Black Agenda Report
Black Agenda Report
News, commentary and analysis from the black left.

  • Home
  • Africa
  • African America
  • Education
  • Environment
  • International
  • Media and Culture
  • Political Economy
  • Radio
  • US Politics
  • War and Empire

Long Live Gridlock and Paralysis of Both Big Business Parties
06 Aug 2014
🖨️ Print Article

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

With Wall Street in firm control of both major political parties, why would anyone on the Left want the Republicans and Democrats to make nice with each other and collaborate more closely to pass legislation? We should thank our lucky stars for gridlock, which has prevented President Obama from consummating a Grand Bargain with the GOP.

Long Live Gridlock and Paralysis of Both Big Business Parties

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

“Since the Left is non-existent on Capitol Hill, and barely evident in the society at large, nothing good can possibly emanate from the executive and legislative branches of government.”

The corporate media, whose job is to create impressions of reality while revealing nothing of actual substance, is full of scorn for the now adjourned 113th Congress, which, according to the New York Times, is “in a race to the bottom” with the previous Congress as the most “do nothing” ever. Media associated with the Democratic wing of the ruling duopoly are especially upset that the Republican faction has not cooperated with President Obama to get something – anything! – done, as if the nation and the world would be a better place if the two big business parties would only collaborate more closely with one another. The current state of congressional gridlock is, according to the pundits, the worst of all worlds.

The truth is, were it not for gridlock, President Obama would have engineered the utter annihilation of what’s left of the social safety net in a Grand Bargain with the Republicans during his first term office. That was his plan from the very beginning, when the new president announced that all entitlements, including Social Security, were on the chopping block. Before his first year was out, Obama had crushed the jellyfish that call themselves progressive Democrats in the health care debate. With his arms spread wide to embrace the Republicans as partners in the Age of Austerity, Obama offered to lead the wrecking crew that would finally demolish Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal and Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society. But, the Republicans were so consumed with racially fueled fervor to destroy the First Black President, they rejected the Grand Bargain and chose gridlock, instead. Lucky for us! Given the circumstances, it was the best thing that could happen.

“We need more ill feeling and deeper paralysis.”

Gridlock has been the order of the day for the past four years, dramatically inhibiting the flow of legislation. Since the Left is non-existent on Capitol Hill, and barely evident in the society at large – and with Black America, historically the most progressive constituency in the nation, now in its seventh year of self-imposed political irrelevance – nothing good can possibly emanate from the executive and legislative branches of government. The only kinds of measures that can sail through the gridlocked Congress are those designed to start a war with Russia or increase the killing power of the Israeli apartheid regime.

Given that we have, mainly, the Republicans to thank for the blessedly constipated condition of Congress, it follows that it is the Democrats, who keep harping on the need to “do something” to get the infernal legislative machinery rolling, who represent the greatest threat to the people’s interests.

In any event, it is definitely NOT in the interest of ordinary Americans for Democrats and Republicans to become more collaborative on the legislative agenda. On the contrary, we need more ill feeling and deeper paralysis in the ranks of the two big business parties. Until a movement can be created that will fight for the overthrow of Wall Street and its duopoly – Long Live Gridlock!

For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to BlackAgendaReport.com to sign up for email notification of new issues of our magazine, each Wednesday.

BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.



Your browser does not support the audio element.

listen
http://traffic.libsyn.com/blackagendareport/20140806_gf_Gridlock.mp3

More Stories


  •  Quest for “Black Faces in High Places” Deceives the People
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
    Quest for “Black Faces in High Places” Deceives the People
    22 Mar 2021
    “If we believe that” achieving “the first Black woman this, and the first Black woman that, will consolidate gains for our community, then we are deceiving ourselves” and “we might as well say, ‘I’
  •  Cuban Socialist Internationalist Medicine Puts Capitalist Countries to Shame
    Black Agenda Radio with Margaret Kimberley and Glen Ford
    Cuban Socialist Internationalist Medicine Puts Capitalist Countries to Shame
    22 Mar 2021
    So few of its own citizens have contracted Covid-19 – less than 300 -- that Cuba must test its vaccines in other countries, said Dr Layla Brown-Vincent, professor
  • Freedom Rider: Ending Poverty in the United States
    Margaret Kimberley, BAR senior columnist
    Freedom Rider: Ending Poverty in the United States
    17 Mar 2021
    President Franklin Roosevelt made profound changes in the US political-economic structure, while Joe Biden only does temporary patchwork on the late-stage capitalist carcass. 
  • New Cold War is Built on Humanitarian Interventionist Lies and Dismissal of Actual War Crimes
    Danny Haiphong, BAR Contributing Editor
    New Cold War is Built on Humanitarian Interventionist Lies and Dismissal of Actual War Crimes
    17 Mar 2021
    To manufacture consent for its own constant aggressions the US claims its competitors are guilty of even greater crimes – sheer inventions that never happened. 
  • Black Citizenship Forum: On Identity and Empire: France and the Colonial Roots of Black Citizenship
    Editors, The Black Agenda Review
    Black Citizenship Forum: On Identity and Empire: France and the Colonial Roots of Black Citizenship
    17 Mar 2021
    You cannot simply declare yourself race free, racism free, and simply think that it will generate a race free or colorblind society.
  • Load More
Subscribe
connect with us
about us
contact us