Topix Underground

"...Which, of course, is why rightwing billionaires and the Republicans they own have been working so hard in the decades since the Reagan Revolution to break our government.

They want a series of terrible crises. And if they don’t happen organically, rightwingers are more than happy to create them, as we saw yesterday when Republicans in the House of Representatives refused to do anything about our southern border or to fund aid to Ukraine and the Palestinians.

Back before the Reagan Revolution — when things were working well, a third of America had a good union job, our schools were brand-new and well supplied and staffed, college was free, healthcare was inexpensive, and the biggest challenge America had was to put a man on the moon and bring him safely home — there was little demand for a dictator in this country.

Sure, women, Blacks, and queer people were demanding rights and their fair slice of the pie, but they wanted part of a pie that was already working (to mangle a metaphor). For the majority of white Americans to adopt a strongman authoritarian, first the country had to be broken and broken badly.

Republicans and their billionaire donors have been working on this project for decades.

It was originally proposed in a memo by Lewis Powell in 1971, the year before Nixon put him on the Supreme Court and he authored the decision legalizing corporate bribery of politicians..."

Things were working well? Carter and Nixon were before Reagan. We were coming off an oil embargo. I believe the unemployment rate was about 8% under Carter. Interest rates through the roof.