The Priorities of the Damned

I put myself on The New Republic's email list when I was young, carefree and stupid, around 1923, as I recall. (In my defense, I will note that I've had an extraordinarily low estimate of that magazine's intellectual and moral worth for some years: "The Abominables of The New Republic: Getting Away with Murder.") In any event, I still receive their missives, which occasionally turn up an item of limited clinical interest.

One such item is Jonathan Chait's column, "What Deal Should Obama Take?" (I additionally note that I've had a very negative view of Chait for several years as well: "Just STFU, Chait.") Chait's piece is just what you'd expect. Relying in significant part on what he terms Ezra Klein's "nice rundown of the Obama administration's rationale for cutting a deal to reduce the deficit as part of the debt ceiling negotiations," Chait/Klein tick off the elements you've all heard numerous times during this "crisis," if you've been unfortunate enough to have been following this important national debate. I've been following it to some extent because of the fascination severely aberrant psychology holds for me (doubtless a disturbed and disturbing failing, but mine own). Also, I have no life. What's your excuse?

So Chait/Klein mention "You can't spend till you cut," "It's your only shot at stimulus," "It's a way to control the timing," "Getting Obama reelected is important," and "Deficit reduction is good economic policy, both now and later." Chait then adds these insightful gems spit out by his churning brain:

Obama's goal here seems to be a fiscal adjustment that takes the deficit off the table as an issue. But that would just lead to an election focused on the state of the economy, and that's a bad grounds for Obama to fight on. ...

The tax code is filled with inefficient subsidies that are regressive but still provide some benefit to the middle class. (Think home mortgage deduction.) Because of his 2008 campaign promise, Obama can't close those tax expenditures. He needs Republicans to give him cover. In return for that, he can offer entitlement cuts, which is something Republicans crave but can't get without Democratic cover. ...

So if a deficit deal is to be had, these are the contours for Obama. Root out wasteful spending on the domestic side, with some balance between domestic and military. Cut spending on Medicare and Social Security in return for closing some tax loopholes. Leave the fate of the Bush tax cuts to the 2012 election.

These are the political calculations of utterly unprincipled, opportunistic, power-seeking peabrains. What strikes me very forcefully about ruminations of this sort -- and these constitute the only sort of reflections you hear from politicians and most commentators (including "leading" bloggers like Atrios, Digby, et al., together with their conservative counterparts) -- is how tired it all is.

I'll use a blunt and, I fervently hope, unsettling comparison. All of these repellent people have decided to rape "ordinary" Americans until they're dead. They're only debating who gets to rape them next. And what these human slugs know but will never acknowledge, and what they hope you won't notice, is that they can't even get it up anymore.

You're being fucked to death by impotent terrorists. The only power they have is the power you grant them. Why do you continue to let them do it?

I have one more point to make, concerning the priorities mentioned in the title of this post. Of course, this is never mentioned by anyone taking part in this important national debate. I've made the point before, a number of times in fact. But I can't improve on the following way of expressing it. In writing about the Obama administration's assertion of its power to murder whomever it chooses, for whatever reason it cares to name or for no reason at all, I said:

Most of you refuse to understand the meaning of what you know. Allow me to offer some assistance.

The highest levels of the United States Government have told you -- repeatedly, at great length, always emphasizing the critical significance of their conviction on this point -- that the lives of Americans are worth less than shit. Your life, the lives of all those you love and all those you know, the lives of everyone in your city and state, the lives of all Americans are worth absolutely nothing. ...

There is no power greater than that of life and death. This is absolute power. This is the power claimed by every slaughtering monster in history. You know this. You refuse to understand what it means. ...

So you continue your arguments about the best course for the United States Government to follow in creating jobs, or preserving Social Security, or providing health care. You continue to act as if the United States Government is essentially civilized.

The United States Government can murder you if it chooses to, today, tomorrow, next week, next year. The United States Government can murder you because someone in government feels like it. He enjoys murdering people. He gets off on it.

And you're going to chat with him about job creation or Social Security? And you're the "realistic" one?

You make me puke.

You should also note that not a single person has resigned in protest from the Obama Administration as the result of the administration's claim of absolute power. Not one single person. At a minimum, this means that all those in the Obama Administration view this assertion of absolute power as of minor importance, certainly nothing to resign over, for heaven's sake. That should tell you a great deal about the depth and breadth of corruption in our national government. Yet you will not understand what it means.

Against this background, anyone who cares at all about which gang of rapists gets to commit the next series of crimes is damned. And he is damned by his own choice.

Don't tell me this is the only choice you have, for it is no choice at all. You have another one, but most Americans refuse to consider it. You can start by withdrawing your support from a system of evil, devoted only to the commission of evil. If you give a damn at all about the innocent victims -- and there are many of them, although you will not find them among the ruling class or its useful allies in the media/blogger complex -- you will decline to take part in this endlessly cruel charade perpetrated by monstrous terrorist-rapists.

If you are still capable of even a flickering, momentary recognition of the sacred value of a human life, you will say, as forcefully as you can: "No."

You're So Easy to Rule

My God and gee whiz, the desperate need for debt reduction by the federal government is a terrifying business. I know this must be true, because all our leaders and all major commentators repeatedly tell us so. To a person, their pronouncements are drenched in urgency, warning of doom if we do not accede to their demands.

For example, one very well-known political figure said that Congress must act now or "the economic damage will be painful and lasting." He went on:

"The reality is that we are in an urgent situation, and the consequences will grow worse each day if we do not act," he said.

... "And if our nation continues on this course, the economic damage will be painful and lasting."

Barack Obama calls it "an American crisis." He continued:

"To the Democrats and Republicans who opposed this plan yesterday, I say: Step up to the plate and do what's right for this country."

Obama went on to sound a favorite theme of the ruling class when they deign to address their hapless subjects: You're just too stupid to know what's good for you. And what's good for you is what we tell you is good for you, you moronic dolts.

Hillary Clinton took time out from directing the torturing, murdering foreign exploits of Empire to emphasize that message for the worthless peasants at home. Warning of the failure to reach a deal, she intoned:

"It sounds dire but there is a risk that commerce could grind to a halt," she said.

...

"[Voters] have to recognize that we are facing a very serious economic slowdown, a recession that could be of long-lasting and deep impact," she said.

Hell, I'm convinced! Raise the debt ceiling! Get those expenditures under control! Slash all the safety net programs! Middle-aged and older Americans have already spent half or even all of a lifetime paying for those programs, but this is an emergency! Everyone has to sacrifice! (Well, not the ruling class, of course, but that's because they're better than we are. That's why they're the ruling class and you're not. And if you don't understand that, you're just stupid. Get it?)

Hey, wait a sec. Oh, gee, I'm sorry. I got confused there for a moment. The above statements were made about the extortion scheme the ruling class rammed through -- in the fall of 2008. I collected those warnings of impending doom in, "Terrorist State, Abroad and At Home." When your preferred, and more and more frequently your only, tactic is terrorizing your subjects -- abroad or at home -- the specifics of the "crisis" of the moment are entirely irrelevant. What matters -- the only thing that matters -- is spreading panic and fear. For a terrorist, terror is the point.

Your national leaders are terrorists. Look on the bright side: they aren't shooting at you or sending drones into your neighborhood. Not yet. You still have that to look forward to, you fortunate idiots.

But most Americans can't or won't acknowledge the fact that terrorists rule them. The ruling class counts on that, and they're absolutely right. Are there millions of Americans camped out in Washington, or even thinking about it? Don't make me laugh.

For the current version of these identical terrorist tactics, see here:

"If they don’t act, then we face catastrophic damage to the American economy. And the leadership, to their credit, and I mean Republicans and Democrats, fully understand that,” Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

And here (via):

"The United States must be strong at home in order to be strong abroad," Clinton said in remarks on the Obama administration's new national security doctrine, which was made public on Thursday.

"We cannot sustain this level of deficit financing and debt without losing our influence, without being constrained in the tough decisions we have to make," Clinton said, adding that it was time to "make the national security case about reducing the deficit and getting the debt under control."

...

President Barack Obama, who pushed through his own huge stimulus spending plan last year amid the global financial crisis, was committed to taking the politically difficult steps needed to put government finances back in order, Clinton said.

"We are in a much stronger economic position than we were. And that matters. That matters when we go to China. That matters when we try to influence Russia. That matters when we talk to our allies in Europe," Clinton said.

Gotta love the Clinton program:

We'll scare Americans to death, and then they won't complain when we destroy their lives.

And then, we'll be strong enough to tell everyone else what to do, while we destroy their lives!

Now, see, I think it would be beneficent beyond measure if the United States lost its "influence" to the degree that it couldn't compel the poorest peasant scrabbling for life on a parched hillside in Asia to lift her little finger. But that's because I'm stupid. Hillary Clinton is smart!

But the ultimate terrorist is not to be outdone:

President Obama on Tuesday said he cannot guarantee that retirees will receive their Social Security checks August 3 if Democrats and Republicans in Washington do not reach an agreement on reducing the deficit in the coming weeks.

"I cannot guarantee that those checks go out on August 3rd if we haven't resolved this issue. Because there may simply not be the money in the coffers to do it," Mr. Obama said in an interview with CBS Evening News anchor Scott Pelley, according to excerpts released by CBS News.

The Obama administration and many economists have warned of economic catastrophe if the United States does not raise the amount it is legally allowed to borrow by August 2.

These very smart terrorists want to rule the whole goddamned world. Although I understand why very few Americans are willing to acknowledge this irrefutable fact, the scope of the resistance to facing what is very painfully obvious still astonishes me. After all, domination and control has been the ruling class's goal for over a century. I had many reasons for titling my series of historical essays "Dominion Over the World," and if you read that series (all the essays are listed at the end of that entry), you'll learn what some of them were.

For now, I'll conclude by offering once more the final paragraphs of the "Terrorist State" article from October 2008:

The system is now set up so that when the ruling class is particularly intent upon a certain objective, even your obedience isn't required any longer. After all, what are you going to do? Move to another country? Not vote for any of these bastards in November?

Most Americans won't do that. They protest now; once the deed is done, they'll go back to their lives, such as they will be at that point, and devote themselves to making the ruling class more wealthy and more powerful.

To a terrorist government, you're irrelevant, as irrelevant as a slaughtered five-year-old Iraqi girl. But they'll continue to try to scare you to death. You're easier to rule that way.

I suggest you get used to it. This is your future.

At this moment, you might want to reconsider a question I have asked before: Why do you continue to support this kind of system? To the degree you comply with the ruling class's demands for obedience, you are not merely obeying: you are supporting.

Is that your choice?

Is it? Even now?

You don't have to make it so damned easy for them. But oh dear, the inconvenience of even mild resistance!

Never mind.

Profiles in Courage

Atrios, July 7, 2011:

Elite Fail

Obama wants to cut Social Security, the ECB just raised interest rates...

We are ruled by horrible people.
by Atrios at 08:18

Atrios, February 12, 2009:

No

I believe this is what we in the professional blogging biz call "trolling," but I'll bite. The Left, including yours truly, will create an epic 360 degree shitstorm if Obama and the Dems decide that cutting Social Security benefits is a good idea.
by Atrios at 09:30

We should endeavor to understand Atrios's priorities. It's difficult to "create an epic 360 degree shitstorm" when you willingly participate in the meaningless charades arranged by the ruling class. C'mon, it was a "big twitter town hall"! There are only so many significant thoughts a "leading progressive blogger" can entertain within a couple of days.

One might observe that those who aid the ruling class in their games of deception are an exceedingly useful adjunct to that ruling class. It's so helpful to keep those people who might otherwise consider a very different course of action distracted, weak and thus firmly in line. One might even say that those "leading bloggers" who repeatedly behave in this manner are only doing the ruling class's bidding. It would appear they are happy to do so. They certainly lead lives of considerable comfort, unlike so many other Americans. One might begin to suspect that certain bloggers are themselves members of the elite (pipsqueak division) they purport to criticize so severely. (I suppose one might call that something like "The Fatal Illusion of Opposition.")

One might make such observations. I, of course, could not possibly comment.

P.S. And does anyone doubt that Atrios, et al. will support and vote for Obama and Democrats generally next year? We may be assured that they will. And you should, too, because the Republicans are crazy!

That's a cue:

I always especially enjoy that argument from liberals and progressives. "Oh, the Democrats might be doing most of the same things, well, practically all the same things, and maybe some of the things Obama's doing are even worse ... but the Republicans are crazy!"

Yeah, I see how that works. Obama and the Democrats do all this -- and they're entirely sane. They know exactly what they're doing, why, and even what the effects will be.

This, we are repeatedly assured, is a notable improvement, for which we should be properly grateful.

It would appear that certain people prefer their pillaging, rapacious, murdering, torturing leaders to exhibit full self-awareness and to be completely in control of themselves at all times. No insanity defense for them!

The Democrats and their supporters know precisely what they're doing. That is: they are doing exactly what they want to do.

They themselves endlessly emphasize this fact. We may therefore pass judgment accordingly.