Reclaiming Our Government
~ An idea, on which I've
posted before, and whose time has come:
to get the corrupting influence of money out of our politics. The problem is not big government, but rather
big money.
“Big government” isn’t the problem. The problem is the Big Money that’s taking over government. Government is doing fewer of the things most of us want it to do—providing good public schools and affordable access to college, improving infrastructure, maintaining safety nets and protecting the public from dangers—and more of the things big corporations, Wall Street and wealthy plutocrats want it to do.
Some conservatives argue that we wouldn’t have to worry about this if we had a smaller government to begin with, because big government attracts Big Money. On ABC’s This Week a few months ago, Congressman Paul Ryan told me that “if the power and money are going to be here in Washington…that’s where the powerful are going to go to influence it.” Ryan has it upside down. A smaller government that’s still dominated by money would continue to do the bidding of Wall Street, the pharmaceutical industry, oil companies, agribusiness, big insurance, military contractors and rich individuals. It just wouldn’t do anything else.
"
Small government" makes a good sound bite, perhaps, but not a good objective. Giving more money to those who already have plenty as part of
an austerity program to shrink government and deficits will not solve the problems of our economy or our society:
"Conservatives say if you don't give the rich more money, they will lose their incentive to invest. As for the poor, they tell us they've lost all incentive because we've given them too much money."
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