Monday, April 14, 2003

My fellow Salon bloggers, The Raven and Charly Z, have responded to my response to Raven's response to an earlier post of mine. I've go tot find a better way to word that...but anyway, more writing on the economy, shall we say. Here's my bit. Raven, it's not that I have the least problem with, to use my previous example, a doctor's kid having a better chance at worldly success than a janitor's kid. I'm grateful for the advantages that my dad's hard work has given me, and if and when I have kids, I will do my damnedest to see that they get all the opportunities I can conceivably give them. That's not a problem. What IS a problem is this: it is so much more difficult for a janitor's kid to follow the same path I have. This is why we need the same high quality of public education in ALL our schools, regardless of whose kids go there. This is why we need college education to be made available to everyone, regardless of their ability to pay. And there's a second problem with what Raven calls "dynastic wealth-building" - the filthy rich passing on everything to their kids. I don't begrudge the right of someone who's made enough money to guarantee that their kids will never have to work a day in their lives. But I do have a problem with someone bequeathing enough money that their GRANDKIDS will never have to work a day in their life. Raven's also beating the dead horse (sorry, but that's what it is) of the lazy unemployed: you know, the ones who just don't want to work, so why should we support them? And you know what? Beyond making sure that they receive the basic human rights and dignities (food, shelter, health care, job training), they shouldn't get more. Again, I'm not proposing Marxism here - though even theoretical Marxism doesn't look fondly on those who don't provide any value to society. My concern is for their kids, who don't deserve to pay the price for their parents' mistakes. My concern is for the kid who has to drop out of high school to help support his mom and siblings, and is never able to make it past near-minimum wage food service and retail work, no matter how hard he tries. And Charly, while spending the taxes the government brings in more appropriately is necessary, exactly as you say, that's not enough: we also need to re-balance the tax burden more appropriately. Which brings me to the answers to my pop quiz: Q) Which decade saw the highest tax rate on the top tax bracket in American history? A) The 1950s. Q) Which decade saw the largest middle class, as a percentage of the total population, in American industrial history? (i.e., the 1820s don't count.) A) The 1950s. Hmm...

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Some quotes from Salon's article on Ron Reagan, Jr.'s contempt for Bush: From 2000 - "The big elephant sitting in the corner is that George W. Bush is simply unqualified for the job... What's his accomplishment? That he's no longer an obnoxious drunk?" "Sure, he wasn't a technocrat like Clinton. But my father was a man -- that's the difference between him and Bush. To paraphrase Jack Palance, my father crapped bigger ones than George Bush." "And the weapons of mass destruction? Whatever happened to them? I'm sure we'll find some," he laughs. "They're being flown in right now in a C-130." On stem cell research - "Now ignorance is one thing, ignorance can be cured. But many of the Republican leaders opposing this research know better, people like [Senate Majority Leader] Bill Frist, who's a doctor, for God's sake. People like him are blocking it to pander to the 20 percent of their base who are mouth-breathers. And that's unconscionable -- there are lives at stake here. Stem cell research can revolutionize medicine, more than anything since antibiotics." On his reaction to the idea of some 'concerned citizens' trying to get him to run for political office - "You mean like they did with George W.? 'Hey, you've got name recognition, that's all that matters -- we'll give you millions of dollars to run!' Imagine coming to a man with just two years' experience in public office, and a ceremonial one at that. Imagine installing such a blank slate in the presidency of the United States! This is a regency, not a presidency.  And they told us, 'Don't worry about W. not knowing anything, good old Dick Cheney will be his minder.' Dick Cheney? And this was going to be compassionate conservatism? Dick Cheney is to the right of Genghis Khan, he wants to drill in your backyard, he wants to deny black people their rights --it was all there in his voting record for us to see. What were we, rubes?"

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