The Light Bulb Comes On
Guess
who’s sorry they fell for the Koch brothers baloney? Oh, none other
than the “U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Federation of
Independent Business, and other business interests”. See, it turns out
that what is good for the Koch brothers isn’t necessarily good for the
rest of the business community, the country or Wall Street.
I
know, you already knew that. But the business community has been
following along behind repugicans for so long that they never noticed
when the party went pro-chaos, post-policy, anti-law wingnut
anarchists. And those things are not good for business.
Back in
2010, the business community blindly championed the infamous
know-nothings running under the tea party banner (and it was clear then
that the majority of these folks are beloved precisely for their
ignorance, not in spite of it) – the same people who are now ruining our
economy with their hubris, greed and stupidity.
Jill Lawrence at the
National Journal reported
that business is not too happy with the tea party. They are “bemused
and in some cases frustrated by the way some presumed congressional
allies are handling their jobs.”
“You don’t really
know what they’re going to do or why,” says NSBA President Todd
McCracken, a 20-year Washington veteran. “It used to be there were not
many rewards for obstruction. Now there are no consequences.”
Tough
to excuse not seeing that one coming. The cabal whose base showed up to
townhalls armed with machine guns and consistently threatened to kill
lawmakers over ObamaCare aren’t reasonable? Gosh, what a shock.
“They don’t like brinkmanship on budget and debt issues, or the more
routine dysfunction that has stalled transportation and agriculture
legislation important to both parties and much of the private sector.”
The
business sector hates ObamCare but they are not interested in repugican showboating and don’t support blocking any bill that relates
to funding ObamaCare. They can see that it’s law and they’d rather focus
on tweaking the law to work better for their constituency.
What
are the odds that the repugican cabal will be able to function
pragmatically enough to actually participate in the process of
legislating to that degree? Slim indeed.
Business leaders express
pity for John Boehner over the unruly tea party caucus of wild
children, but they do nothing to demonstrate that it’s possible to lead
these parasites to water. They helped to create this mess but now their
hands are tied, according to them.
They lament the lack of
infrastructure rebuilding, something Obama and the Democrats have been
pushing because it’s widely accepted that in the middle of a recession,
spending on investments like infrastructure is a smart move that
provides jobs and stimulates the economy. Business relies on competitive
infrastructure. Try telling that the to modern day repugican cabal who
see infrastructure as socialism.
If the business community were
really the grownups they are rumored to be, they would acknowledge
their mistake and realize that it came from not properly analyzing the
current political landscape.
If all they really care about is
the excessive, irresponsible deregulation that the repugican cabal
pushes, this is what they get – because careless is as careless does.
There won’t be smart, good tempered, reasonable, pragmatic, morally
decent people who will push zero regulations and oversight and then turn
around and demand that the taxpayers subsidize big oil during record
profits. To get someone willing to do that, you get all that comes with a tea partier – unwillingness to legislate, anarchy, petulance,
stupidity, arrogance, and most of all personal greed.
On the
other hand, the business community could choose to try running
responsible, morally accountable businesses that both earn a profit and
give back to the community with decent wages and attempts to mitigate
poisoning the air and water for their own profit. That is all the
Democratic Party is asking for, and in return they are offering things
that help business like consistency, growth, infrastructure – oh, and a quickly dwindling deficit.
The
problem is that the business community is just as greedy as the
parasitic fringe they got elected. They are not separate from the
Randian narcissism that’s overtaken the repugican cabal. And greedy people are never
the smartest people in the room because they only see the short term.
To wit, the reason they cite for not getting behind infrastructure bills
when they desperately need infrastructure is that it is seen in
“federal budgetary terms as incurring an expense rather than as creating
an asset.” It’s as if these folks never took a business class.
This
is the problem with modern repugicans – they’re choking on their own
rhetoric. This country can’t stay competitive without reinvestments and
the companies that operate here rely on those investments (aka,
infrastructure) which is just another reason why they should pay their
fair share of taxes like grown ups do.
Sure, they want less
regulation, and workers want better pay. Who’s to say business is
automatically entitled to what they want, or that it’s even good for
them to get it? They haven’t shown themselves to be very good at
self-regulating and the market isn’t taking care of it either, or we
wouldn’t be subsidizing big business with tax breaks and socialized
losses.
“CEOs and business lobbyists have sat down
with lawmakers to explain what it means to them—and the economy writ
large—for Congress to be so polarized and paralyzed.”
Yes,
but did they get their blanky before bedtime story? Wait until the
business community figures out that the tea party (which is nothing but a
rebranding of the wingnutts and has taken over the repugican cabal)
doesn’t CARE that this is problematic. They don’t care that anarchy
isn’t good for business. Anarchy is what got them to DC, and got them a
great salary and excellent healthcare on the taxpayer dime. They’re
hardly going to grow up if it means losing entitlements.
Maybe
the real issue is that the business community is not served well by the
party of Big Business. Small businesses have different needs than the
Koch Brothers, and perhaps that is the real problem here. The repugican cabal is not really the party for small business. It’s the cabal of
billionaire business.
So I’ll say to the business community what repugicans have been saying to poor people forever: We’ll help you
when you help yourself. Get off the tea party crack, go to rehab, deal
with reality, and take responsibility for your choices.
You got
these clowns elected, now fix it. And don’t come crying to Democrats
when you finally realize that the repugican cabal won’t give you
immigration reform or infrastructure because they can’t. Get it? They
can’t because your denial helped elect amoral, irresponsible extremists
who do not care about this country, and they win when we all – and that
includes business – lose.
