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Title: Elections Are A Scam
Author: Morpheus
Date: 31st October 2004
Language: en
Topics: Elections, USA
Source: Retrieved on 2nd August 2020 from https://web.archive.org/web/20070705083131/http://question-everything.mahost.org/

Morpheus

Elections Are A Scam

As in every election we’re now being bombarded with propaganda about how

“your vote makes a difference” and associated nonsense. According to the

official version ordinary citizens control the state by voting for

candidates in elections. The President and other politicians are

supposedly servants of “the people” and the government an instrument of

the general populace. This version is a myth. It does not matter who is

elected because the way the system is set up all elected representatives

must do what big business and the state bureaucracy want, not what “the

people” want. Elected representatives are figureheads. Politicians’

rhetoric may change depending on who is elected, but they all have to

implement the same policies given the same situation. Elections are a

scam whose function is to create the illusion that “the people” control

the government, not the elite, and to neutralize resistance movements.

All voting does is strengthen the state & ruling class, it is not an

effective means to change government policy.

If a party wins the elections but implements policies that go against

the interests of big business then profits will go down and businesses &

investors will withdraw their investments. This capital flight will

cause the economy to crash. If the ruling party does not change its

policies to appease big business then they’ll lose the next elections

due to the bad economy. In practice most parties change their policies

to appease the corporate elite in order to avoid losing power.

This is not merely theoretical, it has happened repeatedly. It happened

in India a few months ago. The left, lead by the Congress party, won the

elections, leading to a coalition government with the Congress party and

the Communist party. This caused the stock market to crash because

investors feared a change in economic policy that would hurt their

profits. Sonia Ghandi, who was originally going to be the next Prime

Minister, chose not to take the position and the new government was

forced to adopt policies virtually identical to the previous government.

Their rhetoric is different, but policy is basically the same.

Usually the mere threat of capital flight is enough to keep potentially

recalcitrant politicians in line (although most politicians never even

consider policies that conflict with the corporate elite/state

bureaucracy). For example, Bill Clinton won election on a mildly liberal

reformist platform. Once in office he was forced to abandon his campaign

promises because if he continued them the bond market wouldn’t react

well and the economy would go down the tubes. Clinton’s famous statement

to his advisers upon realizing this was, “You mean to tell me that the

success of my program and my reelection hinges on the Federal Reserve

and a bunch of fucking bond traders?” He was thus forced to abandon his

program before it even started, instead implementing one virtually

identical to Republican proposals. He complained to his aides:

“I hope you’re all aware we’re all Eisenhower Republicans. We’re

Eisenhower Republicans here, and we are fighting the Reagan Republicans.

We stand for lower deficits and free trade and the bond market. Isn’t

that great?”

In theory the government might be able to combat this by nationalizing

industry but neither the Democrats nor Republicans (or most prominent

third parties) are willing to do this. Even if they were, the Supreme

Court would strike it down. If some way were found to get around this

then the CIA and/or Pentagon would overthrow the government in a coup

(or through less dramatic means). The CIA has overthrown many

governments for nationalizing industry, or even just implementing

policies not sufficiently favorable to US corporations, including Chile,

Iran, Guatemala, Brazil, Greece, the Congo and many others. Doing the

same on their home turf would be a piece of cake.

Once elected representatives are isolated from the general public but

surrounded by bureaucrats and other politicians. They therefore have a

tendency to see things from the perspective of politicians and

bureaucrats, rather than from the perspective of the general public from

which they are isolated, and are much more susceptible to pressure from

government bureaucracies.

Elected representatives’ dependency on the state bureaucracy for

information makes them very susceptible to manipulation by the

bureaucracies they are officially in charge of. For example, in the late

‘50s the CIA secured approval to launch an uprising in Indonesia by

feeding a series of increasingly alarmist reports to their superiors in

the National Security Council, who otherwise might have shot the

proposed uprising down. This shows how government agencies (especially

secretive ones) can pressure politicians and influence policy in

preferred directions. This is enhanced by the fact that individual

politicians come and go but the bureaucrats are permanent, which makes

it easier for bureaucrats to manipulate information and ensures that

politicians have less experience with such manipulation. Because the

state bureaucracy is permanent while politicians are transitory state

bureaucracies tend to accrue more power than elected representatives.

State bureaucracies can also manipulate the political process by leaking

damaging information about politicians they don’t like or by harassing

parties or movements they don’t like (such as COINTELPRO or the recent

harassment of anti-war activists by the FBI). This gives an advantage to

politicians favorable to the interests of the state bureaucracy.

State bureaucracies, especially the military and intelligence services,

have a considerable degree of autonomy from elected representatives and

so aren’t truly controlled by those representatives. When New Zealand

intelligence began secretly participating in Echelon, an international

electronic spying system, New Zealand’s Prime Minister didn’t even know

about it. Most of the CIA’s covert actions (including coups) were done

without Congressional approval and some, like CIA participation in

Ghana’s 1966 coup, didn’t even have Presidential approval. Entire wars

have been fought in secret, including Russia 1918–1920, Laos 1965–1973

and Cambodia 1970–1975. When Congress cut off funding for the Contras

(US-backed terrorists in Nicaragua) in the mid-80s the CIA (and other

parts of the state bureaucracy) just kept doing it in secret,

disregarding Congress’s wishes.

The Pentagon can’t even produce auditable books and regularly “loses”

billions of dollars every year. Auditors for the Office of Management

and Budget found that “unsubstantiated balance adjustments” for

financial year 2000 totaled 1.1 trillion dollars. In other words,

elected politicians (and especially congress) have no real control over

Pentagon spending. The whole process of Congressional hearings and

budgetary oversight is just an elaborate charade — they appropriate

money and the Pentagon spends it however it wants to. Plus there’s the

“black budget” whose contents are kept secret, allowing the national

security establishment to effectively do whatever they want with it.

All of this puts many state bureaucracies (especially the military and

intelligence services) beyond effective control of elected

representatives, let alone the general public. Their secrecy,

manipulation of budgets and complexity (there are too many bureaucrats

for representatives to effectively keep track of them all) gives

government bureaucracies a considerable degree of autonomy. They go off

and do whatever they want, either keeping things secret from elected

politicians or pressuring them into going along with it.

What a politician says to win an election and what he actually does in

office are two very different things; politicians regularly break their

promises. This is not just a fluke but the outcome of the way the system

is set up. Bush the second said he wouldn’t engage in “nation-building”

(taking other countries over) during the 2000 election campaign but has

done it several times. He also claimed to support a balanced budget, but

obviously abandoned that. Clinton advocated universal health care during

the 1992 election campaign but there were more people without health

insurance when he left office than when he took office. Bush the first

said, “read my lips — no new taxes!” while running for office but raised

taxes anyway. Reagan promised to shrink government but he drastically

expanded the military-industrial complex and ran up huge deficits.

Rather than shrinking government, he reoriented it to make it more

favorable to the rich.

Carter promised to make human rights the “soul of our foreign policy”

but funded genocide in East Timor and backed brutal dictators in

Argentina, South Korea, Chile, Brazil, Indonesia and elsewhere. During

the 1964 elections leftists were encouraged by Democrats to vote for

Johnson because Goldwater, his Republican opponent, was a fanatical

warmonger who would escalate US involvement in Vietnam. Johnson won, and

immediately proceeded to escalate US involvement in Vietnam. FDR

promised to maintain a balanced budget and restrain government spending

but did the exact opposite. Wilson won reelection in 1916 on the slogan

“he kept us out of war” but then lied us into World War One. Hoover

pledged to abolish poverty in 1928 but instead saw it skyrocket.

In the 1974 Canadian elections the Liberals criticized Tory plans to

introduce wage and price controls but, shortly after winning office,

implemented wage and price controls. In 1993 the Liberals promised to

abolish the Goods and Service Tax but reneged on that after getting

power. The British Liberal party promised to cut military spending

during the 1906 elections but, after winning, went back on that promise

in order to wage an arms race with Germany. In 1945 the British Labor

party promised to set up a ministry of housing but abandoned it after

winning the election.

According to the official version when leftists get elected to office we

should always (or almost always) get leftist policies and vice versa

when rightists get elected to office but this is not the case. The

German Green party was originally pacifist and was founded on an

anti-nuclear power position. They gained power in a coalition government

in the late 1990s but abandoned their program, effectively delaying the

end of nuclear power in Germany until the nuclear industry wants to end

it and supporting military intervention during the Kosovo war. Lula, the

current president of Brazil, originally ran on an anti-corporate and

anti-IMF platform but is now cooperating with the IMF (although his

rhetoric, but not his policies, are sometimes critical of it) and he’s

just as favorable towards corporate power as his predecessor.

The socialist/social democratic/labor parties in Europe were originally

revolutionary Marxist parties aiming to establish a communist society.

As they won elections and gained power they increasingly abandoned this

goal and became ordinary capitalist parties. At first they continued to

mouth Marxist rhetoric while pushing reformist policies, but eventually

even Marxist rhetoric was abandoned. Prior to world war one they

declared their opposition to any kind of inter-imperialist world war on

the grounds that workers should not kill each other in order to benefit

their capitalist masters. When world war one broke out all but two

parties (the Bolsheviks and US Socialist party – neither of whom had

gained much power through elections) abandoned this stance and supported

their own government in a wave of patriotic fervor. Today they’re

pushing through Reagan/Clinton-style deregulation and “free market

reforms,” dismantling the very welfare states they formerly advocated.

The most liberal American president in the last 30 years was Richard

Nixon, a Republican whose personal beliefs and rhetoric were quite

conservative. He created the environmental protection agency,

established diplomatic relations with China, (eventually) withdrew from

Vietnam, ended the draft, supported affirmative action, proposed a

minimum income and imposed price controls. Every president since Nixon –

including Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton – has been more conservative.

In the US & UK Ronald Reagan & Margaret Thatcher implemented far right

policies that attacked the social safety net and benefited big business

in the name of the “free market.” During the same time period in

Australia and West Europe the supposedly left-wing parties (labor/social

democrats/socialists) held power and implemented the same “free market”

policies. Clinton & Blair from the supposedly left-wing parties

(Democrat & Labor) later defeated Reagan & Thatcher’s successors but

once in office continued the same “free market” policies as their

predecessors.

This refutes all the nonsense about how “your vote makes a difference.”

Politicians are required to implement the same policies (what the elite

want) even if it conflicts with their campaign promises no matter who is

elected. Elected representatives are figureheads. That’s why there are

so many examples of people getting elected and then doing the opposite

of what they promised. Electing different people to power is not an

effective way to change policy. In practice, politicians differ only in

the lies they tell to get in power. Once in power their policies are the

same given the same situation, although the rhetoric and symbolism used

to justify those policies may change greatly.

Changes in policy direction are due to changes in the situation, not who

is elected to office. Most major changes in policy do not coincide with

new people getting in office; they coincide with changes in the

situation. When the Great Depression started the US government responded

with Keynesian state interventions in the economy designed to

resuscitate the economy and prevent growing population movements (caused

by the depression) from bringing about revolution. This actually began

under Hoover, who did more in this area than any previous President,

even though these policies are usually attributed to the next President,

FDR.

In the mid-twentieth century welfare states expanded in most Western

societies as a way of preventing the then large revolutionary socialist

movements from overthrowing the government (welfare programs can make

the poor less likely to rebel since they are better off and because it

makes the state seem more benevolent). The welfare state was in the

elites’ interests because it was a way to prevent revolution and

decrease unrest, which helped them gain and keep power & profit. The

state bureaucracy will sometimes nationalize a limited amount of

industry under these conditions, as a way of preventing revolution and

also of keeping capitalism going (selling unprofitable industries to the

government can be a useful way for businesses & investors to recoup

loses during a depression).

In the later twentieth century these revolutionary movements declined

and the welfare state was gradually dismantled. It was no longer in the

interests of the elite to maintain a welfare state because the threat of

unrest & revolution was no longer there to justify the costs. In the US

this started not under Reagan, as liberals usually claim, but in the

later part of Carter’s term with deregulation and other small attacks on

the welfare state. Carter also initiated other policies liberals blame

Reagan for, including support for the Contras, Pol Pot, Afghan

Mujahadeen and Saddam Hussein. This dismantling of the welfare state and

general move to the right has continued under every subsequent President

regardless of which party was in power.

In the US, during Nixon’s term, there were a number of growing left-wing

movements and spreading revolutionary ideology that threatened to

overthrow the government. Had he not done things like end the draft,

withdraw from Vietnam and implement other liberal reforms there was a

real possibility that socialist revolution would erupt and even if it

didn’t there would have been greater unrest which would likely outweigh

the cost of his reforms.

Although elections do not secure popular control over the state, they do

help secure state control over the populace. Voting is a ritual that

reinforces obedience to state authority. It creates the illusion that

“the people” control the state, thereby masking elite rule. That

illusion makes rebellion against the state less likely because it is

seen as a legitimate institution and as an instrument of popular rule

rather than the oligarchy it really is. This is why even totalitarian

states like Russia under Stalin had elections. Embedded within all

electoral campaigns is the myth that “the people” control the state

through voting. This is implied & assumed by all election campaigns

because it if wasn’t true then the campaign for that candidate would be

pointless.

This is why governments and corporations today are generally supportive

of elections or at least do not question them. Government schools

usually promote the importance of voting, teaching the official view

that citizens control the state via elections, and some corporations

(like MTV) even run commercials encouraging people to vote. It is in the

interests of governments and corporations to promote voting because they

serve to legitimize the system and reduce unrest.

In addition, elections can help neutralize resistance movements by

getting disgruntled individuals to channel their efforts into the

election, instead of more effective means of resistance. Since electoral

campaigns are an ineffective means of changing policy, all the labor and

resources put into election campaigns are wasted. Potential rebellion is

thus diverted into a dead end where it will not hurt the system.

Boycotting elections doesn’t necessarily change things, but

participating in elections (and especially in election campaigns)

changes things for the worse by legitimizing the state and wasting

resources. A vote for anyone is a vote for capitalist “democracy” and to

strengthen the state.

Some Democrats try to guilt leftists into voting for their candidate(s)

by arguing that oppressed peoples — the poor, people of color (POC) —

vote for their candidate and so you should therefore do the same. The

most obvious problem with this is that most oppressed people don’t vote.

You’re more likely to vote the richer and whiter you are. So by their

logic you shouldn’t be voting because most poor/POC don’t vote.

This argument is also based on a logical fallacy. Just because someone

is poor/non-white doesn’t mean everything they believe is correct. Most

believe in god and during periods in the past Leninism was quite popular

among sections of the poor/POC. It does not follow from this that either

idea is true. Just because oppression is wrong does not mean that

everything an oppressed person believes is true.

Some leftists argue that having Democrats in power is better because

they will be more responsive to leftist pressure than Republicans. This

argument was widely used in 1992 to justify voting for Bill Clinton but

the conservative policies implemented by his presidency, which were

basically a continuation of the first Bush’s policies, disprove this

argument. To continue believing it after Clinton is to stick your head

in the sand and ignore reality.

Influence actually goes the other way around: having a Democrat in

office makes the left more likely to believe the president’s lies and go

along with his policies than if a Republican were in office doing the

same thing. Clinton was able to gut welfare, something Reagan wanted to

do but couldn’t, because he was able to co-opt other Democrats into

going along with it. Had a Republican done the same many more would have

opposed it. When Clinton attacked Yugoslavia & bombed Iraq the response

from the left was quite small, but when Bush attacked Iraq the left

formed a much larger movement against it. Many leftists (erroneously)

think that a Democrat is preferable to a Republican and so are willing

to give a Democrat the benefit of the doubt, and therefore are more

likely to believe their lies, but will be much more skeptical of a

Republican even if he does the same thing.

In addition, electing a Democrat can ruin left-wing movements if they

support that candidate. Once in power that Democrat will have to do the

same thing a Republican would under the same circumstances. This can

cause leftists who supported the Democrats to become disillusioned and

drop out – allowing the right to advance even further.

Some claim that the year 2000 “election”/coup shows that “every vote

counts” but it actually shows the opposite. The Supreme Court decided

who became president, not the voters. Gore would be president today if

you went by what the voters wanted (and he would be doing the same thing

Bush is doing).

Actual power lies with big business and the state bureaucracy, elected

representatives must do what these institutions want. If they do not

obey these institutions pressure on them will mount and various

disciplinary mechanisms (such as capital flight) will come into play to

force them to do so. Ultimately they will be removed from office

(through elections, coups, or other means) if they continue to disobey

these institutions. The White House and Congress don’t really make the

decisions, Wall Street and the Pentagon do. Who wins the election makes

no difference (with rare exceptions) because all politicians must do

what the elite want. Elections are a scam whose function is to

neutralize resistance movements and dupe ordinary citizens into thinking

they control the state.