Scott Walker’s victory in Wisconsin as far as Wisconsin goes because the Democrats regained control of the state Senate. This means that Wisconsin will be a negative image of President Obama and Congress in that it will be the Democrats blocking (hopefully) all legislation proposed by Republicans and Walker.
But despite all the handwringing and finger pointing, Walker’s victory was to be expected. The symbolism is clear: the Republicans—and by Republicans read the top 1%--control the United States of America. The top 1% controls the corporate media, the elections, both political parties, the courts, the military, the economy, and employment through the realization of plans carefully-laid some 40 years ago by David and Charles Koch and their cabal of wealthy and powerful friends and associates.
But don’t put all the blame on them because they didn’t accomplish it alone. Republicans alone didn’t put together the current panel of Justices that sit on the U.S. Supreme Court that gave us Citizens United, and Republicans alone didn’t give us the PATRIOT Act, the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars, the Bush tax cuts, the 2008 financial meltdown and TARP, the thefts of the 2000 and 2004 presidential elections from Democratic victors, and the wars on women and employee unions. The Democrats have been there every step of the way voting to confirm all SCOTUS Justices, the wars, the totalitarian acts which violate the U.S. Constitution, and everything else. The Democratic Party itself has been missing in action when it came to supporting the unions, as was demonstrated in Wisconsin these past few months. The Democratic Party is also partially culpable for the War on Women because through its ineptness and timidity, it allowed the Republican Party to control and frame the message to voters so that today, standing up for true personal freedom and economic equality is evil. When people visualize the Republican Party they see it as standing tall with God on one side and the American flag on the other.
Where the rise of the Republican Party/1% began in the 1980’s, the slow decline of the Democratic Party can be traced to a specific date: November 22, 1963. On that date before a worldwide audience, the conspirators and their hired assassinations showed both political parties—but especially the Democrats, that all politicians, including presidents, are expendable. They proved they could assassinate an American leader in front of a city of eyewitnesses and TV cameras and get away with it. The Democrats quickly got the message and signed off on the fictitious Warren Report. As a reminder of the lesson, both Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy were dispatched within a couple of months of each other in 1968 with similar successful cover-ups.
Although LBJ and the Democrats pushed through “liberal” legislation creating Medicare and voting rights and such, LBJ and the Democratic Party were brought down for lying the U.S. into the Vietnam War as surely as George W. Bush lied the U.S. into the Iraq War almost 40 years later. The Democratic Party continued its slide in 1968 with the villainization and FBI harassment of antiwar protest and left wing groups and with the Democratic mayor of Chicago, Richard Daley, waging violent and oppressive warfare against demonstrators protesting legally outside the outside the Democratic convention. When public opinion turned to support of the antiwar protesters, it also turned against the Democrats and Richard M. Nixon was elected to the White House.
Even after Nixon resigned in disgrace in 1974 and was immediately pardoned by President and Republican Gerald Ford (who also sat on the Warren Commission), Americans briefly pouted by electing Jimmy Carter president in 1976 before forgiving the Republicans of all sins and happily ushered Ronald Reagan into the White House. This is where the decline of the Democratic Party gained speed. Reagan’s victory, which completely demoralized the Democrats, who decided to join the Republicans since they couldn’t beat them.
Bill Clinton with the Democratic Leadership Council won the presidency in 1992 by mutating the Democratic Party into Republican-Lite and the Party hasn’t looked back since. Despite all the rhetoric from both parties to the contrary, there is virtually no difference between the Democratic and Republican parties leadership or politicians. Yes, the Republicans excel at dirty tricks and lies, but the Democrats accept scraps of money (compared to the bribes, er, paychecks the Republicans receive) from the same employers of the Republicans. Every time the Democrats regained control of Congress (sometimes with simultaneous control of the White House) since 1980, they’ve done nothing to protect employees unions and women. They’ve done nothing to pass meaningful campaign finance reform, and they demolished the last vestige of consumer banking and investment protection when Clinton signed Democratic legislation repealing the Glass-Steagall Act, which ultimately lead to the financial meltdown of 2008.
While the Democrats continue to claim there is a vast and discernible difference between them and the Republicans, at the very same time they are continually trying to show the voters they are as God-fearing as the Republicans (by refusing to advocate the revocation of tax exemptions from politicized churches and tele-evangelists), as patriotic as Republicans (by voting to send troops to a phony war and continuing to fund the bloat and corruption of the military-industrial complex), and as pro-business as Republicans by voting for unnecessary tax cuts, free trade agreements, and turning a blind eye to the all the American jobs that have been shipped overseas. The Democrats have done nothing to outlaw the electronic voting machines which enable the Republicans to steal two consecutive presidential elections. The Democrats continue to speak softly, through Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, and carry a very small stick, if any stick at all. They talk support of employee unions but have stood by impotently as the Republicans roll past them in pursuit of making the union movement in this country and around the world extinct. And just like the Republicans, they have actively enabled corporate mergers to decimate true market competition, as they refuse to enforce antitrust laws, and approve commissioners to the FCC whose goals were to de-regulate the public airwaves and cable industries, allowing a handful of companies to monopolize all televised and broadcast outlets in America, most of the staunch supporters of the Republican Party. Newspapers, or what’s left of them, are also in the firm control of a handful of corporations also aligned with the Republicans.
The Democrats can’t even get judges appointed to the many vacancies on U.S. District courts, judges who would be able to stem the tide and perhaps reverse the assault on personal freedoms and voting rights that are successfully being waged by the Republicans in the face of non-action by the Democratic U.S. Department of Justice.
The Democrats have abdicated their adversary position to the Republicans—despite self-righteous rhetoric in front of TV cameras—to be just about almost close enough like them so they can keep their phony baloney Congressional jobs. Staying in office has become part important than actually doing anything beneficial and important in office.
Because of the way the Republicans have masterfully framed their message, and public opinion polls to the contrary, most voters see Republicans as representing the future and Democrats as history and irrelevant. Wisconsin proved that last night. To Republicans, Obama’s 2008 victory was just a transitory blip on their radar screen. They specialize in long term planning, and they have all the time in the world to make those plans a reality. Just ask the Koch brothers.