Dismal thought for the day

This seems so apt, I'll just reproduce it.

Democracy generally doesn't apply to warmaking. Until the last weeks of the 2008 campaign, it was dominated by the differences in approach to war and foreign policy between Barack Obama and George W. Bush and many of my friends told me that the main reason the preferred Obama over all the other candidates was his bold stand in that arena.

That was election talk. It's been that way my whole life. Obama and his people figured out early on that they share power with the Military Industrial Complex and they had little desire to use political capital to exercise what they have. What they didn't figure out is that (since 1968, anyway) Democratic presidents get screwed regardless. The MIC knows it has the place locked up --- at this point it's about the spoils, and they get slightly fewer goodies and more petty political hassles under Democrats. (Plus there's the macho Jesus factor.)

I don't know what to do about it. I guess you have to hope that Democrats who run like Obama ran in 08 will want to at least make some changes around the margins that will hold over time. But that's about the best you can hope for as long as America is the world's dominant imperialist power. Until that changes --- and it will, because it's unaffordable --- we shouldn't delude ourselves into thinking we are voting for people who will do these things differently, regardless of what they say on the stump.

Digby

Go read the whole thing.