Every political consultant knows that words like “together” and “unite” play well with voters. That’s why you hear them so much on the campaign trail, from races for local office to presidential campaigns. Remember Obama’s signature speech, with his signature line?
Now even as we speak, there are those who are preparing to divide us, the spin masters, the negative ad peddlers who embrace the politics of anything goes. Well, I say to them tonight, there is not a liberal America and a conservative America – there is the United States of America. There is not a Black America and a White America and Latino America and Asian America – there’s the United States of America.
Now the Republicans are claiming that it’s the Obama administration that’s dividing America:
Democrats will “poison the American spirit by pitting one American against another and engaging in class warfare,” Romney said. “I believe in an America that is one nation under God, and I will keep it that way.”
But here’s the thing: Obama actually tried to work with both sides. I wish he hadn’t tried so hard, since the Republicans have no interest in helping him govern, but you can’t say he was a divider. The GOP candidates, on the other hand, can’t possibly succeed without being divisive; as Kos points, that’s all they have:
Their entire schtick is predicated on pitting Americans against Americans. Without such demonization, they would be unable to function as an ongoing concern.
I don’t have to run for office, so I can get away with saying this: I am not a uniter, not in the sense that the politicians are using the word. I want us all to get along and I’m not a fan of violence, but there’s already a war on in this country. There’s a class war — and our side didn’t start it. Americans have already been pitted against each other — not by Obama but by a small group of the very rich and the political toadies who support them, who have systematically dismantled the tax, education and service system that once made at least an attempt at creating a country with a level playing field, a stable middle class and an income and wealth distribution curve that wasn’t grossly distorted.
The one percent has declared war on the rest of us. And we’re supposed to sit here and take it and not fight back?
Or should we attempt to drown corporatocracy in the bathtub?