Over the last 40 years, Republicans trashed “big government.”They sought to “starving the beast”—attacking what they called “entitlement programs,” insisting on privatization and deregulation, and eviscerating any robust conception of the public good. 1/
The devastation of Covid-19 and what is happening in Texas are the latest examples of how bankrupt this idea about government is. We need to toss aside the debate between “big and small government” and insist on responsible/transformational government. 2/
Government should reflect our national values; at every level, it should be charged with ensuring the background conditions necessary for all Americans to flourish. We have to get clear about what those values are and what the background conditions should be. 3/
The assault on “big government” has been a ruse for some to rob the public coffers blind. The result has been devastation: a planet clinging to life, a deteriorating public infrastructure, and Americans left vulnerable to the whims of markets, storms, and greedy people. 4/
We have focused our attention these last four years on the chaos of Trump—and, to some degree, rightly so. But we MUST acknowledge the bankruptcy of a particular political ideology. The frame of Reaganism must finally be rejected by both parties. 5/
That doesn’t mean a return to the politics of the New Deal or the Great Society. It doesn’t mean a return to any of the “isms” that defined the 20th century. It means we need a new frame—we need to imagine a different way of being together as a nation. 6/
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