Big Bird

Potpourri v24.0


POST 1197

Car Sales And Trumponomics

Dr. Brian Beaulieu of ITR Economics is an economics and investments guru with a pretty good prognostication track record. He sees the chaos that is happening in our economy and sees the numbers. Here’s his recent report.

We did not have the June data for auto retail sales when I did my Fed Watch on Friday. Have it now. The May-to-June drop in domestically produced light duty vehicle retail sales was the worst spanning 60 years of data (including tough recessions) at -26.2%. For foreign produced light duty vehicles, the June drop was -39.6%, the most severe May-to-June decline in a history spanning 50 years.

The data is showing that:

1. Creating uncertainty is bad economic policy.

2. Playing whack-a-mole with tariffs is bad economic policy.

3. It may be possible to have a president come into office with economic policies that truly can disrupt the business cycle, at least temporarily.

You may not research what Beaulieu commonly does, but likely you know in your gut what he expertly shows us.

The Unlimited National Restoration About People’s Equity Act (UNRAPE) of 2025

Trump’s Big Barfy Betrayal Bill (BBBB) is a blatant transfer of trillions of dollars from poor and working class Americans to the very wealthiest in our very divided and economically grossly out of balance society. It is the biggest, but certainly not the first move to impoverish We The People entirely for the benefit of the very wealthy. It will leave most Americans feeling like they’ve been financially raped – yet again – because they have been. Indeed, $50 trillion (with a “T”) has gone from We the Regular People to the uber-rich over the last 40 years.

This is what oppressive governments do. The result is an impoverished populace with all power and most of the money in the hands of the insanely rich. It’s time to reverse that trend with this proposed bill.

TITLE I – WEALTH CLAWBACK

An annual 10% wealth tax is imposed on all persons having over $1 billion of net wealth. Let’s claw back, some of what they took from us.

TITLE II – FAIR SHARE

Federal personal income tax rates are hereby restored to those in effect when Ronald Reagan became President. The top tax rate then was 70% of income over $762,933 (in today’s dollars).

TITLE III – FEDERAL MINIMUM TAX

A minimum federal income tax rate of 20% is imposed on incomes over $1 million, regardless of the source of the income, whether filing individually or jointly, to ensure that very rich people who regularly use arcane tax exemption schemes not available to poor and middle class Americans pay their fair share.

TITLE IV – CORPORATE INCOME TAX RATES – BECAUSE THEY DIDN’T BUILD INFRASTRUCTURE ALONE

Corporate federal income tax rates are hereby restored to those in effect prior to the first of George W. Bush’s tax cuts. The maximum corporate tax rate of 35% will apply to corporations with taxable income over $10 million. Corporations with taxable income over $15 million will be subject to an additional tax of 3% of the excess over $15 million, or $179,000 (in today’s dollars), whichever is smaller. That was the first time in American history when taxes were cut during war time.

For reference, Donald Trump’s 2018 Tax Cut and Jobs Act created no additional jobs and added $1 to 2 trillion to the federal debt, so the restoration of the corporate tax rates to the higher former rates should have no effect on employment numbers but will be a big help with our massive debt.

Let’s put this UNRAPE bill into the hands of Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) to expand and improve it. Email her and tell her to be ready with her proposal on the afternoon of January 20, 2029 or 2027, whenever Democrats retake the Senate.

Say Good-Bye To Your Mind

Congress has cut funding for PBS and NPR and Trump has the go-ahead to kill the Department of Education. Robert Reich explains the why of that:

There are five facets to the authoritarian attack on our minds that I cover in the video:

1. Rewrite history
2. Gut education
3. Dismantle science
4. Suppress the media
5. Attack the arts

Trump is unleashing all of them. And added up, they render us less informed, less inspired, and easier to control. They empower Trump to divide us with hatred and fear. And they prevent us from discovering that we have more in common with one another than with the authoritarians who try to rule us.

This attack on our minds ultimately reduces our capacity for self-government, because ignorance is the handmaiden of tyranny.

From Thomas Jefferson:

An enlightened citizenry is indispensable for the proper functioning of a republic. Self-government is not possible unless the citizens are educated sufficiently to enable them to exercise oversight.

Given Jefferson’s clarity, it’s easy to understand why Trump would want to keep us and our children ignorant.

Worthwhile Quotations Corner

From Steve Schmidt:

The other day, Van Jones suggested that any person who believes Trump’s babble is “weapons-grade stupid.” That is an accurate statement if there ever was one, and everyone knows that stupid cannot be fixed.

Speaking of Stupid

Our Congress is composed of the geniuses we send to Washington to represent us, our interests and desires and the needs of our nation. The Republican side of it has consistently and spinelessly caved to Donald Trump’s every pathological desire.

Congress voted to de-fund PBS and NPR. Republicans stupidly called it the “Defund Government-Sponsored Propaganda Act.”  Now that Trump has killed Big Bird, betcha Trump thinks that oughta distract and shut up those clamoring for the Epstein list. Won’t happen.

Who cares, Republicans seem to be saying, whether kids, especially rural kids and those with compromised early education opportunities get the obvious benefits of public broadcast programming? Or whether people in rural areas receive weather warnings before the tornado strikes? Who cares if Americans have a non-commercial, apolitical source for news, they whine?

Republicans have been saying for a long time that PBS and NPR are voices of woke lefties, a part of the “fake news.” They claim they broadcast propaganda. I challenge anyone to provide even a single example of PBS or NPR programming that even vaguely resembles those inflammatory, ignorant and stupid claims. C’mon, MAGAmites, help me out here.

All but two Republicans voted to shoot Big Bird and every Republican voted to cut Medicaid, SNAP, USAID, Voice of America, FEMA, vaccine research and the rest. Remember that when it’s time to choose in the upcoming November elections. Tell your friends. Tell your crazy Uncle Bob. Tell your Uber driver.

Click me for protest rights tips.

“The Republicans don’t care about you.”
.

It’s already established that you can’t fix stupid. And it looks like you can’t fix hypocrisy or cowardice, either.

From the John Lewis Good Trouble Demonstration
Highland Park, IL, July 17, 2025

Tens of thousands of people turned out for the Good Trouble protests at over 1,500 marches across the country, both to honor John Lewis and to staunchly, powerfully protest this felonious fascist president. Here are pics of  some signs people carried.

Sure do miss RBG

 

 

 

 

 

Our abused immigrants today are just like  your family members who immigrated here years ago. Same hopes, same dreams.

 

 

 

 

 

Be at the next demonstration, because we’re all counting on us.
The Deconstructing Trump* Corner
.
  • A bad cause will ever be supported
  • by bad means and bad men.
  • Thomas Paine, 1777
  • Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of stupidity.
  • Frank Leahy, 1955
  • _________________________________________

* Deconstructing Trump by Mardy Grothe explores The Trump phenomenon through the lens of quotation history.

Mid-Term Election
Countdown Timer
Goes fast, doesn’t it?

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The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not necessarily mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine, but I do wish that I could blame someone else. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  5. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.
  6. Comments offered by readers, whether in agreement with my opinions or opposing, are encouraged and greatly appreciated. All are reviewed prior to going live. I reserve the right to edit for length, readability, punctuation, typos and voluntary idiocy and to exclude those I deem inappropriate or casually cruel. If you must post something cruel, stop reading these posts immediately and instead invest your time with a good therapist.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally and unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA

.


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

Hegseth and Health


POST 1174

DUI Hegseth

Norm Ornstein hit the bulls eye with this:

Trump kakistocracy—government by the least competent

About which Joyce Vance goes on to say that the Trump kakistocracy

.  .  .  continues to harm everyday Americans and put our allies at risk. On that front, the dishonor prize again goes to Pete Hegseth, with reports revealing he shared sensitive national security information in yet another Signal chat on his personal phone—forwarding information about attacks in Yemen last month to his wife, [his] lawyer and [his] brother [none of whom has a security clearance], among others who should not have been privy to such sensitive details.

Sheila Markin comments that he did that

.  .  .  using a chat app that he had installed in his computer to get around the rule that cell phones were not allowed inside the [Defense Department] office.

Our DUI hire Sec/Def is far worse than the obvious international embarrassment that he is. He’s a threat to our immediate safety and to our long term security. We all would be far better off without this fool, but Trump doesn’t have the cojones to hire competent people or fire incompetent ones.

What About Your Health?

STAT is the excellent health and healthcare publication of The Boston Globe. Last week they posted a report of how Trump and his administration are systematically dismantling medicine and science, which will be felt acutely by We The People in the years to come. You better hope that the next pandemic skips you and that your young ones don’t get exposed to measles, polio, smallpox and the rest, because you probably won’t be able to get them vaccinated or cured.

Even if a new administration replaces Trump’s on January 20, 2029 and that it works at “warp speed” and isn’t hobbled by legacy Trumpian dystopian bureaucracy and ineptitude, it will take generations to repair the damage Trump is causing and to restore our healthcare systems. Read Day by day, how Trump is roiling science and health and pray you never need a cure or even get a diagnosis that isn’t routine, because research efforts nationwide are being cancelled. And thank your lucky stars if you never experience any form of dementia as you age, because ways to prevent and treat such decline won’t be getting developed.*

Pro-Life? Really?

I’ve written (here, here and here) about the murderous hypocrisy of self-labeled “pro-life” claimers, but let me do a short review.

You can’t be both pro-life and also refuse to fund rural hospitals, where so many newborns die

You can’t be both pro-life and cheer the elimination of food assistance for millions of children

You can’t be both pro-life and applaud cutting USAID assistance to millions of starving people

You can’t be both pro-life and pro-death penalty

You can’t be both pro-life and applaud the ending of medical research grants

You can’t be both pro-life and support the DOGE hobbling of Social Security into an impenetrable maze that leaves seniors financially shipwrecked

You can’t be both pro-life and applaud the rendition of hundreds to extermination prisons without so much as a whiff of evidence of any wrongdoing

You can’t be both pro-life and claim that everyone should be carrying a gun to stop bad guys

You can’t be both pro-life and in favor of cutting assistance to all the poor grannies

You can’t be both pro-life and support the ending of regulating polluters

You can’t be both pro-life and terminatethe  NOAA severe weather warning system

As you can see, pro-life is actually only pro-fetus. After birth, the pro-lifers set those kids adrift and don’t give a damn about them throughout the rest of their lives. If you support these anti-human actions and still claim to be pro-life, get over yourself and get a grip on reality.

Speaking Some More of Health

We at the societal and cultural level are not too good at looking forward beyond the immediate horizon. That, however, doesn’t mean that the somewhat more distant future won’t arrive. The future just beyond that immediate horizon carries grave danger for us, our children and our grandchildren. Other than stupid, unnecessary, self-destructive wars, our deteriorating climate is the most dangerous thing facing us, regardless of whether we choose to see that danger.

Watch Al Gore’s presentation to the San Francisco Climate Week gathering or read the text of his speech here. Gore doesn’t couch our current reality in terms of myopia, but that is exactly what the current administration is peddling. The muscular calls for more and more fossil fuel extraction and burning, the disbanding of FEMA, the refusal to see the ongoing disasters as the ever-escalating result of global warming that they are keep us from seeing what we are doing to our future generations.

Seeing clearly does not require perfect vision. It only requires paying attention. – Steve Schmidt

The Price of Idiocy

Photo credit: The Onion

There is no evidence to recommend discontinuing fluoridating drinking water. There is goo gobs of evidence showing that fluoride not only protects against tooth decay, but also can prevent various bacterial infections and even death. In the face of that incontrovertible evidence, Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. wants us to stop fluoridating our water. Brain worm, maybe?

He is famously an anti-vaxxer of the first order, brainlessly railing against the vaccines that prevent illness and suffering and save lives.

From Magical Thinking About a Miracle Mineral, by Zeynep Tufekci,

. . . measles [is] one of the world’s most contagious – and vaccine-preventable – diseases

It has been a favorite target for Kennedy, who instead recommends quack cures, like

. . . “aerosolized budesonide,” an asthma drug that actual medical experts say is not relevant to measles, and clarithromysin, an antibiotic that experts don’t mention for this purpose.

Okay, Kennedy really does have a brain worm and a lifetime of being a special boy only because his daddy really was special. More significant are the people who give his uneducated recommendations serious consideration. Unvaccinated kids have died from measles recently and

there are now more than 700 known measles cases in at least 8 states.

Which is why you continue to thank your mom for dragging you into your pediatrician’s office when you were a kid to get the MMR vaccine. Also, the polio vaccine, the smallpox vaccine and more. Too bad the moms of those kids who died recently from measles and those on a path to die didn’t protect their kids.

The beauty of idiocy caused by listening to ignorant, celebrity know nothings is the relief from the hard work of having to think clearly and critically. But, of course, nothing is free. Sometimes the price for idiocy is the life of your kid.

Kermit, Big Bird and Miss Piggy

Trump has signed an executive order defunding PBS and NPR. They are the most recent targets of his reprehensible retributions, the unlawful tantrums of a tyrant toddler. Here’s a pic sent in by pal Jim Nathan to give you an idea of where things stand. You might want to respond to one of those email appeals from the Corporation For Public Broadcasting, rather than reflexively pressing the Delete button. Or click here.

__________________________________________

* Recall that in 2020 Trump The SuperSpreader contracted Covid-19. He was rushed to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, sitting close to Secret Service guys in The Beast so as to be sure to infect them. At Walter Reed he was treated with remdesivir, dexamethasone and more, all breakthrough treatments developed with the aid of medical grants from the federal government. Now that Trump no longer has Covid he’s cancelling funding for medical research because, hey, he himself doesn’t need new miracle drugs.

 

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And add your comments below to help us all to be better informed.

Thanks!

The Fine Print:

  1. Writings quoted or linked from my posts reflect a point I want to make, at least in part. That does not necessarily mean that I endorse or agree with everything in such writings.
  2. There are lots of smart, well-informed people. Sometimes we agree; sometimes we don’t. Search for others’ views and decide for yourself.
  3. Errors in fact, grammar, spelling and punctuation are all embarrassingly mine, but I do wish that I could blame someone else. Glad to have your corrections.
  4. Book links to Amazon are provided for reference only. Please purchase your books through your local mom & pop bookstore. Keep them and your town or neighborhood vibrant.
  5. Clicking on most pics in these posts will take you to the source information.
  6. Comments offered by readers, whether in agreement with my opinions or opposing, are encouraged and greatly appreciated. All are reviewed prior to going live. I reserve the right to edit for readability, punctuation, typos, voluntary idiocy and to exclude those I deem inappropriate.
  7. Responsibility for the content of these posts is unequivocally, totally, unavoidably mine.

Click me

JA


Copyright 2025 by Jack Altschuler
Reproduction and sharing are encouraged, providing proper attribution is given.

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