THE BIPARTISAN DISMANTLING OF AMERICA
The process began in earnest with the words of President Ronald Reagan. His catchy – and destructively false – soundbite, “government is not the solution to the problem, government is the problem,” initiated the dismantling of all we cherish as Americans. A catchy soundbite denigrated the sacred words of our Declaration of Independence stating that to secure the rights of Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness, “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.” It denigrated all those who fought and died in the American Revolution to protect those sacred words. A catchy soundbite mocked the works of Jefferson and Adams and all those caring individuals who dedicated their lives to ensure those who came after them would have a democratic and constitutionally guided government. A catchy soundbite belittled the words of the Gettysburg Address when Abraham Lincoln prayed that “government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. A catchy soundbite trampled on the graves, made a mockery of, all the fathers and brothers and sons who died in the Civil War to see the Government of the United States of America live on. A catchy soundbite by a former President of the United States of America brings great shame to all of us.
Yet Reagan simply laid the foundations. He laid the ground work for the “deregulation” fervor that has neutered our government and destroyed all protections for working people and the environment. He paved the way for “trickle down” economics where giving all our money to the rich was magically going to make us all better off. But if Ronald Reagan opened the door, President Bill Clinton released the flood gates. The darling of the Democratic Party gave our government to Wall Street.
Robert Edward Rubin, a 26-year-veteran of Goldman Sachs – arguably the most corrupt, predatory and parasitic bank on Earth, was made Secretary of the Treasury under President Bill Clinton. In collaboration with then Chairman of the Federal Reserve, charlatan Ayn-Rand-ideologue Alan Greenspan, Rubin proceeded to dismantle all of the banking and financial regulations protecting working Americans from the abuses of Wall Street that had led to the Great Depression in the 1930’s. The work of Bill Clinton came to fruition when the crash of 2007/2008 devastated millions upon millions of decent citizens who had been victimized by the deregulated banking cartel. No single individual is more responsible for the Great Recession than William Jefferson Clinton.
Then came President George W. Bush. Then came tax cuts for the rich. Then came the deliberate and calculated indebtedness of our government and the “privatization” of all that we hold dear. Then came the endless wars based on endless lies. Then came the torture. Wall Street pulled the strings. And then came the financial crash.
If ever a president was elected with a mandate, it was Barak Obama. America hungered for a return to decency and fair play. But Goldman Sachs banker Hank Paulson was the outgoing Secretary of the Treasury “overseeing” the crash caused in great part by his own former bank, and Timothy Geithner, president of the privately held Federal Reserve Bank of New York, would be his replacement. While the Americans who elected him hungered for justice and an end to financial predation, Obama brought the parasites back to life. When the major Wall Street banks should have, and could have, been nationalized and converted to public institutions functioning for the common good, literally trillions of tax payer dollars were instead used to make them whole again. Within a year the top managers of the publicly rescued private banks were giving themselves multi-million dollar bonuses. Working Americans were once again the victims of a con job, were once again left holding the bag.
President Obama was elected for a second term (his flawed opponent, Mitt Romney, was a known financial manipulator in his own right) but by the end of his second term Main Street citizens knew they were still the prey of the oligarchy. They may not have been able to define the causes, but Americans knew the game was rigged.
And then came Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump. It should have been a historic landslide victory for Clinton over the financially and sexually scandalized Trump. But Main Street was sick to its stomach. It was sick of Wall Street cronies masquerading as “ordinary folk.” It was sick of quarter-million dollar speeches given to Wall Street banks that “had no influence over a politician’s vote.” It was sick at the “coronation” of another Clinton and the corruption in the Democratic National Committee. It was sick of being used by Washington elites.
President Donald Trump now carries on the dismantling. He was elected by Ronald Reagan. He was elected by Bill Clinton. He was elected by George W. Bush. He was elected by Barak Obama. He was elected by Hillary Clinton.