Unity 08-An Alternative to Two Party American Politics?

[cenacle]

http://www.unity08.com/

I heard about this new movement tonight on Air America Radio, and thought it would be good to share here. Not sure what I think of it yet...

[senorsalvia]

Hmmm now.   I'm with 'ya Cen, in that I don't exactly know what to make of that....  I will say that all in all, it seems like it could very well become a turning point that will be fondly looked back on as the time when AmeriKKKans finally demanded and began recieving a viable 3rd party option...........  Nice to dream--------- sal

[mconlonx]

Trying to fix a broken system with political insiders? Not my kind of party... It's nice to see a centrist, ostensibly sane party/voice emerge, but nothing that hasn't been done before and just as doomed to failure. Plus, I'm not quite sure how a bipartisan ticket would work, even if they are elected--we got problems with both parties, why does Unity 08 think that things will be different if two more from the same parties and political machines which put them where they are now are elected? Not for me, thanks...

[laughingwillow]

I'm with mcon.

But you can't blame the illusionists for trying.

Folks are finally realizing that the current two party system is really two faces of the same coin, so the old dogs need a new trick. Let's see, you have your heads and tails. What s left ?

(Meanwhile at the next secret kabal meeting) Hey, what if we trick them into believing the dem/repubcoin can land on its edge! That should buy us a few more years until enough time has passed to recycle an old trick or two.......

lw

[cenacle]

I don't believe that the two parties are indistinguishable. Had we not taken the Congress from Bush in 2006, it is much more likely that he already would have led an invasion into Iran. Instead, he huffs and puffs and does little. Similarly, Nixon's plan to conduct a limited nuclear strike on Vietnam was stopped by the anti-war marches in DC around the same time.

Are the Democrats weak and beholden to some of the same crippling money pimps as the Republicans? Of course.

But who belongs to the Democratic Party? Who drives its policy, pushes its ideals when they manifest? The middle-class, minority groups, women's groups, labor, and currently, peace activists.

I'm not a Democrat, haven't been one in many years, but it is obvious to  me by reading that there is in that party much more hope for the future than in the Republican party.

Two sides of the same coin? I don't think so in ways that can be distinguished by voting record, by speeches, by who peoples each party. There are differences. If there weren't, we'd be more fucked than we are, more hopeless.

LW, I for one am not hopeless. Yet I doubt I believe in politics much more than you do. I believe enough to involve myself when something like a major war is going on, but long to back away, far away. I can't right now. The evil fuckers are trying to wear us down, day by day. I for one will not concede to them what is not theirs. They push, I push back. They bite, I bite harder. They back away, I keep fucking pushing.

We can't give up. No choice. We won back the Congress, we'll win the presidency, and then we'll push whichever one wins to get this world back to some light.

I can't let myself think of any alternative because it involves bars and muzzles. Ya know?

[laughingwillow]

Btw ,I'm not sure that "we've" stopped anything. as far as iran is concerned. I don't see that hand as being played out just yet.

lw

[laughingwillow]

... and concerning the real or imagined differences between the current two party system....

One can realdparty platforms and be inspired, but actions speak louder than words, imo.

For instance, Bushco has a number of well documented past infractions which would warrant at least initial impeachment proceedures as far as I can tell.  

Where is the moral outrage at the lies we've been spoon-fed, the foul deeds uncovered and countless innocent lives lost in a war we started under false pretense?

Iat least expect our elected officials to uphold the Constitution of the U$. If the elected leaders of either party are unable to grasp or become outraged that our core rights and values have been under attack for the last number of years,  I'm not convinced that idealistic rhetoric  of any party platforms matters two whits.

lw

[mconlonx]

Actually, I *would* vote Unity 08 if the candidate for Pres and VP included any of the following from the mainstream parties:

Dennis Kucinich
Bill Richardson
Ron Paul

Heck, I'd vote Democrat if they run Kucinich or Richardson, and I would even vote (hack, spit) Republican if they had the balls to back up their supposed conservatism by running Ron Paul.

[cenacle]

I think the problem is that we want statesman and statewomen and what we mostly get are bureaucrats and functionaries. We rarely get visionaries. We rarely get people who see this country as part of the human world which is part of the whole wide world. So we rail and rail against them because we want them to be more, and they are not.

Mostly. Sometimes a man or woman rises up and speaks in a way that inspires and moves us. We look for him or her. Yearn. What we get is usually less.

I find Democrats tend to speak to people's ideals of kindness and generosity more often than Republicans, but then I think it's more the kind of people they attract to their party, and the greater likelihood of someone like that coming along.

Ron Paul...I like him to a degree, he won that debate easily. The Republicans are trying to keep him from the rest. Kucinich I like too, I hope he gets a Cabinet post in 2009 when the Dems take back the White House. If nothing else, a Dem as President means a man like Kucinich has a chance for something like that.

[mconlonx]

A visionary Statesperson would be nice, but the last time one of them was in any position to do anything, they crucified him over a non issue (Howard Dean). Watch for the same thing to happen with Paul...

Bush won, in part, on "America wants a leader!" So maybe a visionary statesman is not what we need right now--we got one already and look what a mess he made.

Part of my complaint with politics now is that the only people to reach the top who might be considered as a presidential candidate is a person who is playing by party rules... which isn't at all necessarily for the benefit of the country, let alone the world. I.e. we get only bureaucrats and functionaries because of the way the system works in each party.

[cenacle]

Howard Dean is now chairman of the Democratic National Committee. It was his "50 State Strategy" that engineered the Dems' taking back the Congress in 2006. So he found some sort of redemption for how the corporate media crushed his campaign.

Such a strategy, in which each state gets some money and manpower and attention in the election cycle, could prove a kind of model for a third party. If such were wanted by enough people to act.

Bush is no visionary. He is a petrocratic tool of powerful, shadowy men who intend to control the country and by extension the world forever. Maybe they could be called the visionaries. In an evil sort of way.

I think men and women can always use visionaries, but the kind who urge others to have visions and ideals too. Not so much, "follow me up the mountain" as "there is the mountain, let's all go!"