My Hopes for Kamala, Tim and the Democratic Party
My Republican self is currently seated at the keyboard. Half my life was spent in that party when they ran businesses, paid their taxes, demanded balanced budgets, and cared for the needy—what many would call ‘the good old days.’
Of course, Democrats must first win the election, but that looks possible and perhaps even likely.
Over the past half-century, both parties have lost their way but, most disturbingly, Democrats
Once the party of union membership, representatives of the working middle class, and those who favored equality in both education and opportunity, Democrats have lost sight of who they represent. They’ve become a milder version of Republicans, timid in their substance and unable to define themselves. ‘Change’ has been their tiresome mantra, without any definition of what that might entail. I am convinced that part of that faded image has to do with their traditional base having been pulled out from under both them and the nation at large.
Labor unions are a thing of the past, as manufacturing left America and headed for the sunnier climes of low-wage Chinese producers. The further downside of that demise of our American middle class is that China became very skilled at quality production, now the best in the world. Your Mercedes automobile or high-end computer is very likely to be Chinese built.
Question is, can Democrats find their way back to a base that’s largely disappeared?
Possibly.
But the bygone days of union membership, and wages that allow a single earner to support a family, are too faded an image for today’s generation. Few in today’s Millennial or GenZ workforce have any memory of those times. With unions gone, too many choices today involve zero-hour contracts, with no healthcare, overtime pay, vacation time, bonuses, profit sharing, retirement benefits or job security. Try raising a family or owning a home under those circumstances.
Building a coalition is the answer and Republicans have set the table for that dinner to be served
I believe that a very large percentage of the Trump followers who took over the Republican Party share the goals of Democrats. But they are so angry over what politicians of both parties have promised and failed to deliver, ever since Reagan, that they want to break up the furniture and burn down the house.
Trump is a house-burner, whose constant message is hatred and division.
Again, it’s only my opinion, but it may be that America might well owe him a debt of gratitude for pointing out our societal spiral to the bottom. We are a nation addicted to things rather than principles, and it is said that addicts must hit absolute bottom before agreeing to a cure.
The American Ship of State is slow to turn, but if Kamala and Tim can begin the process of reviving hope in the renewal of a long-gone middle class, I believe there will be a mass movement of disaffected Republicans to the Democrats.
Let’s take an unbiased look at how we got where we are
I say unbiased, because I voted for Ronald Reagan twice. My excuse is that I was in business at the time and not paying proper attention.
Based on supply-side economics, Reagan’s ‘four pillars’ of policy were to 1) reduce marginal tax rates on income from labor and capital, 2) reduce regulation, 3) tighten the money supply to lower inflation, and 4) reduce the growth of government spending. He failed spectacularly at number 4, tripling the national debt.
Reagan was pretty quiet about his elimination of decades-long social programs, but Ronny was devoted to Milton Friedman, the free-market economist who began the dismantling of the American manufacturing base. He lowered inflation all right, essentially by killing the economy and sacrificing those in poverty.
One of his key strategies to reduce government spending was the privatization of government functions that weren’t nailed down, paying contractors to do work that government agencies had formerly done. His very first act as president was to fire the striking air-traffic-controllers, the opening shot across the bow of unionization across America.
Next came Grover Norquist, who founded Americans for Tax Reform in 1985
At the request of then-President Ronald Reagan, Norquist’s stated goal was to reduce government revenues to a size that government could be “drowned in the bathtub.” He didn’t succeed in that, but he certainly fouled the water, signing every Republican in Congress to a ‘no tax increase’ pledge that still exists today among Republicans and gifted us with a government debt that exceeds $37 trillion, sixteen times the Reagan debt. A single trillion, by the way, is one thousand billion.
So, there’s that
The unintended consequence of all that nonsense—and other steps along the way—is that Republicans created a government in chaos, that wasn’t ever pay its way, and who’s only governing principle is to take more and more away from its citizens while giving more and more to its military and the wealthy who profit from it.
Voila!
The public is screwed (both Democrat and Republican), while an ever-smaller percentage own everything and preen themselves behind gated communities. Maybe it’s not ‘pitchforks and barricades’ yet, but close.
Kamala and Tim have their work cut out for the party they lead
The good news is, if they play it right and begin the journey back to a fair America, that functions as a working civil society, Trump supporters will flock to their cause. But first they need to win.
What a big ship it is to turn.
And what a grand reward exists at the turning.