Politics as usual in DC and the world ignores the real needs of the Sixth District in KY | Opinion
“Our political class does not govern. It entertains. It plays its assigned role in our fictitious democracy, howling with outrage to constituents and selling them out. The squad and the Progressive Caucus have no more intention of fighting for universal healthcare, worker’s rights or defying the war machine than the Freedom Caucus fights for freedom.” Chris Hedges
There was an obscure wedding years ago. The heirs of today’s institutional Republicans and Democrats pledged, to each other, to forsake all others. It probably happened while The Old Schoolhouse Bur Oak was a sapling emerging from the Lexington Limestone of the inner bluegrass. The South Elkhorn ran nearby at today’s Harrodsburg Road and Military Pike. Hedges speaks to achieving neo-liberal domestic policy; the same techniques are needed to gather domestic support for a globalized Washington consensus.
The differences in our two major political parties, with a few exceptions, remain cosmetic. There’s enough bread to keep us fed and plenty of circuses to keep us entertained while some nasty business ensues, at home in the Sixth District, and around the world. Who decides the national interest of the United States is a parochial and insular crowd whose concerns are alien and counter to those of the average American citizen. Foreign and domestic policy aligns with the desires of major political donors. The repeal of Glass-Steagall and the invasion of Iraq are but two of an extended family of cousins.
Congressional leadership, from both parties, owe their careers to the patronage of the managers and owners of the commanding heights of the economy. The political parties’ Presidential candidates must pass an even finer filter to meet the purity standards of finance capitalism, the war and surveillance state, and the drivers of the institutional structure that guides key industry. The thinnest survey of a Congressperson’s or Presidential candidate’s campaign finance filings reveals who pays who for what. At night, when Representative or Senator X retires to the interior of their mind, hopefully, how compromised they are determines their sleep.
By voting billions of deficit spending, spanning many presidential administrations, Congress has funded the production and delivery of the lethal weaponry demanded by the Israeli Knesset. Who accounts for this money? The State Department manages public relations and a compliant national media sells the Palestinian Shoah as essential to the security of the US.
For 40 years we have ignored Russian opposition to the expansion of NATO and the EU. The war deaths of civilians and the destruction of immense parts of Ukrainian infrastructure may have less to do with a madman’s passions than with a President who yields no more to NATO.
Where our foreign aid is plenty, it’s economic austerity for the Sixth District and for Kentuckians in general. I’ve been around the Sixth a bit lately. I’ve seen some prosperity, but most county seats beyond a few blocks are dilapidated. Our towns are languishing despite the efforts of the good people in them. We know what the toll booths of late capitalism feel like. Among the freedoms that “free enterprise” enjoys is the pro-creditor orientation of our legal system. Congress has abandoned large areas of the country and by doing so denies that there exists the “public” or the public welfare. Today’s Congress is the embodiment of a fictitious Democracy, scheming both domestically and abroad. A new new deal is in order. Massive spending on infrastructure, a debt jubilee for the most ruinously indebted, and single-payer health care are a few policies that have historical purchase and that would benefit many of us in Kentucky.
Todd Kelly is a nurseryman and gardener from Lexington.