UPDATE below

This week’s
primaries reveal a fascinating division appearing within both major political parties.  In the process I hope one truth has finally become clear to any progressively minded American, and I would
hope to any Pagan who has thought deeply about the relationship of their world
view to American public life: the
leadership of the Democratic Party is no more friendly to us than the
Republicans.  They are more
tolerant because they do not really care, but they are no more friendly.

President Obama
and former President Bill Clinton attacked liberals and unions in their successful
effort to save Blanche Lincoln’s Senatorial nomination.  Why?  It was not that Lincoln was more electable.  Bill Halter had consistently done
better than Lincoln in all polls comparing their support to that of the
Republican nominee.  Both lost, but
Lincoln was crushed.  As she will
be in November.

Nor was it
because Lincoln had supported Obama’s legislative efforts.  She was a consistent opponent to all of
his signature efforts, such as they were. 
Lincoln has consistently put corporate interests above those of the
people of Arkansas or the public agenda of her own party.

Nor was it
respect for local Democrats against efforts by outsiders to control the
nomination.  While Halter received
out-of-state money, including a little of mine, it came from rank and file
Democrats, Lincoln received out of state money from a list of the most noxious
corporations, and the donations were big ones.  Both received out of state money, but in one case it was
from rank-and-file Democrats. 
Obama went wholeheartedly with the other guys. 

To my mind Barack
Obama has finally exposed his true colors for all with eyes to see.  He lied to the voters in 2008 with his
promise of change.  He is a bought
and paid for member of the corporate elite that in truth controls the Democratic
Party.  Like all good marketers, he
uses the words needed to make the sale. 
But the product is no more likely to fulfill its buyers’ wishes than
Chicken McNuggets are to provide genuine nutrition.

Obama is smarter
and more decent personally than his immediate predecessor, but where the rubber
meets the road, he is remarkably similar. 
That is why so little changed after he replaced Bush.  Both were doing the wishes of their
corporate masters and only played to their non-corporate supporters at the
margins.

Obama’s
supporters have long argued that he could do only so much, given that so many
Democrats in Congress were not as Progressive as he supposedly was.  Today we can see the deception in this
image.  While still a Senator he
supported Joe Lieberman over Ned Lamont, his primary opponent.  He did so despite Lieberman’s long
record of opposing important Democratic initiatives and Lamont’ promises to do
otherwise.  I suspect he passed a
“good old boy” test in doing this.

Since becoming
President, he supported Arlen Spector over Joe Sestak, his primary opponent,
despite Spector’s long record as a Republican who only began voting reliably
Democratic after he was challenged. 
Obama should simply have stayed out of the contest and left it to the
people of Pennsylvania, as he eventually did when Sestak was clearly set to
win.  And then Obama supported
Blanche Lincoln despite the serious pain she caused his alleged progressive
agenda.  Barack Obama’s words are
progressive and humane.   His
actions are in keeping with the wishes of the more far-sighted element within
corporate America.

America’s main
problem politically is that we are roughly split into three groups with some
sense of political awareness, but these groups have only two parties to
represent them.  This taxonomy is a
simplification (this is a blog post after all) but I do not believe it distorts
the big picture.

Corporatists

The most powerful group today is the banking/corporate sector that dominates both parties.  Because they primarily care about
money, they are willing to ally with anyone so long as it keeps the money
flowing in.  Because they are
smaller in numbers than the other two groups, they play both sides when
possible.  That way they win no
matter who takes office.  The more
short-sighted elements, interested only in money now, tend towards the
Republican Party, somewhat farther sighted elements tend towards the
Democrats.  But either way, both
sides do OK. 

Because they
benefit so much from the status quo, the corporatists do not want much
change.  They are the genuine
conservatives in this country.  But
they do not simply rule as they wish. 
They have to accommodate partners with other priorities, and this is sometimes
tricky.

The Old Confederacy

Then there are
those Americans tied in many ways to the old Confederacy and the culture of
domination that lingers in its former confines.  When Southerners broke with our Founders in the early 1800s
they needed to find a new basis for legitimacy after discarding the
Enlightenment and human rights. 
Neither the Enlightenment nor human rights could be easily reconciled
with slavery.  They generally
settled on Biblical literalism, with its obvious acceptance of slavery and easy
relationship to hierarchical authoritarian values.  We still live with the consequences.  This is why today so many Republican
leaders are Southerners and/or Fundamentalists.

The American Democratic
Tradition

Finally there is
the liberal democratic culture rooted in the North.  This group has given us most of the reforms in which
Americans rightly take pride, from the vote for women to the ultimate success
of the Civil Rights movement (Black Americans could not have succeeded on their
own) to environmental protection to Social Security.  The list just goes on and on. Once this group included
northern Republicans as well as northern Democrats, and many of both parties
from the West.  It is not
homogeneous any more than are the Confederates, but its members share the same
basic values.  This kind of
American has been largely expelled from the Republican Party, though some
Goldwater conservatives linger on. 
For the most part, today only the Democrats welcome them.

Fraying Alliances

Currently both of
these alliances are being powerfully strained.  In both parties the corporatists have used their allies’
rhetoric to win their support, while mostly keeping those values limited to the
minimum recognition needed to win votes. 
Now both sides that have been manipulated by the corporatists are
beginning to suspect they have been had. 
As they have. 

The Republicans
are torn between their Confederate and Corporate elements, the former being
represented by the Tea Baggers who are taking on and often defeating the
corporatist establishment in many primaries.  The Democrats are torn between the American democratic
tradition and their own dominant corporatists.  The Democrat’s American wing has been slow to catch on to
the shell game, but they finally are getting it. 

I think
ultimately the Confederate wing will lose.  They are too authoritarian, too inhumane, too fearful and
ignorant of science and too bigoted to ultimately prevail.  The real struggle over the long run
lies within the Democratic Party. American democracy’s future, insofar as it
has one, will largely be played out over the years to come in Democratic
primary elections across the country.

Two other
excellent discussions of these issues are Glenn Greenwald  and Digby. 

UPDATE

Any doubts as to where Obama stands regarding his corporate masters should watch this broadcast about who is exercising power in Louisiana.  He’s been told about it and obviously is doing nothing to stop it beyond running his big mouth.