One in six Americans is unemployed or underemployed, but– except for a few politicians like Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Ca)– Congress doesn’t care. In fact, the Republican-controlled US House of Representatives wants to increase unemployment and underemployment by laying off more federal employees and forcing others into furlough days. In fact, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) flippantly said if the budget cuts result in job losses “so be it!”

Back here in Arizona– the Republican-controlled Arizona Legislature is following in their federal cronies’ footsteps and proposing draconian budget cuts– particularly in education and healthcare– which will result on more layoffs.

In a recent New York Times editorial, Paul Krugman writes that the US is “well on the way to creating a permanent underclass of the jobless. According to Krugman, Americans want jobs… period… but the Republican-controlled state and federal governments are obsessed with cutting budgets and jobs– not creating them.

In addition, US businesses– who had record profits in 2010– are sitting on their cash and trying to squeeze every ounce of productivity out of scared employees who don’t want to be laid off. According to Ed Schultz, 50,000 factories closed or moved abroad since George Bush took office; 75 percent of these factories employed more than 500 people– a loss of more than 18 million jobs. Adding insult to injury, many US corporations added jobs in their overseas factories than in the US, and they are starting new factories abroad.

From The Forgotten Millions…

So one-sixth of America’s workers — all those who can’t find any job or are stuck with part-time work when they want a full-time job — have, in effect, been abandoned.

It might not be so bad if the jobless could expect to find new employment fairly soon. But unemployment has become a trap, one that’s very difficult to escape. There are almost five times as many unemployed workers as there are job openings; the average unemployed worker has been jobless for 37 weeks, a post-World War II record.

In short, we’re well on the way to creating a permanent underclass of the jobless. Why doesn’t Washington care?

Part of the answer may be that while those who are unemployed tend to stay unemployed, those who still have jobs are feeling more secure than they did a couple of years ago. Layoffs and discharges spiked during the crisis of 2008-2009 but have fallen sharply since then, perhaps reducing the sense of urgency. Put it this way: At this point, the U.S. economy is suffering from low hiring, not high firing, so things don’t look so bad — as long as you’re willing to write off the unemployed.

Yet polls indicate that voters still care much more about jobs than they do about the budget deficit. So it’s quite remarkable that inside the Beltway, it’s just the opposite.

What makes this even more remarkable is the fact that the economic arguments used to justify the D.C. deficit obsession have been repeatedly refuted by experience. [For the rest of this article, click here.]

When will this assault on American workers end?

In the wake of the horrific devastation in Japan following the earthquake and tsunami earlier this week, it’s ironic that the Republican-controlled US House of Representatives has America’s natural disaster early warning systems on the small government chopping block. Check out this video link from the Ed Schultz Show on MSNBC.

The OpEd: What happens if tragedy hits here?

Why cut effective programs that save lives and don’t cost much?

Union-busting Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker was caught in a telephone sting. A blogger from the BuffaloBeast posed as David Koch (notorious right-philanthropist, major donor to Walker’s campaign), and owner of 18 factories in Wisconsin and talked with Walker on the phone about his union-busting plans.

Above is part one; here is a link to part 2.

In part 2, Walker brags about “doing something big” as a new governor and brags about how popular his union-busting activities are with Wisconsinites and other governors, who are contacting him. He and the fake Koch also discuss placing thugs among the friendly protesters, and he agrees with the fake Koch when he disses the “liberal bastards” on MSNBC.

“This is our time to change the course of history,” Walker tells the fake Koch, as he compares his struggle with the unions to President Ronald Reagan’s “Mr. Gorbachov, tear down this wall” challenge to the communists.

“It’s all about getting our freedom back,” Walker says. [Huh?] “… The bottom line is we’re going to get to the world movement here.”

Ed Schultz– one of those “liberal bastards” on MSNBC– is going to be covering this story on his show on Wednesday night on MSNBC.

Estimates vary, but between 80,000-100,000 demonstrators protested against Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s union-busting “Budget Repair Bill” on Saturday in Madison, Wisconsin. According to radio talk show host Ed Schultz, another 70 protests were held around Wisconsin over the weekend– despite freezing rain on Sunday. (Burrr… )

The “Mubarak of the Middle West” (AKA Walker) appeared on CNN over the weekend, but he refuses to compromise or negotiate with the unions and refuses to address the crowd regarding the “budget crisis” that he personally created by giving corporate tax breaks that the state could not afford. (Sound familiar?)

Unlike Arizona, Wisconsin has one of the best public education systems in the country. Walker’s union-busting activities are not about pensions. They’re about radical anti-union, anti-public-education, pro-corporate-welfare ideology. (This, too, should sound familiar.)

From The Nation…

What has become clear to the protesters over the past week is that, beyond an assault on unions, Walker’s bill is part of a wider attack on working families and public education.

“The second reason that this fight matters is the future of public education,” The Nation’s Chris Hayes said. “What’s driving it is the ultimate aim of permanently scrapping the model of public education that has sustained this country for years. Teachers unions are the stewards of preserving public education, which is the core element of our civil life.”

Walker’s track record illustrates his lack of support for public education. Before he was governor, he was the executive of Milwaukee County, where the nation’s first mass-scale private school voucher experiment was implemented. He then campaigned for governor on expanding these vouchers, Hayes said.

Under the widely disputed bill, local police, firefighters and state troopers would retain their collective bargaining rights—their unions generally supported Walker during his campaign. Teachers unions, who sided with Democrats in last fall’s election, and other public workers would lose that process.

The proposed bill, according to Walker, is intended to balance the state’s budget and avoid layoffs. But despite an offer by public workers to give financial concessions instead of relinquishing collective bargaining, the governor refuses to drop the plan.

In a statement issued this weekend, Democratic State Senator Jon Erpenbach said that the offer made by public workers was “a legitimate and serious offer on the table from local, state and school public employees that balances Governor Walker’s budget.”

The denial of this offer shows that “Governor Walker’s only target is the destruction of collective bargaining rights and not solving the state’s budget,” Erpenbach said.

Teaching assistants have planned a “teach-out” for Tuesday to permit their students to join them at the capitol to protest the Assembly’s meeting. They also helped organize “teach-ins” over the weekend at the campus’s main library to further explain to students how this bill will affect them.

Graduate student assistants teach 85 percent of discussion sections and nearly 20 percent of the lectures on the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s campus. The proposed bill targets both their benefits and their ability to bargain over tuition remission. This is no small matter: a statement released by the TAA Saturday said that tuition remission is the university’s strongest recruitment tool for graduate students and ending collective bargaining in this area would impact the quality of the teaching and research brought into the university.

Over the last week, groups of students migrated from other state campuses to participate in the protests in Madison. Rachel Matteson, a member of Students for a Democratic Society at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, came down Sunday to rally at the capitol.

“Attacking teachers assistants and teachers directly affects the quality of our education. Students realize this. Many of us will be graduating soon and entering the public sector, so this is also an attack on our own rights,” Matteson told The Nation.

Some 260 faculty members at UW-Madison signed a letter opposing the bill. “We recognize that the state faces a severe budget shortfall. We have already taken wage and benefit cuts to help address that problem and expect to make more sacrifices in the future. But eliminating collective bargaining will not address this shortfall. We urge you not to allow this crisis to undermine our state’s strong traditions of democracy and human rights.”

Public school teachers from around the state have been protesting at the capitol for the past week. On Sunday, after a four-hour debate on how to balance maintaining their opposition to the bill with their responsibilities to teach, Madison public school teachers decided to return to work on Tuesday.

Not only are public school teacher’s collective bargaining rights threatened, but public education is also expected to be reduced by nearly $500 annually per student.

Simultaneously, and also causing a stir, is a proposal expected to be included in Walkers budget that involves splitting the University of Wisconsin-Madison from the rest of the state’s university system. Some officials worry this could cause tuition to skyrocket.

For more on union-busting and Wisconsin, check out these stories.

Video of Ed Schultz broadcasting from Madison from MSNBC

Wixconsin Power Play from the New York Times

Wisconsin’s Protests in Pictures from The Nation

‘This Is What Democracy Looks Like’ in Wisconsin, as Largest Crowd Yet—80,000—Opposes Union Busting from The Nation

The Future of Public Education, as Much as Unions, Is at Stake in Wisconsin from The Nation

Why cover what’s happening in Wisconsin? Because Arizona Republican Governor Jan Brewer and other radical corporate puppet governors around the country are taking pages from the same playbook as “The Mubarak of the Middle West”. Stay tuned. There are a lot of rumblings about marching on Phoenix.

In the past week, the mainstream corporate media has been busily reporting on anti-government protesters in Egypt, Iran, and Yemen– while ignoring anti-government/pro-union protesters in Wisconsin.

Last week, Wisconsin’s newly-elected Republican Governor Scott Walker proposed welching on union contracts with state workers and stripping public employee unions of collective bargaining rights.

Protests in Wisconsin swell to 30,000
Protests by union workers and supporters started almost immediately– even though Walker threatened to call out the National Guard.

On Tuesday, there were 12,000-15,000 protesters at the capitol in Wisconsin. By Wednesday, there were 30,000 protesters– and the action was finally covered by National Public Radio– even though liberal talk show host Ed Schultz had been covering action live via call-ins from protesters in Wisconsin for days and is broadcasting his show from Madison on Thursday (locally on 1330 AM, The Jolt).

From The Nation…

In some senses, Wednesday’s remarkable rally began Tuesday evening, when Madison Teachers Inc., the local education union, announced that teachers would leave their classrooms to spend the day lobbying legislators to “Kill the Bill” that has been proposed by newly-elected Republican Governor Scott Walker.

The teachers showed up en masse in downtown Madison Wednesday morning.

And then something remarkable happened.

Instead of taking the day off, their students gathered at schools on the west and east sides of Madison and marched miles along the city’s main thoroughfares to join the largest mass demonstration the city has seen in decades – perhaps since the great protests of the Vietnam War era.

Thousands of high school students arrived at the Capital Square, coming from opposite directions, chanting: “We support our teachers! We support public education!”

Thousands of University of Wisconsin students joined them, decked out in the school’s red-and-white colors.

Buses rolled in from every corner of the state, from Racine and Kenosha in the southeast to Green Bay in the northeast, from La Crosse on the Mississippi River to Milwaukee on Lake Michigan.

Buses and cars arrived from Illinois and Minnesota and as far away as Kansas, as teachers and public employees from those states showed up at what American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees union president Gerald McEntee says is “ground zero “in the struggle for labor rights in America.

The moms and dads of the elementary school kids came, and the kids, carrying hand-lettered signs:

“I love my teacher!”

“Scott Walker needs to go back to school!”

“Scott Walker needs a time out!”

And, “We are Wisconsin!

“I’ve been here since the 1960s, I’ve seen great demonstrations,” said former Mayor Paul Soglin, a proud former student radical who was nominated for a new term in Tuesday’s local primary election. “This is different. This is everyone – everyone turning out.”

Everyone except the governor, who high-tailed it out of town, launching a tour of outlying communities in hopes of drumming up support for his bill. Most of the support Walker was getting was coming from national conservative political groups, such as the Club for Growth, which have long hoped to break public-employee unions. But the governor held firm, saying after a day of unprecedented protests – in Madison and small towns and cities across the state – that he still wanted to pass his bill. He’s got strong support in the overwhelmingly Republican Assembly. But he cannot afford to lose one more Republican state senator. And the unions and their backers are determined to find that one Republican who is smart enough and honest enough to recognize that the governor’s assault of public employees is an assault on Wisconsin itself.

The state’s largest teachers union, the Wisconsin Education Association Council has called on its 98,000 members to come to rally in their hometowns and then come to the Capitol. “All citizens of Wisconsin should come to Madison!” reads the call. Tens of thousands will come. The state, county and municipal employees will come. The nurses will come. The small business owners will come. The parents and students will come. They will ask the question: “What’s disgusting?” And they will answer with a roar: “Union busting!”

Reporting from the Ed Schultz show on Thursday morning, John Nichols from The Nation said police and firefighters’ unions have joined the students, teachers, and other public union members in protesting the governor’s union-busting efforts. He said, there are no longer union workers and non-union workers– just workers.

Although Wisconsin Republicans have the votes to rubber-stamp Walker’s radical anti-union proposals, there are signs that some are wavering.

At the time of this writing on Thursday, all Democrats have walked out of the Wisconsin capitol building before the union-busting bill could be voted on; Republican lawmakers need the Democrats to have a quorum and a vote. TalkingPointsMemo reports that the state police may be called in to round up the Democrats.

Protests spread to Ohio
Also on Thursday morning, pro-union protests spread to the Ohio capitol; Ohio’s newly-elected Republican Governor John Kasich has proposed union-busting measures, similar to that of Wisconsin’s governor.

Kasich has proposed ending collective bargaining and replacing negotiated salaries with merit raises. Thousands of workers representing multiple public employee unions showed up in the Columbus capitol building to hear the debate.

Ed Schultz’s MSNBC television show will be broadcast from Madison, Wisconsin on Thursday night.

Last week the US House of Representatives voted to extend the Bush Era tax cuts to poor and middle class but not to richest 2% of Americans. On Saturday, predictably, all Senate Republicans (including our own John McCain and Jon Kyl) + 5 Blue Dog Democrats killed the limited tax cut extension and continued to hold out for full extension of the tax cuts to everyone.

A CBS News poll shows most Americans favor a limited extension of the Bush Era tax cuts. (Source: CBSNews.com)

A recent CBS News poll shows that Republican grandstanding for the rich is out of step with most Americans. According to CBS, 53% of Americans favor extension of the cuts to income under $250,000, and only 26% favor extending the cuts to all Americans, including the wealthiest. You’ll note that only 10% of those “free-spending” Democrats want to extend the cuts to everyone, while 46% of those “fiscally responsible” Republicans want full extension.

Why are Congressional conservatives fiercely fighting for full extension of the Bush Era tax cuts? Their fight has even put national security at risk, according to Newsweek, because they have vowed to not vote on anything– not even the New START Treaty– until the tax cuts have been extended to all. Obviously, the vast majority of the constituents in Kentucky (Mitch McConnell’s state) or rural Southern Ohio (John Boehner’s district) or Arizona (John and Jon’s territory) will not benefit from extension of cuts to the richest 1% of Americans. So, why have these four men been been hawking millionaire welfare for months?

Besides the obvious link between the Republican Party and rich, conservative donors– let’s look at the Republicans’ cozy relationship with FOX News.

• Since its inception, FOX news has been a faithful 24/7 mouthpiece for the right.
• Before the midterm election, FOX News’ parent company even donated money to Republican candidates.
• Failed right-wing politicians– like Sarah Palin, Newt Gingrich, and Karl Rove– often land high-paying pundit jobs with FOX after their political careers dwindle.
• FOX News regularly promotes Republican ideas and candidates while hammering all things progressive.

Now thanks to Newsweek, Ed Schultz, and Rep. Alan Grayson, we learn of another reason why FOX News has been pushing for full extension of the tax cuts: their millionaire pundits stand to lose millions if tax cuts for wealthiest Americans are not extended. According to Grayson’s speech and his comments on the Ed Schultz Show (below), here is how much more in taxes popular right-wing pundits would have to pay if Congress does not extend tax cuts to all Americans:

• Rush Limbaugh – $2,689,135
• Glenn Beck – $1,512,352
• Sean Hannity – $1,006,352
• Bill O’Reilly – $914,352
• Sarah Palin – $638,352
• Newt Gingrich – $247,352

So, FOX News donates to Republican candidates and peddles their ideas, and Republican Senators and Congressmen return the favor. After all, it’s all “fair and balanced” in the “no-spin zone.”

P. S. Glenn Beck makes $33 million a year on FOX? And he has the nerve to say government workers are overpaid?

Should the budget-busting Bush Era tax cuts be extended or not? This question has dominated the news in the last few weeks.

President Obama has said for months that the tax cuts should be extended for all income under $250,000, which include rich people’s income under $250,000. Republicans have been fighting hard to extend all Bush Era tax cuts– including tax cuts for the riches 1 percent of Americans.

Progressive pundits like Ed Schultz have been telling the President not to cave on this issue; Schultz has been lobbying for letting all of the cuts sunset– in the name of fiscal responsibility. This would force Republicans to fight for tax cuts for the rich in 2011 while at the same time they fight for cuts in government spending and government jobs– thus exposing their hypocracy on the issue of fiscal responsibility.

Unfortunately, Obama appears to be waffling around on this issue. Instead of sticking to his stated policy– only extending tax cuts for income under $250,000– he has offered several alternatives (ie, temporary extension of all cuts, changing the limit to $500,000 or $1 million, etc.) Get real. If these tax cuts are temporarily extended for 2 years, what is the likelihood of sunseting these tax cuts in 2012? Zippo.

I have a new idea. Rich and upper middle class people only pay Social Security Tax on income under $106,000. Yes, if you are a billionaire, only a tiny amount of your income is subjected to Social Security Tax. So, if rich people want tax cuts based upon their entire income, they should pay Social Security Tax on all of their income. Seems fair to me. It would also greatly help the Social Security fund.

For more analysis of the Cat Food Commission’s debit suggestions, the Bush Era tax cuts, fiscal responsibility, and how all of this affects us, check out the video below: “Did the debt commission get it wrong?”

Fiscal responsibility and a balanced budget were two right wing rallying cries in the recent election.

Repeatedly, Sarah Palin, Ruth McClung and other Mama Grizzlies offered the schmaltzy recommendation that we “sit around the kitchen table like a family” and work together to balance the US budget. Unfortunately, the right wing Mama Grizzlies were just as bad at math as Papa Grizzlies like John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky). While preaching fiscal responsibility, they promoted big ticket spending– like continuing all of the Bush era tax cuts.

Basically, the plan that the Republican touted in the Pledge to America back in Septenber just doesn’t add up. They want to repeal healthcare reform and make all of the Bush II’s tax cuts (especially those for the ultra rich) permanent PLUS cut government and cut the deficit. On the NPR’s Diane Rehm Show, one commentator said that even if the Republicans take government spending back to Reagan era levels + cut more, we would still be no where near a balanced budget.

So, that Mom and Pop Grizzly talk was just smoke and mirrors to get elected. Now what do we do to eliminate the US budget deficit?

Recently, two big stories in the news lately have been: what to do (if anything) with the Bush era tax cuts that will sunset at the end of 2010 and the release of the Bowles-Simpson bipartisan budget committee’s recommendations to cut the federal deficit.

There has been quite a bit of outcry against the Cat Food Commission (as Bowles-Simpson has been dubed). They recommend eliminating the mortgage interest deduction, child tax credit, and the earned income tax credit– which benefit the middle class– plus they want to lower tax rates, tinker with Social Security, and eliminate social safety nets.

In my opinion, the commission lacks credibility since it left big ticket items– like the Bush Era tax cuts and military spending– untouched.

So, here we are around the kitchen table with politicians who are afraid to make the tough choices– as usual! Now what’s a person to do? Our elected officials– on both sides of the aisle– can’t figure this out. Well, the New York Times has come to the rescue. Last Saturday, they posted an interactive budget-balancing tool: Budget Puzzle: You Fix the Budget. Check it out. It took me about 3 minutes to come up with a budget surplus by 2015 (and I let the middle class keep its Bush Era tax cuts).

So, what’s the big deal? The big deal, of course, is all of those corporate strings attached to our lawmakers.

Intuitively, to balance the budget the way a family would you would start with luxury items or things you don’t need (like the wars). Since Bush II and the Republicans (Yes, McConnell and Boehner plus our own John McCain, Jon Kyl and the rest of the right wing drunken sailors) took a few key fiscally irresponsible steps to create the budget deficit, let’s start by rolling those unfunded pet projects back to the Clinton Era (when we had a budget surplus). Here are my recommendations:

Let all of the Bush Era tax cuts sunset. Ed Schultz has been touting this idea on his radio show, and I agree with him. I was seriously disappointed when President Obama hinted that he may cave on his original suggestion (which he has been pushing for months)– continue the middle class tax cuts but let the tax cuts for the rich sunset. Schultz’s point is that the lame duck Democrats don’t have to do anything. Let the Republicans continue to fight for the ultra-rich while pretending to be fiscally responsible. (Their recent pledge to eliminate earmarks for a year would save a tiny fraction compared to Bush II’s tax cuts, and earmarks bring jobs to rural America.) I’m with Ed. If we truly want to bring down the deficit, then let all of the tax cuts end. This would provide a $226 billion savings by 2015 ($54 billion in savings from eliminating tax cuts for the wealthy + $172 billion in savings from eliminating tax cuts for the rest of us), according to the NY Times. (Personally, if the richest 1% of Americans, the big corporations, and the US Chamber of Commerce can secretly donate billions to elect lawmakers to protect their interests, they can afford higher taxes.)

Stop both wars. The Times interactive tool doesn’t give this option, but it does allow you to pick and choose ways to reduce military spending.

Allow the US to negotiate prescription drug prices for Medicare and Medicaid and eliminate Medicare Advantage. These are both HUGE corporate giveaways that Bush II and the Republicans built into the unfunded Medicare Part D prescription bill several years ago. Up until “Obamacare” eliminated these corporate giveaways, the US is the only country that did not get a quantity price break on prescription drugs. The Republicans and Tea Partiers– puppets of the corporatists– campaigned on repeal of healthcare reform. Among other parts of healthcare reform, these 2 initiatives save money.

The NY Times also provides several other spending cuts and tax increases that can help balance the budget– items that have been proposed in the past but didn’t fly for one reason or another– but I think if we started with these unfunded Bush Era initiatives we would be well on our way to getting our fiscal house in order– as it was under President Clinton.

Once and for all, as a nation, we should:

• Give up on trickle down economics;
• Stop the corporate welfare;
• Tax corporations that send jobs overseas;
• Invest in our future by fully funding education and early childhood development;
• Hold elected officials accountable and reward those who make tough choices that benefit the people– not big corporations.

“We have a bumper crop of psycho-talkers running for office this year,” says Ed Schultz, lefty radio and TV personality.

You got that right, Ed, especially here in the “meth lab of democracy.”

• Jesse “no-social-security” Kelly (US House of Representatives)
• Ruth ”Sarah-likes-me” McClung (US House of Representatives)
• John “which-way-should-I-flip-flop-today?” McCain (US Senate)
• Jan “beheadings!” Brewer (Arizona Governor)
• Tom “what-SEC-violation” Horne (Arizona Attorney General)
• John “who-needs-public-education” Huppenthal (Public Istruction)
• Greg “privatize-this” Krino (Arizona Legislature)
• Russel “yikes-brown-people” Pearce (Arizona Legislature)

Please consider voting for sane candidates in November. “Sitting this one out” because your tweaked some issue is a seriously bad idea– unless, of course, you don’t care about Social Security, minimum wage, a healthcare safety net, or public education.

If you do care about these important programs, show the big money right-wingers that voters have the power in Arizona– not out-of-state $$$. Vote Goddard for governor, Deschene for Secretary of State, Rotellini for Attorney General, Cherny for Treasurer and Giffords and Grijalva for Congress. And last but not least– probably one of the most important races– Kotterman for Public Instruction– if you want to save public education in our state.

Don’t forget, Ed Schultz’s One Nation Working Together March is this Saturday, October 2, in Washington, DC.

The Nation recently posted a great background piece– For Jobs, Justice, and Education. In a nutshell, the article talks about the plight of working families in America, tone-deaf Republican and Blue Dog Democrats who are fighting for the rich (instead of working for workers), and the rationale behind the march.

Here is a small excerpt.

“…we should be investing in rebuilding America, thereby helping to close the jobs gap, which will then help close the budget gap.

“Instead, as we careen toward a possible double-dip recession and a second round of devastating home foreclosures, the extreme right-wing media machine is desperately trying to discredit the idea that America’s government can and should move aggressively to create more jobs…

“Nothing they say should persuade our leaders to throw America’s working families under the bus. We are in the middle of the biggest economic crisis in half a century. Through its negligence and recklessness, Wall Street has already forced a brutal austerity program on Main Street. The role of America’s government is to mitigate its effects and reverse the damage, not to make things worse by heaping suffering on top of suffering. This is not the time to abandon schools, shut down clinics, ignore crumbling infrastructure and forego job creation. This is not the time to take more away from families and communities that are already losing so much. We don’t need a public austerity program on top of the private sector–imposed austerity that we are already enduring.

“But some members of Congress apparently think they should focus on closing the federal budget gap, even if it means letting millions more American families tumble. They are mistaken. America’s workers find themselves in a deep hole. You don’t cut your way out of a hole. You grow your way out of a hole. We can afford to invest more in America’s long-term success. We are the wealthiest nation in the world. We should not be giving billions of dollars to companies like Halliburton abroad, while closing hospitals at home.

“…the American people finally will be able to choose between two movements: one that wants to demagogue problems and divide us, and another that wants to promote solutions and unite America.“