DownWithTyranny!: Why I'm Thinking About Nick Ruiz In Thailand... On July 4th

I woke up in Bangkok this morning trying to make heads or tails out of the fact that millions and millions of impoverished Thai farmers had voted for a corrupt billionaire's fascist-oriented fake-populist party. Ousted Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra wasn't on the ballot; he was fined 46 billion baht ($1.1 billion) and is living abroad to avoid a jail sentence. His pre-packaged, well-scripted sister was elected prime minister on a long list of fantasy populist promises that include:

* Guarantee a uniform daily minimum wage of 300 baht ($10) throughout the country; this would rise to 1,000 baht by 2020.

* Raise salaries of civil servants and state workers

* Universal medical care; patients pay 30 baht ($0.97) per visit

* Credit cards for farmers to buy fertilizer and other things needed for production; rice intervention scheme with a guaranteed 15,000-20,000 baht per tonne for unmilled rice

* Three-year household debt moratorium for those with up to 500,000 baht in debt, focusing on teachers, farmers and civil servants; debt restructuring for those with more than 500,000 baht.

* Starting monthly salary of 15,000 baht ($500) for new university graduates, up from the current 10,640 baht

* Free tablet computers for about 800,000 new school children each year. Puea Thai says these would cost 5,000 baht ($160) each and operate with open-source software.

* Corporate tax cut from 30 percent to 23 percent in first year, 20 percent in second year

* Tax cuts for buyers of first homes and first cars

* A flat 20 baht fare for all 10 mass-transit rail lines in Bangkok

* High-speed rail lines linking key cities in the north, northeast, east and upper south regions; trains to link with outskirts of Bangkok and eastern tourism, industrial hubs

* Annual rural village development funds of between 300,000 and two million baht for each of Thailand's 73,000 villages

* Monthly welfare allowance of 600 baht for elderly citizens over 60, rising to 700 baht at 70, 800 baht at 80, and 1,000 baht at 90

* Free Wi-Fi and Internet connections in public places.

Their conservative opposition, the Democratic Party, offered many of the same kinds of promises, which the country can't even come close to being able to afford. Thais were being asked to pick between two packs of irresponsible liars. There were no good alternatives in the election.

Sound familiar? American politics is also shaping up as a contest between a fascist-oriented party, the GOP, and a conservative party, establishment Democrats. Obama's policies have always been predicated on the reelection strategy that progressives will vote for him because the alternative is so much worse. He may be right, but I know my efforts will go entirely towards electing non-establishment progressive Democrats, not conservative hacks like Obama, Tim Kaine, Claire McCaskill, Ben Nelson and dozens of other corporate shills whose anti-family policies are basically as bad as the Republicans'.

This morning I got an e-mail from one of the most thoughtful and perceptive candidates being backed by Blue America this cycle, Nick Ruiz, who's running against right-wing fanatic Sandy Adams in central Florida. Nick needs help (and you can help him here). The conservative Democratic establishment will certainly try to insert one of its own in the race, and even if Nick manages to prevail, the teabagger mentality is still strong enough in Florida to give even absurd extremists like Adams a leg up.

Nick thoroughly understands the essence of the class warfare at the base of U.S. politics, and unlike most politicians he's on the side of working families-- in the truest sense. This is what Nick had to say in his e-mail, entitied "A Little Lie," and illustrated with a song by Depeche Mode frontman Dave Gahan:

It is with relief and even glee that the currently debased political establishment buried Ted Kennedy on August 25, 2009. The last long-standing icon of liberal politics was the nail in the coffin of an era.

Many thought that "Era Ends"-- like the painting by Ed Ruscha. In some sense, this is true.

I know-- Bernie Sanders (I-VT) is a liberal juggernaut-- and yet he alone cannot be expected to carry the weight of progressive Democratic politics as far as America needs it to go. Dennis Kucinich (OH-10), another progressive icon, also cannot be expected to shepherd the entire progressive agenda by himself, despite his unwavering resilience and liberal efforts. Alan Grayson, former congressperson from FL-8-- God love him-- lost in 2010, in the epic sweep of the radical right. And BHO, the liberal world knows, is in need of some serious help reorienting his legislative priorities.

I was born in 1970 in New York City, the epicenter of American liberalism if there ever was one. In the very same year the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) was born, as was the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) was also created that year. The onset of progressive politics and commentary wrought by FDR reaches its terminal apex in the '70s. What would stall FDR’s inspired progressive legacy, of course, symbolically and otherwise, is the election to the U.S. presidency of the salesman and actor Ronald Reagan. The irony of Reagan (and the current crop of Reagan wannabes on the right, and even some on the left) is, of course, that Reagan, the false god of punch-drunk conservatism, voted for FDR not once but four times.

We should recognize that this first stage of FDR-inspired American liberalism, the kind of liberalism that holds ideas like Social Security, Medicare/Medicaid, financial and credit market regulation, human rights and collective bargaining, equal opportunity and non-discrimination, unemployment insurance, federal guarantee for bank deposits, universal healthcare and so on, as first principles of a democratic commonwealth and legal fairness-- is now giving birth to a second stage. Let it not be stillborn. Our second stage of American liberalism must offer new protectors and philosophers of democratic liberty who are committed to the expansion of American progress and opportunity for new generations of Americans to come. The status quo is not enough.

If the status quo fails, like they currently are failing, they will go down in history as the last guard who stood against the second stage of another rising current: the global fascism of corporate wealth and privilege.

American democracy needs the support and confidence of the American citizen-voter if it is to succeed as our model of government. And America needs to realize that despite the self-styled antics of media celebrity crusaders and self-absorbed group opportunism that often passes for democratic progressivism and liberal politics, there is only one way to enact a progressive agenda: by the election of not one or two but a multitude of congresspersons to achieve any meaningful difference at the federal level. Of course, a few strong personalities go a long way, as with some of the people we mentioned earlier, but obviously it takes more than that to legislate New Deal politics. And a brave person can do great things-- as FDR has already proven.

But in the end we must understand that our political lives cannot be left to the discretion of party careerist tropes and wealth-seeking troubadours, "rising stars" and a coterie of yes-people and such. Theirs is an agenda of self-- such is the reality of the little lie of 21st-century corporate American politics.

What we truly need is an agenda of the many. And that is what I aim to enact.

The aristocratic and commercial interests that speak so loudly through the conduit of their enormous wealth, who have the ears and hands of the parties, and their fingers on the purse strings of each party and most affiliates, are not those that would best represent the democratic majority of people of the United States. There are obsessive interests plotting and encircling which would have all the world’s resources for themselves while the people have little and next to nothing.

The truth is, much of the political establishment has sold itself to the highest bidder, and that is not you. The highest bidder is corporate America and the wealthiest global interests they serve. But you already know that. No need to take my word for it. If you doubt what I say, I ask you to look at the last thirty years or so of our so-called "progress." What do you see? Is it widespread prosperity and generational success? Chances are you have seen your working conditions deteriorate, as well as your benefits, retirement and other things.

And yet, the political careerists would have more from you, in a dazzling variety of shrewd and self-serving ways. They would raise your retirement age, raise school tuition and let inflation erode your income and your way of life. They do not care about you, despite what they say to your face. They care only about themselves-- and their political, ideological and legislative actions are all the proof you may need.

The indulgent parade of Republicans and Republicrats in this 113th Congress want to sell you Grecian austerity with an American veneer and fascist potential. But 13 is unlucky for a reason. The dogs of debt scream “Deficits!” and “Patriotism!” But all they have to offer is fear. This current pile of politicians is truly a rancid crop of craven individuals descending upon the American psyche like a pack of hyenas.

I do not envy your position as citizen-voter, any more than I sustain my own as citizen-candidate, but I know in my soul that you and I must make the difference here and into the future, or they will have won. There is much work to do, and few who are truly willing to do it, because it’s easier to go along with bad business and just get paid. You know what I mean-- and you see it all around you. You see the results of decades of such behavior corrupting your neighborhoods and institutions. You see America becoming something else.

I ask you, wherever you are to demand a democratic American difference rather than a meaningless "change." It is the only way forward from here.

Put a progressive Democrat in Congress.