Just how dumb do you think we are?

Change, 2 years ago that word served as a rallying cry around the world as America dumped the Neocons out of office and saved the world from what would have been the unmitigated disaster of a McCain/Palin White House. And yet as the US approaches the midpoint of Obama’s first term, it appears that it was simply not ready for change. The right has shifted even further right with its base delving from implicit racism to openly xenophobic and racist sentiment. It has returned to attempting to stonewall any Democratic legislation, particularly those that represent Obama’s campaign issues. It has successfully reduced health care reform to a sham that will for the most part continue to line the coffers of insurance companies while still leaving significant portions of the public uncovered. It has opposed regulation of the banking regulation in the face of irrefutable evidence that regulation is necessary and yet most crassly it has tried to limit the amount of money that the federal can seek as damages from BP. Also, the Republican Governors of states affected by the oil spill have been loath to activate the National Guard for clean up, but quick to blame this on President Obama.
Yet through all of these acts, most of which could be viewed as malicious toward anyone that earns less than $100,000 dollars a year, the Tea Party and what has to be their mostly ignorant denizens have continued to blindly bash Obama for attempting to right the wrongs that the GOP and their had wrought on the US on the behest of feeding the ever growing capitalist beast. At the heart of all this is the familiar theme of fear of the other blinding those who could benefit the most from unity. Yet the knife being twisted in said heart is the continual lack of any form of reconciliation of the United State’s sordid history of race relations and the divides that fracture the US populous as a whole. However, unless a far larger fraction of the white population becomes willing to seek some sort of understanding of the implications of its racially hegemonic past there will never be true change, the corporations win and hope for actual change continues to fade fast.
Recently, in Trinidad and Tobago, change was also adopted as the war cry of the coalition that pushed the People’s National Movement out of power. Unlike the US I held out very little optimism that any actual change would occur. Trinidadian politics has been dominated by the same 2 parties for most of my life, the difference between this party has not been the politics: both parties thrive on corruption and racial pandering rather than making actual progress, whether economic or social. So when I heard that one party had upended the other, just like the last election, I expected more of the same.
What I got was quite frankly a jaw dropping amount of the same old shit. Yesterday the ruling party released their budget. There were some good ideas, such as tax rebates for installing solar water heaters, which could almost be seen as progressive. Then I heard about the less progressive plans that the COP held. Rather than installing a countrywide rapid transit rail system the COP has decided that it would be a far better idea to connect Maracas(A popular beach) to Tunapuna(A town of middling significance).
Let me make it clear why I am this angry. The COP canceled a project launched by a previous government that would serve to reduce traffic congestion, move goods and labor efficiently, and provide long-term employment for many for a project that would accomplish nothing. Some people will be able to reach a beach more easily, but the actual utility of the tunnel to our country would be veritably nil. Further the COP, to tremendous applause, lowered the taxes on oil companies in order to “encourage” investment. I am left with a sinking feeling. This will not encourage further investment, all of our resources are already accounted for, the COP has simply increased the profit margins of foreign oil companies.
The numerous white elephants that have been erected in my absence may have alerted my people that change was necessary, but apparently it did not make them look beyond their usual options. On the back of racial divides, corruption, and a carnival mentality colonial corporations are yet again winning. This begs the question, how dumb are we?