Dot Connections

According to J.F. Miglio, writing at the website Online Review of Books and Current Affairs, the Democratic Party's apparent meekness while being subjected to continual electoral defeats for the past six years is explainable by the Democrats being in thrall to the same corporate overseers as the Republicans:

Democrats and Republicans are two branches of the same party. Call it the
Demopublican Party or the Republicrat Party-- call it whatever you want. The
reality is that both Democrats and Republicans are financed by the same large
corporations and have similar agendas.

The Democratic agenda is a bit more liberal than the Republican one,
but when it comes to legislation regarding their mutual big contributors-- the
oil and gas oligopolies, the insurance companies, the Wall Street investment
firms, the pharmaceutical giants, the military hardware manufacturers, etc.--
the Democrats are only slightly less guilty than Republicans of prostituting
themselves for money to finance their campaigns.

Teddy Roosevelt warned us about this problem at the beginning of the
last century, calling the Big Money interests who buy and sell politicians the
"malefactors of wealth." His cousin, FDR, cut into their power during the Great
Depression and they plotted to overthrow him. Eisenhower admonished us about
them in his famous beware the military/industrial complex speech. And even Nixon
butted heads with them on occasion.

But ever since Ronald Reagan became the standard-setting shill for Big
Business, political candidates know their place and rarely cross their corporate
sponsors. Ditto with members of the mainstream news media. And anyone who dares to create legislation or tax policy to cut into their profits or attempts to
promote a populist agenda will be marginalized or destroyed. Howard Dean found
that out the hard way when he ran in the Democratic primary against Kerry.
AAARRR!!

And this is why Democrats have kept their mouths shut in the last three
elections and have accepted their losses with humility. If they want to stay in
the game and continue to accept the largesse of their malefactors, they must be
"good team players," a code phrase that transcends politics and applies to all
craven employees who want to survive in today's cutthroat work
environment.