"Obama's Touch of Class"

Thomas Frank on the culture war:

Obama's Touch of Class, by Thomas Frank, Commentary, WSJ [open link]: ...According to the general clucking of the national punditry, my 2004 book – "What's the Matter With Kansas?" – is supposed to have persuaded Barack Obama to describe the yeomanry of Pennsylvania as "bitter" people who "cling to guns or religion or . . . anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations." ...

The media flurry kicked up by Mr. Obama's gaffe powerfully confirms an argument I ... make: That as they return again to the culture war, what the soldiers on all sides are doing is talking about class without actually addressing the economic basis of the subject.

Consider, for example, the one fateful charge ... fastened upon Mr. Obama – "elitism." No one means ... Mr. Obama is a wealthy person... What they mean is that he has committed a crime of attitude, and revealed his disdain for the common folk.

It is a stereotype you have heard many times before: Besotted with latte-fueled arrogance, the liberal looks down on average people... He scoffs at religion because he finds it to be a form of false consciousness. He believes in regulation because he thinks he knows better than the market. ...

Mr. Obama reminds columnist George Will of Adlai Stevenson, rolled together with the sinister historian Richard Hofstadter and the diabolical economist J.K. Galbraith, contemptuous eggheads all. Mr. Obama strikes Bill Kristol as some kind of "supercilious" Marxist. ...

Ah, but Hillary Clinton: Here's a woman who drinks shots of Crown Royal... And when the former first lady talks about her marksmanship as a youth, who cares about the cool hundred million she and her husband have mysteriously piled up...? Or her years of loyal service to Sam Walton, that crusher of small towns and enemy of workers' organizations? ... Didn't he have a funky Southern accent...? Surely such a mellifluous drawl cancels any possibility of elitism.

It is by this familiar maneuver that the people who have ... brought the class divide back to America – the people who have actually, really transformed our society from an egalitarian into an elitist one – perfume themselves with the essence of honest toil, like a cologne distilled from the sweat of laid-off workers. Likewise do their retainers in the wider world – the conservative politicians and the pundits who lovingly curate all this phony authenticity – become jes' folks, the most populist fellows of them all.

But suppose we read on, and we find the news item about the hedge fund managers who made $2 billion and $3 billion last year, or the story about the vaporizing of our home equity. Suppose we become a little . . . bitter about this. What do our pundits and politicians tell us then?

That there is no place for such sentiment in the Party of the People. That "bitterness" is an ugly and inadmissible emotion. That "divisiveness" is a thing to be shunned at all costs.

Conservatism, on the other hand, has no problem with bitterness... They have welcomed it, they have flattered it, they have invited it in with millions of treason-screaming direct-mail letters, they have given it a nice warm home on angry radio shows... There is not only bitterness out there; there is a bitterness industry.

Consider the shower of right-wing love that descended in February on small-town newspaper columnist Gary Hubbell, who penned this year's great eulogy of the "angry white man," the "man's man" who "works hard," who "knows that his wife is more emotional than rational," and who also, happily, knows how to "change his own oil and build things."

This stock character, unchanged ... in the culture-war battles of the last few decades, is said to be as furious as ever, and still blaming the same villains for his problems: namely intellectuals, in the guise of "judges who have never worked an honest day in their lives." But what he really wants is a chance to vote against Hillary Clinton, and "make sure she gets beaten like a drum." I guess our angry toiler didn't yet know about the Crown Royal.

If Barack Obama or anyone else really cares to know what I think, I will simplify it all down to this. The landmark political fact of our time is the replacement of our middle-class republic by a plutocracy. If some candidate has a scheme to reverse this trend, they've got my vote, whether they prefer Courvoisier or beer bongs spiked with cough syrup. I don't care whether they enjoy my books, or would rather have every scrap of paper bearing my writing loaded into a C-47 and dumped into Lake Michigan. If it will help restore the land of relative equality I was born in, I'll fly the plane myself.

Comments

[Pearl]

Since this will more than likely be an excellent post, I am curious as to Dr. Thoma's definition of somebody in the "middle class."

The "Shrinking of the Middle Class" appears to be the new rallying cry of progressives. While I don't necessarily disagree with the general conclusion, my gut feel is a tad bit of over generalization has gained momentum concerning this subject.

[wcw]

The ACS mostly has the data you need on the subject of the American middle-income class.

Any other questions?

[Petter]

An emotional rant about emotional rants from those with opposing views. He will vote for someone that brings more equality, and that's in the ok. Others might care more about other principles, and are very sceptic about the notion that Someone can 'bring' the remedy. That's why some see the implied worldview from sen. O as troublesome, and this man sees it as an reality check.

[Bruce Wilder]

There are various points of views abroad on the subject of growing inequality.

There's the earnest hand-wringing over statistical abstractions, with much clucking over skill-based premiums and globalization and technological change. This can divide into various wonkish views about the merits of trade-adjustment assistance and bi-lateral trade pacts, and disputes over whether government really has much effect on anything but taxes, and whether the decline of unions is cause or effect. And, we can worry about the decline of the middle class in the face of all these things, which no one, it seems, fully understands: technological change, and a globalizing world and financial innovation, etc.

Then, there's what is evidently Franks' view. And, in Frank's view, I recognize my own, which has been forming for years, but has only crystalized, recently.

I think it is about Power, and what is at stake is democracy. If the American People can find a way to take back their government, to take and hold power, and exercise power responsibly, the problems of income distribution can be addressed, because the problem of income distribution originates not with technology or globalization trends or any other abstraction, but in the exercise of power.

The problem of growing inequality really comes down to a problem of very powerful people exercising power to benefit themselves at the expense of everyone else. And, by its very nature it is a problem of plutocracy vs. democracy.

The plutocracy is in power, and democracy is trying to take back the government.

The thing to notice about bitter-gate is not Obama's language, but the coordinated Media response. The former Democrat channelling Sean Hannity's talking points in a Democratic debate, and his colleague pleading for capital gains tax cuts. Today's NY Times article detailing one aspect of the Bush Administration's propaganda apparatus -- the hired, corrupt generals paraded before the Media -- is just a detail in a twenty-year panorama of democracy in rapid decline.

The political campaign may well take on every aspect of a desperate revolution, as the Democrats campaign against the Media, as the most visible apparatus of the Plutocracy. There's real potential here, for the political campaign to become about overthrowing the institutional framework of Plutocratic government, which is first and foremost the corporate Media establishment, which impeached Clinton, warred against Gore, and elected Bush (on their second try), took us into pre-meditated, unprovoked war, with catastrophic consequences, doubled the national debt, and has been undermining the middle-class economy.

I am not so naive as to believe that Obama is democracy's champion. I think he's a supremely ambitious man, who wants to be President very, very badly. His considerable intelligence is focused on that goal alone. In service of that goal, he very calculatedly hewed to relatively conservative policy positions and attitudes.

It is an accident, really, that a resurgent Democracy, in its desperation, still half-blind, has seized on Obama as its instrument.

The Plutocracy has lost some of its support, as sensible conservative folk recoil in horror at what has been wrought. But, the Plutocracy and its Media stumble forward, the Media machinery grinding on, doing their work.

[hari]

There are those who consider *ideology* irrelevant to political system (a basic fallacy) in this forum.

There are those, like me, who consider American political system has been hijacked by K Street - not a plutocracy - the latter are the *servants* of the lobbyists, in final analysis.

Even Presidents (and their potential replacements) are in the pocket of lobbyists, like the current three condidates coming out of the Senate.

Looking at the genre-type of emerging US national politics, candidates are prone to *hide* their ideological affinities for lack of confidence to persuade their electorate. (Only one Republican candidate was out front with his ideological perspective on what's wrong with America).

BO and HRC are mutating towards a fringe which is NOT the likely segment of the electorate to decide the next WH occupant.

[OhNoNotAgain]

"BO and HRC are mutating towards a fringe which is NOT the likely segment of the electorate to decide the next WH occupant."

Look at the primary numbers in terms of total votes cast. You can say a lot about Obama or Clinton, but fringe is not one of them. In fact, I would say that they are clearly in the majority sphere of opinion on the major issues such as health care, jobs, Iraq, etc.

[save_the_rustbelt]

Such crap.

None of the east coast poseurs and beltway bandits could tell the difference between a pipe wrench and a crack pipe, but they presume to analyze people they barely know, and to whom they have no personal or cultural connections.

No one should be allowed to psychoanalyze the middle class and middle America unless they can personally field dress a deer and change the oil in their car.

According to Krugman, Clinton must have done an economic miracle in Youngstown because, my God, there are Starbucks stores in the Youngstown metro area.

And please, do not pollute Lake Michigan. Us peasants do our salmon fishing there.

[reason]

str...
Whose bitter now? But in this case, whether anne likes him or not, Franks has spoken the truth. The people have been conned, and it is about time they woke up.
Well said Bruce Wilder.

[OhNoNotAgain]

"No one should be allowed to psychoanalyze the middle class and middle America unless they can personally field dress a deer and change the oil in their car."

This is the type of thinking that has got us into the current mess, and is exactly what Republicans want everyone to worry about to the exclusion of economic issues.

Culture means shit in terms of how we run our government, and our inability to separate cultural issues from economic issues is costing our middle class dearly. I'm a middle class business owner, and I don't know how to do either of the above things ? So, are you just going to stick me in the upper classes ? When do I get my check for the difference ?

[baileyman]

Bruce said:
"I think it is about Power, and what is at stake is democracy. If the American People can find a way to take back their government, to take and hold power, and exercise power responsibly, the problems of income distribution can be addressed, because the problem of income distribution originates not with technology or globalization trends or any other abstraction, but in the exercise of power."

Yes, and it seems the real cleverness of it all is that it's like the lower 80% is PAYING them to get and remain wealthy and powerful.

[robertdfeinman]

1. Thomas Frank actually did a lot of field work before he wrote his book, unlike, say, Charles Gibson who worries about the capital gains tax for those in the "middle class" earning $200K per year.

2. Hari has it backwards - the plutocracy really exists, it is, roughly the 400 wealthiest families. The lobbyists, pundits and pols all work for them. Since there was a long period where the rich were content with being rich, people have assumed that this is still the case. It's not. When Richard Mellon Scaife spends an estimated half billion dollars on promoting his anti-democratic, libertarian policies this is not like the days of dollar a year men. I refer the unbelievers to consult Media Transparency to see the web of influence.

3. I wrote a recent essay about class where I claimed that there are only two classes in the US: those who have to work to eat and those who don't. The genius of the conservative propaganda effort has been to get those in the top 20% to think that they are part of the plutocracy when they are actually part of the working class. I expect to see a steady flow of stories over the next few years about the high flying financial wizard who is now living in reduced circumstances because he lost his job at a big Wall Street firm.

[Denis Drew]

Here is the scheme to reverse the trend: introduce the management power nullifying "scheme" here that is used around the better paid OECD world: sector-wide labor agreements (collective-collective) bargaining -- wherein everybody doing the same kind of work in the same geographic locale (the whole nation for something like airlines) works under one unified contract -- the one-stop flight to labor heaven IF ANYBODY EVER MAKES IT PART OF THE NATIONAL DISCUSSION.

For those who doubt they want to follow in the foot steps of the better paid Teamsters and other testosterone overloaded unions -- just look on collective-collective bargaining as akin to power steering and power brakes -- collective-collective bargaining shifts the locus of power so heavily to labor unions must take care not to put management out of business.

The "plutocracy" did not create itself -- it filled a vacuum left by American labor's (continuing) complacency. American overall has insufficient sense of the need to bargain in the free market and imagines that the free market somehow sets the fair and appropriate pay level on automatic pilot (the same delusion that afflicts the infamed "Chicago Boys").

First, we have to explain to people how far they have fallen (when they should have risen): 25% now earning less than LBJ's 1968 minimum wage ($10/hr) after a DOUBLING of average income (must always include eco growth to avoid being Malthusian -- being Malthusian is what makes the Repub nonsense work), AT LEAST* 25% of families now below a better worked out poverty line (up from 15% in LBJ's time -- notice the matching 25% numbers?), the median wage (about $15/hr) grew only 10% since 1973 as average income grew 70% (See NYT article** yesterday on the disappearing $20/hr wage).

*http://ontodayspage.blogspot.com/2008/02/are-38-of-american-families-living.html
**http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/weekinreview/20uchitelle.html?_r=1&ref=business&oref=slogin

Once people understand what is happening to them -- and why (it is their own easily reversible fault for coming into the labor market powerless -- it is the supposed liberal media's fault for not informing them of the startling stats: I followed the books, mags and talking head since 1961 w/o ever encountering these stats OR THEIR SECTOR-WIDE SOLUTION; had to accidentally run into it all my high school educated cab driver self) then the legislative solution (that is how sector-wide is imposed -- French Canadian version is simplest of all and right near by to view) follows naturally.

[save_the_rustbelt]

Nobody here has any sense of humor.

Beyond that, we are left with three really bad presidential condidates, while grownup such as Joe Biden could get no traction in the bizarre and dysfunctional primary system so adored by our political class.

Frank condemns stereotyping and then turns loose the astereotype that conservatives are consumed with bitterness because some high preist told us to be consumed. Such tripe.

[bob]

Frank is wrong.

I wouldn't pay to much attention to somebody with his track record.

Remember "Whats the Matter With Kansas".

He didn't know what the hell he was talking about in that book.
________________________________

http://www.leftbusinessobserver.com/Radio_1.html

Scroll down a bit to the september 29, 2005 show

From the link -

Larry Bartels, professor of political science at Princeton, on how the white working class isn't moving right, how social issues aren't getting it to vote against its economic interests, and how there may be nothing the matter with Kansas after all (full paper here)
_______________________________________

BTW - His show is on WBAI which is the resource you want to listen to if you want to hear what the right wing corporate media can't handle.

[bob]

To make it a little more clear who i was talking about

>> BTW - His (Doug Henwood's) show is on WBAI which is the resource you want to listen to if you want to hear what the right wing corporate media can't handle.

[Gerard MacDonell]

Rusty, I got your joke. Well done. I think the author of the article is exactly correct. I don't want a president who can field dress a dear. I coud not care less. What matter's is the guy's policies. Well that plus him not being Hillary.

[Bruce Wilder]

hari: "K Street - not a plutocracy - the latter are the *servants* of the lobbyists, in final analysis."

The Cossacks work for the Czar, hari. K Street is filled with political double-agents, partisans from all factions of both parties, who serve their corporate masters well. They have no agenda of their own except making money by promoting whatever agenda their paymasters hand them.

(But, they are people, too, and Hillary Clinton welcomes their donations.)

hari: "BO and HRC are mutating towards a fringe which is NOT the likely segment of the electorate to decide the next WH occupant."

This election is likely to be decided, as most elections are, by "low-information" "independent" voters, who have a superficial and often bizarre and idiosyncratic view of politics. That fact of electoral politics is what makes an incompetent Media so useful to the corporate Plutocracy: the Media are organized with a dual mandate: 1.) to keep the middle(-income), middle(-of-the-road) voter as ignorant and crazed as possible; 2.) to keep the right-of-center authoritarians riled up and safely within their fantasy-land, where America is "winning the Iraq War" and "Bush has been decreasing the deficit with tax-cuts that increase revenues" while "keeping US safe", and evolution and global warming are conspiracies by the librul media to keep right-thinking out of the schools.

So, yes, the Media narratives are aimed at making Obama-Clinton look like they are far-Left radicals to people, who either know very little of politics or fantasize too much. A bunch of stupid, poisonous memes about flag-pins and madrassas are also fed into the Media stream. (If Hillary stages a comeback, I am sure we will hear new whispers about her murdering Vince Foster.) At the same time, a great kabuki play has been enacted to create the illusion that John McCain is some great and wise Patriot and independent-thinking Moderate, who can be relied on to buck the far-Right radicals of his own Party, and whose heroism and "maverick" qualities are noted in Homeric repetition. (Rumors of a viagra-fueled affair with Rosy-fingered Dawn are greatly exaggerated.)

str: "we are left with three really bad presidential condidates, while grownup such as Joe Biden could get no traction"

Oh, please. Either Democrat is as good a toss of the dice as we are likely to get, while McCain is as absurdly irresponsible and as little of his own man or mind, as George W. Bush. Joe Biden (D-BofA), I am sorry to say, is a narcissitic fool. Get a grip.

rdf: "the plutocracy really exists, it is, roughly the 400 wealthiest families"

Yes, it does. In terms of how political power is generated and exercised in America, though, the American plutocracy is actually a dipole system, with families of Great (inherited) Wealth forming one political field, and the other political field composed of an elite of grossly over-paid CEOs and financial wizards and their various and sundry hangers-on and aspirants.

The dominance of American life by business corporations is critical, and the inflation of executive compensation has drawn to corporate leadership a ruthlessly manipulative and ethics-free leadership cadre. Of course, the destruction and decline of trade unions (and the weakening of other affiliative organizations), as Denis Drew noted, has cleared the field of opposing organization and power. The Really Rich have been with us a long, long time, but the innovations of the late 20th century were mostly on the Corporate side.

bailyman: "it seems the real cleverness of it all is that it's like the lower 80% is PAYING them to get and remain wealthy and powerful."

It's called, de-incentivizing poverty. America is a dynamic society, because we don't coddle the losers, or burden the winners. Responsibility in an ownership society is epitomized by the Pottery Barn Rule: the only way to really own something is to break it. [That's parodic sarcasm, folks.]

[save_the_rustbelt]

Bruce:

Do you really think that BO and HRC are the best the Democratic Party can do? Oh bummer.

[save_the_rustbelt]

In the final analysis, it does not matter much.

The center of power are on the rim (coastal/border areas) and the center of the country is going through a long, slow decline, and none of the candidates are going to give a damn between the end of this election and 2011, when they will all board their buses and start sucking up again.

[ken melvin]

If it comes to be that the masses are manipulated by the likes of Move-on instead of Rove, will they notice the difference?

[kthomas]

Ouch, Frank it delivering some serious body-shots here. Time for a knock out!!!

[hari]

Reich is not a superdelegate but he threw his support behind BO, as I've been suggesting before after his ABC RoundTable appearence with Paul Krugman...and George Wills, he's definitely angling for a job should BO make it to WH.

However, right after Tue debate, in Phil, (former) Sen Nunn threw in his vote for BO...and so on. What's going on? Right after his dismal performance in the debate...incl. serious ethical judgements and more?

Some superdelegates have decided NOW is the time to call it STOP! They're afraid if the current *indecision* goes all the way to Denver Convention floor debate, they may not be able to control the *process*. What can or may take place is that a *third* candidate may become viable? Who? Gore????

BO is surely not going to win in Phil. Listening to Redel/Casey debate on Face The Nation (CBS), I sort of realized BO may be in more trouble than anticipated because he is finally no longer a Mesiaaha or God knows what else!
The American middle-class is jealous of its *sovereignty* and will exercise it with a vengence - if Nun and Reich & Co consider they can STOP the primary process - it won't happen any time soon before summer is out, I suspect.

The risky liaison of BO in Chicago court case is just now coming into the forefront...and may hit the front pages also. The audacity of *will to power* is a ballgame only a *legitimate* candidate can seek with consent of the sovereign - it may be his jagular, I may be wrong.

The American intellegensia have taken the *sovereign* for a ride - for a long time now - Libertarian economists to boot -this may be a watershed election finally - who knows.

[Lafayette]

Ethnic origins

Article: No one means ... Mr. Obama is a wealthy person...

Oh, then someone please explain how his wife earns $100,000 a month for Outreach Consultancy services? She's got a long arm?

And why is it that she seeks kinship with women talk groups by commiserating with them about "how difficult it is to find ballet lessons" for her two girls?

Neither are from the ghetto, let's face it. I can understand Obama wanting to identify himself with the black middle-class. Hey, why not? But, he's also going after the vote of the black poorer classes.

Ask him if he knows how much a ticket costs for an across town bus ride in DC. That sort of question typically separates the wheat from the chaff as regards ethnic origins. And, I'll bet he hasn't the foggiest notion.

He's more genuine than Hillary? When pigs sprout wings ...

And, dammit, when are they BOTH going to get down to showing us the beef in their political platforms!

[euthyfro]

"labor unions must take care not to put management out of business."

Sounds like reformist compromising tripe to me. Putting management out of business is the goal. Taking control of the economy away from that tiny plutocracy through the nationalization of sectors which are too important for our survival too be left vulnerable to profit extraction should be the first step: Food, Energy, Health Care and Transportation systems should be liberated for the good of all people.

We, some time ago, passed the point where a presidential election could rectify the situation of the toiling citizenry. Every day I read another economist or analyst of politics pushing right up to the edge of the unspeakable, unwritable and unthinkable: power to the worker, populism, a more pure democracy, addressing inequality, redistribution of resources...

I know where this is going & it's about damned time. The Revolution has gone through a long period of decline and flux, sporadic resurgence, counter-revolution and now a worldwide reawakening. The challenges of the era are such that cannot be met by the continued application of Capitalism. Profit from any enterprise could be extracted at whatever level desired & the earth will not be saved from our pollution created through the quest for profit extraction. The time is right, the iron is hot, Capitalism is over, it just doesn't fully realize it yet.

[Bruce Wilder]

str: "Do you really think that BO and HRC are the best the Democratic Party can do?"

Pretty much the best candidates, certainly.

By any measure that I can think of, except executive experience (which is not on offer in this election), Barack Obama is truly an extraordinary candidate.

Will he make a good President? Voting for President is an existential nightmare, a crap-shoot, on some level. I think he has the potential to be a Great or near-Great President; I just hope the country does not undergo the kind of trauma, which produces greatness. At the least, just as a living symbol, he'll resurrect American popularity and prestige in the world.

I think Gore was a good candidate, and gave every indication of having the potential for being a very good President. I think Bill Clinton was a so-so candidate, and am grateful to Ross Perot that he had the chance to prove to be a good and honest President. (Lieberman looks questionable, at least in retrospect.)

Kerry was a poor candidate, and, I suspect, would have been an earnest but fumbling President. John Edwards was a respectable candidate.

I think Walter Mondale was a good candidate, with obvious potential and good preparation for the Presidency. Geraldine Ferraro was the choice of a man, who knew he could not be elected. Jimmy Carter was an odd choice, and not a good President, on the whole, though I'll grant he's underrated.

On the Republican side, Richard Nixon, Spiro Agnew, Dan Qualye, Cheny and GWB were all appallingly bad choices, clearly ill-suited to office, burdened with deficits of character and judgement. I consider Reagan a bad President, mostly because he did lots of things I disapprove of and failed to do things I think he should have done. But, I would concede, grudgingly, that he was pretty good at the job, if you can overlook, say, shifting the tax burden, homelessness and national bankruptcy and the sheer stupidity of Iran-Contra. George Herbert Walker Bush had the best resume for a President since Herbert Hoover, and his conduct of the first Gulf War proved that he had the requisite knowledge, judgement and skills to do the foreign policy job, at least. John McCain joins a long line of Repubican candidates singularly ill-suited for the Executive Office.

I review the recent candidates to put things into perspective. There are few ambitious and capable people, who would undertake such an arduous and unrewarding process. If you find personal ambition, itself, somewhat distasteful -- and many do -- no candidate will please you, especially after years of self-promotion on television. (It wasn't until the 20th century with Teddy Roosevelt, that old humbug who loved to hear himself talk, that the candidates customarily campaigned. Before Teddy, candidates at least pretended that they reluctantly accepted the nomination as a duty imposed by their Party, and the Party conducted the campaign, while they maintained a dignified silence. William McKinley received visitors on his front porch in Canton, Ohio; Lincoln's campaign oratory was limited to commonplace remarks made to delegations, who came to Springfield.)

We have to choose Presidents from a very limited menu, created by some dubious political chefs. No menu as short as the two-Party ballot is going to make many of ecstatically happy. No candidate can agree with any one of us 150+ million potential voters on many issues and get elected on that basis. So, inevitably, we have to choose the lesser of two evils, and accept that our choice does not appear ideal.

For once I think the Democrats chose well from a pretty good field, and appear likely to have an extraordinary and historic candidate. (Not ideal, certainly, but when ideal happens, we don't realize it until years later, and have plenty of reason to regret needing it. But, not nearly as corrupt and flawed as the typical Republican candidate of the 25 years, including the presumptive 2008 Republican candidate.)

[Worker]

If railing against plutocracy and bemoaning a loss of democracy, why not stop the tactic of implementing major policy changes through the court system. Gay marriage and global warming come to mind.

And of course, stay away from my right to own a gun. Self-defense is a fundamental civil/ human right.

[OhNoNotAgain]

"Nobody here has any sense of humor"

Sorry, I'm not aware of your specific political leanings, so I didn't pick up on the tongue-in-cheek nature of the post.

But isn't it pretty depressing that our discourse regarding our elections has sunk to the level that I actually thought that your post was serious ? On this same note, did anyone see Chris Matthews trying to sell Bill Maher on the idea that voters thought who would pull over to help them on the side of the road - Bush or Kerry - was a determining factor in the 2004 race ? It really explains a lot about what went on in that election. Kerry may not have been an ideal candidate, but Bush was clearly a sub-standard candidate by anyone's measure at that point.

[piglet]

"Rusty, I got your joke. Well done."

I don't get it, if anybody could explain ... ?

[Green Eagle]

The issue of the growing disparity in wealth is not merely an ethical one. The Great Depression was preceded by a similar unprecedented concentration of wealth. This resulted in a huge increase in the funds the rich had to invest. By simple pressures of supply and demand this inflated the price of things to invest in beyond what could be justified by their earning potential. The result: the collapse of the speculative real estate boom in 1927, driving even more money into an already overheated stock market which itself collapsed in 1929. Is this all starting to sound familiar?

For the economic security of everyone, we cannot afford to let the rich get too rich. Otherwise, we are doomed to endless cycles of bubble and collapse.

[paine]

personally
though i know i can field dress my car
and change the oil in a deer

reading the minds of the multitude
in causal detail
and taking a tally
is for merlins
with brains made of moon cheese

[save_the_rustbelt]

Bruce W.

Good analysis - but would a different primary system yield better results, or would the same stuff float to the top?

Piglet:

Just a little redneck humor, I know how to field dress a deer and change my own oil, but the last time I did either Nixon was president.

[acerimusdux]

Wcw points to the ACS for data on the squeezed middle class. I thought I'd point to a couple of simple tables there I found interesting, B1980 and B19082

Household income:

Share Limit Quintile
03.4% $20,264 1st
08.9% $38,200 2nd
14.8% $60,224 3rd
23.0% $94,150 4th
49.9% ------- 5th

This shows the population divided into quintiles. The second column is the upper limit of household income for each quintile. So 40% of households have income of under $38,200. Consider also that poverty level for a family of four in 2006 in the US was $20,614. So 40% of households would be under 1.85X poverty level for a family of four. The middle quintile, where we ought to find the heart of the middle class, has between $38,200 and $60,224 in household income.

If you had natural bell curve type distribution, the median would be very near the mean, and this middle 20% would receive about 20% of the income. Instead, they are receiving only 14.8%. We have a skewed distribution; skewed towards the top. The other way to look at it is a population distribution, with the population skewed towards incomes on the lower end, as shown here.

As an aside, much like the media, the folks who create all of these pre-defined data tables on the census bureau site seem to think we are far more interested in divisions along race and gender lines than in income disparity (or wealth disparity, which doesn't seem to be an option at all, and would probably be even more telling). These tables that I did find weren't available as recently as 2000, so I can't really use these to show any shrinkage over time. But they show about where we are today.

And, another aside, while I didn't note it in the above table, the top 5% of household incomes start at $170,715, and account for 22.1% of all income. Charlie Gibson may want to take note.

Finally, while many people may prefer a more even distribution as seemingly more "fair", I doubt it would be an issue for many if we were really all somehow more better off as a result of a less equitable distribution. The evidence suggests we're not. With Allan Greenspan talking about a "global savings glut" being a problem, I have to wonder how all of these conservatives square that with the theory that was the basis for supply side economics, which was that all you had to do to increase growth was to increase savings. The majority of econmists today seem to be suggesting recovery will be sluggish due to a lack of consumer spending, not a lack of savings by the wealthy. Maybe it's time for some trickle up economics.

And, this is why I really don't understand Petter's skepticism that someone can "bring" the remedy. Our elected officials were clearly able to "bring" the problem with those "supply side" policies, it shouldn't be that hard to undo some of the damage. The biggest challenge may be electing leaders that really are interested in doing so, and who aren't in the pocket of the wealthy interests who do now benefit from the status quo. I have no illusions that Obama is pure on the issue of influence, but he at least seems to be the best of this group, with his track record of reform legislation, his refusal to take funding from Washington lobbyists, his refusal to engage in payola machine party politics, etc.

[paine]

Worker

your fired !!!!

[OhNoNotAgain]

"The majority of econmists today seem to be suggesting recovery will be sluggish due to a lack of consumer spending, not a lack of savings by the wealthy."

Exactly, and it's actually been that way for almost 30 years. We've just been able to delay everyone finding out about it by a) introducing second family earners to the workforce, b) increasing our debt to the point that we're in negative savings territory.

Unfortunately, the gig is now up, and apparently Keynes was right.

[Lafayette]

It takes a real wizard

euthy: We, some time ago, passed the point where a presidential election could rectify the situation of the toiling citizenry.

Your right, but a lazy union movement has let things get out of hand. Labor is not a monopsony in the US, and a union movement needs large breadth to negotiate with management. For instance, this happens when labor negotiates with GM and both Ford and Chrysler fall in line ... or face the consequences.

Not only, but Labor has left behind white-collar workers who are in a limbo between union protection and stock-options.

In Europe it is slightly different in that Labor may be organized nationally and by industry sector, but it negotiates periodically with the association of businesses in a given industry. So, for instance, if Port Employees walk out, there is nothing the enters or exits a country by sea.

That is a powerful negotiating tactic. A squeaky wheel gets oiled and Labor that rolls over and plays dead deserves the consequences. The Supply and Demand equation as regards Labor negotiations must be equilibrated, or unions will suffer the consequences.

This does not mean that Labor can prevent dislocations willy-nilly. But, they can lessen the pain by making the separation charges considerably more painful, which makes management think hard before hightailing production assembly to the Far East, as they customarily do.

We've seen the consequences of an American industry that dislocates manufacturing and assembly to the Far East, which is a China that has Uncle Sam by the short and curlies holding T-note debt. Whilst our corporate chieftains roll about in Ferraris merited for their "astute business skills".

Astute, me arse. Any fool can dislocate labor to China. It takes a real wizard to know how to keep it in-house.

PS: If we went to China to seek nimble fingers to mount/weld electronic components, pray tell, why could we not seek those nimble fingers on Indian reservations (with 30% unemployment rates?)

[Lafayette]

We wuz robbed

Acer: Our elected officials were clearly able to "bring" the problem with those "supply side" policies, it shouldn't be that hard to undo some of the damage.

The Piketty-Saez analysis, that I linked to on another thread, indicated that in 1989, the year Ronnie left office after having done the damage, began the inexorable rise of the percentage of compensation, from 8% of the total to 16%, garnered by the top 1% of the population.

That is not even the whole story. It’s just the tip of the iceberg. The total received by the top 10% of the population is far, far more. (The Piketty-Saez paper that treats the share of the top decile is here, in pdf.)

Look at the chart of top decile percentiles of income (excluding capital gains!) The historical trend is interesting. In 1942/45 the top decile dropped in total income earned from 44/45% to 32/33% and forty years later in 1982 (who was elected in 1980?) started its climb back up to 44%, where it is now, some twenty-five years later.

When a nation reduces marginal tax rates, it makes a gift to the rich. How does it pay for that gift? It can cut budgets, which Reagan left to a Democrat administration to do, or it taxes must be increased elsewhere. Where is "elsewhere" if not the middle-class?

The Supply-Side nonsense has long since taken its toll on middle-class incomes. We wuz robbed. To create a plutocracy that winces at the first word of Income Inequality.

Worse yet, why didn't the Dems, once in power, rectify the matter? And, why have they not since, having been in power with two Dem presidents. Because they haven't controlled Congress sufficiently.

And, even now, should some miracle happen, would they increase marginal taxation? Hillary and Barak aren't saying boo about Income Inequality. Would they bring America back to post war levels of marginal taxation?

Given their electioneering financing, I seriously doubt so.

I guess the reason they don't debate this issue is that it's some sort of Government Secret? Classified Information, is it? That's why they aren't mentioning the rip-off of the poor/middle classes by the American rich?

So, let's remember, boys and girls, as the presidential campaign unfolds, this stark fact: Ten percent of the American earning population is garnering nearly 45% of the national income.

[ken melvin]

acerimusdux - I agree. It's not even turnip shaped and it needs be shown here there and everywhere until the people understand what is going on.

[Bruce Wilder]

str: "would a different primary system yield better results"

What "results" do you think the primary system is designed to yield?

I don't the primaries really select the candidates -- that's a process of history and networks and dawning expectations that mostly takes place well in advance of the primaries, themselves. The primaries, if they do anything in line of selection, just sort out competing claims by rival networks of support.

The Republican Primaries seem designed to allow the powers-that-be to shut down a challenge.

The Democratic Primaries were designed with greater ambivalence, reflecting the division in the Democratic Party between the guys who just want to occasionally win office and continue the political game, and those idealists, who hope to make a better world. (There really aren't two opposing groups; lots of individual Democrats hold that ambivalence within themselves.) The Democratic Primaries are sort of half-designed to legitimate the "inevitability" of the establishment candidate, and half-designed to enable the second coming of Robert Kennedy and a broad, youthful social movement.

This year the Democrats seem to have gotten both results. It remains to be seen, whether that is a disaster, or a special gift. Right now, I lean toward gift.

[Denis Drew]

acerimusdux,
Mis-distribution may (believe it or not!) be even worse than you think. The Census survey top-codes all income over 1 million dollars out of its family survey -- hiding enough upper fifth income to seriously distort the overall picture. I believe the same holds true for the household survey you quoted.

The family numbers thus reported show 47% of all income going to the top fifth of families in a recent year. I took the growth amount in PER CAPITA income (not top coded) from 1967 through the same recent year (per capita doubled) and grafted it to the overall mean family incomes of a recent year (added up the 5 quintiles).

I figured the overall family incomes should have doubled also (ball park anyway). I then added the shortfall (from doubled overall family income) to the top quintile income report -- which took it from 47% of overall income to 59% in my little guesstimate game.
*************************
Another shocker is that the federal poverty line may be off by half. It is based on -- of all arbitrary rules -- three times the price of an emergency diet (emergency means dried beans only; no canned!) -- and has been based on that for 40 years (maybe it made sense in a different era).

An practical minimum needs (poverty) line worked out in the 2001 book "Raise the Floor" more than doubles the federal number. Matching a practical needs income with the Census mean family income figures shows somewhere between 26% and 37% of American families may be existing below a real poverty line (without food stamps and other helps anyway) depending on how many have health insurance supplied (25% if all families of that income are insured -- 37% if none). See details at:
http://ontodayspage.blogspot.com/2008/02/are-38-of-american-families-living.html

[Denis Drew]

Let's try again -- minimum needs details may be found at:

http://ontodayspage.blogspot.com/2008/02/are-38-of-
american-families-living.html

[Lafayette]

Loose lips sink ships

bw: What "results" do you think the primary system is designed to yield?

The best possible, I suggest.

The evolution of the American brand of democratic politics, which has developed far faster than in other parts of the world, including Europe, has been one that has lead to factionalism of the body politic. An electorate, of either the Right or the Left has its factions, the political spectrum looking like a patchwork.

The intent of primaries help those factions coalesce towards a single candidate from many originally. From my European prospective, I also see the same happening in Europe, though at its own slower pace.

What is remarkable, on the Right of the Left, is that however a society may progress, when people become better off, which often takes two generations after a disastrous war, its citizens shift subtly to the right.

This means that as more of the poor take the escalator to arrive at a middle-class existence, they appear to become subtly more conservative to protect their gains. As Janice Joplin once sang, "Freedom is nothing left to lose". The poor are very free, and the middle-class a lot less free.

Poorness can be an incarceration in terms of both mentality and opportunity. I've not seen the study, but my observations make me think that the poor today are the same as yesterday. And the remarkable distinction is that the newcomers tend to take the escalator early on. They are the minority amongst those poor -- perhaps more visible, but still in the minority. They are more ambitious and far less ambivalent; especially about education and the opportunity that it provides to step onto the economic escalator.

Politics in America is fractioned along pet political notions (abortion, religion (creationism), unionism, small business, education, plutocracy, etc., etc. -- ad nauseam ). The variation being wide, two-party primaries are intended to funnel choices into two large but identifiable groups, one supposedly on the Right and one on the Left.

To get elected coming from either direction, one must seem to be in the Middle. Because the electorate vacillates around the Center -- the Right can move left, whilst those on the Left can easily move right. It is remarkable when a plebiscite is clearly won without a thin margin.

So, to formulate the coalescence, the media spinners work overtime. A candidate who is pro-abortion must make subtle remarks supporting this position, but not so pronounced as to scare those on the Religious Right. And so forth.

Politics has become tightrope walking. And candidate coming from either direction must morph into the center to keep balance. Above all, they must learn to watch carefully the words they speak.

Loose lips sink ships.

[hari]

HRC is defying gravity...elitism...intellegentsia...media pundits and whatnots by winning 55% - 45% in Phil. As I argued above, the *sovereign* must have their final say whether she goes forward to Denver or not - and they have with a vengence!

BO is identified with elitism and intellegentsia of media and blogosphere and whatnot...and if he doesn't watch his steps from now on...the pitfalls are plenty...and his audacity of grasping for power as a newcomer will be challenged all the way to Denver.

I'm however assured he's incapable of changing his style - while HRC - with all her baggage - is now capable of upsetting the superdelegates and their alliance(s) for BO.
It ain't going to be a *walk on roses* for either.