To a great degree it is institutional: The culture inside Washington, D.C., the flux and wash of government, policy advocates, corporate lobbyists, the wealthy, and the media is insulated from life in America at large -- just as the wealthy are insulated from the life of, you know, "little people".
It's an incestuous Village, as the metaphor goes, where reality doesn't stand much of a chance, and the sounds of pigs grunting at the public trough drowns out the cries of hungry children and despairing unemployed workers.
The Tea Partei can be dealt with out of hand: They're an organization begun and bankrolled by wealthy conservative interests as a method of both forcing the old-line Republican party to take political stands further and further to the right, and of forcing the Left to spend money and time to fend them off.
While it's made the likes of President Boner and President Yertle The Turtle nervous, and made a mockery of the process of government in places like Wisconsin (vote-rigging, gagging Democratic members of their Legislature, and ignoring the State's judiciary, no?), the Tea Partei isn't taken seriously. Its leaders -- Little Glenn Beck; Little Sarah, Straight 'n Tall; Grand TurtleBear Bachmann -- are blowhards with personality issues.
The Republicans are the party of take money from everyone and give it to the upper 2% of the population, and to Wall Street banks and investment firms. They want to end Medicare, and privatize Social Security; that's all they've got (Oh, and they want to outlaw abortion and end the ban on prayer in public schools, just as a sop to the evangelical Right).
They believe in supply-side, trickle-down economics, and Will Not Raise A Dime Of New Taxes, Ever. They want to cut spending, 'The New Austerity', as a way to balance our budget and pay down the National Debt -- and it doesn't matter to them if Nobel prize-winning economists (and even those who don't have a Nobel) keep saying that to cut spending will result in nothing but higher unemployment and steadily worsening social conditions for the majority of the U.S. population. It doesn't matter to the Rethugs at all.
The GOP is the party of the Death Penalty and Racist dog-whistling and pandering to the basest instincts of human beings; they're corrupt and venal and should be shunned. But we knew that.
Then, you have the Democratic party, and its leader, our current President, who has found it challenging to meet the majority of his own campaign promises. In my estimation, he's become just another politician from Chicago -- a deal-maker who revvs up the Liberal-sounding language whenever an election beckons, and ignores the Progressives in his party when it isn't.
He believes that's the "smart" play -- but unfortunately, the situation we're in demands rapid, Progressive action. And neither he, or the Democratic leadership in Congress, appear capable of doing so.
My own take on the 2010 midterms was that for some Indpendents, a vote for some conservative Tea Parteigenossen wasn't a vote for new fascism; it was a vote that said I don't believe in the crap of either party. If Obama and his administration had led hard from the Left, made the kind of sweeping Progressive changes to repair the damage done by Lil' Boots -- if he had just led the country -- the Democrats might not have lost control of the House.
People in America know the real thing when they see it. They know Little Rupert's Fox is a waterfall of garbage and lies. People are desperately hungry for truth. They want someone to stand up and name things by their right names, and provide honest leadership. But that's not what the major parties want -- because their backers, the corporations and individuals with money, Left and Right, don't want the boat rocked. Real leadership is off the table.
So, Obama and the Democrats are just one more episode in the blinkered, incestuous action of The Village. Obama wants to be 'fair and balanced', I guess.
A prime example in my opinion (but I'm not alone) lies in the Democrats having thrown away the greatest opportunity to reshape the financial system -- which created the economic crisis we're still living with.
Instead of paying the Banksters free money, and refusing to prosecute the BSDs responsible for destroying the lives of millions of people, Herr Obama could have done precisely what was done with General Motors: Provide a loan -- not a bailout -- force the insolvent institutions into bankruptcy and restructuring.
Instead of forcing the American people to own the debt created by the likes of "Dick" Fuld and Little Lloyd Blankfein and Angelo Mozilo, Herr Obama and his administration would have put it on the shareholders -- where the risk belonged. But, he listened to Timmeh! Geithner, and Larry Summers, who told him this would be bad for the Markets. So they gave the Banksters all the free money they wanted.
And even later, when Paul Volker (aber natürlich), and Larry Summers (unbelievably) argued to do more by way of government stimulus to spur job creation, Obama listened to Little Timmeh. Work on lowering the deficit, he told people. Be good to the Markets. Be kind to America's financial sector.
And guess what? That's what happened. Volker was squeezed out of the President's council of financial advisors; Larry stepped down so he could buy a fifth chin. People like Joseph Stiglitz and Paul Krugman weren't even invited to the table.
And President Obama decided to go with Little Timmeh, and the New Austerity in the Bowles-Simpson Plan, a recipe for higher unemployment. Changing Medicare is on the table! Privatizing Social Security is now on the table!
Where's the 'Hopey-Changey'? But, at least The Markets and The Banksters will remain happy. And Fat, too.
And now, with the National Debt limit up for renewal, the Rethugs are screeching for Austerity -- for preserving the Lil' Boots Tax Cuts For The Super-Rich, for forcing Americans to do with less while others do very well, thank you; they want the future to be shaped by the desires of the Koch Brothers, Ralph Reed, and Little Rupert Murdoch.
And, Herr Obama and many Democrats appear to be poised to bargain away programs and traditions which were hard-fought for... just to appease persons like Boner, McConnell, and President Sessions. There are other roads they could have taken in order to find a more equitable way to right our economy and move forward, but the one the Democrats appear to be walking down leads to more privation for most, and Good Times! for the favored few. As always.
I know that isn't what you wanted to hear, but stripped of all the rhetoric, this is what's happening in our domestic political world. I am completely, utterly disgusted, and I don't have a great deal of faith that the future won't be compromised away by the smiling face of whoever the Politician Of The Moment is.
Hope? Change? What was that about, anyway?
Oh; right -- it was a campaign slogan.
Noch Einmal:
Josh Marshall at TPM notes that despite how bad things are in the real world, for real people, government will not act.
In addition, if there's any hope of keeping Obama, who is no Progressive, in power and not have him replaced with some Tea Partei crazy backed by Little Rupert's Lie Machine, then policy changes have to be instituted now in order to have enough effect on voter sentiment by the fall of 2012 -- this, an argument in favor of Obama doing something. Anything.
...the US economy, while improved from the near catastrophic state of the winter of 2008-09, remains mired in its deepest and most protracted period of joblessness since the Great Depression. And yet the national political debate has focused on more or less massive government retrenchment -- i.e., draining demand and jobs from the economy. By almost any economic standard this is craziness...He follows with an extended excerpt from comments made by former FCC Commissioner Reed Hundt, who said
But for immediate purposes it would make sense for our policymakers to keep firm hold of the following truth: there's not enough demand for things -- goods and services -- in our economy. That's the reason there's not enough work for the people who want and need to work.Read the entire thing here. Weep, if you feel the need.
What the policymakers need to do is pretty simple... They need to identify the parts of every segment of the economy that ought to be replaced and repaired, and the new segments that ought to be created.
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