IF THE GOP WINS IN NOVEMBER, THE “GILDED AGE” WILL BE BACK

….A political cartoon from the Gilded Age

Just look at the score card:  Conservatives 10 / Liberals 0

How many of the American citizens today would you think are aware of the period of time in the United States that is referred to as the “Gilded Age?”

During the decades from 1870 to 1900, this was what was later referred to as the “Gilded Age”.  That is defined as when there was soaring income and wealth inequality like today, and American laborers lacked any basic worker’s rights, the nation’s minorities were being treated poorly, and they were often prevented from voting while the nation’s monopolies such as the oil companies and the railroads were those that were actually running the country.

Well, hold on to your ass, because with a Republican President Trump, and with the Republicans running both houses in the US Congress, if things don’t seriously change with the Mid-Term elections, and with another conservative supreme court justice, the “New Gilded Age” will begin again in 2019.

Just look at what President Trump has promised and what is going on in the country today.

In our social areas, during the 2016 campaign, President Trump said that if he were to be our president, he would nominate those supreme court justices that would overturn the court's abortion rights decision of Roe v Wade.

Just look at the latest decision since the Trump nominated Neil Gorsuch justice joined the high court.  This week the justices voted 5 to 4 to allow government workers who are represented by a union to skip out on paying a fair-share or an agency fee, which covers the cost of the union’s collective bargaining, if they choose not to be represented by a union.

Just as back then, when labor workers lacked basic rights, and just as worker’s wages have been stagnate for the last two decades, we now have massive income inequality and basic union rights are being stifled by a conservative supreme court.  This is the results of multi-year efforts by the right-wing conservatives to kneecap the public-sector unions representing everyone from teachers to nurses to border officers, a vital part of not just the Democratic Party base, but also a now declining middle-class society.

Those that voted for Trump, his real voting base, those are the people that will be mostly affected by the choices that Trump & company make for both the supreme court and all the life-time federal court judges that his Senate is approving.

We are all aware that union membership has been on the decline for decades. Many economic analysts say that is a major factor in the United States’ growing income and wealth inequality. Unions don’t just allow workers to group together to negotiate with employers; they also financially support disadvantaged minority groups. The gender wage gap for union members is only half that of those who are not represented by a union. African Americans are more likely to be union members than whites, and they are also more likely to be employed in the public sector.

But just look at all the things that the conservatives have supported that go against the average working American and that supports the wealthy.

·       It was the conservative Supreme Court that voted 5-4 to support Citizens-United.  That allowed corporations and the rich to spend millions on their election causes and candidates.

·       It is conservatives that focus on not supporting Planned Parenthood, the number one organization for poor women’s and children’s health care.

·       Conservatives love the NRA and want everyone to have a gun, any gun including assault weapons .

·       Trump and other conservatives seem to want to cuddle up to Russia, while penalizing our allies.

·       Conservatives are against Medicare, Medicaid and of course a single payer health care plan for every American.

·       It was conservatives in congress that have continued to shoot down plans for fixing our nation’s infrastructure.  (That includes roads, schools, bridges, public buildings, airports, electric grid, dams, flood plains.)

·       It was the conservative Supreme Court that gave us a 5-4 decision for George W. Bush over Al Gore, and that decision also gave us a war in Iraq.

·       It was a conservative Senate that held up Obama’s nominee, Merrick Garland for one full year, so we could instead get another conservative justice, Neil Gorsuch.

·       Under Trump, we have left the Iran nuclear deal, we left the Paris Climate Accord, the US left the Trans Pacific Trade deal, federal open areas were opened up for oil drilling, we now have trade tariffs that could cause a recession, Trump has also threatened to pull out of NATO, and we are now moving our Israel Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.  

·       The conservatives also gave us a bogus tax cut that rewards average Americans for 5 years, but gives millions to corporations and the wealthy 1% forever.

When FDR first came to power, due to his and the Democrats in government's efforts, the nation developed the largest ever successful middle class in any nation, ever!  The Republicans have been working for decades to change the nation back to the Gilded Age.

From the looks of things, if things don’t change soon, and if the America working middle class doesn’t get off their butts and organize and vote, the conservatives will be toasting themselves and saying that it took a long time, but the Gilded Age is back!

Copyright G.Ater  2018