Dear Reader

Dear Reader,

What a week!  Trump has crashed the economy (which he argues was his intention) and in the last 48 hours since announcing his new tariffs the stock market has lost $5 trillion in value (and $9.6 trillion since inauguration day). Stock markets around the globe followed suit with massive selloffs, leaving experts to predict that a recession is around the corner and wondering whether what Trump and his minions are avidly breaking will be easily repaired.

Trump’s rampage against the federal funding of human services continued last week with more than $12 billion in cuts to the Department of Health and Human Services (see also here) the cancellation of all awards from the National Endowment of Humanities (see also here) and who knows what else? Step away from the keyboard for a few minutes and the funding situation has changed for the worse for someone. 

And the federal government continues to bleed expertise. Mass layoffs, which include our nation’s most senior public health leadership, continue at the nation’s health agencies while a measles outbreak continues to spread across Texas, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Ohio (see also here), and children in Texas are showing up in hospitals with vitamin A poisoning after HHS Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr. touted vitamin A as an alternative to the measles vaccine.  This morning (4/4) Trump fired several top national security officials including the head of US Cyber Command on the recommendation of right wing activist Laura Loomer who charged that those who were fired were not sufficiently loyal to Trump. It’s like a replay of The Apprentice. Chaos abounds!

Meanwhile, those of us who are fortunate to have some kind of retirement account have watched them evaporate before our eyes – with prodigious losses over the last 48 hours. Across America community leaders struggle to fend off panic as resources disappear and needs soar. The chaos and the cruelty now touch every one of us as the radical actions of the federal government reverberate through the country.

Saturday, April 5, is a day of planned actions to protest the dumpster fires that Trump has ignited. More than 1300 protests are planned across all 50 states and beyond. There will be a “Hands Off! Amherst Fights Back” action on the Amherst North Common from 10:30-11:30 a.m. The Indy will be there.  Join us, and bring a sign. Or take a trip to Boston for the big Hands Off Massachusetts event.

By the way, we started to prepare an article on the impacts of Trump’s executive orders on Western Massachusetts but the new tariffs just blew that up.  Maybe next week. But in the meantime, you can look here or here or here.

Whither the Jones Library Expansion? : Show Me The Money!
Given the accelerating national economic crisis and the predicted escalation of costs of goods and services that almost defy belief (e.g. the projected cost of $2300 for an iphone) it is incomprehensible to me that the town could even consider moving forward with the Jones library expansion without knowing what it will cost. We know that it will cost more than was originally planned, and we know that the fundraising operation has come up far short of meeting their original promises. All that timber and steel that go into a construction project are going to be tariffed and drive prices beyond what anyone could have imagined before November.

So what will the library really cost and how are we going to pay for it? The Town Manager’s assurance that the Jones Trustees will borrow whatever they can’t raise and that the town has no liability beyond the $15.8 million it originally committed lacked credibility before the current crisis. It is hard to imagine that the trustees could get a loan for millions (or maybe tens of millions) of dollars, much less come up with the funds to meet the payments on such a loan. This is not the time to be making a massive fiscal gamble based on a promise and handshake.

As I say elsewhere in this issue the bottom line is that entering into a contact now, without knowing the total cost of the project, especially as we enter an economic crisis unprecedented in our lifetimes, is to embrace an enormous financial risk and obligation that no one in our government can assure we will be capable of meeting and with fiscal implications that could reverberate for a generation. 

It’s been a grim week, but there is always something to be done.  Take heart from the resistance that is growing around the country (see also here)  And thanks for reading the Indy

Best wishes,

Art

Art Keene
Managing Editor