Musings About This American Presidential Election

These are the sociopolitical musings of a Canadian who really and truly cares about civil society in the United States of America.

Some of my friends, all of them progressives to varying degrees and all of them intelligent, would like to see Mitt Romney win the US Presidential election next week. They want to see this Romney-Ryan ticket take the White House so that the economic chaos that will undoubtedly ensue wakes up all but the most myopic and narrow minded conservative. This economic calamity, so their thinking goes, will convince Americans to rebel, throw out the Republicans once and for all, and get back to working on creating a civil society.

I disagree with them! The main reason I disagree is that I am worried that one more term of a Republican presidency, especially in this era of Tea Party Madness, will take their once proud and mighty country over the edge and into the abyss! (If pressed about what I mean by the “abyss,” I may have trouble answering. But somehow the success of the NRA comes to mind as being an influential aspect of what I am calling the abyss.)

No, I am a typical Canadian on this front: six out of seven of us want to see Obama win a second term. Call me naïve, but I really do think that given a second term with no chance at a third, Barack Obama will show progressive Americans and others that the inspiration he offered back in 2008 was for real, that he will realize that he needs to do more, especially around economic issues. Let’s face it, the Occupy Movement of 2011 was surprisingly massive, but it would have been even much larger in scope had there not been such a likeable figure as Obama in the White House. If the gap between the Top 1% and everyone else continues to unabatedly grow, the next social movement is unlikely to be so peaceful.

I believe that Obama understands this.

But let’s move the discussion away from Obama’s assumed political consciousness and over to what seems to be a false political consciousness among many American voters. And I use this phrase with confidence because outside of Warren Buffet and a few others, most of the 1% want to see the Republicans back in the White House, what with that party’s penchant for giving the wealthiest citizens large tax cuts.

If the polls are to be believed that it really is a close race, then I think it is fair to say that there are a lot of regular American commoners who are also supporting Romney and Ryan. This is where I want to spend the rest of this space for my sociopolitical musings.

More specifically, I want to look at the possible economic reasons as to why so many members of the 99% might vote for the man known as Mitt.

(As a brief aside, I realize that many conservative commoners vote solely for social reasons, but I just cannot bring myself to even discuss the recent Republican obsession with rape and the control of women. For those of you interested in this topic, check out this article in the UK's Guardian newspaper:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/oct/25/real-republican-party-rape-platform?fb=optOut       Nor am I going to address the fact that the Democratic candidate is a Black man. For this space, let’s keep the discussion on the economic side of things.)

In early September, as most of you will recall, the Mittster was caught on videotape telling a group of one per centers (who paid $50 grand just to hear the guy) that 47% of Americans feel the government should help them get housing, food, education and healthcare, and that he has nothing to offer this group except creating conditions to get them to feel a sense of responsibility to take care of themselves. Predictably, the polls showed a profound disgust for Romney telling it like it really is among corporate conservatives – Obama built up a seemingly insurmountable 10 to 12 point lead!

I really do want to thank Mitt Romney for so clearly demonstrating just how conservatism has evolved since the 1970s. Yes, for a long time conservatives in all western nations (including the U.S. and Canada) have called for a stable group of privileged people to lead their respective countries, to maintain tradition and social hierarchies based on race, gender and especially class. But the old conservatives would think about how best to move things along so that all of society, in their view at least, would benefit. (Yes, I do see problems with this theory, but they thought they were taking care of everyone.)

The Romney 47% Speech demonstrated what many of us had already figured out, namely, that contemporary wealthy conservatives no longer want to consider the whole of society. They are now completely concerned with entrenching their own power and increasing their bank accounts, even if it means the dismantling of the entire social welfare state and civil society.

So considering this, how the heck did Romney come back from 10-points down to bring the election polls to a virtual tie??

Apparently, Obama put in a poor performance during the first debate. Okay, sure. But could that possibly be the reason why so many Americans forgave Romney for the disparaging remarks about almost half the American population? Hardly. This is even more suspicious when one realizes that the vast majority of people who watch presidential debates are politically conscious people who have already made up their minds no matter what happens in the debates.

Methinks that the media coverage had something to do with the quick obliteration of Obama’s commanding lead.

But I do not want to dwell on the obvious fact that corporate media have corporate interests. I want to speculate on the political consciousness of those American commoners who will support the Republican ticket on November 6^th.

Let’s do a quick recap. The American economy went into a serious recession in late 2007 and 2008, with many Americans losing their jobs and their homes. Most economists rightly point to the tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans passed by Republican George W Bush (remember him?) and those two unbelievably expensive wars for the huge economic crisis. (I would like to add the corporate desire for deregulation as a major factor, as well, but then we are also bringing Democrat Bill Clinton into the story. Both parties deregulated the financial industry to the point that the subprime mortgage debacle was a tragedy waiting to happen.)

So in 2008 Obama was elected on a message of hope, and now after four years a possible majority of Americans want to bring the Republicans back into power?? I mean, what gives??

A little more recap. Out of the ashes of the 2007-2009 economic recession arose a group calling themselves the Tea Party. They presented as a populist grassroots movement, but a quick study showed them to be nothing more than an astroturf  movement. How else can it be explained that Tea Party rallies and their successful election campaigns were entirely paid for by the billionaire Koch Brothers and groups the Koch Boys created like Americans for Prosperity? (Yes, this is the same group that sent thugs to break up Obama’s town hall meetings about his healthcare plans.)

All of a sudden political watchers heard a lot of loud and angry shouts for the economic system to be made even more brutal for the victims of the recession! We were shocked to see so much support for policies that would result in even more wealth being transferred from the 99% to the 1%!! I mean, seriously? Let's make sure the wealthy get an even greater percentage of the money??

The U.S. is currently experiencing the worst poverty rates since the Great Depression. Its environment is stressed beyond anything ever before. Its citizens are being incarcerated at higher rates than in any other country. Its public education system is falling behind most other western nations. And any young American from a regular background wishing to pursue a post-secondary education can expect a life of indentured servitude because of overwhelming student debt.

And still Romney might win the election? Maybe we should take a quick look at this guy and how he got to be so rich. Yes, he was born with a silver spoon, but some people still think he has a savvy business acumen to be able to get the American economy up and running much faster than what Obama has accomplished.

But does Romney really have an outstanding business acumen?

When I think of incredible business savvy and innovation I think of Henry Ford and the Model-T. I think of Walt Disney and his cartoons. Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak and the apple computer. So what is it about Romney and the way he made his fortunes that irks me?

Well, we have learned that Mitt was the CEO of some sort of venture capitalist operation called Bain Capital. We now know that Bain Capital is an outfit that looks for wounded companies, buys them up, guts what is useable and moves it out, leaving a shell of a company, many unemployed workers, and a string of bankruptcies. In short, Romney is what is known as a predatory capitalist. Is this really the kind of guy that a majority of American voters want to see in the White House?

I sure hope no one is going to trot out that pathetic trickle-down nonsense. We have been forced to listen to that discourse ever since the 1980s with the Reagan-Thatcher-Mulroney Triumvirate! All we have experienced from it is an incredible transfer of wealth to the wealthiest among us. Research has clearly shown that trickle-down economics is a hollow shell game, just like what Romney’s Bain Capital is all about. It does absolutely nothing to help civil society.

In this context, will Romney actually win the election next week?

If he does, we can only assume that there are myriad forces working against civil society. On this point, I would also like to highlight the influence of policies such as Citizens United, Super PACs, the role of fundamentalist churches, and strategies like destabilizing voter registration lists among groups who traditionally vote for the Democrats as reasons why the Republicans might come roaring back into power. Lest we forget, it has only been four short years since the complete and total disaster of the Bush-Cheney years.

But I would also like to highlight the incredible degree to which a false political consciousness has colonized the minds of far too many regular Americans. And for this we can thank a few select powerful conservatives.

The Koch Brothers. Remember them. And remember Rupert Murdoch and his nefarious minions at Fox News. They are the true enemies of American civil society.

There are many others, to be sure - some of them have the surname Walton. But I think it wise to focus on what Murdoch and the Koch Bros are up to behind the scenes.

I recall the old song by The Who with its angry chorus, “We Won’t Get Fooled Again!!” We can only hope that they were right, for the sake of American commoners, and for the sake of commoners the world over.

These are the sociopolitical musings of a Canadian who really and truly cares about civil society in the United States of America.

Go Obama !! Go Elizabeth Warren !!