Now that the new Republican Congress is off and running, I’m becoming more fearful about the planet’s future prospects. As arguably the world’s most dominant economic power, the policies our Congress enacts affect the whole world. The faulty, incoherent, non-rational belief system of the new Republican majority cannot possibly lead to positive results. Only the wealthy will benefit from their policies. The rest of the world’s population will suffer.
So how do progressives—who believe in a more balanced, rational, caring application of our collective knowledge to reduce human suffering—counter this onslaught of self-righteous lunacy? I wish I had an easy answer. But I know the solution involves the reframing of our politics to a more empathetic, HumansTogether attitude that focuses on what we have in common and not on how we disagree. That is the mission of this site.
Fortunately, I believe that there is an increasing awareness that we need this refocusing. Many of the people in my social circle understand that a system based on creating wealth for the few and hardship for the masses is not sustainable. I believe there is a yearning a new kind of idealism and a revaluing of what is important in life away from the purely materialistic.
I also believe that once people start paying attention to the way this Congress behaves, many will recognize their transparent hypocrisy, irrationality and incompetence. But politics is now being driven by entrenched emotions, enflamed by a mass media that makes more money when there is conflict.
The ideal antidote to would be a new sixties movement—a massive rejection of the current value which favors wealth over well-being. This would be a movement based on consciousness raisin; a movement based on peace, love and understanding. What’s so funny about that?
Just found your website. I agree with your feelings about the Republican-dominated House and that party in general (although I’ve met a few thoughtful and fact-based Republicans, many of whom are wondering what the hell happened to their party). Luckily, I think the mean-spiritedness is finally breaking through to those who are voluntarily or involuntarily unaware.
But it’s a slow process. Having travelled some lately, I think it’s hard for the masses between the coasts and out of the few more sophisticated urban areas to get any new other than Faux or the latest “ain’t it awful” story (The Schwartenegger-Shiver domestic issue leaps to mind as the latest distraction, even eclipsing the very real and ongoing flooding issues.) It will also be hard to generate mainstream awareness because there is no “face of the Republicans”: Palin flamed out, at least for now. Bachmann? Some recognition, mainly because she’s pretty and so totally off the wall. Boehner? Ryan? Cantor? No one knows them. Trump proved to be a joke, Huckabee would rather make money, and Gingrich (who was the “face” that Clinton could target in retribution back in the ’90s) has pretty much been exposed. Even when he says something worthy, as he did a new days ago when he drcried the Republican budget-whacking, the feeling among many thinking citizens was “Even a broken clock is right twice a day!”
I think the key to an antidote to Republicorporatism is to find and put a face to it. “Terror” is scary till it isn’t; bin Laden in the role of demon gave terror a face. Some Repub has to get elevated to be able to be knocked down; the problem will be if he (or, God save us, she in the form of Palin or Bachman) gets elevated too far and can’t be cut back to size.
The silver lining around this cloud, at least for me, is that I think we as a country are a LITTLE farther along than we were when you posted this in January. IF the Democrats can get and keep their stuff together half as well as the lock-step Repubs, then maybe we have a chance in 2012. If not – well, I’d rather not think about the consequences; they’re too scary.