The limits of liberalism

The limits of liberalism by Lance Selfa on Socialist Worker.

Another very good piece that's worth following the link above to read the whole thing.

But this modus operandi is becoming a bit of pattern. Already, the administration's policies to address the financial crisis--from the bank bailouts to the rigged "stress tests"--appear to have been designed to disrupt Wall Street's business as usual as little as possible. For this reason, liberal economists like Nobel Laureates Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz have denounced the administration's policies as, at best, keeping "zombie banks" on life support--or, at worst, robbing taxpayers.

All of this dismays liberals who believe that they have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to enact overdue reforms. Instead, they see the administration compromising with big business that has interests in making whatever reforms are passed as toothless as possible

Ok, but here's what the 'liberals' mentioned in this piece don't get. Today's Democratic Party exists precisely to make sure that 'once-in-a-generation' opportunities for reform DO NOT get enacted. The role of the Democrats in today's American political system is to divert energy away from real reform. The role of the Democrats is exactly what Mr. Selfa says in his piece. To make sure that even when the Republican brand crashes and the people run them out of town, that business proceeds as usual with as little disruption to Wall Street as possible.

The Democrats are supposed to use the popular anger against Republican policies to gain power when people get upset at the Republicans. But then, once in power, the Democrats will a) continue the same policies as much as is possible, and b) actively work to block any real reforms that the people might be demanding.

See the piece just below this one on the page about how Sen. Baucus is handling 'health care' reform for an example. The real reform that most of the American citizens would want is declared immediately 'off the table', the interests of the insurance companies, HMO's and big pharma companies are well represented and looked after, and the cops are called should someone dare to stand up and try to talk about national health insurance.

That's no accident. That's the Democrats doing precisely the job they are well paid to do.