The Tax Cut Deal

The American political process, as seen by the liberal Netroots.
This is the dynamic since 1980. We elect “centrist” Democrats. Those Democrats are then thrown out by Wingnut Republicans, mostly for being too liberal, except they are anything but. Every few years, we work to elect an increasingly rightwing group of “centrist” Democrats. Every few years or so, that group of increasingly rightwing Democrats is tossed out for being too liberal by an even more insane and reactionary group of Republican bomb-throwers. At the same time, every few years, the whole spectrum shifts to the right. Ronald Reagan would almost be a liberal Democrat these days. Barack Obama, the “socialist Communist Maoist Leninist” governs to the right of Bob Dole 1996. The dynamic worsens every few years, with both Democrats and Republicans moving further to the right and the ridiculous center shifting accordingly. Every few years, we are asked to vote for an increasingly evil group of Democrats, on the charming basis that they are less evil than Republicans. Yes! They are less evil than Republicans. And that motivation has kept me voting for the last 15 years. But what the Hell kind of rationale is that? I’m voting for evil people on the grounds that they are less evil than the opposition. At some point, you have to just say stop! Enough of this already. Voting Democrat feels like being in an abusive relationship. I’m unsubscribing from many of my Democratic mailing list. Oh my God, I feel so much better now! A 75 pound load has lifted from my shoulders. I feel like I just erased the names of my 10 most abusive “friends” and resolved never to call them again until they shape up.

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35 thoughts on “The Tax Cut Deal”

  1. Hey look, some commies who get it:
    http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/nov2010/elec-n03.shtml
    Tuesday’s electoral rout will be bemoaned by Obama’s liberal apologists, from the editorial board of the New York Times to the Nation, who will join in blaming the American people for having “moved to the right.” In reality, the election has exposed the Democratic Party for what it is: an alliance of a part of the financial aristocracy with a privileged and complacent section of the upper middle class, a social category that includes the trade union bureaucracy.
    Establishment liberalism is concerned about lifestyle issues and identity politics, but is utterly distant from the needs of the working people who are the vast majority of the population. It has moved so far to the right that the economic program of Obama and that of the incoming House Speaker John Boehner and the Republicans differs only on minor details.
    Coming out of the election, Obama will renew the drive towards bipartisanship with which he began his administration, going out of his way from the moment of his election to rehabilitate a completely discredited Republican Party. All the compromises that he proposes will amount to acceptance of Republican demands for deeper reductions in social spending as well as further tax cuts and other concessions to corporate interests.

    I think this website is run by open borders Trots, but at least here they’re right.
    This American Leftist analysis is really good:
    http://amleft.blogspot.com/2010_11_01_archive.html#5237659334443713593
    The President now resides in what he and his advisors consider to be the best of all possible worlds, one in which he can more fully carry out what I have described as the Second Reagan Revolution, while simultaneously seeking to win a second term by contrasting himself with the extremists to his right that facilitate his program. But they may discover that they have been too clever by half.
    Here’s hoping.
    The Lenin’s Tomb article linked at the American Leftist site makes an interesting point:
    More plausibly, it has been claimed that since the Goldwater campaign in 1964, the Republicans learned how to use ‘culture wars’ effectively to win over a sector of racist white workers. This is arguably the very effect that Republicans were unable to produce in 2008. Thus, the ‘southern strategy’ using a fusion of racial and religious politics, helped depress the overall levels of class voting. But it’s important not to exaggerate this. Most white workers still don’t vote Republican. In most cases, a majority of them simply decline to vote. Further, ‘class voting’ in the sense of working class mobilisation for the Democrats was in decline well before the overthrow of segregation and the onset of the Nixonite ‘southern strategy’. Most of the decline cannot be explained by racism.
    So much for neoliberal Democratic Party shills who are always bitching about working class white people “voting against their interests”. We’re not stupid. We correctly perceive that neither party is in our interests.

    1. Lafleur, as always, your comments are worth the read.
      I think the problem is that all elites, be they liberal or conservative, are simply divorced from reality.
      The part you bolded above is correct. The establishment left, including people like Tim Wise, has indeed moved away from economic issues affecting working people and has come to embrace primarily identity politics and cultural issues.
      Therefore, while they bemoan “privilege” related to race and other lifestyle issues, they continue to hold on to the biggest parts of their paychecks.

  2. Therefore, while they bemoan “privilege” related to race and other lifestyle issues, they continue to hold on to the biggest parts of their paychecks.
    The funny thing is, they think we don’t know what they’re doing. All the people making bank on the CRT circuit are white. Yet all of them claim that white people en masse must be re-educated (by them of course) before we can be trusted to act on class issues. That gives them plenty of time to suck up the big bucks on the diversity training circuit, because you’re never going to get rid of every last bit of racism within people. It’s ridiculous. I gotta give them credit, though. It’s a pretty good scam.
    They’re exactly like politicians, except people don’t even get to vote for them. Most of the people sentenced to endure their speeches are forced to attend by their school or workplace.
    So Wise can tell the Conspiracy of White Supremacy guy that giving even 1% of his speaking fees to black causes would make his daughters “victims”, yet white (and other) Americans who have lost jobs and decent wages to illegal labor are racist for being against open borders. It’s up to the little guy to pay all the reparations, whether said reparations are truly justified or not. Wise, meanwhile, can sit back in his 600K house and give up nothing.
    Noel Ignatiev claims to want to abolish whiteness, but all he’s done is establish a SWPL cottage industry. The whole CRT/whiteness studies racket is a perfect example of the Shirky principle: “Institutions will try to preserve the problem to which they are the solution.”

    1. “The funny thing is, they think we don’t know what they’re doing. All the people making bank on the CRT circuit are white.”
      Actually, many people don’t know what they’re doing. That’s the worst part. There are actually white people out there trying to make society better and not be hateful and these opportunistic assholes are out there preying on them.
      I forgot where I read it before, but I once read someone say that the whold idea of anti racist training camps is really one of humiliation. The point is that those in power can put you in your place and send you to these stupid conferences and there is nothing you can do about it. Its more about forcing obiedience than anything else. Some people will be angered by the experience and spurred to act against such conferences. Most however, can’t handle it. They’re too weak. After being battered by people like Tim Wise instead of admitting the forced submission and humiliation to themselves they will take up the idea that their previous opinions and behaviors really were racist and they needed to go.
      “but all he’s done is establish a SWPL cottage industry”
      What does SWPL stand for?

      1. Stuff White People Like, after the blog of the same name. Pretentious, fashionably multi-culti white liberal yuppies who mistakenly believe that given the chance, everyone secretly wants to be just like them.

        1. ” Pretentious, fashionably multi-culti white liberal yuppies who mistakenly believe that given the chance, everyone secretly wants to be just like them.”
          What’s funny is that this almost sounds like ethnocentrism.

        2. I think it is ethnocentrism.
          Have you heard Robert Jensen claim that white people have to make a choice between being white and being human? He seems to assume that if white people could somehow stop seeing themselves as white, then it follows that people of color are guaranteed to do the same. Isn’t it a bit ethnocentric to make that assumption?

        3. Don’t even get me started on SWPL’s.
          They are by far the most ignorant, naive, pretentious, and self-indulgent people on the face of the planet.
          Any white person who doesn’t want to be exactly like them is “backward” or “reactionary” in their view.
          Not to mention how big of squares they are.

      2. Some people will be angered by the experience and spurred to act against such conferences. Most however, can’t handle it. They’re too weak. After being battered by people like Tim Wise instead of admitting the forced submission and humiliation to themselves they will take up the idea that their previous opinions and behaviors really were racist and they needed to go.
        It would be interesting to consider what makes some people who are sympathetic to non-loony leftism immune from such guilt tripping. I think for me it was noticing how white anti-racists channeled all the derision they no longer felt comfortable expressing towards non-whites toward working class white people. If you as a poor or working class white person call them on this, they will simply sneer that you benefit from white privilege no matter how poor you are, as if that renders your complaint meaningless and excuses their classism.
        I think it’s rather fucked up that capitalist employers, who exist to chew up workers and spit them out, can claim to exert moral authority over the personal beliefs of their workers. It’s even more fucked up that fake leftist “anti-racist” shills like Tim Wise accept corporate money to humiliate workers while never, ever questioning capital. You get the idea that Wise thinks a lowly white cube drone has more power over a non-white person than a multinational corporation.
        It brings to mind Adolph Reed’s great essay about anti-racist politics:
        http://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/Antiracism.html
        I remain curious why the “debate” over antiracism as a politics takes such indirect and evasive forms—like the analogizing and guilt by association, moralistic bombast in lieu of concrete argument—and why it persists in establishing, even often while denying the move, the terms of debate as race vs. class. I’m increasingly convinced that a likely reason is that the race line is itself a class line, one that is entirely consistent with the neoliberal redefinition of equality and democracy. It reflects the social position of those positioned to benefit from the view that the market is a just, effective, or even acceptable system for rewarding talent and virtue and punishing their opposites and that, therefore, removal of “artificial” impediments to its functioning like race and gender will make it even more efficient and just.
        I have quoted this point to Tim Wise and various people in the Abagondosphere and asked them to refute it, but none of them have ever directly answered his contentions. It’s funny, because when white people sidestep an issue CRTs call it derailing.

        1. I think Tim Wise is in it for the money.
          Despite the fact that he gives lip service to anti-capitalism (well, any “true” lefty has to), he doesn’t seem to have a problem with his handsome speaking fees. And he doesn’t seem to consider that perhaps the white masses won’t take too kindly to being lectured on “privilege” by someone making his living off of the corporate/university lecture circuit.
          You know what, if Tim if truly against “privilege,” let him prove it. Let him give up his cushy house to an oppressed “person of color,” since he obviously lives in that house solely on account of unearned white privilege.
          And why doesn’t he also give up his handsome speaking fees to a much more deserving black person while he’s at it?
          I mean, we white people are so ignorant and depraved, we need a paragon of virtue like Timmy to set a good example for us!
          Joking aside, the way I see it, any white person who demands that whites make sacrifices should be the FIRST to make those sacrifices. Every white person who advocates racial affirmative action should be the FIRST to lose their jobs or spots at universities.
          But of course, people like Timmy Wise will never do that, because they want to continue collecting their handsome speaking fees, while smugly talking down to white people.
          They’ll keep their money and self-righteousness, thank you very much.

        2. Ah, gotta love dishonest Abe Foxman.
          He, Alan Dershowitz, and other Jewish leaders could come straight out of Der Sturmer.

    2. Wise, meanwhile, can sit back in his 600K house and give up nothing.
      And believe me, that’s what he’ll be doing, all while telling white peons that they have to make tremendous sacrifices.
      @ Wade
      I think Robert said it best: These anti-racist lectures delivered to whites are little more than bullying tactics.
      There’s always going to be SOMETHING racist about white people, which of course means that they can always be harangued and attacked.
      It’s by design, of course. It’s designed to intimidate whites into going along with their program.
      Whites won’t want to admit that they’ve been castrated by these CRT lectures, so instead they’ll go along with it.

      1. “Wise, meanwhile, can sit back in his 600K house and give up nothing.”
        600k isn’t that much. That’s the standard for the average upper middle class family.

        1. “600k isn’t that much. That’s the standard for the average upper middle class family”
          Yeah, but this is 600k in tennessee. You could buy Tennessee for 600k.

        2. In the South and Midwest, that’s rich. The median house price in Nashville proper, which is pretty gentrified, is only $146K.

      2. I think Robert said it best: These anti-racist lectures delivered to whites are little more than bullying tactics.
        It’s a form of class war by SWPL whites against lower class whites. In a way, they’re the true racists, because they don’t see POC as competition. They see other whites as competition. They think the nice Mexicans are gonna be happy wiping their babies’ butts for the rest of their lives. They love the cheap labor as much as the corporations do.
        I agree that Wise has gotta be in it for the money, at least at this point. Maybe that’s where those empty eyes come from. There are plenty of black bloggers who have called him out on his profiteering, but he has never conceded that they are right in any way. He is remarkably bitchy to them when confronted.
        BTW, have you seen his Facebook picture lately?
        http://www.facebook.com/timjwise
        He looks like a serial killer, LOL.

        1. LOL! He does look like a serial killer! Which is humorously ironic, because he loves to stereotype whites as serial killers.
          Also, he claims to be a fan of the SPLC, which is interesting. For one, I’ve read articles of his in the past where he denounces the SPLC as not actually fighting real racism and simply promoting worthless “teaching tolerance” programs.
          Two, everyone should read this classic by Ken Silverstein on the money making machine otherwise known as the $PLC.
          http://www.americanpatrol.com/SPLC/ChurchofMorrisDees001100.html
          The fact that Wise admires such an organization only demonstrates the fact that he’s a race hustler in it for the money, just like Morris Dees.

        2. There are plenty of black bloggers who have called him out on his profiteering, but he has never conceded that they are right in any way. He is remarkably bitchy to them when confronted.
          Do you have examples of this?
          I also recall his snarky response to an Asian guy who strayed from his orthodoxy.
          Even Tulio, who pretty much agrees with everything Tim Wise says, has admitted that he’s a sanctimonious and overbearing prick.

        3. Do you have examples of this?
          Here’s a couple:
          http://community.livejournal.com/ontd_feminism/337807.html
          http://rvcbard.blogspot.com/2010/08/dear-tim-and-other-white-anti-racist.html
          http://sickofitradlz.blogspot.com/2009/08/tim-wise-zip-it-and-sit-it.html
          The same blogger makes a good point here:
          http://sickofitradlz.blogspot.com/2008/10/shannon-joyce-prince-on-tim-wise.html
          Second, White people trying to help — like Tim Wise — better start grasping some realities.
          I think Wise and Babsie Ehrenreich have a real tendency to glorify skin color and act as if we (African-Americans) are so much more deeper or whatever.
          I’m a lesbian. Believe me, I know that there is HUGE homophobia in my community and it is greater in my community than it is in the White community.
          Third, Wise and others seem to think that they reach us (African-Americans) by ripping into White people with stereotypes. It doesn’t work that way. It doesn’t delight us.

          She’s referring to a Black Agenda Report article where Shannon Prince called Wise out for mocking Christian, working class white people, as he often does:
          http://www.blackagendareport.com/?q=node/10849
          I noticed in Wise’s “With Friends Like These” piece that Wise never ever holds a black person responsible for anything they ever do. He is very patronizing toward them – it’s like they are helpless, innocent children to him. He held gay people fully responsible for black support for Prop 8. Apparently it was all on gay people to convince black people to vote their way.
          http://www.timwise.org/2010/08/with-friends-like-these-who-needs-glenn-beck-racism-and-white-privilege-on-the-liberal-left/
          He’s just a trainwreck.

        4. I just find it hilarious how he rips white progressives for their “intense class reductionism,” and yet EVERYTHING about Timmy’s life and career is based on intense racial reductionism.
          He doesn’t give a shit about black people or their struggles. He just makes rhetorical use of their struggles in order to make a buck.
          Also, he claimed that S.F. was the most racist city around. According to WHOM?
          Yes, blacks will find it racist (well, blacks think everything is racist), because they’re a small minority there, compared to other big cities.
          I think you need to come to realize that when Tim Wise says “people of color,” he’s primarily referring to blacks.
          I think the problem with CRT is that they still look at race using a black/white binary.

  3. ” Pretentious, fashionably multi-culti white liberal yuppies who mistakenly believe that given the chance, everyone secretly wants to be just like them.”
    Overpriced organic food consuming, Montessori parents…

    1. Being offended.
      LOL!
      The “being offended” entry was by far one of my favorites. I laugh at SWPL because when I read it, I see many white liberals in it.
      Granted, it’s a bit exaggerated and not all yuppie, liberal, urban or suburban whites are like this, but many of them indeed do come straight out of SWPL. You’ll find plenty of them in the Bay Area.
      Orange County (where I now attend college), not so much.

      1. Don’t know much about OC. I heeard there was a growing influx of conservative evangelical christians (many of whom are hispanic).

      1. I’m getting tired of this characterization of BAG as a wild eyed Nazi.
        I realize he’s a White nationalist, but I’ve been around a lot of these guys, and compared to your average White racialist type, BAG is definitely a softie. In fact, he’s one of the softer WN’s I have run across. I’m not sure he has totally thought this WN thing through, or else he’s the new breed. Anyway, if all WN’s were like him, they would be easier to tolerate.

        1. “I’m getting tired of this characterization of BAG as a wild eyed Nazi.”
          I never said BAG was a wild eyed nazi.
          BAG should vote for the Tea Party, then we can call him TeaBAG.

        2. BAG should vote for the Tea Party, then we can call him TeaBAG.
          Hehe
          @ Robert
          Thanks for your kind words. Honestly, for me, white nationalism just makes the most sense. The left has moved away from economics and has been hijacked by Cultural Marxist types, mainstream conservatards and Tea Partiers are doofuses, nobody is actually willing to address real problems related to controversial matters such as race and economics.
          The few people who have actually been willing to publicly denounce outsourcing from a pro-America standpoint have been paleoconservatives and pseudo white nationalists such as Pat Buchanan and Paul Craig Roberts.
          Granted, many white nationalists do embrace libertarian economics, which I don’t agree with.
          Anyway, the left demonizes white guys like me and supports groups opposed to whites (while simultaneously moving to the right on other issues), while the organized right supports reactionary and destructive economic policies.
          IOW, what policy should I follow? To me, WN’s offer a lot that others don’t offer. They’re willing to take on controversial matters such as race from a pro-white perspective. Having grown up in the PC Bay Area where I was taught to be an ashamed and self-loathing white person, WN was a welcome change.
          I just have an easier time following those who are pro-white and don’t demonize me at every opportunity. It’s also easy following those who haven’t been neoconned and are opposed to destructive American wars and neoliberal economics (in spite of some of their libertarian leanings), unlike mainstream conservatards.
          WN’s fall under both categories, which is why I am one.

        3. Granted, I most likely would not have been a leftist even before they were hijacked by the Cultural Marxists (ie. I wouldn’t have supported open borders, integration, or other racial/cultural issues that leftists supported), but I could have at least tolerated them, since they at least had more of an economic focus.

        4. I would call him Tea-GAG (Gay Area Guy)
          (ie. I wouldn’t have supported open borders, integration, or other racial/cultural issues that leftists supported)
          What are you referring to when you say you would oppose integration?

    1. Hard to say. Here in CA, I think I will vote 3rd party for sure. There is no way I will vote for Obama because he will win anyway. If it’s close, maybe I will vote Obama since he will kill me more slowly than the Republican, but I hate to vote for one or the other of my murderers.

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