Still True

The more that things change, the more they remain the same. The Republican Party still "represents the big special interests, the oil lobby, the real estate lobby, the big corporations and the banks, and all the rest of that crew". They are a little smarter now though. They include side issues like abortion, flag-burning, creationism, school prayer, religious bigotry, and a thinly-disguised racism. They know they can't really do anything about these issues (since they would have to change the Constitution to do so), and probably don't really want to do anything about them.

But these issues are effective in whipping up passion among non-thinkers, and they provide a great cover for what the Republicans really want to do -- deregulate and remove consumer protections for Wall Street and the corporations, give massive new tax cuts to the rich, protect corporations from having to spend any money to stop polluting the air, water, and earth, abolish Medicare, privatize Social Security, destroy public education, destroy unions, and drastically slash spending on social programs that help hurting Americans.

In Truman's time, the Democrats were the protectors of the working people, women, minorities, and the poor. They have somewhat strayed from this mission sadly, but they are still a much better alternative than returning the Republicans to power. We may not have a great choice in November, but we do have a choice -- and the best choice we have is to re-elect the president, give him a Democratic Congress, and then hold the Democrats feet to the fire, in the hope that they will find their way back to their progressive tradition (represented by presidents like Roosevelt, Truman, Kennedy, and Johnson).