Well that just happened.
Representative democracy wins out again: despite Clinton getting the popular vote (by a margin of less than 1%), straw-haired bigoted hate sausage and professional misogynist Donald Trump now has his fat fingers firmly planted (from January) on the big red button. Top of the world ma!
None of which is to say that Hilary the warmonger was a particularly palatable candidate, with her history of corporate appeasement, foreign 'intervention', and US imperialism. However, as with most elections, the difference, though measurable only microscopically, is still measurable. It's a choice between the unpopular and the unthinkable. Or at least it was, until it was made, last week, by the disenfranchised of America. They, angry white men who feel that, as the dominant power group in society, their loss, at the hands of the capitalist elite, is greater than anyone else's loss - and how dare those other groups (like the blacks, or the women, or the gays, etc) - even try and compare!
The real winner in this election will be capital, because whatever happens that's what controls America. Even if that capital is now in the vaults of Chinese banks. Trump is nothing if not a capitalist. He thinks himself the ultimate dealmaker, but that's not going to persuade Mexico to fund his imaginary wall (now a fence - and a fence is already what exists). Nor will it persuade Wall Street to support renegotiating NAFTA.
He thinks himself a maverick, but only because daddy Trump's casino chips have bailed him out and only because daddy Trump let him the means to leverage more time and money to try and build his shitty empire of bricks and racism.
The problem is this awful representative system, whether in the US with it's clearly broken electors, or the Westminster aristocracy here, is all we currently have. Whether we like it or not, there will be an election by, at the very least, 2020. If we don't vote against the Tories then we vote for the Tories - a fact the radical left ignores at our peril.
It's an unpalatable truth, but the system will continue regardless of how we feel about it; there is not, at present, the revolutionary willpower among the working class to force a change. I wish it were not so. This system is broken across the board.
The truth is that there are differences between the major parties, even between Clinton and Trump, and these need to be exploited for us to gain anything. It is most certainly a case of holding your nose and voting for the lesser of two evils because anything else is seen and used by the system to put our enemies in power: Tory voters will always vote and so anything that splits opposition to that, be it not voting or instead voting for a smaller party like the Greens, will only strengthen their position. The thought of another Tory majority, likely stronger than the present one, is unbearable. That cannot be allowed to happen and is, in my opinion, the over riding priority.
I do not like this reality, I wish it were different, but it is not. We know what happens if the Tories return, it's what's already happening with the deaths of the poor and the sick and the dismantling and destruction of public services. This we can see, we don't need speculation. On the other hand, while there are many Labour representatives with blood on their hands as well, we can reasonably speculate they will not be as bad as the Tories - and that's what it's about. It's an awful shitty choice, but, fundamentally, it is the only choice. It's also one that comes with many caveats; for example, if you live in a safe seat then there isn't much you can do, although you lose nothing by marking a cross on a piece of paper, a job that takes ten minutes of your day. You might as well at least try.
Not least of all, in fact most importantly of all, revolutionary work need not be compromised or interrupted. Using this system does not mean endorsing it, that would be a facile assumption. It is simply a recognition of the reality of the moment. Either we use the system or it uses us.
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