Beggar Thy Neighbor, Beggar Thyself

[upstatecajun]

Having won one class war, Republicans are starting a second. To perpetuate record levels of income inequality not seen since before the Great Depression, conservatives are agitating for middle class Americans to wage a civil war on each other. Their latest divide-and-conquer tactic is to portray government workers as "takers" and "parasites" somehow responsible for the decline of manufacturing and other sectors of the U.S. economy. Of course, like so much Republican mythmaking, the claim not only is untrue, but a cynical diversion to deflect attention from the real winners in the class war.

The latest formulation in the conservative attack on public employees comes from Club for Growth cheerleader and Wall Street Journal regular Stephen Moore. Moore, who in 2004 authored the justifiably forgotten book, Bullish on Bush: How George Bush's Ownership Society Will Make America Stronger, is back to accuse government workers of sucking the life blood out of the U.S. economy. In his op-ed "We've Become a Nation of Takers, Not Makers," Moore placed the blame for the loss of non-service sector jobs where it doesn't belong:

http://www.tloforum.org/viewtopic.php?f=11&t=44

[Mnemosyne]

1. K&R for more visibility. n/t

[tavalon]

2. Well, you use what works and this pitting one another against each other

always seems to work, until one magical day, it doesn't, and the revolution starts.

[Betty Karlson]

3. K&R nt

[LiberalAndProud]

4. Link to original blog.

http://www.perrspectives.com/blog/archives/002143.htm