While Rome Burns

Over the past week, multiple articles and editorials have appeared in Madison print and internet media bearing a central theme:  Now that the recall elections are over, we must put divisiveness aside, forget the sins of the recent past, and move forward together.  The corollary to the primary “let’s all get along” theme is the “get over it, you lost” theme directed at the left.  I read these articles and tried to feel the emotion of reconciliation these articles preached.  I really tried.  Yet, I felt nothing but numbness.  I watched as Governor Walker announced his “beer and brat” summit, while at the same time his communications director Ciara Matthews tweeted taunts and insults at the Democrats for the failure of the recall.  Yet I still felt nothing.  Until, that is, I read an essay published by the Wisconsin State Journal/Madison.com on Saturday, June 9th.  The article was written by Kenneth Mayer, a University of Wisconsin political scientist, and was titled “Time for healing to begin.” Upon reading the superficial yet shockingly condescending piece, I felt anger.  And, as is often the case lately, I felt like writing.

Mayer’s essay, contained in the embedded link above, essentially said the following: Now that the recall is over, both sides need to get along, Democrats need to get over the loss, Republicans shouldn’t rub it in, and, if we all continue to be naughty, Mayer will put us in a time-out.  Yes, he really said this.

The mindset reflected in articles like this is part of the reason this country is in decline.  Mr. Mayer’s essay completely ignores a simple fact: American politics has rocketed to the right over the past 30 years. This fact has been very well documented by Mr. Mayer’s peers, Ken Rosenthal and Keith Poole, University of Georgia political scientists who publish Voteview.  Rosenthal and Poole’s research demonstrates that all branches of government in this country have marched steadily to the right since the Carter administration.  We now have the worst income inequality in the entire industrialized world, we continue to deny segments of our society fundamental civil rights, and we most certainly have a political system that is bought and paid for by corporate money. We are seeing policy changes that would have been unheard of a decade ago, most of which are hurting middle and working class people in favor of corporations and the wealthy.  Today’s Republican Party is so extreme that they have pinned the needle of the political tachometer, and couldn’t move farther to the right if it tried.

Mayer's piece also ignored the fact that the three primary pillars of the current Republican platform are destroying this country, particularly the middle class.  These pillars are 1) Labor unions are bad and need to be eliminated, 2) Lowering taxes on the wealthy and corporations will create jobs and middle class wealth, and 3) Regulation of business, particularly in the financial industry, is what is holding the country back from true prosperity.  These hallmarks are each destructive in their own right, but the synergy of the three is enough to bring a civilization to collapse.  I will write about these more at a later date, but here are a few facts:

When you superimpose the graphs of the decline of union membership in this country over the past 30 years and the decline in middle class wages, it is clear that the those lines are nearly identical in their free fall downward.  Don't take my word for it, the graph is shown below.  It is important to note that the decline in wages reflect ALL middle class wage earners, not just union members.  This was no accident, it was by design.  If the corporate right can destroy unions, it can lower the pay scale for all workers.  It is a tragedy that this message was not delivered effectively to the majority of the people of Wisconsin last Tuesday.  

The other bedrock piece of the Republican platform, the anti-tax platform, has had equally disastrous results.       You don't have to be a member of the intellectual elite the right despises so much to 1) see the pattern in this graph, and 2) realize that we are currently headed off a very large cliff.

Finally, to understand the effect deregulation of the financial industry has on our economy, you merely need to rewind the nation's movie reel to 2008.  An unregulated financial industry run amok is what collapsed our economy, and we bailed them out for their trouble.

Given that Mr. Mayer makes his living studying politics, I was also stunned to see an utterly false premise underlying this essay:  that there has been parity in the polarization of American politics, and this is all politics as usual.  The state of American democracy today is far from “politics as usual,” and Mr. Mayer should know this.  The corporate interests in this country aren't aiming to the right, they are picking up the whole target and moving it, stand and all.  Unfortunately, each time the target moves, the left keeps aiming for the center, believing it succeeds when it hits its mark.  The left’s incessant compromise with these corporate interests has resulted in a political and economic model that is utterly unsustainable because it benefits a select few over the needs of the many. Continued compromise with such an immoral platform will only result in its further entrenchment in our political and social system.  Yeah, getting along is great, but sometimes you have to say enough is enough and stand up for what you believe in.

The dismissal of the effect of money in our political process is perhaps the most offensive portion of the “reconciliation” essays such as Mr. Mayer's.  Our democracy has been completely hijacked by corporate interests with a limitless supply of money.  The fact that a majority of Wisconsinites have been duped by the carpet bombing of false messages and glossy ads doesn't mean we have to accept it. There have been other times in the world's history where the majority of the people have been very, very wrong.

I am sure the corporate right that dominates our political process would love nothing more than for the Progressive movement in this state to follow Mr. Mayer’s advice:  get over it, pretend everything is fine, and go back to sleep. 

The problem is everything is not fine.  We have a democracy that is broken and sick.  We have an economy that benefits a select few at the expense of the masses.  We have a social fabric that has gone from “I am my brother’s keeper” to “every man for himself.“  In February of 2011, Wisconsinites created a movement that rejected this notion.  Yes, last Tuesday was a disappointing defeat, and many like Professor Mayer would prefer that we eat brats while Rome burns.  However, when you are fighting for something as important as the future of our state, and our nation, surrender is not an option, even if the fight is inconvenient. 

Brian