Opinion Dylan Ratigan says America is a third-world country without New Silicon Valley Hollywood Wall Street

[skysolo]

Silicon Valley, Hollywood, Wall Street, and the U.S. military.

Jimmy Dore brings up the "exhaustion date" for social security. The exhaustion date is the year at which social security will stop paying 100% of its benefits. The year 2035 is the forecast exhaustion date at which time social security will only pay out 79% of its benefits.

Ratigan says talking about money in this way is absurd as if money is scarce. We live in a time where trillions of dollars are being given away to special interests. The scarcity of money is being used as leverage in policy making. The super-rich and companies have the ultimate protection against economic collapse while everyone else has no safety net. The nature of the government and how it prioritizes giving money to the wealthiest while the most vulnerable are left behind.

Ratigan calls the CARES Act the greatest robbery in the history of the world. 30 million Americans are out of work and Congress gives upwards of 5 trillion of taxpayer money to the wealthiest companies and people.

Trump is pushing for a cut in payroll taxes and capital gains taxes. The administration is coming after your pensions and retirement.

A cut to capital gains is essentially a cut to pensions and social security. A cut to capital gains is a just another tax break for the rich. There was also another tax provision allowed in the CARES Act that gives (on average) a 1.2 million cut to 43,000 millionaires.

Trump is only following in the tradition of Obama. Obama bailed out the banks while allowing them to evict 5 million people from their homes.

Obama To Bank CEOs: “My Administration Is The Only Thing Between You And The Pitchforks”
https://www.politico.com/story/2009/04/inside-obamas-bank-ceos-meeting-020871

 

[AndroidRage]

And that Tradition is following Bush Jr and Senior, Clinton, Reagan, etc etc. Just administration after administration out to fuck the working class in favor of the wealthy donor class.

 

[7437]

Yeah. The rich are the enemy of America, thats not new.

 

[My2Cents]

The US is a third world country for at least a decade and their political agenda is Often bad for the world

 

[phoenixikki]

To be fair, America would be a first-world country without all the leeches...

 

[lfd0311]

Its not Trump that brought this to you. It's the Democrats.

 

[lfd0311]

And traditionally the only people who say that the US is a third world country are Middle Class white people who've never been to a third world country.

 

[meauneau]

The question is what will the people of America do? If you really live in a democracy and have have freedom why don't you stop being victims and do something?

 

[MilesAbove]

To be fair, America would be a first-world country without all the leeches...

Third-world mentality right there.

 

[MVelsor]

It would be a third-world country without its surplus natural resources, skilled labor, capital goods and position as the globe's primary driver of scientific discovery and technological innovation. Thankfully, it has all of those.

 

[Sir Burton]

Sounds like Dylan Ratigan has never been to an actual underdeveloped country.

also, do people still use “1st world, 3rd world” when referring to countries? I haven’t heard those officially used in decades. Like since post-Berlin Wall dismantling.

 

[Dan O]

Why is “US military” mentioned at the end. It should be the number one reason someone complains. The US will never be a third world country if for nothing else than that they could end the world at a flip of a switch.


Or did I miss Nigeria having a fleet of ballistic missile subs?

Edit: also my podunk ass went to both Iraq and Afghanistan for the navy so get at me bros

 

[MilesAbove]

Sounds like Dylan Ratigan has never been to an actual underdeveloped country.

also, do people still use “1st world, 3rd world” when referring to countries? I haven’t heard those officially used in decades. Like since post-Berlin Wall dismantling.

People misuse it all the time. It was just propaganda for the US to say "we're #1. USSR is #2. Everyone else is #3" and for some reason it has stuck.

 

[nostradumbass]

Dylan Ratigan will make a few smart criticisms and then ruin it by saying something ridiculous.

If you're counting on the government to handle your life for you, and career politicians that you don't know and will never meet who don't ever have to be a part of the economy they're in charge of regulating, did you really think they were going to look out for you instead of themselves?

Nobody on the left wants to hear it, but having really high marginal tax rates 50-65 years ago was a great way to allow the government to pick winners and losers. Nobody paid that amount, they didn't collect a higher percentage of gdp and all it did was allow thousands of pages of exemptions and disparate tax burdens based on connections and what you could lobby congress to add exemptions for, and the same goes for other regulations.

It's also silly to suggest we're anywhere near being a 3rd world country. We still have the most immigrants every year, the most new millionaires, geatest high-tech density and patents and our poor are fat and have luxuries. Our problem is that we're growing increasingly less friendly for new businesses. Demographically, we probably are starting to resemble a 3rd world country more and more. How significant of a population from the 3rd world can you have before the place they move to starts to look more like the place they just left?

Not sure why people keep thinking it's "the rich, the rich, we hate the rich" and "we need higher taxes". The federal budget and tax revenues are already a lot of money, the same it's always been, they just aren't spending it on you and aren't going to and I'm not holding my breath for them to start. Maybe start spending the money you already have responsibly before you start demanding more.

 

[MVelsor]

 

[Trotsky]

And that Tradition is following Bush Jr and Senior, Clinton, Reagan, etc etc. Just administration after administration out to fuck the working class in favor of the wealthy donor class.

Clinton, and Bush Sr. for that matter, are not near the level of Trump, Reagan, and GWB

 

[JDragon]

Or did I miss Nigeria having a fleet of ballistic missile subs?

Not yet, they're trying, of course.

https://m.guardian.ng/news/nigerian-millitary-misses-out-on-global-race-for-submarines/

 

[My2Cents]

Why is “US military” mentioned at the end. It should be the number one reason someone complains. The US will never be a third world country if for nothing else than that they could end the world at a flip of a switch.


Or did I miss Nigeria having a fleet of ballistic missile subs?

Edit: also my podunk ass went to both Iraq and Afghanistan for the navy so get at me bros

once the dollar’s collapses the US army will be impossible to remain as powerful

 

[D3thr0n3d K1ng]

US has been one for awhile. They were a first-world country post WW2 and since then have sunk into third-world status as their oligarchs have made a concerted effort to turn it into one.

Also the US military loses to Russia and China in recent war simulations.

 

[Stoic1]

US has been one for awhile. They were a first-world country post WW2 and since then have sunk into third-world status as their oligarchs have made a concerted effort to turn it into one.

Also the US military loses to Russia and China in recent war simulations.

You mean China & Russia at the same time, right?

Being in the military, and kept quite abreast of relative combat power, I have not seen *ANY* simulations that would have either of these countries beating us. Unless this was some kind of "save Europe" situation exercise.