Part Three Of The Five Part Series-Don't Be Upset With Us, At Least We're Not Republicans! 

Examining the actual role of the Democratic Party In post Reagan America.

In the interest of brevity, I have chosen not to give George H. W. Bush an intallment of his own in this series.  I would rather just make a brief mention of the fact that he was Ronald Reagan's Vice President and his "kinder and gentler" administration was, pretty much an extension of the Reagan Presidency.

Bill Clinton made a point of telling the beleagured middle class that he feels their pain.  I really doubt that's the case because, to this day, his support of "free" trade has caused pain and suffering to middle class families.  I am going to focus on the free trade aspect of his presidency and not on the overstated sex scandals or on his failed attempt at healthcare reform. 

Bill Clinton was a strong supporter of globalization. He believed that, in a modern world, "free" trade was the way of the future. He didn't believe in our country using tarriffs as trade barriers to protect American industries. He actually believed and could say with a straight face that, while open markets would cost some Americans their jobs, we would get more and higher paying jobs in exchange as foreign countries opened their markets to our exports. Yeah, right!

President Clinton supported NAFTA, GATT and other trade agreements that eventually helped to send American manufacturing overseas at an accelerated rate.  Believe it or not, Bill Clinton actually granted China "Most Favored Nation" trading status! As a matter of fact, President Clinton's views on "free" trade were no different that that of Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Newt Gingrich or most other Republicans.

Needless to say, many unions are very uncomfortable with Bill Clinton's trade policies.  Recently, Bill Clinton helped Blanche Lincoln Defeat Bill Halter in an Arkansas Democratic Primary campaign for a US Senate seat.  He appeared in television advertising with a message that said that unions are interfering with local Arkansas politics by supporting Bill Halter.  Unions are starting to feel that some Democrats are biting the hand that feeds them.

By now, you can probably see a pattern forming:
1- The Reagan administration, with it's attack on unions, did major damage to the middle class and the American dream.  Reagans penchant for deregulating the very government agencies that protect the American citizen from corporate excesses has given corporations unbridled power that the robber barons of the past could only envy.  The working person is on his way to becoming a mere serf.

2- The George H. W. Bush administration was essentially a continuation of the Reagan administration.

3- The Democratic Clinton administration, which should have been the light at the end of the Republican tunnel for working people, was just an oncoming train.  His "free" trade agreements would make a "free" market Republican blush, they ushered in the era of job offshoring, US factory closings and the rise of China as a manufacturing power.  Clinton's deregulation of the FCC helped to concentrate TV and radio station ownership into the hands of a few major corporations. His administration also instituted the concept of auctioning broadcast licenses to the highest bidder.  I also want to mention the fact that his banking deregulation laid the groundwork for the mortgage crisis.

The pattern has been that Republican administrations take our country in a pro-corporate, anti working person direction.  We always expect a Democratic administration to correct any damage caused by the preceeding Republican administrations, that never seems to happen.  This pattern will become more apparent in the two final episodes of my series.

 Next: Part Four, George Bushwhacks America!

Part Two Of The Five Part Series-Don't Be Upset With Us, At Least We're Not Republicans! 

Examining the actual role of the Democratic Party In post Reagan America.

Let's take a look at the role today's broadcast media plays in the success or failure of a candidate's political campaign. Politicians are addicted to campaign ads. They need to run tons of ads and have friendly PACs and thinly veiled, corporately funded, issue oriented pressure groups run ads that help them advance their campaign. Translation, he who runs the most ads or has that done for him usually wins.  This takes money: To quote Max Bialystock in the classic Mel Brooks comedy film, The Producers, "money is honey".  To quote the great philosopher Jack Wade, "In today's America, bucks buy ballots".

I'm not saying that our politicians have always needed to finance major TV and Radio advertising campaigns to the extent they are today, I am saying that certain changes in the basic structure of the American broadcast media make that essential to any campaign. Prior to the Reagan administration and it's passion for deregulating government agencies that protect the public interest, the FCC was a model government agency.  FCC regulations made sense and were there to protect the public's interest.  The regulations regarded the broadcast spectrum (TV channels and radio frequencies) as being a natural resource, owned by the American public.  An FCC license wasn't a corporate right, it was a privilege to be earned by proving that you can operate the station, to quote the radio act of 1927 and the communications act of 1934, "in the public interest, convenience and necessity".  A corporation or individual got to keep that station license as long as they could prove that they were good stewards of a valuable public resource.

The FCC protected the public interest in inumerable ways, here are a few :
The Fairness Doctrine: This policy said that stations must dedicate some time to discussing issues that are devoted to the public interest and that stations must provide equal time for opposing viewpoints on controversial issues. The fairness doctrine was eliminated by a Reagan appointee to the FCC, Mark S. Fowler.
Technical guidelines: Rules that required stations to have a licensed chief engineer were eliminated under Reagan regulatory appointees.  The station owners became responsible for technical standards or lack thereof. 
Station Ownership: The number of TV stations an entity could own was expanded under Reagan.  This was nothing compared to the changes that took place to TV and Radio under Bill Clinton. I like to call him Reagan to the 10th power. 
Cable was deregulated in many ways under Reagan!

What we are now left with is a broadcast media that is owned by a few corporate entities. Local radio is usually either an automated music format or worse, a syndicated right wing talk show. A couple of right wing talk shows seem to pop up in every town in the country, like a fast food franchise.  Do you think there's a corporate agenda involved?  The sad thing is that "our" candidates did nothing to reverse this. As a matter of fact, in my opinion, Bill Clinton did more to turn our broadcast spectrum over to corporate interests than any Republican. Changes made to regulations on his watch have station licenses auctioned off to the highest bidder. I've devoted an entire installment to him in this series.
 
Individual votes no longer matter. Wholesale votes, the kind that are delivered by an effective television and radio advertising campaign are all important.  The broadcast media has become a King and Queen maker for hire.  As previously noted, he or she who has the most bucks wins!  Guess where they get the bucks to run ads?  This situation jeopardizes our very existence as a democracy! We can and must fix this! 

Next: Part Three, Bill Clinton Saw The Thousand Points of Light!

Part One Of The Five Part Series-Don't Be Upset With Us, At Least We're Not Republicans! 

Examining the actual role of the Democratic Party In post Reagan America.

Ronald Reagan's ideaology was a product of the years that he spent as corporate spokesman for and contracted employee of General Electric.  Reagan's time with GE was sort of a political conversion process. When he joined GE, he was a Democrat who was once a union president (Screen Actor's Guild).  He hosted GE Theater on CBS and, as part of his duties for GE, gave "inspirational" speeches that expressed the company's position on various issues to employees at various GE plants and locations.  Reagan also made the rounds in the rubber chicken dinner circuit, giving those "inspirational" speeches to civic and community groups in small town America, mostly in the South and Midwest, in so called "Right To Work States."
GE was also training other people to become corporate spokespeople and carry their message.

During his time with GE, Reagan learned the labor relations and other theories of Lemuel Boulware, a GE Vice President  of Labor and Community Relations. In union circles, he was notorious for inventing a "negotiating" technique known as "Boulwarism" or the "Boulware Contract", where the company representative puts one offer on the negotiating table and tells the union representative that "this is our first, final, best, and only offer".  This take it or leave it technique was later declared to be an unfair labor practice by the National Labor Relations Board.

By the time Reagan completed his contract with GE, he was a devout "free" market conservative who knew how to deal with unions. You might say, he was destined to become a newly minted corporatist President, a de-facto corporate Manchurian candidate.  I wonder how many other corporations had similar spokesmen training programs?

He got to put all that political "training" into practice between 1981 and 1989, during his two terms as president.   In 1981, Reagan broke up PATCO, the Air Traffic controller's Union, fired PATCO members for striking and brought in replacement workers.  That action sent an all important signal to America's corporations that it was open season on unions.  Reagan poured salt on the wound by appointing anti-union people to the NLRB, the Federal agency that regulates union/employer relations.  This was the beginning of the end for the middle class and the American dream.

Ronald Reagan was a firm believer in "free" trade and proposed the ideas behind NAFTA during his campaign in 1979.  As you will see in another part of this series the NAFTA concept was actually implemented by a Democratic administration.  Needless to say, "free" trade is a cancer that attacks middle class jobs.

Deregulation was another Reagan specialty.  He believed that government shouldn't stand in the way of corporate profits.  Many government regulatory agencies became rubber stamps for the industries they regulate as the agency ranks were filled with Reagan appointees.  I have personal experience with the effects of deregulation on the broadcasting industry, which I will cover in the next installment.

Next: Part Two, Television & Radio, A.K.A. The Crack of Politicans!