AMERICA SPILLS ITS GUTS IN A BLOODLESS REVOLUTION

Nobody in the political hierarchies are fully getting it. The electorate has finally had enough. They are sick to death with the do nothing politicians. This far far more so on the Republican side than on the Democratic. With the qualified exception of Hillary and to a much much lesser extent Rubio and Kasich the citizenry are not remotely interested in the party hacks. The road up till now is likewise littered with political Presidential wannabes who have been kicked off the freak show that is passing for an electoral campaign. How much more proof is needed that this ship is not going to right itself on its own? It is on the trajectory that the voters are propelling it. If Trump goes Cruz will step in. His manifesto blasts the same message that government is useless. He was elected with that program. Bernie is still unlikely to beat Hillary but whatever happens he has a big enough anti incumbent groundswell support for him to continue right up to the convention and influence the Party platform. 

There is a revolution going on and the two that have tapped into it the deepest thus far are Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump.

THE GRIEVANCES

The underlying message is the same - the little man is being played for a sucker and government is for the billionaires. There are barriers to the American dream such as class, race, minority status, gender itself and gender preference. Bernie and Donald are connecting with the white working class electorate in both political camps on the same vibration. The latter believe they can get nowhere as all the best jobs have been exported so that the corporation fat cats can make even greater profits and not even pay tax. The country is flooded with illegal immigrants that keep down pay rises. Trade agreements are made where the perception is that America is being shortchanged at the man in the street’s expense. Bernie wants to solve this by getting the jobs back and Donald’s priority solution is first kicking and then keeping the Hispanics out.

In the GOP the Evangelicals believe too they have been taken for a ride - they deliver the votes and Roe v Wade and Obamacare still stand. The African Americans are receiving the short end of the stick - the laws, particularly the criminal, are applied unfairly against them and their children are slaughtered by the police. 

THE MILIEU

America is undergoing dramatic change on the demographic front. The reality is that the minorities are becoming a greater percentage of the population. They are steadily gaining enough clout to make their presence grow politically. They are currently over thirty percent of the population and by 2060 they will be well over fifty percent. When Trump longs for “legal” immigrants everyone knows exactly what he means but the white Anglo Saxons have not been coming for a long long time.

Transformations are evident front and center of this very presidential endeavor. The current President is the first African American President in the Republic’s history while the Democratic frontrunner could be the first woman Commander in Chief. The current populist Democratic runner up Bernie Sanders, who has garnered even more Primary votes than Donald Trump, is a jewish socialist and the GOP runners up, Cruz and Rubio are first generation sons of Hispanic immigrants. The populist Donald is an iconoclast businessman and far from a conventional politician. The only other white male on the scene is languishing at the bottom of the GOP pile. So the electorate has already telegraphed the party hierarchies an anti establishment message and this is reflected in the candidates still standing.  

Another major observation is that although the body politic is becoming polarized it is on the whole more liberal. The millenials have made it so. The millenials thus far have not been put off that Bernie is a socialist making a break from the parents' cold war images. The majority of society accept the LBGT community and even the Supreme Court have sanctioned gay marriage. The evangelical influence seems to have decreased. Eighty percent of the electorate are ready to embrace a woman Commander in Chief. Having made these general observations Trump and Cruz are pushing the agenda to the right while Sanders and Clinton are veering to the left.

There is an urgency in this election as the thousand pound gorilla in the room is the fate of the Supreme Court after a half century of Conservative domination. 

All this taking place in a world that is changing by the minute in an America that is ambivalent as to whether they should be involved in the international turmoil. Obama has consciously abandoned America's role as policeman especially in the Middle East. A section of the electorate is responsive to the rhetoric that claims that America has lost its status and that there is a need once again to reinstate their supremacy. Trump is ready to make "America Great Again".

A DOSE OF REALITY

So in spite of the fact that Donald Trump is as phony and as off the wall as they come and Bernie Sanders is as impractical as anyone can imagine their platforms resonate and their core supporters cannot be persuaded to abandon them. In fact their support seems to be growing. Hillary has the advantage, at least in the minority electorate, of having delivered, which gives her the votes of the deciding demographic in this election. However, their youth are for Bernie. The minorities generally are proving to be the most sophisticated constituency understanding the difference between the politics of power and the politics of protest and activism. However, Hillary suffers from the fact that she is by definition part of the reviled political establishment and she has not extricated herself from the trade deals that are considered to be one of the reason for job loss. Her unexpected Michigan defeat has to be a wakeup call for her.

What continues to amaze Jay H. Ell is that Sanders is running on a platform that Obama’s policies are not radical enough. This not withstanding the fact that Obama, who for the first time for years has approval ratings of around fifty percent, was unable to move his agenda in Congress after 2010 and has all but stated that Clinton is the one with the political credentials to ensure progress. Then there is Trump, who has the most bizarre manifesto imaginable and who does not seen to take into account the fact that the GOP who currently control both chambers are unable to influence abortion policy or reverse Obamacare. How he imagines he will get anything done when he has made derogatory statements about the GOP leaders of the House and the Senate and they both have made it clear that they consider him as a liability as the Party nominee. As for Cruz he has declared war on the congressional leadership... 

LESSONS TO BE LEARNED ON BOTH SIDES OF THE AISLE

The question remains to be seen as to whether the massive anti Trump movement will prevent him from winning the nomination either in the Primaries or at the Convention. Whatever happens it is irrelevant as the GOP have lost this Presidential race. What is relevant is whether they have learned the lessons of this cycle to have a ghost of a chance to regroup. They have to accept that their electorate are in favor of social security and medicare for example and are singularly unimpressed that the GOP represent the one percent. Their protectionism of corporations as manifested, for example, in the no bid deal for Pharmaceutical companies for Medicare drugs, no longer passes unnoticed. The GOP Congress has done nothing to stop the special interests from exporting jobs and money outside of the country and this rankles. It is not a coincidence, too, that the two candidates gaining the most attention are not running their campaigns on Political Action Committee funds. The Dems, as a Party, have to realize that they are behind their voting constituency.

No longer can blue collar workers be taken for granted. The Trump backers were interested in jobs and increased wages and to date the GOP have only been interested in the employers mouthing theoretical platitudes about the negative influences of the minimum wage and the like. This criticism applies to a certain extent to the Democrats who had to have taken note that Hillary has not had the all round automatic endorsements of the Trade Unions. The blue collar workers that they have taken for granted for decades have taken a step back.The GOP need to address all these issues and generate position papers on poverty and the like. Thus far their only policies are to oppose the Democrats, abolish Obamacare and talk about givers and takers. 

Then the GOP has to do what Trump didn’t - treat the Hispanic and African American communities like equal citizens. Each election cycle their numbers grow and they are understandably insulted. Until the GOP right this wrong the Presidency has to be out of their reach.

The Democrats have to convince their blue collar workers that Bernie Sander’s message is not fringe to the party. Both he and Hillary need to tone it down a notch or two. The only way for Bernie to become the nominee is to win Illinois, Ohio and Florida for starters and then go onto win California and New York. In spite of his Michigan win that does not appear likely. In fact now that videos are surfacing with him extolling the virtues of Castro and Noriego the going will be heavier. If Bernie does win these Democratic Primaries he would not only be the nominee he would be the next President. 

AT THE END OF THE DAY

The American electorate are spilling their guts in a bloodless revolution. The working class in the electorate have said their say and they have used their vote to change the political landscape forever. The minorities have found their voices and are a ever increasing factor. To the Democrats credit at least this transformation has been accompanied by ideas and respectful discourse as opposed to gutter vulgar and insulting dialogue that has passed for debate across the aisle. 

However, at the end of the day, for any real progress to take place in the American legislative forum, cooperation across the aisle has to happen. The Republican Lincoln needed Democratic  Senate votes to abolish slavery and the Democrat Johnson could not have enacted Civil Rights without Republican Senators. More recently Tip O' Neill and Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich and Bill Clinton saw to it that the country functioned. 

In this bloodless revolution there is plenty that both sides agree on not the least of which is wealth inequity and the unbridled greed of corporate America at the expense of the working man.  It needs statesmanship and political skills to capitalize on what is happening otherwise no progress will be made and those who have voted for change will once again be disillusioned and angry. Maybe some should explain to them how politics works. (Blog: What Could a Trump, Sanders or Cruz Achieve as President ?).