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OK, let me start by talking about Mel Gibson for a minute. Bear with me, this is actually relevant.
Back in 2000 Gibson made a movie, The Patriot, about the Revolutionary War. (I think I saw it on an airplane). And when the movie came out, Michael Lind wrote an essay that has stuck with me, pointing out that nobody involved in the picture seemed to know what patriotism means. The Gibson character was presented as a man who refused to get involved until his own family was hurt — then, he went to war for personal revenge. And this was supposed to show his patriotism.
As Lind said, the truth is that that’s more or less the opposite of patriotism, which is about making sacrifices for the national good, not serving your personal motives or interests.
Which brings me to the subject of this post, the apparently equally misunderstood concept of hypocrisy. I’ve been getting some personal attacks on this front, but it’s a bigger issue than that. Here’s the personal version: suppose that you’re a professor/columnist who advocates higher taxes on high incomes and a stronger social safety net — but you yourself earn enough from various sources that you will pay some of those higher taxes and are unlikely to rely on that stronger safety net. A remarkable number of people look at that combination of personal and political positions and cry “Hypocrisy!”
Wait — it’s not just about me and the wingnuts. If you remember the 2004 election, which unfortunately I do, there were quite a few journalists who basically accused John Kerry of being “inauthentic” because he was a rich man advocating policies that would help the poor and the middle class. Apparently you can only be authentic if your politics reflect pure personal self-interest — Mitt Romney is Mr. Natural.
So to say what should be obvious but apparently isn’t: supporting policies that are to your personal financial disadvantage isn’t hypocrisy — it’s civic virtue!
But, say the wingnuts, you say that rich people are evil. Actually, no — that’s a right-wing fantasy about what liberals believe. I don’t want to punish the rich, I just want them to pay more taxes. You can favor redistribution without indulging in class hatred; it’s only the defenders of privilege who try to claim otherwise.
Lind’s essay about Mel Gibson ended with concerns that we may have lost the sense of what citizenship and its duties mean. Indeed. If people can’t comprehend what it means to work for larger goals than their own interest, if they actually consider any deviation from self-service somehow a sign of phoniness, we, as a nation, are lost.
I think the argument you made could've been applied to someone living in SoCal, Vegas or Miami during the 00's. When, not if, the FedGov jobs bubble bursts, the area will be taken down as a whole. Yes, there are private organizations with people earning good money, but even with both earners getting, say, 150-200K each, the most they can afford is 3x their income (assuming a 10-20% down payment which is hard enough as it is), which puts them in a 900K - 1.2M house. I understand that your typical Vienna house at least 30-40 years old is priced at around that amount. I'm afraid that with the downfall of FedGov, Inc. the private organizations that rely on that recent growth of FedGov, Inc. could be in for a hell of a time. One couldn't be more heavily exposed to a real crisis in the area. And, once the recent buyers jump ship, turning in their keys to save themselves from being 300K underwater, the rest will follow right along like dominos. Of course, if you bought long ago and haven't tapped into your home for equity you should be fine.
Don't say I didn't warn you. (Just like I warned the SoCalers in 2004).
I've lived through several recessions in the DC area and they were not easy. DC is not the same as it was back lets say the 70s, times have changed, the US although going through a rough time is still the most powerful country in the world drawing people all over the globe.That is not going to vanish and neither is the federal government in our life time. Like I said our home prices did take a hit, mine declined in price $200,000 from its peak. My plan is to sell soon and pay cash for my next house across the Potomac.
Payne: Occupy Michael Moore | themichiganview.com | The Michigan View (http://detnews.com/article/20111031/MIVIEW/110310354/Payne--Occupy-Michael-Moore - broken link)
Quote:
This is the same One Percenter - his conspicuous wealth includes a sprawling mansion on Torch Lake and a swanky pad at 200 Park Avenue in New York - who received a $1 million Michigan government handout to make his anti-One Percenter movie, "Capitalism: A Love Story."
In addition to taxpayer subsidies, Moore's wealth comes from multinational corporations like Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment - a subsidiary of Sony that distributes his film, Fahrenheit 9/11 (box office gross: $222 million), on DVD.
Oh goodness, he's been exposed, just like all fat cat, liberal hypocrites should be.
I've lived through several recessions in the DC area and they were not easy. DC is not the same as it was back lets say the 70s, times have changed, the US although going through a rough time is still the most powerful country in the world drawing people all over the globe.That is not going to vanish and neither is the federal government in our life time. Like I said our home prices did take a hit, mine declined in price $200,000 from its peak. My plan is to sell soon and pay cash for my next house across the Potomac.
FedGov, Inc. doesn't have to "vanish". They will decrease in size by 25-40% pretty easily, and pretty rapidly. Power is irrelevant to this occurring. The Soviet Union transformed from world power to almost turd world overnight. A lot of things changed overnight during the 2008 crisis, and I would imagine the same will happen after the FedGov, Inc. bubble bursts. Combined with increasing interest rates on the horizon and the dragged out dissolution of Fannie/Freddie, I would imagine we could have a rather fun time ahead for many in those areas.
Like I said, you have less to worry about if you paid long ago. The coming NoVA housing crash won't mean as much to you since you won't be underwater.
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