I had a confusing conversation with someone today. This otherwise intelligent and observant dude actually said, “The two party system should be abolished.”
Huh?
Two party system? What two party system? I mean, doesn’t there actually need to BE a two party system before we can abolish it? Saying we should get rid of the two party system is like saying the Tooth Fairy should be arrested. If a magical pervert who breaks into your kids’ bedroom and collects their body parts actually existed, I’d agree that she ought to be apprehended and exterminated. But she doesn’t so she can’t be. Similarly, if a political system wherein a duopoly of two ideologically opposed groups were in constant gridlock due to their fundamental and irreconcilable philosophical differences actually existed, I’d agree that we ought to abolish it and establish a system with more than two parties. But it doesn’t so we can’t. This nation is run by a rigid and ruthless monopoly. It may assume different names but all of its members strive for the same goal: Money and power. Yes that ol’ chestnut. You’d think we’d have caught on by now, wouldn’t you? Ah but if we’ve learned anything it’s that we never learn anything.
Unfortunately millions of sadly misguided souls have chosen “a side” and spend most of their time attacking “the other side” not realizing they’re pissing in their own bathtub. Interestingly, most of the accusations and insults they throw are accurate and even insightful. They simply don’t realize they’re cutting themselves with those barbs as well. When a Republican and a Democrat argue it’s a perfect example of how someone can be completely right and totally wrong at the same time. It’s like when a man phones his wife from his secretary’s apartment and leaves a voice mail accusing her of cheating. And then she calls back from the pool boy’s cell phone screaming that he’s a liar and an adulterer. They’re both accurate. And they’re both horrible. And, weirdly enough, they’re perfect for each other.
The problem, I think, is that the loyalist’s impression of his own party is nothing but a fantastical hallucination. What people say about “their party”, and what people say about our political system in general, does not even vaguely relate to the reality of the situation. I’ll show you what I mean:
A Democrat believes his party is the party of “tolerance” and “diversity”, he believes his party is “anti-war”, he believes his party supports “civil rights”, he believes he is in the “working class” party, he believes his is the party for young voters. Yet when I look at the historical resume of the Democrat Party I see a very different picture painted. I see slavery; I see the KKK; I see eugenics and Margaret Sanger; I see Jim Crow Laws; I see opposition to civil rights; I see Japanese Americans dying in internment camps; I see the atom bomb killing thousands of innocent people; I see drone attacks on American citizens; I see drone attacks in Pakistan murdering women and children; I see Somalia and Kosovo; I see Vietnam and Korea; I see the continued use of Gitmo; I see warrantless wiretapping; I see the NDAA permitting the military to arrest and detain Americans without due process; I see the income tax made permanent; I see the withholding system established, forever putting the government between a working class man and his paycheck; I see the Federal Reserve; I see banks and corporations bailed out with blue collar tax money; I see Social Security bankrupting my generation; I see nothing but enslavement, abuse, murder, destruction, manipulation and death. That’s your Democrat Party.
On the other hand, or should I say on the back of the same hand, you have the Republicans. A Republican believes his party is the party of “small government”, he believes his party supports “state’s rights”, he believes his is the party of “fiscal conservatism”, he believes the Republican Party stands for “individual rights” and “family values”. Yet when I look through an unbiased lens at the Republican Party I see something quite different. I see southern states being invaded and burned to the ground; I see the south carved up into military districts for a decade; I see the radical centralization of the government; I see the eradication of Jeffersonian principles; I see the size of government increased under every Republican president for the last 100 years; I see the creation of the EPA, the Department of Health, the Department of Education, the DEA, the ATF, the TSA; I see the Department of Homeland Security; I see Social Security expanded; I see Medicare Part D virtually socializing the pharmaceutical industry; I see federal spending increased by 38 percent under Hoover and by 30 percent under Eisenhower and by 70 percent under Nixon and by 53 percent under Reagan and by 300 percent under Bush; I see the war on drugs; I see the war on terror; I see the Patriot Act; I see the NDAA; I see a parade of adulterers and deviants like Newt Gingrich, Mark Foley, Mark Sanford, Mark Souder, Larry Craig, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Chris Lee, Ted Haggard, David Vitter; I see nothing but tyranny, despotism, taxation, government growth and government spending. That’s your Republican Party.
Generally speaking, these parties aren’t what they say but they are what they say the other guy is. Make sense? The government spends and the government takes and the government infringes on your rights and it makes no difference which party is at the helm. That’s because there is no difference to begin with. Maybe there was at one point. Say, back in the 1860’s. Back when the Democrats were wearing pointy white hats and the Republicans were patrolling the towns they had just destroyed. But those are days they both would rather not discuss. Now if you were to awake from a coma and I were to show you our current foreign, economic and domestic policies, you wouldn’t be able to tell me whether a Republican or Democrat is in the White House overseeing it all. Or who controls Congress. Because their economic policies are identical, they haggle only over percentages. Their foreign policy is indistinguishable, they argue only over which countries to bomb and which dictators to support and which to overthrow. Their domestic policy can not be differentiated, they just tussle over semantics.
They’ve come together. They’ve decided to work as one to tyrannize, control and exploit you and your family.
Isn’t it so sweet?
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