By Charles Andrews
Yes, former president Barack Obama wrote me. I guess anyone who ever registered Democrat gets the letter.[1]
Here is the first page:
____
The back page just continues with several re-wordings of, “Please give Joe Biden and the Democratic National Committee some money.”
I’m used to candidates sending me mail. The letters offer some reform in answer to a problem of the day. The reform measure might be vague; it might be hedged with counter-phrases in order to appeal to everyone; but the candidate says he will do something. Or try to do it. Or add his vote to doing it.
Obama says nothing specific in this letter on behalf of Biden. He mentions no programs, no reforms, no democratic procedures. The argument is just abstract words. They sit on your desk like gray balls of putty.
There is one exception, one definite pledge. Obama tells you that Biden will put together a group of “experts, scientists, and military officials” to run the government.
That is a list guaranteed to put off eighty percent of the population. It reeks of elitism. It implies disdain for real representation of the people. This letter that the DNC sent to millions is a symptom of the further disintegration of bourgeois democracy.
No wonder people look around at populism, at socialism, at communism.
[1] A friend who swears he has never registered Democrat got the same letter. Barack must be good at running a copy machine.
—————-
Charles Andrews is the author of The Hollow Colossus.
