“The political system seems almost on the verge of a breakdown,” Washington Post columnist David Broder said at the Kansas Press Association convention in Wichita last week. The problems are many, he noted, including extreme partisanship, the inability of many baby boomer politicians to compromise for the common good, and the fact that Congress is spending very little time in session, typically only a couple days a week. “Oversight has diminished because Congress doesn’t have time to do it,” he said. Broder faults both parties. Democrats are as incapable of forming alternatives as Republicans have been unable to find agreement, he said.
When asked specifically about the Democratic Party, Broder was especially critical of the top three leaders — Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Democratic National Party chairman Howard Dean. “I cannot recall three less effective party spokesmen in my lifetime,” he said.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
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171 Comments
I think America needs to develop a national consensus of “leave incumbent politicians behind” and replace them with new office-holders. There probably are some good political representatives but not many. I also know it won’t take long for the new ones to also lose touch with the voters but it might serve as a warning to get back to the basics.
JWink
I noticed that when Bush flew over the Katrina victims, he mealy look out a window of Air-force one helplessly.
I would have asked for a headset to talk to the pilot and had him bank and circle the victims while being connect to all helicopters within flying range and beyond and started a caravan of Helo-Help pulling and extracting victims off rooftops and evacuating stranded people from their difficulties.
I’m not the president with the power to do that and neither is Bush when you come to think of it.
It would have been such a simple thing to do.
You’re right, we need to clean-house.
I have never seen such widely expressed hatred in my life before. The juvenile name calling (eg. “repukes”) and the animosity is unbelievable. This same type of partisan mentality is obviously crippling this country.
Solution? Simple…lighten up. Don’t accuse everyone who disagrees with you of being a “neo con” or a “liberal” or whatever other labels go flying around so fast and furious. Try to recognize that other people might have something intelligent to say (excluding of course, Ed and Ian, that is).
Civility and mature discussion is probably too much to hope for…
raptor,
Please. After thirty-five years of GOP-sown cultural division in America (beginning with Agnew’s ’silent majority’ and ‘nattering nabobs of negativism’ and terminating in Ann ‘the man’ Coulter calling liberals ‘traitors’) and the GOP’s addiction to the playing of wedge politics, I have no time at all for Broder’s bromides or for your attempt to paint liberals as ‘hateful’ and driven by ‘animosity.’ Look in the right-wing mirror, raptor: if you have any honesty, you shouldn’t be too pleased with what you see happening on your side of the street. The GOP rules this country by dividing the electorate: racially, economically, ideologically. Hate is YOUR tool, friend.
One party controls all three branches of government to their exclusive benefit. I don’t care how victimized you or any other ‘conservative’ might FEEL, raptor. YOU are in charge. But ‘commentators’ like Broder then go on to act as if there is parity or equivalence on any level. There isn’t.
And more to the point, for him to excoriate Democratic political leadership ignores the fact that the GOP message dominates all media, broadcast and print. Conservative think tanks formulate policy positions that become conventional wisdom. GOP frames are taken up wholesale to become the official story. And the media’s relationship to the GOP–particularly that of Broder’s own ‘newspaper,’ the Washington Post–is so obviously too close and so cozy as to compromise whatever he has to say. I have my own problems with the Congressional leadership and the leadership of the Democratic Party. But for Broder to act as if there’s a level media playing field is just dishonest. There isn’t, and everyone knows it.
We are now in the sixth year of an Administration that has ruled America dishonestly and unconstitutionally, with no regard for anything but the expansion of its own power. This is the crucial fact that Broder is too, well, delicate to mention.
raptor, you sound like every other conservative crybaby who can dish it out but can’t take it. This is the environment the GOP has decided it wants: divided, mistrustful, vengeful. Fine by me, though it may mean the death of the Republic. But don’t complain, raptor, when your party’s tools are turned against you.
CF
That was extremely well written and right on point. You’re a great writer when you set your mind to it.
You won that round hands down.
CF – well written. I have called a Commie, a Saddamer, pro-alQuada and all the rest. So, if those who called me those things don’t like mecalling them Repukes – TOUGH!
I would add to Coulter the fact htat she wished that her hero McVeigh had blown uo the NYTimes.
We went through 8 years of hate-spew against Clinton. Republicans have no right to complain when you get it back.
The hell with governing; I intend to RULE this lousy country!
Great post. Out of the park, CF.
I’ve been angry at the Dems for years, but their failure to “compromise,” as Mr. Pathologically-Centrist puts it, hasn’t been one of the reasons. Compromise with WHAT? And when in recent years haven’t the Dems been positively FAMOUS for caving in?
Ah, yes, David!: A more wimpy, corrupt, bought-off, ineffectual, meaningless opposition party–that’s just what we need!
Sigh. . .maybe I should just get with the program. You’re with us or against us, right?
I love Big Brother!
I think one problem is that we have lost our common identity. When WW2 vets Goldwater, McGovern, Dole etc would disagree they remained bound by their blood experience in WW2. On the other hand, VietNam was and continues to be a divisive war and the vets of that war are even more divided than they are on politics.
P.S.http://www.workingforchange.com/comic.cfm?itemid=18206
Good point, Ben, but. . .Nixon was a WWII vet, too.
Swing and miss, CF. I was referring to negativity on BOTH sides. I wasn’t whining, just asking for a little civility and rational discourse.
Is that too much to ask? Obviously.
Rage – are you sure? Even if he were I would make him the exception to the rule.
I remember watching McGovern and Goldwater doing political commentary on PBS – two adults with strikingly different views of what is best for THE COUNTRY THEY BOTH LOVE. I could almost hear one saying about the other “My patriotic friend here is absolutely wrong on …” Now what I hear is “This traitorous Saddam-loving Commie … “
Raptor – I am willing to try. However, at the first sign of a “Swiftie” the truce will end.
Two parties rabble while Exxon Mobil gets super duper rich through price gouging. Illegal immigration is rampant and their employers get barely a slap on the wrist. The Middle East is in a state of deep ****. (what else is new?) I think both of these parties are ineffectual and place preferences on their own political gain rather than the common good of the nation. However, this is to be expected from the “baby boomer” population which is currently in power; you know, the have it all, my way or the hi-way, have your cake and eat it to, uber-Leftist individualist types.
Good post C F but maybe a little tough on the raptor.
If you read raptor of late you can find him in opposition to some of his parties outrages. I cite his take on Phil Kline and underage sex reporting and his take on the Kansas “bored” of education. There are other examples.
I’ll take Raptors call for calm with a grain of salt. But I’ll take it.
That said, Broder is way off base claiming equal opportunuity hate. Where do I find anti Republican programming all day every day as I can anti Democrat faire in the form of talk radio?
After the 2000 election, did we see bush jr. appeal to all voters “I want to be your President too” as his kinder gentler father did? No he stuck his finger in the eye of 50 million+ people who felt robbed and said “A President of the United States is a president of all the people”. And he did it in a manner that added “nyah nyah nyah nyah nyah”.
And the righties LOVED IT. They embrace it then and to a large part still do now.
Broder doesn’t like the only three Democrats who actually speak out? That, in itself, is very telling.
The Republicans have managed to make the term “liberal” seem like a four-letter word. Screw ‘em!
CF, I salute you!!
CF, you SURPASS the rude pundit….
Repukes? Is that similar to Democraps? I dont think either side has cornered the market on name calling. Rush perfected the art and is the idol of the insult dog.
The r’s spent 8 years employing every sleazy lying smear tactic to overturn the presidential election of 92, culminating in impeachment for lying about an illicit sex act. Good government in action.
George bush lies and thousands die. But wanting to censure him is tantamount to treason? When did we as a nation fall through the looking glass? When did down become up? When did people who care about people become the bad guys and when did the “kill ‘em all and let god sort ‘em out” crowd somehow gain the “moral” advantage?
And the r’s only reply to all incompetence charges?”queers are destroying the family”, or “clinton did it” or “they do it too” or the “bitter liberal” meme. Followed by the angry woman meme.
We get the government we deserve, from Washington to Topeka to any city hall. May the dirty tricksters win and then blame the media when their many failures become obvious. Blame the media, even if the media breaks its nose everytime the gop turns farther right.
But then, we wanted these jerks. WE voted them in. How do WE like them now? Have WE had enough?
It seems to me that there are people who want to lead and people who want to rule. We have had our share of “rulers”.
When do we start voting for leaders?
Had enough? NO INCUMBENTS!!!!!!!!
CruX, wrong group. You’re talking about the Me Generation, not the Boomers. Try again.
I’ve been angry at the Dems for years, but their failure to “compromise,” as Mr. Pathologically-Centrist puts it, hasn’t been one of the reasons. Compromise with WHAT? And when in recent years haven’t the Dems been positively FAMOUS for caving in?
Indeed rage.
They cant have it both ways, can they? I mean the dems are either brilliant but mean strategists who continually confound the r’s or…
they are wimpy and limp wristed (as one poster here insulted another) whiners who cant stand up to a small breeze.
Which is it?
Pathologically-Centrist… I like that. However, I do believe that both parties suck.
Raptor,In my view, CF nailed the essence of what’s been happening in this country. My post didn’t address his comments to you, other than perhaps indirectly, to the extent of which “ye shall show what you reap.” If you voted for those clowns (did you?), this is what you got.
I can’t recall any “swifties” coming from you personally, so I’ll take you at your world on that one.
How do you “make” the price of crude oil 73 dollars a barrel?
I gotta hear this?
It was 9 dollars.
I feel myself really winding up for a rant here, so I better stop after this.
The toxic taliban christians equate me, and by extention, the woman I love, the friends and family I love, and anyone like me, with :
SHEEP… as in “if we let gays have the civil unions formerly known as marriage… why…. SHEEP could get married. What would stop someone from marrying a SHEEP?”
DOGS… as in “if we let gays have their marriages recognized in the civil arena, why someone could marry their GERMAN SHEPARD.”
WE have been called the destroyers of straight marriage, pedophiles at every turn, filthy disease carrying vermin, and no one on the right EVER protested their own party and religion’s positions.
fred and his merry band of christians picketed our funerals twenty years before matthew shepard died. No one gave a damn until he picked on soldiers. We heard “god hates fags” before many of you were born. It is not new. But did you think such words wouldnt bring on a backlash?
And in the face of that much hate, abuse, derision and oppression, you want us to be concillatory? We just arent being um, nice enough? We could have civil unions if only OUR words were more civil?
You are astounded when gay people get tough, fight back, turn your words against you and point out the monumental hypocricy and inherent hatred in your positions?
You are lucky we havent pulled out our limp wristed candy assed guns and taken this to the streets.
But then, that wouldnt be very “nice” now would it? Should we be learning how to be “nice” based on the treatment we have received from the taliban and the republicans?
raptor – is this an example of the “The juvenile name calling and the animosity” to which you referred?
“the have it all, my way or the hi-way, have your cake and eat it to, uber-Leftist individualist types.”
Uh-oh. . .the bone-digs have started. . .
no one on the right EVER protested their own party and religion’s positions.
You are forgetting all the past Phelps threads. Me thinks thine anger doth blind thy judgment.
Sorry, the “yous” are not directed at raptor. He has shown signs of good sense lately :)
But the “you just arent being nice enough” meme is generally directed at the left side of the blog.
When we get mad as hell and dont take the abuse anymore, we are angry and uncivil liberals.
When they start spouting hate, they are just speaking the facts.
“we are not haters” is the ultimate straw man meme.
Ben,
Sorry, but I call it like I see it. =)
How do you “gouge” the price of crude oil up to 73 dollars a barrel?
I’m still waiting?
Forgetting all the past phelps threads? wanna have dueling bone digs?
I see the liberal christians standing against hate and the haters.
I see the evangelical right saying “he isnt a real christian”.
Note to the kansas taliban: Wringing your hands and saying “aint it awful” is not standing up to fred.
Heaven forbid that americans should govern competently in the face of differing opinions. Or in the face of the polarization created by….?
The real slander against america is that we are so weak and ineffective as a nation that our democracy can not govern unless there is total agreement.
Woof. I had more faith in us. My bad.
I dunno, Ed.
G-R-E-E-D
http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-fi-oilrecord22apr22,1,1312110.story?coll=la-headlines-politics
http://news.yahoo.com/s/huffpost/20060419/cm_huffpost/019395;_ylt=A86.I0Lgc0ZE8wYBxQD9wxIF;_ylu=X3oDMTBjMHVqMTQ4BHNlYwN5bnN1YmNhdA–
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2002946213_oil22.html
http://www.commondreams.org/views05/1029-31.htm
CruX – I agree with RD that it is more Gen-X than the Peace Corps Baby Boomers. What wonderful generation are you from that threatens to kill those who differ with you?
Ben,I think you misunderstood my earlier post. I meant that the politicians of today consist of that generation of the people that I have described. It was the “Me” generation however not the baby boomers. I stand corrected.
BH,My generation is your future, senor.
Ed,
You work for OPEC don’t you? I trust you are well pleased with your past fiscal net-growth.
See for yourself.
http://www.commondreams.org/views/070400-105.htm
CruX – thanks for the clarification.
J R,
I, too, have generally found raptor to be his own man. The only name I called him was ‘friend’; though I said he sounds ‘like’ a conservative crybaby, I didn’t say he was one. I think he has the ability to see further into the issue than his comment showed. However, a strong disagreement calls for strong words, and we evidently have a strong disagreement.
The lesson, if there is a lesson, is that it takes respect to get respect. If I feel someone is disrespecting me, they can expect me to get real nasty, real quick. If I am wrong, they can also expect an apology, as was the case in my dust-up with Hank Price some weeks back.
ksfarmgrrl, dayum! Strong words. The folks who fear and vilify you ought to think twice before choosing you as an easy mark for their bullying.
ExxonMobil recently predicted that non-OPEC production is peaking, and that in order to meet demand “past 2010, the call on OPEC (will increase) rapidly, requiring OPEC to add more than 1MBD (million barrels per day) of capacity per year.” If they are correct, “the global energy business, and the cash that comes with it, will increasingly be controlled by the (predominantly Muslim) OPEC countries,” says Robert Bryce, “and that shift has tremendous geopolitical implications” for the entire world.
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0EIN/is_2005_July_20/ai_n14797274
http://www.senate.gov/~schumer/SchumerWebsite/pressroom/press_releases/PR02391.html
http://www.jhu.edu/news/home06/jan06/mideast.html
I hear broder voted for Washington…
Ed Friedemann – did I see you on the video from the michigan neo-nazi rally last week?
couldn’t fool me…I know that was you, with your pink skirt on….and your neon-green swastika
Gentlemen, please. There are better ways of disagreement. This means you Ed and Poindexter.
Raptor, at the beginning of this thread, is right, and the opposition responding with a fully juvenile “you started it” makes no difference.
Most of the writers here (again, excluding the racist/fascist Ian and anti-Semite Ed) are fairly rational and ideas can be discussed. They can be discussed much more thoroughly without the pejoratives thrown around, however. Yes, I know I tossed labels on Ian and Ed, but facts are facts with those two. BTW, Ed, see http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=042006F for history and facts. One sentence neatly sums it up.
That said, Broder doesn’t know his history. As divisive as our politics may be, this nation is far from ungovernable, and our politics have been far more divisive before. What unites us is far stronger than what divides us.
Does Congress do a crappy job? Sure, but they always have. Our biggest problem, long term, is Congress’ inherent inability to look past the next election cycle. That inability is furthered by an electorate nearly equally divided, making nearly any election crucial to party control of a branch of government, and a media focused on the political horse-race rather than policy and the implications of that policy (the horse-race makes for good television; policy is hard and boring).
This leads to a Congress and Administration unable to make hard choices about our most pressing problem: our unwillingness to look our fiscal situation squarely in the eye. And both parties are responsible for that one. Republicans never met a tax cut they didn’t like (even when they don’t make economic or fiscal sense); Democrats cannot compromise on the entitlements they worked so hard to establish (and the core constituencies that go with them) despite the fact that those same entitlements will be bankrupting us within a generation or two, given current demographic trends.
Is there a way out here? Yes, if we act quickly, and both parties tell the truth. Republicans, you cannot continue to cut taxes, and frankly, those who benefit the most from this society should pay more. Some taxes need to go up. Democrats, the reality is that all the programs cannot be paid for; everyone cannot be a dependent constituency. They MUST be cut back. And BOTH parties must step back from the pork barrel trough; this time, Republicans are deeply in the trough you so thoroughly (and rightly) critized Democrats for wallowing in during their long run as a governing majority.
Name-calling doesn’t help. The first step is to recognize that reasonable people (that excepts Ian and Ed, again) can disagree, and still be reasonable people. Once we get to that, compromise is possible.
Julie
I never start it.
GMC – as I said, I am willing to try a cease-fire. However, if “swift-boated” I will not turn the other cheek.
Well done,GMC70.
Thanks, Ed. You’ve just made my point.
Need I say more? I think not.
You make good points about Congress. They have a bad tendency to get embedded into the DC scene at the expense of their Districts. It happened with Glickman and it has happened with Tiahrt. It has happened big time with Dennis Hastart – he is definitely not the same man as the one I knew back when I worked on his freshman campaign.
I’m always disappointed in myself everytime I get dragged into an insult war on this blog. (Or do I jump into it. . .)
That’s why I do my best to just post my opinion once and let it go at that. I know it annoys some posters who want me to provide links or more details, but I’ve found I have much less stress this way.
“a media focused on the political horse-race rather than policy and the implications of that policy (the horse-race makes for good television; policy is hard and boring).”
These are statements of truth. Boy, would I like to be bored with some good policy pretty soon.
Ed,It’s the mommy in me…I don’t care who starts it but it is finished now! :)I really don’t like to see posts where there are personal attacks against another blogger. Attacks about ideas or theories are one thing but personal attacks just aren’t right.
“Is there a way out here? Yes, if we act quickly, and both parties tell the truth. Republicans, you cannot continue to cut taxes, and frankly, those who benefit the most from this society should pay more. Some taxes need to go up. Democrats, the reality is that all the programs cannot be paid for; everyone cannot be a dependent constituency. They MUST be cut back. And BOTH parties must step back from the pork barrel trough; this time, Republicans are deeply in the trough you so thoroughly (and rightly) critized Democrats for wallowing in during their long run as a governing majority.”
If there was a candidate who made campaign promises to correct the problems listed above, and I believed they were sincere about making the changes, I’d vote for that person – irrespective of the party.
I am not expecting to see a candidate like this anytime soon, which is the point of Broder’s editorial.
DD
You may be right. And WE (meaning us, the electorate) are in large part responsible for that. We elect them.
We elect republicans who promise continuing tax cuts, when we know in our hearts that we cannot contintue to cut taxes at this time in our history – though tax cuts can indeed stimulate an economy, under the right circumstances, these are not the right circumstances.
We vote for democrats who promise to “soak the rich,” knowing full well that the rich cannot make up the difference. If the burden is going to fall, it has to fall on the middle class (roughly $30,000 to $250,000 a year); that’s where the money is.
We want to cut gov’t subsidies and benefits, except the one we get. And nearly all of us get one, in one form or another; how many of us want to give up our tax breaks for mortgage interest, or subsidies to colleges for our kids’ education? Add to that any number of benefits we receive, some obvious, most less so. And each of those income transfers have vocal constuencies.
Cutting military spending won’t do it; US military spending is approx. 3.3% of GDP, on a comparable par with most other industrial nations, and considerably less than many other states. Seehttp://www.truthandpolitics.org/military-relative-size.phphttp://www.fas.org/man/crs/RL32209.pdf
Once again, it’s likely true. We have met the enemy, and they are us. The founders created a government they hoped would be responsible to its citizens. In the 200+ years since, we have progressively made government more and more responsive to voters. We may have succeeded in voting ourselves into bandruptcy.
That’s “bankruptcy.”A “bandruptcy” would be where a band splits down the middle, becoming 2 or more little bands :-)
Partisan people keep looking for complex answers to simple problems. You keep voting for the same recycled deomcans and republicrats and you all wonder why things keep getting worse. There are NO political solutions for Americas problems!
Viva La Revolucion Blanco!!!
GMC–
“We vote for democrats who promise to “soak the rich,” knowing full well that the rich cannot make up the difference. If the burden is going to fall, it has to fall on the middle class (roughly $30,000 to $250,000 a year); that’s where the money is.”
Whoa, whoa, whoa there, big fella.
If I EVER heard a politician vowing to “soak the rich,” I’d vote for that candidate in a heartbeat. Nobody that I can remember has EVER said that.
Whether it is a good idea (to soak the rich) or not IS NOT THE ISSUE. The issue is that NOBODY is saying it.
It’s is a perfect example of a made up bogy-man that conservatives can whip. It’s like John Kerry “faking his war wounds.” They fact that he didn’t makes no difference to the hate-mongers.
Obviously, what needs to be done is to reduce government spending. “Reduce” is the opposite of growing it 9 or 10 percent every year like George Bush has done.
If you’re going to reduce government, you have to start with the biggest discretionary funding–the military. I think spending more than every other country in the world COMBINED is a bit much, isn’t it?
I mean we should spend more than England or China or India or Germany or Japan or all of Africa or Canada or all of South America, but do we have to spend more than all those countries PUT TOGETHER?
If we limited military spending to a sane 1-2 percent of GDP like other countries, we’d be taking a big step toward fiscal responsibility.
BTW, an especially brilliant analysis this time, CF. I’m going to cut and paste this to another blog where folks will appreciate it, I’m sure.
Broder tries to come off as a “centrist,” but just comes off as rather an ignoramus. Consider this–
“Broder was especially critical of the top three leaders — Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Democratic National Party chairman Howard Dean. ‘I cannot recall three less effective party spokesmen in my lifetime,’ he said.”
Gee, Dave, how about those great Democratic leaders like head of the Democratic Caucus Bob Menendez (Uh, who?), or that ass-kicking, name taking Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer? Maybe he’s talking about the last Democratic speaker of the house we had 13 YEARS AGO in the dynamic czar of political intrigue and Pillsbury Dough-boy look-alike Tom Foley?
And who could forget “Fighting Mad Dog” Tom Daschle, who milquetoast manner was only exceeded by his lack of conviction? The guy lost his own seat as Majority Leader . . . so much for not being able to unseat incumbents.
Then there’s “Jumping Jomentum” Lieberman who thinks he can beat Republicans by becoming one. He’ll be lucky to win his own primary.
Since the Democrats have been out of power in the House for 13 years, out of the White House for five, out of the Senate for 4 and out of the Supreme Court for what looks like forever, I think that ANY CHANGE IS AN IMPROVEMENT over what we’ve had.
Screw you, Broder.
Well said Tru.
Just as to Broder. I don’t think much of his word on anything. I can’t tell if this guy is Republican playing Democrat or Democrat who wishes he wasn’t but can’t figure out what to do. Some might say that gives him the air of objectivity. I say he is pandering to widen his syndication. Either that or just confused.
If you think there is too much vitriol in politics, the people you listen to about addressing it are those in the battle. Broder? Give me a debate between Molly Ivins and Cal Thomas on the matter.
The hate has probably gone too far by now. We probably can’t fix it. We probably went into the “red zone” during the Clinton years when the republicans spent 6 years carrying out a political assination against Clinton. Democrats have had 12 years to build up venom since the republicans took Congress in ‘94 and Bush got handed the Residency in 2000. Now with a chance of Democrats taking power in 2006, there’s talk of investigations and impeachment. Republicans are going to freak when that happens. But what goes around comes around. Republican rule has meant government representation for only half of the country. Their whole attitude has been f*** you!
I think that if republicans lose control in 2006 and 2008, we have a real problem. I don’t think they’ll accept that.
” What unites us is far stronger than what divides us.”
Sorry, but that’s BS.
I think there’s a real possibility of civil war in this country in my lifetime.
And the republicans have all the guns.
XXX, exactly. That’s why the new politics will have to be about exodus and desertion.
X, I’m just not gonna go there. So long as there are people willing to talk, I’m willing to negotiate.
GMC, I appreciate your willingness to acknowledge that the fiscal situation requires tough choices (including raising taxes for wealthier citizens), but TB pointed out the flaws in your analysis.
I have world almanacs going back to 1958 with federal budgetary figures (receipt, outlays, deficits), and inflation calculators & GDP figures are readily available on the web (maybe in the almanacs too!). I’ll go there if I have to (a lot of unpaid work!), but for the time being I think this cartoon comes close enough to the annoying reality:
http://www.xoverboard.com/cartoons/2005_09_26.html
Seeing what’s really happened to the federal budget ain’t exactly rocket science.
“So long as there are people willing to talk, I’m willing to negotiate.”
Rage, who do you think you’ll be talking to? Yeah, the right wing has been pretty good the last few years about negotiating. Let’s see, they negotiated about… well, there was that time…You know, when I think about it, republicans don’t seem willing to negotiate about anything. It’s pretty much been their way or the highway.Sure, there are reasonable conservatives. We see some on these threads. But you don’t see any in power.
Think civil war can’t happen here? I wouldn’t bet on that.
Why do you suppose republicans have so many guns? Keep in mind, they’re happiest when they’re making somebody hurt.
“Sure, there are reasonable conservatives. We see some on these threads. But you don’t see any in power.”
Exactly my point. The lunatic right is barely holding on to power now. I’d prefer a bloodless revolution, so to speak. Hence, talk to those who are willing to talk.
If it gets to point of tanks in the streets, let’s see how loyal to them the troops they’ve continually screwed over will really be! I predict the angry consensus we’ve seen show up on this blog–in Kansas!–remember?– would spread like wildfire. “Don’t tread on me!” or, the updated version, “Don’t cheney with me!” They can’t kill or imprison all of us.
Even the Chinese government had to import troops to Tianamen Square, because the locals refused to turn their weapons on their own neighbors.
“Any time that you wantyou can shoot me lightlybut ask me to be excusedI won’t go die politely”
Guy Pisciotto
I fear you are correct X cause I know you are not “right”.
I too sometimes fear a civil war. After the “election ” of 2000 I was ready to fight it.
The rise of the “right” is VERY illustrative in the current climate.
Before I go on, this is not an attack on religion. Rather it is an explanation of how a religion of love produced the politics of hate
Give the fundamentalists credit for patience. For 30 years they toiled quietly. In their churches and in local politics, they gradually elevated themselves. Get a large number of the faithful beleiving that God is on the side of your politics and you’ve gotten yourself an army of folks who can never be wrong because you tell them god says they are right. Any behavior or belief found distasteful becomes a cause for defeat and suppression of that behavior or belief. Throw in an affront to their beleifs like a womans right to an abortion, and you’ve got yourself an army of zealots on a holy crusade who cannot even see anything but that one issue anymore. Give them a politician on the other side who does naughty sex and they don’t even WANT to see anymore.
Give credit too to talk radio and in particular Rush Limbaugh. The media, while not particularly liberal, had an open market for those who could attack it as liberal because it was not conservative enough. Make right wing politics entertaining and disparaging of the other side at the same time and they’d gotten themselves the second faithful army. The paranoid folk who are so eager to latch onto one big voice to tell them that their grievances are bigger than themselves and that anyone who says otherwise is a liar or a liberal and that they are mostly the same those two monikers. Get these folks waving the flag and convincedthat any shortage of success in America life is the fault of the victim and that if they just wave the flag and believe that they too will succeed.
Now throw in a pResident that was selected for candidacy because he would preside. He was not to lead. That was the job of those who fronted him. The cardboard candidate was for photo ops and ribbon cuttings. Plan as they did, to challenge the electoral college if the boy can’t win according to the Constitution. But when he DOES win “Constitutionally” and not popularly, trumpet this as a victory for America.
REJOICE! America is attacked! Nothing unites like war! Heal the divisive election. But an attack from individuals with a grudge is not the stuff to keep folks united. Particaularly if catching the bad guy eliminates the threat. No they gotta keep that war unity and go find a more SOLID enemy. And all the while you get to call anyone who disagrees a traitor who is helping the enemy.
So civil war? Maybe. What is really pathetic and sad is observing that about half of America knows more about America Idol than American politics and knowing that may be the mitigating factor that prevents civil war.
There are folks on the right on these blogs who I can talk to reasonably. Mostly they are to their credit denouncing the state of affairs.
There are others. Some see themselves as soldiers for God. Others as soldiers of freedom as long as they get to define freedom.
I define them as enemies. I can find no way to talk to them with any useful result. Oh they may have guns. But I don’t think they have more followers than bullets. And so they might kill and kill and still be outnumbered.
Sort of the way the 1st American Revolution went.—–
The powers that be are going to provoke a race war because they think that in so doing they can avoid a second revolution. In the end they will not prevail as we will have both!
Viva La Revolucion Blanco!!!
Wasn’t it supposed to be the fundie righties that were supposed to have all the apocalyptic rhetoric?
hahaha
You are all fools! Do you really think that this generation of soft, effeminate, comfort-used, pleasure-seeking, materialistic American population will be able to motivate themselves into street-fighting urban combat guerrilla style warfare? Do you think that every American is as disciplined as the military? You are sheep! You are NOT your patriot ancestors of 1776. The third-world will breed you out of existence, Islam will dominate.
We are all, how you say, up the creek without a paddle.
CruX,
If or rather when we halt all third world immigration, cut off foreign aid, end transfer of our food and technology the third world population will quickly recede.
http://www.nationalvanguard.org/story.php?id=1382
Viva La Revolucion Blanco!!!
War as a constant metaphysical battle, both internal within each individual, as well as external, in the case of Nation, Organic State, Race. For war is for warriors not for soldiers, for castes not conscripts. Not for mercantilism but for a great IDEA; that of Imperium!
Wars, giant struggles, great conflicts, have been mostly between Whites. They have been fratricidal and always the object for economic gains and as generator of business. Battles of rich versus poor, petty nationalism always manipulated by the Judas goats.
No more! If anything, we should promote wars amongst wogs. We could induce and encourage non-Whites to kill their kind in ever more decent numbers. We should instigate famine and disease wherever the White Man has not set foot. War should be for the sole benefit and final planetary victory of the Europid.
War is life! War is a self-overcoming! A liberating wind. War, as innovator. War as a hygienic exercise for the White world, together with a eugenics program, eliminating the weak within the Race. War as a final clean-up of the planet from the superfluous billions, the pullulating, non-creative, inferior races.
I don’t know Ian, it sounds kinda MAD… But I guess the necessity of survival is ultimately at stake. What is that old adage? Survival of the fittest.
“I think there’s a real possibility of civil war in this country in my lifetime.”
P-leeease.
You folks are starting to believe your own propoganda. And you accuse the right – I think “fundies” is the pet pejorative here – of being extreme?
This is so ridiculous as to not require a response. No wonder there are so few actual posters here. Most sane folks read much of what is posted here, shake their heads, wonder what koolaid so many posters here are drinking (Ian, Ed, and now JR and CrusaderX), and move on.
I don’t blame them.
Think civil war can’t happen here? I wouldn’t bet on that.
Bring it on. I dont see that gay people in kansas have anything to lose. The only thing you can do to us that hasnt been done is round us up. Just keep thinking we are so limp wristed we will never fight back. Please, just keep thinking it.
And if dicipline is the issue in winning a war, I guess those “diciplined” north vietnamese and iraqi insurgents, hell even the taliban in afghanistan, must be more disciplined than the u.s. Just look at how our “dicipline” defeated them! Only nathan thinks we “rolled through” iraq.
I will take pent up anger and hatred over your “dicipline” any day as a winning tactic. But then, religious republicans actually do that hate, divide, and conquer thing WAY better than ANY athiest liberal could ever do.
I think lots of disenfranchised people would welcome civil war. It may be the only way to break the death grip the religious right has on this nation. Laws, such as election laws, certainly dont work.
Rage, this is a nice sentiment:
“So long as there are people willing to talk, I’m willing to negotiate”.
They will always be willing to talk TO you rage. Their willingness to listen, or talk WITH you has yet to be demostrated.
Personally, I am done with the talking. Seems like 70 percent of kansans are also done talking.
GMC,
That last post was a direct quote from Ian’s link. I do not favor a civil war, unlike the she-devil and her minions.
And gmc… werent you leaving this blog in a huff not too long ago? (bone dig). Something about nothing of intelligence here….
Perhaps you would be more comfortable in a blog of conservative smart people. If you wanna join those not reading or posting here, I would be glad to hold the door for you and recommend several blogs where you wouldnt have to shake your head at us.
Or did stomping your feet and leaving not work for you? Why are you back? To tell us all how stupid and wrong we are?
Just keep shaking your head at us. Please. Be smug and secure in your position. It will eventually be so much easier for us if you just keep thinking we are limp wristed and misguided cowards.
We tried that civility thing once. It really didnt work for us. Just like leaving in a huff didnt work for you.
Of course CRUSADERx would prefer a christian crusade to a civil war. And would “she-devil” be more of that civility we have come to expect from the right?
Here are a couple of words for you cruex. Vichy and jihad.
Au contraire, Have I stated that I would prefer a crusade? Or did you get that idea simply from my moniker? Where is your evidence that I am an advocate for a modern-day Christian holy war? Once again you continue with your slanderous assertions, not that I am at all surprised.
I rest my case.
Where is your evidence that I am an advocate for a modern-day Christian holy war?
It must be in the same place as the evidence you used to call me a she-devil.
Not that I mind the compliment.
Besides, you already won YOUR holy war so of course you are not advocating for more.
OUR holy war will be to undo what you taliban boys and girls already did.
I guess that would make it an UNHOLY war. Kinda like yours.
RAMEN!
Ks,
I haven’t the slightest idea what you are talking about. You are spiraling out of control! Your last post is utterly nonsensical and seething with hatred. Again, I am not surprised “old friend.”
GMC?
You made a few steps at comity and credibility recently. You almost won yourself some respect.I remember reading “good post GMC” a few times. In those instances, you were well worded and NOT on your high horse.I guess you were sick or something. Off your game.
Did you bother to get a complete list of those pondering the possibility of a civil war? That list is growing as you make it. It would also include and was in fact started by XXX who I guess you need to add with your next little pontification.
I think a bonedig might be a good idea KFG. I remember a little exchange between GMC and Brian that was telling.
The subject HERE was animosity between the political factions. And look who just demonstrated a good self congratulatory example of being part of the problem.
As to your continued presence here GMC? S… or get off the pot.
I rest MY case.
I love how JR sets himself up as the almighty irrefutable arbiter of “credibility” and “comity” on the WE blog! Hey JR, maybe you should take your own advice and get off YOUR high horse for a change?
bwahahahahaha!
Republicans have sown hatred and discord for over a decade, referring to Democrats and Liberals with sneers the Pharisees reserved for lepers and Samaritans. Republicans are not content to disagree. They must demonize and have done so as a part of their normal political discourse for a very long time. They are now about to reap the whirlwind and are just now noticing that we resent the abuse from their pundits, from callers on talk radio, and from family and friends who listen to them.
CF was exactly right. Republicans need to extract the planks from their own eyes before they criticize a mote or two in ours.
They should be deeply ashamed of themselves for what they have done to us.
crybaby =)
JR, that exchange between Brian and gmc was EXACTLY what I was speaking about. I even remember the thread, because I posted “buh bye” to it.
Bone digs for gmc and for cruex? It could be done, but why bother. Sane posters remember them and they are legends in their own minds, so no facts will interfere with THAT.
Still, posting bone digs can be so much fun…
You can do one for GMC if you like Kfg.I’d not bother with the blogfart CrusaderX. He probably would enjoy reading from his greatest hits. Let him go do it alone.
The subject here is relations beteen the political factions. So it would be on topic.
HEHEHE. The real crybabies will be the Repukes when the investigations begin. Well, raptor, I guess the ceasefire you had hoped for didn’t last very long.
CF, Rage, Darwin’s Disciple and KSFrmGrrl, I sent you an e-mail about this.
Check it out, at your earliest convenience.
And along the lines of political polarization. This is from bush’s speech yesterday.
Bush: “I base a lot of my foreign policy decisions on some things that I think are true. One, I believe there’s an Almighty. And, secondly, I believe one of the great gifts of the Almighty is the desire in everybody’s soul, regardless of what you look like or where you live, to be free.”
Free unless you are gay. Then the almighty and bush apparantly dont give a damn. We dont count as much as the iraqi’s to 70% of Kansans… and the preznit.
“regardless of what you look like or where you live”
But NOT regardless of who you love.
Do you think if I do a bone dig on gmc’s promise to go away, he might actually keep that promise?
Naw… he’d probably just come back with another nic. Like so many others.
I read the last 10 or so posts, and I wonder why I respond. You all do a much better job of proving me right than I could ever do.
Enjoy your “civil war.” Please.
When you all are done throwing names at each other (You started it; did not) we can get something accomplished. Guess that won’t happen here.
Next thread.
buhbye GMC
GMC,It’s fascinating how quickly you went from acknowledging the generally reasonable nature of people here to disavowing it. All because some speculation (and that’s all it was) took a turn not to your liking.
Aside from your sneering sense of superiority (happens to the best of us), you just plain got it wrong. You haven’t begun to make your case, counselor, on anything.
You offer a “solution” to the budget crisis that relies on cutting the smallest portions of the budget (or were you talking about gutting Social Security?). I gave you credit for at least acknowledging that we can’t keep looting the treasury this way.
You attack CF’s post as “a fully juvenile ‘you started it,” completely ignoring both the tone and substance of his post, which, contrary to your simplistic mischaracterization, was not “you started it” but rather THIS:
“The GOP rules this country by dividing the electorate: racially, economically, ideologically. Hate is YOUR tool, friend.”
That’s a direct quote from above. Funny how you missed that.
And yet it’s the OTHERS who are blinded by propaganda. Right.
The notion of civil war seemed a little over-the-top to me, but so have many things that have already happened in my lifetime that I could not have imagined. Constitutional amendments to defend someone’s narrow, religious idea of marriage? Been done. Stalinist gulags? Got it. Torture chambers? You bet. Releasing classified information for political revenge? Yep. Ignoring and or redefining the “rule of law”? Yep. Legal “nonpersons”? Uh-huh.
Declaring the president above the law? Well, at least that’s been done. Tricking a nation into war? That too.
I really don’t see tanks in the streets, but random nuts–maybe even subsidized nuts!—with huge weapons caches is already a distinct possibility.
You want to see some REAL ranting and raving, go check out the comments at Little Green Footballs or Free Republic. And I find it acutely disturbing when a rubber-room candidate writes a book accusing roughly half the nation of treason, and it becomes a bestseller! Who ARE those people?Do you know them?
Yes, GMC, we were so reasonable, until we weren’t! Were you really seeking common ground, or just your own terms? It jest don’t work that way, pardner!
KFG, I think this bone-dig pretty much sums up my view:
http://blogs.kansas.com/weblog/2006/01/private_school_.html#comment-12576257
Rage, that was a great post. I read the whole thread, and kansassam had a great post too.
And some posters remain the same…
GMC70,As one of those who read more than post, I would encourage to you stay. Your posts are often interesting and exhibit the true nature of what blogs like this one SHOULD represent. You’re also one of the most balanced people here.
Did I read somewhere that NoJoCo is actually a candidate for something? I may be mistaken that. But if so his posts on these blogs might come back to haunt him.
“….what blogs like this one SHOULD represent”
Who made you the arbiter of what the blogs should represent? Your own personal opinion? Gosh thanks for your wisdom!
“You’re also one of the most balanced people here”
I hope GMC stays too. It is so much fun seeing the “most balanced person here” routinely throw a self righteous snit at the littlest provocation.
I would like to encourage GMC to stay too.
He seems like a reasonable, decent conservative. So . . . how does he square that with the Bush administration? And DeLay? and Randy Duke Cunningham? And Jack Abrahmoff? And Kathleen Harris? And Pat Roberts? And Tanker Todd Tiahrt? And Bob “I Support Swift Boat Liars” Dole? And Trent Lott? And Scooter Libby? And Deadeye Dick Cheney? And everybody else with an “R” next to their name.
Republicans = no shame, no honor.
JR,First off, no one was talking to you. Here’s a little hint: IT’S NOT YOUR BLOG!!!!!
Second of all, who made you some kind of made-up spokes person for this blog. Oh, that’s right, YOU did.
I’ll second what GMC70 said above…
“No wonder there are so few actual posters here. Most sane folks read much of what is posted here, shake their heads, wonder what koolaid so many posters here are drinking…”
I’ll take that gauntlett, Rage.
I’ll note that this thread, your post included, quickly dissolved into exactly what Broder commented upon – the unwillingness to engage in ideas, instead become accusing and name-calling. I’m trying (and its hard) not to turn this into a pissing contest.
But just read up this thread, at the commenters. Go ahead, read it. I’ll wait. That is exactly what it became, and quickly.
Little response to the noting that “soaking the rich” will not solve our budget problems (a sentiment expressed each time a Democrat demogouges (sp?) the “tax breaks for the rich” theme, and uses class warfare as campaign fodder).
Little discussion of how our defense budget is approx. 3% of GDP, hardly out of line with our allies, and historically low. Want to reduce it by a third? OK – but you can’t balance the federal budget on it. Not even close. So blaming the Pentagon, alone, is not sufficient.
Little if any discussion of the non-discretionary (non-discretionary only because Congress doesn’t want to touch those sacred cows, of course, and built in automatic spending) entitlement spending that is the vast bulk of federal spending, and threatens to eat the rest within a few decades. Does that include Social Security? Of course. If we take that automatically off the table, the case is truly hopeless. If you want to demogouge that as “gutting Social Security,” so be it. But the reality is that the system as presently set up is unsustainable. We’ve known that for a generation, at least, but don’t have the political will to deal with it.
And then you proceed to demonstrate why.
No, instead, this thread rapidly decayed into labeling, name-calling, etc. Shall I quote from above, or perhaps you can just scroll up to see it for yourself.
I got no problem with challenging ideas, thoughts, issues, real thinking. But that’s not happening. I had so hoped differently. Perhaps that is too much to ask. Instead, we have nonsense about “civil war” and the labels and snits start flying. Again.
Your post, for the most part, was no different. You begin with “you guys started it” and went on from there. You then lay out a littany of perceived evils of the current administration, some of which I agree with. But you offer nothing other than “you started it, and I’m really pissed off.”
OK. You’re pissed off. But that does not advance solutions.
Will you concede that someone who disagrees with you may be reasonable as well? Start with that. It’s a beginning.
How ’bout it? I’ll easily concede that those who disagree with me hold valid points of view. Even if I disagree with them.
We may be able to compromise and end up with a solution acceptable to both. We may not. At some point, elections will decide those issues.
But we accomplish nothing with the constant bickering.
You call it “constant bickering,” I call it “prove it with evidence.”
What is at a historical low are taxes on the top 1 percent of the richest Americans. What is at a historic HIGH is the federal deficit, interest on the national debt, and the national debt itself, which will probably be 9 trillion dollars by the time the Worst President Ever leaves office.
According to March Harpers Magazine, the war in Iraq is costing more than the entire federal gov’t for 1948. The 9/11 Commission declared that, “The Department of Defense is the behemoth…With an annual budget larger than the gross domestic product of Russia, it is an empire.”
Your 3 percent of GDP for the military doesn’t sound right to me. Does it include costs for past military spending, interest on those costs etc?
I’m going to google this.
Also, how does a reasonable conservative justify Bush’s astonishing growth of the federal government?
http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/fields/2034.html
This is a little old, but it’s showing over 4 percent of GDP for the US military.
Compare that with anyplace else you’d actually like to live in like Canada, 1 %, Costa Rica .4 %, France 2.6 %, Germany 1.5 %, Italy 1.8 %, Switzerland 1 %, much maligned Venezula 1.2 %.
Even Taiwan and South Korea, under constant threat of China and North Korea respectively, only spend about 2 and one-half percent.
And our percentage, like everything else about the federal gov’t’s spending, (except for student loans, say) is going UP not down.
Hey NoJoco?”J R, no one was talking to you”Sure you were. It’s an open forum. You “talk” to everyone on it anytime you post. I’d submit you were “talking” to GMC so everyone else could see. And you were talking about just about anyone that was not GMC. If I’m wrong send him an email next time.
You did not confirm whether you are a candidate for something. Are you?Well if you are you’re off to a good start. Attribute something to me which I never asserted let alone stated.
Just where did I ever say this was my blog?It is you know.
It’s also yours and GMCs and Eds and everyone elses. I took you to task for saying what you thought the blog should be. It seemed to me you were claiming this as YOUR blog. Or maybe it was GMCs blog because you like his posts. It was you who erred in the direction of “ownership” not I.I even thanked you for your wisdom.How is that me appointing myself the self appointed spokesman for the blog? Because I spoke up? Should I ask permission next time?
Oh, I forgot the mighty England . . . 2.4 % of GDP.
Oh, I see where you got the 3 percent. That was how much we spent UNDER CLINTON.
Nice, switcheroo there, GMC.
Here’s a better source–http://www.laborresearch.org/story2.php/410
With Bush’s new fiscal year 2007 budget request for $440 billion in overall military spending, plus an additional $120 billion for Iraq and Afghanistan this year, the U.S. is spending more on its military than the entire rest of the world combined.
U.S. military spending as a percentage of GDP dropped to 3.0 percent during the Clinton years and then jumped to 3.4 percent in 2002, 3.7 percent in 2003, 3.9 percent in 2004 and 4.0 percent in 2005, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
The new budget and added spending for the war in Iraq and Afghanistan will push U.S. military spending to an estimated 4.3 percent of GDP.
Bush’s budget also calls for his 2001 and 2003 tax cuts to become permanent, at a cost of $178.6 billion over the next five years and $1.35 trillion over the next decade.
The new U.S. budget increases military spending by 6.9 percent but cuts nonmilitary spending by $2.2 billion, to $393.3 billion. Health and human services spending will fall 2.3 percent and education spending will drop by 3.8 percent.
The biggest health care cuts will come from Medicare by reducing the amounts paid to health care providers, primarily hospitals, hospices, nursing homes and home health agencies. These cuts will affect not only Medicare’s 42 million patients but also the health care workers who are already underpaid in many areas.
*****
So there you have it, billions cut from the taxes of the richest Americans so that Medicare recepients and everybody else gets less EXCEPT for the military, which gets more.
Is that your idea of “soak the rich” rhetoric?
It’s my idea of CLASS WARFARE.
But, thank God, Halliburton is doing well, isn’t it.
I’ve said before, TB, as a conservative I’d like to defend this administration, but it’s sometimes awfully hard.
Is the deficit at historical highs as compared to GDP? I don’t think so, but the problem is that it has continued, year after year, decade after decade, both parties in power. And it is beginning to reach a tipping point. Can this economy sustain such continued borrowing? No.
Now – I won’t even try to defend the bloated budget. I’m so tired of electing republicans who then proceed to govern like 70’s democrats, spending like drunken sailers. Gov’t is growing like mad, and no, I don’t like it. But just try to cut it back, and watch the howls begin.
I won’t attempt to defend Iraq. Said it before we went: going in was a mistake. And I have a son who’s been there. Marine. “Every Marine is a rifleman.” Amen.
The Harper’s numbers are meaningless; comparing 1948 numbers to 2006 numbers is apples and oranges. And google away on the 3%. I provided the links above, if you’re interested.The Pentagon is not the cause of the runaway deficit. The Bush tax cuts are part of the problem, but if we trippled, quadrupled, hell, seized outright the salaries of everyone in the nation who made a million $ a year or more, it wouldn’t make a dent. There just aren’t enough of them.
The money’s in the middle class. If the budget solution is to raise taxes, you have to raise where the dollars are. That’s the middle class, broadly defined.
That means spending must be cut. It must included so-called non-discretionary (entitlement) spending, because that’s the bulk of the budget. And that’s where the crying begins, because that is full of sacred cows; one for nearly everyone. There’s a constituency for each of those programs; constituencies who turn out on election day. We all think our benefit is fair and the other guys is juicy pork. EVERYONE’s ox must be gored, and make no mistake, it will hurt. We’ve become dependent on these transfer payments.
That means political will. The willingness to look beyond the next election cycle. It means leadership which will do what the right thing, even if unpopular, and is willing to take the political hit for it.
Now – if we could just agree on what the right thing is . . . !!
Thanks for your reasonable tone, GMC. I appreciate your honesty that this administration is not conservative. I disagree with the paleo-con agenda, but at least I understood it.
What we have with the neo-cons is Empire for Capitalism. We’re trying to be the new Rome.
Also I still have some quibbles with your assertions–where are the links again?
You state–”Is the deficit at historical highs as compared to GDP? I don’t think so, but the problem is that it has continued, year after year, decade after decade, both parties in power.”
Well, I have to take issue with that . . . The national debt IS at a historic high compared to GDP.
http://zfacts.com/p/318.html
Here’s a graph in constant dollars showing how the national debt bottomed out at about 30 percent of GDP under Carter then exploded under Reagan-Bush to almost 70 percent of GDP. Clinton paid it down–THANKS TO CUTTING THE MILITARY BUDGET AND RAISING TAXES ON THE WEALTHY–But then Bush II took office and the rest is history.
Worst. President. Ever.
The last fiscal conservative we’ve had in the White House since Carter was Clinton.
The rest of them spend like drunken Republicans . . .
There is a solution to this discord. We can return to a simpler form of government.
If all that government did was to perform its essential functions, that is, provide for the national defense, enforce laws and contracts, and a few other very limited things, government wouldn’t be nearly as important as it is.
If we all would agree to take care of our own needs as best we can, relying on ourselves to save for retirement, to provide for our own healthcare, and to educate ourselves and our children, government wouldn’t be nearly as important as it is.
Today, government is so important and has so much power that special interests will pay many millions to have laws changed just a little bit so that they favor them, almost always at the expense of someone else.
We have too much government at all levels. It is no wonder that we all fight over it so much. With a limited government expenditures would be so low, and taxes so low as well, that there wouldn’t be much to fight over. Much of the energy expended and the deadweight costs of government could instead be spent however people want.
I am reminded of F.A. Hayek writing in his book The Road to Serfdom: “As the coercive power of the state will alone decide who is to have what, the only power worth having will be a share in the exercise of this directing power.”
GMC – I question your assertion “seized outright the salaries of everyone in the nation who made a million $ a year or more, it wouldn’t make a dent. There just aren’t enough of them.”
I think I have seen numbers in the hundreds of thousands of those who make $1MM+. Conservatibvely calculating just 100K*$1MM gives $100 Billion. This would be quite a dent. And that ignores MULTI-millionaire status and the fact that it is several hundred thousand. I suspect you would be seeing on the order of a half-trillion.
Deficit, not debt.
There is a difference. Again, I won’t attempt to defend the levels of spending by this administration.
That sounds great in the abstract, KCL. But let’s look at real examples.
Places that have small gov’t’s are in the third world. Places that have big “intrusive” gov’t’s are Europe.
Where would you rather live? Mexico or Italy? Which has a better standard of living? El Salvador or Sweden?
We’ve been there and done that. We got the Great Depression, child labor, poisoned food, and despoiled environments.
Why do we want to go back to that?
Debt will be MUCH harder – it took Bush 6 years to dig the hole this deep it will take a good fiscal conservative a long time to dig our way out. If we can replace the drunken Republicans with fiscally responsible Democrats maybe we can get started.
Correct, Ben. Usually it’s the neo-cons who throw out the “fact” that such a large percentage of income tax is collected from the wealthiest 10 percent (like almost 50 percent) that it shows how they’re TAXED TOO MUCH.
The thing is, they pay so much more because they make so much more. Even if you went to a flat tax, they’d still pay a huge disproportional share of the revenue collected in income taxes.
Because when you’re the WalMart CEO and you make as much in two weeks as a WalMart worker makes IN A LIFETIME, you’re going to have to pay a lot more taxes than that worker at any rate of taxation.
KCL -
I tend to agree. However, given the levels that government has intruded into every conceivable part of society, and the political support there is for doing so, there is simply NO political will for dismantling much of the State.
I wish you the best of luck. I’m probably a borderline libertarian at heart. It chafes me to have to put on a seatbelt (it’s not the nanny state’s job to protect me from my windshield). But given the complexities of a modern industrial economy, the regulatory state is here to stay, I’m afraid. Classic libertarianism is a nice 19th century philosophy – it sounds good in theory, and would be nice, but given modern industrial realities, is unworkable both politically and realistically.
If you have a plan for dismantling much of government that could generate enough support to get accomplished, I’m all ears. It’s not as simple as that, of course.
Ben,I’d like to change “fiscally responsible Democrats” to fiscally responsible people.I know it’s a label thing.
TB -
Those salaries may well be obscene. But the stockholders decide them, not you. Not me.
Should government decide what those salaries should be? How ’bout yours? Mine? What else are you willing to let the state decide?
Want to go to confiscatory marginal rates? Go ahead. You’ll raise some dollars, but not nearly enough. Even that $100 billion figure trotted out by Ben is a proverbial drop in a very big bucket. And there will be an economic price to be paid as well.
The elephant in the room is entitlement spending. And no one wants to talk about it. Instead, we want to blame the evil rich. Evil they might be; I don’t know how stockholders justify some of the salaries paid in this economy. But soaking them will not solve the budget problem.
Folks, the comment about Civil War was an opinion, so let’s not get our panties all wadded up about it. Could it happen? IN MY OPINION, it sure could. Do I want it to? No, but as was stated upthread, a lot of things have happened lately that I never expected to see. And you need to look no further than these threads to understand why. Polite and reasoned discourse? Yeah, right! Civil wars don’t have to start with tanks in the street. But they can start with bombed churches, schools, goverment buildings, etc. To think it can’t happen here is to bury your head in the sand. Half of this country’s people have no say in our government now. Denial of representation is a good way to bring on civil war.
It happened once before.
It seems as if there are others who are drinking the same brand of “kool-aid” as I have been sipping.:)
Today’s Letter: A California High School Teacher Predicts America’s FutureFrom: Scott Patterson [e-mail him]
Re: Edwin S. Rubenstein’s Column: Dropout Nation? MSM whitewashes the role of immigration
I’m a California high school social studies teacher and I read VDARE. COM on a daily basis, with Rubenstein’s and Joe Guzzardi’s contributions about education being of particular interest to me.
In the recent past I’ve been a financial contributor to VDARE as well. I very much support and appreciate the important work all of your dedicated professionals do for our country.
I am troubled because the officials of both major parties have whored themselves and the nation for their own self-aggrandizement and enrichment and are, for all intents and purposes, bought and paid for.
Moreover each day somewhere about 3,000 illegal alien interlopers invade America, with the local, state, and federal governments each eager to lend them copious amounts of assistance in doing so. This is not what our fathers and grandfathers fought and died for.
Looking at history’s example, though, I anticipate that there will be a reaction to the present crisis put into action by a committed few—perhaps those who write for and read VDARE.COM.
To be concise, I strongly suspect that the present Balkanization created by multiculturalism will be violently reversed on a local or regional level, and a new nation closer to the original Republic re-established. When this happens, I expect to find ethnic, racial, and religious separation strictly enforced by the partisans on all sides, much as was the case in Yugoslavia during the 1990’s.
In summary I am saying that America as we knew may fade until it disappears. But then it will reappear on a lesser scale but with increased cohesion. We may pay a high cost in human blood.
Of course, I hope I am wrong.________________
In addition to social studies, Patterson also teaches U.S. history and American government in Ontario, California.http://www.vdare.com/letters/tl_042206.htm
Viva La Raza Blanco!!—–
GMC–
I did not suggest anything about gov’t setting salaries. Nor did I say anything about “confiscatory” taxation rates.
I know it’s a lot easier to defeat an argument when you get to distort that argument and then attack the distortion . . . but argue against what I wrote, not what you dislike in your version of “liberalism.”
My source (see link above) says this: “Bush’s budget also calls for his 2001 and 2003 tax cuts to become permanent, at a cost of $178.6 billion over the next five years and $1.35 trillion over the next decade.”
1.35 trillion is about 15 percent of the national debt. To raise this money, all we’d have to do is simply go back to Clinton’s tax rates for the wealthy, which were already historically low.
That’s a perfectly reasonable fiscally responsible position to take. Conservatives should like it because it reduces debt. Liberals like it because it asks the people who benefit more to sacrifice more.
Anybody but the wacked out neo-cons, who want to prove gov’t doesn’t work by destroying it, should be for it.
Also, entitlements are hated by conservatives. Maybe that’s why they love to keep parroting the falsehood that “entitlements are busting the budget.”
Wrong. Social security is currently fully funded. It’s the only part of our federal budget that IS fully funded. It has a dedicated tax that is pretty regressive because it is only collected on the first 90 K of income.
What’s busting the budget is increasing military spending from Clinton’s (already too high) 3 percent of GNP to our current 4.3 percent of GNP.
We’d be paying down the national debt as we did under Clinton if BushCo. weren’t funnelling that 1.3 percent of GDP to their cronies like Halliburton.
XXX: I have to take issue with your statement that one half of the people have no say in our government. We all do. It’s called the vote. We are all going have our say on election day. That’s the way we settle things in America.
Democrats, after all those years in charge of the government sure seem to have difficulty with being the minority party. I know these are fringe elements that would even bring up the subject of civil war. The “we get our way or we throw a fit” crowd. Civil war…, jeesh.The power of the ballot box will result in inevitable change. I think that it would change a lot sooner if there were a third party that could combine social conservatism with populism. I know that a lot of social conservatives with populist streaks (like me) get tired of the pandering to the wealthy that we see in the Republican party. But we certainly can’t turn to the Democratic party.
Outlander, I see your point, but you missed mine. Democratic legislation is bottled up in committee and not allowed out for a floor vote or Democrats are not allowed to add amendments. Is American government for all Americans, or just for those who support the party in power?
Outlander?
A part populist. Didn’t know that about you. I find that interesting.
XXX you were right in line to bring up civil war. The subject was whether the country is ungovernable because of friction between the factions. Civil War is often the result of such difficulties. ( Witness Iraq) Some folks don’t like it too bad.
Outlander? It isn’t so difficult to imagine.
“The we get our way or we throw a fit crowd” your words
Wouldn’t that describe the GOP zealots who were bussed in to the Florida recounts and shut them down with acts that bordered on riotous? What if there had been a similar crowd of Democrats? What if the decision ultimately came down for Gore?
Think on that. Put yourself in the shoes of 50 million + people in a definite popular victory and a questionable electoral loss. What if a President Gore had stuck his finger in YOUR eye and said in a mocking tone “A president is a president of all the people”
Your side would never have swallowed it. There might have been blood in the streets. And if you think our “hatred” is bad just consider yours if the places were reversed.
By the way Out, with a third party America would more closely act in a Parliamentary fashion. In that sort of system bush would already be gone.
You are right that elections are meant to mitigate such difficulties as civil war. The upshot encouraging thing here is that bush has failed so badly and the GOP controlled goverement with him that the balance will tip back the other way.
But the thing is? I suspect when that happens the hate will only get worse. Only it will be YOUR turn to feel a righteous indignation to justify your portion of it.
Those who believe that only government can save us from ourselves ought to think twice. Please realize also the very slow growth of most European economies, leading to a declining standard of living in Europe. This is not a model that we wish to emulate.
I think it’s quite a stretch to believe that the only reason children don’t work long days in factories in America is because of government. It’s more likely due to increased productivity of adult workers, so most families can have a decent standard of living without sending their children to work. Or are you saying that today, if there were no child labor laws, that children would be sent back to work? (We have illegal immigrants for that, I’m tempted to say.)
As for the Great Depression, whatever its causes, you can find plenty of economists today that argue that Roosevelt’s policies — the start of the really big government era — prolonged the Great Depression.
Poisoned food: isn’t it illegal to poison someone? What role does government have in preventing this? Whatever role it does play, we still have problems, don’t we: e. coli from time to time, Japan won’t accept our beef, Vioxx, etc. So what exactly is government doing for us in this regard?
As to environmental damage, much is caused by the “tragedy of the commons.” The cure for that is stewardship that private property rights foster.
I wonder, TrueBlue, if you believe that higher tax rates are better, did you calculate what your income taxes would have been under the “Clinton” higher rates? And if they were higher, did you send that difference in to the U.S. Treasury? There’s nothing from stopping you from doing this.
JR: You are just letting your imagination run now. Theraputic, I suppose.
If there had been a Gore victory there would have been grousing, but acceptance. After all, Gore wasn’t going to be different than the status quo. “Blood in the streets”. That’s a good one!
I think that these days in America we make mountains out of molehills. An awful lot of people in the world would love to have our troubles.
But we are so into politics now that every little point is magnified 100 times what it was before the days of 24 hr news channels and the internet. Things that you may not even have paid attention to then now make our blood pressure go ballistic.
I don’t know the answer. I hope that reasonable people prevail. I just know that threats to work outside the system are not helpful.
“KansasClassicLiberal”
I wonder at your relevance to this thread.
This thread is about fighting between the left and the right and the difficulties for governing America in that light.
Your post and you seem out of place here “KCL”You are no liberal. You are more Libertarian.(been watching you)
If you cannot be honest about what “side” you are on you’ve no truck on a thread about “sides”.
Do go away and get a more appropriate nic. Then come on back.
J R, who apparently has been appointed moderator of this thread, might want to do some reading in political history.
From Wikipedia: “Classical liberalism (also called classic liberalism) is a political ideology that embraces individual rights, private property and a laissez-faire economy, a government that exists to protect the liberty of each individual from others, and a constitution that protects individual autonomy from governmental power.”
Isn’t that a pretty fair description of my views?
And please, stop watching me. It makes me nervous.
TB
We probably agree more than we disagree. I’ve already written that making the Bush cuts permanent at this time is not wise. There is a time for tax cuts, and a time not to; now is the time not to. In fact, given our current fiscal state, ANY further tax cuts should probably be foregone, at least for now.
That’s a start. Now the other side. Entitlements are still the elephant in the room. Seehttp://www.heritage.org/Research/Budget/tst021606a.cfm
Yes, I know, you’ll complain that the link is to the heritage foundation, a conservative think-tank. Fine. The numbers are the same wherever you go. Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid, the three largest non-discretionary spending items, still exist, even on the democratic think-tank ledgers. And within a generation (20-30 years), given current demographics and trends, those three programs will squeeze out most, if not all “discretionary” spending.
Those programs are “non-discretionary,” of course, only because Congress chooses to make them so. Spending on them is set not by specific appropriations but by adjusting qualifications for receipt of benefits. Congress created those programs, Congress set the qualifications, and Congress can exercise its discretion to change spending here, if it has the political will.
Before the usual suspects go after me for “Republicans wanting to gut Social Security,” just do the numbers. The SS program is long term unsustainable as currently operating. Wishing will not make that go away. Unless you are planning on killing off vast numbers of baby boomers, or adding vast numbers of new workers to the funding side (perhaps those immigrants we are so ready to throw out?) the numbers simply don’t add up. The shell game that is the SS trust fund will run out.
Bush frankly gets credit for little, but he ought to get credit for at least having the political will to raise SS reform. Rather than using his proposal (useful, but flawed) as a starting point for real reform, Congressional democrats demougoged it (I probably didn’t spell that right!!).
Until we deal with entitlements, we are just tinkering on the edges of long-term fiscal cures.
And I don’t think I set up a straw-man at all. You raised the issue; I simply pointed out that government doesn’t control compensation, nor can those dollars be used to get the budget under control without significant tax hikes on those obscene incomes; i.e. soaking the rich. You want to call that a straw man, that’s your problem.
Finally, yes, in my heart of hearts, I think government ultimately doesn’t work. Remember the three great lies? That’s not a joke, that’s reality, no matter which party holds the political levers. It’s the nature of government. So, given a choice, smaller is always better. I have no illusions about returning to a libertarian paradise, however. While it would be nice, human nature in a complex industrial world makes it impossible.
JR
Learn some basic “civics” (I hate that word) before you make statements like this:
“with a third party America would more closely act in a Parliamentary fashion. In that sort of system bush would already be gone.”
A third party would not make this a parliamentary system. Single member districts, fixed terms, etc. make this system what it is, and are the primary reasons a third party is not practically viable.
Want real change?1) reduce the use of primaries to choose candidates. The party hard liners show up for primaries, and push the Reps to the right, the Dems to the left.
2) get involved in organization and campaigning at that primary / candidate selection level, and change the nature of the candidates for the two parties.
A third party? Not viable, not feasible, not realistic given the structural and constitutional realities of this system. Folks who stay home, waiting for that third party to arise that they can rally around are fooling themselves, and handing control of the major parties over to their respective extreme wings.
“If there had been a Gore victory there would have been grousing, but acceptance.”
Yes indeed. We noted your acceptance of both Clinton victories.
And we should believe Gore would have been treated differently? Big eye roll here. R’s spent eight years working feverishly to get Clinton out of office.
Would that the democrats had “accepted” the bush non-election so well.
I was gonna mention that KCL is no liberal in his posts, as evidenced over time. But I see JR beat me to it and took the blows accordingly.
KCL, you dont fit any definition of liberal. It doesnt matter to me, but you could be a little more honest.
‘Before the usual suspects go after me for “Republicans wanting to gut Social Security,” just do the numbers. The SS program is long term unsustainable as currently operating. Wishing will not make that go away. Unless you are planning on killing off vast numbers of baby boomers, or adding vast numbers of new workers to the funding side (perhaps those immigrants we are so ready to throw out?) the numbers simply don’t add up. The shell game that is the SS trust fund will run out.’
Okay, GMC, everything you wrote there is totally wrong. We’ve gone round and round on SS over the years on this blog, and I’m not going to rehash the issue.
GW Bush predicted in the 1970’s that Social Security would be “broke” in 1988. Conservatives were absolutely sure in the ’80’s that Social Security would be toast by the mid-90’s.
But please consider this–even if SS were going broke (which it’s not), that isn’t the problem we’re facing NOW.
The nearly 9 trillion in nat’l debt is NOW, and SS isn’t causing it. As previously stated, SS is the only program that ISN’T in deficit.
We should be paying down the debt we have before we do some radical “fix” for a potential problem that has not yet emerged.
Trouble is, conservatives don’t HATE the debt like they hate Social Security, so it’s not a problem . . .
BTW, how does one work for the government and basically detest what it stands for at the same time?
Not understanding that at all.
ksfarmgrrl,
Indeed. The Right no more would have accepted a Gore Presidency than they accepted a Clinton Presidency. It would have been the same Mellon-Schaife / scandal-treason playbook leading toward impeachment. Does anybody seriously think otherwise?
The Right has decided that it won’t allow itself to be governed by the Left. Once the Left makes the decision the Right has already made, then civil war becomes a real possibility–GMC70’s and Outlander’s complacent reassurances notwithstanding.
GMC–
Why is this not a contradiction?
I’ve already written that making the Bush cuts permanent at this time is not wise. There is a time for tax cuts, and a time not to; now is the time not to. In fact, given our current fiscal state, ANY further tax cuts should probably be foregone, at least for now. . . .
And I don’t think I set up a straw-man at all. You raised the issue; I simply pointed out that government doesn’t control compensation, nor can those dollars be used to get the budget under control without significant tax hikes on those obscene incomes; i.e. soaking the rich. You want to call that a straw man, that’s your problem.
*****
On the one hand you agree that tax cuts for the rich are a bad idea. On the other hand, you say that we can’t raise enough money to pay down the debt unless we raise taxes on the rich which you seem to think is bad.
Why is raising taxes on the rich to pre-Bush levels inconsistent with what you said at the beginning of your post?
Also, the straw man was attacking my position by saying that I think gov’t should have some influence over salaries. I don’t think that. There’s nothing wrong with making those who benefit more, pay more though. And one Bill Gates can pay the taxes of a thousand ordinary workers, which is as it should be, since he makes a thousand times more.
CF -
Threats from your side, not mine. The premise of democratic government (small D) is that the electorate accept the result of elections, whether we like them or not. That does not mean we stop working to get candidates we like elected. When Clinton was elected in 92, it was entirely justified for Reps to work for his defeat, just as it is appropriate for Dems to work for the defeat of the Reps in the Administration and Congress now.
“The Right has decided that it won’t allow itself to be governed by the Left.” You now speak for the “Right?” Any EVIDENCE for this rather outlandish statement? No? I thought not.
Civil War? Puleeease.
Consider that Reagan-Bush-Bush have already created Civil Wars in countries like Nicaragua, El Salvador and are at this very moment eager to overthrow the democratically elected gov’t of Hugo Chavez.
Why?
Because they are leftist.
If the Repubs won’t allow leftist gov’t’s in Central and South America, why should they allow them here?
Accept the results of a rigged election which put a treasonous man who is only serving Zionist Israel at the cost of every American.
You are also insane.
This is a crisis in our United States government. None bigger. Certainly not a “left” “right” issue.
GMC70,
I’ve got to go to class, but here are two pieces of evidence off the top of my head.
-Eight years of Right wing publications (Regnery) and fruitless investigations into crimes by Bill Clinton that did not exist. This wasted millions of taxpayer dollars. Bill Clinton was duly elected, by the way, but this wasn’t enough to stop the rabit right from taking every step possible to delegitimate his Presidency. One still hears these arguments from Wingnuts.
-The decision of Speaker Dennis Hastert to pass legislation with only a ‘majority of the majority,’ thereby nullifying the votes of Democratic representatives.
As for your studied attempt at a breezy dismissal, I’ll believe my own lyin’ eyes over your Right Wing happy talk, any day, thanks.
LH
I thought I was speaking to TB, but that’s OK.
1. I don’t think it’s a contradiction to say that given the current fiscal situation, making the Bush tax cuts currently scheduled to expire permanent is a bad idea. Not sure how that translates to “raising taxes on the rich,” but you set up the false assertion. I’ve never written against progressive taxation; in fact, if you’ve paid attention, I’ve said just the opposite. The issue is just how high do we want those marginal rates to go up, and what is the economic cost of doing so?
2. As noted above, if we are going to tax our way to fiscal responsibility, the vast bulk of dollars will have to come from the middle class – that’s where the real money is. And I don’t think there is the political will to do that in either party.
3. As to Social Security – either you’ve bought the Dems playbook hook, line, and sinker (those big, bad Republicans just want to hurt old people!!!), or you’re not paying attention. Yes, the fund takes in more than it pays out. FOR NOW. But inevitable demographic trends will within 15-30 years change that, and drasticly (just how far out depends on who’s numbers one uses). Further, those current surplus fund dollars are being used to fund the rest of the Fed. Gov’t; we are essentially borrowing from our own retirement account (an account that is destined to fail, eventually, even if we weren’t taking from it) to pay our bills, putting IOU’s in, and treating the IOUs as if they are real money. At some point, those IOUs (gov’t bonds) have to be paid.
In short, given the current system, if you are under, oh, say 30 or so today, SS will be insolvent before you see a dollar in benefits absent substantial tax increases or major cuts in “discretionary” spending. And the longer we wait to fix it, the more painful the fix will be.
Those are the facts, like it or not. Those entitlements are indeed the elephant in the room. We CANNOT get our fiscal house in order LONG TERM without dealing with them.
Ed:
I just look at the source and dismiss your writing. A Jew-hating nut. I feel sorry for you.
CF:
Yea, I know. The “vast right-wing conspiracy.” Bla, bla, bla. Whatever.
Please.
As a Zionist-Jew piece of Shit, I imagine you’d do a lot of things to hurt the Good Jews, and that’s exactly what you do.
Shot any Palestinians today, bastard?
From The Columbia Encyclopedia:
“Classical liberalism stressed not only human rationality but the importance of individual property rights, natural rights, the need for constitutional limitations on government, and, especially, freedom of the individual from any kind of external restraint. Classical liberalism drew upon the ideals of the Enlightenment and the doctrines of liberty supported in the American and French revolutions.”
So when I call my self Kansas Classic (let me underscore “Classic”) Liberal, am I not being accurate?
Ah GMC
Ever the stuffed shirt.
I do see you are learning how to play here. You’re getting better at the art of attack instead of just well worded bloviating.
I did not say a third party would make ours a parliamentary system. I said it would make it act more like a parliamentary system. And I was correct.
Consider bush current standing in the country on just about any issue. Think he’ll be wanted for campaign apperances for many GOP Senators or Representantives? Hell no he won’t they don’t want any part of him.
If some of those congressmen and Senators were of a third party, it is pretty fair to bet the sentiment against bush would have resulted in his impeachment and perhaps removal by now. They would have done it to protect themselves from bush’s fallout.
We also might have ended by now or never entered the rediculous mess in Iraq.
A third party is a good solution to the acrimony. But that acrimony makes it unlikely that a third party could ever get off the ground.
Social Security? I’d like to have seen Al Gore’s oft ridiculed “lock box” get a chance. You know, actually holding the taxes collected for SS to be used exclusively for SS.
Civil war? Probably not. (too bad?) Unless we try to make all the illegals go home. Or cancel American Idol. Or outlaw Nascar. 50% of the American public is too uninformed or too stupid to be outraged.
You best sharpen your knives and your skills GMC. You are up against much bigger guns than me here. No one has posted yet (that I have seen) the news that C Fs eloquent post upthread ( I thought he was a little hard on the not wingunt raptor) has been included in the “greatest posts” on the Democratic Underground. Well done C F!The “moderator” congratulates you.
Oh and KCL? Quit throwing definitions around. Are you trying to convince me or yourself?
J R,
The ‘immoderator’ (that’s me!)thanks you.
GMC70,
When Wingnuts respond to facts by hissing ‘conspiracy theory,’ I declare victory.
Don’t definitions mean anything to you, J R?
As it unfortunately turns out, no time to post today or probably even tommorrow, but I haven’t forgotten about you, GMC. I intended to ignore your extended ad hominem anyway (yawn), and deal with the budget issues in depth; I presume that meets with your approval. If the thread goes cold, there’s always e-mail. . .
JR, while I suspect my words will be parsed to the extreme, informally speaking (no research), “classical liberal” is a term that many self-described “limited-government” conservatives use to label themselves, sometimes with a libertarian streak, sometimes not. To my understanding, it’s based on the notion that they are truer to the ethos of 18th century liberals ilke Madison and Jefferson than today’s liberals are.
Robert Bork is perhaps the most infamous example of a self-described “classical liberal” (as he favors neither limited government powers nor libertarian principles, I would hope KCL disassociates him/herself from the man’s views!).
I see JR is supporting my proposal of a third party. I didn’t invent it. I just read a lot. Like about the Populist Party that Kansas spearheaded more than a century ago. It failed to establish a long-standing tri-party system, but it got Dems and Repubs to make some accommodations. JR doesn’t like much of what I say. I don’t like much of what JR says. But sometimes we agree.
The greatest period of large scale prosperity occurred after WWII. The war decimated Europe’s and Japan’s industrial infrastructure. It annihilated their able-bodied blue-collar corps. America’s blue-collar corps was the only one left standing. Then, the fact that we had 12 million battle-hardened vets who were not going to allow themselves to be abused like their fathers’ and grandfathers’ generation forced capitalists to accept “partnership”.
We’ve lost these conditions. So capitalists are going offshore to get cheaper labor, and bringing them in, against the law. They want to dominate and workers. They don’t conciously say, “We want to impoverish American workers,” but they think, “How can I become rich…superrich?”
Read the Wall Street Journal op-ed pages. They denigrate Europe. You see, Europe is struggling to maintain deccent livelihoods for ALL citizens. So it has socialist-welfare paradigms. They are imperfect. America developed these under FDR and after WWII. Now, the capitalists want to demolish social welfare. They believe in social Darwinism: “Let the fittest survive.”
Maybe this will work. I dunno. I believe in a Gospels’ idea of helping the weak. Maybe this is a foolish idea.
I believe in intelligent design. I mean in terms of human invention, this is undeniably true. I have a belief in its relevance to biology. But I believe in evolution too. When you go to Fiji, or New Guinea, or Australia, and see curly-haired black Melanesians whom geneticists find “They came from China, not Africa,” then that’s evolution.
I think we have humoongous natural energy resources, that if we put our minds to developing, can enable us to not try to dominate other countries that sit atop petroleum, but become independent of them, and then trade with them on an equitable basis. Petroleum consists of amazing molecules. You can do so much more with petroleum than just burn it up. Like construct things with it.
Okay, GMC, I see you’re a good fit for your field.
“We must speak by the card or equivocation will undo us.” Hamlet
Social Security is not going broke as long as we can keep the Republicans away from destroying it.
The real money for taxation is the top 10 percent who con
Top 1 percent ave. net worth of 10 million dollars. The top 10 percent have an ave. net worth of 650,000.
The bottom 40 have a net worth of 1,000 and the next 20 have a net worth of 161,000.
So it’s obvious that the bottom 60 percent of America does not generate enough wealth to pay down our massive debt.
It can only come from, as you say, where the money is–the top income earners.
From 77 to 99, the top 5th saw their incomes grow by 43 percent. The bottom 5th saw their incomes drop by 9 percent.
You got to tax people with income. That means the wealthy.
Sorry to burst your conservative bubble with the simple facts.
BTW, why do you work in gov’t if you hate gov’t?
LH / TB:
Which is it? And why two? Perhaps some schitzophrenia here? Does one debate the other? do you sit across from yourself?
1) “Social Security is not going broke as long as we can keep the Republicans away from destroying it.” Usual demogougery. Unfortunately not consistent with facts.
2) We tax income, not net worth. They’re not the same thing, though related. Now, if you propose seizing property as taxation, let’s just say so. 5th amendment, eminent domain, etc. issues there, of course.
3) The truth is still there. To long-term put the fiscal house in order, one must either raise taxes or cut spending. Now I know it is an article of Democratic faith that it is the big bad rich Republicans who have ALL the money, and if we just took all the money of all the rich, we’d be fine, but it ain’t so. While a very small percentage makes enormous incomes (yes, I think unjustifiably so, but I’m not the stockholders writing the checks), it is in fact a very small percentage of population. The vast majority of income goes to the vast middle class, earning (very) roughly between $30,000 to $250,000 a year. To bring the budget into order with taxes those are the taxes which must be raised. That’s where the income is. I got no problem with progressive taxation (I’m not a flat tax fan BTW), but if you think that if we just make it progressive enough, and take enough rich people’s incomes, all our fiscal troubles are over, you’re dreaming.
4. That still leaves spending, broken down roughly into discretionary and non-discretionary spending. The bulk of that spending is non-discretionary, i.e. entitlements (roughly 2/3, I think). We can slash away at discretionary spending and make a dent (cutting a lot of programs near and dear to a lot of hearts, BTW), but if the entitlements continue to grow as demographics indicate they will, over time they will eat up discretionary spending. To deal with the spending side, we must deal with entitlements. Bury your head to your heart’s content, it won’t change.
Was the “lockbox” a good idea? (say it slower and duller, of course) Yea, as far as it went. Part of reform certainly must be to quit raiding the trust fund to fund spending. But that’s just moving money around – we may have quit robbing Peter to pay Paul, but we still have to pay Paul, of course, and there is an enormous debt to Peter built up. It’s not enough.
The real problem is that SS was designed for a democraphic reality that no longer exists. We’ve tinkered with it, and stretch it to meet today’s needs, of course, but it’s been stretched about as far as it can go. It’s time for some out of the box thinking (yes, even out of the lockbox).
And that is impossible as long as any proposal to reform SS is pilloried immediately as “they’re trying to take old people’s pensions away!”
And JR, you just keep demonstrating you don’t know what your’re talking about. You neither understand parliamentary politics nor the realities of this political system. (sigh). But hang in there.
Gotta go see the significant other and kids, all. It’s been fun!
Okay, if you refuse to acknowledge facts, GMC, there’s no point in continuing.
You say that military spending is 3 percent of GDP and provide no links. I provide links that show it used to be 3 percent but now it’s 4.3 percent of GDP, roughly twice as much as countries in the industrialized world.
You still insist that your 3 percent figure is correct and that you DID to provide links . . . when all one has to do is look at your posts to see you didn’t.
Hey, I got an idea. How about you quit just flat-out lying?
Now let’s AGAIN consider your assertion that taxes can only be raised from the middle class.
Here’s what the Joint Economic Committee reported in Oct of 2005.
“IRS data for 2003, the most recent available, show that the top half of taxpayers ranked by income continue to pay over 96 percent of Federal individual income taxes while the bottom half accounts for just less than 3.5 percent.
“The top one percent of tax filers paid 34.27 percent of Federal personal income taxes in 2003, while the top ten percent accounted for 65.84 percent of these taxes. To be counted in the top one percent taxpayers needed Adjusted Gross Income (AGI) of $295,495 or more. The 2003 AGI cut-off amount for the top ten percent is $94,891, while the cut-off amount for the top/bottom fifty percent is $29,019.
http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache:h6UE6d6MBgsJ:www.house.gov/jec/publications/109/Research%2520Report_109-20.pdf+%22income+tax%22+%22top+ten+percent%22&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=1
What this is clearly showing, no matter how much you want to deny it or ridicule it as a “liberal article of faith” is that our income taxes NOW come mainly from the wealthiest individuals. This would occur no matter what rate of taxation is imposed because they have such a large share of income . . . and under Bush, it has grown sharply.
We cannot dream of balancing the budget unless the people who benefit the most be required to pay for the system that benefits them.
I of course also believe in cutting spending, which another reason I believe Bush is the Worst. President. Ever.
Here’s an article that Democracy for America wrote in response to Dole’s article for SS “piratization.” The Eagle ran it in Sept. Because they charge to access old articles, I have copied it in its entirety below.
Enjoy–
Sen. Robert Dole said in one of his presidential debates: “I used to go home (and) my mother would tell me, ‘Bob, all I’ve got is my Social Security and my Medicare. Don’t cut it.’ I wouldn’t violate anything my mother said.”
Unfortunately, Dole’s recent commentary showed that he is indeed willing to cut Social Security benefits – benefits that support disabled workers and 4 million orphaned children as well as retirees (”New thinking needed on Social Security,” Aug. 23 Opinion).
Dole repeated several of President Bush’s talking points. One is the alarming statistic that in 1950, 16 workers supported every beneficiary, and that now it’s only 3-to-1. But he neglected to mention the rest of the story: In 1945, there were 45 workers to one beneficiary; in 1950, 16-to-1; in 1965, 4-to-1; in 1970, 3-to-1; and today, 3-to-1.
Did the drastic reduction of workers to beneficiaries bankrupt the system over the past 60 years? No. On the contrary, the only agency of our federal government currently operating in a surplus is the Social Security program. Yet Bush wants to pull $2 trillion from the trust fund to “fix” a problem that does not now exist.
By 2017, Dole (echoing Bush) wrote, Social Security will pay out more than it receives. Not only is this misleading, it ignores some important facts. Social Security has paid out more than it took in 14 times since it was created. This has not “bankrupted” the system. More important, payroll taxes were increased in the 1980s to prepare for the larger baby boom population. That’s why the Social Security trust fund now has a $1.5 trillion surplus, a surplus that will continue to grow until 2028.
It’s true that the Congressional Budget Office has projected that full benefits can be paid only until 2052. But that projection is assuming very slow growth for 40 years. Under a normal-case scenario, full benefits can be paid for infinity.
Does it make sense to gut a system that has never missed a paycheck for more than 50 years because of the small possibility it might miss its benefit schedule some 50 years into the future?
Dole also repeated the right-wing talking point that Franklin Roosevelt himself supported the idea of “voluntary annuities.” FDR was referring to a possible stopgap for beneficiaries too old to pay into regular Social Security at the start of the program.
What FDR did believe was that he had set up the program “so as to give the contributors a legal, moral and political right to collect their pensions and their unemployment benefits. With those payroll taxes there, no damn politici an can ever scrap my Social Security program.” Despite FDR’s best intentions, the “damn politicians” now running our country are trying to do exactly that.
Max Skidmore, a nationally recognized expert on Social Security, pointed out in a recent event at Century II that “the only true threat facing the system comes from a skillful and well-financed propaganda campaign, a campaign that has convinced many citizens and policymakers that Social Security is in dire need of reform – that it must be ’saved.’ The real danger is not that Social Security is unsound, but that its enemies might convince the public to accept ‘reforms’ that would destroy it.”
Like Dole’s mom, we need to send our representatives in Washington, D.C., a clear and unambiguous message: Social Security is all we’ve got. Don’t cut it.
P.S. TB/LH (should I explain THAT one to him?—NAAAH! Let him scratch his head), you and others have done a good job of already saying that which I would have said, and TB in particular: you’ve said it better than I would have.
I would just add that putting military spending or, generally speaking, any federal outlays solely into the context of the GDP alone is a perfect way of (deliberately) muddying the budgetary issues, which, unfortunately, do not necessarily correlate with the GDP, at least not in any predictable fashion.
The simple upshot: When receipts fall short of outlays you have deficits. And we have seen repeatedly how economic “stimulus” in the form of regressive tax cuts has failed to generate revenue, and how little the Social Security TRUST FUND (the reason why those of us who make less than 95G a year have a separate FICA box on our pay stubs) has not, in fact, had anything to do with it–though those who have despised the program from the outset would sure like to see it on the table. . .and served for dinner.
Remove the word “little” above (two ways to say the same thing, and they both stayed in by accident. . .)
Where did ProudLib go?
Upthread, I took some flak for bringing up Civil War. Of course we’re too civilized for a thing like that. Cooler heads will prevail, right?
Maybe we should take a little closer look. Here are some conservative responses to an animation on the internet by a 15 year-old girl:
“A little advice for you leftist losers out there: I own a gun, a truck, and a backhoe and prison doesn’t scare me. And I’ve got an extra 15 acres in which to hide your unwashed bodies.”
“It’s people like you who need to f**king die and get raped while your corpse rots in the sun,”
“You are a TRAITOR to your country and should be executed for treason,”
“All you do is bitch about the US. If you hate it so much, why don’t you GET THE F**K OUT.”
“Why don’t you go masterbate (sic) to a pic of Sheehan and fuck off,”
The republicans have all the guns (and backhoes).
Well, X, like I said earlier, I don’t see tanks in the streets. But we got plenty o’ random nutcases, and some not-so-random, and best-selling authors cheering them on. I’m just hoping this crap is starting to play itself out.
Good point XXX – lets not forget Ann Coulter’s hero Tim McVeigh (I only wish he had bombed the NYTimes). Add to that a certain poster here who commented about shooting people just for disagreeing with rightie policy.
Rage, I don’t see tanks in the streets either. The military role in an insurrection would be cloudy. I’d like to say most people in uniform would be hard-pressed to fire on American civilians, but there was that incident at Kent State.
Ben, I think there are a lot of Ann Coulter types out there. I think part of what defines us and sets us apart from the other side is the level of poliemecs in our discourse. While I may dissagree with the other side, I have no desire to physically injure any of them. I don’t know of any Liberal who would want to rape or kill anybody over a political dissagreement. Wish we could say that of conservatives.
Thanks all.
Isn’t it funny how the conservatives love to claim that they’re the ones to whom “facts matter,” until you confront them with facts and then it’s back to the old “liberal/socialist/hate the rich” sliming?
CF put it so well–”hate is their tool.”
Oh, I almost forgot the “class warfare rhetoric.”
It’s fine for reactionaries to ENGAGE in class warfare by slashing taxes for Paris Hilton.
But if you complain about it, then you’re guilty of “class warfare.”
Unbelievable.
“Robert Bork is perhaps the most infamous example of a self-described “classical liberal”
Thanks to Rage for clearing that up, as we say.
I saw nothing “liberal” in KCL’s posts. But then, it never occured to me that BORK would call himself any kind of liberal, much less classic.
I get the distinction. I will ponder if I am guilty as well. I will QUICKLY disassociate myself from Bork!
I dont want to rape or murder either, but I still say let the revolution begin. I’m ready.
Hell hath no fury like a lesbian scorned. :)
Gee, can we pillage? :)
Ditto, Grrl.
Using the 19th century European definition of “liberal” (which also was associated with anti-monarchy movements) in today’s context is pedantic if not downright disingenuous.
It’s like me calling myself a “conservative” because I believe in conserving nature like Teddy Rooseveldt did.
Maybe we should call the neo-cons Humpty Dumpties after this famous passage:
‘When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone,’ it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less.’
‘The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean so many different things.’
‘The question is,’ said Humpty Dumpty, ‘which is to be master – that’s all.’
T R is one of my favorite Presidents. So I get to be a “conservative” too.
Humpty Dumpty reminds me of he who shall not be named.
If I say his name he’ll come back!
I’m a pretty nice liberal. But I think I could probably throw something foul at Annie or Rash or Vanity. Most of their lackeys are not to be beaten but pitied their stupidity.
ksfarmgrrl
Do you know the origin of the term “lesbian”
Yes Ed, I do! The Isle of Lesbos.
“CF -Threats from your side, not mine. ”
I guess GMC hasn’t checked out the right-wing blogosphere. There is–of course!–plenty of sharp-edged lefty invective out there, but Digby nicely lays out the difference:
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2006_04_01_digbysblog_archive.html#114602667351654601
TB
We obviously disagree on this one. I’ll ignore the silliness immediately above (for now) and get to the point.
As to the Eagle article (now there’s a reliable source!):
1) you start with the old canard that all those evil Repubs want to cut SS, leaving widows and orphans homeless as he cackle away rolling in cash. Please.
2) you then point out that demographics have changed drastically over time. Of course. That’s the point. You point out that we have made a number of changes to deal with that. Yes, that’s the point. They’ve been stopgaps, and they’ve worked, so far. And we will have to do so again.
You speak of the $1.5 trillion surplus. A large part of the problem is that it is not a cash surplus, it is in gov’t bonds. That’s the dirty little secret. Many Americans are convinced that somewhere in DC, “their” account is safely tucked away. Not so, never was. If it were deposited in a bank somewhere, gaining interest, liquid, that surplus would be more comforting.
But it’s not. Those bonds will have to be cashed. With tax dollars; tax dollars drawn from the general fund, not FICA dollars. Because as even you concede, there will reach a time when the system pays out more than it takes in.
See. R. Samuelson’s column, current Newsweek. Hardly an administration apologist. And he’s making the same points I am. He further points out that SS may be the bright spot in the entitlements mess. Medicare and Medicaid are exploding even faster (thanks, in part, to the new drug benefit, a badly thought through piece of legislation, certainly.)
As you’ve noticed, I’m not particularly an apologist for this administration either. As a conservative, I find the administration’s fiscal policy appauling. I simply want to be realistic about where we go from here, and what must be done. And gutting the military (yes, even one that has grown since 9/11 substantially, in large part due to the Iraq misadventure) simply will not do it. Slashing discretionary spending alone will not do it. We MUST be willing to put EVERYTHING on the table. That also includes tax increases, which must be broad in order to raise the kinds of dollars needed. Should the rich pay more? Sure. Should they pay higher percentages? Sure. Can the dollars needed be raised from the rich alone? Not a chance.
I’m not interested in gutting the safety net, no one is. On the contrary, I want to make sure that the safety net is indeed a real one, rather than an illusion. And right now, long term (my kids), the safety net is seriously frayed.
But enough. We know where we stand. Thanks, TB/LH for the discussion on issues without the pejoratives being thrown around.
A lot of posters here are either not reading my posts carefully, or they’ve been stuck in the same talking points for too long.Again, if one is willing to concede that reasonable people may disagree, a lot can be understood and accomplished. But, sadly, (look immediately above this post), for too many here that’s simply not the case. They immediately decide that anyone who disagrees with them must per se be unreasonable, and then proceed to marginalize them.
And FKG, KCL is correct in his definition. You’d call it libertarian, but the label doesn’t matter much. “Liberal” as used in American politics has little relation to it’s classic definition, the definition that KCL cites here. Frankly, by that definition, all of us (excepting perhaps a couple of nuts) are classic liberals. That’s why I continue to say that we agree on more than we disagree on. Our disagreements are about the edges, the limits or possible extensions of the role of gov’t. The essential foundations we agree on. And that makes most if not all of us in the American political mainstream “liberal” in the classic sense.
“Because as even you concede, there will reach a time when the system pays out more than it takes in.”
Uh . . . actually, I’m NOT conceding that. That was from the same report that Bush disingenuously used to say SS was going “bankrupt.”
Under normal growth scenarios, as opposed to the fake ones BushCo cooked, SS will not pay out more than it takes in.
Consider–the average payout for SS is about 36 percent of one’s average salary. As long as we have about 3 people paying in for every retiree, we don’t have a problem, do we? It’s self-sustaining.
If there were really a problem–which there isn’t–it could be easily remedied by increasing the cap on SS from 90K to 200K say.
Fortunately, that won’t be necessary as long as the Republicans don’t “piratize” the program.
I know, old thread. But the Wichita Eagle just ran (yesterday, perhaps day before) in section A an article noting that the trustees of the SS / Medicare / Medicaid system reported that the Medicare/Medicaid side is is nearing insolvency, and the SS trust fund is destined for same, absent immediate reforms.
Seems like someone pointed that out. Hmmm, wonder who?
Deny all you like. Sand. Head. Invert. But the problem won’t go away.