Read This Book With Me

Bill,


This book by Mitt Romney's former domestic policy advisor has gotten a lot of buzz from sources ranging from David Brooks to Ross Douthat to Thomas Edsall. The book lives up to hype. I'm half way through and can't put it down. Pretty impressive for a 150 pages of policy wonk.


Cass confirms the argument made here in previous BPS posts that 1) Despite their protestations to the contrary, neither the Left nor Right care very much about working class Americans and 2) The policies of the last 50 years promulgated by both those groups have certainly not helped and often made things worse. He makes a compelling case that it is the failure of the availability of productive work, work that feeds families, gives dignity, provides social cohesion, and strengthens communities, that lies at the core of our current social implosion. While he begins from a conservative perspective, many of his proposal do not fit into convenient ideological categories. Some solutions, such as an end to the college-for-everyone fantasy with movement toward broader vocational training opportunity feel obvious. Others, such as his ideas for trade and immigration reform, are making me rethink long held but poorly thought out notions of just how current policies affect my countrymen, since the current ones either benefit me or don't affect me at all.


Hope you take a look. Available online at your local library.


Eli

Republicans And Race

Bill


You don't need to look to Democrats to call out the Grand Old Party on this issue. This quote comes from Peter Wehner in this month's Atlantic, explaining why he has left the Republican Party.

It would be deeply unfair to claim that most Republicans are bigots. But it is fair to say that most Republicans today are willing to tolerate without dissent, and in many cases enthusiastically support, a man whose appeal is based in large part on stoking racial and ethnic resentments, on attacking “the other.” That has to be taken into account. At a minimum, their moral reflexes have been badly dulled.

It’s impossible for me to know with any precision how much of the Republican base is motivated by ethnic nationalism and racial resentments and anxieties, but it’s certainly a higher percentage than I’d thought. A conservative friend of mine recently had a meal with a prominent Republican officeholder who, when asked what explained Trump’s growing appeal in his state, told my friend it was in reaction to Obama and it was mainly a matter of race.

Eli

Bestraft die Bosen

Bill,


Enjoy your schadenfreude. I might note one important difference in the 2 parties response to their internal miscreants. In general, the Republicans have been complicit until circumstances absolutely compel them to speak out. Indeed, from the beginning of the Bigot-In-Chief's promulgation of the racist theory of President Obama's citizenship, most Republicans have either turned a blind eye or enabled the rising intolerance of a crucial part of their base. In contrast, the Democratic calls for Governor Northam to resign have been long and loud, and will likely continue until he does so. I think the same fate awaits Virginia's his Lieutenant Governor and Attorney General.


We disagree about a lot in American cultural and political life but we agree on this. Overt racism and sexual harassment  are intolerable, anytime, anywhere.


Eli

Galatians 6:7

Eli,

I can't help but feeling more than a bit of schadenfreude over the recent events in Virginia. [Governor is a racist; Lt. Governor is a rapist; Atty. General also a racist].

For years, but particularly since 2016 the Dems have, I think mostly hypocritically and shamelessly, branded their political  and ideological opponents as racist, sexist, homophobes.

Now that they are confronted by the real thing in their own party, its a time for reflection. OK, got it.

Bill