Some dedicated advocates of Medicare For All, breaking up megabanks, ending the war on drugs and mass incarceration, the rights of immigrants, etc. will continue the fight, just as serious peace activists continued to protest President Obama's civilian-slaughtering drone warfare and invasion of Libya. But most will celebrate a Clinton victory and kiss political revolution goodbye.
What will there be to celebrate, beyond the election of the country's first woman to the White House? Margaret Thatcher's tenure as prime minister should warn us against overstating the symbolism of such victories.(1) A Clinton Administration will mean more business as usual, a lot like the Obama Administration but more shameless about its allegiances to the financial sector, Big Oil, and other powerful lobbies.
Lesser-evil voting, by definition, has never been more than a stopgap to fend off the GOP horde. It has become a dangerous trap.
Neither Ds nor Rs are capable of adequately addressing the crises of the 21st century: climate change; concentration of wealth and power among the One Percent, shrinking of the middle class, and shredding of the social safety net for the poor; a growing national-security mass-incarceration state; endless war.
The difference between a Clinton presidency and a Trump or Cruz or Rubio presidency is the difference between driving towards a cliff at 55 mph and driving towards a cliff at 90 mph.
The Sanders campaign has raised hopes that these crises can still be solved. But real change requires thinking beyond an individual campaign. The tendency of progressives to place all their eggs in the Democratic basket and all their hopes in single charismatic leaders has prevented insurgent movements from gaining momentum.
Political revolution requires changing the landscape so that the field isn't forever limited to the two parties of war and Wall Street. It means banishing the fantasy that one of the two parties can be rehabilitated if we just vote for the right Democrat.
Alternative, Independent, Permanent
One hundred years ago, Eugene Debs and his fellow socialists understood that the crises of the time demanded an independent movement with a strong electoral component. The parties they organized had enormous influence, even though they didn't survive laws enacted by D and R legislators to weaken alternative parties and Cold War hostility towards the left.
The New Deal was based on ideas advocated decades earlier by socialists and others outside the two-party establishment. President Roosevelt knew he had to enact them during the Depression or he'd see a mass exodus from the Democratic Party.
The legacy of alternative parties in the U.S. includes abolition of slavery, women's suffrage, the eight-hour workday, workers' benefits, public schools, unemployment compensation, the minimum wage, child labor laws, direct election of senators, and programs like Social Security and Medicare. All of these were introduced by alternative parties and adopted decades later by one or both of the major parties.
The virtual disappearance of such ideas in the last few generations is one of the great unmentioned reasons for the triumph of the right wing in U.S. politics.
When the two corporate-money parties were left alone on the field to be each other's sole competition, it was inevitable that they'd slide to the right. While sharp differences exist between Ds and Rs, their leaders tend to agree on premises: privatization and "free trade" globalization are good for America; no health-care reform is permissable unless insurance companies help draft the legislation; the U.S. may attack any country at will, even in the absence of provocation; too-big-to-fail banks must never suffer punishment for their criminal recklessness, or even face adequate restraints.
Genuine systematic change is always called unrealistic and too radical to be taken seriously, as the political mainstream's critical onslaught against Bernie Sanders proves. The history of progress in the cause of justice and freedom in the U.S. is the history of parties whose ideas were both marginal and indispensible.
An effective alternative party is one that builds its base of support among those who've seen their ideals betrayed and rejected by the two major parties, by those who've realized that neither of the two big parties serve their needs, and by those whose alienation from the two parties has kept them away from voting booths. It engages working people and people of color in a way that enables them to represent their own interests and encourages their leadership within the party. It runs candidates at all levels, from school board to city hall to statehouse to Congress to the White House.
Alt-party presidential candidates use their campaigns to carry the banner for popular movements and for state and local candidates. Green Party nominees since Ralph Nader in 2000 have all promoted down-ticket Green candidates (some of whom have won) and helped state parties achieve ballot status. In 2012, Jill Stein's campaign assisted Green ballot-access efforts in enough states (37 including the District of Columbia) to place her name in front of 82% of voters in the November election.
What will there be to celebrate, beyond the election of the country's first woman to the White House? Margaret Thatcher's tenure as prime minister should warn us against overstating the symbolism of such victories.(1) A Clinton Administration will mean more business as usual, a lot like the Obama Administration but more shameless about its allegiances to the financial sector, Big Oil, and other powerful lobbies.
Lesser-evil voting, by definition, has never been more than a stopgap to fend off the GOP horde. It has become a dangerous trap.
Neither Ds nor Rs are capable of adequately addressing the crises of the 21st century: climate change; concentration of wealth and power among the One Percent, shrinking of the middle class, and shredding of the social safety net for the poor; a growing national-security mass-incarceration state; endless war.
The Sanders campaign has raised hopes that these crises can still be solved. But real change requires thinking beyond an individual campaign. The tendency of progressives to place all their eggs in the Democratic basket and all their hopes in single charismatic leaders has prevented insurgent movements from gaining momentum.
Political revolution requires changing the landscape so that the field isn't forever limited to the two parties of war and Wall Street. It means banishing the fantasy that one of the two parties can be rehabilitated if we just vote for the right Democrat.
Alternative, Independent, Permanent
One hundred years ago, Eugene Debs and his fellow socialists understood that the crises of the time demanded an independent movement with a strong electoral component. The parties they organized had enormous influence, even though they didn't survive laws enacted by D and R legislators to weaken alternative parties and Cold War hostility towards the left.
The New Deal was based on ideas advocated decades earlier by socialists and others outside the two-party establishment. President Roosevelt knew he had to enact them during the Depression or he'd see a mass exodus from the Democratic Party.
The legacy of alternative parties in the U.S. includes abolition of slavery, women's suffrage, the eight-hour workday, workers' benefits, public schools, unemployment compensation, the minimum wage, child labor laws, direct election of senators, and programs like Social Security and Medicare. All of these were introduced by alternative parties and adopted decades later by one or both of the major parties.
The virtual disappearance of such ideas in the last few generations is one of the great unmentioned reasons for the triumph of the right wing in U.S. politics.
When the two corporate-money parties were left alone on the field to be each other's sole competition, it was inevitable that they'd slide to the right. While sharp differences exist between Ds and Rs, their leaders tend to agree on premises: privatization and "free trade" globalization are good for America; no health-care reform is permissable unless insurance companies help draft the legislation; the U.S. may attack any country at will, even in the absence of provocation; too-big-to-fail banks must never suffer punishment for their criminal recklessness, or even face adequate restraints.
Genuine systematic change is always called unrealistic and too radical to be taken seriously, as the political mainstream's critical onslaught against Bernie Sanders proves. The history of progress in the cause of justice and freedom in the U.S. is the history of parties whose ideas were both marginal and indispensible.
An effective alternative party is one that builds its base of support among those who've seen their ideals betrayed and rejected by the two major parties, by those who've realized that neither of the two big parties serve their needs, and by those whose alienation from the two parties has kept them away from voting booths. It engages working people and people of color in a way that enables them to represent their own interests and encourages their leadership within the party. It runs candidates at all levels, from school board to city hall to statehouse to Congress to the White House.
Alt-party presidential candidates use their campaigns to carry the banner for popular movements and for state and local candidates. Green Party nominees since Ralph Nader in 2000 have all promoted down-ticket Green candidates (some of whom have won) and helped state parties achieve ballot status. In 2012, Jill Stein's campaign assisted Green ballot-access efforts in enough states (37 including the District of Columbia) to place her name in front of 82% of voters in the November election.
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