Trumped! A Nation on the Brink of Ruin... And How to Bring It Back

442 Pages·2016·7.51 MB·English

by  David A. Stockman

TRUMPED!
TRUMPED!
A NATION ON THE BRINK OF RUIN . . .
AND HOW TO BRING IT BACK
DAVID A. STOCKMAN
Copyright © 2016
by Subsidium LLC
14 W. Mount Vernon Pl.
Baltimore, MD 21202
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-6212918-4-8 (print)
ISBN: 978-1-6212918-5-5 (ebook)
Published by Laissez Faire Books, 808 St. Paul
Street, Baltimore, Maryland
www.lfb.org
www.agorafinancial.com
Cover and Layout Design: Andre Cawley
Art Director: Susanne Clark
For Jennifer, Victoria, Rachel and Robert.
CONTENTS
PART 1
TRUMPED! WHY IT HAPPENED
1 Flyover America’s Decline and the Rise of Donald Trump
2 Why the Flyover Zone Is Hurting—Bubble Finance Is Strictly for the Bicoastal
Elites
3 The Warren Buffett Economy: How Central Bank-Enabled Financialization
Has Divided America
4 The Case Against Keynesian Central Banking and Why the FOMC Should Be
Abolished
5 Trump Isn’t All Wrong About Trade Deficits—How Washington’s Money
Printers Betrayed American Workers
6 America’s Rolling LBO and Why There Have Been No Breadwinner Job
Gains Since the Year 2000
7 Falling Backwards in Flyover America—Why Real Household Income Is
Down 21% Since 2000
PART 2
BUBBLE FINANCE AND ITS RUINS
8 Government Entitlements: The World’s Sixth-Biggest Economy and the
Coming Insolvency of Social Security
9 “Morning in America” Never Was—How the Federal Debt Went From $1
Trillion to $35 Trillion in Four Decades
10 How the GOP Got Trumped—the Fiscal Follies of Johnny Lawn Chair and
Faker Ryan
11 America’s Bridges Are Not Falling Down: The Perennial Myth of Crumbling
Infrastructure
12 On the Impossibility of “Helicopter Money” and Why the Casino Will Crash
13 Busting the Banksters—the Case for a Super Glass-Steagall
14 Bubbles in Bond Land—It’s a Central Bank-Made Mania
15 Revolt of the Rubes—Bravo, Brexit!
16 The War on Savers and the 200 Rulers of Global Finance
17 Fannie Mae’s Swell New Palace—Why the Imperial City Must Be Sacked
18 Red Ponzi Ticking—China and the Dark Side of Bubble Finance
19 The Apotheosis of Bubble Finance—the Coming Crash of Tesla and the
FANGs
PART 3
IMPERIAL WASHINGTON AND ITS GLOBAL DEPREDATIONS
20 Imperial Washington—Why There is Still No Peace on Earth
21 A Peace Deal for the Donald—Go to Tehran, Bring Home the American
Troops
22 In Praise of Ignorant Politicians—Unschooled in Beltway Delusions
23 Hillary Clinton—Class President of a Failed Generation
24 A Lesson for The Donald—Barack, We Hardley Knew Ye
25 The Aspen Strategy Group—Hillary’s War Cabinet in Waiting
26 In Praise of the Iran Nuke Deal—A Chance for Peace If We Can Keep It
PART 1
TRUMPED! WHY IT HAPPENED
CHAPTER 1
Flyover America’s Decline and the Rise of
Donald Trump
FIRST THERE WERE 17. THEN LITTLE MARCO, LOW ENERGY JEB AND LYIN’ Ted were
gone. At length, there was one. And now there is even a chance he may become
president.
Donald Trump’s wildly improbable capture of the GOP nomination and rise
toward the White House is surely the most significant upheaval in American
politics since Ronald Reagan.
Yet the rise of Trump—and Bernie Sanders too—vastly transcends ordinary
politics. In fact, it reaches deep into a ruined national economy that has morphed
into rank casino capitalism under the misguided policies and faithless rule of the
Washington and Wall Street elites.
This epic deformation has delivered historically unprecedented setbacks to
the bottom 90% of American households. They have seen their real wealth and
living standards steadily deteriorate for several decades now, even as vast
financial windfalls have accrued to the elite few at the very top.
In fact, during the last 30 years, the real net worth of the bottom 90% has not
increased at all. At the same time, the top 1% has experienced a 300% gain
while the real wealth of the Forbes 400 has risen by 1,000%.
That’s not old-fashioned capitalism at work; it’s the fruit of a perverted
regime of printing press money and debt-fueled faux prosperity that has been
foisted on the nation by the bipartisan ruling elites.
To be sure, the proximate cause of this year’s election upheaval is similar to
that in Reagan’s time. Back then, an era of drastic bipartisan mis-governance
generated an electoral impulse to sweep out the Washington stables.
Now, however, it is not just the Beltway political class that is under attack.