The conventional wisdom is that 2010 will be a “wave election” in which Republicans are propelled into office because of an angry electorate who thinks that the country is going in the wrong direction. Well I understand the anger and the wrong direction feeling. What I don’t understand is why any sane person would think the Republicans have a solution. Being against improvements in healthcare, unemployment benefits, and re-regulation of Wall Street isn’t a plan. Stopping government action is not a jobs plan. Even the laudable goal of balancing the budget will not create more jobs. It will create more lay-offs.

The fact is that “throw the bums out” is not a strategy. The government is not in the way of the free market. The government, particularly the Republican leadership, is owned by the wealthy, who are simply looking out for their own interests. If unfettered capitalism is so good, why did we have a crash? And why do most Americans seem to think that returning control of the government to those who screwed it up is such a good idea?

Let’s say that the economy is a child who was injured by its caretaker—injured so badly that recovery will take a lot of rehabilitation and time. So now, because the healing isn’t fast enough, we want to return the child to the caretaker that inured it? If the polls are to be believed, apparently so.

Anger and fear-mongering about “socialism” are not a plan. I’m angry and fearful too. I’m angry that the corporate chieftains and Wall Street types who control the economy are perpetuating the myth that somehow government is to blame and that if we do nothing things will fix themselves. People seem to think that the rich have more because they deserve more and that we should not tax them because that will mean they won’t do as much for us. This is bull.

The rich, like all of us, are motivated by self-interest. This is fine up to a point. But when the rich control both parties and rig things so they can suck up as much wealth as they can, a little balance needs to be restored. Those who think that the government is the enemy are being duped into a self-fulfilling prophesy of voting for people who either have a misguided ideology that no government equals some miraculous cure or for people who are deliberately misleading them in order to keep the government from interfering with the continued sucking of the public’s neck by their wealthy vampire overlords.

I say be angry; but let’s have a rational plan of action that moves us toward a fairer government. The rich will survive just fine; even there is a little mandatory moderation in how much financial blood they can suck. Don’t be a willing victim and vote Republican against your own self-interest.