Tag Archives: trump

Economy

WE NEED A RAISE

The median monthly rent in the United States, as of 2023, is $1,348, according to the Census Bureau (assuming Musk and his rodents haven’t been screwing around with the data).

If you had a minimum wage job and devoted your entire paycheck – 100% we’re talking, sans vacation, and assuming no taxes are taken out – you’d be short $108 every month. 

Also: heat, electricity, food, transportation and clothing would have to appear magically, since you’d have no money left for anything besides your landlord.

The national minimum wage is $7.25 an hour. It has not risen in 15-1/2 years. Remember all that inflation everyone complained about the past couple of years? It ain’t because people getting the minimum wage are getting rich – makes you wonder who actually is causing prices to rise.

In fact, they keep falling back, making their lives more difficult. In the process, because people getting the minimum wage aren’t getting raises, it allows employers to limit the raises they give workers making a little bit more. “You should be grateful you’re getting $10 an hour because I could be paying you $7.25” is the attitude we’re looking at here.

Somehow, most politicians forgot that the people doing the least desirable jobs in our country might be well-served getting a little more money for doing them.

Now, to be fair, a majority of states and territories have minimum wage rates above the national mandate – the highest being Washington, D.C.’s $17.50. But a lot of states have minimum wage rates at the national average, below the national average or even no minimum wage at all.

It fails to take into consideration the fact that people have lives outside their jobs. That they’re supporting themselves and want to build the kind of financial foundation that allows them to realize their dreams.

Businesses thinks that’s not their problem. Being successful is. But if a business can’t make it without paying the people powering it a living wage, maybe that business needs to rethink what it’s doing and how.

A living wage in 2025 America being something in the vicinity of $20 an hour.

Oh, my goodness, that’s inflationary. That’s what the conservatives – the so-called “job creators” – will say. But, again, we had inflation without anyone – especially getting in the minimum wage category – a raise. 

Not only should the minimum wage allow people to actually make a living earning it, but it should also be indexed according to inflation. In other words, a rise should come just about every year – not every 15-1/2 and counting.

This is not a radical concept. Twelve states and Washington, D.C., all have annual minimum wage adjustments. Three of those states – Alaska, Missouri and Montana – voted for Trump three months ago. We do it for Social Security – and employers seem to able to pass on price increases whether or not they raise workers’ wages.

Now a lot of you are thinking “With all the crap going on since TrumpMusk took over, it seems like raising the minimum wage is a low priority.”

Stop thinking like that.

We should have learned by now that you can’t beat something with nothing. Since the Reagan years, Democrats have had to come in and clean up messes left by Republican presidents.

Let’s stop doing that. Let’s advance an economic agenda that benefits the people who somehow vote against their interest and see Trump as a hero. Let’s offer a better path, actual help for the problems they need solved.

Americans – especially young people and those working the thankless jobs that pay the least – need to be able to afford to live. A program to raise the minimum wage and provide a universal basic income, as I suggested two weeks ago, might go a long way toward remedying the economic anxiety millions face.

It would have the added benefit of making the heads of Trump and the Republicans who enable him spin.

If you get a chance, call or write your representative, your senator, the White House and tell them Americans need a raise.

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COME ONE, COME ALL

Trump promised his minions mass deportations. 

So why is anyone surprised that the topic of conversation in the United States this week is mass deportation?

The stories of ICE raids in schools and workplaces are heartbreaking and cruel. But just as important, what’s going on is totally in stupid territory and not in any way in the best interest of the United States.

There’s a feeling of screaming into the void. You can tell people their rights and protest all you want. But a plurality of Americans gave Trump a victory and he believes he has a mandate to do this crap.

So here’s what I think is the best way to respond to this BS:

To the people who want to come here from Guatemala and El Salvador, from Haiti and Cuba, from China and Myanmar, from Rwanda and Congo, from Syria and Somalia, there should be one word – albeit in a different language for each.

WELCOME!

The only people we should stop from coming into this country are the ones who want to avoid going through one of the legal doors – I’d be suspicious of their motive in coming here. But for everybody who comes to a border crossing – people fleeing gang violence, political oppression and/or crippling poverty – I think we should tell them to come on in.

I think that’s the right response to Trump.

That might seem crazy. The sentiment among his supporters is these are people leeching off American prosperity. 

They’ve been stoked into this sentiment by decades of xenophobia. There are strains throughout American history and they’ve been applied to all kinds of newcomers. They never seem to go completely away.

The latest strain cropped up around the turn of this century. It was stoked by people like Lou Dobbs, who spent every night on his CNN broadcast proclaiming that America’s borders were broken and that unwanted people were taking American jobs.

And, of course, the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001, exacerbated fears that people were coming into this country to destroy it. Forget that the terrorists came into this country legally. Forget that their gang leader was a citizen of a supposed ally, Saudi Arabia. 

As far as the stokers were concerned, it was the woman trekking hundreds of miles in brutal conditions trying to get in via a boxcar in 110-degree weather or across desert land in the Southwest who was the “real” threat.

It was – and is – bullshit. Because we found ways to exploit them. We used their desperation to put them in jobs citizens didn’t want to do, pay them what we thought were miserable wages and hold the threat of deportation over their heads if they complained. And we did little to improve conditions in the homelands of these folks, forcing them to flee or die.

It was a situation that needed resolution – the “illegal” border crossings were a contrivance, because people felt the need to get here somehow. And there were people in both parties who understood that – who came up with ideas to help resolve the manufactured crisis.

But the gurus of right-wing power madness had other ideas. Immigration was a gift that kept on giving – fear-mongering as a recruitment tool. As a political strategy.

Trump and the Fox News klan latched onto this nonsense and exploited it brilliantly.

The people who believe in humanity – that would be us – always play this game on their turf. We seem to think that there’s a problem because they tell us there’s a problem. So we try to find a way to placate the radicals when all this is their way of gaining and maintaining power.

Here’s what we want:

We want everybody who wants to come here to come here. We want people who are willing to take the jobs Americans don’t want to do – fruit picking, meat packing, lawn mowing, burger frying – to take the jobs Americans don’t to do. If people are desperate to escape oppression and poverty – and are willing to do anything to make their lives better – we should be their champions.

It makes no sense to create this bizarre system that forces people to use desperate measures to get here. What Trump is doing now enables the coyotes – the people who extort the tired and poor, and make them indentured servants. He’s not hurting MS-13, he’s making it more powerful.

And instead of this nonsense of blackmailing Latin American countries into taking people rounded up by Gestapo wannabes on the streets of our cities, we should work with those countries to improve conditions and allow people to live their best lives in their own homeland.

But those who want to come help us – to make America truly great? Let ’em in. Let them help us build a better country. 

A strong country,  a country that calls itself the most powerful in the world, that calls itself the world’s beacon, isn’t afraid of Honduran 4-year-olds. It embraces them, it educates them and gives them comfort and safety. And then when they succeed, it’s our success as well.

I’m here because a century ago Benito Mussolini was a prick in Italy. My wife is here because 75 years ago Mao Zedong was a prick in China. There are millions of us who can tell that story, from every land on this planet. We’ve worked together to create a nation that – at its best – captures the world’s imagination. 

Because we’re not all the same. And a few more in our situation, wherever they’re from, can help.

That’s what we need to push for. Double down, not double over.

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MAKE AMERICA GREATER

There are just four days left in the Biden administration and it is my intention to enjoy each one as a gift.

A decent, hard-working man – perhaps a bit too old for the job but still good at it anyway – graced us from noon ET on January 20, 2021 to this coming Monday at noon. Like every other presidency, Joe Biden’s wasn’t perfect. But it came as close as any in my lifetime.

Joe Biden guided us gently out of the gloom of the COVID-19 debacle inherited from the guy who’s replacing him. They might be a pain in the butt, but all those highway construction projects you see are making our roads – along with the rest of our infrastructure – more suited to the century we’re now a quarter of the way into.

He stood for Ukraine when Vladimir Putin got frustrated by waiting for his imperial dreams to come true. He combatted climate change and showed respect for people who have been traditionally belittled in American society.

The American economy is the strongest in the world. He managed to blast America’s way out of the pandemic-induced recession and then brought the growth lower with a brief spike in inflation.

That spike, however, did in both him and Kamala Harris. And so we get Trump again for four years – assuming the blowhard makes it to age 82.

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Both Joe Biden and Barack Obama spent way too much of their presidencies cleaning up the messes left by their predecessors.

Biden, of course, had the aftermath of the pandemic. Obama faced both the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression and an American military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan.

I suspect just about everyone reading this and liking it agrees there will be an equal or worse clusterfuck to deal with four years from Monday.

And yet, that’s the mistake we make and the other side doesn’t.

We concentrate on fighting them. They fight us – don’t get me wrong – but they also develop new, crueler, stupider ideas to foist on both the left and the cucumbers who voted for them in November. 

There will be a lot of angst to go around. But part of their gameplan is to frustrate us – to make us concentrate on their latest perverse idea or vendetta.

Right now, you’re seeing it with the wildfires in Los Angeles. How California is a failed liberal experiment and the disaster is due to a combination of its godlessness, diversity and economic initiatives. Just check out some of the comments from Wyoming Sen. John Horsesasso.

It’s meant to drain our energy. And it has to, at least to some extent. You can’t claim to be a decent human being and then deny aid to Los Angeles, or just uproot millions of people living and working here peacefully because they didn’t get the documents you demand. Or tell women they risk prison or worse if they try in any way to end an unwanted or dangerous pregnancy.

But we need to be better this time. And the way to do that is to think about what we want to do to make America greater.

See, I think Peruvian restaurants and Hmong gymnasts and Somalian-born soldiers make this country great. Not McDonald’s or Walmart or Tesla – or not by themselves, anyway. 

And it certainly is not a hateful convicted felon who is absolutely clueless about what it takes to lead an amazing land.

So we need to advance our agenda. To come up with ideas we think will improve our country and, maybe with it, the world. 

They don’t have to be popular now. Some absolutely won’t be. But we need to advance the case so that we can sell them from conviction and evidence. And begin the process of educating and converting some of the just shy of 50% of American voters who actually chose Trump over a really smart, energetic woman.

Over the next five weeks, I’m going to put forward some ideas I’ve thought about as ways we can show how we’re looking toward 2100, not 1900.

The ideas:

— Universal basic income: This is what Andrew Yang promoted when he ran for president in 2000, and then got weird. 

Both liberals and conservatives have reasons to like this idea. But Trump and his supporters will see it as free money (that they don’t think they’re getting) and squawk.

— Police reform. I bristle every time I see a car with one of those black versions of the American flag and the blue stripe in the middle. As if policing in this country should go unquestioned and unfettered. 

But when you see three or four cops together, do you feel safer? Or nervous? And do the answers depend on what you look like? Frankly, few things are in more need of improvement in this country than how we police ourselves.

— Immigration reform. Trump and his minions don’t want to reform immigration. They want to abolish it – unless you can make a considerable donation to the GOP after you get here. The question of how we treat people coming here, for more than four centuries, is one of our greatest dilemmas. 

We should aspire to be better than that – this doesn’t seem like that intractable a problem if we come up with creative and humane solutions.

— Getting around. It’s believed one of Trump’s first executive orders will be to maximize oil production and end credits for electric vehicles – the short-sighted, idiotic “drill, baby, drill” mantra.

Let’s get past both those forms of transportation – there have been few innovations in creating new ways to go places compared with communication technology. Let’s encourage imagination.

— Kindness. Mean will be in power starting Monday. Mean will be the default approach of the White House, Congress and Supreme Court. Mean will drive the stories you see on the news and the attitude of the plurality. If you don’t believe that, explain why a house near me still flew its “Fuck Biden” and “Fuck Kamala Harris” flags as late as New Year’s Eve. 

We have to create new, innovative ways to be kind – to look out for people who are pariahs to the MAGAs. Kindness is our not-so-secret weapon for making America greater – a task that will be easier once we get past Trump and his ilk.

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DRY UP

Did you know there’s a whole array of coffee mugs on sale that purport to be holders of “liberal tears?”

I write this because I’m still hearing from friends and reading social media posts about how terrible life will be following last week’s election debacle.

With every transition announcement from Trump, every absolutely despicable person picked to help him run the country, there’s more caterwauling. More angst. More agitated talk about how this country is lost, how you don’t know how you’re going to make it to 2029 and how you need to think about the country to which you’re going to flee.

Stop it already.

Yeah, this sucks. A lot. All the horrible things we thought about prior to November 5 seem to be materializing. 

It might actually be worse – I didn’t have suspected pedophile and Botox frequent-sticker Matt Gaetz as an attorney general possibility. The biggest disappointment is that my imagination didn’t meet the moment.

But lamenting ain’t helpful. 

The most important reason is that one of the reasons some of these people voted to bring this felon back into our lives is, frankly, that he pisses us off. For some reason, their life gains meeting when they make people they don’t like angry.

I mean, I’ve always thought the rationale for being in politics was to get others to sign on to what you believe. In 1984, Ronald Reagan won a landslide re-election, carrying all but one state and Washington, D.C. One of his supporters, Rep. Jack Kemp, went on TV and said he wanted the administration to work to get D.C.’s support, too.

And the election mandate Trump claims isn’t close to Reagan’s.

If you put 1,000 people in a room and then divided that room into people who voted for him and people who didn’t, you probably wouldn’t be able to tell at a quick glance which side was which. In that room, as of now, 502 people would have voted for Trump, 498 would have voted for Kamala Harris or someone else.

So the idea should be to get more of those 498 people to support you, to make your agenda more popular.

That’s not their idea. They’re playing into the idea that their base is the only thing that matters. 

But they won because people weren’t happy with our side. I’m not sure that was justified, but it is what it is – and we have to fix it. That’s how democracy flourishes.

They’re doubling down on the crazy. Not to do best by the American people. But to piss off the people who don’t support them.

They want you upset. They want you scared. They want you in despair.

Don’t give them what they want.

First, keep in mind that we are enjoying the final 65 or so days of the Biden administration. One of the best presidencies in our lifetime, maybe in American history.

Enjoy the strongest economy in the world as we celebrate the 2024 holiday season. Gather with your friends and family. Play in the snow or find the warm sun and bask in it.

Agonizing over the Trump administration can start at noon EST on January 20, 2025. Until then, Trump’s just a convicted felon and 4-time bankruptee. Why waste the time leading up to it in pain?

Second, the 65 days will give you time to figure out how best to make Trump’s presidency as difficult for him as possible.

Donate to the groups that will be in the front lines of fighting him. My first choices are ProPublica, the public interest news organization, and the Brennan Center for Justice. Donate. Find out what they stand for. Find other groups working on issues close to your heart: gun violence, women’s bodily autonomy, protecting migrants, and so on.

Thirdly, don’t be miserable.

They want that. They want, as they say, to drink liberal tears. 

Keep them thirsty. Challenge them. Confront them. Do whatever you can to frustrate their worst impulses.

As I said, we’ll figure this out. We’re the good guys. Let them bask in their cruelty and pettiness.

The MAGA folks hate the expression “We’ve got this.” It implies a “we” that works for the common good.

Yup. 

We’ve got this.

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I SHOULD HAVE KNOWN BETTER

It was an incident after one of my happiest moments of 2024 – and it served as a warning that I didn’t see until now.

The New York Mets had just won the National League Division Series against the Philadelphia Phillies last month. Euphoric fans – including me – jammed the platform for the No. 7 train to Manhattan.

It originated at Main Street in Flushing and there were passengers aboard before the Citi Field stop. As joyous fans jammed the train, a young Hispanic man was standing by the opposite door.

He could tell the fans were happy, so he shouted “Let’s go Mets!” Which I thought was cute.

But for some reason that I’ve thought about since that moment, he shouted “Let’s go Donald Trump!”

Why the hell he would shout that-  at that moment – bewildered me. Not enough, however, to stop me from shouting back “Fuck Donald Trump!” – language I don’t use in public. (Although I suspect I’ll be using it more for awhile.)

What was going through his mind that he would shout his support of Trump in as unsuitable a moment as that?

Tonight, I found out. According to CNN’s exit polling, Latino men voted for Trump more than ever before – in some states, a majority of them voted for a guy who has belittled or diminished Hispanic Americans for decades. 

It’s amazing. He was first elected because of his racism toward Mexicans and Central Americans. And now some of those people are sending him back to the White House.

Why? 

Is it the phony toughness he projects? Like those wrestlers he admires and who seem to support him en masse. 

Were they suckered by “The Apprentice” into thinking that a guy who has claimed bankruptcy four times actually knows what it takes to make them more financially secure?

Can it be that they associate with his outlaw status? That they think he’s been railroaded they way some of them perceive themselves to be?

Do they, like some spoiled-brat white folks, believe there are people getting “free stuff” that they’re not getting- and either they want some, too, or no one should have whatever that stuff is?

And is the idea that a woman – and it doesn’t matter if she’s white or Black and South Asian – could be the most powerful person in the world so threatening and offensive to them that they’d put an incompetent male in the White House instead? Twice!

I’m angry and sad in a way I haven’t been in eight years. And what makes me most sad is seeing people voting against their own interest, taken in by a conman who is now going to avoid prison by claiming he’s above the law.

Or worse, that he is the law.

I do not pretend to understand why anyone sees a hero in Trump. There is nothing admirable or compassionate about him. He has no respect for people other than himself and anyone who can help enrich him.

It’s bewildering that anyone thinks the guy whose pathetic mishandling of the COVID crisis contributed to the inflation endured between 2021 and 2023 is the guy to bring down the price of eggs.

And because he respects tyrants, this is a moment of triumph from a diverse set of the world’s rogues – from Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinpeng to Benjamin Netanyahu and Viktor Orban.

I suppose the people who voted for Trump would say I’m being paternalistic – that they can look out for their own self-interest without my help. 

Kamala Harris ran as good a campaign as I’ve seen in my lifetime – and she will have nothing to show for it. I’m certain that a key factor in her defeat is that, well, she’s a she. And that she’s also a Black she and a South Asian she.

But the loser in a democratic election concedes. With the grace that Trump refused to give Joe Biden four years ago.

I just hope she doesn’t congratulate him. He doesn’t deserve it. Neither do the people who voted for him. 

As I said at a moment when some jerk zapped my joy of a Met win, “Fuck Donald Trump!”

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TURN THAT DIAL

Because it evades my understanding, I’ve tried to imagine why anyone supports Donald Trump.

When he first announced his candidacy for President, back in 2015, I thought it was a joke. I brazenly told my brother that he’d lose all 50 states if he was the Republican nominee.

One reason for my stance was that Trump was a walking punchline in New York. His braggadocio wore thin when he filed for bankruptcy umpteen times. He was obviously not the business genius he claimed to be. 

But I should have gotten a hint when I went to a party and people were raving about “The Apprentice.” It gave him an image of strength and savvy that was, like everything else in his life, a fraud.

He built a following. Republican politicians didn’t take him seriously. Democrats didn’t take him seriously.

Nine years later, he’s still here. His sense of grievance struck a chord with millions of Americans. And, despite botching COVID, leading an attempted coup and being convicted on 34 counts of fraud, he stands a decent chance of becoming our 47th President.

Why? What’s the appeal?

TV. 

My generation – the baby boomers – are the first people to have grown up in a completely televised age. 

My parents used to talk about listening to Jack Benny and Bob Hope on the radio. That didn’t happen for us. We watched everything – I’m old enough to remember black-and-white – every night. 

And it was simple. There were three major networks. If you lived in a big city like New York, there were a couple of independent channels. There was no concept of the choices we face today.

So the TV you watched was pretty streamlined in the values and concepts it conveyed. Crime shows depicted a dangerous world that could only be preserved by steadfast law enforcers. Westerns showed the power of the good gunman. Game shows gave away dreamy prizes. All the people in sitcoms lived in houses that were much nicer than yours.

It was an aspirational world. And I think maybe my generation – and the generations that have followed – thought that. I can be a civilian and stop a criminal mastermind. I can be a factory worker and still have a 4-bedroom home. I can ride a horse into the sunset.

When our lives didn’t measure up to the ones we saw, it frustrated us. It’s not that easy to be Perry Mason or Dr. Kildare or Joe Friday. 

I think maybe Trump’s appeal is to that frustration that we didn’t get the lives we fantasized on TV. And if we did – if we did get the McMansion in Bergen County or the beach house in Hyannis – we know there are people out there who want it, too. 

And for both groups, there’s the perception that there are people who are newcomers or just different from us who are getting something for free – getting to that dream life we want – without the travail we endure.

When Trump talks about making America great again, he’s talking about that romanticized view of America and the disillusion that’s spreading from the boomers to those younger – and even to some who are not white, because they sense that they’re getting shut out, too.

Over the past days, I’ve tried to share my thoughts about Kamala Harris’ policies, particularly ones I believe show her aptitude and understanding of what America’s problems really are. They’re not magic cures. But they are ways to move the country forward.

She hasn’t been able to get her ideas heard because her opponent’s best chance is to manifest grievance. 

It’s cynical and sad. Giving Trump another chance will tear us apart. It will end with the demise of American greatness and consequences that are almost unimaginable.

There is no alternative to Kamala Harris and Tim Walz. In the next few days, we’ll find out if we’ll make it.

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THE UNSOLVABLE SOLVABLE PROBLEM

Let me throw this out there: The immigration “crisis” is hardly that.

This is a solvable problem. It is one for which Americans should relatively easily find common ground.

If that sounds crazy to you, after the past 20 years of xenophobia and jingoism, do a reality check. Because this is the reality:

— Yes, there are lots of people trying to get into the United States through its southern border. Most of them are desperate to escape poverty and violence – in Central America, in the Caribbean, and even in Asia and Africa.

— Many of these people are taking jobs in the United States. But whether they’re taking jobs away from Americans is highly doubtful. Most undocumented immigrants find work doing stuff that folks born here aren’t interested in doing: mowing lawns, picking crops, working in slaughterhouses and on mindless assembly line jobs.

— The trafficking of these people is a humanitarian nightmare. They are put in compromising positions by criminal gangs, extorted and exploited. 

— The borders do seem like a way for terrorists to penetrate our country – a country whose older citizens still hold dark memories of September 11, 2001. Not that the people who perpetrated that attack snuck in to the United States – the Al-Qaeda gang came here legally. But it’s understandable that people want vigilance on this matter.

There are multiple issues that concern liberals and conservatives. Republicans and Democrats. Responsible people in all 50 states.

But solving a problem means you can’t exploit it. And there seem to be a whole lot of people, mostly on the right, who much prefer making hay on an issue than eliminating or mitigating it.

Democrats and Republicans reached compromise on a bill earlier this year that would have addressed concerns on both sides. Increased security staffing. Guideposts for determining who should stay and who is too dangerous to stay. Fairness and humanity for families. A path to citizenship for those who are here without documentation.

It’s not as easy to scare people when you solve a problem. And that problem can’t be used as your gateway to exploit other issues.

I firmly a President Kamala Harris will not rest until she has some kind of deal that defuses and diminishes immigration as a flashpoint in American life. It would be her signature accomplishment if she succeeds. And with so many conservative Republicans signing on to her campaign, the opportunity to end the constant harping about this issue might never be more readily available.

Because otherwise, we’re going to hear about “caravans” every time wants to stymy a Democratic initiative. We’re going to hear about “broken borders” and “mules” and all the other crap.

Solve the damn problem. Show the world why America is so great,

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HOLDING THE COURSE IN CHOPPY SEAS

If you have a casual familiarity with world history, you know that empire building is a key part of it. The Egyptians, the Greeks, the Romans, the Ottomans, the British.

And now us. Like it or not – and, trust me, a lot of people don’t – the United States is the world’s most powerful nation. It has a fearsome military force, has its thumb on just about everybody’s economy and is the cultural touchstone of the planet.

It’s a privilege and a burden. The world’s lesser powers will either accept American leadership or see it as something to throw rocks at. 

Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, Kim Jong-Un, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. All of them can’t stand the idea that the United States stands in the way of their designs for dominance. At the same time, responsible leaders around the world seek our help in securing their way of life amid peace and prosperity.

No one seems to have understood this better than the 46th President of the United States: Joseph R. Biden, Jr.

Biden has always had a feel for global matters. He’s sought alliances and been a good partner throughout the world. He has led without dominating and reaffirmed American friendship.

He’s also stood up for what’s right.

Ukraine is the best example. Putin wanted this democracy nowhere near his turf. He did everything he could to undermine it. When it didn’t work – and the Ukrainians elected a comedian who turned out to be a real world leader – Putin launched a hideous war against people who just wanted to be left alone.

That Ukraine stands independent today – in what seemed like a considerable overmatch – is largely because of Volodymyr Zelinskyy’s leadership and the grit of its people. It also has a lot to do with Biden, the United States and the coalition of democratic powers that banded to give Ukraine the resources it needed to fight.

The situation in Gaza is a bit more complicated.

The United States has a long-standing and honorable commitment to the security of Israel. We recognized its independence in 1948 within minutes of its declaration. There are ancestral, social, economic and religious ties with the nation.

When Hamas launched the horrific terrorist attack on October 7 of last year, the Biden administration was obligated and inclined to support the Israelis. It has, for the most part, kept that commitment.

It’s kept that despite the fact that Israel’s leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, is probably more spiritually aligned with Putin than Biden. Keeping a nation at war – and putting the burden on non-combatants – is an evil in itself. What Netanyahu has done in Gaza is unforgivable.

Biden has needed to balance all his responsibilities in this crisis. And very few in the United States were going to be happy with whatever he did. That he owned up to the responsibility is a credit to his administration – amazingly, this crisis would be worse if he weren’t president.

It is hoped that Kamala Harris, who didn’t have particular international experience when she became vice president, has learned from Biden. And, because she’s learned for the professionals in this administration, she can be counted on to guide American foreign policy in a moral and protective direction.

She’ll have some freedom to change up a few things – dealing with Netanyahu, who is trying to stay one step ahead of the law in Israel. But she’s clear about her unbridled support for Zelinskyy and Ukraine, and will deal with bad actors directly and firmly.

What she won’t do is back down from American responsibility. She will not threaten NATO, or our partners in East Asia. She won’t talk tough about China before caving like a sandcastle in a tsunami. She’ll deal firmly and fairly with crises throughout the world.

She will not isolate us. She won’t bend under the weight of the power we wield on this planet and beyond.

You can’t say that about her opposition.

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IT’S A TRIP

Communication technology has radically changed in my lifetime – think cellphones, 84-inch TV screens, the whole freakin’ Internet.

But we’re pretty much using the same transportation technology that existed since before I was born.

I don’t imagine a President Kamala Harris is going to be as bold as to push for magnetic levitation, vacuum or anything else short of the impossible (see: “Star Trek,” transporter). So I’ll settle for improving and rebuilding our systems of getting places – and that’s a commitment that will be more of a continuation than a change.

President Biden should go down in history for what’s he captained in terms of infrastructure. It might be frustrating to get stuck in traffic caused by the umpteen highway improvement projects around the country. 

But making these roads safer and more efficient is a job that’s long overdue – and Biden did all this while boosting employment and, yes, keeping the inflation inherent in such an expansion in check. (Yes, we had inflation problems, but those were more about supply chain shortfalls caused by the pandemic.)

Improving highways isn’t the best way to meet our nation’s transportation needs. The idea is to get more people out of cars rather than into them in order to combat climate change and move people more efficiently. But that will take time.

Fortunately, the Biden-Harris administration has been clear-minded about pushing for alternative fuel – particularly, electric – vehicles. And it’s making a difference – there are lots more hybrid and electric vehicles on the road. People are starting to realize how much better life can be when you don’t need to unburden yourself of $40 or $50 to fill a gas tank each week.

Harris wants to expand the network of charging stations so that you’re never more than a few miles away from one. Her administration would also need to push automakers to improve battery life and length – long-distance trips are still a problem because of limited vehicle range.

Biden’s being a train freak has been a boon for public transportation. Improvements in intercity rail and commuter lines were prioritized – New York and New Jersey are finally building a new tunnel to replace century-old infrastructure under the Hudson River.

Now it’s time to expand. Europe and East Asia thrive on high-speed rail. There’s no reason the United States can’t. If it took less than five hours to from midtown New York to downtown Chicago by train, wouldn’t you rather take that than schlep to LaGuardia, wait for a 2-hour flight, then schlep from O’Hare to the Loop.

Secretary Pete Buttigieg – whose high profile has been a reassuring sign that Biden and Harris took transportation seriously – has pushed for an expansion of high-speed rail projects across the country. It’s going to take a while to build them – probably beyond the lifetime of many of us.

But let’s at least start.

One other transportation thought.

This summer, New York was on the verge of a bold experiment, the kind that doesn’t happen often in this country. Like several other cities around the world – London, in particular – New York was going to initiate congestion pricing – making drivers pay a toll to enter midtown and lower Manhattan.

The idea would be to unclog the narrow streets of the nation’s largest city, making it easier for vehicles that absolutely need to get around. Nothing terrifies me quite like seeing an ambulance stuck in gridlock on an impassable side street – imagine the poor person fighting for his or her life inside.

People who live in the suburbs squawked. How dare New York charge us extra to bring our pickups and SUVs into town? (Forgetting how they bar non-residents from using their parks and pools.) So the state’s governor, Kathy Hochul, caved and put off the plan’s implementation.

Should Harris win the White House, she should push to get the experiment started. And she should also, after making sure officials keep their promise to fund mass transit with the revenue from the program, pump federal money into the city to help improve the subways and buses.

Getting people from here to there – safely, quickly and cleanly – appears to be a goal of the Harris-Walz campaign. And let’s face it, it’s the only campaign thinking about something that serious.

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OLDEN DAYS

Whenever one of my contemporaries complains about the problems of getting older, my kneejerk response is “It’s better than the alternative.”

But sometimes I wonder.

Families go through hell when a parent or grandparent requires more than just routine care. In particular, dementia takes an incredible toll on a family’s psychology and finances.

There’s nothing federal or state governments can do to make the emotional pain of watching a loved one diminish. But anything that can be done to lessen the financial burden will help families deal with the heartbreak.

Earlier this month, Kamala Harris proposed allowing Medicare to help pay the costs of elderly home care. She says her administration would pay for this through some of the savings achieved through negotiating drug prices.

It’s an idea and seems worth trying. 

The details would be interesting. Would Medicare establish floors and ceilings for what care providers could receive as part of the reimbursement? Would there be minimum standards for quality?

Right now, finding people to attend to an elder in your care is crazy – at least here in New York. There are agencies and contractors, and they try to place people who might not be especially qualified for the task.

And there are all kinds of other issues. Are families in compliance with IRS regulations concerning taxes? Are the care providers in the country legally, or are they undocumented? How much of a family’s fortune needs to be spent before it qualifies for other forms of assistance, such as Medicaid?

As part of her plans for families caring for elderly members, Harris wants to end the practice of allowing the seizure of deceased recipients’ homes to help allay the costs of care. That is certainly a good thing.

Harris says she’s made these proposals after thinking about the difficulties she had when her mother was dying of breast cancer. That’s something Americans can relate to – when we talk about “economic anxiety,” that – and not some blatantly racist trope – is what we should mean.

The other key issue affecting those who are is the protection of Social Security and Medicare.

Republicans hate those two programs. They are what endear so many Americans to the Democratic Party – gifts from Franklin Roosevelt and Lyndon Johnson to this generation and beyond.

Because the population is aging, the costs of these programs are taxing the systems that support them. This has given opponents an opening. For instance, they believe letting Social Security become a voucher program that allows funds to be invested as recipients see fit would help.

Which it wouldn’t. Especially now, at the point of our lives when Social Security is a crucial part of our income. It would be like gambling. And one mistake could be life-changing – and threatening.

Harris is looking at a longstanding Democratic idea – raising the ceiling at which income is taxed for Social Security and Medicare purposes. It’s ridiculous that Elon Musk pays a lower percentage of his income toward these programs – which he doesn’t need – than a teacher, a policeman or a miner.

But, as befits the point of these pieces, it’s not something you hear a lot about in the campaign coverage. Because the idea is to not let this message get heard – for fear it’s really popular among the demographic that could ensure her election.

It matters to my generation. It matters to my kids. I’ll bet it matters to you. 

In more ways than one, that beats the alternative.

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