There is a widespread discontent among most of us that the country is going down the drain. People are scared and angry. Too many people can find no work at all, and unemployment is not going down.
In fact, this caps off a long-term decline in the earning power and outlook for the whole middle class. The national debt grows, helped by two undeclared and unpaid for wars and huge tax reductions for the very well-to-do.
While we all share the grief, the public is not at all united about who or what to blame. Instead of blaming their predecessors, Republican challengers seem mostly to focus on government itself.
They are competing with each other about easing business regulation even more and lowering corporate taxes. They want to dismantle the very structure of government as we know it. Their cry is that government is out of control, intrusive, oppressive, and needs to be brought to heel, as a danger.
They would cut services back to cut deficits no matter what. They would sweep away needed regulations in the name of freedom. They scorn almost any intervention addressing the growth of corporate power, or the growth of an under-class below the chasm of wealth dividing Americans.
So how do they imagine the world would be with only their miniature government? They do not examine the consequences in their call to arms, but treat it as if it were a utopian vision. Implied is a kind of private-sector panacea. But not even Ron Paul fills in this blank future.
One can conjecture a noble world of individual striving, like in Olympian sports. It is a story of where total freedom to compete would lead _ to victors, to achievers, to progress, to winners.
But ... wealth for all?
There are issues of worker safety, consumer safety and public safety, with food, medicine and equipment. Remember the furor around overturning Ford Explorers? Or Thalidomide? There once was child labor, a work week of 60+ hours, and destructive endeavors like over-fishing or clear-cutting forests. There is still usury in credit card interest rates.
What would happen to the many who have to depend on Social Security? Where there are winners, there is advantage. To the victors go the spoils, and let the devil take the hindmost.
There is more than a whiff of extortion in the profit motive. A strong word, but it is really spelled m-o-n-o-p-o-l-y, not unknown in our economic history. What is not addressed in their vision is cheating. The full picture of human need goes way beyond the "fire" of competition.
Using an analogy of "water" evokes a different connotation. We search for water more than strive for it. We plan how to use and distribute it, as in irrigation. Searching connotes inquisitiveness.
Water is shared as a basic necessity, is given as a form of caring. It refreshes. As a universal need, we associate it with justice. Let justice roll down like water.
George W. Bush even tried to insert the word "compassionate" into his rhetoric. Being kind and open to learning are essential traits that are needed to offset the assertiveness or aggressiveness of competition, and the two cannot really be separated for long without leading to social conflict.
Systems without such balance tend to spawn reform regulations in a democracy. In some industries, companies such as Endicott-Johnson provided community amenities and housing for employees. It pioneered what came to be known as Welfare Capitalism. But ever since slavery, there has been a long history of an exploited group deprived of full participation _ poor people.
When those numbers grew in the Depression, safety-net remedies had to be put into place. Richard Nixon contributed in 1970, with OSHA and the EPA. Now the balance has again come to tilt in favor of those with wealth.
Industry has undercut the working class to get higher profits from overseas manufacturing and global markets. It does not appear to be a matter of economic cycles, but rather a shift of wealth and a departure from the national interest.
Before wages paid bought the products built. Now the cash flow leaves the larger American community out of the loop. Corporations are profitable; small business is stagnant. Working Americans are bypassed, betrayed and abandoned.
If the government is the devil, it has certainly been left to care for the hindmost, though badly criticized for its efforts.
William Masters can be reached at wmasters@thedailystar.com.
Columns
'People are scared, angry' that the country is going down the drain
- Big Chuck D'Imperio
- Cary Brunswick
-
-
Some wisdom is best passed down through books
I was visiting a friend out-of-town recently and the subject of providing a "reading list" to young people came up in conversation. He said years ago he had asked a respected acquaintance in Oneonta to compile such a list for his teenage daughter, to help her be better prepared for life, culture, education, politics and people.
Continued ... - Let pragmatism, not politics, determine birth control debate
- As Center Street Elementary goes, so goes Center City
- U.S. intervention in Syria's uprising would be a gamble
- Santorum, Obama both got it wrong on Honduras
-
- Chuck Pinkey
- Guest Column
-
-
If we don’t develop a sustainable system, who will?
In Otsego County’s local elections last fall, a number of candidates — most of them on the independent Sustainable Otsego line — ran on an anti-fracking, pro-sustainability platform. They recognized that our current way of life — dependent on increasingly scarce, costly and polluting fossil fuels — cannot continue.
Continued ... - Time to get off the bus and on the computer
- Cuomo's Machiavellian maneuvers are a danger
- Home rule laws aren't a radical idea
- Sustainable shouldn't be a dirty word
-
If we don’t develop a sustainable system, who will?
- Lisa Miller
-
-
Being a parent is a constant learning process
I am sitting cross-legged on the floor in the dressing room, waiting for Allie's dance number to be called. The cave girl costume has been donned, the jazz shoes double-tied, the hair pulled back, the requisite dab of lipstick applied.
Continued ... - Healthy doesn't have to mean expensive
- A family era ends with close of Potter series
- Independent stores make up for loss of Borders
- Untethered from the cable box
-
Being a parent is a constant learning process
- Mark Simonson
-
-
Perfect attendance by Saturday’s Bread for 20 years in Oneonta
Oneonta became a settlement and has been a place to do one's "trading," whether it was the 18th century, or 2012, because of the five valleys that converge here. Only the places of doing the "trading" have changed a bit over the last 100 years, and Oneonta remains a place that attracts visitors and has always been a decent place to live and work.
Continued ...
100 Years Ago - Recalling the Hindenburg, John D. Rockefeller in May 1937
- Oneonta residents had diversions aplenty in the spring of 1952
- Damaschke essential to ensuring Oneonta baseball in 1927
- Area tunes to WONT in November 1972
-
Perfect attendance by Saturday’s Bread for 20 years in Oneonta
- Rick Brockway
-
-
Climbing is one thing, but skydiving?
OUTDOORS COLUMN BY RICK BROCKWAY ... Last week, my friend George and I returned to the Gunks for another rock-climbing adventure. After last week's column, I asked about the rattlesnakes and was told not to worry. Rattlers are usually quite timid and will avoid people as much as possible. It's the copperheads that'll give you trouble. They're aggressive and will stand their ground to defend it. Oh great!!
- Rattlesnakes may be closer than you think, so pay attention
- Spring is here, so fishing should pick up soon
- Sneaky fox may be the next animal looking to horse around
- Pass down the rush of turkey hunting to your kids this weekend
-
Climbing is one thing, but skydiving?
- Sam Pollak
-
-
I'm happy with our kids to a certain degree
It was several years ago, and I was in the kitchen, telling my eldest daughter and my then-teenaged son about the person who was taking over as publisher at The Daily Star.
Continued ... - I get by with a little help from my 'friends'
- It’s not easy for a politics junkie to get off the stuff
- The Encyclopaedia Britannica in print, unmourned by me
- Angelo Dundee was always a good man to have in your corner
-
- William Masters
-
-
Time for lawmakers who put needs of society first
Richard Lugar, after six terms as a Republican senator -- known for his middle of the road rationality and his foreign policy finesse -- has been ousted by a Tea Party extremist backed by outside right-wing funding.
-
War not worth gambling with lives of soldiers
Are you not tired of our war in Afghanistan? It had a point, once, after 9/11. Bush couldn't distinguish his myopic personal agendas from the nation's needs and let Osama escape, dropping the ball entirely, causing many deaths.
-
Titanic was a microcosm of U.S. economic disparity
Haunting reminders of the Titanic tragedy have wafted over us with the centenary of its sinking. The maiden voyage of an impressive, state of the art vessel, was a little like that of the Challenger space shuttle, at the cutting edge of developing technology. But the shuttle carried our pride in science and space exploration, not hundreds and hundreds of people.
-
William Masters: Nation stands divided between 'us' and 'them'
In February, Trayvon Martin was shot dead as "suspicious" by a volunteer neighborhood watch man. The case has aroused community reaction in Sanford, Fla., and is still echoing across the country.
-
A quarterback can't win the game alone
What is the relationship between democracy and wealth? Democracy is a political system, while wealth relates to economics. We have equal political rights, but we don't all have money. Extreme differences destroy the continuity of community solidarity.
-
Time for lawmakers who put needs of society first
