Anti-democratic nature of US capitalism is being exposed

[SHRED]

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Another timely article by the great Noam Chomsky!
:thumbsup:

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Anti-democratic nature of US capitalism is being exposed
NOAM CHOMSKY

Fri, Oct 10, 2008

Bretton Woods was the system of global financial management set up at the end of the second World War to ensure the interests of capital did not smother wider social concerns in post-war democracies. It was hated by the US neoliberals - the very people who created the banking crisis writes Noam Chomsky

~SNIP~

The initial Bush proposals to deal with the crisis so reeked of totalitarianism that they were quickly modified. Under intense lobbyist pressure, they were reshaped as "a clear win for the largest institutions in the system . . . a way of dumping assets without having to fail or close", as described by James Rickards, who negotiated the federal bailout for the hedge fund Long Term Capital Management in 1998, reminding us that we are treading familiar turf. The immediate origins of the current meltdown lie in the collapse of the housing bubble supervised by Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan, which sustained the struggling economy through the Bush years by debt-based consumer spending along with borrowing from abroad. But the roots are deeper. In part they lie in the triumph of financial liberalisation in the past 30 years - that is, freeing the markets as much as possible from government regulation.

~SNIP~

"Politics is the shadow cast on society by big business," concluded America's leading 20th century social philosopher John Dewey, and will remain so as long as power resides in "business for private profit through private control of banking, land, industry, reinforced by command of the press, press agents and other means of publicity and propaganda".

The United States effectively has a one-party system, the business party, with two factions, Republicans and Democrats. There are differences between them. In his study Unequal Democracy: The Political Economy of the New Gilded Age, Larry Bartels shows that during the past six decades "real incomes of middle-class families have grown twice as fast under Democrats as they have under Republicans, while the real incomes of working-poor families have grown six times as fast under Democrats as they have under Republicans".

Differences can be detected in the current election as well. Voters should consider them, but without illusions about the political parties, and with the recognition that consistently over the centuries, progressive legislation and social welfare have been won by popular struggles, not gifts from above.

Those struggles follow a cycle of success and setback. They must be waged every day, not just once every four years, always with the goal of creating a genuinely responsive democratic society, from the voting booth to the workplace.

~SNIP~

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/opinion/2008/1010/1223560345968.html

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[orwell]

1. Why is this not hammered home...

...by every Dem pundit every day...

The Political Economy of the New Gilded Age, Larry Bartels shows that during the past six decades "real incomes of middle-class families have grown twice as fast under Democrats as they have under Republicans, while the real incomes of working-poor families have grown six times as fast under Democrats as they have under Republicans".

GDP growth is higher under Democrats. Deficit creation is lower under Democrats.

These are very powerful political arguments from the fact based community.

[Demeter]

2. Democratic Pundits? Do We Have Any?

We have Rachel, Keith, Jon Stewart and Colbert, and I wouldn't call them pundits. they either are serious news people, or serious humorists. Pundits are another thing entirely.

[raccoon]

3. This is what really grabbed me:

"The United States effectively has a one-party system, the business party, with two factions, Republicans and Democrats."

[katty]

4. yes, Chomp is so clear - right to the point