Why the Biden/McCarthy "debt deal" leads us further down the road to fascism
One of the problems with "crisis politics" -- and this is working as
intended really -- is that it makes it difficult for most people to
look beyond the immediate crisis to 2nd, 3rd, and later effects.
The "debt crisis" is a perfect example. The debt limit is a totally
artificial and 100% *political* construct. It has nothing to do with
macroeconomics or actual monetary policy. It is a political creation
specifically to enable the kind of "hostage crisis" political
malpractice -- almost always at the last possible minute because
that's when the fear factor is highest.
So everything gets funneled down to "do we avoid the debt crisis this
time?", rather than what these continued manufactured events mean for
our futures in the longer term.
Increasingly, both parties are owned by their most radical factions.
On the Right side it's outright racism, antisemitism, censorship, and
fascism, and on the Left it's increasingly social policies out of step
(whether one likes it or not) with the vast bulk of U.S. moderates
(where federal elections are still decided), and their own forms of
censorship (180 degrees away from the GOP form, but still censorship).
This has pushed us into a place where the 2024 presidential election
will most likely be between two elderly men, one a fascist, the other
weakened by an obsolete sense that he can "negotiate" with a GOP that
once upon a time wasn't fascist, but now very much is.
Even if we put aside the lies and hype that came from both the GOP and
the White House in this discussion (and indeed, both are guilty of
these), the end result -- no matter how anyone tries to spin it -- is
that the Democratic mantra of "well, it could have been worse" is just
another way of saying that next time, the fascist GOP will indeed make
it worse -- because they succeeded in making a lie of Biden's original
"I won't negotiate over the debt limit" statement and other related
utterances.
Would the world actually collapse if the debt limit deadline passed?
If you *really* think the federal government would risk riots in the
streets over stopped social security payments or closed hospitals, I
don't believe you fully appreciate that one way or another, we'd all
push through. The markets would go wacko, but they'd recover. That's
how they work. But we'd have likely broken the curse of these repeated
manufactured nightmares, for as Franklin Roosevelt said so many years
ago, it's fear itself that is the real enemy.
And using fear as a weapon is what today's GOP is all about. By
letting them succeed this time, we guarantee a far worse battle with
them down the line, with more of their fascism shoved down our
throats. This must end.
I'll add that I don't enjoy these arguments. I despise spending my time
this way. Today I ended up in a mutual block over on Mastodon (with
someone I've known for many years) as these arguments progressed.
And frankly, these are very much the kinds of results that the GOP
wants, and that Democrats are now letting them achieve. -L
- - -
--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein
[email protected] (https://www.vortex.com/lauren)
Lauren's Blog: https://lauren.vortex.com
Twitter: https://twitter.com/laurenweinstein
Mastodon: https://mastodon.laurenweinstein.org/@lauren
T2: https://t2.social/laurenweinstein
Founder: Network Neutrality Squad: https://www.nnsquad.org
PRIVACY Forum: https://www.vortex.com/privacy-info
Co-Founder: People For Internet Responsibility
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800
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