|
|
May 18, 2013
|
|
|
|
 The End of Wall Street LiberalismPosted on Jan 13, 2010
If you held a contest to pick the worst thing a politician could be called at this moment, my nominee would be Wall Street Liberal. That label has everything. I personally despise the way the noble liberal idea has been devalued, but face it: Conservatives have had great success in discrediting liberalism, to the point that most liberals dare not call themselves by their own name. And what institutions are held in lower esteem right now than those represented by the words “Wall Street”? The left has always disliked Wall Street. Populists of all stripes have gone after financiers since the days of Andrew Jackson. And the right can cast Wall Streeters as the recipients of Washington’s largesse. Oh, yes, and they were the highfliers who tanked the American economy. Put Wall Street together with liberal and: Bang! About the only more unpopular combination I can think of is high-cholesterol broccoli. If you want to understand why President Barack Obama’s standing in the polls is not where it used to be—and also why the populist-sounding tea party movement has gained so much traction—consider that some significant part of the American voting population has come to see the administration as both too liberal and too tied to Wall Street. Advertisement This is why his expected announcement on Thursday of new fees on the biggest banks to recoup the costs of the bailout comes just in time. So does the idea now floating around Congress to pay for a reduction in the sweep of the tax on so-called Cadillac health plans by applying the Medicare tax not only to wage income, but also to investment income. Financing Main Street benefits through Wall Street taxes makes sense—and not just for political reasons. Obama is finally trying to address what has been an enormous distortion in our political debate. Many Washington voices are raised to decry the large budget deficit, and independent voters are said to worry about the red ink, too. In the short run, deficits make sense to boost the economy. In the long run, they will have to be dealt with. Some keep pushing the tired notion that the deficits can be cured if we just reduce “entitlements,” which I put in quotation marks because I’m weary of people using this highfalutin word to dodge saying directly that they want deep cuts in Medicare and Social Security. Actually, health care reform is designed in part to contain the long-term growth of Medicare costs. And the savings that can be wrung out of Social Security are limited. In the end, if you care about fiscal responsibility, you have to favor raising taxes. But whose taxes? The truth is that we’ve had a large income and wealth shift in the United States, in favor of not just the rich in general but the financial sector in particular. We are overtaxing wage and salary income relative to investment income, and overtaxing the manufacturing and service sectors relative to the financial industry. It’s why Warren Buffett has said he’s taxed at a lower rate than his receptionist. Moving the tax burden toward the financial sector is thus a matter of both justice and political necessity. The best thing that could happen to Obama would be for him to have a fight or two with Wall Street and the big banks on behalf of balancing the budget. It is precisely the way to shake off both ends of the Wall Street Liberal tag. This also has the benefit of challenging the tea party movement to come clean as to whether it really is populist, or merely using populist rhetoric to pursue the same old low-tax, low-regulation agenda that got us into this mess in the first place. Will the tea party people come out against taxes on banks and finance in the name of their libertarian principles? If they do, what kind of populists are they? After a year in which progressives played defense, it’s time to call some bluffs.  TAGS:
|
Truthdigger of the Week: Sen. Angus King
Email 
Print
Share
Email to a friend
Newsletter 
Like Us
Follow Us
Get Our Feed
Tags|Bazaar|Podcast|About Us|Contact Us|User Agreement|Privacy Policy|FAQ: Comments and Moderation | Google+
© 2013 Truthdig, LLC. All rights reserved.
By ThomasG, January 17, 2010 at 9:25 pm Link to this comment
The Left and Liberal are representative of the best interests of the American Populace/Back Street America.
The Republican Party represents Wall Street and the Democratic Party represents Main Street; and the Left and Liberals, represent Back Street, the American Populace, and is not represented in the making and enforcing of legislated law and order in the United States.
The “frame of representation” of the Left and Liberals by either the Republican Party or the Democratic Party is a false frame.
What can be said of the Left and Liberals is that the Left and Liberals, Back Street America, the American Populace, have been accused, condemned, denounced, and demonized for the past 50 years by the Republican Party, the Democratic Party has been complicit in that accusation, condemnation, denunciation, and demonization, and that it is NOW time for the Left and Liberals, the American Populace/Back Street America to stand up en masse and force its own political representation in the making and enforcing of legislated law and order in the interests of Back Street America, the American Populace.
Report thisBy gerard, January 16, 2010 at 8:03 pm Link to this comment
Why the extreme animus against this particular columnist? If I understand him right this time:
Report this1.Obama has been called “a Wall Stsreet Liberal” by critics, meaning “not a true Liberal, but a so-called “liberal” who panders to Wall Street.
2.The epithet has done him enough harm to warrant his counteraction: ie. Suggesting “taxing financial interests (Wall Street) and the “big banks,” (a “liberal” plan that might unhinge some right wingers recently abused by Wall Street along with all the rest of us, whereas Wall Street is not usually on their critical agenda.
DJs rendering of these machinations is itself cloudy, but it’s doubtful that what he is actually saying is all that threatening to “liberal/ progressives/lefties”—whatever they/we are.
Sure, blaming the financial crisis simply on a “low tax/no regulation agenda” is superficial, but you can’t do much profound or complete exposition in a column for the WP.
By sharonsj, January 15, 2010 at 9:30 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
Okay, I’ll dare it. I’m a liberal. But it’s the conservatives who turned the word liberal into an epithet. So liberals now call themselves progressives.
What confused me is the term “Wall Street Liberal” because I’ve not heard it before. I don’t know many liberals who support what Wall Street has done and continues to do. But I know plenty of conservatives, though, who are gung ho on Wall Street. Try writing about them next.
Report thisBy DieDaily, January 15, 2010 at 4:12 am Link to this comment
Hulk2008, so in your world you have to be either a
Report thismisled leftist idiot or a misled rightist idiot? Dude,
why not just bail from both sides of that dog and pony
show and stick to the facts? Your comment is like “What
do you mean Hitler is bad, you are a supporter of
Stalin then!”. Um, no! Any idiot can see E. J. Dionne
is not only a shill, but a poor writer to boot, a
really non-professional shill if ever there was one.
Any idiot can also see that Liz Cheney is a shill. I
guess in your world, Hulk, you need to pick one idiot
or the other. How’s that workin’ out for ya?
By rollzone, January 14, 2010 at 10:47 pm Link to this comment
hello. completely wrong again. if liberalism is taxing, setting up agencies, growing government: he is a liberal. as goes the wealth of Wall Street, so goes the American economy. hurting them does not solve economic hardship, any more than more bureaucratic regulations on small business. not getting government off our backs, and out of our pockets makes him a liberal. if it is a bad time to be a liberal, hiding in the closet as a coward is about the the only thing your are correct about today’s Democrats. worst thing to call a politician- supporter of the health care bill.
Report thisBy walter ponthaus, January 14, 2010 at 1:48 pm Link to this comment
All excellent comments (except for Hulk2008’s non sequitur).
I used to read EJD’s “commentaries”, but have now ceased to do so. Just the fact that he’s employed by the corrupt, corporate-beholden, war-mongering Washington Post is reason enough to ignore this MSM shill and hope he soon withers away in (undeserved) retirement.
As for the “new bank tax”, which EJD predictably welcomes, this is nothing but empty lip service from BO and his corrupt, corporate-beholden cronies to quell rising public fury about the banksters and Wall St. fraudsters and their fat, filthy, unearned profits and bonuses.
Wanna bet that (once again) BO’s actions won’t match his nauseating rhetoric…
Report thisBy vaibhav, January 14, 2010 at 1:25 pm Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
yeah ! title is actually confusing ! i couldnt get it ! wall street should be going good in the coming months !
Report thisBy Anarcissie, January 14, 2010 at 1:15 pm Link to this comment
Hulk—pointing out that E. J. Dionne is a shill for the established order does not mean that people want another shill of a different flavor.
Report thisBy omygodnotagain, January 14, 2010 at 10:57 am Link to this comment
Well my amex charges me 30%, my banks $35 if I bounce a check, I can’t get a home equity loan to consolidate my credit card debt, this is 17 months after the Financial meltdown, Wall Street got what they wanted in 5 days..
Report thisObama it is time to walk the talk and set the IRS, SEC FBI on the Wall Street Terrorists at Goldman et al
By indc, January 14, 2010 at 10:19 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
This is another gift to the banks from Obama disguised as doing something for the taxpayer, after all Obama is their pre-paid gift card which they cash at will; the health industry folks have bought their own pre-paid gift-card call Obama.. the banks will pass this on and add an administration fee on top of it, so individual clients and taxpayers as a whole will eventually foot the cost… better to tax at a higher rate those getting mega salaries and bonuses, these cannot be passed on without increase the mega salaries and bonus, which would be visible and even more intolerable.
Report thisBy Hulk2008, January 14, 2010 at 8:04 am Link to this comment
Since you commenters dislike Mr. Dionne so much, I can only surmise that you prefer someone like Liz Cheney - a recently-added “media contributor” to the George Stephanopolous show.
Report thisI have noted in the past couple of days that while MSNBC and ABC and NBC and CBS and many other outlets including local channels have been focused on the dire situation in Haiti, Faux Snooze sticks to its guns blasting away at all things remotely “liberal” and the Pres, of course. I suppose they could argue that there are other news items to cover; and fans of Caribou Barbie and her ilk were probably tired of the devastation coverage in the first five minutes. (A right wing crone told me “Those people got what they deserve. They should never have built homes in that area.”)
I really don’t think E.J. hit the ball out of the park with this article. But it fares much better than anything that BMOC or Limp-baugh could offer.
Maybe Fox will get lucky and there will be violence in Haiti - that way they can bash Obama for not treating the earthquake as a terrorist plot.
By Timothy Gawne, January 14, 2010 at 7:34 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
Oh come on now. Faced with Wall Street insiders looting the country, Obama
responds by taxing common shareholders and retail depositors.
It’s like if someone robs a grocery store, we pay for it by taxing the storeowners
and customers.
No Virginia, Obama is still very much Wall Street’s whore. But he is the complete
Report thismaster of beating his breast wailing about the evil banks while serving up all that
America has or could ever make on a silver platter.
By dihey, January 14, 2010 at 6:34 am Link to this comment
Responding as I do to the assessment of “beyond the pale” I will now stop commenting on Mr. Dionne’s fawning. He deserves total ignoring.
Report thisBy DieDaily, January 14, 2010 at 5:55 am Link to this comment
It’s difficult to overstate just how corrupt this
Report thiswriter is. What an instrument of disinformation. I
would comment on the substance of the “story” but I
couldn’t extract any. What a twit.
By bozh, January 14, 2010 at 5:54 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
Dionne must have been rendered semanticly blind to speak of existence of “noble liberalism” in US.
Report thisWhat have these liberals done over 3 centuries? Well, they have nearly extirpated indigenes, invaded some 180 countries; had slaves, wealth, etc.
At the same time they deny own poor education and health care.
tnx
By ardee, January 14, 2010 at 5:44 am Link to this comment
According to Mr. Dionne cosmetic solutions and posturing will save the day…..
Report thisBy ron_woodward, January 14, 2010 at 1:27 am Link to this comment
The post 9/11 War Against Terror era has given way to what I call the post 9/15 Depression age. The 9/11 strategy to encircle Russia and China with hostiles failed with crushing defeats in Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq. The toxic asset poisoning ploy of 9/15 did not bring Russia, China and Brazil to their knees. Presently, they are the nations in the catbird seat.
Report thisThe paradigms for the USA have altered radically. A Fox-approved candidate may become President in 2012. The medical insurance interests now support Coakley to keep the GOP from 41 seats in the Senate. The industry supports passage of the Health Care Bill. Wall Street has become so emboldened by success it allows the media to broadcast its control over the administration and the lawmakers. They have convinced the taxpayers the common people have no say in the government process.
As a former limousine liberal and Progressive, I realize the traditional political designations have lost their discriminating value.
The pundits and politicians are behaving as my tropical fish when I forget to add food to the tank.
By G.Anderson, January 13, 2010 at 10:52 pm Link to this comment
although the title is a little confusing, I would have to disagree, there are many things much worse than calling someone names….namely the mid term elections…
name calling is just like spitting into the wind…
Report this