TRUMP IS AMERICA’S NEWEST EMPLOYEE, HE NEEDS TO CONTINUALLY BE TOLD ABOUT HIS JOB

…One of the 50,000 closed US factories

 

Trump’s voters are not against the US government, they consistently rely on its help.

 

It’s time to talk some truth about what occurred in the run-up to the November elections, and it’s time for those that lost to stop beating themselves up.  The Republicans keep talking about getting rid of the “failed policies of the past”.  They of course are not referring to what President Obama inherited from the GOP in 2008.  Those “failed policies” of the president saved us all from having another Great Depression.  They saved the US auto industry and gave 20 million more Americans health care coverage.

 

As to the latter item, it has been know that Obamacare has needed some changes and fixes since it began.  But it has been the Republicans that have kept any changes or improvements from happening.  All they have done is tried to repeal it well over 50 times in Congress, with offering nothing to replace it for those 20 million people

 

But according to the GOP, the narrow victory of Donald Trump, coupled with the largest ever loss of the US popular vote, this is supposed to be their mandate and the message that the losers were totally clueless and are supposed to now just slink away, and hide in the shadows.

 

Well, that is ridiculous.

 

Let’s face it, there has never been a presidential election as there was in 2016.

 

To start with, there has never been an American presidential election where one party started with a choice of 17 potential nominees.

 

In addition, for many months, the “Birther-in-Chief’s” campaign was covered as nothing more than a publicity stunt.  And why was that?  It’s because Mr. Trump has been well known for doing things with the sole purpose of giving him all the attention.

 

It has become understood that Donald Trump’s original “Birther” issue about President Obama was a way for him to become acknowledged by those individuals that were already against the first black US president.  Why else would he have continued to acknowledge the president as an illegitimate president for five straight years, even after the full birth certificate was produced?

 

Even the New York Times has acknowledged that the whole birther movement was staged mainly for introducing Donald Trump to Republican politics.

 

As the election season progressed, and one by one the GOP candidates dropped out, while Trump continued to absorb the lion’s share of all the free publicity.  Trump’s outrageous and inflammatory statements were reported on regularly, because yes, they were newsworthy. The nation had never seen a presidential candidate like “The Donald”.  No TV star had ever run for national office since Ronald Reagan, and Reagan was nothing like Trump.  Trump’s raucous rallies were a lot more interesting to watch than those of Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio. The fact that Trump got a lot of exposure, however, did not compel a single voter to support him.  In fact, many were motivated in the other direction.

 

But look at the supporters that did vote for Donald J. Trump.  The 87% that voted for Donald Trump were mostly white American workers that wanted serious change because over the past 20-30 years, their jobs were going away and many hadn’t had a pay raise in all those years.  They wanted the change that Donald Trump was promising, even though to this day Trump has not stated how he is going to bring back all those jobs he promises to return. 

 

And I don’t mean 700-800 jobs at Carrier Air Conditioning or 700 jobs at Ford Motors.  I’m talking about the tens of thousands of jobs that have left the country or been replaced by automation.  According to the government studies, over 50,000 US factories have closed or left the country over the past 20-30 years.  And today, annually, more US companies are closing than are starting.

 

 

…Another abandoned US Factory

 

So, this is the explanation for why we now have a Republican President, a Republican Congress and a split US Supreme Court.

 

The world has become a global world.  Those jobs that filled the factories in middle America have either gone away to another low-wage country or they have been replaced by automation.  The population of the country has also changed as well, and this is how a candidate that lost by the largest popular vote ever, still won the Electoral College.

 

The US population has been moving out of middle America and they have migrated to both of the nation’s coasts.  According to the Census Bureau, more than 70% of the US population today lives in “urbanized areas” and more than half live in “coastal watershed” counties, generally within 50 miles of one of the oceans or of the Great Lakes.  With the exception of Florida, the states that gave Trump the election were not those states on the coasts.

 

Americans have been moving from rural areas and small towns into the cities for decades because that’s where they find jobs and economic opportunity.  In addition, for the younger generations, big cities are interesting places to live, full of diversity, educational institutions, cultural attractions and good restaurants.

 

The other point is, that yes, the Democrats have some big issues ahead.  They need to make some serious changes in pursuing local and state political wins, and they need to develop some new and young Democratic leadership.  With Obama leaving the scene, today there is no obvious up and coming Democratic leaders.

 

But what about the increasing national liberal movement, do they have to hang their heads in this latest loss?  Absolutely not!   The conservative majorities in the House and Senate will soon recall that Trump promised during the campaign to improve and even expand the social safety net, not to rip it to shreds. He stated over and over again that he would not cut Social Security, Medicare or Medicaid.  He also pledged to spend $1 trillion on infrastructure projects and to cut “everyone’s” taxes.  (He and the GOP Congress need to be constantly reminded of these promises.)  This spending is not to be done through reducing taxes.  This is spending government money to fix our roads, dams, airports, bridges, schools, vet hospitals, and reservoirs.

 

To read Trump’s win as some kind of sweeping victory for conservatism is absurd. Progressive voices, loud ones, will be needed to hold Trump accountable for his campaign promises. One thing we have learned is that Trump’s voters, not those Republicans in Congress, do not see the government as being so oppressive. They instead consistently rely on its help.

 

The America that supports progressive policies, that rejects racism and sexism in all their forms, that America is real too, and it needs to make itself heard loud and clear.

 

As one Washington Post writer wrote, “…an election was lost, but not the country…..and not our rights as full participants in the American experiment. Donald Trump is our newly hired employee. Let’s not hesitate to tell him what he needs to do.”

 

Hear, hear!

 

Copyright G.Ater  2017