Why I am a Democrat

[woo me with science]

5. Unfortunately, most of that advocacy is in the past.

The agenda of the party has changed as corporate money has become a driving force in the selection of candidates. As a result, the agenda we are seeing today looks more like this:

signing NDAA to allow indefinite detention,
"Kill lists" and claiming of the right to assassinate even American citizens without trial
Abuse of the Espionage Act to target whistleblowers and journalists
Opening of new loopholes to shift costs from health insurance companies to patients
Appointment of crony corporatists and Republicans to important positions throughout the administration
Severe lack of transparency, to the point of refusing to disclose which countries we're at war with, hiding massive trade agreements in progress, refusing to respond to FOIA requests, defense of secret laws, secret courts, etc., etc...
Secret trade memos calling for more offshore drilling and fracking
Bailouts and settlements for corrupt banks (with personal pressure from Obama to attorneys general to approve them),
Refusal by Obama's DOJ to criminally prosecute even huge, egregious examples of bank fraud (i.e, HSBC)
EPA assault on renewable fuels
Advocacy of multiple new trade agreements, including The Trans-Pacific, otherwise known as "NAFTA on steroids," that have been repeatedly described as more about corporate control than trade.
Mass surveillance and storage of American's telephone, internet, phone, and email activities.
Support of legal immunity for telecoms/warrantless wiretapping
Militarized police departments, through federal grants
Collusion with Republicans to weaken the surveillance bill and proactive efforts to extend mass surveillance
Plans to boost US military presence in Europe
Massive expansion of US military presence in Africa
Plan to arm Syrian rebels
Plan to reenter Iraq
A renewed public advocacy for the concept of preemptive war
Drone campaigns in multiple countries with whom we are not at war
Proliferation of military drones in our skies
Federal targeting of Occupy for surveillance and militarized response to peaceful protesters
Fighting all the way to the Supreme Court for warrantless surveillance
Fighting all the way to the Supreme Court for strip searches for any arrestee
The murder of net neutrality and handing over of the internet to corporate control
Supporting and signing Internet-censoring and privacy-violating measures like ACTA
Support for corporate groping of Americans seeking to travel
Marijuana users and medical marijuana clinics under assault,
Skyrocketing of the budget for prisons.
Corporate education policy including high stakes corporate testing and closures of public schools
Adoption of corporate rating systems for colleges, "like rating a blender"
Entrenchment of exorbitant for-profit health insurance companies into healthcare, through mandate
Legal assault on union rights of hundreds of thousands of federal workers
New policies of targeting children and first responders in drone campaigns,
New policies of awarding medals for remote drone attacks,
Appointment of private prison executive to head the US Marshal's office
Massive escalation of federal contracts for private prisons under US Marshal's Office
Support for opening interstates to tolling
Support of drilling, pipelines, and selling off portions of the Gulf of Mexico

Most of the policies you describe above are what drew most of us to the Democratic Party in the first place. Corporate money, however, has changed the direction of the party and the direction of the nation. You can't overestimate the importance of the Democratic Party in the past of protecting America from corporate avarice and the dismantling of our democratic system. The Democratic Party historically has been *the* party to stand between Americans and the predatory, antidemocratic policies that corporatists have long wanted to implement.

It is no accident that America is spiraling today, because corporate Democrats have largely abandoned that critical role. Our middle class has been devastated, corporatists have been installed in every branch of government and the rules rewritten to strengthen their power, and our Constitution itself is under assault.

We. Are. In. Peril. The corporate infiltrators in our government are systematically removing every avenue we have left to defend ourselves against what is being done to this country. They have purchased our broadcast and print media. They are now handing control of the internet to corporations, too. They have implemented mass surveillance to collect and store the activities of every citizen. They are waging war on whistleblowers and selectively criminalizing investigative journalism. They have militarized our police forces and have coordinated federally and with corporate America to surveil and respond brutally to peaceful protesters. And they have created a system of secret laws and secret courts within which any person claimed to be suspected of terrorism (the definition of which has been dangerously expanded to include political protest and normal dissent) can be indefinitely detained or even murdered without due process or transparency.

We are in serious, serious trouble in this nation. The other major party was corrupted long ago, but the corruption of our own has been the watershed allowing corporate profiteers the opening they needed to subvert our government for their own profit and power at the expense of millions of human beings.

We don't need loyalty oaths to a party based on lists of accomplishments from years ago. The reminders are good, but we need to use them not to invite blind loyalty, but to demand a fierce correction of our party's direction and purpose. We need to get the corporate cancer out, and return the party to its mission of representing the people.