Biden & Republicans Unite Against the Poor and the Environment
The Socialist Program with Brian Becker
The Socialist Program
4.7 • 587 Ratings
🗓️ 31 May 2023
⏱️ 31 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
On today's episode Brian Becker and Prof. Richard Wolff discuss how Joe Biden and Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy have unveiled a “debt ceiling” agreement involving major attacks on workers and the environment. The two are now racing to push through Congress a deal that would see stepped up production of fossil fuels, cuts to food stamps, and the rollback of vital services – all while making it easier for the rich to evade taxes and exempting the Pentagon from any spending limits.
Professor Richard Wolff is an author & co-founder of the organization Democracy at Work. You can find his work at rdwolff.com.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | President Joe Biden and Speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy, have unveiled a, quote, |
| 0:07.6 | debt ceiling, close quote, agreement involving major attacks on workers and the environment. |
| 0:14.6 | Yes, that's the deal. |
| 0:15.7 | The two are now racing to push through Congress, a deal that would see stepped up production of fossil fuels, |
| 0:23.1 | cuts to food stamps, and the rollback of vital services, all while making it easier for the rich |
| 0:29.8 | to evade taxes, and of course, exempting the Pentagon from any spending limits. |
| 0:37.2 | We need a new system. We need a new system. |
| 0:39.3 | We need a new society. |
| 0:41.3 | We need to demand that which may have sounded impossible even a few weeks ago, |
| 0:45.3 | but is not only realizable, but an imperative necessity. We're excited to have Professor Richard Wolfe join us again for this, our regular weekly |
| 1:17.3 | segment on the Socialist Program, where we talk about the biggest stories related to the economy. |
| 1:23.6 | The Socialist Program brings you content several days a week. |
| 1:27.4 | Thanks to the support of our patrons at patreon.com forward slash. The Socialist Program brings you content several days a week. |
| 1:33.4 | Thanks to the support of our patrons at patreon.com forward slash the socialist program. |
| 1:41.9 | We appreciate all of your support and encourage you to become a patron today if you enjoy listening or rely on this show. |
| 1:46.0 | Richard Wolfe is the co-founder of the organization Democracy at Work. He's the author of many books, the latest being the sickness is the system when capitalism fails to save us from pandemics or itself. |
| 1:55.0 | You can check out all of his work at rd-wulf.com. That's rff.com professor wolf welcome back thank you very much glad to be here |
| 2:06.2 | thank you so much for joining professor wolf the debt ceiling as you and we have talked about |
| 2:12.3 | over the many months is an artificial political creation. Nonetheless, as an artificial creation, it does |
| 2:21.7 | serve as a time when the Democrats and Republicans struggle together with each other over how to |
| 2:30.1 | raise the debt ceiling or allow government debt spending to continue to grow. And the tradeoffs are |
| 2:38.1 | that the Republicans in this case are demanding and have successfully demanded apparently |
... |
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