I don’t find out about you, however I’m feeling extra anxious concerning the final result of the upcoming election. I’m nonetheless nauseously optimistic, however the nausea is rising.
I’m as skeptical of polls as any of you, however when all of them present the identical factor – that Kamala Harris’s marketing campaign stalled a number of weeks in the past, but Donald Trump’s continues to surge – it’s vital to take the polls severely.
The US vice-president will give her closing message to the American individuals on Tuesday at a rally on the Ellipse on the Washington mall.
During the last a number of weeks she’s targeted on a lady’s proper over her physique and the rights of all Individuals to a democracy. Clearly, Trump threatens each.
Tuesday evening, although, she wants to reply forcefully to the one concern that continues to be highest on the minds of most Individuals – the economic system.
She should inform Individuals merely and clearly why they proceed to have such a tough time regardless of all of the financial indicators on the contrary. It’s due to the facility of huge companies and a handful of rich people to siphon off most financial positive factors for themselves.
Most Individuals are outraged that they proceed to wrestle economically concurrently billionaires are pulling in ever extra wealth. Most know they’re paying an excessive amount of for housing, gasoline, groceries and the medicines they want. Additionally they know {that a} main trigger is the market energy of massive companies.
They need somebody who’ll stand as much as massive companies and the politicians in Washington who serve them.
They need a president who’ll be on their facet. A president who will crack down on price-gouging, who will bust up the monopolies and restore competitors, who will struggle to cap prescription drug prices, who will get massive cash out of politics and cease the legalized bribery that rigs the marketplace for the wealthy and who will be sure that companies pay their justifiable share and finish tax breaks for billionaire crooks.
A president who will put working households first – earlier than massive companies and the rich.
Harris must say she might be this president.
Her coverage proposals counsel this. She’s dedicated to robust antitrust enforcement – cracking down on mergers and acquisitions that give massive meals companies the facility to jack up meals and grocery costs, prosecuting price-fixing and banning value gouging. She must remind voters of this.
She additionally says she’ll increase taxes on the wealthy, present $25,000 in down-payment help to assist Individuals purchase their first dwelling, restore the expanded baby tax credit score to $3,600 to assist greater than 100 million working Individuals, and implement a brand new $6,000 tax reduce to assist households pay for the excessive prices of a kid’s first yr of life.
All needs to be components of her speech this Tuesday about why she would be the champion of working individuals.
She desires to boost the minimal wage to $15 an hour, make inventory buybacks dearer and develop Medicare to cowl dwelling healthcare – paid for with financial savings from the enlargement of Medicare value negotiations with drug producers.
She wants to border all of this as a response to the facility of massive companies and the rich – and say in no unsure phrases that she’s on the facet of the individuals, not the highly effective.
If she fails to do that in her closing argument, Trump’s demagogic response would be the just one the general public hears – that common working individuals are struggling due to undocumented employees and the “enemy inside”, together with Democrats, socialists, Marxists and the “deep state”.
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Harris ought to match her message about democracy inside this financial message. If our democracy weren’t dominated by the wealthy and massive companies, fewer of the economic system’s positive factors could be siphoned off to them. Common working individuals would have higher pay, safer jobs, and be capable of afford houses, meals, gasoline, drugs, childcare and eldercare.
A big portion of the general public now not thinks American democracy is working. In response to a brand new New York Instances/Siena School ballot, solely 45% consider our democracy does an excellent job representing abnormal individuals. An astounding 62% say the federal government is usually working to profit itself and elites relatively than the frequent good.
In her closing argument, Harris ought to commit herself to reversing this, so the federal government works for the frequent good.
Harris began her marketing campaign in July and early August by emphasizing these themes concerning the economic system and democracy. However in newer weeks, she’s targeted on Trump’s menace to democracy. Her marketing campaign appears to have determined that she will draw extra voters from reasonable Republican suburban girls upset by Trump’s position in fomenting the assault on the US Capitol.
That’s why she’s been campaigning with Liz Cheney, and gathering Republican officers as supporters. And why she has chosen to present her closing message on the Ellipse – the place Trump summoned his followers to march on the Capitol on 6 January 2021.
However when she shifted gears to Trump’s assaults on democracy, Harris’s marketing campaign stalled. I feel that’s as a result of Individuals proceed to give attention to the economic system and need a solution to why they proceed to wrestle economically.
If Trump provides them a solution – though baseless and demagogic – however Harris doesn’t, he could sail to victory on 5 November.
Therefore, in her closing message she should discuss clearly and albeit concerning the misallocation of financial energy in America – lodged with massive companies and the rich as a substitute of common Individuals – and her dedication to rectify this.
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Robert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is a professor of public coverage on the College of California, Berkeley, and the creator of Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few and The Frequent Good. His latest ebook, The System: Who Rigged It, How We Repair It, is out now. He’s a Guardian US columnist. His publication is at robertreich.substack.com
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