by NORMAN POLLACK
In Edward Bond’s play, “Early Morning,” which I saw at the Royal Court Theater in London, in, I believe, the fall of 1969, or possibly the months following, Florence Nightingale steps out on a darkened stage and says to the effect of, ”My God, I’ve been raped by Queen Victoria!” The English had a directness, at least in 1968-9 (when I returned home I discussed this with John Lahr who was championing Joe Orton) altogether lacking today, especially in America, whether in the theater or, my concern here, politics, to be exact, Barack Obama, whom, though I’m not a dramatist, I see, in my mind’s eye, metaphorically, of course, raping the Statue of Liberty, a stand-in for raping the American people. Too harsh? Poor taste? Sure, but nonetheless imperative to be spoken—with this qualification. If we were translating rape into political-structural terms, this could be shorthand for fascism. Obama does not quite get that far—yet; so, for the sake of verisimilitude (even drama has its standards of historical accuracy), we must qualify this to say, from Statue of Liberty to American people, or whatever, not vaginal penetration (or its male equivalent—I am no authority!), but extensive foreplay, shorthand therefore for proto-fascism. Serious matters require that we not exaggerate: proto-fascism will do nicely, thank you.
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Dayen reports: “One notable aspect of Obama’s plan is that financial institutions with assets of over $50bn would have to pay a 0.007% fee, a kind of tax for being too big to fail.” Wow, sounds socialistic! A crushing burden, but even that slap-on-the-wrist proves illusive: “But the key to the plan is that it does not attack the bank’s assets, or what they own; it taxes their liabilities, or what they owe.” Whew, for a second I saw the Bolsheviks marching on Morgan Chase. Dayen explains, “it’s a tax on bank borrowing,” and that if Obama simply wanted to raise money—in the Address he viewed it as a way to finance other programs—he “would have proposed taxing the bank’s assets, which are hard to reduce.” But he didn’t. Likewise, the presumed attack on corporations, a centerpiece of Obama’s middle class economics, again, to the barricades: The corporate tax rate in currently 35%. Republicans want the new rate to be 25%, Obama, 28%. On such mole hills are mountains created. In Paris we hear,” Je suis Charlie,” what I’m hearing from Washington, “Je suis Charlatan.”
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