Democrats: Capitalism’s Carrot

There are seemingly endless electioneering, windbag speeches political rhetoric and back-stabbing to showcase the Democrats and Republicans. Biden strives to say as little as possible while Trump endeavors to “Make a Deal.” 

The Republicans and the Democrats are two sides of one coin. In the final analysis, they are both employed by the same master – Wall Street. But these parties do not say or even do the identical thing. They have special and different duties to perform towards their common master.

The Republican party presently holds the reins of government. Consequently all its statements and actions must not only be directed towards maintaining the status quo (the capitalist system) but also to defend the methods employed during their tenure of office, to perpetuate the system.

The pernicious duty of the Democrats springs entirely from present conditions – the pandemic and the ensuing economic crisis. Discontent is rife throughout the land. But it is still vague and undirected. It is not yet clear to Americans which way to turn. The trick of the Democrats is to seize hold of this unrest and to steer it into harmless channels. The task of Biden, Pelosi and the corporate Democrats is to prevent the people from seeing things as they actually are, that it is not the capitalist system that is responsible for the unprecedented crisis and the unparalleled misery. The profit system is both perfect and eternal. But rather it is the Republican party who have misused and abused the “precious” system. This is the main plank in the Democratic platform. It is Biden’s message. The crisis is due to Trump, the shortages, wage cuts and evictions, and unemployment – all are due to Republican maladministration. Drive the G.O.P. out, put us in, and everything will be hunky-dory. This sort of garbage is being peddled by the Democratic friendly media of CNN and MSNBC news and no doubt it will have its effect.

The economic catastrophe of today is not the first in American history. Crises have recurred irrespective of which party was in office. We have known “Democratic” crises as well as “Republican”. The Democrats, and their candidate, Biden, will stand by capitalism to their dying day. But that does not hinder them from posing as saviors of the worker. Biden has nothing but false promises and slick speeches. The progressives of the “Anybody but Trump” camp are selling out the growing number of activists and workers who want a real end to capitalist.

Trump’s is a qualitatively worse administration than any other in memory; he is an autocrat. Look at the chauvinist attacks on Muslims and protesters that rip up the Constitution. How can you not support a Democrat to get rid of this reactionary? Trump is indeed a particularly rotten, reactionary and racist capitalist, but the Democrats offer no real alternative other than grandfatherly Biden. Trump is still not quite as bad as Franklin D. Roosevelt, the liberal Democratic demigod, who threw tens of thousands of Japanese-Americans into internment camps. Trumps sanctions against Iran and Venezuela are little different from John F. Kennedy’s embargo against Cuba or Clinton’s blockade of Iraq. What about Obama’s regime change in Libya and then is subsequent attempt of the same in Syria? Liberal presidents as well as reactionaries engage in criminal acts against oppressed and exploited people. It is part of the job description. Biden will be no different. When progressives demagogically claim that violating democratic norms makes Trump a fascist they are deluding people: real American fascism would mean far worse subjugation of Blacks, Latinos, Jews, Muslims and immigrants—plus the crushing of the unions and the termination of all rights to free speech. Progressives are trying to panic people into voting for the Democrats. They are providing camouflage for the run-of-the-mill capitalist politicians, war criminals and autocrats all.

 For sure particular politicians have differences over foreign policy. Whatever their disagreements on this or that conflict they all defend American interests, and its tentacles which must spread throughout the world if America’s corporate power is to survive. They have no choice. Biden lined up behind Bush in 2003 and he stood solid with Obama foreign ventures. The ruling class expects and gets bipartisan support for their wars. Disagreement are mostly cosmetic, never challenging the blood-soaked expansionist principles of intervention and invasion. The Democrats are a lesser evil only rhetorically. No Democratic president is going to stop the profit-gouging drive against working people abroad or at home. The Democrats are part of the problem and not a solution, not even a temporary one.

Progressives will say to socialists, you can’t seriously mean that Trump and the Republicans are the same as Biden and the Democrats. Look at Trumps reactionary judges, his tax cuts for the rich, his handouts to the corporations. Socialist recognize that there exist certain differences and they are not identical.  We only point out that that the Democrats are no answer to the Republicans. Both parties are inextricably tied to the capitalist system and must defend it at home and abroad. And both parties have long records of handouts to the corporations or do we conveniently forget Obama’s bail-out of Wall St. They simply defend the system in different ways. The Democratic Party play the good cop and Republicans the bad cops. The Democratic Party supporting liberals role is to pretend that they are on the side of beleaguered workers, racially oppressed people, unemployed and the overburdened working families. When people resist, the Democrats make some concessions. These are meant to contain and detour workers, not at all to meet their increasingly desperate needs. Today, with the covid-19 pandemic when capitalism is caught in a fundamental crisis throughout the world, the system cannot easily give sops. Given the evidence of any past Democratic administration, Biden is going to roll back past gains just like the Republicans. He is just as big a liar as Trump. But the attacks on working people will be disguised and the progressives are in a better position to sell the cuts when they arrive, softening us up with the lesser evil arguments.

The more radical progressives will insist that are not blind followers of the Democratic politicians. They say that when Biden is elected, they will be mobilizing in the streets to push him left-wards. But what will the leaders of all the pressure groups and social movements do? They will compete for the patronage of Biden in the White House, competing with one another for special favors, squabbling over scraps of legislation thrown their way. A Biden administration with be the graveyard of activism.

Those who advocate for the lesser evil, to hold our nose and vote for Biden, are Judas Goats, leading our fellow-workers to the slaughter-house. The proponents of the lesser evil are opposed to the fundamental principle of socialism, that the independent working class must create its own revolutionary party and put an end to class collaboration. A genuine socialist party would tell the truth about the system and fight to end it, not to retain it. Join us in that struggle