Who Hijacked Our Country

Tuesday, June 21, 2016

Today’s GOP and the East German Government in 1989 — Note the Parallels

Paul Krugman nailed it in his column titled A Tale of Two Parties.  He says:

“Do you remember what happened when the Berlin Wall fell? Until that moment, nobody realized just how decadent Communism had become. It had tanks, guns, and nukes, but nobody really believed in its ideology anymore; its officials and enforcers were mere careerists, who folded at the first shock.”

And how does this compare with our own corporate-owned-and-operated Republican Party?

“The Republican establishment was easily overthrown because it was already hollow at the core. Donald Trump’s taunts about ‘low-energy’ Jeb Bush and ‘Little Marco’ Rubio worked because they contained a large element of truth. When Mr. Bush and Mr. Rubio dutifully repeated the usual conservative clichés, you could see that there was no sense of conviction behind their recitations. All it took was the huffing and puffing of a loud-mouthed showman to blow their houses down.”

Today’s Republican Party is basically just a few billionaires who are in total iron-fisted control over their rank-and-file prostitutes/politicians who are scared shitless of saying the wrong thing or getting their talking points bollixed up.

The Democrats, on the other hand, are a loose undisciplined group of environmentalists, labor unions, anti-war groups, liberal social activists — you name it.  This is NOT an effective way to steamroll an unpopular agenda through Congress.  But this is what makes the  Democrats a lot more resilient against an attack than the house-of-cards-disguised-as-a-monolith GOP.

Paul Krugman closes with:

“…the Democratic establishment in general is fairly robust…the various groups making up the party’s coalition really care about and believe in their positions — they’re not just saying what the Koch brothers pay them to say…What worked in the primary [Trump’s attacks on his GOP rivals] won’t work in the general election, because only one party’s establishment was already dead inside.”

Labels: ,

5 Comments:

Blogger Jim Marquis said...

Very apt comparison.

Mister McConnell, tear down that wall!

June 22, 2016 at 11:51 AM  
Blogger Tom Harper said...

Jim: Krugman really nailed it. I doubt if McConnell will tear down the wall; the voters will have to do it for him.

June 22, 2016 at 2:58 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

So if I understand Krugman correctly, without a leader like Reagan to truly carry on it's philosophy, the rest were getting decadent, spouting useless phrases and not understanding why? This goes in what I have been reading about how many Trump followers were saying how for years the GOP declared themselves the Party of the Middle Class and promised all sorts of relief which they watched go to the 1% instead. All it needed was a guy like Trump to call them out on it and in way that didn't sound like a Democrat.

He would have never called out Reagan like that, and that's why things fell apart the way they did!


Erik

June 22, 2016 at 11:25 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I am mad at Krugman though as I read his book "Consciense of a Liberal" in which he as a Nobel Winning Economist, points how in detail how we can have equity and prosperity by taxing the rich and removing the subsidies and tax breaks - he spells it out in details with number and charts. Bernie Sanders used him as a constant reference, and then Krugman started saying Sanders was misquoting him. Well either Krugman was lying in the first place or is a Hilary Supporter.

Either way Krugman has gone down a notch or two in my book

Erik

June 22, 2016 at 11:30 PM  
Blogger Tom Harper said...

Erik: I think Krugman's main point was that nobody in the GOP really stands for anything any more. I think a lot of Reagan's followers actually did believe his slogans about "too much government" and "it's morning in America," "if we cut taxes, the wealthiest people's income will trickle down on everyone," etc. Today, it's blatantly all about giving even more money to a few finance/fossil fuel/Big Pharm/Big Ag billionaires. I don't think anyone actually believes the same old "a rising tide lifts all boats" drivel, after being recited to death for over 30 years.

I think it's true that Krugman has thrown Bernie Sanders under the bus. Same with Thomas Friedman -- whenever he mentions Sanders, you can almost see the rolling of the eyes and dismissive shaking of the head. Maybe the New York Times has instructed its pundits to not be seen with the loser (Bernie) and start sucking up to the winner (Hillary).

June 23, 2016 at 3:28 PM  

Post a Comment

<< Home