Politics and Cultivated Stupidity

Charles PierceHow can anyone possibly look at the past 14 years and conclude that the modern Republican party can be trusted to “make the economy favor regular people again”? The party of deregulation, privatization, obstruction, and Mitt Freaking Romney? Well, one reason is that there is no apparent opposition to it on the core economic issues. There has been lip service, and moans of impotent frustration, and Tim Freaking Geithner as Treasury Secretary. So kids come to believe the darndest things…

Yeah, this is about a kind of willful detachment and deliberately cultivated stupidity on the part of what is still allegedly a self-governing people. But it’s also about every Democratic politician who made The Deficit more of a priority than stimulating the economy, all the Democratic politicians who fed Vaal on the Simpson-Bowles fiasco, and every Democratic senator in a “red” state, most of which took the brunt of the collapse right in the teeth, who chose austerity because that’s what “my constituents” want. This is Creationism in a political context, true. But it’s Creationism that both parties pitched to the country. Come next Tuesday, we may see the true triumph of calculated and crafted ignorance. Nice job, everyone.

—Charlie Pierce
Kill Me Now

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