Complacency Kills

As successfully as the Democrats seem to be repelling Bush's assault on Social Security, we still show no conception of how to turn our defensive entrenchment into a powerful counterattack. We cheer when one of our number tags privatization as an attack on Social Security's legitimacy, but what about on the legitimacy of government?

For twelve years this Nation was afflicted with hear-nothing, see-nothing, do-nothing Government. The Nation looked to Government but the Government looked away. Nine mocking years with the golden calf and three long years of the scourge! Nine crazy years at the ticker and three long years in the breadlines! Nine mad years of mirage and three long years of despair! Powerful influences strive today to restore that kind of government with its doctrine that that Government is best which is most indifferent.

For nearly four years you have had an Administration which instead of twirling its thumbs has rolled up its sleeves. We will keep our sleeves rolled up.

We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace...business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering.

They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob.

Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me‹and I welcome their hatred.
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But they are guilty of more than deceit. When they imply that the reserves thus created against both these policies will be stolen by some future Congress, diverted to some wholly foreign purpose, they attack the integrity and honor of American Government itself. Those who suggest that, are already aliens to the spirit of American democracy. Let them emigrate and try their lot under some foreign flag in which they have more confidence.

Head here and you can listen to FDR deliver that speech. It sends chills down my spine. What have we done, that we've gone from crushing Goldwater to allowing Clinton to close out the era of big government? I'm reading about the 1993 health care battle and I'm just stunned at how we let the special interests walk all over us, barely noticing until their foot finally found our throat and stomped down. In FDR's hands, their opposition was a positive; let them mass, it was his job to repulse their assault! In FDR's eyes, those who hated America's government hated America, unlike today, when believing in our country's government is somehow inimical to the ethos of this country. Which one is more logical? How the hell did we lose that rhetorical battle?

In his excellent book The 2% Solution, Matt Miller quotes Bill Bradley on health care saying, and I paraphrase, "Democrats are still scarred from 1994. They can't think big anymore -- they're afraid to go back into the dark room where the bad thing happened." But Christ on a bumper sticker, I'm tired of our post-traumatic stress syndrome. This isn't even hard! Which seems more sensical in the ideological makeup of a patriot: believing our government an incompetent coagulation of bureaucracies or a force for good? And which seems more likely to strengthen the party: painting Republicans as bad on Social Security or painting them as a bunch of ideologues determined to destroy the programs that help average men and women?

Now that Republicans are reeling from running into the brick wall of the foundational Democratic program, wouldn't it make sense to toss their ideology an anvil? Half our number seems to think we need to close the Social Security battle now while the other half wants to draw it out and win it closer to midterms. What about widening our attack so the counteroffensive takes some time and does larger damage? How about using the "crisis" language and the fact that Bush's Medicare pperversion is a much larger economic fiasco to propose fight for changes that'd make it more cost-effective, more progressive, and force Bush's promised veto? How about forcing Bush to roll back his tax cuts to fix Social Security's shortfall, and demand that he not starve government to satisfy his radical ideology?

In 1993, we made the critical mistake of letting health care languish on the backburner. The screw-up proved fatal, as the time we spent publicly crafting it without promoting it gave the Republicans the breathing room to form their coalition for the killing. Initially, everybody loved Clinton's ideas, public approval beat disapproval by 32%(!); months later, we didn't have enough shovels to bury all our fallen congressmen. If we sit here, pleased as punch to neutralize their offensive but lacking the killer instinct to land the follow-up blows, they're going to rally their troops, commission their ads, buy their spots, and push back. And we're going to fall down. Because for them, this isn't a legislative scuffle but a philosophical war. FDR would have agreed. Why don't we?