Massachusetts' - and America's - Message to Dems: Wake the Fuck Up, There Is No Recovery!

Massachusetts' - and America's - Message to Dems: Wake the Fuck Up, There Is No Recovery!

(aka: the impolite version of, "It's the economy stupid.")

by

John S. Ashton


January 20, 2010 – Um, what happened? We were, the Dems are thinking, beginning to head toward recovery. And we were being so nice, about to offer health insurance to millions of millions of Americans. Everything was wonderful. And yet not only did a Republican replace a Democrat, not only did it happen in the home of liberalism itself, but a GOP'er took the seat of the very man health care was being pushed through to honor.

What went wrong?

Seriously. On what fucking planet does no jobs returning equal recovery? Planet Washington I guess.

Ralph Nader ran for President a decade ago on the premise that both parties had essentially become one. His point was that, thanks to Clinton basically adopting conservative economics, both parties were just corporatist trash who pushed things that were good for corporate profits but abysmal for 99% of the nation. GATT, NAFTA - the great free trade agreements of the Clinton era, offered absolutely no advantage to anyone in the nation except corporations who wished to ship American jobs overseas. Offshoring remains legal today - and that not only has no benefit while allowing companies to ship jobs overseas, but allows companies to escape some tax payments.

This is it, folks. These were the revolutionary policies put on the nation back in the mid-1990's. Already, downsizing, which had come upon the scene in the late 1980's, had completely wiped out the upper-middle class and the basic social contract that had allowed a generation of Americans to securely build families and raise their lifestyles above that of their parents. All of these new conservative policies were based on the idea that whatever helps corporate profits is best and should be pushed.

It gets better.

401(K)s. There you have it. Wow, how great for... right, again, a boon for corporate profits but a disaster on a scale yet to be seen for everyone else. How about this: corporations simply eliminate the pension plans that they funded without any cost to the employee, and which allowed a generation to know they could retire securely with guaranteed payments for life. Sound good? Even better, how about if in addition to this, we get a hold of a percentage of everyone's paycheck and lock it up so they can't touch their own money for decades? Yes, the old setup where companies funded pensions and people put money in the bank, gone. No pensions, and the money that used to go to savings now sits where? Of course, in the hands of the largest brokerage firms, which not only get to hold it for decades to keep on their assets sheets, but, unknown to most Americans, get to take a percentage of it every single quarter - yes, management fees.

Ok, let's just make sure we have this straight. You will eliminate pensions. And, instead of us being able to put, say, 5% of our paychecks in the banks to be able to use to buy cars in or emergencies, we have to hand that money to you and can't touch our own money until we are 60 or so? And you skim a bit off of that pile on a regular basis? Even better, I am put into a pool of investment options, from which I can lose even that money?

Again, something that was an absolute wet dream for corporations, and a disaster for everyone else.

Ralph Nader wasn't entirely right, there is a difference between the two parties. While they both espouse the all that matters is corporate profit policies listed above, the GOP also likes to run up a bunch of debt giving hand-outs to the richest and to war-making companies, while the Democrats like to run up an additional ton of debt by handing money we don't have to the poorest and least responsible among us.

So here we are. Again. A huge sum of debt has been run up, this time rewarding people who took out stupid loans and handing people, a number of whom are just the ones who goofed off at school, cut class, don't like to work hard, have crappy attitudes so can't keep jobs, keep popping out babies without thinking about the costs or consequences... these have become, "Those poor people without health insurance, it should be their right." I have lazy ass friends, and friends who make choices like to pursue the arts instead of a job that would give them health benefits. Tell me this: Health care as we have it only exists because of a ton of work done and being done on a daily basis by countless people who have sacrificed and labored to make it so. Doctors who went a quarter mil into debt and sacrificed a decade of their lives - longer if you count earlier school years - to be able to do what they do; nurses who work the toughest of jobs; researchers, who spend years locked away with rats in dark labs so that we can have the medicines and treatments we have; engineers locked at desks going over equations so dull that most of us would rather shoot ourselves than try to follow along, so that they can come up with the amazing equipment our hospitals have; administrators and fundraisers and generous people in the community who have labored for decades, centuries, to make the hospitals we have reality, to make the medical services we have available.

So tell me, what fucking right do my lazy ass friends have to reap the benefits of all this labor and sacrifice? Air you can breathe is a right. Something that comes at great cost and effort, that is a privilege you should have to earn your access to.

But, as you've noticed, whoa, wait a minute, we are suddently WAY THE FUCK OFF TOPIC. Because this has nothing to do with fixing the economy, which is in complete collapse.

Oh, wait. I forgot. Even though we have supposed liberals and Democrats in office, corporate profits are all that matter. Corporate numbers are starting to look better. Ah. So, right, the economy is starting - I'll try not to puke or swear - to get better. Really.

Look you dumb fuck numbnuts. Don't start with your asshole talk, as you are now about to, "Hmm, there may be a 'double-dip' in housing." It's not a double dip, it's the same continuing crash. Crashes aren't straight lines, they do hit bottoms, come up a bit, then continue down, as any first grader who can look at a chart knows. And don't start with 'jobless recovery.' Next thing, I know, you'll be expecting consumer spending to return, since that's 2/3 of the economy, as you like to point out when you encourage us to spend money we don't have. Oh wait, that's right, you aren't concerned we don't have jobs, you want the credit markets to loosen back up so we can continue to spend money we don't have.

Isn't that the best of all, the best part of the scheme, and really the best scam in the history of ever. The goal was to be able to have all the money go to corporate profits without having any of it shared with workers. There was one problem: yes, as said above, without consumer spending, corporate profits aren't so good. WAIT! said one brilliant scumbag. What if we get people to spend without paying them? How the fuck will you do that? Just give them more and more types of and access to credit! BRILLIANT!

And so this is the setup we are being told is about to recover. Really. Consumers, which dictate 2/3 of the economy, are about to somehow go back to spending money they don't have, and that will make everything well. We aren't going to do anything to bring jobs home, we'll ignore the looming retirement disaster as a whole generation - the super-sized Baby Boomer one at that - retires without any pensions to live on, and we'll ignore the fact that the individuals of the nation not only aren't earning money to spend, but have massive debt.

No, no stimulus will help, idiots. Here's a riddle: if you borrow a trillion dollars from the Chinese, give it to people to spend, and it mainly ends up going back to the Chinese since that's where the corporations who get the money do their spending, what does that stimulate? Yes, correct, the Chinese get a great double-stimulation: America now owes them another tril, and most of that tril actually just gets handed back to them and their workers by the American companies that have their plants over in China! Wow! That helps America by.... um. Right, billions for Cash for Clunkers, and who got more of that cash than anyone else? Right, the Japanese, as Toyota was the number one brand purchased via the program.

The reality is, nothing can fix the economy if we don't fix the economy. Conservative economics has put a massive hole in the American economy. You can pump all the cash you want in, consumers can spend all they want, none of it is going to - as none of it ever has - trickle down, so to speak. It's all been and will continue to be siphoned up and sent off.

And your asshole talk of 'recovery' is just a continuation of the the lies that try to lock Americans into supporting the very scheme that has looted their nation, cost them their jobs, and robbed them of their retirement security.

There is no fucking recovery. Our problems are simple and obvious: conservative voodoo economics, which hand all the cash to a few Americans and a lot of foreigners.

Oh wait, a handful of Tea Baggers are supposedly waging protests to try and get things back on track. Right, that isn't just fake protests created by the people who sold us the policies that collapsed our nation to begin with. No, they are nothing like the fake protests they've been waging for similar purpose around the world for years, you know, in third world countries and, um, places like Iran. No, it's perfectly normal for CNN to run headline stories about tiny groups weeks before their protests even happen. Comparative monsters like Moveon.org get completely ignored, but these handful of 'grassroots' loons who, if you've ever seen the footage, can't even make coherent protest signs, they are front-and-center on every station. Has nothing to do with Dick Armey and the rest of the scumbags who sold us this conservative voodoo funding and orchestrating the protests.

On behalf of Moderate Independent America, allow me to say: Fuck you Democrats, for not reversing the disastrous policies of the conservatives and yet claiming recovery has begun; fuck you Republicans, for becoming a party that treats America like a third world nation, pumping 24/7 propaganda out to get the people to support an economy designed to break them and leave them permanently desperate and powerless. And lastly, fuck anyone who shops at Wal-Mart. Save More. Destroy Your Nation. That's the true slogan. And you know it.

It is time to come together in the middle, the 90% of us screwed by both parties. Poor because you're lazy? Go vote Dem. Hate your nation and filthy rich? Go vote Rep.

For the rest of us, welcome to Moderate Independent America.
http://www.moderateindependent.com/v8iJANNoRecover.htm