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While the focus in today’s politics seems to be on reforming various government programs, laws and institutions, when you consider the full range and scope of targets for so called reform it becomes clear that what’s afoot is a radically altered philosophy of government. This is not a new vision of America but a return to old autocratic, less progressive, more conservative pre "New Deal" type policies with somewhat fascist overtones. What is happening is an implementation of the Reagan top-down economic ideology accompanied by an iconoclastic vilification of progressive ideals. The drive seems to be not to repair the social safety net but rather to destroy it totally. Central to this neoconservative assault on the middle and lower classes is a concentration of power at the top of the social pyramid, and movement away from a citizen based power structure. Through the financing of political campaigns and a legion of lobbyists, the private sector increasingly infringes on the public’s franchise by redirecting public policy to it's own interests. This is not to suggest that business should have no business with government, only that a proper balance should be struck between the public welfare and the profit motive. When the middle class is marginalized economically and shrinking consistently, when the working poor cannot afford a lawyer or a doctor, when predacious lenders are allowed to roam freely, and reforms seem only to target the victims—it's obvious that no such balance exists. In today’s politics it seems that capitalism and corporatism outweigh the will of the people in setting the agenda for policy initiatives. The public has been lured into a scheme of hot button reactions to issues like abortion (a matter for the U.S. Supreme Court) and defining marriage (a matter for the states) which seem to matter less to the Congress once the election dust settles. But how much real attention is paid to issues like health care reform, protecting our environment, alternative energy initiatives and other more practical concerns during or after elections? Instead it's tort reform, (we have to protect business) bankruptcy reform, (we have to protect those predatory lenders) filibuster reform, (we resent being checked and balanced) judicial reform, (too much independence there, too much law and too little Congress). We are being transformed into a nation less concerned with the public welfare, with poverty, the elderly, or with families and children, while refusing to redistribute the concentrated wealth of super rich CEOs and stock market billionaires. We are more concerned with transferring responsibility to the states and localities—which themselves seem more concerned with using resources to pay extortion to business and industry under the guises of "incentives” to locate to a given area. Troubling too is the evangelical element in our recent debates. It seems that some of us, out of a confused awareness that our nation’s moral base is eroding, would have us turn to the government for spiritual redemption. Let me get this straight. The government shouldn't fight poverty, ensure access to health care, etc., but it should redeem our soul? Why don't we just replace church steeples with domes, and capital domes with steeples? In my belief, even if it were constitutional, a theocratic autocracy could not save us from the demons that are nipping at our heels. Demons like greed, lust, selfishness, violence and indifference have been around for a very long time. And no community on earth is more divided and polarized than the faith community, which splits and multiplies like cells on a Petri dish. The real question is this: whose country is it anyway? Is this the United States of America Incorporated? Or is it a government by, for, and of the people? And while we are at it, actually thinking about some of these issues, are we involved in a struggle for partisan power and ideological domination? Or is this a struggle for the character, the very soul of our nation?
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WAAV Radio Host Talks Back to the Radical Right… The Way I See It |
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Carolina Civic Voice Summer 2005 Vol 5, No 2 |
