I have grown increasingly concerned with the inability of the Democratic Party to articulate an alternative vision for the American people. Our country has reached one of those rare moments in history when reality overwhelms conventional wisdom and average citizens can "see", if only for a short period, the man behind the curtain. The sudden realization that things are not as people thought they were makes people receptive to new ideas. But this heightened state of awareness will not last long.
This is why the Democratic Party must step forward and give the American people a reason to reject the vision of the Republican Party ... and it must be done before the mid-term elections. Toward that end, I offer the following thoughts on how this might be accomplished.
For 25 years, the Republican Party has been selling their grand vision to the American people. It is a vision that embraces social Darwinism unconditionally while rejecting biological Darwinism completely. Republicans, in other words, have tied their political souls to two beliefs. One is an economic ideology that guarantees Americans that dog eat dog, survival of the fittest capitalism will solve all of our societies problems because of the workings of the "invisible hand" of the free markets. The second is a superstitions ideology that guarantees Americans that dog eat dog, survival of the fittest biological evolution is wrong because it overlooks the "invisible hand" of the intelligent designer.
For 25 years, the Republican Party has been selling this crap to the America people and it is killing us. It is killing our middle class and our working class, and is increasing our poverty class. The Republican Party is killing the American Dream. And while the majority of Americans are running in place or falling further behind, the rich and the corporations are accumulating more wealth, more profit, and with them, more power.
This is what the Republican Party has been selling for the last 25 years. And it is this domestic ideology that the Republican Party has been attempting to "sell" around the world on the back of the U.S. military. This is the foreign policy of the Republican Party, which is sometimes referred to as the Washington Consensus.
If the Democratic Party hopes to capture Congress in 2006 and the WH in 2008, they must craft an alternative vision for America both at home and abroad. A prerequisite for laying out a new vision is explaining the old vision. Here is one man's attempt.
For 25 years, the Republican Party has been experimenting with a cruel version of social Darwinism. This is not the 1st time in American history that the Republican Party has experimented with this regressive and radical "free market" ideology. When it was last tried, between about 1896 and 1932, it was called Laissez- Faire. The Republican Party had convinced American's that markets worked best when left "unencumbered" by government.
For the better part of the 1920's, the Republican Party looked pretty smart. The economy was booming as people were buying new radios and cars. Unfortunately, most of the gains in productivity were distributed upwards, and average worker pay languished. By the late 1920's, American's began to purchase on credit to keep pace. All the while, corporate profits and the stock market continued to soar. By 1929, the top 1% of Americans controlled 44% of all the wealth in America. In October of 1929, the stock market crashed in 1929. The Republican President Hubert Hoover, a staunch supporter of free markets and non-government intervention, kept saying, "Prosperity was right around the corner." Unfortunately for all Americans, the only thing around the corner was the Great Depression.
What saved America then was a Democratic President named FDR who initiated LIBERAL policies, highlighted by the NEW DEAL. Roosevelt saw what was happening around the world as the Great Depression left hundreds of million of citizens of the world's most civilized nations with little or no dignity or hope. Many of these nations sought a non-democratic solution to their woes.
FDR wanted to avoid this outcome in the U.S. at all costs. To preserve capitalism AND democracy he realized he must return dignity and hope to the American people. That was the genesis and genius of the Liberal policies he enacted to end the strangle hold the Great Depression had on the hearts and souls of the American people. This marked the beginning of the greatest period of growth and prosperity in world history. It was the Democratic Party and Liberal policies that produced a growing and prosperous middle class, a working class that flourished, while reducing by half the percentage of citizens living in poverty.
The only class that felt "left out" of this generation of progress was the upper class, the top 20% (particularly the top 1%) and the corporations. The upper class saw their share of national income decrease from 42.7% to 40.7%, and the top 1% saw their share of national wealth decrease from 32% to 20%, and the corporations saw their after tax profits as a % of GDP decline from 8.6% to 5.6%.
The upper class and the corporations, what I call the Elite Ownership Society weren't happy, and they set out to return America to the way it was before the New Deal, to restore social Darwinism to center stage in America once again. With the help of Milton Friedman and other "free market" economist, well funded "think" tanks, and hundreds of millions of dollars from like-minded Elite Americans, the Republican Party put Ronald Reagan in the WH in 1981. With Reagan's election, Liberalism was officially declared dead.
Since that moment, every major domestic policy initiative has been targeted at the special needs of the rich and the corporations. The marginal tax rates on earned and unearned income, and estates, have been slashed. In 1980 for example, the top tax rate was 70%, today it is 35%; the top tax rate on capital gains was 48%, today it is 15%, the top tax rate on dividends was 70%, today it is 15%; the top tax rate on corporate profit was 48%, today it is 35%.
The overwhelming majority of Americans have not benefited from these tax cuts for the Elite. In fact, average citizens now pay a higher overall effective tax rate because payroll taxes have skyrocketed. At the time, Americans were told (by Alan Greenspan and others) that the increase in payroll taxes would insure social security would be fully funded for the coming retirement of the Baby Boomers.
This plan worked nearly to perfection as a massive budget "surplus" was created before Clinton left office. It would be this "surplus", projected to be nearly $5 trillion over the next 10 years, that Bush and the Republican Party would redistribute upwards to the rich and the corporations via the immoral tax cuts in 2001 and 2003. As a result of this swindle, and the unnecessary "war on terror" the projected surplus has now become a projected $2.5 trillion deficit over the next 10 years.
The 25 year experiment with social Darwinism has had the desired result the Republican Party anticipated - the income, profit and wealth of the Elite has exploded while the bottom 80% of Americans have struggled to keep up. The top 20% now earn nearly 50% of all U.S. income and the top 1% control more than 33% of all U.S. wealth. After tax corporate profits as a % of GDP have soared to 8.6%.
And how have average Americans fared after 25 years of Republican Part rule? Not well. The bottom 40% of citizens are worse off than they were 25 years ago, while the middle class has managed to eek out only small income gains after inflation. But in reality, when the average family of 2006 is compared to an average family of 1980, they are worse off today. In fact the bottom 60% of Americans are worse off than they were 25 years ago, and 20% are in about the same shape. Only the top 20%, and particularly the top 1% are significantly better off.
How can that be? Because an average American family now works 33% more hours than a similar family did before the injection of social Darwinism into the American bloodstream. In 1980, only 40% of married women with children under 6 worked outside the home; today nearly 70% do. Let me say this again. When all of the expenses associated with both parents holding jobs are factored into the comparison, an average family today is worse off than a similar family was in 1980.
That is what 25 years off Republican Party rule has accomplished. Thank you, may I have another! Actually, that is only the tip of the iceberg that is the disaster of the Republican Party vision over the past 25 years.
We can't forget about the 37 million citizens living in poverty, including nearly 1 out of 5 children ... or the 46 million citizens under 65 who have no health insurance ... or the 30% of teens who don't graduate from high school each year ... or the 2.2 million citizens in jail, more per capita than any nation on earth ... or the fact that African Americans have 1/12th the average net worth of White Americans ... or the fact that average CEO's make 400 times what an average worker does, up from 50 times in 1975 ...
And how do the Republicans insure this glorious "free market" experiment stays in place in the U.S. and gets exported around the world? By keeping our nation in a constant state of fear, and by addressing that fear with an ever-larger military budget.
In 2006, the U.S. will spend $667 billion on National "Defense." How much? $667 billion! The breakout - $425 billion on defense, $90 billion on wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, $44 billion on Homeland Security, $40 billion of intelligence, $68 billion on veterans affairs. Keep in mind this does not include our spending on our nuclear weapons programs or our "black operations", which, of course, are classified.
How much money is $667 billion? Let's put it this way. When Reagan was investing in the military build up to defeat the Godless "Evil Empire", the U.S. was spending just under 1/3rd of every military dollar in the world. Today, Incurious George is spending more than 1/2 of all the military dollars in the world to defeat a TACTIC - terrorism - that has been used by powerless people since time immemorial.
What is the difference between spending 1/3rd of the world's total military dollars and ½? If we only include defense spending and the two wars in the example, a total of $515 billion, we find the difference between the Reagan level of spending and the Bush level comes to about $180 billion per year, the difference between $515 billion and $335 billion.
So there it is, 25 years of social Darwinism. There is a review of what the Republican Party has done for America over the last 25 years.
Is it that hard to develop an alternative vision?
For 25 years, the Republicans have tried a top down, Darwinian social experiment with the American people. The results are in, my fellow American, and except for those fortunate few at the very top of our society, and the giant multi-national corporations, the policies of the Republican Party have been a tragic failure.
It's time for a change.
The Democratic Party believes a free market is important, but not more important than the needs of the people. For 25 years, the Republican Party has promised the American people a free market would solve all our nations many problems. Their experiment has failed.
The Democratic Party believes the economy should work for all the people. The best way to make this happen is to re-build the American Dream from the bottom up. This will not happen until the government resumes its historic role as the counter weight of the people against concentrated wealth and power.
The Democratic Party believes the government must play a crucial role in making sure that our economic system, capitalism, does not wreck our democracy, which is based on MAXIMIZING THE POTENTIAL OF EVERY CITIZEN. The Democratic party does not believe government should be bigger, but simply more effective for all Americans.
To that end, the Democratic Party strongly believes that ever citizen has the following SECURITY RIGHTS - safety, privacy, health, education, a living wage, a fair and progressive tax responsibility, and a minimum retirement wage.
- Universal health care
- Universal education from pre-school to as far as your talent and drive take you.
- A living wage starting at $7.50 and then indexed to inflation.
- An opportunity to provide for yourself and your family before being responsible for taxes to society - therefore no taxes on the 1st $25,000 of income.
- An opportunity to build a business before being responsible for taxes - therefore no taxes on the 1st $100,000 of profit.
- An obligation to pay higher taxes to society as you earn more income or profit. Therefore a flat 33% rate after the 1st $25,000 in income up to $1,000,000, then a 10% wealth tax on all income over $1,000,000.
Therefore a flat 33% rate on the 1st $100,000 in profit up to $100 million, then a 10% wealth tax on all income over $100 million.
- An obligation for the most successful to return more to the society that created the conditions that made their success possible. Therefore no estate tax on the 1st $5,000,000 of a single estate, then 33% up to $100 million, then a 10% wealth tax on all estates over $100 million.
I'm out of steam and time. The foreign policy will have to wait for another time. But, claerly, it should include
- a rejection of pre-emption
- a commitment to a reduction of oil usage by 25% by 2025, by 50% by 2050, and by 100% by 2100
- the total elimination of nuclear weapons (including ours) by 2025
- a reduction in military spending of approximately $200 billion per year over the next 10 years
- renewed commitment to follow international traeties and solve problems peacefully and multilaterally.
Any thoughts?
rok for dean