My Zen Arcade

I often disagree with Melissa (though, more often than not, I actually agree with her), but this is just spot on.  its a response to a woman who is drowning in a mortgage she direly wants to get out of, and, of course, this woman wanted to go to the whole 9/12 thing in DC and couldn’t.  At the end, she says “I’ve paid my mortgage every month.  And I’m getting no help.  I’m just saying, Let capitalism work”

Shakesville: OFFS

The truth is that she expects her government to be helping her, as well she should. But the rightwing media machine has played three dirty tricks on people like Ms. Frankowski:

1. They’ve convinced them that the government is helping people other than them.

2. They’ve convinced them those other people are undeserving of that help, by virtue of their alleged laziness, entitlement, desire for “special rights,” immigration status, or some other bigoted bullshit.

3. They’ve convinced them, by concealing the reality that the only “people” the government helps anymore are corporations, that “capitalism” is the answer, which creates more demand for the government to capitulate to free marketeering and abandon industry regulations that protect consumers.

In other words, they’ve convinced people like Ms. Frankowski to demand that the government help them less, even as she desperately wonders why, despite playing by the rules and paying her mortgage every month, she’s still hurting and no one’s helping her out.

It would be hilarious, if it weren’t so fucking tragic.