David Dayen at The Intercept writes—Donald Trump Isn’t Even Pretending to Oppose Goldman Sachs Anymore:
THE CONTINUITY OF Wall Street’s dominant role in American politics — regardless of what party sits in power or how reviled the financial industry finds itself across the country — was perhaps never more evident than when Jake Siewert, now a Goldman Sachs spokesperson, on Tuesday praised the selection of Jim Donovan, a Goldman Sachs managing director, for the No. 2 position in the Treasury Department under Steve Mnuchin, himself a former Goldman Sachs partner.
“Jim is smart, extraordinarily versatile, and as hard-working as they come,” Siewert gushed. “He’ll be an invaluable addition to the economic team.”
The punch line? Siewert was counselor at the Treasury Department to Timothy Geithner, as well as a White House press secretary under Bill Clinton.
The ubiquity of Goldman Sachs veterans across numerous presidencies throughout history, both Republican and Democratic, has been well documented. But Donald Trump sold himself as something different, an economic nationalist determined to rankle Wall Street. He even ran campaign ads savaging bankers like Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein for their role in a “global power structure.”
That populist smokescreen is long gone now.
Mnuchin and Donovan are just two of five Goldman expats in high-level positions on Trump’s team. Steve Bannon spent a limited time at Goldman Sachs, but White House assistant Dina Powell, who headed the bank’s philanthropic efforts, and National Economic Council director Gary Cohn, Goldman’s former president, had higher-ranking positions for a longer period. Jay Clayton, Trump’s nominee for the Securities and Exchange Commission, was a partner for Goldman’s main law firm, Sullivan and Cromwell. [...]
QUOTATION OF THE DAY
”It is fatal for any body of workers to have forever hanging from the fringes of its skirts other bodies on a level just below its own; for that means continual pressure downward, additional difficulty to be overcome in the struggle to maintain reasonable rates of wages.”
~Florence Kelley, The Present Status of Minimum Wage Legislation, 1913
TWEET OF THE DAY
BLAST FROM THE PAST
At Daily Kos on this date in 2010—Radical Roadmap: Whack the Middle Class:
NPR's Guy Raz interviewed Wisconsin Republican Paul Ryan Sunday. It was another softball moment. You could almost see Raz nodding in agreement with the genial Congressman as he plugged his radical Roadmap for America's Future. It's this era's Contract with America, with Ryan as a more appealing, more narrowly focused Newt Gingrich, pitching a plan for completing the bumpy 30-year-long journey whose destination for middle-class citizens is the bottom of a cliff. A Deadend Plan for America.
Except, of course, for that hunk of the population that decades of upwardly transferring wealth has already fattened to the proportions of http://www.courier-journal.com/blogs/vel12/uploaded_images/creosote-747728.jpg">Mr. Creosote. For that Top Tenth, Ryan's plan offers more of the same smooth ride. Raz asked Ryan if he weren't concerned that the leadership of the GOP has failed to publicly back his plan. That's the line that Newsweek and the Cato Institute have taken, too. But why should Ryan worry? The leadership will eventually come around. The Roadmap, after all, would transform their Reaganomic fantasies into reality.
HIGH IMPACT STORIES • TOP COMMENTS
On today’s Kagro in the Morning show: Everything is a distraction! So we invited everyone on to distract you. Greg Dworkin, Armando and Joan McCarter offer their takes on DonT Care, Trump’s taxes, and the growing realization of The Donald’s betrayal of the voters of Greater Trumpistan.
YouTube | iTunes | LibSyn | Support the show via Patreon or Square Cash