generalspeaking

"Re-Elect Obama, Vote Newt"

The proud old assurances of equality in America that once dominated in expressing national pride in a liberal, egalitarian society, no longer applies. For one thing, the gap between the poor and the wealthy in America has widened to a degree that can no longer be overlooked. The vast wealth that has accrued to a relative handful of fortunate families and individuals remains in stark contrast to the plight of the poor of America, the unemployed and the vulnerable.

In a wealthy country that remains the world's super power, with the largest economy and social and political clout of any other country on the Globe, the social welfare that most other democratic countries take for granted as necessary in fairness and justice to all, is absent in America. A disabling medical condition, an unfortunate accident, a catastrophic disease all of which require medical help available in abundance for the insured and the wealthy, can ruin lives.

And over the past several decades it has become abundantly clear that those who wish to place themselves in the public arena as political candidates with an intention to win nominations, must do so with the understanding that it takes millions of dollars to succeed. Those with connections and access to rich corporate funding interests, or who themselves possess sufficient wealth, are able to run successful political campaigns.

The political campaigns during election years are themselves vestiges of what they once were, when sober-minded, intelligent and socially progressive, aware and capable candidates where opportunity to exercise a mandate to benefit the public weal was uppermost in mind appears now to have been overtaken by power-hungry, cash-wielding candidates. Focused on their ambitions to succeed to the presidency as a goal to delight themselves; they ask not what they can do for their country.

What's worse, is that while income disparities have accelerated, leaving a poor America restively complaining about that rich America whose comforts and securities they can only dream of, the two political parties that alternate in governing the country themselves now reflect those two polarities. With the Democrats under a populist and popularly-elected biracial president crusading for the poor America - even while it courts the corporate power bases.

And the Republicans who honour themselves with the sobriquet of the Grand Old party, defending the merits of sparing the wealthy and taxing the middle-class and the poor, using tax dollars to support the international conglomerates that have their home offices and official origins in the United States, rapaciously studying their bottom line. While denying the financial feasibility of creating a universal health-care system to benefit the needs of the under-represented lower middle-class.

The current race for the Republican presidential nomination has seen the contenders outdoing themselves in forwarding their messages that condemn the shallow and sinister backgrounds and plans of their adversaries. Each of the contenders celebrates their unassailable pious level of religious affiliation, claiming that their stewardship of the country's future, and only theirs, is capable of reflecting America The Great.

Their rhetoric and off-putting accusations one against the other, each doing their best to inflate past indiscretions of the other as opposed to their own sterling credentials has brought the Republican Party itself to the realization that it has become its own worst enemy. The two leading candidates have their reflections of the situation facing the country: moral probity hampered by the expenditure of $14-million in advertising in one state alone.

As opposed to moral turpitude and a mass appeal by one whose former Washington performance so alienated members of his own party all turned their backs on him while he serenely spouts lies and innuendos and denies ever having been involved for huge monetary gain in supporting the financial elites he now denounces.

Labels: Political Realities, United States

posted by Pieface @ Saturday, January 28, 2012