VHeadline's Washington DC-based commentarist Chris Herz writes: Today's off-year elections in the US states of Virginia, New Jersey and New York will show solid defeats for the Obama government. In New Jersey, an incumbent Democratic Governor, Corzine is in deep difficulties. In Virginia irrational and reactionary Republicans will reverse their losses in the 2008 presidential elections. In New York a special congressional election will probably return a candidate so reactionary that he was unable to win support from the main-line Republican leadership -- and believe this from me if you believe me in nothing else, this is very difficult to manage indeed!

There are many reasons for all this ... but one of the major ones in all three localities is the dismal and pusillanimous performance of the Democratic government in Washington: The super-cautious flip-flopping on the issues by the president and the open corruption of the party's major figures in the legislature.

It is true that for reasons of racial or religious chauvinism and bellicose militarism the largest single bloc, about 40%, of voters describe themselves as conservative. It is also true that this group is very strong in suburban areas such as New Jersey. True too that Virginia is a stronghold of the old Confederacy and that upstate New York has large numbers of gun-nuts. But most true of all is the unwillingness of the Democrats to fight for some unifying principle -- say peace or health care for all.

In Venezuela, President Hugo Chavez Frias faces about the same 40% level of opposition ... but the difference is that he offers to his nation a very definite progressive vision and is always ready to fight for it. Thus he enjoys consistent support from 60% of his people.

• Here in the USA the corruption which is the Democratic Party cannot bring itself to annoy their corporate supporters with anything resembling the sort of social equity for which President Chavez famously stands. Thus this 60% potential majority is usually demobilized on election day.

The 2008 election took place as a referendum on the manifest failures of George W. Bush; and a large portion of his supporters did not much care for the nominee of their party who was deemed not sufficiently Fascistic for their tastes and so they stayed away from the polls. On the other hand, the usually fragmented opposition liked very much the idea of jamming a Black president down the throats of their conservative neighbors and was further energized by the economic crisis, the disastrous wars, and by the Democrats' promises to finally deal with the scandal of health care access. These advantages have been carefully sabotaged by the Democrats' own do-little leaders, who certainly understand their duty to those who pay them. These guys certainly are honest politicians -- they stay bought. They accept their appointed role which is to provide a caretaker regime until such time as the Republicans can recover from the Bush fiasco. This process is well in train; by tonight we shall see it in all its glory.

The corporatocracy's tame press and TV will present all this as proof that the USA is a reactionary country, and its oligarchies certainly are. But really it is only another sorry manifestation of a failed state, one killed by its own incompetent and corrupt elites.

• For Venezuelans and others exposed to US aggression and subversion I say so much the better ... you will notice but little change in the vituperation, the subversion, the outright aggressions launched at you from Washington and its satellites.

And it is certainly to your advantage to have the enemy empire's governance returned to the most corrupt and the least competent among its factions.

From the imperial capital

Chris Herz
chris.herz@vheadline.com

http://www.vheadline.com/herz