“What much of the Left does not sufficiently appreciate is that the two-party system is a SYSTEM, that the parties operate in tandem, that it is the ROLE of the Democratic Party to be the lesser-of-the-two evils, to move to the Left when the masses begin to become radicalized so as to prevent the formation of a true people’s party. In that sense, the theory of the lesser-of-the-two evils is the greatest evil.”
The above analysis was posted on Facebook by Joe G. Kaye, one that clearly defines the system under which we are emasculated.
Joe points out that both the Democrats and Republicans have their roles to play in the drama we witness daily. The Republicans are the bad guys, the evildoers. They represent the ruling class and ensure that the wealthy will remain wealthy at the expense of the masses (me and you). We are merely pawns who offer our labor to provide the ruling class their riches and send our sons and daughters to foreign countries to fight, kill, and die so that the rulers can expand their wealth. In other words, the Republicans openly and without hesitation claim to be the party of the haves.
The role of the Democrats is to enter the scene with their white hats and white horses and offer us relief from the evildoers. They will be our salvation.
But, in reality, their role is to maintain the system and prevent the natives, us, from getting restless and overthrowing this system.
Yes, they do offer us some trinkets . . . gays and trans can serve in the military, they support a woman’s right to choose, they provide us with an inadequate solution to the healthcare debacle (Affordable Care Act—the essence of which originated with Massachusettes’ Republican Governor Mitt Romney), they want to raise the minimum wage to an inadequate level, they inform us that they will protect our Social Security system and Medicare and Medicaid, etc., unless they change their minds.
I agree, these are important issues but we must always keep in mind that it is not the role of the Democratic Party to resolve the problems we face but to placate us and keep us distracted so that a real and meaningful solution, like the overthrow of this corrupt capitalist, imperialist system is avoided. The Democrats’ role is that of the “lesser evil,” but the “lesser evil” is still evil.
Millions of people still, despite an abhorrent history, feel that the answer to Trump is a Democratic president and Democrats in control of the House and Senate. There have been many times when the Democrats controlled the executive office and both houses. For example, when Obama took office, the Democrats controlled both houses. Exactly, what meaningful changes in the lives of working people took place?
There was no attempt to raise the minimum wage . . . wages for working people are lower than ever, health care still remains in the hands of private insurance companies where there are no controls on premiums, we are still at war . . . in fact, Obama increased the US military involvement into 7 countries, there is still inadequate affordable housing leading to homelessness for tens of thousands of Americans, students are graduating colleges with thousands of dollars of debt, public education is being decimated as is the infrastructure of this country, etc., etc., etc.
In fact, with or without Democratic control and leadership, things are worse than ever for the masses. The system exists for the WELFARE of the elite ruling class and it is the role of the Democrats to placate us and give us hope that things could and would be better if we would elect them to office.
But the reality is that both parties serve the elite class and in every election we are provided with the option of voting for one of two candidates who will serve that class at our expense. Voting for the “lesser evil” has not worked and has deluded us into thinking that the system can work for us. After all, we live in a “democracy” and can elect our representatives. But, when have they been “our” representatives?
This past election was a perfect example of what we are faced with . . . while Donald Trump would not hesitate to slap us in the face, Hillary Clinton would, instead, stab us in the back. People were so anxious that Trump would win that they were willing to vote for Clinton, a candidate that has proven to be a warmonger who would not hesitate to inflame relationships with Russia and Iran and who is an intimate friend of Wall Street.
To knowingly vote for the “lesser evil” is not a positive vote for the candidate but, instead, a vote against the other candidate, the perceived greater evil. Under this system, we will never have the opportunity to vote for a candidate whom we favor and who will truly represent us. .
As Joe G. Kaye points out, this is a system, a system in which each party has its role.
It is like watching a play where there is a script and leading actors. For each leading actor, there are understudies and when the lead is not available the understudy fills that role. No matter who fills that role, the script remains the same. Different actors, different perceptions of the role but the script remains intact.
That is how our political system operates. The script or agenda remains the same regardless of who sits in the Oval Office or in Congress. This agenda is and never has been for our benefit.
If we examine the 8 years of the Obama administration, a Democrat, we can see that his actions are not much different than a Republican would have presented:
He put boots on the ground in Syria , despite 16 times saying “no boots on the ground.”
Despite campaign pledges, he planned a $1 trillion program to add more nuclear weapons to the US arsenal in the next 30 years.
He dropped bombs in 7 Muslim countries.
He deported a modern record 2 million immigrants.
He signed the Monsanto Protection Act into law.
He supported Israel’s wars and occupation of Palestine.
He supported Saudi Arabia’s devastation of Yemen, the poorest country in the Middle East.
He deployed Special Ops to 134 countries.
He drastically escalated the NSA spying program.
He pushed for a TPP trade pact.
This is only a partial list but need I say more?
Then we have the other darling of the Democratic Party, Bill Clinton. In 1994, Clinton signed the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, the largest crime bill in history, which allocated $10 billion for prison construction, expanded the death penalty, and eliminated federal funding for inmate education. The act intensified police surveillance and racial profiling, and locked up millions for nonviolent offenses such as drug possession. It helped usher in the era of mass incarceration that devastated communities of color.
In his presidential campaign, Clinton promised to change welfare as we know it and he did.
The Welfare Reform Act, a.k.a Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA). is a United States federal law considered to be a major welfare reform. The bill was a cornerstone of the Republican Contract with America. Yes, you read that correctly . . . a cornerstone of the Republicans’ Contract with America.
In 1996, Clinton signed The Welfare Reform Act into law. It established tougher mandates on poor single mothers and gave states more flexibility in how they spent welfare dollars (opening the door for increased discrimination against minorities).
It prohibited anyone from receiving assistance for more than two consecutive years or for more than five years over the course of their life. The act also requires aid recipients to be employed, in most cases, at least thirty hours a week to get their welfare checks, amounting to an hourly wage well below the legal minimum.
Therefore, single women with children were forced to leave their children daily in order to go out to jobs for which they received monies (welfare checks) below the legal minimum wage. So much for family values and a safety net for those in need.
So, my friends, we are witness to the daily charade known as politics in which the rich get richer and we, the people working and struggling to survive, get our asses kicked regardless of which party is in power.
And we are told we live in the “free” world. Yet, nothing seems to be free.
Dave Alpert has masters degrees in social work, educational administration, and psychology. He spent his career working with troubled inner city adolescents.
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It’s nothing more than political theater
Posted on January 23, 2018 by Dave Alpert
“What much of the Left does not sufficiently appreciate is that the two-party system is a SYSTEM, that the parties operate in tandem, that it is the ROLE of the Democratic Party to be the lesser-of-the-two evils, to move to the Left when the masses begin to become radicalized so as to prevent the formation of a true people’s party. In that sense, the theory of the lesser-of-the-two evils is the greatest evil.”
The above analysis was posted on Facebook by Joe G. Kaye, one that clearly defines the system under which we are emasculated.
Joe points out that both the Democrats and Republicans have their roles to play in the drama we witness daily. The Republicans are the bad guys, the evildoers. They represent the ruling class and ensure that the wealthy will remain wealthy at the expense of the masses (me and you). We are merely pawns who offer our labor to provide the ruling class their riches and send our sons and daughters to foreign countries to fight, kill, and die so that the rulers can expand their wealth. In other words, the Republicans openly and without hesitation claim to be the party of the haves.
The role of the Democrats is to enter the scene with their white hats and white horses and offer us relief from the evildoers. They will be our salvation.
But, in reality, their role is to maintain the system and prevent the natives, us, from getting restless and overthrowing this system.
Yes, they do offer us some trinkets . . . gays and trans can serve in the military, they support a woman’s right to choose, they provide us with an inadequate solution to the healthcare debacle (Affordable Care Act—the essence of which originated with Massachusettes’ Republican Governor Mitt Romney), they want to raise the minimum wage to an inadequate level, they inform us that they will protect our Social Security system and Medicare and Medicaid, etc., unless they change their minds.
I agree, these are important issues but we must always keep in mind that it is not the role of the Democratic Party to resolve the problems we face but to placate us and keep us distracted so that a real and meaningful solution, like the overthrow of this corrupt capitalist, imperialist system is avoided. The Democrats’ role is that of the “lesser evil,” but the “lesser evil” is still evil.
Millions of people still, despite an abhorrent history, feel that the answer to Trump is a Democratic president and Democrats in control of the House and Senate. There have been many times when the Democrats controlled the executive office and both houses. For example, when Obama took office, the Democrats controlled both houses. Exactly, what meaningful changes in the lives of working people took place?
There was no attempt to raise the minimum wage . . . wages for working people are lower than ever, health care still remains in the hands of private insurance companies where there are no controls on premiums, we are still at war . . . in fact, Obama increased the US military involvement into 7 countries, there is still inadequate affordable housing leading to homelessness for tens of thousands of Americans, students are graduating colleges with thousands of dollars of debt, public education is being decimated as is the infrastructure of this country, etc., etc., etc.
In fact, with or without Democratic control and leadership, things are worse than ever for the masses. The system exists for the WELFARE of the elite ruling class and it is the role of the Democrats to placate us and give us hope that things could and would be better if we would elect them to office.
But the reality is that both parties serve the elite class and in every election we are provided with the option of voting for one of two candidates who will serve that class at our expense. Voting for the “lesser evil” has not worked and has deluded us into thinking that the system can work for us. After all, we live in a “democracy” and can elect our representatives. But, when have they been “our” representatives?
This past election was a perfect example of what we are faced with . . . while Donald Trump would not hesitate to slap us in the face, Hillary Clinton would, instead, stab us in the back. People were so anxious that Trump would win that they were willing to vote for Clinton, a candidate that has proven to be a warmonger who would not hesitate to inflame relationships with Russia and Iran and who is an intimate friend of Wall Street.
To knowingly vote for the “lesser evil” is not a positive vote for the candidate but, instead, a vote against the other candidate, the perceived greater evil. Under this system, we will never have the opportunity to vote for a candidate whom we favor and who will truly represent us. .
As Joe G. Kaye points out, this is a system, a system in which each party has its role.
It is like watching a play where there is a script and leading actors. For each leading actor, there are understudies and when the lead is not available the understudy fills that role. No matter who fills that role, the script remains the same. Different actors, different perceptions of the role but the script remains intact.
That is how our political system operates. The script or agenda remains the same regardless of who sits in the Oval Office or in Congress. This agenda is and never has been for our benefit.
If we examine the 8 years of the Obama administration, a Democrat, we can see that his actions are not much different than a Republican would have presented:
This is only a partial list but need I say more?
Then we have the other darling of the Democratic Party, Bill Clinton. In 1994, Clinton signed the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, the largest crime bill in history, which allocated $10 billion for prison construction, expanded the death penalty, and eliminated federal funding for inmate education. The act intensified police surveillance and racial profiling, and locked up millions for nonviolent offenses such as drug possession. It helped usher in the era of mass incarceration that devastated communities of color.
In his presidential campaign, Clinton promised to change welfare as we know it and he did.
The Welfare Reform Act, a.k.a Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA). is a United States federal law considered to be a major welfare reform. The bill was a cornerstone of the Republican Contract with America. Yes, you read that correctly . . . a cornerstone of the Republicans’ Contract with America.
In 1996, Clinton signed The Welfare Reform Act into law. It established tougher mandates on poor single mothers and gave states more flexibility in how they spent welfare dollars (opening the door for increased discrimination against minorities).
It prohibited anyone from receiving assistance for more than two consecutive years or for more than five years over the course of their life. The act also requires aid recipients to be employed, in most cases, at least thirty hours a week to get their welfare checks, amounting to an hourly wage well below the legal minimum.
Therefore, single women with children were forced to leave their children daily in order to go out to jobs for which they received monies (welfare checks) below the legal minimum wage. So much for family values and a safety net for those in need.
So, my friends, we are witness to the daily charade known as politics in which the rich get richer and we, the people working and struggling to survive, get our asses kicked regardless of which party is in power.
And we are told we live in the “free” world. Yet, nothing seems to be free.
Dave Alpert has masters degrees in social work, educational administration, and psychology. He spent his career working with troubled inner city adolescents.