Comedian Lewis Black said it: Both parties are “bowls of sh*t.”

On one side we have politicians like billionaire Donald Trump who unabashedly advocates bigotry: “Mexicans are rapists,” he says. Hatred, which has been the rocket fuel of conservatives since before the Civil War, carries him to the front line of Republican Presidential wannabes despite the fact that he is a bully, a boor and a racist, and has never held a government office in his life.

Not to be outdone in their quest to lead Republicans, Trump’s rivals come up with their own publicity stunts. Desperate for attention, Ted Cruz calls the Supreme Court ruling on gay marriage “the very definition of tyranny.” Huckabee says that Democrats who support the Iran deal are “marching Jews to the oven doors,” and that he’d send in federal troops to stop abortions, and Scott Walker says he will attack Iran on inauguration day. Jeb Bush “disagrees” with Walker – saying he would attack Iran on the second day of his presidency. Ben Carson would bring back torture.

But none of their antics or tantrums seem to be as effective as Trump’s hate-speak, because hate-speak “sells” even better than lurid rage. “He has the integrity to say what he thinks,” claim his supporters.
He is the breath of fowl air the far right has been cultivating for years.

This is the Republican Party.
It is a party of blowhards, boors and liars who preach hatred or anger (sometimes literally from the pulpit) in order to distract from their true purpose – disenfranchising the American people. The Koch Brothers alone are spending a billion dollars to do so. They want to buy everything with their billions, including all our politicians and the Supreme Court.

Then there are the Democrats.
Trash talk is the single greatest difference between Democrats and Republicans. It would be unimaginable for Hillary or Bernie to say something like “Mexicans are rapists,” or that doctors who perform abortions should be put on trial for murder. Democrats do not tend to use hate-speak to appeal to angry, ignorant mobs (who are disenfranchised but do not know why, but suspect that it has something to do with black people and immigrants who are inferior to them.)

Yet comedian Lewis Black says that BOTH parties are “bowls of sh*t.”

Why?
Because Democrats feed from the same trough from which the Republicans feed. Hillary Clinton’s $47 million treasure chest was filled by a handful of billionaires. So was Jeb Bush’s $114 million.

It means that the billionaires win no matter who gets elected. Like Bush, Hillary has been purchased by a handful of billionaires. Former President Jimmy Carter said it best: “Now it’s just an oligarchy, with unlimited political bribery being the essence of getting the nominations for president or to elect the president.” He could have added “or any senator or representative or the dog catcher” for that matter.

The thing is, that most Americans wonder if we have any alternative. “We are still the greatest country in the world,” the “pundits” say. Anyway how do you fight the Supreme Court? If the Supreme Court says corporations are people and that money is speech, that’s what it is. They could declare that a jockstrap is a hat, and their proclamation would make it true. And nothing short of hanging them can change anything.

Corruption may be the status quo, but the status quo for most of us is better than chaos. Most Americans are not yet ready for blood. Most of us still live comfortably despite the fact that the system is crumbling.

Then there is Bernie.
Bernie Sanders refuses to feed from the billionaires’’ trough. He says that there are two primary sources of power: organized money and organized people. He is trying to organize people into a grass-roots movement… into an American Spring that would put an end to oligarchy. About a week ago, more than 100,000 supporters gathered in 3,520 private homes all over America to hear his ideas.

Many Americans are intrigued. However, most Americans fear the power of the billionaires. They are not convinced that organized people can defeat oligarchy.

Bernie trails Clinton in the polls nationally. But his favorability rating is higher than his unfavorable rating. He draws huge crowds, like a rock star, when he speaks. Even the major media – owned and operated by the same billionaires who own the politicians – have been forced to admit that he might prevail in New Hampshire and Iowa. Of course, they claim it will make no difference… that a Sanders victory is unthinkable and impossible. That there is no way America will support an old, Jewish, self-described socialist.

They say that there is no way to change things.
That bowl-of-sh*t politics is the American way, and that Bernie’s idea is pie in the sky.