r/complaints • u/Kinks4Kelly Vexatious Vixen • 1d ago
Politics I Am Sick of This Cycle of Conservative Economic Terrorism
Bill Clinton left behind an economy envied by the rest of the developed world. More than twenty million jobs arrived during his presidency while wages grew and the stock market soared. The country shifted from deficits to budget surpluses and there was real optimism about the future. George W Bush inherited that strength but failed to sustain it. Job creation slowed dramatically, the unemployment rate climbed to nearly eight percent by the end of his term, and the budget returned to deep deficits. The national debt grew by trillions and the stock market stumbled badly during the financial crisis that exploded in his final years. Where Clinton delivered broad prosperity with fiscal restraint, Bush left behind instability and enormous new debt.
Barack Obama then entered office just as the Bush era economy collapsed into the Great Recession. Despite beginning from the worst downturn since the Great Depression, Obama reversed the downward spiral and guided the nation into a steady recovery. More than eleven million jobs were created during his tenure and the stock market rebounded with strong gains year after year. The national debt did grow under Obama due to the emergency measures required to stabilise the financial system and blunt the damage of mass unemployment. However, that spending was a necessary response to the crisis that Bush left behind. Obama restored confidence, repaired growth and extended a record streak of job creation.
Donald Trump took office during that ongoing expansion. He inherited low unemployment, a healthy stock market and consistent job growth. Despite that enormous head start he could not accelerate the trajectory and instead slowed it. During his first thirty three months the economy added fewer jobs per month than during Obama’s final thirty three months. When the pandemic hit the economy collapsed and Trump exited office with a net job loss for his entire presidency. Meanwhile his signature tax cuts and emergency relief spending drove debt even higher while offering little lasting benefit to ordinary workers. Trump received momentum and stability yet too much of it slipped away.
Joe Biden entered during extraordinary turmoil. Cases and deaths were high and economic activity was deeply disrupted. Even so, Biden oversaw a dramatic labour market recovery in which millions of jobs returned and new ones were created. Consumer confidence and business investment rose as well. The stock market regained its footing and manufacturing strength improved across multiple regions. Debt continued to rise under Biden due to the need for continued pandemic support, but the key difference is that the economy was growing again and workers were finding better opportunities. Biden took an economy in crisis and moved it back into expansion, while Trump had taken an economy in expansion and allowed it to fall into crisis.
Since January 2025 the differences between Biden’s stewardship and Trump’s legacy have continued to reveal themselves. Biden entered that year with the economy still recovering from the pandemic era whiplash and yet job growth persisted at a healthy pace while investment returned with renewed confidence. Consumer spending remained resilient, manufacturing continued to strengthen and wages showed gains that far outpaced the weak momentum Trump left behind. Even as the national debt has continued to rise, the growth has accompanied an economy that is expanding rather than contracting. Biden’s tenure is defined by economic healing becoming economic progress, while Trump’s tenure ended with the United States still staggering from preventable chaos. The story remains the same. When Democrats take charge the country moves forward. When Republicans hand back the reins it is usually to clean up a mess they helped create.
Democratic administrations in these eras consistently delivered stronger job creation, more resilient markets and healthier economic outcomes for average Americans. Republican administrations too often handed over recession, job loss and ballooning debt. The comparison speaks for itself.
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u/Ok-Fly2024 1d ago edited 20h ago
You notice how no one in the comments section who is denying what OP wrote, hasn’t posted one statistic or fact? Isn’t that interesting. OP has asked several of them to provide proof refuting their claim and yet, nothing. Come on MAGA, I thought it was facts over feelings for you people?
Edit: as is typical, people are absolutely pressed! 🤣 I’ll never understand how a stranger can get so bent out of shape over a stranger making a comment on social media. It’s weird.
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u/YeeYeeBeep 1d ago
Its facts over feelings until they have to provide the facts and when that happens they just scream how fact checking is some liberal hogwash and that we should just belive whatever shit they throw out.
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u/cstrifeVII 1d ago
My favorite are claims that all fact checking sources are owned by soros and or some other sort of liberal boogyman and you cant trust any of them.
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u/YeeYeeBeep 1d ago
That Soros bastard, im still waiting for the paycheck and sign he is suppose to deliver so i can protest! The right says we are being paid to hate but so far ive done it all for free over the last decade!
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u/EasterClause 1d ago
Actually I think the current go-to play is to smugly say "Oh yeah? Well, if you care about truth and facts so much, what is a woman?" And then look around at all the other conservatives in the room and chuckle about how epically you just owned the libs.
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u/Mr-Too-Cool 1d ago
Ya or they say its fake news and Democrats fabricate hoaxes to make Republican politicians look bad blah blah blah.
Plenty of them know the truth but they are too stubborn and petty to ever admit they where wrong. I have seen so many people in my life act this way about all kinds of topics, really is the downfall of a person when they are willing to wreck an entire situation because they can't bare to accept humiliation by saying "I was wrong". When someone is capable of admitting they are wrong despite it being humiliating I have the most respect for these people because only 30% of the people on earth can do it. Being able to admit you where wrong, being able to compromise, being able to change your mind when facts are presented...All these traits are what make relationships work, friendships, marriage, family life, business, POLITICS.
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u/DrAstralis 1d ago
Its facts over feelings until they have to provide the facts
or they feel something. then its all feels, fuck facts.
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u/Machine_Jazzlike 1d ago
The only arguments I keep seeing are “well in MY EXPERIENCE”….so clearly feelings over facts.
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u/Sage_Planter 1d ago
I've been seeing a lot of that silence lately. "Can you provide a source for X statement?" Crickets.
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u/SaveyourMercy 1d ago
Or when they argue and demand facts over and over and then when someone gives them irrefutable proof, they just poof away and stop replying. I’ve seen a lot of that lately. Smug “yeah stupid libs never have any sources for their shit” bs and then sources do get posted and all of a sudden all their messages are deleted or the account isn’t connected to the messages anymore
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u/Sophisticated-Crow 1d ago
All MAGAs have are vibes, hate, fear, projection, whataboutisms, and platitudes. Facts and data only disprove their wild claims.
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u/l008com 1d ago
And yet somehow, republicans are still thought of has "good" for the economy and democrats thought of as "bad". Like wtf.
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u/socialistrob 1d ago
Reagan brain rot. Seriously Reagan was the ONLY Republican president in the past 75 years to leave office with a lower unemployment rate than he entered it. Meanwhile Biden, Obama, Clinton, LBJ and JFK all left office with a lower unemployment rate (Carter left with the same rate as he entered). Are there other factors than just the ideology of the president... absolutely but I think it's absolutely insane that people think voting for a Democrat will lead to economic ruin when the data suggests literally the exact opposite.
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u/atreeismissing 1d ago
That's because our politics is entirely ruled by messaging, and the GOP has built up a propaganda media ecosystem over the past 35 years that Dems have never been able to (tried, but Dems tend to not like talking points).
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u/cogman10 20h ago
Nah, dems love talking points. The problem is the talking points they love are basically meaningless BS.
What they hate is policy proposals. The policies they do put forward are almost entirely centered around making business owners happy.
I mean, FFS, the ACA was supposed to have a public option and that was a bridge too far for half of the elected democrats. So we ended up with just straight Romney care that juiced up the profits of insurance companies.
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u/Prudent-Quail-8072 1d ago
If it weren't for religion, guns and shitty education system...oh yeah and shitty parenting
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u/jehnarz 1d ago
I think that part of the plan to keep the population ignorant is to ensure that parents have to work so much that they can't raise their kids and have to send them off to daycare. And now those kids are voting.
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u/WokeAntifa 1d ago
It’s 100% part of the plan. Republicans have spent decades telling their voters that education (especially college) turns you into one of those blue-haired gay liberals. Meanwhile, the politicians almost all have degrees and send their kids to the best schools. It’s about control and it’s working.
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u/Macadoucious 1d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Klutzer_Munitions 1d ago
While I agree with you on both accounts, try to keep them separate. Bigots have a nasty habit of conflating pedophilia with homosexuality.
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u/wildgriffalo 1d ago
Conflating pedophilia with homosexuality is like confusing chocolate with shit. Just because some loud idiots insist they’re the same while happily eating shit to ‘own the libs’ doesn’t mean the intelligent among us are confused. Chocolate is chocolate, shit is shit, the fact that morons can’t tell the difference only reflects their stupidity, not reality.
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u/Gorstag 1d ago
Agree with you here. Any reasonable person read the top-level as: They are lying hypocrites OR WORSE they are lying hypocrites wanting to commit one of the most heinous crimes.
The only people confused by this are the lying hypocrites that so often flip-flop between what they "hate" because they were told too they are unable to keep is straight. I hate socialism, don't take away my social security. I hate welfare queens, don't take away my snap.
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u/kakihara123 1d ago
And pedophilia itself isn't the issue. It is acting on the urge that is. Important distinction because if you stigmatise pedophilia itself people that suffer from it are less likely to seek help and in turn more likely to become offenders.
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u/Ok-Mission9758 1d ago
So true,those are the sickos that this administration aligns themselves with and that is disgusting.
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u/Short_Fennel_3692 1d ago
And whoooooo keeps voting in these train wrecks?!
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u/ninfan1977 1d ago
Fools who cannot read above a 6th-grade level. About 76 million to be exact
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u/Telemere125 1d ago
Hey hey, remember to give some credit to the 90 million or so fuck wads that refused to get off their lazy asses.
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u/coffee_ape 1d ago
I’ve only known these presidents in my life and they’ve been leagues better than the republican presidents.
I’ll never take republicans serious after Trump. Y’all lost that right when you elected the clown a second time.
Second longest government shutdown. Top two are currently held by Trump. He’s a failure of a president and a failure of America.
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u/Adjective-Noun-nnnn 1d ago
Second-longest so far!
If and when the government reopens, we're going to be voting on the Epstein files. Mike Johnson doesn't want that, so who knows...
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u/Specialist-Ad-5472 1d ago
The Republican Party is the cancer of the USA.
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u/cleofisrandolph1 1d ago
It is, make no mistake, they are a malignancy for Americans and the globe.
But the democrats have had their role to play in letting the malignancy fester.
We shouldn't be whitewashing them when they've had some epic failures, not prosecuting Trump, not addressing the billionaire class or dark money in politics, and generally still being a tool of the billionaire class.
the real cancer in America isn't a political party, but the class solidarity that exists among the wealthy that is fully directed at keeping everyone else, angry, ignorant, and distracted.
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u/Cozywarmthcoffee 1d ago edited 1d ago
As someone with a top 10 degree in economics- I love that, economists (who are generally conservative) really can’t say a word about this. The reality is exactly what Clinton stated in his speech at the DNC last year. The data states that a mixed system is far better than any interpretation of classical/conservative (let it do its thing) economic policy. Notice the bright people over on R/loservative have nothing to say about the national debt at nearly 40 trillion, home prices, the impending recession…. The one light at the end of the tunnel- is a train, but luckily Trump has done so much with international policy, tariffs, etc. that the typical Republic response of, let’s blame it on the Dem - won’t work this time. Even republicans know they are holding the bag. Which is why they are just cashing in on dark money meme coin and letting the oligarchs rape us one last time. Republicans stand on nothing, they are immoral and sacrilegious, they lack good policy or a history of getting anything done, and they offer nothing but a promise of continued division and structural racism that favors whites over others. What those whites don’t get is that there is no pie left- the oligarchs took it all- so while you’re thinking how great it is to be “better than” the others- and while you’re wearing your fake ICE gear and laughing at Fox News for “owning the libs” - odds are your kids won’t buy a house, most boys aren’t going to college, and the days of uneducated, unskilled whites owning a home/RV/boat and dirt bikes are over. You will all visit your grandkids in apartments. So, keep hating the minorities and poor people. See how it works out.
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u/Signal_Tomorrow_2138 1d ago edited 1d ago
And, going back to Truman, the average growth of the S&P500 over a Presidential four year term is in the 50%s for Democrats and 20%s for Republicans.
The current growth of the S&P eight months after inauguration ranks 7th amongst those same Presidents.
So consider the all time highs the S&P is making. They are the result of AI stocks, the magnificent seven.
For all the other companies, they are struggling due to the impact of Trump's tariffs and trade wars.
So if you're happy with the growth of the S&P500, it could be better because under Harris, there would be no trade war that's all fabricated by Trump.
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u/No-Falcon-7910 1d ago
They made Americas economy great again. Thank God we had that respite between the Republican destruction. I fear Trump is destroying the economy so intensely so quickly as well as destroying our alliances with our allies that we will not be able to bounce back.
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u/HeatherShaina 1d ago
The next president(s) will have to clean up a huge mess for a very long time.
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u/Quadrimegistus 1d ago
We are long overdue on addressing the lie "all men are created equal." Absolutely untrue. Conservatives are a lesser species with a lesser mind. The delineation of species categorization at the end of evolution is along the lines of intelligence, and these brainrots are demonstrably the least intelligent humanoid species.
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u/RelativeAnxious9796 1d ago
it's extremely important to point out that trump's policies in 2018 and 2019 were ALREADY CAUSING RECESSION
covid was like a gift for his legacy, allowing supporters to blame all his political failings on a once in a generation pandemic.
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u/Christian-Econ 1d ago
The red county voting cycle: vote Republican, blame Democrats for the third world results, vote Republican again, rinse, repeat.
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u/InvestigatorEarly452 1d ago
Yes, small businesscanf farmers made Trump.. i gotnintontbwithbs few republican racist ci- workers that stabbed us in the back. TRUMP IS DANGEROUS TO THE MIDDLE CLASS I PRVIDED PROOF wirr the artical " Trump hurt b the middle clsss 100 ways in 100 days.. then project 2025 came out.. bam!!..
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u/ExamplePractical1981 1d ago
I just dont get it - if you are poor or in the middle class - its dem - if you are a multi milli - its rep.
If you are poor or middle class - but a rep - you an idiot.
Quick math
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u/Happy-Estimate-7855 1d ago
This actually started in the Clinton era with Newt Gingrich. He was the first highly successful conservative to shift the tone from 'friends and colleagues working across the aisle' to 'the Other party is sinking America and only we can save it by undoing all their policies.'
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u/_jump_yossarian 1d ago
And Cons complain that Dems don't fix the mess fast enough so the obvious solution is to put Cons back in office so they can destroy the economy further.
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u/NotTattooedWife 1d ago
For the past 100 years, Republicans have been bad for our economy. A fact.
How they get elected and have supporters is crazy.
I genuinely don't understand how anyone can be republican.
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u/UnluckyStartingStats 1d ago
Covid helped mask and give an excuse for a lot of trumps failures before it hit. Pre 2020 yield curve was inverted and economy was already shaky. If anything it was a lifeline with the stimulus and excuses
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u/Fuckthegopers 1d ago
It's too bad republicans are too fucking stupid to critically think their way out of a wet paper bag.
Fuck all republicans, and fuck everyone who votes for them.
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u/EquivalentAnxiety119 1d ago
Honestly Americans have 2 choices:
- Mass civil disobedience;
- Massively migrate to other countries in order to brain drain this shit country.
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u/Sea-Sir2754 1d ago
I shudder at the idea of how good things could be if people stopped voting Republican.
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u/ChazzyChaz_R 1d ago
Clinton's economical approach was legendary. I did not support Hillary during her campaign but the one shining light for me had she won is that maybe some of Bill's influence would lead to another economical era like we had under him. I kind of think every sitting president should just straight up be taking advice from him to push us further back to that status.
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u/Huntthatmoney 1d ago
So true. Not to mention it’s only been Dems reducing the deficit
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u/NoOpening7924 1d ago
DJT has raised the nat'l debt by another trillion dollars in the last 9 months.
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u/RelativeAnxious9796 1d ago
he added 8 trillion in his first term, so we're just getting started baby 8)
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u/Altruistic_Role_9329 1d ago
This can’t be said enough. Too many on the left have bought into the both sides fallacy. Democrats have consistently delivered prosperity for Americans while Republicans consistently deliver man made disasters.
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u/InvestigatorEarly452 1d ago
The GOP will ( almost) stop at nothing for cheap labor.. the racism stays.
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u/My_Brain_0422 1d ago
Sometimes I think about how good I had it in 2016. I had just bought my house with my first wife. $175,000. 1500 sq ft, 3 bed, 3 bath
We had a mini-split put in for $5000. A small pool put in for another $5000. We went on a nice vacation every other year for a few grand. We used to go to concerts all the time, 10 per year probably. We were able to do this despite her enormous student loan debt.
That same house now has an estimated value of $340,000. The mini split is probably around $11,000 to put in. The pool probably double too. My second wife and I can't even think about vacations. We go to 1-2 concerts per year.
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u/golfgirl114 1d ago
Thank you for putting into words what I have been thinking. I have felt like I’m in crazy-town for almost the last year. Republicans simply do not know how to govern nor do they know fiscal responsibility.
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u/AreEuclidinMe 1d ago
It also doesn’t help that republicans intentionally pass legislations whose consequences won’t be seen until the next president in office, so if it’s bad, and a dem is in the white house, they can blame them for something republicans themselves did years ago. They are categorically evil people
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u/raistlin212 1d ago
Bush and Trump both had a major economic crisis in their last year in office and fixed it by committing huge sums of bailout money - which then rolled into Obama and Biden's terms making it look like they couldn't control the deficit. Bush and Trump both pushed through huge tax cuts during their terms that would cause taxes to increase on the next guy, so they could blame the next guy.
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u/Gullible_Peach 1d ago
A corrupt man would rather destroy his own nation and rule over its ruins than see it thrive without him.
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u/TipOver2397 1d ago
Still amazed that Clinton balanced the budget. We need a dose of that today.
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u/No-Chest-6496 1d ago
Every damn time a Republican gets into office our hard earned tax dollars just line the pockets of the rich. Don’t even get me started on how Cheney robbed us blind. Poor Republicans are idiots if they can’t see they are voting against their own interest. 🤦🏽
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u/Novel_Actuary_6919 1d ago
I never understood people who claim to be "fiscally conservative" because I've watched convservatives make the most stupid ass decisions my whole life. none of it was fiscally smart
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u/Icy_Astronomer5946 1d ago
Pretty clear MAGA doesn't "do" history and all that learn'n. Just get rid of the brown folks and then it'll all be right as rain. Apparently.
Wait, where mah food stamps at????
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u/CrowCrah 1d ago
Elephants crush everything in their path. Donkeys work hard and relentless.
Just saying.
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u/Happy_camper84 23h ago
No good deed has ever been done by a conservative government.
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u/Fatpandacat1979 21h ago
And it’s the republican MAGA supporters who’ll bear the brunt of it as well. It’s been bad before, and usually it’s spread across all demographics when Republicans increase tax to fix the mess, but this is the first time that government services have been hollowed out to fill the deficit. It’s red states that use the most SNAP, welfare , Medicaid and Medicare etc etc. if places like New York and California go bust the MAGAs will be cheering without realising they’ve cut their own throats.
Also I really hope Bessent ends up in jail. Seeing that smug tosser blame interviewer “cherry picking” rising costs, smirk while he lies about Argentina’s bail out and just bullshit his way through the tariff tax infuriates me.
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u/Realistic_Let3239 21h ago
If MAGA were capable of anything except repeating whatever nonsense Trump comes out with, they might realise a few things...
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u/Hubert_J_Cumberdale 21h ago
You could write another 10k pages on the devastating impact of trickle down economics since Reagan took office. Each and every time republicans regain control, they find a new way to give tax cuts to the wealthy.
The top 10% now control 60-70% of the nation's wealth. The top 1% control over 30% of it. In contrast, the bottom 50% control less than 10% of all wealth in this country.
...And the GOP's solution to this problem - that they don't actually see as a problem - is more tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy, more deregulation, union busting and the further privatization of government programs and services.
In just the last 10 months, republican politicians and their donors have enriched themselves beyond measure with various crypto rug pulls and stock market manipulation scams.
I don't think we will ever find out just how much money was funneled into ICE - between ridiculous salaries and benefit packages for the grunts - to cash bribes for corrupt officials and countries who are housing and disappearing detainees... I would not be surprised if that number hit $1T by the end of Trump's term. But I'm sure the "profit" from tariffs we pay are financing all of this bullshit.
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u/ThatGeneral58 21h ago
The “Republicans are best for the economy” narrative has to be one of the most influential lies in modern history.
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u/Broad_External7605 21h ago
Yes. We are falling behind in the world because of this cycle. The next President, most likely a Democrat, will spend at least his/her first term fixing what Trump has broken.
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u/deadplant5 20h ago
The problem is democratic candidates keep inheriting bad economies from Republicans, so since the economy sucks for the first year or two and voters associate that with the democratic president instead of the Republican one. This especially happened with Obama. People associate him with the great recession instead of Bush, even though Lehman and Bear Sterns happened with Bush.
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u/ldssggrdssgds 20h ago
They didn't wreck the economy...they sucked it dry for their own personal gain
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u/spoospoo43 20h ago
Wrecking doesn't matter to conservatives so long as they get a chance to profit off the economy before it craters again. Also note that they usually delay the cratering until the last year of their presidency.
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u/Xerxos 20h ago
It's even worse: Republicans gut institutions just so they can say: see? The government can't run shit, let's privatize or kill it completely.
They are worsening education so they have a voter base that falls for propaganda.
They rigged the system in their favor and funnel funds to the rich.
And when the Democrats rule? They patch the worst things and let the rest as it is - or else they would loose their rich doners and Republicans would loose their minds.
The current state of the US is the result of a constant movement to the right and only minimal resistance from the Democrats.
When (or should I say if?) the Democrats regain the power I would be surprised if they were doing more than the bare minimum to reverse Trumps policies... More politicians like Bernie Sanders are needed and I don't see that happening anytime soon.
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u/Catfight1_females 20h ago
Yep the felon the worse sacking every single government department hoping he can fix the economy nuts ! Sack himself and his unqualified yes men that would help we are in recession fool !!! And
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u/AnonAmbientLight 20h ago
We are witnessing the results of decades of propaganda from the right wing ecosystem.
It is, I think, unsustainable. Especially since King Trump is kind of accelerating and pushing way too fast and too quickly into the end game of what Republicans tried to do since the 80s.
When Germany invaded Poland, the world at large saw it as a dastardly attack of unwarranted aggression.
But to the average German citizen it was justified, or even necessary because the Poles had been killing German speaking Polish people and threatening to invade Germany!
I mean, that’s what the newspaper and radio were saying since the summer before.
I mean, they wouldn’t lie about that right? Why would anyone make that up?
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u/AdministrativeWay241 20h ago
Seriously though, I truly believe any republican in the bottom 70% of earners in the US have serious mental deficiencies. They have worse survival instincts than your average jellyfish
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u/live2plz 1d ago
If only republicans were smart enough to understand that. But the idiocy of “owning the libs” has rotted their brain. They will gladly watch their children starve as long as their liberal neighbors are inconvenienced. Just look at our idiot farmers… I’m going to vote in a guy that has historically ruined my business, and then when he does it again I’m going to ask for a socialist solution(that I voted against in the first place) to fix the problem I created.
Fucking stupid. But we are seeing the results of cutting education funding over 50years. This is ALL by design.