When our congressional leaders throw around words like "moral" and "immoral," given the context in which they work, a system that is thoroughly corrupted by big money, and beholden to the very rich at the expense of just about everyone else, I don't pay a lot of attention. However, this morning I found my thoughts resonating with a conservative southern senator.
Consider the words of Senator Mary Landrieu, a conservative Democratic from Louisiana, as she lashed out Tuesday at President Obama's deal with congressional Republicans that allows tax cuts for the wealthy to be extended for two years.
Extending the tax cuts for those making more than a million dollars a year is borderline immoral, Landrieu charged. "I'm going to argue forcefully for the nonsensicalness and the almost, you know, moral corruptness of that particular policy," said Landrieu, walking into a meeting with Vice President Joe Biden and Senate Democrats. "This is beyond politics. This is about justice and doing what's right."
Landrieu was fuming about the deal. On her way into the meeting, she slammed the tax-cut extension as a needless giveaway, adding, "That's all I have to say." But it wasn't. She emerged from the meeting a few moments later to continue prosecuting her case to reporters.
"It's what I'm calling the Obama-McConnell plan. We're going to borrow $46 billion from the poor, from the middle class, from businesses of all sizes basically to give a tax cut to families in America today, that despite the recession, are making over a million dollars. I mean, this is unprecedented. Unprecedented. I want to repeat that," she said. Landrieu added, however, that she had yet to make a decision on the final package and was speaking strictly about the extension of tax cuts for the wealthy.
If there every was a moment to consider who the majority of the U.S. senate represents, this is it.
And, my friends, it ain't us.
