Below is my column in The Hill on the familiar bust-and-boom cycle of socialism, where failure is used to call for even more radical changes. While House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries this week reaffirmed that Democratic Socialists are part of the Democratic Party, radical figures are demonstrating how extreme this agenda is for some. For example, Socialist State Assemblywoman Emily Gallagher has declared that stealing should be legal for those in need. If socialism takes hold in New York, many will indeed need five-finger discounts in the Big Apple.
From New York to California, the American left is proving that nothing succeeds like failure. In areas ranging from immigration to taxes to health care, politicians are playing to their past fiascos to push an even more radical agenda.
Take immigration. Many, including the Democratic Socialists, have called for open borders or disbanding ICE. After the Biden administration chose to allow millions of undocumented people to enter the country, most Democrats are now calling for “pathways” to make them citizens. After all, they argue, there are too many to deport.
We now know the open border was a choice. The Trump administration immediately stopped crossings using the same laws Biden had refused to enforce. As expected, Democrats are expressing horror at the thought that the government would try to deport the millions that they allowed and even encouraged to enter the country.
The same is true on public health policy. Remember when ObamaCare was going to reduce health care costs and improve health care options? While insisting that they did not want government-run single-payer healthcare, Democrats promised that ObamaCare would lower costs while allowing you to keep your own doctor and health care plan. During the 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama promised his plan would “lower your premiums by up to $2,500 per family per year.”
By that measure, ObamCare, or the Affordable Care Act, is a colossal failure. Premiums have nearly tripled since the law took effect, and deductibles have more than doubled. “The cost of coverage for a family of four has increased by more than $10,000,” according to studies.
In 2026 alone, median premiums increased by 20 percent, and that has already risen by another 15 percent in 2027. Meanwhile, enrollments continue to plummet across the country.
Democratic leaders and advocates are now responding to that failure by calling for more regulations and “Medicare for all.” As with immigration, the failure is the basis for doubling down on bad policy with even worse policy.
The same is also true of public education, which has failed families in major cities for generations. The solution has been to increase budgets while lowering proficiency standards. The one thing teachers unions and school districts oppose is a market-based system that lets families choose between programs through voucher systems. The solution is, again, more staff, more funding and more control over families’ options. The system gets worse and more expensive, and the teachers unions get more powerful, including greater ability to block reforms.
No one has perfected the politics of failure more than Zohran Mamdani. In New York, chaos only undermines the status quo. For example, his demand for free buses has predictably led to thousands of commuters — including affluent citizens — skipping fares, costing the Metropolitan Transportation Authority tens of millions of dollars. After all, only a chump would pay a fare that is about to be eliminated.
As the transit budget implodes, the calls for greater state subsidies will only increase — as will calls just to accept the reality and make public transportation free to the user (and expensive to the taxpayer).
Then there is rent reform. With Mamdani promising rent controls, landlords are predictably raising rents. Rent costs have reached their highest level ever under Mamdani, with the average apartment now costing $4,965 per month — and $6,655 per month in Manhattan.
So Mamdani can now push for even more significant regulations and rent controls by pointing to the rise in housing costs in an endless loop. As rent control inevitably constrains supply and prices for market-rate apartments skyrocket, he can call for even greater controls.
Failure can also solve problems through attrition. Mamdani was recently booed off stage at a law enforcement event in New York. The officers and their families are clearly upset with his embrace of figures calling for the defunding of police and his long hostility toward law enforcement. The result, however, is precisely the downsizing that many on the left have wanted. The NYPD has been losing as many as 300 officers a month.
What is true for police officers is also true for wealthy taxpayers. Mamdani has taunted affluent citizens with his new taxes and attacked them as not “paying their fair share.” As a result, the wealthy are fleeing New York and taking tax revenues and jobs with them.
Success through failure is especially evident in the housing policies. Mamdani has brought in socialists who called for “seizing the means of production” (as he has) and wiping out private ownership of housing.
Most recently, Mamdani has embraced figures such as Tracy Rosenthal, the privileged daughter of a well-known music industry figure who has refused to pay rent. Despite her family’s wealth, she has been effectively squatting on property. The co-founder of the Los Angeles Tenants Union and co-author of “Abolish Rent: How Tenants Can End the Housing Crisis,” Rosenthal is a darling of the far left. In New York, she declared that rent is “a ransom,” and “We pay rent at the peril of our need.”
Rosenthal portrays landlords as bloodsuckers and rallied the left to refuse to pay rent even though “if we don’t make this payment, our landlords can call on agents of state violence who can use physical force to throw us outdoors.”
Rosenthal has perfected not only the squatter culture but also the use of regulations to take effective control of properties. In allegedly squatting in California, Rosenthal reportedly pushed to get her building placed under the Housing Preservation Department’s Alternative Enforcement Program. Under that, a landlord must fix problems or risk losing the property.
Mamdani is pursuing a similar model. He has ramped up tenant coordination to bring complaints to his advocacy offices. As landlords are hit with snowballing complaints and costs, they can be forced to surrender their properties or have them seized by the city. The Mamdani administration wants those failures to result in tenant or non-profit ownership of businesses. What it will do is ensure that fewer rental units come on the market, making the problem worse and creating new excuses to take further harmful action.
This pattern of success through failure has manifested itself on an even larger scale in history. Socialists often destroy economic conditions, resulting in greater unemployment and greater demand for government subsidies. That expansion of government power continues until conditions grow so severe that emergency actions are needed.
In “Rage and the Republic” I discuss how this pattern played out in Great Britain and France in the last century, when socialist policies devastated those countries’ respective economies. Great Britain ultimately had to be rescued by the International Monetary Fund, as if it were a third-world nation.
This bust-and-boom cycle is now repeating itself. As these policies fuel decline in these areas, demand grows for expanding the policies and government controls. If McDonald’s were to offer ever-shrinking food items at ever-increasing prices, it would go out of business. Government is the only industry that grows with failure.
For radicals, social and economic upheaval is not a tragedy but an opportunity. Lenin told the Bolsheviks to “utilize” crisis to “hasten the collapse of the rule of capital.”
The future seems bright for the American socialists. After all, with just a little more failure, who knows what Mamdani and others can achieve in America.
Jonathan Turley is a law professor and the best-selling author of “Rage and the Republic: The Unfinished Story of the American Revolution.”
If you’re old enough, you likely remember a time in US politics when good intentions were not enough — this coincided with disciplines like Deming and Six-Sigma being taken up by industry. All policy reforms had to pre-define measures of effectiveness — how we could agree in advance to judge success or failure.
In the current wave of factionalized identity politics, we’ve regressed back to good intentions only. This allows leftist radicals to put forth proposals drawn from shallow ideological narratives. An example from before COVID was DEI. Whether or not it actually improved race relations as measured objectively didn’t matter — there was no such promise of accountability — it was put forth as “the right thing to do”. After 6 or 7 years, the pathetic results were finally irrefutable (at least in corporate culture — schools and universities still cling to it altho not as tenaciously).
The right mans its defensive barricades with its good intentions. Complaints from 20-somethings that the reward system is failing them with low-paying, gig-work and high living expenses are blunted with dismissive indifference a la “you’re not guaranteed a decent living, you get what you earn”. To the right, the reward system is a matter of faith, NOT something to be measured and taken responsibility for if faltering.
This is where we’re stuck. If we can hold ourselves AND OUR OPPOSITION to the same level of measurable results and accountability for what has been promised, that’s a way back from the gathering dystopia.
..these Radical Left-Wing extremists like aoc and mamdani crawl out of the woodwork with no real Work or Life experience or understanding of History (..the true maxim: those who lack an understanding of History will repeat it….) re: the Failures of what they demand.. basking in their Celebrity status & egged on by their puppeteers both in front of (Bernie Sanders who is stuck in perpetual SDS mode from 1968..) & behind the curtains, and by the asleep sheeple, who are convinced the Govt. should take care of them 100%, to bring chaos & destruction to the USA, plain & simple.. so that ‘x’ ‘y’ ‘z’ can gain a real foothold and take over more & more… just like they used The Biden Crime Family to make gains toward that end….. The Big Problem here is the complicit MSM and the sheeple’s inability to move beyond that…. but.. as Thomas Jefferson said, the only way out is to bring Light into Darkness.. to ‘enlighten’ people with real knowledge… again, GOD BLESS PROFESSOR TURLEY for his constant enlightenment.. for calling them out.. for Standing Up for our Constitution.. for Being a true Protector of this Country built on our Constitution…………….
Turley Writes:
“For radicals, social and economic upheaval is not a tragedy but an opportunity.”
* * * * * * * *
Trump says that Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader, has responded to the decision that Trump made on Sunday to reduce joint military exercises with South Korea, a longtime U.S. ally — though Trump would not reveal exactly what Kim Jong-un’s response was.
“I understand him, he understands me,” Trump said. “He didn’t like Biden, he didn’t like Obama, he didn’t like anybody, but I get along with him very well.”
From Today’s New York Times
…………………………………..
Trump is turning his back on South Korea, one of the world’s most successful capitalist nations, in defference to North Koea, a communist loser of a nation hated by almost everyone. Can anyone explain how this makes sense??
North Korea is China, or haven’t you noticed. Shall the U.S. attack China?
Trump (i.e. America) turns his back on South Korea???
KIA, Hyundai, Samsung, SK Hynix, LG, POSCO, CJ CheilJedang (CJ Group), Lotte Group et al.
Total U.S. imports from South Korea (goods and services) reached $142.5 billion in 2025, according to the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA).
_____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
In terms of American sales dollars (gross revenue/market transaction value), Hyundai and Kia generate a combined estimated $75 billion to $85 billion annually in the United States.
While both brands report their global corporate revenue in South Korean Won (KRW), their U.S. sales dollar volume can be calculated based on their record-breaking vehicle delivery volume and the average transaction prices (ATP) in the U.S. market:📊
Estimated U.S. Sales Dollar Breakdown
Hyundai Motor America: Generates an estimated $40 Billion to $44 Billion in annual U.S. sales. This is driven by hitting a milestone of over 1 million wholesale units shipped to the U.S. market, backed by higher-margin SUVs like the Palisade and Santa Fe.
Kia America: Generates an estimated $35 Billion to $38 Billion in annual U.S. sales. North America is Kia’s largest single market globally, accounting for 44.6% of its global volume. Kia’s sales dollars have surged due to its record performance of 852,155 vehicles sold combined with a high buyer preference for top-tier, premium trims like the Telluride SX-Prestige.
Estovir, if all your stats are true, then why does Trump think military coordination between the U.S. and South Korea is no longer necessary? ‘Because we don’t want to upset China’..?
We are talking about coordinated naval excercises with a country with almost no navy. While I am not opposed to such excercises.
Should hostilities break out with NK – the SK Navy is not important.
John Say, we’ve been doing these exercises for years. Nothing has changed. Trump is simply nuts!
They may not excel at military ship-building, but ROK is a manufacturing powerhouse, punching well beyond its population weight-class. That is a major asset in wartime. Note how Ukraine has effectively defeated a country with 3.5 X its population. NoKo is puny as a manufacturing nation.
South Korea today is run by anti Western forces that are looking to destroy the forces that made Korea a great nation. They are destroying the basis of cooperation with the USA and Japan in evrey way they can.
Estovir, today the U.S. is being run by ‘anti-western forces’. North Korea is allied with Putin in Ukraine. They’re not ‘friends’ by any stretch of the imagination.
What is YOUR objective regarding Korea ? Do you want a resumption of the Korean war ?
Or do you want to at worst preserve the status quo ?
So long as NK does not nuke a neighbor, which unlike Iran is highly unlikely because Kim Un would like to continue living and does not beleive that 77 virgins await him in an afterlife
regardless, the status quo with restpect to NK has been fine for 75 years.
SK is an ally but if there is a resumption of hostilities – it is the US not the South Korean Navy that will assure SK’s survival.
I have little problems with Joint exercises. But I also do not see skipping them as a huge deal.
John Say thinks we should throw South Korea under the bus (like Trump did with NATO). It’s hard to imagine any country wanting us as allies. Trump keeps turning on everyone!
Democratic Socialists are part of, but are not a majority of the Democrat Party. Turley cites a few outliers and tries to metastasize their views as applicable to the entire Democrat party–that’s disingenuous. But, because Trump is failing so spectacularly and Republicans won’t comply with their Constitutional duty to act as a check on his authoritarianism, and because poll numbers continue to set new records for disapproval, MAGA media has to harp about the outliers, hoping that voters who won’t vote Republican won’t vote Democratic. Take immigration, for instance–people are taking to the streets to protest ICE abuses, including murders of people. Recall their alleged agenda–they’re going after the “worst of the worse”. That’s clearly not true. Trump’s personal DOJ refuses to even investigate the murders of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, and aren’t cooperating with local law enforcement to take action against the ICE agents who murdered them and are still at large. People also protest the ICE prisons and abuses that are going on there, including incarcerating children and unexplained deaths. Now, we have “shock gloves” in which ICE agents are literally torturing people.
Here’s what the Forbes piece, cited above, says about what the government can do to make health care more affordable:
“In 2025, Republicans and Democrats are debating whether or not to extend Biden-era enhanced subsidies that mask these underlying premium increases for many enrollees. But the question Washington ought to be asking is: How do we make Obamacare-based insurance less expensive in the first place? In the Washington Post, I recently published an op-ed describing what a bipartisan deal could look like: a temporary, one- to two-year extension of the subsidies in exchange for regulatory reform of the Obamacare insurance exchanges.
In particular, Congress should reform age-based community rating, or age bands, so that young people are no longer unfairly punished by Obamacare with double-to-triple the premiums they would normally pay.
In addition, Congress can directly subsidize the cost of coverage for the sick, and other people with pre-existing conditions, using reinsurance, or what some people call “invisible high-risk pools.” Reinsurance is used in Medicare Advantage, and in other market-based health care systems like Switzerland’s, and is a well-established mechanism for protecting the sick while also keeping premiums low for the healthy.
Obamacare suffers from a critical design flaw. It forces young and healthy uninsured people to pay double, or triple, or quadruple, what they ought to pay for coverage, in order to subsidize the high costs of insuring the old and the sick. It doesn’t make any sense to punish one vulnerable group to protect another. There is a better way.”
Instead of taking the advice to continue the subsidies and engage in regulatory reform (something Trump abhors) Trump and Republicans simply cancelled the subsidies, kicking millions off of Obamacare. Health care costs for the rest of us will rise because there will be so many uninsured people going to hospitals who cannot pay. Others will die due to lack of preventive care. Of course, Turley chooses to try to spin Obamacare as some kind of Democrat failure. Do you recall how many times Trump said that Republicans would replace Obamacare with something much better? He claimed to have an “outline of a plan”–where is it? We’ve been waiting for years. The plan is to try to undo everything Obama did because Obama did it.
The rest of this piece is all about criticism of Mamdani, which doesn’t apply if you don’t live in NYC.
Get a load of this Doctor visit bill.
>Englewood Hospital-Lab $10.56
>Englewood Hospital-Lab $39.26
>Englewood Hospital-Hematology $.18
>Englewood Hospital-Other $0
>Englewood Hospital-Natriuertic peptide $132.93 Denied
>Englewood Hospital-Thyroid stimulating hormone $49.85 Denied
>Englewood Hospital-Cyanocobalamin (Vitamin B-12) $44.31 Denied
>Englewood Hospital-Folic acid level $42.09 Denied
>Englewood Hospital-Blood test, lipids $39.88 Denied
>Englewood Hospital-Ferritin $39.88 Denied
>Englewood Hospital-Hemoglobin A1C Level $26.59 Denied
>Englewood Hospital-Blood test group of blood $24.37 Denied
>Englewood Hospital-Iron binding capacity $24.37 Denied
>Englewood Hospital-Complete blood cell count $22.16 Denied
>Englewood Hospital-Iron level $17.72 Denied
The amount provider & PCP billed was $3119.26
If you believe in the US Constitution (as I do), you can only view the Left as evil.
The “left” consists of direct and mortal enemies of the American thesis of freedom and self-reliance, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, actual Americans, and America.
Enemies must be defeated forthwith and with extreme prejudice.
What”Left” are you talking about? Turley and MAGA exaggerate the radical views of a few because Trump and Republicans are failing so badly. They are trying to scare away voters from voting Democratic.
You want to celebrate the Constitution? Trump and MAGA are the antithesis of the Constitution. MAGA is employing the unitary executive theory of Project 2025, after Trump lied about that being his agenda because so many Americans oppose it.
The unitary executive theory puts the president above the other 3 branches of government, which is not what the Constitution provides. The Constitution intended for the 3 branches to serve as checks and balances for each other. Trump, drunk with power, does as he pleases with our White House, helps himself to our treasury, and starts a war without the approval of Congress and Republicans let him.
The Patient Protection Affordable Care Act didn’t fail. The health insurance companies were allowed to interfere with it. It’s like blaming a race horse for not finishing the race after someone shoots it in the head.
By the way, my internet costs have doubled in less time than the PP-ACA has been in effect. Is that also President Obama’s fault?
What else went up – insurance company profits, massively. Not the cost of delivered care, which has seen physicians income squeezed.
The Republicans and many Democrats are supported by the health care industry; the Republicans are motivated to kill the PP-ACA as it is an effective competitor. The Democrats seem to just allow that to happen.
Obongocare is unconstitutional. Congress has the power to tax for ONLY debt, defense, and “general Welfare,” Article 1, Section 8.
General Welfare—All Well Proceed
“General” is all or the whole, not one, some, or a few, and it is not individual welfare, specific welfare, particular welfare, favor, or charity.
Obongocare provides “free stuff” from taxpayers to parasites which constitute only 5.9% of the population, distinctly not general, all, or the whole.
The SCOTUS finally got abortion right after 50 years of Roe, which was forcibly imposed by the corrupt Supreme Court of 1973.
The Supreme Court should get freedom, free enterprise, free markets, and free industries right after 250 years and get rid of wholly unconstitutional Medicare, Medicaid, Obongocare, oh, and wholly unconstitutional Social Security.
________________
Article 1, Section 8
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States….
___________
AI Overview
Article I, Section 8 of the U.S. Constitution lists the specific powers given to Congress. It has 18 clauses that explain what the legislative branch can do, including collecting taxes, regulating trade, coining money, and declaring war. It ends with the “Necessary and Proper Clause,” which lets Congress pass laws to carry out these powers.
“The Patient Protection Affordable Care Act didn’t fail. The health insurance companies were allowed to interfere with it”
If true – that would be FAILURE.
Obama designed it. He and Dems own the FAILURE.
This is typical of you left wing nuts.
“No we did not fail – the plan WE adopted was not perfect and would have worked if it was”.
NO IT FAILED.
The free market DOES NOT FAIL – it ALWAYS succeeds. But it succeeds BETTER the freer the markets are.
The TRUTH is that contra your claim – Socialism fails WORSE the more rigorously it is implimented.
“It’s like blaming a race horse for not finishing the race after someone shoots it in the head.”
Correction – “when it shoots ITSELF in the head”
“By the way, my internet costs have doubled in less time than the PP-ACA has been in effect. Is that also President Obama’s fault?”
Then you are doing a $hitty job of getting internet services. I was paying 230/month for service 1/5th my current speed and 1/3 as reliable, as what I have now that is costing me $60.
And if I wanted I could get service slightly better than I paid $230 for for about $30 today.
In 1985 I bought internet service for $30/month – it was 9.6K baud – that is about a million times slower than what I can get for $30/month today.
“What else went up – insurance company profits, massively. ”
Nope, corporate profits cycle through a very narrow range based on risk/return.
If Insurance companies were getting massively greater returns with no increase in risk – the market would flood insurance and prices and profits would go down.
Generally when prices go up – Profits go DOWN – why ? Because when prices go up demand goes down, and when demand goes down profits go down.
The laws of supply and demand are NOT a suggestion. The only means you can overcome them – and then not for long is by using Government FORCE.
“Not the cost of delivered care, which has seen physicians income squeezed.”
ROFL
Yes Physicians incomes have dropped since PPACA – that is because PPACA discouraged small physican owned medical practices, increased the overhead for practices and most physicans sold their practices to larger healthcare companies – this is common when government moves on a market.
Democrats have moved physicians from well paid entrepeneurs to less well paid employees.
Why do you think there is no “little pharma” ?
A free market is constantly churning with a mix of small medium and large businesses some growing and some shrinking.
“The Republicans and many Democrats are supported by the health care industry”
Whatever domain government moves into – Money will move from that domain to politicians.
It is called rent seeking.
Whatever power you give government – private actors will seek to rent it for their benefit.
This is UNIVERSAL, not new, and can not be eliminated. But it can be reduced – by reducing the domain of government.
The less power government has the less anyone will rent it.
BTW if by magic you could completely eliminate corporate rent seeking – you would just replace it with rent seeking by other interests.
Do you think NPR or PBS or Planned Parenthood are not engaged in rent seeking ?
” the Republicans are motivated to kill the PP-ACA as it is an effective competitor.”
ROFL
You clearly are clueless. PPACA is PRIVATE insurance subsidized by the govenrment. No private insurance companies do not want to kill the golden cow.
And that is why the GOP can not kill PPACA – not because private companies think it is a competitor, but because it is Free money to private insurors.
“The Democrats seem to just allow that to happen.”
Now they DESIGNED PPACA as it currently is – that is why it is wasteful, and why it can not be killed.
Note to the anti-Trump, anti-American, anti-Constitution, communist Supreme Court:
Karl Marx wrote the Communist Manifesto 59 years after the adoption of the Constitution because none of the principles of the Communist Manifesto were in the Constitution. Had the principles of the Communist Manifesto been in the Constitution, Karl Marx would have had no reason to write the Communist Manifesto. The principles of the Communist Manifesto were not in the Constitution then, and the principles of the Communist Manifesto are not in the Constitution now.
OT
The singular American failure is the judicial branch, with emphasis on the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court supports the E. Jean Carroll decision.
30 years post facto. No evidence. No witnesses. No security video. No police report. No medical attention. No rape kit.
A sham “Show Trial” in a Kangaroo Court in a fully communist district wherein the accused is the political enemy and the proceedings are scripted with contrived and unproven tales.
The trial was held at the Daniel Patrick Moynihan U.S. Courthouse in Manhattan, New York City, which houses the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.In this jurisdiction, the Democratic Party overwhelmingly wins elections: Voter Registration: Democrats outnumber Republicans in Manhattan by an approximate 8-to-1 margin. Presidential Elections: Democratic presidential candidates consistently win Manhattan (New York County) with roughly 80% to 85% of the total vote. Local Representation: The vast majority of locally elected officials representing Manhattan—including the U.S. Representatives, state legislators, and city council members—are members of the Democratic Party.
Shame on the Supreme Court of the United States of America.
The E. Jean Carroll case was a Civil trial not a Criminal one. The rules of evidence are different. In a civil trial obviously evidence wasn’t needed. Similar to the OJ Simpson trial where he was acquitted criminally but the civil trial found him guilty.
However, IMHO, it was a “we hate Trump” verdict. They just wanted him to pay.
If I or anyone wrote a fantasy book purporting a sexual assault by a democrat in NY, does any rational person think a civil jury would give the same kind of verdict if there was a civil trial? It wouldn’t even see the light of day.
This Supreme Court understands and respects the role of Juries to sort out the facts…who is telling the truth.
In the E. Jean Carroll civil case, Trump lied from the beginning in his lame, amatuerish way — claiming he accusation was totally made up to smear him because he was a Republican President (and to sell books).
But, the attack took place in 1990s NYC, and she related it over the phone two weeks later to another journalist.
How could she have plotted to smear Trump the Repub? Nobody knew Trump would be anything more than a real-estate scion. That other woman testified under oath about knowing about it since the 1990s. That was devastating to Trump’s lie about when E. Jean Carroll “made the whole thing up as a political smear job”.
Those facts do not get overturned by a higher court. That’s the strength of our legal system — it cannot be commandeered by wealthy elites. He or she who comes in with provable facts wins. Court is where lies go to die and liars to be exposed as inauthentic.
The only cure for blind, willfully ignorant behavior is to let the dumb kid touch the burner to see if it is hot. I would gladly see NYC, California in general and all the other loony prog/left blue urban centers burn to the ground both socially and economically and then clean up the debris and start again. You cannot reason with cult members in the DSA anymore than you can deal with islamist fanatics here or around the globe.
If you don’t have to pay rent because it is “ransom”, why should you have to pay property taxes? My guess is the Lefties would not be amused.
I respect much of Turley’s commentary on government overreach crushing constitutional rights, like the catastrophic LOCKDOWN exercise. But when the right in this country starts hurling neo-McCarthyist memes to protect capitalism, it’s paranoia of losing control, flashes neon. Socialism/capitalism has been the perpetual bogieman whipping boy of capitalists attempting to fearmonger away the public from demanding equalizing limits to the unlimited wealth and poverty consequences of unregulated capitalism.
The existing US, conservative vs liberal Two Party false binary, political system is ruled through both parties servitude to capitalist objectives. They express minor ideological differences, but always team up at the final hour of need to vote to subsidize, deregulate, de-tax, the 1%’s acquisition of excess capital to enable the acquisition of more excess capital. This includes war budgets of extreme excess, wars (better called foreign subversion, invasions, sanctions, coups, theft of resources supposedly to “protect national security interests”, better called neo-imperialism), protecting/subsidizing Wall Street, dollar hegemony, and infinite 1% wealth growth, and finally voting against any form of Public Commons services, otherwise called socialism.
Capitalist hegemony over government obligations to the public have been in decline since Nixon virtualized the dollar, then the Thatcher-Reagan privatization movement (“there is no such thing as society”) attempted to convinced the public to sacrifice themselves to the beneficent gods of capitalism who should be able to do anything they like with impunity. Which the US public is now being pummeled by every day. Which the public now recognizes for what it is and see socialist policies of people like Mamdani as rational remedy. Placing limits to poverty and wealth; terminating war empire, police & surveillance state, and AI remote rentier economic control of society.
Sabotage of a Public Commons remedy to save unregulated capitalist state hegemony is the “conservative” half of the FALSE BINARY two party op. The liberal sabotage half, is to overclock progressive-socialist rhetoric with provocateurs, like Hasan Piker and others, to stimulate justified complete rejection by the American public. “Influencers” like this and even candidate plants that make ridiculous statements like cancelling Valentine’s Day, are saboteurs of rational Public Commons building policies. The “liberal” faction in Congress, legislatures, county and city councils, routinely make statements that they support public services and reject austerity, but then vote to cut services and cut taxes for high income entities. This has been a unified two party, false binary ideology campaign since the 60’s, on hyperdrive since the 80’s, now delivering 1000+ – 1x income disparity that was 5 – 1x in the 1950’s.
To rectify sabotaged progressive-socialist messaging like “restorative justice” over “abolish the police”, or to express need for open borders when US war empire and capitalist dollar hegemony sanction and pummel non-Western citizens to flee war torn impoverishment, is a self-failing mission that liberal saboteurs relish.
The bottom 70% of American society is suffering Banana Republic impoverishment and 50 years of two party Public Commons defunding austerity caused by the hyperfunding of war empire and it’s capitalist overseers. Screaming at commoners for wanting a vibrant Public Commons of services instead of impoverishing war empire and labeling them statist socialists and communists is identifiable “conservative” provocateurism.
Turley Writes:
“Democrats are expressing horror at the thought that the government would try to deport the millions..
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The most recent Employment Situation report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimated that employment actually fell in July, while simultaneously revising the estimates for earlier months down. Thus July’s report confirmed the now widespread view among economists that the Trump-era job slowdown isn’t a blip. It’s now clear that America has entered a new, possibly permanent era of stagnant employment.
U.S. labor supply growth has been slowing for some time because Baby Boomers have been aging out of the work force. However, the rate of job growth has suddenly fallen further due to Trump’s harsh crackdown on immigrants. So it’s fair to call the onset of America’s current employment stagnation the “Trump Stall”.
America’s responsibilities — to ensure national security, to take care of retirees, maintain public infrastructure and provide healthcare — remain the same, but there will now be fewer workers, paying less taxes, than previously expected to meet those responsibilities. Moreover, foreign-born workers bring distinct skills and are willing to do jobs native-born workers shun, such as emptying bedpans and picking fruit. Removing them from the U.S. economy will leave the rest of us poorer and with a lower quality of life.
From Paul Krugman’s Newsletter: 8/16/26
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If Professor Turley bothered to look at mainstream media, he would notice an increasing amount of coverage concerning the plunge in population growth.
The U.S. is almost certain to face LABOR SHORTAGES in the very near future. And these shortages will not only stifle economic growth, they could also exacerbate the collapse of Social Security and Medicare.
The truth is that Trump’s deportations make no sense whatsoever from an economic standpoint!
Krugman admitted that we need tariffs. You’re behind the times:
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/paul-krugman-suddenly-admits-tariffs-may-be-necessary-after-years-of-globalist-dogma/ar-AA26TWjX
Krugman also said the Biden’s budgeting wouldn’t be inflationary. Now he admits it was. Consider the source.
DIOGENES:
From your article:
“Additionally, carmakers in China have been vastly outperforming U.S., European and Japanese companies in electric vehicles, battery innovation, design and software, BBC News reported in May.”
…………………………….
Diogenes, If the Chinese have vastly outperformed us with regards to electric vehicles and batteries, why has Trump done everything possible to sabotage U.S. development of those technologies??
And back to Krugman, do you think U.S. population growth is adequate for economic growth?? Show us the stats on that.
AI and robotics. That’s the way Asia has to go, too, because it has a birth dearth.
Diogenes:
Almost all developed countries in the world are suffering a birth dearth. Nevertheless, there’s a strong correlation between population growth and economic growth. AI workers won’t be contributing to Medicare and Social Security. AI workers won’t be consumers. We need people for that.
So explain how mass deportations are going to lift us economically.
Because 80% of the people want it, so stop obstructing.
Part of the problem with the ACA is that it mandates certain coverage regardless of the need. For example, there are 10 categories of “essential health benefits”. Some of these health benefits (Maternity care, Newborn care, Pediatric care) are clearly only essential to certain people. So a post-menopausal woman can rest assured that if she needs maternity care, she is covered. When the policies offered are irrational and expensive, rational and generally healthy people will opt out resulting in yet higher cost for those left in the insurance pool. Since, by law, hospitals are required to treat people regardless of their ability to pay (unfunded mandate), so sort of insurance ought to be required.
The basic flaws in the ACA are that it restricts people’s coverage choices (and thereby costs) and does not factor in people rationally weighing cost-benefits of health insurance. A better approach would be to offer catastrophic health coverage as the basic policy and then allow for additional benefits from a cafeteria style menu. For those with high cost pre-existing conditions (e.g. Leukemia), an income based subsidization could be targeted.
When I was a student, I paid for such a catastrophic health care policy. I joked that I would never receive any benefit unless a Mack truck ran over me and even then it would likely be useless. There was also a maternity rider (with a 9 month pre-existing condition clause) that I happily paid for when my wife and I were planning a child.
The problem with the ACA is that it is Govenrment.
All the problems with US healthcare are caused by Government involvement
Look at everything that is problematic – Healthcare, education – what these have in common is government.
Get government out of healthcare and both medical providers and insurance companies will have to compete and deliver What people want.
If you want to grasp how that works go to the breakfast cereal (or any other) aisle in your grocery store.
You will find generic puffed rice and wheat for nearly free, and fanci breakfasts with myriads of choices – fair trade, GMO free, Gluten Free, Organic,
local, whatever you want in whatever combinations at slightly higher prices.
This is how free markets work – and something Bernie Sanders does not understand.
There are limits to the economies of scale – producing the same sneakers or deodorant for everyone does not reduce costs unless the market is small.
Once the market is large enough and standard opf living is high enough – as in the US. More choices do NOT increase the price of low end products.
But they DO reduce the costs of better products and provide people with the choices that suit their needs.
Healthcare is no different.
There are 2-3 companies that control the majority of the breakfast cereal market. They have nearly a 90% margin.
Estovir (Arnold), you’re saying Maternity Care is not a legitimate insurance need?? That’s rich coming from an anti-abortion activist. “We’re gonna force women to have babies without insurance coverage”. That’s how dumb it gets!
What is pretty amazing is the observation that college-educated progressives and the DSA favor more government control to fix problems created by government in the first place. Whether it be the tripling of health care costs that resulted from the “Affordable” Health Care Act, the drastic rise in college costs since the government federalized the college student loan program during the Obama years and prohibited private lenders from writing loans for college costs, to government enforced “rent control” that ultimately results in removing rental units from the rental market resulting in higher rents from a smaller rental pool, to the “Affordable” Care Act when the federal government under Biden increased the money supply by printing more money effectively reducing the value of money already in circulation and that resulted in an inflation rate of more than 8%, initiating the “affordability crisis”; and I could go on. Ronald Reagan was prescient when he said, “Government is not the solution to our problems, government is the problem.”
That should read in “Inflation Reduction Act”, not Affordable Care Act. Brain cramp, sorry.
I, OTOH, LOVE what the Democrats are doing. I think people need to suffer the consequences of their poor decision making. So let Blue Cities and States fail. I enjoy my state where the average income is $80K/year and the average house is quite affordable at $236K.
Certainly better than San Jose, CA where the average income is a very nice $220K/year (unfortunately with $55K going to federal and state taxes) but the average house goes for $1.9 million. Also, the schools are crap, the traffic is impossible, the non-income taxes are outrageous, their KwH utility costs are higher than mine and everything, thanks to the regulatory burden puts on them, is much more expensive.
Groceries +12.4%
Utilities +45.4%
Transportation +47.4%
Non-specific General +104.5%
Property taxes +550%
Day care +78%
That big salary doesn’t go very far when everything is massively more expensive.
Look at the gain in appreciation of that home in San Jose vs. where ever you live. If both double, that San Jose house can be sold for $1.9 Million more than was paid for it. They can then move to where you are and buy nearly 10 entire homes on that appreciation alone. Those houses in San Jose cost more because people want to live there.
Keep the migrants. Deport the liberals. At least migrants might behave better when they have to.
Keep anyone looking for Freedom. Get rid of anyone looking for Free Things.
Good idea
Wait! That’s what the Constitution and Bill of Rights establish! Somebody tell the communist Supreme Court!
Kick Google out…look how they push out free stuff, addicting the population. When it was steel, it was called dumping. When it was software, it was free stuff in exchange for hoovering up your personal info. Both run against our capitalist system where you pay for value received.
It’s always about “follow the money” with these Democrats, be they DSA or old-timers. They only care about money and power, and the money that power can bring them.
And, when their local Socialism fails miserably here in America, as it always will, they expect federal taxpayers to bail them out.
The solution is for our federal government to cut off funding to these Socialist, sanctuary cities and states. That will inspire the decent citizens, if any are still left in those cesspools, to rise up and drive the nepo-babies, like Jihadi Mamdani, Chiquita AOC Khrushchev, Weekend At Bernie’s and the other new crop of Islamist terrorist sympathizers, out of their cities and states, if it’s not too late already.
Bottom line should be no more federal money for America-haters. We can use that money to ramp up the deportations that still need to happen, and for which America voted overwhelmingly in 2024.
Estovir (Cliff), where is your backwater town? Alabama? Mississippi?
Where is yours ano
Excellent plan – take money from the people who generate the highest return in America and give it to those who don’t? Both New York and California, noted “socialist” states generate more money for Federal taxes than they currently take back. So the plan is to cut them off completely while robbing their citizens? Typical Republican answer.
Can we take away the socialist Federal highway system and make people subscribe if they want police or fire protection?
I worked in retail. Theft is known as shrink in retail. Will shoplifting be okay In the Mamdani state owned grocery stores. What will happen in his Utopian dream when shoplifters find out that there will be no penalty for filling ip their carts and just walking right out of the store. As usual the solution will be to raise the taxes on the law abiding citizens to keep the stores afloat. Man what a plan by a clan.
Estovir is Thinkthrough with a first person account from his years in retail (whenever that was).
Well then. Thinkingthrough had a job. I’m guess you never have.
DustOff,
Correct.
I have noted how people who have worked jobs when they were young i.e. high school, generally have better command of finances, understanding of economics, and character.
Oh dear, Donnie has been rebuffed again by SCOTUS. How long till HE starts talking about packing the court with the likes of Todd, Bove, Brito, Habba? (Maybe not Pirro…) And would Turley dare criticise him if he did?
Last I checked, Trump has won 78% of his cases so far this term. Better than either Obama or Biden.
What I find funny is that with the Democrats opinion shopping, Trump initially only wins 31% of his cases . But once you get to appeals, it swings in his favor. And by the time we get to the Supreme Court, he’s doing way, way better. Which clearly indicates the liberals judge routinely play games and the Democrats know it, so the find them.
But then, I’m not surprised. Liberals have tended to ignore the Constitution and black-letter law to make up things they like. To find non-existent rights. To pretend the Constitution is a ‘living document that means nothing but what I want it to mean’ instead one you can Amend if your cause is just.
Trump wins a huge percent of cases, because the wins are mostly left wing nuts suing on idiotic constitutional grounds.
Trump largely loses when He tries to significantly expand presidential power.
And that is how it should be
Leonard Leo has won those cases by stacking the courts with Federalist Society supported judges.
We know you hate the executive having power over that function but you can’t explain KBJ? You want more KBJ’s?? cause that’s how you get more KBJ’s! God help us.
Check out this Russian female military march video. Can they clean & cook? Roll it.