(The Intelligence Daily) -- At this point, any idea that the Democratic Party and Barack Obama are “better” than the Republicans should be laid to rest. Talking about what John McCain “would have done” as President is little more than idle metaphysical speculation. The main difference between to the two parties is that the Republican Party pitches their rhetoric at the most rancorous members of the ruling class, while the Democrats aim their rhetoric at more nuanced thinking members of that class. The surface of being a party of people seems aimed mostly at middle class layers- journalists, union representatives, intellectuals- in an attempt to form a coalition which includes the top 1% of American society rather than just the top .1%. If the differences in rhetoric are minor, the differences in policy are largely theoretical.
Never mind that President Obama got up and bald-faced lied to the American public the military’s best and brightest. Let’s talk about the Democratic “opposition” to his proposal to engage in wholesale slaughter and genocide in Afghanistan. My favorite local blog (/sarcasm) Blue Oregon has excellently expressed the perspective fashionable even among sectors of the far right that Obama should be “in it to win it.” Another perspective at Blue Oregon is to provide counsel to Obama on how to best wage war against Afghanistan. Next, there is the similar claim that Obama’s intensification of the war is misguided, best expressed by netroots favorite Russ Feingold. Finally, there is the perspective of the despicable The Nation magazine which studiously avoids any discussion of geopolitical strategies, oil resources, or international conflict.
Missing entirely is any discussion that killing tons of Afghans is a bad thing no matter what reasons are presented.
Then there’s the health care debate. Obama has bent over backward to reassure insurance giants, pharmaceutical companies, medical equipment manufacturers, and other social parasites that their profits will not be attacked. In short, he considers their profits more valuable than your health. Even the weak “public option” has become something for Obama to tap dance around even mentioning. Democrats in the Congress have gutted provisions which provide for women’s reproductive health. Make no mistake about it, abortion is reproductive health care. The attacks on women’s access to abortion are coming not from right-wing Republican circles, but from the Democratic Party itself. Fear of Republicans on the issue of abortion is one of the main things that tethers the “left” to the Democratic Party in America. The current debate on health care shows that Democrats are no better or no worse on this issue when the rubber hits the road. More on this from my girlfriend whenever she decides to write her article on the matter.
I could once again go into Democratic Party support for Wall Street profits over social need as pertains to the current economic crisis, but I won’t Instead, I’d like to point out the mortal danger Democrats are putting me and you in at this very second. You read here first about the drive by certain sectors of the American ruling class, not toward fascism, but toward naked military dictatorship. For what it’s worth, I picked the issue up from the World Socialist Web Site, a site I believe that everyone interested in working class politics should read daily. It is The New York Times of revolutionary politics. Getting away from the digression, two articles strike me as particularly troubling. The first is about the increasing defiance of top military brass of legitimately elected civilian government. The second is about the popularity of a non-existent political party bult out of the Tea Party movement.
I’ve commented several times to my girlfriend that those who flock to such an electoral movement will largely be people who would otherwise vote Democratic. This is because the Tea Party movement despite, or more accurately because of, its fascist character at least addresses issues of importance to working class Americans. Giveaways to Wall Street, anxiety about Obama’s health care plan, deindustrialization, and the continuing crippling recession are all central to the Tea Party message. Because the Democratic Party slanders all of its critics as being right-wingers- and if you need any clearer expression of this, I urge you to spend some time over at Blue Oregon- they embolden the right. Further, their failure to meaningfully address these issues, combined with the two party duopoly of American politics leaves people with nowhere to go but the far right.
Huffington Post is woefully wrong that a Tea Party movement would be a disaster for the GOP. Perhaps the GOP as a political party. However, this presupposes that the Republican Party exists to get elected. On the contrary, the Republican Party exists to push the social, economic, and political agenda of the most ravenous, exploitative layers of the American ruling class. In this sense, a Tea Party-based political party would be a boon for the industrialists and financiers who backed President Bush. The agenda set would be much further to the right, and with fervent populist rancor behind it. Democrats will not be entirely to blame for this phenomenon. But they have cleared the path for the growing fascist movement. They will also do nothing to protect working class Americans, instead relying upon “dialogue” and parliamentary procedure to fight the American brownshirts.
The beginning of political wisdom for all those seeking to end the oppression of capitalism, and to fight for meaningful social change is that our interests cannot be advanced in any way, shape, or form through the Democratic Party. The Democratic Party, not the Republican Party- a place where sociopaths and degenerates of all kinds congregate- is the main obstacle to a social movement capable of fundamentally changing the society in which we live.
Nick P grew up in New England in the 1990s. From a young age he sought out the strange and unusual. He first started irritating strangers internationally when he started writing for Maximumrocknroll in 1995, being voted “Most Hated Columnist.” After being fired for allegedly being a plant for Jeff Bale and Larry Livermore , he went on to write for Jeff Bale’s far superior The Hit List until that folded. He is also a founder of the Esozone event. Nick runs a website called The Black Sun Gazette. 
