He looks like one of the nerdy guys in your high school or college yearbook, right? You know the type I mean. This is the guy who sits alone in the back of the cafeteria during lunch, thumbing through a fat book on Greek mythology or advanced calculus. But with this particular nerd, the book was probably something along the lines of business or issues management strategy.
Never heard that last term? Well, I hadn’t, either, until I Googled, Who is Grover Norquist? He refers to himself as an issues management strategist. To me, that’s fancy speak for someone who manipulates how people think about issues. You know, political and social issues that actually impact people’s lives.
Norquist has never been elected to a public office. Yet, he managed to convince 238 house members, 41 senators, 13 governors, and 1,249 state legislators to sign a pledge that they would oppose all tax increases. He was able to do this, apparently, because his organization, Americans for Tax Reform – ATR – has millions of members who – oh shudder, be afraid – might vote you out of office if you disobey the pledge. And he’ll do that by galvanizing, you know, the loyal right wing troops.
When I look at this guy’s photo, when I hear him speak on TV, I cringe. I feel soiled. This is the man, after all, who says that allowing the Bush tax cuts to expire in 2012, as they’re slated to do, is the equivalent of raising taxes. Yet, the $4 trillion that would be raised as a result would help to cut the deficit and save the social programs like Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security from severe cutbacks. Programs that seniors and the poor depend on.
As one author put it in the Huffington Post, “Master Norquist, you see, says that allowing said cuts to expire as promised is raising taxes, and he’s willing to demolish any Republican who says otherwise. The facts apparently have no place in this matter, so it’s a very small step to say — as many are right now — that Master Nordquist and his friends at Koch Industries are deliberately destroying the Republican Party — not to mention the nation…”
When the Super Committee met to discuss how to cut $1.5 trillion from the federal budget, they failed to reach any consensus. As Senator John Kerry, a member of the committee said, “But unfortunately, this thing about the Bush tax cuts and the pledge to Grover Norquist keeps coming up. Grover Norquist has been the 13th member of this committee without being there. I can’t tell you how many times we hear about ‘the pledge, the pledge.”
What about the pledge all members of Congress take to uphold the constitution? If so many members of Congress are adhering to a pledge they made to a guy who was never elected, then they apparently don’t give a damn about we, the people. You know, the people who are losing homes and jobs, the 99 percent for whom the so-called American dream is fading. Norquist exemplifies everything that’s wrong with government.
There’s obviously no sychro here. But with the world perched at the edge of some sort of paradigm shift, it seems important to pinpoint some of the individuals in the dying paradigm who fight to maintain a status quo that serves the few at the expense of the many.
This man represents a small, special interest group that is clandestinely, and contemptuously, endeavoring to control the American people, and the future of our world and children. If they continue to succeed, everything we “pledge alliegence to the flag” for will be a lie, a joke, an empty gesture. Every benefit we enjoy, from clean air to education to roads we can drive our cars on to social security so seniors don’t just die in the streets comes from “government” – without government there is only anarchy, and violence.
What we should really be frightened about is the banality with which this is happening, the passivity with which the American people are allowing it to happen, the gradual loss and erosion of a true democracy.
But not totally passive. The Occupy movement is like what started in the 60s. There’s hope here. There’s always hope. People re waking up now, I think.
No one should have that much power. No one. At least we know what evil looks like. Sometimes its not a snarling demon like Dick Cheney. Sometimes its a benign-looking nerd. Norquist is most famous for the quote that he wanted to shrink government to the size where it can drown in the bathtub. The guy sounds psychotic to me.
Good point. Not a sneering face like cheney’s, but a nerdy face.
Thanks for this important post…….I hope it spreads far and wide, and perhaps, with your permission, I could copy it into my own (usually very non-political) blog?
Living close to the border, one is always aware of the Mexican illegals who die in the desert as they attempt to get into the U.S. in order to work for $5.00 an hour. I used to naively wonder why they had so little, considering that Mexico has as many natural resources as the U.S. But the truth is that Mexico has always had a very corrupt government, and the core of their problem is that 5% of the population owns everything, and everyone else is mostly impoverished and uneducated, and that keeps them powerless.
Groups who exploit and control the majority, whether they’re feudal aristocracy, Norquist, or even drug mafia, are nothing new in human history. Perhaps what has been extraordinary has been that democracies were ever able to occur. I am so saddened by what seems sometimes like the demise of our own.
You bet, Lauren, post it!
That’s alright. When the GOP are voted out of office for not doing anything to fix the country’s problems Norquist will lose all credibility. Look at the polls – the GOP are losing ground with all voters for their ability to sit their rears in office and do ABSOLUTELY NOTHING.
Then they leave for the holidays.
Can’t really comment as I haven’t heard of Grover or the ATR before – though I did just look this up on Wikipedia quickly. What did catch my eye in your post was that he has “never been elected to a public office.” This must be the annoying part (in the UK we have Europeans like this influencing our laws etc) to think that such people have so much influence on government policy. Unfortunately many politicians seem to be willing agree to anything to keep themselves in power – beliefs go out of the window.
For some of these politicians, you have to wonder if they ever had any beliefs or conscience at all.