The Richest, Most Powerful Nation

In the world.

We spent $672,879,000,000 on war-making in 2012 (we call it "Defense," and don't think about it). That may be why the Department of War became the Department of Defense--although there were bureaucratic reasons, as well. Anyway, we may be the most powerful militarily, but part of the reason for that is that we're somehow persuaded, year after year, to spend on "Defense" as much at least as the five next "most powerful" nations combined. But the most powerful nation cannot control the world.

It shouldn't try. We may be "the richest" nation, but we have a lot of poor people. Nevertheless, we'd rather spend money on military toys and warriors, than on helping to maintain people through unemployment insurance, who still cannot find jobs: there are far fewer jobs than job seekers.

Further, austerity's stupidity is causing disasters all over the world.

Tepid growth in the US compares to what austerity has done to nations like Greece and Spain--despite, in Spain's case, conservative fiscal policy--the result: Depression-level unemployment.

In the US, Republicans boast they forced Democrats to cut off the long-term unemployed. Dismissive phrases they use: "a way of life," "rip off artists," and unemployment is an "easy Street" where "fraud" is "rampant." Democrats are faced with a dilemma that doesn't trouble Republicans. Republicans don't believe in government, anyway, so there's no felt obligation to make it work for people--at least people who aren't CEO's or hedge fund artistes.

Democrats seek the money represented by wealthy and corporate interests, too, but they're torn: they tend to believe that government can be a force for good: FDR was their hero. If in order for government to work at all, the long-term unemployed have to be sacrificed, well, the greater good, some reason….

The bottom line is: the most uncompromising, well-funded side, appealing to a minority of ill-informed white people, gets to call the shots, setting the agenda.

Even the New York Times apparently assumes that Social Security and Medicare are going to have to be cut, despite a growing appeal among progressives for expansion, not contraction of Social Security, in response to the disappearance of private pensions, or fully funded public ones. The media attempt to eliminate any dialog about whether Social Security needs to be expanded, instead of contracted, despite the fact that it's self-funding and the payroll tax, is easily modified. It could be raised on the people paying too little, to make the tax no longer regressive; it subtracts a larger share from earnings below $115,000, than for those above that.

The GOP wages class warfare: progressives must fight back, like Senator Warren, not "go along" with elite greed. Americans should reject the elite's takeover, so reminiscent of the Roman Senators' monopoly of wealth in the Fifth Century.

Chaos

It's what happened in the Fifth Century, well ahead of the "fall" of Rome, and it can happen here, especially if Romney is elected. Even if he isn't, as long as this nation remains so polarized, it's almost inevitable: we'll have chaos, as in large segments of society no longer acting as if they belong to it.

One of the more poignant quotations coming down from the early Sixth Century: the monasteries reporting they had little time for learning, because of the omnipresence of "war bands," that ripped off whatever of value the monks and their neighbors had managed to gain.

As I've pointed out before, the dream of Grover Norquist is realized in Somalia. There is no government: "war bands" roam the countryside. Government was "drowned in a bathtub." Moreover, different war bands roam the seas: we call them 'Somali pirates.'

Seriously. If the obscenely wealthy gain even more power and wealth, by buying the election, or at least government stalemate, then the working class (which no one mentions anymore) will be even more desperate. The middle class will bifurcate into the few 'successful' and the many even more desperate than the working class--because children of the middle class don't expect to be poor.

I taught Revolution as a Political Science class. One of the leading theories for why revolutions emerge, and why some succeed: the leaders came from the disaffected, but highly educated, middle class. That's even true if their class is a small portion of society, like Mao's rich peasants and Castro's private school elite. Roman bandits came from this class.

Chaos will come if Romney is elected, because his policies make no sense: they'll generate a new depression. Even a new war with Iran would only make it worse, but the very rich will get even wealthier. Romney's tax plan, reportedly, would reduce his tax rate from his claimed (and outrageously low) 13% to 1%.

Okay, here's the recipe: depression, increasing misery, savage cuts to income maintenance programs like Food Stamps, skyrocketing medical costs, by repealing Obamacare, government support for breaking unions, cutting wages and raising taxes on everyone but the wealthy; the wealthy clearly flourish. What do you get?

Perhaps Syria is the model for our future. The peaceful reform movement there was brutally repressed, thereby stoking desperation and violence, which eventually led to civil war, maybe it will lead to revolution, once Assad is ejected.

Leftists, don't take heart. Not all revolutions are leftist: Hitler and Mussolini were revolutionaries. The US could go either way and given past history, Americans have tended to blunder right, not left. FDR and Lincoln were outliers.

So, chaos: even if Obama wins--unless he carries his party's progressives with a real mandate to slash unemployment, control the banks, and radically reduce inequality.

How likely is that? Well, maybe if Elizabeth Warren were the Democratic convention's keynoter, there could be cause for optimism. But she won't be.

Comments? See below and scroll down.