They Got Theirs, The Working-Class Got Jacked

Recently Deborah L Purdom on an unemployed Facebook page had took note and made mention - "It is so sad to notice that, as time goes on, we have lost more and more of the original members of this page, and unfortunately, have gained more new ones. I sometimes wonder what happened to the 'first' members and how they are faring. I hope they are managing to survive somehow! Bless them all!"

I would tell her: It's probably all part of the government's plan to eliminate a huge chunk of the middle-aged working-class. Gradually reducing the numbers, incrementally shoving them into poverty (or worse), until they all just fade into obscurity (or die). A leaner and meaner economy, but with a reduced workforce and less tax revenue going in to the treasury (and because of tax cuts extended for the rich). Most programs for the poor will be eliminated first before any goodies for the rich will ever have to suffer.

The politicians cater to American corporations, and they in turn cater to their "emerging markets" overseas. 15 million Americans were sacrificed to further enrich the very few. All the complaining in the world will do nothing for the unemployed. No meaningful laws will ever be enacted to protect American workers and consumers. If anything, just window dressing will be applied to assuage and assure the other 80% of the population who's still gainfully employed - and they will be told that everything that can be done for the jobless, is being done.

It takes 50% of the population to be disenfranchised enough before true revolution breaks out, but the government and America corporations carefully maintain a well-planned balance in this ratio to prevent this "tipping point" from ever occurring. American consumers and workers aren't high on the list for corporate profiteers - American corporations don't feel any sense of honor, patriotism, or responsibility to this country. They are strictly profit-driven with no "human" connection at all.

The politicians are the same way...I can hear them now, "I got mine!" America has been a ME society for a very long time, and everyone who can, will, step over a corpse to make an extra dollar in revenue. Greed prevails, and all their talk about "family values" and "moral principals" is nothing more than the usual BS.

It's not just the federal government that's going broke, the States are too. Nobody has any money except for the rich people (and those in China) and they're not paying any more into the State and federal kitty, nor are they creating jobs for Americans. We can't outsource teacher's, firefighter's, and policemen's jobs overseas; but if WE aren't working, then we can't pay their salaries either. When State and federal jobs are all eliminated, who's left paying taxes - what's left in the treasury to pay THEM unemployment benefits? The downward spiral. We can't even afford to pay the salaries to the people working in the unemployment offices!

Home foreclosures haven't even peaked yet and most home prices are still underwater. If you're rich, it's a great buyer's market, sweeping up all those nice homes for pennies on the dollar from the banks (who wouldn't refinance). I can see a vast number of private homes being permanently rented. We might see many of them turning into multi-family housing units like the old mansions of yesteryear.

"Uncertainty" has been the GOP's and the wealthiest excuse for not hiring before they got their tax cuts extended late last year, but they still aren't hiring. Most of the jobs that were permanently lost were all lost while they had those very tax cuts since 2001. Yet the GOP complains about the deficit, and that's why we're going broke. House leader John Boehner on Meet the Press today was blaming the "federal government" going back 40 years for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, but aren't people like he and the GOP part of this federal government?

The politicians and the corporate profiteers want to blame everybody else but themselves for destroying middle America, and instead of working on solutions, they just continue to allow what collapsed the economy in the first place...while playing the useless blame game. The Vice President tells the unemployed in "hang in there" as they lost their life's savings, their homes, and their cars. What's left to hang on to when everything else is gone, including hope Mister VP?

How does someone who lost their car and now barely subsists on food stamps get back into the job market when jobs are finally (if ever) created? I can't even buy a new shirt or pair of shoes for work if I needed to. I buy items like shaving cream with money I get from my DONATE button on this blog. And I'm one of the lucky ones!

Recently the fed chief Ben Bernanke said it could take up to 4 to 5 [more] years before we ever see a "normal" unemployment rate of 6% again (NOTE: It USED to be 5%, so the bar has been lowered by the feds). But how can even 5% be considered "normal" when ours was only 4% not too long ago (just like China's is today). And the way the government has been manipulating the unemployment numbers for the past two years, a "normal" unemployment rate of 6% in 2016 could very well be a REAL unemployment rate of 10% (it's most likely about 13% today, not 9% as the government boasts).

Smoke and mirrors, lies, and more BS is all we've been getting from the politicians, bankers, and CEOs. They got theirs, and to them, that's all that matters. American citizens, to them, are just a necessary nuisance for them. They would prefer not to have to deal with all our complaining, and to just keep socking away more cash in the bank...because if the dollar loses any more value, and if prices go up much more, those rich pigs might need a wheel-barrel full of cash just to buy a damn loaf of bread. And the unemployed (who got NADA) will be fighting each other just to feed off their crumbs.

This time last year I said it was going to get a lot worse before it got any better. And today I'll say it again. This slaughter of the middle-class isn't near over, not when we still have millions of people who are still dependent of unemployment benefits - their only source of income that will expire in 12 short months. Even if another 14 weeks were ever added, it only delays the inevitable.

And I agree with Deborah - I hope "the lost ones" are managing to survive somehow too.