House of Eratosthenes

The liberal has a proposal. He looks around and sees that we are living in an antagonistic relationship with each other; his proposed idea would put us into a symbiotic one. You spew carbon and are therefore killing the planet. You are keeping the money you make and are denying it to “needed social programs.” You aren’t paying enough tax on your income; your purchases; your gasoline; your tolls. You are killing the Iraqis. You are poisoning the caribou. The oil companies, in turn, are poisoning you. And if you have a gun, it’s just a matter of time before you shoot me with it.

The conservatives are putting out the message that we are already living in a symbiotic relationship. I breathe out and I spew my carbon, it’s a wonderful thing because the trees and plants need the carbon for photosynthesis. Notice that science, on this point, sides with the conservatives. The oil companies supply the gasoline I need to get to work, earn my money and live my life. Hard facts and evidence, here again, side with the conservatives. Furthermore, if the taxes are raised we’re just going to buy less stuff…and if the taxes are raised on the oil companies, they’ll just pass that on to the consumer. Once again: Economic science and historical evidence side with the conservatives.

The liberal says, enact my proposal and we’ll enter into a symbiotic relationship. Next week, the liberal will have another proposal, and offer the same pitch — he won’t admit the last proposal failed to get us into this symbiotic relationship. He won’t offer to roll back this previous failed proposal. To our discredit, nobody will call on him to do so…

The conservative says we’re already in the symbiotic relationship. You are good for me. I am good for you. We can all go on doing exactly what we’re doing. The only thing we should really change is to get those damn liberals to stop voting.

Phil Bond of Elk Grove, writing a letter to the Sacramento Bee which appeared this morning:

This fall, voters can choose whether our goals in the Mideast are better served by keeping our troops in Iraq or withdrawing them. But more important, we can choose whether we want four more years of a failed Republican economy, or whether we want Democrats to reverse its course.

Is our economy better or worse than it was seven years ago? Most would say worse. Crude oil futures, for example, are now more than four times higher than they were at the beginning of the Iraq war (2003).

The Republican economy is marked by the following mistaken beliefs:
• War is good.
• Wealth trickles down.
• The free market will take care of itself.
• Business regulation is bad.
• Consumer protection is unnecessary.
• The wealthy deserve tax relief.
• Health care is for those who can afford it.
• The working men and women of America are chumps.

With a Democrat in the White House, and with a filibuster-proof Democratic majority in Congress, our economy can turn around. We can go from our current record national debt to a more manageable deficit, or maybe even a modest surplus.

The failed Republican economy must be replaced by one that works for all of us. [emphasis mine]

Must be a bitch when Howard Dean’s checks don’t clear, huh Phil? I notice you left the relevant question unasked: When did our economy do a better job of sucking, between seven and two years ago, or between two years ago and now? I mean, that just bubbles up to the top of my cranium when I hear things like “democrat in the White House…filibuster-proof democrat majority in Congress.”

Dude. Gas is up to over four a gallon, plus a good deal more in some parts. You’re making me think of…like…seven eight nine ten. A permanent ceramic plate riveted in place over the 48 states to keep anyone from drilling anywhere, a hundred and ten percent profit tax on anyone who thinks of making any money off oil, and a carbon sin tax to help regulate us little peons into the “correct” behavior.

Is that not the way it works with democrats in charge? If not, then when does this wonderful Nancy Pelosi Marc Foley Congress bring down the gas bill? Ah yes…they aren’t running enough stuff yet. That’s why they suck so much. We need to let them make more bad decisions, then everything will be all wonderful.

Ah, but those words I’ve put in bold, are the ones I think deserve special emphasis: Works for all of us. ALL of us. I’m thinking back on that symbiotic relationship, the one believed-in only by our conservatives…or our conservatives and our moderates, rather.

Our liberals don’t believe in it.

Phil Bond just got done bashing big huge chunks of this “all of us.” The “wealthy,” “those who can afford” health care, Republicans who’ve been running this “failed economy” (especially after the democrats got in to help them run it, which is when it really seems to me to have gone in the crapper, but anyway…). Big oil companies, Republicans, wealthy people — they all need to be taken down a peg in this economy that “works for all of us.” I’m having an Inigo Montoya moment with Mr. Bond on this “all of us” thing. I do not think it means what he thinks it means.

Me quoting me, commenting on Rick’s blog (hours before I learned of Phil Bond’s screed in the letters section):

When liberals use the word “everyone” they never mean it. If [the] roar of a motorcycle or boat engine is music to your ears, and your interest is captured when you hear about a new barbeque sauce recipe, you probably don’t exist to them.

In spite of that clear difference — conservatives think we’re already living in a symbiotic relationship, liberals don’t — it still flummoxes and bedazzles me that the liberals I know, who are approachable and genuinely willing to debate things in good faith do see symbiosis as a noble ideal. These, I think, are the good-hearted people being bamboozled by the career politicians and public-relations hacks.

Your democrat-voting guy-in-the-street, so far as I can tell, wants everybody to live in harmony, with common interests.

But he’s everlastingly married to the idea that it simply can’t happen. He says a lot of words to the effect that he’ll always believe it’s possible no matter how discouraging things get. But his actions are the exact opposite. He continues to be shown, year after year, that we are living in a symbiotic relationship with each other — business owners and employees, men and women, blacks and whites, oil providers and oil consumers.

And he refuses to see it. He’ll pick a solution to our problems, either through multiple-choice, cheer-this-guy-boo-that-guy — or, he’ll put a solution into his own words. Through it all, there’s always a whole class of bad people, who need to be bashed.

Very often, how this helps someone is left unstated — the stated part, is what injures someone else. We’re going to regulate and tax those oil companies………yeah? And? Well, that’ll be good for everyone else. Don’t ask me why. You shouldn’t wonder. It should just be assumed.

He’ll insist this is in service of a society, or economy, or brand new zeitgeist, that will serve the interests of “all of us.” But all doesn’t mean all. It means the opposite. Logical opposite, not numeric opposite — not “none of us.” I mean, “not all.” The guarantee is that there will be a defined subclass of persons who, by design, are injured. It is an exclusive club of people who are serviced by this new economy; there are membership restrictions involved. THAT is what they mean by “all.”

When someone is looking for a change in the symbiotic relationship, they are acknowledging that they are getting less than what they imagine they should. I believe that this comes from regret.

There are many people out there who were sold a way of life that has now become less than perfect, and they are mad. It may be a stereotype, but I believe public school teachers are a perfect example. Perhaps they had high grades in school, looked up to their teachers as the epitome of safety, never left school (college, grad school, job in school…), and now find themselves in a job they cannot enjoy, with a lower stature socially than many of their friends. When you get high grades in school, because they told you grades were more important than sports and being socially mature, and then years later you see some dimwitted jock from high school making sales goals and driving a Lexus, you are going to be bitter. This is not the way it was supposed to be, they think.

The missing piece of the puzzle is their fear: tenure attracts the fearful, and teachers are attracted to jobs that stroke their fragile ego, because it insulates them with those (children) who cannot tell the teacher that they are wrong. Every other job has the risk of loss, and they cannot believe their fear of failure is keeping them from reaping larger rewards. They were told that their good grades would trump all else, and then they realize there’s more to life than that.

The envy makes folks want to control other people’s lives, because they feel controlled/trapped in their situation (you cannot easily remove yourself from the security, payscale and the college/grad school debtload). Your mind is soothed by the thought of raising taxes on the rich, by doling out other people’s money for the poor (so you cannot be blamed for being heartless), and by thinking your president (or the entire Midwest) is stupid.

If fear were on a spectrum line, from “no fear” to “can’t leave the house”, you’d find the correlation between conservative and liberal matches quite well. How many self-employed (quite a fearless bunch) are conservative? A logical argument about why their proposed solutions about the economy or about oil prices will never remove their fear that they are trapped and were “wrong” all these years. Never. It is better to get them to admit their fear, and then begin the path away from it.
- wch | 06/12/2008 @ 09:51
Change last paragraph to “A logical argument about solutions to the economy…..”

And apologies for the length…
- wch | 06/12/2008 @ 09:57

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Wednesday, June 11th, 2008