The donkey and the elepants have been the political mascots of the Democrats (donkey) and the Republicans (elephant) since the 1800's. The first instance being opponents of Andrew Jackson referring to him as a jackass which he co-opted the insult by putting the donkey on his election posters.
The elephant representing Republicans didn't come about until the political cartoon seen above titled " the third term panic" by Thomas Nast where the elephant is being frightened off a cliff toward inflation and chaos. If I'm not mistaken, that is what Republicans today say about Democrats and spending!
The beginnings of the political parties themselves go back earlier to the time before the ratification of the Constitution with the essays of the federalists and anti-federalists. With the ratification of the Constitution, being an anti-federalist became a misnomer as the oath of office essentially made everyone federalists. However, those who served in the first four Congresses (1789-1797) can be thought of as being either Administration (that is, generally allied with those around Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton and Vice President John Adams) or Opposition (those generally associated with Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson and Congressman James Madison). It is important to note that George Washington's presidency was one of "factions" and not "parties".
By the beginning of the fifth Congress, political parties had emerged as Federalists, those who had supported the policies of the Washington Administration (a strong national government as a counterweight to the States), and Republicans, those who had been in Opposition (who felt that defending the sovereignty of the States against encroachments by the Federal Government was a truer essence of the federal republic known as the United States of America). The word Democrat also came in use at this time as a derisive term for Republicans by the Federalists (a term which, at the time, had connotations of the mob rule associated with the then-still very recent Reign of Terror following the French Revolution of 1789), although many political historians refer to Republicans of this era as "old" or Jeffersonian Republicans.
Into the 19th and 20th Congresses, two factions of Republicans had formed, the Adams (John Quincy) Republicans and the Jackson (Andrew) Republicans. By the 21st Congress, the one-time Jackson Republicans became known as Democratic Republicans and the one-time Adams Republicans became known as National Republicans. The Democratic Republicans took their name from their identification with the democracy they urged on behalf of the "common man".
With the 24th Congress the Democratic Republicans became generally known as Democrats and the National Republicans generally known as Whigs. These 19th century American Whigs saw themselves as being a bulwark against the "excesses" of the administration of "King Andrew" Jackson (during the American Revolution patriots were referred to as Whigs and those loyal to England as Tories).
The Whig party eventually dissolved largely over the issue of slavery and by the 34th Congress the Democratic and Republican parties as they are called to this day have dominated the voting booths.
However, the ideologies of the Democrats and Republicans of the 34th Congress differ from the ideologies of the Democrats and Republicans of the 113th Congress in disturbing ways. Just read the Democratic platform as it existed in 1856 and the strict attention stressed on money and the banking institution:
"7. That Congress has no power to charter a national bank; that we believe such an institution one of deadly hostility to the best interests of the country, dangerous to our republican institutions and the liberties of the people, and calculated to place the business of the country within the control of a concentrated money power, and above the laws and the will of the people. "
"8. That the separation of the moneys of the Government from banking institutions is indispensable for the safety of the funds of the Government and the rights of the people."
" 9. That we are decidedly opposed to taking from the President the qualified veto power, by which he is enabled, under restrictions and responsibilities amply sufficient to guard the public interests, to suspend the passage of a bill whose merits cannot secure the approval of two-thirds of the Senate and House of Representatives, until the judgment of the people can be obtained thereon, and which has saved the American people from the corrupt and tyrannical domination of the Bank of the United States, and from a corrupting system of general internal improvements."
Some excerpts of the Republican platform are as follows:
"That we deny the authority of Congress, of a Territorial Legislation, of any individual, or association of individuals, to give legal existence to Slavery in any Territory of the United States, while the present Constitution shall be maintained."
"That the Constitution confers upon Congress sovereign powers over the Territories of the United States for their government; and that in the exercise of this power, it is both the right and the imperative duty of Congress to prohibit in the Territories those twin relics of barbarism--Polygamy, and Slavery."
"...the dearest Constitutional rights of the people of Kansas have been fraudulently and violently taken from them.
Their Territory has been invaded by an armed force;
Spurious and pretended legislative, judicial, and executive officers have been set over them, by whose usurped authority, sustained by the military power of the government, tyrannical and unconstitutional laws have been enacted and enforced;
The right of the people to keep and bear arms has been infringed.
Test oaths of an extraordinary and entangling nature have been imposed as a condition of exercising the right of suffrage and holding office.
The right of an accused person to a speedy and public trial by an impartial jury has been denied;
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, has been violated;
They have been deprived of life, liberty, and property without due process of law;
That the freedom of speech and of the press has been abridged;
The right to choose their representatives has been made of no effect;
Murders, robberies, and arsons have been instigated and encouraged, and the offenders have been allowed to go unpunished...and that it is our fixed purpose to bring the actual perpetrators of these atrocious outrages and their accomplices to a sure and condign punishment thereafter."
The Democratic platform of 2012 reads just like a sales pitch complete with slogan in the header and testimonials throughout.
“In early 2009, the auto industry was collapsing. Our plant shut down and I was laid off. And, like so many of us, I was scared. But then President Obama bet on the American worker and rescued America's auto industry, and it's paying off for our economy and our country. The plant opened its doors again, so I got my job - and my pride - back. That's a great American comeback story.” - Ina Sydney
The Republican platform of 2012 is more poetic and thankfully lacks the testimonials but does contain a slogan and its own inadequacies.
In the fourth paragraph of the Democrat platform is the first mention of Mitt Romney. In the second paragraph we find Al-Queda and 911. I wonder, why begin like this? This is no title bout or a place to put religious extremists or half-investigated "terror" attacks as the first order of business.
The Republicans take a pronounced stance to uphold the constitution and America's founding principles and then "rewrite" several Amendments of the Bill of Rights.
The first amendment: Speech that is protected
The second amendment with a lengthy paragraph to follow of all the idiosyncracies of gun legislation with not one mention of a well regulated militia.
Both parties regard economy in a false sense, "growth" in terms of a class of people rather than sustainable practices of our financial interaction and industrial capabilities.
Has the "money power" mentioned by the 1856 Democrats done what they said it would do, become a "danger to our republican institutions and the liberties of the people, and calculate to place the business of the country within the control of a concentrated money power, and above the laws and the will of the people"?
Yes.
And it has provided us with two main parties of candidates every election cycle that operate within an ideological box where the Republicans set it up and the Democrats fill it. They both are incapable of approaching in a solvable manner modern problems; their rhetoric and records show it.
Federal and consumer debt rise regardless of party control. Waste particularly of products has risen regardless of party control. The rate of incarceration rate has increased regardless of party control. This is the yield of a ravished political landscape where political platforms say 10 times as much, mean less than half, and do even less.
We can be thankful the "disasters" each say of the other move no faster than they do and are still rectifiable.
The "money powers" agent, inflation, " is a man-made scourge, made possible by the fact that most men do not understand it. It is a crime committed on so large a scale that its size is its protection: the integrating capacity of the victims’ minds breaks down before the magnitude—and the seeming complexity—of the crime, which permits it to be committed openly, in public. For centuries, inflation has been wrecking one country after another, yet men learn nothing, offer no resistance, and perish—not like animals driven to slaughter, but worse: like animals stampeding in search of a butcher." As put by Ayn Rand.
I'll end with my favorite line from a movie called "Waking Life".
You can't fight city hall, death and taxes. Don't talk about politics or religion.This is all the equivalent of enemy propaganda rolling across the picket line " Lay down, G.I. Lay down, G.I." We saw it all through the 20th Century. And now in the 21st Century, it's time to stand up and realize...that we should not allow ourselves to be crammed into this rat maze. We should not submit to dehumanization. I don't know about you, but I'm concerned with what's happening in this world. I'm concerned with the structure. I'm concerned with the systems of control, those that control my life and those that seek to control it even more! I want freedom! That's what I want! And that's what you should want! It's up to each and every one of us to turn loose and just shovel the greed, the hatred, the envy and, yes, the insecurities...
because that is the central mode of control-- make us feel pathetic, small...so we'll willingly give up our sovereignty, our liberty, our destiny.
We have got to realize that we're being conditioned on a mass scale. Start challenging this corporate slave state! The 21st Century is gonna be a new century, not the century of slavery, not the century of lies and issues of no significance...and classism and statism and all the rest of the modes of control! It's gonna be the age of humankind... standing up for something pure and something right! What a bunch of garbage-- liberal Democrat, conservative Republican. It's all there to control you. Two sides of the same coin. Two management teams bidding for control!
The C.E.O. job of Slavery, Incorporated!
The truth is out there in front of you, but they lay out this buffet of lies! I'm sick of it, and I'm not gonna take a bite out of it! Do you got me?
Resistance is not futile. We're gonna win this thing. Humankind is too good! We're not a bunch of underachievers! We're gonna stand up and we're gonna be human beings! We're gonna get fired up about the real things, the things that matter: creativity and the dynamic human spirit that refuses to submit!" -driving megaphone guy
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