UPDATE: Reich responds.
Today I read Theda Skocpol’s reply to Robert Reich’s argument that this is what Obama should do. I have been one of those increasingly frustrated by Barack Obama’s not taking over operations from BP in the Gulf spill. I think I may be mistaken. Skocpol pointed out that it is Obama’s most malignant enemies who have been shouting loudest for a bigger government involvement – and that this should alert us to probable bad faith. I have learned that when right wing leaders’ mouths are moving, lies or bad faith are usually emerging.
Then Skocpol nailed just what that bad faith likely is: there is no solution any time soon, and the sooner the right can divert attention from corporate crime to government’s inability to do what cannot be done, the better for them. This disaster is a standing reproach to the don’t regulate” crowd so long as it is BP who is clearly responsible for the problem. They win by deflecting attention – and until the government “takes over” this is one source of their failure they cannot deflect.
I do wish Obama would come down hard on BP’s continuing attempts to control the press. These thugs are not in the Soviet Union or Nazi Germany, and should stop acting as if they were Commissars or Gauleiters.
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