(TriceEdneyWire.com) – It has not yet been sixty days, but in two scant months the 47th President has upended business as usual, in federal government, in classrooms, in business. Many of us who cover this news are experiencing extreme whiplash. Wolf tickets barked at our allies. Tariffs here and gone tomorrow. Tantrums in the Oval Office. State Departments of Education being threatened. Stock markets crashing, with the market’s logging its worse performance for a “new” President since 2009. People are apprehensive about their pensions and their jobs and have dialed back their spending as a result. Consumer spending drives the economy, and many consumers aren’t confident enough (consumer confidence is down by more than 9 percent) to take on extra spending. We are in the middle of a “ball of confusion” the Temptations referenced in their 1970 song.
The 47th President promised no business as usual. What he meant was no business at all! The disruption that has riddled both the federal government and our total way of life is, at best, disturbing. Not everyone is experiencing it, but everyone knows someone who is. What are we to do? I say that in the middle of disruption, of being shaken up, we go back to basics, back to our roots. What does that mean? We shop Black, work Black, live Black, aspire Black. Too many of us drank the integration Kool-Aid without tasting all the integration flavor. In other words, nothing wrong with integration if we value ourselves. The White man’s ice is not colder. White man’s laws are not fairer. Those deluded folk who seemed to think that the 47th President would be better for the economy are now about to find out what Malcolm X meant when he talked about “chickens coming home to roost”. Some of the very people who were touting 47 in November are now whining about job losses, portfolio shrinkage, and deportation.
We’ve been there, done that with government cutbacks. The most glaring history is that of the racist President Woodrow Wilson who fired most of the senior Black people in his administration. Most notably, the demotion of Daniel Murray, Assistant Librarian of Congress was a disgrace that reminds us that those who serve at “the pleasure of the President” can be easily let go. Their firings may be challenged but the work of their agencies will slow, if not stop. And the 47th President’s overreaching has a chilling effect on the progress of some agencies.
For example, the 47th President attempted to remove Gywnne Wilcox as a member of the National Labor Relations Board shortly after he was installed. A federal judge reminded 47 that he did not the authority to fire the member of the independent agency. In her decision, US District Judge Beryl Howell wrote that “An American president is not a king – not even an elected one – and his power to remove federal officers and honest civil servants like plaintiff is not absolute. The NLRB were crippled for a few weeks because they lacked a quorum. What else can we look forward to.
As an African American history scholar, I am especially concerned about Smithsonian Leader Dr. Lonnie Bunche, an amazing scholar and leader. His term lasts until 2027, but if he serves “at the pleasure” of a President who does not believe in Black history or diversity, his days may be numbered. Similarly, Dr. Carla Hayden, the 14th Librarian of Congress, was appointed by President Biden to serve as the first woman and the first African American in that role. Her term ends in 2026. 47 may hold his powder, or he may go after her sooner. These amazing public servants may find themselves on the chopping block as 47 and his co-President Musk take their buzz saw to the federal employees.
It’s overtime for us to fight outward and build inward. Fight outward – protest, protest, protest. Build inward — strengthen our connections, work more collaboratively, and when folk like Dr. Bunche and Dr. Hayden are threatened, prepare to clap back.
In 1919, the Harlem Renaissance poet Claude McKay wrote:
If we must die, let it not be like hogs, haunted and penned to this inglorious spot
While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs
Making their mock at our accursed lot.
The powerful poem, written when the Red Summer of 1919 saw multiple massacres of Black people in at least 26 cities. Been there, done that?
The poem ends both defiantly and as inspiration for today.
Like men (Malveaux adds women) we’ll face the murderous cowardly pack,
Pressed to the wall, dying but fighting back.
In the middle of disruption, we must return to our roots, and we must fight back, surgically and strategically. We have no choice.
(Dr. Julianne Malveaux is an economist and author based in Washington, DC. juliannemalveaux.com.)
It’s retaliation all around. There is a witch hunt against the federal agencies that the current President opposes, including the National Labor Relations Board, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, and many others. The purchased Co-President Elon Musk, with his attitude and oversize chain saw, has no limits, or at least none that the 47th President will impose. And while most economist cringe at his economic policies, he is hell-bent at making a disruptive set of points about tariffs.
Imposing 25 percent tariffs on goods coming from Canada (and 20 percent plus from China) hit low-income consumers where they spend, especially because many lower costs goods come from China. Canada and China have imposed retaliatory tariffs as soon as the US imposed theirs. Mexico says it will announce its own retaliatory tariffs on March 9. All these tariffs do Is increase the cost of imported goods. So, a car manufactured in Mexico that once cost $30,000 will now cost bill at $37,500. That’s inflationary. Whoever buys the car at $37,500 will normally mark it up, and they might absorb some of the costs or pass them all along to the consumer. Inflationary. The price hikes may drive consumers to lower priced cars that are manufactured here, but manufacturing is international. Auto parts come from everywhere. Our markets are international, something the current President seems to have forgotten.
I’m talking cars, but what about produce? Fruit like strawberries, blueberries and avocados are imported from Mexico. Energy products are imported from Canada. While this will hit consumers hard, the 47th President doesn’t seem to care. This is an inflationary tax increase, short and simple. The consumers who will pay are those on the bottom. A ten or fifteen cent increase on a pint of strawberries won’t hurt the oligarchs, but it will hurt those at the bottom who are stretching their pennies. And with government layoffs looming, many of those at the bottom, not the administrators and leaders, but the clerical workers and janitors, are the ones most affected.
The tariff wars will have a negative effect on the US economy, courtesy of the President who said he would bring prices down. Senate Majority Leader John Trone (R-SD) says he doesn’t mind paying more if it the “temporary” tariffs are a means to an end. But what is the end? The destruction of our nation as we know it. The yielding of world leadership to Russia, China, or BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa)? The United States taking second fiddle to the European Union?
With our country playing the isolation game, those at the bottom are most acutely hurt. By tariffs, by layoffs and, at the end of the day, by a despot whose narcissistic tendencies oppress people all over the world.
(Dr Julianne Malveaux is an economist and author based in Washington, DC. Juliannemalveaux.com)
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