Political obscurantism

Protectors of our two party system employ a few tactics to keep the public off guard and to keep any opposition to statism at bay. One tactic used frequently is obscurantism. Anyone who pays attention at all to politics understands that the two political parties are split between tax hikes and spending cuts. The GOP pundits will tell you that Democrats want to raise taxes, and the Democratic Party will tell you that Republicans are stuck on spending cuts and protecting rich people from being forced to pay their fair share.

If you pay closer attention, you'll think you're on the inside of the real conflict, because on the inside, Democratic pundits who understand the real deal will tell you that Obama has offered a balanced approach, willing to deal with entitlement spending, while balancing the reforms with taxes on the richest among us. Insider Republicans will say that Obama is not really serious about entitlement reforms, and that the Democratic Senate would block such reform, anyway. There appears to be a real serious conflict among the political parties.

As the debates rage throughout the political realm, spending increases, and taxes go up. Obama has taxes baked into Obamacare, plus there are hidden taxes such as the ones in high gas prices. In other words, there are no real cuts to government spending. The Fed is pumping $85 billion dollars a month into the economy. While all this real, serious, inside political conflict goes back and forth, the media and both the Republican and Democratic establishments block out the few members of Congress who actually want to limit government power and change the statist system.

Until the statist system is totally restructured, and strict, enforcable limits are placed on government power, the State will grow in power and control. Obscurantism is a political tactic to keep the public divided and confused, and those opposed to statism on defense. You will hear both parties referring to "extremists" who hate government and block all attempts at governing -- they're usually referring to anti-statists who hate statist meddling but don't hate government. Anti-statists respect limited government and believe that government is necessary to protect our rights. What anti-statists don't believe in is an interventionist government that protects a powerful State bent on violating individual rights. 

Sequestration Madness -- Catch It!

Watching Morning Joe today, the panel, Richard Haas, Chris Matthews, Mika, Joe Scarborough, and a few others, discussed sequestration. The talk in media now is that both sides deserve blame for setting up this stupid automatic spending cut trigger if they failed to make a deal on raising the debt and developing smart cuts and reforms in government spending to offset the growing costs of entitlement spending. The reason media sources like Morning Joe, and pundits like Chris Matthews, switched from blaming the GOP solely to blaming both sides for the sequestration stand off is that Bob Woodward came forward and revealed conversations he had with WH personnel during the writing of his new book in which the WH admitted to coming up with the sequestration idea, and that the deal was only planned -- negotiated spending cuts would be considered to avoid across the board cuts. Woodward destroyed the Democrats' narrative of GOP obstructionism, and Woodward accused President Obama of moving the goal posts, as Obama reportedly did when dealing with John Boehner on the original Grand Bargain.

It appears that Obama doesn't want a deal in which both sides look good. Obama wants to make the Republicans look like obstructionists protecting the super-rich, or Obama wants Republicans to capitulate on more taxes and divide the Republican Party even deeper and wider. The guests on Morning Joe have talked some about the political games played, but it's usually in terms of Republican obstructionism because they're captured by an extreme Tea Party base. The guests will sometimes admit that Obama is playing hardball, but they excuse it by saying Obama won the presidential election and, therefore, has the political clout to mostly get his way. The pundits usually fail to mention that GOP lawmakers won in the House, and we have a balance of power in US government, not a monarchy.

I've written recently about the danger in giving our Presidents the power we now give them. If there's any hope of avoiding bankruptcy, complete loss of freedom and eventual collapse, it's with representatives in the House and Governors in states. We can't allow a few pockets of power in federal government to control the nation and our economy. Obama has declared war on all obstacles to his pursuit of power. Obama is not pursuing power alone -- he's pushed by Progressive forces who see this opportunity as their time to shine, to make policy that will transform America into a post-capitalist era of democratic socialism which frees us from economic tyranny and establishes a real path to social justice and equality. Obama has taken every chance to rail against the rich and demand that they pay their fair share. Of course, some of the rich are necessary partners in the Progressive agenda, so they get preferential treatment, but they are only tools, not real partners. If Progressives succeed, the winners in a transformed world State planned of production and services will be determeined by political, ad hoc expediency, and those who are favored today might be disfavored tomorrow. When our nation and economy are control by political means, it will be a totally different world. They will achive equality in that the standard of living for the great majority will be low. The few in power will not be accused of inequality because they are protecting the people from the tyrannical rich who will rise again if not for the courageous efforts of the few in control.

So, this sequestration silliness is only a diversion. There are some in the political realm who understand the stakes, but they haven't decided where they stand and what they're willing to risk. Fighting against a gigantic State machine is intimidating, not for the weak of heart, and we have a lot of weak hearts in Congress. There are many in the political realm who will call what I've written extremist rhetoric, and they will make jokes about the Kenyan Marxist President, and they will go along, like they go along with drone strikes and a war that's killing men and women and children for purely political reasons. These people are lost in the obscurantism and rationalizations of political power.

Morning Joe 1/4/2013 -- Debt and Denial

After following for a couple of years the political pundits and experts who pontificate and analyze each weekday morning on Morning Joe, one thing has been pretty constant among the guests, and that is  denial of our most fundamental economic problems. Many of these pundits are considered to be among the best and brightest pundits and experts in the political class. These are people who know government, know the culture of DC, and know the issues. Because our culture has been politicized to large extent, there's a political focus that many times ignores economic realities.

The Morning Joe crew talked about Boehner's problem with that faction of the House the pundits and experts refer to as the extreme faction, but in reality they are the limited government faction who believe they were sent to DC to make changes and stop the reckless spending and power expansion. This faction in the House is blamed for blocking business as usual, but Obama himself said he was going to Washington to stop business as usual. The House GOP limited government faction is considered extreme I guess because they've tried to keep their word regarding changing business as usual, while Obama quickly took up business as usual with vengeance and several creative twists.

The establishment, the political status quo, the pundits and experts who make their livings off the political status quo, want to maintain the status quo, so when political renegades go against the grain they're seen as rude and ignorant outsiders who've no business upsetting the usual meaningless compromises. Scarborough, and Micheal Steele, who was on this morning, and other GOP moderates who are committed members of the DC political class, have become irritated with the limited government GOP faction because of their diligence holding their ground. To the sophisticated Washington insiders, standing on principles appears naive, stubborn and uncouth -- why, why, it's..it's ideological! The sophisticated political players in the GOP have learned how to talk like limited government proponents, but act like statists bent on protecting the status quo -- they compromise in ways that allow government to grow while giving the impression they're holding back out of control spending. Curbing the growth of spending is the political game in Washington that politicians use to show how they can be responsible. They propose outlandish spending increases, then pull that number back from outlandish to huge and call it spending cuts.

Obama has played that game of rhetoric over substance and actions as he's posed as a statesmen above partisan politics who fights for a "balanced" approach. The political media support Obama's rhetoric, as do his operatives like David Axelrod, who was on the show, and Scarborough and Mika nod as Axelrod says Obama has been willing to make the hard decisions to reform entitlements and deal with spending, but has been blocked by Republicans who can't compromise. This is the political game, and, as it's played, economic reality moves along, unchanged by rhetoric, undeterred by denial. 

Morning Joe 12/20/2012 -- No one is serious about spending cuts

As Joe Scarborough, Al Hunt, Andrea Mitchell, Sam Stein, Mark Halperin and others blamed John Boehner on Morning Joe for the stalled negotiations over our fiscal crisis, none of them mentioned that the spending cuts they say Obama is willing to accept are an illusion.

I don't know if Boehner is stalling because he knows the spending cuts are bogus, because I haven't heard Boehner propose any serious cuts to entitlements. Entitlements are the problem, yet no one in DC is seriously addressing the problem. How the Morning Joe crew can give Obama props for compromising is not a mystery -- the Leftists on Morning Joe are in the tank for Obama and will obvioulsy say anything to make Obama look good and Boehner look bad, but this is a diversion. Blaming this on Boehner alone misses the point that no one in DC with power to affect change is serious about real spending cuts, now or in the future.

Obama is determined to raise taxes, but these taxes won't help anything -- they are symbolic, political, not based on economic calculations. Morning Joe shows once again how partisan analysis on Morning Joe is propaganda, not real reporting and not real political analysis.

Obama's bogus spending cuts

http://danieljmitchell.wordpress.com/2012/12/01/obamas-fiscal-plan-real-tax-hikes-and-fake-spending-cuts-2/

When you hear Obama or one of his operatives or supporters say Obama has already proposed spending cuys keep the link balove in mind and remember you're being lied to. How are they getting by with this? Do Americans not know or just not care? We can't survive as a nation like this.