Day 28 | Two-Party Systems Are Polarizing and Antidemocratic

LUMPENPROLETARIAT—[Tuesday, 16 FEB 2021, 04:21 PST] Today is Day 28 of Biden’s First 100 days of Mr. Biden’s presidency. It has almost been a month since Mr. Biden took office. As we reported previously, Democrat voters were “hopeful”, but not revolutionary, at the outset. They didn’t see the need for fundamental change to the status quo. They were happy to return to normal. This clearly reflects the very low expectations Democrat voters have come to accept from their elected officials. It seems many Democrat voters perceive the extent of their responsibility to political life, as beginning and ending on election day because direct political action in the public sphere, in the town square, the agora of ideas, is not part of their modus operandi. And we’re not the only ones pointing this out, just today the good Rania Khalek slammed the Democrat Party’s impeachment fail, as well she should.

In Rania’s conversation with Anya Parampil (host, Red Lines) for The Grayzone YouTube channel, Khalek pointed out how the extent of Democrat partisan political activity these days consists of cheerleading for ‘the Squad’ or tweeting random thoughts, basically cultural reactions and expressions, without any meaningful political or economic consequences. And, as we heard on Pacifica Radio’s WPFW today in archival audio of a speech by Stokely Carmichael, the struggle for freedom must always be advanced on three fronts: social, political, and economic. Indeed. So, it behooves us on the left to help Democrat voters see this reality, to not stay complacent solely within the cultural front without any clear political or economic objectives.

A glaring case in point for our current historical moment is the Medicare For All issue. Working class people were blessed when comedian Jimmy Dore focused his platform and audience onto Medicare For All recently. Jimmy Dore pointed out the fact that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was up for re-election. This gave the so-called Squad of AOC, et al, an opportunity to pressure Pelosi to put Medicare For All up for a House vote, or else face opposition to her re-election. But AOC and the Squad, evidently, were unwilling to bite the hand that feeds.

“The Hand That Feeds” by Nine Inch Nails, 2005.

Well, surely, now the hope among Democrat voters must be fading. The Squad failed to use available leverage to advocate for the will of the people. The Democrats in the House have failed their voters, and the American people, again, with the refusal to back Medicare For All. And what more opportune time than during a pandemic, which is on its second year of human, health, and economic destruction? The Democrats in the Senate, too, have failed their voters, and the American people, and democracy itself, in their failure to submit all available articles of impeachment, their failure to subpoena Mr. Trump, their failure to subpoena witnesses, their failure to expose the role of the Republican Party in meeting with Mr. Trump to discuss plans for retaking the GOP in 2022, a conflict of interest, as the Republicans in the Senate are supposed to be holding Mr. Trump accountable for his betrayal of his oath to the U.S. Constitution. The decision by lead prosecutor Senator Raskin to decide to show that Mr. Trump “was singularly responsible” for the riots and the siege on the Capitol narrowed the damning evidence and reality of the matter. Yet, we all know the Republican Party and all their funders are behind Mr. Trump. We know that Mr. Trump is sitting on hundreds of millions of dollars of campaign funding. In a sense, Mr. Trump, is a distraction in the impeachment process because the Republican Party has been behind him throughout this whole assault on our republic and government. The source of Mr. Trump’s power is the political party form. The lack of power among the left is the lack of a political party form, which can serve as a vehicle for leftist values and policies. The right understands this, which is why they use the centrist and right-wing Democrat Party to act as a safety valve for liberal, progressive, or leftist political energy. Inspired people of conscience, who finally wake up from the trance of capitalist social relations and decide to act for justice, look around for political power to amplify their concerns around their values, are deceived by the false promises of the Democrat Party. We all know the Republican Party is the party of white grievance. For self-respecting people of color, it makes no sense to validate such gaslighting. White grievance? Really? Come, come, now! Oh, please, do share. Let’s have a national referendum shall we?

Progressives, liberals, leftists, socialists, humanists, environmentalists, anti-racists, anti-capitalists, all manner of freedom fighters get stuck in the swamp, and spin their wheels in futility when they invest their time and energy trying to push the Democrats to do good. But the decadent Democrats never do. That political party lost their moral compass many decades ago, if they ever had one.

Without the Republican Party behind Mr. Trump, he is just another celebrity. But Senator Raskin and the Democrat Party, basically, covered for the Republican Party in all of this by arguing that Mr. Trump was “singularly responsible” and, thereby, covering for the Republican Party.

A journalist on Democracy Now! this morning discussed his article, which argued that the Republicans didn’t impeach Trump because they didn’t want to impeach themselves. From one perspective, that makes sense. However, we extend the unwillingness to be completely honest to the Democrats as well because the sieges of January 6th against state capitols around the nation, not just in DC, was the culmination of years of escalating rhetoric and hate speech in the right-wing media sphere, including rhetoric, such as ‘the only good Democrat is a dead Democrat’ and ‘maybe some of these liberals want to see their heads cut off.’ All of this toxic environment was made possible in American society because of the lack of a real left politics in America. Yes, there are individual leftists, but they vote Democrat, which essentially renders them liberals, i.e., centrists, electorally-speaking. So, the left has no electoral power. Keeping the left politically powerless explains why the Democrat Party colludes with the Republican Party to block alternative political parties from the presidential debates and from ballot access in many states across the nation with top-two primary laws and whatnot. So, our political climate is the product of the collusion between the Republican and Democrat parties to stifle leftist political parties.

The incitement was much bigger and broader than just Mr. Trump and it went back further than just January 6th, or even just the few months prior. The incitement began years prior. But that’s a bigger case to make. And, honestly, we would’ve entered Jeremy Scahill’s “American Mythology: The Presidency of Donald Trump” investigative journalism podcast series into evidence. That is an excellent summary of Mr. Trump’s evil, racist, anti-labor, and antidemocratic campaign.

Yes, the legal definition of incitement is narrow. But we must not forget that this Senatorial impeachment process was not a legal trial. Analysts forget this, at times, as did Rhanek earlier today, in conversation with Parampil. This misunderstanding leads people to wonder aloud what the purpose of seeking to impeach Mr. Trump is when there are so many crises engulfing Americans, from COVID-19 to economic hardship and other social ills.

Well, the important reason to impeach Mr. Trump for incitement is as a democracy-preserving mechanism, a prophylactic, as Ralph Nader discussed on Democracy Now! last week. Mr. Trump must be prevented from being used as a useful idiot again by the American deep state or by any of his funders, which have, evidently, captured our electoral system. We contend that the American ruling class is transitioning away from the two-party system to a one-party system. The attempted coup or insurrection on January 6th by Mr. Trump, Mr Hawley, Mr. Cruz, Ms. Greene, and others, is an indication of the escalating nature of antidemocratic forces in the United States. The cops and politicians and professionals, who participated in the coordination of the rioters and the stand-down behaviors of opening doors for Trump loyalists and, basically, guiding them through the labyrinthian maze of hallways, which Capitol Building veterans have recently reported they still get lost in. This was clearly an inside job, as Empire Files have argued.

Mr. Biden has already demonstrated a continuation of unbroken neoliberalism. It’s like we’ve had the ghost of Ronald Reagan possess every presidential candidate since the 1980s.

“America’s Two-Party Corporate Duopoly” by Second Thought, 25 SEP 2020.

So, if the Democrat Party is a false opposition party, which only continues neoliberalism, then why continue to support it? If two-party systems are polarizing, then why can’t we build viable alternative political parties? Everyone is talking about the polarized nature of U.S. society. Yet, they miss the obvious cause and a needed solution. Even Jacobin recently discussed a book, which interviewed working class people, who said they thought Mr. Trump was racist, but still they held their noses and voted for him, anyway. Everyone looks at the psychology of the individual, or even group, but often overlook the structural nature of the two-party system, which locks people into this binary system, which is polarizing because people can only swing back and forth, pendulum-like, between those two poles. The problem is, because the left has been suppressed since the Red Scares and McCarthyism, all we have are centrist Democrats, who do not meaningfully oppose the excesses of the right-wing. So, this causes the political center to shift rightward. And, now, we’re seeing it reach the limits of the upper-right corner of the political compass, where we enter into the realm of right-wing authoritarianism. But we have people. And there’s always hope, wherever there’s people. Solidarity.

@LumpenProles, 17:44 PST.

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Notes from a working class left perspective, tuning into the most critical analyses of the issues of the day…

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“Government scientist: dystopian ‘new normal’ scares me” by UnHerd, 16 FEB 2021.

0800 wpfw 0824 TW

08:00 PST, KPFK > Democracy Now! > […] 08:42 “Heterodox Economist” 1st time weve heard Amy Goodman use the phrase “heterodox” in the context of economics. Is it? If so, it’s about time. Is it not? Better late than never, we say.

09:00 PST, WBAI > The Gary Null Show […] [TW] 09:49 PST, “Fauci” GaryNull.com or PRN.fm or call 646.926-5422. “The station cannot make its payroll. And the station is in jeopardy of being closed down.” ‘Michael J. Haskins'(?) ‘Article is unvalidated, but it discusses how the station was captured.’ This sounds like the capture of KPFA by Democrat partisans.

1000 KPFA > Letters and Politics > [TW] author on his book on increasingly bordered world and pressures thereupon. […] 10:12 PST

1000 WBAI > Leonard Lopate at Large > medical residents (i.e.., trainees) get ~$40k per year, at times, don’t sleep for 36 hours, medical residents are set up to fail, sounds like my experience teaching. […] ‘How are they gonna pay off $400,000 dollars in debt.’ […] ‘But there are solutions. And the first step is bringing it to people’s attention.’ [TW] […] 10:19 ‘Does sleep deprivation cause depression or other health problems?’ ‘Yes, Harvard study…’ ‘and medical errors, which is 3rd or 4th highest cause of death?’ […] robin simon, film, Do No Harm, on Amazon Prime. […] Filmmaker explained how resident doctors (i.e., trainees) never want to ask for help. “The stigma of mental health will mark you for life.” So, a culture of Elvis-upper/downer-style drug use usually starts in medical school. They would take one drug to go to sleep quickly, if you don’t have much time to sleep, “The stigma of mental health will mark you for life.” […] 10:44 PST, […] 10:46 PST, “It’s not you. It’s the system.” Indeed. That was, basically, your author’s experience as a social sciences teacher in California, dear reader. So, few people are passionate about work in public service. And the few, who are, are shat upon by capitalist social relations and capitalist modes of production. […] 10:48 PST, “And I don’t see any way to stop the hurt,” said the used and abused doctor featured in the film. […] 10:49 PST […] ‘Nurses are killing themselves, too.’

10:00 Wpfw > […] 10:42, [TW] “We don’t walk in fear. We walk in faith.”

1100 KPFA The Talkies > […] 11:10 PST, ‘It will be a mistake to make a commission to investigate the sieges of January 6th.’ Btw, another element missing from Raskin’s case was the sieges around the nation on the 6th. […] 11:15 PST, liberal interview about the second impeachment of Mr. Trump. […] 1116, ‘Trump is currently polling at around 52%, with Pence at about 12%.’ (among Republicans, it seems he meant). […] 11:18 PST, ‘At least 57 politicians were in attendance on the 6th, including at the rally.’ […] 11:20 PST, On the Senators voting for acquittal ‘because that’s what my voters want’. Kris Welch didn’t notice, didn’t point out, the hypocrisy of the senators. Senators always argue that they are not beholden to the voters in the same way, hence the longer terms. But the current excuse for not convicting is a lie, a misrepresentation of the understood role of the U.S. Senate. This exposes the duplicitous and false nature of the Senate as a democratic institution. First and foremost, our duty is always to defend the U.S. Constitution. […] 11:28 PST, ‘national affairs at The Nation’ [TW] […] 11:30 PST, On why Trump is laying low: of course, legal advice, but also seeking “part ownership” of some networks, maybe even a “Trump TV”. […] ‘Why make money for Twitter when you could make money for yourself.’

11:00 PST, WBAI > [TW] real talk. Gag? Activism? “school Shootings”

“Rania Khalek slams phony impeachment ‘soap opera'” by The Grayzone > Anya Parampil (host, Red Lines), 16 FEB 2021.

12:00 PST, KPFA > Against the Grain | KPFA News Headlines [TW] siege of January 6th’ […] | ‘March 31st'(?), end of ‘moratorium on rent deadline’ […] | Ram Daas on aging gracelessly? […] He got the audience laughing with his funny descriptions of aging, trying to work with a gym trainer, and the body not being able to do what the mind wants it to do. Later, Ram Daas listed off some common problems with aging, from arthritis and constipation to insomnia and whatnot. Well, your author suffered all of that, malnourished and impoverished at university at UMKC, then returning home to California to work in sales. I went through the same struggles in the gym, but I fought through it, adapted, fixed my gut. Bodybuilders teach us the neural firing of the mind, the sheer will to move the weight, comes first.

1400 wpfw 1405 Engels tw sounds like Angela Davis. […] 1410 […] elijah Muhammad […] Malcolm X[…] 1445, ‘we should’ve kistened tbMalcoln […] “guerrilla warfare” Sounds like Stokely Carmichael? […] Dr. King: ‘the three dimensions of life’: inward concerns, outward concerns’ ‘There are those, who are more concerned with breadth and longevity’ […] 14:56, local announcements: Spain: Remembering Chick Corea, from noon(?) until midnight. […] 14:57 PST, Sam Cooke – “A Change Is Gonna Come”

“Malcolm X Scene – A Change Is Gonna Come” by Sam Cooke, 1964.

1600 […] 1635, DD […] 1645, Christina Huggins […] DD’s in-laws in Texas are without power today due to winter storm emergency due to climate crisis. […] ‘unveiling of a mural dedicated to the women of the Black Panther Party. Tomorrow, there will be an unveiling and a dedication to Huey P. Newton‘. […] 16:56 PST

1600 wpfw 1636, ‘sounds like Bob Avakian’, on lumpenproletarian life. [TW] […] 16:39 PST, sounds like Sunsara Taylor, ‘Bob Avakian is talking about the heroism of black and brown unity in prisons and on the streets’ speech from 2016? circa prison hunger strikes. […] THIS IS A FUND DRIVE BROADCAST. PLEASE SUPPORT FREE SPEECH RADIO. […] 16:42

17:00 PST, KPFA > Flashpoints > | [TW] Crimes Bulletin with Greg Palast on siege of the 6th and more, but first Camilo Perez Bustillo on maas murders in Mexico, Biden, and more. […] 17:03 | Greg Palast

17:00 PST, KPFK > Background Briefing with Ian Masters > [TW]