What motivated me to devote all my time to politics wasn’t tax policy or the environment or women’s issues or gay marriage or our health care system or voting rights or any particular policy. I’m a progressive on all those issues, but I would have remained on the sidelines if not for one thing: the Republican Party. By late-2003, I had seen enough to convince me that the most pressing issue facing the country, indeed humanity, was the power enjoyed by the Republican Party and the ways they were putting that power to use. I’m not going to list all their pathologies here, but they were well-embodied by people like Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz. As you went down the roster to the Tom DeLays and Jack Abramoffs, to the Jerry Falwells and Pat Robertsons, to the Rush Limbaughs and Glenn Becks, to the Ann Coulters and Michelle Malkins, it was clear that these were all horrible people who had no compunction about misusing the organs of state to kill hordes of people. And they just never stopped lying. They lied even when telling the truth would be more advantageous. It does not surprise me that decent people keep leaving the Republican fold. It did surprise me that so many people thought we could take our eyes off the Republicans the second we elected a Democratic president. For me, kicking them out and keeping them out of the White House was always the most important thing. When the fight became more about nationalizing banks and putting the private health care industry out of business than it was about preventing a repeat of what we all collectively experienced from 2001 to 2009, I could no longer follow the script.
About The Author
BooMan
Martin Longman a contributing editor at the Washington Monthly. He is also the founder of Booman Tribune and Progress Pond. He has a degree in philosophy from Western Michigan University.
Booman Tribune ~ Evil Republicans
I don’t get your conclusion. Are you saying that your one purpose in life is to boot out the Republicans and you don’t much care what – in policy terms – happens after that? You are against Republicans but also against the socialists in the Democrat Party who want to nationalise banks and healthcare? You are beginning to sound like one of those centrists who wish a plague on both their houses. Surely that was not your intention…
I am in favor of eliminating the private health insurance industry entirely and for much stronger banking reforms.
I looked at nationalization and concluded it was a huge guaranteed loss of money for the taxpayer. Catastrophic, really. Geithner’s Plan was a better way to stabilize the system at an affordable cost and with much, much less risk. But I didn’t oppose nationalization on ideological grounds. I just thought it was a bad deal with high risk.
No, my point is that I got into politics to fight Republicans, not to pursue particular progressive policies that I already supported. The blogosphere didn’t arise because people wanted a public option. It arose because people couldn’t believe what Cheney and Bush were doing to the country and the world.
But Geithner didn’t stabilize the system as JPMChase’s wild CDS bets and the London Whale prove. Geithner just saved the rich and let the poor eat foreclosures.
Yep. Many “progressives” are adept at slipping on the rose colored glasses regarding Obama having Fed insiders/protectors like Geithner and Summers on board.
Somehow, this is “different/better” than what a president McCain would have done.
It’s funny to me that people who spent 2009 talking about the Great Depression Two now claim that the government’s actions did not stabilize the system.
We are very fortunate as a people that we have gone so long without an actual financial collapse and subsequent depression that people can look at the period from 2008-present and think that the government didn’t save our asses.
Indeed. And what about the price tag?
Assuming you aren’t just ideologically opposed to the banking industry, the reason to nationalize was that it was the best way to clean things up, hold certain people accountable, and assure that we didn’t leave the system vulnerable to a repeat catastrophe.
However, nationalizing even one major bank would have cost an astronomical amount of money that we never would have gotten back. Doing them all would have probably been financially impossible. Then you have the risk of shaking things up that much at a time of global panic and lack of lending. You’d not only be burning unprecedented amounts of money, you’d be risking countless jobs. On top of that, look at the ferocious resistance that arose to the auto bailout, and to the very idea of letting people renegotiate their mortgages. With the government running our major banks, the freak-out would have resembled a supernova.
It’s true that the system is still vulnerable, there are still banks that are too big to fail, and that a lot of people are still working at high-paying jobs who should have been fired. But, on the other hand, a lot of very bad things did not happen. Important reforms were put in place. And the system stabilized and we’re working on more than two years of constant job growth.
FDIC receivership is not usually referred to as nationalization.
Let’s go to the Wayback Machine, shall we?
Got a grip on the scale and scope of the FDIC budget for 2009? Okay. Now, let’s take a look at the scale and scope of the problem at our major banks.
No one was talking about FDIC receivership.
I was. And so were others.
I can see how you might feel that way if you were reading Krugman at the time, but believe it or not he can be pretty stupid sometimes. He did leave the impression that the FDIC could handle a receivership of Citigroup and BofA, but of course they would needed to jack up their annual budget about 10,000% to do it. Obviously, if we were going to nationalize it would have been done some other way.
Note that in retrospect Krugman was very concerned about about downside risks that never materialized. He was extremely sanguine about other risks, like financial panic. And his assessment of the politics was only partly right. He was correct that the Geithner Plan would be unpopular. He badly underestimated how much more unpopular his plan would have turned out to be, and that’s not even accounting for the obscene amount of money his plan would have cost the taxpayer compared to the basically nothing Geithner’s Plan turned out to cost.
Are you assuming that everyone would get their full account from the FDIC or just the $100K(?) limit? I think it makes a difference and I don’t agree with FDIC back door limit raising. Moral Hazard has to apply to the big depositors as well as the investors. My house is insured for $140K max. The limit changes with inflation but assume I didn’t have that contract clause. Say the replacement cost was $250K. Should I expect State Farm to pay $250K even though they only promised to pay $140K? I don’t see how paying off depositors up to $100K could possibly cost more than covering 100% of everyone’s deposit plus guaranteeing the bondholders. But I already know we disagree on this.
I don’t like nationalization either but I think it preferable to guaranteeing to cover the Bank’s losses no matter what which is the current state of events which I think is untenable. Did you read in the financial news that the notional value of JPMChase’s derivatives is over one quadrillion dollars? What if it all went South? What then? Would we print/ borrow from the Fed a quadrillion dollars to “Prevent a financial meltdown”? TBTF IS financial meltdown. It’s telling a compulsive gambler to go to Vegas and you will cover his losses no matter what.
Again, I don’t advocate nationalization but can’t agree with TARP or TARP II or TARP III whenever it comes. And the Mom and Pop savers shouldn’t suffer either. That’s what the FDIC is for. Every bit of money ever paid to Jamie Dimon and his ilk should be clawed back. He should have to stand in line at the unemployment office, and LIHEAP and the local foodbank. He should listen as the pharmacist shouts out “Your MEDICAID prescription is ready.” In short, he should suffer every indignity and curled lip that has radicalized me.
FDIC-insured bank accounts are the least of the problem when a bank suddenly discovers that it is worth negative eleventy-billion dollars. Their account holders can be made completely whole without much problem. It’s all the people who expect to get paid on their credit-default swaps for suddenly worthless mortgage derivatives that are the problem.
The government threw $20 billion at BofA and CitiGroup in October and again in November and then had to shovel more tens of billions at them in the spring. And that’s just two of the banks.
Basically, what happened is that all the money in the world suddenly got flushed down a sinkhole and we had to pretend that it hadn’t happened or we were all going to be living in a Mad Max world where we shoot each other for gasoline.
Nationalizing the banks became a way to punish the banks for their immorality and the pain they made us all suffer. The problem is that nationalizing banks, which happens all the time, is hugely expensive for the taxpayer. When IndyMac failed in 2008, it cost the taxpayer nearly 11 billion dollars. And that was a relatively small bank, approximately 1/50th the size of BofA or CitiGroup.
I felt like I was spitting against the wind at the time. But I’d like to remind you that the final cost of TARP is estimated to be between 60-90 billion dollars, which is much, much cheaper than what nationalization would have cost us. Many orders of magnitude cheaper.
Until the next time.
Also, the FDIC ended 2008 with about $35 billion in its Deposit Insurance Fund. That’s because they didn’t have to pay out the money to the big banks. If they had, they would have been wiped out by October.
I see. After doing this for ten years, you believe THE largest problem facing humanity is: The Republican Party. Their “power”.
Wow.
Great! What you’re about is “fighting the Republicans”, apparently on an ideological basis only–because obviously pursuing progressive policies that we need is much harder. In fact, progressive policy is more or less impossible with the sort of “democrats” we have in congress.
BTW, how is the “fighting the Republicans” thing going?
http://www.npr.org/2010/11/08/131158449/gop-s-sweet-wins-in-governors-races-may-pay-off
Your reading comprehension sucks.
I very plainly told you why I got started as a political activist.
Has anything changed in ten years?
Yes, the threat has grown considerably worse.
But keep up your “both sides do it” bullshit. It’s entertaining.
OH MY FUCKING GOD, it’s fucking RALPH NADER.
This crap about progressive policy is what is going to re-elect Walker in WI. We need Democrats, and maybe eventually we can get better ones. But NO REPUKELISCUM and GOD SAVE us from FUCKING PURITY FUCKING TROLLS!!
Amen.
http://www.elazigbook.com Elazig’in En Populer Guncel Haber ve Firma Rehber Portali
Are you saying that your one purpose in life is to boot out the Republicans and you don’t much care what – in policy terms – happens after that? You are against Republicans but also against the socialists in the Democrat Party who want to nationalise banks and healthcare?
He’s saying that the differences between Paul Krugman and Barack Obama on policy are utterly trivial, compared to the difference between the Democrats and the Republicans.
they are sociopaths. plain and simple.
Nah, overly intellectualized.
They are evil motherfuckers. Limbaugh is a evil piece of shit. Boehner is a moron, not as evil. McConnell is an evil piece of shit. Rand Paul is a doubly evil piece of shit, who should be somewhat smart – he is a physician (not a doctor, I am a doctor). Now that they got rid of Lugar, there are NOTHING but evil pieces of CRAP in the Senate. The house is filled with even worse people.
The problem with the so called progressive whining is that it removes support from Obama and weakens the the ability to fight the Republicans.
If we were standing together, the Republicans would be up against a powerful force.
As it is, we hear that Obama is going to destroy Social Security etc. This type of stuff is as bad as the lies the Republicans come up with.
I want the commercial banks separated from the investment banks. The SEC needs to be funded properly.
The concentration should be on a better way of life for everyone.
my story is much the same. I entered the “internets” shortly after 9-11 and before the subsequent invasion of Afghanistan, which I opposed, as I did the Iraq War as well.
I don’t have a site like yours, but have had a lot of fun giving them grief when and where I find them.
Funny how that “axis of evil” guy is now one of their best/worst critics, no?
I’m generally more critical of Obama than you are, Boo, but I’m absolutely with you on the nature of the threat. There are seriously people on the left who think it doesn’t matter whether Romney or Obama get in this November. Obama’s been a disappointment on issues they care about – sometimes because he really has disappointed, sometimes because he’s been limited in what he can do, sometimes because he’s saving political capital for other fights, sometimes because progressives had unrealistic expectations of who Obama was to begin with.
But to hear these folks talk you’d think Obama was the same as Bush, or worse, on everything. That’s simply not factually accurate. And it’s not the question at hand. The Republican Party has changed over the last four years, let alone the last 12. A pretty strong case can be made that Romney would be far, far worse than Dubya was. (Compare Romney’s positions ion 2012 with Bush’s in 2000. It’s no contest.) That should scare the crap out of anyone, but we have very short political and cultural memories in this country.
There is not the smallest shred of doubt that a Romney admin would be much much worse. SS would be gone. Medicare, medicaid, any shred of safety net. Insurance would be fully privatised. All help for students, gone. Any small attempt to get tax money from corporations, gone. It would be a fucking fucking disaster.
It would be that bad, because Romney would not have ANY control over Congress. If he wins, he brings full control of the Senate, House, and Potus.
RB Ginsberg is retiring very soon. That is going to happen in the next 4 years, almost certainly. She would be replaced by another Scalia/Thomas clone. The court would be gone for a generation.
It would be a fucking nightmare.
Huh? Dem prognosticators have been saying the democrats will hold on to their majority after the election.
Even IF the repugs win enough seats to have a majority in the senate, your “Romney brings full control of the Senate” comment doesn’t make sense. You’re implying Senate democrats are going to support absurd repug legislation just because Rmoney is POTUS?
Gimme a break.
If Romney wins, the Democrats won’t retake the House and will lose the Senate.
The same developments that might result in a Romney victory – people on the left sitting out the election, moderates turning towards the GOP – would, if they come to pass, also result in Republican control of Congress.
There is simply no mechanism by which a Republican defeats and incumbent Democratic President, while at the same time the Democrats pick up seats in Congress. The two variables are not independent.
Add voter supression into that mix. If Rep’s were in charge every state would see the Florida boot replay. Regaining those disenfranchised to get a Dem elected again would be a slim chance.
When I was a student, there was a “Lefter than Thou” phenomenon whereby to be truly radical, you had to adopt a position to the left of whoever was currently making an argument. There was almost NO position that couldn’t be undermined as constituting collaboration with the enemy.
It was stupid, adolescent, and symptomatic of a deep psychological alienation from life, almost all life – of unresolved conflicts with self, family, “the real world”, the “establishment”. It was an almost religious refusal to be contaminated by “what is”.
However it was never more than a tiny fringe and most people grew out of it. The Right is now mainstreaming a similar phenomenon and seeking to represent it as adult behaviour. It is symptomatic of a caste/race losing power as in Apartheid South Africa.
Those whom the Gods wish to destroy, they first make mad
I might be willing to vote for a Republican who
a) bases his political views on reality
b) does not think that selfishness is a virtue
c) accepts that sometimes big government <is> the answer to big problems (and not just the problem of how to best blow up third world countries)
d) does not wear his patriotism and/or his religion on his sleeve
e) is not a lying liar
Hmmm — I can’t think of any Republican in Congress who passes. Oh well.
You must be drunk. There are NO Republicans who anyone should vote for. The voting discipline on the R side is strong – person is irrelevant.
But its really an academic question, since none of them pass. 🙂
I’m only slightly reassured. The force of evil is strong on the R side.
Indeed. Given that the GOP is a bloc, if you vote for the best Republican you’re also voting for the worst of them.
Yes, but here’s the problem. The US system is a two party system. Its not so good if one of the partys is out and out crazy. I’m hoping that eventually a good fraction if not most of the repug party meets my minimal criteria, the way they did when I was a kid, because it’s only then that the country will get back on track. We’ve seen how trying to go it alone works. At best we can keep a finger in the dike, but we’re going to make minimal progress until the right third of the country wakes up and smells the coffee.
The only way I see we get them there is to totally destroy the crazy ones in elections at every level. Its going to be a lot of work, because the crazy has infected us pretty badly.And I think we’re probably going to need allies. i wouldn’t turn up my nose at anyone from team R who if willing to fight the crazy too.
If you must have a two (as opposed to a multi) party system wouldn’t it be more logical for you to work for the establishment and growth of a second party to the left of the Democrats? Witness the growth of the Greens and now the Pirates in Europe. OK – I know the “first past the post” single seat constituency system make this very difficult if not impossible. But once the only polarity that matters is Dem/GOP, you are going to get a resultant somewhere in between.
“But once the only polarity that matters is Dem/GOP, you are going to get a resultant somewhere in between. “
Absolutely. It’s also evident that a) we’re stuck with the 2 party system absent a constitutional convention, b) it’s the republicans who have drifted to the right, while the dems are pretty much where they’ve been for decades. You want to counter b) by promoting a move to the left by dems or affiliated parties. Maybe, but is more even polarization what the country needs? Might it not be better for the republicans to tack back toward the center? I think so, and about the only way to do it, if its possible at all, is to beat the crazy out of them at the polls.
Removing the Republicans from power at the federal, state, and local level is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for keeping the United States from running off the rails.
We are in need of some fundamental political changes that increasingly the Democratic Party seems unwilling to champion as an institution. And, we are in need of some event that finally discredits the bogus psychotic “conservatism” of the professional right clown car.
My guess is that in 2012 Obama will win and it will once again be irrelevant because of Congress.
I do understand the experience you are pointing out, BooMan. That was my experience in discovering Air America and the blogosphere in 2004; the sense that I was not going crazy, that something was really seriously wrong in the US and the Republican Party was spinning into insanity.
We have an immense amount of work to do.
Ugh, I am so pissed by the last segment on Rachel Maddow where John Harwood was on and basically said that yeah Romney is using Trump’s birtherism to raise money and as a way to “stick it to the lefttis and the Rachel Maddow and MSNBC” and let them know that they dont’ plan to buckle down to the left and that Romney was actually joking about birtherism and the campaign released Romney’s birth certificate today as a way to put the Rachel Maddows and MSNBC of the world that the campaign won’t be apologizing for anything.
Harwwod basically said that hey what backlash, people already consider Trump a clown, so hey who really cares if Romney dabbles in birtherism…I think Rachel was stunned by Harwood. She seemed speechless that Harwood was actually saying that hey it’s no big deal that the Romney camp is happy to out right court racist idiots like Trump. It took her a moment to try to push back, but it was half-hearted at best since, IMHO, she just seemed shock that Harwood was so blase’ about the whole thing.
If Harwood is the voice of the village, then I feel sadder than I already felt for the citizens of US who gets their info from feckless hacks like Harwood and the like.
ETA: Rachel’s intro was great though, but Harwood completely pissed on it.
Any mention of R-Money’s missing tax return along with the birth certificate?
If you know Harwood’s history .. you know he’s a tool of the 1% .. always has been
Yes, but Romney still refuses to release his long-form marriage certificate. I think Maher is on to something.
Yeah, I watched this in disbelief as well. Harwood seemed to think that Harwood calling Trump a buffoon (or whatever word it was he used) inoculated Romney from any downside. He was making a joke of it. But there is no universe where Obama (or any Dem) could seek the favors of anyone comparably venal on the left (does such a person exist) without a firestorm of criticism.
The media is just wired for republicans, with a few like Rachel pushing back against the tide.
Boo:
So what explains an idiot like Artur Davis? The more he opens his mouth these days, the more I wonder how he got to considered a rising star in the Democratic Party in the first place.
I sincerely believe that Arthur Davis is just expressing sour grapes.
He alienated Black voters in Alabama with his vote against HCR and his assumption that of course he was gonna get the Black vote, forget about the fact that he refused to even campaign in the Black neighborhood.
So Blacks ain’t gonna vote for him, but GOP Alabama voters will??
What the heck is Arthur smoking?
Artur Davis is self-absorbed, narcissistic, sociopathic asshole. Period. Exclamation Point. He has no particular value in brains, experience, empathy, or hard work. He has no essential goodness.
There aren’t enough derogatives in the world to adequately describe that cretin. He looks up to whale shit. Dung beetles scurry the other way when they hear his name.
I’d vote for Rush Limbaugh before Artur Davis because Rush has more integrity.
He’s not even good enough to be a Republican.
As Goev said, I’m a LOT more critical than you are.
That said, I’m with you pretty much 100% on this. Where i get worried is when we start to turn into the republicans -and I see that in the civil liberties and assasination policies- but we MUST prevent the republicans from returning to power until they are sane.
I don’t know if that can happen: the crazy is out of the bottle, after all. But to the extent that it CAN happen, we need to marginalize the GOP and their base until they are powerless.
Does anyone remember learning how to use a microscope in 7th-grade science class?
Remember the two different focus knobs?
The precise paths pursued by different styles of Democrats are fine-tuning. The battle between the parties is the big knob.