Topical thread: Throw the rascals out 2/16/2010
“The argument that the two parties should represent opposed ideals and policies, one, perhaps, of the Right and the other of the Left, is a foolish idea acceptable only to doctrinaire and academic thinkers. Instead, the two parties should be almost identical, so that the American people can throw the rascals out at any election without leading to any profound or extensive shifts in policy. Then it should be possible to replace it, every four years if necessary, by the other party, which will be none of these things but will still pursue, with new vigor, approximately the same basic policies.” — Carroll Quigley
I certainly want those who I vote for to represent me. In a general sense I want limited government with only minimal involvment in the economy. Obama with his moving government into the healthcare industry violates this general principal. So did his over the top stimulous bill, not to mention the threat from new environmental regulation. I expect my respersentative to do whatever they can to stop his initiatives. This seems a natural and reasonble position to take.
The Democrats deserve to be thrown out of office. The problem is that it isn’t clear voters deserve to suffer the consequences of more GOP governance. Maybe Gov. Rick Perry has the right idea afterall. Let the wingnuts have old Dixie. Good riddance.
One of the reasons (D)s and (R)s tend to govern alike is that both parties are bound by the same budget and partlimentary/electoral constraints. The founders seemed to set it up that way with no party allowed to run amuck with a simple majority.
But make no mistake, there are differences. The (D)s wanted to nationalize health care, and to regulate CO2, and almost got it done. The (R)s didn’t. That is a monumental difference.
Oh, and by the way, over the last year, it seems like only Democrat “rascals” are being “thrown out.”
Does anybody really think that it’s about left and right, liberal and conservative?
It’s about power, money and getting reelected. The differences after that are basically window dressing. Some may say those differences are great, but overall, no, they aren’t.
I’ll agree with Cantab, I want a representative that actually represents me. And for that to happen to any real degree, it means that I would have to get elected. I guarantee you, you find somebody that you think is just about perfect, and you are still just as liable to find out that person is for something you’re against, or vice versa.
Today — 2001 — it would be very easy for anyone wanting to run for political office to make themselves a hero to the majority of their fellow Americans…
…majority meaning we folks — neither — members of the economic elite (Repubs) who do a really great job of protecting the nation from outside threats (including W Bush!) while trying to wreck the economy for everyone but their rich benefactors — nor — members of the academic elite (yes; unfortunately including regular bloggers here on one of the top three or four progressive blogs [that is the whole point — at this point in this narrative] and the likes of DeLong, Baker, Ezra Klein, etc.) who display little anxiety over external defense (much too much anxiety over whether the feds read a few too many emails) and do not do much of a job at all making the economy work for the average person (they think that is what they are doing that as they run around trying to fix the parts of the economy the Repubs have broken — lately).
The core of all our economic and social problems is the much neglected labor market which may simply be too simple to interest their high IQs or something. Or they might be too economically secure to appreciate it — or identify with us. For sure males of our species think in third-person/what-is-the-current-activity-right-now terms and are literally genetically shielded from completely new approaches: pack hunters, you know (couldn’t have hunted in the forest without this extreme cooperative outlook — slow runners/no fangs or claws).
American have never been told and have no idea that they are to enter the labor market as educated and prepared to protect themselves as any other market they enter (e.g., real estate and finance) — which today means one solution only that has been proven to work all over the better and fairer OECD world: SECTOR-WIDE LABOR AGREEMENTS!
For about the hundredth time here:
Educate Americans that as of early 2007 a quarter of our workforce earned less than LBJ’s minimum wage — DOUBLE THE AVERAGE INCOME LATER!!! Explain that the plurality of the stripped out income went to the top 1/10 of 1%: linebackers, TV anchors and CEOs (all three categories making 25X what they used to) who have done nothing for the rest of us to deserve such giant pots of gold.
1.2 million dollars was the average top 1 percentile household in 2007. Not even your 180,000 Wall Street gamblers who got average $180,000 bonuses to top off their $120,000 average salaries accounted for that crazy income bulge. What accounted for it must be as plain as the egg on our elite progressives faces: squeeze a toothpaste tube at the bottom and it all comes out the top. Economic physics: people on the bottom of the American labor market which puts up no resistance at all to market pressure; as you get nearer the top the inside and outside pressure equalizes (90-97 percentile earners kept up with average income growth since LBJ); after which inside pressure starts to get the advantage over the outside until you reach the “most indispensable individuals” on the very top who get what everybody else didn’t press for (everybody else’s fault).
EDUCATE AMERICANS TO WHAT HAPPENED AND EDUCATE THEM TO THE UNIVERSAL ANSWER: S-E-C-T-O-R W-I-D-E L-A-B-O-R A-G-R-E-E-M-E-N-T-S!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
At least start the discussion.
Anybody who wants to run for office on protecting the nation from the outside as well as ACTUALLY turning the American labor market can make themselves a giant hero in Kansas and every place else (40 years ago, nobody may even have noticed them). Until the Dems go back to where they and the Repubs both were 40 years ago (difference in emphasis mostly) they will be forever running in place — now one step […]
Ah well my friends, you have your blind spots you prefer, I have mine that I prefer. Yes there are differences, but probably not as much as you want to believe.
Bryan,
Could we expand the Congress to 100 million or so….?
Dan, we conservatives have listened to complaints about our views, policies and candidates. Well, the libs/progressive/Dem have absolute control over 2/3s of our Govt and they are finding that those things they espoused for all those years are not what the people, voters and even many members of their own party want.
The successes of this administration are the continuation of the Bush policies. The failures are nearly everything else. Only ~ 9% of the population believe that the stimulus bill created jobs. So this administration will go down in history as the fastest to fail, and unless things change dramatically, will have one of the largest mid-term defeats in modern history.
So, to believe there are little differences between the parties, is to believe that the electorate do not think. They will be the final determinant of those differences, and the measure of their magnitude will be in the size of the defeat.
Hehe, I don’t know how many times I have said this over the years. Although, admittedly, never here.
The greatest scam currently being purported on the American populace is that of a two party system. The two parties are really one and the same, and bow to the same corporate masters, and special interest money. Neither party is concerned one bit about the average person, regardless of the spin. They are concerned with two things, and two things only.
Money and Power. The accumulation and maintenance of both is the only that either “party” cares about.
Let the wingnuts have old Dixie. Good riddance.
Is it ok that us wingnuts took Ted Kennedy’s seat up in good old Massachuetts?
Sweet home Massachusetts
Where the skies are so blue
Sweet Home Massachusetts
Lord, I’m coming home to you
In Framingham they don’t love the governor
Now we all did what we could do
Now not finding nukes does not bother me
Does your conscience bother you?
Tell the truth
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IwWUOmk7wO0&feature=related
You know the message of this song. Its quintessential rock n roll saying kiss my ass.
If you read Republican ads and letters about how many jobs were created in each members districts, and the crowing about how great they are, you would find a confused electorate. To raise the elitist card is a non-starter.
WSJ and the Washington Times
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703562404575067372476731404.html?KEYWORDS=stimulus
Raising the elitist card??? Not me! O:-) BTW, your WSJ article doesn’t seem to make any cogent point re: jobs. It does say that a handful Repubs have supported constituent grant requests from stimulus funding, and even many of them were submitted before the stimulus bill was signed.
Anyway, for a bill that was a “JOBS” bill, it aint. For a bill that was supposed to stimulate the economy, it hasn’t.
As I continue to say, lib/Dem/progressive policies claimed to be a better approach than the Bush policies have been an over whelming failure. I challenge any of the Dems here to show us how those policies have succeeded in the past year.
Yay! More Carroll Quiqley quotes, please. I was beginning to think I was the only person left on the internet who had read any of his books.
111 of them if you check other sources…claiming jobs created for the district but abosolutely no jobs created. I know this is a tendency for DC anyway, but please.
Spencer’s report indicates progress for us wage earners….
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2010/02/guest-post-just-21-of-voters-nationwide-believe-that-the-federal-government-enjoys-the-consent-of-the-governed.html
Discussion of the Rassmusen poll, and possible reasons for the disaffection, and who feels disaffected. You claim it is to the Republicans benefit…it is a two edged sword. Your argument leaves no room to talk about disaffection as a more global phenomenon than mere party line.