3 headlines/reasons why people don't read the paper

Three pretty depressing headlines in yesterday's Post, one ridiculous - the return of football - and two important and especially depressing - stagnation on the job front, and the President abandoning the regulation of ozone pollution.  Of those two, hard to decide where to start, or which one is worse.

I guess I'll start with the news of no new job growth in August and persistent 9 percent unemployment (though the Sierra Club is hiring!). Those numbing stats came out on Friday, September 2nd.  So bad news for the president, the country and of course workers and the unemployed.  

But who is doing fine? An under reported story last week (August 26th) pointed out that corporations are doing great. According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis corporate profits AND cash on hand increased in the second quarter.  And the profits were pretty hefty: $57.3 billion in the second quarter, according to the BEA, after growing $19 billion in the first quarter.  So more than $70 billion in profits, profits hefty enough to in theory give companies confidence to re-enter the job market.

Increasing hiring is a tangible step these profitable corporations should take. And you would think it would be in their interests to do so.  I'll paraphrase a quote every American has heard from Henry Ford: "I want people who have the money to afford my products."

Consumers drive the U.S. economy, but why aren't corporations hiring and thus creating more consumers? 

But I guess it is the height of naivete to question why corporations can't understand the larger stakes here, beyond creating more consumers.  I'm referring to the need to act in the common good.

Before you make fun of my naivete, I'd like to remind folks that the notion of the common good helped guide the United States in the post war years and especially during the cold war. The U.S. and the west needed to show the world that our system was better than the communist one.

So, among other things: workers were allowed to unionize and as a result wages went up and the middle class exploded; the civil rights movement overturned legal segregation; government safety nets such as Medicare, Medicaid and landmark environmental bill were passed; trillions were poured into public universities, etc.

And by and large corporations went along. They offered health insurance, did not move factories and jobs to Mexico or China or wherever, and pay scales were much more proportionate and not nearly as grotesque as they are now, where CEOs make 50 to 100 times more than their employees.  They understood that their profits were a result of operating in a stable, progressive, democratic state, and they benefited from contributing to the common good.

The common good buy-in started to erode under Reagan and the anti-tax movements that hatched in California in the late 70s (remember Proposition 8, the ballot initiative that turned California from the promised land to a failed state? Makes sense that narcissistic politics would start near Hollywood) but really picked up steam once Communism collapsed.  

After the Berlin Wall fell, the narrative became 'capitalism wins!' rather than the more honest, accurate and complex assessment that 'a shared government-corporate commitment to building a huge middle class' won.  Our system was better because government - via laws and programs, and a progressive tax code - and corporations - by paying their taxes AND hiring Americans and paying their workers middle class wages - democratized capital.

As we now know, democratizing capital is no longer a common good. Companies don't care about that or the middle class.  The cold war ended as globalization was getting a foot hold, and corporations abandoned the U.S. and shipped the working class jobs abroad.  Union membership went down, wages tumbled, but corporate profits went up.  Various bubbles in housing, the internet, etc. allowed us to ignore those trends for a while.  But a bursting housing bubble - fed by the repeal of Glass-Steagle and other consumer protections - exposed the tenuous ground many middle class Americans were standing on.

Keynesian economics call for governments to prime the pump when corporations can not, such as in the Depression, or WILL not, like now.  That won't happen any time soon.

Unfortunately, corporations have a key ally in the modern Republican party.  They too have abandoned the middle class in favor of the corporate class - insidiously using social issues and working class votes to do so.  Republicans would rather cut taxes for the wealthy rather than spend tax money on the middle class or on another stimulus or infrastructure bank. And they'd rather see the country suffer than see the President succeed. 

  

Speaking of the President, how depressing to have Obama - not Bush - suspend plans to more tightly regulate ozone pollution. There is no way to sugar coat any aspect of this decision.

One, the decision means more air pollution.  Clean air is NOT a boutique issue that you can chuck or in this case suspend during tough economic times.  Seniors and children will suffer as a result of the White House's decision.

Two, it undercuts the EPA and Administrator Jackson, the best member of the Obama cabinet.

Three, the President is giving in to lobbying pressure from polluters. Giving in to the oil industry does not match the rhetoric of 'the audacity of hope' or 'the fierce urgency of now.'

Four, it is simply terrible politics and yet another capitulation to the Republicans. Cleaner air is not a burdensome regulation, no matter what Rick Perry or John Boehner say.  First it was extending the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, then it was linking increasing the debt ceiling to budget cuts without increasing revenue, and now opposing cleaner air.  

I could have mentioned not supporting a single payer, Medicare-for-all style health care system, but we new that as a candidate he did not support that style of reform.  

But rehashing candidate Obama's quotes DOES remind you how compelling he was two years ago. Now he seems determined to cave on core and important issues that would benefit the country and yes the common good.  Instead, the President is doing things that benefit the wealthy, big oil, and the Tea Party.

Maybe it will help him get reelected.  What on earth are the Rs going to complain about, they've gotten a lot of what they've asked for!  

But we expected and hoped for so much more from President Obama.  I wish the guy from 2 years ago would reappear.

Finally, the reappearance of football season for me always stinks.  I do not like the way TV and the paper pivots away from baseball to report on every little detail about pro and college football.  Baseball and the nation deserve better, from sports and from the President.

OK, my rant is over.  Here's hoping next week is better.