We must take back our country together
If you add up all the populists in the Republican party and all the progressives in the Democratic party, the total would be a slim (but growing) majority of American voters. Progressives and populists are actually natural allies who are being blocked from cooperating in their shared goal of reining in the elites by powerful politicians and influencers spreading lies for their own gain.
But progressive activists working at the grassroots level are beginning to connect with frustrated populists during local campaigns. They’re working for changes, like higher property taxes and fees on second homes and short-term rentals, affordable housing programs and community boards to limit rent increases.
At the neighborhood level, regardless of political affiliation, people are mad as hell at being priced out the American Dream by the billionaires’ rigged economy. They want to vote for anyone who will fight to even the score for the little guy. If candidates can convince people that they will stand up against corporate profiteers and the wealthy, voters will cross party lines to support them.
But too many Democrats these days see giant corporations and the super-wealthy as constituents and donors, not as adversaries in what billionaire Warren Buffett called the American “class war” a few years ago. At the same time, Buffett warned, “The rich are winning.”
Sadly, a critical number of “moderate” Democrats feel they need to work with the special interests, not against them. And conservatives, including some Democrats, are not just working with the corporations and billionaires — they seem to be working directly for the elites, against the interests of regular Americans.
The complex bonds among billionaires, the weapons industry, the American military and national politicians are like a Gordian knot that cannot be untied but must be slashed with a sword, so we can demilitarize the budget and reset our national spending priorities.
American wars of choice and the U.S. armies and fleets posted around the world for decades have had a staggering human, environmental and financial cost — with little or nothing accomplished, except to fatten the balance sheets of international corporations. A defense policy based on business as usual has put our national budget so deeply in the hole that taxpayers can’t even see daylight anymore.
The truth is, Americans can no longer afford to elect representatives to Congress who continue to insist on giving the military even more money than they ask for. Instead, they will have to start giving them less than they ask for. Much less.
War is complicated. Everyone wants the Ukrainians to defeat Vladimir Putin’s brutal invasion. But no one wants another world war. The question is, has the longstanding, far-flung and forward-leaning presence of American forces really helped to keep the peace? Or has it made things worse? Either way, it has definitely cost too much.
American entanglements in conflicts from Vietnam to
Yemen have been futile, bloody and pointless, serving mainly to enrich the arms makers and other elites. Through the years, the War on Terror devolved into an expensive holding action with no end in sight. It has become little more than a cash cow for the military-industrial complex.
America can move away from a weapons-based economy, and build a better way of life. To do that, populists and progressives will have to stop clicking on conflicts with each other and other countries for a change, and stand together for peace and the end of “capitalism without competition,” as President Biden put it.
This is our country and we can take it back with good old-fashioned people power. If workingand middle-class voters cooperate to support game-changing candidates, regardless of party, we can defeat the elites in the coming elections and get America back on track, with a government by and for the people instead of the plutocrats and profiteers.