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July,1999




Depressing Democracy



The  triumphalism over the Yugoslavian slaughter  reached a low point
when the  serial killer Albright was treated like Mother Theresa by
Kosovar Albanians. In their misery, the Albanians can be forgiven  their
gullibility. But how can the  most  affluent  population in the world
accept the fairy tale offered about Yugoslavia? Weapons of mass
destruction and  mass distraction are  creating  an America of mass
mental   depression.

As the re-writing of  history takes place before our eyes, future
fiction is being attempted in the  presentation of  candidates for the
year 2000 . Slobodan Milosevic may have represented more of his people
than the two political ciphers shilling for  accommodations in the
public housing at Pennsylvania Avenue .

Even with the massive mind assault , some might ask  why these two are
even candidates. Of course, one is the vice president, though his most
memorable achievement seems to be that he has not sodomized any of his
staff. The other is a governor,  son of a former  president, and  as
bland, boring and unknown as his opponent seems merely bland and boring.

Those truly  represented by this rich and pampered duo are those who
have  enjoyed the  economic boom , really a stock market boom with some
trickle down value to janitors, lawyers and other servants. Market
fundamentalists  crow  that more people are holding jobs, and that  poor
people are working  . They don’t tell us that Americans are laboring
longer hours, with less benefits, and falling deeper into debt. Nor do
they mention that as more poor people  work , more working people are
poor.

Low unemployment numbers leave out  millions  in the military. When that
group is added to those in jails and prisons, the employment figures
show that without government intervention in the market, however  bloody
it may be, we might have an employment depression.  That would match the
state of mind of citizens who cannot survive without taking  drugs, both
legal and illegal. So much for a rising tide that is  supposedly lifting
all boats.

Whether the tide is high or low, the size and number of  boats are more
important. They range from a relatively small number of luxury yachts
and battleships, to a massive fleet of rowboats, dinghies and cheap
pleasure craft.The latter are more likely to sink  during a working
class  weekend spree on a crowded   river, than sail off to  some
leisure class vacation on a  secluded lagoon. Contrary to  mind
management propaganda , the gap between the rich and the rest of America
is as wide as ever. And it is only the Wall Street minority, not the
Main Street  majority, that thrives on  murder  in Yugoslavia, and
madness here  at home.



The  dim bulbs treated as bright lights in the presidential race are
financed by the same economic forces that will see lavish gain from all
the weapons   produced to replace those used in the destruction of an
innocent people in Europe. They are already recipients of millions of
campaign dollars, and the figures will grow more disgraceful as the
democratic charade goes on. Corporate capital is likely to  have its
bombs replaced, its votes purchased and its political lackeys employed,
while the general public has its mind molested , its pocket picked and
its future threatened.

Democrat Bill Bradley and Republican John McCain offer  some small
contrast to the leading duo of duds , but it will be tough for them to
break through the plastic curtain of high financed  phoniness. While
Gush-Bore extol their love of god and abuse intellectual substance,
Bradley and McCain offer the possibility of  debate from principled, if
only mildly reformist, perspectives.

McCain survived five years in a Viet Nam prison and seems to have grown
from the experience. His honest populism separates him from most in
congress, though he was reduced to nearly drooling on himself over the
lack of land war in the recent  Yugoslavian slaughter. But his
principled stands on issues like  the telecommunications bill and
campaign finance reform place him high above the average  congressional
hustler.

Bradley’s experience as a professional basketball player gives his
privileged Rhodes scholar status an edge of  racial experience
unavailable to any of his wooden colleagues, to whom race is something
you talk about on Martin Luther King Day. Bradley has taken showers with
more black men than most white Americans of his class  have ever talked
to, and his  experience as a member of a white minority in a sport
dominated by blacks has afforded him  insights  and an awareness of our
racial sickness that is unique among politicians.

But can  these two strengthen democracy in a nation so dominated by
minority wealth?Last year,  CEOs at the top 350 corporations averaged
compensation of more than $2.5 million. 90% of the gains in this stock
market have gone to the wealthiest 10% of Americans. In the last
congressional race , 81% of those who contributed more than $200  had
incomes over $100,000 . In this horribly skewed economic environment,
talk of a democratic electoral process is a form of whistling while
walking through a cemetery .

Now our young people can read the ten commandments before buying their
handguns, remembering to disregard the one about not killing,when their
government  murders foreigners. And  their parents  can take lots of
legal drugs , buy more needless products, incur more debt, and borrow,
at usurious rates, from legalized loan sharks . Young and old need to
understand that democracy has little to do with our reality, but
everything to do with changing it. The Main Street  majority needs to
get smarter, and less depressed, to really contest the  Wall Street
minority. Neither legal drugs nor major media are likely to help.

Copyright (c) 1999 by Frank Scott. All rights reserved.

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frank scott
http://www.marin.cc.ca.us/~frank/columns
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