Many people went into this week’s election with many ideas in their heads, among them the notion that they were going to take back the Democratic Party as the party of the people. Were the Democrats ever that? Or is that more of our national mythology?
Yes, it’s part of our mythology. Power and money always go together. No matter what the name of the party that is in power, it got there usually by force and certainly by money. But certainly, the New Deal, which I lived through, was a time when we had a president who wanted to get the people out of the Depression. Most of his programs didn’t work. World War II did work, and he led us into that. We came out owning much of the world, hence the Global Empire. And that was done by President Roosevelt in the name of the people.
Since Roosevelt, I can’t think of a single president who represented the people or did much for them. We’re the only country that doesn’t have health care for the people, or a proper education system or day centers for working mothers. No other country like this! I have just come from a tour of Germany, Austria, Sweden . . . they are all ahead of us.
This is "Old Europe," as they now call it.
Yes, Mr. Rumsfeld’s Old Europe is way ahead of Aging America and its aging structures in which the people pay big taxes and get nothing back from them except armaments and wars to enrich the oil companies.
You and I speak on the eve of the election. Without yet knowing the results, how would you assess the Kerry campaign?
The Kerry campaign was pretty much a disappointment, however it might have ended. You know, it was Howard Dean who pretty much broke down the gates and let the people in. Dean knew intuitively the fact that American people are violently isolationist, and virulently against foreign wars and want to be left alone to do their own business — which is business. And that is quite sensible and is what the life of a people should be.
Dean realized this war was an abomination to all sorts of Americans: lower class, middle class, Democrats and Republicans. He saw that, and rallied them — getting more registrations than anyone could expect from a mere governor of Vermont who just suddenly threw his hat in the ring.
That should have given Kerry a hint. What the people want you to say is that you are against this war of adventure. Against this meaningless war against terror. How do you beat terror? Terror is everywhere. Terror is the government of the United States half the time in how it relates to its own people. Our government is no friend to us and has not been for some years. To smile with satisfaction, "Boy, we got Saddam Hussein." Oh yeah, I feel safer. Terror goes on. And Saddam Hussein does or does not. He’s irrelevant to the story.
But with constant repetition, constantly telling lies, Bush and Cheney have convinced the America people somehow they’re all mixed up together. And they hate us because we’re so good! We’re such a good people. That is cretinism.
