I keep wondering what kind of country we’re living in, where we spend more than twice that of any other civilized country on health care costs and end up rated last among those countries in health care delivered. I wonder why so many of us feel so angry at those less fortunate than ourselves, simply because they need assistance to get through their daily lives.
I have a lot of Republican friends; one of them has asked me not to always be calling Republicans stupid. I know that Angelo is right. All Republicans are not stupid. There is actually a segment of the Right that is smart, and acts like real human beings. Then there is another segment that is very smart. Unfortunately, most of the very smart ones are showing their intelligence by screwing everybody else.
Let me explain why I feel this way. I had a discussion last week with a smart guy who was complaining about the welfare state, a common complaint from many conservatives. This guy is extremely well off and to the best of my knowledge uses his wealth in the right ways. But he was going on and on about the evils of unions and about people who collect unemployment insurance but don’t look for jobs, etc, etc. I was forced to point out that there wouldn’t be unions to have evils, if there had never been abusive management. He grudgingly agreed but was still unhappy with their existence. Then I pointed out that for every lazy clod who collects unemployment insurance and doesn’t look for a job, thereby gaming the system for a couple of hundred bucks a week, there is a an oil company president, a banker, a hedge fund operator, a lobbyist, a congressmen or a judge who have gamed the tax system to screw the entire nation out of millions a week and that’s who he should be worried about.
America has long wallowed in its notion of exceptionalism and it should. We are the biggest, most exceptional bunch of crooks in the history of the world. Everyone who is able too, is stealing with both hands.
Now don’t get me wrong. I don’t think the Republicans have a monopoly on dishonesty or stupidity. We all share equally in those All American attributes. The Republicans are just more out front about them. They just don’t seem to care if you know they are thieves because they feel, as I do, that most people are functionally unable to figure out the basic realities of life, and that they can get their followers to ignore the fact that they are stealing them into abject poverty by convincing them that red flags like abortion, contraception, gay rights, immigration, Planned Parenthood and a few welfare cheats are more important than the reality that they can’t feed their own kids.
When I speak to a guy, as I did last month, who has lost his home to foreclosure, who had to take his sick kid to the emergency room because he didn’t have insurance and couldn’t afford a doctor’s visit and whose wife is seven months pregnant and has seen an obstetrician only once, and he tells me that the problem with this country is that we have lost our faith in God and that immigrants are the cause of his being out of work because they charge less than $45 per sheet to tape sheetrock, I know that there are people who are just too dumb to breathe and I also have found that most of them vote Republican.
Sure I see guys like George Will and David Brooks who are conservative and smart as hell and I remember some of the heroes of my youth like William Buckley, who was exceptional, but these guys are the exception. They have intelligence that is supported by some kind of moral conviction. They are not hate mongers and they do not try to turn us against our fellow man to give them an advantage. They understand and often speak against the ludicrous stances of the NRA, lobbyist organizations, big oil, big gas, Monsanto and the Kochs; whose only goal is to turn this country into an oligarch dynasty where the super rich rule and the rest of the nation become serfs.
Of course the super rich hate big government. They hate it because its function is to protect guys like you and me from them. When do the oligarchs get behind any legislation that is aimed at helping the everyday Joe and his family? Never! But look at what they are attacking. Look at what they brand socialism and attack as un-American; Social Security, Medicare, Obamacare, unemployment insurance, any program that helps the poor or middle class.
The oligarchs scream that we have too much government, that government is big and wasteful. It is big and wasteful, but it wouldn’t have to be big if it weren’t so taken up with fighting those who are always trying to game the system and screw the little guy. It wouldn’t be wasteful if there wasn’t always some rich guy with an angle, trying to get it to buy some product or institute some service on which that guy can make a buck.
A simple example is our defense budget, probably the most wasteful area of our national economy. Why is it wasteful? Because there are always thousands of defense contractors and munitions manufacturers, paying millions of dollars to lobbyists to sell their product, useful or not, to the generals who buy the goods.
Take the Abrams Tank. The military says they have more than enough of them and wants to stop production. Lt. General Robert Lenox, the Amy’s deputy chief of staff told the Senate last month that we should close the factory that makes them for three years because we had more tanks than we know what to do with. He included the information that the move would save American taxpayers $1.3 billion in defense spending in 2012 alone. General Dynamics, the manufacturer, let loose its entire lobbying force and convinced 137 House members that saving this kind of money was bad for America. How do you suppose they did that? Do you figure it was money, favors or just old fashioned hookers? It doesn’t make any difference and it shows that the problem isn’t big government the problem is twofold, big business and complicit dishonest government, government that is in the pocket of said big business.
Now I understand that the congressmen from Ohio where the plant would shut down are against the proposal. They should be, because it’s going to cause employment problems in their district but the congressmen from Mississippi should be, full out, for it, because it will release federal money that can be spent on education and medical care, both of which, are sadly lacking in Mississippi.
But both groups are fighting against the reduction. Why? Because, guaranteed, General Dynamics is spending millions in lobbying costs, perks and favors to make sure that factory stays open, continuing to make a product that we don’t need at a cost we can’t afford. This is what I meant above about the very smart using their intelligence to fleece the not so smart and the not so smart being dumb enough to support the very legislators who are screwing them because those legislators know exactly when to mention, gay marriage, contraception, God and the little brown people who are taking away their jobs.