In the busyness of the season, many readers undoubtedly missed an article which appeared in Alternet by Walter Dean Burnham and Thomas Ferguson on December 17th which made a stunning admission by its very title:
Americans Are Sick to Death of Both Parties: Why Our Politics Is in Worse Shape Than We Thought
2014 signaled a new stage of disintegration
The article begins with this:
The way many pundits tell it, the Democratic debacle in the 2014 midterm elections sounds like a perfect storm of bad breaks. The President was aloof. The party’s message was weak and muddled, in some races focused almost entirely on gender issues. Meanwhile record or near-record breaking waves of political money (for off year elections) cascaded through the political system while voter turnout plunged to levels last seen in 1942.
The real story is much uglier: 2014 was fundamentally a democratic debacle. It likely heralds a new stage in the disintegration of the American political order.
Though Republicans jubilate now, the trend is probably as threatening to them as it is to the Democrats. The reason is stark: Increasing numbers of average Americans can no longer stomach voting for parties that only pretend to represent their interests.
There’s much more to this article, which can be read in its entirety here .
This did catch the attention of some writers, though. By December 21, a gentleman called Bob Swern pulled some of the comments together in an article in the Daily Kos , and added some comments of his own. He dares to make a prediction in this paragraph:
Parsing the collective sentiments of Burnham, Ferguson, Greenberg, Taibbi, and Greenwald, herein, if the status quo leadership of the Democratic Party (not to mention those in the MSM and the blogosphere that parrot their every talking point) doesn’t get a clue, and fast, about what’s happening right in front of them, they will be playing right into the hands of the very entities whom they most vociferously despise: Those thousands here and the scores of millions throughout our nation that are looking for the emergence of a new political force–which could take the form of what might turn out to be the most viable third-party effort witnessed in this country in at least a century–that is truly willing to stand-up to the powers that be.
The article written by Ben Swern can be found here .
Gotta love that button in the article…
That Kos thread is sad. Most of those people have been on the Kos line (basically, support and contribute only to Democrats) for years and by now they are utterly disillusioned with the results. Nevertheless, Kos and his accomplices will gin them up once again in 2016 claiming the naysayers are pessimists and if we don’t support good ol Hillary (who they demonized in 2008) the evil Koch Bros and the Tea Party will bring down civilization.
The Daily Kos is a mind-control cult of the worst sort. The kind that sucks up the time and effort of genuinely good people.
“Both parties” is among the stupider expressions in the English language.
My observation has been that Republicans seem to have noticed their party is in peril, but Democrats have been riding along during Obama’s term without realizing how unhappy many of their own people are. I found it interesting that these articles were so strong in their warning that a “strong third party” could swoop in.
A girl can hope, right?