The Perception of American Parties
The reality of perception is an important component in maintaining relations in our society.
This can range from individuals all the way up to government/corporate entities.
Any actions that these entities commit can have a negative or positive effect on their standing in the world. At times, those actions might be so deleterious that it can cause an organization to crumble and blow away in the wind.
Some things, however, seem incapable of dying. This will be an examination of the two American parties: Democrats and Republicans.
To be blunt straight off the bat, there should be no reason at all that either party should exist today. There should be almost no reason why anyone would want to identify themselves as a Democrat or Republican. And yet, people do.
Tens of millions of Americans identify themselves as Democrat or Republican. That is not only frightening, but utterly disgusting.
To get to the heart of the matter, let's use an example:
Imagine for 2020 you had a major candidate polling exceptionally high against the duopoly. This individual ran as a Nazi. This Nazi tours the country, filling stadiums, going on news shows, kissing babies, and all the hoopla of running an election. Throughout all of this, not a single reporter questions this individual on the history of said individual's party. They just take the Nazi at face value, without apparent knowledge or care for what it means to be a Nazi. There is no revulsion at the ideology. There is no revulsion at the atrocities Nazi's have committed. Nope, it is just frighteningly normal.
No one asks about the Holocaust. It isn't that people deny it; they just don't seem to care.
No one asks about the threat this organization posed to the world a mere 70 years ago.
Nope, it is just frighteningly normal. If you ask people about it, they would hand-wave it away. Something about protecting freedom or spreading democracy.
The scary thing out of all of this is that you could replace the Nazi candidate with either a Democrat or Republican and the scenario still pans out.
And that's the point here.
Why is it here in America that no one seems not only utterly horrified at the concept of Democrats and Republicans, but that they are our major political institutions?
How come you don't have journalists sitting politicians down and asking them:
"You are a Democrat. Why do you affiliate with a party that entered Vietnam and had 4 million Vietnamese people killed?"
"Why do you affiliate as a Democrat when your party sent troops into Vietnam whom gang-raped women and children?"
"...who dropped chemical weapons on the Vietnamese people"
"...who dropped napalm on innocent people"
"...who dropped the atomic weapons on innocent Japanese people and set the world into the Cold War"
"...who destroyed Libya and now those people are being sold as slaves because of you"
"...who killed 20-30 million people with the Republican party since WW2"
This list could go on for pages.
Here I've only focused on Democrats. No, I'm not excluding Republicans. They have their own sins.
The painful reality is that the words "Democrat" and "Republican" should elicit the same horror and venom as when someone says "Nazi".
How is it that the American people can just hand-wave away the hundreds of millions of people who have been raped, tortured, slaughtered, or had their lives ruined because of the actions of the Democrats and Republicans?
Yes, hundreds of millions.
20-30 million people dead since WW2. We could also go backwards and include WW2 and before.
The tens of thousands of women and teenage girls raped.
The millions of people maimed.
The tens of millions of people who had their home/street/town/city destroyed.
This is not a one-off event. This spans for decades. And yet, no one cares. No one bats an eye. Everyone is apparently perfectly fine associating with an organization that committed those atrocities.
People who are currently fighting to "save" the Democratic party, who think that they can rehabilitate it, ask yourself this: Would you "save" the Nazi party?
If you shake your head furiously and scream "No!", then what is the difference with the Democrats?
The simple utterance of "Democrat" and "Republican" must be met with utter revulsion and hatred. And yet, in this nation, there are those who are proud to be a Democrat or Republican.
That is utterly frightening.
Some institutions, some people, some entities seem impervious to perception. No matter what they do, they survive; they persist. No matter how heinous they become, no matter how many times they commit atrocities, they push on like it is nothing.
Sadly, here in America, we call these people our politicians.
Comments
a bit too strong
numerous reasons to doubt the wisdom trying to change the establishment Democrats from the inside
But "Would you "save" the Nazi party?" is overkill seems to me
Few are guilty, but all are responsible.”
― Abraham Joshua Heschel, The Prophets
@phillybluesfan @phillybluesfan I don't think it's
I don't think it's too strong at all.
It probably isn't strong enough actually.
But, you never said why it is overkill. The point about "saving" the Nazi party is that hardly anyone would go through that herculean effort to rehabilitate that entity.
So, why should anyone try to rehabilitate an organization that has killed tens of millions of people?
The usage of Nazi is an easy example and hits the point of an automatic revulsion that someone has to a political party.
20-30 million people are dead because of the Democrats and Republicans since WW2 due to their wars. There is of course the numerous war crimes committed during WW2 and before that. The Nazi's had a short reign, but it was horrifying.
Under the Democrats and Republicans, the world entered the Cold War where for decades it teetered on the brink of absolute destruction. It almost happened even. Right now, both parties are slowly angling for a massive war. The Democrats seem fixated on nuclear superpower Russia, while Republicans grumble at China and sabre-rattle with North Korea/Iran.
Considering that the actions of these two organizations could threaten the existence of 8 billion people, where am I wrong here?
You are not wrong. How can one defend the indefensible?
I agree. The US has been a danger to world peace since even before Allen Dulles. Yet our citizenry is brainwashed from cradle to grave. America the beautiful. American exceptionalism (exceptionally violent, exceptionally good at mucking things up).
Your essay is needed and appreciated (by me at least).
The heart of the issue to rid ourselves of these Janus-like monsters is to abolish the two party system. That won't be easy. The method I would like to see (but with little hope of success) is to see each duopolistic mafia wither from lack of support. Perhaps we may be seeing that happening small scale now. Such as Tim Canova quitting the Dems and running as independent. Perhaps more will follow his example. Such might be the case should Bernie stop sheep-dogging people toward the Dems and instead promote a truly independent third party. Perhaps the Libertarians will revolt from the Republican War party and form a fourth party. Perhaps. Perhaps.
Yes we need to try and "see" with new eyes
I've seen the democrats move from the left, to left center, to center to center right, and the republicans to the far right wing. It still has the label "democrat", but for what it stands for now and what it does it could be called a lot of things. Maybe not nazi, but fascist yes, or some other label to pin on this new thing called by an old name.
@Snode Well to be clear, I wasn
Well to be clear, I wasn't trying to call Dems/Repubs Nazis.
I used Nazis because it is an easy example to get the point across. People are angered and horrified by the atrocities Nazi's committed; however, people then just hand-wave away the atrocities that Dems/Repubs have committed.
Oh no, didn't mean to imply that
just after a hundred years things change and "lying, cheating, torture condoning, civilian and child killer, pandering war monger slaves of Wall Street" needs a little work. I'll come up with something. But yeah, we think warm and fuzzy about FDR, Democrats and unions and this pack of whores (apologies to whores) ain't them.
Understand your point relative to the democratic party
and the reference to a "Nazi" party. Actually, focusing on one political party over others is partisan politics. I've often wondered about the people who are trying to or advocating for reforming the democratic party by electing more and better progressives. Why not try to reform the republican party also? I suppose it's because they consider the dem party either less evil or better in some way. Some of us believe both parties are "two sides of the same coin", a sentiment that goes way back in this country. Therefore supporting the dem party isn't really any different than supporting the repub party. But while progressives seem to be able to highlight and oppose the imperialist actions of the republican party, they tend to excuse the same from the democratic party if the carrot and stick of domestic programs (Social Security, Medicare for All, higher minimum wage, etc.) are given lip service. A big part of why the dem party has become just as much an imperialist warmonger party, maybe even the lead, as the republican party and why there hasn't been a significant antiwar movement in this country since the early days of Bush.
@Big AlActually, focusing on one
I mean I wasn't trying to exclude Repubs from my example of an atrocious party. But yes I did focus a bit more on Dems.
Perhaps because Repubs are working as advertised: They are a right-wing capitalist party who are all about troops and war. They want to gut various government institutions and promote corporate power. They are American exceptionalists and all that jazz.
Perhaps the point is that there is nothing to save or reform, because they work as advertised. Republicans are straight forward with the things they want.
Thing is Democrats want the same thing, they just lie about it. So some folks hold on that they can change and reform said organization. But that task is always just out of reach. Debs talked about the futility of dealing with either party.
Neither party will change. The Republicans work as advertised and that attracts those people. The Democrats lie about what it is going to do and then works against their base.
Actually I wasn't referring to you
with the partisan reference, it was the continued focus on trying to reform the democratic party by the Bernie wing of the party, i.e., progressives.
@Big Al Oh whoops, that's on
Oh whoops, that's on me.
Seems I've been misreading posts lately.
As you say, Big Al, focussing on one party is partisan
Weakening only one of the duopoly only furthers the relative power of the other. Both must be taken down. Bernie's sheep-dogging is terrible and harmful to ending the elitist, mendacious war party government.
There is a difference between the 2 big money parties
Republicans have no empathy. I don't like the corruption in the Democratic party but I do like some politicians who run as Democrats and I hate the lack of empathy among all politicians who call themselves Republican. The people I've voted for, except for Jill Stein, and including Barbara Lee and Bernie, have run as Democrats not Republicans. All the shit that's being done now, that we rage about here, is being done by the Republicans in power. I see little or no mention of Trump or Jared or Bolton in those essays about Israeli oppression. And the implication is heavy that it's Obama's fault, or maybe even Bernie's or Tim Canova's fault, or maybe it's the Rothchilds' fault, which is too biased IMHO.
Beware the bullshit factories.
@Timmethy2.0All the shit that's being
We rage about a lot here, and it has happened under both Dems and Repubs.
Dems rescued banksters and Wall Street, not the people.
Dems pushed a for-profit insurance plan.
Dems destroyed Libya.
Both parties work together to cobble up enough votes to pass the things they like will still showing the appropriate actors playing "opposition".
So... I'm not really following.
Regarding Israel, both Democrats and Republicans love Israel. At times Republicans will even say that Dems don't love Israel enough. Both parties fawn over Israel.
I'm referring to who is in power now.
As well as who has the most voices of empathy and who has the most opposition to the privatization of our country and the perpetration of ignorance about climate change, despite the establishment ownership of both parties. I want the Republicans to lose the midterms.
Beware the bullshit factories.
Keep getting played by "the lesser of two evils,"
"R v. D." charade, dude.
" . . . . who has the most voices of empathy and who has the most opposition to the privatization of our country and the perpetration of ignorance about climate change, despite the establishment ownership of both parties."
Actually, neither party has any opposition to these evils. Oh, sure, the Democrats may make noises about these things, and effectively POSTURE their way into appearing "more caring," or "more enlightened." But, in the end, they have no real intention of doing anything about them.
Or have you forgotten about all the offshore oil drilling Obama approved, or the way Hillary Clinton bragged about doing so much to promote fracking around the world, or the way Obama protected BP from outside scrutiny during the Deepwater Horizon disaster, or the way Obama did nothing to support native Americans protesting oil pipelines through their lands, or . . . .?
Keep getting taken in by the empty rhetoric and political posturing of one of the two major parties. The people in power count on people like you to help them stay in power. I hope it's not too presumptious for me to say to you on their behalf, "Thanks for enabling our schemes."
Do you think the oligarchy could continue this game
if both parties were, on paper, exactly the same? No, they couldn't of course, there has to be two somewhat opposing views although the actions in the last three decades plus show the end results are no different.
But as I've said many times, it's basically always been this way. We can read quotes from activists like Eugene Debs and W.E.B. Dubois where they said the same things we're saying now about the two headed duopoly.
What the republicans are doing now, the democrats did under Obama and Clinton. They both serve the rich oligarchy.
Relative to Canova, he's a supporter of apartheid Zionist Israel, makes excuses for apartheid and also supports U.S. imperialism. It is his fault and those like him and those that support him and vote for him and those like him. In my opinion, voting for any of the private democratic party's candidates is also supporting the war, imperialism and Wall Street policies and actions of the democratic party. There's no sense in beating around the bush any longer imo. Things are too way out of hand for that.
Hopeful expectation
Canova is running in a very Jewish district. Hopefully, with more "progressives" elected, this Israel fawning will slowly be tamped and extinguished.
Here is something to ponder:
Why is it apartheid South Africa had so little influence on the world stage and apartheid Israel has so much? As Jerry Maguire would say "show me the money".
"Very Jewish district", or "very Jewish money district"?
I saw that reference to the jewish population in District 23 a few times so I checked what it actually is and it's not even 5%. So does very Jewish mean population or money? Interesting.
And the problem is that's accepted by progressives as something that must be acceded to, in the form of support for Israeli apartheid, in order to get elected in that district. While the same progressives complain about money in politics.
Follow the money.
It's a tad or three
over the top.
None of the "kids" under 30 identify with either party.
Well, maybe not none, but damn few. Most dismiss the parties as irrelevant.
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.
@Wink Again, another person
Again, another person that says it is over the top but doesn't explain why.
And again, I don't think it is goes far enough.
But go ahead and excuse Democrats killing 20-30 million people since WW2.
Also, I am one of those "kids" under 30. I have no love, no tolerance for Democrats or Republicans. The problem is that both those parties hold power. They aren't irrelevant and they won't just go away. The only way for them to be stopped is for them to be destroyed. Simple as that.
Arghhh ... I am proud of being a C99p reader, because ...
...why are you proud of this?
[video:https://youtu.be/ox4IRQVGsBU]
[video:https://youtu.be/lZD4ezDbbu4]
I don't like to have a hate-love relationship with America. But those two songs have done that to me.
I cry for the American soldiers as much as I cry for any German soldier who fell for being proud to be a German before the world wars started.
The unintended (positive) consequences of the Nazi party's atrocities might have been that it's pretty tough to say "I am proud to be a German". I was saved to fall into the trap to be proud of something I had no influence over.
I envy the folks who are born in the airplane crossing all the oceans there are ... they could say I am proud to be the child out of the sky. That has a nice ring to it, hasn't it?
https://www.euronews.com/