Did the Democratic Party Forsake the Middle Class?

by Madeleine Kando

In his new book ‘Listen, Liberal or Whatever Happened to the Party of the People’, author Thomas Frank (‘What's the Matter with Kansas?) points out that the Democratic Party’s historical role of protecting the working middle class has all but vanished. Since the 80’s, many policies implemented by both Republican and Democratic administrations have hugely benefited the ‘professional class’ as well as the ‘business class’. By ‘professional class’ Frank refers to affluent professionals, lawyers, doctors, investment specialists, etc. This class is very liberal in a cultural sense, but very conservative economically.

The shift in policy in the Democratic Party came after George W. Bush’s victory, when the ‘New Democrats’ tried to be centrist by combining right-wing economic policy with left-wing social policy, which they called the ‘Third Way’.

Frank is especially harsh on Bill Clinton. He was the prototypical New Democrat. He signed the NAFTA agreement, deregulated Wall Street and ‘reformed’ Welfare by putting pressure on the unemployed. Barak Obama continued this trend, trying to fast track the TTP and, although he put the Healthcare Bill into law, Big Pharma and the insurance companies are still in control of health insurance. Read more...

A Century's Worth of Living (Part 3)

by Madeleine Kando

My mother Ata sleeps a lot. She is often in pain because of some nerve damage in her feet, but is happy that I have come all the way from Boston to visit her. It is peaceful here in Bergen. Ata lives in an assisted living abutting the 'polders', vast meadows where sheep, horses and cows share the lush, green grass. The enormous sky dwarfs this flat landscape; I have stepped into a Vermeer painting, the church steeples and windmills dotting the low hanging horizon.

I am trying to come to terms with Ata's life ending soon. Part of my life will also come to an end and I don't know how to separate the two. Soon, I will no longer come to Holland. I will no longer sleep in this little guest room, waiting for the day to break while the smell of cow manure, the cawking of the seagulls, the muffled sound of a truck on its morning delivery mingle in the air. It will all be as faded as the photographs that hang on Ata's walls.

Visiting my mother has always been an intense experience. With all that moving from country to country, she has managed to always bring the family past with her. There are so many boxes where I find pieces of myself, boxes stuffed with old letters, drawings, poems and of course, photographs. Read more...