Friends and frenemies,

Democrat and Republican voters are the same in one major way: We are all Americans.

This year, don’t vote Democrat. Don’t vote Republican. Don’t vote Indepenent, or third-party. Just don’t. Instead, imagine what it would be like to vote for yourself, for your family, and for America.

I was idly wondering earlier today, as I was scanning discovery documents into a network, what if Republican voters — I’m not talking about the crazy leaders, try not to think of them for one moment — I’m just talking about your Uncle Ned & Aunt Martha who lost their little grocery store when Wal*Mart moved into the next town. I’m talking about the guy who runs the corner bar, the military wife, the old guy from accounting — those conservatives. People who are tired because they are working longer hours for less pay, because they have to cobble together a living by working two or more jobs just to make ends meet. Those kinds of Republicans. The ones whose kids come out of school, $40,000 or $50,000 in debt with high interest rates, and few career prospects. The Republican family next door to your mom’s, whose two sons are deployed in Afghanistan right now, and whose daughter is in the hospital with leukemia. The Republican elderly widow who was the receptionist where you worked before retiring a few years ago, couldn’t keep up with her condo payments, terrified at the prospect of having to reenter the workforce in order to survive.

Those are the Republican voters I’m talking about. All we see are the racists, the homophobes, the Randians, the tea-partiers, the Morans who should get brains, climate-deniers, birthers and the like. And I wonder what they see when they think of Democrats, or liberals. Maybe they see hippies marching in the streets, pounding drums and smoking pot, having crack orgies and inviting terrorists into our homes, freeloading commies … and I wonder do we look as ridiculous to them as they do to us? Probably.

And then I ask myself …

COULD IT BE BY DESIGN?

Ya think?

There is no difference between Democrats and Republicans when it comes to wanting to feed our families, educate our children, get the health care we need, live in dignity and not live a life in fear of losing our jobs, our homes, our teeth, and most of all, we fear losing the most that which we have already lost in so many ways, our freedom. But I digress.

The duopoly is just another wedge to divide Americans because: if half of us hate the other half, then we will never be able to come together to form a just society. There is a reason why our government, on both sides of the divide, is corrupt at the highest levels imaginable. One of the main reasons is because we keep falling for their shit. Over and over again. They have scared of going outside, or to another country (as if we could afford it), they have of scared for our health, safety, jobs — the powers that be, call them corporations, oligarchs, the one percent — they want things this way.

If you have not listened to Senator Elizabeth Warren’s speech she delivered on the senate floor on the 6th anniversary of the Citizens United decision, I strongly urge you to do so now:

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In her speech, gave clear examples of the corrupting influence of corporate cash has on our government, and listed numerous things that can be done, right now as in today, this week, not in a year or two but right now, to start to turn that around.

I have to say, her speech sounded extremely familiar, as I imagined it did to everyone who has heard Senator Sanders speak on this subject. It is amazing that these two United States senators, neither of whom started their political careers in the Democratic party, happen to also be the two most progressive senators? Both have warned us, repeatedly, that our democracy is in danger of becoming, indeed, in so many ways it already has become, an oligarchy. But pundits, policymakers, wonks, supporters and all kinds of people falling over themselves to talk around, excuse, explain, justify, rationalize it and the American people are finally figuring out that the system is rigged.

We’ve been happy to settle for politicians who promise great changes, as soon as they can get the details worked out anyway. They’ll get their wonks to hammer out a path up the staircase, to take steps to work toward making the changes that we will make, just as soon as we have the funding, which as you know, in a fluid market blah blah blah … we’re done listening to you pontificate on all the minutia of WHY WE CAN’T. We want to know HOW WE CAN. And we want it now.

Senator Warren closed her speech with the following admonition:

“A new presidential election is upon us. The first votes will be cast in Iowa in just 11 days. Anyone who shrugs and claims it is too hard has crawled into bed with the billionaires who want to run this country like some private club. All of us were sent here to do our best to make government work, not just for those at the top, but to make government work for all the people. It’s time we start acting like it.”

She basically told the government, right to its face, you’re all operating in a corrupt system bought and paid for by the oligarchs, enough is enough and her righteous delivery was met with polite applause.

Does anyone here on DailyKos, honestly have a problem with Senator Warren’s closing remarks? She was not just speaking to polite society and government, she was also speaking to us, for whom the government was meant to function. She is telling us, especially Democrats, that we need to make the government work for all the people.

Why should we continue to allow OUR government to beat us down like this and drink our milkshakes too? How much will the comfortable among you allow others to suffer before you say: Enough is enough?

The United States government is meant to work for the people, not the billionaires, especially not just the fucking billionaires. Because folks, the people running the show now, don’t give a flying fuck about the people. The corporations don’t care about you. The trillionaires behind the corporations only care about what you can produce and consume and how they can profit from your existence. Otherwise, they do not care about you, they only care about what the billionaires bring in for them.

The billionaires earn for the big guys at the Wall Street Casino and the military industrial complex, and the health insurance industry. They profit from endless wars, but they don’t care that your son or uncle or nephew is fighting for what they believe is “freedom” but really, it’s for the corporate good. Many of those young women and men in our beautiful infantry come back whole and alive. But many don’t. But those who profit from war and all of its satellite industries and corporate tie-ins, they don’t give a shit if your son only has half a leg left.

They profit from our illness and misery while at the same time poisoning us with their corporate slop, and making us drink water poisoned with lead. Greed is not good.

They have underlings too, those billionaires, and they know how to richly reward those under them. The Wall Street and insurance industry CEO’s, the multi-multi-millionaires who run the skim, they make money off making money, rip a bunch of people off and rake in more money.

The CEO’s, in turn, lavish millions upon America’s public servant class, both Republican and Democrat, at all levels of government. Those bought and paid for millionaire politicians insure that that money never stops flowing up to the top.

Democrats versus Republicans on the minimum wage: The People: $15 an hour! The Democrats: Let’s start with $12. The Republicans: I vow to abolish the minimum wage! Suddenly, $12 sounds pretty good, right, the Democrat looks pretty darn reasonable, a champion of the people even.

Do you see how that was set up? The system is rigged.

51% of all Americans make less than $30,000.00 a year. Let that sink in for a minute. I’ll bet most of us on DailyKos, not all of us, but I’d wager that most of us make at least that, if not more. I do, I’ll admit I make more than half of America. I have no savings, no 401(k), I’m a contract worker so if I have a sick day, I don’t get paid, and I’m supporting two kids, and after the fire, the cheapest place I could find is over $1700 a month including sewer/water/trash, but not electric, or phone, or internet. But I have an apartment, for now.

Most of us pay more taxes than Verizon and many other mega-corporations. You know why? Because they don’t pay taxes. They get millions in rebates instead. You know that money was entrusted TO the American people, BY the American people, before it was diverted to become tax rebates to the corporations that are soaking us and keeping us on a never-ending cycle of debt service.

People worry that a socialist will raise our taxes. But do they consider that the taxes they pay now are financing who knows how many armed conflicts across the globe? And have you noticed that these endless wars are a huge money suck? Billions in cash missing from Iraq. Why was a billion dollars in cash shipped to Iraq? To pay the soldiers? What would they spend it on? Meals at the corporate Burger King on base? Buying their own Kevlar ‘cause Rummy said you go to war with the army you got, not the one you want?

Is that how we are going into this election, we are going to be content to keep the corrupt, oligarchy-serving government we’ve got, rather than electing the government we want?

Are you going to just shrug and tell me and all Americans that it’s just too hard to make such enormous changes at the last minute? That we have to get all of our ducks in a row before we can have heath care for everybody? That it’s just too difficult to insure that everyone has a fair shot at higher education and a decent life not weighed down by debt and fear of losing what little we have left?

Do you know why the powers that be want us to think change is too hard? Because they don’t want change. Maybe you are a pragmatist, and you think America is not ready for socialism. What if I told you that America is already socialist. That’s right, we practice what’s called Corporate Socialism, where profits are privatized and losses are socialized. See, e.g., the 2008 financial crisis.

The taxpayers bailed out Wall Street to the tune of trillions of dollars, they all got big fat bonus checks, we got shafted, and four of those too big to fail banks are 80% bigger.

Friends, there is a reason why the revolution scares the oligarchy, and why it scares so many of us. Because we are living in extremely fucking scary times right now. And we, as a nation, have a choice. The political revolution is upon, whether you choose to accept it or not. This is a movement, not just an election. I think a great many of us are going to be in for quite a paradigm shift in the coming days and weeks. Viva la revolucion!

Let me close with a Robert Reich quote:

“I’ve known Hillary Clinton since she was 19 years old, and have nothing but respect for her. In my view, she’s the most qualified candidate for president of the political system we now have,” Reich said. “But Bernie Sanders is the most qualified candidate to create the political system we should have, because he’s leading a political movement for change.”

Don’t vote for a Democrat this year, vote for yourself, vote for us, our children, and their children’s futures. Vote for America.

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You know all those hundreds of thousands of people who’ve been to Sanders rallies? They’ve all come not to see a Democrat, but they’ve come to look for America.

Peace.