I don’t always agree with Robert Reich, the former Secretary of Labor in the Clinton Administration, but in this post, he hits the proverbial nail squarely on the head.
What contemporary Republicans are selling is reheated and reconstituted Social Darwinism. (And just for the record, Darwin never used the phrase “survival of the fittest.” Herbert Spencer coined it; Sumner used it.) Social Darwinists twisted Darwin’s theory of evolution to justify wide disparities of wealth and well-being, melding it with a superficial Calvinism to conclude that those who prospered did so because they were a talented and hardworking elect, and those who were poor suffered because they were morally defective.
Not that they put it that way. Instead, the rich were lauded as creative entrepreneurs, while the poor were scorned for lack of diligence and work ethic. In effect, they were told to “take a bath and get a job.”
Sound familiar?
Meanwhile, earlier this afternoon Herman Cain, complete with wife looking on approvingly-or-else, switched from Plan A (seeking POTUS) to Plan B (seeking continuing BOOKUS DEALUS) as part of that branch of (un) Natural Selection known as the GOP nomination process.