[lbo-talk] doom

Scissors MacGillicutty scissorsmacgillicutty at gmail.com
Sat Mar 25 09:26:15 PST 2006


These are important points lost on many who, by temperment, favor incremental change/partial reforms. There's nothing wrong with incrementalism as long as it actually leads to further *increases*. Good criteria for evaluating a proposed increamental change might to ask if opens possibilities for further advances and if it makes sense as part of a larger strategy. If the answers to both questions are yes, then fine. If the answer to either is no, then back to the drawing board.

smg

On 3/25/06, Jim Farmelant <farmelantj at juno.com> wrote:


> The kind of incrementalism that Nathan seems to be advocating
> here, lacks the kind of strategic sense that exists on the Right.
> The Right is interested in building up over time a constituency
> that will perceive themselves as not benefiting from social
> programs like SS or Medicare and the way to do that is enact
> relatively limited reforms that will divert segments of the
> population out of these programs into privately-based schemes.
> Nathan's strategy seems to one of enacting narrowly based
> programs that will benefit relatively small portions of the
> population and hope that the beneficial consequences of these
> programs will convince others to support broader programs.
> But that seems unlikely to happens. Supposing that Nathan
> is successful in getting his narrow-based programs enacted
> into law, these programs will be very vulnerable to cutbacks
> and outright abolition under future Republican administrations,
> since the GOP will always be able to make the argument to
> voters as to why their hard earned tax money should be
> spent on programs that benefit "others," while providing
> no benefit to themselves. US political history over the
> past thirty years suggests that this has been a winning
> political strategy for the Republicans.
>



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