To Break Their Haughty Power!

It was roughly a year ago when Bear Stearns, Lehman Bros, Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae, AIG, Wall Street, the whole shooting match had their meltdown. If you think about it this was an amazing phenomena. As these institutional giants of finance capital deflated we saw billions, even trillions of US Federal dollars flow to shore up the giant loses accrued by these big boys. It was truly amazing! In less than a week, hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars flowed directly from the Federal Government to Wall Street. The Bill was maybe two pages, and minus a bit of a fight over the symbolics of bonus caps, gave the money to the organs of finance capital carte blanche; a virtual blank check!

The above flow of money to Wall Street began under the Bush Administration with a Democratic Congress. The policy however has been carried through without change under the Obama Administration and an even stronger Democratic Congress, with a major flow of cash given away early in the new Administration. And just last week, another pile of billions went to real estate giants Freddie and Fanny; so it goes...

So, back in April with the Obama Federal budget in the works, the Senate was debating an amendment to the budget which would have allowed judges to modify and reduce mortgage payments for folks in bankruptcy proceedings. Wall Street pulled out the stops to beat this one. Lobbyists descended like locusts; lobbying dollars flowed! The issue here was simply that Wall Street is not equipped to manage and modify its mortgages and loans; it doesn't have any customer service departments and real frankly would prefer to hold onto the toxic assets empty and subsidized (by us) rather than invest in re-negotiation towards keeping people in their homes.

Of course, the amendment failed. It was Dick Durbin, Senator from Illinois who said, "The banks own this place..." What's new? Recently, there's been a spate of "good" news... "Housing Industry Reports Increased Sales!!!" The reality is that a least half of these new sales are going to institutional buyers (Wall Street) who are buying their toxic assets back. These houses will remain empty until the big lenders can sell them off profitably (re-inflate the bubble). Meanwhile of course, we're subsidizing this banking strategy; this is what we bought.

It was roughly a month ago when a blogger on this site wrote a piece about an interesting debate on health care occurring at the Marion County Democratic Party meeting. After some discussion, the room divided into halves. One half of the room were solidly behind universal single payer health care. The other side of the room was calling for a government-run public health care plan; then the debate continued. At this point, I would bet the chances are better than half that any health care reform actually passed by Congress will contain neither a public plan or be single payer (Paul Krugman, New York Times columnist and Princeton Professor of Economics agrees with me... hmmm).

The reason we won't have any real health care reform is that from the start the insurance industry and hospital chains have been the major player in the discussion around health care. Here, the insurance industry, the corporate-medical industry and finance capital will define for the Congress what is acceptable and what is not... Congress will obey, as will the Obama Administration. Anybody up for a bet on this?

And then, how about a second stimulus package? Unemployment continues to grow. Smaller businesses are struggling, some going under as the banks cut off credit to just about anybody who can't demonstrate a sure-thing, big-bang profit for the next ten years. Lots of folks are starting to run out of benefits. People are homeless, hungry and sick. Things are bleak. So, how about a second stimulus package? With real jobs!

When pressed on a second stimulus package, the response from the Obama Administration is this:

1. "The economic crisis is much worse than we originally thought."

2. "We never anticipated unemployment over 8%."

3. "Any real improvement for real people is a long way off; be patient."

4. "We didn't make this mess."

5. "The original stimulus package really is working; trust us, it could have been worse."

6. "Therefore, there will be no second stimulus package."

The reality is that there will be no second stimulus package because there is no political will in Washington D.C. or anyplace else to pass such a bill. With the right wing deficit panic chorus turned way up, and with all the really big money having been spent by those socialists, Obama, Bush and the Democratic Congress keeping Wall Street losses subsidized and profits up, there's just no money left... The corporations aren't interested... Sorry! (Funny, the deficit chorus never sings to the cost of war in the Middle East)

It should be pretty clear by now that real change will not be coming from the Obama Administration or Democratic Party. There can be no real change, it is absolutely impossible, until the power of capital, especially finance capital is confronted and broken. The Democrats and Obama have demonstrated over and over that they have no intention of engaging in such a confrontation or putting forward any policy of change which might compromise the primacy of capital's role within American society.

It seems to me that we should begin with the reality of the situation. We are a plutocracy, we are governed by capital through its corporations which have duly bought and paid for a government which is all theirs. This really is the truth of the matter; here's where we begin.

So, maybe the first question ought to be, is this what we want? Should there be any social priority which might trump the desires of capitalism? Does the well-being of society exceed capitalism's desires? Or, is the a number one priority of our society the defense of capitalism no matter what? This sounds all melodramatic, but really it is that basic. By the way, this is not a call for socialism, real socialism; the questions are more basic than even that.

Without a frankly public and society-wide discussion around such matters as the above, a movement of people in the direction of real change won't happen... Any momentum will drown in the limits and boundaries capital sets and the equivocations of capital's bought public officials.

Personally I am pessimistic. I see the growing presence of the tea-baggers and their ilk; stupid, deranged, beyond reason and ugly, as Obama's and the Democrats' policies increasingly fail. Likewise, I see no major institutional forces putting an agenda forward which asks any of the above questions. Here I am particularly looking at the unions. Still, it ain't over yet, and I'd like to humbly suggest that as leftists, as socialists, it is our duty to ask the above questions, move the discussions, pose the analysis, where ever we can for as long as we can. The chips will fall where they will.