The Wrecking Crew

Chet Scoville of Vanity Press has an excellent review of Thomas Frank's book, The Wrecking Crew. Here are snippets, but go and read his review and then go and buy the book.

Chet Scoville: (my bold)

All of these transformations, Frank argues, have focused on only one thing consistently over time: the dismantling of democratic government and its replacement by market rule. Other conservative causes and justifications have come and gone over the years: anti-communism, the defense of apartheid South Africa, right-wing “freedom fighters,” all have slipped away as surely as the “global war on terror” will. What consistently remains is an attitude about government and the market: the former is always irredeemably bad and corrupt; the latter is always immaculately good and pure.

This attitude has profound effects on the way conservatives govern. Simply put, they govern badly because they believe that they must and should. As one conservative pioneer puts it, “the best public servant is the worst one.” The cronyism and ineptitude we have seen under the Bush administration, Frank argues, is not an accident.

[snip]

Frank leaves his readers with a paradox and a challenge. The paradox is that, despite the conservatives’ rhetorical longing for the old days of the white picket fence and the prosperous small town, it is their own movement that has destroyed that world – a world that the New Deal liberalism they abhor built in the first place. The challenge is to find a way to make people realize this fact: that conservatives have had their chance; that we have seen what they do when in power; that they are responsible for what has happened to us. “Whenever there was a choice,” Frank writes, “to be made between markets and free people – between money and the common good – the conservatives chose money. It’s time to make them answer for it” (Frank 274). This book, in providing such a comprehensive account and analysis of conservative misgovernance, is a good first step in that direction.

Exactly. Why vote into government those who are dedicated to dismantling it? Why vote into office those who won't lead? Why let someone speak for you who only speaks for money?

Why?

But the rich are so much more important

Than the poor...

Now that the Fed has chopped interest rates (and will chop again, not that it's going to translate into lower rates for consumers) and they pumped $200 billion into Wall Street, I'd like to know where exactly the so-called free market/industry self-regulate people are. Where are they? They're all at the front of the bloody line calling for more handouts. When Democrats ask for money for SCHIP or food money for the poor or unemployment extensions, all we hear is about cost. What is the matter with Democrats? Is it so hard to scream and yell like the GOP? Why are they so silent on this bailout? Even the homeowner bailout is a pittance compared to the Wall Street bailout.

To show you what frauds the Republicans are, look at how we raised a $200 billion "loan" that uses the garbage subprime papers that nobody in their right mind wants anyway. Debate? Hell no. Just "poof" out of the blue sky, here's a bailout and a healthy loan to Wall Street, which won't be enough anyway. How is it that the "free market" crowd is suddenly nowhere to be found during this crisis?