Luke Weiger <lweiger@umich.edu> wrote: <BLOCKQUOTE style="PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px; BORDER-LEFT: #1010ff 2px solid"> Jenny wrote: > Nathan, most people don't vote. If they had something to vote for, they > might do so. > There's very little in the way of evidence to suggest that significant numbers of non-voters would turn out if only "they had something to vote for." Why are voting rates higher in Europe and orher countries where there are real labor and socila-democratic (as well as as out-and-out fascist) parties? > The Democrats continue to make sure that that doesn't happen by > being so tepid, rhetorically and actually, not because they lack moral fiber, > but because they are beholden to corporate cash and because the Democratic > party has less discipline than a three year-old's birthday party. > Was the party significantly less beholden to corporate cash when most Democratic senators voted against the first Gulf War? It's fairly clear at this point that the current war is not a campiagn carried out at the behest of Washington's corporate masters, but despite them. Two or three be that as it mays: (1) the Dems are and were typically fairly pallid and gutless, lacking the courage od their convictions. (2) They are generally somewhat better than the GOP nonetheless, which is why I unenthusiatically vote for Dem candidates for local and national office other than Prez. (3) I have poured scorn on the idea of lesser evilism for years, saying that the Dems are too lesser and plenty evil, and I unsay none of that. But I have also said that there are real cases where the evils are actually lesser -- Weimar Germany leaps to mind. (Mistaking the probablities, I took 1984 to be such a case: I voted for Mondale because I thought that Reagan was going to blow up the world.)  It's possible that we are in such a situation now. The Dems are craven followers of polls and abjectly submissive to power. But they're not psychopathetic homicidal lunatics, which is what we've got now. jks </BLOCKQUOTE> <hr size=1>Do you Yahoo!? <a href="http://us.rd.yahoo.com/finance/mailsig/*http://tax.yahoo.com">Yahoo! Tax Center</a> - File online, calculators, forms, and more