Quite frankly, I believe Bush did a bit more than Obama in attempting to dismantle social security as a entirely government run program. State of the Union 2005:

http://www.c-span.org/executive/transcript.asp?cat=current&code=bush_admin&year=2005

“Here’s why the personal accounts are a better deal. Your money will grow, over time, at a greater rate than anything the current system can deliver . . .”

“And best of all, the money in the account is yours, and the government can never take it away.”

Additionally, it is my understanding that certain Democratic legislators (senators mostly), rather than President Obama, were the ones who “discredit government involvement in health care by keeping in place a failing private system.” If you might remember, President Obama defended a public plan, defended insurance co-ops, and defended health care as a right for all Americans. However, he cannot write the laws of the United States, he can only sign them into law . . .

Secondly, Obama has had more success in setting the stage for social security privatization and the dismantling of the New Deal, through his deficit commission, than Bush could have dreamed of. And finally, far from setting the stage for health care as a right, Obama has managed to discredit government involvement in health care by keeping in place a failing private system.

When it comes down to it, those that profess to be concerned about such issues seem to be more concerned about their taxes; that is, ultimately more concerned with their own small conerner of the country than with the common good. And it is ironic that someone might consider concern with “the common good” some kind of communist plot, even as they cry “Country First,” which to them apparently means “Tax cuts” First.

The political system, whether its efficient or not, whether it works or not, is not the primary issue. The political system does not operate independently of human action, obviously; But it was meant to take all the worst of human vice and somehow turn all that into a virtue; that doesn’t always happen, obviously. But the system is muteable, it can be subverted, co-opted, what have you. Fictoid based media, money based politics, and narrow interest based legislating all play a part in this. Currently, human vice has the upper-hand. But this is all subject to change, and I believe it inevitably will.

What have now is a problem of concerted collective action and consensus needed to take care of the big issues such as Medicare and Social Security (not to mention two wars and high unemployement). A system meant to pit vice against vice is not necessarily well endowed to do this. To turn back to the issue of plutocracy, I think this is a major reason why such problems go unresolved. Even as I also believe their are important differences between Republicans and Democrats, the conditions of plutocracy have a somewhat levelling effect making them seem more similar than they really are, because to get anything done, and to appease the plutocracy, compromise is necessary. Not that compromise is always a bad thing, but interest-based compromise is not the same thing as reality-based consensus.