Quote:
Originally Posted by afc wimbledon
You know the great con that they suckered poor saps like Nobama into is the idea that there are two political parties in the U.S., there aren't, throughout my lifetime, fifty odd years the American voter hasn't had any more choice than the average soviet voter, the only difference is at least the commies were honest about it, you got to choose which commie you wanted in charge, where as in the U.S. there's this pretence that there was a difference between the Democrats and the Republicans, there isn't, it's the same party, it represents exactly the same interests.
I suppose it's lucky for the U.S. that the ruling interests are better at economics than the Russians were/are but other than that there's not really any difference.
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There's certainly a lot of truth to this but I think you've exaggerated it. The two parties do ultimately serve the same master but they go about it in different ways. The US is, more or less, a plutocracy where the government is run by the rich and powerful which at this point happens to be big business. From an economic standpoint, the Republicans openly support big business with tax breaks, loopholes and the ridiculous concept of trickle-down economics. The Democrats, generally speaking, support higher taxes on the wealthy and slightly higher taxes on business. But both parties are behoven to big business since it's big business that funds their campaigns and helps to keep them in power.
It's a similar paradigm when it comes to social issues. The two parties are very similar but do diverge when it comes to some issues: abortion, voting, gun rights (sort of), etc.
It sometimes occurs to me that there is no difference between the two but then I think about how the world would be a much different (better) place if Al Gore had won the 2000 election instead of W. But maybe that just comes down to individuals rather than parties. But with the exception of the Tea Partiers and Trump, most of the current GOP field is cut from the same Neo-Con cloth as Bush Jr.
Sanders may not be the ideal candidate and he has some fundamentally flawed ideas, but I think he's the only current viable candidate that may actually be able to slow the momentum of the movement to a full plutocracy in the USA.