If you don't have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it over? ~ John Wooden
Last week, Isaac forced the Repubs to reschedule their quadrennial Meeting on the Mount into one fewer day than planned, becoming the first time I ever judged a hurricane as having a positive outcome (for the nation anyway, not Louisiana). But the Repubs lost more than a day of conventioning; they forgot their calendars, lacked a sense of time and were fundamentally time-challenged.
They rewrote history so many times I couldn't keep track – between their misdating the beginning of the recession, misdating the closure of the now-famous Janesville GM plant, forgetting whose administration first contributed to the US deficit expansion, as well as other time lapses. In large part, their non-factual history "lessons" were a result of their need to expunge the years 2001 through 2008 from Repubs' chronometers and consider W, the last Repub president, as he-who-must-not-be-named. In Tampa, the Repubs continued to not recall inconvenient historical facts. More cynically and more realistically, they know the facts but misstate them anyway; don't bother me with facts. They deny their unrelenting opposition to any policy proposed over the past 3 years by President Obama to improve the economic prospects for 99% of folks in the US economy.
These historical distortions allowed the Repubs to paint a simplistic future of disproportionate individualism (and withered government) that wasn't ideal in the 1950s, from which it may have been cast. This future will be as empty as Clint Eastwood's chair. This future certainly will be dystopian, except for the 1%ers whose interests drive current Repub policy. Narrow nostalgia ruled. I wondered why the Repubs hadn't invited Christopher Lloyd as their policy navigator; or maybe they did. Through these tactics they appeared to assume the rest of us were either cheeseheads with nothing but gouda between our ears or simpletons who would unquestionably accept their words as gospel without any thought or perspective.
With the convention's unsurprising emphasis on Family (that's with a capital "F"), the two stalwart main men, Romney and Ryan (R&R), were portrayed as worthy candidates (even if one of them left the dog on the car roof) simply because they are members of telegenic families – remember the videos and TV shots focusing on their wives. From the convention it seems current Repubs abhor the idea that women can have meaningful roles beyond being stay-at-home Moms.[1] A singular role that remains a vital and necessary responsibility for the future of the human race – see Ann Romney – but not what most modern women now face. Among other points, the Repubs forget that women now account for the majority (53.6%) of the US labor force. A Sept 2nd New York Times story, "Who wears the pants in this economy? Welcome to the new middle-class matriarchy," illustrates the changed economic reality that many women and men are facing. This reality is most definitely not the Repubs' desired "Ozzie and Harriet" one. In many ways the Repubs deny the current socio-economic reality facing us.
Why the denial? The Repubs' principal appeal to their base – uneasy white, middle-class males (UWMCMs) – is that they can achieve the "American Dream." This is the Repubs' Grand Deception. R&R's and the Repubs' policy prescriptions of drastically reducing the government's non-military support programs (e.g., Medicaid, Medicare, Education, R&D and Social Security) under the commandment of "reducing the deficit" and providing substantial tax cuts for the already-wealthy will offer UWMCMs an eventual economic nightmare not a dream. Why UWMCMs don't get that voting for most Repubs is not in their economic self-interest remains a fundamental puzzle. From my admittedly non-Repub perspective, I can only surmise that such folks are too myopic, too optimistic about their attaining exalted 1% status or too mistaken about the importance of "social issues" vs. economic ones to logically justify their political choice. Ah, democracy.
Given who will most prominently benefit from the economic policies that R&R have mentioned
It's relevant to note the Dems are not without their own Grand Deception; that our economy can progress without further changing entitlements for the aged and poor and increasing taxes only on the rich will be sufficient to reduce the Federal deficit and spur stronger economic growth. President Obama's Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is a historically important achievement in the right direction, but by itself will neither resolve the nation's structural deficit nor broaden and increase the nation's economic growth. So I will be interested to watch the Dems as they pontificate in Charlotte. Nevertheless, I remain doubtful about their offering any more than their version of the bromides Repubs did; appeals to every American about the bright future the Dems will offer, with a generous discounting of our current economic plight.
Happy Labor Day. Onward to Nov 6th.
[1] An exception was the decent speech (within the context of other, more flamingly neo-conservative utterances) Condi Rice gave that was at odds with the nativistic thrust of the convention by momentarily mentioning foreign policy as a relevant topic and several of the 194 other nations of the earth beyond the US – even if she conveniently forgot that she and W, not President Obama, got us into Iran and Afghanistan.
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