A New Vision for America
Vitriolic rhetoric has always been a feature of political campaigns. Lincoln was vilified as homely,Teddy Roosevelt as a tyrant and FDR is still today referred to as "That Man". A party must have a vision and be willing to fight for that vision. The Republicans, all of them, have a vision which relies almost exclusively upon market driven forces with limited government regulation to ensure the public good. Their anti government rhetoric is carefully crafted propaganda. They refer to the Inheritance Tax as a death tax while they very well know that it is, as TR put it, a tax to preclude the establishment of an aristocracy of wealth. Recognizing the independent nature of our people, they call social insurance programs entitlements in order to reduce their appeal as proper instruments for government action. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Workers Compensation and similar programs are not entitlements but are insurance programs devoted to caring for all among us, rich and poor alike, which require those of us who prosper the most to fairly share the burden, through taxation. Voluntarism is considered the only acceptable method for regulating the consequences of the unrestrained pursuit of profit. Voluntary conservation measures to combat global warming or conserve our natural resources, tax incentives for medical savings accounts, stimulating economic growth by inheritance tax elimination and tax reductions, particularly for the affluent, are all consequences of this vision.
None of those measures resulting from that vision work. The only thing that has worked is the useless expenditure of Billions upon Billions of dollars on military spending which props up the economy. Keynes was right. Government spending induces economic growth and it matters not to what end that money is put (Military or Domestic). The only thing we get for military spending is heartbreak for the over 4000 families who have lost a loved one in this senseless war of Economic Imperialism. Eisenhower was exceedingly perceptive when he warned us to beware of the military/industrial complex. A nation of 350 million people cannot dominate a globe of 4 billion people no matter how rich and powerful it is. Even assuming that our intentions are the very best, the more we try to force our ways upon others, the more enemies we create. Our energies would be better expended improving living conditions for all peoples starting with our own. We will always need a strong military and military cooperation between us and our friends and allies because as the richest nation we are at risk of those who may want what we have. But, if we pursue our current course we will have few friends and allies left.
Remember when we were considered the conscience of the world. We helped establish the United Nations, implemented the Marshall plan and rebuilt Japan, initiated the Peace Corps and expanded student exchange programs. These measures did more than all of our military might to stabilize the world and gradually reduce tensions between us and our adversaries. They laid the foundation for the fall of Stalinist style Communism and promoted democracy in Eastern Europe. Our normalization of relations with China, with student exchanges and expanded trade are producing positive though not exactly similar results there. Today we are rebuked for our inhumane treatment of captured enemy combatants and the rendering of civilians, including our own, to other nations where methods of interrogation are harsh and sometimes deadly.
There is an alternative vision, the roots of which can be found in programs like the CCC, WPA, TVA and a host of other alphabet agencies that began our climb out of the Great Depression and created an infrastructure that resulted in a post war transformation of backward regions in our nation. Stricter regulation of the banking industry and the FDIC stabilized the financial markets. The right to organize and strike coupled with the Social Security Act (first advocated by TR a Republican) established the Middle Class. Medicare is a system of socialized insurance that few today would willingly abandon. Environmental regulations with bipartisan support have been enacted to protect our natural resources and reduce our dependence upon foreign energy. All of these programs represent a vision that provides for government oversight and regulation of market forces to ensure the public good and protect our natural resources. Capitalism still functions well within this government regulated system. The greatest entitlement program of all was the Homestead Act. Government land was awarded free to new immigrant settlers and was thus surely an entitlement. It was first advocated and signed into Law by a Republican President (arguably the greatest president of all) Abraham Lincoln. It resulted in a period of westward expansion and prosperity helping to create the wealthiest society in the world. The voting rights act of the 60’s finally extended the franchise to those who were excluded from participation in democracy for 100 years and it transformed the South for the better.
The current Republican Party no longer produces leaders like Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, Nelson Rockefeller and Eisenhower. Instead we are offered up candidates like Regan, Bush and McCain, who pander to our prejudices, stoke our fears and reward only the plutocrats of privilege. Hermann Goering said you cannot lead a people to war unless you tell them that they are under attack. While we and other societies have suffered terrorist attacks, these are the actions of a criminal conspiracy of despondent men, jealous of the success of other societies and longing for a return to a past that never existed. They are criminal acts of desperation not acts of war. Our response to September 11, an invasion of Afghanistan to capture these criminals, was proper. But we failed to do so instead choosing to use it as an excuse to launch an unwarranted war of economic imperialism against an oil rich secular nation that was no threat to us, all be it one lead by a despicable tyrant. Is Bin-Laden still at large because we need a bogeyman? Reason and logic are discredited as a means to address issues and problems. Reality is supplanted by ideology. Thus we are urged to teach creationism along with evolution in our biology classes. The most educated among us are derided as “Academic Elites” and are treated as the new conspiracy against “traditional values” because of their insistence on the application of reason and logic. Belief is now more important than reality and is used to appeal to fears. Intolerance of all things at odds with our beliefs is exploited for political ends. Appeals to put God back in the classroom, keep marriage sacred and to make English the official language (personally I would, like Jefferson, rather it be German) hearkens back to the days of the “Know Nothings”. Since 1980 we have witnessed lip service to civil rights matched by a retreat from affirmative action, rewards for the deal makers with pittance for those who do, a retreat from regulating the excesses of the market, abandonment of our obligation to be good stewards of our environment and resistance to any measure that would protect homosexuals against the meaner spirits among us. In the name of security we are asked to surrender our right to privacy.
I care not to have another republican in the White House, but until the Democratic Leadership Conference changes its mission from ensuring electability, alla Bill Clinton, to promoting the public good, we will be faced with the impossible task of choosing the lesser of two evils. We need a Jefferson, Wilson, Roosevelt, Thurman or Kennedy who will restore a well regulated and fair society for all citizens, not for just the privileged few. While compromise is necessary to achieve political ends, we must never compromise principle in order to win. Otherwise we will never have a government of and for the people. The Democrat party must return to its “New Deal-Civil Rights-Environmental Protection” vision of America’s duty to its own citizens and insist that we act responsibly and morally in the larger world. Obama is inspirational, a quality this nation desperately requires and is the only candidate who offers any realistic hope of reacquiring this vision.
- Richard Gardiner ◦
