If anything has been a more telling indicator of the direction our nation is heading in, it has been the debt debate in Washington. Teeth-grittingly partisan politics, not just between the two parties but within the Republican party, has choked the political process to the point where the only compromise they can reach is to just put off compromising! There are those that say that our founding fathers (which is a little like invoking God in this country, because who the hell knows?) intended us to have robust debates, to challenge one another's ideologies. What they most certainly did not intend was for those debates, though ostensibly around government spending, to be motivated by politicians loyalties to their corporate sponsors. There's no such thing as legislating anymore, it's all campaigning...even when they're not campaigning.

     Republicans, divided by so-called "establishment" Republicans and Tea Party Republicans, have got a really sweet deal. In the House, when a bill comes up that weakens regulations or controls on environmental mismanagement or corporate oversight, they ban together and have the majority in numbers. The Tea Party used the Republicans in 2010 to get into office and the Republicans used the Tea Party to create a majority. However, when they don't agree, their political perversion becomes a wrench in the gears of the federal political process (as we've seen in the last two weeks). In any case, when they can work together, they manage to create all sorts of havoc for private America citizens, selling them upriver to protect corporations and special interests.

The 112th Republican-dominated congress has:

• Protected corporations, many of whom did not even pay taxes in the last several years, or paid very little, from having tax shelters or loopholes closed and from having any increase to their tax rate.
• Put up 110 anti-environmental votes, the most ever, since January 3rd of this year for stripping the EPA, and the DOI of controls on everything from water and air pollution to oil drilling.
• Attempted some right-wing social engineering in the form of pledges and proposed bills that would scale back the civil liberties of gays, immigrants, Muslims, and other minorities.
• Watered down policies regarding campaign finance that protects Americans from having their elected representatives purchased by corporations or special interests.
• Attempted to, and in some cases have been successful in, stripping basic federally-funded social welfare programs that protect and support millions of hurting Americans.
• By extension, have hamstrung what little economic recovery there has been and may catalyze a double-dip recession.

     In addition, these kinds of policies and mindsets are playing out across the coun try in every Republican dominated state; Florida, Alabama, Texas, Arizona, Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan...the list goes on.

     If the country continues in such an reactionary and illogical direction, we know what it will look like because we've seen it before: in the early 20th century. In that time the wealth disparity was so well-documented that there was a populist Socialist movement (anti-thesis to the Tea Party movement of today). Even Teddy Roosevelt ran as a member of a Socialist Party his first time. Industrial standards in cities with heavy manufacturing were actually so low that children were working in factories and the life-expectancy was actually declining in this country. Racism and bigotry were still an institutionalized component of American society, and the nation was deeply xenophobic, preferring to isolate themselves from foreign nations. As a progressive, imagining this world translated to 21st century American is a heart-breaking thought.

     Matters would be made worse by several issues. In 1929, unregulated financial markets became so top-heavy that they crashed, sending the nation into the Great Depression, which was made worse by the fact that there was very little in the way of social welfare programs to aid affected American workers. Imagine today, Republicans gutting entitlements and defunding and dissolving EPA, SEC, and other regulatory agencies which keep rampant corporate mismanagement in check. The next recession (and nearly every economist tells us that with our present financial system there will be one) could possibly be a global economic collapse. Without social programs to help the masses of Americans laid off from bankrupt and drastically downsizing private sector jobs, unemployment skyrockets and what does exist of government programs are easily overwhelmed. With no Americans working, they're not paying taxes and without taxes the government can not stimulate recovery the way they have in the past. Without stimulus to save top-heavy, unstable TBTF's (Too Big To Fail's) the dominoes fall and we see a complete collapse of our corporate sector. The trillions held overseas by investors, as well as the securities on American goods and services, dry up and other nations fall like dominoes.

     Yes, this is a worst case scenario. However, if the freshmen Republicans in the House and Senate and the right-wing radicals infecting state governments, are allowed to dictate the rules and guide policy, we are moving in that direction. Will everything necessarily shake out the way I said it would? I hope not, but even if our system proves more robust than that, we have the added specters of global climate change and wars. Climate change spawns erratic weather which disrupts everything from the food supply to government relief funds and war has been ratcheting up debt and interest for nearly a decade, which makes the government less able to adjust when crises hit. Yes, this is a worst case scenario. Welcome.