Yes, the fed workers may be better off, but what about the unfed workers, and their unfed families?
You might be asking yourself, who the Hell is this Kevin Hassett idiot, anyway? Good question, and the answer is “an AEI stooge, and a bad economist to boot”.
Hassett is coauthor with James K. Glassman of Dow 36,000: The New Strategy for Profiting from the Coming Rise in the Stock Market. It was published in 1999 before the dot-com bubble burst.
In other words, enough of an idiot that he might actually be overqualified for this maladministration.
See, you’re falling for the great scam! People without homes and belongings are actually better off! No concerns about mortgages or rent… you never have to worry about fires or floods destroying all your belongings. These folks are the lucky ones, really.
The Richmond Times-Dispatch had a big feature article in the Sunday paper about a year and a half ago about the Virginia history books that were mandated by the state in the 1950s and 60s. There was in illustration of the supposed arrival of some slaves on a slave ship that was in one of the 7th grade texts. It was a slave family – mother, father, two children, a girl and a boy. The illustration showed them on the deck of the ship dressed in what would have been Sunday finest even for a fairly well-off white family. The father was wearing a morning coat with a top hat; the woman was carrying a parasol, and the little girl had on a lace petticoat under her dress. Their owner had come on board the ship to welcome them.
Funny that the Virginia Museum of History and Culture exhibits a pair of manacles that were used to restrain slaves for their voyage from Africa to the colonies, and that an illustration of a slaveship in the museum shows the slaves lying naked in the hold stacked up like cordwood. I sort of don’t think any of them got off the ship wearing petticoats and carrying parasols.
Hard to believe anyone could put together a textbook like that with a straight face.
We don’t have to go that far. We need to keep them busy for awhile - young men. That’s for sure. Young men without enough to do are never a good ingredient for the social recipe.
OMgosh. I just came in for the end of Ali Velshi’s segment today in which he repeated an earlier story about a single mom in Alaska, a federal worker, who was selling possessions on Criagslist to make some money. Before the end of his show, someone emailed to ask how he could get in touch with the woman, because he wanted to send her a check.
He looked straight into the camera and said something like this is who we are as a country.
I watched this interview and it was a doozy. Paul Salomon could not keep a straight face at this explanation. And what is really galling to me is Hassett smiled as he was explaining the benefits of the shut down for federal employees. Never mind the missed rent, mortgage, credit card, and utilities bills. Hey they got a free vacation.
