask what your country can do for you.”

My father was part of the greatest generation- a WWII combat vet. He understood hard work and sacrifice. These are concepts the left largely does not understand and their children certainly do not. We have tried to make left better for our children but the left makes the mistake of making things too easy. When society argues about how many genders there are, demanding that transgender women compete in women’s sports and that there such a thing as a “female penis” we are approaching a tipping point. There’s too much time to stand in the streets of Portland beating people who disagree with you in the facade of anti-racism. It’s is a danger sign that there is too much time for self-absorption.

The promise of someone else’s wealth makes them easy prey.

Straight outta Trotsky.

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Yes Trotsky most of it is the “trots” expressed on paper, no sense to it at all. Send the children off to college as part of passage into adulthood to have them taught that they can never ever care for themselves. Normalize ideas that should have them tossed into a looney bin with the other toons.

Either they are totally ignorant
or
They are lying on purpose

Their calls reflect a growing consensus among Democrats over how to deal with a healthy economy that is creating jobs and the rising influence of socialist candidates and lawmakers in the Democratic Party.

Socialism easily takes root when economic opportunities are bad. Socialism is less attractive when the economy is good. So, to compensate for a good economy, I guess they’ll just label it not “moral” enough. Morality is, I guess, having people work then taking their earnings.

But she also accused those praising the Trump economy of valuing job quantity over the quality of those jobs.

Due to the crappy quality of Obama’s jobs, the left has had to compensate by demanding raising the minimum wage.

For example, if violence is used by a group as a way to defend the interests of the masses as a whole and wave the flag for the greater good then it is justifiable.

Whoa. You think the Democrats and ANTIFA have read this?

Capitalism provides opportunity; socialism provides victimization. People can work their way out of poverty under Capaitalism; they get a bit more comfortable in poverty under socialism. My friends and I can sit around and talk about the lean times growing up (not poverty, but only the basics of life) and how our parents provided us with the MEANS to make better lives for ourselves. And OUR children are doing better than WE did. And so it goes, unless one descends into a victimized funk and admits defeat before starting.

The claim of protecting “capitalism” from the evil of “socialism” is presently serving as cover for an institutionalized scam that is further tilting the playing field in favor of the richest at the cost of a trillion-dollar-a-year deficit, which will ultimately affect the richest the very least and spell disaster for everyone else.

This is what happens when you put the greediest and most ravenous foxes in charge of the hen house. Common sense should lead one to expect no other result.

@Greg: It’s socialism vs capitalism. Choose one.

@Greg:

This is what happens when you put the greediest and most ravenous foxes in charge of the hen house

https://www.wsj.com/articles/venezuela-is-starving-1493995317
They promised them free health care

Common sense should lead one to expect no other result.

Her country was once Latin America’s richest, producing food for export. Venezuela now can’t grow enough to feed its own people in an economy hobbled by the nationalization of private farms, and price and currency controls.
Farting cows
People here, in a mix of rage and humor, call it the Maduro diet after President Nicolás Maduro. Who is obese.

So, they call it situational morality.
Bernie, three homes, Sanders sure doesn’t want YOU to have three houses!
In fact, breadlines-are-good Bernie thinks we have way too many options, dazzling us.

“You don’t need a choice of 23 underarm deodorants or of 18 different pairs of sneakers when children are hungry in this country.”

But he “needs” three homes!
Wouldn’t more people be lifted out of poverty by him selling two homes and sharing all the proceeds with the poor rather than putting workers out of jobs making deodorants or shoes or other things we have plenty of styles of?

General Santana warned us to study history.
If we fail to we are doomed to repeat the mistakes others have already made.

Trotsky was one of the very 1st victims of revisionist history: he was airbrushed right out of every photo that put him near the Soviet leadership after their need for him ended.
Later, even tho he fled to Mexico, he was hunted down by Soviet thugs and assassinated.

Take a lesson Dem Socialists of America.

@Greg:

The claim of protecting “capitalism” from the evil of “socialism” is presently serving as cover for an institutionalized scam that is further tilting the playing field in favor of the richest at the cost of a trillion-dollar-a-year deficit, which will ultimately affect the richest the very least and spell disaster for everyone else.

This is what happens when you put the greediest and most ravenous foxes in charge of the hen house. Common sense should lead one to expect no other result.

Uh..show me one example of “socialism” over “capitalism” that didn’t cost several million lives?

You make destroying your arguments too easy, greg.

lol

@Greg: Stalin killed millions. Rockefeller, none.

Show me where Cap over Soc wasn’t the way?

I’m listening.

@kitt:

They promised them free health care

What’s your point? That free-at-the-point-of-delivery healthcare guarantees society-wide disaster?

@Michael: Yes, yes it does

@kitt: What do you have to say about all the countries that have that kind of healthcare system, yet have not faced society-wide disaster?

Straight from Marx himself as to what measures needed to be put in place to transform a country to Communism:

1. Abolition of property in land and application of all rents of all lands to public purposes.

2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax.

3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance.

4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels.

5. Centralization of credit in the hands of the State, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly.

6. Centralization of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the state.

7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State, the bringing into cultivation of waste-lands, and improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan.

8. Equal liability of all to labour. Establishment of industrial armies especially for agriculture.

9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries, gradual abolition of the distinction between town and country, by a more equal distribution of the population over the country.

10. Free education for all children in public schools. Abolition of children’s factory labour in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production.

When, in the course of development, class distinctions have disappeared, and all production has been concentrated in the hands of a vast association of the whole nation, the public power will lose its political character.

Kind of sounds like a nineteenth century version of the “Green New Deal” doesn’t it? Wealth re-distribution through control, control, control. For example, when you think about it, if you were to substitute the use of “climate change” (aka manmade global warming) for cultivation of wastelands and improvement of soil, you have a modern version of what Marx advocated in number seven. Instead of controlling everything to “improve agriculture” they need to control everything to combat “manmade global warming”.

@another vet: Same model but subtle language alterations.
@Michael: What countries are you talking about can you name some? Do you know anyone from any of those countries?

@kitt:
Well, I know that the National Health has been in existence in the U.K. for about as long as the Soviet Union existed, and England is not experiencing a society-wide meltdown of famine and hyperinflation, the way Venezuela is. Neither is Canada. Neither is Denmark. Et cetera, et cetera.

Remember: having to schedule your appointment some distance into the future does not constitute a “society-wide disaster,” which is specifically what you are saying has happened to countries that have socialized medicine.

Do you know anyone from any of those countries?

No, but I can look stuff up, which is what I’ve done since “Medicare for all” became a rallying cry here. You have opinions on Trump and Mueller, among other things. Have you ever met Trump or Mueller?

@Michael: I’m afraid it is ever since massive immigration of non contributing invaders. It has destroyed any premise of freedom of speech. If you personally knew anyone there(my sister in law is from England her family is there) you would be better informed as the BBC an MSM is not giving an accurate picture at all.
Top tax rate is 83% that rate starts at 250K us dollar conversion. Thats England confiscating 207,500 dollars if you make 250, 000
The welfare state is a big part of British family life, with 20.3 million families receiving some kind of benefit (64% of all families), about 8.7 million of them pensioners. For 9.6 million families, benefits make up more than half of their income (30% of all families), around 5.3 million of them pensioners.
Slaves of the State.
30% tax rate for the average citizen.
The free health care is rationed.
Then there are the common acid and knife attacks, the grooming gangs ect…Merry ol England is not so merry, they cant even seem to divorce the distaster of the EU.

@Nathan Blue, #7:

Uh..show me one example of “socialism” over “capitalism” that didn’t cost several million lives?

How about your parents’ and grandparents’ Social Security checks? How about retired Americans’ Medicare insurance? How about public education, and Medicaid, and school lunch programs?

How about the social programs of virtually every prosperous, industrialized Western nation on the planet?

Oh, but that’s not we’re talking about. We’re talking about Cuba, or North Korea, or Venezuela, or the failed economies of former Soviet block nations…

That would be the point. Trump and the loudest voices in the political party he hijacked are deliberately conflating beneficial social programs with socialism and Marxist doctrine. Their followers have been effectively conditioned to accept this blatant deception without question.

It’s not Marxist doctrine and socialism that they would put on the chopping block. It’s our social programs they would like to eliminate or roll back, so they could sustain high-end tax cuts and divert even more wealth into their own pockets. What the hell do you think their “social security privatization” schemes are actually all about?

@Greg:

How about your parents’ and grandparents’ Social Security checks? How about retired Americans’ Medicare insurance? How about public education, and Medicaid, and school lunch programs?

How about they paid for that system? Do you own a home Greg do they break out how much of your taxes pay for a failing system. what are the reading and math proficiency scores in your state? Why is there a supplemental insurance needed for the medicare program?

What the hell do you think their “social security privatization” schemes are actually all about?

Because government sucks at everything they touch, every damn thing. Does anyone under 50 have a hope to retire at 62? 65? 105? on SS?
What is going on at the Venezuelan border as The US is trying to get the desperate people of that country some aid relief? They are killing their own people that are looking for food.
Go there and preach your foolishness, you might be their next meal.

@Greg:

How about your parents’ and grandparents’ Social Security checks? How about retired Americans’ Medicare insurance? How about public education, and Medicaid, and school lunch programs?

Are any of those a success? Public education used to be a solely local government function, but since the federal government has taken so much control over it, it has gone into a death spiral. Michelle ruined school lunches, making them inedible. Medicare and Social Security, thanks to government management, are going bankrupt.

That would be the point. Trump and the loudest voices in the political party he hijacked are deliberately conflating beneficial social programs with socialism and Marxist doctrine.

No, Trump has conflated socialism with socialism. Occasional-Kotex, Bernie, Big Chief Warren are all proposing SOCIALISM and they are popular in their proposals.

It’s not Marxist doctrine and socialism that they would put on the chopping block. It’s our social programs they would like to eliminate or roll back,

Which social programs?

@retire05: That’s what health care looks like when the government is afraid to raise taxes high enough to sustain it.

@retire05: Must be slipping into the nightmare condtions of the public socialist insane asylums of the past, our past. Pennhurst, now Kings County Hospital Center in Brooklyn. They just never improve to show us they are able to handle a larger system.

Because government sucks at everything they touch, every damn thing. Does anyone under 50 have a hope to retire at 62? 65? 105? on SS?

They certainly won’t if any of the privatization schemes republicans have put forward in the recent past ever becomes law. They would redirect a portion of what is presently paid in FICA taxes into the private financial sector. They have never once explained how they plan to make up the funding shortfall that would result—because they have no plan.

The financial genius currently in the White House has left a trail of corporate bankruptcies behind him. His m.o. is to move on to the next greener pasture, not worrying about the people who get left behind holding an empty bag. Even doing that, it’s entirely possible that he’s actually a phony billionaire, in debt up to his eyebrows. This is not the guy you would want to be shoving through a Social Security reform package.

@Greg: The entitlements reform would be the job of the legislators, imagine all the money they could repay the system they robbed if they shrank the leviathan, instead of politicking to make it much, much larger.

@kitt:

Top tax rate is 83% that rate starts at 250K us dollar conversion.

The top personal income tax rate in the U.K. Is 45%.
https://www.gov.uk/income-tax-rates

Thats England confiscating 207,500 dollars if you make 250, 000

I’m sorry that you’re an adult and don’t understand how marginal tax rates work.

The welfare state is a big part of British family life, with 20.3 million families receiving some kind of benefit (64% of all families), about 8.7 million of them pensioners. For 9.6 million families, benefits make up more than half of their income (30% of all families), around 5.3 million of them pensioners.

So far you’re not describing a society-wide crisis. You’re describing a situation where people in society are being helped by the cash payments by the government.

The free health care is rationed.

Healthcare is rationed in a for-profit healthcare system, too. It’s generally restricted to people who can pay for it. You’re probably at the top of the rationing list, so you don’t notice or don’t care.

Then there are the common acid and knife attacks, the grooming gangs ect…

A) These don’t have anything to do with the fact that the NHS exists, and B) We have WAY more violence here, and we have a for-profit healthcare system.

Perhaps you’ll now explain how not-for-profit healthcare is destroying Canadian and Danish society.

@Michael: @Michael: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/tax/9654465/
Its the attitude of the government, allowing crime to run amok.
No one is turned away from any emergency room here even with empty pockets.
Yes I pay for my own health care, out my own pocket. over an above that I pay a penalty on my taxes for not getting ripped off by AHCA. That ends this next tax season my refund goes up.
I am looking for a doctor that only accepts cash and posts prices for medical services.

@kitt:
Your link doesn’t work.

Its the attitude of the government, allowing crime to run amok.

So: nothing at all to do with not-for-profit medicine. Got it.

No one is turned away from any emergency room here even with empty pockets.

Which raises rates for everyone, clogs ERs, and does nothing to help prevent these visits in the first place. Preventative medicine is cheaper than ER visits.

Yes I pay for my own health care, out my own pocket. over an above that I pay a penalty on my taxes for not getting ripped off by AHCA.

Right: medical care is already being rationed; you’re just one of the fortunate beneficiaries of that particular system, and you want to make sure that the rationing doesn’t change to a model in which you don’t come out on top. Nice.

That ends this next tax season my refund goes up.

Your refund’s going up? Good for you. There have been a lot of stories recently about regular folks who were unpleasantly surprised that the same thing isn’t happening for them after the recent change to the tax code.

I am looking for a doctor that only accepts cash and posts prices for medical services.

You have enough money to pay cash for your medical care! Cool! To hell with everyone else, right? You got yours!

Again: Canada? Denmark? Other industrial democracies with government-provided healthcare?

@Deplorable Me, #19:

Are any of those a success?

Yes. Which is why Social Security is still supported by the vast majority of working and middle class Americans nearly 85 years after it came into existence, and why republican politicians who want to eliminate the program to redirect cash into the private sector have to be so damn deceptive about their true intentions.

How many average Americans could put back enough money to cover their own retirement years if they’d had to help support their parents and grandparents through their retirement years, while also supporting and educating their children?

@Greg: No, the left has ruined them all. Social Security and Medicare are going broke due to taking the money out of them to prop up other social engineering projects (remember the $750 Obama stole from Medicare to sweeten Obamacare?), giving SS money to millions who never paid into it and turning public education into indoctrination camps, turning out stupid, but pliable, students.

That second paragraph in post #26 was a question.

@Greg: Oh, you expect questions answered? Join the club.

@Greg:

How many average Americans could put back enough money to cover their own retirement years if they’d had to help support their parents and grandparents through their retirement years, while also supporting and educating their children?

Every generation did until, due to a world wide crisis, the U.S. elected the Socialist FDR and then later LBJ who convinced the populace that the government, not family, not ourselves, is responsible for our every needs. And I not only raised my children, and educated them, I cared for my parents (grandparents died when I was young).

Americans can save for their later years and family responsibilities but that would mean giving up new vehicles every few years, iPhones, big screen TVs, etc.

But Socialists, like you, believe that you are entitled to the services of others.

Every generation did until, due to a world wide crisis, the U.S. elected the Socialist FDR and then later LBJ who convinced the populace that the government, not family, not ourselves, is responsible for our every needs.

This is not the same world our grandparents or parents spent their working lives in.

The Cost of Raising a Child Jumps to $233,610

A few years ago, I had to undergo a very common emergency surgery. I was 3 nights in a hospital. Fortunately I had good health insurance, as my hospital costs alone upon my return home totaled nearly $28K.

Saving for one’s retirement now involves putting your money in a bank account and receiving interest far lower than the rate of inflation, or putting your hard-earned dollars into the gambling casino known as the stock market, on the crack-brained promise that everyone who plays is a winner. In truth, only the house always wins. Oddly enough, they are the ones promoting the promise.

@retire05: But the congress if they end SS shouldnt their retirement benefits also end? Sure they paid in toward that but so did those on SS.
So many of them got rich in government they wouldnt even miss it.

@Greg: But if your money goes to the government for your retirement, how do they grow the investment so there is enough to fund a retirement?

@Deplorable Me: Its kinda like the lottery will you take the lump sum or let the government take care of it for you.
If given a choice of privatizing the money, provided it is in an account with my name on it, the remainder gets to go to my heirs tax free into their retirement money. No one can confiscate it and give it to someone less fortunate or more foolish. Seems privatization may not be that bad.
12 to 15% mandatory 1/2 paid by the employer like taxation, into a fund.

@Greg:

This is not the same world our grandparents or parents spent their working lives in.

How so? Are children not educated now? Is someone no longer capable of ingenuity, innovativeness, a willingness to work and the ability to be fiscally responsible saving even a small portion of their earnings? Perhaps if college students worked, even part time, they would not enter the workforce with tens of thousands of $$ in debt. But instead, your Socialist cohorts tell them they are entitled to a free college education. When college becomes free, it will have as much meaning as high school diploma does now; very little. Then what? More free college to get a Masters or Ph.D.?

The Cost of Raising a Child Jumps to $233,610

So that is what we, the taxpayer, is on the hook for all the welfare kids?

A few years ago, I had to undergo a very common emergency surgery. I was 3 nights in a hospital. Fortunately I had good health insurance, as my hospital costs alone upon my return home totaled nearly $28K.

“Emergency” surgery? Of course, that would be more costly than a scheduled surgery. Did you pay it or did you expect the hospital, its staff, the doctors, nurses, pharmacist and their supplies, to just absorb the cost because………..Socialism and you think you’re entitled to the labor of others? Of course you do, Cupcake, but you are too cowardly to go live in a real Socialist nation.

@retire05: I knew I couldnt be the first one with an idea, there are good financial minds out there, none in government who this whole time could have done this with SSI payments and not robbed the system, turning it into the ponzi scheme it is today.
@Deplorable Me: he said he had good insurance at the time I wonder if he got to keep it….

From what I’ve observed of the average working class Trump supporters that I come into contact with, most would be up a creek without a paddle when they get too old to work or if they became disabled, were it not for the Social Security and Medicare programs. That’s the reality of the situation. If you relieved them of Medicare and Social Security taxes, most wouldn’t set the money aside or invest it in preparation for their eventual retirement.

A new study finds the median American household has $4,830 in a savings account. That’s enough to cover minor emergencies and potentially even a few months of living expenses. Overall, between bank accounts and retirement savings, the median American household currently holds about $11,700, according to MagnifyMoney.

I know what I have done, but it isn’t what most people do. If you want to pretend that the lack of foresight of others has no effect on you, fine. But you’ll be pretending. Social programs maintain the social stability that must be maintained for most people, in order for some people to do far better than average by working harder and planning better.

@Greg: It will take a while for households to restore their savings and investments after that “wonderful” Obama economy.

Some people don’t want to save. They want to blow their money on a good time. It’s their choice. Was we saw with the election of Obama and the votes Hillary got, you can’t make stupid people smart.

@Greg: Do you know how many that lost savings when jobs were outsourced, living on their retirement while looking for work?
Then there are those that get so far in debt cause they cant wait for the latest toy, put it on the good ol plastic, to the point where they were trying to keep up payments by liquidating the value they built up in their homes. Yes home equity loans and lines of credit, up to 125% of the value. They behave just like morons we vote in.
There is really not any correlation between wealth and political leanings. Its spending behavior, saving behavior, and other factors too complex for a post.

@Greg:

From what I’ve observed of the average working class Trump supporters that I come into contact with, most would be up a creek without a paddle when they get too old to work or if they became disabled, were it not for the Social Security and Medicare programs.

Really? How so? Are those “average working class Trump supporters” sharing their most intimate financial information with you? I can just hear the conversation now; “Oh, my, Mr. Greggie Gullible. I only have $13.87 saved and man, without SS and Medicare, I would be up a creek when I retire in 25 years.”

Greg, you’re full of shit.

@Deplorable Me, #39:

It will take a while for households to restore their savings and investments after that “wonderful” Obama economy.

You mean they hadn’t all stashed away huge windfalls as a result of the Bush tax cut and deregulation of the financial sector, like top 10 percent had done?

I know the right likes its fairy tales, but the economic catastrophe that led to what you refer to as the Obama economy had already been underway for a year-and-a-half before Obama even took office. What do you think would have happened without the stimulus program that kept the wheels of the economy from coming to a total stop, and kept state and local governments from going bankrupt?

@retire05, #38:

Really? How so? Are those “average working class Trump supporters” sharing their most intimate financial information with you?

Greg, you’re full of shit.

Apparently you can read, or have an attendant who does so for you. Read the short article I linked. You can find any number of other sources yourself that will tell you much the same. How long do you think $11,700 would last?

@Greg:

I was not addressing any link you provided. I was addressing what you claim is a personal experience with “average working class Trump supporters” that you claim you come in contact with.

But then, obfuscating is what you think you do best.

Hey, keep proving you’re an idiot.

@Greg:

You mean they hadn’t all stashed away huge windfalls as a result of the Bush tax cut and deregulation of the financial sector, like top 10 percent had done?

If they had, the lost most of it, thanks to the recessions brought about by the Community Reinvestment Act, the legacy of Carter and Clinton. I myself lost about $50,000 of my retirement, but worked long enough to build it back. Under Obama, while the markets surged, not a lot of retirement funds benefited to the same extent.

The Obama economy is what was due to Obama. Harsh regulation and taxation that drove businesses and investments overseas. Fear of another recession which drove businesses to stash their money instead of investing in the future. Obamacare which created the expansion of part time instead of full time jobs and hiring suppression. Crony capitalism that saw billions in investments go down the bankruptcy drain as Obama’s contributors got richer. Even Obama’s staunch supporter and “jobs czar” Jeffery Immelt of GE kept all his profits offshore to evade taxes and opened new businesses in China.

I know the right likes its fairy tales, but the economic catastrophe that led to what you refer to as the Obama economy had already been underway for a year-and-a-half before Obama even took office.

Late December 2007 to January 2009 is not a year and a half.