Last week was marred by elections.
Polls showed that 44% of voters said they were worried about ‘democracy’. About as many are worried about inflation. Democrats said they thought Republicans posed a threat to democracy. For their part, Republicans were sure inflation was the fault of the Democrats — specifically, Joe Biden.
It was all nonsense…and fraud.
Democrats and Republicans need each other — like a pair of professional wrestlers, they entertain the voters with a clumsy farce. When one punches, the other must get a bloody nose. When one hits below the belt, the other must cry foul. Together, they distract, mislead, and betray the American public.
The two parties may square off against each other. But both share the same core beliefs. They believe that government is a way to transfer wealth and power from ‘The People’ to the elite. They also believe in democracy; it gives voters the illusion of being in control while allowing the two parties to take turns ripping them off.
They, the other people
When Donald Trump won the election of 2016, the Democrats insisted that democracy was broken. The Russians had taken a sledgehammer to it, they said. They spent the next four years trying to prove it. And even after a lengthy investigation showed what everyone knew in the beginning — that the Russians had probably not turned a single vote — Hillary Clinton and her fellow Democrats still clutched the fantasy near to their hearts…a talisman to ward off the evil MAGA spirits.
Then, when their man, Biden, won in 2020…democracy worked for the Democrats again, they were keen to protect it. But not just by counting the votes more carefully. They aimed to make sure their candidates won, whether ‘The People’ wanted them or not.
From Axios:
‘In one of the highest-profile gubernatorial battles in the country, Georgia Democrat Stacey Abrams is leveraging a vast pool of out-of-state money.
‘Why it matters: Abrams’ fundraising profile — which consists of huge backing from wealthy coastal Democrats and a massive base of small-dollar support — is more typical of a leading national candidate than a gubernatorial contender.’
By the end of June, Stacey Abrams had raised almost twice as much money as her Republican rival. ‘The People’ are supposed to elect their own representatives. But 85% of Ms Abrams’ money came from meddlers who were not ‘The People’ of Georgia. Apparently, there were a lot of people who wanted to elect someone else’s governor.
Deny, deny, deny!
And talk about election deniers! Ms Abrams set the pace. She lost the last election in 2018 and refused to concede. From National Review, August 2019:
‘Stacey Abrams defended her refusal to concede last year’s Georgia gubernatorial election on Monday, arguing that adhering to the democratic norm of conceding to a victorious opponent would make her “complicit” in a “rigged” system.’
Rigged? Of course, it’s rigged up real good. ‘The People’ are supposed to choose their own representatives. But the two parties put up the dumbest, most undesirable, and scurrilous candidates…and then insist that it’s the voters’ duty to elect one of them.
Want proof? From The New York Post:
‘Democrats have spent more than $53 million to boost far-right Republican primary candidates in nine key states as part of a controversial election strategy — despite publicly screaming about the threat posed to the US by such would-be officeholders.
‘In some races, Democrats have spent more than 30 times what the GOP candidates were able to scrape together themselves, according to a Washington Post analysis.’
What kind of democracy is this? The political elite goes into the primaries with millions of dollars to support candidates nobody really wants.
Democracy for sale
Buying votes — especially with the taxpayers’ money — is another venerable way to get your man in office. After the votes were counted last Wednesday, for example, Mr Biden was quick to thank young people. James Bovard explains:
‘Biden deluged them with federal dollars to bail out his Democratic allies. His $500 billion+ student-loan forgiveness scheme was widely condemned — even The Washington Post editorial page slammed it as a “regressive, expensive mistake.”
‘But the handouts helped buy Democrats their biggest boost among voters — a 28% advantage over Republicans in voters age 18 to 29, improving on Dems’ 2020 performance. It won’t matter if federal courts strike down the loan forgiveness as illegal: The votes have already been delivered.’
While the Democrats’ idea that Republicans are uniquely a menace to democracy is absurd, so is the Republicans’ idea that Biden is uniquely to blame for inflation. We remind readers that Donald Trump increased federal spending three-times faster than Barack Obama and 10-times faster than Bill Clinton. He added to the national debt twice as fast as Obama and 12-times faster than Bill Clinton. And Trump’s runaway spending and borrowing required the Fed to ‘print’ money at twice the rate of the Obama years…and almost infinitely faster than during the Clinton years.
It is Trump, not Biden, who bears most of the responsibility for today’s inflation. Biden just made it worse.
But on the key issues — war and spending — the two parties collude seamlessly. Like heavyweight professionals, they put on a good show — pretending to maul and mangle each other. And with so much gouging and thumping on stage, the fans hardly notice when their wallets are stolen.
Regards,
 |
Bill Bonner,
For The Daily Reckoning Australia
