Posted inPolitics: National

Screwed 3.0

Now we enter the next phase of the Great Disruption, where political dysfunction meets unsustainability. The Greek debt crisis is helping prepare the way for American panic about the federal deficit and national debt. These two maladies are a cause célèbre for the Tea Party. The supposedly left-wing media are on board. USA Today headline: "Nation's soaring debt calls for painful choices." Tom Friedman of the New York Times: "After 65 years in which politics in the West was, mostly, about giving
things away to voters, it’s now going to be, mostly, about taking things
away. Goodbye Tooth Fairy politics, hello Root Canal politics." Isn't he cute? I can't wait for the idiot David Brooks to weigh in. (He's already written about how "as
government grew, the anti-government right mobilized. This produced the
Tea Party Movement — a characteristically raw but authentically American
revolt led by members of the yeoman enterprising class…As government became more threatening…" Funny, he means the Obama administration, not the Bush wars, shredding of civil liberties and crony capitalism leading to trillions in federal bailouts, i.e., government growing.) You see, we're just like Greece — a profligate nation that needs to tighten its belt, cut government.

The reality, of course, is very different. Whatever his failings, Bill Clinton showed that seemingly intractable red ink could be turned into surpluses. The present deficit and debt is almost entirely a creation of the Bush tax cuts, the Bush wars and the Bush bailout of Wall Street (for which Sen. Obama voted). The fiscal situation was made more severe by the worst recession since the Great Depression. It's as if FDR fought World War II twice as long, cut rather than raised taxes, and did all this in the worst part of the Depression while using federal money for the banksters rather than the people. It's a wonder the deficit is so low as a percentage of GDP. It is not a cause for hysteria.

But, ah, dear reader, it will be used. "You never want to let a serious crisis to go to waste," said White House tough guy Rahm Emanuel, who is letting the real crises of the Great Disruption do just that. The extreme white-right — the idiot David Brooks' "yeoman enterprising class" — and the plutocracy will use the "crisis" of federal spending to their own ends. And if the effectiveness of their party as the minority in Congress is any indication, wait until they take the House this year from a feckless Democratic Party. And then the Senate and White House. Prepare for Screwed 3.0

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Posted inPolitics: National

Oh, yeah? Well, your mama’s a socialist!

With all the screams of "socialism" by the McCain camp, a thoughtful electorate might shake its heads and move on, or perhaps use this as a teaching moment. I have yet to believe we have such an electorate, but who knows?

If you are of a certain age, when history was still taught in American schools, you know that socialists believed that the "means of production" should be owned by the people, not by private interests. Railroads, mines, utilities, banks, insurers — it's a very 19th and early 20th century concept (unless you're the Bush administration and Hank Paulson). Real socialism also never took hold in America, not even in the Great Depression. For one thing, it was co-opted by the Progressives and the New Deal. Socialists weren't communists. The two detested each other.

Europe saw the evolution of social democracy, which combined a large welfare state and activist government with democratic freedoms — this is pretty much the governing model in much of the EU today. In America, you could probably fit all the true socialists into a mid-sized tavern or faculty lounge.

No, when wealthy Republican John Sidney McCain III and his running mate, the unqualified and dangerous Sarah Palin, yell that Obama is a "socialist," they're not giving a history lesson. They're engaging in soft McCarthyism.

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Posted inPolitics: National

Is the ‘nation of whiners’ also a nation of suckers?

Let’s get this straight at the outset: Phil Gramm, President-elect McCain’s chief economics adviser, did not misspeak when he said the only thing wrong now is a "mental recession" and America is a "nation of whiners." The corporate media, to the extent they are covering the story at all, are leading with McCain’s disavowal of Gramm. McCain has said the same kinds of things. He also said Social Security is "an absolute disgrace." This is what Republicans believe. Imagine if Obama had said such things?

While McCain is again showing his fundamental dishonesty, and the media are continuing to cover for him, Gramm unambiguously showed the mindset of today’s Republican Party. "Creative destruction" is their mantra, "free markets" their religion. And if you lived Gramm’s life, you might well wonder, "why are people complaining?" The former senator from Texas championed tax cuts for the wealthy, breaks for corporation and deregulation. He was repaid handsomely, most recently with his ties to the giant bank UBS.

Most Americans have paid a huge price. Median incomes have actually fallen in recent years, millions have lost their health insurance, and most average workers are losing the foundation of the middle class: secure jobs at good wages with benefits and pensions. This was partially concealed by the scam of the housing bubble, and now that’s gone. The Republican leaders, who have become wealthy from tax cuts, outsourcing, union busting and community-destroying mergers say, "stop whining."

But will they pay a price in November? I’m not convinced.

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