One of the most irksome aspects of the current political divide is the conservative caricature of progressive stances on economic thinking. Here are some of the most egregious myths that have taken root about our supposed likes and dislikes:
Myth #1: We like high taxes. No we don't. Progressives merely recognize that only the government can supply the resources to provide for national defense, healthcare for the elderly, a safety net for the poor, homeland security, national education, environmental protection, food and drug safety, border protection, the criminal justice system and all of the thousands of functions the vast majority of us deem necessary. We believe in the level of taxation required to get the job done. That doesn't mean we "like" taxes. We pay them too, after all.
Countries like Venezuela and Saudi Arabia, awash in oil revenue, don't have income taxes. Guess what? They have lackluster or non-existent democracies, because citizens who don't pay taxes do not demand accountability from their government. We can debate the healthiest level of taxation, but everybody paying their fair share is actually a symptom of healthy democracy.
Myth #2: We like regulation. Would that the first factory owner had said: "Why, that child is 14! Of course I won't hire her. She needs to be in school!" Would that the first mine-owner refused to foul local rivers with the coal run-off from his mine. I could cite endless examples of how the need for regulation was born, but it all comes down to the same thing: Business owners simply never choose the greater good over higher profit margins. Without regulation, we get pollution, labor exploitation, casino capitalism and oil spill disasters. (Oddly enough, Republicans are distinctly pro-regulation when it comes to abortion rights or gay marriage. Only when it comes to making money or owning guns do they suddenly find regulation tyrannical.)
The day capitalists start doing the right thing without being required to, there won't be a liberal in the world screaming for more regulation.
Myth #3: We like big government. Not really. We just know our history. America had small government back in 1929, and millions suffered terribly from the lack of a safety net during the Depression. Social Security and unemployment insurance were not invented out of an affection for the idea of a big state apparatus. They were created to improve the lives of the people.
Republicans would have far more credibility on this issue if they ever objected to growth in the biggest of big government programs: the military. Apart from Ron Paul, no one on that side of the aisle has ever suggested that defense spending is too high -- in fact, every year they insist on across-the-board increases. The idea that we can cut the size of government without shrinking defense spending is not only ludicrous, it's mathematically impossible.
Myth #4: We don't like free enterprise. Millions of Democrats start, own and operate small and large businesses. That doesn't mean we define success in life as having more things than your neighbor and living in gated communities. Money is nice, but real abundance comes from one's capacity to form and nurture bonds with other people. These bonds are strained to the breaking point by the economic consequences of a system that ensures a tiny minority will accumulate inordinate wealth at the expense of the vast majority. "Free" enterprise the way Republicans would have it work isn't very free at all.
These lies propagate the myth that conservatives and liberals have wildly differing versions of utopia. We don't. We'd all like to live in a country that has a good defense, no poverty, affordable healthcare. Everyone would love to see a prosperous middle class, the capacity to get rich and a favorable business climate. No one likes pollution or a weak infrastructure; all of us want clean air and water and a viable planet to live on.
Liberals would be delighted if all this could be achieved with a lean government, minimal regulation and low taxes. The fact that it's not going to happen is not a product of our unwillingness, it's just reality.
Follow Mark Olmsted on Twitter: www.twitter.com/MarquisMarq
Richard (RJ) Eskow: Too Old to Rock 'n' Roll, Too Young to Die Ruin Social Security
Don't Fear the Boomers. Despite the scaremongers' attempts to incite generational war, people born between 1946 and 1964 are not going to destroy Social Security. But don't just take my word for it. Ask an actuary.
Lawrence Jacobs and Benjamin Page: Deficits, Social Security, and the American Public
We have carefully reviewed the best available survey-based evidence concerning public opinion on budget deficits and Social Security. Elected officials ignore the public's wishes at their peril.
Geoffrey R. Stone: Conservative v. Liberal Justices: Piercing the Myths
Conservative commentators have persuaded the public that conservative judges apply the law, whereas liberal judges make up the law. These are appealing but wholly disingenuous descriptions of what judges actually do.
Francine Hardaway: Faith in Government Gone, Citizens Appalled by the Oil Spill Turn to Each Other
It's apparent that even if the media moves on to other stories, the people will not forget about the oil spill, and that it makes them more unhappy by the day.
Taxes are patriotic. They represent a willingness to care for of your fellow Americans in a civil society. If you drive on a road, stop at a stop light, call the police when you are burgled, fly in an airplane, are prescribed safe drugs, watch Public TV, send your kids to school, get loans for college, collect social security and on and on and on, then you are benefiting from paying taxes. All these people who think taxes are tyranny should move to Somalia. See what no taxes get you.
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The real question is why Democrats won't do political theater and beat the Republicans at their own game.
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Often it comes down to "these truths are self-evident." Relay a fact, backed up by observable evidence - that should be all it takes, right? Because humans are self-aware, reasoning creatures, right? And feeling baffled and helpless party-wide because the other party's general tactic is an appeal to fear - of the "other," of change, etc. Maddening, but difficult to make the jump to appealing to emotion from a position of logic.
Almost all the time. To the store. To restaurants with my spouse. To work whenever possible. To the train station for nights on the town.
But the point here is, I'm largely unconcerned with the price at the pump. I have a car and I use it for long distances and heavy loads. But mostly I bike. And so does my spouse.
Where, oh where, is my GOP hero riding up on a white steed to prevent my tax dollars from going to subsidize everyone else's oil?
I'm also completely against all war's of aggression. Yet war takes huge bites out of my taxes.
They are very eloquent about how their tax dollars shouldn't go to fund programs I like and they don't. But just listen to those crickets chirp when I want to prevent my tax dollars from going to programs they like.
How about this for a constitutional amendment?
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No money shall be allocated from the general budget to fund instruments of war or to prosecute wars on foreign soil. In the event that Congress votes to declare war they must fund it by means of taxes levied against the top 5% of wage earners and businesses. The population at large will not receive the spoils of war and thus should not be expected to finance its execution.
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So everyone can see clearly just how much its costing them and vote appropriately with the military beast constrained by the constitution to live within its means.
For the American system of government to work, there’s an assumption that individuals will take care of themselves. This calls for individuals to have a sense of personal responsibility.
The assumption is that an individual will take the steps necessary to be self-sufficient by working in an occupation that they can contribute and be compensated to pay their own way.
In the past, the American culture prized personal responsibility and looked down on the willingness and desire to take without producing more than they consumed.
The casino capitalists who created the economic meltdown that has deprived millions of willing workers of jobs almost all come from privilege--just read the marriage announcements of the New York Times. George W. Bush, had he been born the son of a postal worker and a waitress, would have probably have ended up a cocaine dealer or a truck driver. These people do not achieve and maintain their wealth because they are the hardest-working, the most enterprising or the greatest creators of value. They are mostly parasites of privilege.
Small government, no regulation and unfettered capitalism brought us the robber barons, who lived in opulence and splendor while millions of immigrants lived short-brutish lives in overcrowded tenements, riven by disease and overwork. I suppose the right considers that paradise, because they certainly would like it duplicated. A huge, cheap labor force without the coddling indulgences of healthcare, retirement, unemployment insurance or decent working conditions.
How ironic that the same people who tend to challenge the validity of evolution are so committed to social darwinism.
While this is a lovely sentiment, it has absolutely no basis in reality. You fail to take into account a LOT of divergent possibilities. Until *very* recently in our 234 year old history, if you were born anything but white, you simply did not have the same range of opportunities. If you are born anything but middle class, you most likely will not have the same quality of public education. You might fall prey to catastrophic illness through no fault of your own. You might work for a corporation that decides, for whatever reason, that you no longer contribute to their bottom line.
None of these possibilities have anything to do with "poor choices". They have more to do with lack of choices. Should one's sense of "personal responsibility" extend to preying on the less fortunate to "take care of themselves"? Maybe we should just devolve back to the Stone Age where resource shortages were handled with rocks and clubs?
The wealth of our nation is getting concentrated in fewer and fewer hands. If we stay on our present course, there will be so few people satisfied with their standard of living we'll either revert to a police state or there will be revolution.
As George Santayana said, ""Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."
Theydenounce "anchor babies" AND abortion! What would you tell a Mexican woman at an abortion clinic, Mr. Graham, someone who couldn't go back to Mexico without losing the job feeding her children. Have the baby here? "Kill" the fetus? Put your other children back in the same poverty you escaped?
The Republican party and devoid of serious intellect. The have demonized one of the finest human traits: empathy. The only people who really count for them are upwardly mobile, healthy, entreprenurial, heterosexual Americans--preferably white---who fetishize guns, Jesus and makin' money. Everybody else is "other" and not quite like "us," propagating another myth: American exceptionalism. Another example of egregiously emotional wishful thinking.
Wrapping yourself in the flag does not grant moral or any other kind of superiority to the rest of the world's citizens. Mindless patriotism is just a cheap route to ersatz self-esteem.
Although, in fairness, his screed in the actual article was pretty hard to swallow as well. Equally, if that's possibe, misinformed and tangential, drawing lines of conclusion and (get this) doing that "progressive" kabuki dance of calling anyone with a differing point of view - a valid one backed up by science and thought - as merely opposite, other, different...ergo: evil.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medieval_Warm_Period
DrGrass... is lazyminded. Wrapping onself in the blanket of "progressive" and applying that to thought, based upon conjecture, a movie and the mass appeal of Gore to the left does not good cience make.
Neither did the Romans have SUVs when they grew grapes in England for 500 years to make wine.
Myth 2; Mr. Olmsted claims: "Business owners simply never choose the greater good over higher profit margins." A worthless generalization. Many, many small business (and other sized businesses) owners contribute significantly to their communities and are the first to respond to crisis. (Think 9/11). And I can cite "endless examples" of how government regulations have had negative impact on the "greater good".
Myth 3: Mr. Olmstead appears to be unaware of government spending. Roughly 75% of all government spending is on entitlement programs. All revenues today are consumed by the big 3 programs and we are borrowing to finance everything else - including national defense.
If we didn't spend a nickel on defense and continued the entitlement direction we are on, the country still goes bankrupt.
Myth 4: Another foolish generalization. "Millions of democrats" start businesses but are more focused on the greater good than the profit motive? All republicans only want to maximize their profits? Utter nonsense. Then Mr. Olmstead dives head first into the deep end of the class warfare pool.
Rich people are rich. Some worked for it some did not. Some got very lucky.
The role of government is not to create so called economic justice. At least not under the current Constitution.
Have a nice day.
Thanks!
(FNF)