Will the ‘Middle’ Really Save Us?

@ livefreeyou need to go back to night school and get a library card… Maybe then you might be less focused on the Reid’s, Pelosi’s and Boehners of the world who are the public face for corporations (you just haven’t done enough work to find out who owns them)… You asked a question as to why then if corporations run the world, why the hell would they fund a democrat versus McCain…. Again, if you were more learned and less reactionary to the left-right debates, you might understand that each of the people you reference are apart of the establishment: by definition being that they belong to Business Council Roundtable, connected to the business community (Rubin, Summers, Volcker, Greenspan, Bank CEO’s and Military Defense Contractors) and serving the larger neoliberal economy …. This is why left and right do not matter in this country. Our major economic decisions are always left up to federal reserve (a private corporation)or Treasury (who has been infiltrated for decades by the banking sector) or economists (which is a field that has gain preminence only recently in the early 70′s with the help of Milton Freidman)… If all of leaders accept these premises as a means to secure the presidency, then it serves power interests to shift between Bush, Clinton, Bush, Obama and now a republican as a way to divide people on issues that are of no earthly importance to elite financiers…. You need to answer the question: who has the most power in our society? When you really research this, read, interact with people who actually know how things work (not how to spin them to an ideology), you will realize that our policians are irrelevent in terms of their power since they are selling to the public one thing but acting on behalf of their financial backers…. You aim your target too much at leftist politicians (evil/good type shit) when these dialogues are put forth precisely to create division. Livefree, have you lost your entire mind… Our country has not seen such a wealth of corporate monopolies and oligopolies in out major industries in seventy years…. How does it feel to know that your education did not prepare you the world other than to be an oblivious pawn of the narrative put forth by people with significant resources (while they laugh at you during their dinner parties and investment meetings)? Since I have been in this milieu, I know first hand what they think about you….You are someone that will happily carry their water for them: militarily, socially and organizationally… They will feed your mind with their beliefs. They will tell you to your face how much they appreciate your like minded commitment(internal – white privileged) and they will foment a connection to a culture that has been engineered, but once you leave earshot they are admitting how gullible and ignorant their followers are… And many of the promises they are making to you will be broken and will be blamed in some sick social darwinistic narrative designed to be hidden from detection… Grow an imagination@ Laurie,This was an excellent piece. You definitely have range and depth of talent. Peace

Yes, dr_ll, I agree, Stewart’s point is to put the spotlight somewhere other than on the lunatic fringe of tea baggers. I lament with Professor Essig that it is necessary in this country–America–to invoke ideological neutrality and common-sense whenever one counters the rabid right, but it is rhetorically and ideologically necessary, no doubt.Stewart is doing our country a real service here. He has my unequivocal support. I am already less depressed about living in America.

@5 chicolini,They’re the same people who weather Democratic and Republican administrations as best they can, basically aware that neither party is truely interested in their welfare or well-being.

“The majority of voters fall into Aristotle’s category of craftsmen and laborers, that is, too consumed by merely sustaining their existence to have the ‘leisure’ to participate in study, discussion and leadership roles in the polis.”Yet they have enough leisure time that they can average seven hours a day watching “American Idols Dancing With Fifth Graders” and “Who Wants To Be Smarter Than A Mollusk” and whatever other uplifting and informative images go flickering across their television screens. Apparently, all these wise and decent “craftsmen and laborers” must consider gawping in open-mouthed wonder at fifty-inch flat screens to be essential to “merely sustaining their existence”, while actually being an informed, rational, thinking electorate is a “leisure” activity they just can’t find the time for. They can find the time to watch Glenn Beck and football, but not to read a book. Oh, the poor downtrodden, striving so hard every waking minute to sustain their existence.This is, of course, sheer amphigory. Utter demagogic nonsense, to twang the emotional strings wired to the notion that the great unwashed are wise and decent folk who are simply working too hard to know how to vote correctly. But the truth is, the majority of voters have more leisure time per week than work hours, and a great many of them, being unemployed, have nothing but leisure time. The truth is, they aren’t interested in becoming informed, rational, thinking, educated, knowledgeable voters: they’re interested in hearing candidates stroke them, appeal to their emotions, assure them that they will be taken care of, and their precious leisure time and wide-screen televisions will be protected. They’re interested in hearing that once the incompetent and evil incumbents are thrown out of office, everything will come up roses, and they won’t have to worry about fixing the problems because the new office-holders will handle it all. Or, they’re interested in hearing from the incumbents that everything would have been fixed by now if not for the evil bad guys who are causing all the trouble and getting in the way. Most of all, of course, they’re interested in hearing someone — anyone — tell them how very special they are, and how much better they are than those terrible people on the other side, who want to destroy them and everything they believe in. That’s what they want to hear, so they can nod their heads, and write their comments on the Web or call in to the radio talk shows, and parrot the propaganda they’ve absorbed, and tell everybody what’s wrong with the world and whose rights have to be eliminated or which country needs to be invaded next in order to fix it.That is the American electorate, and they’re getting exactly the government they have chosen. Tell them that they have to “participate in study, discussion and leadership” and you’ll get anything from a blank, glassy-eyed stare to a loud and fruity Bronx cheer, and then they’ll turn back to their idiot box, open another Budweiser, and resume muttering about either the evil socialist conspiracy or the evil corporate conspiracy, depending on which political church they’ve sworn blind, ignorant allegiance to. But the only time you’ll see them get really worked up is if the cable goes out. THAT is what’s most important for “sustaining their existence”. Let a serious, rational, intelligent television program about political-economic history preempt Family Guy, and the croaking, grunting vox populi will certainly be heard. The voters are getting exactly the government they have chosen, and one that perfectly represents them: incompetent, uninformed, ignorant, self-centered, superstitious and irrational. Representative government works.

“[If] I want to do something with my life that doesn’t have a market value, I’m not really free to do it.”Yes, you are. You can sit around making mud pies all day, if that’s what you want to do. If that’s your dream, go right ahead. You’re free to do so.But that isn’t your complaint. Your complaint is that you want somebody to provide for you: provide food, clothing, housing, medical care, schooling, heat, electricity, transportation, entertainment, and anything else you want. You want somebody to give you everything, while you pursue whatever activity you choose, regardless of whether it provides any value to anybody else. You want to live outside the world of reality, where everything — from food and housing to medicine and beach shoes — has to be produced, and live in a world where all those things simply appear for you, and you don’t have to pay for them by producing anything of value in return. You find reality terribly annoying and inconvenient, and you want everybody to pity you for it.Freedom means you’re free to starve, if you don’t want to do anything of value, to feed yourself, clothe yourself, house yourself, take care of yourself and family. And that really ticks you off. You want freedom to mean “I get taken care of, for free.” But that isn’t what the word means. It not only doesn’t work that way, it can’t work that way. Because everything you think should be given to you for free is something somebody else is going to have to work to produce. Society is an organism, and no organism can survive once the parasites are devouring more than is being produced. You don’t want to produce anything anybody values? Okay, you’re free to do so. Sit and make valueless mud pies. But thinking that other people are somehow obligated to work hard in order to take care of you, in addition to providing for themselves, is childish, irresponsible, and unrealistic.You hate your job? Gosh, that’s a darn shame. Sounds like you made a lot of very bad decisions in your life. So now you think that whining about it, and calling yourself a slave, is going to make people feel bad for you. You hate your job? Quit, and take up some other occupation. You’re free to do that: a slave isn’t. But you don’t want freedom; you want to be taken care of and have your needs provided for you by others. That isn’t freedom; it’s dependency. A free man will starve if he doesn’t provide for himself. A slave won’t starve: master will provide food for him. I prefer freedom. It isn’t that difficult to provide for myself and my family; I like my job, I’m good at it, and it pays well. It pays well because people value what I do. It’s a simple equation. Provide something people value, and get something of value in return. Or provide nothing of value, and get nothing of value in return. You’re free to choose either of those two options. Choosing a non-existent option of “I don’t want to do anything of value, but I want other people to give me value for nothing” isn’t freedom, it’s simply delusional.You don’t want to have to spend money on schooling for your kids. Oh no, you’d much rather have me and every other property owner spend money for public schools for your kids — schools which, under the clever leadership of local, state and federal bureaucrats, are now the laughingstock of the industrial world. The primary and secondary public education system in this country are a disaster, despite the fact that we spend the “outrageous amount of money” that you deplore. But hey, it isn’t YOUR money, so that’s okay; it would only be if you actually had to spend your own money to educate your kids that you’d be upset. Letting them go to a publicly-funded school is dandy for you, even if they don’t get an education: hey, at least it’s “free” school.You resort to the bumper-sticker cliches like “worshiping dollars above all else”, but the truth is that you worship whoever will give you something for nothing, give you food, clothing, health care, housing, education, all for free. That’s your notion of freedom. But it’s actually slavery: you become a slave to whoever is giving the handouts, a dependent on political favor and bureaucratic largesse, instead of an independent (i.e. free) man.

@ livefree,LIVEFREE QUOTE”You really need to go back to vaginas. You had the opportunity to put together something that made sense, but then you had to regurgitate all that left wing horse crap.”Grow up! We are not competing here for who is the biggest victim livefree. First, your comments have consequences. “Man-up” and accept this. As I have said ad nauseum ever since you embedded yourself into the CHE brainstorm bloodstream, your comments have been more often than not ignorance disguised in anti-intellectual wrapper espousing grandiose and vague wordplays by Frank Luntz that chicagodan rightly refers to. You cannot remove the personal attacks and criticism from the context of your own comments. I suspect telling Laurie to stick to vaginas has no meaning for sexist meaning for you? Again I challenge you to think before speaking or read about what sexism is…..Second, you overreach about what is being said way too often. Your comprehension of the issues requires more reading and listening and less talking/posting (or at least more questions). In terms of clarification, my comments do not correspond to the Trilateral commission but to the actual decision makers in industry, federal reserve policy, Bank CEO’s, Economists and global economic players. The business round table, the chamber of commerce and the national association of manufacturers have been funding an onslaught against New Deal Programs for decades at Cato Institute, American Enterprise Institute and the Heritage Foundation (Harvey, 2005)— A Brief History of Neoliberalism. This is no theory of conspiracy and one can quickly confirm this veracity by attending their own websites if you so choose to visit them….Lastly, I find it interesting that you have already given so many of us labels that we do not accept for ourselves (leftist, liberal, communist, socialist)… I am always amazed in your assumptive assertions. While I freely assert your ignorant and repetitive posts assumptively, I am always willing to go back and repair a wrong that I have caused or an attack that was errant. However, with you that there is a difference between the assumptions I make about you and your life and ones you make about many of the people here…. These issues discussed here are not black and white and we live in the ambiguity of informational asymmetries, faux counter-narratives and incomplete stereotypes. I guess this is why you have never attempted to directly answer the criticisms of writings directly (without first going off into your distractions and self -professed certainties)… For instance, the faux left-right divide-and-conquer approach to media, education and political shape shifting that is propaganda in this country. What this is means is if Fox news is your most pivotal outlet for information, then you are OWNED but too stupid to admit it! This is not an assumption, your words have been read on this website too many time for this not to fall into the category of evidence. My advice to you here is to own your weaknesses, explore differences by asking questions that are designed for dialogue not monologue and begin to honestly be a person of dignity and respect. This starts with the assumption that you are not the brightest person here….

Yes, George Soros, the Ford Foundation, the entire University/State Department Complex, Hollywood, ACORN, the media, the National Immigration Forum (funded largely by those evil billionaires and corporations you love to hate, looking, as usual, for cheap labor): none of these groups have any power at all! When they fund groups and political activists, it’s obviously just to give the underepresented voices. Nothing at all like the dictations of a bunch of elitists who hate ordinary Americans. When ordinary Americans organize and some billionaire gives them paper clip money it’s obviously a conspiracy. The chutzpah of you people never ceases to amaze me.

dkhan,Your response to chicagodan was concise, well-written and cogent. It was also dead wrong. I’m always amused how libertarians such as you seem to be start sputtering about the “freedom to starve” when someone like chicagodan – or myself – points out the essential corruption of our socio-economic system. In any modern, capitalist economy there are two primary actors – labor and capital, and capital has all the power. This adheres across the board, white collar or blue, professional or non. In our particular system it is also true, but even more so. You reveal a great deal of bad faith when you pretend otherwise, and I believe you are pretending because your response demonstrates that you are intelligent, however wrong-headed you may also be. But let me illustrate by addressing your response point-by-point:”Yes, you are. You can sit around making mud pies all day, if that’s what you want to do. If that’s your dream, go right ahead. You’re free to do so.”This is pure sophistry. It’s not even a valid counter to chicagodan’s points, as it proceeds from illogical supposition to fallacious conclusion. In a socio-economic system that compels everyone to work, and our’s certainly does, there is no meaningful “freedom” to do anything but obey. Unless, of course, you’re making the callow libertarian argument that freedom is an absolute, which is another way of saying that my freedom to swing my fist does NOT end at the tip of someone else’s nose.”But that isn’t your complaint. Your complaint is that you want somebody to provide for you: provide food, clothing, housing, medical care, schooling, heat, electricity, transportation, entertainment, and anything else you want.” Another fallacy, as chicagodan not only didn’t make that argument, he didn’t even imply it.”You want somebody to give you everything, while you pursue whatever activity you choose, regardless of whether it provides any value to anybody else. You want to live outside the world of reality, where everything — from food and housing to medicine and beach shoes — has to be produced, and live in a world where all those things simply appear for you, and you don’t have to pay for them by producing anything of value in return.”And there it is, the nub of the matter. No one with an ounce of sense believes or argues this. Hell, even the Communists in charge of the old Soviet Union didn’t argue this, because there citizens were not allowed to have “everything”, only their basic needs. By way of example, don’t forget that when Oswald defected his new Russian worker friends were annoyed by his laziness.No, what chicagodan and I, and others like us, want is a guarantee that no one will be allowed to fall below a certain station in life, regardless of the reason for their falling. Basic, decent housing, food, clothing and adequate transportation and medical care for all, regardless of ability to pay. Then if someone wants, for example, “beach shoes”, they have to go out and work for them. This is basically how it works in the Scandinavian Social Democracies; you know, home to such notoriously “irresponsible” enterprises as Ikea, Volvo, Nokia, Saab, and Ericsson.”Freedom means you’re free to starve, if you don’t want to do anything of value, to feed yourself, clothe yourself, house yourself, take care of yourself and family.”Yet another fallacy. That isn’t freedom, khan, that’s tyranny by naturalistic means. “Do what I say with your life, or you will die.” The fact that in this case it is cooperation in the production of sellable goods and services, as opposed to eternal fealty to the Party or somesuch, is a distinction without a difference. Tyrants from time immemorial have all claimed that what they demanded was only natural, so I’d say you’ve got yourself into some pretty seedy moral company. As to “things” appearing, well, human beings have been organizing themselves in various ways to clothe, feed and shelter themselves, usually cooperatively, for millenia.”You want freedom to mean ‘I get taken care of, for free.’”No, it is YOU who want freedom to mean the opposite, so you can enforce your own personal will to power over others.”But that isn’t what the word means. It not only doesn’t work that way, it can’t work that way. Because everything you think should be given to you for free is something somebody else is going to have to work to produce.”The word “freedom” has many meanings, most of them contextual. “Freedom from want” is one of the highest moral callings of mankind, though admittedly it has birthed much tyranny and suffering. But not *every* time it has been tried. Again, I direct you to the Scandinavian Social Democracies. “Society is an organism, and no organism can survive once the parasites are devouring more than is being produced.”Kudos for taking this long to deploy the “P” word. “You don’t want to produce anything anybody values? Okay, you’re free to do so. Sit and make valueless mud pies. But thinking that other people are somehow obligated to work hard in order to take care of you, in addition to providing for themselves, is childish, irresponsible, and unrealistic.”No, it’s pretty much the way human society always worked…until, that is, the arrival of agriculture and, with it, the concepts of wealth, paternalism, women’s inferiority, and so forth. You will undoubtedly argue that the list should include “civilization”, but which kind? Aztec? Polynesian? There are devils in your details, sir, and you can’t hide them from me (or chicagodan).”You hate your job? Gosh, that’s a darn shame. Sounds like you made a lot of very bad decisions in your life.”Oh please. In a modern capitalist society it is only necessary to “decide” to be born black or brown, and/or female, and/or poor, to almost guarantee bad economic outcomes. And there are few things worse in life than having to spend eight or more hours a day, every day, engaged in an activity that is immiserating. Only people addicted to resentment think or believe otherwise.”So now you think that whining about it, and calling yourself a slave, is going to make people feel bad for you. You hate your job? Quit, and take up some other occupation. You’re free to do that: a slave isn’t.”Finally, a point that makes sense. You’re absolutely right…accept, of course, when you’re *not*. But I’m quibbling.”But you don’t want freedom; you want to be taken care of and have your needs provided for you by others. That isn’t freedom; it’s dependency.”No, it’s enlightened human decency made manifest in social and economic policy. You know, like in Sweden, New Zealand, Norway, Denmark, Holland, Germany, France, Japan, Finland, Iceland and Greenland. And Canada, sort of.The rest of your response is not worth wasting my time on. Though intelligent, khan, you are an execrable person. You are perfectly happy to piss on your fellow citizens in the name of a rather slapdash political pseudo-philosophy that is based, in the end, on the most grotesque selfishness imaginable. I’d write “shame on you”, but I am old and experienced enough to know that people such as you have no shame, and never will. And to others here who conflate George Soros with the Koch Brothers, please investigate further before sounding off. You sound fainlty ridiculous.

Wow! Talk about missing the point!Yes, let’s all over-think while the extremes tear us to pieces — The middle, viewed from a long distance to either the left or the right, is really just another extreme! Goodness. Better do nothing. Or better yet, join one of the extremes. They’re more authentic. What the “Muddled Middle” (what an idiotic turn of phrase — more muddled than who, I ask?) needs is a clear view to the consequences of global capitalism. Ideology is not actually a prerequisite for perceiving one’s own self-interest. Sorry… but speaking from the middle, I would rather reason this one out — and that is what the Middle allows one to do that is absolutely, positively forbidden within those anxious little communities we call Left and Right.