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View Full Version : Derbyshire: War against the Middle Class




Cowlesy
05-01-2010, 01:46 PM
Piece of Radio Derb's transcript below:

http://www.johnderbyshire.com/Opinions/RadioDerb/2010-04-30.html


03 — War against the middle class. To tell the truth, as regular listeners will know, screaming isn't really Radio Derb's style. If it's a foam-flecked rant you're wanting, go watch Keith Olbermann. When I need a scream, I get one of my research assistants to fake one. Candy, would you do us the honors please? [Scream] Thanks, Honey. And this is kind of the problem. Allow me to elaborate.

I've always liked the American middle class, since I first encountered them forty years ago. What's not to like? Middle-class Americans are polite and hospitable, generous and kind, law-abiding and patriotic. This is indeed, as my colleague Florence King once tagged it, the Republic of Nice. The problem with being so nice, however, is that the un-nice will take advantage of you. They'll bully and manipulate you. They'll turn you against your neighbor and make you feel bad about yourself, using your own generous values as a weapon against you, in a sort of politico-cultural ju-jitsu.

American political life today isn't really a struggle between two parties; it's a struggle between the political and the un-political — between, on the one hand, activist ideologues and cynical rent-seekers, and on the other, mild middle-class types who'd rather just get on with living their lives and raising their families while bothering with politics as little as possible. Class-wise, it's not the rich against the poor: It's the rich and the poor united against the middle. The overclass has allied with the underclass to milk the middle class. By way of fortifying the alliance, the overclass is keen to import tens of millions of high school dropouts from Mexico, to keep the ranks of their underclass allies well filled up with cannon fodder, and to make it easier to browbeat the middle class with charges of racism if they dare to raise any objection to alliance advances and usurpations.

That's the context in which this fuss about the Arizona law should be seen. The United States today is a gigantic press, the overclass looking for cheap profits and cheap grace, the underclass looking for free benefits and make-work jobs in the public sector, and in between them the poor old American middle class having the blood squeezed out of it to pay for everything. Should the middle class try to rebel, as they have with the Tea Party movement, all their good-natured values are turned against them. They're told that they are full of "hate," when there has never in the history of the world been a body of people less inclined to hatred than middle-class Americans. They're told they are Nazis, when their fathers and grandfathers suffered and died to destroy Nazism. They're told that they're nativists, when they've been turning the other cheek for decades as foreigners pour into the country in defiance of our laws. They're told they're "anti-immigrant," when half their own parents and grandparents were immigrants.

As the overclass sneers at them and the underclass threatens them, America's middle class soldiers on, keeping the country going, keeping the lights on, getting up on cold winter mornings to feed their families, perform their civic duties, mind the laws, pay their own bills, and then pay all over again to support the underclass, even as the underclass swells with foreign scofflaws, swamping our schools, hospitals, courts, and prisons.

Well, guess what: middle-class Americans can still vote. Because they are too decent to care about politics, they don't always vote wisely, but once in while they get to have their own way, passing a law that throws sand in the gears of the overclass-underclass alliance. Then all hell breaks loose from both ends of that alliance. The overclass lays down thundering barrages of rhetoric about "hate" and "Nazis" and "profiling," while Al Sharpton and La Raza mobilize to march and break a few middle-class windows. That's what you've been seeing this week: the outrage of the politicals, that the un-politicals dare to defy their will — which is, as they never cease to remind us, rooted in the highest ideals of morality and social justice, never in self-interest. Not at all!

Interesting take.

I have always thought there was something to the elite using the uber-proles to further their policies, while the middle-class people are left walking in circles in the middle.

malkusm
05-01-2010, 01:52 PM
Awesome, thanks for posting....I think he's dead on, but I think the rich/poor alliance is really the rich manipulating the system and using the poor to justify their actions.

Stary Hickory
05-01-2010, 02:41 PM
This is really accurate. The rich/poor alliance. Rich use the poor for manipulating the democratic system to maintain power and control. In the process making the middle class smaller and smaller and increasing it's power.

Very sickening.

bobbyw24
05-01-2010, 02:43 PM
Read of the day

aravoth
05-01-2010, 02:50 PM
This is really accurate. The rich/poor alliance. Rich use the poor for manipulating the democratic system to maintain power and control. In the process making the middle class smaller and smaller and increasing it's power.

Very sickening.

This is the way it's always done.

Government is a revolving door of people that made a fortune off of expolioting the fears of middle america. They use the poor to guilt the middle into submission, while promising the poor everything under the sun.

The "Forgotten Man" is the American middle class.

amy31416
05-01-2010, 04:33 PM
Perhaps this is cognitive dissonance on my part, and I'm sure it is to an extent--but I believe that this article points out some really interesting and true points, yet I still don't think the AZ law is a step in the right direction.

Anti Federalist
05-01-2010, 05:02 PM
In three...two...one...


http://redwing.hutman.net/~mreed/Assets/howlers.jpg


Howlers generally populate academic, technical or special interest forums. Newbies to such forums often wander in thinking they have found some devastating new argument or special insight on the forum topic on interest, but unless the forum has been recently formed an active discussion group will probably have heard and debated the argument at length. So instead of being welcomed into the bosom of the group the newcomer is forced to flee under a shower of invective.


Piece of Radio Derb's transcript below:

http://www.johnderbyshire.com/Opinions/RadioDerb/2010-04-30.html


03 — War against the middle class. To tell the truth, as regular listeners will know, screaming isn't really Radio Derb's style. If it's a foam-flecked rant you're wanting, go watch Keith Olbermann. When I need a scream, I get one of my research assistants to fake one. Candy, would you do us the honors please? [Scream] Thanks, Honey. And this is kind of the problem. Allow me to elaborate.

I've always liked the American middle class, since I first encountered them forty years ago. What's not to like? Middle-class Americans are polite and hospitable, generous and kind, law-abiding and patriotic. This is indeed, as my colleague Florence King once tagged it, the Republic of Nice. The problem with being so nice, however, is that the un-nice will take advantage of you. They'll bully and manipulate you. They'll turn you against your neighbor and make you feel bad about yourself, using your own generous values as a weapon against you, in a sort of politico-cultural ju-jitsu.

American political life today isn't really a struggle between two parties; it's a struggle between the political and the un-political — between, on the one hand, activist ideologues and cynical rent-seekers, and on the other, mild middle-class types who'd rather just get on with living their lives and raising their families while bothering with politics as little as possible. Class-wise, it's not the rich against the poor: It's the rich and the poor united against the middle. The overclass has allied with the underclass to milk the middle class. By way of fortifying the alliance, the overclass is keen to import tens of millions of high school dropouts from Mexico, to keep the ranks of their underclass allies well filled up with cannon fodder, and to make it easier to browbeat the middle class with charges of racism if they dare to raise any objection to alliance advances and usurpations.

That's the context in which this fuss about the Arizona law should be seen. The United States today is a gigantic press, the overclass looking for cheap profits and cheap grace, the underclass looking for free benefits and make-work jobs in the public sector, and in between them the poor old American middle class having the blood squeezed out of it to pay for everything. Should the middle class try to rebel, as they have with the Tea Party movement, all their good-natured values are turned against them. They're told that they are full of "hate," when there has never in the history of the world been a body of people less inclined to hatred than middle-class Americans. They're told they are Nazis, when their fathers and grandfathers suffered and died to destroy Nazism. They're told that they're nativists, when they've been turning the other cheek for decades as foreigners pour into the country in defiance of our laws. They're told they're "anti-immigrant," when half their own parents and grandparents were immigrants.

As the overclass sneers at them and the underclass threatens them, America's middle class soldiers on, keeping the country going, keeping the lights on, getting up on cold winter mornings to feed their families, perform their civic duties, mind the laws, pay their own bills, and then pay all over again to support the underclass, even as the underclass swells with foreign scofflaws, swamping our schools, hospitals, courts, and prisons.

Well, guess what: middle-class Americans can still vote. Because they are too decent to care about politics, they don't always vote wisely, but once in while they get to have their own way, passing a law that throws sand in the gears of the overclass-underclass alliance. Then all hell breaks loose from both ends of that alliance. The overclass lays down thundering barrages of rhetoric about "hate" and "Nazis" and "profiling," while Al Sharpton and La Raza mobilize to march and break a few middle-class windows. That's what you've been seeing this week: the outrage of the politicals, that the un-politicals dare to defy their will — which is, as they never cease to remind us, rooted in the highest ideals of morality and social justice, never in self-interest. Not at all!

Interesting take.

I have always thought there was something to the elite using the uber-proles to further their policies, while the middle-class people are left walking in circles in the middle.

Anti Federalist
05-01-2010, 05:07 PM
All kidding aside, JD is correct in his assessment of the problem, although, like Amy, I'm not at all convinced giving the cops even more power is the right solution.

The NWO has really gotten us backed into a corner here, where every possible solution is shouted down.

They are masters at what they do, that is, destroy nations.

EndDaFed
05-01-2010, 05:25 PM
I don't understand this theory. Who stands to gain from no more illegal immigration the poor, the middle class, or the rich? More unskilled labour in the workforce would mean that the poor would be hurt the most. The middle class would benefit from cheaper services, and the rich would benefit as well due to cheaper unskilled labour costs. So from the perspective of someone in the middle class it would be best to have no welfare or immigration laws. The poor are generally more often than not anti illegal immigration. Under our current system it's the elderly that suck the most off the state with medicare and social security. Just look at the budget to see that. Which works out given that they are one of the biggest voting blocks and will remain so for many decades (baby boomers). Even so those are indirect benifits. The worst comes from government contracts, special regulations that drive out competition, and bailouts that the wealthy use to leach from the system.

AuH20
05-01-2010, 05:37 PM
If you destroy the middle class, you can reshape the country to your liking. The middle class or bourgeoisie usually are the most independent, principled and aware socio-economic class. This engineered deconstruction has been carried out time and time again throughout history in various locales.

AuH20
05-01-2010, 05:42 PM
I don't understand this theory. Who stands to gain from no more illegal immigration the poor, the middle class, or the rich? More unskilled labour in the workforce would mean that the poor would be hurt the most. The middle class would benefit from cheaper services, and the rich would benefit as well due to cheaper unskilled labour costs. So from the perspective of someone in the middle class it would be best to have no welfare or immigration laws. The poor are generally more often than not anti illegal immigration. Under our current system it's the elderly that suck the most off the state with medicare and social security. Just look at the budget to see that. Which works out given that they are one of the biggest voting blocks and will remain so for many decades (baby boomers). Even so those are indirect benifits. The worst comes from government contracts, special regulations that drive out competition, and bailouts that the wealthy use to leach from the system.

You're replacing an American resistance with a class of people who are more receptive to central planning. Secondly, illegal immigration allows employers to literally circumvent natural wage increases and neglect the allocation of a viable insurance programs for those employees. The state and subsequently the taxpayer is soaked with the exorbitant bill whether it's increased school taxes, medical coverage expenditures and the like. It's a transfer of wealth not unlike the bailouts.

EndDaFed
05-01-2010, 05:51 PM
You're replacing an American resistance with a class of people who are more receptive to central planning. Secondly, illegal immigration allows employers to literally circumvent natural wage rises and the allocation of a viable insurance programs for those employees.

That is what you get when you have a prohibition on something.


The state and subsequently the taxpayer is soaked with the exorbitant bill whether it's increased school taxes, medical coverage expenditures and the like. It's a transfer of wealth not unlike the bailouts.

The same could be argued about the poor that already live here. This is just an argument against welfare.

silverhandorder
05-01-2010, 05:54 PM
That is what you get when you have a prohibition on something.



The same could be argued about the poor that already live here. This is just an argument against welfare.

Exactly it is an argument against welfare. First we need to stop that, then we can have open borders.

Cowlesy
05-02-2010, 04:57 PM
Perhaps this is cognitive dissonance on my part, and I'm sure it is to an extent--but I believe that this article points out some really interesting and true points, yet I still don't think the AZ law is a step in the right direction.

Perhaps it is cognitive dissonance on the author's part, as he is a naturalized citizen (as is his chinese wife) that went through the entire process, legally.

Agorism
05-02-2010, 05:23 PM
audio for this?