I wish there was more of an effort to teach how the antebellum South practiced democracy. The vote was public, the landowners and their families were also candidates, and everybody knew who would win in advance and who wouldn't get the best choice of milk, meats, and veggies as the result of their vote.
That’s the southern tradition they want to bring back.
The antebellum south was so awful that being known for “simply” for having a large share of its population in chattel slavery, is kind of a propaganda/PR coup.
Few know about its system of mass incarceration, surveillance and informant network, endemic corruption, horrendous public health/diets, non existent infrastructure, unstable economy, as well as the poverty and servility experienced by most southern whites.
Hyper exploitation of a racial underclass poisons everything in a society. Plunder, coercion, and dishonesty bleeds into every facet of life.
I mean at a certain point **** just has to get cheaper too.
I make more money than I ever have but it doesn’t even matter and they aren’t about to be paying me 140 dollars an hour so I can live like the old timers did.
Saying small raises is good for workers is wild though.
It's called stagflation.
The price of things have gone up enough that people buy less which Means that companies cannot give higher raises.
The fact Trump keeps attacking Iran hides the fact we were tilting into stagflation to begin with.
The craziest part of stagflation is studies show even when people are doing well, they stop buying because they don't believe their prosperity will last forever, because reality is nothing is assured to vr forever. It's the struggle they see around them which is a root cause of stagflation. Lack of consumer confidence and why presidents have between Carter until now moved mountains to put money in regular people’s pockets.
The whole neoliberal order than existed until…. Well now…. Was based on the push for consumers to never question the idea of never ending growth? Prosperity is the American Dream.
I am telling ya’ll America is not ready for the day the media stops lying to them and explains how Trump killed the golden goose because he wanted to decorate his office with it’s feathers.
Yup. No more yearly phone, no more eating out like we used to, no more clothes just because. Really just the things off the top of my head. Selective isn’t even the word. the things I (we as a family) used to do aren’t even looked at as options. Just complete lifestyle changes
Funny thing is, we have more now than we’ve ever had. If I was brining in what I was 8-10 years ago I’d be explaining why we’re giving up the house lol. People who haven’t made serious moves in the past couple years have to be hurting. If you were paycheck to paycheck in 2022, you’re in the soup kitchen today without a doubt
Qualitatively, this is the worst economy I’ve experienced in terms of day-to-day life and the general vibe. Most of the people whom I knew in 08-09 and still hang out with now range from upper-middle class, professional class and few petite bourgeoisie and they have all reigned in their spending big time. This despite the fact that their wages are much higher than in 08-09 and they have some degree of economic security from their families assets (ranging from trust funds down to the ability to move back home and live rent-free). Even the ones who get income from rents and investments, reinvest everything. Even for those on the right side of the K-shaped economy, inflation and economic pessimism are supressing consumption. But there's something even more powerful at work here, dread. Unless things radically change, everything will be privatized, the cost of health care and education will keep going up, the dollar is in danger of losing its reserve currency status, and a handful of billionaire tech bros are selling their latest technology as being the
destroyer of good jobs.
So Milton Friedman had an idea called the "Permanent Income Hypothesis." The idea is that assuming that households have sufficient access to credit, households will not change their marginal propensity to consume in a manner that closesly mirrors the fluctutaions of top-line macro economic numbers. Durning temporayer downturns and marginal losses of income or asset depreciation, household will borrow in order to offset their short-term losses. During good times, they will pay back what they borrowed in bad times. Friedma argued that there will be high marghinal propensity to consume if the fundamentals of an economy are strong.
I'd argue that in many ways, he was correct as far as the 08-09 GFC indicated. The top 10% of wealth and income holders (minus the top .01%) saw the crisis as transitory, had economic backstops in terms of assets, and could borrow in a way that papered over temporay loses in asset value and in returns from investments.
In 2026, the Permanent Income Hypothesis still holds true among the top 10% (minus the top. 01%) but the distressing parts is that this top 10% (less the super wealthy) have made a vote of no confidence towards the US's Economy's
fundamentals. Their consumer spending has dropped and it is saying that hard times are ahead unless there is major structural change. This is why low unemployment numbers, high stock prices, and generally low inetrest rates have not moved the needle very much.
Your reply to me felt as if I said something against your opinion. You can see my prior replies. I know we lost and **** will get infinitely worse if they win come November or he suspends the elections, which I can see him trying now that Nicaragua did just that. 
I'm sure he had a chair in his bedroom to sit and watch. What a c***!
