When Income Inequality Is All the Rage

Everybody who's anybody in the ruling media class is all atwitter over Noam Scheiber's New Republic piece, officially introducing Elizabeth Warren as the antidote to the serial inevitability of Hillary Clinton.

With the ascension of mildly progressive Bill de Blasio to the New York City mayorality this month, Occupy has risen from the premature grave that the corporate media dug for it in 2011 in order to make room for the re-election campaign of Barack Obama.

But the president's approval ratings have plummeted to all-time lows. Obamacare is a universally acknowledged mess, not least because it's hitting some affluent Obama supporters right in their wallets.  And now that heiress apparent Hillary has been caught red-handed buck-raking from the universally hated Goldman Sachs, the Beltway pundit class has officially acknowledged Warren as the next big thing, elevating her to rock star status as Populist Goddess.

So it looks like this might be the week that Obama achieves irrevocable lame duck status. Former supporters are openly calling him a liar, both on health insurance and on the security state. Immigration reform is dead. And columnist to the plutocrats Bill Keller penned an op-ed echoing the disenchantment of the moneyed class with the weak politician they were counting on to deliver up the New Deal to them on a silver platter. (Needless to say, the comments were withering, both on Keller and on Obama.)

You know your presidency is a failure when even a Democratic senator is now calling for an investigation of the failed rollout of your signature achievement. The Republicans must be kicking themselves at this point over their misguided government shutdown over Obamacare.

The media hates a vacuum. So now we have an uprising of "The Left". But as per usual, what passes for the left is snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Because at the same time they're calling for an Elizabeth Warren challenge, they immediately let you know it's a head-fake. They  see Warren as a scold to nudge Hillary the Inevitable away from her ingrained plutocratic centrism. In other words, the Clintons had better start talking the populist talk if they want their One Percent candidacy to gain any public traction. From The Hill:

The goal of such a challenge wouldn’t necessarily be to defeat Clinton. It would be to prevent her from moving to the middle during the Democratic primary.

“I do think the country would be well served if we had somebody who would force a real debate about the policies of the Democratic Party and force the party to debate positions and avoid a coronation,” said Roger Hickey, co-director of Campaign for America’s Future, an influential progressive group.

Adam Green, another progressive activist, suggested that Hillary should maybe address income inequality and support the reinstatement of Glass-Steagall while she's collecting her six-figure speaking fees in closed meetings with banks and corporations. 

With such advance notice that she'll be used as a populist prop, I am sure Elizabeth Warren will be eagerly jumping into the presidential ring any minute now. Of course, there's always the chance that she actually will get the nomination despite the passive-aggressive endorsements. Never say never. Also never say never to a third, fourth or fifth party. Or a revolution not predicted or approved by Washington insiders.

As if reading disaffected minds, the centrist think tank known as the Center for American Progress is starting up a special Inequality offshoot to "investigate" the class war. It's headed by lobbyist John Podesta, a corporate Clintonite from way back. They'll be searching for the root causes of wealth disparity, as if they actually think the causes are still a deep dark mystery.

So Hillary will inevitably be following in the footsteps of Boss Obama and talking the populist talk sooner rather than later. Like Obama, she'll be sending her operatives to corporate boardrooms to give them a reassuring wink and nod.