The Democratic Party has transformed from a political party that represented working-class interests to a party that serves affluent professionals. In the process they’ve become a faux opponent very much like the Washington Generals who pretended to oppose the Harlem Globetrotters.
If this wasn’t obvious, the Democrats have again made it crystal clear with their selection of Tom Perez to head the DNC that they have no intention of changing, even if it means losing to the Republicans forever.
“Minnesota Congressman Keith Ellison lost his bid to become the chair of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) on Saturday after a scorched-earth smear campaign targeting his religious faith, his affinity for the Nation of Islam in his youth, and his support for Palestinian rights alongside a secure Israel.
Instead, the majority of the DNC’s voting members chose former labor secretary Tom Perez to lead the party.
Perez was widely perceived as being brought into the race by allies of President Obama, former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, and other members of the party establishment. Ellison — a black man, a Bernie Sanders supporter, and the first Muslim elected to Congress — earned initial support from many Democrats until a strong backlash from the Obama and Clinton camps and prominent pro-Israeli activists.”
In my lifetime, conservatives have hijacked the language that was developed by the labor movement. They’ve appropriated it and turned it around to mean the opposite. Economic reform used to refer to unionized labor, regulation and intervention in the US economy by government to protect workers and consumers, trust-busting, and so on. Today, the economic language churned-out by our corporate media is predictably right wing, anti-labor, pro-financial. Economic “reform” means to cut back social spending and have all the gains go to the wealthy and to the corporate sector via privatization of the economy, monopolies, outsourcing, and rent-seeking
Executive Director of the Labor Institute, Les Leopold, examines the behavior of the Democratic party and come to the same conclusions.
“Ask the corporate Democrats who have turned losing into an art form.
Since 2008, they have lost 917 state legislative seats. Explanations range from Koch brothers funding to gerrymandering, to voter suppression to the rise of the Tea Party. All partially true.
The Democrats also shoulder a good deal of the blame. Ever since Bill Clinton triangulated into NAFTA and away from working people, the Democratic party’s embrace of financial and corporate elites have become the norm.
Hillary Clinton took $225,000 per speech from Goldman Sachs not because she was corrupt. Rather, this is simply the way the political game is played. You raise money from rich people, and then you back away from attacking their prerogatives while still trying to placate your liberal/worker base. Getting rich along the way is to be expected.
But as economist Jamie Galbraith put it, ultimately it is not possible for the Democrats to be both the party of the predators and the prey.”
In my opinion, losing to the Republicans is acceptable to Democratic party insiders as long as they can kick the left. The reason that Obama supported Perez over Ellison was to ensure that the Democratic establishment maintains its fatal grip on the party and, in particular, to prevent Sanders followers from having any say in the party’s direction and identity.
Already with the so-called resistance, the Democrats have sought to co-op any movement that develops against Trump and prevent it from emerging as a challenge to their corporate sponsors. What truly concerns the Democrats and their corporate media handmaidens is how this vast social and economic discontent can be diverted into channels that will leave the wealth and power of their financial backers undisturbed.
Maybe basketball isn’t the right analogy for what the Democrats have become.
Maybe a better description is Kayfabe. The US political process has been transformed into an ongoing spectacle–just like pro wrestling– with Democrat and Republican representatives kitted out in wrestling togs, while an orange-haired President who knows a thing or two about the pro-wrestling business oversees as the master of ceremonies.
Update: Here’s all you need to know about the modern Democratic Party.
“Barack and Michelle Obama have sold the rights to their next books to Penguin Random House for a sum that has reportedly passed $60 million, according to a report by the Financial Times. (They will be writing separate books, but the rights were sold jointly.) As far as past and present presidential book deals go, this one’s a biggie: it surpasses previous records set by George W. Bush’s reported $7 million deal and Bill Clinton’s reported $15 million dollar advance.”
camelotkidd 