Trump Moves Further Into Dictatorship

 https://robertreich.substack.com/p/trumps-further-descent-into-dictatorship

Ten Reasons for Modest Optimism in the Battle Against Trump/Facism

If you are experiencing rage and despair about what is happening in America and the world right now because of the Trump-Vance-Musk regime, you are hardly alone. A groundswell of opposition is growing — not as loud and boisterous as the resistance to Tump 1.0, but just as, if not more, committed to ending the scourge. 

https://open.substack.com/pub/robertreich/p/ten-reasons-for-optimism?

Here’s a partial summary — 10 reasons for modest optimism. 

1. Boycotts are taking hold. 

Americans are changing shopping habits in a backlash against corporations that have shifted their public policies to align with Trump.

Millions are pledging to halt discretionary spending for 24 hours on February 28 in protest against major retailers — chiefly Amazon, Walmart, and Best Buy — for scaling back diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives in response to Trump. 

Four out of 10 Americans have already shifted their spending over the last few months to be more consistent with their moral views, according to the Harris poll. (Far more Democrats — 50 percent — are changing their spending habits compared with Republicans — 41 percent.)

Calls to boycott Tesla apparently are having an effect. After a disappointing 2024, Tesla sales declined further in January. In California, a key market for Tesla, nearly 12 percent fewer Teslas were registered in January 2025 than in January 2024. An analysis by Electrek points to even more trouble for Tesla in Europe, where Tesla sales have dropped in every market.

X users are shifting over to Bluesky at a rapid rate, even as Musk adds more advertisers to his ongoing lawsuit against those that have justifiably boycotted X after he turned it into a cesspool of lies and hate (this week, he added Lego, Nestle, Tyson Foods, and Shell). 

2. International resistance is rising. 

Canada has helped lead the way: A grassroots boycott of American products and tourism is underway there. Prime Minister Trudeau has in effect become a “wartime prime minister” as he stands up to Trump’s bullying. 

Jean Chrétien, who served as prime minister of Canada from 1993 to 2003, is urging Canada to join with leaders in Denmark, Panama, and Mexico, as well as with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, to fight back against Trump’s threats. 

Mexico’s President Claudia Sheinbaum is standing up to Trump. She has defended not just Mexico but also the sovereignty of Latin American countries Trump has threatened and insulted. 

In the wake of JD Vance’s offensive speech at the Munich security conference last week, European democracies are standing together — condemning his speech and making it clear they will support Ukraine and never capitulate to Putin, as Trump has done. 

3. Independent and alternative media are growing.

Trump and Musk’s “shock and awe” strategy was premised on their control of all major information outlets — not just Fox News and its right-wing imitators but the mainstream corporate media as well. 

It hasn’t worked. The New York Times has done sharp and accurate reporting on what’s happening. Even the non-editorial side of The Wall Street Journal has shown some gumption. 

The biggest news, though, is the increasing role now being played by independent and alternative media. Subscriptions have surged at Democracy Now, The American Prospect, Americans for Tax Fairness, Economic Policy Institute, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, The Guardian, ProPublica, Labor Notes, The Lever, Popular Information, Heather Cox Richardson, and, of course, this and other Substacks. 

As a result, although Trump and Musk continue to flood the zone with lies, Americans aren’t as readily falling for their scams. 

4. Musk’s popularity is plunging.

Elon Musk is underwater in public opinion, according to polls published Wednesday.

Surveys by Quinnipiac University and Pew Research Center — coming just after Trump and Musk were interviewed together by Fox News’ Sean Hannity, with Trump calling Musk a “great guy” who “really cares for the country” — show a growing majority of Americans holding an unfavorable view of Musk. 

In Pew’s findings, 54 percent report disliking Musk compared to 42 percent with a positive view; 36 percent report a very unfavorable view of Musk. Quinnipiac’s results show 55 percent believe Musk has too big a role in the government.

5. Musk’s Doge is losing credibility.

On Monday, DOGE listed government contracts it has canceled, claiming that they amount to some $16 billion in savings — itemized on a new “wall of receipts” on its website.

Almost half were attributed to a single $8 billion contract for the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency — but that contract was for $8 million, not $8 billion. A larger total savings number published on the site, $55 billion, lacked specific documentation.

In addition, Musk and Trump say tens of millions of “dead people” may be receiving fraudulent Social Security payments from the government. The table Musk shared on social media over the weekend showed about 20 million people in the Social Security Administration’s database over the age of 100 and with no known death.

But as the agency’s inspector general found in 2023, “almost none” of them were receiving payments; most had died before the advent of electronic records.

These kinds of rudimentary errors are destroying DOGE’s credibility and causing even more to question allowing Musk’s muskrats unfettered access to personal data on Americans. 

6. The federal courts are hitting back. 

So far, at least 74 lawsuits have been filed by state attorneys general, nonprofits, and unions against the Trump regime. And at least 17 judges — including several appointed by Republicans — already have issued orders blocking or temporarily halting actions by the Trump regime. 

The blocking orders include Trump initiatives to restrict birthright citizenship, suspend or cut off domestic and foreign U.S. spending, shrink the federal workforce, oust independent agency heads, and roll back legal protections and medical care for transgender adults and youths. 

In other cases, the Trump regime has agreed to a pause to give judges time to rule, another way that legal fights are forcing a slowdown.

7. Demonstrations are on the rise. 

We haven’t seen anything like the January 2017 Women’s March, the day after Trump 1.0 began, but over the past weeks, demonstrations have been increasing across the country. Last Monday, on Presidents Day, demonstrators descended upon state capitol buildings.

In Washington, D.C., thousands gathered at the Capitol Reflecting Pool, chanting “Where is Congress?” and urging members of Congress to “Do your job!” despite nearly 40-degree temperatures and 20-mile-per-hour wind gusts.

The nationwide protests are part of the 50501 Movement, which stands for “50 protests. 50 states. 1 movement.” One of its leaders, Potus Black, urged the crowd of protesters in Washington to stand united in order to “uphold the Constitution.”

“To oppose tyranny is to stand behind democracy and remind our elected officials that we, the people, are who they’re elected to serve, not themselves. The events over the past month have been built to exhaust us, to break our wills. But we are the American people. We will not break.”

I expect that in the coming weeks and months protests will grow larger and louder — and by summer perhaps a “Summer of Democracy” will sweep the nation.

Acts of civil disobedience are also on the rise, as are resignations in protest against the regime. This week, former NFL punter Chris Kluwe was hauled out of a Huntington Beach City Council meeting after speaking out against Trump during public comments against plans to include a MAGA reference in the design of a library plaque.

As cheers erupted from the audience, Kluwe told the council, in words that should be repeated across the land:

“MAGA stands for trying to erase trans people from existence. MAGA stands for resegregation and racism. MAGA stands for censorship and book bans. MAGA stands for firing air traffic controllers while planes are crashing. MAGA stands for firing the people overseeing our nuclear arsenal. MAGA stands for firing military veterans and those serving them at the VA, including canceling research on veteran suicide. MAGA stands for cutting funds to education, including for disabled children. MAGA is profoundly corrupt, unmistakably anti-democracy and most importantly, MAGA is explicitly a Nazi movement. You may have replaced a swastika with a red hat, but that is what it is.”

When he was done speaking, Kluwe said he would “engage in the time-honored American tradition of peaceful civil disobedience.”

8. Stock and bond markets are trembling.

Trump has not lowered prices; in fact, inflation is rising under his control.

Trump’s wild talk of 25 percent tariffs is spooking the market. Yesterday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which measures the performance of 30 large-cap U.S. stocks, dropped by more than 1.40 percent. 

Treasury bonds also dropped after a report showed more U.S. workers applied for unemployment benefits last week than economists expected — an indication the pace of layoffs could be worsening.

Transcripts of the last Fed meeting showed that officials discussed how Trump's proposed tariffs and mass deportations of migrants, as well as strong consumer spending, could push inflation higher this year.

Economic storm clouds like these should be troubling for everyone but especially for a regime that measures its success by stock and bond markets. 

9. Trump is overreaching — pretending to be “king” and abandoning Ukraine for Putin.

Trump’s threats of annexation, conquest, and “unleashing hell” have been exposed as farcical bluffs — and his displays this week of being “king” and siding with Putin have unleashed a new level of public ridicule. 

On Wednesday, following his attempt to kill a new congestion pricing program for Manhattan, Trump wrote on Truth Social: “CONGESTION PRICING IS DEAD. Manhattan, and all of New York, is SAVED. LONG LIVE THE KING!” The White House shared the quote accompanied by a computer-generated image of Trump grinning on a fake Time magazine cover while donning a golden crown.

Negative reaction was swift and overwhelming. Social media has exploded with derision. New York Governor Kathy Hochul said, “We are a nation of laws, not ruled by a king.” Illinois’s Democratic governor, JB Pritzker, said, “My oath is to the Constitution of our state and our nation. We don’t have kings in America, and I won’t bend the knee to one.”

The reaction to Trump’s abandoning Ukraine and siding with Putin has been more devastating, putting congressional Republicans on the defensive. Prominent Republican senators Roger Wicker of Mississippi and John Kennedy of Louisiana criticized Putin. Bill Kristol, a former official in the Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations, noted that “Nato and the US commitment to Europe has kept the European peace for 80 years. It’s foolish and reckless to put that at risk. And for what? To get along with Putin?”

10. The Trump-Vance-Musk “shock and awe” plan is faltering.

In all these ways and for all of these reasons, the regime’s efforts to overwhelm us are failing. 

Make no mistake: Trump, Vance, and Musk continue to be an indiscriminate wrecking ball that has already caused major destruction and will continue to weaken and isolate America. But their takeover has been slowed.

Their plan was based on doing so much, so fast that the rest of us would give in to negativity and despair. They want a dictatorship built on hopelessness and fear. 

That may have been the case initially, but we can take courage from the green shoots of rebellion now appearing across America and the world. 

As several of you have pointed out, successful resistance movements maintain hope and a positive vision of the future, no matter how dark the present.

More than 55 years ago, I participated in the resistance to the Vietnam War — a resistance that ultimately ended the war and caused a once powerful president to resign. That resistance gave us courage we didn’t even know we had. It changed American culture, inspiring songs such as “The Times They Are A Changing,” and “Blowin’ In The Wind.”

No one person led that anti-war movement. It was an amalgam of groups and leaders spanning more than six years of mobilization and organization, at all levels of society. 

The Civil Rights Movement that culminated in the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 required over 18 years of organizing, demonstrating, and mobilizing. 

The current coup is less than five weeks old, and resistance has only begun. The Trump-Vance-Musk regime will fail. Even so, the Democracy Movement now emerging will require at least a decade, if not a generation, to rebuild and strengthen what has been destroyed, and to fix the raging inequalities, injustices, and corruption that led so many to vote for Trump for a second time. 

Those of you who want the leaders of the Democratic Party to step up and be heard are right, of course. But political parties do not lead. The anti-war movement and the Civil Rights Movement didn’t depend on the Democratic Party for their successes. They depended on a mass mobilization of all of us who accepted the responsibilities of being American. 

We will prevail because we are relearning the basic truth — that we are the leaders we’ve been waiting for. 

Robert Reich, 

Getting Rid of American Oligarchy - Reich

 https://robertreich.substack.com/p/the-oligarchy-will-decide-what-truth?

The Big Picture: How We Got Into This Mess, And How We Get Out of It | R...

This time of year reminds me of his anxious dependence on holiday sales (and in the days after Christmas, the frantic returns). Between Thanksgiving and Christmas, he needed to earn enough to pay the bills and have a sufficient sum to carry us through the first part of the following year.

We weren’t rich but never felt poor, and our standard of living rose steadily through the 1950s and 1960s — as factory workers and their spouses did better and better.

This was an era when the income of a single factory worker or schoolteacher or baker or salesman or mechanic was enough to buy a home, have two cars, and raise a family.

FOR THREE DECADES after World War II, America created the largest middle class the world had ever seen. During those years, the earnings of the typical American worker doubled, just as the size of the American economy doubled.

Over the last 40 years, by contrast, the size of the economy has more than doubled again, but the earnings of the typical American have barely budged (adjusted for inflation). Most of the gains have gone to the top. 

In the 1950s and 1960s, the CEOs of large corporations earned an average of about 20 times the pay of their typical worker. Now they rake in over 300 times the pay of an average worker.

In the 1950s and 1960s, the richest 1 percent of Americans took home about 10 percent of the nation’s total income. Today they take home more than the bottom 90 percent put together.

Then, the economy generated hope. Hard work paid off. The living standards of most people improved through their working lives. Their children enjoyed better lives than they had. Most felt that the rules of the economic game were basically fair.

Although many women, Black people, and Latinos were still blocked from getting a fair share of the economy’s gains, the nation committed itself to changing this. New laws guaranteed equal opportunity, barred discrimination, promoted affirmative action, and expanded educational opportunity for all.

Today, confidence in the economic system has sharply declined. Its apparent arbitrariness and unfairness have undermined the public’s faith in it. Cynicism abounds. Equal opportunity is no longer high on the nation’s agenda.

As you’ll see in “The Big Picture” video on this page, recent American history can be divided into five periods:

1. 1946-1979, we grew together. Almost everyone gained ground.

2. 1980-2008, the great U-turn. Most economic gains began going to the top.

3. 2008-2010, the financial crisis. The banks were bailed out but millions of Americans lost their jobs, homes, and savings. The experience revealed the gross inequalities of wealth and power that underlay the new economy. This caused widespread disillusionment with the system.

4. 2010-2016, anger at the establishment. Both Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump emerged as anti-establishment candidates — although Trump’s anti-establishment persona was fake (and still is). 

5. 2016-2050, the choice between oligarchy and democracy. The 2024 election represented a lurch toward oligarchy, but I believe Trump and his oligarchy will overreach, and we’ll choose a more robust democracy. 

***

WHEN MOST PEOPLE STOP BELIEVING that they and their children have a fair chance to make it, the tacit social contract begins to unravel. And a nation becomes susceptible to demagogues such as Donald Trump peddling the politics of hate. 

Many of the most vocal proponents of the “free market” — including Elon Musk, executives of large corporations and their ubiquitous lawyers and lobbyists, denizens of Wall Street and their political lackeys, and numerous multimillionaires and billionaires — have been actively reorganizing the market for their own benefit.

The consequence has been a market created by those with great wealth for the purpose of further increasing their wealth.

This has resulted in ever-larger upward distributions inside the market, from the middle class, working class, and poor to a wealthy minority at the top. 

Because these distributions occur inside the market, they have largely escaped notice. We tend to debate only downward “redistributions” that occur outside the market, through taxing the rich and transferring some benefits to the poor and working class. 

Musk and Trump want to reduce such redistributions. 

But the hidden upward redistributions inside the market are arguably larger.

This is why it’s so important that those of us who care about social justice speak out and explain what has happened. And why it’s crucial that Democrats focus on reversing the staggering inequalities of this era and getting big money out of politics. 

Otherwise, the only explanation most Americans receive for what has happened comes from Trump authoritarians who falsely blame immigrants, “socialists,” the “deep state,” “woke”ism, Democrats, Black people, women, and other countries. 

And the only agenda most Americans receive for remedying what has occurred is by backing Trump and Musk and their lurch toward fascism. 

My friends, the underlying issue is not the size of government. It’s whom the government is for. The fundamental choice is democracy or oligarchy. 

Share

Robert Reich: Total Control, step toward authoritarianism

 https://open.substack.com/pub/robertreich/p/total-control?

How Can This Race be Tied ? Robert Reich.

  

How the hell can the race be tied?

Two weeks before an election in which America should be sending Trump home (and then to jail), he and Harris are in a statistical tie in the battleground states. 

ROBERT REICH OCT 22

 

https://robertreich.substack.com/p/how-the-hell-can-they-be-tied?

How Can Trump be Running Neck and Neck ? Reich

https://robertreich.substack.com/p/how-can-it-be-that-trump-is-running?

Reich: 10 Basic Economic Myths

Reich.

Basic economic myths.  Plus 

 

https://open.substack.com/pub/robertreich/p/bonus-debunking-myth-trump-supporters?r=1fnbdp&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email

 

 

It’s too easy to conclude that Trump supporters are ignorant.

Addressing the root causes of their support for Trump doesn’t justify their support of him. But if we want to reduce the lure of Trumpism — of authoritarianism and neofascism — we need to address these root causes.

For the past 10 weeks, I’ve offered 10 video essays on the 10 biggest economic myths. They have been used to justify a system whose gains increasingly go to the top, while most Americans have been working harder but getting nowhere. 

Over the last 40 years, the “free market” has been rigged and power has shifted upward to corporate executives and investors who engage in organized bribery — bankrolling lawmakers who change laws and regulations to their benefit. 

This has allowed the powerful to monopolize industries, bash unions, pay lower taxes, make big financial bets on Wall Street and get bailed out when the bets go sour, outsource jobs abroad, and pretend they’re job creators who deserve all this power.

The result? The richest 1 percent of Americans now own nearly as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent put together.  

Most Americans without college degrees are working longer hours than they worked decades ago and taking fewer sick days or vacations. They have less job security. 

Life expectancy has been falling for Americans without college degrees. That’s because income and wealth have direct impacts on health and longevity. Income and wealth determine access to life-supporting services like high-quality preventive health care, nutritious foods, and housing. 

Income and wealth also have a lot to do with whether someone is endangered by handguns, opioids, and economic stress.

We cannot separate what has happened to the typical American from the dangerous lure of Trumpism. Trump has exploited their anger and anxiety for his own ends, but the anger and anxiety are real. Unless addressed, they will be exploited by other authoritarians long after Trump is history. 

America’s working class has become angrier and more frustrated — and more vulnerable to demagogues like Trump, peddling the politics of hate.

But this doesn’t have to be our fate. We have the power to make the system work for the many, not the few. 

The goal in the upcoming election is not only to vanquish Trump. It’s also to vanquish Trumpism — the attraction of authoritarian fascism. How? By shifting power and wealth away from America’s oligarchs and back toward average working Americans. 

This requires:

Breaking up monopolies. Strengthening labor unions. Making it harder for big corporations to outsource jobs abroad. 

Providing paid leave. Raising the minimum wage. Ensuring that everyone who needs a job has one. 

Making child care and elder care, and housing, affordable. Providing Medicare for all. Paying for this by raising taxes on the super-wealthy and on big corporations. 

And, not the least, getting big money out of politics. 

None of these goals will be easy to achieve. They will demand our energy and tenacity. The Biden-Harris administration has made a good start on them. The Harris-Walz administration will do even more, if given a chance. 

We must all do our part — not just by voting but also by being activists in our communities, our states, and in the nation. 

The stakes could not be higher. 

***

I hope you’ve found our debunking series useful. Please share. Many thanks for joining me. 

If you’d like to see or review the entire series, just click on the link:

Myth #1: Economics has nothing to do with politics, morality, or power. BUNK! 

Myth #2: Government obstructs the free market. BUNK!

Myth #3: The rich deserve to be rich. BUNK!

Myth #4: Corporate political donations are free speech. BUNK!

Myth #5: The market doesn’t play favorites. BUNK!

Myth #6: Global trade is good for everyone. BUNK!

Myth #7: America is socialist. BUNK!

Myth #8: Corporate tax cuts create jobs. BUNK!

Myth #9: Inflation is caused by wage increases and too much government spending. BUNK!

Myth #10: Economic growth is always good. BUNK!

***

 

 

How to Survive Until the Election + Robert Reich

 

Reich: How to Survive This Election 

	Forwarded this email? Subscribe here for more How to survive the next 60  days (and help America survive beyond them) Putting your outrage to constructive use ROBERT REICH  Before President Biden decided to not run.  Friends,  ( See the organizations at the end of this post. ) Fewer days now.  The 2024 election is  100  days away. How can we survive until then? How can we help America survive beyond it? Many of you tell me or write in the comments section of this letter that you’re already filled with outrage. I am, too.  Trump is still not locked up, although he incited an attack on the U.S. Capitol more than three years ago, which resulted in several deaths and could have cost the lives of many more, including members of Congress.  He did it to overturn the results of the 2020 election.  If he’s able to delay his trials and he gets elected, he may never be held accountable.  He hasn’t stopped lying that the 2020 election was stolen from him, causing Americans to be more divided than at any time since the Civil War.  He’s on the way to winning the Republican nomination, and polls (unreliable as early polls are) show him beating Biden.  He has turned one of our two major political parties against democracy and toward neofascism.  He embodies moral squalor — bragging about sexually assaulting women, being found in a civil trial to have raped a woman, lying constantly about everything, claiming immigrants are “poisoning the blood” of America, calling for a “termination” of the Constitution, describing political opponents as “vermin.”  And on and on.  All good reasons to be outraged.  But do me a favor right this moment. Take a deep breath and consider what you’re doing with your outrage. Outrage on its own is exhausting (take this from someone who’s spent the better part of the last 77 years feeling outraged about one thing or another).  It can also lead to two disempowering states: despair and cynicism.  I know many who are in despair about the possibility of another Trump presidency. Their despair follows them around during the day and wakes them at night. It is robbing them of most joy in their lives.  I know others who have sunk into deep cynicism. The system is rotten to the core, they tell themselves. Why even worry about Trump? Nothing can be done in any event. They’ve stopped listening to or reading the news. Why bother? Maybe you fall into one of these camps. I don’t mean to criticize you. I understand completely. Hell, I’ve been there myself. But despair and cynicism can be self-fulfilling prophesies. They can stop you from taking political action. As such, they make it more likely that Trump will become president — and that neofascism will prevail.  Outrage can be a positive force if it fuels activism — if it gets people off their butts to do any number of things that individually don’t seem like much but taken together can have a big impact. What sort of things? Forgive me if I’ve suggested this before, but for example:  1. Becoming even more politically active. For some of us, this will mean taking more time out of our normal lives — up to and including getting out the vote in critical swing states. For others, it will mean phone banking, making political contributions, writing letters to editors, and calling friends and relations in key states. 2. Starting now to organize. Even if you cannot take much time out of your normal life for direct politics, you will need to organize, mobilize, and energize your friends, colleagues, and neighbors. A number of effective groups can help you (I’ve added their names and web addresses at the end).  3. Countering lies with truth. When you hear someone repeating a Trump Republican lie, correct it. This will require that you prepare yourself with facts, logic, analysis, and sources. 4. Not tolerating bigotry and hate. When you come across it, call it out. Stand up to it. Denounce it. Demand that others denounce it, too. 5. Not resorting to name-calling, bullying, intimidation, violence, or any of the other tactics that Trump followers may be using. We cannot save democracy through anti-democratic means. 6. Being compassionate toward hardcore followers of Trump, but remaining firm in your opposition. Understanding why someone might decide to support Trump is fine. But you don’t want to waste your time and energy trying to convert them. Use your time and energy on those who still have open minds. 7. Not wasting your time complaining. Don’t gripe, whine, or kvetch about how awful Trump and his Republican enablers are. Or about how ineffective Biden and the Democrats are in communicating how bad Trump and his Republican enablers are. None of this will get you anything except an upset stomach or worse. 8. Asking everyone you know to vote for Biden and not sit this election out or vote for a third-party candidate. Even if they don’t especially like Biden — even if they’re tired of voting for the “lesser of two evils” or fed up not “voting my conscience” — they still have to vote for Joe Biden. He may not be perfect, but Trump is truly evil. 9. Demonstrating, but not confusing demonstration for political action. You may find it gratifying to stand on a corner in Berkeley or Cambridge or any other liberal precinct with a sign asking drivers to “honk if you hate fascism” and elicit lots of honks. But this is as politically effectual as taking a warm shower. Organize people who don’t normally vote to vote for Biden. Mobilize get-out-the-vote efforts in your community. Get young people involved. 10. Not getting distracted by the latest outrageous Trump post or speech or story. Don’t let Trump’s hunger for immediate attention or the media’s complicity with that hunger divert your eyes from the prize — the survival of American democracy during one of the greatest stress tests it has had to endure, organized by one of the worst demagogues in American history. You probably have many other ideas (please feel free to add them in the comments).  My point is to use your outrage. Please don’t let it wear you down. Don’t try to smother it. Using it will make you feel and be powerful. And your power is desperately needed right now.  Share If you’d like more specific guidance on what you might do, check out these organizations: Swing Left: https://swingleft.org/ VoteForward: https://votefwd.org/ MoveOn: https://front.moveon.org/ Indivisible: https://indivisible.org/ Data for Progress: https://www.dataforprogress.org/ Stand Up America: https://standupamerica.com/ Common Cause: https://www.commoncause.org/

guidance on what you might do, check out these organizations: Swing Left: https://swingleft.org/ VoteForward: https://votefwd.org/ MoveOn: https://front.moveon.org/ Indivisible: https://indivisible.org/ Data for Progress: https://www.dataforprogress.org/ Stand Up America: https://standupamerica.com/ Common Cause: https://www.commoncause.org/ https://www.mobilize.us/dailykos/

The Job Creation Hoax I 10 Economic Myths Debunked #8 | Robert Reich

10 Economic Myths Debunked #7

How We Get From Corporate Personhood to bad air, water, health care, and more.

 Robert Reich, 

For years, conservatives have railed against what they call the “administrative state” and denounced regulations. 

But let’s be clear. When they speak of the “administrative state,” they’re talking about agencies tasked with protecting the public from corporations that seek profits at the expense of the health, safety, and pocketbooks of average Americans. 

Regulations are the means by which agencies translate broad legal mandates into practical guardrails.

Substitute the word “protection” for “regulation” and you get a more accurate picture of who has benefited — consumers, workers, and average people needing clean air and clean water. 

Substitute “corporate legal movement” for the “conservative legal movement” and you see who’s really mobilizing, and for what purpose. 

**

I spent four years as policy director at the Federal Trade Commission, advising the commissioners on how best to protect the public from corporate excesses. I spent four more years as secretary of labor, protecting American workers from the depredations of big American corporations. 

Most large corporations I dealt with obeyed laws and regulations designed to protect the public, but they spent a great deal of money trying to prevent such laws and regulations from being created in the first place and additional efforts contesting them through the courts. 

Last week, the Supreme Court made it much harder for the FTC, the Labor Department, and dozens of other agencies — ranging from the Environmental Protection Agency to the Food and Drug Administration, Securities and Exchange Commission, Occupational Safety and Health Administration, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and National Highway and Safety Administration — to protect Americans from corporate misconduct.

On Thursday, the six Republican-appointed justices eliminated the ability of these agencies to enforce their rules through in-house tribunals, rather than go through the far more costly and laborious process of suing corporations in federal courts before juries. 

On Friday, the justices overturned a 40-year-old precedent requiring courts to defer to the expertise of these agencies in interpreting the law, thereby opening the agencies to countless corporate lawsuits alleging that Congress did not authorize the agencies to go after specific corporate wrongdoing.

In recent years, the court’s majority has also made it easier for corporations to sue agencies and get public protections overturned. The so-called “major questions doctrine” holds that judges should nullify regulations that have a significant impact on corporate profits if Congress was not sufficiently clear in authorizing them.

Make no mistake: Consumers, workers, and ordinary Americans will be hurt by these decisions. Big corporations — especially their top executives and major investors — will make even more money than they’re already making because of them. 

**

These rulings are the consequence of a corporate strategy launched 53 years ago.

In 1971, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, then a modest business group in Washington, D.C., asked Lewis Powell, then an attorney in Richmond, Virginia, to recommend actions corporations should take in response to the rising tide of public protections (that is, regulations). 

Powell’s memo — distributed widely to Chamber members — said corporations were “under broad attack” from consumer, labor, and environmental groups. 

Economic myths. The rich. Reich.

 Dangerous Economic Myths. Robert Reich.

The Rich deserve to be rich.

https://open.substack.com/pub/robertreich/p/debunking-myth-2-government-obstructs?

Don’t be fooled by the myth that people are paid what they’re “worth” — that the rich deserve their ever-increasing incomes and wealth because they’re worth far more to the economy now than years ago (when the incomes and wealth of those at the top were more modest relative to everyone else’s). 

The distribution of income and wealth increasingly depend on who has the power to set the rules of the game.

Those at the top are raking in record income and wealth compared to everyone else because:

1. CEOs have linked their pay to the stock market through stock options. They then use corporate stock buybacks to increase stock prices and time the sale of their options to those increases.

2. They get inside information about corporate profits and losses before the rest of the public and trade on that insider information. This is especially true of hedge fund managers, who specialize in getting insider information before other investors. 

3. They create or work for companies that have monopolized their markets. This enables them to charge consumers higher prices than if they had to compete for those consumers. And it lets them keep wages low, because workers have fewer options of whom to work for. 

4. They use their political influence to get changes in laws, regulations, and taxes that benefit themselves and their corporations, while harming those without this kind of influence — especially smaller competitors, consumers, and workers.

5. They were born into (or married into) wealth. These days, the most important predictor of someone’s future income and wealth in America is the income and wealth of their parents. Sixty percent of all wealth is inherited. And we’re on the cusp of the biggest intergenerational transfer of wealth in history, from rich boomers to their children.

None of these reasons for the explosion of incomes and wealth at the top has anything to do with worth or merit. They have to do with power — or the power of one’s parents.

Meanwhile, the pay of average workers has stagnated because they have lost economic power and the political influence that goes with it. Corporations have kept a lid on wages by outsourcing work abroad, replacing workers with software, and preventing workers from unionizing. 

Bottom line: Wealth doesn’t measure how hard someone has worked or what they deserve. It measures how well our economic system has worked for them. 

Thanks again for joining me today. I hope you’ll share our “debunk” series. If you’re able, please help support our efforts by purchasing a paid subscription for yourself and a gift subscription for someone else.

The Dangerous Anti Democracy Coalition _ Reich

 Elon Musk and entrepreneur and investor David Sacks reportedly held a secret billionaire dinner party in Hollywood last month. Its purpose: to defeat Joe Biden and reinstall Donald Trump in the White House. The guest list included Peter Thiel, Rupert Murdoch, Michael Milken, Travis Kalanick, and Steven Mnuchin, Trump’s Treasury secretary. 

Meanwhile, Musk is turning up the volume and frequency of his anti-Biden harangues on his X platform. 

Since January, Musk has posted about Biden at least seven times a month, attacking the president for everything from his age to his policies on immigration and health. Last month, Musk posted on X that Biden “obviously barely knows what’s going on” and that “He is just a tragic front for a far left political machine.”

So far this year, Musk has posted more than 20 times in favor of Trump, arguing that he’s a victim of media and prosecutorial bias in the criminal cases that Trump faces.

This is no small matter. Musk has 184 million followers on X. And because he owns the platform, he’s able to manipulate the algorithm to maximize the number of people who see his posts. 

No other leader of a social media firm has been as willing to tip the political scales toward authoritarian leaders around the world — not just toward Trump but also toward Javier Milei, the president of Argentina; Jair Bolsonaro of Brazil; and Narendra Modi of India. 

Some of this helps Musk’s business interests. In India, he has secured lower import tariffs for Tesla vehicles. In Brazil, he has opened a major new market for Starlink, SpaceX’s satellite internet service. In Argentina, he has solidified access to lithium, the mineral most crucial to Tesla’s batteries. 

Musk has slammed Biden for his decisions on electric vehicle promotion and subsidies, most of which have favored unionized U.S. auto manufacturers. Musk and his Tesla are viciously anti-union. 

But something deeper is going on. Musk, Thiel, Murdoch, and their cronies are backing a movement against democracy. 

Peter Thiel, the billionaire tech financier, has written, “I no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible.” 

Hello? If freedom is not compatible with democracy, what is it compatible with?  

Thiel donated $15 million to the successful Republican Ohio senatorial campaign of J.D. Vance, who alleged that the 2020 election was stolen and that Biden’s immigration policy meant “more Democrat voters pouring into this country.” (Vance is now high on the list of Trump vice presidential possibilities.)