The Love Chronicles

Why Government is no longer

By the People or for the People

The blog you are hopefully about to read is inspired by a man whose articles and blogs are a favorite of mine. His writings mirror my own thoughts, but he has a much more educated background to draw from, so I am going to encapsulate several articles he wrote, culling the thoughts I wish to convey. His name is Robert Reich, Chancellor’s Professor of Public Policy at the University of California at Berkeley, was Secretary of Labor in the Clinton administration. Time Magazine named him one of the ten most effective cabinet secretaries of the twentieth century.

Before January 2009, the filibuster was used only for measures and nominations on which the minority party in the Senate had their strongest objections. Since then, Senate Republicans have filibustered almost everything, betting that voters will blame Democrats for the dysfunction in Congress as much as they blame the GOP. So far the bet is paying off because the press has failed to call out the GOP – which is now preventing votes on three D.C. Circuit Court nominees, the Labor Department and the EPA, the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, and the National Labor Relations Board. The GOP has blocked all labor board nominees. They have also violated hundreds of years of Senate precedent by filibustering the nomination of a Cabinet secretary, Chuck Hagel for Secretary of Defense, and using the filibuster to delay John Brennan’s nomination as CIA Director. I am not saying that all of these nominations and measures should not have been challenged, but when almost everything is held up stagnating the congress and it’s ability to perform, then I am saying we must look to the source. This congress has done less work than any in history. I am also not laying all the blame for the lack of product on the GOP, I am after all a Republican. But the entrenched GOP is not looking after my interest, or yours right now, and we need to see the truth of this, as it is as plain as the giant locust that just smashed into your windshield!

What happened to the Republican senators, such as Mark Hatfield of Oregon and Nancy Kassebaum of Kansas, who were willing to compromise, and who cared more about preserving the institutions of government than getting their way? Even Orren Hatch and John McCain in those days were more concerned about the institutional integrity of the U.S. government than about any particular policy difference they may have had with the other side.  But the new breed – Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, Sam Brownback, Jeff Sessions, David Vitter, to name a few – don’t give a rat’s ass about how or whether our government functions. In fact, they give every indication that they’d rather it didn’t. Economics, and much of public policy and political strategy, assume that people are motivated by self-interest, that the definition of acting rationally is to maximize what you want for yourself, and that other values – service, duty, allegiance to others, morality, and shared ideals – are either irrelevant or negligible

Ayn Rand, the philosophical guru of the modern Republican Party, popularized this view of human nature. In her world, selfishness is the only honest and justifiable motive. By looking out for Number One, we accomplish everything that’s necessary. Economist Milton Friedman extended the logic: The magic of the marketplace can be relied on to allocate resources to their highest and best uses. Anything “public” is suspect.

The titans of Wall Street and the CEOs of our major corporations have put this narrow principle into everyday practice. In their view, the aggregation of great wealth and maximization of profit is the only justifiable motive. Greed is good. Eight-figure compensation packages are their due. People are paid according to their economic worth.  This crimped perspective misses what’s most important. Shared values are the essence of a society. They fuel not only acts of valor, but they also motivate people to become teachers and social workers, police officers and soldiers, librarians and city councilors.

So why do our politician act as they do, because big banking, and entities of big business like the Koch brothers –have long been intent on blocking any legislation that does not benefit their deep pockets, at the expense of you and me. All politicians, but it is epidemic in Washington, pander to the people who have the influence and the cheddar to get them reelected and offer them high paying employment for doing next to nothing when their political careers have run their course.

One last example of to illustrate me point. Earlier this year the Republican-led House passed a bill pegging student-loan interest rates to the yield on the 10-year Treasury note, plus 2.5 percentage points. Republicans estimate this will bring in around $3.7 billion of extra revenue, which will help pay down the federal debt.
In other words, it’s a tax — and one that hits lower-income students and their families.

Meanwhile, a growing number of Republicans have signed a pledge – sponsored by the multi-billionaire Koch brothers — to oppose any climate-change legislation that might raise government revenues by taxing polluters. It is called the No Climate Tax Pledge.

Why are Republicans willing to impose a tax on students and not on polluters? Don’t look for high principle. Big private banks stand to make a bundle on student loans if rates on government loans are raised. They have thrown their money at both parties but been particularly generous to the GOP. Meanwhile, the Koch brothers, again – whose companies are among America’s 20 worst air-polluters –have long been intent on blocking a carbon tax or a cap-and-trade system. And they, too, have been donating generously to Republicans to do their bidding.

We should be taxing polluters and not taxing students. The GOP has it backwards because its patrons want it that way. Remember this is being said by a long time Republican, but we need to see that our party needs to change, along with the Democrats, to return to a government by the people and for the people. I mean all of the people, not 1% of the people, who just maybe will share to a lesser degree with a lucky 10% of the people.

The following paragraph is the most important statement I will be making, so pay attention. The modern GOP is based on an unlikely coalition of wealthy business executives, small business owners, and struggling whites. Its durability depends on the latter two categories believing that the economic stresses they’ve experienced for decades have a lot to do with the government taking their money and giving it to the poor, who are disproportionately black and Latino. The real reason why small business owners and struggling whites haven’t done better is the same reason most of the rest of America hasn’t done better: Although the output of Americans has continued to rise, almost all the gains have gone to the very top. If we were still doing things the way we did four decades ago a typical household’s income rose in tandem with output. But since the late 1970s, as we allowed big business, wall street, and banking to slowly weaken unions and lower taxes on corporate America, allowed out-sourcing of our wealth so they would not have to pay taxes in America, which slowly caused most Americans’ incomes to flatten. Had the real median household income continued to keep pace with economic growth it would now average $92,000 instead of $50,000.

I know my views do not make me popular with some of my dearest friends, but I will always keep you close to my heart, while still trying to convince you to see what I think is so obvious. If I did not, I feel that not only would I be letting myself down, but you as well. So I have to keep on trying. We need to get rid of the political parties as they are now. They do not work, just look at the mess we are in for evidence. I have written about that subject before so will not grind on you about that today. I hope, if nothing else, I have gotten at least one person thinking with a little more of an open mind. No one is trying to become the King of America or any other such claptrap. If we want things to be better, we have to not be lazy, and we have to be able to look at both sides of a problem, not make up slogans full of half truths and outright lies to convince ourselves that we are right, but debate with one outcome in mind, to make America work, for everyone, not just those you happen to agree with. Also, in closing, the people who can afford to influence you the most, or almost without exception your enemy, not your friend. So it all boils down to on simple fact, our politicians no longer represent you and me, but the 1%, or maybe the 10%, but that still leaves 90% of us hanging in the proverbial breeze! We now work harder, longer, for less money than most of our European neighbors, a far cry from just 40 years ago, and getting increasingly worse year by year.