“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.
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Elizabeth Warren and Bill de Blasio: How to revive the American Dream
In this land of big dreams, there was never a dream bigger or more important than the one so deeply rooted in our values that it became known as the American Dream. Across generations, Americans shared the belief that hard work would bring opportunity and a better life. America wasn’t perfect, but we invested in our kids and put in place policies to build a strong middle class.
We don’t do that anymore, and the result is clear: The rich get richer, while everyone else falls behind. The game is rigged, and the people who rigged it want it to stay that way. They claim that if we act to improve the economic well-being of hard-working Americans – whether by increasing the minimum wage, reining in lawbreakers on Wall Street or doing practically anything else – we will threaten economic growth.
They are wrong.
That thinking is backward. A growing body of research – including work done by Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz and the Roosevelt Institute – shows clearly that an increasing disparity between rich and poor, cronyism and an economic system that works only for those at the top are bad for the middle class and bad for our economy.
Christian Christensen: Citizens rise up against corrupt media
Baltimore showed that the public has had enough with news corporations twisting the truth about their lives
Standing on the streets of Baltimore to cover what his employer Fox News was calling a “riot,” Geraldo Rivera found himself at the receiving end of a passionate and articulate lecture from Kwame Rose on skewed, sensationalist and racist media coverage. As Rose attempted to engage Rivera in a conversation, the reporter kept walking away, refusing to even make eye contact. The episode was captured on video, uploaded and went viral. Rose became a sensation. Rivera would later intone that Rose’s actions represented “exactly that kind of youthful anarchy that led to the destruction and pain in that community.”
The Rivera confrontation was one of many between media professionals and citizens and activists in Baltimore. What is becoming clear is that many people are more than aware of the ways in which the news media have the power to frame and reframe events through words, images, suggestion and omission. What is also clear is that these people are no longer willing to put up with it.
For many middle class families in Oregon and around the country, our economic recovery has not translated into higher wages or the availability of better-paying jobs. Nationwide, many Americans who are working hard and playing by the rules are still struggling.
Two decades of failed U.S. trade policy is one reason. At issue is not whether to trade, but under what rules. For workers, the environment and the health of American families, getting the rules right is essential. [..]
Time and again, we’ve been promised the next trade deal will mean increased exports and more jobs. Since 1993, and the implementation of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), our nation has lost 5 million manufacturing jobs — including 11 percent of Oregon’s manufacturing jobs — and seen trade surpluses with our biggest trading partners turn into large deficits. [..]
The administration has called people like me trade alarmists. I believe trade can be done right. The U.S. is the world’s largest economy and we should use that power to implement truly high standard, enforceable trade agreements. But fast track and TPP fall flat. Let’s not miss perhaps the last opportunity we have to make U.S. trade policy work for Oregonians and all Americans.
Robert Reich: Making the Economy Work for the Many, Not the Few — Step 1: Raise the Minimum Wage
A basic moral principle that most Americans agree on is no one who works full time should be in poverty, nor should their family.
Yet over time we’ve seen significant growth in the “working poor” — people working full time, sometimes even 60 or more hours each week, but at such low wages that they remain impoverished.
What to do?
Sen. Bernie Sanders: Break Up Big Banks
During the financial crisis of 2008, the American people were told that they needed to bailout huge financial institutions because those institutions were “too big to fail.”
Yet, today, three out of the four financial institutions in this country (JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo) are 80 percent larger today than they were on September 30, 2007, a year before the taxpayers of this country bailed them out. 80 percent! [..]
Today, just six huge financial institutions have assets of nearly $10 trillion which is equal to nearly 60 percent of GDP. These huge banks handle more than two-thirds of all credit card purchases, write over 35 percent of the mortgages, and control nearly half of all bank deposits in this country.
If Teddy Roosevelt were alive today, do you know what he would say? He would say break ’em up. And he would be right. And that’s exactly what I plan to do.
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