We can’t make America great again until we Make America FAIR Again. And we can’t make America Fair for All, let alone restore it to greatness, unless we INVEST in it! Unless we FUND it! Why do I have to do all the friggin thinkin ‘round here??!! 

(And then along comes the Corona Economic Shock Treatment. Well, perhaps this is an opportunity for this latest strain of Quantative Easing to prove itself. Perhaps it’s the last chance. As I was saying… )

What I find so amazing… before the Corona Chaos came along, all these folks on both sides of the political aisle said they wanted to restore America to greatness. Wonderful! And they all seemed to agree that America was in an unprecedented mess… which the mis-management of our current Corona Crisis and concurrent stock market meltdown is making  painfully obvious. Of course, the causes of the pre-corona mess seem to depend on which flavor politics and economic system you prefer to believe in. Guess what… ANY system, whether capitalism, socialism, communism… not funded, not invested in, collapses. End of argument. What I don’t understand is why neither party makes any specific time period reference to exactly when America was great and makes absolutely no mention of the tax rates that were in place during that time of greatness when big business and the wealthy invested in America. The most recent opportunity to give Americans that point of reference was completely overlooked in all the Democratic debates! Talk about dropping the ball. A ripe opportunity lost! 

Interestingly, as we head fast toward a very uncertain economic future, we tend to cling harder to a mythical past. The real crisis here is not just the corona pandemic, it’s the brutal realization of just how unprepared we are to manage any type of crisis due to the Republican, Libertarian and corporate Democrat’s non stop, incremental de-funding of our government and the elimination of the government institutions that were once put in place to protect we the working folks and the land we live in from corporate/financial opportunism and natural calamities.  Depending on one’s age and circumstances, America’s “perceived” age of greatness was either during the 1950’s Eisenhower administration when tax on wealth was 91% and 50% on big business/corporations (not on workers, Labor or Main Street!) or the Reagan administration where tax on wealth had been cut to approximately 50% in 1985 and corporate tax cut to 33% . Those were the tax rates on wealth and corporate big business that once upon a time of greatness, FUNDED America. And what’s the current tax rate on wealth and corporations barely funding America now? Glad you asked… the approximate average of corporate and wealth tax combined is around 20 to 25% of what it was in the Eisenhower Ozzie and Harriet days of the late 1950’s. At least that’s what it was “effectively” as of 2019. So in the spirit of Reagan’s “Voo Doo” (Q. Bush Sr!) trickle down economics, we have incrementally DEFUNDED America from 1950’s 70% (corporate + wealth/2) to 1980’s 41% (corporate + wealth/2) and now we’re down to damn near 20%. The numbers are approximate, but you get the idea. That’s 65% less investment in America Kids!! That means less money to fund the administrative needs of our population that’s grown by 80% since the late 1950’s. Or, to put it more precisely, corporations and many of the wealthy just don’t find it useful to invest in America anymore, finding the blatant looting of our government’s treasury a much more lucrative pastime. It seems patriotism and integrity, along with American manufacturing, has also been “off-shored” and now considered inefficient and obsolete. This is not a recipe for restoring American greatness!

Let me ask you, dear fellow flea marketeers; before the corona wrecking ball came barreling along, could you comfortably maintain your modest lifestyle and raise your family if your income was slowly but incrementally cut by 25% one year, and then another 25% a few years later, and then another 15%, until eventually your income was 35% of what it was when you were rolling in greatness? I didn’t think so. And we haven’t even factored in inflation or the rate of union membership when America was great compared to what it is now… a reduction of 75%! Is the lightbulb beginning to turn on? People didn’t have to work two or three jobs to make ends meet when America was great because, unlike now, they made a living wage then! Big business also had incentives to pay labor livable wages in order to pay less tax to Uncle Sam. Win Win! And good wages create “demand” in an economy, something the “supply” siders always seem to overlook. But that dynamic slowly changed with the passing of “less tax for the wealthy!” legislation and corporate/big finance deregulation. It seems the corpo-wealthy have successfully colluded with our government bureaucrats and elected oaf-icials to have us citizen consumers make up the difference in lost funding by slowly putting more of the tax burden on our shoulders. Brilliant! How Beautifully Evil!… Greed is So Sexxxy, yes? And that’s why, pre-corona melt down, some of my customers (and flea market vendors) couldn’t come to the vintage shows that often because they had to work those two to three jobs just to make ends meet. Disposable income? Like the American Dream, a fast fading memory. Post corona, even less disposable income!!

A great America with an acceptable quality of life for all citizens has to be invested in, has to be properly funded in order to be properly administered, Period! Being resourceful and self-reliant only goes so far. Do you want your Social Security, Medicare and V.A. benefits? Gonna have to fund it! Want your bridges and roads built and maintained? Gonna have to fund it! Want to give our teachers a reason to teach so your kids can have the skills they need to navigate life? Gonna have to fund it… an investment in our future! Do you want to live in an America that has solid, effective plans in place to manage the inevitable weather, disease, or man made economic and enviromental disasters? Gonna have to fund it!!! I guess you can call me an economic “fund”-amentalist. Everyone, especially the wealthy and corporations, has to pay their fair share of taxes, has to invest in America, or we wind up with the chaos and uncertainty we are now dealing with from a poorly managed government that doesn’t have the funds, the wisdom or the will to manage itself and currently seems hell bent on dumping the entire contents of the US Treasury into the piggy banks of the elite insider politicians and multi-national corporate/big finance CEO’s, before it all completely blows up. See what happens when you listen to Grover Norquist and his merry gang of government de-funders… America’s woeful inability to meet the Covid 19 challenge is the most egregious example. Defunding America will NEVER make America great again. Sorry Grover. Sorry Mitch. Defunding our American government until it’s small enough to drown in a bathtub… sounds like MURDER to me. Ok, maybe it’s only treason. Me thinks these jokers might just have hell to pay. 

Here’s something to think about. Our current form of exploitive free market Capitalism has been crashing like clockwork about every ten years as of late. What’s the next inevitable challenge going to look like? Can it get any worse?

… tick tick, tick tick, tick 

One thing that remains undeniable is the steady decrease in the amount of taxes (investment) the wealthy and our corporate masters have had to pay to fund, or rather, de-fund, America’s greatness. It slowly began in the 1960’s. Since then, America’s income funding from tax revenues on wealth and corporations has been cut by approximately 65% from it’s time of Eisenhower greatness to the 15 to 20% trickle it is now as our population and expenses grow. And guess what, defunding will be going lower when Trump’s new “tax cuts”/hand outs for his wealthy vulture buddies go into effect in 2020!! And that’s assuming they pay any taxes at all! Ha! I see Apple and Amazon (who paid zero corporate taxes in 2018) are blushing. Gotta luv them loopholes! I can understand Trump’s hesitation to pinpoint that magical period of America’s greatness, after all, he’s too “smart” to contribute anything to American greatness by paying his fair share of taxes at any rate. Donald Deadbeat?! He’d prefer to leave the funding burden to us working class flea market folks. No? We can settle this right now. Let’s see his tax returns! And because of his access to tax loopholes and the creation of “shell” corporations, etc, not available to most of us; he, just like his wealthy predatory buddies, can benefit and brag amongst themselves about being non-contributing deadbeats, too “smart” to invest in American greatness! Blatant tax avoidance. Is that something to be proud of? Are you seeing the contradiction, double standard and hypocrisy here? Is the absurdity of defunding America’s greatness by promoting endless tax cuts for wealth and corporations as the way to economic nirvana sinking in yet? 

Makes me wonder, since when is not contributing to American society by avoiding paying taxes, “smart”? That used to be called, being “a god damn, hippie liberal deadbeat!!” Now being a non-contributing, “smart” deadbeat is a fashionable badge of honor amongst many Republicans, Libertarians and Corporate Democrats. And just as important as ditching deadbeats is independent citizen oversight of government spending to make sure our tax money investment is not squandered. Sometimes I can’t blame the Anarchist Republicans (Bakunin, Tea Party) who want to eliminate our wasteful government. Isn’t this what is really the issue here… all of our tax money, investment, wasted by our corrupt system of corporate/government bureaucratic collusion? Oh yeah, better hurry before Trump defunds the Government Accountability Office! (a future rant!)

As I’ve illustrated, all the tax cuts on wealth actually do is incrementally defund our government’s social and administrative abilities more and more until all our hard “earned benefits” (Social Security, Medicare, VA, etc.) evaporate from our pockets, and then magically reappear into the vaults and computer accounts of Wall Street CEO’s and their corrupt political enablers. Isn’t tax magic fun? Defunding our government is just like defunding your household income or your modest lifestyle. Sooner or later, (NOW!? Who’da a thunk…) you’re gonna hit the friggin wall and it ain’t going to be pretty. America will not return to greatness until the predatory vultures and their pandemic of greed and “rent seeking” are no longer allowed to defund, and rob, our government. That means legislation kids. And/or undoing the legislation crafted by the Koch Bros, ALEC, etc., designed to make you and I go broke and dependent on their credit/debt, digital payment, funny finance traps that snare us into a life of indentured servitude unhappily ever after. The American Sucker Society they have painstakingly crafted has played right into their hands. Welcome to Conform-unism. And those of you who choose, yes choose, not to speak up; who continue to choose to be apathetic… are now free to enjoy the rotted fruits of your inaction. And now that you’ve got a bit of free time on your hands, maybe you’ll get off your apathetic asses and demand our mis-leaders make the changes necessary to make America great again. Or are you going to continue to let others do the work for you? Yes, the long overdue Guilt Card. Ya see, in my world, the socially politically apathetic ain’t much different from the non-contributing corporate, wealthy deadbeats. There be takers and there be givers.

So, gotta ask…  just what kinda world, what kind of America, do you want to live in anyway? One where greed and empty tabloid bluster continues to Trump common administrative sense? If we’re going to make America Great Again, if we’re going to revitalize what’s left of the American Dream, if we are going to attempt to make America FAIR For All… we need to fund it!! We need to see it as an investment in restoring American greatness. Fingers crossed. Another round of Magic Money/Quantative Easing might just prime the pump… unless we squander it. Last call?

Don’t let the Trump/Minuchin bailout hit ya in the butt! 

Dismal Dave Lancon… …. attempting to stay amused despite all the reasons why I shouldn’t. All Rights Reserved © Dave Lancon May 2020