UPDATE: This is my first blog post. It is three years old. It is AMAZING how little has changed We have met the enemy and it is us. It is clear that we are in a crisis. It is a crisis of our own making. It is a political crisis. Our corrupt, amoral, incompetent elites crashed the world economy in 2008 and.......nothing really happened........nothing really changed......nobody went to jail. In fact the elites are doing the same garbage that got us in trouble in the first place. They don't have the slightest idea on how to change. Worse, they don't WANT to change things. Why should they? They got to loot the middle class then. They get to loot it now. Party on guys! Never mind that you are destroying the middle class lynchpin of the United States, which just happens to be the lynchpin of the world. And yet, our system of democracy does nothing. We throw the bums out and nothing changes. Meet, the new boss, same as the old boss, unless, of course, the new boss is WORSE. What has happened to our country?
The problem is political. I am optimistic in the long term as I believe in the long term resilience of human beings. Unfortunately, we got to live in the short term, and it is there that the bad guys got us in a stranglehold. Remember, in our current situation, all the elites have to do is play stall ball and keep the status quo. It is the middle class that has to force change to save itself, Unfortunately, we are getting little help from liberals. Liberals seem to be paralyzed by a weird combination of long term overconfidence and learned helplessness. There is lots of talk of demographic change and how the Republicans will lose the ever growing Hispanic vote. Hey, were carrying Florida, Virginia and Colorado! We got a stranglehold on California! We already got New Mexico and Nevada! Tomorrow Georgia and maybe even TEXAS!! Wheeeeeee!
Pardon me if I don't get too excited.
Yep, it was sure cool how Obama won in 2008 and 2012. And it sure was good when right wing weirdos nominated a witch in Delaware, a rape apologist in Missouri, an scary gun nut in Nevada, (Harry Reid Saved!) and several other freakydoodles in other states that allowed the Democrats to hold on to the Senate. All well and good. But remember, if things stay the same, the bad guys win. And things are staying the same. Its all because the elites can block progress. That's because of the recent election that REALLY counted, the Great Tea Party Slaughter of 2010.
You remember that election don't you. The election where Barack said he got "shellacked?" The one that elected hideous corporate criminal Rick Scott to the governorship of Florida,(where I live) where he denied poor people Medicaid coverage, even though it was provided by the federal government? People will die in Florida because it offended this corporate criminal's conservative sensibilities. Or the time he refused to accept funding for a railroad linking Tampa and Orlando that would be an economic boon for both cities? Imagine if the international city of Miami, the financial capital of Latin America, and Orlando, an entertainment colossus which just happens to be the number one tourist destination in the world, were linked by rail to the million plus citizens of Tampa Bay? Heck, it would make Lakeland an international city! But nooooo, it will remain just a dream. Because a bunch of Tea Partyers scared of their own shadow (and a black man in the White House), had to elect a right wing fanatic corporate criminal just because he had am "R"' after his name. Good God.
Need more? How about Scott Walker, governor of the once great state of Wisconsin and his jihad against teachers, policemen, and firemen.( My late father was a fireman. ) Ol' Scotty knows how the political game is played. Prostitute yourself to billionaires for millions of campaign cash ( political whores can be bought for a billionaires chump "change). Next you slander hardworking Americans as +government employees" and refuse to pay the pensions that they earned risking their lives and teaching unruly children. Jesus loves you Scott Walker. I'll pray for you.
Need more? How about Rick Snyder, the glorified salesman selling off parts of the entity we once called "Michigan". Get yourself elected "governor". Look for cities and towns that are struggling financially. (if they are majority black, so much the better). Take away the power of the elected officials in the name of "fiscal responsibility", appoint one of your buddies emergency manager (something we once called "dictator") and sell all the best parts to your cronies!
It was cute when Snyder was just attacking little towns. Nobody cared except Rachel Maddow. After all , it was just a bunch of irresponsible blacks. ( When blacks loot the treasury, it is called "corruption" .When rich whites do it, its a "public private partnership". Isn't it great to be living In postracial America?). It is now a bit of a problem when one of those towns is something called "Detroit". Go for it governor! Screw the pensioners! Screw the current police and fireman who are desperately trying to keep the damm place together! Screw the people who live there who, against all odds have kept Detroit's broken heart beating! There is MONEY to be made! (Google "Belle Isle", which is kinda like the island Ayn Rand imagined for John Galt and all of society's "winners")
Whew! Three right wing horror shows. But as gross as they are , they are all sideshows. The crowning glory of the 2010 election is Speaker John Boehner and YOUR...UNITED.. STATES ...HOUSE ,,,OF ...REPRESENATIVES!!! I get a kick out of it when Boehner is mocked by liberals as weak and the current Congress is mocked as the most" DO Nothing Congress ever. Which just goes to show you how clueless liberals are. HELLO liberals, this House most definitely Does Something. IT KEEPS THE ELITES IN POWER AND ALLOWS THEM TO KEEP DRAINING THE MIDDLE CLASS!!! Remember, all the elites have to do to stay in power is to play stall ball. The middle class needs to force change in order to survive. But there will be no change. The House of Representatives is there to prevent it. People say that Boehner is a weak Speaker. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Boehner use his power to prevent the necessary changes that must occur for the middle class to defend itself. That's real power. Not Good power but real power.
Up against this are the Liberals and their learned helplessness. Their terror of being outspent by corporate funded conservatism is now in its fourth decade. The handwringing of Citizens United is just an update of the corporate funded PACS of the Reagan area. Liberals just assume that any attempt to get out there in the fields and change minds one at a time is just going to be buried in a blizzard of 30 second attack ads. It should be obvious by now that there is so much money on both sides in politics that the attack ads just cancel themselves out. People now zap out watching annoying ads and these are some of the worst. No, the worst thing about money in politics is that it just makes good people throw up their hands and quit before the elections even start.
Another example of learned helplessness is the handwringing about gerrymandering. Yes, at its worst, it is poison for democracy by letting the politicians choose their own voters instead of letting the voters pick them. But liberals whine too much. Take Florida, for example. This state is about as 50-50 as you are going to get. Obama took it twice. Any slight advantage that the GOP had is getting slowly eroded by demographics. So why do the Republicans rule the Florida Senate by 26-14 and the House by 76-44? "Gerrymandering!" cry the Florida Democrats. Really? I don't buy it. not all of it. I would concede that gerrymandering by itself could give the GOP 65 to 68 seats in the House. But 76? No way. Could it be that part of the problem is that Florida Democrats are about as visible as Bigfoot and as effective as a screen door on a submarine? Not even a constitutional amendment passed by the voters in Florida that reduced the effectiveness of gerrymandering in Florida somewhat could not reduce the GOP's crushing margins. No the real problem is learned helplessness. We can't POSSIBLY take the Florida Legislature, so we won't even try. Were stuck with the freaks and weirdos until 2020 when we'll probably lose again. Gerrymandering, you see.
Well folks, it is obvious that if the middle class is to be saved, its members have to save itself. The elites don't want to and wouldn't know how if they wanted to? Well the author Eric Hoffer gives us a clue. He compared people who are learnERS with people that are merely learnED. Hoffer stated that is the learners who will inherit the future because they can adapt to change. The learned will fall away because they cannot adapt. Or,more likely, they won't want to adapt because they have so much invested in the old order. Indeed it is the old order that made them elite in the first place. Why should they learn something new? Indeed they will try to suppress everything that is new. Its what is happening now. It needs to end. There is no time for complacency or learned helplessness. The elites need to get out of the way before they ruin everything. We have to push them
