Empire In Retreat: Under Trump, we’re seeing the fall of the empire of America in real time

[IM2]

Well for a falling empire we aren't doing bad.

There are jobs for anyone who wants one. UE is the lowest its been in decades.

Working people have more money in their pay checks.

The economy is roaring along.

More people are happy with the direction the country is moving in.

Guess you will be disappointed when the empire doesn't fall.

Oh well. Maybe next time. LOL.

Trump gave tax cuts to billionaires. Especially himself
Any meager increase in take home pay for workers had been wiped out by inflation, increased fuel costs and fewer deductions

So did Trump and other billionaires hide their tax cuts under their mattress or bury it in the backyard? I can totally believe you think that right?
What do you think they did with their tax cuts?
Oh wait maybe bought another yacht or two or three!
But to me that was ok back when I helped a yacht manufacturer set up their inventory control systems because they would hire more people who had more money than unemployment benefits and they and their employer paid more in payroll taxes...all because some billionaires bought more yachts.

But I guess that FACT seemingly doesn't fly with people like you who KNOW those evil billionaires hide their tax cuts under the mattress or buried in their backyard.
Yea, that's what they did.

When you can show us that the trickle down theory has ever worked on a large scale, let me know.

Right Dumb Ass….

We all know the poor make it all happen….

If you understood how things really worked, you'd realize just how true that is.

The poor buy stuff. They create demand. No demand no sales. No sales no jobs created.

So you give the rich huge tax cuts, but the demand for their products stay the same. Why should they hire?

But if you give the poor the cuts, they have more money to spend. They buy more stuff. Demand increases. The rich need more people to meet the demand. Jobs are created.

It's that simple. That fish you're holding in the avatar could tell you that.

 

[IM2]

If he had been white he'd be hailed as the greatest president of all time.

You are not only a RACIST…

You are Delusional.

Maybe if your addled minded ass watched something other than the fox news channel you'd understand just how much of the 8 years of Obama you chose to ignore.

Again, you got it all bass ackwards…

I do watch and listen to a lot of

Different sources..

That’s why I know for a fact that

FOX and Conservative talk radio

Are the most reliable Sources.

for the TRUTH.

Hey Dumb Ass….

I know this may be difficult for you…But…

Lets use Common Sense and Logic….

Have any of my go to sources ever

Faked blowing up trucks or doctoring

a 911 tape to fit their agenda?

Have they ever faked papers like dan dumb ass rather?

Have they ever faked a cover like time lying magazine?

I could go on and on but I know it’s a waste of time

with a dumb ass RACIST ZEALOT like yourself.

Actually they have.

 

[BluesLegend]

Riiiiight what we need are higher taxes and bigger government and more regulations and trade deals that suck so our jobs flee to China, Mexico, and Canada. /EPIC sarcasm

 

[Aldo Raine]

Poor lefties whine... "it doesn't feel like we've advanced" . The economy is booming but they lost an election and now the chicken shit pop-culture video game hypocrites hate everything about the U.S.. No surprises here.

You must have a very strange definition of booming...

First quarter growth was only 2.2%. Stocks are way below their high. Labor force participation is very low. Wages are stagnant. Deficits are skyrocketing....

Facts hurt their lil brain cells, go easy Brian.

 

[Aldo Raine]

I think you’re seeing the fall of the empire of America in real time, before your eyes; the internet has eroded the fabric of decency in our civilization,.

Our decay began long before Trump.

He is merely a symptom, a reflection.
.

You are correct. It started decades ago. Trump is the cure. He’s the bitter pill, the bad tasting spoonful of tonic, you could say, but he’s still the cure.

Rump and Rumpisum is the incurable, fatal disease. Unfortunately this country has caught it at least for now.

 

[SeaGal]

Yep! Now that Trump is in office we can make the Republic great again by insulting those who have stood by us, kiss our detractor's asses, make information the enemy of the State, stand at attention when Trump speaks, create new industries such as private jails and detention camps for a new class of felon formerly known as political opponents that said mean things about Trump. And Pardons for felons who said nice things about Trump. The list of the path to 'greatness' is endless.

The paranoia within you is strong...

...unless, of course, you've confused this administration with the previous?

 

[IM2]

Yep! Now that Trump is in office we can make the Republic great again by insulting those who have stood by us, kiss our detractor's asses, make information the enemy of the State, stand at attention when Trump speaks, create new industries such as private jails and detention camps for a new class of felon formerly known as political opponents that said mean things about Trump. And Pardons for felons who said nice things about Trump. The list of the path to 'greatness' is endless.

The paranoia within you is strong...

...unless, of course, you've confused this administration with the previous?

 

[rightwinger]

...we the people are gonna take back this country and we refuse to go back to yesterdays America!!

Uh, We the People already did. Yesterday's America belonged to Obama & Co, after he fundamentally transformed it...'member? I don't want to go back to that either.

You must have lived outside of the country during Obama.

Dude, I don't know what planet these mindless pea brain fucks was on when Obama was president, but being elected twice, the guy must have done something right....yeah, he was sane!!

obongo got elected because he was Black...

If he were White we wouldn't know his name....

obongo and his supporters were all fools like yourself...…...

The Great Obama was elected because the Bush Presidency was such a disaster

 

[IM2]

Riiiiight what we need are higher taxes and bigger government and more regulations and trade deals that suck so our jobs flee to China, Mexico, and Canada. /EPIC sarcasm

 

[Deno]

Well for a falling empire we aren't doing bad.

There are jobs for anyone who wants one. UE is the lowest its been in decades.

Working people have more money in their pay checks.

The economy is roaring along.

More people are happy with the direction the country is moving in.

Guess you will be disappointed when the empire doesn't fall.

Oh well. Maybe next time. LOL.

Trump gave tax cuts to billionaires. Especially himself
Any meager increase in take home pay for workers had been wiped out by inflation, increased fuel costs and fewer deductions

So did Trump and other billionaires hide their tax cuts under their mattress or bury it in the backyard? I can totally believe you think that right?
What do you think they did with their tax cuts?
Oh wait maybe bought another yacht or two or three!
But to me that was ok back when I helped a yacht manufacturer set up their inventory control systems because they would hire more people who had more money than unemployment benefits and they and their employer paid more in payroll taxes...all because some billionaires bought more yachts.

But I guess that FACT seemingly doesn't fly with people like you who KNOW those evil billionaires hide their tax cuts under the mattress or buried in their backyard.
Yea, that's what they did.

When you can show us that the trickle down theory has ever worked on a large scale, let me know.

Right Dumb Ass….

We all know the poor make it all happen….

If you understood how things really worked, you'd realize just how true that is.

The poor buy stuff. They create demand. No demand no sales. No sales no jobs created.

So you give the rich huge tax cuts, but the demand for their products stay the same. Why should they hire?

But if you give the poor the cuts, they have more money to spend. They buy more stuff. Demand increases. The rich need more people to meet the demand. Jobs are created.

It's that simple. That fish you're holding in the avatar could tell you that.

IM2, you are very confused....

 

[SeaGal]

Yep! Now that Trump is in office we can make the Republic great again by insulting those who have stood by us, kiss our detractor's asses, make information the enemy of the State, stand at attention when Trump speaks, create new industries such as private jails and detention camps for a new class of felon formerly known as political opponents that said mean things about Trump. And Pardons for felons who said nice things about Trump. The list of the path to 'greatness' is endless.

The paranoia within you is strong...

...unless, of course, you've confused this administration with the previous?

My pleasure...

 

[Deno]

...we the people are gonna take back this country and we refuse to go back to yesterdays America!!

Uh, We the People already did. Yesterday's America belonged to Obama & Co, after he fundamentally transformed it...'member? I don't want to go back to that either.

You must have lived outside of the country during Obama.

Dude, I don't know what planet these mindless pea brain fucks was on when Obama was president, but being elected twice, the guy must have done something right....yeah, he was sane!!

obongo got elected because he was Black...

If he were White we wouldn't know his name....

obongo and his supporters were all fools like yourself...…...

The Great Obama was elected because the Bush Presidency was such a disaster

You are a fool.....

It was White Guilt....

 

[JohnPrewett]

.............No wonder Trump hates the press. ................

 

[IM2]

Trump gave tax cuts to billionaires. Especially himself
Any meager increase in take home pay for workers had been wiped out by inflation, increased fuel costs and fewer deductions

So did Trump and other billionaires hide their tax cuts under their mattress or bury it in the backyard? I can totally believe you think that right?
What do you think they did with their tax cuts?
Oh wait maybe bought another yacht or two or three!
But to me that was ok back when I helped a yacht manufacturer set up their inventory control systems because they would hire more people who had more money than unemployment benefits and they and their employer paid more in payroll taxes...all because some billionaires bought more yachts.

But I guess that FACT seemingly doesn't fly with people like you who KNOW those evil billionaires hide their tax cuts under the mattress or buried in their backyard.
Yea, that's what they did.

When you can show us that the trickle down theory has ever worked on a large scale, let me know.

Right Dumb Ass….

We all know the poor make it all happen….

If you understood how things really worked, you'd realize just how true that is.

The poor buy stuff. They create demand. No demand no sales. No sales no jobs created.

So you give the rich huge tax cuts, but the demand for their products stay the same. Why should they hire?

But if you give the poor the cuts, they have more money to spend. They buy more stuff. Demand increases. The rich need more people to meet the demand. Jobs are created.

It's that simple. That fish you're holding in the avatar could tell you that.

IM2, you are very confused....

Wrong. I helped build a business from the ground up and saw that's how it works.

 

[IM2]

Uh, We the People already did. Yesterday's America belonged to Obama & Co, after he fundamentally transformed it...'member? I don't want to go back to that either.

You must have lived outside of the country during Obama.

Dude, I don't know what planet these mindless pea brain fucks was on when Obama was president, but being elected twice, the guy must have done something right....yeah, he was sane!!

obongo got elected because he was Black...

If he were White we wouldn't know his name....

obongo and his supporters were all fools like yourself...…...

The Great Obama was elected because the Bush Presidency was such a disaster

You are a fool.....

It was White Guilt....

Wrong. Obama was a better option than McCain.

 

[IM2]

.............No wonder Trump hates the press. ................

This is crazy.

 

[SeaGal]

Wrong. Obama was a better option than McCain.

Ahhh...like Trump was a better option than Hillary.

 

[Yousaidwhat]

Where’s that $4,000 Raise the GOP Promised Workers?

When Republicans in Congress passed a big, fat tax break bill in December, they insisted it meant American workers would be singing “Happy Days Are Here Again” all the way to the bank.

The payoff from the tax cut would be raises totaling $4,000 to $9,000, the President’s Council of Economic Advisors assured workers.

But something bad happened to workers on their way to the repository. They never got that money.

In fact, their real wages declined because of higher inflation. At the same time, the amount workers had to pay in interest on loans for cars and credit cards increased. And, to top it off, Republicans threatened to make workers pay for the tax break with cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

So now, workers across America are wondering, “Where’s that raise?”

It’s nowhere to be found.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor statistics reported this week that wages for production and nonsupervisory workers decreased by 0.1 percent from May 2017 to May 2018 when inflation is factored in. The compensation for all workers together, including supervisors, rose an underwhelming 0.1 percent from April 2018 to May 2018.

That’s not what Congressional Republicans promised workers. They said corporations, which got the biggest, fattest tax cuts of all, would use that extra money to increase wages.

Some workers got one-time bonuses and an even smaller number received raises. But not many. The group, Americans for Tax Fairness, estimates it’s 4.3 percent of all U.S. workers.

Most of the money went to stock buybacks, which enrich corporate executives and wealthy stock holders because they have the effect of raising stock values. Corporations set an all-time record for buybacks in the first quarter of this year. They bought $178 billion of their own shares, up by more than 42 percent from the first quarter in 2017.

The New York Times story about this record breaker describes the phenomena way: “Companies buy back their shares when they believe they have nothing better to do with their money than to return capital to shareholders.” So despite promises from the GOP and the President’s Council of Economic Advisers, corporations believed further enriching their own executives and shareholders was a much better way to use the money than increasing workers’ wages – wages that have been stagnant for decades.

Form 1945 until 1982, worker pay rose in tandem with productivity. At that time, buybacks were rare, primarily because they were deemed a forbidden manipulation of stock prices. In 1981, S&P 500 companies spent about 2 percent of profits on buybacks.

But after 1982, when the Reagan administration legalized stock buybacks, the connection between wages and productivity broke wide apart as corporate executives focused all of their efforts on increasing share value. Last year, the S&P 500 companies spent 50 percent of profits on buybacks and 41 percent on dividends to stock holders. That left a pittance – 9 percent. Corporations socked away some or all of that in overseas tax havens. Their workers, whose labor produced that profit, got virtually nothing.

CEOs self-centered focus on stock buybacks is a big part of the reason Republicans’ promised raise is illusory. But it’s not just the raise. The tax cut itself is a sham.

Workers can be excused for not noticing that big, fat tax cut in their paychecks. Those who earn less than $25,000 a year, that is those in the lowest fifth of income brackets, will get a tax cut this year totaling $60. That’s just about a dollar a week.

For those in the middle income quintile earning between $49,000 and $86,000 a year, the average tax cut is $900. That’s $17 a week. The cost of a large pizza and a Coke. Hardly earth shattering.

By contrast, the top 1 percent of taxpayers, those with incomes above $733,000 a year, will get a tax cut averaging $51,000. That’s $980 a week. So every week this year, Uncle Sam will hand the nation’s richest a tax benefit that is $80 more than the entire amount that the middle-income worker will get in a year.

Workers across America are wondering, “Where’s that big, beautiful tax break?”

While they’re searching, workers will have to pay more for cars and homes and credit card debt. That’s because the Federal Reserve increased the cost of borrowing this week for the second time this year and promised two more hikes before year’s end.

Fed officials said they did it because the tax break and additional federal spending have heated up the economy. It’s hot for corporations, alright, but not for workers.

And the real cost to workers hasn’t yet hit. The GOP’s tax cut will add $1 trillion to the national debt. Even before passing the tax cut legislation, Republican leaders like Speaker of the House Paul Ryan began saying that workers would have to pay those costs in the form of cuts to cherished safety net programs, that is Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

And they’re not kidding. They already tried to slash funding for food stamps, the program that feeds the poor.

And now, incredibly, Republicans are planning a second round of tax cuts. They say they want to make that $17-a-week tax break for the middle class permanent. As it is now, that tax cut disappears in 2025, while the massive break Republicans gave corporations is permanent. In addition, Republicans want to slash the capital gains tax. This, again, is a tax cut for the rich.

Now, it’s not as if workers haven’t benefitted at all under the current administration. Jared Bernstein, a senior fellow at the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities and former chief economic adviser to Vice President Joe Biden, estimates that the real hourly pay of middle class workers has risen 0.4 percent over the past 18 months of Republican control of Congress and the White House.

At that rate, Bernstein figures, it will take 28 years for a worker to get that promised $4,000 pay bump.

So before Republicans start trying to reward rich people again for being rich, they need to answer one question:

Where’s that $4,000 pay raise promised to the middle class?

Where’s that $4,000 Raise the GOP Promised Workers?

The bottom 47% workers of this country....GOT NOTHING!!!

I suggest they get off their asses and put forth some effort to succeed like the rest of us.

Blaming someone else for their failures keeps them where they are.

 

[rightwinger]

Well for a falling empire we aren't doing bad.

There are jobs for anyone who wants one. UE is the lowest its been in decades.

Working people have more money in their pay checks.

The economy is roaring along.

More people are happy with the direction the country is moving in.

Guess you will be disappointed when the empire doesn't fall.

Oh well. Maybe next time. LOL.

Trump gave tax cuts to billionaires. Especially himself
Any meager increase in take home pay for workers had been wiped out by inflation, increased fuel costs and fewer deductions

So did Trump and other billionaires hide their tax cuts under their mattress or bury it in the backyard? I can totally believe you think that right?
What do you think they did with their tax cuts?
Oh wait maybe bought another yacht or two or three!
But to me that was ok back when I helped a yacht manufacturer set up their inventory control systems because they would hire more people who had more money than unemployment benefits and they and their employer paid more in payroll taxes...all because some billionaires bought more yachts.

But I guess that FACT seemingly doesn't fly with people like you who KNOW those evil billionaires hide their tax cuts under the mattress or buried in their backyard.
Yea, that's what they did.

Did those tax cuts go to workers in the form of significant pay increases? No
Were they used to expand manufacturing? No
Did the contribute to public well being? No

As usual......They just keep it

 

[healthmyths]

You must have lived outside of the country during Obama.

Dude, I don't know what planet these mindless pea brain fucks was on when Obama was president, but being elected twice, the guy must have done something right....yeah, he was sane!!

obongo got elected because he was Black...

If he were White we wouldn't know his name....

obongo and his supporters were all fools like yourself...…...

If he had been white he'd be hailed as the greatest president of all time.

/——/ You mean like Jimmy Carter ? Bwhahahaha Bwhahahaha

Carter was better than what we have now.

I think you weren't born then but I was just entering the job market under Carter and we were suffering under the Misery Index...