Why I Want a Democratic Landslide by Chris Kahn

[handy]

Well, THIS is an interesting take on it...

Why I Want a Democratic Landslide by Chris Kahn I want to see the Democrats win all the way around; the Presidency, the Senate and the House of Representatives. It is not for the reasons you might think. I have no illusions. I do not think they will do anything to address any of the issues I consider important. I think they will do all the wrong things and it will accomplish nothing but to make things worse. Not that I think the Republicans are any better. They would also accomplish nothing either. I have no doubt that the United States are headed for a financial crisis that will make 2008 look like a picnic. None of the underlying issues that rose to the surface then have been addressed. They have simply been papered over with lies and flimflammery. Sound and fury signifying nothing. The problem is the media and the punditry have created a false narrative. Voters have been told that there is a clear choice. On one side is a Democratic party that believes government should take extraordinary measures to stimulate the economy and alleviate the effects of unregulated greed among the big Wall Street banks. On the other side is a Republican party offering radical free market policies that would cut government spending to the bone and take us back to gilded age of robber barons and sweatshops. The portrayal of the Democrats is for the most part accurate. They really do believe that government should act despite the fact that every time such policies have been enacted they have failed. One only has to compare the responses to the depression of 1920 to those of 1929. One resulted in a quick recovery, the other lead to fifteen years of stagnation that was only relieved by the demobilization at the end of World War II and the explosion of prosperity in the 1950s brought about by the reduction of federal economic management. It is the image of the Republicans that bothers me. Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan are being portrayed as champions of free markets. Nothing could be further than the truth. Ryan's proposed budget has been criticized as drastic. The truth is even Fox News recognizes that Ryan's "budget plan doesn't actually slash the budget." In reality, the Republicans wouldn't know a real budget cutting plan if it were presented to them. However, the people who vote don't look at details; they listen to the sound bites and rhetoric that tell them what they want to hear. Herein is the source of my desire for a Democratic landslide. As I said, I believe the worst is yet to come. There will be a collapse worse than 2008 and if Romney is President what the majority of the people will believe is that his "free market" plan did not work. All they will know is Romney's "radical capitalism" caused a disaster and the very idea of genuine free market solutions will be set back for decades, if not generations. My hope is that if the Democrats are in charge when the collapse happens, the idea of government as an economic savior will be collapse as well and that maybe a real free market solution will have a chance. October 11, 2012 Chris Kahn [send him mail] is a stereotypical baby-boomer. He provisions network and VoIP hardware for an Internet service provider in Washington DC. Ron Paul led him to Murray Rothbard and he is now an avid student of Austrian Economics. Copyright © 2012 by LewRockwell.com. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.

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[podfish]

However, the people who vote don't look at details; they listen to the sound bites and rhetoric that tell them what they want to hear. Herein is the source of my desire for a Democratic landslide. As I said, I believe the worst is yet to come. There will be a collapse worse than 2008 and if Romney is President what the majority of the people will believe is that his "free market" plan did not work. All they will know is Romney's "radical capitalism" caused a disaster and the very idea of genuine free market solutions will be set back for decades, if not generations. My hope is that if the Democrats are in charge when the collapse happens, the idea of government as an economic savior will be collapse as well and that maybe a real free market solution will have a chance.

Except for the fact that if this happens, we'll all be living through a disaster, I'd think it'd be a nice education for the population. However, although it's true he's not a radical capitalist in the way some wish he was, he's close enough that his policies do seem likely to cause disaster, and it's because his policies further support the looting of the world by the financial elites. I fear a couple of different scenarios - Obama does get re-elected, but world events in Europe or China, or further obstructionism by a Republican congress, trigger deeper economic problems and in next election some wackos like Ryan get to be in charge of even more branches of government. OR even worse (though more comfortable for many of us in the short run) Romney wins, fails to overturn some of the better parts of health-care reform but cuts taxes heavily, the economy continues to improve as it's been doing for a while, we do ok even if the rest of the world gets worse, and he takes credit; to cap it off, he and Ryan assume Reagan's mantle, stack the Supreme Court, and make the world safe for the privileged while finding ways to further marginalize the less fortunate by discrediting their commitment to the Protestant work ethic, along with blaming retired government workers for believing that they could get away with receiving pensions they were promised.

[Karen the KAT]

Handy, I like that! The only thing that saved FDR's bacon was WWII, which he of course maneuvered us into. Otherwise that would have been the end of the Democratic party.

But I don't see a Democratic landslide, more the opposite...

Podfish, Lemme get this straight: Obama giving us four more years of crap is good and Romney giving us an economic recovery is bad?????

As Kelsey Grammer said: "What color is the sky in your World"???

Oh........ Because you think the financial elites are all Republicans.. Those bad Republicans that want to take away the checkbook, make people work and save, and be mean to all those nice Muslims...

Well far more are actually Democrats, just look at the 2008 NYT editorial on the anonymous poll they had among the top 700 Wall Street executives where over EIGHTY FIVE PERCENT of these financial elite came out as DEMOCRATS!!!

Here's some absolute truths that so many Ostrichs don't want to believe:

You are responsible for you.

Nobody owes you anything.

There is no such thing as a free lunch.

Not everybody wants to get along with everybody else.

If you give something away, people lose respect for it , de-value it, and abuse it.

There will always be poor people and there will always be rich people, because there will always be people who want to be poor and people who want to be rich.

We are all selfish and lazy by nature, the only thing that is different is the degree.

Money is just paper.

All politicians are to some degree owned by big business

The government IS big business, big business IS the government

America is a Republic, not a Democracy.

Communism has a 100% failure rate

Want more????

[rossmen]

your speculation is silly too. obama and romney will have almost identical economic policy, though obama might be slightly better at manifesting government action. economic collapse is beyond us policy and if it happens we will all be dependent on our local resources. will wacco be any help? probably not! and we will all be trying to survive, hopefully in cooperation with people we live close too.

Except for the fact that if this happens, we'll all be living through a disaster, I'd think it'd be a nice education for the population. However, although it's true he's not a radical capitalist in the way some wish he was, he's close enough that his policies do seem likely to cause disaster, and it's because his policies further support the looting of the world by the financial elites. I fear a couple of different scenarios - Obama does get re-elected, but world events in Europe or China, or further obstructionism by a Republican congress, trigger deeper economic problems and in next election some wackos like Ryan get to be in charge of even more branches of government. OR even worse (though more comfortable for many of us in the short run) Romney wins, fails to overturn some of the better parts of health-care reform but cuts taxes heavily, the economy continues to improve as it's been doing for a while, we do ok even if the rest of the world gets worse, and he takes credit; to cap it off, he and Ryan assume Reagan's mantle, stack the Supreme Court, and make the world safe for the privileged while finding ways to further marginalize the less fortunate by discrediting their commitment to the Protestant work ethic, along with blaming retired government workers for believing that they could get away with receiving pensions they were promised.

[podfish]

Here's some absolute truths that so many Ostrichs don't want to believe: You are responsible for you. Nobody owes you anything. There is no such thing as a free lunch. Not everybody wants to get along with everybody else.

and a broad brush is always best for painting, because the reality comes in broad strokes, never in small details. that's a cartoon philosophy, based on extreme generalizations. Most if not all the principles are true - but enumerating them's not much help in dealing with the competing ideas and desires and attempts to exert control that we encounter as part of a complex society.

[podfish]

your speculation is silly too. obama and romney will have almost identical economic policy,

I woudn't dignify those outlines as "speculation". They're a bit hyperbolic, but that's the direction events might trend. Of course there's an immense amount of inertia in our system, and even if Romney and Obama did hold wildly different ideas neither could steer the ship solely according to their desires. And of course they share a huge investment in preserving most of what you could call the status quo.

But I do believe that they are significantly different in some key ways. It's also possible that there are key tipping points in the near future. For example, the world would be very different if Gore had been the one in charge. I won't even try to guess what middle-eastern politics would be like, but there wouldn't have been American troops in Iraq or Afganistan, and the incredible amount of money pissed away in the two wars would have been otherwise mis-spent. I do think that what we laughingly refer to as government services will erode much further if we have a Republican-dominated government. Look at the recent proposals to charge for parking at the beach as a trivial example. Even in a Democrat/socialist dominated state like ours, we're tacitly accepting the general premise that too much money is being 'taken' from us to spend on public good. Sure, the need to pander to seniors will prevent sudden gutting of things like Medicare, which actually is the bulk of government spending - but the premise that everyone should pay-your-own-way, and sharing expenses is bad (see Kat's post, for example) - will be further insinuated into public policy. Obama's not as good a spokesman as I wish he was for the opposite view, but he's all we got.

[lynn]

...."The only thing that saved FDR's bacon was WWII, which he of course maneuvered us into. Otherwise that would have been the end of the Democratic party."...
Oh yeah?....What the hell makes you think that?...
That whole line of thought has been debated...read up!

..."Obama giving us four more years of crap is good and Romney giving us an economic recovery is bad"????
Heellllooo?...Apparently, YOU can't even see an economic recovery when you are smack dab IN the middle of one.
*Local Businesses have been doing better since the stimulus.
*Don't you see all the road work that's been being done?
*Foreclosures are down.
*Employment IS up.
*Consumer confidence is UP.
Try some glasses...and then some observation, and reading.

How the hell you think RoBDmey - Someone who would like to speed up foreclosures, get rid of SS.,medi-care, planned parenthood, PBS, etc. - would be good for our country, beats the hell out of me.

As Kelsey Grammer said: "What color is the sky in your World"???

Right back at you..."What the hell color is the sky in YOUR World????...

"Oh........ Because you think the financial elites are all Republicans. Those bad Republicans that want to take away the checkbook, make people work and save, and be mean to all those nice Muslims. Well, far more are actually Democrats, just look at the 2008 NYT editorial on the anonymous poll they had among the top 700 Wall Street executives where over EIGHTY FIVE PERCENT of these financial elite came out as DEMOCRATS!!!"

Heellloooo...Most people work their butts off no matter who gets in office. But historically, the middle class, and poor do better economically when Dems. are in office...

And, so, freakin' what?: about Dems that is...Even IF that is true, you assume they always vote Dem? Money is always going to be going into D.C. More of it SHOULD be for good social causes, innovation, eduction, and infrustructure. Investement in our country is what disgtinguishes it being a 1st world nation, rather than a 3rd world one.
And I vote DEM for that!...NOT these current insane, greedy, disgusting ReTHUGS!

And why the hell you brought Muslims into this I do not know.
Do we have to go over the good vs. bad Muslim shit again? And how Obama has been dealing quite 'nicely', as in killing the bad Muslims.

"Here's some absolute truths that so many Ostrichs don't want to believe:
You are responsible for you.
Nobody owes you anything.
There is no such thing as a free lunch.
Not everybody wants to get along with everybody else.
If you give something away, people lose respect for it , de-value it, and abuse it.

Right, and most of us have heard this stuff many times in our lives, and we are not Ostrich's.
Yes, we are mostly responsible for our own lives, and ReThugs spew this saying like it's the eleventh commandment on steroids.

But, guess what - often others are responsible for others too.
If you don't have people in Gov't creating good regulations, then bad people do bad things...
It was nice when people had to work 16 hrs. a day, and companies didn't have to give a shit if they died on the job or not. It was so nice when the Coal Industry went cheap, and didn't give a shit when 28 miners died a few yrs. ago...That's the kind of thing ReThugs love - Industry doing their own thing, and not giving a crap about others...Every man for himself.
Yeah, yeah we know.

"There will always be poor people and there will always be rich people, because there will always be people who want to be poor and people who want to be rich.
We are all selfish and lazy by nature, the only thing that is different is the degree."

Gawd, what the hell are you talking about? The only people I know of who 'want' to be 'poor' are those who make a vow to be so...Like nuns and monks.
And many people inherit their wealth...Like RoBDmey for one.

Obama is the epitome of the American dream, and people like you want to spit on it? Shame on you!

Most people I've known are not lazy, selfish yes. And apparently you like the selfish part, since it seems you want even more of it to be running this country.

"Money is just paper."
Actually, it's 75% cotton, 25% linen.

"All politicians are to some degree owned by big business."
So, that is a good thing for you, since you want even more of it. Okay.

"The government IS big business, big business IS the government."No, Gov't is not big business, and vice versa.
That generalization needs some serious deconstruction, and examination.
.
"America is a Republic, not a Democracy."
That I will agree with.

"Communism has a 100% failure rate."
Not sure why you brought up the 'communism' boogeyman here?

"Want more"????

No, I sure don't...Already want to vomit with all the pro-RoBDmey crap.