The Democrats Are Acting Like Democrats—What That Means for What the People Must Do

December 17, 2016 | Revolution Newspaper | revcom.us

 

Many people who are horrified by the Trump-Pence victory are questioning why the Democrats aren’t putting up a fight like the Republicans have and are doing. Leading up to election day, Trump declared that he would not accept the results of the election if he lost. He clearly meant what he threatened and was riling up his followers in anticipation of an all-out fight if Hillary Clinton had won. Contrast that with how, as one recent New York Times op-ed bemoaned, the top Democrats “have been almost absent on the national stage.”

Even after winning the election, Trump and Pence are leading the fascist charge, and Republicans at all levels are continuing with their rampage. They are dead-set on imposing their fascist rule and agenda. They are not going to be stopped by legal precedents and accepted “norms” in politics and other spheres of society but are quickly moving to set new fascist “norms.” Look at North Carolina, where the Republican governor, Pat McCrory, lost to a Democrat. Instead of telling people to give the incoming Democrat a “chance” (like Obama and the Democrats are doing with Trump), the Republicans refused to accept the result, claiming without evidence that there was widespread voter fraud. When this did not work, the Republicans in the state legislature pushed through bills to undercut the powers of the new governor, and McCrory has already signed one into law.

Any notion that the Democrats can be counted on to stop the Trump-Pence fascists is foolish and dangerous. There will be no savior from the White House coming to the rescue. Bernie Sanders is not going to be any help in real resistance. In fact, he’s talking about cooperating on “infrastructure investment for jobs” while opposing Trump “if” he attacks rights. This is like working with Hitler to promote jobs to make trains taking people to the death camps—but not to fund the gas chambers and ovens themselves.

The Democratic and Republican parties both represent the interests of the capitalist-imperialists who rule over the people—even as they have some sharp differences over how to best protect and push forward those interests. The Democrats will not call people out into the streets and lead a real fight to stop the Trump-Pence regime from taking power, because they fear mass rebellion, and even more so, actual revolution—much more than they oppose the fascist sections of their own class.

But this does NOT mean that the fascist onslaught is unstoppable. The huge numbers of people in all corners of society who are profoundly disturbed by the Trump-Pence victory and do not want this fascist poison are a real reservoir of resistance. The people must be organized into a force that can mount the kind of courageous, determined, massive resistance that is needed to STOP the Trump-Pence regime from taking power. We can and must rely on ourselves to do this.

       

 

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