The madness in Madison is spreading. Now Democrat lawmakers have fled Indiana too to avoid a vote. States are broke. And although it should be, the fact that the state may be heading toward a fiscal crisis is not the real cause of all the fuss.

The real issue is about power and who will pull the strings behind the scenes. Unfortunately, no matter who wins, the reality becoming increasingly clear is we will all lose!

Republicans have long been accused of being in bed with big business: loving to spend money and hand out gifts—but equally fond of letting corporations run loose in government chambers without paying for their taxation loophole tricks.

Democrats, however, are held up as the representative of the working man, the small guy, and the browbeaten. Democrats are the compassionate party for the underemployed, underprivileged and underappreciated, we are told. And if you can’t make a go of it, or if young single mothers are going to have babies anyway, government should lend a helping hand, they say. If teenage mothers don’t want to have their babies, the government should help them too.

At one time, the Democratic Party for the oppressed may have been somewhat true—but not today. As their actions recently prove—at the most base level—Democrats are just as sleazy as Republicans. The only difference is they prostitute themselves in different circles.

It isn’t a hopeful picture considering America is a nation of only two choices. It is a land governed by the compromised and corrupted, and neither party acts for the nation’s good. Politicians are tools for self-interest groups—our $14 trillion national debt and $50 trillion in unfunded pensions and other retirement promises prove it.

When Wisconsin senators fled the state rather than cast their vote, their actions told Wisconsin residents that the welfare of their union backers held higher priority. When Democrat representatives in Indiana did the same last Tuesday, they confirmed it.

And when Indiana Democratic Party Chairman Dan Parker called the proposed legislation “an assault on working people” he not only confirmed whose interests his party really represents, but insulted the majority of state taxpayers who are not unionized and think it is reasonable that they have the right to chose whether or not to be a union member and still be allowed to work for their government.

What gives politicians the right to mandate that taxpaying citizens must belong to unions and pay union dues before being allowed to work? This is obviously bad for taxpayers, especially when unions turn around and use union dues to make sure that politicians remain either friendly or fearful of them. It is legalized taxpayer-funded bribery and extortion.

Why should union members have more job protection than those employees who chose not to join the union (in states where this is even allowed)? Why should unionized employees be the last to be laid off when cutbacks are necessary just because they pay to play? Should not merit and job performance be the more important factor?

And how does it benefit taxpayers to have “collective bargaining” laws which legally limit the state’s ability to say “no” to demands? Why should the taxpayers be legally forced to sit and negotiate with union extortionists until a deal is reached? Why can’t taxpayers have the same right to walk away as unions do?

These are not laws that benefit taxpayers. But they do benefit union leaders at the expense of taxpayers.

As of 2008, only 13.7 percent of workers in Indiana belonged to unions—yet look at the extremes to which elected leaders are willing to go to protect them. The reason is simple, and deep down everyone knows it, even if they don’t like to admit it. Union wages fund campaign coffers. The only “working people” absentee politicians are really interested in protecting are their private union cash cows.

But it is not like Republicans are not beholden to special interest groups either. They just have different clients. Republicans have been in charge of Indiana since 2005. Before that, Democrats held power for 16 years. The cumulative result is a state with debt and unfunded pension liabilities of $23.7 billion.

All told, states across the nation have pension liabilities that add up to a shocking $1 trillion according to the Pew Center. Joshua Rauh of Northwestern University and Robert Novy-Marx of the University of Rochester argue that it is actually closer to $3 trillion (as of 2009).

Throw in municipal pension liabilities and federal pensions, Medicare and Medicaid liabilities and you have a nation that has promised its way to poverty.

The years of political vote-buying are finally coming to a head in America. Wisconsin and Indiana may be in the news right now, but that circus will pale into insignificance when Illinois, California, New York and New Jersey blow up.

And the surgical cuts so far outlined by leaders in Wisconsin and elsewhere are nothing compared to what is needed and is coming. Greece-style revolts are all but guaranteed to erupt when politicians are soon forced to either massively increase taxes, or cut social programs. In heavy red states, the unions will probably take a bigger hit. In blue states, it will be the taxpayers. While in neutral states, with all the political fighting, nothing will probably get done until the whole house falls down.

Wisconsin shows the tragic failure of democracy. Voters vote for those who promise the most gain without pain. Once in office, public funds are disbursed to curry more votes and to keep loud minority groups and special interests happy—bridge to nowhere for this group, subsidies for widget makers of that group, special rights to other groups. Even if no money is given out, tax breaks can be just as lucrative. Ultimately, no matter which party is in office, it always leads to the same place—a crisis at the public treasury.

Then all the politicians who never saw the crisis coming in the first place all of a sudden become experts on how to solve it. It usually involves taking from one group of people to give to another. Or as in the case when the government chooses to print money to pay the bills, it involves taking from everybody—as the dollar plummets in value, inflation soars, and savers and those on fixed income are wiped out.

As it has often been observed, democracy is a terrible form of human government. It is prone to corruption, prone to minority tyranny, and—when things break down—prone to mob rule. But, sadly, it is the best of all the systems man has yet tried.

On Nov. 19, 1863, President Lincoln gave a speech at Gettysburg. In it he reminded the nation that if America was to have true liberty, the nation must remain dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. He said that government had to be of the people, by the people and for the people.

Unfortunately Lincoln’s intentions have been forgotten. Politicians use government to bestow privileges on special interest groups—creating the very inequality they are supposed to oppose. Special interest groups extort and buy politicians. There is no honest government of the people and it is certainly not for the people.

And this nation is guaranteed to all but perish from the Earth.

But there is good news: Once the approaching tough times end, and people are disgusted with and sick of man’s rule, this nation shall have a new birth of freedom—under God—as Lincoln said. Speed the day of His return. A Higher Power truly is needed to save this country, to right the wrongs, and set up an everlasting kingdom of judgment and justice that shall not perish from the Earth.