Halloween Ain't Nothing Compared to November

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde revised by the US political duopoly.

HEY! Halloween is here, but the scariness will arrive in early November when the zombies show up at the polls to vote!

It reminds me of Robert Louis Stevenson’s The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.  You are reduced to a two-party system that operates as one entity.  No matter how you look at it and what team you support, it all operates as the same party.

There are so many examples through history of how the two-party system achieves their goal.  George Herbert Walker Bush tried to pass NAFTA, but it took the folksy Bill Clinton to really make it happen.  Roe v. Wade is a current example.  For fifty years the Democrats could have codified it into law.  Barack Obama ran on this being his number one policy, but once he was elected it was no longer that important.  The Biden administration allowed it to be overturned.  Most people blame the US Supreme Court, but where were the Democrats for fifty years?  It comes down to the fact that the Republicans and Democrats achieved their goal.  Look at the Palestinian genocide: Democrats and Republicans support it.  For people who thought that either party stood on any principles, it’s just like how the moral Dr. Jekyll became the sinister Mr. Hyde.

All ended in tragedy, just as it happened and continues happening with the two-party duopoly.  The candidates on both sides continue to show the voters how corrupt and treacherous they have become in representing the wealthy elites and corporations over the interests of the people.

Nothing scares Democrats more than third parties and why would this be in a land that prides itself on democracy and freedom.  Hell, we bomb countries to bring them these very principles.  Third parties are often referred to as spoilers and blamed for overturning elections to undesirable candidates.

On his way out the door President Washington warned against the rise of political parties, which “become potent engines by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will enable to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government.”

Third parties tend to rise through disenchanted politicians.  Let’s look over the last 100 years, from 1924 to now, which is twenty-five presidential elections.  I should mention that 1912 was a big year for third parties.  Theodore Roosevelt and the Progressive Party received 27% of the popular vote and 17% of the electoral vote and he took a bullet too on the campaign trail.  Eugene Debs and the Socialist Party received 6% of the popular vote, but no electoral votes.

It was Robert La Follette in 1924 running under the Progressive Party that scored 17% and scored 3% of the electoral vote.  Through his career he was against corporate control, political corruption, supported funding schools, and protection of the workers and farmers.  Too bad he died the next year in the senate because La Follette would have fit into the third-party movements of today with his policies.

It would be another 20 years for the next upheaval in 1948 with Strom Thurmond pulling in 2.5% of the popular vote and 7% of the electoral vote.  Following in his footsteps in 1968 was George Wallace.  Wallace claimed 14% of the popular vote and close to 9% of the electoral vote.

John Anderson gave a run in 1980, but it was Ross Perot that started the game plans for the mind meld of the DNC and the RNC.  George Carlin astutely pointed out that, “The things that matter in this country have been reduced in choice, there are two political parties [….] but if you want a bagel there are 23 flavors.  Because you have the illusion of choice!”

The homespun billionaire, Ross Perot, was the last time a third party was allowed into the presidential debates of 1992.  Perot ran on immigration and drug control, he was a moderate on gay rights and abortion and fiscal responsibility with a common-sense approach, which was the populist view of the time.  More than 30 years later all his policies are still the concern, and still blathered on about by the current two parties.  In 1992 he received 19% of the popular vote and a dismal 8.5% in 1996.

And then the rise of the Green and Libertarian parties came.  Ralph Nader ran because Democrats and Republicans weren’t listening to the people.  Nader saw that the two parties were both under control of corporations and the wealthy elites.  He ran on affordable housing, campaign finance reform, universal health care, free education, a living wage, marijuana legalization, the environment, criminal justice, and higher taxes for corporations.  Basically, all the same issues that the third parties have run on for the last 25 to 100 years.

Thousands came to Nader’s rallies in the same numbers that Bernie Sanders drew years later as Democrat.  All this was acceptable until Nader became a threat to Al Gore’s candidacy.  Nader wasn’t responsible for the bad platforms of the Republicans and the Democrats, and he hoped that the two parties would learn a lesson from his platform.

Nader in the end (through help of the corporate media with the DNC) was blamed for the win of George W. Bush, even though Gore conceded rather than call for a recount in Florida.  The two-party system—let’s call it the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde of US political parties—saw that Nader had realized their true identity, and while many supported the idea of third parties, US voters were still too scared to go against the Mr. Hyde of a duopoly.

The duopoly had to come up with some diabolical scheme to crush third parties in the future without seeming to eliminate democracy.  You can still vote third party, but restrictions appeared on state ballots by increasing the number of registered voters’ signatures needed, and the League of Women Voters being replaced with the Commission of Presidential Debates.  Massive hurdles were set up to limit access to third parties.

George Washington was right, because by the attack of 9/11 the merger of the Democratic and Republican parties was completed.  Anyone that has seen TV wrestling realizes how the two-party system plays off each other to stir the country into attacking Afghanistan and Iraq over 9/11.

Now the zombies have taken over with their rhetoric of “Vote Blue, No Matter Who” or “MAGA”, which really centers on the Military Industrial Complex.  In the 1960s, Stanley Milgram proved that eighty percent of people will go along with whatever is suggested to them.  Nothing has anything to do with representing “We, the People” anymore.  Most people know more about corporate-owned sports and entertainment than they know about the policies of the politicians that they vote for.

Everyone who thinks critically can see how the Trump lawsuits were pushed by the DNC and RNC.  If the US government cared or wasn’t seeing Trump as a threat, they would have tossed Dick Cheney in prison years ago, but now he’s the darling of the Democratic Party.

The difference between Trump and his last run can be attributed to Steve Bannon, who guided Trump and kept him on track.  The difference this time around is Trump is all over the place with his rhetoric.  The Hyde potion for the DNC and RNC is to keep a three-percent spread between the candidates to allow Kamala to win.  A narrower gap would be ideal because there will be no recall or recounts.  Trump burned his bridges with Washington, DC, and learned a valuable lesson over the last four years.  There is no way this time Trump would call for recount or claim the election was stolen.

Our two-party duopoly has become what Dr. Jekyll became when Mr. Hyde’s persona became dominant.  The policies between Trump or Kamala aren’t different both would continue US imperialism, collapsing the economy, encouraging the rise of BRICS, and allowing border crossings in the hope of driving down wages.  Basically all the evils that third parties have been against.

In the old horror movies the villagers would rally together with torches and pitchforks to end the monster’s reign.  It seems the US voter is just too afraid or has their head buried in their electronic machines to do any such thing.  They could easily break the grasp of Mr. Hyde by running away from the Democrats and Republicans and vote third party.  Instead, they hope that Dr. Jekyll may be able to restore his decency as though there is a magic potion.