This is Trump’s latest promise, which like all his promises (“Mexico will pay,” “I’ll replace Obamacare with a better plan”) were full-on lies, but makes a statement that those ignorant of federal finance will believe: Replacing income taxes with tariffs.
In one short phrase, it makes three false assumptions. They are:
The federal government needs and uses income tax revenue (false)
Tariffs cost you nothing. They are paid by the exporting nation (false)
Trump will do as he says (false).
1 INCOME TAX: The federal government is Monetarily Sovereign. It invented the dollar, and by passing laws, it creates all the dollars it wants. So long as the government doesn’t run short of laws, it won’t unwillingly run short of dollars.
Alan Greenspan: “A government cannot become insolvent with respect to obligations in its own currency. There is nothing to prevent the federal government from creating as much money as it wants and paying it to somebody. The United States can pay any debt it has because we can always print the money to do that.”
Ben Bernanke: “The U.S. government has a technology, called a printing press (or, today, its electronic equivalent), that allows it to produce as many U.S. dollars as it wishes at essentially no cost. It’s not tax money… We simply use the computer to mark up the size of the account.
Jerome Powell “As a central bank, we have the ability to create money digitally.”
St. Louis Fed: “As the sole manufacturer of dollars, whose debt is denominated in dollars, the U.S. government can never become insolvent, i.e., unable to pay its bills. In this sense, the government is not dependent on credit markets to remain operational.”
Of course, if the government passes silly laws, like the “debt limit” (which does not limit debt; it limits paying for existing debt), it can run short, but there is no way to overcome a foolish Congress and President.
The sole purpose of federal taxes is different from the purpose of monetarily non-sovereign state/local taxes.
Rather than funding spending, federal taxes:
A. Assure demand for the U.S. dollars by requiring taxes be paid in dollars.
B. Control the economy by taxing what the government wishes to discourage and giving tax breaks to those it wishes to reward.
C. At the behest of the rich, make the rich richer by widening the Gap between the rich and the rest. Contrary to popular wisdom, the rich pay a lower percentage of their income in taxes than you do.
By contrast, state/local taxes do fund state/local spending.
2 TARIFFS: Tariffs on, for instance, Chinese imports are not paid by Chinese sellers. They are paid by American buyers and passed on to you. Unfortunately, America’s rich hardly pay anything, which is why the Republicans support it.
The vast majority of tariffs are paid by you middle- and lower-income Americans.
Substituting tariffs for income taxes would merely shift dollars from middle America to the rich.
3 TRUMP WILL DO AS HE PROMISES: You must be joking. He:
1 Attempted a coup 2 Waited 3 hours to end coup 3 Was fined $25 Million for cheating Trump U. students 4 Was fined $2 Million for fake Trump Foundation, 5 Was fined $5 Million for sexual abuse 6 Fined $83 Mil. for defamation 7 Cheated on 3 wives 8 Fined $150 thousand for Stormy Daniels 9 Stole classified material /refused to return it 10 Lied that COVID was just a common cold 11 Pushed fake COVID cures 12 Lied about vaccination 13 Draft dodger / fake heel spurs 14 Fake hurricane report with Sharpie 15 Was a multiple nepotist 16 Cheated casino employees out of wages 17 Lied about real estate worth 18 Cheated lenders with 6 bankruptcies 19 Admires dictators: Putin, Kim, Orban 20 Received $7.8 Million from foreign nations 21 Separated immigrant children from parents 22 Made anti-abortion multiple flip-flops 23 Is a multiple conspiracy monger 24 Is a hatemonger: blacks, browns, gays, Muslims, immigrants 25 Insults judges and prosecutors 26 Calls dead soldiers “suckers” 27 His kids received $2 Billion from Saudis 28 Faked results of his physical exam 29 Denies election results 30 Lost 60+ court rulings re. election results 31 Impeached twice. 32 Has eight close associates sentenced to prison. 33 Approves of a President murdering rivals 34 Spent more golf time than any President in history 35 Claimed global warming is a Chinese hoax 36 Pardoned 144 criminals on last day in office 37 Called convicted coup rioters, “patriots” 38 Called Nazi marchers “good people” 39 Told 30,000 lies in 4 years of Presidency 40 Denies knowledge of Project 2025 41 Over 26 Trump-related business failures 42 Failed/neglected to comply with/Fair Housing Act 43 Threatened to withdraw from NATO 44 Will eliminate funds for electric car incentives 45 Said he would be a dictator “for one day.” 46 Tried 60 times to eliminate Obamacare 47 Tried to ban Muslims from entering the US 48 Tried to end birthright for children born in the US 49 Will penalize schools that even discuss “woke.” 50 Encouraged illegal electoral college votes 51 Says, “If I lose, blame the Jews.” 52 Supports Mark Robinson, Holocaust denier 53 Dined with anti-Semite Nick Fuentes 54 Backs Marjorie ‘Jewish space lasers’ Greene 55 Pals with anti-Semite Kanye West 56 Lied that Pres. Obama was born in Kenya 57 Lied that Dems favor “post-birth abortions” 58 Lied that wind turbines cause cancer 59 Wants to deport millions like Hitler did 60 Told Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by” 61 Pretends to give to charity 62 Pretends to be religious 63 Had GOP vote against disaster funds for FEMA 64 Is a coward afraid to debate Kamala Harris. 65 Politically plans to take fire-fighting $ from CA. 66 Plans to use the US military against Americans 67 Promised that Mexico would pay for the wall 68 Asked Putin to investigate Hillary Clinton
For those of you too young to understand what caused WWII, know this: Trump is following the Hitler playbook. The German people thought it couldn’t happen there.
The above are articles published on this blog. There are thousands more, published elsewhere.
Trump has been so obvious as a Hitler wannabe that the earliest of these posts were published before Trump was even elected.
Now, Trump has said, “I am urging my supporters to go into the polls and watch very carefully, because that’s what has to happen. I am urging them to do it.”
And what are these supporters supposed to do, other than intimidate voters — especially minority voters — and frighten them away? Of course, that is the plan: To eliminate America’s voting democracy.
Nevada’s attorney general said he would prosecute people who follow President Donald Trump’s advice to go to polling places and monitor votes being counted, accusing the president of encouraging voter intimidation.
During his first debate against the Democratic nominee, Joe Biden, on Tuesday, Trump refused to commit to accepting the results of the November election and repeated his unsubstantiated claims that mail-in voting is open to widespread fraud.
Trump falsely claimed that poll watchers with his campaign were being wrongly barred from satellite in-person absentee voting sites in Philadelphia.
In reality, as The Philadelphia Inquirer reported, no poll watchers affiliated with the Trump campaign are certified to observe polls in the state of Pennsylvania.
How can one respond to a man who barks one lie after another while refusing to keep his pestilential maw shut for a mere two minutes so his opponent can speak?
Try to respond to one lie and he lets loose another four and drowns you out with them before you’re done.
But the Trump campaign came into the debate pushing the line that Biden is a senile old man. Biden more than demonstrated that isn’t true.
Most of all, Biden came off like a politician, citing policies and data and hitting the president over his record while occasionally trying to raise his own rhetoric to the lofty heights traditionally favored by men and women in public life, seeking the honor of winning its highest office.
Trump is utterly incapable of running to the center of public opinion, of making an appeal to a broader range of voters.
So he just gets louder and meaner with the same old extreme, right-wing, Republican message, hoping and expecting that a wider swath of the public will submit to the assault.
If anyone out there still believes that in some way Trump is less dangerous to America than Hitler was to Germany, I pity that person’s ignorance of history. Never could the German people imagine the Hitlerian horrors that were to befall them. They would have laughed at warnings. No German laughs, now.
At least, Germans had an excuse for following their madman. Their economy had been shredded by World War I and by the appalling terms forced upon them by the winning Allies.
For America, the “Great Recession” was bad, but the economy was not nearly so bad as 1930s Germany’s was, and it was recovering. Nevertheless, some Americans wanted change, and boy did they get it. In spades. We Americans received change from a benevolent, caring society to a mean-spirited, bile-filled nightmare.
The darkness that is Trump has spread over the land. All he offers is hatred and more hatred— hatred of blacks, hatred of browns, hatred of gays, hatred of Muslims, hatred of the media, hatred of Obama, hatred of Democrats, hatred of liberals, hatred of the poor, hatred of immigrants, hatred of all other democracies, hatred of our democracy, hatred of former associates and relatives who tell the truth about him.
Trump’s hatred is as contagious as the COVID and much more deadly. America is learning that. Like the COVID does, Trumpian hatred will continue to punish us for many years.
There is no compassion in Trump. He “loves” only murderous dictators like Putin and Kim. But truly, he loves only himself.
In Germany, the politicians who followed Hitler to disaster later denied their involvement. In America, it will be the same.
The Republican Party was not always cold and without humanity. It was actually conservative, meaning it wished to conserve America’s traditionally humane mores and care for the underdog. That was one part of the American dream.
But first with the Nixon “Southern Strategy” (an appeal to Southern, white bigotry), and then the dawning of the Tea Party(a merciless, pro-rich ideology), the Republicans’ hearts hardened.
Today, the GOP is a party of “punish ’em,” “deport ’em,” “wall ’em out,” and “kick ’em while they’re down,” with the primary solution to every problem being to blame the victims for their own misery. To the right-wing, compassion is for “losers.”
Never is expressed a concern about the have-nots in America, even by the right-wing have-nots themselves. In a tad more than five weeks, at the behest of the right-wing, 20 million Americans may lose their healthcare insurance coverage, while innocent children at out southern border will continue to be tortured by sadists.
The pusillanimous right-wingers, the Lindsey Grahams and the Fox News know-nothings, who echo Trump’s every lie, will upon his exit from office, deny they ever knew him, just as Trump denies ever knowing any former associate who has a bad truth to say about him.
There are reasons why Germany has no statues of Hitler. I am quite sure that, for similar reasons, America will have no statues of Donald Trump.
Ever.
Meanwhile, as we teeter on the edge of tyranny, one only can pray that those who express so much love for Jesus and for unborn fetuses, also will begin to shed some tears for already-born children of color and of poverty — and for the future of our once-great nation.
Few of us remember what we were doing on December 6, or December 8, of 1941, but if you’re old enough, you well may remember what you were doing, on December 7, 1941, when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and precipitated America’s official entry into World War II.
It was called, “a date which will live in infamy.”
You well may remember where you were, and what you were doing, on September 11, 2001, when America was attacked by the Islamic terrorist group al-Qaeda.
It too, is a date which will live in infamy.
And in the future, you may remember where you were and what you were doing on the day Donald J. Trump officially turned America into a fascist dictatorship.
On July 14, 2019, Trump tweeted:
“So interesting to see ‘Progressive’ Democrat Congresswomen, who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe, the worst, most corrupt and inept anywhere in the world, now loudly and viciously telling the people of the United States, the greatest and most powerful nation on earth, how our government is to be run.”
“Why don’t they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime-infested places from which they came. Then come back and show us how it is done.”
“These places need your help badly, you can’t leave fast enough. I’m sure that Nancy Pelosi would be very happy to quickly work out free travel arrangements!”
If you saw the video of the Trump crowd screaming, “Send her back,” you might have been reminded of Hitler.
I have written on several occasions — as far back as 2015 — about the uncanny resemblances between Hitler’s crowds and Trump’s crowds — the same blind, foaming-at-the-mouth, animal hatred — the same ability to believe the most outrageous lies, simply because der Fuhrer told the people to believe
Just as the Germans in the 30s neither could have anticipated nor believed what was about to befall them, today’s Trump followers scoff smugly at the notion of Trump being a reincarnation of Hitler.
Some of them even wish to follow a Hitler clone, because he’s a “strong leader.”
Hitler’s ideas included inequality among races, nations, and individuals as part of an unchangeable natural order that exalted the “Aryan race” as the creative element of mankind. [vs. “shithole,” black nations and Latinos.]
According to Hitler, the natural unit of mankind was the Volk (“the people”), of which the German people was the greatest. [“America first.” “Make America great again.”]
Parliamentary democratic government stood doubly condemned. [Trump’s angry battles with judges who rule against him.]
Hitler assumed the equality of individuals did not exist and supposed that what was in the interests of the people could be decided by parliamentary procedures. [Trump’s repeated attempts to bypass the Constitution]
Instead, Hitler argued that the unity of the people would find its incarnation in the Führer, endowed with perfect authority. Below the Führer the party was drawn from the people and was in turn its safeguard. [Criticism of Trump is “unAmerican.” The GOP Congress does not dare disagree with him.]
Beyond Marxism Hitler believed the greatest enemy of all to be the Jew, who was for Hitler the incarnation of evil. As early as 1919 he wrote, “Rational anti-Semitism must lead to systematic legal opposition. Its final objective must be the removal of the Jews altogether.” In Mein Kampf, he described the Jew as the “destroyer of culture,” “a parasite within the nation,” and “a menace.” [Trump’s attempts to remove immigrants and Muslims. The concentration camps at our southern border.]
In 1930, with the help of Hugenberg’s newspapers, Hitler was able for the first time to reach a nationwide audience. The alliance also enabled him to seek support from many of the magnates of business and industry who controlled political funds and were anxious to use them to establish a strong right-wing, antisocialist government. [Magnate Rupert Murdoch’s FOX News, Breitbart, Twitter help Trump reach a nationwide audience.]
The subsidies Hitler received from the industrialists enabled him to make effective his emotional appeal to the lower middle class and the unemployed, based on the proclamation of his faith that Germany would awaken from its sufferings to reassert its natural greatness. [See the character of Trump’s audiences. Trump: “I love the poorly educated.” “Make America great again.”]
Those who deny, or even agree with, Trump’s obvious, hate-filled bigotry and public failings, and are anxious to believe he will “make America great again,” have forgotten history, if they ever knew it.
And history forgotten will be repeated.
Yes, it can happen here and it is happening here. The people of Germany learned much too late.
And they and their children paid a very high price.
The most important problems in economics involve the excessive income/wealth/power Gaps between the richer and the poorer.
Wide Gaps negatively affect poverty, health and longevity, education, housing, law and crime, war, leadership, ownership, bigotry, supply and demand, taxation, GDP, international relations, scientific advancement, the environment, human motivation and well-being, and virtually every other issue in economics.
Implementation of The Ten Steps To Prosperity can narrow the Gaps:
We may not have been the first to call attention to the massive similarities between Trump and Hitler. Over the months, we were not the only ones. And surely we won’t be the last.
Trump is following the Hitlerian playbook and unfortunately, many of us Americans are following the German people’s playbook.
Hitler preyed on discontent. He told the German people they were being treated unfairly, and he alone could save them. They believed what they desperately wanted to believe. Some still do.
Trump is capitalizing on a longing for charismatic leadership, to which even highly developed Western democracies seem very susceptible when democratic structures fail to deliver all the desired outcomes.
There is a very real sense amongst a large part of the population that they have not been on the “winning side” for a long time.
Trump promised: “We’re gonna win so much you may even get tired of winning and you’ll say please, please Mr. President, It’s too much winning! We can’t take it anymore!”
The gap between rich and poor is getting wider, and in the process, the classical attributes of political leadership—education, expertise, eloquent speeches—have come to be seen not as problem-solving strategies, but as the identity markers of a social elite who are looking after their own interests only.
Even where new policies on healthcare, education, or job creation achieve their goals, they are not popular, because they are tinged with that smell of elitism that makes many ordinary people not feel valued by the political classes.
Trump has not been the first demagogue to capitalize on such sentiments.
Thus, when Senator Bernie Sanders proposed Medicare for All, he was ridiculed. It was “too good to be true.” The populace opted for Trump’s empty lies rather than accept Sanders’s substantive proposals.
If Trump is known for anything, it is his repeated use of the words, “Fake news.” Hitler used the term, “Lügenpresse” (lying press).
All dictators hate a free press.In “Trumpworld,” free speech is only for the Nazis, the white supremacists, and the KKK, and of course, for Donald Trump — not for newspaper reporters.
Trump wants news media to fawn over him as Breitbart and FOX do, and like the many, right-wing conspiracy blogs that still excuse Trump’s faults by focusing on Hillary’s Emails, Barack’s birth certificate, and Bill’s affairs. (They never mention Trump’s wife-cheating, his groping, his Trump University con, his compulsive lying, his incompetence, his notorious laziness, etc.)
If Trump had his way, he would bankrupt the mainstream media with lawsuits, or with military action, Putin style, Putin being one of Trump’s heroes.
A cowardly draft dodger, Trump longs for war. Perhaps North Korea will provide him with one. He seems to hope so.
How did we get here? How did the United States arrive at the same place as Nazi Germany?
Perhaps we should ask, why did the Republican party trade its soul for a political victory, knowing full well that Trump was evil for democracy, evil for America, and evil for the middle- and lower-income people?
The lust for power replaced the GOP’ moral center. It led to health care plans that would have cost millions of Americans their lives and tax plans that widen the Gap between the rich and the rest.
I understand and sympathize with Trump’s voters. They were desperate, unappreciated and so, they were consumed with hatred.Trump made many promises everyone knew he wouldn’t keep, but for desperate people, the heart needs to feel hope, even when the mind knows it is all a lie.
And of course, they need someone to blame, and Trump gave them that, too. Just as Hitler offered up for hatred, the Jews, and the Gypsies, Trump offers up the Mexicans, the undocumented, the Muslims, the immigrants, and the poor.
All are to be despised, as a balm to American self-pity.
Predictably, the man who promised to “drain the swamp” filled his government with swamp creatures — billionaires who care nothing for the people, as they try to undo the laws that protect the people — supposedly to provide jobs, but in reality to provide profits for rich investors.
And now, the GOP urgently tries to pass a tax bill that will benefit those swamp creatures most.
Today, 1/3 of America still hopes and prays that Trump’s lies were real, and that Trump’s GOP (Yes, it’s his now), really intends to help them, though that’s an obvious lie.
They gave away two of their most valuable possessions, their votes and their souls, and in return what did they get? The vague hope that poor pregnant women and undocumented immigrants will be punished. That is their sad reward.
In the end, these Trump backers, having closed their eyes to the obvious, will find themselves more desperate, less appreciated, and more consumed with hatred.
Their real reward: Their pockets will be emptier, and their mouths will be filled with ashes.
Here we are, like the people of Nazi Germany, like the people of other nations who traded freedom for a dictatorship, making that same mistake, again.
The most important problems in economics involve the excessive income/wealth/power Gaps between the have-mores and the have-less.
Wide Gaps negatively affect poverty, health and longevity, education, housing, law and crime, war, leadership, ownership, bigotry, supply and demand, taxation, GDP, international relations, scientific advancement, the environment, human motivation and well-being, and virtually every other issue in economics.
Implementation of The Ten Steps To Prosperity can narrow the Gaps:
Ten Steps To Prosperity: 1. ELIMINATE FICA (Ten Reasons to Eliminate FICA ) Although the article lists 10 reasons to eliminate FICA, there are two fundamental reasons: *FICA is the most regressive tax in American history, widening the Gap by punishing the low and middle-income groups, while leaving the rich untouched, and *The federal government, being Monetarily Sovereign, neither needs nor uses FICA to support Social Security and Medicare. 2. FEDERALLY FUNDED MEDICARE — PARTS A, B & D, PLUS LONG TERM CARE — FOR EVERYONE (H.R. 676, Medicare for All ) This article addresses the questions:
*Does the economy benefit when the rich can afford better health care than can the rest of Americans?
*Aside from improved health care, what are the other economic effects of “Medicare for everyone?”
*How much would it cost taxpayers?
*Who opposes it?”
3. PROVIDE A MONTHLY ECONOMIC BONUS TO EVERY MAN, WOMAN AND CHILD IN AMERICA (similar to Social Security for All) (The JG (Jobs Guarantee) vs the GI (Guaranteed Income) vs the EB (Economic Bonus)) Or institute a reverse income tax.
This article is the fifth in a series about direct financial assistance to Americans:
Economic growth should include the “bottom” 99.9%, not just the .1%, the only question being, how best to accomplish that. Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) favors giving everyone a job. Monetary Sovereignty (MS) favors giving everyone money. The five articles describe the pros and cons of each approach.
4. FREE EDUCATION (INCLUDING POST-GRAD) FOR EVERYONE Five reasons why we should eliminate school loans
Monetarily non-sovereign State and local governments, despite their limited finances, support grades K-12. That level of education may have been sufficient for a largely agrarian economy, but not for our currently more technical economy that demands greater numbers of highly educated workers.
Because state and local funding is so limited, grades K-12 receive short shrift, especially those schools whose populations come from the lowest economic groups. And college is too costly for most families.
An educated populace benefits a nation, and benefitting the nation is the purpose of the federal government, which has the unlimited ability to pay for K-16 and beyond.
5. SALARY FOR ATTENDING SCHOOL
Even were schooling to be completely free, many young people cannot attend, because they and their families cannot afford to support non-workers. In a foundering boat, everyone needs to bail, and no one can take time off for study.
If a young person’s “job” is to learn and be productive, he/she should be paid to do that job, especially since that job is one of America’s most important.
6. ELIMINATE FEDERAL TAXES ON BUSINESS
Businesses are dollar-transferring machines. They transfer dollars from customers to employees, suppliers, shareholders and the federal government (the later having no use for those dollars). Any tax on businesses reduces the amount going to employees, suppliers and shareholders, which diminishes the economy. Ultimately, all business taxes reduce your personal income.
7. INCREASE THE STANDARD INCOME TAX DEDUCTION, ANNUALLY. (Refer to this.) Federal taxes punish taxpayers and harm the economy. The federal government has no need for those punishing and harmful tax dollars. There are several ways to reduce taxes, and we should evaluate and choose the most progressive approaches.
Cutting FICA and business taxes would be a good early step, as both dramatically affect the 99%. Annual increases in the standard income tax deduction, and a reverse income tax also would provide benefits from the bottom up. Both would narrow the Gap. 8. TAX THE VERY RICH (THE “.1%) MORE, WITH HIGHER PROGRESSIVE TAX RATES ON ALL FORMS OF INCOME. (TROPHIC CASCADE)
There was a time when I argued against increasing anyone’s federal taxes. After all, the federal government has no need for tax dollars, and all taxes reduce Gross Domestic Product, thereby negatively affecting the entire economy, including the 99.9%.
But I have come to realize that narrowing the Gap requires trimming the top. It simply would not be possible to provide the 99.9% with enough benefits to narrow the Gap in any meaningful way. Bill Gates reportedly owns $70 billion. To get to that level, he must have been earning $10 billion a year. Pick any acceptable Gap (1000 to 1?), and the lowest paid American would have to receive $10 million a year. Unreasonable.
9. FEDERAL OWNERSHIP OF ALL BANKS (Click The end of private banking and How should America decide “who-gets-money”?)
Banks have created all the dollars that exist. Even dollars created at the direction of the federal government, actually come into being when banks increase the numbers in checking accounts. This gives the banks enormous financial power, and as we all know, power corrupts — especially when multiplied by a profit motive.
Although the federal government also is powerful and corrupted, it does not suffer from a profit motive, the world’s most corrupting influence.
10. INCREASE FEDERAL SPENDING ON THE MYRIAD INITIATIVES THAT BENEFIT AMERICA’S 99.9% (Federal agencies)Browse the agencies. See how many agencies benefit the lower- and middle-income/wealth/ power groups, by adding dollars to the economy and/or by actions more beneficial to the 99.9% than to the .1%.
Save this reference as your primer to current economics. Sadly, much of the material is not being taught in American schools, which is all the more reason for you to use it.
The Ten Steps will grow the economy, and narrow the income/wealth/power Gap between the rich and you.
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THE RECESSION CLOCK
Federal Deficit — 1955 – Present. Vertical Bars are recessions
Federal Deficit — 2004 – Present
As the federal deficit growth lines drop, we approach recession, which will be cured only when the lines rise. Federal deficit growth is absolutely, positively necessary for economic growth. Period.
#Monetary Sovereignty - Mitchell 