It seems that the collapse of the Interstate 35W bridge has finally managed to drive home a point in the popular imagination that even the ongoing Katrina catastrophe flabbergastingly somehow hasn't quite managed to do (I'm sure that racism has nothing at all to do with that perplexing failure of imagination).
Progressive public figures (for example, the always wonderful Rachel Maddow), policy wonks (for example, Rick Perlstein), editorial writers (for example, Nick Coleman), and so on are all openly and insistently making the connection between the Movement Conservative Republican antigovernmentality and the consequent abject failures of Movement Conservative Republicans who actually get elected and then try to make a go at governing (if you can call endlessly lowering taxes, endlessly deregulating corporations, and handing out endless sweetheart deals to unqualified cronies "governing" in any sense of the word). And, stunningly enough, this time around, at long last, they seem to be getting traction when they make this glaring connection.
The Democratic Wing of the Democratic Party Is Finally Beginning to Say No Way to the "Third Way." "Reagan Democrats" are sobering up into Fighting Liberals ready for a New Deal 2.0.
The proper response to neoliberal and neoconservative antigovernmentality is to champion uncompromisingly the practical ideal and actual implementation of good, democratic government.
2 comments:
I listened to a report the other day about how rates of depression and suicidal ideation (and weird crimes, like poisoning pets) have sky rocketed among some of the displaced people of New Orleans, since they were placed in "temporary" mobile home parks in remote places, away from home, away from job opportunities, and so on.
These people have already been forgotten.
Capitalism is the water that raises all boats.
You do have a boat... right?
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