Government is not the enemy. We still need it to help solve some of our biggest political issues from income inequality to heath care.

Sergio Mota, of Sebastian Fl. is an active voice for progressive change. At age 21, in 2015 he ran unsuccessfully for Sebastian City Council, but received over 3,700 votes. He is once again a candidate for Sebastian City Council.

The American middle class was weakest prior to FDR in the wake of Republican non-regulation. Glass-Steagall remedied the rapacious tendencies of the financial market, and World War 2 provided for the greatest expansion of the middle class. But sadly, the military-industrial complex, in conjunction with Wall Street, have obliterated those gains. Reagan’s trickle-down policies simply don’t work, and financial deregulation will eventually usher in another economic collapse.

Repeating talking points simply doesn’t get it done. The American middle class was at its largest as a percentage of the population prior to the Great Depression. It also held the greatest proportion of American Wealth that it is ever held prior to the Great Depression. the greatest expansion of the American middle class occurred during the industrial era, not World War II. It is fashionable among liberals to say that Reagan’s economic policies didn’t work. The only problem with that statement is that Reagan’s economic policies did in fact work. the economy grew at record rates, jobs were created, and wealth increased. The only people who were left out where those who are stuck in the perpetuated poverty of the welfare classes.