Philosophically I'm closer to OWS than to the Tea Party. In terms of policy, I'm reluctantly closer to Clinton/Gore than to anarcho-socialism.
So why am I an OWS supporter?
I think I can put it into a picture like this ... [1]
The Y axis is volume in the American discourse; that's what enables political "courage". The X axis represent a range of governing policies. The blue box is the limits of the rational -- the range of policies that are most likely to lead to a relatively long and happy life for human civilization, democracy, and us.
Obama is to the left of that range (I'm deliberately flipping this with the conventional left/right picture of American politics.).
In the middle is GDKK - Gordon (hey, it's my blog), DeLong, Klein and Krugman -- in rough alignment with my TP to OWS spectrum.
At the right is Occupy Wall Street.
Without OWS the rationalists are at the far right of this X axis, and the "middle" of the American discussion is outside the bounds of reason. In this context a Carbon tax, for example, is inconceivably radical.
With a healthy OWS movement the volume shifts.
I think that will help.
[1] Google's drawing tool app is amazing. It's the best part of the Google Apps suite at the moment, which is saying quite a bit.
See also:
- Roots of the irrational in American politics: pre-dementia and religion 7/11
- Why is the modern GOP crazy? 7/11
- Isn't this what the GOP really thinks? 3/11
- A taxonomy of American politics (the boundaries of the rational are attitudes to the weak 2/11)
- Sympathy for the devil: Anything good in RyanCare? 5/11
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