Thomas Frank at Salon explains just how the Republicans pulled off their election victory -- yes, low voter turnout, big money, and anger in the land, but then there was this: Indeed, it is now possible for a Republican soldier like Frank Luntz to explain the Republican victory by writing, People say Washington is broken and on the decline, that government no longer works for them — only for the rich and powerful. You read that right: After deliberately breaking Washington, the Republican Party just rode to power by protesting Washington’s brokenness. Having done all they could to enrich the rich and empower the powerful, the GOP has now succeeded in presenting itself as America’s warrior for social justice. In other words, the usual sleight of hand that Frank has so often illuminated in the past. Tom Last week, with the Republican campaign robo-calls coming one after another over the phone in suburban Kansas City — at least a dozen of them every day, the right-wing super PACs’ version of a World War I artillery barrage — I picked out one phrase from the hailstorm of words: Washington’s liberal class. That phrase, delivered with sneering emphasis on the second word, may have been a key to the whole confusing affair. Consider the many ironies of the 2014 elections. Georgia, the state with the highest unemployment in the nation, just elected as its United States senator a businessman who is “proud” of his career of outsourcing. The voters of Illinois overwhelmingly approved a referendum calling for a higher minimum wage, but they also chose as their governor a Wall Street type who in the past has asserted that the minimum wage ought to be reduced or eliminated. And the public as a whole, driven to fury by the spectacle of Washington gridlock, just handed over the U. S. Senate to a party that has enshrined obstructionism as its most precious article of faith. Low turnout is one reason for these contradictory results. Big money is a second. But a third reason voters did these futile, clashing things is that this is our fourth hard-times election in a row. Lashing out blindly and in all directions against the powerful — against low wages as well as against a comfortable “class” that is amply represented in Washington — is still our political default position, some six years after the financial crisis and the Wall Street bailout. For many Americans, the recession is still on. They know that their region hasn’t recovered … that their household wealth isn’t coming back … that people like them no longer have a shot at the middle-class life in which they were raised. salon/2014/11/09/the_gops_poisonous_double_speak_thomas_frank_on_how_republicans_hijacked_the_midterms/
Posted on: Mon, 10 Nov 2014 13:30:01 +0000
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