08-17-2016, 12:30 PM
(This post was last modified: 08-17-2016, 08:32 PM by Eric the Green.)
(08-17-2016, 06:48 AM)David Horn Wrote:(08-17-2016, 02:35 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: ... Democrats are concerned about helping the disadvantaged, the underdog, the poor, the discriminated against; those going through hard times; those who need a hand up, not just a handout. Which could be you or me. Republicans represent those like Donald Trump or the Koch Brothers who kick people out on the street, who exploit people with low wages and bad working conditions, and who destroy the environment and speculate with the economy. They support gutting social programs for the poor, on the theory that if you then give tax breaks to the rich, business will improve and the benefits will trickle-down, and the poor will either learn self-reliance, or suffer due to their own failure, or their membership in some inferior group. That's what Reagan thought, and that's what he did. But those policies have "died of a theory," just like racism before the Confederacy. They don't work, because if you give the breaks to the already wealthy and powerful, they say thank you very very much, and then pocket the money. There is no trickle; it's a tinkle.
This is the old Democratic focus that is just not there anymore. Today's Democrats favor niche movements, primarily minority based. They also favor Wall Street. Their coalition is the result of decades of drift; the GOP is similarly changed. Bernie tried to move them back in the direction they occupied at their policy peak, and that may still happen in time ... just not this time.
I don't see that Democrats are just about the niche movements and not about the old focus anymore, although that focus was lost to a large extent under the "New Democrats" in the time of Bill Clinton. Hillary is now following in Bernie's direction, rhetorically, because the times demand it, whereas in Bill's time during the Third Turning (when Reaganomics still held sway) they could get away with forgetting that direction to some extent. Whether Hillary's appointments and policies follow suit, is yet to be determined. Her appointment of Salazar is not a good sign, however.
Bill Clinton famously said "the era of big government is over," but the pundits nearly always fail to quote the remainder of his sentence, in which he said "we can't go back to the time when our citizens were left to fend for themselves," which is what Reagan and the GOP wanted, and still want. The fact that the rest of his statement is suppressed, says a lot about how the elite wants to tag Bill as anti-liberal and pro-Reagan, and keep the regressive powers rolling. But Bill was NOT a Reagan clone.
https://youtu.be/yp3OXUnVK34?t=19m25s