When the GOP wanted to defeat Obama-Care, they convinced seniors that Obama was going to cut their Medicare. The GOP pretended to be defenders of Medicare, the Holy Grail of Liberal Social Programs, which is thoroughly dependent on progressive taxation.
But everyone knows that the Republican Party wants to end Big Government entitlements like Social Security and Medicare. They want to tear at the fabric that allows middle class families to give their children a portion of the resources of those born wealthy.
The benefits of Medicare
When middle class families are not destroyed by their parent's health costs, they have more money for consumption (to drive the economy), and more money to invest in their children's education (a.k.a. upward mobility).
Question.
Do Republican seniors who depend upon and want Medicare understand that they are sheep being lead to slaughter?
Have Republicans created a base of voters who don't understand that their leaders are creating a world of concentrated wealth (enabled by massive tax breaks), where a small elite uses that wealth not to create jobs (which they're shipping to dictator-countries in the 3rd world) but to manipulate the American political process? Does the GOP voter understand that concentrated wealth is concentrated political power? When the money doesn't trickle down into American jobs (which it hasn't since globalization freed American capital to go to the 3rd world), than that money trickles into politics, that is, the money that was supposed to trickle down becomes concentrated political power. [The GOP voter does understand that they have created the very concentrated power they detest. They have handed this country to a small group of corporations who now fund elections and staff government. Goodbye representative democracy, hello lobbying industrial complex]
How is it possible that Republican seniors believed that the GOP was going to save their Medicare? Has the GOP created a media machine so powerful that they can get people to vote against their economic interests?
The ability of Republicans to win geriatric Medicare-dependent states like Florida in 2012 will depend on a very effective network of lies and distortions. A world where Osama morphs into Hussein, and oil geopolitics is covered-up by banal cliches like "Freedom is on the march". This is a world where the government policies that saved Reagan's family in the 40s are re-branded as evil socialism. This is a world where naive voters are fed strategic wedge issues and "culture war" rhetoric to distract them from a very real class war: the GOP is handing the country to a small group of corporations and shareholders. How does the GOP do it? How do they give all the power to a small group of corporations and shareholders while convincing everyone else that they stand for average people?
[Remember how Reagan, in 1984, strategically used the culture war to peel northern catholic union workers from the Democratic Party: "Reagan Democrats". Reagan went into the heart of union country and convinced union families that he was their leader. Then, 30 years later, his Revolution took dead aim at unions. Reagan lead those sheep to slaughter. The GOP has turned this into an art]
But everyone knows that the Republican Party wants to end Big Government entitlements like Social Security and Medicare. They want to tear at the fabric that allows middle class families to give their children a portion of the resources of those born wealthy.
The benefits of Medicare
When middle class families are not destroyed by their parent's health costs, they have more money for consumption (to drive the economy), and more money to invest in their children's education (a.k.a. upward mobility).
Question.
Do Republican seniors who depend upon and want Medicare understand that they are sheep being lead to slaughter?
Have Republicans created a base of voters who don't understand that their leaders are creating a world of concentrated wealth (enabled by massive tax breaks), where a small elite uses that wealth not to create jobs (which they're shipping to dictator-countries in the 3rd world) but to manipulate the American political process? Does the GOP voter understand that concentrated wealth is concentrated political power? When the money doesn't trickle down into American jobs (which it hasn't since globalization freed American capital to go to the 3rd world), than that money trickles into politics, that is, the money that was supposed to trickle down becomes concentrated political power. [The GOP voter does understand that they have created the very concentrated power they detest. They have handed this country to a small group of corporations who now fund elections and staff government. Goodbye representative democracy, hello lobbying industrial complex]
How is it possible that Republican seniors believed that the GOP was going to save their Medicare? Has the GOP created a media machine so powerful that they can get people to vote against their economic interests?
The ability of Republicans to win geriatric Medicare-dependent states like Florida in 2012 will depend on a very effective network of lies and distortions. A world where Osama morphs into Hussein, and oil geopolitics is covered-up by banal cliches like "Freedom is on the march". This is a world where the government policies that saved Reagan's family in the 40s are re-branded as evil socialism. This is a world where naive voters are fed strategic wedge issues and "culture war" rhetoric to distract them from a very real class war: the GOP is handing the country to a small group of corporations and shareholders. How does the GOP do it? How do they give all the power to a small group of corporations and shareholders while convincing everyone else that they stand for average people?
[Remember how Reagan, in 1984, strategically used the culture war to peel northern catholic union workers from the Democratic Party: "Reagan Democrats". Reagan went into the heart of union country and convinced union families that he was their leader. Then, 30 years later, his Revolution took dead aim at unions. Reagan lead those sheep to slaughter. The GOP has turned this into an art]
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