This is really good -- from C&L

The Debt Orgy In Pictures

OMG! OMG! OMG! Mass-teria!!!!™

All you have to do, as Harold Hill well knew in the Iowa country-side back in times of yore, is manufacture a crisis and sell your phantom product as Salvation. Seems like that lesson has not quite stuck with the masses, tho, eh?


Meanwhile, Krugman is visibly Shrill in these segments from ABC's "This Week."




'Bout gonna bust a blood vessel, he is, while everyone else is calm as cool as cucumbers.

No one else on the panel is even aware that there ARE proles who are being hurt as it is, and who will be hurt even more by the continuance of the Shock Doctrine Economics of the White House, Congress, and their Owners and Sponsors. It's not even so much that they don't care anymore, it is that they are utterly oblivious to the human wreckage they are deliberately causing and sponsoring. When Krugman repeatedly goes ballistic at the appalling lack of conscience (as well as lack of wisdom) by the High and the Mighty, the rest of them have nothing, not even a blank stare, in response.

We are near the end game at Versailles. Louis XV (not XVI) was the one who faced -- and was unable to overcome -- the Tax Strike by the Nobles. It all fell apart, inevitably, in the next reign. The dissolution took the form it did in part because of the American Revolution, which set the pattern for "Liberty". There is no such pattern-setter today, or if there is, the cry is not for "Liberty", it is for ever stricter Authority.

Welcome to Thunderdome....

And Another Thing.

Prominent "progressive" blogger Steve Benen writes:

On the debt ceiling, Dems are willing to accept a trade-off — they’ll accept spending cuts in exchange for at least a little new revenue. That, to them, seems fair. Indeed, it’s probably too fair — in the last 80 years, no party has ever had to pay a ransom to get a party to do their duty.

Eric Cantor has a very different idea about the nature of the process. They see an alternative trade-off — the GOP will accept spending cuts, and in exchange, they won’t deliberately destroy the economy.

Dems are willing to accept concessions to strike a deal. Republicans are willing to not shoot their hostage in the head in exchange for Dems giving the GOP what it wants.

The former is an example of a party negotiating in good faith. The latter is an example of reckless thugs pretending to be a political party.

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal/2011_07/cantor_conspicuous_confusion_o030791.php

This whole thing is being argued from the wrong premise. Note the bolded part of the excerpt from Washington Monthly above. "... and in exchange, they [the Rs] won't deliberately destroy the economy."

What's wrong with this premise and argument?

Simply this: the "economy" is already destroyed. For millions upon millions of Americans, more each and every day, there is no going back to an economy that used to be, there are no jobs, there is no security in even the basics and necessities of living. Poverty and homelessness are growing at a time when social services have already been cut to the bone or eliminated altogether.

The Rs, just like the Ds, are captive to the forces that deliberately -- or was it purely an accident? -- destroyed the economy. The Rs are not agreeing to accept massive additional cuts in government spending in exchange for not destroying what's already destroyed. They are demanding massive additional cuts in government spending because they can and because they have a Partner in the White House.

Failure to raise the debt ceiling will most certainly make a very difficult economic situation worse for the vast majority of people -- oh well, too bad so sad -- but it will make the economic situation of those who own and control both political parties and their apparatchiks thrilled and delighted. It will not destroy their economy. Hell no. It will plump up their bottom line. All those hideous consequences we keep hearing about: higher interest rates, for example, don't hurt the bond-holders and coupon clippers, do they? Of course not, don't be silly.

The Rs aren't promising not to make things worse for the masses. The cuts in government spending themselves will make things worse for the masses, guaranteed. There is no question of it. EVERYONE KNOWS things will get worse for the many while they will get better for the few, no matter what is done under any of the current scenarios.

How much worse, and only that, is being argued by the High and the Mighty, not whether more millions of Americans will be forced into poverty. That's a given.

If we really don't want that to happen, then we have to argue from a completely different premise, one that recognizes that both parties are fully on board with the premise that imposing as much hardship on the American People as they can get away with is what they are doing and what they intend to do for the indefinite future. The "economy" is already destroyed for the masses. Nothing either party is proposing can or will restore the "economy" for the masses. Not gonna happen.

If we truly want a vibrant economy to be restored for the masses, we will have to do it outside the political process -- a process that is intent on ensuring that the common people's economy is never restored.

Got it? Good.

The Continuing Obsession with Republicans

You've got to hand it to the Republican Party Powers That Be: they have fielded such a troupe of energetic clowns and mountebanks that almost the whole Democratic/Progressive political class is utterly mesmerized.

dKos has been All Rs All the Time for weeks now, and it looks like the diversion from anything "Democrat" over there might be permanent. As you scour the so-called Lefty blogosphere you will find constant discussion of Republicans, Rightists, and their Fellow Travelers, almost nothing about their ostensible political opposition -- except note taken of the fact that the Dems have caved once again, and the White House is making nice with the Rs -- though the Rs continue to hurl epithets and curses no matter.

As the motto says, "All publicity is Good Publicity," so even when the Rs are being mocked and denounced in the so-called "Lefty" blogosphere, the fact is they are the constant -- permanent? -- center of attention, and as long as that's the case, there is no real opposition to them. They Rule, completely.

It reminds me of what happened with the recent AARP flap. Rupert Murdoch's Wall Street Journal published a front page article implying that AARP had "changed its position" and would now "accept cuts" to Social Security benefits. All hell broke loose on the so-called "left." Now there are plenty of reasons to be less than enthusiastic about AARP, but this story was just phony from the word go. It was -- you might almost imagine -- a deliberate provocation by Murdoch and his tools at the WSJ to see what could be stirred up. The so-called "left" went into hyperdrive denouncing AARP and all it stood for, which must have pleased Murdoch no end, as he had been busy stirring up the same sort of denunciations of AARP from the Right for years. The only problem was that the story was... not true. You can argue with AARP's positions on a lot of things, but they haven't changed their position on Social Security, and the implication that they had was false, deliberately false in my view.

But the story became the center of an absolute firestorm on the "left" for days. Just so, almost any one of the R presidential candidates can set off days of howling denunciations or distracted criticism on the "left." Practically any R office holder can do the same (Scott Walker, anyone? Rick Scott? The Devil Himself, John Kasich?) Or how about Newt?

The Problem here is that all this obsessing on the Rs leaves essentially no room for anything else, like coming up with something better and strategies to get there. What it means is what I posted over at Digby's Place: "Murdoch pwned the left. Again."

What passes for the "left" is now a wholly owned subsidiary of the Republican Party and its media tools -- because the so-called "left" can focus on nothing at all except what the Rs are doing and what the corporatist media says is important.

Funny-sad.

------------------------

UPDATE: Apparently others have noticed the total spectrum dominance of the Republicans at dKos among other supposedly "lefty" sites on the Intertubes, and behold, dKos comes up with a break in Constant Republican Promotion on the Front Page to actually suggest there might be an alternative.

Their "Think Big" front page series finally starts (on the Internet, everything always "starts," nothing ever finishes, though) to consider the idea that there might could be an alternative to the Rightist Future of Decline and Despair that's been pounded into us for decades.

Think Big: Labor Law

Think Big: Small Business Administration

Think Big: Higher Education

Think Big: Pick Your Fights

Caveat: none of these Big Thinks are all that Huge when you get down to it. In fact, they are more like Internet-favored "Baby Steps". They "go back" to the way thing either used to be or are supposed to be, reflecting a very strong Restoration ethic that you'll find among so-called progressives just as much as you'll find it among the most reactionary Rightists. Everyone, it seems, yearns to return to a Better Time.

Yes. Well.

How Fares Teh Revolution?

Taking Stock?

Well. That seems to be the case anyway.

The Ruling Class has been very busy with its various neo-liberal plots and plans to take over the country, to take over the world, and they have been steadily gaining ground in spite of the fact that every now and then the People rise from their torpor and say, "WTF?" before sinking back into passive non-resistance.

Teh Revolution to halt their progress has barely been a bump in their road, at least so far. It lost its steam -- such as it was -- when the matters at issue in Wisconsin and elsewhere wound up as a dispute in court over process, not a matter of policy. Even if the case is won by the Revolution in the end, it will be a Pyrrhic victory at best. The policies continue on.

Right now the big deal is over "changes to Medicare and Medicaid" which the Republicans are "demanding" as a condition for acquiescing to the need to raise the debt ceiling by sometime in July-August.

"Changes in Medicare and Medicaid" that are not specified, of course, but one assumes they would require the eventual end of the government health care program for the elderly, the disabled, and the poor. That's the goal Republicans have had on their agenda since the inception of the programs.

What they say they want is a private health care system, not a public one, that provides a declining amount of "premium support" to Medicare "customers" and provides states with financially capped block grants to partially pay for medical care to the indigent. Or not. As they so determine.

I'm pretty sure that's not actually what they want, but that's what they say for the purposes of argument. Basically, what they want is all the money now in the System diverted to their private portfolios. Same as with Social Security.

The standard response has been to argue their points, issue by issue. They are so "wrong" about this or that, and the standard opposition position is to support the status quo against their radical changes to the System.

For me, that's a real problem because the System is pretty fucked up when you get down to it. It "works" after a fashion, but because it has been under relentless assault by those who want all the money in the System diverted to their private portfolios, it costs far more than it should and it provides far less medical care than it should, while simultaneously requiring doctors and hospitals to over-prescribe, over-test, and over- or under-treat patients.

Rather than use the opportunity to make the System better -- and take the reins from the Reactionary Party of Theft and Greed -- all the oppositional energy is concentrated on keeping things the way they are.

Well, things the way they are suck.

Rs want to make it worse -- "Ha-ha, Suckers!" -- whereas Dems and most "progressives" don't want any changes at all.

And so it goes.

Is it any wonder the Rs and their radical reactionary sponsors continue to make substantial gains in their relentless quest for their brass rings whereas everyone else is the loser? It's not just a political struggle. It's a social and economic struggle that really only they are engaged in.

Practically everyone else is... passive in the face of their onslaught, or they are arguing the finer points of custom and law in hopes of protecting parts of the status quo. Or, praise be, continuing to marvel at the ignorance and arrogance of Alan Simpson.

Yes, well. Not surprisingly, the Radicals and Reactionaries are thundering forward.

The rebellions in the Midwest earlier this year did not succeed in thwarting the nefarious plots and plans of the Minions of Reaction, but they weren't entirely unsuccessful. They certainly raised a bit of consciousness, and they demonstrated that the vast majority of people are not at all inclined to agree with the Rs slash and burn tactics.

On the other hand, the Rs relentlessness in pursuit of their objectives has the effect of chipping away at resistance and opposition, and the generally positive media coverage the Rs have been receiving, despite the radical nature of what they are doing and what they want, is shaping opinion in their favor.

While marching and carrying signs is all well and good, and we need much more of it, unless the protest movement can provide a Better Solution Than the Status Quo, it is ultimately doomed to failure.

On the Absence of Critical Thinking

Hm.

There's been a study done that tracks the development of critical thinking skills among some 2,200 college students which finds that... many don't learn critical thinking skills in college and university.

This ties in with a post I made at the beginning of the year discussing what I regarded as the very deliberate determination by the Powers That Be (specifically Reaganists) toward the end of the Sixties to disable the critical thinking capabilities of public school students once and for all -- so as to make it impossible for public school students every to rise up again.

It's been successful.

One of the interesting aspects of the study is that, apparently, the researchers assumed students entered college and university without critical thinking skills, and they were supposed to learn them while in college/university.

The point I tried to make was that these skills were taught in public schools, at least in California, well before college, in my recollection beginning in junior high school. By the time I got to high school, practically every course reinforced and expanded critical thinking as part of the fundamental process of education.

There was a problem, however. If students as young as seventh or eighth grade could at least begin to apply critical thinking to what they were being taught in school and to what they were being told in the News, they would shortly come to the conclusion that they were being lied to, propagandized, and manipulated to become willing little servants of the Corporate State. (Yes, even then, we knew what and who was really in charge.)

And that would generally lead to rebellion, as it did among America's students throughout the mid-and-later Sixties.

So. What do you do if you want to suppress rebellion? You make it difficult or impossible for students to learn critical thinking skills.

Sure enough.

One of the key factors of the study is that:

Many of the students graduated without knowing how to sift fact from opinion, make a clear written argument or objectively review conflicting reports of a situation or event, according to New York University sociologist Richard Arum, lead author of the study. The students, for example, couldn't determine the cause of an increase in neighborhood crime or how best to respond without being swayed by emotional testimony and political spin.

Read more: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2011/01/18/106949/study-many-college-students-not.html#ixzz1BVAzLxND

Indeed. That's the point.

If someone is incapable of sorting fact from opinion or speculation, then "all things are true, all things are false." This is where the "he said/she said" false equivalence reporting so beloved of the Post-Modern Press comes from.

I found it interesting too that business, social science work, and communications majors had the most difficult time understanding and using critical thinking skills.

It does explain a great deal about why so much of the "discussion" these days is so strange and so pointless.

On the KY It-Boy, Nitwit (Now with Update!)

[Tedious little peckerhead (h/t gunnison @ FDL) Rand Paul, MD]

I've commentated about Li'l Paul, who I've dubbed the KY "It-Boy", in several fora, mostly lambasting him for his mind-numbing Propertarian clap-trap and general incoherent babbling, but it's looking more and more (at least for the moment) that he actually might represent a Problem for The Powers That Be.

He's supposed to be a part of the Establishment like his Daddy. Oh, his designated role within that Establishment is to be on the Farthest Right Propertarian Fringe and to get the Cracker Vote all riled up and to appeal to some of the younger elements in the Propertarian/Libertarian firmament.

But he's journeyed off the reservation on the matter of the Civil Rights Act and apparently other things, and though he's apparently been provided with study material and the appropriate talking points -- "Moi? Why I support the Civil Rights Act of 1964 in its entirety; I can't imagine why you would think otherwise. Ha ha ha ha ha." -- I've got this sense about him that he may try to break free of his handlers, somewhat like Half-Term Sarah did, and go for something else again. Something even more populist... shall we say.

The fear of Rightist populism is completely justified given its blood-soaked history in the 20th Century -- and I'm not just talking about the Nazis.

Rightist populism has a long history in this country, too, not least in the South.

And this nitwit comes along and starts pumping it up again, after several decades of deflation.

"We've come to take the Government back." Not take the country back, you notice. That was Dr. Dean's theme, and some observers would say that Dean and the Deaniacs got pretty much what they wanted -- or at least what they were working for, whether they knew it or not -- with the capture of all three branches of Government by Democrats.

What a disappointment that's been. But that's another topic. One day I'll have to go into some of my experiences working on the Dean campaign, and how some of the same enthusiasm and personnel were transferred to the Obama campaign, as were some of the delusions. But not just yet.

"Take the Government back..." There's a lot of code-talk in the KY It-Boy's campaign designed to appeal to the fine upstanding Southern white boys who have felt their Government was taken from them by all these uppity darkies and wimmen, especially the darkie in the White House, but including dames like Mrs. Pelosi and the Always Arch She-Demon, Hillary.

So they're gonna send Ron Paul's nitwit son to sit in the Senate to git 'er done. Don't laugh. It could happen.

Nitwit though he may be, and with a birdsnest of curls on top of his very swelled head (h/t some commenter at FDL), Rand Paul strikes me as quite possibly the charismatic Rightwing Populist leader Half-term Sarah has been pretending to be on her road show. It's more than obvious that Half-term Sarah is in it for the money -- which she is making hand over fist -- just like Glenn Beck, the other potential RW Populist leader -- until the KY It-Boy came along.

Despite the fact that the Big Republican Leadership is trying to train up Li'l Paul to behave on the stump, it looks like this babbling boy is bucking the grownups and forging his own path. Half-term Sarah was apparently purchasable for hard cash, but I'm not at all sure Rand Paul can be bought. And if he can't be, Katie Bar the Door. He's got an immense ego, and he's already let his primary victory swell his curly haired head up so much he can't even get it through ordinary doors anymore.

If he continues to try to rally the reactionary Crackers -- which he's doing with every teevee appearance -- it's possible the Government will have (another) BIG problem on its hands.

The Arizona Thing was kind of a harbinger, along with the huge amount of public approval Arizona's pissant reactionary behavior is garnering.

We're going down a path we've been down before, and it's one that doesn't end happy.
----------------------
UPDATE:

Here's Rachel asking some questions of America:



But I think she's being somewhat disingenuous. The little Cracker twerp has backflipped and backtracked all over the place for the last 24/36 hours over the "Civil Rights" Thing -- scare quotes intentional -- and in the process has managed to convince a portion of the Big Media that the Controversy is meaningless, a tempest in a teapot, he's just a Normal Guy who wants to be Free, come on, anyway.

And of course plenty of his partisans and flacks, who believe as he does on the larger question of the Sacredness of Property Rights (as opposed to Human Rights), are styling him as Perfectly Normal as well. The "Civil Rights" Thing being long settled. You see.

Rachel touches on it toward the end of her soliloquy, but it is in a very arch and abstract way, laying out "questions" issue-by-issue, just barely relating them to the whole, ie: the Libertarian World View.

But it is really more fundamental than that.

Is it the Right to and in Private Property more important to Americans in the 21st Century than Human Rights?

Should interest in Property trump every other interest at all in the law?

Should the acquisition, holding, and defense of Property be the central focus of American society, law and custom?

Does the Constitution protect and defend Property at the expense of all other rights and interests?

When the questions are asked this way, the inherent dangers of Pauliac Propertarianism to all other rights and interests takes on focus. Its fundamental anti-Constitutionalism, and the impossibility of Constitutional Self-Government under Pauliac Propertarian law is revealed.

So long as the focus remains on the "Civil Rights" Thing, the danger that Propertarianism represents to all mankind is masked. ("Of course I believe in Civil Rights! Heh.") Of course. And if those civil rights -- and the concept of Human Rights -- are trumped by Property Rights... oh well!

-------------------

Furthermore: The process of "opening the discussion" of the Civil Rights Act and the Public Accommodations provisions reminds me a whole lot of the means by which the issue of torture was put in the Public Square when time was, and how, over the course of the "rational discussion" that ensued, and the careful weighing of the pros and cons, the ethical and moral "dilemmas", and all the practical considerations -- along with plenty of field practice -- it was determined that the public was actually split on the issue, and while the Obama White House promptly prohibited "torture" -- which wasn't going on anyway according to the Cheneys -- everyone expects it's still going on. And few care.

Transfer that same process to key civil rights issues, whether focused on accommodation or otherwise. We've already seen what's happened with the Arizona law requiring you to produce your papers. Americans by and large are all in favor. Well, if the civil rights and accommodation issues are "aired thoroughly" -- as they will be as long as people keep yapping about Rand Paul's outrageousness -- we'll find, surprisingly enough, that the Public is "split" on the issue.

And won't that enable justification for ignoring the laws?

Well?