By Allen Coleman

We the people of the United States of America periodically take up grievances against our government and big corporations.

The working class often has socialist/communist ties, which since the McCarthyism era of.politics has been a hot topic, but it shouldn’t be. What best describes the working class? The modern American family; in a nuclear family unit, comprised of a mom, dad, kids, and maybe even grandparents. That family is often below, or right at poverty and lives paycheck to paycheck; with little to no savings. The dad works a regular job making $40,000 annually and is taxed accordingly. That family is comfortable and okay, while another working-class family receives social welfare. This family is quite the same in its family unit, yet because of numerous factors like financial, medical, or mental the family can’t provide as much for themselves. These groups of individuals are taxed accordingly and fairly.

The workers are slowly becoming burdened with rising inflation and lower wages. These get set by big corporations and the same corporations hand out the low wages. This is a system designed to keep the working class down, in a constant state of survival and suffering. The working class is too busy working to break free of poverty, while the people we elect to represent us; care more about their lobbyists’ donors. They might give us a show when it iselection season and make us think we get a real say in the government, yet they’re all just status-quo stand-ins for whoever bought them out.

The two-party (Republican/Democrats) system is designed to give false hope to the working class. At the same time, our own trivialities divide us, and the information continuously changes with the news/media increasingly straying away from telling the truth, instead selling headlines and clicks.

We can use our greatest weapon against them; voting. We can elect candidates who don’t play the political game and who stand up to the media. We elect politicians with clear policies and concerns for the community, and we vote. What is voting? It’s when the system shakes and democracy starts anew.

Our two-party system is the death of democracy. How did democracy where everyone gets a voice, end up like this?  In a first-world country; built on diversity; how did it end up with two parties that don’t represent the American people, but instead the elite? When did “we the people…” turn into “we the corporations…”?

Allen Coleman, a new contributor, is a member of Kansas City, Kansas SDUSA