Crossposted from Hillbilly Report.
Fresh off their humiliating defeat in the debate about what has really caused the problems that have beset our country Republicans just cannot give up on one thing. Using the debt they ran up with their failed wars, tax cuts for the very rich, deregulation that crashed the economy and three decades of trickle-down economics to convince Americans to allow them to steal the social safety net we try to enjoy. Indeed in their selfish little world they will blame everything but the real problem for our debt and deficits. Their own greed.
Their lust to balance the budget on the backs of already strapped working Americans is never-ending. Even after having to retreat on increasing revenues and raising the debt ceiling they still have not given up on redistributing even more of our country's wealth to themselves. They are still trying to put the blame on anything but the real problem that has crippled our economy.
That is why they were out en masse after President Obama's second inaugural address whining like the selfish children they are about the same old garbage never once mentioning the real problem in America today. John Thune led off the Republican gnashing of teeth that they will not yet be able to steal your Social Security and Medicare:
“We were reminded yesterday that this is a liberal president with a liberal agenda, which is why the words ‘spending’ and ‘debt’ were probably not included in that speech,” said Sen. John Thune (S.D.), the Senate’s No. 3 Republican.
http://thehill.com/...
And daily we are reminded why Republicans are quickly becoming a regional party of selfish people who care nothing for their country as a whole. Some things we did not hear from Thune were "two failed unpaid for wars" or "greed and deregulation that crashed our economy", or "banking bailout". Instead they try to pin the debt they caused with their failed policies of trickle-down on President Obama because he tried to help all Americans recover after Republican policies almost caused another Great Depression.
Now we hear the same old garbage from folks like Republican Golden Boy Paul Ryan, the failed Vice Presidential candidate and likely Presidential candidate in 2016, crying about not getting to gut entitlement programs working Americans have earned and depend on to survive after three decades of trickle-down idiocy:
House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) accused Obama of punting on the nation’s “debt crisis,” citing his defense of entitlement programs.
“He basically said we’re not going to change these programs, we’re not going to reform these programs to prevent this,” Ryan said. “He basically said we will not fix this debt crisis.”
President Obama "punted" and refused to "reform" these programs for one simple reason. They simply are not the problem and the folks that depend on them have all sacrificed far too much while folks like Ryan have gotten fat and still feel entitled to more of our nation's wealth. Social Security has never added one cent to the national debt and needs only minor adjustments to be viable for decades.
But of course no whining about not being able to steal even more money from working Americans, seniors and children would be complete without the Republican "leader" the Senator for Communist China spewing forth poison from his disgraced, selfish mouth:
McConnell called the nation’s deficit “the transcendent issue of our era,” and blasted the president for failing to address it in wide-ranging remarks.
Indeed this is all for a simple reason. These Republicans are once again stepping to the plate hoping they can convince you to ignore the real "transcendent issue of our era". The plain and simple fact that they have redistributed wealth that should be in your pocket and bank account making life easier for you and your family to them.
And when you hear them preaching about "American exceptionalism" one thing they fail to mention. They only consider American exceptional when it leaves millions of it's citizens behind while a very few people who care nothing about anything but their own greed reap all the rewards. Their vision of the American dream simply does not include most of America:
That said, there's a case to be made that U.S. income inequality is in fact exceptional, and not just because of its severity. I was reminded of that last night, when I saw this graphic from a 2008 report by the OECD making its way around Twitter. In broad terms, what it tells us is that in many developed countries, a rising tide has truly lifted all boats, with the wealthy rising a bit faster. In the United States, the tide is lifting up the rich, while drowning many of the poor.
http://www.theatlantic.com/...
And indeed the reason they rail against "European style socialism" is simple. Only in America have the very rich been able to redistribute all the wealth to themselves as the rest of the people are left behind. These charts illustrate that fact nicely plain enough that even a brainwashed teabagger should understand:
Indeed this chart shows exactly what folks like McConnell, Ryan, and Thune consider "exceptional". People like all of us get to work harder every year to fall further behind as the fruits of our labor are stolen away and redistributed to a very few of the greediest and least patriotic among us who can never be satisfied until we are all starving and homeless:
Like their peers across the developed world, American women's earnings rose as they broke into the labor force -- though less so for lower-income women. For American men, it was a different story. Among the upper-middle-class and rich, male earnings inched up on the whole. Among the lower-middle class and poor, their incomes shrank. The only other country that saw a similar phenomenon was Canada, where incomes seemed to stagnate in general.*
That's what's so frightening about the way the U.S. economy was changing even before the Great Recession. It's not just that the rich saw their finances improve faster than everyone else's. It's that many Americans were seeing the value of their work, and in some cases their standard of living, decline. And that makes us at least a little bit special, in a very unfortunate way.
The very thing that they will never admit is that much of the spending on things such as food stamps, housing assistance and other programs that help the poor would not be necessary were it not for their own greed. If Americans were being compensated for the work they do and were being allowed to contribute to the economy and not the ever-expanding bank accounts of people like Mitch McConnell most of the problem would be solved.
That is why they are coming after your Social Security and Medicare and other programs that help folks who were left behind by their greed. That quite simply is all that is left they have not already stolen from you. Until we can address the real "transcendent issue of our era" our country will continue to experience the Republican idea of "freedom". The "freedom" to work harder and live in poverty so a few greedy people can sit on their asses and get richer.