ABSTRACT
The real question may well be: Who needs one Republican party? Indeed, as we review the excesses of the last few Republican administrations, we cannot help but ask: Who needs economic exploitation; environmental devastation; a bloated military and a succession of invasions ranging from Afghanistan, Lebanon, Grenada, and Panama to the covert wars in Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Africa; a class-polarized social agenda; insider trading and Wall Street buccaneering; race-baiting politics, from Willie Horton to Clarence Thomas; a $100 billion plus “off-budget” Savings and Loan bailout; budget deficits that double those of all previous administrations combined; a for-profit health care system that fails miserably to meet the nation’s needs; a homeless population that has become a source of disgrace in the world’s wealthiest country; and a hemorrhaging of the educational and cultural resources of a nation that is not overly generous in these regards to begin with? Who needs policies that make the rich richer and the middle and working classes poorer, policies that leave the poorest of the poor (according to the mythology of Reaganism-Bushism, the source of the problems) outside the system?
