Dropped Stitches: GOP Candidates Can't Sew

I'm watching the Republicans debate tonight, and I'm reminded of the older women in my life. They sewed. They made clothes, and quilts, and drapes, and coats, and whatever else needed making. Their hearts, minds, and eyes were always focused on the needs of the people they loved and for whom they were responsible.

I'm not the first to see a quilt as a metaphor for a nation. A quilter knows that any quilt is only as strong as its weakest stitch. A quilter knows to look at the whole quilt before saying "Mission Accomplished," because the mission is not accomplished until everyone's last stitch is firmly in place, and every bed is warm.

A dropped stitch -- really a knitting term -- is a stitch that didn't take, that missed its mark, that doesn't hold.

Republicans don't understand about that. Over and over again, it's clear from what the candidates say that seeing a world whole, or even a country whole is just not part of a Republican's conceptual or emotional framework.

Should we sell 20% of the US stock market to Dubai? Sure, as long as Dubai passes a safety and security test. That's nice, except regimes change. Ministers come and go. Loyalties ebb and flow. Personal ambitions, even of the native born, rarely coincide with national interests. Corporate profits aren't necessarily in sync with the public wellbeing. A dropped stitch.

How's the US economy? Just ducky! Inflation's down, the market's up, umpteen million jobs have been added (source undisclosed), and our economy is "the greatest story never told." That's nice, except that everyone I know is scared to death of their economic future. Every dip of the market causes most of us to feel real fear, which is not something millionaires relate to. Everyone I know is aware of the millions who aren't prepared for retirement. None of the Republicans seems to have a clue about that.

Millions of Americans are losing their houses to predatory lenders. Half the country is working two or three jobs and still has to reach up to touch bottom. Major sectors of the economy--agriculture, mining, and construction--are headed for a train wreck because of shoot-first, racist, xenophobic immigration "solutions." Free trade is about jobs going thataway, not about workers or jobs or benefits or a sound workplace ecology coming thisaway.

Our jobs are being rapidly outsourced, and CEOs are sucking up the fruits of the economy at the rate of 500 times what the lineworker is making. Doesn't seem fair because it isn't fair. It's Republican. Dropped stitches.

How about trade policy? It's terrific except that China cheats, so we really ought to fix that. Someday. Outsourced American jobs? Impact on the global economy? We're pillaging Third World countries. If their workers can come here, they're coming. If they can't, they're killing each other or starving or dying of AIDS. And the American Middle Class is in a nosedive.

Impact on the environment? What environment? On global warming? What global warming? Dropped stitches.

Privatization and global poverty? Whatever can you mean? Dropped stitches.

War in Iraq? Wise choice. Going well, except maybe we could do better "politically." Of course oil had nothing to do with it. It was about terrorism and WMD and Saddam. Iraqis will come around. What's good for Halliburton is good for America. Dropped stitches.

Planning for retirement? Simple: People need to save. Never mind that "people" make minimum wage, work two jobs, have a spouse that works two jobs, and share the flat with another family and still there's nothing left to save.

Sanctions on Iran? Great idea. Never mind that sanctions hit the people, not the leaders. Never mind that sanctions didn't work to stop Saddam, and sanctions won't work to stop Ahmadinejad. Dropped stitches.

Free market? Essential. The story of America. Except for the part about robber barons and the Great Depression. Great suffering for a great many. Republicans don't seem to know or care about that. Dropped stitches.

Republicans see nothing except money, unilateral US power, and white male supremacy. Let them scream. The proof is in the policy. This isn't an aberrant GOP. This IS the GOP.

They see corporate health but not people's health. They see oil but not a ravaged Wyoming and a destroyed Iraq. They see sanctions but not children dying of starvation and infectious diseases. They see outlawing abortion but not women. They see life in the womb but not life in the ghettos or abroad. They see prosperity for the wealthy and indentured servitude for the rest of us. Consistently, Republicans drop the single most important stitches of all: the people and the planet. This isn't any religion I know about.

Without setting the health, welfare, and stability of the people and the planet as its highest priorities, a nation is a nasty thing, a Petri dish for predatory corporations, war-mongering, religious tyranny, and fascism. That's why we have a Constitution.

Use it or lose it.