Are Neolib Democrats Real Democrats? NO!

"Hehehehehe..heeheehee. Hey, you may not like my money grubbin' ways and support of the wealthy, but I'm a Democrat too! Hehehehehehehe..."


Yes, I have to 'fess up, I hate the bastards! All the soft in the spine, money grubbing, pro-bribery poltroons who make up the "centrist" branch of the Democratic Party - or what I call Demo-rats. As a recent salon.com article put it:

"The argument for centrism within the Democratic party is a distraction, but also a tactic. After all, what does centrism really mean in Washington? It means corporatism. It means the neoliberal alliance between Wall Street and D.C. that we have seen wreak havoc over the past 30 years"

Couldn't have put it better, given I hate the Neoliberal idiom and  false market worship which paves the way for Wall Street  Democrats to even exist. Ensconced in their gated communities or high end condos, stuffing themselves on wine and brie, they care not a whit about the 85 percent of citizens on the lower end of the income scale.

Worse, they are now seeking to sink the reputations of Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. An example of the Wall Street mutation of the Dems is the “centrist” think tank, “Third Way,” founded by a coterie of former Clinton staffers. This organization has aggressively gone after Elizabeth Warren and the liberal movement, saying in a Wall Street Journal editorial:

“If you talk to leading progressives these days, you’ll be sure to hear this message: The Democratic Party should embrace the economic populism of New York Mayor-elect Bill de Blasio and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren. Such economic populism, they argue, should be the guiding star for Democrats heading into 2016. Nothing would be more disastrous for Democrats.”

In other words, Third Way is an enclave for DINO traitors to the genuine Democratic cause and brand. The 'Third Way' is actually a craven fourth column which seeks to upend the social justice actions, legislation put into place by FDR, and instead extol Neoliberalism.  Perhaps no better synopsis of Neoliberalism has been written than by Henry Giroux (Protesting Youth in an Age of Neoliberal Savagery' )

"As the latest stage of predatory capitalism, neoliberalism is part of a broader economic and political project of restoring class power and consolidating the rapid concentration of capital, particularly financial capital (Giroux 2008; 2014). As a political project, it includes “the deregulation of finance, privatization of public services, elimination and curtailment of social welfare programs, open attacks on unions, and routine violations of labor laws” (Yates 2013).

As an ideology, it casts all dimensions of life in terms of market rationality, construes profit-making as the arbiter and essence of democracy, consuming as the only operable form of citizenship, and upholds the irrational belief that the market can both solve all problems and serve as a model for structuring all social relations.

As a mode of governance, it produces identities, subjects, and ways of life driven by a survival-of-the fittest ethic, grounded in the idea of the free, possessive individual, and committed to the right of ruling groups and institutions to exercise power removed from matters of ethics and social costs. As a policy and political project, it is wedded to the privatization of public services, the dismantling of the connection of private issues and public problems, the selling off of state functions, liberalization of trade in goods and capital investment, the eradication of government regulation of financial institutions and corporations, the destruction of the welfare state and unions, and the endless marketization and commodification of society.

Neoliberalism has put an enormous effort into creating a commanding cultural apparatus and public pedagogy in which individuals can only view themselves as consumers, embrace freedom as the right to participate in the market, and supplant issues of social responsibility for an unchecked embrace of individualism and the belief that all social relation be judged according to how they further one’s individual needs and self-interests.

Matters of mutual caring, respect, and compassion for the other have given way to the limiting orbits of privatization and unrestrained self-interest, just as it has become increasingly difficult to translate private troubles into larger social, economic, and political considerations. As the democratic public spheres of civil society have atrophied under the onslaught of neoliberal regimes of austerity, the social contract has been either greatly weakened or replaced by savage forms of casino capitalism, a culture of fear, and the increasing use of state violence."

How any Democrat with red blood coursing through his veins could support such a bastardized system is beyond me. But perhaps this is because I am a product of the 50s and 60s and always embraced the true liberalism manifested by FDR and JFK which the current mutation of Wall Street Dems despise. (These "Dems", as another indicator, were also behind the Chained CPI cuts to Social Security when Obama - another Neolib- first proposed it via his "deficit commission").  I also have not changed my political stripes one iota over a generation. I have not changed one metaphorical millimeter moving to the center, or to the right.

Why not? Because principles valid to liberalism - which the Democratic Party should be about in counterpoint to the Repukes' pro -business, wealth agenda- do not change over time. What was unacceptable in the 1940s, or 1950s, 1960s (e.g. kids going hungry, seniors without social insurance dying in ditches, kids working in factories, people lacking access to health care) must also be unacceptable in the 2000s, or even 3000s.

As Conor Lynch puts it (ibid.), pegging why the corporatists and their lackeys are so terrified of Sanders and Warren:

The fact is, Wall Street is afraid of modern liberalism, and is working hard to kill it from within with the same arguments that were made in the eighties and nineties. The only difference is, today, we know just how bad neoliberalism has been for the majority of people, and how good it has been for folks on Wall Street.

The financial crisis and the current inequality we face discredits the neoliberal ideology of the past thirty years.


SO make no mistake that Elizabeth Warren and the rising liberal movement (which even Karl Rove in yesterday's WSJ noted claims 31% of Americans, up from 25% five years ago)   have created a real fear within the Republican party and Wall Street. Certain right wing pundits thus hysterically paint Warren as nothing less than a radical socialist, aiming to overthrow the capitalist system. This is irrational fear. Fear that the new liberal movement is not just a fad, and that the future is moving leftward. (It is, and each year that inequality continues, pushes the marker further left)

Those Democrats who are aware what side their 'bread is buttered on' know well enough not to support the Neoliberal imperative any longer. Already, six House Dems vying for Senate seats in the 2016 elections have rejected the Trans Pacific Partnership - the cornerstone of current Neoliberal market manipulation. They have stated openly that their constituents have made it very clear to them that they want no part of this egregious, Anti-American deal.

It would be well for other Dems, especially the nominal ones, DINOS and Neolibs, to perhaps let that sink through their heads lest they vote on the TPP "fast track" passage in the near future.

Why Don't More Americans Call Themselves Liberals: Ans. Too Many Phoney Ones!

"For the Democratic Party is not a collection of diverse interests brought together only to win elections. We are united instead by a common history and heritage--by a respect for the deeds of the past and a recognition of the needs of the future "- John F. Kenendy


Rachel Maddow presented some astounding facts a week ago, on her show. The theme was that despite the fact Repukes portray the U.S. as a “center right nation", poll after poll discloses Americans are foursquare for LIBERAL programs. 82% do not want any cuts to Social Security and 74% demand no cuts to Medicare. 94% are also in favor of universal gun checks. So why, despite polling for unabashed liberal positions or programs do only 22% of Americans regard themselves as liberals.

One worthy theory is that  of Joel Kotkin, a fellow in urban design at Chapman University, who argues in similar terms to what I have (in previous blogs) regarding the infection of the Democratic Party by cancerous Neoliberalism, or shameless pro-Business dominance. Kotkin argues that the Democratic Party and the left are now dominated by what he calls “gentry progressives”: largely white, well-educated, culturally liberal urbanites. (Or analogous to what we who attend football games refer to as the ‘brie and wine’ crowd, who sit in their temp. controlled little domes and schmooz while we in the lower seats grab some brats and beer and sit in the elements!)

In an essay published by Forbes  a month after Obama’s decisive re-election, Kotkin wrote:

“The now triumphant urban gentry have their townhouses and high-rise lofts, but the service workers who do their dirty work have to log their way by bus or car from the vast American banlieues, either in peripheral parts of the city (think of Brooklyn’s impoverished fringes) or the poorer close-in suburbs. This progressive economy works for the well-placed academics, the trustfunders and hedge funders, but produces little opportunity for a better life for the vast majority.”

BINGO!

Kotkin makes the additional case that the Obama coalition which united well-educated, often upscale liberals, with such struggling, often disadvantaged constituencies as single women, racial and ethnic minorities, and the young is fragile at best:


“The class issue so cleverly exploited by the president in the election could prove the potential Achilles heel of today’s gentry progressivism. The Obama-Bernanke economy has done little to reverse the relative decline of the middle and working class, whose share of national income has fallen to record lows. If you don’t work for venture-backed tech firms, coddled, money-for-nearly-free Wall Street or for the government, your income and standard of living has probably declined since the middle of the last decade.”

The fragility of temporary, expedient political coalitions, as opposed to a party grounding itself in firm principles, may be why JFK warned against them in one of his most famous and stirring quotes:

"For the Democratic Party is not a collection of diverse interests brought together only to win elections. We are united instead by a common history and heritage--by a respect for the deeds of the past and a recognition of the needs of the future"  

Sadly, the New Dems seem to have forgotten that message, and have left their respect for the deeds of the past behind to build on the quicksand of expediency and temporary coalitions. This is what Kennedy was warning against, and instead insisted the party needed a committment to its common history and heritage - which clearly is distinct from the Reeps. This common history thereby demands REAL progressives (aka bona fide Liberals, as opposed to Neoliberals)  embrace the principles of the New Deal and NOT put Social Security up for grabs as the wine and brie faction are wont to do.  

Yet all these Gentrified Libs (who are really Neoliberal - free market worshipping freaks) consider “Entitlement reform”  a necessity and share Beltway Hack Bob Woodward’s deformed meme, expressed in his recent book, The Price of Politics’, as: 

"Unsustainable entitlement spending on Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security as highlighted by Republican House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan and familiar to all informed politicians and economists....has been left largely unaddressed."

Thus, feeding the fears of the landed gentry libs that "costs are now exploding"  according to the immutable logic of demographic and actuarial facts.    No surprise then that this debased progressive "elite " now fancies it can disregard the distributive consequences of their  New Deal- 1960s forbears. A perfect example of these brie and wine degenerates:   calling for gradual reduction in Social Security benefits – either by raising the retirement age or switching to a “chained” Consumer Price Index (a revised inflation index which cuts government spending by reducing annual cost of living adjustments.  

Who would be most affected? Those in the bottom quntile of the elderly who depend on Social Security  for 84 percent of their annual income, and those in the next quintile dependent on Social Security for 83 percent of their income. At the beginning of 2012, the average Social Security benefit was $1,230 a month, or $14,740 a year. For 35 percent of elderly white beneficiaries, for 42 percent of Asian-Americans, for 49 percent of blacks, and for 55 percent of Hispanics, Social Security represents 90 percent or more of total income.   

Tragically, in the current debate over financing the cost of income support for older Americans, the chained C.P.I. proposal has more political support than the TRUE  progressive alternative of raising the current $113,700 payroll tax cap . Low-income Social Security beneficiaries are not equipped to absorb cuts in benefits that a switch to a chained consumer price index would entail; on the other hand, according to the centrist Tax Policy Center, raising the cap on income subject to the payroll tax could completely cover Social Security costs into the foreseeable future without reducing benefits.  

But do the entitled "liberal" brie munchers and chardonnay sippers in their gated communities want this? Hell no! These lily-livered rats would rather keep their lower taxes than make any real sacrifices for their lower wage, struggling, blue collar brethren! And then they have the nerve to wonder why so few Americans - barely one fifth - describe themselves as political liberals? Well, DUH! Because along with the Repukes who soiled the name, so have these MFs by their disdain and inaction for true liberalism.  

As NY Times columnist Thomas B. Edsall noted (‘New Liberalism’)”

“Obama’s victory and the growing evidence of an emerging majority Democratic coalition pose the danger that the left will take false comfort. The demographic forces currently powering the Democratic Party in no way guarantee a resilient coalition assured of a long-term competitive advantage.

In addition to the glaring class conflicts between the party’s upscale cultural liberals and the larger body of Democratic voters with pressing material needs, there are a host of potential fissures.

In cities from Los Angeles to Chicago to Houston, African-Americans are competing with Hispanics and others for government jobs, good schools, good neighborhoods, political power and basic resources. Republicans are looking toward these tensions to see how their party can capitalize on them"

Can the Repugs profit at Dem expense? Of course! If enough of the lower strata Dems see how the Gentrified bunch is screwing them over! Just watch and see in the coming months if a Chained CPI is really enacted under a nominal Dem administration or if Medicare age thresholds are increased. You will see the Reeps able to exploit it like a  pack of hyenas rips into defenseless prey.

The way to preserve and expand Dem victories? Upper income Dems must be part of the solution and not the problem. They must not show themselves as Neoliberal rats, who already have theirs, and deny (or cut) government support for their lower- income brethren.  They need to re-learn the lesson, seemingly lost, that in this age of vast corporate wealth and power the rest of us need gov't as a counter-lever now more than ever. IF the Dem party isn't prepared to embrace its own heritage (from FDR) and ensure that, they may reach the stage of the Whigs faster than the Repukes!

Superstorm 'Sandy': The 'Black Swan' of this Election?

Black swan, (n) def. An event or occurrence that deviates beyond what is normally expected of a situation at a given time and when it occurs in tandem with a political election can produce unforeseen effects.


"In our personal ambitions we are individualists. But in our seeking for economic and political progress as a nation, we all go up, or else we all go down, as one people." Franklin Roosevelt, 1937

“Disasters are inherently political because government is political and preventing and responding to disasters is a primary role of the State.” – Quote from Rachel Maddow Show (10/30/12)
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Quick question: If you were in one of the states ravaged by the Superstorm named ‘Sandy’, with mammoth destruction all around, who would YOU rather have as President, Mitt Romney or Barack Obama? Hurry – only a second!

A week and a day before the general election a “Black swan” transpired in the form of a Category One Hurricane (‘Sandy’) that morphed into a superstorm and ravaged the northeast. Earlier ‘black Swans’ coinciding with elections included the video of Osama bin Laden 4 days before the November, 2004 elections, putatively giving Bush Jr. the win over Kerry (though exit polls DID show Kerry taking OH and hence the presidency) and the collapse of Lehman Bros. in 2008, followed by the massive stock market crash that triggered a dynamic for millions to vote Obama. (It also didn’t help that John McCain tried to beg off the 1st presidential debate by appealing to the crash, while Obama wisely remarked that a President "needs to be able to handle two things at once.”)


What has Sandy wrought? So far all of her effects have been inimical to Romney:


- The Superstorm has taken Romney off message, i.e.diluted his yapping lies (e.g. about Chrysler sending Jeep jobs to China)

- The Storm has wrecked Romney’s bullshit that “Obama can’t work with Republicans across the aisle”. The blazing, repeatedly televised images of Obama walking with NJ Gov. Chris Christie through the storm-ravaged landscape and Christie’s effusive praise for Obama’s help in getting federal dollars, blows this BS into a cocked hat.


- The storm has forced “Mittens” to recant on his earlier vow (during the Reep debates) to fold FEMA into a privatized Neverland operated mainly by the states. Once more, then, it’s exposed this bastard as a shameless shapeshifter who can’t be trusted to say one straight thing.


- Along the same lines, it’s forced Romney and his Zombies to play act token support for the storm sufferers, i.e. the campaign staffers buying $5,000 in canned groceries at Walmart, then giving it to supporters to carry in to a photo-op as if THEY were the ones donating these to the Red Cross. (Btw, another mess up here- since the Red Cross has made it clear on its site it needs MONEY not canned goods!)


- The storm has shown Obama to be commander-in-chief in a time of regional emergency, leaving “Mittens” to run around like an impotent weasel chasing his tail – and contradicting himself every two minutes.


All of the above convey auspicious signs that Obama has received a bump from this ‘black Swan’ – as the scenes in the aftermath especially of bipartisanship, have eliminated Romney’s momentum. Meanwhile, statistical guru Nate Silver on his 538 blog now has upped the odds of Obama winning from 73% to 80.9%. Because of this Silver has been the target of unseemly attacks on the right, including by blowhards like Joe Scarborough and fake “unbiased” websites like Politico.

There are actually some deluded Repuke Hacks (think of Karl Rove) forecasting Romney in a landlside, but they are detached from political reality (Unless the Reeps steal the elections in key states via voting machines. Here in COLO, for example, Reep officials have demanded REEP Secretary of State Scott Gessler “recalibrate’ all machines before Nov. 6th!)  See also about Repo voter fraud crimes being investigated currently in Colorado and Virginia at: http://www.salon.com/2012/11/03/gop_voter_registration_fraud_probe_widens/

But moving away from the deluded or outright criminal (including all those 1 million assholes from 'True the Vote', "Vote Fair' etc. who think they will “question” voters across the nation come Nov. 6th ) these fools are in a world of their own.


Thus, Talking-Point Memo’s Poll Tracker currently projects Obama to win 285 Electoral College votes to Romney’s 191 (270 wins the White House); without toss-up states, Real Clear Politics has Obama with 290 Electoral College votes; and as I noted above, Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight model gives the incumbent an 80.9 percent likelihood of victory; meanwhile Sam Wang at the Princeton Election Consortium is even more bullish, projecting 318 Electoral College votes for the president and giving him a 97 percent chance of winning re-election.


What may well be the lasting image in the wake of this latest,  putative ‘black Swan’ is Obama working with Republican Governor Christie to try to make one devastated region better – via the use of federal resources. Even as jackass 'Mittens' seeks to make his sorry ass relevant by collecting pre-purchased (by his campaign) canned goods the Red Cross can’t use!

In the meantime, this election of 2012 is arguably the most important in our lifetime. Indeed, it’s so similar to the Roosevelt vs (Alf) Landon in 1936, that it forces the American people to make a fundamental philosophical choice. As a nation, we will either move forward as "We, the people," or adopt a small-minded, visceral rat-like philosophy of "As long as I got mine, screw YOU!”

Ask those people in New York or New Jersey which paradigm they prefer. In the meantime, let's hope that given the black Swan favorable indicators for Obama, the American people will show up and prove they're as smart as the voters in 1936.