In The New York Times, Tom Friedman reports from India, "After asking for an explanation of the Tea Party’s politics, Gupta remarked: “Where is the American dream? Where is the optimism?” To help answer those questions, watch the CBS 60 Minutes Segment, here (Can't do anything about the Viagra ads.) on the people of Newton, Iowa. The landscape of Newton reflects a nation that went from mom-and-pop stores and businesses serving industry, to franchises of corporations serving other corporations, using economies of scale to obliterate cultural differences. Newton, Iowa is not so different from anywhere else, after all is said and done: scared, in debt, and shell-shocked how fast 40 years of prosperity came to an end.
The GOP demolition crew that brought America the politics of the "Ownership Society" is back in power. That would be Karl Rove and other Republican leaders who flattered Alan Greenspan into lowering interest rates while they fired up boiler room operations selling mortgages to anyone who could fog a mirror. They were rewarded for speed in execution of those mortgage pools and titles and deeds; fees for engineers, lobbyists, and campaign contributions rolled into toxic goop.
So here is the problem, India, that you might envision through the Bhopol disaster. The goop that materialized so quickly, doesn't go away for a long, long time.
The TARP program that the Tea Party detests, was a Hail Mary pass by the Bush administration. The hair-on-fire crowd doesn't remember that. When the banks tried to unload their toxic mess, they found that it wasn't nearly as easy to do as it was to sign and transfer title to millions of Americans made gullible by the chain of corporate fraud. Consumers and taxpayers and voters, who were willing accomplices then, don't want to be held accountable now. Today contract law is acting like sand in the engine to resolve the foreclosure mess. The only good news, comparing Newton, Iowa to the people of Bhopal, is that the poison isn't in their bodies.
To frame this subject matter comes an excellent report, in the excellent series, Fresh Air. Terry Gross interviews NY Times Gretchen Morgenson on the foreclosure mess. These two women are heroes for Clarity. I urge all EOM readers to spread the word: listen by clicking here.
In Florida, we could see the economic disaster rolling up like a thunderous hurricane. Citizens and activists, watching the way the Growth Machine tore up the Florida landscape with insta-gro suburbs and degraded wetlands and dying Everglades, knew that it was all unsustainable. They were powerless to stop it.
As a post-script: on Tuesday Florida Hometown Democracy, a proposed constitutional amendment to give voters the final say on whether or not to continue allowing speculators to tear up the landscape, was crushed by builders, realtors, the Chamber of Commerce and Associated Industry. The measure needed 60 percent to pass. Its opponents inflicted this supermajority requirement in 2006, dooming any future grass roots initiative unless it comes with $!0 million in the bank to wage a war on television. Its organizers, exhausted by seven years of battle to make the state-wide ballot, ran out of gas. FHD only garnered 33 percent of the statewide vote, but here is an interesting fact. The measure passed in Monroe County and the Florida Keys-- where growth management is the perennial issue-- by more than 50 percent.
There was no special campaign by Florida Hometown Democracy in the Keys. But if you know the Keys, then you know that growth management controversies pitting citizen activists like those that started Florida Hometown Democracy against irresponsible development are more ubiquitous than mile markers. Voters in the Keys knew the power of Florida Hometown Democracy. Too bad, the general electorate was dazed and confused. Exactly the point of the torrent of corporate money in the mid-term elections that delivered an anxious America to the party that built its viewing platform.
3 comments:
I watched the segement on Newton Iowa. It's happening here in Florida small towns all over the map.
There's plenty of blame to go around with both party's. The Dem's had control of the House & Senate and made sweetheart deals with the banks. Think Dodd & Frank.
TARP II should never have been because TARP I was a disaster to the taxpayers.
Amendment 4 may have been part of a workable solution to the development mess down here, but it still would not have been a cure, just another road block.
Voter's in Florida really erred on Tuesday. We needed balance in Government, and now we will have more of the same - without the DCA, because you know they're not going to fund it in 2011.
The County Commission is a mess and until there's a Charter change, nothing will change there, just a few new faces and VNS ruling the roost.
I'm looking at where I can move for the next few years so I can work for a decent wage and not get taxed to death! Any ideas? I'm one of those MBA's without a job who had a good one.
Gimleteye: Back at you. Your posts make me dizzy because the ideas come at breakneck speed. I clip along and at the end I am exhausted...mentally. Now I am left with: Should I go back to bed or eat?
I agree that there is more than enough blame to go around: I've been unsparing in my criticism of the Democrats. I have written how the first breaches in Growth Management occurred under Lawton Chiles, Democrats and not Republicans. But the whip-saw going on now needs to be called for what it is. The corporate connection between the Tea Party and the GOP: who does this benefit? While Marco Rubio plays 'good cop' (ie. Republicans do not have a mandate), Mitch McConnell plays 'bad cop'. (No compromise.) and nothing will get done for two years, in the midst of a very severe economic crisis. Between the faith based and the coal based and the sugar based GOP, I don't see where Democrats have a place in the near future.
Post a Comment