I’m cynical, so I see it as that the Democrats can’t be or do those things, because the need for campaign donations has turned them into a fundamentally neo-liberal party that stands for wealth and corporate greed.

finally somebody's fucking saying it. party of controlled opposition. everyone has liked to pretend since the 90's and even before that this generational streak of incompetence in policy time and time again is the product of some sort of infernal curse, some sort of streak of bad luck, some sort of unrelated descent of the american populace's IQ points that just naturally predisposes them towards fascism. it's not. it's an intentional befouling. they are fine with losing, it will not be them that suffers. what they're not fine with, is populist policy actually getting passed. you can even do the obama thing and then lie about it, and then just face the occupy protests later on and tell them all to fuck off. they are even too afraid of that, so entrenched in their own ideology are they. it's insane and ridiculous to believe that this is just due to some sort of incompetence. if it is, then it's structural in nature, needs to be pulled out by the root, and is probably not really reformable or recoverable at the highest levels, because we've had this problem even since the hundred year old jimmy carter in hospice was in office.