The Bullshit That Democrats Keep Telling Themselves

Pelosi blames Biden for staying in too long, a strange complaint for someone who held the speaker’s gavel from 2007 to 2011 and again from 2019 to 2023. Bernie Sanders said “It should come as no great surprise that a Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that the working class has abandoned them.”

Democratic strategist Rodell Mollineau said, “In the coming weeks and months, Democrats are going to need to have an honest conversation about who we think we are and what we stand for versus what the American people think we are and stand for because there is obviously a communication divide here, and we need to address it.” Spoken like a strategist hoping for another whack at it.

There is cause and there is effect. Sometimes they are decades apart in their impact

But you need to be either old or an historian to recognize the connection, and the 2024 election forgot to teach young voters their history lesson.

There was a time when the ‘far left’ wasn’t all that far.

Worker unions kept wages in line with inflation, while our industrial strength supported a healthy and growing middle class. The poor have always existed, but our cities and towns were never awash with the homeless, and the family doctor made house-calls. A college education wasn’t beyond reach and a single earner supported a family.

One of the few advantages of getting old is having been there when Democrats had an argument to make, along with witnessing their every stagger along the way to where they are today. They say the old are wise, which isn’t provable at all. Wisdom comes from having done more things wrong than the young, who haven’t had as many chances. “Yep, tried that, didn’t work.”

What was once the Republican Party’s ‘worthy opponent.’ became their ‘willing co-conspirator’ as money overtook principle

Nike essentially led the manufacturing move to China, arriving there in 1981, during a Reagan presidency. Was there a whimper from Democrats?

Nope, nor did they complain, as industry after industry left America. Campaign contributions (swollen after the Supreme Court allowed unlimited money from corporations) bought silence from both parties.

Could that disaster have been stopped?

Sure. A simple tariff on all American goods manufactured elsewhere would have done the trick, but the investor class was having none of that. The investor class, by the way, has no more loyalty than a highly paid prostitute looking for her next John. The flash-trade is their bread and butter.

And so?

So, indeed. In the four decades following the Reagan presidency, America’s middle class essentially disappeared. In an astounding unintended consequence, 37 years after Nike moved to China, that nation had built a middle class of 707 million people, almost twice the size of the entire American population.

That’s how powerful the engine was that we willingly packed off to China, in order to turn a perfectly fine class of millionaires into useless and dominating billionaires. Was it a good idea for Wal-Mart to destroy small businesses in towns across America? Are we really better off, abandoning local family restaurants for fast-food joints at the interstate exchange? Does a far more profitable running shoe from Nike make up for the missing fishing-boat in a salary-man’s driveway? Is there actually a tolerable excuse for the existence of Jeff Bezos and Amazon?

Really?

It wasn’t always like that

In 1955. my yearly cost (including food and housing) to attend Michigan State University amounted to $2500. Those out-of-state costs today exceed $56,000. In 1961, I bought a four-bedroom house in Evanston, Illinois for $18,000.

How did it happen that all that middle-classsidness went away? Well, gather ‘round folks, and I’ll tell you a story.

We once upon a time had a graduated income tax that topped at 92%, no national debt, plenty of money to support a reasonably fair-minded society, a middle class that was the envy of the world, and no homeless encampments on the streets. Health care didn’t give a damn about prior medical history, schools either prepared you for college or a place in the job market, bridges didn’t fall down and Marlboro cigarettes were the cowboy smoke.

We had a Republican party that took decent care of business and Democrats concerned themselves about the rest of us

So, when Kamala and Tim promised us what we already once had, and their party had co-conspired to take away, the consensus was they were a little late to the game. That ship sailed over four decades ago, hope and promise were the leftover stale jokes of times long gone. The snake-oil salesman, at the very least, admitted he was lying to us.

I gave up Marlboros after 73 years of smoking, but never in my wildest dreams did I think I’d live to see America give up on itself.

And I’m still not sure it has.

But I guess we’ll have to see.