You’ll be surprised at how democratic American politics actually is, if you discount those cash-fuelled TV ads
There’s nothing like a US presidential election cycle to prompt British pundits to think about Anglo-America as a “thing”. The UK is the 51st state in all but name, right? In reality, the similarities are more complex, and the differences are stark.
You can understand where the idea comes from. On both sides of the Atlantic 40 years of Reaganite and Thatcherite policies of financial deregulation, union emasculation, and a sanguine attitude to de-industrialisation, have sculpted Anglo-American society in similar ways: declining life expectancy among those whose communities destroyed as a consequence of these policies; and a surviving population that blames immigrants for their problems.
Continue reading…
Source: US Politics - theguardian.com
