In my last post Isis made the following comment to my “horse race” style questions:
Why would I care to answer such a question?
This race is over, it’s a disgusting bamboozlement of the Democrats by Big Media to isolate the primaries to 2 candidates. Who cares about this distracting minutae? It just takes the wind out of activism and pointing the finger at the real problems in this country and world by giving smart people like you, Steven, some bulls**t to waste your energy on. Who cares?
Obama=Hillary=McCain. It doesn’t matter any longer. There is no contest, no “race,” just a long season of distracting the US public and it’s best and brightest (?? Hmmm, I guess maybe not our brightest??) journalists and activists following how the big donor money is spent. How boring is that?
What happened to global warming?
What happened to single-payer health care?
What happened to eradication of global poverty and economic development?I guess trying to guess what punditry crap that emanates from the Lying Class of politicians has superceded real human and planetary needs. Thanks, Steven.
I started to respond to her in the thread, but then I decided my response needed to be longer than a pithy one liner, and her concerns deserved more than that as well. So follow me below the fold to see what I have to say to her, and to you as well about the concerns she has raised:
(cont.)
I confess, Isis, you have better questions than I do. I wonder though if the ultimate problem isn’t far more systematic. We are a Republic, but one that is effectively run for the benefit of an oligarchy, or a plutocracy or however you want to describe the wealthiest individuals and largest corporations. And our media is a willing servant of that corporatist oligarchy. The oligarchs, through the amount of money they can supply to candidates, indirectly choose who will be allowed the chance to serve them as President.
Perhaps this is the real reason Gore decided he didn’t want to run. In effect, the President of these United States is a bought and paid for employee of Big Business. Some may be more upfront about their allegiances (the Republicans) and others less so (the Democrats, especially the DLC brand of Democrat) but all of them are limited in what they can do to cross those who provided them the funds to win their elections. Gore saw this quite clearly, and he also saw that he could do more working outside the system to effect real change in our nation (and our world), which as we are all aware is irretrievably broken.
Perhaps the real question I should have asked is what happens when the collapse of our society is finally apparent to even the most willfully blinded individuals. At that point what happens? I don’t know, but the possibilities frighten the crap out of me. Hyperinflation? Depression? Military coup? Fascist/Christianist takeover? War, famine, plague?
These aren’t just hyperbolic statements made to inflame the passions of the “choir” but sincere concerns. Across all sectors our country is is regressing, losing ground: in education, as an economic power, as a diplomatic power, and even as a military power. Our infrastructure is dangerously in need of massive repairs across the board. Our ability to supply fresh water in the future is at great risk, either from pollution in the East, overuse in the West and/or the effects of Global Warming (eg., the current drought in the Southeast). Our democracy, and in particular the great compromise which was the result of the FDR Presidency began to show cracks in the late 50’s and early 60’s. Those cracks were pasted over during the 70’s after Watergate, but now, after nearly 30 years of Republican rule (and I count the Clintons as a form of Republicanism within the Democratic Party) the cracks have been torn asunder by the Bush Presidency and the raw wounds exposed for all to see.
We will collapse like the Soviet Union did, but the manner and the form of that collapse will be different. I supported Edwards in large part because he was the only candidate with a serious hope of winning who represents a revitalized progressive movement based on the principles established by FDR, the last time we faced a crisis moment in our nation’s history when the country could have torn itself apart.
Now all it seems is that we have to hope that the “hope” of Obama has something behind it other than mere charisma. Clearly he is the most charismatic Presidential candidate since JFK, but JFK did not really get much accomplished as President. His greatest accomplishments were negative ones. He didn’t get us into a nuclear war over Cuba (a much closer occurrence than we used to believe), and he didn’t openly oppose the Civil Rights Movement, though he didn’t do much to encourage it either.
The trouble is, that we are heading into times in which the dangers we face are orders of magnitude higher than what Kennedy faced (with the exception of the Missile Crisis). We need more than charisma and the ability to give a good speech from our President. We need a program for radical change such as the one FDR provided during the Great Depression (along with all his charisma and eloquence, too). What I fear is that no President in our era can openly propose such a program, much less get it passed through Congress, until the collapse of our society has advanced so far that even jaded politicians will accept it out of fear of revolution or worse. By then, it likely will be too late.
If that sounds too pessimistic, I’m sorry. Someone once said (and I’m probably paraphrasing here) hope is what you have left when all reason to believe that you can avoid calamity has fled. I have hope for the future, but at this point very little reason to believe that any one politician will be our salvation.