Posted on 06/12/2025 7:22:23 AM PDT by DIRTYSECRET
The former Texas senator says income inequality is a myth. He couldn’t be more wrong, but I admire the old grouch for trying.
The former senator and onetime economist at Texas A&M amassed a fearsome campaign war chest to run for the Republican presidential nomination in 1995, only to quit the race in February 1996 after suffering humiliating defeats in Iowa and New Hampshire. That year’s Republican nominee, Bob Dole, would later lose to President Bill Clinton.
(Excerpt) Read more at newrepublic.com ...
He's being interviewed on Mark Davis. Check out the podcast. Davis is also giving kudos throughout to the late Brian Wilson.
He’s right.
There’s no incentive to improve oneself when everything is handed to them for free.
He perfectly explains why he has no problem with the rich. He lives in a rural area and his satellite signal is cheaper and better because Elon Musk is rich.
Is this the guy who used to tell a painfully long story about a red wagon and people hopping on and off as it chugs along?
America’s poor are in the top 1% globally.
EC
If you look at today's poor, they're not stupid: they know with their lack of skills that's as far as they'll go. And that's assuming some illegal hasn't taken the job. Those jobs won't even pay enough to rent an apartment, let alone enough to make a young man appear a good candidate for marriage.
The result? Crime, massive numbers of out of wedlock births, drug abuse, and multi-generational welfare. All so the rentier class can get a higher profit by outsourcing manufacturing and hiring illegals. That's the real problem.
He’s right.
There’s no incentive to improve oneself when everything is handed to them for free.
ON much reflection, I am glad I grew up poor.
People are panicked about giving up their carefully knitted safety net by venturing into an income or assets level that would threaten it.
We really have created destructive social policies that I used to think were just the result of well-meaning incompetence.
1996-Dole was ‘next in line’ and put up as a sacrificial lamb but 73 years of age? The GOP is wising up now but never stood for anything until Trump ran. Graham had no ‘executive’ experience but could have been a not-so-poor man’s Barry Goldwater would have paid the county benefits down the line.
**Is this the guy who used to tell a painfully long story about a red wagon and people hopping on and off as it chugs along?((
Probably. He wasn’t afraid to express his opinions-something lacking then and now.
We also presumably have approximately 50 million citizens with an IQ of 85 or less.
We have a system of forced wealth redistribution. Under this system if a person requires subsidy to live, or if he produces children whom he cannot support it behooves the productive to make his life less pleasant until he increases his production or decreases his consumption.
Yet another way leftists pit man against man.
“French economists Piketty & Saez used IRS statistics on individual tax returns to get their numbers, using just wage, salary and tip income. They completely ignored the success of the Reagan years and all the business tax returns that were filed by entrepreneurs. Business income was NOT counted, and moreover, investment income was not counted, nor was Social Security, Medicare and transfer payments such as Foods Stamps, Welfare, or child support, disability, etc. Essentially, the 70% tax bracket at $105,000 in 1980 put an artificial cap on salaries, and once it was ended, salaries took off for athletes, entertainers, CEOs and small business owners........more money was created, and they did not get the money by stealing from or by exploiting others.
401K plan and mutual fund or investment income was not counted, which was a big gain by the middle class after Reagan, then with the Internet. In the 1970s, you needed $10,000 and to pay a stockbroker to invest. That changed.
Biggest ommission other than not counting business income tax returns in their communist studies of income inequality, was counting people who retired as becoming poor. Since retired people received wage, salary or tip income, they were counted as the “shrinking middle class “ in these French professor studies touted by the Left, even though many seniors owned their own homes and were living well. It’s no different when liberals talk about the wage gap between males and females as if the NBA and WNBA are the same thing, using “per capita income” of males and females that does not take into consideration how many hours worked or if somebody was a plumber or an unwed mother, a receptionist or heavy equipment operator, a public defender or a corporate lawyer, a social worker or a hedge fund manager.”
It’s my understanding is the statistics on the poor are based on income only. Let’s say your income is $1,000. You are poor.
That you live in public housing, receive food stamps, receive heating assistance in winter, send your kids to public schools, receive Medicaid for yourself and your children, and receive cash assistance, etc. count for nothing.
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sorry. retired people received no wage, salary or tip income, so were considered the shrinking middle class by the French economists.
I tried reading that tripe but too much fluff.
When you have generational welfare, they are the privileged class. Have a problem? Throw money at it and more money and more money. I know I’m a broken record but our food budget is a third less than what the government thinks should feed the poor and, hey, why not give them free phones, internet, discounted utilities, etc. which we pay for along with a home, medical, education, blah, blah, blah. Someone, please tell me why SNAP doesn’t deduct the 360 free meals students get every year and the sometimes weekend box of food from their food stamp benefits. Oh, and there’s the summer free lunches for ages 0-21 that aren’t deducted. Nor are the food pantries they are automatically eligible for, even the income based ones, which they can visit as many times a month as they wish. Then there are churches and other charities. It sure smells of double and triple dipping. BTW, the average income for a family of 4 across the nation to still be eligible for SNAP is $50k so when someone says they only get $23/mo you know what their income is and they still get phones, internet, discounted utilities, etc. Excuse me, this household has never seen that high a working paycheck and we eat just fine on $112/mo/person and we pay our own bills. Gramm is right, a certain growing group has it waaaay too easy.
I think Gramm blew it in in ‘96 when he lost it after Pat Buchanan’s early success. He alienated a lot of people who might have backed him later. Dole mostly stiluck to his knitting and rode it out.
**The New Republic is quite like Liz Cheney and Chris Christie and other never-Trumpers.**
The article is critical of him.
Btw-the tribute to Brian Wison is pretty good(the Mark Davis show). Some music fans were too snooty to appreciate him-they’ll begrudgingly have to acknowledge his legacy.
In the wake of the death of Sly Stone some will call this coverage racist. It would be nice to have a celebration of life(2 of them) for each similar to Michael Jackson with
several rockers doing their music.
The local food stamp secretary got tired of being hollered at by their clients that their kids had no milk yet sat in the lobby bragging about getting their hair and nails done to party over the weekend. She crunched the numbers proving they were getting more than she was working 40/hr a week. She quit that day.
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