Many of us naive souls had a surge of optimism in 2008, thinking that surely, after the Bush GOP Crash and their national security crashes too, we would finally get a 21st Century FDR plan and Democrats would be democratic again, focusing on the greater good rather than the prosperous few.
But instead of saying "step aside, GOP! You crashed our economy!" Our Democrats pretended they needed to compromise. Instead of saying--
The Bush Crash put millions into foreclosure, we need Medicare for All right now. Millions are suffering and we can't imagine how a compassionate country would burden its citizens facing foreclosure with shouldering the soaring privatized medical expenses that have forced so many into bankruptcy-- we saw bailouts for the super rich and compromising for months and months on protecting the most vulnerable.
During that interval, cruel right wing PR machines cranked up their "genuine grass roots support" activities, getting the scared, angry vulnerable citizens to storm town halls against the very attempts to strengthen good government protections for our poorest people.
And this naive Democrat for decades (me) had to wonder why Democratic legislators would not have known the right wing which had been consolidating and extending its power since Ronald Reagan would not continue doing so. They had to know that the only way for them to secure power was to revive good government in a big way.
"Medicare for All," while unfashionably compassionate, would have put more money into the pockets of suffering citizens, which they would have spent locally, on daily necessities, thus helping their local economies.
Massive jobs programs to repair our national infrastructure which had been allowed to crumble under the Bush Gang's All War policies may have been roundly denounced by Republicans but they, too, would have pumped more cash into local economies and helped them stay afloat.
But my Democratic legislators played the Gotta Compromise game which the ruthless GOP does not do. My Democrats pretended we were back in the old days of Nixon (who would be condemned as a socialist today)in which Republicans made a few compromises to protect the environment and some government assistance for the needy. My Democrats cut back on the very policies that would have most improved our economy and the ruthless Right capitalized on people's continuing misery. My Democrats sometimes compromised even before the debate had really gotten going.
Millions of us were very optimistic about going green. It was to be the counterweight to the suffering after the Bush/GOP Supply Side Crash. Even though millions had been devastated by the crash, we would all be working together to add conservation and alternative energy technologies into repairing our crumbling bridges and levees. We would be working together to introduce green technologies so we could use oil more conservatively because we know we will still need oil for decades to come.
We were ready, willing and excited about supporting a democratic renewal and rebalancing of our economy. That more realistic, scientific approach to our country's future would have included supporting the space program.
Green technolgies would also strengthen our national security but we are still supposed to pretend that brutal warfare is the way to go. We're supposed to be delighted that there has been a bit of talk about cutting 38 billion from military spending over the next ten years. Even though our legislators cut ACORN funding because of an allegation of fraud, while continuing to deal with military contractors with solid fraud convictions among them.
http://www.contractormisconduct.org/ Our party compromised with the very unrealistic Greedy Obstructionist Plutocrats who wanted to preserve and strengthen the Winner Takes All status quo, extended and strengthened since the Reagan era. Even though we know that big business has been hoarding cash and not hiring, that they have taken their tax breaks and shipped the jobs overseas too, we are all supposed to keep saying "Cut taxes on the Top Ten Percent and they'll create jobs," so how can you expect us to be realistic about the longer term benefits of a space program?
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