Presidential Candidates: What a Let Down

OK. It's true. Obama has told us that it's up to the people to demand change. So, we better start making noise.

The President is a tool of which ever elite faction gains control. When I say "elite" I mean the wealthy and powerful, not intellectuals who ponder big issues.

LibHom recently tallied a sickening number of examples of Obama selling out. They're sickening, because that's the way your stomach will feel when you read them.

I was reminded of the recent interviews I've heard with Andrew Bacevich, author of The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism. Rightly, Bacevich holds both parties accountable for the pending demise of the country:

There’s a lot in the book that tries to hold the Bush administration accountable for recent events, but I would not for a second want to suggest that the crisis in which we find ourselves today ought to be laid simply at the foot of the Bush administration or the Republican Party, because it’s been a long time coming.

[both political parties,] over the last twenty years or so, [have had] an increasing willingness to use military force to cause the world to look the way we want it to look. And I think that that expression of American exceptionalism is one that’s not only utterly false, but is greatly at odds with own interests as a country.

However, it's not at odds with the goals of transnational corporations that make windfall profits from "opening foreign markets." In short, both Republicans and Democrats have used military force to prop up unpopular dictators so that the natural resources and labor of foreign countries can be exploited. They take advantage of the grains of truth in "fighting communism" and now "the war on terrorism," to bully their way into massive profits for a few people, including pay-offs to the political elite in both parties.

It's a scam that no-one has exposed better than Marine Corps Major General Smedley Butler in his essay "War is a Racket."

A sample:

I spent 33 years and 4 months in active service as a member of our country's most agile military force--the Marine Corps. I served in all commissioned ranks from second lieutenant to Major General. And during that period I spent most of my time being a high-class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer for capitalism. I suspected I was part of a racket all the time. Now I am sure of it. -- S. D. Butler

Sources:

Democracy Now, "The Limits of Power: Andrew Bacevich on the End of American Exceptionalism", August 20, 2008.