My father used to say that the trouble with the Republican party was its generalized contempt for the labor movement. He was not original with this but today, thinking of him and of the current flap over George W. Bush’s characterization that recent economic problems in the U.S. occurred because "Wall Street got drunk", I’m mindful of how intellectually bankrupt the G.O.P. has become. Now that there’s no labor movement to kick around, and now that the middle class has been damaged beyond recognition, now that most of the wealth has been sucked out of the republic by the top 3 per cent of the nation’s wealthiest citizens, now that this money has been transferred to Dubai or the Caymen Islands, well, it’s clear to me that the final insult to America is that the plutocrats will trivialize the entire collapse of the financial infrastructure of the middle class. I’m glad my father isn’t alive to see this. I really am. Wall Street got drunk and now it’s having a hangover. What a simpering, cynical ass you are, Mr. President!
S.K.
Planet of the Blind 