copyright Bettina Network, inc. 2012

This could be subtitled “democracy vs dictatorship”.

It was a very exciting morning to be a part of a discussion on this topic which I had not thought about in terms of our being in the middle of a civil war between those who want us to be a democracy and those who prefer the corporate structure to carry over into our government structure and who would like our president to be a corporate-type leader rather than the head of a democratic government.  It has been staring me in the face for years and I just didn’t get it.  This breakfast was like a light coming on – hey, that is really where we are.  It is becoming more overt and not happening on a covert level anymore, so the din is getting louder from those who object and who are fighting to  maintain a democracy against those who are moving to take it over and convert it into a corporate-type structure (more so than it is already).

Corporate executives are not elected by the general populace – sometimes by an executive committee and sometimes by just a couple people at the top – appointed by those who control behind the scenes.

I have been very upheaveled about the political scene and what is going on with the Democratic and Republican parties, but to think of it as a civil war and a huge fight between the forces of democracy and those trying to turn this country into a dictatorship is a new idea.

The discussion moved fast and furious.  It started with a few minutes talk about the media’s role.  It was about the hundreds of millions of dollars  being spent on political campaigns.  We have gone crazy trying to secure power for four years by spending like ‘drunken sailors’.

Projected from the primary to the Presidential Campaign it looks as though some two billion dollars or more will be spent.  Spent on what?  It will be spent on the media, the poll takers, the candidate and his retinue.  Even on clothes so the political candidates and their families will look the part – remember the fight which broke out between Sara Palin and those who thought she spent too much of the campaigns money on clothes?  That was but a drop in the bucket compared to the amount spent on poll takers.  They must live off these campaigns – telling them on a minute by minute basis almost where everyone is -what the public is doing – which way they are leaning, etc.  IT seemed to us that an honest politician wouldn’t need so much money if he or she didn’t feel they needed to support the poll taker companies in high style.  When did that happen?  You can’t run today – or so some politicians think – if you can’t afford to pay the multi-millions to the pollsters.

The money spent with the media will also be enormous – no wonder their reporting is so skewered.  Would the media be able to survive without the political campaigns?  It is spent, apparently – according to this breakfast table talk – to entertain the masses who will get caught up in the drama of it all and not see the lack of substance.

We have had breakfast table talk in the past about how campaigns and the politicians in the Senate and the House are looking more and more like Southern politicians from the days of Huey Long and friends – or even Strom Thurman and his buddies.  The fighting, name calling, oppressing one group against the other to get the public angry so they will vote for you out of that anger and need to be protected against the sub-humans, etc. – that all has been going on in the Southern United States for generations.  It was very entertaining; vicious; lively and when it was over everyone went back to being friends and family.  This political fighting is such that when it is over one won’t be able or want to go back to being friends and family.  We will all be us and them, the good and the bad, those who are with us and the enemy outside of our group.

This breakfast conversation  had more than a modicum of truth.  Our businesses are oligarchies with the little guys struggling to succeed under the weight of the oligarchies which are  tryiing to make sure they don’t succeed – or if it looks as though the little guys may be on to something in their struggling businesses, to gobble them up before they get too strong a toehold.  I had not thought of our politicians as fighting it out for the corporate leaders to be the power people and to destroy the democratic leaders because they get in the way.

Corporations in a democratic society are an anomaly to begin with.  They have money and power and have been gradually taking over trying to move us to the brink of fascism or, at the very least, dictatorship.  We have reached the tipping point and all of a sudden everyone is waking up to see they may soon be living in a country which is on its way to becoming controlled by the few – with the vote gone – the democracy a thing of the past – and where did these corporate fellows come from?  They used to stay in their corporations, working hard to make lots of money and now they are all over the place running for office or putting up multi-millions for their minions to run for office and the country changes.  And I do mean fellows because women don’t fit in this scenario.  Well, maybe they fit a little as distractions to push up front with the name calling, the anger making, an excuse for the rough stuff.

I was amazed to hear what is going on in Michigan.  Democracy is being replaced with a dictatorship or worse under the name of saving the state from bankruptcy or worse.  Democracy does have its problems and to solve them can be a messy process, especially if you want to solve the problems in the context of the democracy and not change to the more efficient fascist model.  The democratic model will be lots of people involved trying things that don’t work and hitting on some that do work almost by accident; being concerned about the freedom and interest of the minority as well as the majority; and being ethical in choices even though it is not the most expedient way to do things.  If you prefer the dictatorship, fascist model that is efficient, quick and oppressive to the many who then have to live under that system then your results will be quick and look good for a time, until the price, all those who have to live under that dictatorship, have to pay becomes obvious and they begin to have to pay the price of no freedom, no vote, no voice in their government, etc.

It was quite a breakfast and will cause me to think long and hard about choices in this coming election time!!!  And in the times after this one – to make my choices dependent upon who respects this system more and wants to see it maintained and refined along the lines of a democracy – not changed into something less with the excuse that dictatorships work better.  What is not said – they work better for the very few who succeed and thrive while the sacrifices of the many  become more destructive to those who have to support the success of the few.

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