This is the way things look to me.
The left—those folks who I
had mistakenly thought were supposed to be opposed to the status quo—have
strangely sided with the establishment powers-that-be since Donald Trump won
the election.
And
as bad as Trump is—draining the swamp with one hand, and filling it with the
other—he has at least at times engaged in some swamp draining!Minimum Wage, Maximum ...Check
Amazon for Pricing.
Further these people have the
audacity to call themselves “The Resistance”! I’m not sure this has happened
before. A group of rabble rousers rallying to the cause of the Status Quo?
Rabble rousing to defend the ruling class against someone who would dare
challenge the comfort of the privileged folks on top? Do you remember Trump’s
great line at his inauguration with presidents George W. Bush, Barack Obama,
Bill Clinton, and Jimmy Carter, and Congressional leaders Mitch McConnell and
Paul Ryan standing right there behind him?
For too long, a small group
in our nation’s capital has reaped the rewards of government while the people
have borne the cost. Washington flourished, but the people did not share in its
wealth. Politicians prospered, but the jobs left and the factories closed. The
establishment protected itself, but not the citizens of our country. Their
victories have not been your victories. Their triumphs have not been your
triumphs. And while they celebrated in our nation’s capital, there was little
to celebrate for struggling families all across our land.
Millions of Americans are fed
up with politicians of both parties, and indeed hate and feel contempt for
Washington’s officeholders. Thus, the vote in 2010 for a Republican House
against a sitting Democrat president, the 2014 vote for a Republican Senate and
the 2016 vote for an outsider like Trump for the presidency. But it looks like
these voters’ preferences will be overridden once again.
Under
constant pressure from The Establishment and their champions among the rabble
rousers, Trump is capitulating at an increasing rate. Most recently it seems
Trump is excited to see positive statements written about him in The New York Times and The Washington Post.
The policies that Trump has joined with the Establishment in supporting during
these first eight months in office include continuing the wars in the Middle
East despite his campaign rhetoric, allowing the unconstitutional executive
order enacting DACA to linger on for another 6 months after leaving it to
linger on for his first 8 months in office despite promising to rescind it his
first day in office, supporting the bill that would only slightly alter the
unconstitutional Affordable Health Care Law rather than demanding the repeal
and replacement he had promised, increasing the debt limit once again as has
been enacted by the Establishment more than 20 times now, increasing the
levels of protectionism to the detriment of the American consumer, and populating
his administration with a lopsided array of Goldman Sachs personnel. (Gee, I
wonder who these guys will favor while in office?) Likewise, is the case of the
many military generals—remember the MIC (the Military-Industrial-Complex that
President Eisenhower warned us about in 1961?) We may be witnessing a slow-motion military coup as Trump
appoints and follows the advice of general after general. At this rate, the
Trump presidency may prove to be a third term of Obama/fifth term of Bush)!
Jim Cox [send him mail]
is the author of Minimum Wage, Maximum Damage; The Concise Guide to Economics, and most
recently The Haiku Economist and did not vote for
Trump having pulled the lever (with little enthusiasm) for Gary Johnson.
