The Two Candidates Corporations Don't Own.
I have read recently on the internet that one billionaire or another said recently that he doesn't care who the American people elect as president (or any other office, my words), as long as he gets to pick the nominees. That makes a great deal of sense if you are one of them. If you bankroll ALL of the nominees, it means you own ALL of them. That is the main reason for the emergence of Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump. Neither of them takes corporate donations. One of them only takes small donations from everyday citizens, no corporate donations or superpac donations. And the other has his own money to spend to be elected. He doesn't need donations.
Mr. Sanders has a long documented history as an activist and a populist. He has taken on all comers throughout his long and illustrious career. From civil rights to the environment to corporate welfare to non-interventionism. And he has never shied away from the big issues. He has fought the tough fights. Many are labeling him a "socialist" in an attempt to muddy him. At one time in American politics, that would have been enough to end his run for the presidency. But in these days and times, when the economy is doing well for only the select few on the backs of the many, the term capitalist seems to have more negative connotations than does socialist. Mr Sanders has described himself as a "democratic socialist", which simply means he wants government to be responsive to the needs of it's people and to hold business interests accountable for it's policies. Government should control business, not the other way around.
Mr. Trump is a capitalist. When capitalism has fewer and fewer people getting richer and richer, it doesn't have such a positive image as it once did. When capitalism was restrained and everyone had a decent paying job, everything worked much better. But now, the rich are getting richer, corporations control our government and our foreign policy. Our children and our grandchildren are being sent to fight unnecessary wars all around the world for the sake of corporate profits and when they come back home wounded, there is no health care available to them. And to add insult to injury, our wages are 30 years behind the cost of living. Capitalism is no longer attractive as it was in the years before the Reagan administration. Since I was a child, I have hears the virtues of capitalism extolled from the highest mountains, and I believed it when I was young and not really paying attention to life. But time has aw ay of making you open your eyes and really see what life is all about. That is when you learn the difference between capitalism and unrestrained capitalism. Capitalism without any restraints benefits only the few, but capitalism with the proper restraints can be beneficial to the entire nation as a whole.
Donald Trump sounds like a populist in tone, but the fact of the matter is that as a very rich man, he has clothing factories overseas and even at his businesses in this country he has immigrants bussed and flown in from other countries to take jobs away from Americans so that he won't have to pay fair wages to the people who work for him. His populist appeal is due to two facts. One is that since he is fabulously wealthy, he is beholden to no one. He doesn't have to toe the line like most politicians do. He can say and do as he likes. His other appeal is his racist dogwhistle politics. He appeals to the tea partiers and other racist groups who hate everything that is not white. Those and business (whether you believe it or not) are his base of support. Do you actually believe that a smart businessman will go against business interests just to help the working people in this country. He can make much more money by hiring people in third world countries. The difference between Sanders and Trump is that Sanders is truly a man of the people and will actually fight for us. Trump will fight for business. That is his only loyalty. Republicans will be fooled again. How simple is that?!
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