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‘Pity the Billionaire: The Hard Times Swindle and the Unlikely Comeback of the Right’ by Thomas Frank

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January 01, 2012|By Michael Washburn

(jacob thomas for the boston…)

Welcome to election year - we’ve started our initial descent. The Iowa caucus looms, and in 310 days the polls will open and we’ll respond to the ludicrously expensive carnival of recrimination, strategic cynicism, and merciless sanctimony of campaign politics. The next 11 months will deliver much over-hyped stagecraft and little statecraft. Rather than a substantive debate on the most fundamental issues confronting the country - issues that reveal radically different conceptions of politics and human nature, such as how best to steward the physical health and financial security of our fellow citizens - what we’ll receive is a series of well-financed caricatures of political engagement.

None of this is surprising.

What is surprising, according to Thomas Frank’s “Pity the Billionaire: The Hard-Times Swindle and the Unlikely Comeback of the Right,’’ is that the American right not only retains legitimacy but has thrived despite the 2008 economic collapse and ongoing recession, the direct consequence, he says, of ever-expanding conservative influence. “Pity the Billionaire,’’ which inaugurates the extended political publishing season, offers a spirited, acerbic, stylish exploration of this Republican resurrection.

Frank, a columnist for Harper’s Magazine and the author of “What’s the Matter with Kansas?,’’ argues that for 30 years the country has been enthralled by conservative fiscal experimentation. The presidency changes hands, yes, but in economic terms neoliberalism has moved the country consistently rightward, lowering regulatory standards, hobbling organized labor, and encouraging an illusion of personal liberty at the expense of economic security. Experiments often end in catastrophe, which is precisely what happened.

“In 2008,’’ Frank writes, “the country’s financial system suffered an epic breakdown, largely the result - as nearly every credible observer agrees - of the decades-long effort to roll back bank supervision . . . . And yet, as I write this, the most effective political response to these events is a campaign to roll back regulation, to strip government employees of the right to collectively bargain, and to clamp down on federal spending.’’ In essence, the right managed to convince a large number of its followers that fuel was the best way to extinguish the fire.