As the Cookie Crumbles: Anecdote Is Not Data; Person Is Not Party!

A correspondent on Fbook hung up this poster on the Wall and took me to task me for continuing to insist that the differences between Dims and GOPhux are insignificant, him citing the mere presence of this appalling assortment of shitwhistles, drooling fools, fucknozzles and ass-wholes as evidence. Surely, there aren't any such ignoramae among the Dims, right?

I replied: You make the same mistake, over and over, Bubba!

There are indeed individual differences between members of the two parties. Nobody disputes that. Mutt Rmoney is NOT St. Barry...There is no equivalent to Michelle Bachmann on the other side of the aisle.

But that's a specious argument, disingenuous, at best.  The claim that they're the essentially the SAME doesn't rest on individual psychopathies.

Where the similarities reside, and where it is impossible NOT to observe them, is in the area of the respective agendas of the PARTIES!
ITEM:

• Both are pro-war and support global, military adventurism; both support the continued slaughter of innocents in Central Asia in the name of "counter-insurgency" and rumored stores of natural resources;
• Both are advocates of increased electronic surveillance of citizens' private communications, and of the Internet generally;
• Both support the TPP and "Free Trade," in general, which undermines national AND local sovereignty in "trade," labor, and environmental matters;
• Both support the NDAA's provisions for 'preventative' detention and extra-judicial assassination;
• Both support for-profit health "Insurance" rather than single-payer, universal health care;
• Both support increased privatization of the public sphere, especially the privatization/charter-ization of public schools, and the corporatization of what's left of the Commons;
• Both support expanded nuclear and hydro-carbon exploration and exploitation; both dismiss the threats of the climate change crisis; both have blocked meaningful remediative legislation, and both have opposed proposals to expand subsidies to alternative energy sources..
• Both advocate for and welcome larger roles in Government for CorpoRats in domestic affairs and are willing participants in the CorpoRatization of the People's institutions, such as the Presidency, the Congress, and the Courts;
• Both attack "entitlements" for the weakest members of society yet support 'em for the wealthy.

There's more. I could go on, but you get the point, don't you?.

It would be untrue and indeed specious to claim there were no "differences" between the INDIVIDUAL candidates.

But it is equally specious to claim there are NOT significant and highly suggestive similarities, even identities,  between the PARTIES on such vital, global issues, which bear on our very survival.

If you have further differences, we can take them up when I see you out in the line-up, chers!

Paz!

OH, and if you're looking forward to the weekend, thank a Union member...