Tone-deafness doesn't cover it. I always love it when Republicans make the case for Barack Obama and other Democrats so clearly, not only in their vicious policies, not only in their disdain for the rest of us, but also in laying out the case point by point for not supporting them and for supporting President Obama, and Democrats all up and down the ballot.
You heard Republicans at their convention chanting, "We built that!" And Romney in a recently prominent video from a fundraiser calling 47% of us moochers, while the rich pretend to be entitled to tax cuts, subsidies, and deregulation.
Not that any of this is in any way new.
Everything for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind.
Adam Smith, Wealth of Nations
The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.
John Kenneth Galbraith
Well, let me take part of Romney's speech apart, and tell you who really built that.
Also, the rest of that fundraiser speech has been released. Rachel Maddow is dissecting it as I write. Enjoy.
Here is the money quote from Romney, with my comments.
There are 47 percent who are with [the President], who are dependent upon government
because the rich screwed the rest of us over, as they have done in this country for two centuries, and in the colonies before that, and throughout recorded history, and because we took responsibility for ourselves when we created Social Security and Medicare, among other things. We built that!
The rich are of course dependent on government, too, as President Obama was explaining. If they really want out, I have a Modest Proposal for a Tea Party Utopia to offer them—Have I got a tax cut for you! No taxes whatsoever, but correspondingly no services, because of course you don't need them, or so you claim. All or nothing. Put up or shut up. I lay out the whole catalog.
who believe that they are victims,
because we are victims of the kleptocracy, which the Lincoln Abolitionists, the Teddy Roosevelt trustbusters, the FDR New Dealers, and the Truman-Eisenhower-Earl Warren-LBJ axis of Civil Rights worked so hard to prevent or undo, and we are still doing today. We built that!
who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them,
when nobody else will, because those of us who took responsibility, worked hard, and played by the rules have earned it, and are willing to share with those who did not have the chance to work because of age, disability or economic distress. We built that!
who believe that they are entitled to health care,
What, not even if we pay for it? You make me laugh. And by the way, thanks for your part in ObamneyCare, Mitt. We built that, and you did, too!
to food,
So, no Right to Life, then? Did you know that Food Stamps started out as an agricultural subsidy program, an entitlement for farmers? Regardless, we built that!
to housing,
Because the homeless, especially the mentally ill, add so much to the quality of life of the rich? I don't care how much low-income housing and how many shelters and hospitals you and yours tore down and sold off. We built that, and we will build that again!
to you name it.
Education, clean water, clean air, pure food and drugs, national parks, product safety, travel safety, roads, bridges, the military, financial and economic regulation…We built that, and there's more where that came from!
That that's an entitlement.
I'll say it again. We built that. All of us. We created the political will, we paid for it, we did the work, and we all reap the benefits.
Now we are going to build a Democratic Congress, and set about rebuilding America. Would you like to build that?