You didn’t get the change you were promised
By
Robert Reich
To watch this video directly on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUEI69GsBC0
If you voted for
Donald Trump, I get it. Maybe you feel you’ve been so badly shafted by the
system that you didn’t want to go back to politics as usual, and Trump seemed
like he’d topple that corrupt system.
You voted to change
our country’s power base – to get rid of crony capitalism and give our
government back to the people who are working, paying taxes, and spending more
just to survive. Lots of Americans agree with you.
But now, the president
is turning his back on that idea and the many changes he promised.
He did not drain the swamp. After telling voters how he would take control away from special interests, he has surrounded himself with the very Wall Street players he decried.
Now, those who gamed politicians for tax loopholes and laws that
reward the rich don’t even have to sneak around with back-room deals.
Steve Mnuchin, Gary
Cohn, Dina Powell and others from Wall Street, as well as corporate lobbyists
by the dozens, are now inside the Trump administration rigging the system for
the extremely wealthy from the inside.
They want to make it
easier for banks to once again gamble with your money and repeat our financial
crisis.
They want to cut health care for millions of you.
They want to lower
taxes on corporations and the rich.
They want to get rid of rules that stop
corporations from harming your health or safety.
That’s not the change
you were promised.
Make America Great
Again? The Trump administration wants to expand on policies that have kept
American wages stagnant for almost four decades.
Huge corporations and
billionaires get the breaks, and hardworking Americans once again get left
waiting for the crumbs. That’s not the change you were promised.
Bringing back fiscal
responsibility? The Secret Service budget is skyrocketing to protect his family
on international business trips, ski vacations, and separate New York City
living quarters.
At the same time, the
president still refuses to untangle himself from his businesses and prove he’s
not leveraging our government for his financial gain. You’re paying for his
lifestyle while he’s doing nothing to help yours.
That’s not the change
you were promised.
ROBERT
B. REICH is Chancellor's Professor of Public Policy at the University of
California at Berkeley and Senior Fellow at the Blum Center for Developing
Economies. He served as Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration, for
which Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries
of the twentieth century. He has written fourteen books, including the best
sellers "Aftershock", "The Work of Nations," and "Beyond
Outrage," and, his most recent, "Saving Capitalism." He is also
a founding editor of the American Prospect magazine, chairman of Common Cause,
a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and co-creator of the
award-winning documentary, INEQUALITY FOR ALL.