Saturday, August 13, 2011

How Lazy Are Liberals?

Last week, a flood of outside money blunted what could have been a historic exercise of democracy in Wisconsin.  As it was, two GOP state senators were recalled, and that's a good thing.  But we needed to get three to block the wholesale assault on worker rights that's going on there.

So, time to give up and go home?  Whine about how we'll never be able to beat the billionaires?

Today, Texas governor Rick Perry announced his candidacy for President, and it was like déjà vu, all over again. Here was a smarmy Texas governor, spouting obvious platitudes and lies, knowing his billionaire backers would be running interference for him.  Here's a direct quote from his speech today:
"We cannot afford four more years of this rudderless leadership. Last week, that leadership failed, and the tax and spend and borrow agenda of this President led to the first ever downgrade of the credit rating of the United States of America."
Now for those of you not scoring at home, the recent credit downgrade of the US Treasury from AAA to AA+ came from Standard and Poor's, who explicitly laid blame  for the downgrade on the GOP, which can be read in their report [from page 4]:
"Compared with previous projections, our revised base case scenario now assumes that the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, due to expire by the end of 2012, remain in place. We have changed our assumption on this because the majority of Republicans in Congress continue to resist any measure that would raise revenues, a position we believe Congress reinforced by passing the act."
I am not here to talk about the deficit, very few people are being honest about it anyway.  I only bring up this example of a hired hand (Perry) willing to lie, knowing vast amounts of cash and power will protect him.  In this post-Citizens United era, I guess it's game over, right?  We should all just give up?

In case you hadn't noticed yet, the conservatives never give up.  The Koch Brothers, and their father before them have been supporting right wing causes for decades.  I believe the election of Barack Obama was a great event, but it also created the illusion that the battle was over.  Obama had the ruby slippers, and all he needed to do was click them, and we'd all go home and be happy.

But, then came the 2010 elections.  When Obama didn't give us the magic flying sparkle pony that farts glitter, we got bored. We didn't show up to vote, and the teabaggers took over Congress.  Things were bad enough with the GOP minority in the Senate able to filibuster any meaningful legislation, now there would be none to block!

So, let's wrap this up.  I think nothing is more important than the re-election of Obama, and the defeat of the teabaggers, and the hopeful return of Congress.  So, the question is, is the game already over?  Is it too late? Will the propaganda machine win?

I don't think it has to end that way.