Democrats Betray Their “Base” Once Again

For the umpteenth time, the Democratic Party, under their latest slick con artist of a leader, Obama (how like Bill Clinton he actually is) is selling out the interests of a segment of the populace they purport to “represent.”

The Republicans in Congress want to slash the maximum unemployment insurance coverage for discarded workers from 99 weeks to 59 weeks. (The maximum isn’t even available in all states.) The Democrats counteroffer? Cut it to 79 weeks. 

So at a minimum a cut in unemployment is already baked into the cake. If the GOP even agrees to 79 weeks. And they'll "trade" away a demand for drug testing of applicants as their

"concession."

This is what is called “compromise” in U.S. political discourse- the Democrats making unilateral concessions to reactionary proposals. 

Here’s what the Dems should have done, and would have, if they really represented the interests of the unemployed, and workers generally. Told the GOP We need to increase the coverage to 119 weeks, and make it mandatory in all states. Then if they want to compromise, they can agree to keep the status quo.

But the Democrats, contrary to their cowboys like The Nation magazine crowd (chronic Nader-haters) who exist to corral progressives and whoever into the Democratic party pen, are not “for” the people, do not represent anything except a lesser evil. Which is evil. Which means that, if decade after decade, all you ever do is exhort, browbeat, and guilt-trip people into voting for evil, you are part of the problem.

Oh, I forgot: “Think of the Supreme Court!” Think of this: a DEMOCRATIC Senator, by the name of Joe Biden chaired the Judiciary committee in a DEMOCRAT-controlled Senate, and rammed through Clarence “Pubic Hair” Thomas, lying to other Senators about Anita Hill. (See Jane Mayer and Jill Abramson’s devastating book, Strange Justice : The Selling of Clarence Thomas.) And Antonin Scalia was confirmed 98-0- including a “yea” by DEMOCRATIC Senator Al Gore- who got his just desserts when Scalia was part of the 5 person GOP cabal on the court that stole the Presidential election from him in 2000.

Sure, it makes a difference which party is in power temporarily. Like when LBJ kept the U.S. out of war in Vietnam, as he promised. Oh wait, that’s not what happened. (There’s a tradition of double-crossing Democratic presidents. Woodrow Wilson also ran in 1916 promising to stay out of WWI, and guess what? Another policy switcheroo. Hey, presidents have to be flexible to respond to changing conditions! And Obama has pulled too many double-crosses to cram into parentheses.)

 But seriously, there are differences between the two parties. But unless you except lifetime imprisonment in a political straitjacket and submission to the rule of corporate oligarchy and a bourgeois class dictatorship, there is no alternative to building a genuine opposition movement. You don’t see reactionary fanatics selling out their principles- they force the GOP to give them what they want. If progressives can’t do that- and there’ no evidence that they can- the only principled thing to do is decisively break with the corrupt corporate party. Stop being a battered political wife.

When you look at the contemptuous treatment dished out to progressive supplicants by Obama, his various spokesmen, and Jim Messina, a truly despicable operative, one is struck by the parallels to abused wife syndrome. It’s the psychology of entrapment, feeling that one has “no where else to go,” and continually self-delusional hopes that “he’ll change” and “this time it’s different.”

Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me fifty times, shame on my pathetic ass.

Jasonzenith.blogspot.com

Taboo-truths.blogspot.com