DON'T JUST LEAVE THE DEMOCRATS;BUILD A NEW PARTY

I posted this comment on the Minnesota Green Party discussion list after David Lindorff's article in COUNTERPUNCH on resigning from the Democratic was posted on the GP discussion list.
Robert Halfhill

Perhaps this would be a good time to contribute my comment in response to another
article on resigning from the Democratic Party that David Lindorff published on OpEdNews.
Robert Halfhill rhalfhill@juno.com

rhalfhill
DON'T JUST LEAVE; BUILD A THIRD PARTY


For those of you who are arguing that we don't have time to pressure the Democratic
Party into changing its stripes, unless you change your thinking, it will NEVER be the
time and you will still be arguing we don't have time in 2008, 2012, 2016, 2020...

In 2004, many antiwar voters supported John Kerry as the lesser evil candidate, a
lesser evil candidate who said he would have been for going into Iraq EVEN IF he had known
that there were no weapons of mass destruction there, and that he would send more troops
"if the generals asked for them." It should be a nobrainer that you cannot
oppose the war on Iraq by supporting a candidate who says he would have been for invading
even if he had known there were no weapons of mass destruction there and that he would
send more troops "if the generals asked for them." Since lesser evil support of
Kerry was totally futile, no harm would have resulted from spending your time on another
totally futile tactic.

But actually, by leaving the Democratic Party, you would have opened up the alternative
of spending your time on building an independent third party, even if that tactic did not
produce results in time for the election.

In fact by throwing their energies into campaigning for Kerry, antiwar voters actually
hurt their cause. You probably remember the massive antiwar demonstrations of 2002 and
early 2003. There were estimates that, worldwide, fifteen million people came out in to
the streets to oppose the war. But in late 2003 and 2004, those mass demonstrations
vanished because people had dropped what they were doing to campaign for Kerry. The
antiwar movement still hasn't recovered the strength it had in 2002.

In 2004, in spite of his good positions on many issue, Kucinich adhered to party
discipline and supported the Democratic endorsed candidates, including Kerry. Unless
Kucinich leaves that rotten party, supporting him is also a waste of time for opponents of
the war on Iraq.

According to historian Mark Lause, people have been going into the Democratic Party to
reform it since 1871 and it has never worked. Don't you think it is time to try some
other tactic?

Edward Maynick pointed out an even deeper reason why going into the Democratic Party to
reform it can never work. Even if, after failing to take over the Democratic Party for
136 years, you somehow managed to get a majority of delegates in the Democratic Party and
elected new party officers, those who are funding the Democratic party are not going to
spend money on a party that doesn't support their interests. They will either transfer
their support to the Republicans or, since the ruling class in this country has benefited
from having two partys to keep the voters going back and forth from one to the other,
transfer their support to building another ruling class party so they can maintain their
duopoly. A minority of voters may still keep voting Democratic out of habit, but, once
those multi millions of ruling class dollars are pulled out and the ruling class media
start publicizing their new party, you'd be surprised how quickly even most of those
habitual Democratic votes vanish before the next election.

So David Lindorff, I would recomend that you go even further and not only resign from
the Democratic Party but spend your time tryng to build an independent third party. If
the Green Party nominates Ralph Nader in 2008, I would recomend that you devote your
efforts to building the Green Party. But if the Green Party gives in to the pressure from
hysterical liberals accusing them of electing the Republicans as they did in 2004, and
runs another safe states, covert lesser evil candidate who does not make a serious attempt
to campaign in states where he or she is afraid of throwing the election to the
Republicans, as the GP did in 2004, then it will still be necessary to build A third
party, even if it is not the Greens.

Robert Halfhill rhalfhill@juno.com


by rhalfhill (1 articles, 63 comments) on Thursday, September 27, 2007 at 4:34:47 PM

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