SimpleDon
Veteran Member
I have pushed the idea on these pages that Trumpism is the inevitable result of 40 years of movement conservatism and neoliberalism. That its journey, pushed by the triangulation of the rightward movement of the Democrats, had gone ever further rightward through the full range of conservatism to full blown reactionary and that it had to finally end up on the doorstep of fascism, which is where we find it today.
I now think that this is wrong, that Trumpism is the result of the failures of movement conservatism and neoliberalism to deliver on their promises, especially to the lower income, largely rural, whites who are Trump's core of support. An admittedly subtle, but I think important, difference.*
There is no question that movement conservatism and neoliberalism have failed. Their failures came to the fore in full force in the Bush 43 administration. They failed on all of the fronts where they drew a battle; foreign affairs, the economy, theology, governance and the social wars.
The prominent events and social trends of Bush 43's term were examples of the failures of movement conservatism and neoliberalism,
It is not an accident that all of these failures occurred to the first generation of conservative politicians raised believing that movement conservatism and neoliberalism constituted a valid set of policies with which to run the country and not just a cynical way to gain enough political power to give the wealthy more tax cuts. Conservative policies are always doomed to failure, especially in a dynamic society like ours.
Am I being too optimistic? If Trumpism is the result of the failures of movement conservatism and neoliberalism, then the inevitable bust up of Trumpism should signal the end of movement conservatism and neoliberalism, right?
Too optimistic would be if I thought that these failures were beginning to be realized by conservatives themselves. It doesn't seem to be the case even among our urbane and knowledgeable conservatives here.
If this tax bill didn't convince conservatives that the purpose of movement conservatism and neoliberalism is to increase the incomes and the wealth of the already wealthy, then I don't know what it will take. If the average conservative is so insulated from reality that they don't know that this tax bill provides 60% of its benefits to the top 1% initially and 80% of its benefits after 10 years, that Obama and the Democrats provided a a true middle class tax cut, a larger tax cut to the bottom 90% than this tax bill does, I then I don't know how to reach them.
* I don't say this to diminish the role of the Democrats in this. We certainly bear a great deal of the blame for where we are today, we played politics when we should have been doing what we had always done before, to stand up for the 99%, to stand up for the New Deal and the Great Society, to stand up for social democracy and to stand up for the workers. We overestimated the power of money in politics and underestimated the power of a good idea and policies that help people. We sold our souls to Wall Street.
** The only thing that doesn't seem to have blown up in the faces of movement conservatives and neoliberals yet is the issue of abortion, even as it has turned into largely an issue of contraception, which makes a hypocrite out of nearly every pro-life advocate.
It is regrettable that abortion on demand was introduced by judicial fiat, but lost in subsequent moralizing about the subject is the fact that it was successfully adopted in five states including Kansas and signed into law by no less than Mr. Conservative himself, Ronald Reagan in California, although as a public health issue, which it once again is destined to become as Republicans are more successful restricting it.
I cobbled this together from multiple sources, primarily economics blogs, like Marginal Revolution and Evonomics, but also The New York Times, and The Washington Post.
But unlike my normal rants I can cite a single source for 80% of this post, this article from the economic blog Noahopinion.
Jolly Penguin told me that instead of derailing, (he was too polite to use that word), a thread by going on and on I should start a new thread. This could backfire as I have way too much idle time on my hands and a backlog of peer reviewed, stonewall factscrudely formed opinions that I haven't been able to express sneak in threads not appropriate for them.
I now think that this is wrong, that Trumpism is the result of the failures of movement conservatism and neoliberalism to deliver on their promises, especially to the lower income, largely rural, whites who are Trump's core of support. An admittedly subtle, but I think important, difference.*
There is no question that movement conservatism and neoliberalism have failed. Their failures came to the fore in full force in the Bush 43 administration. They failed on all of the fronts where they drew a battle; foreign affairs, the economy, theology, governance and the social wars.
The prominent events and social trends of Bush 43's term were examples of the failures of movement conservatism and neoliberalism,
- 9/11 and the threat of terrorism from non-government entities like al Qaeda,
- the two failed Middle Eastern Wars, and with those the failure of doctrine of diplomacy through military strength, while throwing away our greatest asset in foreign affairs, our moral leadership,
- the failures of the two supply side tax cuts to improve the daily lives of the vast majority of people in the country,
- channeling H.Ross Perot, the great sucking sound as jobs, capital and intellectual property left the US in the greatest (unintentional) foreign aid program ever undertaken, a trade deficit that was one half of a trillion dollars in 2016, a program that greatly strengthened one of our two greatest geopolitical enemies and the only remaining major communist country on the planet, China,
- the Great Financial Crisis and Great Recession, the gift that keeps on giving from the deregulation of Wall Street with a special shout out to the banks too big to let fail,
- the turn away from religion, if largely in practice and not yet openly voiced,
- the broad acceptance of homosexual marriage, out of wedlock births and single parent homes,
- the continued growth of the federal government and the budget deficit, suggesting to the astute that both might possibly be important beyond their use as political whipping posts,
- the world wide acceptance of the truth of climate change,
- the growing realization of the failure of the war against drugs, the idea that harsh and ever increasing prison sentences probably aren't the best way to deter non-violent crime,
- that no one outside of the Republican establishment is on board with cuts to Social Security and Medicare,
- that illegal immigration is not just a source of cheap labor that has to be normalized into a guest worker program to continue to provide a cheap source of labor,
- that the healthcare industry is more important than just as a place to soak up excess financial capital and to test the appropriateness of the free market principles, especially when doing so doubles the cost of health care every seven years, that these spiraling costs were single handedly destroying American competitiveness, that people who can't afford health care die quite often,
It is not an accident that all of these failures occurred to the first generation of conservative politicians raised believing that movement conservatism and neoliberalism constituted a valid set of policies with which to run the country and not just a cynical way to gain enough political power to give the wealthy more tax cuts. Conservative policies are always doomed to failure, especially in a dynamic society like ours.
Am I being too optimistic? If Trumpism is the result of the failures of movement conservatism and neoliberalism, then the inevitable bust up of Trumpism should signal the end of movement conservatism and neoliberalism, right?
Too optimistic would be if I thought that these failures were beginning to be realized by conservatives themselves. It doesn't seem to be the case even among our urbane and knowledgeable conservatives here.
If this tax bill didn't convince conservatives that the purpose of movement conservatism and neoliberalism is to increase the incomes and the wealth of the already wealthy, then I don't know what it will take. If the average conservative is so insulated from reality that they don't know that this tax bill provides 60% of its benefits to the top 1% initially and 80% of its benefits after 10 years, that Obama and the Democrats provided a a true middle class tax cut, a larger tax cut to the bottom 90% than this tax bill does, I then I don't know how to reach them.
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* I don't say this to diminish the role of the Democrats in this. We certainly bear a great deal of the blame for where we are today, we played politics when we should have been doing what we had always done before, to stand up for the 99%, to stand up for the New Deal and the Great Society, to stand up for social democracy and to stand up for the workers. We overestimated the power of money in politics and underestimated the power of a good idea and policies that help people. We sold our souls to Wall Street.
** The only thing that doesn't seem to have blown up in the faces of movement conservatives and neoliberals yet is the issue of abortion, even as it has turned into largely an issue of contraception, which makes a hypocrite out of nearly every pro-life advocate.
It is regrettable that abortion on demand was introduced by judicial fiat, but lost in subsequent moralizing about the subject is the fact that it was successfully adopted in five states including Kansas and signed into law by no less than Mr. Conservative himself, Ronald Reagan in California, although as a public health issue, which it once again is destined to become as Republicans are more successful restricting it.
I cobbled this together from multiple sources, primarily economics blogs, like Marginal Revolution and Evonomics, but also The New York Times, and The Washington Post.
But unlike my normal rants I can cite a single source for 80% of this post, this article from the economic blog Noahopinion.
Jolly Penguin told me that instead of derailing, (he was too polite to use that word), a thread by going on and on I should start a new thread. This could backfire as I have way too much idle time on my hands and a backlog of peer reviewed, stonewall facts
