Trump, Sanders and the Revolt Against Decadence.... Ross Douthat

[mystery-ak]

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/31/opinion/campaign-stops/trump-sanders-and-the-revolt-against-decadence.html?ref=opinion

Trump, Sanders and the Revolt Against Decadence

Ross Douthat JAN. 30, 2016

ONE of the puzzles of the 2016 campaign, unexpectedly defined by the ascent of a billionaire reality TV star and a septuagenarian Vermont socialist, is why now? Yes, voters are angry, yes, they’re exhausted and disgusted and cynical about everything. But why is everything boiling over in this particular cycle, in this presidential campaign?

Consider: The economic picture is better than it was in 2012, when Republican primary voters settled for Mitt Romney and an incumbent president was re-elected pretty easily. (In both Iowa and New Hampshire, the unemployment rate is currently under 4 percent.) The foreign policy picture is grim in certain ways, but America isn’t trapped in a casualty-heavy quagmire the way we were in 2004, when Democratic voters played it safe with John Kerry and George W. Bush won re-election.

continued

[truth_seeker]

It is cumulative. Most people are not statistics.

The college grad buried in student loan debt, flipping burgers or doing telemarketing

is "fully employed" in statistics, but doesn't register it that way.

Nor do his parents, forced to "retire" before they planned, or were financially ready for.

They blame it on both on both sides. But mostly they are pissed off.

[Scottftlc]

Once again The NYT sits in it's Ivy-covered tower and can't understand why the peasants are revolting...don't they have cake?

If you graduated from college any time in the last 7 years, if you are employed at all you are working retail...wow, an ops manager job at Old Navy...or in food service, or perhaps you caught on with a temp agency bouncing between two week stints at many prestigious firms.  Or maybe you are doing a couple of those things part-time because no one wants you cross that 30-hour threshold.  And you just manage to hang on to your one bedroom apartment.

If you are 65 and haven't been forced out by your employer onto the Walmart or Home Depot circuit, you are not thinking for a minute about actually retiring, you are hanging on until they pry your hands off because you can't maintain anything like your lifestyle when you compare your pension to your debt payments.

I agree with T_S, they blame both sides, and today they even blame our very system, which is only working for those at the very top and those at the very bottom.