As the pundits on all major news outlets are surmising over who won the first Democratic Presidential Debate on CNN, I heard nobody mention the only real loser of that debate - the American political system and, therefore, the American people.
The decisive moment happened even before the candidates were introduced and entered the stage. At the outset, Barack Obama addressed the Democratic candidates and the viewers in a taped video message, advising them to work and fight hard to keep the White House in 2016. Mind you, if a Head of State, who has to be the leader of all people, addresses only the candidates of his political party, something is seriously wrong. It was a clear sign that the United States' political system degenerates ever more into a caricature of what it is supposed to be.
When it comes to the institutional pillars and the bipartisan principles of the political system he is constitutionally bound to serve, a president ought to rise above party politics and exercise some measure of political neutrality that his office demands. In other words, if Obama addressed both Democratic and Republican candidates, encouraging a fair and constructive race for the presidential elections in 2016, he would raise respect for the office he is holding. To abuse a video message before the debate of Democratic candidates for cheap partisan propaganda is repulsive.
But this is but one manifestation of the decline of the political culture in the U.S., besides the constant lying of even the highest political representatives, the shirking of responsibility for policy failures, and the polarization between political forces to the degree of outright hatred and attempted annihilation.
That the political system in the U. S. is degenerating into the lows of a Banana Republic is no longer an unfounded assumption. To initiate a swift turnaround is the call of the hour.
The decisive moment happened even before the candidates were introduced and entered the stage. At the outset, Barack Obama addressed the Democratic candidates and the viewers in a taped video message, advising them to work and fight hard to keep the White House in 2016. Mind you, if a Head of State, who has to be the leader of all people, addresses only the candidates of his political party, something is seriously wrong. It was a clear sign that the United States' political system degenerates ever more into a caricature of what it is supposed to be.
When it comes to the institutional pillars and the bipartisan principles of the political system he is constitutionally bound to serve, a president ought to rise above party politics and exercise some measure of political neutrality that his office demands. In other words, if Obama addressed both Democratic and Republican candidates, encouraging a fair and constructive race for the presidential elections in 2016, he would raise respect for the office he is holding. To abuse a video message before the debate of Democratic candidates for cheap partisan propaganda is repulsive.
But this is but one manifestation of the decline of the political culture in the U.S., besides the constant lying of even the highest political representatives, the shirking of responsibility for policy failures, and the polarization between political forces to the degree of outright hatred and attempted annihilation.
That the political system in the U. S. is degenerating into the lows of a Banana Republic is no longer an unfounded assumption. To initiate a swift turnaround is the call of the hour.
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