Why do Republicans hate America? They spent eight years under “w” destroying our security, our honor to the Constitution and the economy and now that Obama was elected they decided why not continue by preventing him and the incompetent Democratic Congress from doing anything positive.



They think the public won’t notice that they have obstructed and stymied everything the supermajority attempted to do. The sad thing is they’re probably right. I agree that the Democrats in Congress are pathetic. With a huge supermajority they should be able to ram anything they want through but they are too weak of will to do it. Even though I totally disagreed with what “w” and the repus did in their years at least the Democrats helped them push through all their policies. They were truly bipartisan and if they didn’t go along with “w” the repus and media would claim the Dems were unpatriotic and anti-American. Why don’t they do that to the Republicans today?



Unlike the Dems under “w” the Repus march in lock step to stop anything Obama wants like healthcare reform. Do you honestly think that if the Republicans had a 60 vote majority in the Senate and the big majority in the House that the Democrats would, as a group without dissent, block what they insisted on doing? The facts bear out the truth of the matter.



Republicans have brought this country to a standstill so that no progress can be made to resolve the economic problems we face. They just want political advantage rather than to help the people of this country who are suffering. They are repus first and

Americans second. They rail and vote against deficit spending for stimulus to pull us out of the near depression they caused and then when defeated on the bill they fight tooth and nail for the stimulus money for their state. How hypocritical is that?



Newt and the repus did the same to Clinton in the 90’s by shutting down the government and they are doing it again now. The public wants healthcare reform and a big jobs creation bill but Republicans are preventing it from happening. Millions of people are without any or very little coverage and millions will go bankrupt even with insurance if they encounter a major illness. Do the Republicans care? Of course not. Their only concern is to take away a person’s right to sue for malpractice but their message to those without is tough luck. They only represent the insurance and pharmaceutical companies and the people secure enough to have good jobs with healthcare already. Their message is “Deal with it losers.” That is not what the American public wants regardless what FOX frauds tell you.



The Republicans don’t represent the average person in America. They never have and never will. They represent the powerful corporate and wealthy interests and if they gain a majority, expect the same that we got during “w’s” two terms. They are not populists. They are corporatists just like many of the conservative Democrats like Evan Bayh. I’m glad to see him go. I just wish more conservative Dems would also resign to let real populists take their place. Tea baggers claim to be just that but they are being used as usual by hypocrite Republicans. I am an independent and I wish we had more truly independent politicians that aren’t bought and paid for by lobbyists from corporate America. If something doesn’t change soon we will all be knee-deep in rancid repu tea bags

Objective observations over the last several months only confirm the well known truth that right-wing conservatives are much more adept at whining about political issues than actually doing anything constructive about them. Ever since President Obama took office from the most pathetically incompetent president and pathologically demented vice president of the last century, all right-wingers can do is practice revisionist history and pretend their policies and actions had nothing to do with the mess Obama inherited.



Right wingers complain that Obama is increasing the deficit as though doing nothing is the desired answer to righting our economic quagmire. If "w" would have left Obama with a huge budget surplus and healthy economy the way Clinton did for him rather than two wars, the largest deficit and worst economy since the great depression they may have a legitimate complaint but they ignore reality as usual. Like most delusional right-wingers, their mouths are bigger than their brains. They can go on FOX TV and rail against the evil liberals all they want but when it comes to actually governing right-wingers have no clue. They continue to claim that torture is no big deal but won't be water-boarded themselves and put their money where their big mouths are. What happened to that tough-guy attitude? Remember "Bring it on?" Why not bring on the water-boarding for right-wing right-to-life terrorists here in America? After the last eight years right-wingers have proven they can't govern and have no logical or rational ideas about how to correct this country's problems. Their endless lies and fear-mongering over the last 8 years got us nowhere. The public knows how pathetically bankrupt of answers they truly are. They won't even give Obama a couple of years to enact what needs to be done before they try to destroy him and pray for his failure. When the roles were reversed eight years ago they claimed anyone not fully supporting "w" was unpatriotic and un-American. How pathetically hypocritical is that in light of their actions since January?



Their leaders are blow-hard drug-addict talk show clowns and they demagogue the issues adinfinitum. They practice hate-speech toward their opponents and distort the issues then stand back and claim their violent incitement (by calling doctors "baby killers") of the easily manipulated low-intelligence-violent-NRA-faction-white-supremacist mentality in our society, had nothing to do with the murder of said doctor. It is one thing for an individual to be against something that they think is wrong or sinful. If you are against it, don't do it; that's what I do. But it's another to force your religious views on others that disagree with you and then contribute to the climate of violence that leads to their killing.



When is someone in the Republican party going to stand up to these insane religious extremists in their party who feel it is their duty to kill anyone that doesn't agree with them in the name of God? That sounds like the Taliban or Al Qeada. I am disgusted by continuously hearing Christians say they are glad a doctor was killed for doing his job or that homosexuals and illegal immigrants deserve to die. That is sick. You can't force others to follow your religion through the law. Try reading the U.S. Constitution. It is none of my business what a citizen does with their body or what they and their doctor decide is best for the health and life of their patients. When doctors are intimidated, threatened and killed for practicing legally under the law and it is condoned by the police and politicians then anarchy rules. That is not liberty. That is religious tyranny, a Theocracy, or as our founders feared, the End of the American Constitutional Republic. Keep our civil Constitution and government separate from religious megalomaniacs and institutions that desire to destroy our freedoms by forcing religious uniformity through a Fundamentalist Theocracy.

For all the local FOX right-wingers that respond to my comments like Pavlov's dog, I don't think you understand what the definition of freedom and liberty truly is. Why is it that you insist on dictating your views of morality on to other freedom loving Americans that don't see things as you do? It was my understanding that traditional conservatives thought the government should stay out of the personal lives of its citizens. I know that is what liberals like me believe. When it comes to my personal life and religious convictions the government should mind their own business. I don’t need the government in my bedroom or doctor’s office with me. Somehow FOX right-wingers think that it is their duty to impose their religion and morality on all citizens through the law. You can be a religious extremist all you want. You’re free to do that but don't try to force me to adhere to your religion. That, by definition is not liberty or freedom. That is a "Forced Theocracy".



I choose to live by my own religious convictions and will not yield to the government forcing someone else's on me through the law. Now that is real freedom and liberty as elaborated in the Constitution. This country guarantees freedom of, for and from religion. Our Constitution is a secular document and was never intended to be used as a tool or weapon by any particular religion to force their beliefs on others. I thank God for this great country of ours and for the genius of our founders to keep government and religion separate. That is what makes both religion and our government in America free and dynamic. Don't succumb to FOX right-wing dictator totalitarianism and arrogant talk show sycophant mentality. Read, study and understand the U.S. Constitution thoroughly. It puts any right-wing blow-hard talk show host to shame.



Happy 4th of July to all freedom and liberty - loving Americans

Based on what I hear from my local right-wing friends there are definitely two totally different ways of looking at current events. One is from the standpoint of inhabitants of planet Foxoid and the other is from normal people back here on earth. In delusional Foxoid world President Obama stole the election and is intent on destroying America, bankrupting our capitalist system and the Christian religion. To those of us here on mother earth President Obama is an intelligent and honorable American, duly elected overwhelmingly, trying his best to help restore our economy, rebuild our integrity and improve our international standing throughout the world.



On planet Foxoid President Obama’s birth certificate proves he wasn’t born in America, is a Socialist, and is a 2nd Amendment hating atheist who will not rest until all that is good and righteous in America has been eliminated. The rest of us think that adhering to the Constitution and respecting our laws are what good citizens and leaders strive to do. Doctor killing and liberal hating Foxoidians believe that Obama is the antithesis of morality in all respects while rational people think a man who loves his wife and children and has his mother-in-law living with him in the White House, is the epitome of real family values.



Why inhabitants of planet Foxoid are so paranoid of a good man who is attempting to straighten out the horrendous mess of terrorism acts ignored, two wars (one which was based on lies), endless debt and an economic depression that was thrust upon the country by a group of irresponsible ultra-conservative neo-con sycophants, is beyond me.



But for the good common sense of the average voting citizens of planet earth we could well be in the grasp of an ever expanding cosmic vacuum black hole of debt and death led by a novice Alaskan barracuda beauty queen that winks and flirts her way into a right-wing, talk-show Foxoidian political utopia. Thank goodness a supreme power is watching out for us and keeping us from going completely out of political orbit. The change we need won’t come over night but at least we are headed in the right direction now. Give change a chance.

What is it about today’s Republicans that cause them to give up on reasoned debate and instead just distort and lie concerning the issues? The issues should be debated on merit, not lies. Case in point is the Health Care Bill presently in Congress. The ignorance and histrionics surrounding this issue is typical of right-wing talk show methods. It is a fact that Rush, FOX news and the like control and lead conservative Republican thought in this country. No right-thinking Republican elected official will dare contradict anything said by right-wing media sources for fear of national humiliation on the airwaves. How many Republican politicians have gone on Rush’s program and apologized on bended knees for having the audacity to disagree with his views? It’s a sad day in American politics when an unelected drug-addicted blow-hard talk show host runs one of our two major political parties but that is the case in today’s essentially all-white rural fundamentalist Southern regional Republican Party cult.



Republicans are in such disarray and have no constructive ideas on how to resolve the myriad of problems they created over the last eight years that their only recourse is to just try to destroy and obstruct any effort put forth by our President to resolve them. The ignorance by which they do this is astounding. The Democrats should stop trying to compromise with them and just create their own program. It is futile to try and work with a group that is dead set against any health care plan. One comment from a recent Republican critic said, “Keep your government hands off my Medicare” as though he had no idea that Medicare was a government program. That ignorant view is much like driving cross country to protest the highway system. The heath care insurance and pharmaceutical industry are so desperate to derail the health care program they have resorted to the same scare tactics and lies they used in 92 and the 60’s against Medicare and Medicaid programs. It’s interesting to note that the administrative costs of private insurance companies are 20% while the administrative cost for Medicare is only 3%. Now, you tell me which one is more efficient and cost effective.



Not to be outdone by the health insurance industry, politicians like Sara Palin and other simple-minded Republicans have hysterically claimed that the government will force death panels and make euthanasia mandatory for the elderly and disabled. That is the most blatant lie perpetrated so far but the conspiracy theorists on the right fall for this kind of tactic every time. When you can’t win the debate on the facts just lie, demagogue and scare people that don’t know any better. They continuously do this on issues like abortion and the Presidents birth certificate. Anti-abortion extremists act as though abortion wasn’t even around until 1973, ignoring the fact that countless women were maimed and died from back-alley botched abortions for decades prior to 1973. That is why it was legalized in the first place. Another lie perpetrated by the right is that the government funds abortions. This is a blatant lie but it doesn’t keep right-wing zealot nutcases from repeating it ad infinitum. Are these the kind of people you want dictating to you and your doctor if you can use birth control pills or not? On the one hand they are against abortion for any and all reasons and on the other they rail against welfare mothers who live off the government by having child after child irresponsibly. They cater to illogical reactionaries and paranoid NRA types.



These right-wing Republican domestic terrorists incite violence in unstable people and that is why so many doctors and leaders from their ideological enemy’s lists are threatened and killed with guns or anthrax. For a political party that still insists Saddam was involved in 911 and that he had weapons of mass destruction what else do you expect? Until right-wingers address the issues honestly and stop all the lying and scare tactics they don’t deserve to be taken seriously. Otherwise they should be called what they are. Dare I say it? Ignorant and dishonest. 2nd letter below



Huckabee is doing nothing else but bashing Obama and, by extension, American foreign policy while on foreign soil. And that's quite obviously precisely how it's being perceived by the Israeli press.

But in branding what I wrote as "not just inaccurate -- it is a purposed lie," Huckabee doesn't even bother to address his Obama-bashing comments which I cited.

Huckabee doesn't even bother to address his Obama-bashing comments which I cited. Instead, he simply attributes the argument to "some in the left wing of the press" (an odd way to describe the conservative Jerusalem Post) and then assumes (correctly) that his followers will do the rest of the work: anything that doesn't come out of the collective mouth of Fox News and Rush Limbaugh is presumptively false.



The Republican base lives in its own alternative, (planet) or insular reality and any unpleasant or negative facts can be waved away not by refuting them, but by attributing them to the work of "the liberal media."



His denial is totally incoherent and substance-free -- it just tosses around the word "lie" and "left-wing press" without addressing any of the evidence I cited -- but in the warped right-wing cocoon he inhabits that is all that is necessary to dispense with facts. That's why roughly 30% of the country lives in its own world and possesses its own set of realities.



Criticizing American foreign policy while on Foreign Soil) which the Right has long insisted was a terrible sin:

Remember the Dixie Chicks in London or Al Gore in Saudi Arabia or Obama in Europe? They called all three of the above mentioned treasonous. How quickly the right forgets its patriotic principals. Why is no one on the right condemning Huckabee?





2nd letter



It’s so interesting to watch and listen to right-wing extremists at Town Hall meetings and those writing conspiracy theory op-eds with ridiculous references to Nazi’s these days. I noticed a crippled lady with a life threatening disease struggle to stand up talking about how she had been consistently denied insurance coverage by her private insurance company countless times and had exhausted her life savings. So many people that are fortunate enough to even have private insurance have also been dropped because of their condition and most can’t get private insurance because of pre-existing conditions. The tragedy of this story is that while the women struggles to stand with her crutches and tell her story another loud mouth tea bagger nut-case behind her a few rows back screams, her face distorted and ugly in it's anger, ignorance and selfishness, "I shouldn’t have to pay for your health care!" And these are normal, patriotic, "concerned" citizens?”



Tell me our present system is not a sick health care policy. It is what those who are against Obama’s plan want to continue. Doing nothing is not an option. These right-wing protesters are the ones lying, abusing disabled people, hanging people in effigy, destroying property, depicting Obama as Hitler and making death threats while ignoring essential medical needs of fellow citizens. These are the kinds of people Republicans are counting on to destroy Obama’s health care plans by lying to them and provoking them with fear mongering about death panels and forced euthanasia. Our present Medicare system doesn’t require that and the proposed system doesn’t either. Purposely lying about the proposed health care insurance system is sick and so is our political discourse today.

I keep hearing how GOP lawmakers are lying about and provoking their less discerning constituents by claiming America will become Socialist if we have a health care system that allows for a public option. Many tea baggers claim they want the same excellent health-care our Congressmen have and nothing less. Well, if going to a government run hospital is so horrible why do all these Republicans that rail against it go to the very hospitals they want you to reject? Case in point: Mitch McConnell went to Bethesda Naval Hospital for a very successful elective coronary artery bypass and he didn’t have to wait. He received the best care available. John McCain had surgery at Bethesda for a cancerous melanoma. No problems. Kit Bond, senator from Missouri, went to Bethesda for hip replacement surgery. Great results! He received the best care possible. No complains from him about government run health-care. George Voinovich, senator from Ohio went to Bethesda for heart surgery and a pacemaker. Perfect outcome. No complaints. Most all government officials use government run hospitals for the best care available.

And last but not least when a grad student at a town hall meeting told G.O.P. Chairman Michael Steele that his mother couldn’t afford medication and recently died of cancer, Steele turned his back to him and the crowd of right-wingers cheered and applauded. That says a lot about who really cares about your welfare and health concerns. Politicians saying one thing and doing another and the GOP Chairman and his sycophants ignoring those Americans in need of basic health care. Now who do you trust to do what’s best for the American public? The very poor have Medicaid. Veterans have veteran’s healthcare. The retired have Medicare. The employed have private healthcare. Those who are in need are the working poor who work in jobs that don’t provide health coverage, the unemployed / laid off and their children. Since when did America reject anyone as being undeserving of the basic needs of life as listed in the Declaration of Independence?

After reading the predictable Republican comments toward my letter recently, it seems that some local conservatives are in denial about their plight in today’s political wilderness. After eight years of total failure in governing both at the executive and legislative level they can’t even admit their countless errors. I sit and listen to Republican leaders like Rudolf Giuliani and Dick Cheney lie with impunity about there being no terrorist attacks during their eight years in charge, yet they ignore the fact that they were responsible for the worst terrorist attack in American history on 911, and numerous terrorist killings from doctor murders to anthrax poisonings and shoe bombers on U.S. planes and soil. This doesn’t even include the endless bombings of Americans worldwide by terrorists over the last eight years. Neo-Cons orchestrated the collapse of our capitalistic economic system by blowing the Clinton surplus, conducting two wars on credit cards, spending needlessly with borrowed money for bridges to nowhere and refusing to regulate or offer any oversight of our banks and financial institutions. This has resulted in the worst economic decline in the last century yet they now whine constantly about the Obama team’s effort to correct these problems and get people back to work. Right-wingers would apparently prefer that Obama do nothing in response to the problems they inherited and just allow the economy to tank into a full-blown depression so they can use it in their political attacks as a means of getting elected.

To listen to my critics’ complaints, their aloof, pompous and erudite attitudes show they are detached from reality when it comes to those citizens who have no jobs or medical coverage. Could it be that is why less than 20% of our population identify themselves as Republicans? Is it any surprise that Republicans have done nothing constructive during Obama’s first year in office? They have not cooperated in any way with the new president and have voted in lock step against everything he has proposed. They are the epitome of obstructionism and seek only to gain partisan political power rather than do anything that will help Americans in their time of need. They only represent corporate and moneyed interests yet claim to be common populists. They claim not to be racists but have no black Congressmen and always vote against any minority helping bills. They walk in lock step to Fox and Rush propaganda but don’t even blush when they claim “Fair and balanced reporting.” They try to savage Senator Harry Reid and claim his recent comments were much worst than Trent Lott’s wish that the famous racist, Strom Thurman would have been elected president. That’s just a pathetically ridiculous comparison. I think most African Americans care more about what a politician does for them than any misspoken comments and on that count Republicans are very much lacking. If hypocrisy were a disease they would have a terminal malignancy.

As an independent, I for one am happy to see that Senator Kennedy’s old seat has gone to the challenger in Massachusetts. It’s about time the Dems wake up to what working class people want in this country. Hopefully Obama will learn a lesson from it. It will be interesting to see if Mr. Brown will actually be an “independent and different kind of Republican” or the same old corporate, McConnell-like sycophant who cow tows to the whims of any big money interest typical of DC Repus. If not he will be gone in two years when he is up for reelection.

Prior to Obama we had eight years of nothing but incompetence, lying, unregulated greed and needless war. I expect Obama to change more of the way Washington operates in his remaining 3 years. He has only been there for one year and has had some good successes but I feel he has been way too accommodating to corporate interests and Wall Street bankers. Now that he is listening to Paul Volcker on financial matters rather than Tim Geitner, hopefully he will reinstitute the Glass Segal Act so the “too big to fail” Banks will be reigned in and kept from practicing the same high-risk financial games with derivatives that got us into the horrible mess that Bush allowed during his time in office. That brought us to the brink of a world-wide depression and employment is still suffering terribly because of Republican irresponsibility.

The Dems have also failed in delivering health care so far because of corporate interest and political games played by conservatives in their own party. Why the unemployed and those who have no health insurance can’t be added to Medicare I can’t understand. It is shameful that thousands of people die every day as a result of having no medical insurance in this country. We can’t continue to go on as we have in the past. Health care is costing a larger percentage of families budgets each year and it must be contained. At least the Dems have tried to resolve the issue. Republicans did nothing under Clinton and Bush and have been nothing but obstructionists under Obama. They stopped reform in all areas. They could care less about those without health insurance. They only think of the haves and ignore the have-nots. The conservative Supreme Court also helps corporate and repu interests by allowing unlimited spending by business on political campaigns.

Until the Democratic Party becomes what it has always claimed to be; a party for the average person they will flounder. They are just Republican-lite in many ways. If Obama can become more of a populist I think he can succeed in doing what he said he wanted to do but in this country nothing happens without money behind it. Selling out to corporate interests will be viewed as moving to the Right and help him succeed but he will lose the hearts of those who believed he was different than other politicians. We’ll see. If he moves to help working people who really need it, the loss in Massachusetts will have been worth it.

The key to understanding the populist right's accusations that Obama is a socialist

By Michael Lind

The tea party movement may have been started by Washington lobbyists, but it has tapped into a powerful strain of American political culture — a strain that has always presented an obstacle to reform in the United States.

American political culture was British before it was American. During the English civil war of the 17th century, two themes crystallized — and have influenced American public discourse to this day. One was the idea of the Ancient Constitution. The other was the idea of the True Religion.

Many British opponents of the Stuart monarchs claimed that they were defending an ancient, unwritten English constitution against corruption in the service of tyranny. Sometimes this ancient constitution was identified with the laws of the Anglo-Saxon King Alfred, and contrasted with the "Norman yoke" imposed on freedom-loving English people by William the Conqueror and his despotic successors after the Norman invasion of Britain in 1066. As history, this was nonsense, but as political mythology this narrative had enormous appeal. History was viewed as a gradual decline into tyranny, a long fall following a golden age of English liberty in the distant past.

This myth of primordial English liberty rhymed neatly with radical Protestantism. According to dissenting Protestants, the true church was the earliest church. Christianity had been corrupted over time, and Reformation required a restoration of the early, pure practices and beliefs of the apostles.

Put the myths of the ancient constitution and the early church together, and you have a view of history as decline from an original state of perfection, in politics and also in religion. Innovation is equated with tyranny in politics and heresy in religion. Virtue consists of defending what is left of the old, more perfect system and, if possible, restoring the original government or church. Progress is redefined as regress — movement away from the wicked present toward the pure and uncorrupted past.

This way of thinking is more or less extinct in Britain, its original home, but it became an important part of the political culture of the British North American colonies that won their independence from the mother country. Having become Americans, the former British colonists found it easy to replace the ancient constitution of the virtuous Anglo-Saxons with the 1787 constitution of the virtuous Founding Fathers, who were quickly elevated to the status of demigods like the legendary King Alfred.

Anglo-American Protestants viewed Catholicism as the chief enemy of the "true religion" of Protestant Christianity well into the 20th century, and some still do. But in the mythology of the reactionary right, the United Nations has long since replaced the Vatican as the center of global conspiracies, and the alleged Catholic threat to Protestantism has been replaced by the alleged "secular humanist" threat to the "Judeo-Christian tradition."

This is the key to understanding the otherwise inexplicable accusations by the populist right that Barack Obama is a socialist or fascist or whatever, as well as fantasies about a global secular humanist conspiracy. We are dealing with a mythological mentality, based on simple and powerful archetypes. Contemporary figures and current events are plugged into a framework that never changes. "King Charles (or King George) is threatening the rights of Englishmen" becomes "Barack Obama is promoting socialism" — or fascism, or monarchism, or daylight saving time.

As in other cases of mythological politics, like messianic Marxism, this kind of thinking is resistant to argument. If you disagree, then that simply proves that you are part of the conspiracy. Inconvenient facts can be explained away by the true believers. It's hard to come up with arguments that would persuade people who think that Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi are totalitarians to change their mind.

Nevertheless, progressives cannot cede the high ground of debate over first principles to this kind of reactionary, paranoid populism and fight instead in the swampy terrain of utilitarian social science. In a debate for the hearts and minds of the American people, Ron Paul will defeat Peter Orszag every time.

Against this backward-looking version of Americanism, rooted in early modern British fantasies about the ancient constitution and true religion, progressives must deploy a counter-narrative that is equally rooted in American values. The ideas of natural rights and popular sovereignty are, if anything, more fundamental to American political culture than the idea of political or religious golden ages in an idealized past. But natural rights and popular sovereignty can be invoked on behalf of reform. The history of basing civil rights on natural rights is one of improvement over time, not one of decline. The abolition of slavery by the 13th Amendment and the nationalization of civil rights by the 14th improved the U.S. Constitution, and Franklin Roosevelt's notion of economic rights marks a further advance.

Likewise, the idea of popular sovereignty, though it dates back to John Locke in the 17th century, need not inspire reactionary reverence for existing institutions, much less a desire to restore an alleged golden age. On the contrary, the sovereign people have the right to remake their political and social order every generation or two, in order to achieve their perennial goals in changing conditions.

This was the view of Abraham Lincoln, who said in his Second Annual Message to Congress: "As our case is new, we must think anew. We must disenthrall ourselves and then we shall save our country." And it was the view of Franklin Roosevelt in 1932 in his Commonwealth Club Address: "Faith in America, faith in our tradition of personal responsibility, faith in our institutions, faith in ourselves demand that we recognize the new terms of the old social contract."

At the high level of public philosophy, the debate between the tea party right and progressives boils down to this: Do we think that fidelity to our predecessors means mindlessly doing what they did in their own time, even though times have changed? Or do we think that we should act as they would act, if they lived in the 21st century and had learned from everything that has happened in America and the world in the past 200 years?

To put it another way: The American Revolution was a beginning, not an end. The real equivalents today of the American revolutionaries are those who view the republic, not as an 18th-century utopia to be restored with archaeological exactitude, but as a work in progress to which every generation of Americans can contribute.

Let the debate begin.

Michael Lind is policy director of the Economic Growth Program at the New America Foundation