I'm a sixty year old white woman and have been the beneficiary of the programs that were part of the New Deal.
Programs that allowed people to rise from poverty, be educated, find a job that paid a living wage and in the end were able to enjoy some peace of mind after retirement with Social Security. Now I fear all that is at an end with nothing to replace it and make people's lives tolerable.
I remember a lot a things in my 60 years but the one thing I remember and feel it very relevant for today's political climate is the day Newt Gingrich was sworn in as Speaker of the House. The first thing out of his mouth was something to the effect that the New Deal was over, and it was greeted with great applause from the republican house members. I think that is one of the driving forces behind this election cycle. We are in a situation, economically, that is the closest we have been to a depression in my lifetime and I wonder why people are so anxious to give control back to the party that had the greatest and longest control over the government since the 1980's and who has been the major cause of the changes that have led us to this point.
There are many causes for the Great Depression but some have to do with stagnant wages, over extension of credit and no controls of the recklessness of the stock market.
Since the 1980's we have seen an ever increasing gap in the wages/ earnings of people in this country. The average worker has seen their wages go down or disappear altogether with their jobs... outsourced to another country and non union labor. The New Deal legitimized labor unions and allowed for workers to have a voice in the workplace dealing with wages,benefits,pensions, working conditions all the things republicans hate. They are not interested in a well paid and happy workforce that has kept this consumer economy going for all these years. They are only thinking of the bottom line and the amount of profit for their supporters. They don't care about you pension or 410K but they will go to the mat to protect the off shore tax shelters of their corporate supports like the Tea Party supporting Koch brothers who have hundreds of off shore tax shelters. I say hands off of the unions and workers pensions, benefits etc.
Also, public education. I worked as a teacher for 30 years and during all of that entire time we worked with austerity budgets. Cuts were made all of the time. The unofficial motto of or district was we do more with less and in the past 10 years that could have been we do everything with nothing. By demonizing public education they have created a self fulfilling prophecy. The less you give to it or try to improve it the worse it becomes and you argument seems more convincing. Everything, including leaving students behind was linked to the amount of money the district had to spend. Discipline was guided more by the fear of legal reprisals that actual problem solving and so the system, unattended, continues to decay. In the meantime parents are tempted with the promise of vouchers to help them get a better education for their children. What they may not realize is that in private schools you pay for each individual child. Is's not buy one get one free. You pay a single amount of taxes regardless if you have one or ten children in the school system...try to get that bargain in a private school. Although, in a Christian school you may have that loaves and fishes thing going on... Ha Ha.
Also the more kids that leave the system the more likely you will be left with the most undesirable academically suited kids and that will further contribute to the slide of public education and add to the prophecy of broken schools. P.S. Schools are a mirror of society the more broken society gets the more broken the schools get.
Jobless recovery. For 30 years jobs have been bleeding out of this country to other parts of the world. In the 1960's for example over 90 percent of the garment industry was in America. Today it is about 5 percent.
The same type of situation for hundreds of industries in this country. WE HAVE A JOBLESS RECOVERY BECAUSE THERE ARE NOT JOBS. Thanks specifically to Tom DeLay and all of his buddies.
Social Security, created by the New Deal is now on its way out. Republicans have been floating the idea of individual savings accounts for people instead of the government keeping your money. And who would make sure the people were actually saving this money. In recent years there was no encouragement to save anything, on the contrary we were encouraged to spend it faster than we made it. Republicans like Grover Norquist would like to see that money in the stock market along with your pensions and 401K's and let the market take care of it. No thanks Grover I'm tired of subsidizing the wealthy at the expense of everyone else.
One stock market crash and we're all done. Social Security has worked fine for 75 years and I say if it isn"t broken don't fix it. But by all means keep up with the maintenance. Also is this the republican version of pulling the plug on Granny? Or are they recent converts to global warming and don't see the need for Granny to live in a house as the weather gets hotter.
My last rant has to to with something out side of the New Deal. I want to address the pro-lifers. Being pro-life means life before and after birth. I can understand your argument about abortion but I cannot reconcile you refusal to help the life that is born. After birth you wipe you hands of responsibility for that precious being and
constantly complain about social safety nets that would help that precious child have a better life. You get enraged about the child who dies from neglect in the state run foster care systems yet you constantly want to cut government funding to help make these programs safer and work better for the welfare of the children who
are caught up in them. Not logical to scream to save a life and then ignore it and resent it because it cannot change the circumstances of its life.
So to all of my social democratic friends, think before you vote. We may not always be happy with the democrats but we will never be happy with the republicans.
ALL YOU PATRIOTS WHO LOVE AMERICA, REMEMBER THIS SOMEONE HAS TO PAY FOR AMERICA.