It is election time again in the United States, and millions of people are getting swept up into the cult of one candidate or another, despite the fact that they are all generally the same when it comes to the fundamentals of the power structure that they work in and benefit from. Even activists who are awake and aware of what is going on in the world, are still getting sucked into the trap of politics, and showing support for some of the more edgy candidates such as Rand Paul or Bernie Sanders.
However, despite the lip service that these candidates pay to make small “reforms” to the system, they fail to question even the basic tools of oppression employed by the government. In reality, Rand Paul and Bernie Sanders are not much different than Jeb Bush or Hillary Clinton, they just have different marketing schemes that appeal to different demographics. This is an age old tactic that has been used by the establishment since the early days of democracy, and it was used as recently as the last election, with the cult of Barack Obama.
As we saw with Obama, he paid lip service to popular issues, and led people to believe that he was an anti-war candidate, who wanted to legalize drugs, fix the economy and bring more freedom to the people of America. Sadly, people learned very quickly that Obama was no different than Bush, he was just another smooth talking politician who did exactly what the ruling class wanted him to do, just as every politician has done before him.
Now in the new election, why is it that anyone thinks that anything is going to be different, especially when none of the candidates will even address the oppressive institutions and ideas that are at the root of our suffering? Below are some of the topics that show that all politicians have the same mindset, and playing for the same team, regardless of their party or marketing scheme.
1. Military
At one point or another, every politician has voted for some military funding or military action. In the current election, Jeb Bush, Hilary Clinton, and Donald Trump have all been vocal about their desire to kill people in other parts of the world, but so have some of the candidates that are more popular among activists. Bernie Sanders for example, has consistently voted to send billions of dollars worth of funding and weapons to Israel so they can terrorize the Middle East on behalf of the military industrial complex of the Western world, despite the fact that he is now positioning himself as an anti-war candidate. Rand Paul has also positioned himself an anti-war candidate, but he too has promoted senseless war in the Middle East, even writing his own declaration of war in the midst of the ISIS hysteria. Each of these candidates has failed to make a serious stand against the very concept of war, and in many ways continue to perpetuate the fear-based notion that military is needed and keeps us safe.
2. Police
Police brutality and oppression has become a trending topic in the United States because more people are recording police and holding them accountable. The brutality that is seen by people around the world on a daily basis is so bad at this point that most politicians are forced to make slight concessions on their rhetoric about police. Many candidates are now pushing for “reform”, which still leaves them in control, but none of them is pointing towards the real solution, which is the outright abolition of the police. The police as an institution is a monopoly that has roots in slave hunting in American culture. All throughout the world police are known as agents of oppression, from Ceasar’s guards to Hitler’s Nazis, the police have always been the bad guys. The institution is not broken, it is inherently corrupt and has no place in a free society, but this is not a perspective that you will hear during a political debate, even from the edgy candidates like Bernie Sanders and Rand Paul.
3. Centralized Currency
Having a centralized currency is one of the major tactics that the ruling class has used to control populations economically, and one way or another every political candidate supports some form of centralized currency. Even candidates that criticize the Federal Reserve still want the currency to be centralized and controlled by Congress, instead of central banks. These politicians, known as “green backers” believe that Congress would be somehow less corrupt and more accountable than central banks, when in reality, these two institutions are both composed of ruling class individuals who share the same interests, and in many cases, even hold positions in both organizations at different times in their life. You will not hear a candidate ever promote the idea of allowing people to freely develop decentralized currencies on their own, because this would shake the foundation of the economy, and bring power and wealth from the ruling class back to the people.
4. Government Indoctrination (Public Schooling)
Public schooling is one of the biggest sacred cows of government, and it is incredibly rare for a politician ever to recognize how damaging it is to children, and that its real intention is to indoctrinate, not educate. Politicians like Bernie Sanders want to pour more money into schooling, as if schooling is a positive thing, however, this is simply not true.
The education system in America and most of the rest of the world is a corrupt establishment that does a lot more harm than it does good. The main focus of public education is to mold young minds into accepting authority and to teach them the very basic skills that they will need to be a part of the workforce. Schools do not teach people how to think, but only what to think, or more accurately how to remember and regurgitate information that has been fed to them. The useful information that is taught in schools would realistically only take a few months per year to go over, but passing along this information is not what’s important to the public school system. What is important to them is the day to day structure of how the school is run that “socializes” and indoctrinates the children. This structure is designed to break the child’s spirit and teach them to be submissive to authority figures.
It is also specifically designed to groom working class children for their future jobs, which will be at a corporation or bureaucracy of their choosing. Surprisingly, this fact has been recognized to some extent by Rand Paul, but instead of promoting ideas like homeschooling, unschooling, or Montessori schooling, he seems to want the same type of government school structure, but just in a private setting. So again, while he may pay lip service to reform, he fails to go far enough and strike at the root of the issue or bring forward any radical solutions. He has suggested abolishing the Department of Education, though which I must admit is a decent start.
5. Prosecution of Victimless Crimes
In some way or another, every politician out there supports legal penalties against people who have not harmed anyone or violated anyone’s property. Even politicians who want to legalize marijuana, still advocate legal penalties against other drugs or other nonviolent actions. Furthermore, even the politicians who do wish to legalize certain nonviolent crimes, still refuse to legalize anything fully without writing regulations and imposing taxes on it. Bernie Sanders, Rand Paul, and all of the other major candidates have failed to make a clear stand and differentiate victimless crimes from crimes with victims, because they each have pet laws that they wish to keep intact, although they may be willing to make small compromises on rare occasions.
6. Majority Rule
Although we were taught through school, media and popular culture, that democracy is freedom, it is truly oppressive. As has been pointed out in the past “democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what’s for dinner” and “democracy is mob rule.” Put simply, democracy is the process by which 51% of the population violently imposes their will on the other 49% that want to do things differently. It is the process by which neighbors oppress one another using the middleman of government, and the principle stands the same even in countries that adopt a “direct democracy.”
There is no reason why people should be bound by the whims and preferences of their neighbors, or of politicians, so long as they are not hurting anyone and not interfering with another person’s property. This is another thing that a politician will never recognize or call attention to, because this system is where they derive their power and wealth, even if they don’t explicitly realize it. The power structure itself, and the underlying violence and coercion that it embodies is not recognized by politicians, and until it is, none of them are worth our time or attention.
John Vibes writes for True Activist and is an author, researcher and investigative journalist who takes a special interest in the counter-culture and the drug war.
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