Republican and Democrat party policies consistently represent privileged Americans at the expense of most everyone else – notably since Bill and Hillary Clinton’s deplorable 1990s co-presidency.
Campaigning ahead of the 1992 election, Bill promoted the idea, using the phrase “two for the price of one.” The prospect of repeating the same mistake this November should scare everyone.
Meeting in St. Louis last weekend, Democrats drafted a largely business as usual platform, lofty mumbo jumbo rhetoric pretending otherwise – final approval coming when the full platform committee meets in Orlando, FL on July 8 and 9, ratification at the Philadelphia party convention from July 25 – 28.
Jobs creation is highlighted, fulfillment way short of bipartisan campaign and platform rhetoric, notably since the GW Bush years.
Most good ones went overseas to low-wage countries. They’re gone, others joining them. Largely rotten low-pay/poor-benefit ones remain. Workers need two or more to survive.
Proposals for universal healthcare, a $15 minimum wage indexed to inflation, ending Israel’s occupation of Palestine, a carbon tax, opposition to the anti-consumer, stealth corporate coup d’etat Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and fracking were rejected.
Nothing was said about the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) -like TPP, involving America and EU countries – both trade bills nightmarish for ordinary people.
Nothing about Washington’s imperial project. Nothing about endless wars of aggression. Nothing about renouncing them, endorsing peace as the party’s top priority.
Nothing about rescinding police state laws. Nothing about endorsing governance of, by and for everyone equitably, the general welfare, making America beautiful for everyone, instead of its privileged few alone.
Virtually nothing worth supporting. Weasel words about “advancing our party’s progressive ideals…addressing the needs of all Americans,” supporting public education, “looking out for working people,” taxing the super-rich, “expanding Social Security,” curbing prescription drug costs, promoting clean energy, ending mass incarceration, and “Wall Street reform” rang resoundingly hollow.
Even claiming to support the abolition of the death penalty “as a cruel and unusual form of punishment (for) the first time in (party) history” is duplicitous.
What about millions of imperial war victims, corpses attesting to bipartisan barbarity – capital punishment on an industrial scale, genocide by any standard!
Undemocratic Democrats like their Republican counterparts aren’t looking out for anyone but themselves and privileged interests they support.
In November, voters should either back independent candidates or none at all – renouncing neocon-infested Democrat and Republican parties once and for all.
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected].
His new book as editor and contributor is titled “Flashpoint in Ukraine: US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III.”
http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanIII.html
Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.
Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network.
