Eenvoudiger kan het niet uitgelegd worden: er zijn twee manieren om een begrotingstekort aan te pakken, ofwel de belastingen verhogen ofwel de uitgaven verminderen. Belastingen verhogen betekent geld halen waar het zit, namelijk bij de rijken. Uitgaven verminderen betekent geld halen bij de armsten.
George Monbiot in The Guardian: "Debt deal: anger and deceit has led the US into a billionaires' coup
The debt deal will hurt the poorest Americans, convinced by Fox and the Tea Party to act against their own welfare
There are two ways of cutting a deficit: raising taxes or reducing spending. Raising taxes means taking money from the rich. Cutting spending means taking money from the poor. Not in all cases of course: some taxation is regressive; some state spending takes money from ordinary citizens and gives it to banks, arms companies, oil barons and farmers. But in most cases the state transfers wealth from rich to poor, while tax cuts shift it from poor to rich.
So the rich, in a nominal democracy, have a struggle on their hands. Somehow they must persuade the other 99% to vote against their own interests: to shrink the state, supporting spending cuts rather than tax rises. In the US they appear to be succeeding.
As the Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz points out, in the past 10 years the income of the top 1% has risen by 18%, while that of blue-collar male workers has fallen by 12%.
... a group called Americans for Prosperity (AFP) set up a Tea Party Facebook page and started organising Tea Party events.
So who or what is Americans for Prosperity? It was founded and is funded by Charles and David Koch. They run what they call "the biggest company you've never heard of", and between them they are worth $43bn. Koch Industries is a massive oil, gas, minerals, timber and chemicals company. In the past 15 years the brothers have poured at least $85m into lobby groups arguing for lower taxes for the rich and weaker regulations for industry. The groups and politicians the Kochs fund also lobby to destroy collective bargaining, to stop laws reducing carbon emissions, to stymie healthcare reform and to hobble attempts to control the banks. During the 2010 election cycle, AFP spent $45m supporting its favoured candidates.
But the Kochs' greatest political triumph is the creation of the Tea Party movement.
AFP mobilised the anger of people who found their conditions of life declining, and channelled it into a campaign to make them worse. Tea Party campaigners take to the streets to demand less tax for billionaires and worse health, education and social insurance for themselves.
Are they stupid? No. They have been misled by another instrument of corporate power: the media. The movement has been relentlessly promoted by Fox News, which belongs to a more familiar billionaire. Like the Kochs, Rupert Murdoch aims to misrepresent the democratic choices we face, in order to persuade us to vote against our own interests and in favour of his.
What's taking place in Congress right now is a kind of political coup. A handful of billionaires have shoved a spanner into the legislative process. Through the candidates they have bought and the movement that supports them, they are now breaking and reshaping the system to serve their interests."
In Europa wordt hetzelfde procédé nog eens dunnetjes overgedaan. Ook hier staan onze media bol van de aansporingen om vooral goed te bezuinigen. Dat een meerderheid van de Amerikanen dom en geïndoctrineerd is dat kun je verwachten, maar dat dezelfde goedgelovigheid in Europa heerst is een teken van uiterste domheid en kwaadaardigheid.