My Canadian counterpart has figured out who is to blame for the lousy economy.
Some asshole named Grover Norquist:
There was a point in the late 1970s when American conservative politics became completely disconnected from reality, particularly on economic policy. Remember, it was Ronald Reagan who believed that you could cut taxes, spend a veritable shitload of money, run massive deficits, and everything would work out just fine. Some people forget Reagan’s involvement in that, given how George W, Bush and Barack Obama have since turned that retarded philosophy into a retarded science.
Well, everything didn’t end up being all right. The period of the late 70s and early 80s was when the United States transformed itself into a debt-based economy. If you were paying attention last fall, you might have picked up on the fact that it hasn’t worked out that well. And idiots like Grover Norquist helped make that possible.
Hating Norquist for being a scumbag lobbyist is always a good place to start, but by no means is that all there is to it. His bad ideas about virtually everything are one of the primary causes behind the Republican party’s slow-motion self-destruction.
You see, Grover is the Godfather of the idea that you should never, ever, never raise taxes; no matter how many wars your country is fighting at once, how many of your cities are underwater, and how much catastrophic debt statutory entitlement programs are creating. The Norquist answer is to cut spending, which never happens because something called politics gets in the way.
Voters are inherently dishonest and stupid, almost as much as Norquist himself, and they tend to like multiple wars and insane program spending. That’s why you don’t see politicians promising to cut Social Security and Medicare and stop invading everybody. Instead they talk about “pork”, which accounts for exactly nothing as a percentage of the budget and voters tend to like as well. They want their sports stadium, they just don’t want anybody else to have one.
That might sound harsh, but that, my friends, is reality. All the mindless bitching to the contrary, American voters don’t just like unnecessary spending, they love it. If they didn’t, it would have been stopped by now. That’s why presidential elections are decided by dumb shit that has nothing to do with the presidency, like the Pledge of Allegiance, gay marriage, “Hope” and places called Hope. When someone decides to be a real show-off, they promise to build bridges through time itself.
Taxes. Why would any government ever need to raise taxes?
Voters are inherently dishonest and stupid, almost as much as Norquist himself, and they tend to like multiple wars and insane program spending. That’s why you don’t see politicians promising to cut Social Security and Medicare and stop invading everybody. Instead they talk about “pork”, which accounts for exactly nothing as a percentage of the budget and voters tend to like as well. They want their sports stadium, they just don’t want anybody else to have one.
Wrong. Democrat politicians running for president swear to God that they are against WAR and will not ever ever go to war. Remember Wilson? That was what he ran on to get elected president and then what happened? Oh yeah, he had Congress declare war on Germany. I think the same thing happened with that Roosevelt fellow. He swore that there would be no war and what do you know, the Neutrality Act was akin to shoving an electric eel up the Germans ass while the various economic embargoes against Japan had the same effect. “Who ever would have seen that happening?” Remember who those idiots declared war against first? And the voters turned and elected another man who swore that he’d had enough of war and yet, nevertheless involved us in Vietnam and had the Vietnamese President assassinated…LBJ drove us deeper with less purpose. Hell, there hasn’t been a war in the 20th century that DEMOCRATS didn’t love but they always hid their predilections for gory war behind their false promises that they would not go to war. No sirreee bub! Ole Jimmy Carter, what a snooze. Bill Clinton never saw a war he didn’t want to engage in unless it was a bunch of darkies and then he could not care less. None of these towering moralists ran on a pro-war agenda and yet, somehow, war found them.
Me, I’m getting a little insular. I’d be happy with 4 carrier battle groups, 2 ARGs and a vastly reduced Global Strike capability. I’d pull back 100% from Europe, the Middle East, Asia and Africa. I’d keep 10 divisions but I’m not sure what the mix would be between AC and RC. I’m kind of ready to let the world do to the world what the world wants to do and cheer from the sidelines. I’m feeling distinctly European or maybe Japanese today.