Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Practically On the Table

Practically On the Table by Ralph Nader

Mr. Nader ends a good article on how the Democrats are shafting us on 'health care reform' with this ...

Face it, America. You are a corporate-controlled country with the symbols of democracy in the constitution and statutes just that—symbols of what the founding fathers believed or hoped would be reality.

Even when the global corporate giants come to Washington dripping with crime, greed, speculation and cover-ups, and demand gigantic bailouts on the backs of taxpayers and their children, neither the Republicans nor the now majority Democrats are willing to face them down.

The best of America started with our forebears who faced down those who told them “it’s not going to happen,” or “it’s not practical” to abolish slavery, give women the right to vote, elevate the conditions of workers and farmers, provide social security and medicare, make the air and water less polluted and so on. These pioneers, with grit and persistence, told their members of Congress and Presidents—“It is going to happen.”

To paraphrase the words of a great man, the late Reverend William Sloan Coffin, it is as if those legendary stalwarts from our past, knowing how much more there is to achieve a practical, just society, are calling out to us, the people today, and saying “get it done, get it done!”


Lying, deceitful politicians, who promise to represent and serve the people just to get elected, but who then serve only the rich and powerful once in office ... these are not new to America. What seems to be new to America is the lazy acceptance that their corrupt world is all that we can be.

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