Will the U.S. Become the Next China?

It’s more than a little disturbing to me when assessing the potential outcome of a radical right wing takeover of the U.S. government, especially if a Republican wins the next presidential election.

We could suddenly be thrust into a situation in which an emasculated EPA and the reversal of environmental laws would remove any restrictions to carbon pollution, resulting in the increased fouling of our air, water, and land. We’d be living in a country in which the oil and gas industries could operate at will with little federal oversight, thus increasing the risk of catastrophic spills, the destruction of vital underground aquifers, and unrestricted emissions of greenhouse gasses.

Since the Senate majority leader represents a large coal-producing state, one can envision the lifting of all coal plant pollution restrictions, thus hastening the climate change processes that could soon plunge Miami, New Orleans, New York City and other coastal areas underwater and destroy essential croplands in the West and Mid-West.

From a financial standpoint, a radical right-wing takeover will probably result in the scaling-back of most banking and Wall Street regulatory controls, allowing these institutions to again run roughshod over the U.S. economy, which is their natural tendency as they insatiably pursue profit. Naturally this will lead to an eventual financial collapse, an inevitable bailout by American taxpayers, and perhaps another Depression.

The radical right will also get rid of Obamacare, resulting in the millions of Americans currently insured through the exchanges or through the expanded Medicaid program either to lose their coverage and face potential bankruptcy as a result of illness or injury or face radically higher premiums. And, ironically, the cost of healthcare will actually go up if the ACA is abolished.

Finally, a radical right government with the ability to further politicize the U.S. Supreme Court, will appoint ultra-conservative ideologues when certain superannuated justices retire, which could result in outlawing of abortion for any reason, remove all campaign finance restrictions, and rescind any employee protections opposed by corporate interests, including the right to form unions.

Long story short, we would become China. In its single-minded quest for economic growth to placate a restive populace, China has become the most polluted country on earth. People in Beijing, which is ringed by coal-fired power plants, and Shanghai, walk the streets with surgical masks over their faces.

Some days the air is so foul they can’t even leave their homes. Clean and safe drinking water is nonexistent in most places due to a lack of regulatory controls and rampant government pay-offs from polluters. But to its credit—and driven by circumstances—China is also making the world’s biggest investment in green energy.

Since Chinese citizens do not have a national health care plan, they save much of their income to pay for catastrophic illness and injury, but they would be quickly bankrupted if medical care cost a fraction of what it does in the U.S.

And, the oligarchs do well in China. Government officials and their well-connected friends reap most of the rewards of a rapidly growing state, with precious little trickle down to ordinary citizens. Sound familiar?

Conditions in China have much in common to circumstances that are turning the U.S. into one of the least egalitarian countries in the developed world. Sad to say, these trends will likely accelerate under a radical conservative regime that now dominates both houses of Congress and the Supreme Court.

The difference between China and the U.S. is that the conditions under which the Chinese people live are promulgated by a totalitarian regime. We in the U.S. don’t have that excuse—we have freely elected the buggers who are hell-bent on destroying our quality of life!