Via Sullivan, David Weigel puts his finger on it:
The Democrats are in worse political shape than they were a year ago because unemployment is at 9.8 percent, the war in Afghanistan has grown less popular, and the bailouts of struggling banks are seen as wastes of money that haven’t worked. Republicans benefit when they talk about this stuff. But Beck and the others don’t let them talk about this stuff. For the past few months, they have moved the discussion onto fantasy terrain, accusing the president of reaching for dictatorial powers and surrounding himself with “radicals” who want to destroy capitalism.
…[In] the current political context, it seems like they’re missing the forest for some shrubs. It’s as if Democrats tried to press their advantages in 2005 not by going after the Iraq War or the mishandling of Hurricane Katrina, but by spending weeks attacking mid-ranking members of his administration and claiming that President George W. Bush was driving the nation toward fascism.
You might have noticed that we’ve been engaging in some criticism of Obama around here. That’s not incidental; as I say in the print piece this week, I think he’s getting some things right, but on the biggest thing - the economy - I think he’s blowing it, for exactly the reasons Taibbi listed yesterday.
Obamism at this point looks to be just a different flavor of corporatism.
So at what point do I become a winger?
In other words, there would seem to be a natural alliance between those on the left who are angry at Obama’s inability or unwillingness to address the central issue of our time - the evolution of this country into a full-fledged oligarchy - and those on the right who have similar concerns.
Except, the hysterical right makes it impossible to make common cause with them. There’s one key difference between my criticism of Obama and Glenn Beck’s: Both may talk about crony capitalism, but Beck gives the capitalists in that equation a bit of a pass. Because capitalism is neither good nor bad, see - it just is! And if there’s a problem it’s because government is involved; and the growth of government necessarily means fascism or communism or whatever -ism he’s on this week.
Whereas, as Ilargi noted yesterday, my view is that deregulation played a huge role in this crisis; government did not do its job. The problem is not that government had its fingers on everything and inevitably screwed up; it’s that for more than two decades there has been a concerted effort to get government’s fingers off the market. Because the market will regulate itself!
It didn’t. And here we are.
The question becomes, what to do about it?
