Breathtaking Arrogance

Once again Democrats are bringing a glove to a knife-fight in which Republicans have brought a tank. The Democrats' response to the total annihilation of decades worth of constitutional protections brought by the conservative Supreme Court is almost nonexistent. Still Joe Biden has the gall, the breathtaking arrogance to wag a blaming finger at his own supporters...

As much as Republicans are to blame for attacking and destroying women's bodily autonomy, LGBTQ+ protections, gun-control and democracy itself, Democrats have to take some, if not half of the blame. Why? Well, because they faithfully play their part in the "Ratchet Effect," where Republicans pull the country to the right when they're in power, and Democrats refuse to pull back in the opposite direction when they have the White House, Senate and House of Representatives. Democrats are content to just hold the new line established by the GOP.

Case in point, just to illustrate: Roe v Wade. Democrats have had decades to codify women's right to abortion, but they haven't. Obama promised he would, but he didn't. Democrats' weakness on this point is now being punished by a GOP that's now so far to the right that it borders on becoming a full-blown fascist white supremacist party. Their last two presidents lost the popular vote and their current Supreme Court is overturning rights that had massive popular support. And they're not even being secretive about their authoritarian inclinations anymore; the gerrymandering, the voter-suppression, the "caring more about guns than lives," the eroding of the separation between Church and State, and the promotion of "replacement theory," it's all out in the open now.

What started as blaming Democrats for their "open border" ideology (which is absurd on its face by the way), has become a physical wall (or at least the promise thereof) between Mexico and the U.S. What started as a debate about fetal viability to determine at what stage abortion is or is not allowed, has become a full-blown restriction on women's choice in red states, soon to become a federal restriction if the current GOP gets its wish. What started as states having the right to implement gun-restrictions by their own interpretation of the 2nd Amendment (in complete accordance with the right-wing's view on individual states' rights), has now been pulled of the table because the conservative Supreme Court has forced their own interpretation of the 2nd Amendment on the state of New York.

The fact that both parties are unwilling to do something about filibustering is troublesome and indicates that anti-democratic tendencies are not just the purview of the GOP. In order for Democrats to get anything done, the filibuster must be struck down first, so what does that tell us about their actual willingness to get anything done?

In Federalist No. 22, Alexander Hamilton described super-majority requirements as being one of the main problems with the previous Articles of Confederation, and identified several evils which would result from such a requirement:

"To give a minority a negative upon the majority (which is always the case where more than a majority is requisite to a decision), is, in its tendency, to subject the sense of the greater number to that of the lesser. ... The necessity of unanimity in public bodies, or of something approaching towards it, has been founded upon a supposition that it would contribute to security. But its real operation is to embarrass the administration, to destroy the energy of the government, and to substitute the pleasure, caprice, or artifices of an insignificant, turbulent, or corrupt junto, to the regular deliberations and decisions of a respectable majority. In those emergencies of a nation, in which the goodness or badness, the weakness or strength of its government, is of the greatest importance, there is commonly a necessity for action. The public business must, in some way or other, go forward. If a pertinacious minority can control the opinion of a majority, respecting the best mode of conducting it, the majority, in order that something may be done, must conform to the views of the minority; and thus the sense of the smaller number will overrule that of the greater, and give a tone to the national proceedings. Hence, tedious delays; continual negotiation and intrigue; contemptible compromises of the public good. And yet, in such a system, it is even happy when such compromises can take place: for upon some occasions things will not admit of accommodation; and then the measures of government must be injuriously suspended, or fatally defeated. It is often, by the impracticability of obtaining the concurrence of the necessary number of votes, kept in a state of inaction. Its situation must always savor of weakness, sometimes border upon anarchy."
_{source: Wikipedia}

A minority holding the majority hostage; that's exactly what's happening in America and it's exactly the specialty of the undemocratic GOP. The Supreme Court that dances to the tune of the highly authoritarian, theocratic and xenophobic GOP, is making Americans' lives less save, less free and less democratic. So what's Joe Biden's response? And can American voters trust him to fight back this time around? Will the Democratic Party stand idly by once again while the country's forced to explore new extremes on the wrong side of the political spectrum? Going by Biden's words in the below linked video, American progressives will once again be disappointed... While leftists like AOC have concrete plans to curb the power of this authoritarian anti-democratic SCOTUS, Biden chooses to lay the responsibility at the feet of voters. "Go out to vote for us, for this time we won't let you down!" seems to be the extent of his "plan." So, watch the video. I wish I had something uplifting to say about this whole ordeal, but I don't. Maybe and hopefully the Democratic Party succeeds in their feeble attempt at luring voters to their cause, but if they do, it won't be thanks to them, it'll be thanks to the horrific prospect of another four years under GOP rule, thanks to Americans once again having chosen the lesser of two evils...

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