Who's driving this train?

Some thirty five years ago, as a teenager, I became politically active for a time. Those were days of social conscience and the sort of hope that promised the dawn of a new age, for the lack of better words.
We gathered in various homes a few evenings a week and discussed the war in Vietnam and how to get George McGovern elected. I will say now my politics and my beliefs were largely formed by the people I fell in with, the music of the day and the fact that my big brother was fighting in the jungles of south east Asia. There were also a few girls I was so enamoured of, that I found myself under the spell of the democratic party in particular, just to be around them. I have no idea how others find their way to their ultimate political choices. My own choices would seem a bit shallow but in the interest of being perfectly honest here I cannot say I experienced any sort of epiphany that dictated my decisions. It seemed like common sense to follow a party that would end the war and put people to work.
I would thank those people now for showing me one road of many that, a lifetime later, I still travel, but now question the sincerity of. The party seemed in those days, to be the most genuinely concerned with the human condition. The war had been raging out of control with no end in sight. Then as now, there was no clear reason to be involved in such a conflict. Racial tensions were also high. The killings of JFK, and Dr. King still hung in the air so thick one could not escape the stench of loss. These were men that held the promise of bringing all people together under a sort of Utopian umbrella.
Perhaps because I was young, those ideas seemed to be viable. The theory of collective consciousness was somehow more than wishful thinking. If enough people believed we could change the world, then by god, we could. We felt on the verge of living in peace with one another and that humans would embrace the idea that we are all here to take care of each other and the earth.
Well, Mr. McGovern's campaign fell by a landslide to Richard Nixon in 1972. This, in my recall, had been the last straw in a movement that had begun to deteriorate a few years earlier. The idea that if one was against the war and concerned with the brotherhood of man, then one was no doubt involved in illegal drug use, free sex and branded a draft dodger. This applied to some but ripped the hearts out of the rest. The dream was over almost before it had begun. What remained was a huge portion of society that felt that their heroes had been taken, one by one and that our government was for sale to the highest bidder.
I had aligned myself with a party in belief that our government was fully capable of, and interested in the welfare of all Americans. I never really gave much thought to the two party system or why a free country needed two parties. It seemed to me then and now more than ever, let the best of the brightest run and let the best choice of the majority win. I will not go into the electoral process which seems to defeat the idea of every vote counting. If anyone can enlighten me further on this subject, please by all means do so.
Nearly forty years later, there is a palpable distrust of government. As much as one would like to believe our elected officials are working on our behalf, their actions for the most part would say otherwise. Government bows to the interests of big business in effort to win elections and implement their own agendas, gaining riches and power beyond all reason. I have no doubt there are a few in government that still believe they can make a difference. These folks are branded idealists and are kept around predominantly for amusement purposes.
Looking now at the antiquated two party system, I see no difference between them. It takes huge money to run and win an election. It takes inherent corruption and a winning smile to defeat your opponent.Big government means big government contracts to loyal friends. You buy me the election and I'll promise your kids the best education and that gleaming castle on the hill of your choice. As good Americans the rest of us are expected to accept a certain amount of indiscretion by our leaders for the good of the whole.
America has managed to impose itself as a dominant force throughout the world. Instead of providing an example of successful policy to developing countries, we dictate how it's going to be.
As of 2003 the US had 702 overseas bases in about 130 countries. We deploy some 253,000 uniformed men and women to inhabit these outposts. These installations bring massive wealth to civilian interests which design and build weapons for the armed forces. Companies such as Halliburton and it's subsidiaries have "won" the majority of contracts to maintain these installations. It comes as no surprise that our current vice president was once the chairman of this very company. This is a conservative estimate of our actual military presence across the globe. Numbers generated before we were in full swing in the middle east.
The general consensus seems to be, that we are targeted by terrorists as a result of our wealth and freedom. Our immoral ways of life. One would have to argue that the real reason must be due, in large, to our meddlesome policies in countries we have no business occupying. We have become the watch dog and police force in every corner of the world. As a result our economy is now largely based on military contracts.How is one to believe then, the rhetoric spouted on both sides in this election year, to be anything other than career politicians on a quest for the golden ring?
The republicans in the battle of their lives to distance themselves from the incumbent, yet follow party lines and appease the multinational corporate giants.
The democrats find themselves in a comfortable position due to the near dictatorship of George W. Bush and his regime who, have effectively turned Washington into a Superfund site that will take generations to clean up. The democrats however cannot seem to decide to run a civil contest and put aside their squabbles over race and gender. It seems apparent that one is in it to become the first woman president and the other to become the first black to inhabit the white house. The American public has already decided that neither of these issues are issues at all. Yet the top contenders have so far, not realized this concept.
The idea that "real change" is just around the corner is a joke at best. To inherit the office as it stands now is akin to bottling cooling water from Three Mile Island and selling it as spring water. The cast of hucksters hawking this cool drink of water is straight from the Twilite Zone.

Mr. Mike Huckabee wants to change the wording of the constitution to fall more in line with the bible. Did I miss something here? Why is this campaign regarded as anything but ludicrous. A faith based run should not be a part of American politics. Whatever happened to the separation of church and state?
Mitt Romney treats the race as some sort of olympic event after every primary having come out with "gold or silver". I would expect nothing less from a billionaire. What the hell kind of name is "Mitt" anyhow?

Mr. McCain is running on a purely military platform. However admirable his service record, including his six years as a guest at the Hanoi Hilton, it does not inherently qualify him to run this country. He seems to find no problem with comitting our military to Iraq for decades to come. Military contract anyone?
Nor does Mr. Giuliani's stint as mayor of New York qualify him for any higher office. He has been credited with "saving the city". If Ronald McDonald had been mayor at the time of the WTC attacks, he'd also have become America's hero. His record after the attacks is less than stellar, yet he was deified.
Mr. Ron Paul is the only candidate willing to take on the rebuilding of our government from the bottom up. The banks have taken our economy to the brink of destruction. People are losing their homes. Manufacturing is all but a memory in our country. I wonder how Mattell feels now about taking American jobs to China. The standard fix is to fire up the presses and print more dollars. Dollars worth only as much as the faith the public has in them. We no longer have any sort of standard to back them up. Only as long as people continue to believe this green paper is worth something, will the present economy keep it's decks above water.I am not naive enough to think Mr. Paul has a chance in this race. The country needs and deserves however, to have another opinion to examine, and questions raised that none of the front runners seem to want to address.
I do not claim to have the answers to the ills of government. I do know that it was designed as the government of the people and somewhere along the line that notion was lost. What i would hope is to find people outraged at such a loss, and accountability a priority.
I wonder to this day why the American public finds it so hard to understand who is actually driving the damned train. Again, it takes millions of dollars to buy your way into the white house. Promises are made in return for those campaign donations, long before the actual elections. Any candidate promising change is a liar. Whoever inhabits the office will get there on the backs of big business, not your vote. If a winning candidate does in fact effect change, you can sit back and wait for a scandal to drive him or her out of office, or an assassination , which generally sends the message.
We are in it for the long haul and on a track back to the stone age, unless a rude awakening occurs in the public at large. This is unlikely until there is not a drop of affordable fuel left to feed your hummer, or heat your house, if in fact, you still own a house. Need a clean glass of water? Better know where to find it or how to make it. As for myself I am glad I took the time to learn to build a shelter, fish, shoot and sail. I don't know when it's going to happen, but those who only know how to run a pencil and paper will starve first. Maybe none of this will come to pass. If it does, those I love will have a fighting chance.
A last thought...Wanna know who's got a good chance of taking the "gold" home in this election year? Call General Electric corporate HQ in Ct. Ask who's campaign sticker is on the side of Mr. Jeff Immelt's helocopter... The rants of a madman? Hmm...perhaps.