Interesting article

The reality appears that both major parties are in for a significant realignment, and soon.

The recitation of support for Clinton shows just how far right her appeal extends.  She has little centrist and virtually no liberal/progressive support. These are, as noted, folks who might well vote for McCain. And I agree that few of the dropout Democrats from this realm would switch to Green  or Indie status.

However, if the superdelegate issue develops into convention chicanery, then it is the typical Obama supporter who might be looking for a new home, and would be welcomed to Green or Indie venues.

It is long overdue, I believe, to have the parties break up and realign. Neither one is doing a good job. Neither one has the trust of the majority of the people (see Congressional ratings-lower than pond scum). And neither has put forth a candidate sufficiently capable of rescuing the country from the mess it is currently in.

Personally I hope both parties shatter this summer., Then perhaps people  will re-examine the reasons they have for voting in a particular pattern. Perhaps the average voter will start to vote in their own interest again. Perhaps it will end campaigns based on smoke and mirrors and lapel pins and ministers. Perhaps it will bring issues in governance back to the voter, where they belong. Perhaps it will restore our Constitution and Bill of Rights. Those items are in sad need of attention, and not of the kind shown recently by Republicans and sadly, Democrats. Long overdue. So let the breakup begin.

by Jack Harrington (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 83 comments) on Saturday, May 10, 2008 at 10:32:14 AM
 

Humpty Dumpty

I agree with your thoughtful response.  The breakup of both parties is long overdue because both represent only power brokers and seldom the will of the American electorate.

My writings are meant to provoke thinking, something that Americans seem to do little of, mostly driven by emotion and platitudes.  For that reason, we are gradually becoming a Third World country, with now being listed as number 28 in childhood mortality and 48 in longevity among other nations.  China and India are leaving us behind in many categories, especially in educating engineers and scientists who will make the difference in how the US is able to cope with the rest of the economic world.

Thanks for posting, I appreciate the feedback. 

by TheSeeker (4 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 24 comments) on Saturday, May 10, 2008 at 3:56:59 PM
 

Your writings

I think we are losing to India and China because we stopped our drive for humanitarian goals as a nation and began our search for aid to the wealthy and corporations. When our old superordinant goal went away with Reagan and his "Morning in America" we climbed down off the mountain top and began another cycle in wealth accumulation that has obliterated all other goals, large and small. We have found ourselves subsidizing the wealthy and corporations instead of eradicating poverty, we invade other countries for empire and oil instead of using diplomacy and business; we threaten countries that are not 'aligned' with our neocon and neolib policies, ala Chavez and Venezuela, and our revived "Fourth Fleet" which is going to reinstitute a new version of the  Monroe Doctrine. We no longer look to find a cure for a pandemic illness, rather we search for every last penny of profit from that ill. We no longert look to space research for the sake of human knowledge, but abandon it because there are no short term profits evident. We give our children and grandchildren "No Child Left Behind" because it will make them better servers at McDonalds, better bolt tighteners on some  assembly line, rather than make them critical thinkers and better citizens.

Our national goals shifted, deteriorated badly, and we have suffered accordingly. Now we labor under neocon leaders who follow neolib economic practices.  Gone are the days when our political process oversaw our economy, now we have the wealthy and the captains of industry detailing daily events in our lives.

A third party is the only practical way to change this.  I am a Green and believe we have the possibility of someday filling that mission and returning our country to a better world. Cynthia McKinney is my candidate, and I think it would be great if the impossible dream occurred this November.

I hope the disintegration of the two major parties helps accomplish that.

by Jack Harrington (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 83 comments) on Sunday, May 11, 2008 at 11:19:01 AM
 

MULTIPLE FAILURES OF THE LESSER EVIL STRATEGY

The theme of history since at least the 1940's is liberals. radicals, and socialists supporting the Democratic Party in the hope of bringing about far reaching change and, each time, being disappointed once the Democrats are elected.

During the 1940's. the Democrats and Republicans joined in dismantling the Wagner Labor Relations Act and the gains achieved by the massive strikes that led to the formation of the Congress of Industrial Organizations.  (And incidentally, the formation of the CIO and the establishment of industrial unionism in place of craft unions and the legal recognition of collective bargaining were gains won by millions of workers striking; it was not a gift from the Democratic Party.)  The Taft Hartley Act outlawing boycotts of struck businesses was passed in Congress by both the Democrats and Republicans in 1947.  And the majority of Democrats voted for it, so even if those big, bad, greater evil Republicans had magically vanished from Congress, the Democrats would still have passed it.  Taft Hartley is one of the principle factors responsible for the decline of the unions from its post war strength when it represented a third of the American work force to its present anemic position where less than 5% of U.S. workers are union members.

In 1960, John Kennedy promised to eliminate segregation in federally owned housing by executive order if he were elected.  After he was elected, the Congress Of Racial Equality had the picket Kennedy's every appearance over the next six months before Kennedy finally issued an executive order banning segregation in only one-fourth of federally owned housing.

Although the Vietnam war started under Eisenhower with about seven hundred U.S. troops in Vietnam, and a few thousand under Kennedy, it was Kennedy's Vice President, Lyndon Johnson, who escalated the number of American troops to 500,000 after he became President.  The United States did not begin pulling out of Vietnam until General William Westmoreland reported that the number of American troops in Vietnam had to be increased to one million, and the draftees in Vietnam started fragging their officers.

Bill Clinton promised to admit the Haitian boat people into the United States as refugees and to issue an executive order ending the ban on Gays and Lesbians in the military.  Instead, those Haitians who were HIV positive were barred from entry to the U.S. where they could receive medical care until ACT-Up picketed his every appearance for the next six months.  And instead of ending the ban, Clinton gave us "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," which resulted in several times as many Gays and Lesbians being expelled from the military.

All the practitioners of lesser evil politics expected Bush to be impeached and the Iraq war to end once the Democrats gained a majority in Congress.  Instead, Nancy Pelosi announced that impeachment was off the table at her first press conference as Speaker of the House, and the Democrats have continued to vote for every appropriation of the funds needed to continue the U.S. invasion of Iraq that Bush requests.  Hilliary Clinton has said that the majority of Americans won't support single payer health care and proposed instead that all Americans be required to purchase health insurance.  Barak Obama's proposal would not even cover all Americans.

Since at least 20% of every health care dollar is wasted on health insurers playing postal ping pong by sending insurance bills back and forth to each other, single payer is the only way to get our escalating medical expenses under control.  So even if the majority of Americans won't support single payer, the only solution is to keep explaining why it is necessary until the majority of Americans do support it.  And if the Democrats won't impeach Bush and stop funding the Iraq war, which along with the need for single payer health care are our three most critical problems, those who who advocate voting for the Democrats as the lesser evil must be asked if they have gained ANYTHING with their lesser evil strategy.

Robert Halfhill

by rhalfhill (3 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 224 comments) on Saturday, May 10, 2008 at 5:24:01 PM
 

More Humpty Dumpty

A well-presented history lesson.  My question now is where do the 62% of Americans who consider themselves Independents find representation?  Certainly not in either party:  the Democrats represented by Pelosi and Reid with a 16% approval rating among the public; the Republicans represented by a President who has the lowest approval rating in history.  I know the questions, I just don't know the solutions.

by TheSeeker (4 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 24 comments) on Saturday, May 10, 2008 at 6:26:14 PM
 

DISPLACING ONE OF THE MAJOR PARTIES WITH A THIRD PARTY

The only solution is to start building a third party and keep at the hard work of building it until it is able to displace one of the two major parties.  Advocates of the lesser evil strategy will immediately protest: "We must get Bush out of office NOW and end the Iraq war and, by the time you build that third party, the U.S. will have invaded who knows how many other countries and Bush will have either declared martial law and become the first of the Bush dynasty of American Emperors or the Republicans will keep stealing elections and continue Bush's policies into the indefinite future!"  But the point is that if you continue supporting Democrats, and even get them elected, you will not have stopped the present policies of the administration anyway and the totalitarianization of the Presidency, the invasion of Iraq and the invasion of many other countries, people becoming ever more unable to afford to pay for health care, and many other disastrous policies will keep getting worse.  If you continue to defer building a third party because of what you think is the immediate need to replace the Republicans with a lesser evil, you will NEVER make any progress on any of the issues you care about and these same problems will ALWAYS be present. 

People argue that a third party can never win because of the winner take all election system in the United States.  But there is an example of a third party displacing one of the major parties in American history.  In 1856, the Republican Party was founded as a new third party and in 1860, it displaced what had been the Whig Party as one of the two major parties.  The Whig Party went into the dust bin of history.

And people putting most of their time and energy into supporting the Democrats as the lesser evil is what is responsible for the disappearance of the mass anti war movement between 2003 and 2004. The antiwar movement brought 15 million people into the streets worldwide in 2003. But everyone dropped everything they were doing to work for John Kerry's campaign and the mass antiwar movement seemed to have vanished in 2004. And although the majorty assumed Kerry was against the Iraq war -- this lesser evil tactic has become such an automatic response on the left that people just ASSUMED he was against the war -- he is on record as saying he would have been for invading Iraq even if he had known there were no weapons of mass destruction there, and that he would send more troops if the generals asked for them. It should be a no brainer that you cannot oppose the Iraq war by supporting someone who said he would have been for invading Iraq even if he had known there were no weapons of mass destruction there and that he would send more troops if the generals asked for them

I thought that Ralph Nader and the Green Party had the potential to start a mass break out from the Democratic Party in 2000.  Many people had been saying that they did not want a Republican masquerading as a Democrat as President and it looked like Clinton's neo liberalism has finally caused enough people to become frustrated with the Democrats for a viable third party to succeed.  The Democrats managed to scare enough people with their threats of what would happen if the big bad Bush were elected and keep the Green Party from gaining major party status by holding our vote under ten percent.  Still, our polling under five percent and the Green Party's dramatic growth in membership had the potential to grow into a viable third party.

However many Greens caved into the barrage of accusations from friends  and political associates blaming us for electing Bush.  So many Greens wimped out in 2004, or at least enough Ginos, Greens in name only, ran as Nader delegates under false pretenses to keep Ralph Nader from being endorsed.  Instead, the Green Party nominated a covert supporter of the lesser evil strategy when they nominated David Cobb with his safe states strategy.  Safe states means you don't make a serious attempt to campaign in states where there is a danger that you might throw the election to the Republicans.  Cobb's running mate, Pat LaMarche was REALLY SUPER SAFE STATES, saying she was not even going to vote for herself unless the polls in her home state of Maine indicated that John Kerry was going to win 70% of the vote.

The decline in the Green Party's membership and finances can be dated almost to the day of the month when the Greens wimped out.  Even Ralph Nader running without party endorsement won more votes than Cobb.  The Greens in name only not only brought the ensuing debacle on themselves (and the rest of us!), they deserved it.

However, all the other the other left third parties are microscopic shadows of their former selves.  The Greens are still the largest third party on the left and thus represent the best chance of rebuilding a viable third party from the wreckage inflicted on us by the Cobbites.  There may come a time in the near future when the best strategy will be for radicals to stop fucking with the Green Party.  But for now, the strategy that has the highest probability of success for radicals is to try to reform and rebuild the Green Party.

The front runner for the Green Party nomination in 2008 is Cynthia McKinney.  She not only has all the advantages of Ralph Nader but, unlike Nader, she has publicly discussed Bush-Chaney and the neo cons complicity in causing 9/11.  The best strategy for radicals in 2008 is to support the campaign of Cynthia Mackinney.

Robert Halfhill

by rhalfhill (3 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 224 comments) on Saturday, May 10, 2008 at 8:33:26 PM
 

A third party

If a third party is to succeed, it would need someone very rich who could finance his/her own campaign, no political baggage and a platform that would appeal to the white working class and Hispanics, the latter of whom are becoming a large voting block.

by TheSeeker (4 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 24 comments) on Saturday, May 10, 2008 at 10:16:34 PM
 

A THIRD PARTY HAS ALREADY SUCCEEDED IN THE U.S.

Ross Perot and his Reform Party was an example of that on the right.  For a while, the polls were indicating he would win 19% of the vote and he still had many months to campaign and build up more support before the election.  But for some reason, he flaked out and withdrew his candidacy, leaving the Reform Party high and dry.  But still, the Reform Party won a higher percentage of the vote than any third party on either the left or right since Norman Thomas and the Socialist Party.

But that is only a subsidiary point, not my main point.  My main point is that there has ALREADY been one example in American history of a third party replacing one of the two major parties, the Republican Party forming in 1856 and winning the Presidency in 1860 with Abraham Lincoln.  Meanwhile the Whig Party which had hitherto been one of the two major parties went into the dustbin of history.

When the social conditions are right, a third party WILL succeed.  American society was ready to move beyond slavery at that point, and when neither the Whigs nor the Democrats would end slavery, the Republican Party was organized and replaced the Whig Party.

Other articles on OpEdNews have discussed the escalating housing and energy crises.  An increasing percentage of people are going to be foreclosed out of their homes, be unable to afford the gasoline to power their cars and the oil to heat their homes, and will eventually be unable to afford increasingly expensive medical care.  These are only a few of the developing crises that will confront us.  For instance, if Bush is going to invade Iran and Syria after the U.S. has been unable to digest Iraq, the only way he is going to get the cannon fodder he will need for these additional wars is by reinstituting the draft.  With these mounting crises, the chances of the majority of workers and minorities, as well as the majority of Americans who are not wealthy, supporting a third party will be greater.

Robert Halfhill

by rhalfhill (3 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 224 comments) on Sunday, May 11, 2008 at 2:22:27 AM
 

Living in interesting times

While there is uneasiness among Americans because of the credit and housing problems, their thinking is manipulated by the media so that Bush could be reelected for a second term and Obama can acquire a cult-like following that either doesn't want to about his past relationship with corrupt Chicago politicians or are so mesmerized by his orations that they don't care.

 Based on this present election, when given the chance, it appears to me that Americans intellectuals would rather choose and financially support a myth, much as Germans didwhich helped to bring Hitler to power. 

As to the draft, with the private armies that have been tested and are serving in Iraq,  the Bush administration has not had to rely on conscription to fill the ranks of the army.  Striking out at Iran would not be by foot soldier but by bombing it into oblivion, something that would please the countries in the Mideast that would also welcome its demise.

While I consider history a great teacher, I look at it in relation to how the technology of the twenty-first century and the control it gives manipulators over the American mind.

by TheSeeker (4 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 24 comments) on Sunday, May 11, 2008 at 10:44:19 AM