[Peace-discuss] What passes for politics, while the WH kills chilren

[Carl G. Estabrook]

The NYT today reviews "THE AGE OF AUSTERITY: How Scarcity Will Remake  
American Politics," by Thomas Byrne Edsall, an apparently boring &  
predictable example of US political punditry "inside the bubble," as  
Harry Shearer says. From the review:

    '...Mr. Edsall contends that the G.O.P. tends to overestimate  
“ideological support from the general public.” Though it has won  
elections for four decades “by mobilizing white voters, especially  
white married Christians,” he says, this base is “steadily eroding,  
while Democratic voting blocs — Hispanics, African-Americans, other  
minorities, and single women — are expanding as a share of the  
electorate.”

    'Because of these changing demographics, he adds, Republican  
leaders “see the window closing on the opportunity to dismantle the  
liberal state.” The 2012 election is therefore “positioned to be the  
most ideologically consequential contest since 1932,” fought over the  
size and scope of government and the allotment of diminishing  
resources.'

In fact Republicans and Democrats alike are continuing the 30+ year  
project of Neoliberalism, including financialization of the US  
economy, off-shoring of production, elimination of the welfare state,  
and accelerating concentration of wealth in (a fraction of) the 1%.

The question is, can they retain their class allies while they do so?  
The 1% is too small to rule by itself, and needs allies from those who  
hope to join the 1% - the 'political class,' roughly the 20% of the  
population who went to a good college.

The arrangements have shifted historically in 'realigning  
elections' (1968, 1932, etc.). Will 2012 be one?

"The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly  
limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate  
within that spectrum - even encourage the more critical and dissident  
views. That gives people the sense that there's free thinking going  
on, while all the time the presuppositions of the system are being  
reinforced by the limits put on the range of the debate." --Noam Chomsky