*Grassroots progressive groups on Tuesday urged Democratic congressional leaders to ignore Republicans, right-wing members of their own party, and neoliberal economists who are pushing lawmakers to hit the brakes on federal spending as inflation surges to levels not seen in decades.

The US is in danger of a recession. To cut spending now would make that recession worse, as it did for President Hoover in 1930: it hoovered up the jobs, and dumped Americans into Hoovervilles. The way to avoid a recession, as Keynes taught and FDR carried out, is to increase government spending. The US government learned to do this, until the plutocrats came to dominate the government in the 1980. Now a recession is an opportunity for the richest to get richer.