…and this stuck out at me:

“First of all, everything Reagan attempted succeeded.”… In contrast to Bush, Reagan was very cautious in his use of force… As Margaret Thatcher said, he destroyed the Soviet Union ‘without firing a shot.’ That was a major achievement. Iraq is a disaster.”

Emphasis added by me.

That is such a load of bullshit. Fresh, stinking bullshit, not the useful composted bullshit.

Remember the Beirut Airport? That didn’t work out so well, did it?

Remember the Contra scandal? That didn’t work out so well, did it?

In point of fact, it seems more correct to say that the only thing Ronnie Raygun attempted that succeeded was to goad the Soviets into an arms race that bankrupted their economy. Oh, and busting unions.

BC

RevDeb @ 6

Some good news for what Jordan is talking about. Barney Frank, chairing Financial Services (I think) in the House is a strong supporter of the Employee Free Choice Act. it is on his agenda.

And referring to the courts hearing the cases that trickle up, at least at this point the worst of the worst nominees are pulling their names off the list of judicial nominees. Pat Lahey is our new watch dog.

The big question for me is what will it take to break the MallWart unfair labor practices? They only grow larger by the day and are hurting America in ways we will never be able to completely list.

Barney Frank is chairing Ways and Means, but, yeah, broadly, that’s finances.

WalMart, dunno. Would like to see the states put some pressure on them on the wage end. The other way to give them heartburn would be to start some hard lobbying efforts at the state level to undo so-called “right to work” laws, or at least those provisions which enable WalMart to do union-busting on the job….

Boys and girls, with regard to Wal-Mart, we have met the enemy, and he is us.

Collectively, we are the Wal*Mart problem. As long as we continue to shop there, we are subsidizing and encouraging their bad behavior.

The way around the Wal*Mart problem is through patronage. Don’t shop at Wal*Mart. Shop at K-Mart or Target instead. Don’t shop at Sam’s Club. Join (and shop at) CostCo (or another warehouse store in your area) instead.

There are other things to do, like oppose Wal*Mart’s expansion plans when they violate your local zoning laws.

As long as we (collectively) patronize Wal*Mart, Sam Walton’s heirs are going fuck over the help and their suppliers. It’s that simple, folks.
Step 1: Stop patronizing Wal*Mart (and its affiliates — they’re trying to move upscale).
Step 2: Raise the consciousness of those around you. Get them to understand that low prices have hidden costs of human exploitation.
Step 3: Hurl thy Holy Hand Grenade at thy foe, who, being naughty in My sight, shall snuff it.

BC

rumi @ 106

does it apply as a self identifying label of a subgroup rather than what one would normally assume? If the average middle class, investor class person considered themselves as a form of elite in comparison to the lower classes, then their votes/actions would lean toward conservatism regardless of what they called themselves?

Sure. You are what you believe yourself to be. But, here’s a clue about labels. You describe in this example, the “average” “middle class, investor class” person. The average middle class person isn’t an investor, except marginally. 80% of the stock in the country is owned by the top 10% of the population. That remaining 20% is spread out among the bottom 90%, and most of that in the next 10%.

So, investing is almost entirely an upper-class preoccupation, though you see it as “middle-class.”

There are lots of people who have an extremely tiny part of the pie, a few shares of a favorite stock, or a 401(k) that is mostly their money from wages, and some of those people, certainly, may be convinced that they are part of the “ownership society,” and may self-identify on that basis.

We are now suffering the consequences of a long term drive that was mostly driven by the (previous) middle class. It’s part of what made the New Democrat – Progressive movements attractive over a decade ago. The irony is, it’s mostly the same folks who now want to fix it because Bush turned all of the benefits upward to a smaller select group -faster. The slow growth and return on investment was changed in the 90s to a new hope of fast wealth and extra expendable income. This isn’t only stock investments, it’s buying and selling houses for huge profits, perks offered as job packages, misc benefits…they all created a mindset that demanded record profits at each quarterly report and at least partially driven by the middle class with the perception of themselves as included in ‘the elite’ as compared to those without.

The negative effects are also seen by the attractiveness of union representation…

The benefit of being in any elite group is that it supports a drastic disparity in income potential and opportunity.

Somebody tell George Will I saved his life today: I killed a shit-eating dog! (Just kidding … I would never kill a dog, shit-eating or otherwise.)

Matewan is a terrific movie, if you have never seen it, go rent it.

Agreed, AirportCat, & based on our current leadership vacuum in the White House, we might all go out & rent Sayles’ “Silver City” also…

I think that’s exactly what terrifies them so much on the other side of the aisle, although they’d never articulate it (probably incapable of doing so, another failure to separate the icon from the real). They are afraid that she’s liberal enough to win, conservative enough to take swing-voters, and not cut from their au courant type of conservative; she’s not an ideologue, and they trust ideologues.

She’s also got a class issue hanging over her, like she’s nouveau riche moving in a much older money circle. Can’t quite pin it down, but it’s there, and they don’t like riff-raff that hasn’t been aged and steeped in their investments for hundreds of years. The class thing doesn’t bother me. It bothers me more that I can see it but that I can’t quite get a bead on it.

montaq — what can I say? the Kool-Aid addiction is notoriously hard to break.

Can you imagine the mental gymnastics these folks have had to perform to get to a point where they’d ever bash one of their own? Their bashing of liberals is reflexive; they are primed from birth to do so. I doubt they could ever willingly give that up short of extensive electroshock-therapy and many pharmaceuticals in concert with guided hynotherapy.

Yes, I understand that. I liken it to Bush I and Bush II. Bush I is the guy who liked operating behind the scenes–he was after exactly the same thing as his son, but he didn’t want to leave any fingerprints, and he wanted a legacy of public service to remain so that all his offspring could continue to use government and the contacts from government–just as he did–for personal enrichment. Bush II came along and just hung out all the laundry on the Truman balcony for everyone to see (that was a function of the haste I mentioned before).

But, they’re both elitists of the same stripe. That may be what’s annoying the shit out of Fein and Hart and Roberts–Bush has exposed, for all to see, the naked money-grubbing behind modern conservatism all these years.

But there it is, raw, naked, virtually impossible to ignore: the imperialistic, fascistic 43rd presidency. I consider Fein and Roberts more intelligent and enlightened of their cohort, to be able to see through the Kool-Aid haze.

I also wonder if they instinctually realize they will not be able to get their own message across to their own kind if they do not bash liberals reflexively in one paragraph while laying out the case for the failure of neo-conservatism/right-wing radical ideology.

Maybe it’s because I am not comfortable with HRC’s potential candidacy like Fein, that I’m so understanding…

Well, I’m not much liking HRC’s candidacy, either–but, not for the reasons they are. They instinctively dislike her–perhaps because of the labels she’s stuck on herself–while I don’t think the labels much apply to her. Hillary Clinton started life as a Young Republican and, where it counts, still is one. :)

does it apply as a self identifying label of a subgroup rather than what one would normally assume? If the average middle class, investor class person considered themselves as a form of elite in comparison to the lower classes, then their votes/actions would lean toward conservatism regardless of what they called themselves?

Sure. You are what you believe yourself to be. But, here’s a clue about labels. You describe in this example, the “average” “middle class, investor class” person. The average middle class person isn’t an investor, except marginally. 80% of the stock in the country is owned by the top 10% of the population. That remaining 20% is spread out among the bottom 90%, and most of that in the next 10%.

So, investing is almost entirely an upper-class preoccupation, though you see it as “middle-class.”

There are lots of people who have an extremely tiny part of the pie, a few shares of a favorite stock, or a 401(k) that is mostly their money from wages, and some of those people, certainly, may be convinced that they are part of the “ownership society,” and may self-identify on that basis.

rumi — got your back, eh? ;-)

montaq — I think the other factor that conservatives struggle with is that conditions change; what were once imperatives no longer work in this environment.

Adam Smith, for example, and his “invisible hand” along with his railings about interference of government in private persons’ affairs. He lived in a time when corporations did not exist as they do now,

Actually, he did. The British East India Company was pretty much in its heyday during his heyday, and it, just like corporations today, depended heavily on their insider arrangements with the governors of society.

But, Smith is largely regarded today for what is remembered of what he said by the rapacious in society. They’ve carefully ignored all of what he said about being mindful of local law and custom and being mindful of the people and resources which bring wealth, that such wealth had to be shared with them–because, if one is not mindful of them, the means to wealth diminish. Even Smith had some small notion of the joint ownership of the commons and an at least marginal understanding of the value of labor (with a decidedly Scottish bent). To that extent, today, what he wrote has been steadily perverted–for the benefit of the wealth of the few.

Admittedly, “conservatism” is now a catch-all to describe a host of political and economic behaviors and inclinations which cannot be ascribed–accurately–to a single source. It’s an amalgam of bits and pieces, drawn selectively, from everything from Plato to fascism, which is why most lefty observers today describe it as without intellectual foundation.

But, if one desires that label of “conservative” today, they’re asking to wear that silly frippery of a hat. :)