Henry C.K. Liu
Doug Henwood wrote:
> Jim heartfield wrote:
>
> >In message <19981221.154155.3366.0.farmelantj at juno.com>, James Farmelant
> ><farmelantj at juno.com> writes
> >
> >>But Doug, you don't see the big picture. The Republicans in my judgement
> >>are in danger of imploding the way that the Canadian Tories, the
> >>British Tories, and the French right have all done in recent years.
> >
> >This seems all too plausible to me. One of the most destructive things
> >that happened to critical opinion in Britain is that everyone continued
> >to concentrate their fire on the Tories even at the point when they were
> >dead in the water ...and turned a blind eye to what was happening in the
> >Blair Camp.
>
> A problem with comparing U.S. political parties to their foreign
> counterparts is that U.S. political parties are little more than marketing
> operations, shell corporations who franchise their name. There's no base,
> no membership. Tony Mazzocchi, founder of the Labor Party (US, not UK),
> said they had someone call the Republican and Democratic Party HQ asking
> how many members they had, and how to join. They have no members, and
> there's no way to join. You can contribute money and get a cute little
> donor card, but nothing else. Clinton's 72% approval rating has done
> nothing for Congressional, state, or local Democratic candidates, and he's
> spent the last 6 years distancing himself from his party.
>
> Remember that lots of folks pronounced the Dems dead after 1994.
>
> Doug