The coronation of Hillary Clinton has now been completed. The farce of the primaries, in which millions of people voted for Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, only to be told that they don’t know what’s best, and that the super-delegates would select the nominee, is behind us, and even Mr. Sanders has gotten into line like the good little corporate soldier that he is. On opening night of the Democratic convention, he gave a shining endorsement of Mrs. Clinton, who stands for all the things that his ‘revolution’ seeks to destroy. But, what is any of that, when the need to keep a Democrat in the White House is so important, despite the fact that, in substance, there is little difference between the major policies of the two parties?
We keep hearing about the most ‘progressive’ Democratic platform in history, without any mention that it is completely non-binding, and is basically just the recycled blathering we’ve been hearing for months: more money for the military; more oppression of the Palestinians; less concern about the environment, etc. Oh yes, progressive indeed!
It is long past time for the United States to join the rest of the nations that purport to have some semblance of democracy (the fact that the U.S. simply doesn’t is a topic for another essay), and expand to more than two parties. The Libertarian Party traditionally wins the most votes, after the Republicans and Democrats. But with dozens of third parties fielding candidates for president, why on earth would any thinking person vote for either Mrs. Clinton, the epitome of elitism, corruption, arrogance and entitlement, or the Republican candidate, Donald Trump, a loud-mouthed windbag who appeals to the basest instincts of the most ignorant citizens? Why would anyone in the 99% vote for either of these charter members of the 1%?
Let’s look at just a few areas of concern:
+ Student debt: The average debt for a student who graduated in 2016 is $37,000. Seventy-one percent of students graduate with some debt, and the total student debt owed in the U.S. today exceeds $1 trillion. This cash cow for the government will continue under a Trump or Clinton presidency. However, the platform of the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), headed this year by Gloria La Riva, calls for the cancelling of all student debt. The Green Party, with Jill Stein as its presidential nominee, also calls for abolishing student debt.
+ The Military: While at least a quarter of the children in the United States live in poverty, the government spends billions on the military. The PSL platform suggests redirecting that money “to provide for people’s needs here and around the world.” Hmm, what a novel idea! And from the Green Party: “cut military spending by at least 50%. “That amount of money over just a couple of years could wipe out poverty around the world.
+ Police Violence: Both the Green Party and the PSL support an end to the nearly absolute impunity that police officers have, regardless of their crimes.
+ Foreign Policy: Whenever politicians have an audience, if anything related to foreign policy arises, we hear about the great need to protect and defend Israel, a brutal, apartheid regime that has a powerful lobby in the U.S. The PSL’s 10-Point program clearly states the need to end all aid to that country.
+ Wall Street: Mrs. Clinton is the darling of the financial sector in the United States; its donations to her various campaigns total in the tens of millions; she received nearly $700,000 for three speeches to Goldman-Sachs. By endorsing her, Mr. Sanders has crawled into bed with them as well. Mr. Trump, like all good members of the 1%, also bows down at the Wall Street altar. The PSL considers capitalist banking “a form of organized crime, rewarding greed and fraud with obscene bonuses,” and calls for seizing these assets to be used for the good of the people. The Green Party seeks to break up the large banks. Both of these views are heretical to the two-headed Repubocratic Party.
This information provides the reader with a view of alternative candidates; in this case, two women of integrity and common sense. The platform of the Green Party, in the context of the Republicans and Democrats, is radical, but in terms of being reasonable, it is a moderate, workable plan.
The PSL, on the other hand, goes farther in demanding basic rights for all people, at home and abroad, in smashing the failed capitalistic model, and replacing it with one in which all people can prosper, possibly at different levels, but without the stark extremes that the U.S. now experiences, with the extremely, obscenely rich on one end, and the destitute poor on the other.
With Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton the current major-party candidates to inhabit the White House and wreak international havoc for the next four years, could there be any better time to elect a president who would change the fundamentally flawed paradigm that the U.S. has operated under for two centuries? Is this not the time for a real revolution, not the artificial rhetoric, the ‘meet-the-new- boss-same-as-the-old-boss’, pretty sounding but empty words of the likes of Bernie Sanders?
It is unlikely that a third-party candidate will be elected president this year, although with both candidates highly disliked, and new embarrassments being forever revealed, anything is possible. But even lacking that, when faced with two awful candidates, and one shrinks in horror to consider candidates more awful that Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, voting for a candidate who cares about people makes perfect sense.
Although this writer’s ballot will probably not be counted (absentee ballots are only counted if the vote in the state in which they are cast is sufficiently close that such ballots could impact the outcome), he will vote for Ms. La Riva. Much as he likes and respects Dr. Stein and the platform of the Green Party, he supports greater change than even the substantial change that they offer. And while he encourages the reader to vote for Ms. La Riva, he implores everyone to find a third party candidate, and vote accordingly. A vote for either Mr. Trump or Mrs. Clinton will only bring more suffering around the world, more poverty, and more riches into the foreign bank accounts of the already super-rich. Third-party votes represent the voices of those who oppose the continuation of the repressive status-quo. It is high time we make our voices heard.
Originally published by Counterpunch.