tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36646589.post9083230944961324150..comments2023-10-30T19:03:59.225+01:00Comments on David Seaton's News Links: New Year's 2011... singing in Grover Norquist's bathtubDavid Seaton's Newslinkshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00269813419598042699noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36646589.post-56676429256985881492011-01-03T01:33:48.161+01:002011-01-03T01:33:48.161+01:00Americans don't want a strong state. They are ...Americans don't want a strong state. They are like addicts who have abused themselves for so long that permanent brain damage has set in and logic and reason are no longer within their grasp. They literally can no longer hold a train of thought long enough to think things through. Had Wikileaks never dumped documents, it would be no different. How Americans' preference for weak, hands-off government is Assange's doing is still unclear to me. I can't see what Mr. Schreiber's crystal ball speculations about how future organizations will function are at all relevant to a situation where the best-funded war machine in the world was incapable, for whatever reason (heck-of-a-jobism, hubris), of securing its internal communications.<br /><br />Our government is indifferent to our welfare; we don't need to ferret-out non-state actors to pin the tail on that donkey. Our government is concerned about the profit of the wealthiest and no one else's. They don't need Assange's help on that one. Americans are so hostile to the idea of a welfare state that they, as you point out, will now be clamoring for the destruction of the benefits of public employees who aren't suffering enough, apparently, and need to be punished for their career choice because the American dream didn't pan out for some who chose the private sector. Damn that Australian libertine.stuntednoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36646589.post-48853706067972146072011-01-01T22:46:18.215+01:002011-01-01T22:46:18.215+01:00The average, only barely politically-aware America...The average, only barely politically-aware American is blind to the well-constructed argument you've presented precisely because most of them can buy whatever pseudo-luxury good they wanted this past holiday season. Of course, only because credit cards are once again fairly easy to get, but they've still got their consumerist crap in hand so it's all good, right? <br /><br />I recall reading recently (can't remember where; sorry) that the current middle and lower classes have a vague idea that even if things aren't so good right now, they are better for someone of their class than they were in the 1930's or 1950's so it can't be <i>that</i> bad. Add in that peculiar American myth that anyone can get rich if they work hard enough and you see huge numbers of people who will never be affected by the estate tax highly opposed to it, because what if they are the lucky mythic winner someday? No matter that the data show that upward mobility is stagnant and has been for quite some time. Of course there is a whole winger media structure devoted to the proper use of propagandistic syntax: estate tax = DEATH tax, etc. <br /><br />The only real solution to all your essay describes is (1) overturning the Citizens United decision, and (2) heavy, hard, and effective campaign finance reform. Corporate capture of our politics was extensive before Citizens United, but that is the epoxy designed to guarantee that we never get that lock open again, ever.StringonaSticknoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36646589.post-14785381667628195202011-01-01T07:30:59.673+01:002011-01-01T07:30:59.673+01:00@Anonymous:
word.@Anonymous:<br /><br />word.PALGOLAKhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14130401987893732346noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-36646589.post-82909684846954263012010-12-29T21:29:02.071+01:002010-12-29T21:29:02.071+01:00While white rage explains much of the anti-governm...While white rage explains much of the anti-government hysteria on the right, I think there's also another explanation. It is the need to lock in certain advantages that people have or think they have. So, we have the bizarre spectacle of Republican candidates promising to protect Medicare against any cuts (!!!) along with protecting the obscenely lucrative for-profit health care system. Throw in the military/industrial complex, and you have the three legs of the GOP stool. Above all, take care of your constituencies since they might not appreciate privation even if it's for their own Randian good.<br /><br />The points about racism as an instrumentality of political control is profound and depressing. For better or - likely - worse, we are tribal beings who see skin color and ethnicity as more primary identifiers than nationality. The harsh xenophobia we see in places like Arizona is a reminder that any stress is likely to expose these raw nerve endings. <br /><br />There's an ironic coupling in the right's authoritarianism and libertarianism. Obviously, one strain will have to triumph over the other and I'm pretty sure it will be authoritarianism. Grover Norquist might want to drown government in a bathtub but that government is keeping Fox News' principal demographic in tall cotton. It keeps military personnel happy along with their corporate lobbyists. And it's indispensable for other rightwing interests like Big Oil, Big Ag, and the private prison industry. There has to be a government to tax us to keep these players content. <br /><br />What Norquist really wants isn't some quasi-anarchic utopia but a state interwoven with corporate interests so the undeserving no longer afflict our collective conscience. We're about halfway there and the mind-fuck of anti-government rhetoric ensures that we'll keep advancing down that road. But that rhetoric is just a fig leaf for the grubby process entailed in taking care of "real Americans". If this sounds like another description of civil war, it is. And we earnest liberals have lost the most crucial battle: the basic premise of the social compact underlying our dying American experiment.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com