Tag Archives: democrats

Political Rants

Rollback.

Some short takes. Pretty seriously under the gun these days (figuratively, though, not literally as many just now). Just make mention of a few serious setbacks this week.

Wisconsinitis. Got to hand it to the GOP – they are good at the old sucker punch. Gov. Scott Walker and his political allies were determined to curtail union organizing rights, and they succeeded via political maneuvers that their Democratic opponents would never dare attempt on the state or national level. Always the way, it seems: Republicans are willing to push to the wall, no matter how unpopular the position. Democrats tend only to push their own base to the wall. The situation is, if anything, worse in Michigan, where not only are union rights being curtailed but the republicans have passed legislation that enables them to dismiss local elected officials under certain vague “crisis” circumstances and replace them with hired hacks, perhaps corporate subcontractors. Pretty ugly stuff.

Of course, as we know, elections have consequences. If you give a drunk a gun, don’t be surprised when s/he shoots you in the ass. (Lesson leftover from the Bush administration.) But the warning goes both ways. If you shoot someone in the ass, don’t be surprised if s/he kicks yours a little later on.

Libya redux. The opposition to Qadaffi’s government is seriously outgunned, largely thanks to the Western governments now threatening to send the strong man and his crew to The Hague. And yet, with respect to the no fly zone, I’ve found myself agreeing with Defense Secretary Gates in that it is not simply a matter of putting a few flights in the sky above Tripoli. Such a policy would entail a full on assault against Libya – no other way to accomplish it. When they put the zones in place in Iraq in 1991 (after many thousands were killed), it was following an attack that destroyed Iraq’s capacity to fight back. If we were to proceed today, it would involve killing many Libyans, attacking a sovereign African state, and all that those things entail. Seriously…. aren’t there other ways to help?

Afghanistan. Word has it that we’ve started pounding Afghanistan in a more serious way, since the counterinsurgency tactic is proving itself an unmitigated failure. Where is this headed, after ten years? Back to bombarding villages into oblivion? We are manufacturing future enemies – that’s all we’re accomplishing. In the words of the late Molly Ivins: Get. Out. Now.

luv u,

jp

Political Rants

On capitulation.

Okay, so the president has a bit to apologize for. He’s not alone in that respect – plenty of blame to go around here. Fact is, the administration is certainly wrong to criticize the liberal-left for denouncing the deal he cut with Republicans this week. If the president was painted into a corner, it was not by the left. The Congress members who were dead set against raising the tax issue before this past election were “Blue Dog” conservatives, worried about offending their constituencies – the same voters that would soon send more than half of them packing.

It is now these conservative Democrats that Obama is relying upon during the lame duck session to shepherd this deal through the House. It seems likely that most Republicans will support it, so he hardly needs the entire Democratic caucus. In any case, the capitulation happened a long time ago. At this point, the main thing is making certain that unemployed workers get the help they need. I don’t care how we get there, particularly, so long as they don’t give away the store… and reserve the right to start fighting again fresh on January 1.

There will be a lot to fight about, particularly when you consider how the Republicans have been behaving in the wake of their electoral victory. To wit,

  • Jim DeMint has talked about the possibility of making unemployment insurance more like “a loan” to give unemployed people incentive to go to work. No, really… he’s serious.
  • The main talking point on these upper income marginal tax cuts is that they are “NOT tax cuts”, that to not implement them is, in fact, a tax increase.  I heard Jon Kyl plying this one yesterday. A little wordplay here – perhaps they don’t remember that when they invented these tax cuts nine years ago, they put an end point on them. The tax cut has a time limit; when that passes, it’s over. Extend it, that’s a new cut because it involves additional billions. Got that, Jon? 
  • Tax cuts for the rich don’t add to the deficit. Unemployment benefits do.

You get the picture. One last point… it was mentioned in passing on NPR business news today that American corporations are sitting on $2 trillion in cash. Sitting on it.

Again… do these people really need a tax cut?

luv u,

jp

Political Rants

Payback time.

The election is barely past us and corporate America is already knocking on our door for the rent.

Speaking of timing, former Sen. Alan Simpson and former Clinton Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles, co-chairs of the president’s commission on deficit reduction, have agreed we should gut Social Security, Medicare. Well, there’s a surprise – both have an execrable history of animosity towards these quite successful social programs. (Simpson’s contempt for elderly people is palpable and disgusting, and he never misses an opportunity to toss a rhetorical brick at them.) Of course, their proposal also calls for tax cuts for the rich and for corporations. Again, no surprises there.

This is just the latest chapter in the attack against the poor, working class, elderly, and infirm that has been underway for decades in this country. Time and time again they have sought to undermine Social Security, to loot its trust fund, and to convert it into something it was never intended to be – an instrument for the creation of private wealth. Social Security is a supplemental guaranteed retirement program and, as such, an extremely successful one. It has kept elderly people (at least the ones who did not retire on a mountain of money, like Simpson) out of poverty for seven decades. Likewise, Medicare has not only made the elderly more financially secure, but it has also improved their quality of life in demonstrable ways. Not for nothing that these are the most popular social programs in America.

It may mean little to Simpson, Bowles, and many who share their views that people they don’t know will have to work until 68 or 70 and do without adequate cost of living adjustments in their old age. It sure as hell matters to me, and I imagine to many others as well. Social Security is not on the brink of bankruptcy – far from it. They just want to use its revenues to cover our government’s bad decisions with regard to financial regulation and foreign policy – decisions that have cost trillions of dollars over the last decade alone. Now we are being asked to pay for those criminal actions. There can be only one answer to that.

Don’t know, but we may have to take a page out of France’s book. If it takes standing in the street to protect the lives and livelihoods of ordinary people, it’s goddamned worth it.

luv u,

jp