International observers of US electoral politics can be forgiven for thinking Republican (GOP) candidates are just there for comedic relief since they provide no end of banal idiocies & hopelessly stupid remarks. They don’t come dumber. Just when you think Donald Trump takes the cake, Mike Huckabee pipes in, or Bobby Jindal–& all hell breaks lose in idiocy.

In fact, the Republicans play a central role in politics. Just as the Democrat’s purpose is to manage & control dissent from the left, the GOP’s is to manage crazies & reactionary ideologues on the right. Those who espouse ideas of the Confederacy, misogyny & mangled views on female anatomy, anti-immigration xenophobia represent big money forces in US politics who want white & male supremacy & social hatreds of all kinds written into the already dead-ass Constitution. The GOP provides a window into the gestalt of US rule.

It’s not that the Democratic Party represents the progressive wing of oligarchy; there is no such thing in the era of neoliberalism, the barbaric phase of capitalism. The DP is there solely to manage dissent from liberals & the left.