This is why we need more than two political parties. And there are two other political parties out there that are on the verge of becoming viable -- the Libertarian Party and the Green Party. But to become viable electoral options, they need to get some media coverage. Without that, most people will never even know they exist. But sadly, just like with most politicians, the corporations have bought up most media outlets -- and those corporations are not going to allow their media to cover any political party they have not bought.
What's most disturbing of all is that most Americans have been deluded into believing they have a real democratic system, and a choice on economic issues. But as long as the powers-that-be, in collusion with the corporate-owned media, can limit the number of political parties allowed to compete in elections, that will never really be true.
As long as we continue to vote for the two corporate parties, we virtually guarantee that other parties will never be viable. I suspect the media would have no choice but to cover them if they had more people willing to vote for them.
ReplyDeleteEven four parties would be far too few, as the problem is the party system istelf. It is a system which channels thinking into formulas and in so doing reduces the need for actual thinking altogether. I no longer need to know what positions a politician actually holds on individual issues, I merely need to look at what letter he puts after his name. Voting made easy.
ReplyDeleteAll social orders, be they religious or political, go through the same metamorphosis. They start out based on profound philosophies and require sacrifice from the membership, and over time the focus on sacrifice and prociple is lost and they focus more and more on comforting and facilitating the membership, with a leadership that has a sense of entitlement. Thus churches have clerics who get away with pedophilia, homeowner associations have tyrannical boards of driectors, and democracies have governments like the US with voting publics who divide into tribes by political parties because it's easier that way and they are largely indifferent to actual principle.
Agreed on all counts and comments. I'm also beginning to come around to the view that we need to totally re-think/re-configure our government's operating system: our constitution.
ReplyDeleteThere is an excellent video in rotation right now on LinkTV in which Professor Richard Wolff discusses several things we need to be doing today. His main point revolves around workplace democracy, but during the question and answer period he also discusses some of the differences between our system and other, more modern democracies in places such as Germany.
One thing they have which would make a huge difference in our country, is proportional representation. If Germany, home of the strongest capitalist economy in the world right now, can not only allow minority parties that openly challenge capitalism, but offer them and all other parties earning over 5% of the vote seed money to help build and spread their message, why can't we.
I suspect it is because the sociopathic captains of our corporations realize precisely how corrupt and immoral their actions are, and they know we wouldn't stand for it given an alternative.
I'll look for an online copy of the video and try to post it soon if possible.
Sorry for the double post, but here's the info. Not currently available online.
ReplyDeleteRichard Wolff - Democracy at Work: A Cure for Capitalism
Airdates: Times are Eastern
Wednesday, October 17th 12:30 am
Friday, October 19th 07:00 pm
Saturday, October 20th 05:00 am
Sunday, October 21st 12:00 pm
DIRECTV Channel 375 | DISH Network Channel 9410
I cannot recommend this strongly enough, and Wolff is a fairly entertaining speaker (rare in an economist).