@Thom_Hartmann blog: No to Double-Down-on-Trickle-Down
by Thom Hartmann,posted Sep 6 2012 3:43PM
Day two of the DNC was one giant punch in the gut to Republicans. The night featured Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke painting a picture of what America would look like for women if Republicans win in November. She described a Republican Party that will restrict access to contraceptives for women – force women to undergo intrusive probing before an abortion procedure – and redefine rape. As Fluke said – the choice comes down to, “a country that honors our foremothers by moving us forward, or one that forces our generation to re-fight the battles they already won.”
After Fluke, Massachusetts Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren took the stage to give a spirited defense of the middle class in America. She exposed how “rigged the game” is against working people in America – and she blasted the idea of corporate personhood, saying, “Corporations are not people. People have hearts. They have kids. They get jobs. They get sick. They thrive. They dance. They live. They love. And they die. And that matters.” That might mark one of the first times in political convention history that the issue of corporate personhood was given the spotlight.
Then, closing off the night – former President Bill Clinton took the stage to defend the Obama presidency – and tear down the myth of trickle-down economics. Clinton explained how over the last several decades, Republican presidents have added the majority of debt, while Democratic presidents have added the majority of jobs. And then he went after the Republican lies – saying that it takes a lot of “brass” for Paul Ryan to attack President Obama’s Medicare savings – while including those very same savings in his own budget.
Ultimately, Bill Clinton’s message could be summed up by this one warning he gave to the nation, which is, we can’t “double down on trickled down.” Never mind the fact that some policies signed into law by Bill Clinton got us into this mess, the former President gave one of the best defenses of the Obama Presidency yet – and explained how dangerous today’s Republican Party is to the nation.
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