Chinese Fire Drill, Musical Chairs or Food Fight?
‘Scuse me for belaboring the obvious, I’m thinking about these as analogies even as I write. A popular nonsense prank in the 50’s was the Chinese Fire Drill, where a car full of teenagers would stop in the middle of traffic, then everyone would get out of the car, run around it for a few seconds, then jump back in. The car would then move on as if nothing would happen (with irate drivers behind them). You could say that given our election system’s built-in Incumbency Protenction Plan(tm), this is a good description of what happens during a U.S. national election.
Musical Chairs is an old kindergarten game, where the players walk around a circle of chairs while music plays, and when it stops, everyone tries to sit down. The catch is, there are always one more player than there are chairs to sit in, and whoever is left standing when it’s time to sit down is “out.” One might say that some elections are musical chairs in reverse, where the number of chairs remains constant but the number of people to sit in them increases.
The term “food fight” needs no explanation. :D
Right now, “word on the street” is that the Dems will take back the House, and the Senate will prolly split 50-50. Will that happen, or will electoral machinations, well-timed propaganda, and the general fiestiness of the electorate turn things onto a different path?
Dunno. I don’t see the Democrats taking the Senate easily – but I do see the possibility of the Republicans losing the Senate majority in a scandal; the blame-game that the GOP fought so hard against post-Katrina is now in full swing, and just like a food fight, anyone who looks vulnerable and who can get the heat off you is going to catch some institutionally-processed pizza in the face. About the only potential good thing in all this is that you can be sure that the chaos of American politics very neatly mirrors the chaos in the world outside our borders (draw whatever conclusions you wish about this). About the only people that aren’t gnawing on their boots in frustration and/or anticipation are the Bidnessmen. Even with Pelosi’s declaration of the Democratic House’s first hundred hours:
House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi is thinking 100 hours, time enough, she says, to begin to “drain the swamp” after more than a decade of Republican rule.
As in the first 100 hours the House meets after Democrats _ in her fondest wish _ win control in the Nov. 7 midterm elections and Pelosi takes the gavel as the first Madam Speaker in history.
Day One: Put new rules in place to “break the link between lobbyists and legislation.”
Day Two: Enact all the recommendations made by the commission that investigated the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Time remaining until 100 hours: Raise the minimum wage to $7.25 an hour, maybe in one step. Cut the interest rate on student loans in half. Allow the government to negotiate directly with the pharmaceutical companies for lower drug prices for Medicare patients.
Broaden the types of stem cell research allowed with federal funds _ “I hope with a veto-proof majority,” she added in an Associated Press interview Thursday.
All the days after that: “Pay as you go,” meaning no increasing the deficit, whether the issue is middle class tax relief, health care or some other priority.
To do that, she said, Bush-era tax cuts would have to be rolled back for those above “a certain level.” She mentioned annual incomes of $250,000 or $300,000 a year and higher, and said tax rates for those individuals might revert to those of the Clinton era. Details will have to be worked out, she emphasized.
So why isn’t Bidness worried? Read on.
“We believe in the marketplace,” Pelosi said of Democrats, then drew a contrast with Republicans. “They have only rewarded wealth, not work.”
“We must share the benefits of our wealth” beyond the privileged few, she added.
Because as long as the marketplace is king, then all Bidness has to do is adapt, not truly change – and the amount necessary to “reward” the poor in this country is chump change compared to what the wealthy actually have. Since the Senate is even more allied with Bidness than the House, I see anything that the wealthy find particularly troubling meeting a grisly end there. Consider it the Contract on *coughs* with America in reverse.
So, my prediction for the midterm elections is this: musical chairs in execution, food fight in style, and chinese fire drill in the largest part of its effect. How effective that remaining small part will be what makes or breaks the country for the next twenty years, especially in those unaddressed areas of increasing fundamentalism and militarism in our society. The Badger thus prognosticates, and wanders off in search of more caffiene.
((BTW, that computer repair didn’t go so well, seems part of the problem was a fault on my motherboard. The good news is that I have a new motherboard on the way, and should be back to ranting on my own computer soon.))
