The United States of Pakistan

According to Nicholas Kristof, the United States of Pakistan is where we are headed if Republicans get their way.  As Kristof rightly points out, Boehner et al aren't trying to turn DC into "Islamabad-on-the-Potomac," but his funny comparison and analysis does highlight some important points about the direction Republicans are trying to turn America. 

For starters, let's deal with fiscal issues: Republicans want low taxes.  So do I, so does everyone.  But taxes are already low; in fact tax rates now are remarkably low, and we have a huge budget deficit.  Why make them lower and make the budget bigger?  In Pakistan only 2% of the population is paying taxes and look how well they are doing economically!  Oh you didn't see them on the list of countries by GDP? Sorry, I should have told you, you have to scroll down to 179...

Maybe GDP isn't a fair way to judge Pakistan though, after all, a lot of people live there.  But that's just the problem, as funny as Kristof's comparison is (and as he points out, the United States is no closer to becoming super conservative Pakistan than we are to becoming super liberal Sweden), there is a problem with a gross gap between the rich and the poor.  

We can learn from the lessons of history; when a fraction of the people control most of the wealth (as is already the case in America), the whole country suffers. Sure rich people can buy a lot, but they can't buy enough to support the economy which is propped up by domestic consumption.  If most of the people can't afford to buy the X-Box 360 it doesn't matter if Bill Gates has 40 of them. He can't support the economy by himself.  Conservatives label Obama as a socialist saying he wants to redistribute wealth; in fact, conservatives say that about all Democrats.  But rich people know just as well as Democrats that it is in their best interest for people to have enough money to buy things.  It's no good to produce a bunch of stuff if there is no consumer base for it.  The way Republicans talk about it you would think everyone was going to have the exact same income.  In fact, Democrats are the ones who should get credit for encouraging the accumulation of wealth because no one gets rich if everyone is too poor to buy.  

This doesn't mean we are communists.  Far from it.  In a working system like the one we've got, rich people will profit greatly if there is a thriving middle class to buy things.  In fact, that is how the American economy got to where it was before the latest recession, on the back of a large and prosperous middle class.  That middle class is disappearing and any attempts to revive it (as well as alleviate poverty which is also a drain on our tax dollars) is met with cries of Communist!  

Ok, fine then, let's stop taxing people altogether and become Pakistan, a country with no taxes and no GDP; a country in which extreme poverty breeds violence and the handful of wealthy people pay for their own power generators and bodyguards instead of paying taxes for electric grids and a police force.  

Obviously we are in no danger of becoming Pakistan, but the funny comparison has real parallels and perhaps the laughable extreme of the United States of Pakistan will make people think twice about the future that the Republican party envisions for America.