Quote of the Day

From William Grieder in The Nation:

The Republicans are a wholly owned subsidiary of the business-finance machine; the Democrats are rented.

Does this mean that electoral politics doesn’t matter? No. It only means that we have to be more creative in how we approach it, while also being more aggressive outside the electoral arena. On this point, here is more from Greider:

What we need is a rump formation of dissenters who will break free of the Democratic Party’s confines and set a new agenda that will build the good society rather than feed bloated wealth, disloyal corporations and absurd foreign wars. This is the politics the country needs: purposeful insurrection inside and outside party bounds, and a willingness to disrupt the regular order.

Historically, it is what made labor unions effective, along with so many other social and economic movements. The willingness to break with the system to generate change within the system created a moral urgency, a momentum that pushed the system to reform itself. The outsiders’ efforts create space in which reformist insiders can work.

Author: hankkalet

Hank Kalet is a poet and freelance journalist. He is the economic needs reporter for NJ Spotlight, teaches journalism at Rutgers University and writing at Middlesex County College and Brookdale Community College. He writes a semi-monthly column for the Progressive Populist. He is a lifelong fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks, drinks too much coffee and attends as many Bruce Springsteen concerts as his meager finances will allow. He lives in South Brunswick with his wife Annie. View all posts by hankkalet