The Difference

I heard it again, the other day. Twice, in fact. “There is no difference between democrats and republicans.” One of the people who said this was a college graduate with a degree in poli-sci. First off, poli-sci is typically considered a prerequisite for a LEGAL career, not a POLITICAL one. Second off, studying politics from a book no more makes you an expert on real-world political practice than studying surgery from a book qualifies you to crack open someone’s brain.

I would beg to differ, and let me give you an example.

For six years, the republicans ruled all three branches of government. We had a conservative (in name, if not action) president, a conservative (in name, if not action) legislature and a conservative judiciary. When this group did something wrong, there was almost always public outcry. And their response? Basically “Shut up – we’re doing this for your own good.” No acknowledgement that they had screwed up, and no attempt to correct it.

Now the democrats are in charge of two of the branches – the presidency and the legislature. Recently… well… they screwed up. They passed a bail-out bill that included AIG without making sure that the money couldn’t be given to the executives who screwed the system up. As a matter of fact, when this idea was proposed, the democrats shot it down. So guess what happened? There were a hundred and sixty five million dollars given out in bonuses to… you guessed it… the people who screwed the system up. And there was a public outcry. Here’s where the democrats are different, though – they at least made an attempt to correct it. They passed an emergency bill imposing a tax of 90% of those bonuses from people whose income is $250,000 or greater. I’m kind of thinking that includes most or all of the people who received bonuses.

I keep saying that it was the democrats who did this. Where were the republicans during all of this? Frankly I’m not sure where they were during the initial bail-out. But in the emergency 90% tax bill, they were split down the middle, with a slight majority voting AGAINST it. So in other words, in all probability, if the republicans had still been in charge, this idiocy would probably have gone uncorrected.

I am not saying that the democrats are not corrupt. They are. It’s pretty clear. What I am saying is that they are LESS corrupt than the republicans, and that there may still be hope for them as a party.

Just for a lark, I Googled the terms “republican indicted” and “democrat indicted”. The first page of the republican list included Ted Stephens (taking bribes), Scott Muschany (sexual assault of a 14 year old girl), “Lt. Gov. Krolicki” (the website is down, so I can’t get his first name – misappropriation), Mark Deli Siljander (terrorist money laundering), Rick Renzi (extortion, wire fraud) and Ernie Fletcher (conspiracy). From the “democrat” front page comes William Jefferson (bribery). Oh, and the SON of Tennessee lawmaker Mike Kernell for hacking Sarah Palin’s e-mail account. So that’s six to one. Or one and a half , if you count the kid.

And this doesn’t include probably the biggest indictment of all. Tom “The Hammer” DeLay. This is the guy who went to a U S Possession (the name escapes me at the moment) where it is the norm to lure girls there from Asian countries with the promise of going to America, forcing them into prostitution, stripping or sweat shops, forcing them to get abortions when they become pregnant, and referred to it as a model for American-style capitalism. This is the guy who organized the gang of republican legislative assistants, all from out of state, to go to Florida to protest the presidential ballot recount in 2000. You remember the angry mob of suit-wearing young men? Yeah. Not Floridians – legislative assistants from Texas and Alaska (one of the assistant of the aforementioned Ted Stephens) and God only knows where else.

So how did the republicans get so much more corrupt than the democrats? They hooked their wagon almost entirely to the falling star of big business. As far up the asses of big business as Bill Clinton was, he was an amateur compared to the republicans.

The democrats, instead of courting big business, have courted minorities, women, homosexuals, hippies, artists and intellectuals. So they have been able to stay FREER, if not entirely FREE of corruption.

There’s still hope for the democrats, as proven by this 90% tax to get OUR money back that half the republicans voted against. So if you’re a republican reading this, bear this in mind: the democrats may have stupidly given your money away, but it’s also the democrats trying to get it back. More than half of the republicans tried to prevent that.

Peace.

Randal