Matt Stoller finds the failure of three recent DOJ antitrust cases to be a good sign for our efforts to break free from monopolies, partly because, well, you don't make good law if you don't risk losing cases, but also because two of those cases will get new trials thanks to hung juries, and also because our DOJ demonstrated that wage-fixing violates antitrust law (even if they couldn't convict on particular price-fixing accusations). Mr. Stoller wonders if juries won't convict because "cheating has become normalized in American culture, so people have a tough time viewing stealing from your employees as crime." That could be, but it could also be that we've all conditioned ourselves to value winning above all else -- as Mr. Stoller suggests, folks don't want to lose, even if losing would prepare the ground for future victory -- and thus juries "pick winners" when they should be doing justice.
Ho hum, prime time TV news programming goes on and on about how rising wages, not corporate greed, causes inflation. Again, folks have just accepted profits-über-alles as a feature of the landscape -- as it most certainly was not when corporate taxes and taxes on executive salaries were much higher and stock buybacks were illegal -- and erasing corporate profits from the discussion pits worker against consumer, meaning it pits American against American, just like they want it. When we fight each other, of course, we don't fight the real enemy. And yet even as our "liberal" media would blame your year-old $1400 checks for inflation more than they'd blame corporate profiteering, not even three in 10 Americans think corporations have "no choice" but to raise prices in the absurd manner they've been doing.
Oh look, now Amtrak wants to use our TSA's notorious "no-fly" list to stop good Americans from using our national train system. As Paul Craig Roberts has said, if a "no-fly" list has a million people on it, why aren't we having terrorist attacks involving planes every day? I'd also point to the notorious "Interstate Crosscheck" database, which deregistered voters for the heinous crime of having the same name as a citizen of another state, thus depriving them of their right to vote before charging them with any kind of "voter fraud." Thus it's not a "risk" that "limited information provided by Amtrak will result in inaccurate watchlist match results," but a certainty. And then, I guess, our government will squeal NASHUNAL SECURITEEZ!!!! so that anyone wronged by the "no-fly" list can't redress their grievance in court. Funny how that works.
Here's some good news: an Atlanta, GA Apple Store becomes the first one to file for a union, with Apple employees in at least six others looking to do same. If you're thinking that maybe $20/hour is already good enough for "those workers," you might want to try making it in Atlanta on $20/hour! Apple has 272 stores in the United States, so Apple workers have a long way to go to reach the levels of Starbucks organization, even, but I wish them the best. And I suspect that Apple's anti-union arguments will be even stupider than Starbucks's have been -- and, speaking as a long time Mac user, I also suspect they'll be a lot more condescending.
And now for another exciting edition of "The Headline Says It All": "McConnell and McCarthy Talked a Big Game About Dumping Trump After January 6, Then Did Nothing Like the Cowards They Are." Mr. McConnell, in particular, might like to more closely study the example of fellow Kentucky Republican Senator John Sherman Cooper (served 1946-49, 1952-55, and 1956-73), who famously told Sen. Robert Taft of Ohio, after Mr. Taft suggested he should vote the way the party wanted him to vote, that he represented the people of Kentucky, not the party. I kid, of course -- Mitch McConnell is as empty and soulless a human being as has ever lived, and would never do anything for any reason other than power. (Later, Mr. McCarthy denied ever having said he'd dump Mr. Trump, even after the world learned his comments existed on tape. What a great Speaker he'll be!)
Finally, I can't say I'm against the Florida law that dismantles the "special district" basically run by the Walt Disney Corporation, but I notice the law wouldn't dismantle the district until June of 2023, or nearly eight months after the election in which the bill's biggest booster, Gov. Ron DeSantis, is running! Since the district's disappearance means over $150 million in higher taxes annually for Orange and Osceola counties starting next year, I'd say that's not exactly a profile in political courage. Maybe a campaign ad from his eventual opponent can frame it as such! Or an ad could talk about forcing those two counties to raise taxes next year in the larger context of the drama Mr. DeSantis constantly foments. There's a winning argument here, if Democrats would but make it.
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