美国右翼卷土重来的秘密

    最近，对冲基金经理人、亿万富豪里昂•库伯曼发表了一份公开信，抱怨奥巴马总统对富人太过苛刻。亿万富豪大倒阶级斗争苦水？多么悲剧啊！作者托马斯•弗兰克或许很不以为然。难怪芸芸众生对华盛顿身居高位的领导人深感不满，而且不再只是停留在语言层面。因为，正是在华盛顿诸公的领导下，美国的收入不均现象二十年来日益严重，失业率居高不下，而房地产市场更是乱得一塌糊涂。

    弗兰克的新书《可怜的亿万富豪》（Pity the Billionaire）就透着这股怨气，探究了共和党人卷土重来的背后力量。弗兰克称，大萧条以来最严重的金融危机刚刚过去一年，茶党运动就强调经济复苏依赖于自由市场理念的重生，并借此绑架了公众的愤怒情绪。这一策略确实奏效了。如今，金融改革几乎没有触及华尔街的利益，税率也没有上调，尽管失业率高企而消费需求疲软，美国企业界仍然赚得盆满钵溢。

    “新奇的是，”弗兰克指出，“值此自由市场理论证明自己不过是一种带来灾祸与欺诈的哲学之际，它反而得到了赞颂。”这正是弗兰克不满之情的核心：奥巴马任期刚刚开始一个月，主要由私营部门的贪婪引发的经济危机还相当严重，可保守阵营已经宣称，整个乱象都是政府的错，还籍此出尽了风头。

    2009年初，美国消费者新闻与商业频道（CNBC）记者里克•桑塔里站在芝加哥期货交易所（CBOT）的大厅里，大肆抨击一项联邦抵押贷款调整计划。他呼吁聚在自己周围的交易员们成立一个芝加哥茶党。而这些交易员是些什么人呢？弗兰克援引了桑塔里的话：他们“直截了当地说……是美国很好的一个统计截面，是沉默的大多数。”

    这一手玩得相当漂亮，弗兰克指出，事实上，桑塔里将他周围那些富裕的交易员描述成了大胆与体制相对抗的小人物。“右翼抓住了机会，重新界定了辩论的主题，”弗兰克哀叹道。“他们利用政府援助计划，使政府代替华尔街承担了骂名。”

    Recently, billionaire hedge fund manager Leon Cooperman published an open letter in which he complained that President Obama was being mean to rich people. A billionaire complaining about class warfare? How tragic, author Thomas Frank probably thought. Excuse the rest of the population whose gripes with Washington's leaders -- who have presided over two decades of growing income inequality, high joblessness, and an unrivaled housing mess -- extend beyond a little hurtful rhetoric.

    Such is the cranky mood of Frank's new book Pity the Billionaire, which examines the forces behind the resurgent GOP. Just a year after the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression, in Frank's telling, the Tea Party movement hijacked popular anger by arguing that economic salvation lay in the revival of free-market ideals. It worked. Today, financial reform has barely touched Wall Street. Taxes aren't rising. Corporate America is piling up profits despite high unemployment and weak consumer demand.

    "What is new," Frank observes, "is the glorification of this idea at the precise moment when free market theory has proven itself to be a philosophy of ruination and fraud." This is the heart of Frank's grievance: barely a month into Obama's term, in the midst of an economic crisis sparked largely by private-sector greed, conservatives stole the spotlight by arguing that the entire mess was really the fault of government.

    In early 2009, CNBC reporter Rick Santelli stood on the floor of the Chicago Board of Trade in early 2009 and ranted against a federal mortgage modification program. He called on the traders surrounding him to stage a Chicago Tea Party. And who were these traders? Frank quotes Santelli: They were "pretty straightforward ... a pretty good statistical cross section of America, the silent majority."

    It took deft handling, Frank notes, but Santelli effectively presented the wealthy traders around him as little men standing up to the system. "It was the Right that grabbed the opportunity to define the debate," Frank laments, "using bailouts to shift the burden of villainy from Wall Street to government."