I make a pretty good living as an airplane driver. I like what I do, usually things are pretty routine, and once in a while I am pretty surprised that they pay me what they do for me to do what I do. But then, suddenly, I'll find myself working pretty hard to salvage a good outcome when things just don't go according to plan. It could be a weather problem, killer storms along a route of flight or lingering at the destination airport. It could be an ill passenger or a failing airplane system; maybe a flock of birds insisting on the right of way. While even complex jobs don't required the ultimate in expertise at all times and in all places, when things go to shit in today's complex world everyone hopes there is an expert at the wheel. I am a firm believer in letting an expert do an expert's job.
I think it is fair to suggest that the economy has gone to shit. The problem is, there does not appear to be an expert in the house anywhere. As usual, the fight in the US is described as being between one of two choices. There is the right; conservative / cut taxes / cut spending / supply-side economic model that declares itself to be the real capitalism. Then there is the left: Keynesian / increase taxes / deficit spending model that sees capitalism as a good system so long as it is carefully regulated. (Out in the rest of the world somewhere is Socialism - the evil boggy man the frightens all the children of America.)
All of which is a puzzle. The administration of Bush II cut taxes. Jobs went away in masses. President Obama has kept the Bush era tax cuts in place; and has proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that tax cuts do not equal job growth. Clearly just cutting taxes has nothing to do with jobs; the right wing model simply doesn't seem to work. The same Bush II administration spent money like a drunken sailor...including starting two wars. President Obama has spent even more money. In spite of this river of money flowing in to the military / industrial complex and trillions of tax dollars spent to salvage Wall Street, the economy is still on its ass. The left wing model doesn't seem to work either. Once upon a time in the Bush administration (the right - thank you) it was claimed that deficits do not matter. Now there are people on the left claiming the same. (The right having changed its mind on the matter.) Spending money one doesn't have? I don't know of anyone who really thinks deficits don't matter when it comes time to pay the bills.
What seems clear to is that neither the left or the right as the slightest idea of how to run an economy. Which is actually what I kind of expect. The economy of any first world nation is at the leading edge of social evolution. New ideas, new discoveries, new products and services based on those discoveries, a tumult of continuous creation. Part of the tumult are new ways of measuring wealth and new ideas of how to build social structures. Parallel to that economy is the social discussion of what constitutes the moral use of wealth, new appreciations for the toll accumulating wealth takes on the planet and society, and a growing reluctance to have economics dictated from the top down. Which is why both models, left and right, must fail.
Currently the experts on the left and right are looking backward, trying to keep the future at bay by preserving top-down economic structures. The "top" for the left is political / government structures. The "top" for the right is the bankers, capitalists and corporate elite. (The right, in this case, is a lot more subtle than the left, buying the political /government structures, but still dictating from the top down.) On the left is the government, on the right business, both trying to dictate the terms on which everyone else can accumulate or disperse resources. And, though both sides are loath to admit it, there is quite a bit of cross-pollination between the two. There are no active political leaders in the US who do not have massive personal fortunes to protect. That need trumps any call to service they might feel and is reflected in the regulations they enforce (or remove), the subsidies they hand out and the in the tax codes they write.
No tax code will ever be perfect. But I can't help but think that one which determines a certain amount of tax on a certain amount of income, no deductions, no loop-holes, wouldn't be a damn sight better than the one we have now. Most important, it removes the ability of law makers to punish some individuals for making legal choices, (small families and renters) while rewarding others (large families and buyers). Why should those who chose to have small families or rent their home subsidise those who have large families and buy? The same kind of top-down pressure is applied in countless ways. Why should those who give money to a church (which uses most of that money for buildings and salaries) get a tax break while those who simply give money to hungry or homeless people don't get the write-off? People who buy a new car might get a tax break, used car buyers get no such help. People who buy a new corporate jet get a tax break, but not used jet buyers. (That's a weird one, isn't it?)
The same should hold for corporations. Oil companies, wind generator suppliers, cigarette manufacturers, distilleries, car builders...it doesn't matter. So long as what the company supplies is legal, the taxes on their income should be the same. As it is now maybe oil companies, using the influence they have in the political arena, get a tax code that hampers the wind generator manufacturer from getting a toe-hold in the market? (Has anyone ever seen any evidence that corporate entities actually like competition - regardless of the propaganda they employ?)
It may be true that tobacco companies are evil empires that sell the most addictive drug known to man to the young and the foolish. It may be true that oil companies are not often the good guys. Automobile manufacturers want to sell big cars that guzzle fuel because those units provide the largest margin of profit, and profit is what they do. It is what they should do. It is what society needs them to do. But the preferences of those who make up a society are best satisfied when the corporations are all treated the same.
[There is a whole different discussion needed on how to keep corporations doing what they do, providing goods and profits, while keeping them from trashing the environment and killing workers. No thinking person would call for abolishing environmental laws or allowing companies free reign in advertising under the guise of first amendments rights of free speech. On the contrary deliberate false advertising should carry a mandatory 1 year jail sentence for anyone involved in writing, production or distribution of such attempts at lying to the public - and that includes political adds. (Lies presented as truth is the tool of top-down power structures.) People might make stupid choices, but they should be informed stupid choices. But these musings are about taxes and subsidies and bottom-up vs. top-down economic and social structures.]
On the flip-side, all government subsidies should be halted as well. Why subsidise corn and sugar, not green beans or squash? My guess is that corn and sugar interests own more politicians than do green bean and squash growers. Why should be subsidise oil producers and not those who build wind generators? Once again we see a top-down enterprise able to project their views and/or desires. Removing all such subsidies is a bottom up move.
Will that "fix" the economy? Maybe. Maybe not. But at least we can get a clean look at what is going on. Everyone who makes money pays taxes, and at the same rate for the same income. Products go on the market for a price that bares some relationship to the cost of production and distribution. More of the people, more of the time, are then free to make their own decisions on how to spend what they have. Making those choices is very essence of a bottom-up society and reflects the continuous evolution of human society. All economic policy should be written while looking forward, knowing that it must reflect that reality.
As top-down structures falter under the weight of wide spread information sharing and demands for a fair shake from the bottom, some new economic experts have to emerge. More likely is that whole new economic structures will emerge and jinn up some economic experts in the process. I have no idea what those structures might be, but I suspect it they will be wildly different than anything we have yet imagined. The most valuable commodity in the world is knowledge, information, and the wisdom to use them well. And yet the price of knowledge and information is falling drastically as our ability to share them increases exponentially. Soon, as in a matter of years, the most valuable thing, the one thing human society needs to survive, will be a thing that requires no money to acquire. Already one can go on-line and study virtually any subject up to a collegiate level - math, writing, science, economics, weather, plate tectonics, history, physics - it is all there for the taking. One has to attend a bastion of "higher education" and spend thousands of dollars to get a piece of paper that certifies one has mastered the knowledge. But anyone can gain access to the knowledge with an Internet connection.
Our current economic models simply do not fit in the society that is evolving around us. Someday soon our economies will have to reflect rewarding a person for what they know, what they can do, how skilled they are in networking with others having knowledge needed to finish a project, and how well that project satisfies a need that society as a whole has uncovered. An economic system that simply rewards the powerful will fail for that power, based mostly on controlling and withholding information, will simply melt away. (The claim that knowledge is power isn't exactly true. Knowledge is power only when I know something you don't know.) The vanguard for the change can be seen in the actions of every tyrant in the world, every religion, every political party battling for supremacy. They all know the threat that knowledge poses for their top-down power structure. They all seek to restrict access to learning and understanding in order to preserve the world as they want it to be. And they all engage in relentless propaganda, which is just cover talk for lying to the public in order to keep knowledge out of their collective hands.
The chaos in today's economy is partly due to pure stupid. (Cutting taxes does not make jobs. Massive deficit spending can not "grow" an economy.) It is partly due to the pervasive corruption of a government bought and sold by economic interests. (Such corruption lives because it hides behind the ignorance of those being abused. Does anyone think this government and this Supreme Court is actually going to make campaign finance transparent without a fight?) And it is partly due to the many character flaws an evolving band of tribal apes carried down from the trees. To some lesser degree we are still a bit xenophobic, greedy, self-centered and prone to violence. (The knowledge that we are an evolving band of tribal apes is, itself, under constant assault by those who need religion in order to cling to power.)
Right now all of our economic experts are wedded to economic systems rooted in the past. We need some new experts at the wheel.
Friday, May 18, 2012
Wednesday, May 9, 2012
Stumbling into renewal
The T-party fanatics continue to toss long-time Republicans aside. It is any one's guess when the time will come to admit that the GOP has been completely converted into the party of religious - corporate lunacy; but it must be close (if it isn't here already). The doctrines of the T-party, religious extremism and exclusivity, not-so-subtle racism and xenophobia, class warfare and exploitation of labor and resources, unrelenting fear mongering, war and the unrestrained hatred of nearly everyone for nearly any reason, are the very politics that have lead to the decline and fall of civil society and democracy. The idea that more of the same will somehow salvage the future of the USA as a political entity in the world is like thinking that a 5-pack a day smoking habit will cure a case of 3-pack a day, stage 4 lung cancer. It probably can't make the prognosis any worse - imminent death is imminent death - but it certainly won't make it any better.
If there was some hope that the USA could be cured the T-party would never have moved to a place of prominence in either party. Rather it would have remained like the KKK or the American Nazi party; loud, ugly, an embarrassment to any thinking human being, but basically inconsequential in the large scheme of things. That the T-party has moved to a place of prominence and influence is a symptom of the disease, like the fluid filling the lungs of our cancer patient. It suggests that the illness has about run its course and final arrangements should be made.
T-party types love to howl that they are trying to save America, and if America somehow fails to elect them to power it will be the end-of-the-world. They also like to hint that, should Americans not be smart enough to realize that T-party lunacy is the only hope, taking the reins of power by force would be truly patriotic on their part. They are wrong on all counts.
Their definition of a "saved" America is a Christian / Corporate / Military machine that rules the world, and American citizens, with blunt forced trauma. It will never come to pass. Doctrine pure religion, including Christianity, is an illusion that is failing all of its own. Corporations are very good at some things, but ruling isn't one of them. No group of people, no matter how affluent, can afford a military machine that can conquer the world. The world is not so easily ruled, and not all American Citizens are so easily cowered. The America the T-parts dreams of creating would be a nightmare. The effort to build such a place is guaranteed to fail.
The failure, however, will not be the end of the world. After all, the land isn't going anywhere. Many, maybe even most, of the people are going to survive. From the ashes of the failed experiment that was the United States of America something different, maybe even something new, will rise. What ever happens will be chaotic of course, rebirth always is. But that is the way evolution works. There has never been an Internet before, never been near universal translations that will soon allow pretty much any person on the planet to chat with any other person. Though there are still a lot of secrets around, there are not as many as there once where. Any thing that any person learns or knows can soon be known by nearly everyone else. Never in the course of human history have we built a civilization with that kind of capability. Put bluntly, we don't know how to do it and are mostly along for the ride as it evolves.
Clearly the forms of civilization that evolved before will not fit in this new environment. Top-down power structures, (which is the definition of most religions, corporations, governments and tyrants) simply can't survive. There will be no air for them to breathe, no land which will support their weight, no food to keep them alive. Conservatism, as back-lit by the T-party, is terrified and angered by this encroaching doom. The anger, hatred, and endless allusions to violence give evidence to their fear. And to some degree it is completely understandable. Surly the Doe-doe bird, if it could, would have rebelled against the changes that lead to its extinction. Top-down power structures are the Doe-doe birds of society's evolution; current America (as well as much of the world) is built of top-down power structures.
See it unfold. The power structure goes ape-shit crazy over gay people. They decry the end of civilization, pass idiot laws defining "marriage" (a miniature top-down power structure of its own that is in rapid decline), and think that somehow that will turn back the tide of civilization's evolving knowledge that gay is not evil, it isn't a choice, and that it isn't the gay people who are doing harm, it is those who hate gay people and insist on the right to tell other people how to live and who to love. If the polls are to be believed, 50% of the people in America have figured this out, which points to the coming extinction of the T-party types and religious dinosaurs. Another clue? Just a few dozen years ago no one even talked much about gay rights and homosexuality; it was a completely hidden issue. Now? All over the world civil societies (Which even includes parts of the USA - how amazing is that?) are granting full civil rights to the gay community.
Civil rights for, and the empowerment's of, women, follow a similar path. Though the sad reality is that women are still routinely abused over much of the planet, that abuse gives way as societies encounter education and...well, truth. Catholic and Islamic ideology are particularly guilty of mistreating and oppressing women; and I suppose they will continue to do so as long as women continue to cling to those religions. (That women remain Catholics or Muslims is one of the real mysteries in the world.) Overall though, I think it is safe to say that the fairer sex has made up a lot of ground over the last few hundred years, and this in the face of the violence and abuse visited upon them by virtually every religious tradition.
According to the people who run the organizations, organized, doctrinally driven religions, are shedding followers at an alarming rate. At least it is alarming for those making a living from such organizations. But what they see as humanity loosing its way I see as humanity shaking off illusions. And that can't be anything but a good start.
What I, (and I hope there are others like me) hope is happening is the beginning of the end of any social structure whose purpose is to allow the few to impose their will on the many. And that, brothers and sisters, is a whole new world.
If there was some hope that the USA could be cured the T-party would never have moved to a place of prominence in either party. Rather it would have remained like the KKK or the American Nazi party; loud, ugly, an embarrassment to any thinking human being, but basically inconsequential in the large scheme of things. That the T-party has moved to a place of prominence and influence is a symptom of the disease, like the fluid filling the lungs of our cancer patient. It suggests that the illness has about run its course and final arrangements should be made.
T-party types love to howl that they are trying to save America, and if America somehow fails to elect them to power it will be the end-of-the-world. They also like to hint that, should Americans not be smart enough to realize that T-party lunacy is the only hope, taking the reins of power by force would be truly patriotic on their part. They are wrong on all counts.
Their definition of a "saved" America is a Christian / Corporate / Military machine that rules the world, and American citizens, with blunt forced trauma. It will never come to pass. Doctrine pure religion, including Christianity, is an illusion that is failing all of its own. Corporations are very good at some things, but ruling isn't one of them. No group of people, no matter how affluent, can afford a military machine that can conquer the world. The world is not so easily ruled, and not all American Citizens are so easily cowered. The America the T-parts dreams of creating would be a nightmare. The effort to build such a place is guaranteed to fail.
The failure, however, will not be the end of the world. After all, the land isn't going anywhere. Many, maybe even most, of the people are going to survive. From the ashes of the failed experiment that was the United States of America something different, maybe even something new, will rise. What ever happens will be chaotic of course, rebirth always is. But that is the way evolution works. There has never been an Internet before, never been near universal translations that will soon allow pretty much any person on the planet to chat with any other person. Though there are still a lot of secrets around, there are not as many as there once where. Any thing that any person learns or knows can soon be known by nearly everyone else. Never in the course of human history have we built a civilization with that kind of capability. Put bluntly, we don't know how to do it and are mostly along for the ride as it evolves.
Clearly the forms of civilization that evolved before will not fit in this new environment. Top-down power structures, (which is the definition of most religions, corporations, governments and tyrants) simply can't survive. There will be no air for them to breathe, no land which will support their weight, no food to keep them alive. Conservatism, as back-lit by the T-party, is terrified and angered by this encroaching doom. The anger, hatred, and endless allusions to violence give evidence to their fear. And to some degree it is completely understandable. Surly the Doe-doe bird, if it could, would have rebelled against the changes that lead to its extinction. Top-down power structures are the Doe-doe birds of society's evolution; current America (as well as much of the world) is built of top-down power structures.
See it unfold. The power structure goes ape-shit crazy over gay people. They decry the end of civilization, pass idiot laws defining "marriage" (a miniature top-down power structure of its own that is in rapid decline), and think that somehow that will turn back the tide of civilization's evolving knowledge that gay is not evil, it isn't a choice, and that it isn't the gay people who are doing harm, it is those who hate gay people and insist on the right to tell other people how to live and who to love. If the polls are to be believed, 50% of the people in America have figured this out, which points to the coming extinction of the T-party types and religious dinosaurs. Another clue? Just a few dozen years ago no one even talked much about gay rights and homosexuality; it was a completely hidden issue. Now? All over the world civil societies (Which even includes parts of the USA - how amazing is that?) are granting full civil rights to the gay community.
Civil rights for, and the empowerment's of, women, follow a similar path. Though the sad reality is that women are still routinely abused over much of the planet, that abuse gives way as societies encounter education and...well, truth. Catholic and Islamic ideology are particularly guilty of mistreating and oppressing women; and I suppose they will continue to do so as long as women continue to cling to those religions. (That women remain Catholics or Muslims is one of the real mysteries in the world.) Overall though, I think it is safe to say that the fairer sex has made up a lot of ground over the last few hundred years, and this in the face of the violence and abuse visited upon them by virtually every religious tradition.
According to the people who run the organizations, organized, doctrinally driven religions, are shedding followers at an alarming rate. At least it is alarming for those making a living from such organizations. But what they see as humanity loosing its way I see as humanity shaking off illusions. And that can't be anything but a good start.
What I, (and I hope there are others like me) hope is happening is the beginning of the end of any social structure whose purpose is to allow the few to impose their will on the many. And that, brothers and sisters, is a whole new world.
Thursday, May 3, 2012
Good guys and bad guys
It is always hard to tell the good guys from the bad guys. In the first place no one is completely good, no one completely bad. In the second place the unintended consequence of a bad guy's effort might turn out to be a good thing, while the unintended consequence of the good guy's best effort might turn out to be a disaster. As an example take Hitler's rocket technology, developed to drop explosives on Britain, it grew to put the satellites into space that under gird much of the world's economy. On the other hand most of our society's efforts to eliminate poverty look to be a miserable failure. Uncounted billions of dollars spent, more and more people are poor.
And then, sometimes, good people just do bad things; and, sometimes, bad people do good things. So sorting them out and deciding who to support and stand with isn't very easy. Adding to the confusion is the difficulty in simply getting any real information. To hear tell (depending on which media outlet one chooses) President Obama has never done a good thing in his life, nor Mitt Romeny a bad thing. (FOX) Or, the President is the best thing since sliced bread (whole wheat of course) while Mr. Romeny is the epitamy of an evil corporate and social devil. (MSNBC) It is, of course, in the economic interests of both these outlets to keep the left-right, conservative-liberal, capitalist-socialist diatribe running at full throttle; outlets and pundents both make a good living selling ring-side tickets. Would anyone actually bother with Mr. O'Reilly or Mr. Schultz were they not bomb-throwing cheerleaders for their respective political squads?
(American politics seems like just another big sports franchise. Teams square off against each other to win or lose, but the most important thing is that they provide entertainment for the fans. Ultimately the "teams" are all on the same side, seeking to please the same sponsors, and desperate to keep the public thinking that what they do is actually important in any meaningful way in the real world. Clearly, if football, (American or EU style) basketball, baseball and NASCAR all faded from view next week, most of the people on this planet wouldn't notice. I suspect the same can be said of America's current "two-party" political fantasy. The system has ground mostly to a stop when it comes to actually representing or providing leadership. Most Americans want out of Afghanistan, long ago understanding the war to be a complete failure and waste of lives and resources. Obama just signed a "strategic agreement" that keeps us in the middle of the Muslim civil war for at least another DECADE. Most Americans are not homophobic and don't see any reason to fear gay marriage - hell, many Americans have given up on the institution of marriage all together. Has that altered the political debate at all? Virtually every American tax payer knows that the tax code is a joke. The political parties talk about the failure to lead, but they don't actually do anything to address it. The tax code benefits the political, military and corporate elite - it isn't likely they will allow it to be changed much. Can any society, where the public will on war, taxes, and basic civil rights is being routinely ignored by the political leadership, really call itself a "democracy"?)
So, how to tell the good guys from the bad guys? I've gotten to here...
If the talk is of "Law and Order" that is a bad guy. The law and order types inevitably mean they want to write the laws and give the orders. (A lot of them imagine they hear the voice of god in their heads, and it is his [never her] orders being passed along.) The good guys talk of a fair and just society.
If the talk is of "personal responsibility" that is a bad guy. What is usually meant is they do not want to be held responsible for fucking you silly. They have the police on their side. They write the laws, jiggle the tax code, dictate what regulations are applied, then blame you for not being able to "beat the house." The poor are responsible for being poor, though they lack access to health care, and quality education, and even find that transportation is hard to find even should anyone hire them. The homeless aren't largely physically or mentally handicapped, they are just lazy and reaping god's punishment for not being good workers and consumers. Good guys talk about civil societies and level playing fields.
"Gun control?" That is a good guy. "Gun control" does not equal "taking every one's gun away so the government can bust down your front door and put a homosexual in your bed". (Okay, that is a stretch, but not much of one in the paranoid world of the NRA.) "Second Amendment rights?" That is a bad guy. He wants the right to hide a weapon on his person that he can use to kill you. Mind you, in spite of what the NRA might want to have us believe, (or see as a reality) that vast majority of us don't see a need to carry a gun with us everywhere we go. (There is that whole "democracy" thing again. Virtually every person I talk with, including gun lovers, see a need for enforcing responsible gun laws. A reality that has no impact on a government bought and paid for by NRA and gun manufacturer dollars.)
"The Ten Commandments..." There is a religious fanatic and most likely a bad guy. His Ten Commandments take president over anything you think your god might have written. They take president over anything enlightened people in a free society might have decided for themselves. This guy will use his Ten Commandments to judge you in a civil court in a society where religion and government are supposed to be separated. Oddly enough, those who champion the Ten Commandments the loudest love war and the death penalty (in spite of #6). They do seem to have a lot of mistresses or boy friends (in spite of #7). Number 8 apparently doesn't apply to the natural resources of another nation or a workers wages. They are completely immune to #9 when it comes to people of other religions, beliefs, or political views. As for #10, violating it is the basis for a god-inspired, capitalist society. Religious good guys shy away from invoking the Ten Commandments...though maybe that is due mostly to the hypocrisy of their fundamentalist brothers.
"Deregulation." That is a bad guy. There are a lot of silly regulations loose in our society, but the anti-regulation crowd never seem to be talking of those. The regulations they hate are the ones that cost corporate profits but save worker's lives and protect their health, protect the environment for the next generation, and prevent those in power from abusing the rest of us. The good guys are pretty sure a first world society is built on thoughtful regulations equally applied to all.
Not an exhuastive list of course, and not 100% accurate. But it seems a pretty good kind of "every-day" guide to who is a good guy and who is a bad guy.
And then, sometimes, good people just do bad things; and, sometimes, bad people do good things. So sorting them out and deciding who to support and stand with isn't very easy. Adding to the confusion is the difficulty in simply getting any real information. To hear tell (depending on which media outlet one chooses) President Obama has never done a good thing in his life, nor Mitt Romeny a bad thing. (FOX) Or, the President is the best thing since sliced bread (whole wheat of course) while Mr. Romeny is the epitamy of an evil corporate and social devil. (MSNBC) It is, of course, in the economic interests of both these outlets to keep the left-right, conservative-liberal, capitalist-socialist diatribe running at full throttle; outlets and pundents both make a good living selling ring-side tickets. Would anyone actually bother with Mr. O'Reilly or Mr. Schultz were they not bomb-throwing cheerleaders for their respective political squads?
(American politics seems like just another big sports franchise. Teams square off against each other to win or lose, but the most important thing is that they provide entertainment for the fans. Ultimately the "teams" are all on the same side, seeking to please the same sponsors, and desperate to keep the public thinking that what they do is actually important in any meaningful way in the real world. Clearly, if football, (American or EU style) basketball, baseball and NASCAR all faded from view next week, most of the people on this planet wouldn't notice. I suspect the same can be said of America's current "two-party" political fantasy. The system has ground mostly to a stop when it comes to actually representing or providing leadership. Most Americans want out of Afghanistan, long ago understanding the war to be a complete failure and waste of lives and resources. Obama just signed a "strategic agreement" that keeps us in the middle of the Muslim civil war for at least another DECADE. Most Americans are not homophobic and don't see any reason to fear gay marriage - hell, many Americans have given up on the institution of marriage all together. Has that altered the political debate at all? Virtually every American tax payer knows that the tax code is a joke. The political parties talk about the failure to lead, but they don't actually do anything to address it. The tax code benefits the political, military and corporate elite - it isn't likely they will allow it to be changed much. Can any society, where the public will on war, taxes, and basic civil rights is being routinely ignored by the political leadership, really call itself a "democracy"?)
So, how to tell the good guys from the bad guys? I've gotten to here...
If the talk is of "Law and Order" that is a bad guy. The law and order types inevitably mean they want to write the laws and give the orders. (A lot of them imagine they hear the voice of god in their heads, and it is his [never her] orders being passed along.) The good guys talk of a fair and just society.
If the talk is of "personal responsibility" that is a bad guy. What is usually meant is they do not want to be held responsible for fucking you silly. They have the police on their side. They write the laws, jiggle the tax code, dictate what regulations are applied, then blame you for not being able to "beat the house." The poor are responsible for being poor, though they lack access to health care, and quality education, and even find that transportation is hard to find even should anyone hire them. The homeless aren't largely physically or mentally handicapped, they are just lazy and reaping god's punishment for not being good workers and consumers. Good guys talk about civil societies and level playing fields.
"Gun control?" That is a good guy. "Gun control" does not equal "taking every one's gun away so the government can bust down your front door and put a homosexual in your bed". (Okay, that is a stretch, but not much of one in the paranoid world of the NRA.) "Second Amendment rights?" That is a bad guy. He wants the right to hide a weapon on his person that he can use to kill you. Mind you, in spite of what the NRA might want to have us believe, (or see as a reality) that vast majority of us don't see a need to carry a gun with us everywhere we go. (There is that whole "democracy" thing again. Virtually every person I talk with, including gun lovers, see a need for enforcing responsible gun laws. A reality that has no impact on a government bought and paid for by NRA and gun manufacturer dollars.)
"The Ten Commandments..." There is a religious fanatic and most likely a bad guy. His Ten Commandments take president over anything you think your god might have written. They take president over anything enlightened people in a free society might have decided for themselves. This guy will use his Ten Commandments to judge you in a civil court in a society where religion and government are supposed to be separated. Oddly enough, those who champion the Ten Commandments the loudest love war and the death penalty (in spite of #6). They do seem to have a lot of mistresses or boy friends (in spite of #7). Number 8 apparently doesn't apply to the natural resources of another nation or a workers wages. They are completely immune to #9 when it comes to people of other religions, beliefs, or political views. As for #10, violating it is the basis for a god-inspired, capitalist society. Religious good guys shy away from invoking the Ten Commandments...though maybe that is due mostly to the hypocrisy of their fundamentalist brothers.
"Deregulation." That is a bad guy. There are a lot of silly regulations loose in our society, but the anti-regulation crowd never seem to be talking of those. The regulations they hate are the ones that cost corporate profits but save worker's lives and protect their health, protect the environment for the next generation, and prevent those in power from abusing the rest of us. The good guys are pretty sure a first world society is built on thoughtful regulations equally applied to all.
Not an exhuastive list of course, and not 100% accurate. But it seems a pretty good kind of "every-day" guide to who is a good guy and who is a bad guy.
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