If Austerity enjoys this degree of support from all sides of the political spectrum, why is it a crisis? A crisis for whom?
For over 2 centuries capitalism, in all its phases, has been a continuing (and growing) disaster for most of the global population. The famine in India (mentioned in Capital) brought about with cheap textiles from Manchester, is only one of many such. Quite aside from the present Austerity and Repression in the (former) "capitalist core,' one can mention the continuing horror in Iraq and the terror being visited on the Honduran people (with enthusiastic support from the Obama Administration).
The problem is not the Republicans, or even the vicious policies of the Obama Administration, but capitalism.
When I objected earlier in the year to Lou's absurdity re capitalist "greed," he gave the weak reply that he wrote for a general audience -- but _that_ is THE mistake; it is precisely when writing or speaking for a general audience that it is essential to put the blame on capitalist relations, not cover and in effect excuse those relations by hauling in petty squawks about "greed" -- in fact greed was far worse, more fundamental, in _pre-capitalist_ social orders than it is at present.
Neoliberalism (Austerity & Repression) has triumphed. There is no economic crisis. There is no group whose immorality can be blamed. We face naked capitalism. The crisis, if there ever was one, is over.
Carrol