 |
 Latest |
 Greatest |
 Lobby |
 Journals |
 Search |
 Options |
 Help |
 Login |
| Home » Discuss » Journals » Time for change » Read entry |  |
 Advertise on more than 70 progressive blogs! |
THE UNFULFILLED PROMISE
Business and financial monopoly… class antagonism… war profiteering We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob. Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me – and I welcome their hatred. – Franklin Delano Roosevelt, on the eve of the 1936 presidential election
While George W. Bush has doled out trillions of dollars in tax cuts for the wealthy and hundreds of billions for a catastrophic war, our national debt has skyrocketed, social programs have become starved for funds, the income gap has widened to Gilded Age proportions, and tens of millions of Americans have suffered the consequences. Yet, when politicians dare to suggest reinstating pre-Bush taxes on the wealthy to pay for much needed social programs such as health care, they are countered with dire predictions of financial collapse and accusations of “class warfare”. There is indeed a kind of class warfare going on in our country, manifested as a reaction of wealthy right wing ideologues against any infringements on their prerogatives. Its history can be briefly summarized as follows: 1) Prior to the presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt great income disparity existed in our country, with the top 1% of individuals accounting for 17% of annual income and the top 10% accounting for 44% of annual income. (And that’s not even counting income from capital gains, which create even greater income inequality.) 2) FDR, after ascending to the presidency in 1932, initiated a wide range of policies – collectively referred to as the New Deal – which had the effect of substantially reversing income inequality for the first time in U.S. history. These policies included: Progressive taxation; labor protection laws; and several policies to provide a social safety net for Americans and otherwise reduce income inequality, including the Social Security Act of 1935, the GI Bill of Rights, and the development of several policies to facilitate job creation. 3) FDR’s New Deal was so successful that it lasted for several decades, despite tremendous opposition from the right wing elites whose wealth and power had been reduced. Then, beginning in the 1980s, right wing conservatives began to have success in dismantling the New Deal, such that today we have income inequality in our country that equals that seen in the pre-New Deal days. Since today’s right wing ideologues warn of dire financial consequences from any attempt to approximate the conditions created by FDR’s programs, it is worth taking a close look at the effects of those programs as they played out over the several decades after they were initiated in the early 1930s: Progressive taxation A high top marginal tax rate is one of the mechanisms that FDR used to reduce income inequality, by making the wealthy pay their fair share of taxes(*). One good indication of progressive taxation is the “top marginal tax rate”, which is the highest tax rate paid on income above a certain level. You can see from this graph that, except for a brief high top marginal tax rate during and shortly after World War I, the only long lasting high top marginal tax rate in U.S. history began with FDR’s presidency. It then continued at high levels, 70% or more, for several decades after FDR’s death, until it declined precipitously at the start of the Reagan presidency in 1981. It continued to decline during the Reagan and Bush I years, then rose moderately during Bill Clinton’s presidency, before substantially declining again under Bush II. * -- Some refer to high top marginal tax rates as “income redistribution”. I think that it is more appropriate to consider it as making the wealthy pay their fair share of taxes. The wealthy don’t accumulate their money in a vacuum. Rather, they benefit immensely, more than most other Americans, from government programs and infrastructure (e.g., corporate charters, roads, airports, airwaves, electricity, fire and police protection, the courts, etc.) that allow them to accumulate and maintain their wealth. Labor Unions Labor unions are a great means for reducing income inequality because they empower ordinary workers with the means of negotiating fair wages and benefits in relation to their more wealthy and powerful employers. They also tend to increase the political awareness of their members, thereby facilitating greater citizen participation in the electoral process. Furthermore, they not only raise wages and benefits for their members, but do the same for non-members as well, since they provide all employers with incentives for offering fair wages, lest their members be tempted to join unions. Table 1 in this article shows that prior to FDR’s presidency the highest percentage of nonagricultural U.S. workers who were members of labor unions was about 10%. That percent rose precipitously during FDR’s presidency and remained at close to 30% for several decades thereafter. However, with the anti-labor policies of the Reagan administration, the percent of workers in unions declined precipitously. And today only 13% of American workers belong to labor unions – one of the lowest if not the lowest rates of union membership among the industrialized nations of the world. Income equality following FDR’s New Deal The United States achieved unprecedented levels of income equality beginning with FDR’s New Deal and continuing for several decades thereafter. Economist Paul Krugman, in his new book, “The Conscience of a Liberal”, discusses this issue: Where the America of the twenties had been a land of extremes, of vast wealth for a few but hard times for many, America in the fifties was all of a piece. “Even in the smallest towns and most isolated areas,” the Time report began, “the U.S. is wearing a very prosperous, middle-class suit of clothes… People are not growing wealthy, but more of them than ever before are getting along.” And where the America of the twenties had been a land of political polarization, of sharp divides between the dominant right and embattled left, America in the fifties was a place of political compromise… Unions had become staid establishment institutions. Farmers cheerfully told the man from Time that if farm subsidies were socialism, then they were socialists. The entrenchment of the New Deal in the United States over several decades As noted in all the above accounts, the New Deal didn’t just fade away after FDR’s death. Instead, due to its stunning success, most of its components lasted for decades. Even the Republican Party gave up on trying to fight it. In 1952, Dwight Eisenhower became the first Republican elected to the U.S. presidency in 24 years. A large part of his appeal was that he demonstrated no inclination whatsoever to overturn the New Deal. This is what he wrote to his brother on the subject: Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance, and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes you can do these things. Among them are…. a few Texas oil millionaires… Their number is negligible and they are stupid. The long term economic effects of the New Deal As I noted at the beginning of this post, today’s right wing conservatives warn of dire consequences to our economy that would result from any attempt to increase taxes on the wealthy, even to the relatively moderate levels that existed just prior to the Bush II presidency. From these warnings you would think that the very high rates of taxation on the wealthy, starting with FDR’s presidency and lasting for half a century, would have resulted in catastrophic economic consequences, notwithstanding the reductions in income inequality. This chart shows median family income levels, beginning in 1947, when accurate statistics on this issue first became available. With the top marginal tax rate approaching 90% at this time, median family income rose steadily (in 2005 dollars) from $22,499 in 1947 to more than double that, $47,173 in 1980. Then, for the next 25 years, except for some moderate growth during the Clinton years, there was almost no growth in median income at all, which rose only to $56,194 by 2005 (85% of that growth accounted for during the Clinton years). However one wants to interpret those numbers, nobody could possibly conclude that they indicate overall bad financial consequences accruing from high tax rates on the wealthy. To the contrary, as Krugman notes, this period coincides with “the greatest sustained economic boom in U.S. history”. It is also of interest to consider the effects on our national debt, which has currently reached unprecedented levels, and which really does portend a financial crisis in our country. This graph, which shows change in our national debt by year, says it all:  Note the two huge mountains of increasing national debt in this picture. One began with the Reagan administration and went on for the 12 years of Reagan and Bush I presidencies. Then following 8 years of precipitous decrease in the rate of debt accumulation, the onset of the Bush II presidency was marked by another, even more precipitous increase in debt accumulation than was the Reagan presidency. In other words, where we have seen huge tax reductions for the wealthy we have concurrently seen huge increases in our national debt, with no compensatory increase in median income. Our current status Today, 46 million Americans are without health insurance, which results in thousands of premature deaths every year, including thousands of infants; approximately 7 million Americans who want jobs are unemployed; 12% of American households lack adequate food; approximately 3 million Americans are homeless in any given year; and 37 million Americans are in poverty, while the poverty rate continues to rise under George W. Bush’s administration. Despite all this, and despite the fact that income inequality has risen back to pre- New Deal levels, most Americans are better off today than they were prior to the Great Depression of 1929. Krugman explains why: Though the inequality of income (prior to the Great Depression) was no greater than it is now, the inequality of living conditions was much greater, because there were none of the social programs that now create a safety net, however imperfect, for the less fortunate. All the same, the family resemblance between then and now is both striking and disturbing. The social programs that Krugman refers to, of course, were those created by FDR and extended by some of his successors, especially including Truman, Kennedy and Johnson. But those are precisely the social programs that George W. Bush and his fellow right wing ideologues would desperately love to completely dismantle. These ideologues would like to dismantle all government programs that have been created for the well being and protection of American citizens – to let all fend for themselves, so long as they have the money to do so. Naomi Klein, writing in The Nation, recently explained how this kind of philosophy promises to work out even with regard to such government services as Americans have long taken for granted. Referring to the recent California wildfire tragedy, and the private fire fighting services purchased by some wealthy Californians, she writes: “There were a few instances,” one of the private firefighters told Bloomberg News, “where we were spraying and the neighbor’s house went up like a candle.” With public fire departments cut to the bone, gone are the days of rapid response, when everyone was entitled to equal protection. Now, increasingly intense natural disasters will be met with the new model… The “new model” of course means continuing to dismantle New Deal programs and any program which serves the great majority of Americans. This has been the goal of the right wing ideologues ever since their idyllic world was interrupted by FDR and his New Deal. When the wealthy right wing ideologues have so many hundreds of times more wealth than everyone else they see no reason for government programs that benefit other people. Such programs require taxes, and those taxes reduce their own wealth and power. As far as they’re concerned, the ideal state of affairs is for them to have so much money that every government program other than the military can be safely eliminated. Lessons for today’s liberal/progressive politicians Between 2002 and 2006, right wing ideologues in our country and the Republican Party that represented them controlled the presidency, both houses of Congress, most of the federal judiciary, our national news media, and a great proportion of the wealth in our country. Yet, to distract from this eye opening truth they continually referred to liberals who would dare to question their policies as “the liberal elite”. These are the same types of people who aggressively fought FDR in his attempts to reduce poverty and create a sizable middle class in our country. FDR was not at all timid about confronting them and explaining the situation to the American people, as he did when he accepted his second nomination for President: Throughout the Nation, opportunity was limited by monopoly. Individual initiative was crushed in the cogs of a great machine. The field open for free business was more and more restricted. Private enterprise, indeed, became too private. It became privileged enterprise, not free enterprise. An old English judge once said: "Necessitous men are not free men." Liberty requires opportunity to make a living – a living decent according to the standard of the time, a living which gives man not only enough to live by, but something to live for. For too many of us the political equality we once had won was meaningless in the face of economic inequality. A small group had concentrated into their own hands an almost complete control over other people's property, other people's money, other people's labor – other people's lives. For too many of us life was no longer free; liberty no longer real; men could no longer follow the pursuit of happiness. Against economic tyranny such as this, the American citizen could appeal only to the organized power of Government. The collapse of 1929 showed up the despotism for what it was. The election of 1932 was the people's mandate to end it. Under that mandate it is being ended. Today’s liberals should not be hesitant to meet this issue head on. The myth that policies that reduce income inequality hamper financial growth is easily disprovable, as New Deal policies clearly resulted in just the opposite of that for several consecutive decades. The idea that policies that reduce income inequality are somehow “unfair” to the wealthy are equally absurd. All Americans should have the opportunity to work, and all Americans who work should be able to earn a decent living through their work. That’s what the American Declaration of Independence says. If wealthy right wing ideologues don’t like that idea, they can go somewhere else. FDR wasn’t afraid to tell it like it is, and he didn’t exactly have to pay a political price for his courage. Today’s politicians could do a great deal of good for our country and for themselves by striving to emulate him. |
The Unfulfilled Promise
The Unfulfilled Promise of the American Dream: The Widening Gap between the Reality of the United States and its Highest Ideals  Time for change  Notwithstanding the lofty sentiments and purpose of the U.S. Declaration of Independence, the reality of the United States of America did not then – and never has – lived up to its ideal. Our nation remains today a long way from fulfilling the promise implied by those ideals. Yet, our Declaration was a great start, and it has long shone as a beacon of hope for people all over the world. Throughout our history, while many have striven to close the gap between our highest ideals and the reality of our nation, others have focused on the accumulation of private wealth and power, at the expense of everyone else. In recent decades the latter have gained much ground, leading to increasing imperialism abroad and deteriorating democracy at home, characterized by routine (and legal) bribery of our public officials, the fusion of government and private corporate interests (corporatocracy), a corrupt election system largely in the hands of private corporations, a corporate controlled communications media, and the widespread acceptance of Executive Branch secrecy, routinely justified with little if any questioning, by the magic words “national security”. All of this is rapidly turning our country from the democracy proclaimed at our founding into a plutocracy (government by the wealthy and for the wealthy). The result is the most obscene wealth gap our country has ever known, the highest imprisonment rate in the world, rampant militarism, routine flaunting of international law, the least efficient health care system in the developed world, a pending environmental catastrophe that threatens to destroy the life sustaining forces of our planet, and myriad other problems that threaten to destroy our nation and tyrannize our people. My new book, The Unfulfilled Promise of the American Dream – The Widening Gap between the Reality of the United States and its Highest Ideals, explores the roots and consequences of the demise of our democracy, and why most Americans have been unable to understand this process or even become aware of it. A good understanding of why and how we have deviated so greatly from the ideals of our nation is the first and necessary step towards getting back on the right track and revitalizing our society. The book is currently being sold in electronic PDF format and can be purchased at http://www.unfulfilledpromise.com/Buy-the-... for $3.99. It will also soon be available in Amazon Kindle format. DU members who cannot afford to buy the book but would like to read it can pm me with your e-mail address, and I will send you a free PDF copy. I’ve previously posted on DU a slightly earlier version of the introduction to the book, which is also posted at my site. Here is the Table of Contents, followed by a brief description of the three parts of the book: TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction Acknowledgements Prologue – What is Wrong with the United States of America? Part I – Root Causes of the Impending Demise of American Democracy Chapter 1 – Legalized Bribery Chapter 2 – Human Psychological Factors Chapter 3 – Corporatocracy Chapter 4 – Corporate Control of Media Chapter 5 – Corrupt Election System Chapter 6 – Government Secrecy Chapter 7 – American Exceptionalism Part II – A Sampling of Imperialist Actions Chapter 8 – Slavery and its Legacy Chapter 9 – Early U.S. Imperialism Chapter 10 – U.S. Imperialism in Cold War Chapter 11 – Iraq War and Occupation Chapter 12 – Afghanistan War Part III – Consequences Chapter 13 – Election of George W. Bush Chapter 14 – War and Imperialism Chapter 15 – Class Warfare Chapter 16 – Predator Financial Class Chapter 17 – Shock Therapy Chapter 18 – Contempt for Int. Law Chapter 19 – The “War on Drugs” Chapter 20 – Climate Change Chapter 21 – “War on Terror” Chapter 22 – Health Care Chapter 23 – Unaccountable government Chapter 24 – Response to 9/11 Attacks Epilogue PART I – Root Causes of the Impending Demise of American Democracy It is somewhat difficult to separate the causes of our problems from their consequences, since they combine to form a long chain of cause leading to consequence, leading to more consequences, etcetera. Nevertheless, it seems worth while to identify the root causes of our problems, those that occur early in the chain and lead to so many of the tragic consequences we see today. The only chance we have of reversing the demise of our democracy is through addressing and attacking its root causes. At the top of the list is the systematic bribery of public officials by the powerful corporations (Chapter 1) whom our government is charged with regulating in the public interest. Instead of calling it bribery, we call it “campaign contributions”, but what we call it isn’t as important as what it is. It is hard to fathom how democracy can survive when such a practice is legal and condoned. Working in tandem with our system of legalized bribery is the nature of the people who inhabit our country. That is not to say that Americans are inherently substantially different than any other people. Human beings are imperfect, and that is probably a major reason why in a world where civilization began more than five millennia ago, the oldest written national framework of government in the world today – the Constitution of the United States of America – is only a little more than two and a quarter centuries old. Chapter 2 explores the roles of basic human needs, authoritarianism, psychological defense mechanisms used to prevent us from perceiving reality as it is rather than as we’d like it to be, and corrupted ideologies in causing us to passively accept the accumulation of power in the hands of ambitious and ruthless individuals who care about little else than expanding their own wealth and power. When bribery of public officials is tolerated as an inevitable aspect of public life, government inevitably grows close to the wealthy interests that shower it with money in return for legislative and other favors. A malevolent symbiosis grows between the state and corporate power, resulting in rule by an oligarchy that is highly detrimental to the lives of ordinary people (Chapter 3). Using their accumulated wealth and power to manipulate our legislative process, the oligarchy grabs for more and more control of the communications media (Chapter 4) that are used to control the information available to and shape the attitudes of our nation’s people, in pursuit of their own narrow interests. Since the 1980s an orchestrated campaign has been underway to demonize “big government”, thereby paving the way for private corporate control over more and more functions that were previously deemed intrinsic functions of government. Among those functions is the running of public elections (Chapter 5) – the function that symbolizes democracy perhaps more than any other single function. Consequently, the purging of selected registered voters from our computerized voter rolls has become a routine recurring event throughout much of our country, and without a doubt determined the results of the 2000 – and probably 2004 as well – presidential election. Just as bad, more and more of the counting of votes in our public elections have been turned over to private corporations, which count our votes using electronic machines using secret software to produce vote counts that cannot be verified by anyone. Bribery, the fusion of government and private interest, fake and biased news, and corrupt elections are not things that government and its corporate allies want us to know about. Consequently, they construct walls of secrecy (Chapter 6) to keep us from obtaining information that sheds light on their activities. The perfect phrase for facilitating this is “national security”. When our government tells us that the “national security” requires that certain things be kept secret from us, the understanding is that to question such a pronouncement is unpatriotic, and to actually attempt to obtain the “secret” information may be treasonous. But indefinitely maintaining secrets from the American people can be very difficult, because at least some people want to know what their government is up to. So in addition to the formal mechanisms of secrecy, informal mechanisms are constructed (Chapter 7) to keep vital information away from us. One of the primary methods for doing this is to make certain sensitive subjects taboo – that is, to create the widespread belief that discussion of these topics is so outside the bounds of acceptable human discourse that anyone who discusses them should be shunned by society, or worse. The most common issue that falls into this category is any discussion that sheds light on the disparity between American ideals and the reality of life in our country today. PART II – A Sampling of Imperialist Actions in U.S. History Notwithstanding the fact that our founding document says that “all men are created equal” and speaks of the inalienable rights of humankind, the United States has throughout its history partaken of massive exploitation of other peoples. It is estimated that at the time of our birth, 18% of our population was black slaves. In our expansion westwards during the late 18th and 19th centuries, we decimated the original inhabitants of our continent, and often treated them with great cruelty. In 1846 we manufactured an excuse for war with our neighbor Mexico, in which we continued to expand our country westwards and southwards. In 1893 we began our overseas imperialism with the conquest of Hawaii. Our overseas expansion was greatly accelerated in 1898 with our participation in the Spanish-American War, which led to our conquest of Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Philippines. With our arrival at world superpower status at the end of World War II, we began the Cold War, which led to and served as a rationalization for covert and/or direct military actions against myriad foreign nations over the next 46 years. With the September 11, 2001 attacks on our country, we declared a perpetual “War on Terror”, which served and continues to serve as an excuse to invade and occupy Iraq and Afghanistan, nations that posed no threat to us. We do not know when or if this perpetual war will ever end. We don’t know how many additional imperial conquests it will lead to. Most Americans don’t think much about all this. Many of these actions are done in secrecy, and the American people don’t find out about them until many years later – or we never find out about them at all. Those that we do know about are spun into the most favorable light, to make them seem benign or even noble. But these actions come at great costs: in the lives of our soldiers; in the ruined lives of the peoples of the victim countries; in trillions of dollars cost to our people and their future generations; in our international reputation; in anti-American hatred leading to terrorism; and, to our democracy itself. For how can a nation claim to believe in the inalienable rights of humankind specified in its founding document, while making a mockery of that belief in the way it treats other peoples? For that reason alone it is worth while to take a brief look at our long history of imperialist actions. PART III – Consequences In the Prologue I give a brief account of what I see as some of the worst and tragic consequences of the root causes that I discuss in Part I – to enable the reader to see where this book is heading. When elections of our public officials are for sale to the highest bidder… when our public officials are so addicted to the “campaign contributions” of their wealthiest constituents that they develop a symbiotic relationship with them… when our communications media are owned and controlled by an oligarchy of wealthy elites… when our citizenry lack the ability to differentiate propaganda from reality… when we allow machines provided by private corporations to count our votes using secret electronic software… then we should expect that the consequences will not be pretty or comfortable for the vast majority of our citizens. In Part III, I explore those consequences in much greater detail, in the hope that the reader will agree with me that these are very serious problems, and that they must be successfully addressed if our country is ever to fulfill the promise of its ideals, or even make progress in that direction. When enough Americans recognize our problems as problems, stripped of the gloss and spin put on them by our oligarchy, they will rise up and do something about them. Until then there will be no progress, and we are very likely to head in the direction of all the former empires of our planet, ending in chaos, widespread catastrophe, suffering, and ignominy. Profile Information Time for change
Visitor Tools
Use the tools below to keep track of updates to this Journal.
The Usual Suspects
Greatest Threads
The ten most recommended threads posted
on the Democratic Underground Discussion Forums in the
last 24 hours.  World Press Photo of the year awarded to Samuel Aranda 8 recs : By No Elephants Obama: Religious-backed organizations won't have to pay for birth control 7 recs : By Contrary1 Skin cancer drug reverses Alzheimer's in mice 6 recs : By No Elephants Wasilla Teabagger Ousted in Recall After Puking, Pissing on Hotel Furniture 5 recs : By Sapphocrat Doctor in Homs: Everyone is waiting to die 5 recs : By No Elephants My Forums
Democratic Underground forums
and groups from my "My Forums" list.
Random Journal
 Discussion Forums
Big Forums
More Forums
Today's Featured Forums
Latest Threads
The ten most recent threads posted on
the Democratic Underground Discussion Forums. China's Wen pledges greater freedoms for Tibet By ellisonz Florida AG Pam Bondi: Lax on big mortgage lenders; took their campaign money; fired investigators By seafan Burglar breaks in, folds clothes, cooks dinner By Contrary1 Lochness-like monster filmed in Iceland By bikebloke World Press Photo of the year awarded to Samuel Aranda By No Elephants CPAC...AKA... By Me. Skin cancer drug reverses Alzheimer's in mice By No Elephants Is there any way Fareed Zakaria could be more of a shill? By No Elephants |
