| There is a reason Democrats and Republicans don't | | | | have been stripped from the Bill of Rights, and all the |
| get along, but it's no longer a matter of difference of | | | | noble prattle has been eviscerated from the |
| political ideas and ideals. Both those determinants | | | | Constitution, money and capitalism have emerged |
| took a bullet to the brain on Nov. 22, 1963, as did the | | | | freely to take preeminence in the democratic |
| sort of gravitas that came with them. | | | | process. Money holds democracy fast by the throat. |
| What we have now is partisan squabble about | | | | Kennedy and LBJ were just two odd men out. And |
| money. Who will best govern the purse strings of the | | | | idealism didn't work out well for Carter, either. |
| nation, who is fittest to serve the corporations best | | | | Now that the Corporatocracy is out in plain sight, it is |
| interests, who is most likely to garner the sort of | | | | very clear what democracy means in America. Barring |
| fuzzy popular support of Americans so that | | | | some very unusual set of circumstances, the |
| corporations can gain, maintain or increase their | | | | candidate with the most support of lobbyists and |
| holdings without too close scrutiny. | | | | corporate interests will win. And if the money race is |
| Democracy was a grand experiment launched from | | | | close, then the success of idealistic backstabbing |
| lofty ideals, meant to serve both decency and | | | | determines the victor. |
| fairness, as long as you were male, rich, and white. | | | | There really is no longer a meaningful difference |
| To many whose framework about democracy has | | | | between Republicans and Democrats. As the |
| focused on idealism, democracy has failed. To those | | | | Democrats shift to the right, and the Republicans |
| with real money, democracy is the justification for | | | | shift even further to the right, it is clear that the real |
| their continued skipping along the yellow brick road. | | | | winners in American politics are AIPAC, Mobil, Shell, |
| Democracy was somehow confabulated during the | | | | BP, Merck, and the conglomerate of private health |
| years of LBJ to actually mean that all men were, in | | | | insurance companies. Money does, in fact, make the |
| fact, created equal, when that is not now and never | | | | world go around. |
| has been true, as much as we would all benefit from | | | | And President Obama is good with this. So is Mitch |
| just such equality. | | | | McConnell, and Nancy Pelosi, and John Boehner et al. |
| Democracy is democratic in that it simply allows that | | | | The only real fight being conducted in the name of |
| whatever will happen, happens. And for Americans in | | | | 'democracy' these days is about who controls the |
| the 21st Century, it means that money no longer has | | | | purse strings. |
| to hide behind the ideals of LBJ or anyone else any | | | | Either democracy has failed, or this is what the |
| longer. Now that all pretenses about human rights | | | | founding fathers truly had in mind all along. |