Right emotions, wrong targets
News blogs, sports blogs, entertainment blogs, and more from Philly.com, The Philadelphia Inquirer and the Philadelphia Daily News.
Right emotions, wrong targets
It's always interesting when one of the nation's premier liberal voices -- take-no-prisoners blogger Glenn Greenwald -- says that he can sympathize with the so-called Tea Party protestors who turned out en masse on Saturday in Washington to air their greiviances, some real and some perceived. Greenwald's point is right on the money, that the American middle class is right to be furious, but their true targets lay elsewhere:
This is the paradox of the tea-party movement and other right-wing protests fueled by genuine citizen anger and fear. It is true that the federal government embraces redistributive policies and that middle-class income is seized in order that "someone else benefits." But so obviously, that "someone else" who is benefiting is not the poor and lower classes -- who continue to get poorer as the numbers living below the poverty line expand and the rich-poor gap grows in the U.S. to unprecedented proportions. The "someone else" that is benefiting from Washington policies are -- as usual -- the super-rich, the tiny number of huge corporations which literally own and control the Government. The premise of these citizen protests is not wrong: Washington politicians are in thrall to special interests and are, in essence, corruptly stealing the country's economic security in order to provide increasing benefits to a small and undeserving minority. But the "minority" here isn't what Fox News means by that term, but is the tiny sliver of corporate power which literally writes our laws and, in every case, ends up benefiting.
Greenwald makes a point that I've thought about, too, that there was a brief moment in American when most people -- right, left, and even center -- were mad about the same thing, and that was the billion-dollar bailout of Wall Street bankers. Since Bush was behind the bailout and Obama (and McCain) voted for it, there was a target for everyone. But no one protests the bailout anymore, not in the concrete way that conservatives oppose health care reform. Too bad.
Just think what would happen if right-wing radio hosts, left-wing bloggers and, um, regular folks dropped their natural disdain and instead worked together -- to publicize banks that behave badlly. People could withdraw their money en masse from unethical financial institutions and move their money to banks that agree to sound principles and that work to benefit the middle class and not their own personal Swiss bank accounts. Now THAT would be a true public option.
Comment removed.
---}}} OK, so clearly I am wrong.. {{{--- Nice job, bryanc. Showing some accountability. I think you're learning. Congratulations. (Oh, and btw, you're wrong whether someone is orthodox or not. According to Jewish law, abortion is not murder. but nice try. LOL!).— Talking point sleuth- Comment removed.
- Comment removed.
- ((((Anyone want to bet that half the guys were called Joe and naturally have a red face?***))))) So, they're native-americans then? *** Just another subspecies who will be a minority soon, hence some are vehemently angry***— Tony_From_PA
Yeah, she was a good sport, especially during the opening act with Will Ferrell. And I can hardly tell Fey and Palin apart when Fey is in character. I think Palin might have even started imitating Fey's sing-song imitation of her after a while.— Hamlet- LOL! Apparently you had some trouble reading the excerpt that you, yourself posted. {{{--- so abortion can't be murder. ---}}} There you go. You earn some points for finally showing some accountability, and admitting that you were just wrong (after laughably claiming that you deliberately posted something wrong just to get a rise out of me, LOL!), but then you go and try to laughably state that even though you admitted you were wrong, you weren't really wrong. Accountability, bryanc. It's really not all that complicated a concept. You said, according to Jewish law, abortion is murder. You were wrong. Take some friendly advice, bryanc. Just own up to the fact that you were wrong, and move on.— Talking point sleuth
- Comment removed.
- Comment removed.
- You know the Republicans are losing the argument any time they bring abortion into the discussion. bryanc...how many motherless children have you adopted?— chasing history
"Oh, those wacky, wacky Republican protesters: http://www.themudflats.net/wp-content/uploads/fixed.jpg" That is just too funny! I can understand a typo or a misspelling, but I don't care which side you are on, you could at least learn to spell America.— one_eyed_jack- Comment removed.
- Can one of TPS's friends tell him he is a long winded, tool?-------Do we have to look at TPS's 2000 word posts every minute?— Illogical Liberal
- Until then, they should stop pretending they're anything like our founding fathers.....Our Founding Fathers had principle, courage, honor and dignity. The T-baggers have none.— chasing history
- What will it take for wingnuts to admitt that they are being taken advantage of.— cmkplumber
- Andrew Sullivan
- Blinq
- Blogorrhea
- Blonde Sagacity
- Free Republic
- Instapundit
- James Taranto
- ScrappleFace
- The Corner
- Buzzmachine
- Eat the Press
- Editor and Publisher
- Media (Huffington Post)
- Media Bloodhound
- Mickey Kaus
- Pressthink
- Romenesko
- The Inksniffer
- A List of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago
- Above Average Jane
- BlankBaby
- Citizen Mom
- Keystone Blog
- Metroblogging Philadelphia
- Phawker
- Philadelphia - America's Hometown
- Philadelphia Will Do
- Philebrity
- Philly Future
- Phillyblog
- Phillyist
- The Clog
- The Next Mayor
- Welcome to Phillyville
- Young Philly Politics
- Afro-Netizen
- All-Spin Zone
- Atrios
- Bad Attitudes
- Billmon
- Booman Tribune
- CorrenteWire
- Fables of the Reconstruction
- iFlipFlop
- Kiko's House
- MyDD
- Philly (Dragonballyee)
- Rowhouse Logic
- Slacktivist
- Suburban Guerilla
- Tattered Coat
- upyernoz
- AmericaBlog
- Andy Borowitz
- BuzzFlash
- Crooks and Liars
- Cursor
- Daily Kos
- David Sirota
- Drudge Report
- Echidne of the Snakes
- Fire Dog Lake
- Glenn Greenwald
- Hullabaloo
- Jesus' General
- Jon Swift
- Josh Marshall
- Juan Cole
- Kevin Drum
- Mad Kane
- Majikthise
- Matthew Yglesias
- Oliver Willis
- Raw Story
- Swing State Project
- Talk Left
- Taylor Marsh
- TBogg
- The Carpetbagger Report
- Think Progress
- War and Piece
- Wonkette
- A Citizen's Blog
- Balls, Sticks and Stuff
- Beer Leaguer
- Dick Polman
- Phillies Nation
- Philling Station
- Shallow Center
- The 700 Level
- The Good Phight
