The Oligarchy Has Picked Its Candidate!

by Stephen Fleischman

The wreckage caused by the Republicans and the Bush Administration is even too much for the corporate oligarchy to take. Although Republicans have usually been their favored party, they now want a Democrat in the White House and they want that Democrat to be Hillary Clinton.

The Hillary-Bill combo has worked for the oligarchy before and will work for it again. They’ve been tried, tested, and vetted to carry forward the oligarch agenda. Our two-party system pays close attention to the dressing of democracy; there always has to be a choice, a Tweedledee and a Tweedledum and always a way to vote for a lesser of two evils—which, unfortunately, becomes the evil of two lessers. Through the strategy of triangulation, the Clintons have achieved the strangulation of the democratic wing of the Democratic Party. Where are you, Dick Morris, now that the Clintons need you again?

The running dogs (the fourth estate) have gotten the message and you can hear the slow build of their howl. They can stage a mighty convincing horse race. But the election is already being fixed, as it was stolen in 2000 and 2004.

That’s capitalism, for you. Its nature is to show the appearance of democracy, masking the actuality of oligarchic control, while robbing the working class of the surplus value it creates. The Clintons have proven they can do the oligarchy’s dirty work when called upon to do it. They will get the prize money for services rendered.

So, let’s follow the money.

The Military Industrial Complex is a Member of the Oligarchy (MOTO). This year, the war industry, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop-Grumman, Raytheon and General Dynamics, to name a few, has shelled out more money to Democratic candidates than to Republicans, and Hillary has gotten the lion’s share of that. The manipulators of power always hedge their bets. They play both sided against the middle.

“Mrs. Clinton has also emerged as Wall Street’s favorite.” says Leonard Doyle, Washington correspondent for The Independent, “Investment bankers have opened their wallets in unprecedented numbers for the New York senator and, in the process, dumped their earlier favorite, Barack Obama.”

Big Pharma and the Health Insurance Industry (MOTO) has already socked it to ‘em. Even though you never heard the words, “single payer” even whispered, back in ’93 when the Clintons were faking a Universal Health Plan, the “industry” dropped Harry and Louise, characters in a TV commercial, on them that exposed their plan as a “Rube Goldberg” that would never work. Now that Hillary is running for president, she is tinkering with another Hillarycare plan. This time she is making sure the plan won’t offend the industry. So the industry has opened its “alms” to her.

According to the California Nurses Association and the National Nurses Organizing Committee, the healthcare industry (which includes drug and insurance companies) spent more that $2.2 billion on federal lobbying over the past decade. Senator Hillary Clinton (D) and Senator John McCain (R) collected 40% of the overall total.

The Oil and Gas Industry (MOTO) is a major player in the Oligarchy. Big Oil is not running on empty yet. There is still oil to be stolen around the world. But, there will be blood. Senator Hillary Clinton is the receiver of the largest largesse of Oil and Gas than any other Democrat in the presidential campaign: $151,950.00.

Iraq and Iran – a couple of delicate subjects. Hillary walks on eggs when she talks about them. Her stance must please the Oligarchy.

On October 10, 2002, she made her now famous, or infamous, speech on the Senate floor, and voted in favor of S.J. Res. 45, “A Resolution to Authorize the Use of United States Armed Forces Against Iraq” in support of Bush’s war. Even more despicable, in defending her position, she subtlety implies a connection between the attack on the World Trade Towers of 9/11 and Saddam Hussein in these words, “…from the perspective of a Senator from New York who has seen all too closely the consequences of last year’s terrible attacks on our nation…in balancing the risks of action versus inaction, I think New Yorkers who have gone through the fires of hell may be more attuned to the risk of not acting. I know I am.”

Hawk Hillary goes even further on Iran. Speaking at Princeton University on the occasion of the Wilson School’s 75th anniversary, last year, she must have pleased both the Oligarchy and the Israel Lobby with these words: “…a nuclear Iran is a danger to Israel, to its neighbors and beyond. The regime’s pro-terrorist, anti-American and anti-Israel rhetoric only underscores the urgency of the threat it poses…and we cannot take any option off the table” (emphasis mine).

The Kyl-Lieberman Amendment in the Senate, designating Iran’s National Guard as a terrorist organization, for which Hillary voted, rests on intelligence as shaky as the claims that led us into the Iraq war and plays right into the hands of the neo-con oligarchy thirsting for another war.

So, what’s the answer, campaign finance reform? We have a chicken-egg situation here. You can’t get the hawks out of the nest with other hawks bought and paid for by the oligarchy.

Where is Houdini now that we really need him?