Another great commentary from Robert Reich. This one on what is at stake in the 2012 elections in the US. With resonance for Progressives everywhere.
Another great commentary from Robert Reich. This one on what is at stake in the 2012 elections in the US. With resonance for Progressives everywhere.
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Hmm- So Romney is regressive, I got that, but not one mention of Obama or democrats as progressive. Wonder why that is???
Everything the regressives want to do the National-led government is doing. What’s worse, they’re repeating the identical lingo used in this video.
What does that tell us?
Jeremy, there are two reasons one Obama is not that progressive, two even to the extent that he is there is still dependence on Congress to enact progressive measures. Even with a rare Congressional majority the Democrat party is not unified around support for progressive policy, they are against the regressive Republican alternative.
Let’s aggregate all the sociopolitical positions of Americans into one single dimension. No subtlety. No ambiguity. Just black and white (definitely no grey). Two choices. A nice simple binary. The world’s much easier to understand when complexities are reduced to a binary.
How easy for moralizers to divide the world into another good vs evil dichotomy – progressive vs regressive. There is no substantive commentary in this. It is just a childish oversimplification. And to Grant this is “great commentary”?
It’s a good thing we can have all of these fights in New Zealand. When Geoffrey Palmer introduced our Bill of Rights Act he made sure it applied to corporations!
Got to be something rotten to the core with a system when it takes a billion dollar fundraiser to make a president.
And when the supreme court backs the law forcing insurance companies to provide cover for all citizens, Romney suddenly finds an extra 200 mil of donations in his account.
That’ll be democracy you hear spinning in her grave.
@ al1ens, not at all. It’s a big country. Lots going on. Takes big bucks to be heard. Even more to be understood. Even more to persuade. Even more to prompt action, like going to the polls and voting. A billion bucks is only $3.20 a head.
Never mind Robert Reich’s fine words let’s see something concrete Labour. How about a policy to make the tax system less regressive, repressive, obscurantist, and unjust? Where is the policy for the tax free personal allowance that exists in other countries? Personal income tax in New Zealand is nothing but a crushing turnover tax on the small wage earner. How many other countries place such savage consumption taxes on basic necessities? New Zealand does and Labour has no meaningful plans for reform. Far from promoting a progressive tax system it is said that some Labour MPs actually minced for joy when gift duty was abolished.
al1ens, it costs $200 mill in the US just to advertise a major car brand, and thats not anything near what the big manufacturers spend in total.
@ jennifer:
Sure advertising is expensive, but like Mr O says, it’s billionaires writing out 10 million dollar cheques. That doesn’t sound like a level playing field at all.
Even in our pretty little fish pond there are seven figure sums at play. Exclusives v Greens for example.
Does big money need to be capped to ensure a fair fight?
I think so!
@ al1ens, big money has always been involved. No problem with it. So long as it is disclosed properly. And in the US it is. The rules are very strict. Besides, the President has ‘his’ billionaires, too. Funny thing about the US, there are probably as many ‘blue’ billionaires as there are ‘red’.
@ Quoth the Raven
But surely the US situation is ‘binary’, two dimensional, call it what you like – BUT… they suffer from the undemocratic nature of a ‘First Past the Post’ electoral system, and so minorities have minimal influence. Quoth.. you must be so pleased(?) that WE have seen the light and now have, a much fairer proportional voting system! Reich certainly simplified, and ‘hyped’ the situation, but his summary is not “childish”.
Remember that he was addressing the mostly appallingly ignorant US electorate(-only 40%(!) believe in evolution… so may God help them).
Reich`s summary is sensible, and we should realise the dilemma facing the US…ie, that the unconscionably selfish ‘right’ may indirectly have a disasterous consequence on the world economy. Grant Robertson is right to warn us.
By its very nature the ‘right ‘ primarily represents existing wealth and privilige, and consequently tend to have plans to maintain their position in the ‘short term’. Sensible policy, for long term gain for all, is unpalatable,if it impinges at all on their wealth NOW! Such foolish policy is also evident with our present government?
Are you a creationist … Quoth…?
How wonderful that we can have both red and blue billionaires to scatter money enough to snuff out the voices of the 99%
Paul – Can’t you see that sensible people will disagree on just what constitutes “sensible policy for long term gain for all”? That what is needed is a substantive means to ends discussion, a rational-empirical debate, not demonisation of your opponents. Robert Reich provides no help in that regard.
Do you think that this video from Reich would open the minds of people on the opposite side as him? Or is it just closing the minds of people who already agree with him?
I’m glad we don’t have the U.S’ two party system, but we have more than enough red team, blue team, green team, partisan nonsense to have Grant import asinine hyper-partisan hyperbole from the U.S.
@ Quoth the Raven,
Do you think we are into semantics a bit?
When the state fosters intelligent discussion perhaps more NZers might carry out fruitful debate. BUT The sad fact is that our government cynically strives to dumb us down (eg termination of TVNZ7).
Even so of course,.. ‘you can lead a horse to water… but that may not help’ The US is worse – it has some good debate but so many of that great nation now seem to prefer reality TV… or worse..”Fox”type sniggering misinformation ,- and anyhow few even bother to vote.
WE should have a scrupulously unbiassed “civics’ course in secondary school before it is too late?! I understand that the ‘right’ is particularly averse to such education for our future “Mums and Dads”!… Wonder why?
Anyhow, in the cicumstances Reich`s piece is practically ‘US politics 101′?
If the ‘right’ here does not approve of his ‘take’ – then it can produce its version of ‘fact’. That is certainly happening in the States.
Of course an ex Merrill Lynch trader might have an angle, even an insight, but perhaps prefers to keep it to himself for a reason?
No, but I am going to now.
It is an unfortunate feature of political debate that we are encumbered by often vague and contradictory labels. How meaningful is the term “progressive”? Is progressivism defined by the goals in which it wants to achieve or specific means to achieve them (or both). Perhaps someone here would like to provide a definition for me. One goal could be a more prosperous society for all. Then sensible people will disagree on the means to achieve that and almost anything could be labeled progressive. In fact throughout history many things have been labeled progressive which I’m sure Grant does not want to be associated with (e.g., eugenics). Which of course is true in much of politics. This again leads to a substantive means-ends debate something which Reich does not provide.
What about values within the liberal tradition which I hold so dear like that of the individual having rights over and above any interference by the state. These are old ideas now. Ideas which were once profoundly “progressive”. Am I a reactionary or a conservative for defending them against those, who may label themselves as progressive, because they think them unfashionable and old? What is progressive and what is reactionary does not to me to be so easily clear cut. This is the ambiguity which is not expressed by Reich. This why Reich’s piece is not “practically US politics 101″. It is, as I said, a childish oversimplification.
If you actually think there was much in the way of intelligent debate on TVNZ7. We have such amazing access to information nowadays. What is stopping people from reading a book, or a journal article, or reading an intelligent blog, or watching an online lecture? Certainly they will find far more intelligent content than what was on offer on TVNZ7.
Politics itself, in the abstract sense not simply its practice, is not ideologically neutral. Unless we have a recognition of that fact you cannot have a “scrupulously unbiased civics course” and I doubt you will get recognition of that.
@ Quoth the Raven
Well..
1/…. Semantics and such
Well, what was the purpose of Reich`s video clip. I was not serious when I suggested it was ‘US politics 101′,but it was a brief summary of his take of the economic policy of the two US parties. If he analysed and posted references etc he would have very few viewers indeed. I think you are being elitist expecting everyone to dismiss information/promotion, or whatever, that does not reach your required detail.
BUT… perhaps it could be a requirement of election advertising that advertisements etc must be backed up by ‘a site’ fully justifying the statements – now wouldn`t that be interesting?
2/…The government dumbing us down- & ‘terminating’ TVNZ7
There WAS agreat deal of intelligent discussion on ’7′ – Media7 , the Court report . NZ History, Art, Literature. ‘Backbenchers’ was an excellent means of introducing ordinary NZers to politics in an engaging manner( I doubt you approved?). Perhaps there could have been more formal debate – But Quoth.., you should have suggested some?
Actually, I suspect that TVNZ was so terrified of the govenment that bald debate of political issues would involve too much hand wringing. The Nats held the whip hand and were “she who must be obeyed”?
But hey… did you follow the series of Reith lectures on ’7′? I believe they might have been right up your alley.
3/…. That we should have a ‘Civics course in schools… & the difficultiy with being idealogically neutral
You may have a point, and some parents might choose to ‘pull’ their darlings. But our society is under strain as homelife becomes ‘cluttered’ and often lacks a decent socialising, child friendly, environment. Schools are increasingly being forced to take this role. A formal ‘civics, ethics, citizenship’ course, – particularly dealing with responsible citizen behavior seems a sensible option, dont you think? Quoth, you might find it would encourage much more of the intelligent debate that you so seek!
But as I said earlier I suspect that such a course would NOT be favoured by a party that prefers its citizens are dumbed down. We will all have to wait a little while?
Up until the inter-war period extensive & socially penetrative state apparatus were rare; few nations had such capacity and those that did shied as best they could from expanding the state on the basis of the economic consensus of the age (& the Smith/Mill breed of liberalism), yet at the same time the state was inexorably expanding into policing, direct taxation, education etc. Thus those proposing “something different” were almost universally proposing an acceleration of the expansion of the role of the state (as opposed to those who seemed to be “holding back the tide”), to call this political niche “progressive” made semantic sense.
But we’re a long way down the political road; we’ve experienced the state that wished to “know everything” and states that tried to occupy every facet of the individuals life, and many forms of extremity there besides. In the past we had an obvious & untried role for the state which seemed like the obvious route to progress; now we have walked that road to its unpleasant end & we have to assess where along the way the optimum point is, and the arguments are nuanced to say the least – whether a political stance is “progressive” is now a deeply subjective issue.
“Progressive” implies an objective good and from a modern, apolitical standpoint I feel uncomfortable with any point on the political spectrum attempting to claim it.
@Grant Robertson,
Why is the Labour party taking side in another democracies election?
Don’t you think that if Romney wins the White House such actions could undermine the relationship between two future governments?
You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to work out which of the major US parties is ideologically close the Labour party, but descending into the mudslinging that is US elections is a bad idea.
How would the Labour party feel if Australian Liberal party ran adds for the National party? I imagine not very kindly!