AFTERMATH, III

 

[This blog is amid a series of postings that aims to share with the reader a history of the nation – albeit highly summary in nature – from the perspective of a dialectic struggle.  That is the struggle between a cultural perspective that emphasizes more communal and cooperative ideals of federalism and the individualistic perspective of the natural rights construct.

The general argument this blog has made is that federalism enjoyed the dominant cultural position in the US until World War II, and after a short transition, the natural rights view has been dominant.  Whether one perspective is dominant or the other; whichever it is, that fact has a profound impact on the teaching of civics in American classrooms.]

 

The last posting[1] relied heavily on the work of Andrew Marantz[2] and his study of social media.  This posting continues that review, but the reader, if he/she has not read the last posting, is encouraged to do so.  This entry also has a short commentary, as a last bit of information, about how one element of federal thought has been able to survive in a very important aspect, that of spending money – see below.

From that previous posting, one can see that social media has set up a new political stage and that every day, one finds more consequences as a result of this pervasive means of communicating by all sorts of people.  Marantz points out that those who have delved into this new technology have entrenched themselves and share a community among its producers and consumers. 

But to set the stage for the current state of affairs within that community, one can note that by 2014, it had been established.  Of note, an early practitioner was former US Congressman, Ron Paul.  He initiated a blog, interestingly called The Right Stuff.  In doing so, he started what came to be known as “post-libertarian” sites.  Opting a strident style, these sites generally serve up far-right political messaging. 

And this messaging established itself as libertarian-to-far-right “fodder” that has fed the extreme right with, at times, bizarre images and content upon which it has come to rely.  Marantz characterizes its political content as creating a pipeline by which far right messaging effectively is distributed to a waiting audience by encouraging a movement toward a “full radicalization” of those who consume what is being offered.

          Among the techniques these outlets use to promulgate their propaganda are photoshopping images, parodied songs, and creative “countersignal memes.”  These memes are characterized at times by depressingly cruel images or messages lodged against usually leftist targets or at other times an array of unsavory, self-serving images or messages.  To date, one can judge these efforts as generally skillful and among their audience they are considered “must see” material.  In short, they are effective propaganda.

Anecdotally, these outlets have replaced mainline news sources for the far-right segment of the citizenry to get its daily news.  This is the case despite the fact they, the sources, have been readily proven to present misinformation and predictions that don’t come true.  And this less than stellar track record has been going on for over a decade.

Highlighting this record has been the Trump led claim that his “win” in 2020 was stolen.  And with that, given the seriousness of such a message, one begins to earnestly question whether what that social media is producing should be protected under the rubric of free speech.  Given its worldwide “stage,” should online content be regulated as TV network programming has been for years?  Yes, that would include the contents of Gravitas (this blog) – have at it.

This blogger’s only concern would be that any devised criteria for acceptable content is publicly sanctioned (through some public bureaucratic structure) and maintained its substantive concerns to content that would be found to be encouraging or resulting in violence (especially if the information can be shown to be untruthful), otherwise illegal activities, or defamatory messaging.  This blogger is fairly confident the reader would agree that this blog falls far short of getting into any trouble given these concerns.

But more generally, what are the implications of social media in terms of the nation’s further fall into a view of politics based on natural rights thinking?  Not only has social media been, to date, the ultimate means by which the individual has a megaphone to express him/herself not just on a local stage, nor a national stage, but on a global stage. 

When one considers the implications, one’s breath is taken away.  Through the various developments this blog has outlined since World War II, one can detect a continuance of ever-increasing forces bolstering already heady levels of individualism.  This site has traced a furtherance of social/political forces that has undermined the qualities of collaboration, cooperation, and community across the nation. 

In its wake, one has seen the interests of local life being sacrificed and the quality of meaningful democratic life being diminished.  But there is one realm this blog has not addressed and that is money.  And nothing reflects the feelings and commitments of a people more than tracing where their expenditures are directed or from where they are solicited.

So, to address this last factor – ever so briefly – here are some figures that address this concern.  In the third edition of his book, American Federalism:  A View from the States,[3] Daniel Elazar has a section entitled, “Financing the Partnership.”  Given that that edition was published in 1984, this blogger thought it would be beneficial to, one, review his findings, and two, update, where possible, his figures. 

More to the point, the question is how generous the American people are, through their government’s policies, to local governments?  Here is how Elazar introduces his response to this question:

 

Part of the reason for the development of sharing as a means of maintaining the position of the states and their localities lies in the very real, if not explicit, supremacy of the federal government in matters of taxation and spending.  Though the power to tax and spend is constitutionally concurrent, the federal government has been in a better position to use its share of the power over the years, for constitutional and political reasons.  This position, strong in 1970, was further strengthened by the adoption of the federal income tax amendment in 1913.  In fiscal year 1980, the federal government collected 61 percent of all tax revenue in the United States.[4]

 

Here is how tax collection breaks down currently[5]:  individual income, 36%, corporate income, 11%, social insurance and retirement receipts, 23%, general sales, 8%, excise or selective sales, 6%, property, 10%, other, 6%.  From these figures, one can get a sense of which governments are collecting these taxes since state and local rely on certain types of taxes and the federal government on other types.  There are, though, some overlaps (e.g., both federal and some state governments collect income taxes). 

In terms of overall tax collection, the breakdown today is as follows:  federal, 67%, state, 20%, and local, 13%.  While there is no denying the federal government has the predominant level of dominance in terms of taxing, certain programs have maintained an active role for state and local governmental decision making. 

For example, grants by the federal government continue to place large degrees of latitude in the hands of more local governmental actors as to how public funds are expended.  And those amounts have grown significantly in the years since 2013 (an enhanced projection that further expands increasing levels beginning in 1970). 

In 2013, federal grants totaled just over $450 billion dollars; in 2021, the total was just over $1,092 billion dollars.[6]  This reflects the ongoing respect the federal government exhibits for the prerogatives of local governmental entities, a bias this blog noted in how the New Deal dealt with federalist initiatives to fight the effects of the Great Depression back in the 1930s.

And with that, this blog ends its generalized view of the dialectic struggle between federal ideals and values and those of the natural rights view.  The next posting will review the overall lesson this blogger draws from that history.

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[1] Robert Gutierrez, “Aftermath, II,” Gravitas:  A Voice for Civics (February 22, 2022), accessed February 24, 2022, http://gravitascivics.blogspot.com/2022_02_20_archive.html .

[2] Andrew Marantz, Anti-social:  Online Extremists, Techno-Utopians, and the Hijacking of the American Conversation (New York, NY:  Penguin Random House, 2019).

[3] Daniel J. Elazar, American Federalism:  A View from the States, Third Edition (New York, NY:  Harper and Row Publishers, 1984).

[4] Ibid., 63-64.

[5] “State, Federal and Local Taxes,” National Conference of State Legislatures (n.d.), accessed February 24, 2022, https://www.ncsl.org/documents/fiscal/statefederalandlocaltaxes.pdf .

[6] Federal Reserve Economic Data (n.d.), accessed February 24, 2022, https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/AFGSL .