Hartmann Report

This Sunday, a book review instead of an excerpt... My trip back to Michigan last weekend for my brother Stan’s celebration of life led to a long conversation about the state of literacy in America with my brother Steve who, like me, shares my parent’s passion for reading and collecting books. That reminded me of one of my Dad’s favorite books, about which I wrote this review back in January, 2007 for Buzzflash.com. I hope you have a chance to read Cannery Row; it’s a great short introduction to Steinbeck’s extraordinary body of work which informed the nation in a way that set the stage for Truman’s, Eisenhower’s, Kennedy’s and LBJ’s reconstruction of America after the Republican Great Depression.

The Best of the Rest of the News — Did America have a true “Manchurian Candidate” in the White House for four years? A literal agent for one or more foreign governments and/or international organized crime figures? — Are death threats now a normal tool of politics for Republicans? — There’re YUGE pro-democracy protests happening in Brazil: will Bolsonaro survive the backlash against the authoritarian dictatorship he tried to set up? — Republican politicians who openly and enthusiastically reject democracy are winning primaries in the most important swing states, setting up a very dangerous 2024 if they can carry 2022 elections. — How “Christian” is it to expel a 5-year-old orphaned girl from school because the aunt who adopted her when her parents died is lesbian? — Geeky Science! What starts in the Arctic doesn’t stay in the Arctic... — Crazy Alert! Trump is calling the Qanon crowd to his side. — In Good News: The blowout jobs report & “Blowout Joe!”

So, how should America deal with media that purports to be “news” but, in fact, is offering a healthy serving of spin, misdirection, and outright lies? if you have any additional ideas, what are they? Can a nation survive as a democratic republic without an honest and trusted news ecosystem? Is it an actual fact that truthful and reliable news — combined with the kind of cultural trust people have in both government and each other as the result of a shared reality — are both historic and necessary preconditions for a democracy to work at all? Thomas Jefferson once famously said that if he was given the ultimatum of choosing to live in a functioning nation without newspapers or a place with newspapers but no national government, he’d surely choose the latter.

It’s time that these “persons,” when they become egregious & recidivist criminals (particularly when they kill people), be treated the same as human criminals: remove them from society permanently. Today’s hot news has it that New York Attorney General Leticia James is considering the corporate death penalty for the Trump Organization. If true, it’s really good news for the entire field of corporate governance in America. It’s past time to bring back the corporate death penalty.

This is no small matter, and every time a TV host or reporter lets it slide, it digs the knife deeper into the side of our nation’s body politic. From time to time I’ll see, mostly on message boards and social media, Democrats refer to the Republican Party as the “Rethugligans,” “Republicons,” “Repukes,” or similar attempts to twist the name of the party Lincoln first led to victory in the election of 1860. While outrage at Republican policies and the egregious lies of their elected officials — from election denialism to birtherism to trickle-down — is justified, society and American media generally agree that use of such language reflects more poorly on the person using it than it does the GOP. It’s seen as a somewhat childish sign of disrespect — a schoolyard taunt — and does nothing to advance honest discussion of politics or political parties. Which is why it’s so baffling that when a similar name-twisting slur is applied to the Democratic Party — frequently and casually on Sunday talk shows and in other media — the same standard of respect for the Democratic Party’s name is ignored.

If this was just routine political corruption by a few rogue politicians, it would be a problem but not a crisis - however - this cynical embrace of strongman oligarchy has put America itself at risk. Republicans claim to “love America,” but what does that mean? They sure don’t love our religious freedom. America was founded in 1789 as the first secular republic in the history of the world, an accomplishment the Founders and Framers reveled in. Secular literally means “not religious” or “not based in religion.” But Republicans will openly tell you that they hate secularism and want, instead, the opposite of the core value on which this country was founded: instead, they want to put the interests of a particular religion (and only one sect within that religion) above all else.

At the very least, let’s stop the egregiously deceptive advertising. Only Medicare should be able to call itself “Medicare.” Congress must pass a law to stop the deceptive advertising of Medicare Advantage plans. Only Medicare should be able to call itself Medicare. Unless you’ve been out of the country for the past few years, you’ve seen the ads on TV featuring Joe Namath, Jimmy Walker, or William Shatner hawking so-called “Medicare Advantage” plans. Medicare Advantage is not Medicare.

Let’s take the first small step rolling back Reagan’s neoliberalism by making “income” from Social Security, unemployment benefits, and tips tax-free once again! It’s The Ronald Reagan Memorial Competition: which Republican can make the rich richer and the poor poorer the fastest? This week, Republican Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin wants to one-up Republican Senator Rick Scott of Florida in this perpetual GOP contest over who can most effectively screw working people. Johnson wants Congress to vote every year whether or not to continue funding both Social Security and Medicare, while Scott says it should only be every five years.

How CEOs pulled off their coup, ending the Golden Age of growth for the middle class while beginning the current era of the CEO as modern-day superyacht-owning Emperor… Want to get rich without doing much work? Insanely, fabulously rich? Private yacht, country estate, private jet rich? So do America’s CEOs. They began hustling for an old-time scam to accomplish this when Ronald Reagan was elected president in 1980. Soon thereafter, they got their way. This is the story.

If their plan works, they’ll rewrite our Constitution and state governors, the US Congress, and the President will have no say whatsoever in the process. If you think the Supreme Court overturning abortion rights in this country was radical and shocking, you ain’t seen nothing yet. There was a convention you should know about this past weekend in Denver, funded by some of the wealthiest men and foundations in America, that has received altogether too little publicity. Imagine if most public schools in the country closed and were replaced by for-profit charter and private academies — often racially segregated and only serving families who could afford their tuition — because the Constitution required federal compulsory education laws and federal funding for education (at all levels) to end.