What is really at stake today is democracy: in the new era, which class will rule
These are revolutionary times, quite unlike any most of us alive today have ever experienced before.
Underlying the politics of the 2016 presidential elections are profound — revolutionary — economic changes driven by the introduction of labor-replacing technology and its impact on production domestically, jobs domestically, and the global competition for markets.
The Democratic Party is no longer the party associated with the poor, working people, and minorities — though it proclaims that it is. The Republican Party is similarly in crisis as it seeks to reconcile international and domestic interests with the allegiance of workers taught to blame minorities, immigrants, and foreigners for their ills.
Increasingly, the core elements of both parties are being exposed as two faces of the same beast, which is the rising dictatorship of government doing the bidding of the corporations, which need fewer and fewer of us to accomplish their ends.
What is really at stake today is democracy. The rulers can’t rule the way they used to, offering us a rising standard of living in exchange for our loyalty to either a Republican or a Democrat. Today many Americans see the parties as the same. So the rulers are having to restrict our freedoms and democracy. They are slowly introducing what is called fascism, which means that government works to serve the corporations and billionaires at our expense .
The intent is to divide and confuse us so that we don’t see our class interests. Fortunately enough Americans still believe that government should be ”of the people, by the people, and for the people.”
There is a saying that “direction is more important than velocity.” Some are drawn to the velocity of Trump’s speedy black-and-white descriptions of the problem and shot-from-the-hip solutions. Others are drawn to Bernie’s direction, though they fear he does not go far enough.
Regardless of what happens in the primaries, it is important to recognize that Bernie has unleashed a powerful direction to the motion. “It is not the man but the program” is how to look at it.
We, too, cannot continue to live in the old way, so we, too, need to look for new solutions.
What we need is awareness of our interests as a class. The rulers, whether they fund the Democratic or Republican parties, are united in securing their own interests. The rest of us, who are targeted by Trump, Sanders, or Clinton, need to become conscious that we have interests separate from the ruling class.
What unites us is our need for food, clothing, shelter, education for our youth, and securing a bright future for our families. A starting point is becoming aware of who our real enemy is, and who are friends are. The next steps will flow from that understanding.
