Don't put your trust in either political party

 

I'm getting very tired of people lambasting "Republicrats" or "Demoncrats" or the like on social media.  Partisans of both parties routinely denigrate and insult the other, and those who follow it.  The problem is, both parties are just as bad as one another.  There isn't much to choose between them.

Sundance had this to say about it:

The Republican National Committee (RNC), and the Democrat National Committee (DNC), are private clubs.

The RNC and DNC are corporations, private businesses; and just like all private businesses, they have the ability to make rules, bylaws, terms and conditions of membership and association that are completely arbitrary according to their charter.

The RNC and DNC are not entities of government.  The RNC and DNC are not affiliates of government.  The RNC and DNC have absolutely no connection to government, other than their arbitrary business model for helping politicians enter and remain within government.

In fact, the RNC and DNC are simply private corporations who engage in the business of politics.  Whenever we start to forget the DNC and RNC are private corporations, we can slip into the mistaken belief that they operate on any form of baseline altruism.

These corporations exist for the fulfillment of their mission; and their mission is to use the business of politics as a method of financial reward to sustain the business model.

Some call these private entities, these corporations, “clubs,” because using that term helps to remind us that these groups do not operate without a private agenda.

The rules within the RNC club are determined by the people who control the club charter, primarily large donors who fund the corporate business.  If they have a particular intent or direction, they wish the club to support or take, they control how the club engages in the process of achieving their outcome.  That effort is taken regardless of the opinion from the subordinate members in the club.

Through the process of controlling the corporations, the private clubs, both the RNC and DNC control how political events take place.  Nothing within this process is contingent upon the support of the voting electorate.

Each state and local precinct has their own chapter of the club, and often the corporate direction, specifically the club activity in/around Washington DC, is different from what the local groups want to see take place.  However, just because the local chapter of the group disagrees with the parent company or board of directors, does not mean the larger corporate entity will change anything.

When we are evaluating political events inside the United States, it is critical to keep reminding ourselves that what is taking place, or what is not taking place, are outcomes determined within the executive suites of a private club.   This is an unfortunate system dynamic, but it is a critical point that once fully understood explains many of the issues people have with the registered politicians within the club.

The RNC and DNC are businesses.  Their decisions are business decisions.  The club actions, or lack thereof, are all part of the business of politics.

The tenured participants in the club do not operate arbitrarily in a vacuum.  They talk to each other, communicate with each other, organize with each other, plan with each other, and collaborate for the larger objectives of the private corporation.

Nothing within the business system of DC and club politics has anything to do with the constitutional framework of U.S. government.

Again, for emphasis.  The governing process and constitutional aspects of the framework within the U.S. government, have absolutely nothing to do with the two private corporations known as the RNC and DNC.

There's more at the link.

Bear that in mind next time you hear someone fulminating against either of the major political parties.  It doesn't matter what the parties' official platforms claim to be their policies.  The reality is, they'll consult with each other and come up with a "compromise" that, in fact, is nothing more or less than a way to ensure that both parties continue to derive the maximum possible benefit from running the country.  It's "You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" writ large.

If you dislike one political party and/or its representatives, remember that those you support are just as corrupt, just as two-faced, just as self-centered, just as dishonest.  Neither the Democratic Party nor the Republican Party are trustworthy.  Nor are most of the individual politicians within those parties (although there are a few honorable exceptions).  As the late, great H. L. Mencken put it:

A professional politician is a professionally dishonorable man. In order to get anywhere near high office he has to make so many compromises and submit to so many humiliations that he becomes indistinguishable from a streetwalker.

Word!

I've said for years that I won't vote for the party, but for the person - the individual candidate.  Many have derided that position, saying that since the individual has to "toe the Party line", he or she won't be able to be honest or independent.  That's true:  but I continue to hope that if we elect enough relatively honest representatives, they may be able to exert their influence inside their party and make it that much less dishonest and corrupt.  That may be (probably is) a pipe dream . . . but one may hope.  Indeed, we'd better hope, because if there's no hope, then the time has come to take stronger, more decisive action against all our politicans than we can do through the ballot box.

I've seen that happen often enough in the Third World.  I never want to see it again . . . particularly not in these (nominally) United States.

Peter