Why the Green New Deal Triggers Conservative Scorn
Union-Tribune Op-Ed Vitriol Proves Progressive Vision’s Virtue
A quick tour around the world of right wing scribes reveals an almost giddy glee over the policy aspirations of the progressive wing of the Democratic party.
The Green New Deal is the numero uno abomination on the list drawn up by conservatives and libertarians who can’t stomach Trump but feel entitled to chime in on fixing the mess (they helped create).
Last week, the Union-Tribune’s Chris Reed said this Congressional resolution (a word he uses to envision mandated rotting airplane carcasses and force-fed broccoli) marks the point where “modern American liberalism lost its mind.”
To call it half-baked is an insult to ideas that are half-baked. It is fully baked. It feels like the product of a caffeine/THC bender by a 22-year-old poli sci grad student who’s never read anything but The Nation.
This contemptuous approach mirrors the (often bi-partisan) establishmentarian response to the new wave of elected persons making themselves heard in governments throughout the nation.
Accordingly, Alexandra Octavio-Cortez wasn’t allowed to have fun in college, is ineligible to represent her district because she isn’t wealthy enough, can’t dress for success, and is to be completely discredited daily for whatever trolls can dig up and hand over to Fox news. The only explanation for her degree in economics to those suffering from this way of thinking must be affirmative action.
God-forbid she or any of these other ‘outsiders’ should make a rookie mistake. Then (they think) it will be all over and Sean Hannity can crawl back into whatever hellhole he came out of.
Getting back to the UT, Reed’s mocking tone for this essay turns serious as the trouncing of George McGovern by Richard Nixon in 1972 becomes exhibit A in building the case that “liberal Democrats appear ready to reject the lessons of history — to Republicans’ immense pleasure.”
Reed points out the Very Serious People who agree with this premise:
The day the “Green New Deal” was released, Axios reporter Jonathan Swan said, “It’s like Christmas and Hanukkah and every other holiday has arrived” for Trump’s 2020 campaign team. “Every Republican in the country should get on their hands and knees and thank Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez,” ex-White House official Andy Surabian told Axios reporter Alayna Treene. Conservative columnist Kimberley Strassel wrote in The Wall Street Journal that Ocasio-Cortez was the GOP’s “secret weapon” in the 2020 race.
Never mind the 14 page HR-109 mandates nothing and needs zero funding. It's a resolution, not a bill.
What it does say, and this why the right feels the need to go into full ridicule mode, is our current predicaments are ultimately about ‘the economy, stupid.’
This prescription isn’t about “acid, amnesty and abortion,"ala 1972. It’s about paying the rent.
Consider this headline from Business Insider:
Read the story at the other end of that link and you'll discover that the truth is more nuanced than the headline suggests. You'll also understand why the righties are determined to shut this conversation down.
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The Green New Deal is a vision, based on data establishing the failure of market-driven economics to provide for the future of the planet and the near-immediate needs of the vast majority of Americans.
Let us not forget for a moment the current scheme in place for our nation’s future (with or without) The Donald is more of the same. Or a lite-version thereof. The so-called ‘reasonable’ politicians will try to smile a little more as they say “we can’t afford” [fill-in-the-blank].
We have a dozen (or so) years left before we reach reach the point of no return on global climate change. In the name of the almighty dollar, the minimal steps taken over past decades (by administrations run by both parties) to protect the environment are being reversed.
The best answer the ‘market worshiping’ set can come up with in response to this planetary emergency is to deny or ignore the data.
Even Richard Nixon wasn’t that stupid.
Seven million Americans lost their health insurance last year. Hell, thanks to the GOP propaganda machine, 31% of the country thinks the Affordable Care Act has been repealed. Life expectancy in the United States has declined for the past three years. The US and Serbia are the only nations in the developed world where maternal mortality rates have increased since 1990. We pay more and get less for our health care.
The soaring CEO salaries and stock buybacks provide no comfort to those paying twice the price for insulin in recent years.
A vast majority of Americans (including Republicans) agree some variation on Medicare-or-All is what this country needs. What we should be doing right NOW is negotiating the details.
Instead, the Freedom Caucus is still trying to repeal Obamacare.
At the root of the country’s problems is the chasm of inequality that’s opened up since the myth of “trickle down” became the driving economic philosophy for both parties.
Gabriel Zucman, an economics professor at the University of California, Berkeley, for the National Bureau of Economic Research as quoted in Axios:
"Because the wealthy have access to many opportunities for tax avoidance and tax evasion—and because the available evidence suggests that the tax planning industry has grown since the 1980s as it became globalized—traditional data sources are likely to under-estimate the level and rise of wealth concentration."
Zucman also notes that data shows the share of total wealth owned by the top 1% has increased by 9 points since 1989 and by 10 points when including the Forbes 400. In capitalized income estimates, it has increased by 11 points.
"The share of wealth owned by the bottom 90% has collapsed in similar proportions."
Sorry, kids. You’ll probably earn less than your parents did. You will never buy a home, unless you get lucky and win the lotto. And retirement? Ha! How about a nice job as an Uber driver?
“...American leaders need to do a much better job of making sure the benefits of a booming economy are spread much more widely..” doesn’t offer up much hope.
It’s obvious to all but the AynRandian faithful that hope and prayers don’t cut it. While the numbers may vary according to how the questions are asked by pollsters, three out four registered voters agree on higher taxes for the very wealthy.
At the root of the conservative arguments against the thrust of the vision provided by the New Green Deal is the assumption that the majority of Americans will view these sorts of changes as unnecessary government intrusion into their lives.
Somehow the nation survived the high taxes and acceptance of organized labor as a needed part of society during the Eisenhower years, and I suspect we the people would survive another bout of leveling the playing field. (Only this time, everybody gets to play.)
Cries of big bad big brother ruining everybody’s lives are borne out of the right’s resistance to progress, so this is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Remember the Obamacare “death panels?”
Are all these prescriptions for what ails the nation a path to socialism? I doubt it, at least in the short term. (Once the millennials take over, all bets are off.)
What is clear is contemporary capitalism/market driven economics has failed. And adjustments will be made. What form they’ll take, I don’t know. This isn’t about utopia. It’s about effin’ survival.
I just know we need to do better for the future of our children and of the planet.
Tell it, sister.
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