Wouldn’t it
be great…?
By David
Perez
April 04,
2020 "Information
Clearing House"
- As the coronavirus crisis makes real the
possibility that the remaining Democratic Party
presidential primary could actually be canceled, or
that the Democratic National Committee will simply
choose their preferred candidate (Biden or some
other yo-yo), it raises, in my mind, the whole
viability and even relevance about the electoral
process in the United States, particularly the
presidential kind—that winner-take-all,
big-money-driven, spectacle-soaked, and
mind-numbingly LONG process where we get to choose
between the finer nuances of empire and the rule of
the elite.
A casino where, despite a jackpot here and there,
the house always wins.
Of course, if some popular type of revolt causes
someone like Bernie Sanders to become the Democratic
Party nominee – or if they run as a third party
candidate – then the electoral route becomes a whole
other ballgame.
Nevertheless I can’t help wondering: Might the
deeper problem be our constant effort to reroute a
train going in the wrong direction? Might the whole
point be to get off the train?
Have we ever stopped and considered that there has
never been a President or member of Congress who’s
been elected by a majority of the population? When
you take the average 40 percent of the votes
garnered by the loser and then add the eligible
voters who don’t vote (usually another 40 percent,
give or take), and then add those who can’t vote
(teenagers under 18, prisoners, undocumented workers
and so on), you invariably come out with a winner
with only a small percentage of support.
Democracy? Hardly.
But who ultimately rules the U.S. anyway? In the
1987 Oliver Stone movie, “Wall Street,” billionaire
corporate raider Gordon Gekko lectures his young
protégé, stockbroker Bud Fox about how 1 percent of
the population controls 90 percent of the wealth.
With a knowing snicker, Gekko asks Fox: “You’re not
naïve enough to believe we live in a democracy are
you?”
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