Cheap Labor Conservatives love to smear government. It's "inefficient" it's a damn "bureacracy"- y'all know the drill. They've done this becaue they know damn well it does work and they want it working for them.
Cross Posted at Conceptual Guerilla's Strategy and Tactics
How do we talk about that? It's the toxic CW within a vast number of people and it's been planted there by the Cheap Labor Conservatives. It needs rooting out. Maybe if we just remember. . .
WE are the government, or are supposed to be. The "Free market" corporatists have seized our government and used it to create legislation that benefits them, not US, while all the time the politicians in their pockets- since REAGAN- have pounded the meme that government is THE problem. They do prove that time and time again simply with the government they have given us.
How did they seize the government? They did it with money, of course. As campaigning for office is currently structured, it takes huge amounts to run for anything. Those who give those huge amounts do it for access. It has gotten so bad that their access has morphed to their lobbyists actually writing legislation that benefits them and screws the people. Conversely, they prevent legislation that would benefit the people. All you have to use here to prove your point is the ferociously unfair bankruptcy "reform" law, actually written by credit card companies and the fact that we do not have access to reasonable healthcare, as does every first world nation on earth.
But these thieves and toadies still have to get elected, no matter how much money they're getting, right? Sure they do, and they do that by running on bullshit "issues". Gays, Ten Commandments, Creationism, etc. There are dozens of these wedge issues they use to prevent debate from ever centering around policies that benefit people over Corporations. In fact, if you are a candidate dedicated to actually serving the people, chances are you will not get much campaign cash and you will be smeared unmercifully by the candidate who does have oodles of corporate cash.
What can government do for people? It can do a lot when the people pay attention and refuse to have their concerns railroaded into obscurity by flag burning amendments and all the other crap. It's up to us- Government of, for and by the people, remember that? And look what gets done when that happens. You put people to work (WPA) you get people housed and educated (GI Bill, VA & FHA Loans, low cost student loads which the government should carry fully instead of handing off as a gift to Big Banking who take none of the risk and keep an outrageous profit from). How about Social Security? That worked for me when I became disabled and supported me until I was well again. Medicare? Ask them what old people who weren't well-to-do did for healthcare before that. They went without and died is what they did. There are gobs of good examples. And if you run into the Tax thing- ask them if after 25 years of Republicans talking about tax cuts, how their tax burden has gone, not to mention, we all pay heavy taxes and get next to fucking nothing for it. Why is that? That's because tax policy as currently constructed by repubs redistributes OUR money into the pockets of the wealthy. The biggest way is the ridiculous expenditures for so-called defense. When they run huge deficits because of tax cuts to the wealthy, that's money that will have to be re-paid by US, not them.
We have serious issues in this country, issues that challenge whether we will survive as a nation of free and prosperous people or as virtual slaves in thrall to our corporate masters. All that stands between those two choices right now is a citizenry who says BY GHAWD, that's just about fucking ENOUGH of this bullshit- and starts tossing these corporate bought and paid for politicians out on their asses and get some people in there that understand what they are there to do and for whom.
It's real easy to say government can't solve anything, that way a person doesn't have to take responsibility for the hard work of good citizenship which amounts to "PAY ATTENTION" and "VOTE" for candidates who will work for you and refuse to be emotionally swayed by bullshit tossed your way to distract you from the ongoing disaster that is our government as it currently operates.
There is much much more to this, understanding why CLC's want people to have no faith in their government is a first step in explaining it to others and it comes down to this- Government in the hands of the people is the ONLY thing capable of putting restraints on the ruling elite, that can prevent them from turning this country into a complete banana republic shit-hole, which of course is what the CLC's want. Solution for the CLC'ers? Destroy government, of course. Destroy people's faith in its ability to serve them. Bankrupt it so it has no financial capacity to help people and finally, use it to further enrich themselves and consolidate their power. That's all you need to know that government DOES work, look at Corporate profit margins in this "jobless" recovery. Look as the tax burden shifts from capital overwhelmingly to labor.
Sure government works, it just depends on who's running it that it works for.