The politics of Fear

While glancing at the usual places where I read and remembering some of my exchanges with conservatives as well as my impression of the RNC. I started thinking about how fear is not only being used, but created, exploited and cashed in on by those who are on the right.

The politics of fear are nothing new to our political spectrum, but even in an age of instant information, wireless communication, and media saturation, the politics fear are stronger than ever an in electorate of which half of are scared to death. 

Whether it be fear of Muslims from 9/11, to fear of the LGBT community; to becoming a failed economy like Greece, the Republican party of today are using fear as an effective political motivator to defeat Barack Obama. 

What drives that fear? 

People are resistant to change, change of habits, diet, perceptions, and ways of thinking. To change one must have an open mind. To many that can be a scary thing. It's sort of like being afraid of the dark, you don't know what you'll find there. To be afraid of the unknown is not something that's uncommon. To draw a parallel I look at the full Imposition of the ACA in 2014. People on the right are afraid of it one, because they're not sure what it means for them, and two, because the Republican establishment has perpetuated lies about it, saying that it's a bureaucratic takeover of your healthcare by the government, and that politicians will be getting between you and your doctor. Not to take away from the fact that the president didn't really sell healthcare reform to the people as well as he could have. 

Republicans have also sold the public on the uncertainty factor as it pertains to healthcare reform. Telling the base that businesses wont hire because they're uncertain about what will happen when the ACA becomes fully implemented, which pins unemployment squarely on the shoulders of Obama and the Democrats who passed health reform. That brilliant strategy shifted focus away from the massive obstructionism in the congress when presented with the jobs bills the President pushed for.

One last thing about fear of change, the whole idea of conservatism is keeping things the same, not progressing forward, not trying new and scary things. That has a huge impact on a part of the population who as a majority is undeniably older, who pine for the glory days of the 1950's (which ironically had tax rates of up to 90% on the wealthy) and are still afraid of social progress which is held as a platform of the modern GOP. That's not to say there isn't progressive elderly, I know a few myself.

But it's not just fear of change.

Fear of the "other" is also a huge part of the Republican party. That Democrats, and specifically Barack Obama, are somehow not American, that their ideas are...foreign. They've gone so far as to even question where the President was born, and when presented the evidence, it's hailed as some sort of elaborate cover-up. I wish I could say it's a fringe attitude, but with a CNN poll from 2010 saying that six out of ten Americans doubt that our president told the truth about his place of birth, I just can't. According to another Pew poll 17% of Americans think he's a Muslim, even though he assures us of his Christian faith. 

I personally don't care if he's a Muslim, Jew, Buddhist, or even a Satanist, as long as he does his job and protects the constitution by not allowing his faith to influence policy. 

There is also this idea that President Obama is a socialist, which a whopping 63% of Republicans believe. This is a fear that is akin to the McCarthyism of the mid 20th century. It's a fear of losing the American way of life to some Communist hellscape filled with free healthcare! *gasp*

Perhaps the most worrisome part of this "fear of the other" on the right is the fact that major party spokespeople have spread the idea that all social programs, are either just handouts for lazy minorities, or reparations. All this does is gin up resentment for minorities by saying "Obama wants to take your hard earned money and give it to...those people." Since President is half black (his mother was white) he is still considered by the right as the physical embodiment of  the "other" and therefore only works on behalf of those who are not real Americans

Fear of the other doesn't stop there.

The LGBT community has also been used as a way to scare people into voting GOP. The Republican party repeatedly speaks out against gay marriage, and not just speaks out, but actively stops efforts at allowing gays to marry. They say of course that their purpose is to protect traditional marriage. A task that actually not possible since the definition and use of marriage has changed throughout the centuries. Still it's an effective way of making an argument that uses fear as a way to keep the rights of Americans down. The common theme among the right is that if we allow gays to marry, then men and women wont get married to each other anymore, people would marry animals and the entire human race would set itself on a course for extinction because no children would be born anymore. Everyone would just be gayin' it up all day.Oddly enough the "no more children" argument is also used by pro-life proponents as well.

Fear of Immigrants. 

More like fear of Illegal immigrants. The horrible bogeymen of the GOP is one that can be easily used to scare Americans who are already fearful of losing their jobs. A common refrain heard from the right is that the illegals are coming to take your jobs. The GOP plays on that fear, to their own benefit as seen with the new voter ID laws which are, according to the Republicans, there to stop "rampant voter fraud." The real effect of the voter ID laws are that many voters who are Americans and who have voted would no longer be eligible, a majority of which vote primarily democratic.During the debates there were even talks of a fence, an electrified fence, between the U.S. and Mexico. It got a great applause line from the crowd, though later Mr Cain came back and said it was a joke. 

Sure.

A theme also heard by those on the right is the fear of American decline.

This fear is manifest in the idea of America no longer being the city on the hill, the shining beacon of freedom, and it's people being complacent and no longer exceptional. It takes the form of opposing anything that is used for the common good as well as tools used to further that purpose, specifically social programs and taxation. We hear from the right on a regular basis how taxes are too high, there's too much regulation and red tape that's choking innovation and job creation. We hear how Obama and the Democrats are creating a culture of dependency on government programs like SNAP and TANF, and that use of these programs takes away your freedom and gives it to the government. We read and hear daily about the "evils of collectivism" over the government created Internet on our laptops, or on the radio in our union built cars as we drive down government created highways. The fear of collectivism seems to outweigh the understanding that we all need to invest in our countries infrastructure. The irony of this whole fear of American decline is that  those who have this fear are perpetuating an actual cause of decline by denying the government the ability to reinvest in Americas once envied infrastructure. 

What is the medias role in this?

The media has a large role in the politics of fear. Fox news is undeniably the number 1 rated news channel on television. Fox news calls itself fair and balanced, many of us know that it is anything but. Its role in the Republican party is nothing short of setting agendas, framing debates and demonizing opponents of the pro-corporate Republican agenda. It used its influence to galvanize the Koch backed Tea Party movement when it was still young and when it still railed against bank bailouts and against privatizing gains, while socializing losses. Yet went after the Occupy movement that were protesting the same things. Fox news regularly uses fear to promote their corporate agenda, by calling the president and his policies socialist. They also have called him Anti-American. 

Radio host Rush Limbaugh has even said that Obama hates America. All of this toxic crap plays up fear and the belief that we have an illegitimate, foreign born, anti-American, freedom hating, socialist that wants to give white peoples hard earned money to black people and illegal immigrants because he hates you.  

In my opinion the politics of fear is an extremely difficult thing to deal with. Fear is a base emotion that came naturally with evolution, it's kept our species alive but now it's hindering progress. How can one dispel the politics of fear if the only tools you have, facts, logic, and reason are ignored? Fear is in the gut, Colbert calls it truthiness. I call it a successful tool for manipulation. We can't stop fear itself, but we can stop those who spread it around with lies. 

Dirty Politics: The GOPs lowbrow attacks

There has always been an innate nastiness to political rhetoric. From the muckrakers of the 1800s, to the McCarthyism of the 1950's. But never has it been so nasty, so distasteful and so divisive as it is today. It's also never be so normal. Normal to question the integrity of an entire party, Normal to ensure the failure of a President through legislative blocking, normal to project an image of a traitor onto a sitting president. And yet here we are, in 2012, being pummeled ceaselessly by political ads and rhetoric that not only lie, & obfuscate, but make it seem that the president himself isn't even an American citizen.

In the center of this is a party that uses every dirty trick in the book to ensure a sitting president is not only defeated in November, but derided as a complete failure. Not only do they wish to tarnish the image of a sitting president, but they even went so far as to attempt to destroy his signature achievement, one that they came up with in the first place, one that would help millions of Americans, and one that they offer no replacement for.

I am of course referring to the GOP, a party struggling to find itself after the eight dismal years of George W. Bush. Who have found themselves being cascaded further right by its fringe elements. So far in fact that the moderate conservatives have been leaving the party altogether.

Over the weekend former Florida Republican Gov. Charlie Crist, even went so far as endorse Barack Obama.

So as the fringe right continues to take control of the Republican party the attacks against the President, and the Democrats become even more nasty, and divisive. Now I do know that even Democrats can get nasty, I wont deny that, but I think in many instances the Democrats claims are usually backed up with facts, whereas   many Republican ads are completely made up.

Take the Romney Welfare ad that charges Obama with taking the work out of Welfare. Essentially saying that people on Welfare will no longer need to train for a job but instead; "They just send you your welfare check." This line of attack has been completely made up.

Even though the ad has been fact checked again and again being shown to be completely dishonest, Romney is doubling down by charging that the Obama welfare waivers are just an effort to shore up the base.

Which is funny because the wealthiest among us are receiving tons of corporate welfare in the case of subsidies, tax breaks, and oh yeah, bailouts.

That's not even close to being the nastiest attacks.

Rep. Allen West, from Florida in a nod to McCarthy accused most of the Democratic party of being Communists. Former Gov. John Sununu insinuated that the President doesn't understand America and is somehow foreign. Reince Preibus has said that the President looks toward Europe for his policies. All of them regularly call Obama and his policies "Socialist" and make charges that he wants to make America into Europe. The insanity just doesn't stop.

There is also the various Nazi references to President Obama, as well as comparing him to Stalin.

Nasty.

Of course a side effect of all this blind hateful rhetoric being thrown around all the time is that we've become accustomed to hearing the word Socialist, Communist, European being tossed around by the candidates and even the leaders of the Republican party. We've become desensitized to these labels that are frankly not even used correctly. Ask most people and they don't even understand the word Socialism, or even the word Liberal anymore. Fact is that Nazi-ism and Communism are complete opposites in theory. Nazi-ism is a very nationalist right wing idea, that espouses racial purity, anti-homosexual attitudes, anti-worker, anti-abortion, pro corporation, statist, and anti-civil rights themes.

Even worse are the charges of the president not even being a citizen, Trumped up by of course, birther king Donald Trump. He gets help from birther queen Orly Taites, and even Mitt Romney who claims to have made a poor joke to his base during a speech in my home state of Michigan. This rhetoric works quite well, in a 2011 poll 1 in 4 Americans think that Obama wasn't even born in the U.S.

But is it really the leaders who have lurched the party so far to the right, or is it the base?

That's a difficult question to ask, but no one can deny the base is responsible for electing these leaders. I remember during the debates, how the crowd was cheering about executions of possibly innocent people in Texas. How about during the video of the gay soldier serving his country being booed just for being gay and wanting to be open about who he is. Even worse is the subject of the man without health insurance, and how we should just "let him die" which drew massive applause. Then there's the Hank William Jr's, the bloggers, hell even a couple of my old friends from Facebook believe in this terrible stuff.

The question I have here, is what came first? The leaders spouting this crap, or the base influencing the leaders? Maybe it's both, or maybe its the coding, the language and the deluge of false information in the media.

The guns, god, and gays agenda of the right wing, wrapping all of those things up with patriotism and charge those who wish to regulate guns, keep god out of the legislature, and allow gays to marry as un-American, socialist, commu-nazis is an example of how the worst of American culture can be allowed to wield so much power in our government.

I don't however believe that the majority of  America is like this. In fact I can prove just how disgusted America is with all the nasty politics. The low approval numbers say it all. So maybe it's just a matter of time before the politicians start being civil again.

I think before that happens the Republican party may have to self-destruct. Maybe then it can regain its collective sanity and again become a party we can actually work with to solve the real problems facing our great nation.

Libertarians: GOP drones minus the culture war

It was only a matter of time until I came after the Ron Paul revolution. It's kind of sad because in quite a few ways libertarians are an ugly breed of both Liberals and Conservatives, shunned by Liberals and existing as the red headed stepchild of the conservative movement and yet, people my age seem to find them so endearing.

Libertarianism marries the best of the free thinking Liberal ideas of gay rights, anti-war, pro drug legalization, and get rid of big brother watching you and stay out my business sentiment. Because what Liberal enjoys being watched by the Government and harassed for no reason right? It also combines the worst of conservative top-down economics that have killed our economy, stalled wages, and polluted our air and water (see fracking) for 30 years.

The Libertarian premise is simple, cut taxes, cut government, let everyone do what they want, and somehow magically everyone becomes responsible, altruistic, wealthy and super happy.

Really?

Libertarianism is actually quite a selfish doctrine. The main tenet is about advancing the self and nothing else, no collective roads or bridges, everyone is out for themselves. If you Fuck up then its your fault, your responsibility, and if you need help that's just too bad because why should I give up what's mine to help you? Taxes are considered a punishment on everyone, and therefore should be as low as possible, for everyone.

Yeah, just what Exxon Mobil needs; another tax cut.

Libertarians believe that you alone have the power to make your own destiny as long as you work hard. If you succeed you did so because you were awesome, you work harder then others, you were smarter, and you had no one to thank for your success but you.

Let me a blow a hole in that load of BS

You do have the power to succeed, but you only learned what you needed to know to succeed by going to a school, maybe a public, maybe a private school. But you had a teacher that also went to school, spent his or her money on college to learn the things they ended up teaching you. Sometimes those teachers used their own money to provide supplies, sometimes they spent time with you after school to help you with those pesky geometry problems you had a hard time with. Sometimes they even inspired you.

Now we also cannot forget the school itself, built with the pure evil that is socialism. Its socialist buses picked you up from your house for free. The school had free water fountains, and heating in the winter. If you were poor you had free lunches. Remember those monkey bars you played on all the time? Socialism.

Odds are you lived on a street with a paved road that allowed you to get to your first job. You had electricity from power lines laid by the government, you had clean running water from public aquifers that you could drink and bathe in. You had inspectors making sure your food was not toxic or infected with E. Coli. If you own a business that uses the Internet, you should thank the Federal government for laying the foundation for it.

All of that stuff helped you survive, and thrive, so you could focus on learning and working hard to get where you are today. It's a collective effort, everyone gets the same basic foundation in which to succeed, of course people are more successful due to the effort they put in but we all have to pay for these simple things like roads, bridges, schools, firefighters, cops, teachers, food inspectors, power lines and all the other infrastructure we use.

The argument from Libertarians is "Why punish people for being successful." I ask, how is paying more taxes on having more money a punishment? If you have more money you're already better off than someone with less, so if we take a fair amount from someone with a larger income, and use it to help someone who has less live a better life, or become successful himself then what's the harm. It's not as if we ask millionaires to give up all their wealth in taxes, they're entitled to a large share of the wealth they earned.

But, and here's the but, the wealthy have more, and have used more resources to get wealthy. So why shouldn't they pay more? If you ask someone who makes 20 million a year to pay 5 million, they still have 15 million, that's an incredible amount of money. More than enough to survive extremely comfortably. Even if you ask them to pay 15 million out of 20 million in taxes, they still have 5 million. Compare that to the guy who makes $60,000 a year. That is over $4.4 Million a year more that the rich guy still has compared to the middle income guy. That is roughly 73 times more money a year that the wealthy person makes in the same amount of time. And that is even after taxing the shit of the rich guys initial 20 million.

Let that one sink in

After seeing those numbers I don't understand how anyone can see that a progressive tax system on the wealthy is punishment. Hell I wish I was rich, I'd gladly take that punishment if it meant I made 73 times more than a middle class wage earner!

Libertarianism is nothing but a right wing tool to bring in those people who uncomfortable with the GOPs culture war but want to continue the economic policies of more tax cuts for the wealthy and more deregulation. So why are so many kids my age enthralled at this? It's all about messaging, you tell these young college kids that they're awesome because they worked hard and tell them that they'd be rich if only the government would get out of their way. Throw in some stuff about Pot, and why they shouldn't have to help the lazy (poor) or the people who didn't save for retirement (seniors) and you get all these 20 somethings who can't wait to willingly fuck themselves over in the future because they think they know it all.

Well played Ayn Rand, well played.

Should The Presidency Require Business Experience?

In a word, No.

In two words, fuck no!

Let me explain why this makes no sense to me.

Conservatives argue that in order to be a good president that you must have a background in business, and some even say you need military experience.

That's utter crap, here's why.

Government is not a business, it doesn't run as a business and it shouldn't ever be run as a business. See people tend to forget that a government is really a contract between the government, and the governed.

Business however is different, it exists to make profit, usually by providing a good or service in exchange for something of value. They're not really similar at all.

To prove my point I turn to the founding fathers.

"Government is instituted for the common good; for the protection, safety, prosperity, and happiness of the people; and not for profit, honor, or private interest of any one man, family, or class of men; therefore, the people alone have an incontestable, unalienable, and indefeasible right to institute government; and to reform, alter, or totally change the same, when their protection, safety, prosperity, and happiness require it."

John Adams: Thoughts on Government, 1776

I love that quote.

Business exists to enrich the owner of said business, or as John Adams says, the private interest of any one man, family, or class of men.

What I am saying is if government is ran by a businessman, and is run like a business, it wouldn't favor the common good, it would work for the interests of a few people, a few wealthy, powerful people.

That's called an Aristocracy.

Another difference between government and business is how they work. Businesses are run by a CEO, usually put there through a board of investors (this is obviously in the case of a large business) Those investors let the CEO do what he needs to do to make money and will not usually interfere too much so long as the business is profitable.

Government works through a careful system of checks and balances so no branch gains more power over the other, there is no de facto leader in a government as each branch depends on others in order to get things done. If the business loses money it cannot function, and must downsize or run the risk of not being able to pay its stockholders, creditors and workers. Government however is able to run a debt and continue, not indefinitely of course but nonetheless it can function while running a deficit without going under.

Of course it's best to run make a habit of running deficits, which is why we have taxes, unlike business. I think Mr. Hamilton addressed this one...

"As to Taxes, they are evidently inseparable from Government. It is impossible without them to pay the debts of the nation, to protect it from foreign danger, or to secure individuals from lawless violence and rapine."

Alexander Hamilton: Address to the Electors of the State of New York, March, 1801
So why shouldn't business experience be required to be president as Mr. Romney had once said? Because they are different. They are run differently and have different goals and ways to get there. One should never run government like a business, one should never even consider it, and one should most definitely NOT merge government with business.

I think there is a word for that.

Let the Medicare attack ads begin

Now that the Ryan pick has been confirmed, like I said last night Liberal pundits are high-fiving each other all over the country. Ushering in a direction to this campaign with Romney saying that his campaign will be focused“American aspirations and American ideals.”

It's a big change from talking about Bain and the economy, or hiding from his tax returns. It's no secret the Obama campaign has been hitting him on his time at Bain over and over, like the Joe Soptic ad that talked about his wife dying from cancer because they didn't have health insurance, as well the many good paying middle class jobs that were lost while Romney and Bain walked away with millions.

The Ryan pick in my opinion is the result of a desperate need to change the narrative in the media, to Medicare, where they can hit Obama back for his supposed $500 Billion in cuts to Medicare in the ACA which is crap that easily debunked the non-partisan CBO. It does make for some good politics though, going after the Tea Party "get your gubmint hands off my Medicare" crowd, which is ironic at its best.

Another reason I think for the Ryan pick is that it shifts the focus off of Romneys tax returns, after today few people will be talking about what is in his returns because they will be so focused on this VP pick.

That's not to say this isn't important, choosing Ryan like I mentioned will change the narrative, whether it works in Romneys favor is yet to be seen, but Ryan like Romney has a bunch of baggage that can and will be scrutinized.

Lets start with the fact that Paul Ryan used Social Security to help him get through college, and now he wants to privatize it so that Wall st. can get richer. Wow, big surprise. He wants to turn Medicare into a coupon that does not automatically change in value if healthcare prices increase, that's not saving Medicare that is shifting the cost the seniors while giving them lip service. We'll continue that Paul is Ayn Randian follower who gave out copies of Atlas Shrugged on Christmas. (Thank goodness I'm not on his Christmas card) Ayn Rand is famous for being a staunch libertarian but not so well known for taking Social Security and Medicare benefits near the end of her life. How fucking hypocritical are these assholes? Talk about burning bridges.

The Ryan plan cuts government spending, by a lot. It also repeals the Affordable Care Act, which has been gaining popularity since the supreme court decision upheld its constitutionality. Like I mentioned it changes Medicare into a coupon, privatizes Social Security, lowers corporate taxes, and promotes drill baby drill.

The plan is awful, it takes from the poor, and the elderly, and gives it to oil companies and corporations.

Lastly I think the Ryan pick is there to excite the conservative Tea Party base. Ryan has been a rising Tea Party star in the House and is the perfect person to unite the Teabangelical base with the moneyed establishment. It also gives the Romney campaign some help overcoming the trust issues conservatives have with Romney. Before the Ryan pick conservative voters only backed Mitt because he was the anti-Obama, they never trusted the one who implemented Romneycare in Massachusetts which then became the model for Obamacare. They never trusted the "I will be to the left of Ted Kennedy on LGBT issues" Mitt Romney, and the Romney who was in favor of not overturning Roe v Wade, combine that with the fact that 68% of independents polled say that Mitt Romney represents the rich.

This is why both sides are thrilled about the Romney/Ryan ticket, it gives the Obama team ammunition to use (and lots of it) while giving Romney a chance to change the narrative as well as excite the base and help ensure high turnout on Nov. 6th