Welcome to the new America.

CNN has called it.  The Senate now belongs to the Grand Ole Party.  As of this moment the GOP has 52 senators, and now we get to look forward to even more dysfunction in the Congress, and representatives whom we elected to represent us, representing big business, big oil, big religion, and the ultra-rich.

In addition, for three years we will not see an increase in the federal minimum wage, which will throw even more people under the bus.  We will likely see a repeal of the PPACA, which will put coverage caps, and preexisting conditions back into play.  We will likely also see more attempts to privatize Social Security, and Medicaid.  However, we will not have to worry about more shut downs because the GOP will put forward the Ryan Budget, and guess what, that will slash our already thread bare social safety nets.  

There will be more tax cuts for businesses, and the ultra-rich, and more spending on the military.  Is there a light at the end of the tunnel?  Sure there is, the current GOP cannot govern itself out of a wet paper bag.  That light is a very dim light at the end of a tunnel that is a long way away.  While the GOP cannot seem to get things right, they can get things very wrong.  They will cater to the people who are paying their way to Washington, not you or I.

That is why things will start slowly going wrong.  We will not get that minimum wage hike, which we need.  We will not get tax reform of worth.  We will not get money out of politics, the Amendment dealing with over-turning Citizens United.  What will we get for the ignorance and apathy of the majority?

Well, here is your prize; we might get the Keystone XL Pipeline (if Obama does not man up, or the Democratic Party does not become the new party of no), which will create less than fifty permanent jobs in the US.  We will not get cheaper gas prices, and we will have one hell of a security weak spot, that if damaged in any way will crush the environment around it.  We will have fewer regulations on the banks, so they can recreate their bust of 2008, fewer environmental protections, so our air and water can be further contaminated.  They will fight with all their might to obstruct anything that might slow down or reverse man made Global Climate Change.  There will be more restrictions placed to try and stop law abiding citizens from voting out of fear.  

It will be business as usual for the GOP, and there will be jobs created as Cruz said, but they will likely be low-income jobs, where you have to work 20 hours a day, seven days a week just to survive.  Welcome to the new America.  Let us see just how far down the pipes the GOP can send our country.  We all get a front row seat to this freak show.  So in the words of Jack Torrance while residing in the Stanley…  “You get down here and take your medicine.”  I can survive this, I have survived in conditions that would drive most people to suicide, I do not want to go back, but I can.  The question is, can everyone else?  You should hunt through this blog; you might want to print off a copy of the survival guides here.  You might need them.