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If you read on you’ll realize we are all in the same boat on this Mexican deal-
The President’s idea to add a 20% tax on imports from Mexico to finance the Great Wall of America doesn’t really fly with me-not so much…Why? Well, if you’ll lift a glass with me we can get on to that. 
I get the feeling that most American’s are in the same dark I am in when it comes to understanding the actually workings between Mexico and America. We hear or read each day about the drug cartels and illegals crossing our border, but what else goes on between America and Mexico?
It turns out the flow of goods and services between Mexico and America are Huge.
America and Mexico interchange 1.6 billion dollars worth of trade everyday! (2015 stats) See? That’s a bit of pocket change. On the world-wide stage Mexico is America’s third largest Import/Export partner.
I keep thinking about the idea of building a wall between us and our third largest trade partner. Honestly, I’d no idea! But, maybe, it’s important to see what we trade back and forth? I mean it wouldn’t hurt the US if Mexico’s major export to us was, say, Twinkies, right. Don’t get me wrong, I loved these as a kid, but I could’ve lived without them.
This brings us to a quick run down of what actually passes hands between America and Mexico…
Here’s a short list of what the US imports from Mexico
- The top import categories (2-digit HS) in 2015 were: vehicles ($74 billion), electrical machinery ($63 billion), machinery ($49 billion), mineral fuels ($14 billion), and optical and medical instruments ($12 billion).
U.S. imports of agricultural products from Mexico totaled $21 billion in 2015, our 2nd largest supplier of agricultural imports. Leading categories include: fresh vegetables ($4.8 billion),other fresh fruit….
- ($4.3 billion), wine and beer ($2.7 billion), snack foods ($1.7 billion), and processed fruit & vegetables ($1.4 billion).
Hmmm…I like fruit and I drive to stores to buy fruit. Wait!?!?! Does this list “2.67 billion per year in wine and beer!” See? Screwing this trade up just isn’t gonna get it for me.
There’s something about this Great Wall /Tax Mexican imports 20% that doesn’t quite fit.
Here’s a short list of what America exports to Mexico
- The top export categories (2-digit HS) in 2015 were: machinery ($42 billion), electrical machinery ($41 billion), vehicles ($22 billion), mineral fuels ($19 billion), and plastics ($17 billion).
- U.S. exports of agricultural products to Mexico totaled $18 billion in 2015, our 3rd largest agricultural export market. Leading categories include: corn ($2.3 billion), soybeans ($1.4 billion), dairy products ($1.3 billion), pork products ($1.3 billion), and beef products ($1.1 billion).
So if all this back and forth were to be disrupted it seems a few workers might be out jobs in the States… Actually, to be specific, 1.1 million American workers are employed solely in providing the goods and services we export to Mexico…This seems like a lot of jobs, a lot of mom’s and dad’s livelihoods depend on trade with Mexico. Should we let the building of the Great Wall between our two country’s screw this up? Plus, er, there’s that wine and beer thingy stat.
One more I’m the most interesting man in the world thought—
Isn’t that Super bowl thing coming up, ya know, the one where American’s consume enough wine and beer to sink the world? Can we just maybe put off this Great Wall add 20% to cost of goods and drinks from Mexico for about another 100 years? Let’s re-think this deal.
Maybe we should think about taking another course?
Okay, one more idea or two. I’ve got the nagging feeling that our President’s main attraction to building this Great Wall of America is that it will stand as a testament to his Presidency whether it works or not. AND–when Paul Ryan says the Congress can find a way to pay for this wall isn’t he really talking about our tax dollars paying for it? It doesn’t matter what name the Congress gives the funding, right-it’s still our money paying for it. ”
McConnell estimated it(the Wall) will cost $15 billion at most — he cited a range of $12 billion to $15 billion.” (Other agencies estimate the Wall to cost 25 billion.)
Here’s one bottom line-when Trump manages to have Mexico call off their meeting with him today I think about running out and buying a truck load of Corona’s, Dos Equis, Negran Modelos and a few Tecates’ and Sols. Heck, I’ll be saving at least 20% on each bottle!
Can we maybe rethink this Great Wall idea? What do you all say?
Cheers…
Franque23
Bare Ass Pond-the late 1970’s. I got dressed for the pic.
It wasn’t that long ago…
About 1953 on Long Island outside of our family home-the Northeastern’s blew snow in almost every winter.
Okay, maybe it was a long time ago. For me, it’s a blink of a memory comprised of forever.
I built snowmen without a hint of what was to come-great dreams for the earth.
Change started massing energy when the Beatle’s sang on Ed Sullivan-those tunes soon morphed into a mud bath called, Woodstock. There were the teachings of tolerance,,, justice, right and wrong, but I think most of all we were taught to hold within each of us a dignity of spirit. Once these ideas were in place, the new world could arrive.
Looking back, the festival announcement that the brown acid was bad made the assumption some listeners were still able to discern brown from white, black, green. purple, polka-dotted or blue. We’d stripped bare to prove the old ways were gone, basic change was here, as fundamental ways of behaving and thinking were dead and gone. The lines between us all had vanished for good.
Conventional societal mores were cast aside and a new course had begun. Yes, we got naked…(Woodstock)
It’s easy to wonder why any of us thought smoking pot might help the situation we enthusiastically fought to change. You’d think we might have been savvy enough to vote for change, but we’d given up on that. Millions in my generation decided taking it to the streets was the best if not the only way to make change happen. Were we right?
I sang on stage back in the day all about the message-peace, love, freedom and equality.
Pete and I started singing the message early on in High School. ( I’m in the background)
First serious guitar in its first gold color…(I’m 15.) Hopin’ to sing the message.
So, my wheel turns way back, runs through the middle of so much history and arrives here in the closing days of 2016. To be clear-I remember dad getting our first TV, a thing still new to everyone on our block. I went to college when there were no computers, no cells phones but, yes, short dresses and pot but no Aids that we knew. I began to work as a Library Specialist 21 years ago when the Alachua County Library District had acquired only a few computers. My reference work for patrons was done entirely out of books or through phone calls in those earlier years. All the while, I prayed for peace along with so many other Americans.
Today, many feel political drifts forecast a turning away from the sun shining in as we all hoped it might in the 70’s, from the environmental concerns many of us have held for so many years, and from our hope for peace.
Home coming parade. Gainesville, 1970…hmmm, this wouldn’t happen today.
It was once easy for hundreds of Gainesville’s people to strip naked at lime pits and swim with others.
“The year was 1970, and the band was Mudcrutch. Petty sang and played bass alongside Mike Campbell (guitar), Tom Leadon (guitar and vocals), Jim Lenehan (lead vocals) and Randall Marsh (drums).” This is Gainesville in the 70’s, so it doesn’t matter that there are five names and only four people? The main point was in the music.
We shared the understanding that to find the truth of our existence it was necessary to shed the barriers between us and the earth. Open, accepting, and always understanding-Peace was the message. We wanted the naked truth.
Now? We need to revisit the messages of my generation, to create a solidarity of purpose that keeps America on the right path. My generation didn’t want the Nam war to go on and we stopped it. Today, we can stop anything as well. The key is to really try, never give up and work harder.
If not ‘Bare Ass’ time, its bare knuckle time. Environmentalists, humanitarians and lovers of life, it’s time to dress down our opponents. We have to tune up and sing our song louder than false claims, disingenuous motives and misguided hearts can yell. It’s time to dive in and win again.
Franque23
To list a few….
Obamacare
détente
Give Me your tired and your poor
Women’s Rights to equal pay
Women’s right to have abortions in most cases
Current Social Security retirement age
Some amount of Social Security Check
A major part of the funding for the EPA
Emission controls for cars a business(The Clean Air Act)
A better, standard minimum wage
Wall street regulations
Union Rights to organize
Defined Pensions for Workers
National Park funding
Alaskan Pipeline resistance
Taxes on the Rich
What we get in return?
A President who is inexperienced in the field of World-Wide politics
A President who seems unaware of people’s constitutional rights and the workings of the U.S. Government
The NRA ( A gun in every closet)
A President who has called some women pigs, dogs and worse.
A President who gloated after 9/11 since the event would make him money
A President who mused how the housing crash and economic crash in the U.S. several years ago would make him money.
A President who is against environmental protections
A President who has gone bankrupt numerous times.
A President who will soon address in court accusations of Fraud (Trump University) and rape charges.
There will be a Wall we will pay for
A First lady who has posed naked for tabloids. ( Not a crime, but is this appropriate considering the stature of the position?)
One more takeaway
You can only squeeze the middle class workers so much and for so long via both political party’s actions before that electorate is willing to shoot themselves in the foot rather than vote for an ongoing economic travesty.
The day is done; our country’s course is set for the foreseeable future.
Advice for President Obama:
Sign as many (a thousand or more) Executive Orders between now and January. This might slow that foreseeable future of a beast down.
Franque23.
The day is done…for now.
ya know…..The Standing Rock protest is super important…
At Woodstock, my friends and I were young, not yet strapped by so much obligation–we could go there at the drop of a hat to speak our minds, to express ourselves.
The vocals held the message, “Purple Haze, run in my mind..”
we wanted freedom; to make love, not war, and to roll baby roll
Thing is, people who are about my age today are most likely wrapped in bills and a job they can’t afford to skip out on for a few days-a week-and lose. Or, we’re just too dang old. Plus, we’ve already been cracked over the head, jailed, spit on and frowned upon during the ever-changing 1960’s. Yes, I’d guess my generation’s spirits haven’t changed but it does seem it’s the younger generation’s turn to make a difference, to take one for the team, to band together to right this wrong that is taking place at Standing Rock.
Maybe, the younger generations don’t really know how much effort it took for my generation to turn Nam around and to end that bloody mess. It took plenty.
One day while attending Gettysburg college I joined about eight of my classmates and gathered in two cars to drive to Washington D. C. for what we’d heard was to be a massive protest against the Vietnam war. It was-maybe one hundred thousand gathered to march in D.C. that day. If tear gas, clubs and charging horses is peaceful, then this was a Peaceful demonstration.
Here’s my point: if two sides meet with opposing views and one side is peaceful while the other isn’t, is that a peaceful demonstration? Ask the supporters of Standing rock who are being dragged down, beaten, gassed, arrested and striped searched if this is a ‘peaceful ‘ demonstration.
It takes two to tango; two to talk.
No, the Nam years were battle years both abroad and here at home. Three of the group I went to Washington with didn’t make it back to campus until they’d been released from jail (I think we went to D.C. on a Saturday and we didn’t see these three again until the following Wednesday-one had been clubbed on the head.) One college friend had flunked out by Christmas our Freshman year and gone to Vietnam. Three months later, by late Spring, he returned to visit missing a leg. It was horrifying; I spent at least a week smoking my brains out trying to forget John’s fate.
My whole generation fought the Nam war one way or another. We didn’t send Memes. We got in the streets and marched as an unarmed army of what was right and good.
At first, protesters tried flower power.
It was a peaceful demonstration, so the National Guard of Ohio took a knee and…..
shot….
these four dead, randomly killing them and wounding nine others
All across the nation members of my generation fought and were bloodied , even killed, for what we thought was right.
My generation served our time. And we learned, Love has a down side.
bullets kill…love doesn’t.
So, I’m wondering…why aren’t the 18 to 21 year old’s going to Standing Rock to stop this pipeline? You have the ability-some of you-like maybe 500 thousand, right? And yet, you aren’t joining our Native American people to fight for your right to live in a clean, healthy environment. Somewhere, somehow, between the protests of the Nam Era and the rattle, smoke, shake, rock-in-roll days of Woodstock my generation’s spirit to join in mass to fight what’s wrong for what is right has gotten lost; the ball got dropped.
Maybe the environmental movement just isn’t fun enough? I don’t know…
In the rub lies the ointment, and in there are the flies. Sometime, somewhere, I feel certain the next generation will have had enough, and chose to fight in the streets rather than type on a computer as I am. Both are good; both actions can bear results-but getting out in the streets in mass has worked before. It can work again.
It’s still not too late to join the protester’s at Standing Rock. In the end, Life becomes a memory. You’ll want to know you did what’s right. Good luck.
Here’s a Drone video and update on Standing rock https://vimeo.com/189876726
Franque23
Here’s the dirt on the proposed pipeline and how and why it was redirected….
Tonight is the last debate, and I’m wondering just how ‘BIG’ it will be? Will the discussion be about policy and new ideas, or will it sink into the muck of He/She said this or did that? I’d like Trump to stop saying “Trust Me” and tell me why I should.
You know what? I Don’t trust Trump.
I’m for Hillary but I’ve got a question. Of all the claims Trump made about her that were found to be untrue by fact checkers, why didn’t anyone fact check Trump’s claim that Hillary was the Devil?!?!? Oh bother. You’d think someone would look that one over first—seems important.
Maybe for Halloween….
No, in the end the discussion about Hillary’s morals and the past charges against her, no matter how vetted, play to Trump’s advantage.
Maybe the bottom line of the muck is Bill got off and Trump may not.
Personally, though, I wouldn’t have smoked that cigar with Bill even though Monica was a consenting adult at the time, and people have done much worse with consenting adults.
This year’s election muck is smeared anyway you look at it: Trump’s constituency will not go away after this election….they may still hold over 35% of the votes….this group, parts of it, are a bit off in my estimation-maybe way scary radical. Still, they represent a segment of society other Americans will have to deal with; we’ll have to find some sort of middle ground where we can all stand together and work side-by-side after this election.
I’m thinking after Hillary gets in we will have a few tough years of contraction as many have suggested, and then a recovery. Things could be worse.
Trump put his foot in his mouth, period. Palin could see Russia from her porch and there was Howard Dean’s whoop…These are the phrases that etch the paths of history. Sometimes, the words make the, ‘Man.’
For Donald Trump, it’s too late to close that barn-door mouth.
I am proud of anyone for wobbling a bit off Trump after hearing the tapes. Some are getting on the Trump Train Dump. Honestly, I think being born so rich has kept Trump from being able, or needing to, mature past a Jr. High school locker room level. I’m sad for him. I know he’s lived the life of a king, but the best part of life is trying to mature as a spirit. It seems Trump will never use the chance.
Maybe I’m overboard, but I’m starting to feel bad about squashing centipedes. So I feel like I’m hearing the verbosity of a lost soul, a wasted life, when I listen to Trump rant and rage on so many people and topics. Again, it’s a downer.
My mom would say he’s catching flies….My locker room friends would say-er never mind.
Trump is running for President. This is to his credit. The trouble is he needs a shrink not the Oval Office.
I’ve one more question(for now).
Will vulgar become vogue? The Italian parliament ruled just this year that it’s legal to publicly masturbate as long as children aren’t watching…odd. But, it’s another useless law. What good does that law do a guy after he’s gone blind? Yes, I’m assuming it will be the men who take ‘advantage’ of this new law in Italy-go figure.
Words can set precedent, Donald! And oddly, that word sounds like….?*
She’s climbed the hill and soon Hillary will be President. Then, she can toot her horn(s)-as if.
Franque23
* Hint: Presi****.
- My Avatar Magic series is out on Kindle now….here are the three links to each book..I do hope you’ll spread the word and enjoy these writings.
- Bk one http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00B0NYO80Bk two http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KXMIIOKBk three http://www.amazon.com/dp/B018RX67BW
What if Hillary had said, “I grab them by the balls!”
What if your wife had said that?
How about your girl friend?
You gonna jump on board and unzip your pants.?
Are you gonna vote for Trump for President? ” I grab women by the pussy.” http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2016/10/07/donald_trump_2005_tape_i_grab_women_by_the_pussy.html
Get real. American Politics has a real problem—our discord with the past forty years with middle class earnings being reduced to squat has left us grabbing at straws…not pussy.
So Trump has out trumped himself with a vulgarity he may not be able to out do.
Meetings are being held by the Republicans right now in Washington about what to do about Trump… but I think little can be done at this point.
Here’s to the obstructionist in Washington and the dumb ass grass roots right who lead us into this heap of a mess…
Oy Vey..BTW-the whole world is watching,, and Trump is down right embarrassing.
He’s like a shoe shine boy without a stand..or equipment.
That’s where Trump belongs. Trump has no viable platforms, no experience and no political savvy.
The man is a walking, talkin’ disgrace.. Oh my God,, please make this man shut up!
For all my daughters,,, to all the women I’ve ever known,, to my female friends who I love dearly,,and to my wife,, please forgive me for there being a Turnip,,, no, Trump. I so mean this…I swear- I had nothing to do with this.
Vote Blue- Democratic- and turn the house and congress back to the People’s party…they support the middle class workers and our rights. The Republicans need a re-set.
Franque23
Actually, I can’t lose. If Hillary wins I’ll be dancing. If not, I’ll be drinkin’. So what’s not to like…of course, there is this chart that explains in detail why I’d be so miserable if Trump won-
.
Trump is a garbage mess of bad ideas: build a wall that won’t work(there’s trains, planes, ladders and tunnels, one million boats, cars not to mention trucks); deport immigrants; end social security; give the rich more tax breaks cause the trickle down theory has worked so well in the past(not.); let all our enemies and the rest of the world have nukes-the more the merrier; if we all paid no taxes we’d all be smart; women can too be pigs-just look at what they do with men.
Give this man a nuke!
Supporters of Trump have slipped off the wheels of time, so unhinged it’s mind boggling.
Three cheers? to being a bit ‘off’.
Some Democrats hope Republicans won’t find the voting polls-anything is possible. But, to be fair, these misguided, mistaken, emotionally over wrought voters are not all bad people. They don’t all love the KKK members, right wing obstructionist or feed on ill-fed facts from Fox-not-news. It’d be wrong to think every Republican is a blow-hard who hates Blacks, Latino’s, Mexicans-anyone different looking from them- or one who thinks women can take a back seat on wages and human rights issues. No, not every supporter of Trump believes we can put America in a protective bubble within walls no one can climb while we blow up our enemies-nuke em’.
No, somewhere, there’s a normal Trump supporter-there has to be!
Just maybe not here…..
It’s been theorized by studies that those who support the Republican side of politics are basically people who like to make decisions and stick to them, facts be damned. Now, I believe it. After all that has unfolded during and through Trump’s Presidential split-rail, first I said it now I didn’t, campaign there’s no other up-beat let’s take the high road explanation for those beings who still support Trump.
Why? Here’s why facts must not matter to those who stand by Trump.
Trump makes crapola proud, turds smell like roses and outright lies the highway to heaven. The man’s a flam-flaming, short dealin’, back stabbing business man who claims he could shoot someone and still get votes. Plus, he’s never said what he said from either side of his mouth.
Yay– a Meme!
Then again,-
The man’s so Huge, the best of the best, so clearly smart-it’s his genes. He’s so going to do the unimaginable, a leader Putin style, so perfect, it all will come back to America thru him. He’s the only one who can do this, forget any outside business interests, they’re huge, rightly so wrong for any President. It’s he with hands so beautiful who never said fighters who get caught, killed or have mental trauma’s about killing others are cowards, losers, and not worth a dung pile. Who on any planet in their right mind wouldn’t want all of that? Well, I have to say, sorry, but Trump does have small hands and his names rhymes with, Dump.
I say-dump Trump; the man’s not worthy of air time. He’s a shameful example of a cut-throat business man at best. A low life womanizing(and how young/) money grubbing double dealing man at worst. He could be President? Of what? A crap shoot in a cow patty field?
Oh no buddy, Pick another field….
Yes, maybe he can manage that patty field and not lose another fortune.
Trump could help sell Cow Patty Clocks….
Vote blue down the line this Novemeber-wouldn’t it be nice to have a Supreme court nomination at least voted on? Wouldn’t it be nice to have woman’s rights supported? How about keeping Social Security in place? And how nice it would be to pass the funding of programs already approved and put in place by congress! This group of right obstructionists in Washington need to go-go with Trump and build another bankruptcy. Thank the obstructionists for downgrading America’s credit rating; thanks for Trump-heck, Republicans, thanks for nothing. The right has been lousy with bigots and cheats for too long. I want the Gallant Ol’ Party back to at least some form of sanity,,, but not through Trump’s misdeals and pig-like thinking, no way on that.
Franque23.
“Look at Putin—what he’s doing with Russia—I mean, you know, what’s going on over there. I mean this guy has done—whether you like him or don’t like him—he’s doing a great job in rebuilding the image of Russia and also rebuilding Russia period.”-Trump on Larry King-
Wait!!! “Rebuilding the image of Russia!” In whose mind is Putin rebuilding Russia’s image? There’s a scary thought…
*
The chart of charts on the candidates positions…
Okay Suzie Q, I do love the way you walk.
Just look at that mud! Woodstock.
Heck, I noticed the difference in first grade. The girls were lighter on their feet, somehow balanced to attract my attention. Their hair was way longer, worse, they knew stuff-some sort of magical power made them better readers and spellers.
So yeah, those early childhood magical female powers morphed big time during the high school years into throat gulping physical traits, ones that could crack a guys head open with one look.
Here, four guys practice yoga neck exercises on a park bench. Hot took on it’s third meaning in high school..hot outside, hot to touch and ouch, plain hot. 
None of anything about this was fair. Girls who I thought of as women filled all guy’s minds with distraction. Females used fashion, makeup, too many smiles, hand holding-more-to dominate the scene from the pseudo-rear of power within our groupings. 
It’s been going on, like forever….
Plus, all the management of boys was encased by girl’s sharpened wit, tongues that spoke way beyond earthly speed, a million perfumed smells, a ton of books they read, whims that changed daily, skirts that might ride up when they sat at a desk, “Let’s dance” moves, great ideas about kissing, walking and those parties. Every guy I knew remained rigidly fixed by their popularity, or not, among the girls-that was key. For me, sports was an inner drive but the crowd and who it comprised was always important.
Two young men practice math with flash cards.
The saddest thing is most high school guys were aware of the gigantic brains supported by those faces and bodies we looked over but it seldom mattered what those minds thought. The issue was mostly sex. There is an entire book* that postulates America’s move west from the east coast was led by whore houses being built further and further west as a result of laws making prostitution illegal in the east. I remember Chicago was a major whore house for New York City clients once the Big Apple shut down the business-sorta. So, roads needed to be built and other businesses popped up along the whore trade routes.
Why is it all sad? For one, the result of most men’s single fascination with the female body rather than their mind is that Mankind has missed out on most of Women’s mental powers throughout our history! Yikes!!
This man’s reading all the fine print about the calamity right now.
But let’s put this another way–what if that censorship was on the other foot!??!! What if everything men had to say hadn’t been heard until the last one hundred years or so. Actually, maybe things would be….nah, we need all of us to be heard if we’re ever to make it out of the stupidity muck it seems the world has found.
So Mister Me can accept that fashion shows, world pageants, even back room pole dances are really about how people look, walk, sway, make muscles or bat eyes.
Everyone needs some fun
Thing is, a person’a intelligence should never be overlooked. If the world could keep it’s eye of the prize-the power of intellect-we might get somewhere. This is why Trump’s recent remark that Hillary hasn’t the look to be President is more than a bit off. What? Would he have ever dated Margaret Thatcher? That’s a low shot but it makes my point.
Looks can be deceiving. Worse, looks can kill more than a man’s ability to think with the correct head, they can kill the potential of many thinkers, hide them beneath a shroud of lust and the odd disdain some men have for owning those feelings. We as a people miss hearing thoughts we need to hear and respect because of looks.
So, head’s up, men and women! And this time, Men, for this election and for the next bazillion years-at least for your lifetime- be sure the right head is up when a woman speaks. Cheers
Franque23
*Actually, I don’t think it’s this title–but this book may cover the idea…https://www.amazon.com/Upstairs-Girls-Prostitution-American-West/dp/1560373571
My books are on Kindle…. The Avatar Magic series, by Gerald Franquemont..I hope you’ll read them….
Politics is more than dirty, it’s a murderous business–Shakespeare knew. We all should vote during this upcoming election, then duck for cover. Some good things–it doesn’t matter what happens now, the world will eventually(if we survive) become solar-powered; diets with much less meat will prevail(dang it- I love meat but , yeah, this will happen); bullet trains will cross America(built by the U.S. or China-it’s a given*).
One bad thing- the world of indiscriminate killing is here to stay, no matter who gets to be President of the U.S….
It will be semi-okay no matter who wins this election–I felt poorly (nice term) about Bush Jr.–especially Cheney —but I survived. Just remember our military is in charge of our foreign policy, and for now works mostly to gather as much oil and gas power as possible from other regions.
It doesn’t matter what the President says about military matters–unless they get in the way–then they get shot three times by one magical bullet. Again, the world’s eventual shift to solar power is certain…. the TPP by any name is certain.
TPP protest…
The discussion
The middle class slide will continue-the Bank of England(Queen-)The Feds who set interest rates will continue to control our economy’s money supply- Vote as you will and speak your mind as you can! We are in a huge river of time, of humanity, and it only flows one way.
Here in America, and across the globe, we’re way past the debate about a ruling class. Police and military are out to enforce the decisions of the rulers, the owners, and workers fight back with sticks and stones. 
The Rockefeller commission(in the 1960’s) set out to organize a world economy, countries be damned, and NAFTA and the TPP are just steps laid by that body. For us, the workers, there is no way out. We can only elect those who at least speak of our plight and say they’d like to help, or fight to the death.
A guaranteed income is really being discussed by those in power…What is AGI?.. It’s a check we, the displaced workers, get each month that is a set amount. Why? It’s simple. Rulers see that through computer technology and IT work that millions upon millions of workers world-wide will be laid off within the next twenty years….What to DO? If people have no buying power, laid off, without funds, how can any business profit? Worker’s laid off will have no purchasing power. Yes, the answer is a world-wide guaranteed income…..odd, huh?
It’s all too weird for me to wrap my head around,, but know this: the FEDS-not at all an American group- has orchestrated America’s economy for like forever. Our interest rates and money supply has been solely controlled by this group-we don’t have a so-called, “free market,” as so many of American’s believe. Our interest rates, those lashes, are controlled by an agency outside the U.S.—we are under that thumb. In fact, to this date our economy dictates the world’s stability, everything we know is controlled by this group.
Depressing? Maybe. But them’s the facts,,,and has been for soooo long. You want a better life for yourself and for our children like I do. I know that. But so many things are beyond the reach of our efforts, and of our President. Still, I’d favor a President who at least speaks to the plight of the middle class… I don’t hear that from Trump…not at all. He’s stuck on the ‘Trickle down economics’ that amounts to the middle class getting pissed on. Me? I’m not into that.
Hillary is our only hope to make things a bit better for the working class at this point. Pull that lever, or mark your ballot for Hillary—we can’t fall back to business take all while the middle class quickly falls into obscurity. Sometimes, slow is better.
The Republicans can try again in four years. The general economic forecast is for a tough three or so years ahead with a recovery around 2020ish..Who’s is President won’t change this…That might be an opportunity for the Republicans then, but not now.
Franque23 wants a chance for our children.
I’m there, at that age, and I can tell you- every middle class , upper middle class and anyone below these classes needs to have the benefits of their hard-earned paychecks(investments), a pension from the jobs they have served long-term, plus social security when they age. Really, getting old is not a walk through white daisy fields-the ones we will one day push up
— but a daily struggle of will and body that differs for each person who gets to ripen with age.
It’s a journey-we all needs hats and safety nets.
It’s not that things fall off when you get older.
Hey look! It’s not me!!!
Heck, in some ways at 67 I’m as strong as I ever was, maybe less distracted, more focused. The early years are swamped with wonder. The middle years filled with responsibilities, trials, tribulations, too many bills, phone calls, the ‘What the hell are my kids doing?’ moments, booze, parties, I’m absolutely positive thoughts, mistakes and breakthroughs, couches that need to be replaced and ‘If only’s’.
It’s the year of the Meme…
Welcome to the inner sanctum
The older years are when things start to slow down though Grandchildren, if you have any, can keep things spinning but not, usually, twenty-four seven like immediate family chores. Older years give a person time to reflect, hear the birds, feel the breeze, garden, and finally take time to sit in that rocker bought so long ago. It’s a great time to read and to forget the worry-a silent apprehension that things may not work out. Heck, if you reach the older years, things have worked out. Congrats.
You’ve won…..
Sure, everyone should count pennies as they go but this shouldn’t be a full-time job when you reach retirement, not unless you’re some sorta mathematics savant who loves the pastime. This is why every American should demand a pension from jobs they have held for long periods of time, and a social security check. Oh, I know, I know-owners, the ruling class, and some workers clamor on about investing in stocks rather suffering through Social Security paycheck deductions. The thing is, I do think workers should have an investment scheme going on for their lives, but also Social Security. The stocks can wobble up or down, and sometimes down for long periods of time just when a person reaches an age when they need them to wiggle up. Social Security stands now as a constant income as should be.
The notion that Social Security should be disbanded or its funds stolen for other government programs is a trash heap of garbage that stinks for workers.
Dumping Social Security and eradicating pensions smells fishy–don’t go down that road.
What a load….
Those opposed to Social Security keep flappin’ their jaws spewing crap.
Don’t buy into that premise. Invest in stocks-go high or low risk as you like- work your ass off when you can during your life in pension rich jobs, and demand Social Security. Do this and you’ll not only hear the birds but have time to learn their calls and name them during old age. The Life scheme as it was set for workers and running so well in the 1950’s still works.
Don’t let the politicians steal, erode or flim-flam your mind with gobbledygook.
Americans should expect and demand a Federally insured, defined benefit pension option for every job…Social Security with viable health insurance and a healthy investment market-that’s government by the people, for the people and security.
Cheers-keep up the fight. Slough off the crap and sling the truth.
Franque23
Diversity of incomes helps…
