The Democrats Have No Soul: The Clintons, Neoliberalism and How the 'People's Party' Lost Its Way

[Ferd Berfel]

http://www.salon.com/2016/04/12/the_democrats_have_no_soul_the_clintons_neoliberalism_and_how_the_peoples_party_lost_its_way/

Republicans never had one. That makes Democrats' betrayals, deceit and crisis of legitimacy that much more serious


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Looking beyond the daily tussle between Donald J. Trump and the Republican Party, or Bernie Sanders and the Democratic Party, let’s consider the larger historical picture to see what the current election campaign tells us about the state of the two major political parties and their future.

Over the last forty years both major political parties have been in a state of terminal decline for a number of reasons, primarily the ideological contradictions each has developed quite in sync with the other, driven by the same economic trends. Both are in a death spiral at the moment, but this being America, where political accountability is not as rapid or conclusive as in Europe, it’s likely that they will continue in more or less their existing forms for the foreseeable future, further deepening the crisis of legitimacy. Whatever the realities about their loss of credibility, we are not likely to hear an announcement anytime soon that the Democratic or Republican parties are dead, having ceased to serve the respective functions for which they accumulated much legitimacy at different points in the twentieth century.

(snip)

It is noteworthy that a great many among America’s intellectual elite support Hillary Clinton over Bernie Sanders, offering standard neoliberal justifications, whereas those outside elite intellectual circles are more likely to support Sanders; likewise with Trump and his antagonists and supporters. What the establishment will not do is take either of them seriously; meaning that they will not, as they haven’t for forty years, acknowledge the concerns of the constituencies they are supposed to represent, and direct the very real anxieties felt on all parts of the political spectrum toward positive resolutions good for the country and for the rest of the world.

[highprincipleswork]

1. F Neoliberlism!

[Ferd Berfel]

3. and the Horse it rode in on

[NorthCarolina]

2. We don't really have two political parties, we have one party with two names. nt

[Vincardog]

4. No we have two parties with one owner

[NorthCarolina]

5. Same difference. nt

[rhett o rick]

6. In my opinion it's a distraction to talk about the party differences. The divide is

between the Have's (and their authoritarian followers) and the Have Nots. Or in other words between the Wealthy 1% and the 99%. Now the Clinton fans will tell you that although Hillary and Bill have amassed a huge wealth (abt $150,000,000 that we know of) that puts them in the top 1% of the top 1%, that their main goal is to help those struggling among us. Well their actions sure don't show it. Trashing welfare safety nets, supporting tough drug laws that see millions incarcerated, the Iraq War helped their friends but not anyone in the 99%, fracking for oil company profits doesn't help us, prosecuting medical marijuana dispensers doesn't help us. Come to think of it, they help their wealth friends and not the 99%.

We are in a class war and not between the D's and R's, but between the Greedy and those struggling to get along.

[noiretextatique]

7. +1000 eom