The same oil companies that contribute to Republicans also give campaign checks to Democratic candidates. Insurance, HMO, and pharmaceutical industry contributions (with Hillary Clinton a top recipient among both parties) ensure that none of the leading Democratic presidential hopefuls will endorse genuine universal care under a single-payer national health plan.
There's no greater evidence of such collusion than the reluctance of Democratic leaders to seek impeachment and hold the Bush-Cheney gang responsible for criminal abuses of power: deceiving the American people about why we invaded Iraq, torture, detention without trial, surveillance of US citizens without warrant, violation of international laws and treaties, inaction and racist response to environmental emergencies (Hurricanes Katrina and Rita), endangering public health by tampering with scientific research on global warming, former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan's revelation that Mr. Bush and Mr. Cheney were involved in the conspiracy to expose the identity of CIA undercover operative Valerie Plame.
When Dems in the current Congress approved the nominations of of Samuel Alito and John Roberts to the Supreme Court and Michael "Waterboard" Mukasey as the next Attorney General, they made the damage of the Bush-Cheney White House extensive and probably permanent.
There's a tendency among many liberal and progressive Americans to think of the Democratic Party as the opposition, that it provides a check on the Republican agenda, and that the excessive power of the Bush Administration represents a break in two-party democracy.
This is wrong. The Bush catastrophe is a natural, perhaps predictable outcome of bipartisan politics. Dems and Repubs compete on the same turf, seeking corporate campaign donations and the votes of a vaguely defined 'moderate' constituency, without any strong countervailing progressive political force. The drift of Democrats into ever greater loyalty to corporate lobbies and increasing abandonment of working people has guaranteed a license for the Republican Party, under neoconservative standard-bearers, to adopt agenda so extreme they imperil US democracy and global stability. It was thus inevitable that a Bush and a Cheney would come to power and wreak havoc
Progressive and antiwar Dems remain a vocal bloc in their party, but with nearly zero influence. The Democratic Party's leadership knows that upstarts like Dennis Kucinich and Mike Gravel won't get the corporate dollars necessary to compete with the Clinton and Obama war chests, that they barely register in the media, and that Democratic voters who oppose the Iraq War and favor various progressive reforms will vote for a nominee annointed by Wall and K Streets who shares none of their sentiments "because they have nowhere else to turn."
Mr. Kucinich and Mr. Gravel will have no effect on the Democratic Party platform and will not be permitted to speak at the party's convention. Their only effect in 2008 will be similar to the role played by Jesse Jackson, Jerry Brown, Al Sharpton, Mr. Kucinich, and others during the past few decades: they'll corral millions of voters behind a Democratic ticket that ignores them.
As Green Party candidate David Cobb said during his 2004 presidential campaign, "The Democratic Party is where progressive ideas go to die."
Third Party Interference
The only way to thwart the direction of bipartisan politics is for bipartisan politics to end. I'm not arguing for a new era in bipartisan cooperation, which would accelerate all the worst things I've described, but for an end to politics limited to two parties.
The first step is the election of candidates to Congress who are neither Democrat nor Republican, who accept no corporate money, and who embrace a platform that demands immediate withdrawal of troops from Iraq, enactment of single-payer/Medicare For All, dedication to the rights and needs of working people, and other progressive and populist goals. There are many third party and independent candidates who meet these criteria, among whom the best organized and most promising belong to the Green Party.
If Greens win seats in Congress in 2008, it'll shock Democrats (and some Republicans, too) into immediate action to end the Iraq War. Democratic and Republican candidates will no longer be each others' sole competition for votes.
With Greens in the House and Senate, genuine antiwar Democrats and Republicans who aren't getting help from their own parties will expand their own numbers and be able to create the political bloc necessary to end the war. Democrats and Republicans won't be able to ignore thinly supported legislation like Rep. John Conyers' single-payer bill, and more will sign on. Greens in Congress will help write and sponsor such legislation.
Green competition often leads Democratic and Republican candidates to modify their positions. In 2000, the presence of Green candidate Ralph Nader forced Al Gore to not to take the Democratic Party's progressive base for granted. During the Democratic convention he promised voters "I will fight for you" and won votes from many Americans who had considered voting for Mr. Nader. (It's one of many reasons that the 'spoiler' accusation against Mr. Nader and the Green Party is dishonest.)
The growth of the Green Party, as more Americans register and vote Green and more Greens win elections, represents the necessary shock to the system. It's a nonviolent and modest shock -- the Green Party is hardly a revolutionary vanguard -- but it's dramatic enough to change the nation's Bushward direction. It's as necessary as the Republican Party's arrival was in the 1850s.
Prospects for the emergence of the Green Party and other alternative parties are fragile. Democrats and Republicans in many state legislatures have conspired to rig the system, passing ballot access laws designed to privilege themselves and hinder third party and independent candidates.
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