GOP Misuses the word "Woke:" As they remain silent on their past Corporate links

Many in Cabinet Used to be Corporate Shills

(Some sought Federal deregulation)

Trump’s binge of deregulation was another form of trickle-down economics – that story here from Salon in 2018 and boy it’s still in play today with this headline from former Labor Security and expert in such matters:

“Robert Reich: The dangerous myth of deregulation”

Trump and his appointees were on a binge of deregulation that masks another kind of trickle-down economics, where the gains go to the top and the rest of us bear the risks and losses.

They say getting rid of regulations frees up businesses to be more profitable. Maybe. But regulations also protect you and me — from being harmed, fleeced, shafted, injured, or sickened by corporate products and services.

So when the Trump administration gets rid of regulations, top executives and big investors may make more money, but the rest of us bear more risks and harm.

After heavy lobbying by the chemical industry, for example, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) scaled  back the way the government decides whether some of the most dangerous chemicals on the market pose health and safety risks. Which may increase the profits of the chemical industry but will leave the rest of us less protected from toxins that can make their way into dry-cleaning solvents, paint strippers, shampoos, and cosmetics.

1. For example: Scott Pruitt may have left the EPA under Trump, but Trump put a former coal executive in his place. Which means the EPA will continue to try to repeal the Clean Power Plan, a regulation that set the first-ever limits on carbon pollution from U.S. power plants. If it’s repealed, wealthy shareholders may do better, but most of us will bear the costs of more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, and faster climate change.

2. Another example: Trump’s former Education Secretary under Betsy DeVos stopped investigating for-profit colleges that resulted in more profits for the for-profits, but left many young people and their parents more vulnerable to fraud.

3. Still another example: Trump’s Labor Department reduced the number of workers who were eligible for overtime pay. But, they also proposed allowing teenagers to work long hours in dangerous jobs that child labor laws used to protect them from. Again, more profits for business, more cost and risk for the rest of us.

Trump weakened banking regulations put in place after the financial crisis of 2008, even rolling back the so-called Volcker Rule that prevented banks from gambling with commercial deposits. The result: More profits for the banks, and more risk on you and me. 

(FYI: Now today the GOP calls that reaction to SVB closure as being “woke” - which is totally insane).

Trump’s gang of former industry lobbyists (pictured above) and executives who then got busy deregulating the same industries they once represented will no doubt do very well when they head back into the private sector after leaving the administration.

But the rest of us won’t do well. We may not know for years the extent we’re unprotected — until the next financial collapse, or the next public health crisis, or the next upsurge in fraud, or the next flood or drought hits because the EPA failed to do what it could to slow and reverse climate change.

Don’t fall for it. Trump’s binge of deregulation is just another form of trickle-down economics — where the gains go the top, and nothing trickles down except risks and losses.

Here is Reich’s short YouTube presentation (worth watching):

My 2 Cents: Good analysis from a very smart man. Sadly, today this “new” GOP in control of the House blame President Biden and the DEMS and their so-called “woke” agenda for everything, which is false and downright goofy as they selectively forget Trump’s past.

But, that too is simple and obvious and so typically GOP nonsense, but sadly it sells with their base who lap it up.

Thanks for stopping by.