Ernie S.
Diamond Member
...The country is fucked if they do. Congressional democrats may be mostly useless, but they at least push legislation that popular opinion supports:
1) Raising the minimum wage
2) Background checks for gun ownership
3) Extending unemployment insurance
4) Path to citizenship for illegal immigrants
Yes Obama's approval ratings are at an all time low, but guess what? He still has twice the approval ratings republicans do. Even democrats have higher approval ratings. So why will republicans likely take the senate? I have no idea. They are corrupt, self interested, scumbags. Americans need to wake up. I dream of a world without republicans and their propaganda machine Fox News.
Our biggest economic problem is the enormous wealth inequality in this country. 1% of the top earners own 40% of the nation's wealth. Meanwhile the federal minimum wage hasn't kept up with inflation. Since the recession there has been a significant decrease of high wage jobs and a significant increase in low wage jobs all while corporate profits are at an all time high. Productivity has increased 100% since the 30s for the Lower classes yet wages have only increased 8%. 95% of the income gains have gone to the top 5% of earners. Expert economists say this massive wealthy disparity will only lead to more economic crises. Do you really think republicans are going to do ANYTHING about this problem? No. They won't touch it. They will let it continue. We don't even need to come close to socialism to fix this problem. The wealthy class can still thrive with higher wages for the lower classes.
According to the CBO, raising the min wage to 10.10 will cost 500,000 jobs (big maybe on that). However it will lift 16 million people out of poverty. Not only that, but the higher wages means more consumer spending which means JOB CREATION.
Say what you want about Obama, but we have had consistent job growth since his first year in office. A slow recovery no doubt, but we should all be grateful the economy isn't collapsing.
Why should you vote democrat? Is it because they will fix everything? No. Of course not. The reason you should vote democrat is to keep republicans out of office. Democrats are simply the lesser of two evils.
If only Democrats didn't squander the opportunity they were handed in 2008.
If only they created good legislation, put money toward infrastructure instead of settling for photo ops in front of bridges, put their weight behind comprehensive immigration reform in the first year of the Obama administration as explicitly promised, crafted a health reform law which was good enough that they didn't need to lie about it, honored pledges about lobbyists and transparency, ... little things like that.
If they had been trustworthy, perhaps their hold on the Senate would not be endangered now.
If only republicans in Congress had funded those infrastructure and jobs programs when they were proposed.
They gave you nearly a trillion dollars for shovel ready projects. It was Democrats that wasted it on green crap and union pay offs.