I only saw this picture for the first time last night. But it is a classic from Life magazine. The actual history of the photo isn’t quite as stark as the message of it. Just the same, the message that people take away from it is still true. There is a group of African Americans standing in a food line and behind them is a billboard featuring a a very white family (Even the dog is white!) that proclaims, “World’s Highest Standard of Living.” The tag line — “There’s no way like the American Way” — takes on a whole different meaning than was originally intended.

The photograph was taken by Margaret Bourke-White during the 1937 Ohio River flood. This particular one was taken in Louisville, Kentucky. The only thing that really matters about this is that it explains why people are holding buckets. Even more than food, the people needed clean water. The area had received 18 inches of rain over a two week period. Check out all the pictures from the original article to see just how bad the situation was. But Bourke-White was known for her ironic photographs, and she certainly knew what she was doing. She was making a broader point.

The billboard was not, as one could reasonably assume, part of a government program to cheer people up and head off revolution. No, then as now, it is our private sector that is in the business of hoodwinking us into disbelieving our lying eyes. This billboard came courtesy of the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM). According to James Guimond in American Photography and the American Dream, photographers[1] for the Farm Security Administration (FSA) took great relish in going after these kinds of things:

What I think is so amazing about this whole thing is that nothing has changed — except that people working for the government wouldn’t think of taking potshots at big business today. I’m reminded of this every time I hear someone claim that America has the best healthcare in the world. What they actually mean is that if you are rich you can get the best healthcare in the world here. Of course, you can do the same thing in Germany, France, and Japan — but let’s not go there right now. It’s ridiculous to think this way. It’s like saying, “Why did the French people revolt against King Louis XVI? His life was great!”

But I’m afraid that most Americans like their pretty delusions. But it gets harder and harder to maintain those delusions. I don’t think the inequities in our society today cause people to be outraged the way they did in the 1930s. Instead, we’ve reverted to an older and more cynical view of the world: the rich are rich simply because they are; the poor are poor because that is what they deserve; God wills it. This is not a rational response.

[1] Margaret Bourke-White was not part of the FSA.

As you probably heard, on Monday, The Wall Street Journal reported, Israel Spied on Iran Nuclear Talks With US. And they used the information they got to funnel it the Congressional Republicans in an effort to destroy the deal. This resulted in Israel stating unequivocally that they do not spy, Netanyahu’s Office Denies Nuke Talks Snooping. But it was a curious denial. It’s kind of like being accused of robbing a 7-11 store and responding, “I’ve never killed anyone in my life!” The information that was being used so inappropriately is not technically spying. And the real sin here is that the Israeli government is actively trying to screw with our foreign affairs — just like all of us liberals have been saying the last few weeks.

But it is worse than that. At The Intercept, Glenn Greenwald and Andrew Fishman wrote, Netanyahu’s Spying Denials Contradicted by Secret NSA Documents. You know, those Snowden leaks are the gift that keeps on giving. All throughout these NSA documents are discussions of what a threat Israeli spying is on the United States. They are ranked third after Russia and China. A lot of this is exactly what we are seeing with the Iranian negotiations. It would seem that the Israeli government is quite paranoid, despite the fact that it couldn’t have a more constant and true ally.

Interestingly, another problem is that Israel does a lot of industrial espionage focused on us. That doesn’t come as a surprise to me. Last year, I wrote, Spam Geography at Frankly Curious. In it, I described a method I had developed to determine whether a visitor was a real person or a spammer. Users coming from the US, UK, Canada, and India are pretty much all real. So are the vast majority of users from Indonesia. But Israel, which I would have guessed then would also have been mostly real, was as big a spammer as the eastern European countries. In fact, Russia is actually substantially better than Israel.

The fact that Israel isn’t quite as “western” as we’ve been led to believe isn’t that big a deal. But Israel’s behavior toward the United States is really unacceptable. It reminds me of a younger brother who is always depending upon his older brother to protect him. Yet the younger brother does everything he can to undermine his older brother. This is exactly the dynamic I created between Steve and Darren in “The Post-Postmodern Comedy Hour.” Except that in it, Darren (the “younger brother”) is a puppet and he gets his comeuppance at the end of every episode. Darren wouldn’t be a likable character in real life.

We don’t know about what Israel is up to just based upon the NSA leaks. The Intercept also noted:

I don’t know where all of this leaves me with regard to Israel. It’s been clear to me for a long time that the Israeli government has no interest in a two-state solution because of the way that it has encouraged the illegal settlements. More and more I’m thinking that the United States is more than enough of a safe haven for the worldwide Jewish population. Maybe Zionism just leads to the kind of conservative jingoism that Israel now represents. I’m not suggesting that we abandon Israel. But big brother is starting to think of little brother as a selfish brat who needs to learn some manners. Maybe a couple non-vetoes on the Security Council might help the Israeli government to grow up.

As you may have heard, Ted Cruz used to be into “classic rock.” But after 9/11, he said, “I didn’t like how rock music responded.” But he was very happy with the jingoistic response of “country music.” So since that time, he’s listened just to country music. A lot of people have mocked this change on his part. Jonathan Chait wrote, After 9/11, True Patriot Ted Cruz Sacrificed His Love of Rock Music for America and the Republican Party. He questioned whether it isn’t all just for show. Ed Kilgore was even less charitable, Ted Cruz’s Friends in Low Places. He wrote, “It all seems kind of mechanical and unimaginative for a man of Cruz’s supposed brilliance…” I agree with all this. Count me with Holden Caulfield: Ted Cruz is a phony.

But I’m interested in this subject from a personal perspective. At the time of 9/11, Ted Cruz was 30 years old. That’s about the time that a lot of people have a falling out with rock music. Yesterday, my business partner Will told me that he was shocked to find out that Cruz is younger than we are. “He just seems so old!” He is the political operative that Rafael Cruz built — more automaton than human. And for Rafael — born in 1939, I believe — that places his image of a politician in the 1950s. Thus it isn’t surprising that Ted Cruz has the feel of Joseph McCarthy.

The people I’ve known who switched from rock music to country music were never that interested in music to begin with. They were interested in what I term “pop rock” and then they went onto “pop country.” What is the difference between The Romantics and Garth Brooks? Slide guitar. (I know these are old references; I don’t stay up on this drivel!) It’s all so pathetic. That’s not to say that musical tastes don’t change, but they are usually gradual and based on, you know, music and not politics.

Do you know who I can totally see making decisions about art based solely on ideological considerations? Joseph Goebbels. Now, I’m not saying that Cruz is a Nazi, because he isn’t. He’s certainly a lot closer to Hitler than to Thomas Paine, but that doesn’t make him a Nazi. Proto-fascist perhaps, but not Nazi. The main thing is that he’s an ideologue. Everything seems to take a backseat to his political aspirations. So I think we can reasonably say that Ted Cruz doesn’t care much for music, film, or any other kind of art or entertainment. Or as he might say, “That art is good which leads to success, and that is bad which fails to achieve the desired result.”

I would love to think that this means that Ted Cruz would not win the “have a beer with” election. But that’s always been more about pandering. I never understood how it was that people would rather have a beer with George W Bush — who didn’t drink — than John Kerry. They were both tiresome people who graduated from Yale. I couldn’t be less interested in having a beer with either. So I don’t doubt that the people will come to the conclusion that Ted Cruz is a “cool” guy who they’d like to hang with. But at least with Bush and Kerry, you’d know that they would have an opinion about the the song on the jukebox that wasn’t based on the political opinions of the singer or how the song focus grouped in red states.

There he was at the top of the column on “innovation” in The Washington Post — every dimwit’s idea of the ultimate innovator: Steve Jobs holding up an iPhone. I don’t really understand why it is that people always think that flashy products like smart phones are the true signs of innovation when it is actually more mundane things like container ships and washing machines that have had the biggest effects on our lives. But I know this much is true: when people talk about innovation, they are usually spouting nonsense. Talk of innovation is usually some form of apologetics for aspects of the economy that don’t work right.

The specific column I’m referring to is George Will’s Wednesday outing, How Income Inequality Benefits Everybody. He started the article by discussing how sweatshop labor in China gives Americans a raise because of all that cheap “apparel, appliances and other stuff.” That’s true as far as it goes, as I recently discussed in, Middle Class Is Dying Because of US Policy. But the really expensive and important stuff is not available via Chinese sweatshop labor. Of course, Will isn’t interested in how globalization is making us all wealthy (perhaps because it isn’t). He wants to argue that income inequality here at home is really to all our benefit.

Will is a shockingly boring writer. Here is his list of billionaires: Mark Zuckerberg, Michael Dell, Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos and Steve Jobs. Interestingly, I have a low opinion of each one of these guys. From the non-innovation of Facebook, which is not worth nearly what it is valued at, to the tax evasion that drives Amazon, to the legal bullying that makes Apple a profitable company, these are not guys who have changed the world. Will then referred to “iPod, iPhone, and iPad” as “unique products.” That’s like calling a cool new brand of jeans a unique products. And finally, he wrote that the price of the iPhone has come down. It has not. It’s submental.

The rest of the article is an introduction to John Tamny’s upcoming book, Popular Economics: What the Rolling Stones, Downton Abbey, and LeBron James Can Teach You about Economics. But you don’t need to read the book — or George Will’s column — because it is just what you heard month after month during Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign. These wonderful innovators are only there to help us: “when the wealth gap widens, the lifestyle gap shrinks.” And monopolies decrease prices. And the Rolling Stones moved to France because their taxes were 83%. The implication, I guess, is that this means we must lower the top marginal tax rate to 15%. Also: cheery picked numbers rock and opportunity costs don’t exist. Also: the Rolling Stones never would have recorded Let It Bleed if they hadn’t known there were hundreds of millions of dollars to be made.

There are a couple of things that I find fascinating about these excursions into income inequality apologetics. The first is that the arguments are meant to imply conservative policy. But they don’t. People like Will and Tamny seem to be arguing with communists in the 1920s. No one is calling for a 90% top marginal tax rate. But somehow, for these people, if dropping the top tax rate from 90% to 50% is a good idea, dropping it to 15% is a better idea. It just makes no sense, but then it isn’t based about rationality; it is based upon a desire to further enrich their class. Everything flows from that.

The other interesting thing is how conservatives claimed for so long that income inequality wasn’t a thing. Sure, the rich were getting richer, but so were the poor. But now that this myth has been completely destroyed, the conservatives just come up with another argument for why we shouldn’t worry about income inequality. Now they argue that income inequality rocks! We should love it because we can buy five dollar t-shirts at Walmart. We may die from an abscessed tooth, but that’s a small price to pay for all the cheap junk we have access to.

Conservatives will always argue that we do nothing about economic inequality — or that we make it worse. The reasons for this will change. Two centuries ago, they would have argued that God wants it that way. Today they argue it is good for the poor. But the main thing is that the conclusions never change. That’s the nature of apologetics. Let’s just not mistake it for economic or political analysis.

Noah Smith is such a brilliant guy, I have no idea why he wrote, Guess What’s Destroying the Middle Class? He started with the silliest notion that there are three reasons why middle class wages are falling: robots, unions and China. I realize that there are a lot of people who talk about this, but don’t we all know that it is a little more nuanced than that? That it isn’t that simple? If you asked me, I would say that the primary reason for falling wages is something else entirely: the new normal coming into 2001 was that middle class wages were stagnant. The difference between stagnant and falling wages is just a matter of degrees. The capitalists in America have gotten even better at siphoning off profits.

There is nothing especially new about this; it’s been going on for forty years. And robots, unions, and China are all symptoms of the larger problem. And the larger problem is that the government has had it out and continues to have it out for the middle class. Let’s do a little Dean Baker 101. High paying jobs in America moving to low paying jobs in China should also reduce the cost of living for Americans. And indeed: televisions are cheaper. But what isn’t cheaper? Healthcare, legal support, college educations. And that’s because we haven’t subjected workers in those fields to the same globalization. And that is a choice that was made by the power elite for the power elite.

I agree with Smith that the robots story is weak. There is a larger problem, however. Our policies allow the owners of capital to capture more and more profits. Robots help in that regard. But technological improvements were arguably as fast during the 1950s as they are today. And we did not see more and more money going to the capital side of the economy at that time. I think that unions are clearly a bigger issue. But even they aren’t huge. I still think the bigger issue is the way that norms have changed. These now allow billionaires to think they deserve their money and don’t owe anything back to society. And this has ripple effects all through the nation, not the least of which being the low taxes on the extremely wealthy.

What really amazed me about the article was Smith’s fatalism with regard to the problem. He concluded that the problem was China — and I think that’s clearly a simplistic way of looking at income inequality — was so fundamental that the only thing that we can do is nothing. “The only solution to the problem of globalization may be to wait.” Chinese wages are increasing. So soon, all those factories will move to India. And then there won’t be any super-large countries for our patriotic companies to run to. In other words: don’t worry American middle class; your wages will rise in just another forty years!

(There’s something I don’t exactly understand with this reasoning. I thought that he was using China as a metonymy for the whole of globalization. But he seems to mean it literally. And apparently, only India can take over China. Somehow, a bunch of countries in Africa wouldn’t work. I don’t understand that, but I don’t suppose it really matters.)

A big problem with the people who claim that robots or education are the only things that are responsible for economic inequality is that these reasons are used as an excuse for doing nothing — or for arguing that there is nothing that can be done. But that is the conclusion that Smith draws from his China hypothesis. And this is strange, because like I said, he’s a brilliant guy. There is no reason for fatalism. The state of the American middle class is not the result of forces beyond our control; it is the result of our own policy choices.