It'll Take A Real Sales Job

I read with a combination of amusement and dyspepsia that the Koch brothers and their Americans For Prosperity super-PAC plan to spend $20 million on a P.R. ad campaign to try to convince us that the GOP trickle-down tax scam is thing of beauty.  Call me a cynic, but I must ask:  If the benefits are really so widespread and self-evident, why spend so much money on messaging?  Why spend any?

While Davos Don blows sunshine up his own skirt, remember that U.S. economic improvements are continuing a steady and pre-existing upward trend;  the $1.5 trillion tax cut goes almost entirely to businesses and wealthy individuals;  the average American wage earner will gain about $17 a week;  although some companies are making a big show of one-time bonuses and minimum wage increases, the vast majority of businesses have done neither -- corporate tax benefits are flowing to top executives and shareholders.

And consider these recent announcements:  

• Kimberly-Clark, maker of Kleenex, etc., is laying off 5500 employees.
• AT&T is laying off 4600.
• Macy's is laying off 10,000.
• General Electric is laying off 12,000.
• Sam's Club closed 63 stores and laid off 11,000.
• Toys R Us is closing 180 stores.
• The Gap is closing 200 stores.
• The Carrier plant in Indiana which Trump and Pence "saved" from relocating to Mexico has laid off over 600 workers, including 215 earlier this month.
• Locally, Huntington Bank announced record 4th quarter profits, including $123 million attributed to the corporate tax cut.  Huntington has no plans to pay bonuses or raise wages. 

Will Trump take credit for these developments?

The Kochs and AFP see it clearly:  Trump's tax cut is a crock of shit and it stinketh.  It'll take a real sales job to make it seem like it smells better.