Monday, March 01, 2010

Storm Clouds Looming

Robert Reich comments that the House and Senate Democrats are losing their base for monetary reasons (campaign funds and future private sector employment) and Presidential political lobbying/armtwisting ineptitude.

The Congressional Democrats don't see the storm clouds approaching (here and here) because of lack of sympathy for their voters. Why should they care? They are taken care of. Both Congressmen and Senators of either party get pensions after serving one term of office and they have jobs waiting for them on K Street or Wall Street after public service. Meanwhile, the country dissolves in anger and craziness as the Middle Class is destroyed by an uncaring political establishment and a greedy global corporate conglomerate. The government-private sector revolving door corrupted the Executive Branch first, but now the rot has spread to the Legislative Branch. The Judicial Branch in the form of the Supreme Court is already lost. Between allowing Eminent Domain to be extended in support of corporate land grabs and affirming the position that campaign contributions are a form of Free Speech, the Supreme Court of the United States only accelerates the decay. The U.S. Government formed under the Second Constitution of the United States will become a front or shell for a Corporatocracy. The irony is that the Angry Right Wing Grassroots and folks of similar mindsets could destroy the one entity that could stand against the corporations and actually bring about a fascist state just like the Weimar Republic was replaced by the Third Reich. (See footnote.)

One has to hope that all of this Right Wing fury and bombast will signify nothing. Unfortunately, there is a lot of righteous anger due to the way the Great Financial Crisis was handled in the United States, and the crazies on the Right are tapping into it. It's one thing to demonstrate for political and economic reform of the government. It's another thing entirely to demonstrate for the destruction of the government without hint of reform. The latter is just destructive mob mentality masquerading as social rebellion.

Footnote:
Neofeudalism only describes what the corporations are doing to their workers and is an inaccurate politically correct term for what is happening to American society. Neofeudalism more accurately describes American slavery and sharecropping prior to the American Civil War. German corporations during the Third Reich used disposable slave labor for projects. Oskar Schindler used Jewish labor for his factory because it was the cheapest labor available. He came to his senses after he saw the SS murder some of his workers.

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Comments:
I don't really think the extreme right is significant compared to neocons (there since late 90s) and the even more influential group of "lower taxes" rich conservatives.
 
Yes, I agree. The majority of Republicans are neocons and wealthy conservatives, but they'll tell the voters what they want to hear to stay in office. I received a call from some Republican caller last week. State elections are today, by the way. The guy was stating that his candidate was a "true" conservative and was in fact more conservative than the incumbent Republican. I'm sorry, but that was a load of nonsense. This is Texas which is a politically conservative state. How can someone be politically more conservative without wearing a brown shirt and a swastika armband, or be a card carrying member of the John Birch Society? I know those two examples are extremes, but this is what Republicans say to challenge other Republicans in a one party state like Texas. It is a values campaign instead of a political campaign based on substance. And this is why the Republicans are dying? They've screwed up the country, and all they can offer as fixes is more tax cuts, curbs on illegal immigration(which never work), and blocking healthcare reform, while admonishing that the deficit is ballooning because they bailed the banking system out at the public expense. Bush and company were the architects of the TARP bailouts as well as enablers of the financial crisis in the first place. If Obama is to blame for anything, it's that he kept the same economists in power that Bush used and he screwed up the recovery by not passing a bigger stimulus bill, endorsing some sort of work sharing program, or pressing for reasonable financial reform bills last year. The Democrats have wasted political capital they could have used and they appear to be watering down every bill that gets proposed. Our political process seems quite broken, but then both federal Democrat and Republican incumbents are all wealthy. If you weren't a millionaire when you were elected to office and you aren't a millionaire by the time you leave office, you've done something wrong.
 
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