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The 2004 U. S. Presidential election brought us Bush versus Bush Lite. In 2006, the Democrats took the U. S. Congress and while things started getting worse at a slower rate, the overall tone was the same. This documentary from BBC Dispatches examines the political parties of England and how, in recent years, rather than offering visionary leadership in increasingly complex times, they all have been posturing to be perceived as “toughest” in the same areas, such as immigration control and street crime, and spending much of their campaigns on competing to outdo each others’ placebo-based pandering. The main issue at the “rotten heart” of the current electoral system according to Dispatches: “parties, cut adrift from their popular roots, are now cold-blooded vote-winning machines. If you ignore them, they ignore you.” When there are no substantive differences between the utterly bland major parties, is it still democracy? In this sickening look into the “mass marketing” campaign style of today, Dispatches says that no, democracy is a thing of the past. With enough work, though, it can be a thing of the future as well. [END] Permalink: Why Politicians Can’t Tell the Truth